Podcast Transcription: How to Stop Losing and Gaining the Same 10 to 15 Pounds with Ted Ryce

Ted Ryce: What is up my friend, welcome back to another episode of the Legendary Life podcast. I'm your host health expert, Ted Ryce, coach to CEOs, executives, and other high performing professionals. That's a bit redundant. What I meant to say was entrepreneurs, executives, and other high performing professionals. Excuse the brain fog today, it's a bit gloomy here in Brasilia, Brazil.

Today we're going to be talking about something really important. We're going to be talking about how to stop losing and gaining the same 10 to 15 pounds.

For example, anyone can lose 10 pounds or 15 pounds, but if you're like many of my clients, you probably lost the same 10 to 15 pounds more times than you can even remember. So, we don't have a weight loss problem in the United States or the world really, what we have is how do you lose it and keep it off.

And that's what we're going to cover on today's episode. So if that's what you're interested in, you're in the right place! And what we do here, by the way, on the Legendary Life podcast is we break down science-based information on how to lose fat, prevent disease and live a longer, healthier, legendary life.

What I'm going to be sharing with you today is going to be a combination of both research and also my personal experience. I've been in this business for 22 years now, actually 23 years - Oh my gosh! Time's getting away from me! - 23 years now in the health and fitness business, it's all I've ever done. And it doesn't mean I was great when I first started doing it. I wasn't, but after working with people in person for a long time, I started to realize what people really needed and what people were missing.

So many people have misconceptions about weight loss, about what it takes to maintain weight loss, about what they should do to lose weight in the first place. And a big thing for me was after being in the business as a personal trainer in Miami beach, working with celebrities and high net worth individuals, is that I went back to school to get my biology degree in my late twenties. Actually, I was on my way to becoming a medical doctor, so I thought, but, a change of plans happened, let's say. I'm not going to go into that right now, but... my foundational training in biology.

So, I took chemistry, calculus, physics, biology, cellular biology, genetics, all undergraduate courses, nothing too crazy. But I came out of there realizing that there is a lot of gold in science, but the problem is that the people doing the research don't communicate it, they don't get out the message.

And if they do, they get out the message in a way that if they said it, you would just be like, "Eh, yeah, I don't really understand what you're talking about, don't really know how to apply what you're talking about. So I'm just going to ignore you!".

And what you end up listening to, so many of us, I include myself in this, is some jacked girl or guy on Instagram. Well, these days it's on Instagram, YouTube, whatever, maybe a podcast. But when I was doing this, there wasn't any of that. So anyway, what we're going to dive into today, we're going to be talking about what the studies show. So, let's jump right into it. Let's get into it! How to lose weight fast and keep it off for good?

First. I want to tell you what you're up against. I feel like people may understand… people either have like these extreme views, very, very prevalent in American society today, there's not a lot of middle ground, right? They think losing weight is super easy, or it's going to be super fast when they finally get committed to do it. Or they feel like it's impossible... So let's share what we know, let's dive into the data.

There is a meta analysis - and by the way, when we say meta analysis, scientists run studies and studies provide evidence for or maybe even against something. And the next level of evidence is doing a meta analysis, which is a group of studies. And in this particular group of studies, they used 29 long-term weight loss studies. But what they found is more than half of the lost weight was regained within two years. And by five years or more, 80% of the lost weight was regained.

And previous failed attempts at weight loss have also kind of dissuade people from trying to lose weight again. In other words, a lot of people believe that weight loss is just futile. Just why should we do it? It just doesn't work.

So, I've got good news for you! And you've probably heard me, if you've been listening to the show for a while, you probably heard me talk about 95% of people regained the weight. I forget these statistics because there's several different studies, but all the studies show that - and this meta analysis is the best example of that - that people gain the weight back. But what we're learning is why people keep gaining the weight back? Why, why can people be successful and then lose it, right? Or gain it, in this case. Why can they lose the grip on their maintenance and go backwards? Why do we go backwards? So let's talk about that!

