Latest / Wits & Weights | Strength & Fat Loss Over 40 / 4 Ways to Increase Your Metabolism by 500 to 1000 Calories per Day | Ep 236

Transcript

4 Ways to Increase Your Metabolism by 500 to 1000 Calories per Day | Ep 236 · Wits & Weights | Strength & Fat Loss Over 40

• 0:01
  Philip Pape: If you're tired of feeling like you need to eat less and less just to avoid gaining weight and you see others who seem to be able to eat way more food while staying lean, this episode is for you.
• 0:11
  Philip Pape: Today, I'm breaking down exactly how to increase your daily metabolism to burn 500 to 1,000 more calories every day, without endless cardio or anything extreme.
• 0:22
  Philip Pape: You'll discover the four key factors that actually determine your metabolic rate and how to optimize each one for maximum but sustainable results.
• 0:31
  Philip Pape: Whether you're deep in a fat loss phase or trying to maintain while eating more food, this episode will give you a specific list of things to do to add up to a thousand more calories to your daily metabolism.
• 0:44
  Philip Pape: Welcome to Wits and Weights, the podcast that blends evidence and engineering to help you build smart, efficient systems to achieve your dream physique.
• 0:58
  Philip Pape: I'm your host, philip Pape.
• 0:59
  Philip Pape: Picture this You're eating what feels like barely any food.
• 1:03
  Philip Pape: Maybe that's 1,100 or 1,500 calories a day, depending on your metabolism.
• 1:08
  Philip Pape: You're doing cardio several times a week, your energy is in the gutter and still the scale the fat will budge.
• 1:16
  Philip Pape: Meanwhile, you see others eating 2,000, 2,500, even 3,000 calories, while maintaining a lean physique.
• 1:23
  Philip Pape: Well, what if I told you there's a way to systematically increase your metabolism by 500 to 1,000 calories per day, not through endless cardio or restrictive dieting, but through strategic approaches that work with your body to increase what we call energy flux.
• 1:40
  Philip Pape: That's exactly what I'm giving you in today's episode.
• 1:43
  Philip Pape: I'll show you exactly where these calories come from and how to implement each strategy in a way that actually works for your lifestyle without feeling deprived anymore.
• 1:52
  Philip Pape: Now, if you want to connect with other listeners who are applying these same approaches to their fitness journey, go ahead and join our free Facebook group.
• 2:00
  Philip Pape: It's called Wits and Weights.
• 2:01
  Philip Pape: Just search the Wits and Weights community on Facebook or use the link in my show notes, and it's a great place to ask questions, to get support from like-minded people who, most of whom, listen to the show as well.
• 2:14
  Philip Pape: Share your wins, your progress, but also focus on building your best physique through the smart, efficient systems we talk about, like increasing your energy flux to burn more calories, and then you can eat more food, have more energy and get the fat loss and muscle gain that you're going for.
• 2:31
  Philip Pape: Speaking of other listeners, I always promise that if you submit a review, I will give you a shout out and read it on the show Now, if you've submitted a review in the past and you're like I still haven't heard it written.
• 2:42
  Philip Pape: I might have inadvertently missed it, and so please shoot me an email or a message on Instagram and let me know.
• 2:48
  Philip Pape: But just to share some of what we've received lately Sarah P she recently wrote that the podcast is quote real, diverse, relevant.
• 2:57
  Philip Pape: I appreciate so much the information on this podcast.
• 3:01
  Philip Pape: Philip seems like a real person who I can identify with.
• 3:04
  Philip Pape: He talks like someone I can understand, who has a ton of knowledge in a field I'm trying to dive into.
• 3:09
  Philip Pape: I love the diversity of information for men and women, bodybuilders and soccer moms.
• 3:14
  Philip Pape: The episodes are to the point and enjoyable to listen to.
• 3:17
  Philip Pape: Thank you so much for all you do to help us on our individual journeys.
• 3:21
  Philip Pape: Thank you so much.
• 3:23
  Philip Pape: I love reviews like that that show that you're really absorbing and listening to the information and you get something out of every episode.
• 3:30
  Philip Pape: Sdjvdas said quote love this pod Seriously.
• 3:35
  Philip Pape: So informational Can't get enough.
• 3:37
  Philip Pape: The host is a class act too.
• 3:39
  Philip Pape: I really appreciate.
• 3:40
  Philip Pape: You know can always take a compliment, so thank you.
