To be a life-changing fitness pro, you need to take responsibility for both the advice you offer, and your client’s ability to follow that advice. Yes, even those “difficult clients.” The ones other fitness professionals tell you to fire.

Here at Precision Nutrition, we don’t fire our clients. We take a completely different approach.

In this 4 part video series – filmed live at the 2011 Perform Better Summit in Long Beach, California – we’ll share that approach with you. And, by the end of the series, you’ll be better equipped to get unbelievable results with every type of client you work with. Even the challenging ones.

For now, simply click the play button below to get started with Part 2 of The Compliance Solution.  (If you missed part 1, click here).  The video is about 15 minutes in length.

For the past four years now, Precision Nutrition has coached over 8,000 clients to lose over 150,000 pounds of fat. Weight is lost, behaviors are slowly modified, and lives are changed for the better.

The really cool thing is, our coaches rarely meet clients in person — all coaching is done online.

Now these results wouldn’t have been possible without understanding the power of change psychology, specifically helping clients modify their daily practices and get past common stumbling blocks.  Indeed, it’s only when we switched from an exercise and nutrition focus to a change focus that we saw a huge leap forward in our success rate.

Of course, our data support this approach.  Compared to our earlier example – where only 55% of patients are compliant with their life-saving medications – our coaching system yields, on average, over 70% compliance.

In other words, for every 10 workouts or nutrition habits prescribed, our clients do about 7 of them.

That’s a pretty awesome accomplishment considering that people take their prescription medications only 5 out of 10 times. Plus, we’re asking a lot more of them than to swallow some magic pill.

The question, however, is this: how do we get these kinds of results? Well, there are four key lessons I’d like to share with you over the course of the next few videos.

First up…

Lesson #1: Coach To Both Sides of the Brain

You may have heard that the brain can be split up into two sides: a left side (or hemisphere) and a right side (or hemisphere). You may have also learned that everyone is dominant in one side or the other. While things are a bit more complicated than that, we can use this as an interesting model for coaching change.

According to the hemispheric model…the left brain is the logical side and it’s responsible for:

• Logic and analytical thinking
• Rationality and reason
• Forming strategies and creating structure

On the other side is the right brain, and it’s responsible for:

• Intuition and emotion
• Holistic thinking and pattern recognition
• Creating art, beauty, and using imagination

Unfortunately, most of us spend all our time appealing to the left side. We talk sets and reps, calorie expenditure, disease risk rates, macronutrients, target heart rate, and nutrient timing.

It’s a lot like math. And when clients fail to understand and appreciate a subject we think is especially important, we give them an equally left-brained handout or website to read.

The problem? Most of our decision making (whether we like it or not) is more right-brained than left. So, by appealing to reason alone, we get the classic situation where clients think they know exactly what to do. But they simply feel like they can’t do it.

The solution? Start speaking to their right brain.

In the great book Switch, authors Chip and Dan Heath use the metaphor of a rider with a whip, steering an elephant.

• The elephant is the emotional brain.
• The rider with the whip is the logical brain.
• The path they’re walking is the environment.

As with any new change scenario, the elephant (emotional brain) may be scared, especially when it perceives the change to be difficult or uncomfortable. And fear brings resistance.

Of course, the rider (logical brain) has the reigns and a whip. So he can steer, prod, and lash that frightened elephant. However, that never lasts long. The rider always gets tired and, after that, the elephant goes where it wants.

Here’s the point: the rational brain can only control the emotional brain for so long, and that’s exhausting to do. As a coach, it’s far more effective to get the elephant and the rider on the same page by minimizing fear.

In addition, the Heath brothers introduce another concept called “shaping the path.” In essence, it means helping clear away of temptations and roadblocks before they become an issue. It means helping make daily practices automatic so that they’re habitual and don’t use up our precious willpower reserves.

Here are just a few examples of strategies for shaping the path:

• To stay committed to a morning workout, lay out your workout clothes the night before.
• To avoid food temptations, get rid of the cookie jar and candy bowls around the office.
• To avoid skipping workouts, pay for training sessions in advance.

There are hundreds of other examples we could use here but the point is this: most fitness professionals have spent their careers focusing exclusively on their own left-brained learning.  And while their heads are full of interesting physiology, biochemistry, and mathematics, they’re poorly equipped when it comes to helping real people make meaningful change.

To overcome this problem, it’s essential to spend some time doing some right-brained work.  As a professional, this time spent will mean a huge leap forward in client results.

Wrap-Up and Today’s Takeaways

That’s it for Part 2 of The Compliance Solution. In just a few days we’ll be back with Part 3 of the video series, and a few additional lessons.

In the meantime, here are four important takeaway messages for you to think about.

• Switching from a focus on exercise physiology alone to a balanced focus on physiology and change psychology is an important first step to getting remarkable client results.

• As a coach, you must focus on both sides of the brain. Taking a strictly rational/logical approach to behavior change will create clients who think they know what to do. But feel like they can’t do it.

• By working with deep motivation and recognizing the role of the emotional brain in decision-making we can prevent rider fatigue and better facilitate change.

• We can also go one step further by helping clients shape the path to health and fitness.

PN Certification Program begins Wednesday, March 7th, 2012 — waiting list now open.

If you’re interested in learning more about how to deliver life-changing, research-driven nutrition coaching – so that you can help each and every type of client that comes to you for advice – the PN Certification program is perfect for you.

Based on over 10 years of research and statistical data from over 8,000 clients, the certification is a comprehensive nutrition coaching course designed specifically to teach professionals working in a personal training or strength coaching environment how to get clients in the best shape of their lives.

We’ve opened the waiting list for the March 2012 program. I strongly recommend you get your name on the list now because spots are limited and typically sell out within hours each time we run the program.

Click here to join the waiting list.

To be a life-changing fitness pro, you need to take responsibility for both the advice you offer, and your client’s ability to follow that advice.  Yes, even those “difficult clients.” The ones other fitness professionals tell you to fire.

Here at Precision Nutrition, we don’t fire our clients.  We take a completely different approach.

In this 4 part video series – filmed live at the 2011 Perform Better Summit in Long Beach, California – we’ll share that approach with you.  And, by the end of the series, you’ll be better equipped to get unbelievable results with every type of client you work with.  Even the challenging ones.

For now, simply click the play button below to get started with Part 1 of The Compliance Solution.  The video is about 15 minutes in length.

Problem clients…it’s okay to admit it, we all have them.

Some appear to be “great clients” at first. They show up for all their training appointments. They listen attentively when we talk about nutrition and lifestyle. Some even memorize shopping lists, calorie counts, and meal plans.

Despite all this, they sometimes get poor results.

So we push them harder during the workouts, give them less food, add more cardio, and cycle their calories. But, as the weeks turn into months, nothing changes.

The client is frustrated, we’re frustrated, and left with only one logical explanation: they’re lying. They can’t possibly be doing what we recommend.

Other clients never even get that far.

While they’re present for all training appointments, they won’t even pretend to care about nutrition and lifestyle change. Indeed, when it’s time to talk their diet and their daily practices: They. Just. Never. Listen.

We’re Not Just Educators; We’re Coaches

When faced with difficult clients, many of us throw up our hands. “It’s not our fault!” we exclaim. We can only provide the education. It’s our client’s job to do the rest. Right?

Well, not exactly.

Over the past 10 years, the Precision Nutrition team has coached thousands of people in what many people consider to be the World’s Largest Body Transformation Program. We’ve helped them lose fat, get healthy, and change their lives.  The results have been incredible. To date, over 150,000 pounds have been lost and thousands of lives changed.

We’ve also spent a tremendous amount of time learning subjects that traditionally go beyond the boundaries of exercise and nutrition; including coaching theory, change psychology, and neuroscience.

And, after working with all these people, charting their progress and behavior changes, and applying the latest exercise, nutrition, and coaching strategies — only one conclusion can be drawn. Helping clients change, using the best practices of change psychology, is the only way to have long-term success in this field.

In other words, helping clients take the next positive step in their lives — and knowing what steps are right for them — is the key to becoming a life-changing fitness professional.

Compliance and The Medical Field

Make no mistake, coaching people through their struggles with compliance isn’t always easy. However, it’s not a challenge reserved for fitness pros.

I was shocked when I first learned that doctors report embarrassingly low compliance rates when prescribing life-saving heart disease, diabetes, and cancer medications. In fact, the latest data suggest that patients take these medications only half the time.

Scary, for sure.  Also a little intimidating since, as fitness pros, we’re asking our clients to do much more than swallow a magic pill. Exercise, nutrition, and lifestyle changes; they’re a bit more involved.

What’s Your Success Rate?

Keeping compliance issues in mind, typically, if a trainer has 20 clients in their roster, their client breakdown looks something like this:

• 1 client experiences jaw-dropping results
• 9 clients experience decent results, but could be better
• 6 clients experience poor results
• 5 clients drop out

It’s a little disturbing.  And I should know, I’ve been there.

I began my career as a trainer and I can tell you that I struggled through the same challenges.  I wondered: why are more than half my clients getting poor results or dropping out?  And why are so few of my clients achieving jaw-dropping transformations?

At the time, my solution was to learn more.  So off to grad school I went.

What I Didn’t Learn In Grad School

After a few years in the field, I decided to go back to graduate school.  I figured I needed to learn more about exercise and nutrition so I could help my clients achieve those jaw-dropping transformations they were all after.

Five years later, after spending a ridiculous amount of time and money earning a PhD in exercise and nutritional science, I was a little disappointed. While I wouldn’t trade my grad school experiences for the world, when I got back out into the field I wasn’t much further along.

I learned that it wasn’t the high level physiology stuff that was tripping my clients up.  Instead, it was the simple habits and practices built into their daily lives.  Unfortunately I hadn’t learned anything about helping clients with those.

In other words, I can tell you something with authority: what’s missing from your programs isn’t a mystery nutrient or exercise protocol.  What’s missing is something called change psychology.

