How to Enjoy Summer Without Falling Off Track

Summer is when a lot of people lose momentum.

The kids are out of school, routines change, vacations come up, BBQs happen, sleep gets disrupted, and suddenly the plan that worked in January does not fit real life anymore.

In this LOF Office Hours episode, Coach Mike breaks down how to enjoy summer without falling off track.

Inside this episode, you’ll learn:

• why people lose consistency during the summer
• how to avoid the “I’ll restart Monday” cycle
• how to use the 3 Ps: Protein, Produce, Pleasure
• how to build a minimum effective dose for summer
• why structure creates freedom
• how to travel, socialize, and enjoy food without guilt
• how to make health support your life instead of isolate you from it

This is not about restriction.
This is about a sustainable structure.

Get coaching, support, and your next step here!

💭 Thanks for listening to The Lifestyle of Fitness Podcast with Coach Mike Caulo - NBC-HWC health coach, retired pro Muay Thai fighter, father of 4, and founder of the LOF 100-Day Comback System, 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

So, you are more than likely about to repeat the same cycle this summer. You're going to start off motivated. You're going to fall off by the 4th of July. And then by August, you're going to feel guilty and you're going to go to restart and reset in September. If that sounds familiar, you don't want to stay tuned for this. I got you. Tonight we're going to basically break down how you can actually enjoy your summer without losing momentum, without having to give up the things that you enjoy, but creating sustainability. Okay. This past weekend was Memorial Day weekend. That was a great example of it. Put out some content on a baseline principle that captures that. I'm going to go into that. We're also going to go into, again, being realistic as a parent, as a business owner, as a just active martial artist, as someone that also wants to enjoy vacation and time out with my kids. I also get the idea of where there's potential gaps in our rhythms and routine. And the idea here is really just you don't have to be perfect. The idea of being imperfect is not only acceptable, it's realistic. And that's what we're actually shooting for. So number one, let's look at like why is this a thing in the summertime where we may fall off? Okay. I want to start with if this sounds like you, you're not alone. And also to just anticipate this because this is natural, this is normal. Think about whether it's because you're in school and you stop it, you have kids that are in school, you're basically having less structure. There's less structured meetings, things, potential classes going on. Also, there's when we see an increase of vacations, travel, and trips. Again, going back to with the less structure, kids being out of school, there's a lot more. Whether even if they go away to camp, there may be more opportunities for you to have an atypical, not routine dynamic. Again, there's also more social events, whether it's like barbecues, mention that because we have our cookbook. That's a great resource that you'll be able to get on Amazon for free as you're watching this live, or make sure if you're listening to the replay, come back. We'll have some resources annually. And if you sign up on our newsletter, you'll get access to that and when we give it away for free. But basically, the social events of things can make it hard, right? You don't want to say, oh no, I can't have that. The can'ts of the world or the don'ts can be tricky to navigate. Also, disrupted sleep, whether it's because of vacation, whether it's because we're staying out later with friends, the days are longer. There's more fun stuff to do, there's outdoor activities that's gonna impact our sleep quality as we get less sleep. We're going to be less logical and we're gonna be more impulsive. And your brain and your body is gonna be more than likely to crave sugar and crave carb latent, calorie-dense foods to make up for the energy it doesn't have. And again, we talked about travel with travel, with social times, with vacation, alcohol can tend to come up, or some of the more like um social habits around that. And then there's also potentially more emotional eating, whether it's because of the social dynamics, whether it's because of a lack of structure, whether it's because a combination of things, maybe there's mourning taking place, whatever's going on, that's a part of it. And the whole principle of I'll start tomorrow, I'll start Monday, whatever that looks like. And again, I'm not shaming any of this. This is all to be realistic. But the key here is summer doesn't have to actually ruin your progress. Abandoning the structure is what actually is going to kill your progress. So keep in mind, structure and systems are going to be the key here. And that's what we're going over. The whole point of all this is actionable things you can do right now, today, as you're watching or listening to this, to implement and have a system and to also have