 In this episode of The Mind Pump, so look in this episode we answer questions from listeners like you who post questions on our Instagram page, but we also talk about current events, our lives, and the people that we partner with. That's in the intro portion of this episode. So here's what we talked about for the first 37 minutes, the intro portion. We talked about our new partner, Nutrition Coaching Institute. This is the company owned by our good friend Jason Phillips. It's a phenomenal place you can go if you're a coach and you want to become an online coach. You want to be a better online coach to learn how to work with nutrition with your clients, but here's the deal. We got you, we're going to give away actually to people a free scholarship. So here's how you apply. Go to applywithnci.com forward slash mind pump fill out the form and two of you this month will win a nutritional coaching bundle scholarship valued at over $6500. Then we talked about beef cake season. This is a, this is the season of bulking. Apparently I'm getting a little heavy. I'm getting thick. Yeah. You got a thickness about yourself. There's a lot of seas there. Then we talk about our trip to Tahoe. That was a lot of fun. Adam talks about how he went fishing and caught fishes. Good times. We talked about PRX, PRX, another one of our partners who makes phenomenal home gym equipment and actually has a payment plan. So you can buy the home gym equipment to a payment plan. So instead of paying your gym to rent their equipment, why not own one? Yeah, why not own your own, your own gym? That way it's not all filthy and covered with sweat from the hairy dude that was on the machine before you. That guy always. Then we talked about Halloween movies and how one of those movies had Justin trying to explain to his nine and five year old what a virgin was. Come on, Disney. I thought I thought I was safe. Then we talked about Chicago and how they decriminalized the use of psychedelic mushrooms and other plants. Maybe on it will move there. We talked about dish pizza and mushrooms. We talked about creatine and cancer. Believe it or not, creatine may actually help the body fight cancer. You thought it was good for your biceps. Not just that. It's good for cancer too. Wow. And then we talked about what makes people charismatic because of course we're charismatic as hell. All of us. Then we got to the fitness portion of this episode. The first question was this person says, Hey, you guys don't love machines, but what are your favorite machines and why? So we talk about machines and their value. I love robots. The next question. This person wants to know how to work out and grow their trapezius muscles. Those are the muscles next to your neck. Next question. This person has hit a plateau with their deadlift. What can they do to get their deadlift to go up again? Deadlift. One of the best exercises you can do works the glutes, the hamstrings and the backs. We talk all about that. And the final question. This person wants to know what our bad habits are and how we're working on them. And Adam was, of course, in his brilliance, was able to point out my bad habits. Thanks. It was actually quite accurate. Yeah. Also this month, all month long, the only time we're doing the sale during the whole year, MAPS anabolic, one of our most popular fitness programs is 50% off. So MAPS anabolic, phenomenal for muscle building, fat loss and metabolism boosting. It's 50% off. Here's how you get the discount. Go to MAPS red.com and use the code red 50 RED 50 no space for the discount. Stop whatever dumb program you're doing and do anabolic. This room is the, we'll call it the opposite room from now on. If it's cold outside, hot as shit in here. If it's hot as shit out there, freezing in here. If it's a good temperature out there, it's a uncomfortable temperature in here. If it's an uncomfortable temperature out there, it's still uncomfortable in here. That's the one time it's the same, Doug, is when it's uncomfortable everywhere, still uncomfortable in here. Yeah. Yeah. Uncomfortable for me to triangle. I don't know about you guys, but I definitely appreciate temperature contrast training. Not all the time when I'm trying to podcast though. You know what I mean? Right. I'm not trying to strengthen that part of myself when I'm podcasting. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. When I'm like going for it, like I'm going to go sit in the sauna like, because this, I want to heat up. You don't have to sit in the sauna. You could just sit in your chair in here. You could. And do a podcast and sweat. And then poor Chokey walks in and she's like, hmm, smell flies. It's so musty in here. Smells like man. So how excited are you guys on what we're doing with Jason Phillips going forward? More excited than you sound. Pepping your step. I already know how excited I am. I wanted to hear how excited I am. You're trying to downplay us. I don't want to sell you on how excited I am. Are you excited? Dude, are you kidding me? So all we've ever heard is good feedback from his great things. Yeah. Nutritional coaching Institute. You know, it's a good thing he's doing that because the online coaching world is just exploded. Yeah. And it's good and bad. It's good because it's a new market. More people have access to more help. It's bad because most of them suck. Yeah. The majority of them suck. I mean, let's be honest. 98%. I remember one of the things that we hit it off with Jason really well. And, you know, you and him did a couple of really good YouTube videos together. He's a great communicator and he's been in the space for a long enough time to understand like the value of education and then also the value of being able to take that education and be able to translate that for the average person to understand. And I think the stuff that he does in his NCI, that's what he does really well. I mean, when we first got on the phone few months back and we were first starting to have this conversation around, you know, what we would do or how we would work out some sort of a partnership together. One of the things that he was talking about that, you know, precision nutrition is probably one of the most reputable nutrition institutes that are out there right now. And he says that it's a major feeder system for his business. And I was asking him why. And he says it's because it's incredible information. It's just so high level that the average trainer that goes through it goes through it. They're blown away, feel like they got all this information, but then they don't have the tools to go apply it to their clients as well. And so he kind of filled that gap he feels like. And that's why they're doing so well. Well, the most important thing for a trainer, I probably said it a hundred times on the podcast is how effectively you communicate. You can have all the great information in the world. And a lot of trainers do have a lot of information. They know the steps to burning body fat. They know the steps to building muscle. They know the steps to improving health, but getting your clients to really understand and not just understand, but apply in long term, lifelong ways. That's the skill that makes you an effective trainer. Because any trainer, if you can get a client to just do what you tell them, you know, for three months, great congratulations. What happens after that three months? That means you didn't communicate it well enough. You didn't do a good enough job. And so the feedback I get from people who go through the NCI course is exactly that, that they're able to not just learn what they need to learn, but actually effectively apply it to their online clients. They also have courses on nutrition for hormones. You guys know that? Yeah. So it's just, there's like level one, level two, but then there's hormone courses. So you can help people with nutrition and the hormones. It's extremely extensive. So I'm excited to work with them. And then what's the deal with them? Are we giving stuff away, right? Well, what Mind Pump is doing is we're actually going to pay for two people to go through that. So every month we're going to give away. That's what we'll announce on the show. Yeah. Where we will actually give away two of these certifications, which are that two together are valued at like $6,000. So we're giving away access to all this stuff. I just think that's a cool way to do a partnership. That was something that him and I talked about for a long while. I was like, you know, instead of us giving like some sort of a discount to our listeners, which I think is cool too. Let's do a scholarship. Yeah. Let's do a scholarship program if you're down for it. And he says, I would love to do that. So, you know, and we'll continue this on, especially if we get a good response from it. If this is something that trainers are looking to do, but we'll give away two scholarships every single month as long as it's going well and people are appreciating it and liking it. So well, I'm excited about it. I mean, the best way for us to combat a lot of this bad information out there to start putting more, you know, of these like certified coaches out there that are actually like taught by somebody that's really reputable. And I think that this is a great program that we can finally lead people towards to, you know, flood the market with really solid information. I just got a DM yesterday. I have two of them. I had one girl who DM me and said, Hey, I have an online coach and my online coach told me to eat 220 grams of protein every single day. So, okay. How much do you weigh? 