For me, when I realized this, I completely reworked our coaching approach here at Precision Nutrition. And the more we learned about change psychology, the better the results our clients achieved.

Learning The Basics of Change Psychology

If you’re interested in learning more about this dynamic field, the best way to get acquainted is to read a few excellent, and landmark, books:

• The Power of Less by Leo Babauta
• Influence by Robert Cialdini
• Crucial Conversations by Kerry Patterson and colleagues
• Switch by Chip and Dan Heath
• The Blackmail Diet by John Bear
• Motivational Interviewing by William R. Miller PhD, Stephen Rollnick PhD.

These books will open your eyes to a whole new way of coaching.

For example, one of my biggest ah-ha moments came when reading Motivational Interviewing.  Until I read this book it never really occurred to me that with my coaching strategies I could be making my clients less likely to change.

That’s right, even with the best of intentions, even if I deeply care about helping my clients, my own agenda, even my language, could literally make my clients less able to make important changes in their lives.

Powerful stuff.  Lessons we all need to learn if we want to be the best fitness pros we can be.

Wrap-Up and Today’s Takeaways

That’s it for Part 1 of The Compliance Solution.  In just a few days we’ll be back with Part 2 of the video series.

In the meantime, here are three important takeaway messages for you to think about.

• Real world coaching requires a mix of physiology and psychology. And psychology is perhaps the most important of the two.

• To improve your knowledge of change psychology, I recommend starting with Motivational Interviewing.  It’s the best book on coaching behavior change that I’ve ever read; the insights come fast and furious.

• For most clients their biggest stumbling block is compliance, the ability to do what they know they should do. Understanding how to help them overcome their limiting factors is the most important skill you can have as a coach.

PN Certification Program begins Wednesday, March 7th, 2012 — waiting list now open.

If you’re interested in learning more about how to deliver life-changing, research-driven nutrition coaching – so that you can help each and every type of client that comes to you for advice – the PN Certification program is perfect for you.

Based on over 10 years of research and statistical data from over 8,000 clients, the certification is a comprehensive nutrition coaching course designed specifically to teach professionals working in a personal training or strength coaching environment how to get clients in the best shape of their lives.

We’ve opened the waiting list for the March 2012 program. I strongly recommend you get your name on the list now because spots are limited and typically sell out within hours each time we run the program.

Click here to join the waiting list.

We’ve all seen amazing before and after photos, the kind where the transformation is so huge it looks like two different people are posing. Here at Precision Nutrition, we literally have thousands of these jaw-dropping transformations.

But the photos only tell one small piece of the overall story of body transformation.

What really happens in the months between the photos? How do these people lose fat, gain lean muscle, and find their smile?

Well, in this video (and the accompanying article) we’ll tell you exactly what they did.  And how you can do it too. Simply click the play button to get started.

Over the past 10 years, our team has coached thousands of people in what many people consider to be the World’s Largest Body Transformation Program. We’ve helped thousands lose fat, get healthy, and change their lives.

The results have been incredible. To date, over 150,000 pounds have been lost and thousands of lives changed.

After working with all these people, and charting their progress and behavior changes, we’ve pinpointed 10 key lessons that makes the program work; lessons anyone can follow to achieve an amazing body transformation.

These are things that you can use immediately to help you lose fat and get healthy, no matter where you’re at now.

Lesson 1: Put nutrition before exercise.

When most people think about losing weight or getting in shape, they think about exercise. They sign up for a gym, hire a personal trainer, or grab a book or a magazine to find a workout plan. But while exercise is a crucial part of losing weight and getting healthy, I’d argue that it’s not the most important piece.

Research shows that with exercise alone you can expect to lose only about half a pound to one pound per month. That’s less than inspiring. Sad, really.

So if exercise alone gets dismal results, what does work? Simple: Focusing on nutrition and eating habits. With a program that combines both nutrition coaching and an exercise program, you can expect to lose five times more fat in the same one month period.

That’s why in Lean Eating we spend the majority of our time coaching nutrition. And that one detail makes a huge difference in the kind of results our clients get. Of course, you can’t ignore exercise. Which is why we also have one of the most comprehensive exercise programs on the web built into the program for free.

But when it comes to losing fat and getting in shape, we know the majority of our resources and time should be spent on helping clients with their nutrition and eating habits.

Takeaway: Yes, you should exercise.  But you must put nutrition first.

Lesson 2: Find a big motivator.

We’ve all heard that to make a big change, motivation must come from inside. And it’s true. We all need a “reason why” — a real purpose and a sense of why losing fat and getting in shape is important to us.

But sometimes you need extra motivation to actually start making change. You need a big motivator that pushes you into action.

In Lean Eating, we have our big motivator: Cash. And lots of it. Each round we give away $75,000 of our own money to clients who have the best body transformations.

We even fly across the country to surprise our Grand Prize winners at their homes or at their offices with giant checks.

Not only do our finalists and Grand Prize winners lose fat and completely change the way they look — they walk away with thousands of dollars. Now that’s motivation.

Takeaway: What’s your big motivation? How can you make it even bigger?

Lesson 3: Find something to lose.

Throughout our body transformation, we need to be held accountable. There needs to be something at stake, something to lose if we don’t follow through or if we drop out early.

In Lean Eating, we take away all of the risk to our clients by guaranteeing results as long as people stick with the program for the full year and do 80% of what we tell them to do. If they follow the program, they will have an amazing body transformation. If for whatever reason they don’t, we’ll give their money back, no questions asked.

But if they drop out on their own accord before the year is up — or if they don’t do at least 80% of what we ask — then we not only don’t give them their money back, we spend it on frivolous parties to celebrate their departure.

Okay, I’m just kidding about the party.  However, we do enforce client commitment. 

The principle here? The harder it is to quit, the easier it is to succeed.

Takeaway: Raise the stakes and put something at risk to keep you going.

Lesson 4: Choose proof over theory

Most people get lured into trying out untested theories, and have only disappointment and wasted time to show for it in the end.

No one wants to start an exercise or nutrition program where the success rate is zero. Yet a lot of people invest their time and money in something where they’re not quite sure if it works.

In Lean Eating, we take away all doubt by showing our clients’ before and after photos. These photos answer questions like:

“Does the program work?”
“Who else have you helped?”
“Are there people like me who’ve done this?”

If you’re looking for results, only commit to a program that can prove it actually works.   In Lean Eating, we show you exactly what the program is capable of, before you begin.  In fact, you can even talk to our clients directly on our forums.

That kind of transparency is only possible when a program really works. Success doesn’t hide.

Takeaway: Commit only to a proven program, and leave the theories for everyone else.

Lesson 5: Do one small thing each day.

My colleague Dan John once put it this way: “If something is important, do it every day; if it’s not important, don’t do it at all.”  That’s especially true in body transformation.

In Lean Eating, we reach out to you daily, and we give you one small act to do, each and every day. Any less, and you lose momentum; any more, you get overwhelmed.

Sadly, some people find this out the hard way. They make a heroic effort to change every part of their life, from the time they wake up in the morning to the kinds of foods they eat to adopting a new workout program and dozens of other changes.

This all-or-nothing attitude may work for a week or two, but pretty soon they’ll crash and burn and be right back where they started. That’s why it’s important to practice one small thing at a time instead of trying to make a mad-dash for the finish line.

In Lean Eating we don’t worry about the past or the future. We focus on TODAY.

We ask ourselves, “What healthy habit can our clients follow today that will propel them forward?”

These small, daily habits slowly stack on top of each other until eventually our clients have a healthy set of eating and exercise habits they practice consistently.

Takeaway: Turn your commitment into a single, daily action.

Lesson 6: Make it a little too easy.

Most people attempt to change too much at once. But that makes it nearly impossible to change anything at all.  That’s why whatever one small thing you decide to do, you must be confident that you can do it consistently. A habit doesn’t become a habit by practicing it only a few times.

In Lean Eating, on the other hand, we give our clients one thing to practice at a time, and we ask a simple question:

“On a scale of 1 to 10 — 1 being not confident, and 10 being very confident — how confident are you that you can do this one habit every day?”

If the answer is a 9 or a 10, you have your new habit and can start practicing it immediately. But if you answer anything other than a 9 or a 10, you need to make the habit easier until it becomes something you’re confident you can do consistently.

If your one small habit is to eat five servings of vegetables every day, you must answer with a 9 or 10 before starting. If you don’t answer with a 9 or a 10, you simply need to make it easier.

Instead of eating five servings of vegetables every day, could you eat 3? What about 2 servings of vegetables every day?  What about 1 serving of vegetables every day?

Whenever you can answer a 9 or a 10 — “Am I confident I can do this habit every day?” — you have your new habit.

During the process of scaling down your habit, you may realize it seems ridiculously simple. It may seem too easy. That’s perfect.

If it seems so easy that you have to roll your eyes, you know you can do it consistently. And you can gradually increase the difficulty over time.

Takeaway: Make everything you commit to easier until you have 90%+ confidence you can do it.

Lesson 7: Find someone to answer to.

You need someone in your corner who helps keep you accountable and picks you up when your motivation wanes.

In Lean Eating we send daily emails reminding our clients to log into our custom software to read and practice their new habits, go over the workouts, and chart their progress. In fact, once our clients log in, they have to answer either “yes” or “no” to a small selection of questions to let their coach know what they did.

Did they practice their new habit today?
Did they do their workout?
Did they read their new lesson?

If the client answers yes, they’ll click a box and a green check mark will appear on the screen. If they answer no, a red X will appear instead. Not only does this show the client how compliant to the program they are, it also shows their coach how the client is doing.

This accountability helps our clients stay on track even when things get tough. And of course, their coach is always there to help in whatever way they can.

Takeaway: Put someone in your corner to hold you accountable.

Lesson 8: Measure actions, not outcomes.

