How to find the PERFECT diet. Interview with Brian Keane

 In this week's episode I have the pleasure of talking with personal trainer, author, podcast host and all-round-good-guy-and-happy-chappy  Brian Keane.

You might, or should I say "should", know Brian from the Brian Keane podcast ( which is one of THE top nutrition podcasts in the UK) and his social media presence. He is one of my favourite people in the health and fitness world at the moment as he never tries to sell you a shortcut, is always truthful and is very generous with his knowledge and expertise.

We are talking "the PERFECT diet".

How do you go about finding the perfect diet?
What is the most important thing when it comes to diet?
Why the diet your friend recommended does not work for you.
Should the health and fitness industry stop dealing in black and white?
Are cookbooks/recipe books beneficial?

And much more. Anyone who is familiar with Brian's work will know he is one of THE guys to talk to about this sort of thing and I have no doubt at all that you'll be inpired and get a tonne of useful information from this episode.

Brian can be found in all corners of the internet, he is everywhere!

His website
Make sure to catch The Brian Keane podcast
Instagram
Facebook
You can find his books on Amazon, and I'm sure other places as well.


In the news this week; This "good news for millions of women" article from WBUR about vaginal fluid transplants. Yes the science is new but it does hold a lot of potential.

Remember to follow us on Instagram and Facebook for the competitions, wisdom and cute videos. And, of course, you can always find us on our YouTube channel if you like your podcast in video form with little pictures :)

Visit healthypostnatalbody.com and get 3 months completely FREE access. No sales, no commitment, no BS.

Email peter@healthypostnatalbody.com if you have any questions or comments 

Playing us out this week; "Feel better now" by  élise (This has some sweary words)

Transcript

How to find the PERFECT diet. Interview with Brian Keane

Peter Lap (PODCAST INTRO): Hey, welcome to Healthy Post-Natal Body podcast with your Post-Natal expert Peter Lap. That, as always would be me! You oh lucky you're listening to the number three here charting health and fitness podcast in Kazakhstan. So  you're in the right spot, I still can't believe that there are people from Kazakhstan listening to, this as Salem to you guys, and everybody else won't keep bringing it up forever. This is a podcast for the 21st of August. And I'm talking to the man the myth, the legend, Brian Keane about the perfect diet. Now you might know Brian, you should know Brian from the Brian Keane podcast and all that sort of stuff. We're talking about the perfect diet, and many, many other things how do you go? What is the perfect diet? How do you go about finding out what's the most important thing? Why the diet that your friend recommended to you doesn't work for you all that sort of stuff? Now, Brian is host of “Brian Keane” podcasts, number one nutrition podcast in the UK. And you know this is going to be a good one. So without further ado, here we go.

Peter Lap: So let's start, like I said, with the easy question. So what is the best diet in the world?

Brian Keane: It's a great question, Peter, to kick us off. And to be honest, I could go in a million different directions with it. Because ultimately, the best diet is the one that's in alignment with your goals that you can stick to. And then you're just reverse engineering that. So if you're Post-Natal, or if your goal is purely weight loss, if you are training for a couch to 5k or a half marathon, your goals are going to be different. So based on the goal, you want to reverse engineer and have a plan in place that gets you towards that goal. Now, I also have things that help people keep on track, it's really important to include foods that you enjoy making sure that it fits into your lifestyle and schedule, but we can unpack it in any direction you like. But it's very important for people to understand that there's not a one size fits all, when it comes to diet out there. If that was the case, everybody would eat the same way, we'd all follow the same diet, and we'd all have the results we wanted. It's a case of well, what am I looking to do in terms of my specific goals? And what nutritional strategy and protocol do I need to follow? What foods do I need to include, that helped me get there?

Peter Lap: Yeah, because that's an interesting one. Because I'm sure you come across this a lot as a PT as well. The amount of people I have come to me say, “My friend did keto, so I have to do keto” because that works for her or him. And therefore that's going to work for me, that's going to be the diet for me.

Brian Keane: It's the same as just you give me a very good intention. I don't mean to cut across you, Peter, but just because when people say that, Karen did keto or Jane did Slimming World or whoever did X, Y or Z. I always think, “Well, you wouldn't wear their shoes”. I was like, it ends the exact same equivalent, like you might be SI-6 meaning that, you can borrow Karen shoes, or you might follow that diet she did and it works great for you. But if you're a seven or a five or a nine or a three, it's gonna be a terrible fit and diets are exactly the same. You're looking for the nutritional fish that works for you.

Peter Lap: Absolutely. And feel free to come across me anytime, that's how this whole thing works. Because, it is quite often the way diets are sold especially in the health and fitness world. The way diets are sold are almost, it's taken all the personalization out of it. A lot of PT’s and I know for a fact you don't fall into this gap, but you'll have worked, you've seen personal trainers in gyms like this. They sell Slim Fast or they sell Herb life or they sell whatever. And therefore that is what they recommend. They don't necessarily look at their client goals, they don't adapt any diet or diet advice to their clients, their goal is just tend to go along the line of, “This is what I like and therefore this is what you will have to do. And if you don't like it, go work with somebody else”.