• 3:42
  Philip Pape: And Jason Z27 wrote quote definitely recommend.
• 3:47
  Philip Pape: I've been trying to work out more, but it's difficult to know if you're doing it right, figuring out how to diet, what muscle groups to work, how to find the right balance with cardio, etc.
• 3:55
  Philip Pape: This podcast clears up a lot of those questions to make sure you get as much as you can out of your health plan.
• 4:01
  Philip Pape: So so good.
• 4:02
  Philip Pape: I love those reviews.
• 4:03
  Philip Pape: Thank you for sending them in.
• 4:05
  Philip Pape: The reviews offer what's called social proof.
• 4:08
  Philip Pape: They help others find the show and have some trust that it's what they're looking for.
• 4:13
  Philip Pape: It makes a huge difference than in growing the community, and so if you're a listener, if you love the show, if you haven't left a review yet, hey, my birthday was two days ago before this episode came out.
• 4:22
  Philip Pape: On the 26th of October was my birthday.
• 4:25
  Philip Pape: I'm 44.
• 4:26
  Philip Pape: I'll come out right out and say it I'm 44.
• 4:28
  Philip Pape: And my goal is to get one year younger for every year of age when it comes to my physical fitness.
• 4:32
  Philip Pape: But the best gift you can give me for my birthday is just a review of the show.
• 4:36
  Philip Pape: That's all I ask for, please.
• 4:37
  Philip Pape: I mean, you don't have to give me a gift at all.
• 4:39
  Philip Pape: Just reach out and say hi, that would be great too.
• 4:41
  Philip Pape: But leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
• 4:44
  Philip Pape: I'll give you a shout out.
• 4:45
  Philip Pape: I'd be very, very grateful.
• 4:46
  Philip Pape: Now, one of the reviews said we get to the point, so I better live up to that.
• 4:50
  Philip Pape: Let's get into today's topic.
• 4:52
  Philip Pape: Here is what we are covering today.
• 4:55
  Philip Pape: First, I want to go over the exact breakdown of where extra calories come from.
• 5:00
  Philip Pape: When we talk about metabolism in general, I want to give a refresher of the components of metabolism and then how you can increase your metabolism in a sustainable way by up to a thousand calories a day, how to implement these strategies sustainably and then a little bonus approach at the end for those who might have been dieting for a long time.
• 5:20
  Philip Pape: So stick around for that, all right.
• 5:23
  Philip Pape: I want to start with the overall theme here of increasing your metabolism, and some of you might be skeptical rightly so.
• 5:29
  Philip Pape: You're like hey, philip, 500 to 1,000 calories is insane.
• 5:33
  Philip Pape: That could be like double my current metabolism, or not double, but a huge jump to what I'm currently burning every day.
• 5:39
  Philip Pape: But stick with me here because I'm going to break down objectively, scientifically, exactly where these numbers come from and give you a menu of options and you can kind of put them together.
• 5:48
  Philip Pape: You don't necessarily have to do all the things, but it gives you some ideas to get started and make them work for you.
• 5:56
  Philip Pape: So first is strength training All right if you're not already lifting weights.
• 6:00
  Philip Pape: That is the biggest low-hanging fruit in existence for your physical fitness for the rest of your life.
• 6:06
  Philip Pape: In so many ways, well beyond calorie burning, even though that's the context for today, it is huge for your health, for your bone density, for your insulin sensitivity, for your function, for living a long, amazing life and, like I mentioned earlier, potentially turning back the clock as you age.
• 6:26
  Philip Pape: I spoke to someone recently on his podcast.
• 6:30
  Philip Pape: It was called On the Brink, john Brink.
• 6:32
  Philip Pape: He's 84 years old and he's the oldest natural competitive bodybuilder on the planet, and he didn't get started until his, I think, late 70s.
• 6:40
  Philip Pape: Bruce and Jan on Instagram they're in their 70s and they're kicking butt in the gym, showing that you can be strong and functional and completely defy aging.
• 6:49
  Philip Pape: Okay, I'm getting off track, but I think it's important.
• 6:51
  Philip Pape: So let's talk about specifically calories.
• 6:54
  Philip Pape: If you can add muscle just that alone let's say eight to 10 pounds of muscle over the next six to 12 months, which is totally achievable for both men and women you're going to burn an extra at least 50 calories per day at rest, and we know that because research shows that you can burn up to 9 calories per pound of muscle tissue on your body just from the tissue itself, let alone all the corollary ways that your body burns calories when you have more muscle.
