 Our first caller is Danielle from New Hampshire. Danielle, how's it going? How can we help you? It's going great. Thanks. Guys, I just want to let you know how grateful I am for you and all that you do. Earlier this year, I lost my dad to COVID. So it got me to start thinking about my own health and my own mobility. About June of this year, I started working with an FRC coach. And she basically has me unwinding everything that I've learned. So I've always been active. I was a member of the Y. I like to swim. I like to hike. I like to ski. But I started to think about, there's things I can't do. We're in Kinstretch and we're learning about, we're going to flex our toes and we're going to roll our ankles around. And so I'm learning, I'm getting new mobility, but I'm still struggling. And then I came across this article and I'm just wondering, so basically I'm 5'9". I'm about 185 pounds and I'm like a tall pair. I guess you could describe me. And just wondering, how does your body shape fit into some of the exercises that you may be able to do or not to? So for instance, a squat. I can get really low when I have no weight, but as soon as I put weight on the bar, I'm back to being parallel. I know what the answer I want you to say is, but I'm just curious to get a little bit of feedback, I guess. Yeah, no, that's a good question. So the answer is actually in what you just said. You could do a full squat with no weight, but when you add weight, then your form obviously goes in the wrong direction. That's a strength issue. How big of a role does your body shape play in a lot of these exercises? Somewhat of a role, small role for most people, because a lot of these movements are kind of foundational, fundamental pieces of human movement. So it's like walking, right? So there's a person's body shape play a role and their ability to walk to some degree, but really small, right? Because we all evolve to be able to walk. Well, you also evolve to be able to squat and press and row and rotate to some degree and do some split stance exercises. Now, when you get into very technical movements that require very specific types of mobility, then maybe it plays a larger role. But when you're talking about, you know, most of the exercises you're going to do in the gym, a lot of it has to do with strength, mobility and connection. And much less of it has to do with just our body shape or the length of our limbs or how our joints look. And I know there's like this movement in the fitness space to talk about, you know, hip joint and the socket and the length of the femur. And, you know, and yes, there's definitely cases where that plays a role, but it's a lot smaller than people think. For the most part, all of us have the capability to be able to do most of these movements. And what gets in the way is just, you know, tightness, weakness and lack of stability. Danielle, first of all, I think the fact that you're doing FRC and you've hired a coach is incredible. I think everything that they're teaching over there is phenomenal. It's life changing. Absolutely. It really is. Yeah. No, I love, I love hearing when people actually sign up and start going through that process. It was life changing for me. So I think that's great. Are you doing any, are you following a maps program or anything in conjunction with it, or are you doing that by itself? Just by itself. And then I work with her, the trainer, three days a week doing heavy lifting and stuff like that. So I am the kind of person that needs that constant correction and that for right now where I'm at, I just need someone standing over me and correcting form. And like I said, I have done push-ups wrong. I didn't realize this. I was doing push-ups around my whole life. So it's a little bit eye-opening, but I just need someone right now where I'm at to, to guide me through the phases and the exercise and using proper form. Are they, are they coming with you in person or are you doing this virtually? How are you doing it right now? No, I'm going to their studio. Oh, nice. Well, I mean, and you know, I tell you what, like if you didn't, if you weren't following something, I would have recommended something like maps performance, I think would complement what you're doing with FRC. But even our programs, I think we've said this many times on the show, nothing beats a really good coach in person, somebody who can call an audible while they're coaching you and explain to you why this feels this way or what's going on with your body. Hey, let's move over here and now do these movements. And if that coach is doing that stuff with you, I think that it's at this point, it's more just about being patient, be patient, stay consistent. You're doing the right things. I think you're on the right track by having someone like an FRC coach help you out. I think you're in great hands. Yeah. I mean, going back and going through all the different clients that had limitations, you know, there, there are, you know, very, very few examples of morphology sort of getting, you know, in the way of being able to attempt these types of movements. It's every single time I've gone through it and we've, you know, the more educated I got with techniques like FRC and, you know, other types of, you know, ways to address connectivity issues and stability issues. It really highlights, you know, just the amount of times you've just patterned this certain process forever to where you've, you've self-regulated and sort of limited that a lot of times just based off of like the, the type of habits and routines like you've done over the years. And there is a way to get, go in there. And like you said, kind of unwind and unpack and, and, you know, dive into that process and see like, unlocks a whole new potential movement-wise. And that's what I love about, you know, those types of modalities is it really like highlights the abilities are there, but you have to do maybe sometimes more work to, to get back to the root of the actual cost. And Danielle, it says in your written question that you started in June of this year. Yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah, you got to get just warming up. You're just, you're just, I know, but it's really