plans around if system A fails, what happens with system B or plan B, as it were. So I'm gonna pause, take a little hydration sip. That's another example. One of the things I've learned is during my content creation on busy coaching days, I tend to hydrate less. So, what do I do? I have bottles of water or seltzer available by my desk. That's a perfect example of a system that allows me to stay hydrated. So let's look at this. One bad meal day or even weekend isn't going to actually erase your progress or kill your gains. This is, I think, a big concept that gets misconstrued. Now it doesn't mean have a horrible quote unquote weekend every weekend, but one day, one meal, one even weekend isn't going to destroy all of the progress and gains you may have had. Let's say you were staying on the ball from January until now, summer hits and we start to potentially derail. It's not derailing because you had one day or one meal or one weekend. It's because you've now allowed a little bit of that. I'll start tomorrow, kick into I'll start Monday, then that's I'll start next Monday, I'll start next month. And before you know it, you've gone a month without doing any real kind of exercise, your nutrition's gone all over. That's where it starts to compound. So what we want to focus on here is a very clear system and having momentum over being perfect, having consistency over intensity, and having adaptability over restriction. So instead of saying, no, I can't have that, saying, Well, I can have that, but before I have that, I'm going to have this. So I this is a resource I shared yesterday. I'll give you a perfect example, especially throughout the summer. This is going to be massive for you. So please use this not just for the summer, but for your entire year. But the three Ps. What are the three Ps, Mike? I'm glad you asked. It's protein, produce, and pleasure. So, hey Dina, before you build out your plate and put what you want on that, you're going to start with a protein source. Whether it's from a barbecue, you're going to have your like meat, your chicken, your turkey, your steak, your pork, your burgers, whatever is going down. And if you're a vegan or vegetarian, you can build off of your protein latent options around beans, legumes, maybe it's tofu, maybe it's a soy-based thing. I'm not here to judge what your protein source is by itself right now. We're just here to get protein first and foremost. Build that off of your plate. The great analogy I loved is using your hand. You got about a palm's worth of protein in every plate. That's a good foundation. Hold up your palm. My palm's gonna look different than yours, then yours, then yours, than yours. It's relative to our size and potentially our needs. So you start with one protein source, a palm's worth, and then you build from there. Number two, we have our produce. So again, produce whether it's cabbage, whether it's fruit, whether it's any type of vegetable or fruit that you enjoy, we're gonna add that to our plate next. And then lastly is our third P, which is the pleasure-oriented things. If you like chips, if you like dessert, if you like something outside of the protein produce category, that's where you can add it on to what's left of your plate or to your meal. But first, you're filling yourself up on protein, which is going to be filling. It's going to have value for retaining muscle. It's also when you have produce, you're more than likely going to have fiber. So that's gonna help keep you full and regulate all these other things. And then lastly, with your pleasure, you're gonna probably eat less. Like instead of eating an entire bag of cookies, being able to first, all right, cool. I'm gonna have a burger with a no bun, some baked beans, and then uh maybe have some cheese. And then, cool, I'll have a cookie as well. You're gonna eat a lot less of those cookies if you have that stuff first than if you just start with the cookies. So I'm gonna pause there. I'm gonna kind of get into the comments to see we got some questions here. Oh, baking cookies, what's up? Speaking of cookies, I see down the comments baking cookies for the first time. Should I use regular dough? Do you know what that dough is? Oh, you got protein dough. Okay, so yeah, no, I've I've not heard of uh that, but I I do appreciate the uh the troll component of it. If you say that type of dough fast, I see where you're getting at. But hey, being able to actually, when you do make cookies, though, this is why I will give you as a pro tip, even though you're being silly, I got you guys. Being able to, when you make your own cookies, when you make your own brownies, when you make your own whatever it is at home, find ways to add fiber and protein. That's like the money right away. Be able to get protein in first and foremost, whether it's with their protein powder, whether it's protein shake, whether it's being able to add a Greek yogurt, that's gonna help with your satiety. And it's also gonna help with like muscle preservation. So that's one of the strategies, and again, the