Latest / Wits & Weights | Strength & Fat Loss Over 40 / My Escape from Low-Carb Diets to More Energy, Muscle, and Fat Loss | Ep 322

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My Escape from Low-Carb Diets to More Energy, Muscle, and Fat Loss | Ep 322 · Wits & Weights | Strength & Fat Loss Over 40

• 0:01
  Philip Pape: If you feel like you are stuck eating low carb, even though you know deep down, carbs might not be evil, this episode is for you.
• 0:08
  Philip Pape: Today, I'm sharing my personal journey from strict keto and paleo to eating hundreds of grams of carbs daily.
• 0:15
  Philip Pape: You'll learn exactly how I overcame the biggest obstacle to change, which wasn't information.
• 0:20
  Philip Pape: It was really about my identity.
• 0:22
  Philip Pape: I'll reveal the physical changes I experienced as I reintroduced carbs, the mental obstacles I had to overcome and the practical strategies that finally helped me break free, so you can do the same.
• 0:34
  Philip Pape: Welcome to Wits and Weights, the show that helps you build a strong, healthy physique using evidence, engineering and efficiency.
• 0:47
  Philip Pape: I'm your host, philip Pape, and today's episode's a bit different because I am actually interviewing myself, which I'm always hesitant to do in terms of sharing my personal journey.
• 0:58
  Philip Pape: But people are always asking and I think it's important to understand that we all struggle with the same things, just in different ways.
• 1:05
  Philip Pape: I personally used to have very strict diets.
• 1:09
  Philip Pape: I've done everything from SlimFast and Atkins way back in the day to strict keto, paleo, various low-carb diets and even other weird diets that are probably outside the scope of today's episode, and today I eat easily over 300 grams of carbs every day, with better performance, with more muscle, with zero guilt.
• 1:28
  Philip Pape: I love to eat food now and I can enjoy it and make progress, and I've worked with hundreds of clients who are able to do the same, some of whom were very, very hesitant to introduce carbs, some of who even introduced more carbs and said whoa, what is going on with you?
• 1:45
  Philip Pape: On with bloating or quick weight gain, or things that are explainable but very frustrating and hard to wrap your head around until you understand how carbs work in those transition periods, and I want to try to touch on those different things today.
• 1:57
  Philip Pape: But what I did is I posted in our Facebook community, which is free.
• 2:02
  Philip Pape: You guys can join it, use the link to join anytime.
• 2:04
  Philip Pape: And I asked you all hey, what would you ask me?
• 2:07
  Philip Pape: Facebook community, which is free.
• 2:08
  Philip Pape: You guys can join it, use the link to join anytime.
• 2:09
  Philip Pape: And I asked you all hey, what would you ask me if this was an interview about that topic?
• 2:12
  Philip Pape: And you sent me a ton of questions and effectively going to ask myself those questions today and answer them more or less off the cuff, as if it was an interview.
• 2:17
  Philip Pape: I would be remiss if I didn't say this episode wasn't inspired by one person in particular and that was a listener, alex B, who asked a really insightful question that resonated with me and I actually sat on it for a few months before I recorded this episode, because it sounded like a heavy topic for me to tackle and she wrote about struggling to bridge that gap between knowing the science behind carbs right, many of you know the science, or you've heard the show and you know it.
• 2:45
  Philip Pape: Many of you don't.
• 2:45
  Philip Pape: You're new to the show, or you're new to evidence-based nutrition and maybe still think there's a problem with carbs they're evil, they make you get fat, whatever and kind of having that knowledge, but then still finding it difficult to break your old habits or let yourself give into it and experiment with these because of these old habits, whether it's keto, paleo or something else and honestly, this could apply to any restrictive diet carnivore, veganism, vegetarianism, whatever that you've imposed on yourself because you think it's the right thing to do from a health perspective Not from a values-based perspective that's a different topic but just from a health perspective because of what you've heard or read.
• 3:23
  Philip Pape: Or maybe you've gotten some short-term results or others have gotten some of those results, and so today isn't about spewing more information at you.
• 3:31
  Philip Pape: I have plenty of shows that do that.
• 3:33
  Philip Pape: It's actually about how you change your behavior despite the fear, despite the identity you've built, despite years of conditioning.
• 3:43
  Philip Pape: Sometimes we condition ourselves, sometimes our upbringing and society and the content we consume has conditioned us, and so that's what we're going to do today.
• 3:55
  Philip Pape: Right, and again, I reached out to our Facebook group and they sent me some fantastic questions.
• 3:57
  Philip Pape: We're going to cover those.
• 3:58
  Philip Pape: So, before we get into it, if you enjoy the show in general, if you want to connect with people who like these sorts of topics and really to dig in and understand their identity, who want to know what works for them, who want to personalize in and not just be given macros or templates, that's what we do in our community.
• 4:15
  Philip Pape: It's a free community.
• 4:16
  Philip Pape: It's called Wits and Weights.
• 4:17
  Philip Pape: In Facebook I will give you the link to click in the show notes, and that is a place where we have these conversations.
• 4:23
  Philip Pape: We support each other through our transitions of nutrition experience right, we share our wins, we get our questions answered, we deal with some tough, vulnerable topics as well and in a I hate to use the word safe space, but effectively it's a nonjudgmental place where you know anybody who's negative and doesn't need to be, generally gets the boot.
• 4:44
  Philip Pape: So if you're looking for a supportive place, that's it.
• 4:46
  Philip Pape: If you want to get away from the politics and the negativity, that's where it happens and that's where this stuff came from for today's episode.
• 4:53
  Philip Pape: So just head to Facebook and search for Wits and Weights, or just click the link in the show notes request to join, and I'd love to see you in there.
• 5:00
  Philip Pape: All right, so we're going to start with the origin story.
• 5:03
  Philip Pape: Right?
• 5:03
  Philip Pape: Every hero's journey and I'm not calling myself a hero, I just love the idea of the hero's journey from, for example, star Wars or really any great story arc starts with the origin story.
• 5:14
  Philip Pape: What first attracted me to low carb diets and there are a lot of them out there.
• 5:20
  Philip Pape: When we say low carb, what do we mean?
• 5:21
  Philip Pape: We mean that control for calories, or maybe maybe sometimes you have no idea what the calories are.
• 5:26
  Philip Pape: You're trying to reduce the amount of carbs you eat and increase your protein and or fats.
• 5:33
  Philip Pape: Right, the three macros carbs, protein, fats was throw it on the wall and see what sticks and see if it works.
• 5:49
  Philip Pape: Based on the content I was consuming, which tended to be in the early days, you know, diet books from Barnes and Noble or random forums on the internet, maybe some influencers here and there, although I was never really into social media, so that wasn't a thing for me.
• 6:01
  Philip Pape: You know, five, 10 years ago we're talking, we're talking from the early two thousands to like the late 20 teens, and I also I never really had a concrete goal, other than I'm unhappy with my body.
• 6:13
  Philip Pape: I'm a little bit fluffy at times or skinny, fat, frumpy.
• 6:17
  Philip Pape: Didn't like how I looked in, you know, at the pool without my shirt on and I just had a bunch of insecurities around that, and so I would primarily be focused on losing weight.
• 6:27
  Philip Pape: Let's just put it that way.
• 6:28
  Philip Pape: Like many of us are, I didn't think about energy, health, any of that, especially when I was younger and so in the early 2000s, the first diet experience I could remember is during college, on my internship.
• 6:40
  Philip Pape: This is around the year 2000.
• 6:41
  Philip Pape: I was, I believe now in hindsight, emotionally eating due to some things that happened that I'm not going to go into details on some personal relationship things that happened at a young age, and I wouldn't say I was depressed, but I was definitely finding comfort in food and it would be things that had a lot of calories, like uh, you guys know friendlies there.
• 7:03
  Philip Pape: They started up here in Massachusetts, I'm in Connecticut, and they have these, um, ice cream Sundays.
• 7:07
  Philip Pape: Right, I love ice cream still to this day and I now I still enjoy ice cream.
• 7:10
  Philip Pape: But I would get these massive Reese's peanut butter cup Sunday things, which you look at the calories Now, they're probably like 1500 calories and I would have that just about every day.
• 7:18
  Philip Pape: I like I'll put it this way, I couldn't help myself, right?
• 7:21
  Philip Pape: You guys know that experience and I gained a lot of weight, let's just put it that way.
• 7:24
  Philip Pape: I went from about averaging 165 at 5'9 to about 210 pounds.
• 7:30
  Philip Pape: Okay, totally unchecked, no training, no exercise, none of that.
• 7:33
  Philip Pape: And a lot of the gurus I had been following at the time were around the Atkins community, and so when I got back to college for my junior year, I said I'm going to do this thing and I out all fruit, vegetables, anything that was a carb.
• 7:47
  Philip Pape: I basically ate meat without a bun and, oh man, I can't even remember it was like literally just meat.
• 7:55
  Philip Pape: Okay, it almost reminds me of carnivore.
• 7:57
  Philip Pape: And what would happen is I started to lose a lot of weight.
• 8:00
  Philip Pape: Of course you do, because what happens when you cut out carbs.
• 8:02
  Philip Pape: What happens when you cut out most processed foods, you lose a lot of water weight because of the carbs, but you also cut your calories significantly and so I lost a lot of weight, but I also had some very unpleasant digestive side effects, let's just say.