First of all, let's talk about the misinformation. I mean, there's so much, if you believe that you need to cut out carbs, give up your favorite foods permanently to lose weight that... so many people are misinformed. They think carbs are bad, or seed oil is a big thing on Twitter right now, I've been spending a lot of time on Twitter. Really like the platform actually, but you see seed oils, carbs, sugar...

Look, there's an element of truth to those things, but that is not the issue. This comes down to calories in, calories out. It's really simple. And if you don't believe me, go look at my results on legendarylivepodcast.com. I get killer results with people and I'd say about half of my group clients keep their results. And probably 90 ish percent of the one-on-one clients, they don't go backwards.

In fact, the group is closed now, one of the reasons it's just a... I don't know if we'll ever open it again, or at least open it with me running it. We may, we'll see.

So, so many people are misinformed, okay? That is working against you. People are misinformed, not with just nutrition, but with exercise as well. And I guarantee you, you're a victim of this. I guarantee you, guarantee you!

If you think you've got to cut out carbs to lose body fat, you're misinformed. If you think you have to do a ton of exercise every week, you're misinformed. If you think that protein will damage your kidneys if you eat too much of it, you're misinformed. If you think that your hormones are stopping you from losing fat, you're misinformed. If you think that you have a slow metabolism and that stops you, you're misinformed.

So misinformation is a huge one. Let's talk about what actually is affecting you. So, here's something: your body wants to gain the weight back, when you lose weight, there's a physiological response to weight loss and...

People say "Oh, it's the hormones. It's the hormones!" Guys mean testosterone, women mean estrogen or progesterone or some ratio of estrogens progesterone. That's what they usually mean, or maybe cortisol. But what actually is a relevant here, the relevant hormone, more so than even thyroid hormone, which directly affects your metabolic rate is leptin. Have you ever heard of that? Most likely, right?

So, leptin is a hormone that regulates your physiological response to weight loss, so let's say. It regulates your weight and it works in an area of your brain called r hypothalamus. We're not going to talk too much about that. It's also made by your fat cells.

So, here's what happens: Fat cells make leptin, leptin talks to your brain and says "Hey! We're at a good weight here. Let's keep it." But you don't want to keep it. You want to fit back into that closet full of clothes that you can't fit into, you want to look sexy in your swimsuit. So you say "I'm going to go on a diet and lose weight!"

Start to lose weight, what happens? Ooh, hunger happens! What is that hunger from? Well, it can be from several different things, including poor food choices or a shitty program, but let's say you're doing everything right. Leptin lowers because you're losing fat, right? Fat cells make leptin. You lose fat, less leptin, less leptin drives you to do two things: One makes you more hungry, "Hey, gain back the weight!".

Two: move less. In fact they've done studies on this. People actually move less. They move less and it's unconscious. So what do we do about it?

Let first ask the question: Why does that happen? Well, our bodies aren't designed for the modern environment and we'll talk about environment in a second, but just understand that a hundred years ago there wasn't Uber Eats, a hundred years ago you weren't working on a computer, a hundred years ago you were way more active, a hundred years ago, you didn't have the same temptations, the same food availability, the same types of foods available.

Before all our technological advancements in refrigeration and other methods to preserve food, we suffered more from starvation and famine, then obesity. Obesity is a new issue and our bodies are programmed for the old environment, the hunter and gatherer environment, the agricultural environment. But it's certainly not the modern digitized sit on your butt, work on your computer or on Uber eats environment during a pandemic that we're all dealing with.

So, understand that there's a physiological response to weight loss that has to do with leptin and it drives hunger levels to go up when you lose weight and movement to go down.

And the second thing that happens is that, especially in America, the UK, Canada, Australia, we live in what's called an obesogenic environment. In other words, you're bombarded by marketing messages, if you watch TV, or any place where there's marketing, you're surrounded by all these temptations.

You go shopping at the supermarket and what is at the checkout aisle? Fruits and vegetables? No! Candy bars, gum and People Magazine that wants to hook you in like a “Tom Cruise is having a reptile baby” or whatever, right? National, I guess that's the National Inquirer, right? Stupid magazines, all the ridiculousness. And they do that for a reason: impulse buys.