sustainability so that you can still have momentum, you can have consistency, you have adaptability. It provides you that consistency and adaptability. So you can still go to a barbecue, partake in food, but you're getting in protein, you're getting in good quality nutrients from the produce side, and you're still having a little bit of fun. And maybe your pleasure is going to be different each time, but you're starting with your protein and your produce, and then you can add in that pleasure-oriented choice. And again, you don't need to earn your way back after one weekend. This is a big one I get to continuously, if I'm being honest, I get to continuously work on. I have a really big mindset that I get to shift around. I need to be able to earn the treat. Okay. And first off, the fact that it's a treat in the first place is its own category. But being intentional with how, like, I'll give you a perfect example. Tonight, after all my live streams, I was able to, um, or be even before live stream, I had some pizza, had some meatballs, a little mozzarella cheese, bam, boom, boom, post-workout, delish. Then after I do all my live streams and my coaching, about three hours before I go to bed, I'm still gonna get, I'm gonna get a cookie and I got Carrie made some homemade cookies. I'll be honest, there's not even added protein to it, but they're homemade versus processed from the store. I know exactly what went in it. I'm also gonna have a bran muffin from a local um coffee shop that I know what they put into it. So I get some of my produce in there, even though there's added sweetness and sugar. I got carrots, I got um bran, I got raisins in there. And then what I'm gonna do to add to that is I'm going to have a protein shake. So I have my oikos, it's got six grams of fiber, nice chocolate protein shake, getting in 30 grams right there. It's gonna help feel satiety-oriented. And I'm as a bonus, gonna add in a little bit of almond butter with a high fiber wrap and my sea moss gel. I'm gonna go with the mango pineapple, and do a little like almond butter jelly roll-up. The wrap in and of itself is gonna have like five to six grams of fiber per wrap. I'm gonna have two of those. I'm gonna get 12 grams of fiber in, plus the oikos, I got 18 grams of fiber. I've got about 40 to 45 grams of protein, plus, I'm gonna have a cookie, half of a muffin, and a couple of uh low sugar, like four ingredient caloried peanut butter cups spot on. So the point is being able to have intentionality and being able to have that as part of my system. Also, I worked out today. I was working on resistance training. The carbs and things I'm putting in are gonna help my body repair from a muscle standpoint. All right, I'm gonna pause, see if we got questions. Again, I get a little hydrate, and then we'll go into the next segment. So that was one of the actual things you can take away from today. If you just take that away, that's a win. You can turn this off and tune out, and you've already set yourself up for sustainability and success. The next thing is having a minimum effective dose throughout the season. For the summer, have a minimum effective dose. What are your measurable targets, your non-negotiables, the things that you are baseline for? This is the strongest practical aspect you can focus on. So for me, you've heard me if you've heard my content in the past, I'm doing at least 150 grams of protein a day. So when I start my day, I have 30 grams of protein with a protein shake and I have it with my coffee. That's how I start every day. 99% of the time, unless there's some weird thing going on, or I'm fasting like really intentionally with no calories, no protein, nothing. But 99% of the time, 30 grams of protein with my coffee, first hour of waking up after having about 16 ounces of seltzer or water. That's how I start my day. That's a non-negotiable baseline target. That's my floor. Another option of this is having a certain amount of protein at each meal. Maybe it's 20 or 30 grams of protein at each meal, or having a palm size worth of protein at each meal. Another aspect could be hey, hydration first. So for me, it's having 16 ounces of fluids when I first wake up before I go to coffee, whether it's my water bottle or it's seltzer. I'm going with usually about 12 to 16 ounces of water or seltzer, no calories first thing in the morning. So hydration first. That's like a paramount practice for me. And it's measurable. Again, the goal for all this is building measurable things. Another option could be what our minimum buy-in from movement is. For me, it's 30 minutes of movement, whether it's stretching, walking, resistance training, shadow boxing, martial arts, jiu-jitsu, whatever it is, 30 minutes is my buy-in. And you can do another way. Instead of doing 30 minutes, you're like, cool, I want to hit 5,000 steps, 10,000 steps, 2,000 steps, whatever it is. For me, it's 5,000 steps a day. And usually if I'm doing my 30 minutes of walking, I'm hitting that number or close to that. And then I'm doing a little bit more walking and other