• 7:22
  Philip Pape: And again you might be thinking well, that's only 50 calories, right?
• 7:26
  Philip Pape: But there findings from research that I want to add on to that, that people miss in this equation, and I've talked about them recently.
• 7:35
  Philip Pape: The adaptations in your heart and other organs from consistent training, from being an athlete, which you are, if you're a lifter, can actually contribute another 50 to 100 calories a day.
• 7:47
  Philip Pape: Now some people might question the number, but I've seen it often anecdotally, and there does seem to be research that backs this up, if you add it all up.
• 7:57
  Philip Pape: So, in summary, what I'm saying is, if you add muscle tissue, if you train like an athlete, if you're active, your organs increase in size as well.
• 8:05
  Philip Pape: Your BMR will increase from multiple sources.
• 8:09
  Philip Pape: You're more active in general.
• 8:11
  Philip Pape: You are lifting weights.
• 8:12
  Philip Pape: That burns calories.
• 8:13
  Philip Pape: You add it all up and we're talking an extra 100 to 150 calories.
• 8:17
  Philip Pape: So that's our first 100 to 150 calories.
• 8:19
  Philip Pape: Just go out and lift weights and that is going to massively unlock so many other things.
• 8:23
  Philip Pape: All right.
• 8:25
  Philip Pape: Second is non-exercise activity thermogenesis, or NEAT, and it's important to give you a refresher on these, even if you've heard it a million times, because somebody might be listening and saying I don't even know what that is.
• 8:37
  Philip Pape: What are you talking about?
• 8:38
  Philip Pape: Neat is the components of your metabolism where we can make the biggest impact, because it is all the non-exercise movement, such as walking, such as parking farther from the store, doing your chores, doing yard work, fidgeting, unconscious movement, really everything other than deliberate training or exercise.
• 8:59
  Philip Pape: And we've seen that NEAT can by far have the biggest swing in your metabolic rate.
• 9:05
  Philip Pape: For example, by increasing your daily steps by about 5,000, which sounds like a lot, but most people are super sedentary and getting only three or four so five gets you up to eight, nine, maybe 10,000 steps Stretch goal would be 12,000, but let's say eight to 10.
• 9:21
  Philip Pape: That's about an extra up to an hour of walking spread throughout your day, and walking can be spread all over the place in all different ways.
• 9:30
  Philip Pape: Just doing that is going to burn an extra 200 to 300 calories.
• 9:34
  Philip Pape: Now this is independent of your job, of how active you are in general.
• 9:38
  Philip Pape: We definitely have seen a widespread between people who are sedentary, people who have a modesty, active jobs and like manual laborers of up to something like don't quote me on it, but I want to say it's almost a 2000 calorie difference on the extreme ends.
• 9:53
  Philip Pape: But even if you were to shrink that by down to a quarter, we're still talking two 300 calories, right, just from your lifestyle.
• 9:59
  Philip Pape: But deliberately walking every day in some way, excessively to you in an enjoyable way, is going to burn an extra 200, 300 calories.
• 10:08
  Philip Pape: Right, we're not talking about intense exercise, we're not talking about running, it's just moving more throughout your day, getting off your butt, pacing around the house, doing all the things.
• 10:17
  Philip Pape: And the beautiful thing about this is that is really sustainable.
• 10:20
  Philip Pape: Right, you're not killing yourself with high intensity interval workouts or specific cardio sessions.
• 10:26
  Philip Pape: You know, hopping on the treadmill, unless it's just to go walk on a treadmill.
• 10:29
  Philip Pape: Or what I like is a standup desk with under-desk treadmill if that's a possibility for you.
• 10:34
  Philip Pape: So that's our next 200 to 300 calories.
• 10:37
  Philip Pape: The third way we're going to add calories is optimizing your nutrition a bit, and one component of your metabolic rate is called TEF, the thermic effect of food, and there are a lot of people in the evidence-based space that are like eh, you know the extra calories burned from that really isn't worth discussing.
• 10:55
  Philip Pape: I tend to disagree, because maintaining a higher protein intake and by higher I mean 0.7 to 1 grams per pound of your body weight, which is almost or more than double what most people are getting to start, and if you're eating more whole foods, with fiber, for example, you're going to burn more calories just from processing the food.
• 11:16
  Philip Pape: You know it could amount to an extra 50 to 100 calories a day based on that shift.