110 pounds. Okay. Way too much frickin program. And the reason why she DM me is because she said, I'm having the following symptoms. I'm bloated. I have low energy. My workouts are suffering. I said, well, how's your digestion? And she says, Oh, it's, it's okay. And I said, Are you having a mobile movement every day? She says, no, it's every two or three days. Too much damn protein. It's, and I'm not going to air out who the coach was, but it's one of those, you know, social media, Instagram coaches. Then I had another person message me and say, Hey, my online coach said that eating fat and carbs in the same meal is really, really bad for my hormones. What? Yeah. And I know there's some Ayurvedic practices that will talk specifically to certain individuals about combining certain foods, but that's just it. It's very, very individual with the average person. No, there's nothing wrong with eating proteins and carbs and fats on the same meal. Do you think we're going to see this die off? Jason and I actually were on the phone yesterday and talking about this, about, you know, the coaching world online. Do you think that we're, we're seeing this huge spike in it because everybody now is an expert. If you have X amount of people following you or whatever and selling coaching and training online, do you think we're going to see that plateau and then come back? I do. I think there's going to be a little bit of a reckoning. Like all markets is a market, it grows for starts like the, like the dot com market. Remember when it was, there was the dot com bust and you had all these companies coming in and they were getting valued at ridiculous amounts because it was the new thing and then a whole bunch of them failed. It's like, it's any market anytime filtering process. Yeah. And this is new online coaching is really exploded recently because of social media and because of the false sense of authority because when you go on Instagram and you see someone who has 10,000 or 20,000 or 30, 40, 50,000 followers, the perception is this person must know what they're talking about. But I think that that's starting to change. We're already seeing it now with these, these, you know, these insta celebrities who can't sell more than three t-shirts, even though they have two men following. You can fake it for so long with like the foreign after picks and like personal anecdotes and people like, you know, giving their testimonials and all these types of things to kind of like rep your, rep you as far as like a coach or, you know, just look at you like visually, like you look awesome. So therefore, you know, you must be providing good information, but that only lasts so long. Yeah. It's like a shitty restaurant with great advertising, you know, eventually everybody eats there and it tastes like shit. And the pictures of the food look amazing. Yeah. It's like, wow, that look, that picture of that burger looks amazing. That's what it's like. So you have people that are doubling, tripling down on the advertising, which would be their following, right? Which is, you know, driven through pictures or gimmicks or whatever to get attention. And then what ends up happening is a good portion of those people go through that process and find out like, Oh, this just tastes like a fast food restaurant. I'm cool. I'll move along. It's garbage. Yeah. So I gotta tell you guys, I had a little bit of a shock over the weekend. A little shock and a little bit of a surprise. What's that? Okay. So I knew I've been putting on a little bit of weight recently, you know, you're eating like a horse. I'm just feeling, I'm feeling, you know, just, just bigger. You know what I mean? I feel strong. I'm strong. I haven't been the strong a long time feeling bigger. And I'm like, ah, you know, I know I'm over 200 pounds. And I typically walk around so long as you guys have, we've worked together 90 something between 189, 188 at the low to like 195, 196 at the high. It's just where it fluctuates. And I'm like, I know I'm over 200 pounds. I got to be over at least 201, 202. Ah, dude, it's 209. Whoa. Whoa, beef cake. Bro, you can't use your little formula on me anymore, dude. You used to use that a lot pound for pound stronger so that if I passed you in a thing, you'd be like, well, I'm like 190. What are you where we're about three pounds off of each other now, dude? I'm just going to be the bigger guy, I guess. New goal, huh? No, dude, you know, so, you know, I weighed myself. So I went to a wedding with Jessica over the weekend. Her cousin got married. Great, great dude, by the way. Great wedding. And I put on a suit that I, it's my suit. You know, I have one suit that I wear out because I never wear suits. So it's like, this is what I wear for weddings. I got it dry cleaned. I hadn't worn it for five or six months. And I put on the pants and the, they were short. So like I'm standing there and you can see my socks a little bit. So like, I didn't get taller. And I realized like, oh, it's because my ass and my quads are lifting the freaking pants. It was just tight. It was just tight around my cakes. Yeah. You know, I felt like Justin, I was walking around with the Justin, Justin Walker, whatever it feels like. I've been giving you the good game pat. You know, back in the day, I, up until probably, I want to say seven, eight years ago, six, seven, eight years ago, I used to, every winter, I used, I would call it beefcake season and I will bulk up to two, 20, 225. I used to do this every, every single winter. And then every summer, I'd cut down to like 190, 192. I was always off on that. You were to bulk up in the summer? Yes. It just worked out that way. It was never, you know what I'm saying? I always told myself that I'm going to bulk in the winter, get cut and shredded in the summertime. And just for whatever reason, whatever was going on in my life at that time, that it just didn't work out that way. I ended up the opposite. No, I just, I think my, my best shape I've ever been in my life for some reason has always fallen in the winter for some reason. No, dude, I just, I used to get heavy in the winter and I do it on purpose. I'd follow the whole bulking cutting thing, which is all baloney. And what had, the reason why I haven't done that for so long, first off, it's not effective. You don't need to push your body that much. Some bulk and some cut, sure, and keep them short, but the long, you know, extended when I'm getting up to 220. And I don't have a huge bone frame. So 220 on me is like, it's like 240 or on you, for example. Right. It's just, it's just too much weight. But, you know, because my gut health tends to be always in or out. And so I can't push food that much, but it's been good for a long time now. So that's why you guys saw me over the weekend eating because I don't have that. You're actually mad at us for not stopping to eat. I don't know what's happening. I hope I don't get back up to. He's a hungry boy. 220. You guys don't want to see my round. I just wanted to get home, bro. We did. Do we leave Wednesday or Thursday, Doug? Is it Wednesday or Thursday? We left on Wednesday evening. Yeah, Wednesday night. We drove Wednesday night, you know, to get up there. Thursday, we looked at what, nine houses or 10 houses. So drove all over Southlake, Northlake, Incline Village, Truckee area, all on Thursday. Friday, we hit what, two or three properties, plus talk to the realtor stuff, drove all over again, Incline Village and stuff. Then hit the road Friday, drove all the way back to San Jose, hit a little bit of traffic, but, you know, sitting in the car again all day long from 9 a.m. all day. Get to San Jose, finally. I come home, I unpack the bag from Tahoe, shower really quick, pack the bag up, kiss Max, kiss Katrina, get out the door again, drive back the direction that we just came from to go to my buddy's place in Lodi, which is another two and a half, well, with traffic on Friday, a good three hours plus of sitting in traffic, back there. Get there at like 10 o'clock or so at night, say hi to him, talked to him for a little bit, hit the sack, back up at 5 a.m., head to the Delta Sack River area and drop in the boat there, fish all day long on the boat and sun and doing that thing. Geez. And then drive back to, oh man. You're pretty energetic today. No, just stop there. Then we get back that night, late that night, crash, get up early in the morning again and we go for a hike out at Los Altos Hills. I forget the name of the trail that Katrina likes to go there. I forgot that was planned, that she wanted to take his photos up there and do, we did this lot with their kids and so now all three of us have our kids and we did this, it was like a dream. I'll tell you something, dude, going on a hard, going on a long trip and not getting good sleep and now is going to have a different meaning for you now that you have a kid because it's like you come home. Oh, yeah. And it's not like you, when you don't have kids, you don't catch up. Yeah, exactly. What happens when you come home and you don't have kids, like, oh, cool, I get to go to sleep, take naps. No, come home, got to take care of the kids, got to stay up. So I can't be super dad. It was, I came home and of course, and I know this, right? So, you know, I know that Katrina, like, this is the longest I went without seeing Max. So going two days in a row, not seeing them, then seeing him for like five minutes