activities. Another aspect is how much sun exposure do we want? So ideally, in the first hour of waking up, getting 15 minutes of sunlight, for example. Again, these are measurable goals. Being able to have sleep consistency. Now let's be really specific around the measurables around that. Instead of saying, hey, I'm going to get seven to nine hours of sleep a night, which is great if you can, but that sometimes can be a lot harder to control. So, for example, what we can focus on is I want to not, for example, eat three hours before bed, or I'm not going to have stimulating conversations an hour before bed, or I'm not going to watch screens two hours before bed, or I'm not going to do work for two hours before bed. Some version of that again is another measurable that influences sleep. And oh, what's going on, Carrie? I see you. Good afternoon. And again, if you have questions, I'll pause here if you guys want to drop questions in the comments, you're watching it live, or even in the replay, circle back, add comments. Like I love going back and answering questions here. Being able to also have a plan when you're traveling. So we talked about what can build inconsistency around the summer or seasonal types of life. Having a plan in place for when you're traveling, you're going on vacation, you're dealing with those types of things. Have all of these targets apply to even if you're traveling. So for example, when I like recently we for Mother's Day, we did a weekend trip. Um, I had I still was able to get like 10,000 steps in. I was able to get a band workout in, I was still able even for my own phone. I did 20 minutes of guitar playing on the times I was away. So having some baseline targets that allow you to have consistency. So ultimately, if you think about it, it's like doing less, but doing it consistently. So instead of saying, All right, I'm gonna work out an hour three to five times a week, it's like I'm gonna do 15 minutes every single day. That's way more impactful and gonna be sustainable as far as building your rhythm and your routine and having consistency. And even if it's not every day, even if you shoot for five out of seven days a week, that's gonna be more impactful. I'm gonna pause there before we go into the rest. And I'm actually gonna see if we can have questions. And also, again, I'm gonna plug not only our sponsor BioLore, but today specifically. So, Carrie, for you watching on Amazon, anyone watching live anywhere else, if you hop on over to Amazon, I have our 28-day reset Kindle Edition book is gonna be free for today only. Our slow cooker cookbook, the Kindle edition is free, and our barbecue cookbook, the Kindle Edition, they're all free for today only. So that's something just to plug and voila. And let's see if I have any questions. Does look like we got some fun trolley comments? Uh streamers have guessed. Bam! I love the guessing. And then went to a camp at Maros and Rains the whole time. It was a washout. Oh man. Womp womp. Well, while that that sounds a little bit of like warm on having some of the washout, at least being able to have time away, you know, like there's that expression I was teaching my kids. A bad day fishing is still good better than a good day at work, which I don't prescribe to. But the idea, the principle of is like, hey, being able to go fishing, doing something you enjoy is still positive, even if it's not the experience that you wanted. So yeah. And again, if you have questions, feel free to drop them in the comments. Uh, but now let's dive into the next aspect. I was to kind of alluding to this before with like the guitar playing, but the idea of fun, here's the important thing I think is massive, whether it's summertime or any other time, but the role fun will have, this is going to be a massive differentiator, whether it's in our movement, whether it's in our food, whether it's in our social time, whether it's in the entire experience, being able to intentionally have fun and fulfillment into the choices that we were making. So, how should support your life not isolate you from it? Meaning, if you like traveling and you want to get out into nature and you're like, hey, I don't really have time to be able to go run a 5k and go hiking and enjoy this awesome scenic walk. I want to do is like you don't have to do both. Go enjoy that hike. Go enjoy to be able to get out. And that can be your activity, that can be your movement for the day. The cool thing, and this is something I'm gonna do in a content series coming up, is guess what? We have an awesome lake that people come from all over to explore and vacay to Lake Junaluska. And it's a great, I don't even know if it's two miles, but let's say it's a mile and a half loop all the way around, or maybe it's a mile. I don't even know off the top of my head. But I have these little checkpoints I like to stop at, whether it's to stretch, do some bodyweight squats, do some push-ups, do some dips, things like that, being intentional with even as you get out into nature, being able to be mindful with how you move and bringing some joy. And yeah, to your point, Keith, in the comments, like being able to just be more active, but finding joy, finding joyful experiences around that. Even if you like like wrestling, like what me and my friends used to do, we would do like backyard trampoline, you know, activities. And like, again, I'm not saying what you guys need to do, but find some sense of joy and double down on that. Um, working out, have an example of teamwork. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, that's exactly it. So going into the idea of fun and fulfillment, it can apply to movement. So find activities you enjoy if it's playing golf, if it's tennis, if it's martial arts, if it's hiking, if it's swimming, if it's a different type of sport. Like adult, this is the thing I find a lot of times with adults. We stop playing sports. Because, like, oh, I'm not gonna be a professional athlete. We stop. It's like, dude, no, keep playing, make it fun, and it's going to help keep you active way more than forcing yourself to go to the gym if you hate weight training. Weight training is great for you, but you know what's actually way better for you? The activity you're going to actually sustain for the rest of your life. That is way more impactful than forcing yourself to go to the gym two, three times a week for a couple weeks and then stopping for six months and then doing it again. That doesn't actually build the momentum or the consistency that you want. So that's like the differentiator there is have fun. And then also it doesn't have to just be on the physical side, it can be on the nutrition side. What Karen and I are talking about, what we'll do, and you'll see more content around this too, is we get our kids involved in the food making process, whether it's cutting up veggies, whether it's making the pasta, whether it's putting something in the oven, whether it's making ice cream, we have a ninja creamy, which is absolutely awesome. So we make our own ice cream, whether it's doing popsicles, we have popsicle molds, whether it's making gummies, we're getting gummy molds, whether it's being able to make our own peanut butter cups or almond butter cups, we have our own recipes that the kids really enjoy, whether it's making cookies, getting the kids involved, getting yourself involved, getting your friends involved, getting your spouse involved, make it an enjoyable activity where you can be social. And then also the cool thing is what I used to like to do when I was still an active fighter is I would on Sundays have my fighter buddies come over. We go to my coach's house, we would meal prep. You could do your own grocery shopping, bring your own food, or you could all go together and you bring your stuff over and you all meal prep together. So you're hanging out, you're socializing, you have your own containers, you're getting stuff done, and it's not a chore, it's something you're enjoying to do. So I think that's a massive piece. And again, health should compliment, support your life, not take away, not isolate you, not make you feel like you have to sacrifice. Because if you feel like you're sacrificing your whole life, that's not gonna be sustainable, it's not gonna be enjoyable, it's not what you're gonna want to create, especially about if we associate to summertime. I don't know about you guys, but I associate a lot of fun and fulfillment from that. And it doesn't have to just be in the summertime. Ideally, all seasons will have that, but it just looks a little different because of weather, right? I already talked about the three Ps, but I'm gonna go back to this because I think it's so impactful. And I'll be honest with you guys, I have a little checklist of things I want to go through. And this is where it brings up the three P's is being able to have the again. I'll go back. I mentioned this first, I'll mention at the end because I'm about to wrap it up here in a little bit. Is if you could just do one thing today, implement the three Ps. If you implement this strategy, it will have an impact on your life. I can like pretty much impactfully guarantee you that. And also thank you for the follow. What's up, Hyde Junior? Um, the three Ps, I'll break it down. Protein first, build your plate and your meals off of protein, then you add fruits and vegetables, your produce, and then you can intentionally add pleasure and not feel guilty about it. But be intentional with what comes first, then what comes after, and then what you're gonna follow with. So pleasure without structure just becomes chaos and guilt. And then structure without pleasure becomes ultimately burnout. So it's being intentional and having that application of intentionality to have fulfillment. Again, whether it's fun with your not only exercise, but fun with your food as well. So again, protein first. If you don't know how much protein you need, if you don't know what kind of servings of produce, if you don't know any of the measurables, if anything, just start. Start with a palm's worth of protein, start with a cup hand's