Brian Keane: It's really important for people to have a bit of a critical eye on where nutritional advice or where dietary advice is coming from. Meaning that, if the person has an incentive to promote a certain product or a certain style of dieting, then there's a good chance that that person isn't going to be as objective as you probably wanting a nutritionist or dietician or a personal trainer or a coach to can help you and the understanding that as the consumer is the person potentially buying into a nutritional strategy or any diet out there, that's arming yourself with the knowledge because we want to default to trust. Most of us will look at a personal trainer, look at nutrition, look at dietician, and especially if they're in shape, or they've worked with other people who they've got into shape, our mind wants to go to, “Well, they clearly know what they're talking about, and maybe they do”. But if they're promoting a product, or a diet or something, a supplement line that is very clearly incentivized for them, meaning that they're an affiliate. Furthermore, they're working with that company, then you probably have to approach it with a little bit of a critical eye and ask, well actually, has this person got the best intentions for me? Or are they trying to line their own pockets? And I'm all for each to their own in this world, everyone will have their different approach. But it's important to know that going in, because again, I'm not a fan of those companies as you mentioned, there's other approaches that tend to work better, but some people like them. I won't throw the baby out with the bathwater completely wash. It is a case of where you're getting your nutritional advice from, what I love about your podcast, Peter, my podcast does this. There's other coaches out there and trainers out there do some similar, we work as a filter for people, meaning that we filter a lot of the information so people can see, “Well, this is the noise. And this is the signal. This is where you should be paying attention, this is what you shouldn't. This is what you should be ignoring, this is a fad. And this is what could potentially help you”. And these conversations are important for that. And it brings that awareness to people that arms them with the first tool that can potentially help them with whatever dietary strategy they do decide to follow.

Peter Lap: Yeah, I'm completely with you. Because at the end of the day, and this is what I always discovered I was trying to talk about is, the whole point of a personal trainer is that it's personal to you. Otherwise, I'd just be a coach. I would just be a level two group exercise instructor, nothing wrong with that. Those guys are making a killing and probably more money than we do, let's be honest. But the point of a personal trainer and personalized diet advice is that it's personal to you. And that it should fit your lifestyle and like you said, your goals

Brian Keane: 100%. And with diets in particular, you're looking for a square peg into a square hole. Meaning that, there might be elements of a ketogenic diet, or intermittent fasting or a clean eating or a Paleolithic diet or a plant based diet that works really well for you. But you need to make tweaks and alterations to its. For example, my nutritional strategies largely adapted form of paleo, I eat a lot of boil foods, nutrients foods, loads of plants, but strict paleo for me doesn't make sense. With my training load, I train quite intensely. I do a lot of high intensity runs and CrossFit and endurance events. So I need a little bit more carbohydrate that would be on a traditional Paleolithic plan or paleo diet. So you're making those slight alterations to you. So with a nutritional strategy that you're thinking of following, first you need to determine your goal is it to try and get your weight or body fat back down after having your child or having a child? Or is it you're in a different season in your life, now you just want to get into the fittest and healthiest you've ever been. So your energy levels are high, you need to determine that first and foremost, and then all you're doing is reverse engineering. There are basic nutritional protocols that no one can counter or argue against. Like, calories make a difference. That understanding basic chloric intake is important i.e. not eating too many calories if you've a fat loss or weight loss goal, and things nutrient density of food is important and can't be really counter argued. Some foods are more nutrient and dense, plants, complete protein sources, healthy fats, your avocados, your nut butters, your complex carbohydrates to a degree, your brown rice or quinoa, all these foods are quite nutrient dense. So they're going to keep you feeling fueled and feeling more energized throughout the day. So you're more likely going to be able to hit whatever goal you've set for yourself whether that going for the gym multiple times a week or being more active so you're going for walks after work or just being energized that you can play with your kids lots of different goals, common shapes and forms and having the basic nutritional fundamentals of, “well this is how calories work in terms of energy off your body. This is how nutrient density works i.e. the foods that give you the vitamins, minerals phytonutrients you need and everything else outside of that is down to what works best for you”. So once those core principles of calories and macros to degree if you need to but more so nutrient deficiencies and nutrient density of foods, once you know that everything else nearly up for negotiation.

Peter Lap: Because that's an interesting that you mentioned about, because there are a lot of people that have separated this stuff in the fitness industry. Because I've kind of an angle there. The meat doctor that says you only eat red meat, or people don't eat enough red meat. And vegans are all going to die a horrible slow painful death. And then you have the other guys on the other side of the spectrum that said, “No, you should never touch any meat whatsoever”. And because it's fiber, that makes all the difference when it comes to feeling fuller for longer, and all that sort of stuff. And then you look at the research and look at the studies on all this stuff. And the studies actually say, “Actually, guys, it's both protein and fiber”. And you can take one element of it, and you can tweak it shot. But it's tempting to only look at the extremes. I won't spend too in nutrition course by a very, very big nutritionist. In the UK, very famous, and one of the top, they paid a lot to go to the course. And they literally said, “Calories don't matter”. And that wasn't the introduction opening statement, as in this will be a shock and I will explain why? That was pretty much the summation of the entire course. And I thought, we've spent a lot of money on this. And we have to agree on the basics, “Calories matter”. Calorie intake matters. That is just the way it is. The law of thermodynamics always applies. And I'm very much with you in the counter. After that you're looking at the quality of the food you're eating, nutrient density, and macros are interesting to tinker with. But most people, I'm guessing you get this as well. Most people say, “I just can't eat enough protein”. And you're thinking to yourself, “We in the West, most people have massively over consumed their protein macro for what their goals are”. I've never come across anyone that says they can't eat the carb, micro carbs maybe. But unless you're an Olympic level athletes, carbs are easy to hit. But everybody complains about protein, I'm thinking that you have to understand what your goals is, like you say, you have to understand what your goals are and then calculated. So how do you give your clients the knowledge to calculate it? How do you talk that through with your clients?

