Healthy Habits Aren’t a Physique Strategy

In this episode, we’re talking about the difference between generally living a healthy lifestyle and actually following a specific strategy to create physique change. Because if your goal is to build muscle, lose fat, create more definition, grow your glutes or build a lean, athletic body, healthy habits alone are not enough. You need specific nutrition, specific training, and specific lifestyle protocols that match the outcome you are trying to create. And we're talking about all this today

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Eating healthy, moving your body, drinking water, sleeping well, like those are all important, but they're not the same thing as following a protocol that's designed for a specific outcome. Welcome back to the embodiment lab. My name is Addy, and today we're talking about specific protocols and getting really nitty-gritty about actually shaping and becoming the architect of your dream body. Now, I'm super freaking passionate about this because it is my own personal journey, my own beliefs and opinions. I've shared the same ones that you probably have in my past, like when I first started my fitness journey, and those things kept me stuck. And I'm gonna explain why, and I'm gonna explain what you need to do if you want to build shape. You want to build muscle, you want to build a specific physique and a specific look for yourself. So buckle up. First thing I want to say, and I just want to get this off my chest because I think it's kind of funny, but I posted a reel several months ago. I don't even remember when, but it was basically talking about this topic and like how if you want to build muscle, if you want to look hot, you want to do all the things like for your physical health, like that's totally okay. Because for some reason it's a hot topic that if you want to look hot and you want to look good and feel good in your body, that you should feel shame for that or you should hide that and like you should only want to get healthy for your health. But, anyways, I had this comment on that reel that basically said, like, what about the people that just like don't care about their physical appearance and they just want to do it for their health? That's fine. That's a wonderful goal. However, why are you coming for the people who want to feel good and look good and feel confident in every single piece of clothing that they put on their bodies? Like, that's none of your business. I thought that was a silly thing to say. I'm like, well, yeah, okay, health is great. But also when you take your health and you go a layer deeper and you dive into the specific metrics that it takes to actually like transform your body, like that's cool, man. Let us have that. Okay. If I want to feel hot and fit and have a fat ass and feel confident in a swimsuit and know that my back looks freaking bomb in a backless dress, like by all means, let me let me do that in peace. But, anyways, all that to say, we're gonna dive right in. So there is a difference between like chasing health goals and chasing physique goals. And the difference is specificity, right? Because there are healthy habits that are like the foundation, but they're not the full picture of what your plans should be if you're wanting to transform the way that your body looks, right? So these are things like eating healthy foods. That's a fantastic habit to have. It's great to take care of the cells of your body by giving your body whole natural, nutrient-dense foods. That's amazing. That's a great thing to do. Working out consistently, yeah, it's really important to move your body and to use your muscles and your joints and stretch and challenge your heart rate and your endurance and your lungs. Like it's really, really good to have movement in your body. So simply like going for a walk or going for a run or going to the gym in strength training or swimming or dancing or doing any of these things. Movement is movement. Movement is wonderful. It's healthy, it's good for you. Drinking water, super simple, super basic foundational health goal, making sure that your body is hydrated, making sure that your digestive system has water moving through it so that you can actually digest and break down foods. Super healthy, super good for you. Avoiding junk food. You know, like these toxic ingredients that are in in junk food these days, like avoiding that. Yeah, sure, that's great. All of these are wonderful. Managing your stress, your sleep. All of this theoretically should be baseline for just the human population, right? It should just be normal to do these things. Obviously, we've gotten very far away from that, and that's not normal. It's like abnormal to care about your health. But here's the thing: like, just because you're healthy doesn't grant you the magic wish of having a bangin' body, having the physique that you want, right? Being healthy can still be random. And we're gonna dive into what exactly that means. So let's just start with the most basic thing with calories, right? So you can be eating healthy. Say you get up in the morning and you have two eggs and a piece of toast, and that's probably about 200 calories. And then you go to work and you know you feel yourself getting a little hungry. So maybe you have a salad packed. So it's like romaine lettuce, a little bit of chicken, a little bit of maybe like tomatoes or dressing or whatever, and it's about maybe about three to 500 calories, right? So we're at about 700 calories for the day. And then you get kind of hungry around like three, and so