worth of produce, and then add your pleasure. Doesn't have to be anything that crazy. If you want specific numbers, again, we have great resources. You can go to lifestyle of fitness.com. We have an entire basically app, and then we have an integrated AI system now that we've been and I've been prompting with my team and we're refining it constantly that will literally answer all your questions. And you can even jump on a call with myself or someone on my team to go over, hey, what could be the best resources for you? Whether it's free resources, whether you have paid coaching, we have a variety of things. It's all here to support you at the end of the day. And then lastly, just even throwing it because on Amazon, for my peeps on Amazon, speaking of free, right now we have all of the Kindle books you see on my carousel are free. So the 28-day reset, the slow cooker recipe book, and the barbecue cookbook, all three of those are free for today only, the Kindle edition. So if you want to be able to take advantage of that, I highly recommend checking it out because today it's absolutely free. I really just wanted to be able to support that in honor of Memorial Day. And because I haven't actually made these things free for a little bit of time. So I was like, all right, today's actually a good time for that. And I will have them again every quarter. We make them free for a couple days. But these are literally, they've been in the top 10 when we give them away for free every single time. So I appreciate you guys for the support on that. I'm actually gonna pull them up right now. Let's see where they're at because we only did it for one day. Usually we do it for a couple. I'm curious to see right now, yeah. Our slow cooker ones, number seven. Let's see what our barbecue one is. Looks like it's number 15. We kind of dropped in the ranks there. Oh man. And then our 28-day reset looks like it's 21 in its top category. So again, in the top 25 for all these already. If you guys get some download and value from it, I'd love the feedback. Please feel free to share. Again, this is going to be on Amazon, the Kindle Editions only. So if you're watching on TikTok, if you're watching on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitch, YouTube, any of the other platforms, hop on over to Amazon. I'll also put it in the comments if you want to take advantage of it today. This is for the live only. But if you end up watching the replay and you do want the free version, just comment, uh, let me know, shoot me a DMM, send it in the comments, and we'll either let you know when we have it again for free on the Kindle edition side, or I have PDFs I'll gladly send and share to you guys. With that being said, that's pretty much all of it. I kind of wanted to go through it a little bit quick today, be precise, be efficient, add value for you guys, not take up a lot of your time, ultimately deliver, get in, get out. And honestly, I'm gonna tag in with my fiance to see if we can get baby hope ready for bed. I got some more coaching calls after this. Hopefully, you guys are staying hydrated. Cheers to everyone. I'm gonna pause, see if you guys have questions, and then I'm also gonna give one more quick plug. Shout out to BioLore, CMOS Gel, uh, CMOS Gummy sponsor. Again, to me, I'll be honest with you guys, it's not like you don't need these things. These are just nice to have that will save you some calories, add some flavor profile, add over 90 minerals to your nutrition from either the gummies or the seamouse gel that they will add value that you may not be getting from your current nutrition. So you have nothing to really lose. But again, I wouldn't lean on that as the only source of produce. You can add that as a produce source, but I'll still make sure get your fruits, get your vegetables, all that fun stuff. And if you do have, again, an interest, you're not already follow and subscribe. I'm gonna be putting out our live streams every week. We're gonna have follow-up content. I love talking about not only health and wellness, but dad life, business owner life, being a retired professional fighter. I'll talk about content around that, having a dog, having a family, all those fun things. And if you want to invest in your own self, go to lifestyle of fitness.com. We got all the awesome resources for you. But that is gonna do it for today, y'all. I appreciate you guys. Thank you again for tuning in for the support for the comments. I see you, Ron. Uh that's a great, great username on tree. Uh Keith, I appreciate you. If you guys aren't following Keith on TikTok, go check him out. Dina, great seeing you in the comments. Carrie, thanks for dropping by. And then uh Hi Junior, appreciate the follow as well. But yeah, that's gonna do it. I'm gonna wrap it up. I'll hang out on Amazon for a couple more minutes since I have the books open, but I'm gonna end the live stream everywhere. So if you guys want to tune on on to Amazon, check it out. Same thing on TikTok, hop on over here to Amazon. I'll see y'all in the next one. Later, yeah.