Speaker 1: So we're in an obesogenic environment. Another thing is that we just don't move very much and most places in the U S it's not a walking environment. You're not out walking, you got to get in your car and drive. So, there's all these things, we all have, Or most of us have a sedentary lifestyle. It's just the setup of the environment.

Another problem is doing things too strict. If you do a low carb diet, because you enjoy eating fattier foods, and don't really love carbohydrates too much, well, that's a really good reason to cut your calories through cutting carbohydrates. But let's say you love carbs and love dessert every once in a while. There's no reason to do it! If you're too strict, you will fail. You have to learn how to be flexible.

Another thing is people don't sleep that much. Another thing is people are under too much stress. Another thing is you're, you know, not focused on changing your behavior and learning new things. You just go on a diet.

I remember when I first started doing my group coaching, I gave people meal plans. I don't do that anymore. I might do that, if I feel like... if someone asks me for it, I'll give a client a meal plan, but I will explain it's just a template, but you've got to find your own things. You have to find your own way to make the principles of nutrition work in your life. And we can all do that. This is something we can all do.

So let's talk about nine best ways to lose weight and keep it off. And these nine science-based ways, okay? This is coming from research as well as my own experience. I'll say when there's research, I'll say when it's coming from my own experience.

#1 Be Honest About Your Willingness and Ability to Change!

And this first one is, number one is: be honest about your willingness and ability to change.

It's like, people want to make a million bucks until they realize that "Okay, cool! You want to make a million dollars, all right! Well, you're going to work a hundred hours a week and you're going to do this, you're going to do that, you're going to give up your weekends..." And then you're like: "Oh yeah, well, you know what? I don't want to, I don't want to make a million bucks anymore!"

Let me tell you, losing weight it's a lot easier than that. Or at least for me, I'm not particularly good at business. Although a seven figure business is something I will be achieving soon. But the point here is: be honest about your willingness and ability to change.

Willingness, 1 to 10, how bad do you want to lose weight? How bad you want to change your body? And then, two, is the ability to change. On a scale of 1 to 10, how confident are you that you know what you're doing to change your body?

With me, I'd rate my willingness about an 8 to change my body, I'm in the process of getting ripped again, so I can annoy you with talks about the veins on my abs, which disappeared over the past few months. But my ability to change is at a 10, I know exactly what to do. I know exactly how to keep it, what to do... But for a lot of people, they don't, they may or may not have the willingness, enough willingness to change, but you don't know what's involved. So let's talk about that!

So, number one is being honest about your willingness and ability to change.

#2 Long-term Results Require Long-term Strategy

Number two is long-term results require long-term strategy. So check it out! They did a study showing the difference between...

So there were two weight loss groups. And this in a study, right? And the group that had a maintenance program lost more weight and kept it off for longer. And I want you to think about this: If you are... now, I want you to think about first: how much weight do you have to lose? How big are you? Because the more you have to lose, the more obstacles you're going to have to hurdle, because there's a reason why you're as big as you are.

So, if you're overweight, that's just, you know, kind of normal life getting the best of you. Obesity..., it really depends, morbid obesity, there are a whole slew of things that you're going to have to do and a coaching program might not even be the right thing.

And we'll talk about that at the end. But just understand, one of the things that we're going to do is: when someone needs a lot of help, I'm not going to let them sign up with me, unless they commit to a long-term. Like for example, if I do a group weight loss program, again, it will be for six months to a year long.

So what I want you to take away is this: do not short-term yourself! Do not say "Hey, I'm going to lose some weight real quick!" No, say "I'm going to give myself a year, six months to a year." And again, if you're, if you're quite obese or morbidly obese, or class three obesity, whatever term you want to use, give yourself a year, right? Give yourself a year and understand that you're not probably... you're probably not going to, you're probably not going to get this on your own, just not going to happen.

And don't listen to me, just look at your past behavior. If you're constantly losing and gaining or running into problems and then blaming your metabolism or whatever, you're not going to be able to do this on your own. You're gonna need long-term strategies that require coaching and or counseling.

#3 Be Prepared for Temptations and Relapse!

So number three, be prepared for temptations and relapse! I mean, one of the things that I tell my clients, relapse is part of the game. Look at me, I got super, super ripped. I mean, the best shape the I've ever been in my life was last year in Colombia. But I lost it, I lost that peak shape when I had to go back to the United States to deal with my dad.