• 11:22
  Philip Pape: All right, so again, I give you I'm giving you ranges because we can be conservative and say maybe it's 25 to 50, maybe it is up to 100, depending on where you started and where you went.
• 11:31
  Philip Pape: If you're eating a lot of ultra processedprocessed foods now a lot of fast food, quote-unquote junk food, whatever you want to call it chances are your body is not having to work very hard to digest it.
• 11:40
  Philip Pape: If you switch to a lot of protein and whole foods and fiber things you have to chew harder foods, things you have to digest you are going to burn a bunch more calories just through digesting and processing that food, because protein requires 20% to 30% of its calories just for digestion, compared to, say, 5 to 10% for carbs and 0 to 3% for fats.
• 11:59
  Philip Pape: So there's another funny thing If you are from the low carb, high fat camp in the past and now you're eating a more balanced diet with much higher protein and then some higher carbs, both of those are going to contribute to this metabolic bonus, just for eating different foods.
• 12:13
  Philip Pape: So that's pretty cool, all right.
• 12:15
  Philip Pape: The fourth method here is what I call just active lifestyle enhancements, like light physical activity that you actually enjoy.
• 12:24
  Philip Pape: Now you might say, well, this is part of NEAT, isn't it?
• 12:26
  Philip Pape: But with NEAT we talked about specifically adding in walks.
• 12:30
  Philip Pape: In this case, while it is part of NEAT, it's thinking of everything you do in your life, your daily life, and being more active in general.
• 12:39
  Philip Pape: So this could be gardening, playing with your kids, recreational sports, yoga I don't care what it is, I bet, unless you're the type of person that's always out hiking, that's always out playing sports, which a lot of us are not.
• 12:52
  Philip Pape: We're kind of I'm not going to say stuck with desk jobs, but you sit around all day.
• 12:55
  Philip Pape: You're tired.
• 12:56
  Philip Pape: At the end of the day you just veg out, right, and then maybe the weekend you do some fun activities here or there.
• 13:01
  Philip Pape: But can you think of a strategy where you every day are active, doing something, and if you have kids for example, fathers, mothers out there I mean especially the dads out there if you're not playing with your kids almost every day in some way, take advantage of that.
• 13:15
  Philip Pape: It's such a wonderful bonding opportunity, it's so great for them.
• 13:19
  Philip Pape: You know, get away from the devices and all that, just have fun, especially quick five-minute snacks, what we call.
• 13:24
  Philip Pape: What did Brian Borstein call cardio snacks or exercise snacks.
• 13:41
  Philip Pape: For example, running up and down the stairs a few times I mean silly things like that you can add another 50 to 100 calories to your day.
• 13:48
  Jenny: Hi, my name is Jenny and I just wanted to say a big thank you to Philip Pape of Wits and Weights for offering his free 50-minute nutritional assessment.
• 13:57
  Jenny: During that time he gave me really good tools on how I can further my health and fitness goals.
• 14:04
  Jenny: He asked really great questions and stayed true to his offer of no sales pitch.
• 14:10
  Jenny: I have since applied these things and gotten really close to my health goals and my weight goals, and now I'm able to flip over and work on my strength and my muscle conditioning using a lot of the things he offers in his podcasts, and I just am very grateful for his positive inspiration and encouragement for all of our health.
• 14:32
  Jenny: Thank you, Philip.
• 14:34
  Philip Pape: So, if we add it all up, strength training and the adaptations from strength training and the lifestyle of strength training add up to about 100 to 150 calories.
• 14:41
  Philip Pape: Increased meat through walking is another 200 to 300 calories.
• 14:45
  Philip Pape: Optimizing your nutrition, your protein, your fiber, whole foods another 50 to 100 calories.
• 14:50
  Philip Pape: And having an active lifestyle 50 to 100 calories and that's maybe 400 to 600 calories per day.
• 14:57
  Philip Pape: Right there, all right.
• 14:58
  Philip Pape: Now here's the bonus strategy that can push this even higher.
• 15:01
  Philip Pape: For those who've been dieting for a long time and that's a lot of you If you've been in a prolonged calorie deficit and you may not even be in enough of a deficit to be losing weight anymore, you may just be below your set point for your current metabolic rate and just kind of under eating but not really losing weight.
• 15:19
  Philip Pape: You could be in that situation.
• 15:20
  Philip Pape: Your metabolism is probably adapted downward right.
• 15:23
  Philip Pape: It's called metabolic adaptation and it's basically conserving resources because you're not eating enough.