Brian Keane: That's a great question. And before we get into that, it's important to understand what you said there is such a great point. People never struggled to overeat or hit their carb targets for the day what to do with their protein. And something that I tell people on that is, it's worth understanding that things like fat, three macronutrients fat carbohydrate, protein, but fat and carbohydrate workers protein spirit and macronutrients as well, meaning that if you're hitting your carbohydrate intake and your fat intake for the day, your protein intake doesn't need to be as high as you think because your body will utilize a carbohydrate and fat for fuel and other things. And then you'll utilize the protein for repair and growth. While most people are looking for whether they know it or not. It's repair and growth satiety between meals so that you're feeding full between meals, but also hitting your protein requirements on top of repairing cells and making you feel better and brain function and health and all of that that comes with it outside of obviously, fatty acids from fats, but you're repairing your metabolic and keep your metabolic rate up. If you're training, it's very important for people to hit that protein requirement. If they're active or moving, if you want to build muscle growth to build muscle, but also the more lean muscle tissue you have the higher metabolic rates. So if you have a fat loss goal or a weight loss goal, having your protein intake high or hitting those minimum requirements, even adjusting your macros and fats, like we've said, you're going to be keeping you're elevating your metabolism, you're going to be burning more calories while you rest. I call it the calorie burning equivalent of making money while you sleep. With a fat loss and weight loss goal, it's important to hit those protein requirements or even adjust them downward slightly, you won't struggle provided that you are hitting fat and carbohydrate requirements each day with it. So I just wanted to add that when it comes to educating clients. I have a bit of the way I work with people in my program. So I've been online since 2016. So I worked for five years as a one to one personal trainer, nutritious with people in the one to one. And the last several years, I've been purely online with people and I have what I call adjust from a moving stash. Meaning that when somebody signs up and works with me, I'll give them a nutritional strategy based on their goals. So if they're 60 kilograms, 5’2” and they've got a weight loss or fat loss goal, they get a calorie plan, macro plan, recipe plan, food plan based on that. And then I follow a, I basically eat my own cooking for the part and upon that I will make adjustments to that with people. So once they have their plan based on food choices they like that they based on recipes based on their lifestyle and their schedule, based on their specific goals, if they have a secondary goal or a third goal that they're trying to hit alongside body composition, which is where I primarily focus with people. And we'll make those adjustments as we go along. So I have basic things that I follow similar that we touched on, calories are something that I will keep an eye on. Although there are a percentage of people who I won't track it with. If I'm working with somebody who's clinically overweight or obese, I tend to not track calories with those people. Just to get them we work off a little bit more of a clean eating protocol. And then we course correct to make the adjustments with calories. With calories, I think it's important for people to understand, because I never want to get lobbed into the bracket of calories in calories out coach, although they're important. There’s so many other things to factor in. But calories for me as a coach and the same for you, Peter. It gives us direct feedback as coaches where we might need to make adjustments for people if their body isn't responding. So it's just feedback. It's the same as somebody trying to save money, if you're looking at your bank account every day. And you see that, actually, I spent Seven Euro on a latte every day this week that was Seven Euro I probably didn't need to spend, it gives you direct feedback that you're actually spending too much money on this thing. And that's what calorie tracking and calories do. You can look at your food and go, well actually, I'm eating a muffin every day. But that muffin is topped off with icing and chocolate and there's 360 calories there, I thought it was only about 100 calories in it, and straightaway, you can make an adjustment to that. And so it's given you feedback. And when it comes to education, it depends on the individual. I'm one of those people that I love knowing exactly the calories, the macros, the nutrients within my food, I geek out on that. I love that area. So there's people out there like me, and some people I work with are like me, they like to know their calories, they like to know the macro splits, they like to know what nutrients are getting in the food. But then you have people on the other end of the spectrum, who are like what I call in books, I was like me with my car. If I bring my car into the mechanic, I literally couldn't care less about my care, it's four wheels on a piece of metal that gets me from A to B or A to Z. And if something breaks down, I don't want my mechanic explain what happened, whether it was in the engine or another pipe or something that went on, I’m like just fix us. I was like, I don't care. Just fix it, please. And some people are like that with their diet and nutrition. I don't actually need to know how calories work, I don't need to know macros, actually don't care about any of that. I just want to lose weight, or I just want to lose body fat, or I just want to build muscle or tone up. And those people, I'll take a bit more of a looser approach where we will focus on food choices and meal timings and then everything in between. So when it comes to nutrition, as I said, I don't think it's a one size fits all. It's literally the reason that I still coach on my programs, because I don't think you can just hand a diet to somebody that was the case, I would just put it in a book, and then just sell it in the book as opposed to say, here's the diet, you know and there's nothing wrong with that method. As I said, there's lots of trainers out there. Dieticians, nutritionists who will sell a one size fits all diet and that's great. If we follow the analogy of the shoe size, if you're a size six, meaning that you apply that diet, and it works for you brilliant, but it's just that there's 99 other people out of 100, who probably won't work for. But if you're that 1 out of 100, it’s amazing, you found what works best for you, I would keep that nutritional strategy for you going forward, or make adjustments to it as you need to and I think it's that awareness around it. I would love to see Peter, everybody eat this way at these times, and you'll get your own results, it'd be so much easier. And it would, if anybody had the answer to that they would be a multimillionaire, particularly in the fitness industry because of body composition change in results. But it's a bit more nuanced than that you need to make the adjustments but thankfully, when you do, you tend to have better short term and long term progress with.

Peter Lap: Well, especially long term progress, because you'll actually be able to stick to what you're, because this is the thing. I mean, I had someone on, I can't for the life of me remember, one of the listeners email me, I will link to it in the podcast when I figured out. A doctor PhD in weight management, so we're talking the guy, one of the American leaders in this field I had him on. And he said the only thing that matters for diets is diet adherence, end of discussion. Doesn't matter what your goal is, diet adherence is key. He said and that is the problem with most diets for most people is diet adherence because they're choosing either willingly or unwillingly something that doesn't actually quite work for them. And therefore adherence is almost impossible. And it's interesting what you say in both regards to the overweight or obese clients. I personally don't track calories with hardly anyone because I'm very much in the, you want to feel better field. Let's make you feel better because that's especially postpartum there. There are ton of postpartum weight loss coaches out there. And there's again, there's nothing wrong with that having that as a goal is just not really where I come in simply because I think there probably one or two things that are more important postpartum then there are done weight losses. And there's certain restrictions or multiple restrictions, postpartum, that make weight loss more difficult. Hormonal balances, prolactin, your breastfeeding hormone and all that sort of stuff means, you're likely to retain 5 to 10 pounds anyway. So why am I fighting against nature that it will come off when you stop breastfeeding? But I do find with most people that I speak to, is that when we start eating a bit healthier, when we start eating more whole foods exactly like what you're talking about when we start looking at nutrient density, satiety and all that sort of stuff. The weight almost automatically comes off when they're overweight or obese. For a lot of people, and I admit there, you can overeat on chicken and kale as well. Don't get me wrong, because for most people, calories are important. But they're like you said, it's inflammation. We started the diet that was eat as healthy as you can if you're not losing weight, okay, let's see if we need to address portion size and all that sort of stuff.