• 8:16
  Philip Pape: And the other thing is, when you have a higher fat diet, we do know that it can help with satiety, even though today I recommend using protein and fiber for satiety.
• 8:26
  Philip Pape: That is fullness.
• 8:27
  Philip Pape: We do know from the keto community, for example in carnivore, that fat can be satiating as well, and so I was able to go through my day not feeling too hungry, suppress my appetite, I had a lot of water, weight loss, a lot of scale drops due to the lack of calories and, you know, I gradually brought it down to where my scale weight was maybe in the 170s again and I definitely felt better about myself, finding that something could work and I knew something was behind it.
• 8:53
  Philip Pape: But I never.
• 8:54
  Philip Pape: I didn't know calories, I didn't know macros, I didn't know any of that stuff back then.
• 8:56
  Philip Pape: And also, um, the other thing that comes to mind is how we defined the carb.
• 9:01
  Philip Pape: So back then, to me any carb was bad right, like carb equated to sugar, equated to bad, equated to, that's how you get fat.
• 9:08
  Philip Pape: I believed it to the extent that I didn't even know about calories or energy.
• 9:13
  Philip Pape: Right Now we're much more educated on that, given social media, and people will still say, oh no, it's not about energy balance, it's about the types of calories or it's about carbs specifically, regardless of energy balance, and that's just false.
• 9:25
  Philip Pape: Like we know, energy balance is behind whether you gain or lose weight.
• 9:28
  Philip Pape: Macros and nutrients come into play with a lot of other factors like body composition, energy, digestive health, all the other things, right.
• 9:36
  Philip Pape: So that was my first foray into low carbs.
• 9:40
  Philip Pape: I didn't know why it worked, I just know it worked and I probably sustained that for a couple of years and then I realized I didn't like to eat just hamburger patties right, and I'm kind of oversimplifying, but effectively was that simplistic of a diet, which means it was that highly restrictive of a diet.
• 9:54
  Philip Pape: Going into my twenties and even thirties, new diets started to pop up.
• 10:00
  Philip Pape: Okay, and I want to say, for about a five to 10 year period, I didn't even diet at all, I just ate whatever.
• 10:04
  Philip Pape: And I gained a bunch of weight.
• 10:06
  Philip Pape: And this was into when I got married in the mid, that was 2006.
• 10:17
  Philip Pape: And then around 2000, I want to say eight, nine I discovered paleo.
• 10:21
  Philip Pape: I think that was around the time I discovered primal paleo and I just jumped in whole hog into that world, the idea of ancestral health, of, okay, well, our ancestors didn't have access to grains or dairy, so of course they couldn't eat those things they also ate.
• 10:32
  Philip Pape: They were opportunists.
• 10:33
  Philip Pape: So they hunted and gathered and they they had this feast or famine approach and I basically went all in on no grains, no dairy, which basically means little to no carbs.
• 10:42
  Philip Pape: Because, yeah, you can can quote, unquote eat fruit, but I didn't eat a lot of fruit or veggies at the time.
• 10:50
  Philip Pape: I was very picky, see, that's the other part of this but I did, I did that's what they say I did paleo and I did that for probably five to 10 years and that was the most dogmatic, I'll say religious zealotry that I got into when it came to a diet.
• 11:04
  Philip Pape: I had probably like 20 books on paleo.
• 11:06
  Philip Pape: I had all these recipe books and I have to say you can make a lot of great meals when you're thinking paleo, because it's a lot of meat and vegetables.
• 11:12
  Philip Pape: During that time my wife helped me get past my pickiness when it came to vegetables, let's say, and that's a whole other story, but it was helpful that I was incorporating those and I was eating a lot of whole foods and it was.
• 11:29
  Philip Pape: There was a lot of things I was adding in as a result of payload.
• 11:30
  Philip Pape: That, I would say, is a good thing.
• 11:31
  Philip Pape: I would say it's a good thing that is lean meats and vegetables and fruits, you know, whole foods uh, eggs, I believe, but I wasn't eating dairy and I wasn't eating actually I forget about eggs, but I know it wasn't eating any grains whatsoever which, in my mind, was carbs.
• 11:44
  Philip Pape: And I want to take a little side tangent here, because carbs are highly misused as a term.
• 11:56
  Philip Pape: Carbohydrates are found in apples and they're also found in Snickers, but you know, what else is found in Snickers Is lots of fat and sugar.
• 12:03
  Philip Pape: Now, you could say, well, sugar is a carb, yes, but lots and lots of added sugars in a form that has been engineered beautifully to look good, to taste good, to have a multi-sensory, time-based, almost orgasmic experience when you eat it.
• 12:20
  Philip Pape: And I'm serious, you guys know what I'm talking about.
• 12:22
  Philip Pape: Pick your most favorite delicious, indulgent thing, I don't care how processed it is.
• 12:28
  Philip Pape: Okay.
• 12:28
  Philip Pape: I use Snickers as an example, because of the way it's designed.
• 12:31
  Philip Pape: The way it's designed with layers of chocolate and caramel and peanuts nugget I don't even know that's in there, maybe not, but different layers to and it's pre-processed.
• 12:39
  Philip Pape: Now, this is the disgusting thing about a lot of ultra-processed foods is they're effectively ground up ingredients that are smushed together in an engineered way to be highly palatable, delicious and easily consumed, and then you're still hungry and you want to eat more, and hence the slogan you can't have just one.
• 12:55
  Philip Pape: So when you think of carbs, do you think of pizza and ice cream and donuts and Doritos, or do you think of oats and rice and apples and potatoes?
• 13:06
  Philip Pape: Big difference, right?
• 13:08
  Philip Pape: However, the anti-carb groupthink lumps them all together, and when people say I cut carbs, I'm like what do you mean?
• 13:15
  Philip Pape: So I want you to ask yourself that question what do you mean?
• 13:17
  Philip Pape: So for me, they were all poison, they were all lumped together, they were all like sugar in my mind, including fruits, and we know that's not the case today.
• 13:24
  Philip Pape: So I did that and at the same time, I started CrossFit.
• 13:27
  Philip Pape: I've talked about CrossFit before early on in one of my earliest podcasts.
• 13:29
  Philip Pape: I did that for about eight years, from like 2010 to 2018.
• 13:33
  Philip Pape: And throughout that, most of that time, I also stuck with some version of paleo or low carb, eventually getting more into the keto side of things, which there's not a lot of differences, I'll be honest.
• 13:45
  Philip Pape: It's basically a high fat approach that didn't really account for protein or calories.
• 13:51
  Philip Pape: It was just what can't you eat, what can you not eat, what do you have to cut out?
• 13:54
  Philip Pape: And so I, and throughout this whole time I more or less maintained my weight, but I was also doing CrossFit and a lot of cardio and I was kind of stressed out from the workouts a bit, didn't really look forward to them usually and it didn't do anything for my physique at all.
• 14:07
  Philip Pape: Right, like I could lift.
• 14:08
  Philip Pape: When I started, I probably could squat, you know, 95 pounds or something small like that.
• 14:13
  Philip Pape: And then by the time I was quote unquote done with CrossFit, I was only up to 225 on my squat.
• 14:18
  Philip Pape: That.
• 14:18
  Philip Pape: And then by the time I was quote unquote done with CrossFit, I was only up to 225 on my squat.
• 14:20
  Philip Pape: And I hear stories like this all the time Unless you focus on strength, you're not going to get it up.
• 14:22
  Philip Pape: You know, currently my squat is over 300.
• 14:25
  Philip Pape: My deadlift is over 400.
• 14:26
  Philip Pape: My bench is well over 200, right, just the numbers you would expect from even average strength for somebody who's doing strength training, and I wish I started earlier, but I didn't.
• 14:34
  Philip Pape: But that's a whole different thing.
• 14:36
  Philip Pape: When we talk about training, however, it's important because I wasn't training the right way and therefore I wasn't thinking of eating to train the right way, and I never knew that carbs could be beneficial, nor was I training in a way where they were going to be that beneficial, if that makes sense.
• 14:50
  Philip Pape: In other words, the vast majority of the population is either sedentary or they're active, but not in a purposeful way, such that they're not utilizing carbs in the way that carbs can be highly effective, which we're going to get into in this episode and why I wanted to do this.
• 15:04
  Philip Pape: So that brings me to the next part of the story, which is the breaking point, and here's my first question from a listener, where Tony asked, after essentially being anti-carb, what cracked that shell?
• 15:17
  Philip Pape: So in late 2019, I would say the breaking point is ironic.
• 15:25
  Philip Pape: And it's ironic because it happened around Halloween, which is around the same time as my birthday, and I decided yet again to go cold turkey from carbs, and I did it by avoiding the candy drawer.
• 15:37
  Philip Pape: So I had gotten into a habit of I don't want to say sneaking, but those of us who understand emotional eating, you do it in a way that you feel guilty, right, you feel like I know I shouldn't be doing this, but I'm going to do it anyway.
• 15:50
  Philip Pape: I can help myself F it, I'm already doing it.
• 15:53
  Philip Pape: And then each day it's like you think you're going to reset and you don't right.
• 15:57
  Philip Pape: Can you relate?
• 15:57
  Philip Pape: So for me it was all sorts of snacks, but especially candy, which you know people say that's like eating like a kid.
• 16:04
  Philip Pape: Well, yeah, a lot of us.
• 16:05
  Philip Pape: That's what we're doing, the way we eat, right.