• 15:28
  Philip Pape: And if you can then recover out of that, if you could track your food, recover out of it, increase your calories to the point where you're now at your, you know, full, recovered, homeostatic maintenance calories, you don't have to use a reverse diet, right?
• 15:43
  Philip Pape: You don't have to go into a building phase, although that can, in my opinion, you know, ramp it up even further.
• 15:48
  Philip Pape: You can definitely add another, maybe 100 to 200 calories to your daily metabolism, and that's just like a starting point.
• 15:54
  Philip Pape: Some of you may be more adapted than that.
• 15:56
  Philip Pape: You know three, four, 500 calories, but if you've been dieting a lot, then 100 to 200 is a good estimate.
• 16:02
  Philip Pape: If your thyroid has been slightly downregulated through being in a deficit, okay.
• 16:06
  Philip Pape: So that brings our total potential increase to 500 to 800 calories per day.
• 16:12
  Philip Pape: And I would say there is one more thing that I totally forgot on my list, but it was what gets you to the thousand, and that is getting more and better quality sleep.
• 16:23
  Philip Pape: Okay, so just improving your sleep would increase your metabolic rate, because a lack of sleep affects your hormones.
• 16:31
  Philip Pape: It also affects things like visceral fat or visceral fat storage in the belly, but that's a separate topic.
• 16:37
  Philip Pape: It downgrades your metabolic rate, downgrades your thyroid production, affects your cortisol, all the things, such that your body also conserves energy, and so getting more sleep is going to increase your metabolic rate.
• 16:49
  Philip Pape: Notice that nowhere in that entire list that I mentioned cardio.
• 16:52
  Philip Pape: In fact, for some of you, you're doing so much cardio that it's actually adding too much net stress to your body and that is actually causing you to burn fewer calories.
• 17:02
  Philip Pape: You may be burning some calories from all the movements, but it is a small percentage of what you should be burning for that movement, because your body has adapted to compensate.
• 17:10
  Philip Pape: So that gets you plenty of things to think about, of low-hanging fruit, where you may not be giving your body what it needs to fully thrive and be in this high energy flux state.
• 17:22
  Philip Pape: So how do we actually implement these in a way that's sustainable?
• 17:24
  Philip Pape: All right, let's talk about strength training.
• 17:26
  Philip Pape: Let's break it down Strength training if you can lift weights, if you can aim for three days a week to start and then eventually four or even five I like four or five for folks that are more in the intermediate to advanced phase of their training.
• 17:39
  Philip Pape: Three days a week, full body, progressive loading with compound movements I'm talking squats, deadlifts, bench presses, rows the basics that build strength.
• 17:50
  Philip Pape: Right, they build strength and by building strength they're going to build muscle as well.
• 17:54
  Philip Pape: So don't think about it as two different concepts and you don't need anything fancy here, just consistent, progressive training that challenges you.
• 18:01
  Philip Pape: That's lifting.
• 18:03
  Philip Pape: I've got tons of resources If you're like where do I start?
• 18:05
  Philip Pape: How do I train?
• 18:06
  Philip Pape: What program do I use?
• 18:07
  Philip Pape: This is where you can jump on a call with me a 15 minute rapid nutrition assessment, and if you just want to talk training, I can get you started exactly where you need to go.
• 18:15
  Philip Pape: You know, no charge.
• 18:17
  Philip Pape: I don't charge for those calls.
• 18:19
  Philip Pape: I also don't sell you on anything.
• 18:20
  Philip Pape: I literally will suggest an app, I'll suggest a program, maybe even give you a guide or two that I have.
• 18:25
  Philip Pape: If you're kind of newer to this and just send you on your way and if you're like, hey, I really love what you do and I need more support, that's when you'll reach back for more support.
• 18:32
  Philip Pape: But I want to get you started.
• 18:34
  Philip Pape: So reach out and you can use the link on my show notes to do that For neat.
• 18:38
  Philip Pape: For walking, first you have to know how many steps you're getting, so you should be tracking your current daily steps and almost any device now phone or wearable even very inexpensive wearables track steps just accurately enough.
• 18:50
  Philip Pape: They're just fine.
• 18:51
  Philip Pape: And if you can start this week and add a thousand steps a day this week, that's not very much at all.
• 18:58
  Philip Pape: That's like a 10 minute walk, ideally after a meal.