before I went out the door again and then be gone again for a day and a night. So that was the longest stretch. So there was a part of me too. I couldn't wait to get home and hold them. But I'm so exhausted, right? So I take him right after his bath time, which we kind of settle him down and get ready for bed. And Katrina comes upstairs and she wakes me up. And I've got one leg up on the bed, the other one's on the floor like this. And I was rocking him and I had laid down for a second and passed out. Yeah, like, leg on the floor, leg up on the bed, sitting halfway up with him in my arms and she comes over and she wakes me up and she's like, Hey, are you awake? And I'm like, what, what? Get up, put him in the bed. And man, I was a tire. That's the wrong one. Dude, I'll tell you what, dude, that whole Tahoe area is just, I love it up. It's the best. It's my favorite. I'm just happy that we all feel the same way about that. Yeah, I know. It's super important, you know, and this is a lesson that I didn't learn until much later. So if you're a young entrepreneur, this may be something you want to think about is, you know, when you have a business, you can be so busy that unless you schedule time and make it a priority to have time where you unplug, it's not going to happen. Now people ask, what's the value of that? Because you think to yourself like, Oh, you know, I just need to work. I just want to be busy all the time. Well, the value is you're fresh. The value is it maintains and spurs creativity. It keeps your innovation. It keeps things in perspective. So it's really, it's a really important thing. So for us going up there, potentially finding a place that we can all go up and go away and in scheduling, here's a big thing for me. That's why I sent you that long text after we got back. I want, I want to, I want your kids to know me like family. I want to know your kids like family. I want the same thing for my child. I think it's super, super important. And it'll just create, it'll foster a bond between all of our families that I think will benefit everybody's lives, but then also benefit the business that'll make us just better at what we do. And we have to have it. We have to have it scheduled. And it's not going to happen on accident for sure. Yeah. It's never going to happen. I learned that lesson with just Katrina and I in our relationship. I think I talked about this on the show not that long ago, where you know, we made this deal in our relationship. I don't know if this was probably five years ago. Katrina's, we've been together now for over nine years now. In that time, she has seen me start and build three different businesses. And I can get very myopic when I decide I'm going to put my brain to something and that that's what I want to focus on to the, to a, to a fault, right? I mean, that's, I would consider that a strength of mine, but it's also a detriment when it taught, when you talk about other people that are affected by that. And so, you know, I remember us having our first like Rocky parts of our relationship years and years back. And what, what I mean, Rocky, like her and I just never disagreed or really fought ever. We had such, we have such a great relationship and understanding, but the things that would probably start to wear on her is that my desire to work all the time. And something that I said to her that, listen, if you ever feel this way, and you feel like I'm not paying enough attention to you, or you feel I'm distracted all the time or all I'm doing is working, you have control of everything. You have all the accounts, you have my schedule, you have all access to all of that. You just fucking, you put a weekend in there and you just book it out. Like, you know, don't, don't stand for it longer than a couple more weeks schedule us. So to still to this day, I'll open up my calendar sometimes and have not looked ahead two or three weeks. And then all of a sudden it comes up that week and I'm like, what the hell, why am I blocked off for these three days? And then she'll tell me, oh, we're going here or we're doing this. You have to do it, man. No, you have to. It's important. It makes a world of a difference in our relationship. So I compare it to, to working out, like, you know, how many times did you have a client that was an executive or an entrepreneur or a business person, and you try to talk to them about the value of exercise, and they'll say things like, I just don't have time, I work 12 hours a day, I'm busy. But then when you finally, if you do a good job, if you do a good job and you convince them to do it for long enough, then they start to see the value. And what do they always tell you? I'm more productive. I'm more effective. I remember the first time this happened to me. I had a client that I trained who was a older gentleman, very, very successful, self-made businessman. And he came to me to train him. His wife actually told him he had to start getting training because he had some doctor's appointments that weren't so great. And it's so funny, three months into the training and he comes in, he goes, I got some feedback for you. And I think he's going to say to me, like, oh man, I look better, I'm stronger, you know, I'm leaner. He's like, I've never been so good at my meetings to my staff. I'm like, what? And he goes, yeah, he goes, because of the workouts, because of the workouts, because I feel better, because I get that time to myself, when I have my meetings, I'm way more effective. He goes, I'm doing way better in business. And I knew that when he said that to me, that he would never stop working out. And to this day, he's now 81. I still see him on social media. He still exercises. Because for him, he found that value in the workouts. The same what Sane applies, I guess, the trading dimes for quarters, right? Yes. So you do have to compromise a bit because, yes, like your schedule is super slammed and booked, like everything business, you're going to cram in there. But now you wedge in something that's going to make you even more productive later. You know, initially you might have a little bit of a drop in productivity, but you're going to gain so much more. This is why I think, why I value having a gym in my garage so much, right here, because it reduces all the non-workout time, like the time it takes to drive to the gym, the time it takes to get your bag and get all ready and all that shit or whatever. I can work out in my garage whenever I want. I can wake up in the morning, don't even need to brush my teeth or anything. I can go out there and work on underwear if I want to, which I do sometimes. And I go out and just do my workout whenever, and it keeps me, it just removes all the potential, that's the thing, like what you want to do is you want to eliminate all the potential obstacles that come up in your way. So an obstacle would be like, oh, I got a, you know, I'm going to go home and then I got to go back to the gym. Like that's an obstacle. So maybe you just go straight to the gym from work. That helps a lot of people. No, access whenever. Yeah, that's been the game changer for me. Just to be able to go downstairs and then keep, you know, like going one exercise at a time, just even if it's just, I got to go bench and then I'll do like a few reps. Do you do that very often all the time? Do you really? Yeah, that's actually the most effective way to work out. It's like, yeah, and I've noticed myself doing this more frequently lately, like the last two months or so, where I'll just take one lift. I have it set up and ready to go. Courtney gets mad because it's like, I don't put the weights away. You know, I'm like, this is my gym. You know, I'll do it. I walk. But I, you know, I do that specifically on a lift or like a, you know, a trap bar deadlift. I'll have it like set up and ready to go. And so I'll go down there and do some reps and I'll hit those reps maybe like five, six times, you know, throughout the day. And that's what I think I would do if I had one in my house. Do it. I would do the same thing. And it's a lot of volume. Yeah. Remember when I did those experimental all day workouts? Well, it's funny that we, we assume that you, and I think for the most part, a lot of people do this. They, they block off and I would for convenience, right? For convenience and scheduling purposes, it makes sense to block hours off every single, you know, day that you plan to work out and then you go to your gym or wherever. But if I had like a PRX set up, like you do in your house, like your place, I would set it up to where I just come in there, do one exercise or two exercises and then go out and then come back and go out and come back. I would love to do that. And on, especially on weekends when I'm there all day long, that would be the most convenient actually even for me to do with that. There's a lot of freedom with that mentality too, because it's like, you know, you could just on a whim because that those opportunities, it's like, you think they won't happen very often. They have all the time. It's just like, okay, there's nothing going on. I'm going downstairs. I'll be right back up. Yeah. Well, the, the, the, the turnoff I think for people with the home gym or the reason, the objections I would often hear from people is, well, if I have it at home, I'm not going to do it. And the reason why they think this way, it's false, by the way, it's not true. Actually statistically, if you look at consistency with people who have access to