Shadowing Practice: Unfortunately, Getting Lean Really Is This Simple - Learn English Speaking with Video
Creating lesson...
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what is up YouTube I spent the last 15 years of
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my life as a professional bodybuilder dieting multiple times down to 4 % body fat
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and what I realized is that is unknowingly simple to get lean people just overcomplicate it
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and don't focus on the things that they need
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the famous quote I heard from Justin first I don't know where it comes from
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but what isn't measured isn't managed
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but the average person who's not into fitness just gets a food journal
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and right stance every single thing that they eat most of them will lose weight
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so the first step you always need to do is be able to track everything
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that you were doing so that you can manage it
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and make changes 243 243 my stage weight limit was 242
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and the cutting water cutting weight three four percent body fat shredded especially
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if it's something for your health that's really important to you
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i think you should be weighing yourself every day at least
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at the beginning of your journey once you're at a healthier point
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and you don't want to be stressing about it all the time i totally agree it can become obsessive
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but if you're weighing yourself every day at the same time every day you can get a weekly average
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and see how you're trending whether up or down is consistent typically
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when you start a diet you're going to lose the water weight immediately
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and then the more consistent you are with everything you are
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doing the more you know the variables aren't causing the change so
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if i'm eating the same thing every day sleeping in the
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same manner all those things are the same then this weight
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on the scale should be coming from body fat change how
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do you decide what calorie target to start with as a beginner this is why tracking is
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so important because if you eat a consistent thing for a matter of time
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and you're tracking it then you know what your baseline is
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don't just pick a random number like oh this guy at least 11 calories everybody's body is
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so different our metabolism change throughout the year throughout the month it's
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so all over the place
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so you really need to know what you've been eating what your body currently needs to maintain the weight
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that it's at and then you drop a couple hundred calories from there see how your body responds
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and you keep tracking and keep watching what your body does
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and you adapt over time one of the biggest questions i
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always get is how do i break past a plateau
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when i feel stuck and honestly the answer
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that i have might surprise you what i'm serving i want to eat breakfast
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so i'm going to get to
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that later in the video now i'm going to eat what's
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your breakfast a good old smoothie is for breakfast few things
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beat a smoothie when you're trying to get in shape
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when it comes to efficiency and filling yourself up with a minimal amount of calories
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and high protein you can throw
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so much shit in it 20 grams of creatine some aloe
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vera juice turmeric fiber whatever you can find in the cabinets of something just toss it in there, blend it together, and then you're healthy and getting leaner.
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What are the main micro and macronutrients that you focus on when you're cutting?
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What you really need to focus on, because for the sake of simplicity of just getting lean and getting the most out of the least, it's calories, and then it's protein, because if you're watching my channel,
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you should care about being strong and having muscle, and then having whole foods.
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So the less processed foods you have, the more whole foods you're having, the more micronutrients you're getting out of it, so you don't need to overstress about it.
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Calories, protein, whole foods.
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i know jokes die from explaining what foods make dieting easier for you personally protein shakes make dieting easier
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because they could fill you up they're very low calorie i used to put shredded lettuce in almost every meal
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that i would eat shred lettuce to get shredded you guys know the drill practically zero calories
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but it gives you a crunch some volume salsa
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or like pico de gallo is very low calorie as well
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and you throw that on a meal
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and it all of a sudden ground turkey
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and rice becomes a nice mexican dish
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so those little things definitely help me a lot in prep is there a way to minimize hunger
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when you're trying to get lean at the end of the day
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if you want something especially different from the rest of the
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world you're going to have to do something that's hard
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so i think it's almost better to go approach the mindset this is going to be hard
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because it's worth it things that are worth it in life often are hurt
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so instead of avoiding what's hard lean into the hard times
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and when you feel hard
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when you feel hunger switch your mindset don't be like oh
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this sucks i'm hungry be like i'm hungry i must be getting lean i remember
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when i to be a prep and i'd be like starving
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and exhausted and be like oh my god i must be getting shredded right now
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because my body is feeling it so just try
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and switch your perspective
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and stop avoiding hardship how important is
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cardio for getting lean i do think it's something
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that helps a lot because the more you allow yourself to eat
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and then the leaner you can get the better your body's going to be working
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so if you're expending a little bit more calories by doing
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cardio so that you can eat more
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that helps just your body become more of a more of a machine constantly pumping through the food
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that you're putting in it I don't think you need to stress about cardio being like going for a run
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or a really intense bike ride or hit.