Brian Keane: Yeah, there's a million ways to do it. And I think that's why conversations like this are so important, because some people will fall at the camp that it's all about clean eating, and others were fall into the camp that it's all about calorie tracking. And there's a lot of different ways to potentially lose weight and reduce body fat, whether it's producing portion sizes, whether it's tracking calories more rigidly, whether it's just the macronutrients. So you're feeling more satiated between meals, whether it's looking at the nutrient density of your food for your so you're feeling more energetic, energized, and your each activity goes up, your non exercise activity Thermogenesis, so you're moving around more, you're walking more, because you're feeling more energized. So you're burning calories that way. So there's a lot of different ways to potentially do it. It's just about finding what works best for me, it's really interesting, you said there about the doctor who was on and I would just add to that, that adherence is so important. I literally think it's probably 80% of it, I wouldn't go as far to say it's 100% because you can be climbing a ladder, and it can be up against the wrong wall. Sure you can get in the car and be driving to the wrong destination. I think having an idea of what you're actually looking to do is important. But then the adherence is really the final piece to that jigsaw. And as you said, it's just aligning those expectations. There's so many different ways to do it. People that can help you, whether it's you, Peter, whether it's me, whether it's another coach or another personal trainer, or nutritionist, there's lots of people out there who can help you. Or if it's the case, if you're putting it together yourself, you just aligned the expectations.  I'm a big believer that you can get everything you need from podcasts like this, or from reading books or reading blogs, and you will get 80% of the information yourself that you can get really good results with. The reason to work with a coach or a trainer on a program is you're cutting out learning curve. You don't want to do the trial and error yourself. And neither method or approach is right or wrong, it's just about what's gonna work best for you.

Peter Lap: Especially like what you said, if you're working with a coach as one of my lawyer clients, I used to cook for this guy when he was one of my one on one clients and basically, he was a weight loss client and he trained with me three times a week and very successful lawyer and he trained me with three times a week and then sort of his diet and then he said to me, actually, Peter, I don't want to train with you anymore. Because I'm too busy and I don't have time. I hate training. I hate exercise. And I always say most people hate exercise. They like the feeling afterwards, they enjoy the session but going to train is horrible. And I train several times a week and I still hate it but I go because it's a routine, it's just what I do. But this guy didn't like it then you have to busier a lot. He said but I do want you to continue cooking. I said I'm expensive as a chef because first of all I'm not a chef. He said, it doesn't matter. He said to me, Peter, you cook for me on the weekend. So once on a Sunday I brought him like a whole stack of main meals for the weekend and overnight also in order for breakfast. So pretty standard stuff, nothing too exciting. And he said, Peter, I make 350 quid an hour. You said for me, you're cheap, because I would spend five hours doing all my meal prep. And that's on my weekend where I value my time a lot more than I value it at the office. So I value my time on the weekend is 500 pound an hour. So you talk to me 200 quid for something of value 2500 pounds. He said this no brainer. And don't get me wrong I'm not still doing that because to be fair, he moved away. But it's exactly like what you're saying, you can gain all the knowledge yourself. You can, I mean there's amazing people on YouTube, people like yourself on Instagram that are just and podcasts that are throwing knowledge out there that is insanely good and that is sound. But it doesn't mean you have to spend an hour listening to a podcast in the hope that little nugget that you're looking for is going to be there or you can just spend ‘X’ amount of money. I'm not sure what you're charging. But it's hard to know if suddenly we're 50 or 100, 200, quid or whatever it is, for a couple of sessions and just go like you sort it out. You pay for the knowledge, you have a shortcut. You don't need to buy Tom Carriages book, and Gordon Ramsay's book, and Joe Vexes book and all that before you know it, you've got 10 cookbooks that all recipe books and diet books that all tell you different things. And they all have a new book every year. So you just keep reading, and you keep hearing different things. Where are you on those, by the way on cookbooks in general, other than, you know, the stuff works for some people?