something at home versus people who have to go somewhere, when you look at total use, the amount of times people work out is higher when they have access at home. Now, the reason why people have a false belief that they're, that they're less likely is because they're comparing when I'm at the gym, I know I need to work out when I'm at home, I can do other stuff. Well, when you count in factor in the fact that you're probably not going to get to the gym. Sure, if you're at the gym, you're going to work out, but now factor in the fact that probably not going to want to drive to the gym. How easy is it to make an excuse to not drive your ass to the gym? So statistically speaking, if you have something accessible at home, the odds of, of, of you exercising are much higher because you're eliminating obstacles. It's just, and that, that, if you think of it that way, it makes perfect sense. As far as the workouts are concerned at them, all day workouts, the most effective workouts I've ever done. It's inconvenient for a lot of different reasons. You got to be going in and out all the time. But if you're doing stuff at home, No, but I like, that's my Saturday, especially I guess dad life, especially now, right? Saturdays and Sundays are the days of getting caught up from the week, right? I'm laundry is getting done. I'm washing the vehicles. I'm straightening up the house, fixing whatever needs to be fixed. I could just a long day of that. Anyways, if I'm in town, that's kind of what my Saturday or Sunday looks like. And so if, if I could actually set it up to where, and I guess the only reason why I haven't done it yet is because we were only supposed to be at this house temporarily for maybe a year. So, and I may only be there for another, you know, 10 months. So that's the only reason why I haven't set myself up the same way, both of you have, because I get it. And I can see the, especially now being a dad, I totally see the value of that, having that access whenever I want to go down. Plus you're so consistent. Obviously, you're not going to stop your workouts, but I'll tell you what dude, when you hop in and out of doing sets throughout the day, because I do this when I write. So if I'm writing like a big, like a one of our guides or whatever, I'll pop in and out of the garage and do a set here and there, but I'll track the sets. Yeah. And I end up doing two or three times the volume that I would do my regular workouts, but because it's so spread out, it doesn't hammer my body the same. And I swear to God. Every time I do that, I swear to God, I see changes in my body. Plus it's a mood altering thing. Right? So like if I'm ever like in a feisty mood and corn is a go downstairs, you know, like she's just like, go, you know, work it out. I really do. Like I need that. Like I need to work it out. The other objection is the cost because buying equipment is really expensive up front, but buying a membership is usually, you know, 60, 50 bucks a month, 70 bucks a month or whatever. But the equipment man, PRX now has a monthly option. If you can get their equipment, pay monthly, but now you have your own gym. Yeah. It's like nothing, but now I've suddenly bought your own gym. And to be honest with you, I, depending on the kind of workouts that I do, because I go to gyms too, I'll go to a gym at the moment, two days a week, maybe one or two days a week. And then I'll do one to three days a week at home, depending on the week. But I'll tell you what, dude, my, you want, when I want to lift heavy and I want to get after it and be just chalk and just loud, you know, and just beefcake workouts. So right now I'm working out more of my garage. It's more of the beefcake style workouts. If you guys start watching Halloween movies or anything to get you into the spirit of things, right? Yeah, you're all against like horror movies. Yeah. Did you guys, did you see that meme that I think it's, who is it? Cara that put it on our forum that did the meme of the friends that you, watching the guy who's got his hands covering besides the scary horror. It's that time of year where you need to bring your friend who doesn't like watching scary movies. She tagged me in a corner. I'm excited because my son's 14 now. So now he's like, it's cool to watch some scary, I'm not going to put the disturbing ones on, but I was going to say, what's the level you go now? Well, I'm going to watch six cents with him. I think that's appropriate, right? That's kind of, he's got a nice twist at the end. So that'll be good. Do you have like Halloween movies you watch every year? Only because like, so Courtney's big thing has always been hocus pocus, which is like the cheesiest, you know, Bet Midler or whatever. I think it's like a comedy. Yeah, it is. It's so cheesy. It's actually scarier than you think though, but you know, she grew up with it. It has all this like memories with it and stuff. And so like we got the kids to watch it with her. And so we're sitting on the cows for watching, you know, this, this cheesy movie and popcorn or whatever. And there's this part where like, so he has to, he has to light this candle and he lights this candle. And the whole thing is the, the witches won't come unless a virgin lights the candle. Oh yeah. Right. And so he lights the candle and then they're kind of like making fun of them throughout this whole movie that he's a virgin. And then so the kids pick up on this and they're like, dad, what's a virgin? I'm like, dude, there's six and nine. Like I don't feel like it's red. Like it's time for me to like, you know, have the sex talk. How is that conversation, bro? Would you say somebody who's never been married before? Yes. I said like, I was like, basically I was like, people who weren't parents. It's so real. So immediately they raised us like, I'm a virgin, dad. I'm a virgin. I'm like, all right, let's calm down. Like, like, don't go around town saying that all loud, you know, like it's like, let's just move on. And they're just like, I'm a virgin. So it's like the latest joke now is just like going to a room and say they're a virgin. I didn't, I didn't win on that one. I didn't do a good job. Your oldest is nine. Nine. So you're like two, three years, two years away from talking about sex. Yeah. That's when it starts to come up at 11. Like 11, 12. Really? Yeah. I mean, for a boy? Yeah. I mean, they kind of know how babies are made. Well, hold on. What grade is he in? Is he fourth? What? Yeah. He's in fourth, fifth grade, bro. Fifth grade is sixth grade. Wow. You are right. So I had the conversation. He's in third. That seems so early now. And then I think, oh, shit. I gotta have this conversation with my daughter. Yeah. I'm going to be talking about this with my daughter soon. Okay. Good luck with that one. Here we go. That's not a problem. You know what you do, dude? I tell you what, because I thought about it on my, oh my God, cause my parents didn't say shit about sex with me. Oh yeah. I didn't learn from my parents. You kidding me? No. You know, the first time I heard the word sex on my mom was after I got married. Then all of a sudden she thinks she could talk about sex with me. I'm like too late mom. I don't want to hear you talking about sex. I learned from our teacher. I remember it vividly. She had like this like huge perm. It was like a fro, but she had like really big, you know, anyways, it was really distracting. I didn't like listen very well, but that's where I learned sex. Oh man. So with my son, what I did was, is I was just very frank, just very straight up and honest. So I said, oh, you know, I know you're learning this in school and here's how babies are made. Here's the mechanics. No, you just say, here's how babies are, and you're just honest. You say a man, you just tell them. The train goes into the canal. No, no, no. Just be straight up. He puts his penis in the vagina and then, you know, then sperm goes in there and you talk and then they'll ask you a question and just be cool about it. And then my son was asking me questions like, how did you get it in there? I'm like, well, I think if you'll be able to figure out when you want to do it, this is what happened. She'll help you. Don't worry. Yeah. When the time comes, she'll help you out. I need some extra hands. I don't know. You know why? You don't want him to figure it out from his buddies or the internet. You definitely don't. Cause that's how I learned shit. Well, I was a little worried, like he's just going to go to his friends and be like a virgin. My dad says I'm a virgin. Are you a virgin? You guys like, no. Hey, do you guys hear what happened in Chicago? No, no. They decriminalized all psychedelic plants in Chicago. Yeah. So they're following the same. What town was it? Oakland? Yeah. Remember how Oakland did that? Yeah. Dude, little by little. The war on drugs. We are going to, this is the beginning of the end of the war on drug to start with marijuana. Sorry, Nancy Reagan. It started with marijuana. Now it's moving to psychedelic plants. It's going to eventually move down the list. And what we're going to end up seeing mark my words are looser and looser, uh, regulations. I don't think they're all going to be regulated the same, but looser and looser regulations. I think I still think distributing, uh, you know, trying to sell is going to be very strict, uh, regulations, and laws. But I think self and personal use were, this is the beginning of reduced sentences and just the way we treat people who don't hurt anybody but