We can’t control outcomes, but we can control our actions that may lead to those outcomes. In other words, you can’t focus on losing 20 pounds since it’s an outcome that’s out of your control. Every day you step on the scale, you’re focusing on what you don’t have.

“I still have 17 pounds to go. I’m not even close to there yet. This is so frustrating.”

Instead of focusing on the outcome, our clients focus on their action, the small, healthy things they do consistently every day. Instead of focusing on what they don’t have, they turn their attention to what they do have.

“I’m going to do my workout today.”
“I’m going to practice my new habit and eat 5 servings of vegetables.”
“I’m going to read my lesson and contact my coach if I have a question.”

Actions practiced daily and built up over time, lead to amazing results. Focusing on outcomes only leads to frustration and despair.

Takeaway: Track what you have control over – your actions.

Lesson 9: Let your coach track results

While you’re busy with your daily habits and behaviors, you’ll need someone — a coach, a trainer, a friend who’s made a similar transformation — to monitor your progress and make small adjustments if needed.

This frees you to focus on the most important thing within your control: your daily behaviors.

In Lean Eating, our coaches closely monitor each client’s progress, photos, and daily compliance to see if their behaviors match their goals. If they do, our coaches are there to offer support and answer questions. But if the coach sees something that needs tweaking, they can make an educated decision to change one small thing to help steer the client back on the right path.

Takeaway: Find a coach or mentor to monitor your progress and save you from “wondering and worrying.”

Lesson 10: Choose a support group.

Here’s something you’ve probably heard before: “You’re the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with.”

But this isn’t just some sound-byte. It really applies, especially when we’re talking about amazing body transformations.

People who have a strong network of friends, co-workers, family members, or even complete strangers on the Internet often have more dramatic transformations than someone who goes at it alone.

With a good support network you can connect with people when you’re excited, confused, or wondering what to do next. You’ll have people around you who can offer feedback, guidance, and support.

Our clients in Lean Eating have the ability to connect with their coach or with other Lean Eaters in the members-only forums. When you have a bunch of cool people all focused on one goal, it’s truly amazing what you can accomplish.

Takeaway: You’re the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with. Choose wisely, and make sure to build a good support group.

10 Body Transformation Lessons from Lean Eating

There you have it; 10 lessons for an easier and more successful body transformation:

1. Realize that exercise alone doesn’t work.
2. Find a big motivator.
3. Find something to lose.
4. Choose proof over theory.
5. Do one small thing every day.
6. Make your commitments a little too easy.
7. Find someone to answer to.
8. Focus on behaviors, not outcomes.
9. Let your coach track the results.
10. Get a support network.

What To Do Next

So what do you do with all of this?  Here’s what: the key is to make one simple change right now. Don’t try tackling all 10 (that violates most of the lessons!)  Instead, take an inventory of which of the 10 you already have. Do you have a support network? How about mentor or a coach? If not, it’s time to get one.

Next, take an inventory of the things you don’t have.  Do you have confidence in the workout and nutrition program you’re following? Do you need to be less heroic and more in tune with your small daily habits?

Pick one thing, and start there.

Of course, in the Lean Eating coaching program, we take care of all 10 of those things and much more. If you’d like to work with us, we’d be happy to help. All you have to do is put your email on the waiting list below, and we’ll tell you exactly what to do next.

But remember — what you do is not nearly as important as actually doing something.  You won’t get anywhere if you don’t start.  So go through the 10 Lessons, pick one thing, and do it right now.

Because getting started is the most important lesson of all.

Click here to join the waiting list.

In the last week alone, over 35,000 people read the free book.  And the number one thing they asked for was a printable version. So we created just that.

Click here to download the free PDF

This beautifully designed PDF version of the book is now available for you to download, print out, and share with your friends and colleagues.  It’s just a special thank you to everyone who checked out the book.

One more thing.

If you already read the book and have any questions about the content, feel free to post them on our site.  We recently created a “comments section” at the bottom of each chapter.

This means that you can post your questions in the relevant section and receive a reply from myself or a member of the PN Team.  So far, the most frequently asked questions include:

• Which form of IF is best for women?
• Can IF be used in people with heart disease or diabetes?
• Should compettive athletes use IF?
• What if I’ve always eaten small meals, more frequently?
• What if I’m struggling? Should I just do something else altogether?

We answer these questions and more in the comments section at the end of each chapter.  So, if you have questions about the book, don’t let them go unanswered.

Click here to post your intermittent fasting questions

Free E-Book: Experiments with Intermittent Fasting

Click here to join the waiting list.

When we live a certain way, we look a certain way.

The opposite is true too: When we look a certain way, it means we live a certain way.

Being lean is a side effect of a lean lifestyle. Our output reflects our input, and our input doesn’t just include what we eat. It includes how we live. In fact, how we live may be even more important than what we eat.

Waking up each day hoping to be lean doesn’t translate into being lean. It’s kind of like hoping to be rich and famous. Being lean (consistently for life, not just after a 3 month diet), like being rich and famous, isn’t something we can impose.

Rather, leanness emerges as a “side effect” of our lifestyle, mindset, and who we are.

Focus on the journey, not the outcome

I remember a client who followed 25 diets over the course of five years. He started each diet wanting to get lean. All 25 diets were unsuccessful.

What’s going on here? This client was 100% focused on a lean body.

But might this be the problem? Sometimes the more we aim at something and make it the only target, the more we might miss it.

How can this be, you say? Shouldn’t we be laser-focused on our goals?

The problem here is over-emphasizing the outcome, rather than the quality of the process, and the behaviours and meaningful actions that get us there.

In fact, making “get a lean body” our only focus may lead us to do downright unhealthy things.

When we make “a lean body” the only destination that matters, we ignore the process. We might be tempted to take shortcuts (e.g., drugs, surgeries, starvation diets). If we’re just outcome-focused, we don’t care if we harm ourselves getting there.

And if we don’t get to our “lean body” goal in the way we expect, or if we don’t get there “fast enough” (whatever that means), we might criticize ourselves, feel like a failure, and/or give up.

But when we make the journey itself the reward — for instance, if we enjoy learning more about resistance training, going deeper on our squats, de-seeding a pomegranate, roasting beets, feeling good after eating nutritious foods, and living the lean lifestyle — then there are no shortcuts. And we feel good about every single step on that road.

“But Ryan, you’re wrong, I’m lean and it’s my only focus!”

Fine. A 12 week diet/workout blitz will help you lose fat. But if the sole reason someone eats nutritious foods and exercises is to lose fat, what happens when there is no more fat to lose?

We often expect fat loss to be good enough to justify the eating changes and exercise that made it possible. But this isn’t always the case.

Once we have a lean body, then what? What else brings us joy and value?

Once we’re familiar with leanness, we might dishonour it more. How many people do you know who let their eating habits slip after getting to their goal weight? It’s like brushing your teeth once, then never doing it again.

But here’s good news. We don’t have to worry about losing our lean body if a lean body is merely a “side effect” of who we are.

Make leanness a “side effect”, not the main event

Forget about making “a lean body” your main goal. Instead, learn to “live lean”.

“A lean body” isn’t enough incentive for sustained behaviour changes.

What if as a society we embraced larger, more meaningful incentives? Wouldn’t a lean body occur as the unintended “side effect” of our dedication to a cause greater than ourselves?

Make a lean body a “side effect” of your life in three ways:

• Understand who you are and what is truly, deeply important to you.
• Honour your body with meaningful choices.
• Focus on the quality of the journey.

Break it down

Here are three areas to think about.

1 – Personal

Why do you want a lean body? OK, why do you really want a lean body? Ignore the first two answers. Now tell the truth. Why do you REALLY want a lean body? Use the third answer.

What is truly important to you? Are you living these core values? If not, why not?

Do you have the skills and knowledge you need to be lean? For instance, do you know how to squat correctly, how to roast vegetables, and/or how to make a sleep ritual? If not, how can you learn?

2 – Social

Who do you spend time with, healthy people or unhealthy people? This isn’t about “good” versus “bad” people. Rather, the people we’re around simply encourage us, knowingly or unknowingly, to live a certain way of life. For example, I regularly attend theatre productions because my sister and brother-in-law own a theatre company. If I didn’t spend time with them, theatre wouldn’t even be on my radar.

What do your social activities consist of? Do you do leanness-supporting things for fun? For instance, do you enjoy cooking, go hiking or running with your dog, or take tango lessons?

Do you have a mentor and/or coach who supports a lean lifestyle? If not, how can you find one? (Hint: Check out our Lean Eating program!)

3 – Environmental

How do you structure your home and work environment? Does this environment support leanness or fatness? For instance, are healthy foods easy to get and prepare? Conversely, are junk foods far away and hard to get?

Do you make the healthy-lean option the easiest option? If not, how could you make it easier, more convenient, and more pleasant?

Do you make the unhealthy option the hardest option? If not, how could you make it tougher, more inconvenient, and more painful?

Putting it into practice

Here are some examples to give you an idea what I’m talking about (but remember, these are specific to me):

1 – Personal

I am motivated to have a lean body so I feel good, have confidence, don’t cost my health insurance company a lot of money, will be around for my family/friends, can function well in my job/volunteer commitments, sleep well, and so I don’t drain the planet of resources.

I read lots to learn more about exercise techniques, preparing nutritious foods, and the best way to improve behaviours.

I am always trying new experiments to see how I adjust. Latest experiment: cutting down on food packaging and plastic (a side effect of this is that I’m eating more nutritious whole foods).

2 – Social

My closest friends and family all value a healthy lifestyle.

I distance myself from those who don’t support my healthy lifestyle. (This doesn’t mean I reject unhealthy people… just don’t ask me to go pub crawling with you until 4 am.)

Activities in my social circle include eating at healthy restaurants, healthy potluck meals, farmers markets, volunteering at farms, yoga classes, walking/hiking/biking/swimming.