you have a handful of almonds. So that's probably about another 200 calories. So now we're at 900 calories for the day. Then you go home and you have a little bit of chicken, a little bit of broccoli. That's probably another like 400 calories. So now we're at 1300 calories. And you ate really healthy all day. You ate whole foods, that's fantastic. But you only ate 1300 calories. Now, for most adult women, the baseline recommended daily intake is 2,000 calories. And so what you've done is you have eaten 700 calories under what your body needs. Okay. Your metabolism, we've talked about this many, many times on this podcast, but your metabolism is like a wood-burning fire. The more that you put on it, the bigger, the brighter it burns. But if you're only putting 1300 calories on a wood-burning fire that requires 3000 calories, not 3000, sorry, 2,000 calories to burn big and bright, then you're dimming its light, which means that your body has to slow down to match what you're giving it so that it's not burning more than what it's being given. It's adaptive, so it will slow down and it will adapt, which means that the systems in your body become less efficient at doing their jobs, right? So it becomes more difficult to burn fat, but more importantly, it becomes more difficult to build muscle. And a lot of times I have people talking about wanting to build muscle, and they're like, Addie, I don't know like why it's so hard for me to build muscle. I've tried really hard. I'm in the gym, I'm strength training, I'm eating healthy. But the missing piece, and this was my my situation several years ago, the missing piece is that your body simply isn't giving getting enough fuel to be nice and functional on its own. And if it's not even getting enough fuel to support itself, it definitely doesn't have enough fuel left over to build new tissue, which it would have to support through energy that it doesn't have enough of already. So giving your body the right amount of food is so crucial. And that's where that specificity comes in because it's not just about eating healthy, it's about eating the right amount of food for your body. And if you're more of like in the newbie phase where you're just starting to work out, or maybe even like intermediate where you've been working out, but you're not like in it, you're not strategic with it, and you haven't been for a little bit, then you can get away with building a significant amount of muscle just by eating at your maintenance calories, which is incredible. Now, if you want to get even more specific, your body will eventually adapt to, hey, we're consuming an adequate amount of calories, and your body is adapted to the kind of workouts that you're doing. It's adapted to strength training, it's adapted to being challenged. Then now it's no longer about how long can I keep this going for if you've been plateaued at that point. It's about, okay, maybe we need to go into a little bit of a surplus and they provide our body with a little bit extra energy to build muscle with, right? So it's about getting specific about what your calories actually look like and how much of them that you're consuming. But even deeper than that, you have to worry about your macros. You have to make sure you're getting in enough protein. You have to make sure you're getting enough carbs to be able to build muscle and recover that muscle. You have to make sure that you're eating enough fat to make you feel satiated and to support your hormones and all of that good stuff. Your macro makeup determines the composition of your body. If you are eating primarily just fats and carbs, but like not enough protein, then you're probably going to look a little fluffier and a little softer than if you were to prioritize protein and carbs and keep your fats nice and moderated, not low, not dangerously low, but moderated, then you would look stronger, you would look more jacked, you would look more fueled, you would look lean and like you actually lift weights. That's the difference. It's getting specific with that. Okay. Another difference is in the way that you are working out. There is a huge, huge difference between just going to the gym and doing cardio, right? Just going to the gym and walking on the treadmill for an hour, or being on the stairmaster for an hour, or doing hit circuits, or even like doing strength training. If you're running three exercises back to back to back with minimal rest and you're using the same weight for a shoulder press as you would for a squat, you're not actually training with intention. You're just training to move your body, which is great, but you're not actually building anything. Your body actually has to be challenged strategically and intentionally if you want it to grow. It needs a reason to grow. And just going to the gym and walking on a treadmill and lifting five pounds for your biceps and squatting with that same five pounds, that's not enough to actually challenge and change your body. You need to be strategic about it. I talk about how I build my programs with my clients. And I actually really like how I explained this to a client the other day. So I'm going to share it here. But their programs are built and set up in a way where it's like, I think of it like a tower that's made out of puzzle pieces, right? I don't know why that's the image in my head, but that is the image in my head. And all of these puzzle pieces are different points of your workouts, different areas of your workouts. You have your warmups, your stretching, your foam rolling, and then you have the actual exercises. So