themselves. I think this is a very, very good thing. That's exciting. Kind of kind of interesting, right? Yeah. And you know, Mexico has taken their stance. Their stance seems to be moving in the opposite direction because of all the insanity of their, did you know that one? How's that affecting the cartel relationship with the people in there? Well, dude, I just, I just saw this the other day. What, what was that town in Mexico? Juarez? I think it was. That was the, the one where there was all those, those drug cartels or whatever. Is that what Breaking Bad is, is in? That's Albuquerque. Oh, Albuquerque. Yeah. A little different. Yeah. But in, I think it was Juarez, if I'm not mistaken, somebody was getting murdered every hour. It's not a huge town. Wow. There was, that's how many people were getting, it was like straight up wars over there with the cartels. Like the cops are afraid to do anything. Wasn't it, one of you guys when we were in Tahoe that was talking about someone got kidnapped, one of the major drug dealers, son got kidnapped or something? Oh, I don't know. Yeah. Maybe Doug said that. I thought it was you guys that told me that. Maybe it was my, my buddies when I was fishing with them. It's all, it's like groundhogs. It's all blurred. It's what a fucking long day for me. It's my other friends. It's my other friend, Justin and brother. That's like when you're like, we were up there and, uh. No, who got the pizza last night? I was like, what, was it you? Neither one of us. None of us did. It was your other friend. So look this up. I'm pretty sure that one of the major drug lords' son got kidnapped. Oh, there he is. Yeah. It's a, it's a big deal right now. What? I thought that's what you were talking about. Opportunistic fraudsters, son's arrest in a bid to steal Bitcoin, huh? The capture of El Chapo's son. So I think his son was arrested. Oh, maybe his son was arrested and then the, there was crazy amount of retaliation and gangs, like fighting each other over him being arrested. And I think they were, had to release him because it was getting so crazy. How the fuck up is that the cops release you? Yeah. Oh my gosh. I thought for sure you guys, that's what you would do that. Yeah. My buddy was just telling me, this is recent. Look, it's five hours ago, two days ago. Dude, I'm telling you right now, here's the thing. We need to all, we need to, as humans, we need to face the reality. There are markets for things and sometimes the markets are so strong that trying to ban them only causes more problems. So people using drugs and abusing drugs, not a good thing. Trying to make them illegal makes it worse. You know what I'm saying? There's just markets that you can't, that you, it's like, you got to accept at some point like, okay, people are going to do drugs. So what's the best approach here? Because this crazy, these crazy laws are causing a lot of children to be raised without fathers. And they're, you're creating a very vibrant black market. And in the black market, people settle disputes, not through lawyers and courts, but through violence because that's the only way to do it. So anyway, super crazy. Oh, another crazy article I read. Creatine, the supplement that does it all, yeah. Also may actually help fight cancer. What? Yeah. Yeah, scientists studied the T cells that go after cancer cells and kill cancer cells. Wow. And they found that when those T cells were not, when they didn't have enough creatine, they weren't nearly as effective. And so they speculated that having adequate creatine levels could make your T cells more effective at getting rid of cancer. Because, you know, creatine. Replenishes your energy. ATP, which is one of the main sources of energy in the body. So that makes sense. But that also would it be like one of those situations too that in the wrong environment could promote it? That's a very, very good question. Because I would think that that makes sense for fighting it for a healthy person, but then maybe somebody who has it taking it would also fuel the cancer, I would think. That's a very, very good question. Cells need more than just creatine for energy. They need glucose and amino acids and ketones sometimes. But that's a very interesting question. But what they speculated was no. The opposite that you want to have adequate creatine so that your T cells can always go around and get rid of, you know, potential cancer cells. Also considered an antioxidant? Creatine? Yeah. It's got some antioxidant properties for the heart. Dude, I'm telling you right now, creatine is- There's a lot more to it then. Creatine is the next big wellness supplement. I'm going to say that right now. It's been for a long time. Performance. It's been all about- First of all, it's about bodybuilding, muscle building. Then it was, oh, just pure performance. Then it was, oh, it's good for cognitive benefits and boosts. But I guarantee you creatine is going to start to be marketed as an all-around wellness supplement. I don't see how it can't be with this movement right now with veganism too. I figure that whole game-changers- Right. Those people are going to benefit probably the most from it. Totally. So I would imagine that there's definitely going to be a push on it. Totally. You're trying to invest in your creatine supplement. No, I think it's pretty interesting and pretty rad. It's like the one supplement that actually works. Yeah, I know. And it does everything. All right, there you go. If I was going to recommend any supplement, it would be, aside from a nutrient that you may need, it would be creatine. So, and then last article, I got one more I wanted to mention to you guys. I've read this interesting article in New York Times. There were these scientists and experts trying to explain what makes somebody charismatic, which I thought was a very interesting article. Like they're trying to break down- What are they tease out? I mean- Yeah, no, that's the question, because they were saying how it's so difficult. Like you can have two completely different people. Like you could have an entertainer, then you could have like a person like Elon Musk, or you could have a comedian, or you could have someone that's on TV, a villain, or a good guy, both of which are considered charismatic, even though one is like someone you like, one is someone that you hate. And they define charisma- Just like a magnetism. Yes, they define charisma as you want to be around this person. This person makes you feel better, and you want to hear what they have to say. And so there are a few different things that they narrowed it down to, but the one thing that they had in common were that all charismatic people, as far as they could tell, were excellent storytellers. They were very good at using analogies and metaphors and at telling stories. And they said that charisma, a lot of times people believe it to be something that you're born with, but they said no. If you learn how to tell good stories, and you learn how to listen really well, and make people feel like they're the only person in the room when you talk to them, and you use good metaphors and analogies, you'll dramatically improve your level of charisma. And in my opinion, that likeability, that charisma likeability, that's a skill that'll benefit anybody. It'll make you more money, it'll make you more better in your marriage, it'll make you better. Totally. Anything that you do. How interesting is that? That is really interesting. First question is from Parker Glesner, 6.6. Despite you guys not loving machines, what is your favorite machine and why? I think we need to clear that up first. Yeah, we do. It's not that we don't like machines. Machines have a lot of value when you inject them into a well-planned and programmed workout. It's just the reliance on machines or the, that's all I do is machines. It tends to be the problem. Free weights, a couple different reasons why free weights are better overall. Free weights form to the body. Machines, your body has to form to the machine. Machines are typically designed for someone who's about average height, average limb length. Even though the seats adjust and the arm lengths adjust, you get a tall guy like Adam on there or somebody who's a little bit shorter like Doug. And some machines just don't work well for them at all. And I used to encounter this with clients. I put them on a machine and it just didn't line up well with them. The other thing is that free weights tend to, that some of the best exercises you could ever do for your body are the free weight ones. I have yet to see a deadlift machine, a squat machine. There's very few that are, I would even put in the same categories of squat. That being said, adding machines can be beneficial machines. Yeah, they have their value. But yeah, when you're in a fixed position and you have these machines that you're on a track, you can only get really good at going on that specific track. And so the carryover for me has always been not quite as substantial as me doing that same exercise but now having a lot more variables attached because that's just more things to consider when I have to move in multiple directions. Right, and now adding frequency and volume and changing the angles. Machines can be awesome. If you see me working out in a gym because I usually work out in my garage and my garage is mainly free weights, if you see me in a gym, you'll see me using mostly machines. And a lot of that is because I just don't have access to machines so I like