I read articles and listen to people who inspire me.

3 – Environmental

I only keep foods in my house that make me feel good after eating. Foods that make me feel sick, bloated, or ashamed of myself don’t appear in my cupboards.

I don’t have cable TV. This frees up money for nutritious foods, gym memberships, and yoga classes. I want fewer processed foods (because I don’t see commercials) and I go to bed on time (instead of staying up to watch “my stories”).

I don’t have a car. This allows me to spend more time walking, biking, in the sun, and interacting with folks in the neighborhood.

Value the doing

A lean body occurs as a result of changing our attitude and the way we do things. The truest indication that we’re living a lean life comes in how we spend our days.

Live lean, be lean.

When we focus on how we are living, feeling, and thinking each day, and on the quality of each choice we make, the body will simply be restored to lean proportions (all the while you might have forgotten about getting lean – it just happens).

Yes, it takes time. Some of those choices may be challenging. But if you “live lean”, “being lean” will happen.

Consider the following.

• What are the “side effects” of your current lifestyle?
• What if instead of pursuing a lean body, you merely let it ensue?
• What if a lean body simply became a “side effect” of your dedication to a new way of living?

Exciting to think about… isn’t it?

Image credit: darkmatter, Flickr

Click here to join the waiting list.

Every week, the Globe and Mail — Canada’s largest national newspaper — runs a fitness column where they detail the eating and exercise program of a well-known Canadian, then ask a fitness expert to suggest two short, simple, and specific improvements.

A few weeks back, I got the call to critique the program of a guy named Brett Wilson.

Brett is a Canadian philanthropist, the chairman of Canoe Financial, and the host of a TV show called Risky Business. However, he may be best known for being one of the “dragons” on another hit TV show, Dragon’s Den.

While Brett has a home gym and tries to work out daily, he admits that his travel schedule often gets in the way of his fitness goals.

Flying an average of 2-3 times per week, he often sleeps in hotels and pops in and out of business meetings. This schedule makes it hard from him to eat and exercise like he does at home, where he generally works out for 2 hours each morning doing some running, some weights, and some stretching.

With these long workouts and his travel demands, it’s no surprise that Brett claims his biggest fitness challenge is working out and eating well on the road.

Of course, Brett’s not alone here. In fact, I suspect that we’ll all face this challenge as some point in our lives.

• Maybe the hotel gym sucks.  So we skip our workout instead of improvising.

• Maybe we’re in meetings all day (or sightseeing) and don’t have time for 2-hour exercise sessions.  So we do nothing at all.

• Maybe we eat a few extra desserts because we’re off the training plan.  So we might as well be off the diet plan too.

Two travel strategies for success

As a bona fide frequent flyer myself, I know the challenges associated with maintaining a fitness program on the road.  So, in the Globe and Mail piece, I shared my two favorite strategies with Brett, which I’ll outline below.

These tips are useful, time-efficient, and allow me to stick to my program — and even maintain 5% body fat — while traveling. Truly, I use these strategies during every trip I take, whether for business or pleasure.

Strategy #1: High-intensity Treadmill Sprints

Regardless of how bad the gym is, almost every hotel has a treadmill. That’s why I recommend my frequent flyer clients build their travel workouts around treadmill sprints and perform them every other morning while traveling. Here’s an example of my morning travel workout, incorporating treadmill sprints.

7:00 am: Wake up, do my bathroom business, drink 500 mL of water.

7:15 am: Head down to hotel gym and do 5 minutes of stretching and dynamic warm-up.

7:20 am: Start the treadmill and walk slowly for 2 minutes. Next, increase the treadmill speed to 8.5 mph and the incline to 12% while standing on the sides of the treadmill belt. As soon as it’s up to speed, sprint for 20 seconds. At the end of the 20 seconds, jump back on the side of the belt (be careful and grab the handrails securely!) and rest for 10 seconds. Repeat this cycle 10 times, for a total of 5 minutes of intervals. At the end of the 10 sprints, walk slowly for 2 minutes to cool down.

7:30 am: head back up to room for shower, drink 1 L of water mixed with greens+, take multi-vitamin, and consume 10 BCAA (branched chain amino acid) capsules. Then I start my day.

This workout is only 15 minutes long — including stretching, warm-up, and cool-down. That may not sound like much, but it’s one of the most intense workouts you’ll ever do.

(In fact, if you haven’t tried this type of workout before, I strongly encourage you to start much easier than this. Maybe begin with the treadmill speed at 8 mph, the incline at 10%, and do only 6 total sprints.)

Although high-intensity treadmill sprints are a staple of mine when traveling, I’ll usually throw in some bodyweight or resistance training on the days I’m not doing sprints, if I have time.

Additional resistance training, by the way, is completely optional. In other words, I don’t put too much pressure on myself to do more than the treadmill sprints. Anything else is a bonus. (Notice how I focus on small, concrete, realistic accomplishments rather than making big plans that are likely to fail?)

If you decide to follow this approach, here’s another tip: to keep the progress coming, make one small improvement each time you do the workout. For example, increase the speed by 0.1 mph, the incline by 0.1%, or the number of sprints by 1. By continuing to improve in small increments like this, you’ll keep getting fitter, faster, and leaner.

Strategy #2: Skip Breakfast

I know, I know. Most of the fitness world tells us that breakfast is the “most important meal of the day”. But there’s nothing necessarily magic about breakfast. Generally, breakfast is only important because it can help people control their eating later in the day.

Yet some people achieve their very best fitness and body composition while skipping breakfast regularly. These folks are are usually what we call Level 2 or Level 3 eaters. This means that they have a higher level of food awareness or dietary discipline. They don’t overeat in the evening to compensate for a missed morning meal.

(So if you know you’re struggling with evening overeating, try the opposite strategy — have a substantial breakfast and try missing dinner instead.)

It’s for these reasons that I often recommend skipping breakfast as a calorie control and fat loss strategy for my road warrior clients (again, provided they won’t be ordering all-you-can-eat room service at 11 pm).

And I practice what I preach.  When I’m on the road, I typically skip breakfast, saving my first meal for around 1 pm and eating my last meal by around 9 pm. This means my “eating window” is about 8 hours and my “fasting period” is 16 hours.

Some people call this “intermittent fasting”, as I’m extending my typical overnight fast to 16 hours. Fancy names aside, the protocol is very simple and extremely useful. Here’s what it looks like.

Putting it into practice

I’ll typically start my day with the sprints outlined above. After my workout, I’ll shower, get dressed, drink my 1L of water mixed with greens+, take my multi-vitamin, and pop 10 BCAA (branched chain amino acid) capsules. That’s it. No stop for a food meal.

Between my workout and lunch time I’ll usually have one or two cups of green tea or coffee. Then, around 1 pm, I’ll have my first food meal of the day, typically a high-protein meal with a full plate of veggies.

My go-to meal in most restaurants for this lunch-time meal is a large Cobb salad with an extra hamburger patty or 6 oz steak on the side. No extra sides. No extra carbs. Just the big salad (which usually has avocado, eggs, bacon, and chicken on it) and the burger or steak on the side.

Between this lunch and dinner, I’ll usually drink another litre of water and maybe have another cup of green tea. Later in the day, usually closer to 8 or 9 pm, I’ll have another large protein and veggie meal. This time it’s usually a 16 oz steak, 2 large chicken breasts, or 2 large pieces of fish and another huge plate of veggies.

While this eating plan may seem weird to most fitness enthusiasts, it’s a huge time-saver for me when I’m traveling. I only have to stop for two meals during the day. And by sticking with protein and veggies – but eating LOTS of them, usually requiring a special conversation with my waiter or waitress and an extra “get lean” surcharge – I get enough calories while still maintaining a low body fat percentage… maybe even losing some fat.

In the end, my traveling, workout-time-pressed, restaurant-eating clients have found this breakfast skipping strategy – in conjunction with the high-intensity sprints – the best approach for maintaining, even improving fitness.

So, next time you’re on the road, whether it’s for work or for vacation, try these strategies. They’ll have a big impact on your health, performance, and your physique.

One final note on exercise duration

I didn’t get into this in the Globe and Mail piece, however, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention one more thing.

Daily, 2-hour workouts are completely unnecessary — maybe even counterproductive — for busy professionals.  Indeed, for a guy like Brett, who has limited time and modest goals (including losing about 10 pounds and maintaining his physical, emotional, and intellectual health), much less time should be spent in the gym.

For anyone interested in exploring more time-efficient but supremely effective exercise programs, check out this article: Two Experiments in Exercise Minimalism.

And for anyone interested in some additional and creative ways to exercise with no equipment, and no time, check out this article: No Equipment? No Time?  No Excuses!

Click here to join the waiting list.

Ever been hungry… but not really hungry?

Like you’ve just finished a big meal, but there’s something inside you yelling “Dessert!” Or you’re eating something that doesn’t taste all that good, but what the heck, you’re there…and it’s there…and as they say…if you can’t be with the one you love, love the one you’re with?

Yeah, me too. What’s up with that?

Well, there are many reasons for over-eating, which I define simply as eating more than our body needs. And one reason, which I’m sure will be familiar to many of you, is emotion.

Sure, many of us know that we eat when we’re sad or happy or have had a bad day at work.  But what about the other, less obvious things?

The times when we catch ourselves over-eating and we don’t know why?  The times when our usual over-eating explanations just don’t apply?

That’s when you need to dig in and find out what is up with that. Because emotions are tricky things. We feel them throughout our body, often in places we don’t expect. Like our stomachs.  And, sometimes it’s easy to mistake these emotions for hunger.

My Experience With Mysterious Hunger

Recently, I had an interesting experience.  I finished my second meal of the day, a satisfying meal, yet I still wanted food. Like really wanted food.

Now, my left brain knew I’d had enough. Macronutrients were perfectly balanced, portion exactly right, nailed protein + veggies, etc.