hard when, when someone says you don't have the prerequisite to do that. Do it, you know. Well, you know what, don't, don't, don't, I saw too that, I mean, you admit that it's kind of a shot to the ego for somebody who's been working out and doing fitness. You know what, it was, it was challenging for me too. I remember the first time that I hung out with Dr. Brink and he broke me down. Here I am a personal trainer. I've been training other people my whole life. And then basically to tell me the same exact thing, hey, you don't have the prerequisites to be squatting that much weight on your back. You should be doing X, Y, and Z. And, and I'm also somebody who falls under that like, you know, morphology is not ideal for squatting really deep. I'm six foot three. I do have a long, a long femur. I have poor ankle mobility. So it was extremely challenging for me to get to where I'm at. That's why, that's why to today I'm more proud about my squat depth than I am any PR I've ever hit in my life as far as, oh, I've, you know, I've squatted 420 pounds. I've benched X. Like, I don't really care about that. I'm more proud about the change in movement that I made in the depth. You have totally different metrics now that you're applying towards these exercises. And yeah, and you just have to look at it completely differently, like of how much you're accomplishing, but in a completely different path than you were before. You're on the right track, Danielle. You're doing the right stuff. So just hang in there and you're going to continue to improve for a while. I appreciate that. Thank you. No problem. Thanks for calling in. Yeah. A lot of people don't realize that, by the way, forget mobility, forget what this person's talking about. If any, if someone hires me as a beginner, it's, it takes six months at least humbling before they released. I'm able to really start pushing them with their work out literally for the, this is the average part takes at least six months before that happens. She's an athlete, dude. This is, I can totally connect with this feeling. Like when she said that, you know, it's tough to be somebody who's been hiking, swimming, running, biking, you know, playing sports your whole life and then have somebody break you down and basically say, you've been doing all that wrong your whole life. Yeah. That's a shot to the guy. Yeah. And there, there's these things. It can be a shot. And then it is, I think, you know, mobility progress is seems to be a little more daunting than seeing just more weights. I feel like it's easier to get strong in my opinion. It's easier to add three to five pounds to the bar on almost any exercise you're doing than to see yourself get an extra inch or two of depth. Well, it's more, I guess, ego rewarding. It's counterintuitive. Yeah. It's just more ego rewarding. You don't, you don't, I mean, you, you want to brag about your new PR, but, you know, I went, you know, a half an inch deeper on my board. Exactly. Nobody else gives a shit that I can get. You know, it's like, how much are you squatting? Well, I mean, well, for me, this is what I'm concerned about. So that plays a role. Yeah. And back to what I said, it's, it takes a while. It doesn't mean you're not, you don't have a certain level of fitness or stamina or strength for what you were doing. It's just you're relearning movements and it takes, it takes a while. She's probably already made tremendous improvements in that short period of time, but wanting it to happen faster it does just take time. But once you get there and you start to get there fast, you start to get there faster and faster. It's a snowball effect. Well, and a lot of this is just reframing the way you look at, you know, kind of exercise and to Justin's point, I had my nephew just call me recently. He just, he's just transitioned out of maps in a block. He's going into maps performance and he's kind of like overviewing the workouts for the first phase. And he's like, you know, this seems too easy for me. Should I add, he was calling to ask if he should add sets or do some of that. I said, listen, I need you. And I know him really well obviously, so I can, I have a little more insight. I'm like, I need you to look at this program completely different than the way you looked at maps anabolic. When you went into maps, anabolic was about building your metabolism, about getting stronger. Now that we're moving into performance, I really don't care if the workout looks like it could be easier, it could be harder, it could be more, your get away from the, I want to be strong. And that's where you're heading. Just even though that's your, maybe your longterm goal, the goal of this program is to perfect your movement, is to increase mobility. So when you go into a workout, let's say you're doing like the reverse lunge to press with the landmine, which is a unique exercise. A lot of people may have not done that before. I care less if you called me and said, Hey, Adam, last week I was doing that with 50 pounds and now I'm doing it with 80 pounds. I would rather you say, I started out with 50 pounds and I actually had to back off to 40, but man, I, the movement feels so smooth. It looks so good. You know, I can, I can slow it. Yes. So, and that, that's the idea is you, but it's hard if you are, you know, like my nephew who wants to be, he's a, you know, ex football player, strong guy, like that's all he cares about is getting buff and strong or losing body fat. It's all centered around that and just getting him to wrap his brain around. When we are now working on movement and mobility, it's a different mindset going into it. So she needs to do the same thing as, is stop worrying about how fast you ran or swam before, forget about how much weight you squatted or bench-spressed before. And now it becomes, you know, what did the movement look like last year and what does the movement look like this year with the work that I've been putting in and, and start, start being proud of yourself for the gains that you've made in that direction versus the weight going up or down the bar. Hey, if you enjoyed that clip, you can find the full episode here or you can find other clips over here and be sure to subscribe.