Brian Keane: I think with cookbooks it's funny, because, and again it sounds weird coming from me, because I've written four books, three bestsellers, none of them cookbooks, they're all books that you read. But there's recipes in my last book, “The Keen Edge”. And when I remember having the conversation, this was on a bit left fields come back to what you asked. When I was talking with my publisher about our last book, they got into the conversation about doing a cookbook and having recipes in the book. And I said something very similar to what you said there. I rhymed off Joe Vexes, Gordon Ramsay several books that are out there of people that have done that. And I didn't want to just do another and have another recipe book out there. There’s millions and some people love them. My sister, for example, she's a PhD Lecturer, Research Lecturer in Sports Nutrition, but she just hoards cookbooks, she loves them. And they're kind of her version of like collecting Harry Potter and collecting Game of Thrones. And some people have that with cookbooks. And if you love to cook, and it's your meditation, and it's your thing that you really love, then by all means, 100%,  there's a time and a place and by the new one that comes out every year, I think if you were and I have the same issue with nutrition and fitness books, and this is I'm very aware of probably cutting off my nose to spite my face when I say this, as somebody who sells fitness books and nutrition books, there's a premise that the author is trying to get you to follow. And there's a bias that they're trying to bring you around to in every fitness and nutrition book that you read, mine included. And the problem with that is, if you consume too many of those books, or read too many of those books, you get information overload and you get confused. And so for example, my last book, “The Keen Edge” is a nutrition book, fitness book. But it's very heavy on the mindset side of nutrition to self-sabotage, falling off track with diets, why you can't stick to a nutritional plan. So my whole premise is the mindset and the way you're approaching your nutrition is the problem, not the diet you're following. So straightaway, that anchors a little bit of a bias that this is what I'm going to be potentially promoting when you're reading this book. And then if you go and read another one that says, well, carbs are the devil, or your protein is going to cause toxicity or plants are the problem or whatever it is, you start to get this confusion. And there's information overload. And that's the problem with self-education with podcasts and books, because anybody can say what they want for the most part on a podcast and most people can write books and either self-publish it or hybrid publisher. In my case, traditionally published and you get all these mixed messages. The advantage to working with me, working with you Peter, or working with somebody else is a cut straight through that noise. And you can say, well, that's not applicable to you, somebody will send me a supplement of a client that's working with me and say, “Well, you know, Karen down the street is using this”. And I'm like, “Well, look, that's not for you”. You don't have this goal. Why would you add this into your regimen, this isn't going to help. Same with a food or a nutritional protocol. So with cookbooks, and with fitness nutrition books in general, I think it's important to know that going in, that's why I always am very hesitant to recommend books and fitness nutrition books in general, I tend to bring authors onto my podcast, go through the book and let people decide if it's going to be a good fit for them based on the argument the author made. I think that has been my way of filtering through it. And I offer the same advice for clients when they asked me about documentaries and when they asked me about different books that they can read them and look it depends just don't confuse yourself because there's so much conflicting information out there. The problem with diets and nutrition is it's more like religion and tribal than anything else. And as a result you have similar to what you said earlier, Peter, carnivore advocates saying that plants are so bad for you, and vegan, and plant advocates saying that meat is going to destroy the world and destroy the planet and destroy your body. When the truth and the science as of now, although science changes is in the middle, there's a lot of pros and cons to both of those approaches. And it's very easy to get binary in black and white in nutrition in something that's extremely gray. And that becomes the problem because it leads to confusion. And I think if cookbooks, fitness books, nutrition books, or even the information you're consuming online, social media, podcasts, etc, is doing that, you probably need to narrow your field division and pick 2, 3, 4 people that you follow online, listen to their podcast, consume their social media, read their books if they have books, and then just take away your field of vision until you get a better understanding of what it is that you're looking to do. So for example, like I can listen to whatever I want to nutrition and fitness, I've been working in the industry for 10 years, I can navigate and go “Well, that's not applicable. That's not evidence backed”. And I'm able to filter and navigate that. Whereas if I'm reading something on real estate, or crypto currency or something that I haven't proficient in, I don't know what's right or wrong. So I have to be very mindful on where my information comes from. And I think it's useful to apply that in your own life based on whatever it is you're looking to achieve.

Peter Lap: Absolutely. And this is interesting being a thing about the keynote, which I believe is your last book? That's the one that came out this year. Because like you said, it's not a recipe book, as it's not a, this is how you make a kale salad that will have you lose five pounds, or something like that isn't much more anything works for you as long as your mindset is. Anything that works for you is fine, as long as your mindset is and all that sort of stuff. So you have an angle, because you're selling a book, there's something to the book, there's a bias there. But it’s not the, “this is the magic diet book”. Every recipe has turmeric in it, and therefore your cancer will be cured and all that sort of stuff. And what I do find a lot of that when you're talking about, especially social media, getting great information, like what you're talking about out there is so remarkably difficult, because of black and white message is so much easier to sell. I genuinely wish I could have simple slogans for everything, and just have things be evil. And just the top three people, top three things I hate, or at the top, this magic recipe will do X, Y, Z, when, like you said, especially health and fitness, it's all a gray area, right?

Brian Keane: 100%. And there's an old adage in the news world that if it bleeds, it leads. And that's how social media can be. It makes way more sense from a business standpoint, and from an argument standpoint, and from a tribal standpoint to make those extreme claims with one side and that's fine. As I said, I actually don't have an issue. With people doing that. It's easier for me, as I said, I probably have more of a natural filter based on my background and education with it. But I don't have an issue with that where I start to get a bit muddied in the water is when people are getting extremely confused, that are potentially working with me or consuming my content as well. And without the context of this sells, and at the end of the day, social media and I have such a love hate relationship with social media because I've got quite decent following on all my platforms, Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, etc. But I have such a love hate relationship with it. Because although it's an incredible platform for getting your message out there, and it's literally grown my business, I used to be a primary school teacher and social media gave me that initial zero to one leg up when I joined the fitness industry 10 years ago. So I'm eternally grateful first, but also, it's condensed messages of and can be condensed messages of people firing and targeting other people, other diets, other individuals for the sake of building up themselves and building up their profile. And that's okay, but if you're the consumer coming in watching that, and following that, you need to know similar to what you mentioned earlier about the incentive of a coach who's selling Herbal Life or selling Juice Plus or selling whatever it is that there's an incentive there. And that's at the end of the day, why I love podcasts so much because we can delve into these topics, we can go deeper on things, it gives more context to situations and I think in terms of a medium, I think books and podcasts are a very decent way of doing that you can explore a message it's not a sound bite Instagram reel of attacking plant based or attacking carnivore, attacking keto or attacking fasting or showing how incredible that plan is based on all the positive research etc. So I think once people know that without going to into the Pandora's box of this, like there's some basic nutritional principles to follow, I think, one of the most, and this is going to sound so simplistic and as someone who's a sports nutritionist as my background, I think eating well, when it comes to nutrient density and foods, moving more so that you feel better throughout the day, and then recovering and making sure you're looking after your sleep. I think you do those three things to not oversimplify something that is probably a little bit more complicated. Most people will feel considerably better with that.