Right brain? Nuh uh. That thing wanted MORE DAMMIT NOW.

Interesting.

I sat with it for a few moments. It felt like a gnawing hole in my middle. It felt like real hunger.  But this couldn’t be. Logically.

Huh.

I said, “OK, let’s take 5 minutes and go down this rabbit hole.”  I sat down and dug in. What was I feeling? Where, in my body, was I feeling it?

I then realized that I wasn’t feeling hungry at all…I was feeling angry.

That’s right, I was ANGRY!! I kept focusing on where I felt this emotion in my body.

(Important: Do try this at home, kids.  Next time you’re feeling a mixed bag of emotions, dig in and define how you’re really feeling.  Then focus on where you’re feeling it in your body.  Don’t rush, though.  Body signals are often slow to reveal themselves.  Take your time.)

My jaw was clenching. My brow was furrowing. And my stomach was growling.  I was angry…IN MY BELLY.

So then I thought, “OK, what’s the deal?”

I worked backwards using a concept we teach in the Lean Eating Coaching Program called “Break the Chain.”  With this exercise, you assume that eating is just the last link in a chain that stretches into your past.

It might feel like you’re hungry now, but maybe you walked past a good-smelling bakery 15 minutes ago and forgot about that. Or maybe something stressful happened this morning.

So, link by link, working backwards along my chain of events, I started asking questions.  What was I doing just now? What was I thinking? Where was I?

Ah!  I got it.  The source of my anger.

I had just been reading about a large muscular male setting his “fat loss” intake at 2500 calories a day. His FAT LOSS intake at 2500 calories a day. For me as a 37-year old 5’0″ desk monkey female, 2500 calories/day is epic nom nom nom.  Weight gain city.

And fat was just falling off him. $&%*!!

At that point I realized that I was angry for two reasons (Be sure to read this in your crankiest toddler voice):

• This is so UNFAIR! Wah! Poor little me!
• I’m stuck eating these rabbit portions! Damn it! That sucks!

And then I realized I was angry because these two things seemed to contravene two of my key values:

• fairness
• freedom (and independence)

So, I wasn’t actually hungry.  I was angry because I felt that my two “Fs” were being compromised. (Luckily, my other F-word — feminism — remained intact.  Ha!)

What next?  Well, I gave myself 5 minutes to REALLY BE MAD in my body.

(Again, don’t gloss over the importance of this.  Emotions are primarily body signals. So feel them in your body, don’t over-intellectualize them in your brain. Grit teeth. Make “grrr” sounds. Squinch face.  Whatever it takes.)

After my 5 minutes were up, I then released that sh*tball of anger and let it float away. Out of my throat and face. Out of my chest.

Ahhhhhh.

The hunger was gone, as suddenly as it arrived. And a lesson was learned.

What To Do With Mysterious Hunger

If you ever find yourself struggling with mysterious hunger, here are a few tips to help you deal with it:

1. Begin by assuming some thought, belief, and/or emotion is driving this, even if you don’t yet know what it is.
2. Look for where your emotions are in your body. “Scan” your body from head to toe, observing any signals or physical feelings you notice.
3. Observe only. Don’t analyze. Right now you are gathering information.
4. Wait. Don’t rush to explain things with your immediate response, e.g. “Oh it must be my mother issues because blah blah blah” or “Oh, it must be because I had no protein and only 20 g of carbs.” If the answer pops up quickly, that’s your brain. Your body is slow and quiet with its signals. You must wait. At least 30 seconds, ideally 60.
5. Remember that emotions can feel like hunger. Yes, it’s weird. But so is an elephant’s trunk and Nature’s made both of these things possible.
6. Don’t “should” yourself or rush to judge the feelings. Let them come even though they seem stupid. Just be a little distance away from yourself and observe, like an anthropologist with a clipboard.
7. If you feel a feeling, ask yourself how the situation you’re in might relate to a perceived threat to your own identity and values. Ask yourself, politely and conversationally, “Oh, OK, that seems important to you? Why?”
8. When you get a response (again, wait — the body is slow), ask some more. “What’s that all about? Why is that important?” Keep asking, then wait and watch the body’s response. It’s like playing the getting warmer-getting colder game. “Is it this? Hmm, no. Is it that? Ah yes, that seems more significant.”
9. Give yourself a few minutes to experience whatever emotions you’re experiencing. Check your watch if you need to, and allocate 5 minutes to this project. Unlike houseplants, ignoring feelings doesn’t make them go away. You might as well turn and face them. Roll around in the mud with the feelings for a few minutes. If you’re sad, cry. If you’re angry, chomp your jaw and growl like a pissed-off baboon. If you’re anxious, run around in circles like Homer Simpson.
10. Work backwards along the “chain” for more clues. What were you doing just before you felt this? Who was with you? What was happening? What about an hour ago? This morning?
11. Take 10 deep breaths. Exhale using a slow 5-count. Try to empty your lungs completely. If necessary, release the emotion you’ve been sitting with. Just let it float off, like a soap bubble.
12. Once you’re done, notice whether your hunger has changed. If so, how? If not, how not?
13. If you can’t find a private place to do this (e.g. at work, with kids running around), sneak off to the bathroom. If you keep the bathroom fan running, nobody will hear you whispering Grrrr!!!!

Click here to join the waiting list.

Cafe Dolce, 9 AM

I turn as two moms walk into the cafe and stand in line behind me to order. They look to be in their early 30s, but I don’t ask. It’s rude.

Each carries one of those baby baskets, the kind with the handle, and I can see two little heads poking out. The babies are three months old. (That one I did ask. Moms love to talk about their babies.)

I order my coffee and head back to my table where, coincidentally, I’ve come to write this piece about how new moms can stay healthy and fit, whether they’ve worked out all their lives or have never set foot in the gym.

On my computer screen is the interview I did with Amanda Graydon. A new mom, Amanda had the same fears most new moms have — fears the two moms at the cafe may have had too.

She was afraid of getting sick. Of not being able to stay active and eat healthy food. Of gaining a lot of unnecessary weight… and of not being able to take the weight off after she delivered her child.

Mothers she met had dire warnings. “Yeah, I looked just like you before I got pregnant,” they’d say. “But it’s all downhill from there. I hope you’re ready.” It seemed, from these reports, like motherhood involved a future of poor health and aggressive gravity.

But she didn’t let that get to her. By leaning on friends and family, Amanda turned her fears into a positive plan of action, focusing on the things she could control while letting the rest take care of itself.

Early in our interview, Amanda told me something that set the tone for the rest of the conversation.

“Before my pregnancy, I was worried,” she said. “But eventually I learned that my body wasn’t doomed. I wasn’t necessarily destined to gain excess weight or suffer negative health consequences.

“Now, I did realize that the outcome — what actually happens to me — is always beyond my control.”

Hormones, after all, can do powerful things to a woman’s body and emotions. Carrying a baby is a big job for the body, and one never knows what might happen. If new moms focus on trying to control an inherently uncontrollable situation, it’s a recipe for a lot of anxiety and worry.

This energy is better spent elsewhere, as Amanda says. She focused on what she could control — her actions and behaviours.

“These are the things I can change. I can control what I eat and how I move my body. I directed my energy toward that, instead of worrying about body processes that I can’t control.”

Amanda - 8 months pregnant - showing off her belly.

Meet Amanda and Amalynn

Amanda Graydon is eating a boiled carrot and trying to imagine what it would be like to only have two teeth. Could she actually eat this? Or would she just suck on it and spit it back out?

Her 15-month old daughter Amalynn watches her and sticks her hand out, her fingers clasping air. Amanda hands her a carrot and watches as the baby puts it in her mouth. She sucks and sucks then spits it out.

“She doesn’t want baby food anymore,” Amanda tells me. “She watches John and I eat. And I can tell she wants our chicken and sweet potatoes. She wants Big Girl food.”

But she’s not quite ready for Big Girl food just yet. So she gets something in between. Protein muffins, pureed sweet potatoes, scrambled eggs in small pieces, greens+ (for kids) mixed with natural fruit juices, organic baby food, and all kinds of soft veggies.

But Amalynn wants food with substance, something she can pick up with her hands and feed herself. Yet, even then, she still isn’t past spitting it out.

Amanda understands. She knows what it’s like to spit up food, too. Amanda got sick so often during her pregnancy, Morning Sickness should have been renamed All Day, Every Day sickness. She struggled with even basic foods like fruits and veggies.

Amanda takes another carrot and puts it in her mouth. This time she uses all her teeth. This carrot is for her.

“I was very sick during my pregnancy. I kept a diary. It shows I threw up, on average, 2 times a day for the entire pregnancy. That was a long 9 months.

“Nowadays, it just feels great to be able to chew and eat without having to run to the toilet,” she laughs, then touches her daughter’s nose with the tip of her finger.

“Let’s get you another tooth on top so you can start chewing,” she says to Amalynn.

“Tooth?” says baby Amalynn, smiling with her little two-tooth grin.

Amalynn - at 16 months - smiling her 2-toothed smile.

Conquering New Mom Fear

Let’s make this clear: Amanda was in awesome shape before she had Amalynn. A former high-level athlete with a long competitive career, Amanda had recently competed in figure shows, which meant regular, intense training. (Of course, it doesn’t hurt that she’s married to PN’s Dr. John Berardi.)

In terms of her nutrition and exercise skills and history, Amanda’s not exactly the average woman. Yet even she wasn’t immune to New Mom Fear. She wondered things like:

“Will I still feel attractive?”

“Will I gain weight too fast and not be able to take it off?”

“Will I ever be able to get back to my fit and healthy pre-baby body?”

After all, almost every woman she talked to would emphasize the inevitability of her body’s demise. And while pregnancy can be a challenge for every woman, it can be especially so for athletes who are accustomed to their bodies obeying their every command. One’s identity and capability change… a lot. It’s tough to adjust to day-long vomiting and a growing belly if you’ve gotten used to banging out a zillion tire flips and burpees.