like strengthening your legs and your arms, you have core work, and then you have cardio and endurance. And all of this works together. It's like plugging in different puzzle pieces to create this little tower. Right. And so usually what happens when a client comes to me in the beginning of the program, in the beginning of Embody You, they start their first phase of their workouts, and they notice that it takes them a little bit longer to get through workouts. They notice that they're experiencing some pain in some different areas because maybe they have a weaker core. They're noticing that their squats are feeling a little uncomfortable because they're not as flexible. They're noticing that they're out of breath a lot more. Now, all of these things they play a role in your general and your overall fitness, but they also lay a foundation that we can build off of that helps us to actually build your body and build muscle. So as you do, and this is why I have my clients do the same workouts on repeat for about six weeks before I adjust their programs and give them new workouts, is because each week you're getting stronger and stronger, right? Each time that you do the warmup, you're getting more flexible, which is helping you to get more range of motion, to get more out of your workouts every time that you do them. So if you're doing a squat and you're only able to really go halfway down because your flexibility doesn't allow for you to go further, you're only getting like half the benefits out of that squat. Now we're stretching to make your body feel more comfortable. We're stretching to help you avoid injury, but we're stretching also to help you get deeper into that squat so that you can get more out of that squat and build more muscle. We're working on core, which is going to help you to have a strong trunk to be able to lift more weight, right? Imagine trying to do like a heavy squat with no core. Imagine trying to do a shoulder press with no core, right? It's your center, it's your foundation, and we're building off of it. A lot of people experience some back pain when they first come into the program. And it's because they have a weak core and they forget that their core is not just the abs in the front, it's your trunk, it's your whole center of your body. So that includes your back. Your back, there are stabilizer muscles that are in your back. And a lot of the exercises that we're doing are helping to train those stabilizers to help you to learn how to stabilize your body in every single movement. So that's another puzzle piece. Also, when you're doing these exercises, it gets your heart rate up. Not necessarily in a cardio way, but just simply because you are moving your body in a way that you weren't used to before, it gets your heart rate up. So you're challenging your lungs, you're challenging your endurance, your stamina will improve. You notice as you go through the program, week by week, your workouts start getting shorter and shorter because you take less time to do each set, although it's not about rushing through it, you're just more efficient because your body is stronger and it's getting a better endurance quality through that workout. So you're improving your endurance, your stamina, your cardio, all of this, all of these puzzle pieces get plugged in to create a strong body. Because then once we have your flexibility nailed down, your core nailed down, your strength nailed down, your balance, your stability, your form, your endurance, all of this is laid down and established in the first program. Then we can build off of it and start plugging in the fun pieces of building muscle because now we have a nice solid foundation. So you see how it's much, much, much more strategic and intentional than just simply going to the gym and just doing movements. It's so in-depth. There's so much more to it than that. All of this is exactly why you have so many disciplined women who feel stuck because they're so disciplined in yes, I'm showing up, I'm getting my stubbs in. Yes, I'm drinking my water. Yes, I'm eating healthy. Yes, I'm going to the gym. But all of that effort is it's not the problem. It's just misdirected effort. And we start focusing that effort toward, hey, are we eating enough food? Are we getting enough protein in? Are we eating enough carbs? Where's your fiber at? Where's your water at? Where are your steps? How are your workouts going? All of these things that is a more directed effort to a more specific physique goal rather than just a general wellness and health goal. That's also why you have to get so specific about what you actually want when you are starting a healthy fitness journey. Do you want to just be healthy? Do you want to just look in shape? Or do you want to have definition? Do you want to have sculpted arms? Do you want to build your glutes? Do you want to look lean and athletic? Because looking lean and athletic and built is a whole lot different than approaching your fitness journey with, I just want to be healthy. Those are two completely different goals. Being healthy can be a byproduct of building the physique that you want. But it's going deeper than just I want to be healthy that changes your body, not only in your mindset, but in your approach. Sometimes when talking to women in my DMs especially, is that tracking can feel scary. Following a plan can feel scary. Eating healthy can feel scary. Doing the same workouts can feel scary. But the scary part is not having the structure. And in fact, it's having that structure that actually creates so much safety and so much