the novelty. My body responds well to throwing them in. Every once in a while, I want to have access to them. I use them quite a bit. As far as favorite machines are concerned, I mean, I have one machine that if I see it in the gym, I'm going to use it, the pullover machine. Love the pullover. Not a lot of gyms have them. I was wondering what you were going to say. Yeah, I haven't seen that in every gym. That's one machine that if I see it in a gym, I'm going to 100. I love it. I love the feel of it. It's better than a dumbbell pullover even. I don't know if I have a single one machine. I love machines. And being the bodybuilder, one of us, I mean, they were used a lot. I still, my core training was still free weights and compound lifts. But I did a lot of the auxiliary work. I did a lot of these focusing on little details and small muscle groups. So I think I have probably a favorite machine for there's not a lot of gyms. Okay, so I'll go Sal's direction like a rare one to see. I get really excited. I love and I'm so pissed. In fact, the gym that I go to on a regular basis got rid of this machine. And there's a rear delt fly machine that you lay face down. Oh, I know what you're talking about. That's a great one. I fucking love that machine. And, you know, and why I'm partial to that because rear delts were a major focus of mine when I was competing really just brought out my back and my shoulders. And there's not a lot of machines that are designed for the rear delts at all. And that was a phenomenal machine. Would you guys, can you say that a cable exercises are machines or is that out of the category? I would consider it a machine, you know, like a free motion cable machine. Like, I mean, because it's all, I mean, the thing about that though is it gives you a lot of angles. If you were going to use that, then I would have to, that is because if you, or if you were going to use that as listing what we think is our favorite, I use a free motion. I'll try to use that the most. Yeah, I use a free motion. Cables the most. Cables, because you can do so much. Like a low pulley row is a staple in a back workout. A lat pull down tends to be a staple in a workout. So cables, if you put cables in there. Oh, I love cables. And when I train clients, if I put a client on a machine, and if we're considering cables, machines, 99% of the time it was cables, 99% of time. That was the machine that I would put. Another, another great, and I don't know if this falls in this category. I like the seated row, I mean, excuse me, the t-bar row chest support machine. Yeah. And the reason why I like that is because I deadlift so much. And sometimes my low back is a little fried from deadlifting, but I still want to hit my, hit my back and keep the frequency up. And so an exercise like that lends itself really well because I can still load it good. I can still train my back really hard, but then I'm not, I'm not crushing my erector spinae at all. You know, it's another good machine that you never see anymore. And I know, I think you, you and I have talked about this before, Adam. I think this was a favorite of yours too. The lateral machine where it was, there were metal arms and there were handles that you held with your hands. And it was like a circular cam and you came out and did laterals. That one, I don't know why I don't see those, I think because people don't know how to use it, but I love that for shoulders. Absolutely one of my favorites. I still, I love the reverse hyper. I consider that a machine, even though like it's plate loaded. And, you know, but to me, like I get such a great feeling, you know, all the way up the back, my entire posterior chain, I can feel get involved with that exercise. So I'll supplement with that every now and then, you know, in between deadlifts, in between good mornings. I think we could all go down the rabbit hole here. Machines are great. I think the reason why we've made that point on this show, and that's why I wanted to clear it up before we went on this tangent, that we've all started on different, there's a lot of favorite machines and machines have definitely value. The problem is it, a lot of the average person that is either listening to this show or that we would train gravitates towards machines in fear of training free weights and compound lifts. And they don't have, they don't spend a lot of time in the gym. The average person is going to work out two to three days a week, 45 minutes to an hour. And if, when you don't have a whole lot of time, you want to do the most effective, best, most functional exercises. And that's free weights. Now, if you're in the gym five days a week, and you do it in every body part two, three times a week, and you're doing all these different exercises, well now machines have a lot more value. Now you're looking for more angles. You're looking for different types of tension on the muscle. You're looking at hitting certain muscle groups and not exhausting another side, like the example I gave the T-bar rows. So you're trying to compliment your combat. So that's, I like machines to compliment all the big compound lifts. Where we hate machines, or I think we talk out on them a lot, is replacing them with those. And that's where we have to be careful when we explain stuff like this, where we talk about the value and how great this machine is or that machine is. It's not great if it replaces a good free weight exercise or a lot of the free weight or compound lifts that we talk about on the show. It's incredible, they're incredible to compliment all those movements. So no matter what your favorite machine is, even like a dumbbell pullover, well dumbbell pullover is great and Sal loves that machine, but I guarantee it's not great in replace of a deadlift or a row. No. Now those are staple movements, that's a great tool or a great thing to incorporate to compliment the big compound lifts. Next question is from JP94. How do I grow my traps? Oh, good old traps. Grow them traps. You know, the most common exercise for traps is our shrugs, but I'm beginning to believe that shrugs are not the best exercise for the traps. And I learned this because of MAP Strong. We wrote MAP Strong, there were two exercises in there that I'd done before, but that I didn't do in regular rotation. I'd throw them in every once in a while, but I didn't do them consistently. The high pulls. The snatch grip high pulls. Snatch grip deadlift. Yeah, snatch grip high pulls mainly, and heavy farmer walks with a trap bar. Man, I started doing those in my routine and I did them regularly because in MAP Strong they're in their weekly. I mean, if you want to blow your traps out, you should follow MAP Strong. Yeah, that was when centered around that. When we were, I remember when we were riding it with Robert Oberis, one of the things, and one of the ways that when we create a program like that, a lot of it is us still steering the programming, but we ask a lot of questions from the athlete. Like, what are some favorite moves or what have you found well? And one of the things that when we were like looking over a lot of the stuff that Robert was doing, all of us right away were like, God damn, a lot of upper back stuff here. I mean, you're, and he's like, yeah, no. I mean, for the lifts that you have to do, and it makes sense. It makes sense why he was doing a lot of that. And so that's part of what is unique to that program is we made sure to include, that's not something we would, that high of that much volume in the upper back and trap area is probably not something we would do in a normal standard program. But because that is a supporting area for a lot of overhead pressing and lifting that they do, it's crucial. So if you're somebody who's interested in growing traps and you haven't followed MAP Strong, to me, that's got to be a must in your rotation. I'll tell you what, traps is one of those muscle groups that, you know, when you see certain muscle groups really developed on a person, you know like that's a strong. You know they're strong. Yeah, that's a strong person. Like you see a lot of developed biceps. Doesn't necessarily mean they're a strong person. You see a dude with developed traps. Usually it means they're pretty damn strong. It's just one of those body parts. And it really is an important muscle group. It stabilizes the entire shoulder girdle. The traps are very important for overhead presses and for rows and just for giving you strength in that upper back area. Traps like any body part respond well for most people if you train them about two to four times a week. So on average about three days a week, they respond well to different rep ranges just like any other body part. Anywhere between low reps, three reps to higher reps, maybe as high as 20. And they also respond really well to different angles. Shrugs, overhead shrugs, snatch grip, high pulls, and then tension movements like heavy farmer walks. Like when you're walking with really, really heavy dumbbells or a heavy trap bar and you're standing tall and maintaining good posture, because you're using so much weight, because when I did a trap bar, you know, farmer walks, I got up to over 400 pounds. And although I'm not doing a shrug with that weight, just a simple fact that I'm supporting it and staying stable with my upper traps in my upper back. I mean, they respond. Well, it's such a great contrast between that and then doing an explosive movement where you're getting that fast twitch response out of the