And I knew exactly what to do, but I couldn't do it because of a lot of reasons. The coping, the ways I was coping, the healthy ways I was coping were gone. And I, it was, I couldn't maintain, I just couldn't maintain it. I was so stressed, I couldn't work out that much.

So, what I'm getting at here is you got to have plans and practices for managing relapses, for managing falling off the wagon, understanding that, number one, it's going to happen. Then you have to evaluate why did it happen and how can I be better next time? And I will say this: I say, I fell off the wagon, but the good news is I put on maybe 10 pounds, I didn't gain that much, right? After being at 210 and going all the way down to like one 179. So, 30 ish pounds, let's say 30 pounds just to make the math easy. I only put back on 10.

So, I was doing well, but I wasn't able to... So, I didn't slide back all the way back. Cause I was able to reign it in. I was able to do enough to not go completely off the rails.

And so you... but you have to understand you're going to face things where you're probably gonna, you're gonna fall off. Now falling off might be a meal, it might be a day, it might be a week, it might be, in case, a few months, but you have to understand, you're gonna run into things in life that are gonna throw you off.

How are you going to deal with them? Thinking that it's not going to happen, that you have this solved completely and you'll never struggle with it again is wrong. Okay? It's wrong . And this is, again, this is part of, this is part based in research, people relapse.

#4 Track Your Progress and Review It

Number four, track your progress and review it.

One of the things that happens is…, especially during stressful times, is it focuses…, stress focuses our focus, narrows our focus. So, you forget...

Let's say you're a little bit stressed and then you look at your weight and you're like "Aw, man, I'm up a couple pounds!" But you lost 20 pounds! “Oh yeah, but…”. You don't remember it!

One of the things we do in our coaching program is we show people the progress, we show them how far they've come. We show them their photo. We have people take photos every two weeks. We have people weigh in every week, sometimes every day. And when they can look back and see how far they've come, it’s always like "Oh, wow, look at that! I'm a different person now!"

But we forget, we forget our values. We forget how hard we work. We forget our progress. All we know is "I'm not happy right now!" Happens to all of us, myself included. Sometimes I feel like my life is really in a bad place, except it's the best it's ever been.

So I've got to remind myself of that. I got to remind myself: "Hey, remember when I was in Miami beach, I was fat, stressed, not sleeping well, I had to do all this positive self-talk to go and train my clients because I didn't want to train them. And I had to show, I showed up to all these places and I would not want to train them!" I'm like, "you got to be grateful. You got to show gratitude, be grateful for training this person because they are helping you to move to the next level by giving you business, by paying you, by continuing to pay you so fine, gratitude." But we forget.

So again, track your progress, review it, review your progress. It puts things into perspective because we forget, our focus gets narrowed.

#5 Learn How to Manage Negative Self-talk and Stress

So number five, learn how to manage negative self-talk and stress. So here's the thing: There are triggering events and there are the consequences. We see this happen a lot on social media, but it happens in weight loss as well.

So, one may let's say, for example, steps on the scale and they're the same way they were five days ago. And the consequence of seeing that number is "I'm not getting results, I've hit a plateau, this is not working for me. I should just give up. I feel bad because the scale hasn't moved!" So common! Or even worse when the scale goes up a pound or two.

And what we don't want I realize is in-between the triggering event in this case, stepping on the scale and the consequence which is the negative feelings, low feelings of self-worth, depression and anxiety, anger, frustration, whatever, whatever the negative emotion is.

There are thoughts or perhaps even core beliefs that are your filters for interpreting the number on the scale. Because the number on the scale is just data. It's your lens, it's your interpretation. And some of these core beliefs, they are deep in some people.

So, what do you do with these? Well, getting into a good program... Well, I will tell you what I do with my clients. So I get my clients results, results help reframe their core beliefs from something they can't do to something they can.

But I'll tell you, even on the way we've got to work hard too, because a lot of people want to give up or feel like giving up at least when they see backwards progress or stagnant progress. And so while the biggest thing I think here is knowing how to change the program in a way that gives you results.