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Sometimes it's just getting more steps in the day.
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But I do think it's a great tool
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if you're trying to get lean and you haven't been doing it
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and you're trying to add more and more variables that are leading you towards getting cut.
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When I was prepping for the Olympia, the only cardio I did was walking on a treadmill at a pretty slow speed, like 3 .7 -ish.
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But at the start of my preps, it was 20 minutes a day and it would slowly increase to like an hour, 15, hour and a half.
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When do you think someone should introduce cardio to their cut
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if you're doing zero kind of cardio
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and your steps are like three thousand a day
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because you have a sedentary job i think there's nothing wrong with putting it in immediately i usually tell people
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if they do no cardio and you're starting to get lean the best thing
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that you can do the best prescription i can give you
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is to do a 10 to 15 minute walk after every single meal
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that you eat
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so it's just super light it helps your body digest you
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can get outside a little bit it's good for your cortisol
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and stress and all these different things
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so i think that's of the easiest levers
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that you can pull should you be worried about losing muscle
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when you do cardio it's definitely a thing depending on how low your calories are but
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if you're doing like 45 minutes of a light type of cardio every day you shouldn't be too stressed about
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that if you're doing a lot of stairmaster
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and you're not eating a lot that can make your legs shrink for sure
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but until you're like severely depleted doing hour plus of cardio
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today you really don't have worry
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about losing my
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sponsor no
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more cable
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machine a new one coming you guys remember me hitting
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that thing with my car been a little beat up
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so i got rid of
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that one i got a new one coming should we pop up the clip one more time for old time's sake?
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We should pop up the clip for now that the machine's gone.
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How would you recommend someone train while they're trying to get lean?
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The average person, I would say not to stress it too much.
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If you adjust your training too much because you think you're getting leaner, usually people end up doing lighter weight, more volume, which can lead to you having less strength,
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which can lead to you having less muscle mass.
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You don't want to lose your strength in a cut.
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Don't just think getting lean means you have to increase volume or that you have to increase your volume to get lean.
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That's a complete myth.
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The goal is to keep training as you would, as hard as you could.
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Stay as strong as you can for as long as possible
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and by doing so you'll hold on as much muscle mass as possible while reducing your tailors.
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So can you still make progress while cutting or are you just trying to maintain?
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Your intention is still to always be making progress.
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If you're telling yourself, oh I'm just maintaining, you will just be pushing yourself less hard.
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The goal is still to push yourself, you're just less likely.
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You're giving yourself less potential variables to increase that progress when it comes to strength or putting on muscle mass.
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So it's absolutely possible but it really depends on the person and your genetics.
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How can you use gym performance as feedback barrier?
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one way would be those gunshots those were gunshots were they yeah
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all right specifically at the beginning to the middle of a cut
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and your strength is quickly declining that's a bad sign your strengths may decline now
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that i was saying the last question but
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if it drops really fast like one day you're benching 225
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the neck for six next time you get like four your body probably needs more fuel
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and you're cutting too hard too fast
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because you don't want to be getting significantly weaker really fast because if
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that happens too fast you're going to be losing a lot
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of muscle mass it's a box jump right there that's a
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box jump right well technically i didn't do this one yeah what's that three
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so three inches off the top that's the goal the first
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goal is standing no step 60 inch box jump yeah then it'll be a walking 63
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and then standing 63 and then 85 inches.
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Imagine over a mile of an inch.
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What would you say is the best body fat percentage where you kind of like look great, feel strong, and you're not depleting yourself?
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That's so person dependent.
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Justin has one client in the UFC who has like striated pecs
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and triceps and obliques and everything and he fights in the UFC.