muscle, which stimulates it completely different way. So now you get your traps to develop both directions. Yeah, I know what's funny about traps is a lot of people get tight in their neck and they get that tension. And a lot of times people think, don't work that area out because you're really tight. And I used to believe that. Now what I'm about to say isn't the opposite. I'm not saying go hammer the shit out of your traps if your neck gets tight. But some full range of motion in that area actually reduces the tension and stress you feel in that area. So I would get clients who would have really tight trap areas. And I would work on correctional exercise for their shoulders and offset the overactivity of those muscles. But then I'd have them do some really light full range of motion shrugs. Really, really light. Just let them come all the way down. Let them squeeze all the way. And they'd get all this relief in that area. So just because something's tight doesn't mean it's too strong. Sometimes it could be tight and weak. Oftentimes it could be tight and weak. Now I know a lot of women avoid training their traps. I think this is a mistake. Now of course there's an aesthetic component. If you're somebody that has really well developed traps and you don't want them to get too big I get it. But if you're a woman listening and you don't have really big trap muscles don't be afraid of training your traps because you think you're going to wake up tomorrow looking like a power lifter. It's not going to happen. It takes a long time to develop any muscle including the traps. Still train your traps because here's what's going to happen. It's going to make your mid-back look better. It's going to give you better posture if you train them properly. It's going to make your overhead presses stronger. It's a very important muscle for overhead presses and if you want to develop good shoulders you also need to have strong supportive traps. So don't avoid trap training just because you think oh I don't want a big neck or whatever. Worst case scenario you get to the point where you look in the mirror and you're like okay I think I'm happy where my traps are. Then you can really scale down but it won't happen overnight. I wouldn't freak out over it. Don't avoid the trap. Next question is from MiniFig. When you hit a plateau with your deadlift what exercises or techniques can you implement to help you overcome the plateau and increase the weight you're able to lift? So specific to the deadlift. Yeah well I'll tell you why. This is hard when you don't know why they're plateauing. Yeah you know we don't know why but so I'm going to give you some general answers that I think apply to a lot of people. Okay one of the one thing that I did that made a big difference with my deadlift was when I started using bands on my deadlift. When I was able to get a platform and you can do this without a platform too it's just way more convenient and easier to do with a platform. I would have bands on either side of the bar so I'd load the bar with weight have the bands and then as I deadlift the bands as you stretch bands out they get tighter and tighter. So what ends up happening is at the bottom of the deadlift it's pretty much whatever the weight is on the bar plus a little bit of extra resistance but as I'm pulling it up it gets harder and harder because the bands stretch out. So it's giving me this kind of variable resistance and that alone added about 15 pounds to my deadlift. Once I incorporated those I noticed and they just feel really good when you get up to the top and it's the heaviest at the top of the rep. So that's one thing that I did that really made a big difference. Another thing I did was deficit deadlifts. This one was really good. There's an easy way to do this by the way. Some people like to stand on like 45 pound plates. It's a plate. Yeah here's another easier way. Here's an easier way to do it. Use 35 pound plates. It's another bar shorter. So now you have to get down lower to do your deadlift and then do your deadlift or use 25 pound plates and start easy and go slow. This is a great way to hurt your back if you're not good at these. Or you can stand on a block or something like that but those really, really low deadlifts we have to squat down real low and come up. Those also transferred to my deadlift strength and my deadlift weight. Without seeing or knowing too much about this person the first area that I would always go is to I would look at programming. Like and assume that if you're like most people when they hit hard plateaus it's a lot of times because their programming has been pretty similar. They've been following the same programming whether it be the same types of exercises all time or and if you're trying to work on your squat or your deadlift I mean you're probably just deadlifting all the time. Some of the best things that you can do is if you go convention all the time go to sumo. If you're always strength training for three to five reps and chasing PRs try training eight to 12 reps and lightening the load up and then to Sal's point messing with the strength curve by adding bands or chains are all great techniques or what Justin said go to trap bar for a little bit. So I mean I always look first to programming when someone tells me they're at a hard plateau and then another possibility I know personally from chasing PRs or trying to increase strength I was over training so I would also assess that part of programming. Am I deadlifting so much that I'm not allowing my body to fully recover and then come back to it. So you may need to back off volume and maybe work more technique instead of going loading so heavy all the time. So it's really tough for these types of questions when we get like a very specific what should I do because it could be a very simple answer. I mean if I looked at your programming and saw something like that where there's a big hole where it's like oh yeah well the last six months I've been training you know five by five you know consistently always training that way well shit let's jump to the eight to 10 rep range and or let's do tempo and slow down the tempo. Oftentimes when people hit a plateau with a lift I assume if someone says to me I hit a plateau okay it means you've been focusing on this lift this is an important lift for you you've been trying to get stronger at it that means you've probably pushed pushed pushed and you might need to back off a little bit right and oftentimes that that tends to be the key where if you're if you're always in the in the gym and you're always hitting you know 200 pounds on your deadlift or 300 pounds on your deadlift and you're pushing it maybe cut the weight in half for a few weeks and just focus on speed and technique speed or perfect form and do that for a little while and then you'll find that your strength comes up here's another one with deadlifts that I noticed both of myself and with clients if your squat goes up your deadlift tends to also go up the alternate isn't always true if my deadlift goes up my squat doesn't always go up so sometimes what I would do is I would back off on my deadlifts I'd stop deadlifting as often or stop deadlifting as hard focus just on my technique and my form so I'm going lighter and then push my squat a little bit and see how strong I can get in my squat then as my squat went up and I started feeling stronger then I'd go back to deadlifting a little harder and I'd notice oh there's that there's that boost in strength you know that happened I know you mentioned the trap bar yeah I mentioned the trap bar mainly two for changing up you know the grip and one of the things too for me that was always like I would hit like a certain amount to where I could get that you know pretty easily or not was my grip was the factor and so your petite hands yeah my nice little like dainty hands that's not true at all not this is pretty rough dude look at that but anyway so I would I would actually use again the the farmer walks were great for me to just focus on you know sustaining like getting more grip endurance and being able to grind through and and you know maintain that grip I know that you switched up your grip Sal with with the hook grip and I was wondering at what point do you want to factor that in in terms of like okay I can hit I can hit this weight and there's basically a ceiling to this to where I can grab you know with a conventional grip you know prone versus like now maybe I'll try you know a different technique completely and start all over yeah no I had to because I had deadlifted for so long with a alternate grip and it was like my heavy sets were all right hand you know facing up left hand facing down and I had actually developed an imbalance in my back and a lot of people say it doesn't matter no it matters you develop an imbalance and so then I said okay I'm going to go to to just both overhand and I'm going to work on a hook grip you know what I noticed when I went to a hook grip with both sides you know it got really freaking sore on me I think it was my brachialis muscle underneath my bicep because it was pronated and I'm like handling so much way so it took me a year to work up to my normal weight with a hook grip now to this day my hook grip is it's not quite where my my alternate grip is my alternate grip I could still do probably 10 to 15 pound more than my hook grip but it's it's damn close and I get better more balanced development I would recommend everybody practice working on hook