Certainly, that won't help with these core beliefs in the moment, right? It's going to take repetition of seeing success, success, success over the course of months to retrain your brain.

But in that moment, you know, one of the things that I do is I take my clients through what's called a seven-day thought record or a thought record. Sometimes I give it to clients, sometimes I just take them through it. But we have to understand negative thoughts are not the real..., thoughts aren't reality. They aren't good or bad, they're not reality, they are opinions, and they can be helpful or unhelpful.

So if you have a lot of unhelpful thoughts, working with someone can really help you. Now, for extreme cases, you probably want to see a therapist and do some of what's called cognitive behavioral therapy, psychologists who specialize in CBT are experts at helping you to restructure these cognitive patterns.

Because if negative thoughts are playing a role in sabotaging you, you've got to deal with the root and it takes time and it takes work. You can't just listen to a book, you can't just listen to a podcast, you got to work with someone, if you're not getting this handled on your own.

#6 Become More Flexible!

Number six: become more flexible! One of the issues here with people in dieting is perfectionism. Perfectionism isn't really perfectionism. It's super lame, okay? I'm not saying you're lame, if you happen to have or struggle with perfectionism, you're not lame. You're probably a higher performer, but the idea that you're going to be perfect at something that you're definitely not good... If you're overweight, you're not good at this stuff. If you're obese you are even worse at it, right? The results... a financial, wealth management expert who's broke is not good at his job or her job, as the case may be. Okay?

So, the issue here is that... And that's okay, it's okay to not be good at something, but you gotta go through the repetition of getting better. That's how you get better at anything.

When I first started, for example, I'm in Brazil right now, I spoke very little Portuguese when I got here and it was super frustrating. I felt, I felt isolated from people, when I first got to Brazil. I couldn't speak the language, I knew a few words, I knew how to say a few things. And people would talk back to me a little bit, but then they would go... just get into these conversations I couldn't participate in. I felt locked out, I felt isolated, but it wasn't a prison of walls, it was a prison in my mind. Anyway, sorry. The point is like I felt really annoyed and frustrated.

And then I started studying Portuguese with the Pimsleur method every single day. And eventually I got better at it. But I suck, Portuguese is super hard! Learning Spanish, I've been around Spanish my whole life, I've taken Spanish classes, but Portuguese, it's got some similarities, but it's way harder. I had to stick with it.

And now I can say things like "Eu não tenho tempo para isso agora", right? Which means "I don't have time for that now". So I can have conversations now. They need to not speak too fast, but you know, I can have conversations, I can communicate with people. And when I don't know a word, I can say "Hey, como se diz em português?" Right? "Como se diz?" How do you say in Portuguese?

If I don't know how to say something I can say "Oh, eu não entendo ... como se diz em português?" Right? And they can tell me, and then I can repeat it. But I couldn't even do that.

So you got to understand, the perfectionism it's just ridiculous. You've got to... anything that you're..., you don't have good results in it means you don't have good skills in and you need skill and repetition to get better at it. It makes sense, right?

The other thing is you've got to become more flexible with your strategies. What do I mean by that? People want to do low carb, but then when they can't do low carb, they don't know what to do. People ask me "Hey, are you anti-low carb? You talk bad about low carb all the time." And I say "No, I'm not anti-low carb. I'm pro learning the principles of nutrition.”

Now, if you're doing low carb, because you understand the principles of nutrition and you just choose to eat that way, great! Or if you're doing a low fat approach, great! But there are times where you're not going to be able to do it. There are times when, you know, you're on low carb and then your family wants to go out and eat sushi. And for you, you are gonna eat some of the sushi, you're not just going to have sashimi, right? Or if you're on low fat, you're going to go out and you're going to have some barbecue ribs every once in a while or whatever it is.

You gotta be flexible with your approach. And what I do with my clients is I helped them understand the principles of nutrition, what I call this truth about nutrition. I show them, okay, well, how much protein is in an egg. Like people think eggs are a good source of protein. But if you look at the percentage of calories coming from... protein from an egg, it's not that great. It's an okay, a source of protein, but it's not great.