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Some people feel horrible when they're at 12 % body fat.
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It's one of the things where you have to be able
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to be in tune with yourself to know train for an extended period of time
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and then get lean
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and then once you start sacrificing performance more than you want to stay there for a
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while and rebuild your performance at that level of body fat your body will adapt
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and you'll be able to rebuild a new peak strength at that body
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what's the biggest training mistake people make
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when they're trying to get lean i would say the biggest
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mistake is people think cardio is some magical fat burning thing
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that you do an excess amount of cardio and you're just going to get shredded so they'll sacrifice their workout
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in order to do more cardio as opposed to weight lifting which burns more calories to do
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allows for more muscle mass the more muscle mass you have the more your resting metabolic rate is
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so all day long you're burning more calories and
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that on top of thinking volume is going to get you
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leaner you're not really going to burn them to more calories by lifting less weight
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and more volume and again if you're losing muscle mass you're hurting yourself overall
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most people already know that they need to eat less to get lean
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but if it's
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that simple why do most people still fail i think a
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lot of people are using food to feel good they use it as a sense of enjoyment of pleasure
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because they're lacking a sense of fulfillment or self -esteem
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or self -love that they don't have so they eat
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and they feel good for a moment and then they keep eating more
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because it's the thing
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that makes them feel good most people are struggling to hit
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their goals sometimes the number one thing you need is some
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meditation breath work therapy something to dive deeper into yourself more
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than it is the best diet program in the world
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or something like that what are what are some rules
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or routines that you can recommend implementing
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that improve decision making a big rule to help decision making is to make less decisions
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so like when i was in olympia prep everything was made so easy
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because i ate the same things at the same time i
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was on the same workout routine every single week everything was
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so systemized i didn't have to think i'm just doing the right thing continuously going forward in the direction
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that i want to be going
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how do you handle disruptions in your schedule like meals out travel family events things like
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that tips are when you're traveling no carbs at breakfast small lunch
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when you're going out for dinner get the steak get the steak
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and vegetables at most every restaurant will have a steak say cook and no butter.
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Everything on menu is usually covered in sauces and spices and fats and oils and butters.
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Steak is just grilled.
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And a big tip that I've had that helps is if you drink a protein shake before going to dinner, it curbs your appetite like crazy.
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So you're craving way less.
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What's your approach to cheat meals?
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It should be driving you towards a goal.
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Most people don't realize that if they're trying to diet and they're having a bunch of cheat meals, it's actually making them crave more throughout the week.
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I truly believe people trying to cut is for a lifestyle
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thing the whole point of this is you want to look good
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and feel good so figure out what you need doesn't have the fancy automatic open all right
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so i alluded to this earlier but talking about plateaus even
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if you're dialed in everything is locked in you're going to hit a plateau eventually
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because eventually the body still will flatline and there's a lot of reasons why
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but i'm going to give the most common is usually just
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because the body adapts to what it's doing
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and your calories can only go so low so
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if everything else is locked in this is
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when you truly need a break your body has probably been dieting coming in for so long
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and now it wants to hold on to as much as it can without losing any body fat
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or any muscle mass or whatever it may be so this is
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when you can take a full week of having refeeds
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or eat whatever you want even for a week
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and truly allow your body to like rest and relax
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and realize it has an abundance of food
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so it can go back into that high metabolism fat burning mode
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and start going through it all right
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when should the cut end i think the cut should end
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when you're at a point in which it starts to sacrifice progress
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and performance in the gym a few other cues
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that would be your sleep starts to suck
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because your body's in a state of stress because it's starving that you can't sleep, you're dieting for a lifestyle to look good and to feel good.
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So when it starts to sacrifice to feel good and your stress starts hitting you, your sleep is bad, you're tired, you can't focus at work, all these kind of things are getting in no way, you're probably getting
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beyond the point of too lean that you need to be because it's taking away from your point of view enjoying life.
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Getting lean really is that simple.
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It's just about doing the simple things consistently enough so that they actually work.
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If you have liked this video, I actually did a full day of eating, of getting lean without eating like a professional bodybuilder.