• 16:07
  Philip Pape: So I would take the candy out of the candy drawer and of course that means I was deliberately going out and buying it to put there.
• 16:15
  Philip Pape: I didn't have the restraint like my wife did in terms of eating, just eating anything in moderation.
• 16:20
  Philip Pape: She's great at that, she's really good at that.
• 16:22
  Philip Pape: Just, I'll say, naturally she's always been that way and I'm not, so I can overeat.
• 16:26
  Philip Pape: And that Halloween slash birthday.
• 16:29
  Philip Pape: I said, okay, I'm done, I'm not going to have the candy for Halloween, I'm going to go cold turkey.
• 16:32
  Philip Pape: And I did that for about two or three months Again thinking I need to cut out carbs.
• 16:38
  Philip Pape: That is going to be the solution.
• 16:39
  Philip Pape: But oh, did I feel miserable, did I feel awful not being able to eat all the things during the holidays.
• 16:46
  Philip Pape: I didn't have energy, I didn't feel like doing my CrossFit, like the whole thing.
• 16:51
  Philip Pape: And so the turning point came and this is to answer Tony's question.
• 16:55
  Philip Pape: It took time, right, it wasn't like a black and white is, with the mental fatigue and the performance stalls and being unhappy about my body and the social rigidity and like all of this stuff.
• 17:04
  Philip Pape: I said, man, there's got to be something better, because I see people out there succeeding.
• 17:08
  Philip Pape: I even see guys in what was the CrossFit gym and now is more of a strength and conditioning gym with great physiques.
• 17:14
  Philip Pape: They seem energized, like maybe it's just genetics.
• 17:17
  Philip Pape: I had always thought that to that point, like it's just genetics.
• 17:20
  Philip Pape: So I asked my trainer again.
• 17:22
  Philip Pape: I've I've talked about this story before, so I'm not going to get too far into it, but I asked my trainer, andrew, like what do I need to do to get a better physique?
• 17:29
  Philip Pape: And kind of figure this out.
• 17:30
  Philip Pape: And that's when he turned me on to.
• 17:32
  Philip Pape: He's like you just need to lift for strength, big lifts, progress over time.
• 17:37
  Philip Pape: Let's forget all the wads, you know the workouts of the day, forget all the conditioning, just go for strength.
• 17:42
  Philip Pape: And that got me down the path of going to Google and YouTube and podcasts and learning about strength.
• 17:47
  Philip Pape: And it turned me on to guys like Eric Trexler and Annie Morgan with their muscle and strength pyramids, to starting strength, of course, and to that whole world, eventually into the nutrition side of it about a year after that, which I'm getting to.
• 17:59
  Philip Pape: So what shifted is I started to train for strength.
• 18:05
  Philip Pape: The pandemic hit.
• 18:05
  Philip Pape: That's kind of a almost an afterthought at this point, but it did cause me to have to build my home gym for the first time instead of go to the gym, which is cool because to this day, that's what I have.
• 18:15
  Philip Pape: I got a power rack, I got a bar, I got a plate it's all that fun stuff and started to train Squats, deadlifts, presses, overheads, just cranking the numbers up, and I heard that you had to eat a lot of food.
• 18:25
  Philip Pape: So I just said forget this low-carb stuff, forget any diet, I'm just going to try to gain weight.
• 18:31
  Philip Pape: It sounded really liberating actually to just gain weight and not care about it, because I thought, well, now, this is a purposeful gain, even though it was not done optimally by any stretch of the imagination.
• 18:42
  Philip Pape: So, yeah, a lot of whole milk in there.
• 18:45
  Philip Pape: I started consuming a lot more protein because that was part of it was oh, I actually need that much protein.
• 18:50
  Philip Pape: You guys know what I'm talking about.
• 18:52
  Philip Pape: You know that one gram per pound, or even 0.8 grams per pound, when you are not paying attention to your protein your whole life, you realize you are woefully under eating that stuff.
• 19:00
  Philip Pape: So, adding more protein, in adding more, I had more whole milk, more fat, more carbs, more everything, and I started to gain.
• 19:07
  Philip Pape: I started to gain, gain, gain started to grow, but my girth started to grow as well.
• 19:11
  Philip Pape: Okay, and I always tell this story on other podcasts but, like after, I gained a bunch of strength and muscle during that first newbie phase of about a year.
• 19:22
  Philip Pape: That's when I realized well, now I really need to understand even more about nutrition, because there's got to be a way to lean out.
• 19:26
  Philip Pape: And that's where I learned about macros, flexible dieting and the fact that we don't eat to lose weight.
• 19:34
  Philip Pape: We eat to support our energy, we eat to support our metabolism, we eat to perform, to feel great, to manipulate our physique, at times right To lift optimally in the gym all of that stuff.
• 19:48
  Philip Pape: And so again, shout out to you, tony, because you were there from early on when I got into the coaching side of things and to this day, push me and also and you will admit this are one of the people who are a little bit afraid of carbs yourself, and it took a while even to convince you right that they would be helpful.
• 20:06
  Philip Pape: You had to experiment with it back off a bit and then experiment again back off until you realize wait a minute, when I have more carbs I tend to perform better.
• 20:14
  Philip Pape: They're the body's preferred fuel under load.
• 20:18
  Philip Pape: They're the body's stress reliever.
• 20:20
  Philip Pape: They provide you the glycogen you need.
• 20:22
  Philip Pape: They are anti-catabolic, they prevent the breakdown of muscle tissue All the wonderful benefits of carbs that I've talked about on multiple episodes.
• 20:29
  Philip Pape: Just go search my podcast feed for carbs and, like once I realized that I could eat and lose weight on the scale, which I still was fixated on early on.
• 20:40
  Philip Pape: I didn't quite understand fat loss versus weight loss and body composition.
• 20:43
  Philip Pape: It wasn't until I read a book by Elaine Norton I think it's called Fat Loss Forever where I learned all about body fat overshooting.
• 20:49
  Philip Pape: You looked at the studies about the biggest loser, all of it started to come together.
• 20:53
  Philip Pape: I said, oh wow.
• 20:54
  Philip Pape: So now that I'm strength training and focused on muscle and strength, now that I'm eating for fuel and for how I feel and perform, and now that I know calories are the dial to gain and lose weight, it all came together.
• 21:09
  Philip Pape: Keep the protein high, manipulate the carbs lower, because carbs do get pretty low depending on your calories and fat loss and that is how I could get the physique that I want and I started to improve.
• 21:26
  Philip Pape: I'll say quickly but don't be misled that you can totally change your whole transformation in six months.
• 21:32
  Philip Pape: It doesn't work that way.
• 21:33
  Philip Pape: It does take time.
• 21:34
  Philip Pape: I would say your first year, though, you're going to see a meaningful change, but then the real like kind of looking a little bit jacked or having that six pack, whatever that starts to happen more in the years two and three, like just to be realistic, unless you already have a good starting point or you have a history of this.
• 21:48
  Philip Pape: You know you're pretty lean, whatever, so kind of answer the question.
• 21:52
  Philip Pape: The aha moment took me a year and a half to realize that carbs were just a great tool and they were useful and they were helpful, and it took me like two or three more years of doing this podcast, researching and coaching clients, to be able to express that right, to be able to talk about it in a way that made sense.
• 22:11
  Philip Pape: So that's why a lot of you are listening and I wanted to do this podcast, because it's not necessarily easily accepted by society or even by you listening right, and I'm not here to convince you, I'm just trying to hear it tell my story.
• 22:24
  Philip Pape: So then this brings me to the next part of the story, where I'm going to answer Alex's original question to me, and she said hi, you've mentioned our previous, or your previous keto paleo adherence and how you've since learned better and, more importantly, done better.
• 22:38
  Philip Pape: My question is how you bridge the gap between knowledge and implementation.
• 22:41
  Philip Pape: I'm someone who knows the science behind carbs, but I still really struggle to break my old keto paleo habits and include anything more than non-starchy vegetables and a little fruit.
• 22:52
  Philip Pape: So there's a lot in that question, alex, and this is why I wanted to talk to you and everyone today, and I kind of answered it somewhat already.
• 23:02
  Philip Pape: But I would say first of all, the habits that were hardest to break were thinking of food with like a moral judgment that anytime I saw anything with carbs that was a no-no right, that I had to avoid it.
• 23:15
  Philip Pape: And so I think the biggest game changer for me and this helps a lot of people that I work with is the idea of additive nutrition, of adding in the things you need along with the things you want.
• 23:28
  Philip Pape: So both In other words, being intentional In the past and many of you listening you're not intentional about it, and by intentional I don't mean you're intentional about cutting out a bunch of foods.
• 23:37
  Philip Pape: No, I mean you're intentional about it.
• 23:38
  Philip Pape: And by intentional I don't mean you just you're intentional about cutting out a bunch of foods.
• 23:40
  Philip Pape: No, I mean you're intentional about why you eat what you eat and including those in, and so for me that was okay.
• 23:45
  Philip Pape: I know that I need to eat more carbs before and after I train, along with protein, because that's going to support my training.
• 23:52
  Philip Pape: I'm going to feel better.
• 23:53
  Philip Pape: I know it might help to have carbs at dinner because it's going to help me sleep better, and I know that I only need so much protein and fat, and if the rest of the calories come from carbs, then carbs may be a lot higher than I used to eat.
• 24:03
  Philip Pape: And now I have to find how to get them right, like it's those kinds of anchors, I would say.