Or nuts are a great source of protein. Again, too much, too many calories coming from fat, right? So I teach people the rules and then they can, they have the flexibility to plug in what they want.

It's kind of like having a budget. Having a budget means you have a budget, so you can go to the club and spend your money on $20 drinks, or you can, if you're here in Brazil, have caipirinhas,. But you can also go to a self-help seminar or whatever. It's up to you how to spend your budget and how you spend, right? As long as you maintain your budget, certainly it matters what you spend your money on, but you will certainly not go into debt if you, if you don't spend beyond the budget.

So I teach people: here's your budget, you have this budget to play around with. That's why I love working with entrepreneurs and executives because they understand the numbers. And once you understand the numbers, then you can spin things, then you make choices about what you want to spend your budget on.

So, be more flexible, learn, get rid of perfectionism, understand that you've got to be more flexible with yourself and be more flexible with your nutrition approach. Really learn about food, because you don't know. If you're just trying to cut carbs or do intermittent fasting, if it works for you, great! But if you're struggling here, you're going to have to take it to the next level.

#7 Know Your "Why"!

Number seven: know your "why"! Let me ask you something: Do vegans have to decide whether they're going to eat meat or not on any given day? Of course not, they're vegan, is who they are.

Do Jewish people who eat kosher need to decide whether they're going to eat kosher that day? No, they eat kosher because it's who they are, it's just... Or Muslims eating halal, do they need to decide whether or not they're going to do that? No, because each of those things are aligned with their religious, ethical and or deeply held beliefs and values.

So, how do we take a lesson from that and apply it to ourselves? Well, why is this really important to you? "Well, I just want to be a little healthier or lose weight." Well, that's the problem! That's uninspiring.

What we do in our coaching program is the heaven and hell exercise. If you don't get this handled, how is your life going to be in five years? How's it going to be in 10 years? How much are you going to weigh? What are you going to struggle with? How is it gonna affect you? How is that going to affect the people you love in your life? And then... that's the hell, by the way, if it wasn't immediately obvious.

Then we talk about the heaven. Well, let's say you get this handled. How's your life going to be then? How's your business going to be? How's your family going to be? How are you going to feel? Got to paint that picture.

Also, another thing is you got to find things that you enjoy doing. I'll share a secret with you. I don't love lifting weights. Actually. I'm starting to fall in love with isometrics, but I don't want to go on a tangent here.

So, I don't love lifting weights, it makes my joints hurt, if I do too much, but I know I have to do some and I even... even if it didn't make my joints hurt, I just don't love it like I used to. I love doing sports. I like doing muay thai, like doing jujitsu, I like going hiking, I like going scuba diving.

So I like those things, being adventurous is part of who I am, is a value I have. I want to explore... We only have one life to live, I want to live it up, I want to do amazing things. I want to go scuba diving and awesome places. I want to go sand surfing in the dunes of Florianopolis, Brazil, which I'm going to be doing next week. So that's what exercise is really about for me.

Another thing is I don't want to die like my dad did. I don't want to. It's not even the way he died, it's just the, not even at the end… What I mean is that I don't want to decline like my dad did, it traumatized me. So that's another value.

Another value is I don't want to be one of those... I want, I want to be the model of health and fitness of, of... not a person who's perfect, cause I've done more street drugs than anyone should ever... in my twenties, I partied, I was in Miami beach, not going to share that story, but I'm saying like "Hey, listen, no matter what's happened to you and all the traumas and tragedies I've been through, listen, you can still get it together and live a great life!" Those are my values, that's what gets me to the gym.

But why I do it, isn't as important as why you do it. So know your "why", figure out why you're doing this. What do you really value? And how does health and fitness help you live up to those values? And how does not focusing on your health and fitness take away from, or how is it out of alignment with your values? Important questions to ask here.

#8 Manage Expectations

Number eight: manage expectations! At one study patients entering a diet and exercise program expected to lose 20 to 40% of their starting weight. You know, who... If you're not working with an expert like me, and even then it really depends on the person.

Just a quick tangent. One of my keys to success is I pre-qualify my clients, because I know if someone's not ready for the program, they're just gonna, they're not going to get good results and I've gotten better and better and better at attracting the people who work best with me and I work the best with.