• 19:01
  Philip Pape: That's where I would place it if you have a choice, because that will help with blood sugar, insulin sensitivity, digestion and it just feels good Usually after you eat.
• 19:11
  Philip Pape: It kind of helps settle down your stomach, gets the blood flowing and all that.
• 19:14
  Philip Pape: But wherever you can add, it is what matters.
• 19:16
  Philip Pape: So add a thousand steps this week and keep doing that each week until you consistently do it as a habit and reach your target, which I would aim for eight to 10,000, or, if you're bold, go for 12,000.
• 19:27
  Philip Pape: All right, so this could be taking a 10-minute walk after meals, like I mentioned, or having walking meetings where you're pacing around on your Zoom calls, parking further away from stores, using the stairs.
• 19:42
  Philip Pape: When I go to any place with a parking lot.
• 19:43
  Philip Pape: Now it's awesome because my goal is to park in the farthest spot I can possibly find, unless it's in like a massive Walmart or something where I have to walk.
• 19:47
  Philip Pape: You know half a mile and there's a time constraint or something to my shopping.
• 19:51
  Philip Pape: But you give yourself some time.
• 19:52
  Philip Pape: I try to park far away.
• 19:54
  Philip Pape: Guess what happens Nobody else is trying to get that spot.
• 19:56
  Philip Pape: Your car is nice and safe.
• 19:57
  Philip Pape: You get the steps.
• 19:59
  Philip Pape: It's great, all right.
• 20:00
  Philip Pape: So the key here is just making it feel effortless and natural and just part of what you do Not like.
• 20:06
  Philip Pape: Oh, I had to get a walk-in, or I feel like I'm forced to get a walk-in.
• 20:09
  Philip Pape: All right, nutrition that's a whole separate topic that I cover many times on this podcast, but I would focus first on just hitting your protein target.
• 20:17
  Philip Pape: Use a tracking app, and I'm going to, of course, suggest MacroFactor, because it's the only app that, once you track your food and weight, it can calculate your metabolism and if it knows your metabolism, it knows the targets it needs to give you for your calories and macros to get to whatever goal you have.
• 20:36
  Philip Pape: But just start tracking, eat at maintenance and ensure that you're actually getting enough protein.
• 20:42
  Philip Pape: People overestimate their intake big time.
• 20:46
  Philip Pape: And then, after protein, I would shift toward more whole foods, with an emphasis on fiber, not being restrictive, but adding in the things that taste great, that satisfy your needs, that give you nutrition, that give you protein.
• 21:00
  Philip Pape: We're talking lean meats, vegetables, fruits.
• 21:04
  Philip Pape: I love fruit.
• 21:05
  Philip Pape: If you can't think of what to eat for lunch and you haven't meal prepped, just think of a meat and a fruit, because to me that's super convenient.
• 21:11
  Philip Pape: A meat maybe you've meal prepped it or maybe you've got some leftovers.
• 21:14
  Philip Pape: If you don't, that's a good place to prep on the weekend, cook a whole casserole of chicken thighs, for example, and then fruit is usually just, you pull it right out of the fridge or right off the counter, the fridge or right off the counter.
• 21:27
  Philip Pape: And that's why I suggest that as a very sustainable first step.
• 21:29
  Philip Pape: And fruit people underestimate how nutritious it is.
• 21:30
  Philip Pape: It's so tasty, it kind of covers your carbs and your fiber altogether.
• 21:35
  Philip Pape: Sure, it has some calories, but it's so many fewer calories than you think given the volume, right, obviously, greens like broccoli are going to have almost no calories.
• 21:44
  Philip Pape: But it's not all about calories, right, it's also about the fiber and the taste and you need some carbs and so on.
• 21:49
  Philip Pape: So protein, then fiber, you know whole foods, and then you're still going to enjoy some of the foods you love anyway as part of that process.
• 21:57
  Philip Pape: But now your body is going to be burning, you know, more like a furnace when it comes to digesting all of that food.
• 22:03
  Philip Pape: And you're just optimizing your pattern slowly over time, all of that food, and you're just optimizing your pattern slowly over time.
• 22:09
  Philip Pape: So that's for nutrition, for the active lifestyle.
• 22:13
  Philip Pape: Find something you really enjoy to do.
• 22:14
  Philip Pape: Maybe it's throwing a frisbee with your kids, maybe it's doing some yard work.
• 22:16
  Philip Pape: Let me tell you something my wife has taught me.
• 22:17
  Philip Pape: Okay, I used to hate doing the lawn.