• 24:09
  Philip Pape: And I still had anxiety around carbs for a while, I would say, because I had gained all that weight while lifting properly.
• 24:18
  Philip Pape: I was wondering how much of that was associated with carbs.
• 24:21
  Philip Pape: And I hear guys still on podcasts say well, you just got to cut out carbs, that's how you eat better.
• 24:25
  Philip Pape: And again, they're not talking about carbs, they're talking about carb, sugar, fat combinations, like processed foods, like pizza and whatnot, and but instead of thinking that I have to cut them out, I think what do I need to add in?
• 24:36
  Philip Pape: And then what's left?
• 24:41
  Philip Pape: And I can still enjoy other foods.
• 24:43
  Philip Pape: And so where I'm going with all this, alex, is you know you said it's hard for me to break my old habits, including anything more than non-starchy vegetables and little fruit.
• 24:48
  Philip Pape: I would reflect on your like, the psychological flexibility and your identity around that.
• 24:56
  Philip Pape: For example, what are you avoiding?
• 24:58
  Philip Pape: What are you avoiding and why?
• 25:00
  Philip Pape: So?
• 25:01
  Philip Pape: When I think about your struggle to break old habits, what comes to mind is things like habit loops.
• 25:09
  Philip Pape: I don't know if you're familiar with Atomic Habits by James Clear, but the reward, the trigger, reward type cues, the loop, the habit loops and instead of thinking of carbs as this generic blob of a thing out there, be intentional.
• 25:22
  Philip Pape: Ask yourself first, alex, what is it about keto and paleo that you are still sticking to?
• 25:28
  Philip Pape: Like, think about the habit that you are still doing Because you said you don't want to include more than non-starchy vegetables and a little fruit.
• 25:34
  Philip Pape: So like, excuse me, does that mean grains?
• 25:36
  Philip Pape: That you don't want to include grains for some reason?
• 25:38
  Philip Pape: And I had to break that loop when it came to paleo because I always thought grains.
• 25:44
  Philip Pape: And then I would tie it into this whole rationale or justification about how ancestors didn't have access to that.
• 25:47
  Philip Pape: And they have phytonutrients and they have anti-nutrients, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
• 25:50
  Philip Pape: And then I had to slowly learn about the science of carbohydrates and the fact that consuming grains is perfectly acceptable if you can tolerate it.
• 25:58
  Philip Pape: Some people can tolerate gluten, some can't, some people tolerate other grains, some can't, right, and that for me, when I consumed those things, I didn't seem to feel any worse, like didn't seem to affect my digestion, but it gave me an extra flexible source of energy that I needed for my goals.
• 26:14
  Philip Pape: So part of the cue or the trigger could be like not about eating more carbs, but you know I'm a person who values evidence-based training and sources of energy.
• 26:26
  Philip Pape: I know that carbs give me the glycogen I need to train really hard and rice is a great source of carbs.
• 26:34
  Philip Pape: I like rice, I like to prepare rice in this way and that way and therefore I'm going to include half a cup of rice with my next meal.
• 26:40
  Philip Pape: And again, I'm just kind of spitballing it here with you about how to approach this for you.
• 26:45
  Philip Pape: Like when I work with clients, alex, everybody's a little bit different and I know you and I talked about having accountability meal planning, meal prepping, pre-logging.
• 26:54
  Philip Pape: For some people it's just like doing it, just saying, okay, I'm going to plan these things into my diet and I'm going to give it a shot and see how I feel and then, if I notice that I actually feel better, that's a good reinforcement of that loop guilt.
• 27:19
  Philip Pape: Right now, you may feel guilty when you grab something else that's not on your list of approved things that you used to think were bad with keto, and it might require just adding one of those things in and seeing what happens and noticing that the sky doesn't fall and, if anything, you'll realize, ooh, I really enjoyed my food a little more because I had this extra ingredient.
• 27:34
  Philip Pape: Ooh, it gave me some more energy, you know, better sleep.
• 27:38
  Philip Pape: Some people report better hormones or less stress, like all of those things.
• 27:41
  Philip Pape: If you can lean into usually the non-scale victories they call them and tie them to these choices, you can gradually break the loops and build them in again.
• 27:50
  Philip Pape: Working with a coach can be helpful because they can be someone you fall back on and you can transfer some of that emotional stress over.
• 27:56
  Philip Pape: Um, and I love, I love to help people do that, because they might just not do it on their own and they need that push.
• 28:02
  Philip Pape: But I'm hopefully giving you that little bit of a push here and you could always jump into our Facebook group and just post your experience, say, look, I brought this up with Philip.
• 28:10
  Philip Pape: He had the podcast.
• 28:11
  Philip Pape: It wasn't a good enough answer, so I'm posting for you guys to help me out and be specific and we could do that.
• 28:17
  Philip Pape: So that's just kind of my thoughts on habits.
• 28:21
  Philip Pape: Right, like any habit, you're going to have to break it, but you break it in a positive way by adding in the thing you need and then tie it into a loop of a reward.
• 28:29
  Philip Pape: Which leads me to the next question, which is from Christy L, and she said what part of your identity or belief system did you have to confront or let go of when you shifted away from keto, and how did that affect your relationship with food and your body?
• 28:44
  Philip Pape: So the thing I didn't realize for years, christy, was that I basically had disordered eating, without admitting it or knowing it right.
• 28:52
  Philip Pape: It was disordered.
• 28:53
  Philip Pape: It wasn't to the point of like, like orthorexia is an obsession with clean food.
• 28:57
  Philip Pape: Obviously there are.
• 28:58
  Philip Pape: There's eating disorders, nothing like that, but more of a disordered eating of tying so much of who I was with what I ate.
• 29:06
  Philip Pape: And the irony, as you know, is I talk about this stuff all the time.
• 29:10
  Philip Pape: Now I talk about food all the time, I track my food and everything, and yet I feel free from food, if that makes sense.
• 29:16
  Philip Pape: In other words, I know the fact that I have dietary and psychological flexibility now is so empowering and it gives you this sense of confidence knowing that you can manipulate your health, your physique, your activity, your whatever, get a result you want and do it eating anything and I say anything with quotes because, again, this is not licensed to just literally eat anything whenever right.
• 29:42
  Philip Pape: It's in a controlled, structured way.
• 29:44
  Philip Pape: So again, your question what part of my identity or belief system that's part of it is the moral judgment on food, the disordered eating, the fact that there's a right, there are good and bad foods, the fact that science somehow supports that you can't eat a whole and bad foods, the fact that science somehow supports that you can't eat a whole class of foods, like to this day and you know this from Dustin's work as well.
• 30:06
  Philip Pape: He talks about it all the time.
• 30:07
  Philip Pape: It's like seed oils and artificial sweeteners.
• 30:10
  Philip Pape: There are so many boogeymen out there and the general default response I have to any of those, until proven otherwise, is no, the dosage makes it the poison and almost anything can be consumed in moderate amounts without any.
• 30:25
  Philip Pape: You know negative effects and therefore I don't worry about those.
• 30:29
  Philip Pape: What I do think about is how do I feel myself as an athlete?
• 30:33
  Philip Pape: So I guess my identity and my belief system was that I could even be an athlete, that I can perform and lift weights and, heck, look good.
• 30:42
  Philip Pape: I mean honestly, and I'm still working on it.
• 30:44
  Philip Pape: Like we all have insecurities, it's not really about that, so much as I see the result from it.
• 30:49
  Philip Pape: And once the food freedom kicked in and I was doing the right things, which is important, right, because some of us are not training the right way, or training at all, or training consistently, and that's a big piece of it.
• 31:00
  Philip Pape: Once I was doing that, it all started to click and then my relationship with food became very objective, I'll say like it's not emotional anymore, right, even hunger.
• 31:11
  Philip Pape: Now, when I experienced hunger and a fat loss phase, it's like an objective feeling of, okay, I understand what that is like physiologically, physically, psychologically.
• 31:18
  Philip Pape: I understand what it is now and it takes work to get there.
• 31:21
  Philip Pape: Right, it takes a lot of work for some of us, myself included, and this is what I work with clients every day, and I'm sure you've experienced that yourself.
• 31:27
  Philip Pape: And then it translates to your relationship with your body Because, let's be honest, when you actually get a result, when you start, when you're able to lose fat and build muscle and, like, improve your physique, your hormones, your metabolism, it gives you tons of confidence and it makes you walk upright, it makes you have less anxiety among people, let's say, if that's your thing, it makes you more confident to take action throughout other areas of your life, and all of that is tied up to our identity.
• 31:49
  Philip Pape: So that's kind of what comes to mind for me.
• 31:51
  Philip Pape: Hope it answers that question.
• 31:53
  Philip Pape: So shout out to you, christy, for that.
• 31:56
  Philip Pape: I think I addressed what you were asking.
• 31:57
  Philip Pape: And then, when we get to the practical side of things, I love these questions as because they're kind of easier for me to answer.
• 32:02
  Philip Pape: But Jimmy Q asked how many carbs did you go from and to?
• 32:08
  Philip Pape: So how many carbs did I go from and to, and was there an immediate weight gain, even if superficial, like water weight or glycogen?
• 32:14
  Philip Pape: Let's see.
• 32:15
  Philip Pape: He had other questions too how long did it take to regulate and get used to high carb?
• 32:18
  Philip Pape: How much more energy did you end up having at the gym, assuming you were strength training during both diets in similar fashion?
• 32:23
  Philip Pape: Good question, so.