But I'll tell you, people expect to lose 20 to 40% of their arting weight.You know what does that? Reliably bariatric surgery. And if you don't want to go there, you're going... And even if you do decide to do bariatric surgery, there's a lot of lifestyle changes that go along with and counseling that goes along with it. It's not just bariatric surgery, it's not just a one and done surgery, there's a lot of counseling that goes into it.

You can't get around the coaching, folks, or the counseling, depending on, you know, what you need. So, if you we're going to lose 20 to 40% of your starting weight, and it's going to happen easily, you are going to have to invest a lot of time, a lot of effort and depending on what your idea of a lot of money is probably more than you want to.

I'll give you an example, to join my group coaching program was $3,000 and I offered a discount of $500, if people signed up on the call with me. My one-on-one is more expensive than that. And I'm going to raise the price and all the people that I know who do a great job - because I'm not the only one doing great work here with clients, all the ones that do it they charge more than I do. All the ones that I know they charge more than I do. Part of it's because a couple of the guys I knew are British. And so they charge in pounds, but they all charge the same rate. People who get results, we all charge the same rate.

And people who don't charge that much unfortunately you just don't get the results. In fact, I got a client who worked with a nutritionist, he gained weight, when his goal was to lose fat. Gained weight, good for me, but bad for him and that experience certainly not good for the business of that particular nutritionist.

So you got to understand here or... so I want to share this with you: Numerous studies show that diet, exercise and behavioral counseling in the best of cases only lead to a 5 to 10% average weight loss. Think about that! Diet, exercise, behavioral counseling.

Now, I get better results than this, but that's the average of programs. And again, they're probably working with average people, average experts, you might say, not the top of the top. But still like, you got to understand, in best cases most people lose 5 to 10% of their average weight. So if you weigh 180 pounds, looking at, for 180 pounds, you're looking at 18 pounds, right? Nine to 18 pounds as average.

That's, I'm sorry... That's not average results. Those are in the best of cases. This is from research. People aren't doing research on what I'm doing, or on the other coaches that I know. We're running businesses, I don't have time for the academic stuff like that, maybe one day, who knows?

But what I'm trying to tell you is if you've got expectations... what I tell my clients, I keep telling my clients "Listen, it's like, best case scenario is 20 to 30 pounds with me, for someone who's overweight or obese. 20 to 30 pounds.

I've had one person lose 40 pounds in three months, actually two people who lost 40 pounds in three months. And one worked with me for three months, Kim, and another one, Todd, worked with me for six months, he lost 70 pounds in six months. So I think he lost 40 pounds in one of those months, It wasn't 35 and 35. So anyway, two people... but most of my clients lose 20 to 30 pounds in three months. So think about that.

But I will tell you, if you're doing this on your own, a pound a week. So in three months we're talking, if you're losing 12 pounds in three months, on your own, that's great results. That's not good, that's great. Okay?

So, if you're thinking you're going to get great results on your own because you're so smart and you're working so hard in the gym, it's not going to happen, right? It's not going to happen. It's taken me 20 something... This is all I do, it’s been taking me 23 years to figure this stuff out, what I do with my clients now. 23 years! You listening to podcasts and reading articles... Again, one a pound a week on average, that's great results.

And if you're getting any results and it's constant, be happy, be happy! And if you want more, you're going to have to invest in more, right? So, I'm not saying you go hire someone, I'm saying, manage your expectations about it. If you choose to do this on your own, which is totally fine with me, I can't even handle that many clients. I'm shifting away from coaching, although I'm still taking clients, I'm shifting away from coaching and more into writing and some other things. I love coaching, but it's hard to scale.
So anyway, I'm saying that because I want you to keep expectations. If you're doing that on your own, if you're losing 12 pounds in three months, or four pounds a month, you're doing great. All right? Great progress! Not good, not okay, great progress. So keep it up!

And again, if you're getting any progress at all and it's consistent progress, like, let's say you lose a pound every, I don't know, every month, which seems really slow, or every two weeks, a pound, every two weeks, that's still progress, be happy for that progress. And again, if you want more, you're going to have to invest in more. Okay.