• 22:19
  Philip Pape: We have a huge yard.
• 22:21
  Philip Pape: Now it's like an acre and a half.
• 22:22
  Philip Pape: We have a mowing tractor.
• 22:24
  Philip Pape: I still, in the back of my head, think, oh, I have to mow the lawn.
• 22:27
  Philip Pape: Now my wife loves it.
• 22:28
  Philip Pape: She just loves being outside in general and doing anything outside, including yard work.
• 22:32
  Philip Pape: She sometimes mows the lawn, so thank her for that.
• 22:35
  Philip Pape: We have an equal opportunity household.
• 22:36
  Philip Pape: I would say it's 50% of the time I mow the lawn, but she's taught me Now, granted, that's a lawn tractor.
• 22:42
  Philip Pape: So this is actually a terrible example.
• 22:43
  Philip Pape: I just realized a lawn tractor.
• 22:44
  Philip Pape: So this is actually a terrible example.
• 22:45
  Philip Pape: I just realized.
• 22:46
  Philip Pape: But after doing that, I'll go do some weed whacking, some cleanup of the weeds, you know anything to just use my hands.
• 22:57
  Philip Pape: Take pride in my house and I don't outsource any of that stuff.
• 23:01
  Philip Pape: The only thing we outsource is plowing the driveway because it's like 300 feet long in the middle of winter in New England.
• 23:06
  Philip Pape: I'm not going to do that when I've got to get to work, anyway.
• 23:10
  Philip Pape: So I don't know if I'm like helping my case or hurting my case.
• 23:12
  Philip Pape: Find a thing that you enjoy doing.
• 23:14
  Philip Pape: Maybe you don't enjoy doing yard work, maybe you want to take a dance class, dance with the kids.
• 23:18
  Philip Pape: Whatever, the goal is to move more without it feeling like exercise.
• 23:22
  Philip Pape: Okay.
• 23:23
  Philip Pape: So, hey guys, this is me being real.
• 23:24
  Philip Pape: I'm not even going to edit any of that stuff out.
• 23:26
  Philip Pape: Take with it what you will.
• 23:27
  Philip Pape: All right.
• 23:28
  Philip Pape: Now here's something that most people miss.
• 23:31
  Philip Pape: When it comes to enhancing your metabolism, it's not just about stacking up ways to burn calories.
• 23:37
  Philip Pape: It's doing things that support your physical health, your function, your longevity, and allowing those things to then drive you to do the other things that also support that and create this compounding effect, not just a habit.
• 23:52
  Philip Pape: Compounding effect like one thing leads to better outcomes over the long term.
• 23:57
  Philip Pape: It's that one activity like lifting weights leads to wanting to move more, leads to wanting to eat better, leads to wanting to sleep more, and so on and so forth, and it starts to add up and create a compounding effect.
• 24:10
  Philip Pape: I've mentioned the term upward spiraling from positive psychology.
• 24:15
  Philip Pape: Once you do one positive thing, it leads to another, to another, to another, and they just start to stack on top of each other.
• 24:20
  Philip Pape: Right?
• 24:21
  Philip Pape: So you think about, for example, when you build muscle, you're not just burning calories in the gym.
• 24:27
  Philip Pape: You're also burning calories when you're at rest.
• 24:29
  Philip Pape: You're also increasing your organ size.
• 24:32
  Philip Pape: So that's even yet another way to think about the compounding effect is that there's a cascade even in your body.
• 24:37
  Philip Pape: Your body's like okay, I see what you're doing here.
• 24:40
  Philip Pape: You're active, you need to move heavy things, you need to load your body, I need to adapt.
• 24:45
  Philip Pape: I as in like anthropomorphizing my own internal body's monologue.
• 24:49
  Philip Pape: I need to optimize everything cognitively.
• 24:52
  Philip Pape: You know the neural connections, the muscle tissue and the sarcomeres, the way I utilize nutrients and you become this like machine with a huge engine burning, burning lots of calories.
• 25:03
  Philip Pape: And again, it's not just about that, but hey, take the bonus along for.
• 25:05
  Philip Pape: And again, it's not just about that, but hey, take the bonus along for the ride for doing all these wonderful things that are great for you anyway.
• 25:13
  Philip Pape: Right, when you increase your neat, when you walk more, when you get up off the chair, you then improve your cardiovascular fitness.
• 25:20
  Philip Pape: And, by the way, studies now have confirmed that the amount of cardio is more important than the type Meaning.