• 32:25
  Philip Pape: The first one once I learned about macros and energy balance, it was actually pretty easy.
• 32:30
  Philip Pape: Number one anchor my protein.
• 32:32
  Philip Pape: Okay, 0.8 to one grams per pound.
• 32:34
  Philip Pape: Number two peg my fats at around 30% of calories, give or take 10%.
• 32:38
  Philip Pape: Number three the rest goes to carbs.
• 32:40
  Philip Pape: So by definition, you are now anchored by calories, protein and a little bit by fat.
• 32:46
  Philip Pape: I mean, the fat is flexible, right.
• 32:48
  Philip Pape: So you're kind of anchored by calories and protein, meaning trying to gain weight versus lose weight, you're going to have much different level of carbs or much different level of calories, but because the protein is anchored, the fats and the carbs are going to swing around a lot.
• 33:00
  Philip Pape: So, in actual numbers, if I'm at maintenance, eating, say, 2,800, or it depends on what my maintenance is at the time, but 2,600 to 3,000 calories, I'm still going to be eating 350 grams of carbs.
• 33:11
  Philip Pape: Maybe If I'm gaining, I'm going to eat a lot more than that.
• 33:14
  Philip Pape: So, like crazy amount, maybe 500.
• 33:16
  Philip Pape: And if I'm losing for me most of my diets I'm eating around 2,000 calories, maybe 1,800.
• 33:22
  Philip Pape: Then I'm down to like a couple hundred grams, maybe less, which, as you know, none of those are low carb.
• 33:28
  Philip Pape: Now, having said that just caveat I have plenty of clients who have much lower metabolisms.
• 33:33
  Philip Pape: They're smaller, or you know a petite female or somebody who just happens to burn fewer calories, and they might burn, let's say, 2,000 calories as their maintenance and when they go to a diet they're at like 1,400 calories.
• 33:45
  Philip Pape: Well, their carbs are now probably going to drop to 120 grams, 100 grams, maybe less than 100, maybe 80 grams, maybe even 60.
• 33:56
  Philip Pape: And then we get into what we think of as low carb or even VLC, very low carb or keto, right.
• 33:59
  Philip Pape: So it's going to depend on the calories and then the protein, where trade-offs can always be made, and that gets into the nuances we're not going to get into today.
• 34:08
  Philip Pape: Trade-offs can be made Now, the keto and carnivore worlds when they think of carbs, they think of just making it as low as possible because they care about being fat adapted and they care about ketosis and all of that, none of which matters, because the glycogen is the first source of energy your body's going to seek.
• 34:28
  Philip Pape: If it doesn't, it's going to go to fat.
• 34:29
  Philip Pape: At the end of the day, calories are calories, like, based on how much you consume and how much you burn.
• 34:34
  Philip Pape: You're going to store energy, whether it's consumed from glycogen, glucose or fat, right, and I've talked about that many times as well.
• 34:41
  Philip Pape: So the caveat is, if you've been low carb for a long time and I did the math recently if you've been like, say, 50 grams of carbs for the last two years, you know keto and all of a sudden you jump to 300 grams of carbs or 400 grams of carbs, right, and I don't recommend doing that overnight, you know.
• 34:57
  Philip Pape: Take take a week or two to do it regularly.
• 34:59
  Philip Pape: I mean incrementally.
• 35:00
  Philip Pape: When you make a jump like that, every gram of carbs results in almost a gram of glycogen stored in your liver and your muscles, which draws in about three to four grams of water.
• 35:13
  Philip Pape: So if you did the math, you could easily gain two to five pounds with a big jump in carbs just from water weight.
• 35:22
  Philip Pape: And that's like at almost like any body weight.
• 35:25
  Philip Pape: So a lighter person will see that as a massive weight change and get freaked out.
• 35:30
  Philip Pape: Conversely, when someone goes on keto and they had been consuming lots of carbs, whether it was on purpose or not, they'll say oh my God, I just lost five pounds in the first week.
• 35:38
  Philip Pape: Water weight, it's all water weight.
• 35:39
  Philip Pape: It's water weight Because the only way you lose fat is to be in an energy deficit, a true energy deficit.
• 35:46
  Philip Pape: Okay, a pound of fat, roughly 3,500 calories of an energy deficit.
• 35:50
  Philip Pape: Now, to be fair, if someone goes on keto, they probably are cutting out a whole bunch of foods and a whole bunch of processed foods and thus a whole bunch of energy or calories, and they might lose fat as well as water weight.
• 36:03
  Philip Pape: And they're probably also going to lose muscle, because most of those people are not lifting weights.
• 36:06
  Philip Pape: Some are.
• 36:06
  Philip Pape: That's a whole separate discussion.
• 36:09
  Philip Pape: Now, as far as how long it took to regulate and get used to high carbs, it took me like a day, you know.
• 36:13
  Philip Pape: And no, I say that in jest, but remember, when I talked about how I started lifting, I started following starting strength and I started just eating whatever.
• 36:22
  Philip Pape: I switched my mind at that moment to saying, look, I'm a lifter right now and I need to fuel myself and I don't know, I don't care what it takes.
• 36:29
  Philip Pape: And so I actually didn't put any governors or regulators on how much of whatever I was eating and I tolerate foods.
• 36:36
  Philip Pape: Well, like I'm lucky Maybe is that the word Like, no matter how badly I've eaten in the past, my gut seems to be, seems to handle things.
• 36:50
  Philip Pape: Well, I don't seem.
• 36:50
  Philip Pape: I don't have any allergies, I don't have any intolerances.
• 36:51
  Philip Pape: Now a purist or a functional doctor or somebody might say well, you don't know, until you go on a elimination diet and like, get all those toxins out of your system to see what you really tolerate.
• 36:57
  Philip Pape: Well, guess what?
• 36:58
  Philip Pape: I've done that before and I didn't notice much of a difference.
• 37:01
  Philip Pape: So we're not all the same folks Like some of us can tolerate a lot of these foods and, by the way, the science says most of these foods are perfectly edible, perfectly healthy, in moderation.
• 37:12
  Philip Pape: So going back to the dosage is the poison.
• 37:15
  Philip Pape: So how long it takes to regulate and get used to high carbs, I would say within a few weeks for most people.
• 37:19
  Philip Pape: That's my short answer.
• 37:21
  Philip Pape: If I have a client who all of a sudden needs more carbs, it doesn't take long before they do it and they start to enjoy it and they start to say, whoa, like you're right about this stuff, like I have more energy, I can lift more, I got, I got.
• 37:33
  Philip Pape: I was stuck on my bench for months or years and all of a sudden I'm up.
• 37:36
  Philip Pape: You know, five pounds on my bench last week, or 10 pounds, whatever.
• 37:38
  Philip Pape: Same thing happened to me.
• 37:40
  Philip Pape: I mean, I did them both at the same time.
• 37:43
  Philip Pape: So it's kind of tough to tease out the variables.
• 37:44
  Philip Pape: But because I was actually eating more on purpose and for years and years and years I had been like restricting, restricting, restricting.
• 37:50
  Philip Pape: I did that combined with strength training exactly what I do with my clients now when they get started and it was just like oh, everything started to take off like never before.
• 37:59
  Philip Pape: Right, all my lifts just went up five, 10 pounds every time for a few weeks and then it kind of leveled off a little and then kept going for a while after that before I had to go to more intermediate programming.
• 38:09
  Philip Pape: So, yes, you'll get an immediate weight gain.
• 38:11
  Philip Pape: It's all fluid because energy balance is the only thing that should be taken account when it comes to fat and you can do the math and you can see that if you're eating your maintenance calories, then anything you're gaining is probably not fat, it's probably fluid period.
• 38:24
  Philip Pape: Same thing when you take creatine.
• 38:25
  Philip Pape: So, jimmy, thanks for the question Shout out to you I'm trying to see if I missed anything.
• 38:31
  Philip Pape: You get a better pump.
• 38:32
  Philip Pape: You get a much better pump in the gym.
• 38:34
  Philip Pape: I mean you will lose that altogether.
• 38:35
  Philip Pape: If that's important to you and for a lot of us that's like a great feeling.
• 38:38
  Philip Pape: What else you?
• 38:46
  Philip Pape: What else you get?
• 38:47
  Philip Pape: Better energy, sleep, mental clarity.
• 38:48
  Philip Pape: In many cases I did a whole episode recently about cortisol, the connection between carbs and cortisol.
• 38:50
  Philip Pape: Like so many things improve just because of the increase in carbs that you wouldn't realize until you do it, let alone the performance in the gym for sure.
• 38:57
  Philip Pape: I mean I know this because as soon as I go on a diet, even if the calories aren't that low.
• 39:02
  Philip Pape: The carbs come way down.
• 39:03
  Philip Pape: You know I take a hit.
• 39:04
  Philip Pape: Or if I forget to not forget to, let's say, I don't have as much or any pre-workout, for whatever reason because of my circumstances, I'll notice it.
• 39:13
  Philip Pape: Right, don't get enough sleep, you'll notice it.
• 39:15
  Philip Pape: I think I covered your question, so I'm going to move on to the next one.
• 39:18
  Philip Pape: The next one is from Luke P.
• 39:20
  Philip Pape: He says what benefits do you get from low carb versus high carb?
• 39:25
  Philip Pape: High carb is not always better, I'm assuming.
• 39:27
  Philip Pape: So I was thinking of how to answer this question.