#9 Seek Help if You're Not Getting Results

Number nine is: seek help if you're not getting results. And no I'm not here to plug coaching again, I've talked a lot about what I do, and I'm sure you formed an opinion about it, or whether you get annoyed with me talking about the results that I get or not. Well, that's your issue, I'll let you deal with it. But I will say this: some people are not right for what I do, or for any of the people that I said what they do.

It's not, they're not right for guys like us or for the women that do this. You may need something else. You may need an obesity medicine physician, you may need a comprehensive weight management clinic. You may need a behavioral psychologist to help you with your binge eating disorder or body dysmorphia. You may need a marriage counselor because the stress from your marriage is what's driving your eating habits.

Seek help if you're not getting results. So one of the things that I do with people who hop on a call with me is I try to figure out is this person right for what I do? Do they need something else? Because I can't fix a broken marriage. I don't have those skills. I can't help if you hate your job. I can't help on those things. And so what I try to do is I try to figure out is this person right?

And what I want you to try to do, because a lot of us, we want things like "Oh yeah, my big problem is I need to lose weight!" Okay, well, why do you want to do that? "Well, yeah, I just, you know, I stress eat a lot and I'm not exercising because I'm so tired all the time." Okay. Why are you stressed and so tired all the time?, "Oh, yeah, You know, I hate my husband or wife. I want a divorce, but I won't get one. I hate my job, but I won't leave it."

I mean, losing weight, it's not going to help with that, right? It may help in some ways, will give you the energy a little bit, something to focus on, but you have to really know yourself as best as you can.

You've got to ask questions: What do I really need here? Maybe you had a... I got a bit fat after, I got my fattest after my sister committed suicide. I never got therapy, unfortunately, until much later. I couldn't afford it, or at least I thought I couldn't afford it. Actually, if I would have made sure that I afforded it, I might've made more money. So I would have felt better and got more stuff done.

So really, really understand where you're struggling here. What do you need to do? And again, seek help if you're not getting results and seek the right help. You may not be..., you may think that you want to work with me, but you may not be a good candidate. It may be better to work with a psychologist. It may be better to work with a marriage counselor. It may be better, if you're morbidly obese,

I may not be the person to work with. Working with someone who is an obesity medicine physician, that may be the right thing, or a comprehensive weight management clinic might be the right thing for you, or even bariatric surgery. I'm not a doctor. I'm not here to tell you what you should or shouldn't do. I'm just saying, figure out what you need.

And if you're trying things and not getting results, that's the way to move forward. Seek, help my friend. Please seek help! It's one thing if I could go back... I didn't even know, I didn't even have anybody who was telling me "Hey, you need to get therapy. You've had this fucked up life, man! Get, get some therapy!" Nobody told me that, I would've done it. At least I would like to believe I would have done it. But nobody told me.

And I'm telling you, I'm trying to save you from that now. Get the help you need. All right?

So, let's end this on a high note here. I hope you enjoy today's show, I know it got a bit deep at times, but I hope... I want to ask you, what is one thing that you're taking away from all this right? Think about that. Think about the one thing that you can take away and put into action in your life.

So I hope you enjoyed today's show! On this week, RTF, we'll be talking about how you and I aren't the same people after the pandemic. And I want to share with you some things that will help you reinvent yourself. And I'll also share what I'm personally doing, in case you're interested. But again, with the focus on you, we're not the same people. So, that's what the subject matter will be, talking on Real Talk Friday on this Friday.

And lastly, we rely on you spreading the word to grow the show. So if you could, if you, if you know someone who needs to hear this, because they're struggling with this losing the same 10 to 50 pounds, pause the episode right now, text a friend who you think would either love to hear this, or, really needs to hear this, send them the link to www.legendarylifepodcast.com. . We'd really appreciate that!

So, that's it for me! Have an amazing weekend and speak to you on... An amazing week, sorry, and speak to you on Friday. We'll be talking about how you and I aren't the same people after this pandemic and maybe what some strategies are moving forward.

That's it for me, folks, have a great one! Speak to you soon! Love you lots! Bye!