Peter Lap: Well, because that's the thing, isn't it? Everybody what I find is that, have you read like, I think it's called the 5-Pillars, or the 4-Pillars, or whatever the book is called?

Brian Keane: Yes. Dr. Rangan Chatterjee?

Peter Lap: Yes, I think so. I think it's basically that, you know, you just do your as best you can on those four or five things in stress management, and all that sort of stuff. I know, it's a big thing at the moment. Everybody's talking about stress management all of a sudden, this is not a bad thing, because it's about time when we start looking at all that sort of stuff. But if people manage to sort those things out as best they can, chances are they'll feel better for it.

Brian Keane: Yes, I agree. And I think it's the as you said, it's a good thing conversation to bring up. I think stress management, particularly in 2022, off the back of the last couple years for sure is definitely a conversation worth having with people.

Peter Lap: And so where are you on things like, because I'm a big one on self-awareness. Because everything we've discussed thus far with regards to setting your goals, setting your diet, your sleep, or whatever, requires a level of self-awareness. That I don't think a lot of, at least a lot of the people that I bumped into, don't necessarily have that. They don't know what they're eating throughout the day. They don't know what their sleep really is, like they think they went to bed at 10 o'clock last night. But they don't know what time they fell asleep that sort of thing. I'm not saying that you should track these things religiously. You should track your meals religiously. But where are you on? How do you raise your client’s awareness of what they're actually doing versus what they think they're doing?

Brian Keane: By showing them that what they focus on tends to be what expands and if they're not bringing basic awareness to elements and parts of their life that are going to enhance their health, wellness, fitness, vitality, the areas that I specialize in, then they're not going to have a very successful return with my program or working with me. And similar to what I touched on earlier, nutrition, training or moving, whatever that looks like is do exercises a very wide spectrum all the way from a stem count to smashing CrossFit workouts five days a week, seven days a week, and recovery. So your sleep and your just recovery in general, your stress management, your cortisol and your ability to not get stressed out either chronically or acutely throughout the day. So whatever stress management techniques falls into, I think it's all under that same umbrella. I think basic awareness is important. I don't think you need hyper awareness unless you're extreme athlete. I used to prepare I used to do bodybuilding shows back in 2014, 2015. And I used to prepare people for those shows, I think those individuals need hyper awareness on their food, hyper awareness and every calorie every macro split, every training session, every cardio and all the sleep, I think the higher you are on the spectrum, meaning that if you fall on or what I tend to put people on, just to give them an idea is a one to 10 spectrum. So 1, 2, 3 is like couch to 5K's first training program haven't been the gym before don't fully understand food, haven't really had conscious awareness around food. Your 3-8 are kind of your weekend warriors, your people who are like I go to the gym, I work out regularly, I eat well, but I want a balanced lifestyle. And you have your 8-10, which is your professional athletes, your talk to your people who this is their life, it's their highest value on their ladder rung. And I think the awareness comes down to where you fall in that spectrum. So if you're listening to this podcast, ask where are you on that spectrum at the very beginning, in that zero to three, which is totally fine. All you're looking to do now is bring a little bit of basic awareness. How did you eat today? How much did you eat today? What was your portion sizes? How did you sleep? You know, how did you sleep? As you're seeing what the quality goes, you know, did you sleep for six hours or seven hours or eight hours? And did you get up five times to go to the toilet in the middle of the night? A little bit of basic awareness same as your movement. Are you sitting all day, or are you moving? I think then when you move into that kind of 3-8, you're gonna get more nuanced. You might look at macronutrients, you might look at food choices, you might look at quality of sleep, so your REM cycles, your rapid eye movement, sleep cycles, how recovered are you feeling you know, after those sessions? Do you need seven hours or eight hours or nine hours a night to feel a 10 out of 10 in terms of a feeling of energetically? How you're feeling after a good night's sleep? And then if you're at the top end of that spectrum, which is a tiny percentage of people. You're obviously going to have hyper awareness and everything you're doing.

Peter Lap: And that's fascinating, like you said, because I come across this an awful lot. And you probably do as well, that people who are 0-8 or 0-3, especially because I think the 4-8, kind of nowhere they are they just make some tweaks, but they're kind of on the ball, they kind of where they want to be, they kind of where they need to be, for general health is to people who are starting early on. So we're just starting out the 0-3 category, like you mentioned, they think they have to be like an 8-10. So they come at you like, okay, but this is what the Olympic level athlete does. And this is therefore what I need to do to, if you're an Olympic level athlete, and that is your goal, then sure, but this is not what your starting point is because it becomes impossible.

Brian Keane: It’s the mic drop there, Peter, like applying an extreme approach for non-extreme gold is the recipe for failure.

Peter Lap: It really is. And we come across this a lot because this gets sold a lot. Every piece of equipment in a gym, like a TRX is a prime example for. Don’t get me wrong, I love a suspension trainer. But when I used to work for, let's say, a high end changing in the UK, and there is only one, so everybody knows I'm talking about David Lloyd. But we were told you got to do these taster sessions to sell people on personal training. Did you ever work in a box gym?

Brian Keane: I did. I worked in Fitness first. I know exactly where you're going with the story.