freedom. Because think about it. Say, for example, you are scared of tracking. First of all, if you are scared of tracking, it's because you've done it incorrectly in the past. It's become this rigid thing that it didn't need to be. That's one side of it. Another thing is maybe you didn't learn how to track in a way that was actually efficient. There are little shortcuts that make tracking easier. But the biggest thing with tracking is if you are not tracking, but you're saying that you want to build muscle, that is like the equivalent of saying that you are going to get in the car with a blindfold and no GPS, and you're going to hope and cross your fingers that you make it to your destination safely. You need to be able to see where you're going and you need to know where you're going. Same thing with tracking. You need to be able to see exactly what you're eating. You need to know exactly how much you're eating. That way you can identify gaps because those gaps are the reason why you aren't seeing the progress that you want to see. And then you know how to fill those gaps in order to actually build the body that you want. Right? So it's changing your mindset around it, but then it's also being able to identify what you're doing, what's not working, and how to fix it. Another thing I hear is women saying, Oh, I don't want to eat the same things every single day because I get bored. I need variety. Okay. How much time do you have in the day? How difficult do you want to make it on yourself? Do you have time or the creativity or the brain space to wake up in the morning and be like, what fancy breakfast can I cook up today? Because I can't eat what I ate yesterday. What fancy lunch do I want to have? I need to eat something different because I just I get bored. What am I gonna have for dinner? Because I need to create this whole new idea of what I can have. That's exhausting. What I do is I eat, I mean, we've heard this 75,000 times before because I talk about this all the time. But I eat six meals a day. Five of those six meals are the exact same. You know why? Because it's easy for me to get up and to make the same breakfast and move on with my day. Eat the same snack, move on with my day. Eat the same lunch, I don't have to think. I just make. I go into autopilot, I make these meals, I put them together, I eat them, and I move on. They actually taste good to me. That makes a difference. If you learn how to actually make healthy food that tastes good, makes a big difference. The meal that I allow some flexibility with is my dinner. I can have different things for dinner. Now, now that doesn't mean that every night is a full-on cheat meal. It just means that one night I can have steak and rice. Another night, maybe I can have rice, like pilaf and sausage. Another night, you know what I mean? Like I can have fun and different things without changing up my whole entire day. Because I know that the other meals in my day have enough protein, fiber, carbs. They all add up to help me hit my numbers at the end of the day. And I have some extra wiggle room with some fun things for dinner. So saying that you don't want to eat the same things every day because you're bored, that's not a good excuse to not build meals consistently throughout the day that make it easier to hit your goal. Right? You're just making it harder for yourself. Same thing with I don't want to do the same workouts, I get bored, okay? What you need to understand is when you are building muscle and you're losing fat and you're working toward fitness goals, it's not gonna be fun and exciting. It's gonna be a lot of repeating the same shit every single day. Because it's doing the same shit every single day that builds up the consistency that you need to change your body. Because if you're doing different things every day, your body doesn't know what the heck to listen to. And it's not gonna change. It's gonna stay right in the same spot that it is. You have to show up, you have to eat the same amount of food, the same kinds of food, the same macros, the same fiber, the same water, the same workouts in order for your body to adapt to that and to change. Going to the gym, obviously you have to do the same workouts if you want to track progressive overload. Progressive overload is the way to build muscle. That plus food, you have to have fuel to build your muscle. But how are you gonna track progressive overload if one week you're going to the gym and you're doing squats, hip thrust, abductions, and hamstrings, and the next week you're going to the gym and you're doing step downs, lunges, leg extensions, and adductions. Like, how's your body gonna know? Those are different exercises. You need to do the same exercises week to week and progress them over time. So feeling bored is not an excuse if you truly want to build muscle. But honestly, being bored is the gateway to building muscle because you have to show up and do the same things every single day. And the sooner that you can learn that and accept that, the easier it's gonna be for you to actually change your body. So hopefully by now you can see that there is a major, major difference between being healthy generally and driving specific physique changes. I hope that you enjoyed today's episode. That is going to be it for today. If you did enjoy this episode, please let me know over on Instagram. I love it when you guys message me and tell me that you came from the podcast and that you love it so much. It means the absolute world. And with all of that being said, I will chat with you guys in the next episode. Bye.