grip or if they use an alternate grip to alternate to to really alternate don't do what I did where I alternated but then when I went heavy it was always the same size yeah I would try and go overhand as far as I could go and then that's when I would switch yeah yeah but I like the trick I like the trap bar a lot I dead lifted 600 pounds on a trap bar about four months before I did it on a straight bar and that's because I I plateaued and I switched the trap bar exclusively and got my weight all the way up to 615 I think it was on a trap bar then I went back to the straight bar and I'd noticed I just felt stronger more solid and I was able to get it up to 600 pounds so try all of those things one at a time on your routine and see if it if it kind of helps you out if I have to take a guess I'd say you're probably you're probably in store for some backing off though if I had to take a guess just from the way the question was was worded next question is from JC kuback what's one bad habit you're working on or would like to work on and what's one habit you're just not that concerned about oh gosh that's a tough one bad habit they want to know our bad stuff yeah I don't know what's uh what would be a bet you know I I if I get nervous actually this is something I don't actually I don't have to be fucking nervous if I'm sitting I tend to wreck whatever the hell's in front of me or around me even right now as I'm on this podcast I'm twiddling with the freaking wire to my mic I have it's just whatever it's there's a pen cap in front of me that thing's going to be destroyed if it's an eraser it's going to be two a million different pieces you know I would like to work on it but to be honest if I don't have an outlet with my hands then I don't think I can function very well I think it's just like a coping mechanism I don't know sorry are you counting that as the one you're trying to work on and also the one that you're not concerned about you know you don't get to do that it's a two for one that's a weak ass bad habit it's a terrible bad habit it's both I don't know man it's the one that first came to my I'll give you a bad habit you have because it's somewhat of a what a jerk oh yeah so piling it on you so actually this is no this is this is sour is a great reflection for myself when we first met because it used to fucking annoy me that he does this that's so nice but it we're always a reflection of ourselves I'm not as handsome reflection right now we're always a reflection of ourselves and if it bothers me and him that's obviously something I need to work on myself so I although I'm jabbing him right now it's also something that helped me a ton and I have this habit it's the the leader in me the teacher in me the the guy who likes seeking out knowledge and sharing and giving like and that's how it plays out in my head but I have this habit of like telling people all the time oh yeah and you know and I mean well by it just like I know he means well by it but it's fucking annoying sometimes when you're on the receiving end of that and I remember feeling that when we first met and I remember I remember I had empathy for him I didn't like give him shit because I went fuck that's me like Katrina always gives me a hard time that I do this to her like I go right into teach mode all the time and it's like instead of having dialogue or conversation or maybe asking her what do you think or what do you know about this I go right into telling you what I know and it it rubbed some people the wrong way and this was a bad habit of my own that I've continued to to try and work on and so you're talking about your your bad habit of teaching by teaching me well I gave you your shot first I gave you your shot to figure it out first and you didn't so this is me now coming in let me help you out with that fucking bad habit of yours bro I won't disagree actually I and funny it's funny I literally had a conversation this morning with Jessica about that exact thing she has a tendency to do the same thing yeah and no I yeah I know I for sure you know what it is I think that's how I learn it is the more I teach the more I learn about it me too me too me too one of the things that is so I have empathy for I totally do again I always say on this podcast your greatest strength is normally your greatest weakness so I think that's also one of your greatest strengths I know it's one of mine I would we talked about this in Tahoe I learn a new word I learned a new study I learned something right away what I've found is if I say it or do it myself or apply it or use it or teach it to somebody else it becomes cemented in my own brain and now it's it's it's knowledge that I have acquired it's not the first time I hear something I don't feel like I've fully of acquired that knowledge until I teach it or someone else so I am empathetic to you and understand that but I at the same time too I know this is an area it's a bad habit that I have I tend to do it my uncle's also a great reflection for that for me because him and I are very much so alike he works with the company he drives me fucking crazy sometimes again it's a reflection of myself like oh my god I probably do this to people too so and and I know I'm going off and on my soapbox here with this about salad this is an area this is mine so this is one of my areas that I'm always trying to work on not talking at people that's what it comes off if you if somebody else tells you feel like you're talking at them it works well for a podcast though it does it serves us super power on the podcast right right it serves it serves us in many other areas but that's a bad habit I've I've spent a good majority of my life being a talker being to have people skills in that I'm trying to spend the back half of my life being a better listener and observer so that's that's my personal bad habit I think in what I'm trying to work on what's Justin's bad habit yeah help me out yeah I know I have plenty uh I I think for me mainly in the like this is something I've been working on for a long time is just being more open to criticism and you know like allowing people to kind of chime in in my process where before that I was like completely would shut you off and be like no fuck you I got this you know and like I wouldn't consider anybody else's input if I felt like I've had a very clear vision of the way that I was going to be able to approach any project or any kind of a thing like I get really annoyed when too many people would chime in and I feel like I could handle and this is something that me and Courtney have battled you know it's a time old battle of like I don't know if you should do it that way and I'm like I'm doing it this way you know it's just how like I just very stubborn very very stubborn very adamant that my process the way I do things and this is this was again this was kind of a superpower of mine too when I was playing sports and like coaches would try and they'd break down film and I would actually tell them insights that they didn't have and so they were just like they would just all of a sudden after a while they'd be like okay we're hands-free you know you got this I see that's working for you I'm not really going to change you know whatever direction you're going with this and so it just kept cementing my own ideas for things and then so anyway I've been working on this a lot and like really trying to like consider if I'm especially I'm working with other people like considering other people and their thought process along the way so I would say what step one is just being able to identify it step two is to work on it but boy does that require a lot of like self-awareness right yeah who wants to say that they're bad at something they do something that's annoying or whatever it's like you know recently I've realized how in many ways how I can be annoying to to certain people one way is the way that Adam you know so eagerly mentioned the other way he's very quick on that hey was I not on point or what was I not on Adam guys are very similar and it has a bad habit of telling people what they're better now all joking aside no you hit it the nail on the head so it there it's difficult to look at yourself because you don't want to know you don't want to admit that you're wrong you know and what's funny is when you get to the point where you're like yeah oh yeah I definitely you know like I've been told probably my whole life that I didn't pay it that I don't pay it enough attention and then I'm really forgetful or whatever and you know half the time I'm like whatever don't pay attention to what they're saying yeah what would you say anyway yeah but you know more recently I've really come to realization that geez that's really fucking annoying and I know I do that so now it's like how do I fix it you know I mean how do I work on that it ain't easy it's probably a habit because you know how does something turn into habits probably you just do it enough time so where it becomes second nature try to change second nature yeah that is really really really tough thing to do I think you have to be comfortable with yourself before you can do that otherwise you feel like you know I feel like shit you know I mean yeah but I'm pretty comfortable with myself so it's all good anyway with that go to mind pump free calm and download our guides they're all absolutely free you can also find all of us on Instagram you can find Justin at mine pump Justin you can find me at mine pump Sal and Adam at mine pump Adam