Peter Lap: So you have to then say because these people get a free program. So that doesn't make the club any money. And doesn't make me any money as a PT. So I needed to buy PT and that was a way that they showed you how to do taster sessions on the TRX usually 10 minutes and show people our complexities of equipment works. And we had Vipers and we had kettlebells and every single taster session they did have to be along the line of the TRX was invented by a Navy SEAL. Viper was started by someone from the Royal Marine Commandos, who fought five did five tours in Afghanistan and wanted to keep his core strength up. Kettlebells are used by Russian FSB as it is now. And you're talking to people who are couch to 5k people who are just like, Dude, I just made it to the gym, I'm happy to be at the gym, show me how to do some bicep curls or something. I'm just happy to use a treadmill. Selling that extreme, the whole fitness world is kind of a lot of the fitness world is kind of set up that way. Look at what all these cool people can do. Wouldn't you like to be one of those cool people? And I think realistically the answer to that, wouldn't you like to be one is now because I'm not willing to put in the sacrifices those guys make. I'm a 48 year old PT.  I'm not going to train like any professional athlete is going to train I'm not going to be like a Commonwealth level swimmer. I mean, or like Andy Murray preparing for Wimbledon or anything like that, there is such a big gap between like what you say the 0-3, 4-8, and the nines and the 10s. I mean, that gap is huge. I mean people generally, even I used to train a football player, professional football player in in SPL so in the Scottish Premier League for Americans listening to it, that's the highest league in Scotland. A bit of these other very good league but you know, the guy gets paid to play football. So he's a professional athlete. Even the gap between the SPL and the English Premier League La Liga is so big that the fitness levels of these players is incomparable, the top 1% of people you don't have to train like Cristiano Ronaldo, that's all I'm saying. You don't have to have five, six hours a day. You don't even have to train at the level of I’m training. You have to go to the gym five, six times a week. You don't have to eat like I eat. And like what you said, you do CrossFit and you do a lot of high intensity stuff on your Instagram feed and all of that stuff. So people want to the Zumba they can do Zumba. There is no one better way to do, it is all I'm saying.

Brian Keane: And it's about what you enjoy as well. I think exercise gets overcomplicated. Like, I think it's important to see where people fall in an exercise spectrum. Like, I am one of the people who loves to work-out and always have I came from a sporting background. And I love to work out. I love to train so that that doesn't feel like effort to me or work like I like to push it that difficulty or to that level of difficulty in my workouts. Whereas if you're someone who doesn't like to train, you're looking at what I call them, Boxster immedi, your minimum effective dose, what's the minimum amount of work in alpha training that you need to do to hit your end goal. And then because you can be consistent with that, like most people can do two to three workouts per week and hit a daily step count, or maybe get a standing desk or be a little bit more active. You don't need to go five, six times a week, seven times a week, I don't think anybody needs to go seven times a week, unless you're maybe Ronaldo, as you said Lionel Messi or something along those lines. And I think that's important to understand. Because it's very easy to look at my Instagram page or other fitness influencers are quote, unquote, putting people under that umbrella brackets and go well, I need to do what they do. But maybe they love what they're doing, and you don't. So that's an important distinguishment to make, because your approach is going to be different based on what you enjoy.

Peter Lap: Oh, absolutely. And like I said, the same goes for diet. At the end, you mentioned this, and we come full circle. Because you mentioned this in the beginning. I don't mind eating loads of spinach. You know I like spinach, I'm Dutch, I like spinach is one of the few things we grow in Holland. And therefore, I was raised and stuff, I drink a lot of milk. Because I was raised on that sort of stuff. If you don't enjoy those things, you don't have to eat them. It is that simple. It's very tempting to fall into that look at what this guy is eating, or this woman is eating or whatever. And therefore that is what I should eat or that's what I should be doing. Especially when you're if your life isn't the same way, because we can all train seven hours a day. We could all spend seven hours if you have nothing else to do. And you mainly see those with movie, movie actors. The friend of mine is personal trainer. And he trains, let's say the B-list Hollywood star, so he doesn't train to Rock. But he trains the level below that. So people who studio pays to train him for films for a certain look. And he's a wonderful personal trainer. I mean, the guy's amazing. But he only works with people have nothing else to do during the day. Because these guys all the girl and women all get paid to do nothing else. So you know, I went to watch sport yesterday. I know I'm a bit late to the party, but the last for a movie and everybody knows that Hemsworth looks insane. But Natalie Portman is in that film. And Natalie Portman plays female for, I don't know, if you've seen the thing. But she looks in tremendous, tremendous shape. So I'm bound to get some people saying, I would like arms like Natalie Portman has. But then people don't realize that Natalie Portman trains three, four hours a day. Her diet was on point because she's in the studio to pay for her shift. And she has nothing else to do during the day other than recover. Because if you're trained three hours a day, you can bet your ass at five hours have to be recovery time, because otherwise you're ruined for the following day.

Brian Keane: It's funny you say that because I did a podcast, Peter, with Magnus Lygdback, who is an LA Hollywood Trainer. He prepares people for most of the, I'm not sure if Natalie Portman's on his this section or that you say it, but he trains people for the Marvel movie. So when he was talking about the regimen when he was preparing Alexander Skarsgard for the North Ben, Ben Affleck for Batman people along those lines. What I had met people messaging me off the back of that coin. I didn't realize that this is, it sounds really obvious. They said it to me after they're like, it sounds really obvious. But I would get DMs on Instagram people going, I didn't realize the amount of work and short timeline that those people transform their bodies, but this is their full time job. And I'm like, “Yes”, I was like this is literally as you said, Peter, is what they get paid to do. Working with these trainers working with these chefs preparing for those movies. And it just realized those expectations with if you are not in that position than your timeline, and this ridiculous 6 or 8 or 12 week transformation that a Hollywood star could potentially do might not be realistic for you. If you've got you know, two kids at home and you're working part time or full time job.

Peter Lap: For sure. You know, like I said, that brings us back to the beginning that finding what your goal is and making your goal realistic for you. Because, you know, we all have the idea that I want to run a marathon by the time I'm 50 some shit like that. I just also hate running. So I'm not gonna run a marathon. Do you know what I mean? Then I might well have it as a vague goal. But if I'm not willing to put the effort in that should always be the second question. Is your goal realistic for you? As far as I'm concerned, you just said this is what my goal is. I want to run a marathon in August or something like that and go okay, you know, if you only go three weeks. I can't manage 5K. So I probably should manage my expectations a little bit because I have other things to do that fit around my life.