So, after the initial rush and joy of discovering she was pregnant, Amanda was torn. She liked her body. She liked what she could do with it. She didn’t want that sense of fitness to go away.

“A lot about what women know about pregnancy is socially conditioned,” she says. “We look at what other women are doing — sometimes what they’re being told to do — and start thinking: Maybe I have to eat a lot, not work out at all, and just sit on the couch. Maybe that’s all I can do.”

Amanda tried to find examples of women who stayed healthy, fit, and exercised during pregnancy. But there were few “fit moms” for her to emulate. So, shortly after learning she was pregnant, Amanda started to ask some difficult questions.

“What if all these moms are just following socially reinforced ‘rules’? What if I did the opposite?”

True, Amanda was eating for two now. The well-being of her unborn baby was the first thing on her mind. But she just had to believe there were strategies for staying healthy and fit while pregnant. And ways to get back in shape quickly, and easily, after the baby is born.

There had to be strategies for holding true to who she was: a healthy, fit female athlete who thrived while moving her body and eating good food.

There had to be.

Amanda's progress: October (1 month pregnant - 121 lbs), January (4 months pregnant - 131 lbs), April (8 months pregnant - 151 lbs), and May (1 week after delivery - 125 lbs).

Amanda’s Solutions to New Mom Fear

New Mom Fear #1: Body Weight

I’ll gain too much weight while pregnant.

Reality:

Becoming aware of a) the type of food you eat and b) the amountof food you eat can help you minimize fat gain.

Amanda knows how easy it is for moms to gain extra fat when they’re pregnant. 30 healthy and normal pounds can turn into 50, 60, or more very quickly.

“You need to set up an environment for the baby that’s conducive to growth, love, and protection,” says Amanda. “But it doesn’t mean your body needs thousands of extra calories.”

That’s why Amanda ate enough to supply healthy nutrients to her and her baby, but not enough to gain a lot of extra fat.

She did so by eating foods that were nutrient dense instead of calorically dense. Her menu revolved around eating veggies (at least 5 fistfuls per day), lean meats (one palms’ worth with every meal) and good fats, including fish oil, mixed nuts, and avocado.

She did throw in a few extra starchy carbohydrates per day as well. But only a few as she lowered her exercise volume and intensity when she learned she was pregnant. Any additional carbs simply aren’t necessary unless you’re burning a lot during exercise.

In addition, she ate slowly, sometimes taking up to 20 minutes to finish her meal. This allowed her body enough time to signal to her brain that she was full.

And once per week she’d have ice cream or chocolate, but she always went out for dessert instead of keeping the sweets in the house. Temptation or not, you can’t eat it if it’s not around.

Of course, Amanda still got sick a few times per day. But she didn’t give up; she continued to do her best. With support and encouragement, she stuck to her eating plan.

[For specifics on what to eat- and avoid – during pregnancy, check out Dr. Berardi’s Nutrition and Pregnancy article.]

New Mom Fear #2: Exercise

I can’t work out while pregnant.

Reality:

Working out consistently and intelligently is not only safe, but it’s a great way to boost the health of both mother and baby.

Yoga’s cool. So is Pilates. And most moms who choose to work out go that route. (Many more moms don’t do any kind of exercise at all.)

Amanda showed you can still push it in the gym and cross train. She lifted weights 3 times per week, swam once per week, did weekly yoga, and just kept moving as well as she could — whatever that looked like to her on a given day.

“You can still challenge yourself as long as you do it intelligently,” she says.

That’s why well into her pregnancy, Amanda was still deadlifting 135 pounds for reps and doing squats, push-ups, and pull-ups. She even ran a 5K race a month before she gave birth. (“I didn’t go to compete,” she says. “I just wanted to run at my own pace.”)

The only thing she didn’t do was lie on her back — like, say, to do a flat bench press — since the increased weight of her uterus would have pressed on the vein that returns blood from her legs to her heart, making it quite uncomfortable (and potentially dangerous) for both her and the baby.

Instead of letting that deter her from working hard, Amanda simply switched to incline bench presses, which didn’t affect her blood supply at all.

Every morning, she’d go for a walk outside – or on the treadmill at a slight incline – for 20-30 minutes.

Interestingly, her best meals came post-exercise, when she was less frequently sick. So that provided some extra incentive for working out.

[For specifics on how to – and how not to – exercise during pregnancy, check out Dr. Berardi’s Exercise and Pregnancy article.]

Amanda - 8 months pregnant - doing front squats.

New Mom Fear #3: Stretch Marks

I’m going to have stretch marks!

Reality:

You can significantly reduce the likelihood of stretch marks by taking fish oil, rubbing almond oil on your skin, and activating your stomach muscles.

The first thing Amanda did when she found out she was pregnant — aside from getting excited and hugging her husband — was triple the amount of fish oil she was taking, to about 15 g per day.

Of course, fish oil does awesome things for the baby, including increasing brain development. But it also has wonderful benefits for Mom.

Amanda believes the increased fish oil improved her mood — it’s been shown to combat depression — and helped keep her skin elastic, making it less prone to stretching.

She also rubbed almond oil into her skin religiously – up to 5 times per day – to make it supple and smooth.

Finally, she became more aware of her stomach and how she was standing and sitting. Many women find they experience back pain as the lumbar spine is pulled forward from the baby weight.

“If I wanted to relax my stomach muscles, I could push my growing belly really far out,” she says. “But the more I activated my abs and pulled my stomach in, the more I engaged my core and kept my posture strong.”

To help remind her to keep her stomach engaged, Amanda wore a specially made pregnancy belt while she went about her daily activities. And at the end of it all – no stretch marks.

[For the Almond Oil Amanda used, check out this link. And for the Maternity Support Belt she used, check out this one.]

New Mom Fear #4: Getting Back In Shape

It will take me forever to get back in shape after my baby is born!

Reality:

Setting a goal and working toward it will help you get back in shape quicker than you imagine.

The day she gave birth, April 21, 2010, Amanda weighed 151 pounds. (And baby Amalynn weighed almost 7 pounds). That means she gained about 30 pounds during her pregnancy.

But thanks to the eating and workout habits she followed during her pregnancy, she was confident she could get back in awesome shape.

She also had another thing: a goal.

Amanda wanted to compete in a figure show exactly one year after her daughter was born. That goal gave her motivation to train and eat well while nursing.

“It doesn’t have to be a figure competition,” says Amanda. “That’s just what worked for me. I had the background to manage that. It’s definitely not for everyone!

“But I think any goal — running a 5K, reaching a certain bodyfat percentage, scheduling a mom and baby photo shoot — even just taking a class once a week to get you out of the house and have some time to yourself — can motivate you to work out and eat well to get in great shape.”

She emphasizes that each woman’s goal will be unique, and that new moms need to go at their own pace. After all, a new baby is a big responsibility, and understandably a new mother’s focus can be somewhat… distracted. (Or exhausted.)

For many women, the goals should be moderate, do-able, realistic, tailored to their own abilities, and most importantly — fun. There’s a lot of pressure on new moms already, so Amanda recommends that they find something to suit their own interests, skills, and routines instead of worrying too much about being “perfect”.

However, she also encourages women to be creative and inventive — to simply move, as well as they can, as often as they can. And baby can get in on the act.

[For ideas for short, effective, often baby-inclusive workouts, check out Two Experiments in Exercise Minimalism and No Equipment? No Time? No Excuses!]

Amanda's physique 1-year post-pregnancy.

Back in April 2010, newborn Amalynn lay on a soft blanket on the home-gym floor and watched her parents train.

It was Amanda’s first workout since giving birth.

She and JB did bench presses, air squats, and ab exercises. In between sets, she’d come over to the colourful baby blanket and nuzzle her daughter with her nose, nursing her when needed.

Thanks to a good fitness regime and a speedy recovery, it only took Amanda 4 days to get back into the gym after delivering baby Amalynn. And after only a few weeks, Amanda was back down to her normal weight of 125 pounds. (Each mother, of course, will go at her own pace.)

But she kept her goal of competing. For Amanda as a former athlete, it was hard to beat the lure of the competition stage.

About one year later — after 12 months of care-giving, working, training, and eating well — she stepped on stage at the Ontario Provincial Championships. Surprisingly to almost everyone in attendance – except Amanda and JB – she showed up in even better shape than when she competed pre-baby, in 2008. No small feat for a new mom.

She even walked away with 3rd place in the contest, qualifying for the National championships. But on the car ride back home from the figure show, Amanda decided to stop competing.

“I think I’ve achieved the best I can unless I want to make this competing thing a full time job,” she says.

“For that to happen, the focus would have to be on me, which doesn’t work for our family. I have a child and a rich, full life. I want to spend that extra time with my daughter, my family, and my friends.”

But don’t mistake Amanda’s retirement from competition for a lack of training. Amanda is currently walking around in great shape, exercising 4-5 days per week and including baby Amalynn in her workouts.

She also has a new goal: to help moms everywhere look and feel their best during and after their pregnancy.

“I know what it’s like to be fearful about your body and health once you’re pregnant,” she says. “However, I learned that you can look great and provide a healthy, safe environment for your baby.”

Of course, she says, not every woman will have the same experience she did. Women can easily struggle with a difficult pregnancy. They can do their best to eat well and exercise, and struggle with health and body weight issues anyway. Amanda feels pretty lucky.

And this is why, she says, she chose not to focus on her own outcome but rather her actions and behaviours. She also recruited lots of support from family and friends.

“I think the most important lesson is to focus on what you can control, whatever your own circumstances. By moving as much as you can, and focusing on healthy foods, you’ll create a safe environment for your baby to thrive in. Then, after the pregnancy, you can get to the task of getting healthy again, as well as you can.”

After all, motherhood demands strength, flexibility, and endurance… just like the gym.