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So it's not my old diet prep.
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It's what I would do now to get lean, live a proper lifestyle.
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I'll link that right here.
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You guys can watch that.
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But anyways, appreciate you guys watching as always.
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I'll see you next time.
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This speaking lesson is built on the video “Unfortunately, Getting Lean Really Is This Simple”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: lean, calorie, cardio, eat. This video has 233 sentences and 2861 words to shadow. The speech runs for 14:56. The speaker talks fast, about 192 words per minute, so expect linked and reduced sounds. 84% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English; the rest is worth studying before you start.
Key vocabulary in this video
15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| lean verb | /ˈliːn/ | To incline, deviate, or bend, from a vertical position; to be in a position thus inclining or deviating. |
| calorie noun | /ˈkæləɹi/ | A non-SI unit of energy, equivalent to 4.184 kilojoules, that can raise the temperature of a kilogram of water by one degree Celsius. This is the unit normally… |
| muscle noun | /ˈmʌs.əl/ | A contractile form of tissue which animals use to effect movement. |
| meal noun | /ˈmiːl/ | Food that is prepared and eaten, usually at a specific time, and usually in a comparatively large quantity. |
| sacrifice noun | /ˈsæk.ɹɪ.faɪs/ | Originally, the killing (and often burning) of a human being or an animal as an offering to a deity; later, also the offering of an object to a deity. |
| steak noun | /steɪk/ | Beefsteak: a slice of beef, broiled or cut for broiling. |
| consistent adjective | /kənˈsɪs.tənt/ | Of a regularly occurring, dependable nature. |
| lifestyle noun | /ˈlaɪfˌstaɪl/ | A style of living that reflects the attitudes and values of a person or group. |
| variable adjective | [ˈvæɹ.i.ə.bl̩] | Able to vary or be varied. |
| adapt verb | /əˈdæpt/ | To make suitable; to make to correspond; to fit or suit. |
| plateau noun | /plæˈtoʊ/ | A largely level expanse of land at a high elevation; tableland. |
| hungry adjective | /ˈhʌŋ.ɡɹi/ | Affected by hunger; having the physical need for food. |
| suck verb | /sʌk/ | To use the mouth and lips to pull in (a liquid, especially milk from the breast). |
| butter noun | /ˈbʌtɚ/ | A soft, fatty foodstuff made by churning the cream of milk (generally cow's milk). |
| decline verb | /dɪˈklaɪn/ | To move downwards, to fall, to drop. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| pop up verb | To come up with a "pop" sound. |
| beat up verb | To give a severe beating to; to assault violently with repeated blows. |
| come in for verb | To be subjected to. |
| end up verb | To bring to a conclusion. |
| figure out verb | To come to understand; to discover or find a solution; to deduce. |
| get out of verb | To leave, exit or escape from; to become free of. |
| go through verb | To travel from one end of something to the other. |
| take away from verb | To subtract a quality from; make something seem not so good or interesting. |
Sentences worth repeating
Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:
- How would you recommend someone train while they're trying to get lean?
- How can you use gym performance as feedback barrier?
- What's your approach to cheat meals?
- I'll link that right here.
- I'll see you next time.
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect continuous have/has been + -ing — an action that started earlier and is still going on | you've been eating · haven't been doing · has probably been dieting |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | isn't measured · are hurt · was made |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 93 contractions and reduced forms, such as you're, don't, I'm. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “th” sounds: myth /mɪθ/, smoothie /ˈsmuːði/
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: shake /ˈʃeɪk/, efficiency /ɪˈfɪʃ.ən.si/, intention /ɪnˈtɛnʃn̩/, dish /dɪʃ/, prescription /pɹəˈskɹɪp.ʃən/
- Long words — get the stress right: metabolism /məˈtæb.əˌlɪz.əm/, efficiency /ɪˈfɪʃ.ən.si/, automatic /ˌɔː.təˈmæt.ɪk/, consistently /kənˈsɪstəntli/, practically /ˈpɹæk.tɪ.k(ə.)li/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like lean, calorie, muscle.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.