Brian Keane: I think asking is the juice worth the squeeze is always a good way to approach. Like, I think if you apply that with whatever it is you want to do, whether it's a marathon or losing weight or whatever, you won't go too far wrong.

Peter Lap: Not exactly. On that happy note, was there anything else you wanted to touch on that? 

Brian Keane: No, Peter, really enjoyed this conversation. Thank you so much, again, for bringing me on. And I know that you're serving that postpartum post-natal space tremendously well. So as a fellow podcaster, and person who's trying to influence people in my space, I love that you're covering this as well. So keep doing what you're doing, man. And thank you so much for bringing me on.

Peter Lap: Lovely.  Thanks very much. On that note, I will happily press stop record here. 

Peter Lap (PODCAST OUTRO): Press “Stop Record” is exactly what I did. Thanks very much to Brian for coming on. I mean, I love Brian, I love this attitude about stuff. He's always positive. He's always optimistic. And he's one of those guys that you know, you spend an hour with you feel better after the hour. He's a tremendous amount of knowledge. His books are well worth a read, you know, I will link to absolutely everything website, his podcast, make sure you catch that if you don't already listen. And he gets a lot more listeners tonight. So I'm guessing that you know, you do this, and at least in the UK does. You know, follow him on Instagram, Facebook, and all that sort of stuff. You can buy his books on Amazon, they are well worth reading, like I said, there is his last book, like, like he mentioned is much more to do with mindset and all that sort of stuff. And overall, like I said them, and I'm absolutely loved the guy. So you know, check him out. What are we doing? There is no any news this week, simply because I haven't done one in a while. So let's have a look. 

So and this is what a fancy, can you tell that not so subtle editing. Obviously, Brian's interview was recorded a while before this came out. And then after to do the outro record and all that sort of stuff and send it off to whoever the guest is for their approval and all that sort of stuff. And then they you know, I add the last bit when everything is true. So now we're at the last bit. And I found a great news this week. That took me a while to find something to be honest. Because there hasn't been an awful lot in the news recently. It's slow news, everyone's on holiday. First of all, a little mention, I interviewed Don Barclay a while ago on the podcast in April. I think it was about her books called “Traveling Different”. We spoke about traveling with neurodiverse kids and all that sort of stuff. Well, her book is out. And it's already got a start rating from Library Journal or something like that. So congratulations to Don. This is one of those massive books that I think will be very useful for everyone. And I told her I'd give it a mention. So there you go. If you’re a parents of a neurodiverse kid, or you know someone who is and you think this book might come in useful, it's called “Traveling Different” than there's a whole long title after, so I will link to it in the podcast description. I had COVID this week, so I'm sounding a bit iffy maybe but now, hopefully not worse than usual in the news this week, because that's where we are. And then we'll wrap this thing up. And then I can go back to you know, lying in bed slowly contemplating a COVID related becoming COVID related statistic. From WBUR which is an American site. The nation's first vaginal fluid transplant of our hope for millions. And this is an interesting article and I'll link to the thing because apparently we're talking bacterial vaginosis (BV). Apparently one in three women in the US suffers from this at any given moment. And you know, a number is much higher in certain groups. Again, it's a sort of condition that's much more prevalent in African American people by according to this, and it's linked to some serious long term health issues and all that sort of stuff. And the interesting thing is that as with all these type of things, it's a woman problem and therefore, you know, it's maybe it's an embarrassing woman problem, and therefore, you know, there's no money to be made out of it.

So medicine is a little bit behind. We know this when it comes to treating women's issues, especially when it comes to women of color issue. The priority isn't there, we make little blue pills. But we don't do this stuff. Anyways, bacterial vaginosis, so I'm guessing the numbers in the UK will be just about as high. It doesn't make sense for the numbers to be fair 2% in the US and 0% in the UK. So this is interesting. This is, basically they've transplanted vaginal fluid from one woman who had a healthy vagina to a woman who had an unhappy vagina. Basically, as it says here, take fluid from happy vagina, put it in unhappy woman and see what happened. Much like fecal transplant and all that sort of stuff. Fecal transplant stuff is also a relatively new, study beldo I remember talking about this, I think a few years ago after listening to it on radio force medicine program. I can't remember what that's called. Anyways, it's still relatively new, I'm not saying there's going to be a solution tomorrow, but it comes down again, to the microbiome comes down to taking care of your bacteria properly. And, you know, we're only just starting to realize just how important this is. I had Dr. [inaudible 00:56:36] on a while ago now. And I know I've mentioned this before, he was obviously as he has a PhD in the microbiome and all that sort of stuff. And as he explained that, it's new stuff, but it's very, very interesting. Hopefully, this comes to something. Obviously, we can't be handing out little bottles of vagina juice, and all that other stuff everywhere. But there might, this might be that as sort of a do it yourself, Home Kit or something like that, that shouldn't be the case. But the hopefully, there will keep investing a bit of money into this and then you know, we can crack on and get these problems solved. Because interesting be enough and actual transplant according to this is remarkably simple, the actual collection of the fluid is very difficult. But the transplant is basically, as the doctor who said, they use an eyedropper, a speculum exam, with eyedropper, put the fluid into a vagina and have the person laying there for 15 minutes and that's it. So it'll be interesting to see some trials are being run in Denmark and Israel and all that sort of stuff. The interesting to see where it goes, but hopefully, hopefully, some money will be spent on this sort of stuff and we will come up with a solution. So if you're suffering from this, this hope might be around the corner. 

Anyways, that's all from me, peter@healthypostnatalbody.com if you have any questions or comments then you know, you get in touch and let me know. And I'll check in to you next week when I believe I have a wonderful interview with Kelly next week, coming out next week. Oh, you're gonna love. Kelly's amazing. [Inaudible 00:58:33] meditation micro habits and all that sort of stuff. She's very popular already and for good reason. But anyways, that's me done. You have a lovely week take care of yourself. Bye now.