• 39:29
  Philip Pape: I already talked about how the carbs are the main thing that changes when you go from gaining to maintaining, to losing, right.
• 39:37
  Philip Pape: So my approach, my philosophy, is as long as you've got your protein, the fats and carbs are pretty flexible and there's no reason to lower the carbs just to lower carbs.
• 39:49
  Philip Pape: Does that make sense?
• 39:50
  Philip Pape: In other words, even when you are in a fat loss phase, we don't lower the carbs because low carbs better.
• 39:55
  Philip Pape: We lower them because we don't have space for enough carbs, right, we're having.
• 40:00
  Philip Pape: We need our protein and our fat.
• 40:01
  Philip Pape: In some cases I actually want somebody to slightly lower their protein and increase their carbs if it gives them just that burst of energy they need.
• 40:07
  Philip Pape: I guess what I'm saying is that all things equal.
• 40:11
  Philip Pape: I would generally never want to lower carbs for the sake of it for any reason, but I would want to increase carbs for many reasons.
• 40:19
  Philip Pape: So when we say low carb and high carb, it's kind of like protein.
• 40:21
  Philip Pape: It's very misleading.
• 40:22
  Philip Pape: Like people talk about high protein.
• 40:24
  Philip Pape: Well, most people are eating extremely, extremely low protein and I want people to eat moderate protein, but it looks high compared to the average population.
• 40:33
  Philip Pape: I mean, whoa 25% of your calories has protein.
• 40:36
  Philip Pape: That's huge.
• 40:37
  Philip Pape: Well, it's only 25%.
• 40:39
  Philip Pape: So is that really high protein or is it just much higher than the population?
• 40:42
  Philip Pape: Similarly, with carbs, like to me, if I'm getting a lot of protein and plenty of fat and then I'm eating 400 grams of carbs, is that high carb or is it just what I need and like filling in the rest of the energy equation right?
• 40:56
  Philip Pape: So when you say high carb is not always better, I would agree with that statement when we are talking about the context of other macros.
• 41:03
  Philip Pape: So if the carbs are taking away from your protein or fats in a detrimental way, then it's not better, but there's no case where I would say you need to lower your carbs, just to lower your carbs?
• 41:13
  Philip Pape: Does that make sense?
• 41:14
  Philip Pape: So hopefully I answered that the research definitely supports higher carbs for muscle building across the board.
• 41:21
  Philip Pape: Any study we see comparing low carb, comparing a low carb to a moderate high carb the moderate high carb wins out for sure when it comes to muscle building.
• 41:27
  Philip Pape: So like that to me is not a question anymore and I see it anecdotally all the time.
• 41:31
  Philip Pape: Having said that, if you just don't like to eat a lot of carbs, and it doesn't hurt you to lower the carbs and it gives you more protein because you're a big protein eater, that is a scenario I can get behind, and I know plenty of lifters like that who want to eat 250 grams of protein or 300 grams of protein and kind of moderate carbs.
• 41:48
  Philip Pape: I like 200 something grams of carbs.
• 41:49
  Philip Pape: I'm like, yeah, you got a lot of flex there and that's okay, that's okay.
• 41:53
  Philip Pape: So that's my thoughts on that is, what are the trade-offs?
• 41:56
  Philip Pape: What are your goals?
• 41:58
  Allan: Hi, my name is Alan and I just want to give a shout out to Philip, pape of Wits and Weights, for being a huge part of the foundation for my continued health and well-being.
• 42:08
  Allan: Philip exemplifies a nutrition coach who demonstrates how much he cares.
• 42:13
  Allan: Philip works tirelessly and with dedication to provide coaching, support and major content for us to use.
• 42:21
  Allan: He creates a practical approach from research and Philip empowers all of us to use food as quality for our health.
• 42:29
  Allan: He is skilled in how to assess and direct nutrition.
• 42:33
  Allan: Philip creates a community full of wisdom, support and camaraderie.
• 42:38
  Allan: In summary, philip Papers the real deal.
• 42:41
  Allan: He knows how to assess and direct nutrition and he continues to steer me in the right direction.
• 42:46
  Allan: Thank you, philip.
• 42:50
  Philip Pape: Emily asked a question about timing and travel.
• 42:52
  Philip Pape: She said timing overall.
• 42:54
  Philip Pape: What is your timing of carbs?
• 42:56
  Philip Pape: Do you eat more in the am or pm?
• 42:59
  Philip Pape: So I'm going to answer her questions one at a time.
• 43:02
  Philip Pape: So, timing of carbs carbs, I distribute them evenly when I'm not Dieting.
• 43:07
  Philip Pape: When I'm in fat loss, however, I shift them to the morning because that's around my workout.
• 43:12
  Philip Pape: If it's a Non-training day, I tend to eat them spread out evenly as well.
• 43:17
  Philip Pape: Simple, right, it's as simple as that.
• 43:19
  Philip Pape: Now, if you are the type of person who trains first thing in the morning and doesn't want to eat which there's a small percentage of people that do that you want a lot of carbs with your dinner.
• 43:26
  Philip Pape: If you're the type of person that sleeps better with carbs at your meal, you want them at dinner.
• 43:30
  Philip Pape: If you're the type of person that needs the carbs after your workout to recover from being drained of your glycogen, you might want more carbs after your workout.
• 43:37
  Philip Pape: Get what I'm saying Depends.
• 43:59
  Philip Pape: So me personally, distribute it evenly, except on training days, then, or except during fat loss, in which case more percentage of it like up to 50% of my carbs are going to be around training, and that's what I recommend.
• 44:04
  Philip Pape: When your carbs are tight.
• 44:05
  Philip Pape: Put more of them are your go-to pre or post-workout snacks and or meals.
• 44:06
  Philip Pape: I am super boring and simple.
• 44:09
  Philip Pape: I eat a banana and a protein shake beforehand, and then I have some oatmeal with peanut butter afterward, and then lunch is not far behind to get more of my protein.
• 44:21
  Philip Pape: I like to have a lot of protein with my lunch and dinner and because I'm having a nice big protein shake before my workout, I don't need a lot of protein right after it.
• 44:28
  Philip Pape: Right, there's no such thing as the anabolic window anymore.
• 44:30
  Philip Pape: You could distribute your protein however you want.
• 44:32
  Philip Pape: The carbs are a little bit more important.
• 44:34
  Philip Pape: So when we're talking carbs specifically, I love fruit before the workout because I can have it as close as like half an hour before my workout, very fast digesting, and then after my workout I like something a little more fiber, a little more tasty and comfort food style which is where the oatmeal comes in and plus a little bit of fat and taste from the peanut butter.
• 44:51
  Philip Pape: I will say if I am gaining, I need even more calories.
• 44:55
  Philip Pape: I will also add in HBCD, highly branched cyclic dextrin.
• 44:59
  Philip Pape: It is a extremely digestible, very easy on the stomach form of carbs powder form that pretty much anyone can tolerate and it is a great intro workout as well.
• 45:09
  Philip Pape: You can sip it or have it before your.
• 45:11
  Philip Pape: I actually put it before, during and after when I'm gaining and trying to eat like 4,000 calories Carbs on travel, you asked.
• 45:19
  Philip Pape: This is still, emily.
• 45:20
  Philip Pape: It's so easy to lose track when working and not controlling meals.
• 45:24
  Philip Pape: Also, buffets at meetings tend to be carb heavy.
• 45:27
  Philip Pape: What are your strategies?
• 45:28
  Philip Pape: And, socially, how do you track without a scale next to your boss?
• 45:31
  Philip Pape: Okay, there's a lot of questions here.
• 45:34
  Philip Pape: I guess it could be a whole topic on its own, and it's funny because I think, emily, you and I just talked about this on a group call in Physique University and I think that was about going to track meets or something right, where you didn't have enough time between traveling and everything to to have the food you wanted, um, and it was like four hours and they had hot dogs and other stuff staring you in the face, right.
• 45:55
  Philip Pape: So it really does come down to meal planning, meal prepping and the logistics of it all.
• 46:00
  Philip Pape: So you've got to just think ahead, use if-then strategies.
• 46:04
  Philip Pape: If you know this is going to happen twice a week, then what is your strategy?
• 46:08
  Philip Pape: Is it to have a cooler, ready to go, and then you pop it in your car.
• 46:11
  Philip Pape: Is it to have snack-type foods in your purse?
• 46:14
  Philip Pape: That is it For me.
• 46:16
  Philip Pape: I know what you're talking about.
• 46:16
  Philip Pape: Buffets and meetings tend to be carb-heavy and they're not always the carbs that we want.
• 46:20
  Philip Pape: They're often like muffins and stuff, maybe they're bagels or something.
• 46:24
  Philip Pape: So if you know you're going to eat the meaty food, just again you got to plan for it and say maybe I'm going to bring my you know first four meat sticks or something for my protein or protein bar or something to go along with it.
• 46:37
  Philip Pape: If they don't have meat options, you know sometimes there'll be sandwiches and you can like grab a bunch of the cold cuts and maybe eat half the bread.
• 46:43
  Philip Pape: If you don't, if you're not trying to get that much, that many carbs, but it's it's planning.
• 46:48
  Philip Pape: It's planning and like having if, then strategies.
• 46:51
  Philip Pape: That's really all it is.
• 46:53
  Philip Pape: Your last question about tracking without a scale and next year boss.
• 46:56
  Philip Pape: So two options.