Amanda placing 3rd at the Ontario Championships, just 1 yr after delivering her first baby.

A Snapshot of Mom and Daughter

Amanda’s in her home gym walking on the treadmill. 15-month old Amalynn walks on her little baby treadmill beside her mom, arms spread wide, tiny fingers gripping the handles, her little feet powering the belt.

It’s early morning and the sun is shining through the big plate-glass windows.

Momma blows kisses in between strides, and baby blows them right back.

Amalynn - at 10 months old - enjoying a treadmill workout with mom in the family gym.

Editor’s note. After this article ran, we got a lot of questions about breastfeeding. Specifically, readers wanted to know if Amanda nursed during her figure preparations. No; Amanda nursed Amalynn for 9 months. Then she naturally stopped producing milk. That’s when Amalynn switched to formula and food; and Amanda started dieting and training for her contest.

Also note. Some of the very same strategies Amanda used while pregnant can also help women post-pregnancy. For more, check out Kia’s story. Kia lost 61 pounds post-pregnancy in our Lean Eating Coaching Program for Women.

Click here to join the waiting list.

To me, that’s just lazy and cynical: are fitness professionals really supposed to work only with the easy clients, the ones who need the least help, while refusing to help the ones who need it most?

We can do much better than that. At Precision Nutrition, we hold ourselves to a higher standard — and if you’re a fitness professional reading this blog, I’m betting you do too.

Don’t fire your clients — help them!

In the PN Certification Program, we’re careful to remind fitness professionals never to dismiss clients as “unmotivated” or “lazy.” Every single client can lose fat, build muscle, and improve their health.

The question is: how do you it?

Well, an elite fitness professional recognizes that different clients will require vastly different coaching approaches, and will change his or her approach as needed to help ALL kinds of clients.

At Precision Nutrition, we group our clients into 3 categories, each one requiring a different coaching strategy:

Client #1: Low compliance.
Struggles to follow the program.

Client #2: High compliance, low results.
Follows the program, gets below-expected results.

Client #3: High compliance, high results.
Follows the program, gets above-expected results.

Each of these types has specific needs and the ability to make dramatic change. Learn the coaching methods for each group and you will start to see success with EVERY client that comes to you for advice.

Client #1: Low Compliance

Struggles to take the action you prescribe.
Roughly 60% of all clients.
Goal: Boost compliance.
Strategy: Make it too easy.

In our online coaching programs, for example, we define a low compliance client as someone who does less than 80% of the habits and workouts we prescribe — and as a result, gets poor results.

Of course, this is the type of client that many people suggest you fire. Just one small problem: this type also happens to be the vast majority of all personal training clients.

Many trainers write the Low Compliance client off as unmotivated, but with some help changing habits, this type of client can see amazing results.

At PN, we’ve found that the Low Compliance client needs the following:

1. A clear understanding of why change is important to them.
We never assume that getting in shape is important to our clients; instead, we ASK them. “On a scale of 1-10, how important is this to you?” If it’s anything less than a 9, we begin by helping the client find their own sense of purpose and meaning in their pursuit of fitness — otherwise, it’s just a matter of time before they flounder and quit.

2. Confidence in their ability to do what’s asked of them.
This is the cause of so many issues for clients — they’re just not confident they can actually do what the coach is asking. And many coaches, out of haste or ignorance, forget to ask! Our experience is that unless a client is nearly 100% confident that they can follow a plan, they’ll never begin in earnest.

3. Clear operating instructions to avoid ambiguity.
We make no assumptions that our clients will understand what we’re asking them to do. “Take fish oil” may sound simple, but what brand? How much? When do I take it? With meals or on an empty stomach? Any ambiguity in your advice will lower confidence, and in turn, compliance.

4. Simple, high value habits they can feel successful in doing.
Coaches often assume that their advice is easier to follow than it actually is, and become judgmental of clients who can’t follow it. In fact, behavior change is extraordinarily difficult. Advice as simple as “Make a healthy breakfast” can really mean a dozen changes to a client’s life, from how they shop to what time they wake up in the morning.

So be cautious when giving advice, because it’s far easier than most coaches realize to give advice that is essentially impossible to follow.

The solution? Make it easier — too easy, in fact. Advise only the smallest possible behavior change that will yield a noticeable and significant physical result.

So how do you do all of this at once?

The Confidence Method:

1. Suggest a daily habit to be followed for 2 weeks. E.g., “Each day, you’ll make yourself a healthy breakfast of your choosing from the Gourmet Nutrition cookbook.”

2. Ask the client to tell you how confident they are that they can do it. “On a scale of 1 to 10, how confident are you that you can do that every day for the next two weeks?”

3. If they’re at least 90% confident, go with it. If they answer either “9” or “10”, have them start practicing that habit, and check back in a week to see how they’re doing.

4. If they’re less than 90% confident, suggest an easier habit and try again. If they answer “8” or below, simplify the habit or come up with an easier one. E.g., “How about a quick shake each morning?” or, “How about taking 6 grams of fish oil each morning?” Keep going until you get a response of “9” or “10” on the confidence scale. When you get it right, clients typically respond, “Psshhh, well, obviously I can do that.” And that’s the exact response we’re looking for.

5. Once you’ve found your habit, give the client permission to ignore everything else. The client needs to know that this one habit is all that matters. They can skip everything else they’ve read about nutrition, and everything else they think they “ought” to do. But once they commit, this habit has to be done every day.

Why it works:

Instead of following orders, the client is co-creating their own new behavior. Instead of disempowering clients by telling them what to do, we guide them and encourage them to choose for themselves. Ultimately, all change has to come from within.

The chosen habits are confidence-inspiring, realistic — and most of all, attainable. Clients get easy-to-follow daily habits perfectly suited to their own lives and abilities, which drastically improves compliance.

By simplifying and clarifying the habit, you can help your clients feel bigger than the challenge ahead.

And as their confidence increases, their compliance and rate of change (fat loss, performance, health markers) will increase as well. Then you can challenge them with incrementally bigger habits, and the results build on themselves.

Client #2: High Compliance, Low Results

Takes the prescribed action, doesn’t get the expected result.
Roughly 20% of all clients.
Goal: Measurable progress.
Strategy: Experiment with new (and somewhat more challenging) habits

A High Compliance, Low Results client follows the program but isn’t getting optimal results.

In our online coaching programs, a high compliance client does more than 80% of the habits and workouts we prescribe but falls below our body transformation targets. With clients working on fat loss, for example, we look for those losing less than 0.6 percent of their body weight per week (for guys) or 0.5 percent of their body weight per week (for girls).

[One caveat: fat loss isn’t always linear, and progress may be made in fits and starts. But on average, over time, the above numbers are what we aim for.]

Now, this type of client can be just as frustrating as the first group, but for a different reason: they seem to be doing all the “right things,” but the results just aren’t coming. But let’s not “fire” these clients yet either. They, too, can be helped.

The goal with this type of client is to have them lose weight at or above the target rate of weight loss, which will also increase confidence and motivation. And we use two approaches to help boost their progress.

First, we help them achieve a slightly higher compliance rate. Simply going from 80 to 90 percent compliance often makes all the difference in this type of client.

Second, we individualize their program. And this is where your all your training as a fitness pro can really shine through. Here’s where you tweak the training program, introduce more advanced nutrition concepts, and start those fancy, body-type specific supplement protocols.

[If you’d like to see how we do individualization, I strongly recommend you check out the Precision Nutrition Certification. In the certification program, we offer all sorts of advanced troubleshooting and individualization ideas.]

Client #3: High Compliance, High Results

Takes the prescribed action, gets the expected result.
Roughly 20% of all clients.
Goal: Prevent burnout and build sustainable habits.
Strategy: Give praise, permission to be imperfect and cautious attention.

A High Compliance, High Results client is someone who follows the program with greater than 80% compliance and is also meeting the target rate of body composition change.

For example, at PN, our target rate of fat loss is 0.6% of body weight per week for men, and 0.5% of body weight per week for women, on average.

Results higher than that are fantastic — clients are doing the program, and getting the results they want. However, they still need your cautious attention.

When the going is good with this client we recommend two things: congratulations and a new challenge.

For the “congratulations” portion, offer praise and recognition. “It’s obvious how much you want this, John — your dedication and results have been amazing so far. Nice work. Let’s keep it up.”

You can also throw in a gift certificate to a healthy restaurant, or hook them up with a book you think they’d enjoy. You could also post their name up on a progress bulletin board at the gym. In the end, the method doesn’t usually matter — the fact that you recognize their hard work and progress, either privately or publicly, does.

As for the challenge, consider giving them a similar but new and more challenging habit to follow. That’s assuming, of course, that they’re still “9” or “10” on the confidence scale. And as time goes on, choose habits that build lifelong nutrition strategies and allow for imperfection.

For example, if clients have a history of binge eating, habits might include weekly hunger management or appetite awareness practice; if a client has a tendency to be obsessive about food, habits might work on eating healthy while relaxing the “rules” a bit.

We mention giving this type of person your “cautious” attention because sometimes the clients who start out strongest do so by throwing themselves completely at their goal. That’s OK, but only if they’re also developing strategies they can follow when they’re unable to devote 100% of their life to fitness. And, none of us can do the “all fitness, all the time” thing.

So keep a close eye even on your superstars, because burnout is always a risk with them. You’re in a perfect position to help out if it arises, and if you watch closely, you can often prevent it in the first place.

To help ALL clients, add nutrition coaching to your resume.

I can’t tell you how many times other fitness pros have told me, “Man, I envy you. You have the best clients. If I could get clients like you have, I’d love my job.”

But I start out with the same mix of clients that every other fitness pro starts with. The difference is this: I know that each type of client can climb the ladder and move up to High Compliance, High Results. I start with a belief that every client can become the “perfect client,” and I’m constantly testing new strategies to make it happen.