• 25:26
  Philip Pape: If you just walk a lot and it's equivalent to running the same amount, you're pretty much going to get a similar cardiovascular improvement, with the exception of the optimal end of that.
• 25:37
  Philip Pape: In other words, if you're trying to go at maximum VO2 and maximum conditioning and endurance sports, okay, you should probably add in training for those.
• 25:46
  Philip Pape: But if you just want general fitness, that's like as good as it needs to be to thrive for the rest of your life and be sustainable.
• 25:52
  Philip Pape: Walking can do it.
• 25:54
  Philip Pape: Believe it or not, now, many of us get into that.
• 25:56
  Philip Pape: We're like okay, now what do I do?
• 25:57
  Philip Pape: I'm going to throw on a rucksack, I'm going to go on an incline.
• 26:00
  Philip Pape: Maybe I'm going to throw in some prowler pushes.
• 26:01
  Philip Pape: Maybe I do want to do some sprinting, maybe I want to do this sport over here.
• 26:05
  Philip Pape: And you start to get more athletic, anyway, hopefully.
• 26:08
  Philip Pape: Some of us, though don't Some of us just like to lift.
• 26:10
  Philip Pape: We get off our butt, we walk around, we're just generally active.
• 26:13
  Philip Pape: We do things outside, we do things with our hands, we go help somebody move into their new house and we're just a more active person.
• 26:19
  Philip Pape: And then people are not having to take care of us when we're in our 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s In fact, we might be taking care of them because we can, because we're capable.
• 26:28
  Philip Pape: So when you optimize all these things, other things improve when you optimize your nutrition.
• 26:33
  Philip Pape: You improve your ability to train, to perform, to recover, and, yes, that includes potentially increasing your carbs.
• 26:40
  Philip Pape: All right, I saved it for deep into the episode because then I know all the YouTube trolls will never hear it.
• 26:46
  Philip Pape: All of these things create an upward spiral where each improvement enhances the other.
• 26:51
  Philip Pape: Now, the opposite of that would be crash diets, extreme exercise programs right, which are short, quick fixes, where you punish yourself, you berate yourself, you get a short-term result that you think is what you want and it ends up not being and it has no long-term impact whatsoever, makes you miserable and it trashes your mental state.
• 27:11
  Philip Pape: That's not what we want.
• 27:12
  Philip Pape: So the key to making all this work is sustainability.
• 27:16
  Philip Pape: I think that is one of the most important terms that we use on this podcast and in this philosophy is getting it to work for you and it's part of your life.
• 27:26
  Philip Pape: Don't try to implement everything at once right.
• 27:27
  Philip Pape: Start with one thing.
• 27:28
  Philip Pape: Maybe you increase your daily steps, maybe you start training right With a new training program and then, once that becomes ingrained, a habit, a system, you start to add other elements in right.
• 27:40
  Philip Pape: So not quick fixes, not extreme measures, but building and stacking a running, burning metabolism that also supports your goals long-term, and your body's incredibly adaptive.
• 27:51
  Philip Pape: It's incredibly adaptive.
• 27:53
  Philip Pape: So give it the stimulus, that positive stimulus that it needs.
• 27:57
  Philip Pape: Give it to it consistently and it will respond and do the work for you.
• 28:00
  Philip Pape: And then, guess what?
• 28:01
  Philip Pape: You can eat more food.
• 28:02
  Philip Pape: Hey, you're like what does this all mean?
• 28:04
  Philip Pape: I can eat more food.
• 28:05
  Philip Pape: Yes, absolutely All right.
• 28:07
  Philip Pape: So if today's episode resonated with you and you want to discuss these metabolism boosting strategies with other people who are implementing them, join our free Wits and Weights Facebook group super supportive community where we dive deeper into topics like this.
• 28:22
  Philip Pape: We share our experiences.
• 28:24
  Philip Pape: We help each other succeed.
• 28:25
  Philip Pape: I do a bi-weekly live on fridays answering your questions.
• 28:28
  Philip Pape: So much good stuff in there.
• 28:30
  Philip Pape: Just search wits and weights on facebook or click the link in the show notes to join the group and I will approve you.
• 28:37
  Philip Pape: Until next time, keep using your wits lifting those weights and remember your metabolism is dynamic and you can train it to work for you, not against you.
• 28:46
  Philip Pape: Talk to you time here on the Wits and Weights Podcast.