• 46:57
  Philip Pape: One is just take a picture or eyeball it and estimate.
• 47:01
  Philip Pape: I mean, I do that all the time now.
• 47:02
  Philip Pape: It's a skill that you build over time.
• 47:03
  Philip Pape: You're like okay, this is a turkey sandwich and this is pasta salad, right, or whatever the buffet food is, or if it's just a lunch you packed and you didn't pre-measure it, which you could pre-measure it if it's at home, but if somebody cooked for you.
• 47:17
  Philip Pape: Again, just estimate each of the main ingredients that have calories and put them in as grams.
• 47:21
  Philip Pape: Macrofactor has a new AI feature where you can take a picture and it'll do it for you.
• 47:25
  Philip Pape: It's like 90% accurate, which is plenty good enough for most people and you could.
• 47:29
  Philip Pape: There's a text box so you can tell it generally what's in there, like no-transcript, all right.
• 47:40
  Philip Pape: Next question this is from Alan F.
• 47:43
  Philip Pape: All right, mr Alan, everybody knows him from the Facebook group, for sure, and also Physique University.
• 47:48
  Philip Pape: He says did you give thought to the glycemic index of the carbs you were utilizing?
• 47:54
  Philip Pape: And then another question did you have a priority list of carbohydrate foods you were incorporating?
• 47:59
  Philip Pape: I'm going to answer that one because it's easier.
• 48:01
  Philip Pape: My priority list is just the simple list of foods that I like.
• 48:04
  Philip Pape: That's it.
• 48:05
  Philip Pape: So like if I were to provide some nuance on that, because this could be why you're asking somewhat is different foods have different levels of macros, right?
• 48:13
  Philip Pape: So rice is pure carbs, just like shrimp is pure protein, essentially.
• 48:17
  Philip Pape: Beans, however, are carbs and protein.
• 48:20
  Philip Pape: So if I were to prioritize, if I'm absolutely trying to have pure carbs, I'm going to have things like fruit and oats.
• 48:28
  Philip Pape: Well, oats have protein too, but never hurts that protein.
• 48:31
  Philip Pape: You know, rice, simple starches they could be refined, whole grains, but I mean simple, you know, like breads and pastas and whatnot.
• 48:37
  Philip Pape: And I'll just, basically, it's just like I would do if I was trying to have dairy that was more protein than not.
• 48:43
  Philip Pape: I would look at the protein density.
• 48:45
  Philip Pape: Same thing with carbs what's the carb density?
• 48:47
  Philip Pape: And then I don't stray from that.
• 48:49
  Philip Pape: I'm fairly boring.
• 48:51
  Philip Pape: I like to explore occasionally in the grocery store, but usually I just stick to okay, here are my five favorite fruits, here are my five or six favorite vegetables.
• 48:58
  Philip Pape: I like oats, I like rice.
• 48:59
  Philip Pape: Keep it simple.
• 49:01
  Philip Pape: And I know you are.
• 49:02
  Philip Pape: You are very, um, I'll say you love to explore the variety of foods out there and do lots of fancy recipes, um, just like Carol does in the group, and that's awesome too.
• 49:11
  Philip Pape: Right, that's what you love to do.
• 49:12
  Philip Pape: But going back to your first question, did you give thought to the glycemic index of the carbs?
• 49:16
  Philip Pape: Uh, the answer is no, but I used to.
• 49:18
  Philip Pape: So I'm glad you brought that up, because I fell prey to a lot of these silly little things.
• 49:25
  Philip Pape: Like I say silly, like I was going to say blood sugar and that's going to offend a lot of people.
• 49:29
  Philip Pape: I think blood sugar is important but I don't think I don't think it takes a lot to do it right and then not have to think about it.
• 49:36
  Philip Pape: In other words, like if you eat balanced meals and you have a lot of fiber, you're going to take care of your blood sugar as long as you're training right, as long as you're lifting weights and walking, so I don't want to give too much thought to it.
• 49:46
  Philip Pape: I know some coaches and some folks even I've had on my show like they focus on that and and it can be a valuable tool for people who aren't aware of it, because then it says, okay, how do I, how do I improve that?
• 49:55
  Philip Pape: But glycemic index has to do with you know as well.
• 50:00
  Philip Pape: That's why I bring this up Insulin sensitivity, all of that it doesn't matter.
• 50:08
  Philip Pape: Once I discovered through learning the science that if you're lifting weights and you're walking inactive, that you're going to be highly insulin sensitive, it didn't matter.
• 50:12
  Philip Pape: I could even eat a carb meal.
• 50:14
  Philip Pape: My blood sugar will spike and it's fine when I'm low on calories.
• 50:19
  Philip Pape: I don't do that, though, because what will happen is I'll get like an energy crash, and many of you listening if you feel that like 3 pm energy crash.
• 50:30
  Philip Pape: Sometimes you go for a high energy food, like a candy bar, right, or chips or whatever for that reason, because your body's craving the energy.
• 50:34
  Philip Pape: But if you have balanced meals that are always protein and fiber first, you don't have to worry about glycemic index at all, and for anybody who knows GI, you know that it's like averaged out for the meal.
• 50:43
  Philip Pape: So if you're having protein and fiber in there and some fats or whatever, it's going to bring the whole GI down for the meal.
• 50:48
  Philip Pape: If you're diabetic, it's a different situation.
• 50:50
  Philip Pape: You may have to be more conscious of it.
• 50:52
  Philip Pape: So the answer is I didn't really.
• 50:54
  Philip Pape: I went down those rabbit holes sometimes, but I was just trying to avoid carbs in general.
• 50:59
  Philip Pape: I wasn't like oh, give me the low GI carbs, not the high.
• 51:01
  Philip Pape: Now, I didn't do that.
• 51:02
  Philip Pape: If that's a concern for you, I'm not the guy necessarily to talk to, because I don't think it's necessary for most people.
• 51:08
  Philip Pape: Or if you're training, walking, eating, balanced meals, yeah, and then nutrient density, yeah.
• 51:14
  Philip Pape: So I think that's it.
• 51:15
  Philip Pape: I think glycemic load is what we call it, right, the context of the whole food matrix.
• 51:19
  Philip Pape: That's more important.
• 51:20
  Philip Pape: Okay, next question is from Alex B.
• 51:22
  Philip Pape: So this is going back to the original listener who wrote in and this is another part of her question.
• 51:28
  Philip Pape: She said I think it's a combo of habit and learn, fear or anxiety response from years of indoctrination.
• 51:33
  Philip Pape: I know better, but knowledge only gets you so far.
• 51:36
  Philip Pape: I've done the prepping, but not logging ahead.
• 51:37
  Philip Pape: There are basically always potatoes, beans and bread ready to go.
• 51:41
  Philip Pape: In any case, I think you're right.
• 51:43
  Philip Pape: I don't have a knowledge gap, but an accountability one, and I and many others default to maladaptive habits and systems even when we know better.
• 51:48
  Philip Pape: So I wanted to throw this in and kind of close the loop on all of this, because for many of us, myself included, no matter how much we know, the right thing is to do.
• 51:58
  Philip Pape: We need that accountability, and accountability comes in so many ways, right, you can even build self accountability by using an app, like I use macro factor initially for my first year and a half of nutrition.
• 52:10
  Philip Pape: I just use that.
• 52:11
  Philip Pape: Then my accountability came in the form of getting a coaching certification, having clients and I have worked with coaches, like informally, for my nutrition as well.
• 52:21
  Philip Pape: I haven't actually worked one-on-one with a nutrition coach for a period of time.
• 52:25
  Philip Pape: I've been thinking about it for some of the advanced things, but, at the same time, I'm confident in my nutrition and this is the thing you got to assess.
• 52:32
  Philip Pape: Like, if you really enjoy something and you love learning about it and you're able to be consistent with it, then you're good.
• 52:39
  Philip Pape: You're good.
• 52:39
  Philip Pape: If, however, something like strength training, you're constantly missing your training sessions, constantly moving things around, never sure what to follow, like you just have all this uncertainty and lack of confidence around it, or you feel frustrated and inconsistent, that's where you need something, whether that is a free Facebook group, a friend or accountability partner, a coach, a community, paid free, it doesn't like they're all different forms.
• 53:02
  Philip Pape: Obviously, I provide various forms of this because everyone has different budgets and needs and whatnot, and some people can shift between them, right?
• 53:11
  Philip Pape: I've had folks that came into the Facebook group link in the show notes totally free.
• 53:15
  Philip Pape: They saw what things were about, they started to learn, they started to listen to podcasts and they're like okay, interesting.
• 53:20
  Philip Pape: Well, I had this really big goal and I'm kind of struggling to get there, even though I know what to do.
• 53:24
  Philip Pape: Let me join Physique University and get motivated by people, but also be able to reach out to Philip and get some more personalized guidance.
• 53:31
  Philip Pape: You know, have a plan, have a way to diagnose issues along the way, and they'll do that and they'll get a great result.
• 53:37
  Philip Pape: Or they'll do that and they'll say, all right, I'm getting a result, but I had these very specific issues for me related to my hormones, my thyroid medications, my age, my equipment access.
• 53:48
  Philip Pape: Maybe I'm kind of shy and I don't want to be sharing everything with a group, right, like there's different reasons and they'll say, okay, I want to work with you one-on-one.
• 53:54
  Philip Pape: Or, again, there are things in your life where you may be able to hold yourself accountable.