The key is the ability to identity what type of client someone is right now, how I can help them, and what specific steps I can take to get them to that next level.

That is the job of the elite fitness professional — and with a little effort, it’s a skill you can learn. If you’re interested in learning how, we’ll teach you in the Precision Nutrition Certification.

PN Certification Program begins March 7th — waiting list now open.

If you want to add nutrition to your arsenal and join the ranks of the elite fitness professionals, the Precision Nutrition Certification Program is perfect for you.

Based on over 10 years of research and statistical data from over 6,000 clients, the certification is a comprehensive nutrition coaching course designed specifically to teach professionals working in a personal training or strength coaching environment how to get clients in the best shape of their lives.

We’ve opened the waiting list for the March 2012 program. I strongly recommend you get your name on the list now, because spots are limited and typically sell out within hours each time we run the program.

Click here to join the waiting list.

Some tragedy has befallen you. It could be a speeding ticket or the loss of a loved one. You reach for comfort food. Whether it’s fried chicken, donuts, or a tub of ice cream, comfort foods are usually high in fat, and they make you feel better.

Do you really feel better? Why?

Our “second brain”

Your autonomic nervous system is the part of your nervous system that handles the “back-end”, non-thinky, “body maintenance” tasks, like breathing, digestion, regulating your heart rate, and so forth.

• The sympathetic nervous system (SNS) is our “fight/flight” (or “feed and breed”) department. It responds to immediate threats and cues from our environment.
• The parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) is our “rest and digest” department. It keeps the system steady, orderly, and tidy.

If our body were a car, the SNS would be the gas pedal, and the PNS would be the brake.

About 60 years ago scientists discovered a third part of the autonomic nervous system: the enteric nervous system (ENS).

With 100 million neurons, the ENS has more nerve cells than your spinal cord. It’s even called the second brain because it’s so big and complicated, and because its role is so important.

Where could such a complicated neural organ be?

Look down. It’s right there behind your bellybutton. More accurately, it’s in the layers of tissue that make up your GI tract. (Gives new meaning to the term “navel-gazing”, doesn’t it?)

Yup, your stomach actually does have a mind of its own. Originally scientists thought all these nerves were sending information from the brain to your gut, but 90% of the neurons of the primary visceral nerve connecting your gut are sending info to the brain from the gut.

Gut-brain communication & emotion

Cool factoid! Our GI tract controls and regulates much of our immune system health. More banally, the gut sends info about sensations like pain, discomfort, nausea, hunger and fullness.

Scientists now think that these gut sensations get perceived as (or, in fact, are an essential part of the experience of) emotional pain, depression, fatigue, anxiety, disgust, cravings, pleasure, and a sense of well being. In other words, we really do have “gut feelings”.

Gut nerves are involved in experiencing emotion. For instance:

• You get “butterflies” in your stomach when you’re stressed or worried.
• You feel nauseous or have to run to the bathroom before you have to give a speech.
• You get a “gut feeling” about situations or people.

Indeed, anti-depressant medications may actually be working more on the gut more than the brain.

Most anti-depressants block serotonin-reuptake to increase serotonin, but since 95% of the body’s serotonin is in the gut, it’s possible that their main effect is on the GI tract. (This also explains why depression and anti-depressant medications affect appetite, or perhaps why people describe depression as feeling “empty”.)

Disease and the brain-gut interaction

Many chronic health problems, such as anorexia nervosa, obesity, and irritable bowel syndrome (IBS)  may involve breakdown of the brain-gut interaction. IBS patients had greater activation in specific brain regions, higher emotional arousal and more cortical modulation when their GI tract was distended.

And researchers are now observing connections between gut health and mental illnesses or altered cognition. For instance, children with autism also often suffer from food intolerances, especially gluten. Food intolerances also appear more often in schizophrenics. Intriguing links indeed!

One factor in obesity may be decreased gut signalling to the brain. Insulin, ghrelin, and leptin are proteins secreted by the gut that can stimulate the central dopamine  system.

Since obesity is linked to decreased sensitivity from the reward of food, it could be the gut is making less dopamine triggering proteins. Problem is, we don’t yet know which happened first: the obesity, or the decreased satisfaction from eating.

Research question

This week’s review explores how the gut-brain connection relates to emotions and comfort food.

Can what you eat make you feel better… even if you can’t taste it?

Van Oudenhove L, McKie S, Lassman D, Uddin B, Paine P, Coen S, Gregory L, Tack J, Aziz Q. Fatty acid-induced gut-brain signaling attenuates neural and behavioral effects of sad emotion in humans. J Clin Invest. 2011 Jul 25. pii: 46380. doi: 10.1172/JCI46380. [Epub ahead of print]

Methods

Twelve volunteers with normal BMIs got four separate MRIs after not eating for 12 hours. Here’s the setup:

1. Before each MRI, researchers asked participants how hungry and/or full they felt.
2. A feeding tube was inserted into the volunteers’ stomachs.
3. Participants were put into the MRI, and the scanner started.
4. Participants either listened to sad music and looked at sad faces, or listened to neutral music and looked at neutral faces, for 33 minutes.

Three minutes after starting the music, researchers fed either fat (in the form of dodecanoic acid) or very dilute salt water (0.9% saline) through the feeding tube for 2 minutes, for a total of 250 mL (about a cup).

Then at 15 minutes and 30 minutes after the feeding, volunteers were asked how hungry or sad they felt on a scale from 1 to 9 (1 being not hungry/full at all). Sadness was also measured on a scale of 1 to 9, with 9 being very happy and 1 being very sad.

Each volunteer ended up getting 4 scans in total:

1. Neutral emotions, no fat
2. Neutral emotions, with fat
3. Sad emotions, no fat
4. Sad emotions, with fat

Fat type

One really interesting, and probably important, point is that the type of fat may be relevant. Researchers used a very specific type of fat, dodecanoic acid, that is saturated and found in coconut oil, palm oil and some milks.

Recent research is suggesting that naturally occurring saturated fats have positive effects on mood and cognition. It could be that cutting out saturated fat too aggressively might actually affect our mood — and that a little bit of healthy saturated fat could keep us feeling groovy.

Results

Overall, when people were sad they were also hungrier. It didn’t matter if they were getting fat or salty water pumped into their stomachs.

Gee, this might explain people’s compulsion to reach for a tub of ice cream or fried chicken when they’re sad. They’re just hungry.

Or it there more to it?

Emotions and fat

There are a few key findings here.

1. You feel emotions as hunger. People’s perceptions of hunger and fullness changed with their emotions. Sad people were hungrier.
2. Fat somehow makes you feel less hungry when you’re sad. When people were sad and were given fat, they were less hungry than sad people who got salty water.
3. This occurs even if people can’t taste the fat. Remember: volunteers were fed via feeding tube. So any change in hunger wasn’t happening because of the taste of fat. Something is happening in the GI tract to make this work.
4. This only works if people are sad. When people weren’t sad, getting fat or salt water didn’t change how hungry they were. This means that it’s not just the fat calories or fat itself that matter — it’s the combination of sadness and fat intake.
5. If you’re sad, getting fat makes you less hungry, but when you’re not sad, getting salt water makes you less hungry. Weird.

MRI: Your brain on fat

Researchers used the MRI to look at changes in blood flow as the subjects experienced emotions and either fat or saline intake.

The researchers figured that based on the effects of fatty acids on gut-brain communication, certain areas of the brain might get more or less blood as a reaction to fat and emotion. Indeed, several areas had changes in blood flow with the combination of sadness + fat:

• medulla/pons;
• midbrain;
• hypothalamus;
• thalamus;
• right hippocampus;
• mid-cingulated cortex; and
• posterior cingulated cortex.

Don’t worry about the specific brain parts. There won’t be a test. The important point is that these changes in blood flow with emotion and fat intake were measurable.

Conclusion

For me there are two take home messages from this study:

1. Food and emotions play off one another.
2. Your body is smarter than you think.

The study was designed to figure out if fat could change people’s mood. But what they really wanted to know if whether fat could make people feel less sad.

We don’t know yet whether other fats (e.g. other types of saturated fats, or non-saturated fats such as oils) would have the same effect.

I’m always suspicious of things that try to trick your body, such as low-fat foods. Indeed, research suggests that people feel less satisfied with fake versions of the real thing, and end up eating more anyway.

Based on this study and others, not only do you need to fool your tongue into thinking it’s getting fat, but also your small intestine. Hmm… not sure how that market research will play out.

Bottom line

You feel emotions as hunger (or fullness). When you feel sad, you’ll feel hungrier.

Eating fat will make you feel less hungry and even less sad.

Before you think this is an excuse to chow down on tubs of chocolate ice cream when you’re feeling sad, it’s not. First, there are many healthy sources of saturated fat, including:

• raw coconut
• avocado
• eggs
• grass-fed/pastured meats and high-fat dairy

Look for naturally occurring saturated fats without sugar added.

Second, this knowledge is empowerment, so you don’t reach for comfort food, but rather deal with the underlying sadness (or any other emotion).

Examine how you feel emotions in your body. Next time you have a craving, ask yourself what emotion you might be experiencing.

Be proactive: Learn to identify what you’re feeling first, before you reach for that soothing fat. And remember, exercise is also a great anti-depressant!

References

1. Mayer EA. Gut feelings: the emerging biology of gut-brain communication. Nat Rev Neurosci. 2011 Jul 13;12(8):453-66.
2. Gershon MD. Developmental determinants of the independence and complexity of the enteric nervous system.Trends Neurosci. 2010 Oct;33(10):446-56.
3. Näslund E, Hellström PM. Appetite signaling: from gut peptides and enteric nerves to brain. Physiol Behav. 2007 Sep 10;92(1-2):256-62.
4. Gibson EL. Emotional influences on food choice: sensory, physiological and psychological pathways. Physiol Behav. 2006 Aug 30;89(1):53-61.

Click here to join the waiting list.