• 53:59
  Philip Pape: It's all different, it's a spectrum.
• 54:07
  Philip Pape: So why I brought this up Alex is because she acknowledged that she has the knowledge but has a lot of habits and they're hard to break sometimes without that accountability.
• 54:11
  Philip Pape: So I just signed up a couple of clients, this week in fact, who are very much like that.
• 54:15
  Philip Pape: They are advanced clients.
• 54:16
  Philip Pape: They have been training and learning and applying nutrition and tracking macros and everything for years and have gotten great results.
• 54:23
  Philip Pape: Some of them have competed.
• 54:24
  Philip Pape: You know bodybuilding and stuff like that, but they know that they can learn more.
• 54:29
  Philip Pape: There's always subtle things that they need to to reach out to someone else for.
• 54:33
  Philip Pape: Okay.
• 54:34
  Philip Pape: Anyway, behavior changes is is is so important in this space.
• 54:38
  Philip Pape: The role of like cognitive dissonance where what we believe doesn't match what we're experiencing and we're trying to resolve that when it comes to shifting our diets is really, really important, along with the role of community and accountability.
• 54:53
  Philip Pape: All right, I think this episode is way past the time I wanted it to be.
• 54:58
  Philip Pape: Hopefully, I'm able to edit it to be shorter, but I think the big thought from all of this and I don't even know if I covered half my story, to be honest is that what I finally learned around 2021, when I launched the podcast, was that the sustainability and the flexibility are the main driver of all of this, like your ability to adapt and go with the flow and go with life, and if what you're doing does not have that flexibility, it's going to be a problem at some point.
• 55:27
  Philip Pape: It's going to be a problem I guarantee it If you're following strict keto or any other highly restrictive approach.
• 55:34
  Philip Pape: And don't tell me carnivore is like just wonderful and it works for you and it solved all your problems and I could do this the rest of my life.
• 55:40
  Philip Pape: Maybe, 0.1% of people maybe.
• 55:43
  Philip Pape: But in reality you come to me a year later and tell me that you're still eating only these three foods and I'm using a little exaggeration, I realize, but it's kind of what it is.
• 55:52
  Philip Pape: You know, it's kind of like a kid who only eats like six things, right, doesn't eat their fruits and vegetables.
• 55:58
  Philip Pape: That's carnivore.
• 55:59
  Philip Pape: But any of these approaches are highly restrictive and when you're living that way, you know what it's stressing you out.
• 56:04
  Philip Pape: You are in this state of like, constant vigilance, like what can I eat?
• 56:09
  Philip Pape: What's the next poison or toxin lurking around the corner that I have to avoid?
• 56:13
  Philip Pape: Man, isn't that stressful?
• 56:15
  Philip Pape: Doesn't that sound awful, like an awful way to live?
• 56:17
  Philip Pape: And if you're living right that way right now, why do it to yourself, right, every single time you eat?
• 56:22
  Philip Pape: You're like it's this Machiavellian calculation combined with extreme discipline and willpower.
• 56:28
  Philip Pape: You know, social events are these minefields where it's all temptation.
• 56:32
  Philip Pape: Like every social event, all it feels like is constant temptation and saying no, and the mental bandwidth that you have to have to maintain that is just enormous.
• 56:40
  Philip Pape: It's enormous.
• 56:41
  Philip Pape: So I'm getting my soapbox here, because it's a call to action to anyone listening that you can have it all.
• 56:49
  Philip Pape: You can balance your approach to all of this.
• 56:51
  Philip Pape: You can include carbs, you can get nutritional freedom.
• 56:54
  Philip Pape: You just have to have the flexibility and you can still track macros, prioritize protein, make whole food choices, but without rigid rules that govern every bite.
• 57:05
  Philip Pape: It's guardrails, it's structure, it's targets, it's ranges, it's not eat this, not that it is very different.
• 57:11
  Philip Pape: If you want to argue with me that it's the same, I'd like you to try them both out and tell me that they are the same, and if they are to you, then that's your experience.
• 57:19
  Philip Pape: And even with that, I would say that there are other ways to have those guardrails and flexibility, just with a slightly different approach or method that doesn't require cutting foods out.
• 57:30
  Philip Pape: And so, instead of thinking, okay, I need to follow this diet, think how do I build a sustainable lifestyle that supports my goals, that enhances what I'm doing?
• 57:40
  Philip Pape: Doing?
• 57:45
  Philip Pape: Quality of life is so important, it's so important, and you got to live with what you're doing and be happy with it.
• 57:47
  Philip Pape: You don't want to just tolerate with misery what you're doing.
• 57:49
  Philip Pape: Think about it.
• 57:51
  Philip Pape: Are you just tolerating your diet right now?
• 57:53
  Philip Pape: Are you miserable or are you living with it happily?
• 57:56
  Philip Pape: You know, I don't mean the roses and sunshine and it's perfect every day, of course.
• 57:59
  Philip Pape: I don't mean that.
• 58:00
  Philip Pape: I mean you're satisfied, you're like, yeah, I can do this the rest of my life.
• 58:03
  Philip Pape: There's always a little effort involved with everything, of course, but this is way more freeing and flexible than the other approaches.
• 58:10
  Philip Pape: So I guess, as we wrap up this self-interview but I guess it ended up being a Q&A what I want to emphasize is that I was looking for a diet like the one true diet for years Keto, atkins I didn't even mention SlimFast, but I did that Paleo and at the end of the day, it wasn't about the right diet, it was about the right approach for me, which means your diet itself evolves.
• 58:37
  Philip Pape: So it's principle-based rather than method-based, and that means you can have multiple nutritional approaches, not only for different people but for you, at different stages, for different times of the year, for different contexts and objectives and goals.
• 58:50
  Philip Pape: That's the power of all this, because now you're not fixed into one approach.
• 58:54
  Philip Pape: So let's say you're currently thriving on a low-carb approach and it aligns with your goals Fantastic, like.
• 59:00
  Philip Pape: I'm not going to judge you for that, but if you're staying low carb because of fear rather than like preferences or results, even, I hope this gives you the permission you want to experiment, to evolve your approach.
• 59:11
  Philip Pape: That's what we are all about, because the social media world, the nutrition world, is just full of zealots who promote their preferred diet as the only way to eat.
• 59:22
  Philip Pape: They do it for views, for clicks, for engagement and for money and I'm not against money.
• 59:27
  Philip Pape: I'm a capitalist through and through.
• 59:28
  Philip Pape: I love money, just like you but I wouldn't do this shameful self-promotion and something that actually harms people for that.
• 59:38
  Philip Pape: Now, I've been the person who talks people's ear off about how great low-carb is.
• 59:43
  Philip Pape: This was before it ever became a business for me and in hindsight it was exhausting and isolating.
• 59:50
  Philip Pape: And I think there's tremendous freedom in letting go of dogma of any kind dietary dogma, training dogma and embrace the idea of flexibility.
• 59:59
  Philip Pape: Not that we're all special snowflakes or anything like that.
• 1:00:01
  Philip Pape: We're all like super, super, super unique that what works for you doesn't work for me.
• 1:00:05
  Philip Pape: The principles are there.
• 1:00:07
  Philip Pape: Principles are universal.
• 1:00:08
  Philip Pape: It's the dogma of fixed methods and approaches.
• 1:00:13
  Philip Pape: I think that your relationship with food should be a great part of your life, like it should just be a good, fun part of your life and something you enjoy, not constraining.
• 1:00:22
  Philip Pape: Your diet serves you.
• 1:00:23
  Philip Pape: It's not the other way around.
• 1:00:25
  Philip Pape: Your knowledge is going to continue to grow as your experience grows, as you listen to podcasts, get involved in communities, learn, learn, learn.
• 1:00:34
  Philip Pape: The evidence is going to keep changing as well.
• 1:00:37
  Philip Pape: You know what we know about the evidence, I should say, and that's to me very exciting.
• 1:00:41
  Philip Pape: So if you found value today, if you stuck through this long, if you want to continue the conversation, just join our Facebook group.
• 1:00:48
  Philip Pape: That's all I'm going to ask today.
• 1:00:49
  Philip Pape: Just search for it in Facebook or click the link in the show notes, and that is where questions like the ones we covered today get discussed.
• 1:00:55
  Philip Pape: All the time you can share your journey with carbs or any other diet you want.
• 1:01:00
  Philip Pape: You know some people are there who are doing carnivore and they're like yeah, I love it, that's great.
• 1:01:04
  Philip Pape: Come in there.
• 1:01:04
  Philip Pape: We're not going to judge you.
• 1:01:05
  Philip Pape: We're going to present all the evidence and let you decide for yourself.
• 1:01:08
  Philip Pape: As long as you experiment, promise me that you will try, that you will make an attempt and not just assume something will or won't work until you've tried it.
• 1:01:19
  Philip Pape: And if you haven't tried it you.
• 1:01:21
  Philip Pape: You're going to find support there, you're not going to find judgment.
• 1:01:24
  Philip Pape: That's my point.
• 1:01:24
  Philip Pape: So Wits and Weights Facebook group link in the show notes and I look forward to seeing you there.
• 1:01:29
  Philip Pape: Until next time, keep using your wits lifting those weights and remember the best diet isn't the one with the most zealous following.
• 1:01:36
  Philip Pape: It's the one that works for your body and your goals and your life.
• 1:01:41
  Philip Pape: I'll talk to you next time here on the Wits and Weights podcast.