-: All right, so we're talked about periodization,
incorporating deloads or doing it for potentiation,
but what we haven't really talked about is, you know,
how we kinda actually look at the individual's goal,
you know, whatever their end goal is for the 12 weeks,
16 weeks, six months, however long you happen to be working
with the person or if it's you, the rest of your life.
But where does that fit in in terms of me determining
what program that I'm gonna use
and the order that I'm going to use them.
So, first thing is how trainable are they or you
for their particular goal.
So, many times, the least trainable phase for a person
is the program that's most associated with their goal,
because it's the one they've been doing
over and over and over again.
That's the big reason that they're not seeing
a lot of results, is they've completely blown out
the trainability for that particular program.
So, they're desensitized to the stimulus,
'cause they've been doing it constantly.
They have poor recovery, because they don't ever go
into any other phases to enhance their recovery
or to be able to improve their stimulus.
And because they've been training in a system
where basically they're at or maybe exceeding
their recoverability, they're starting to actually
damage their cells, their systemic functions.
They're dealing with all the issues
with chronic over-training and under-recovering,
whether it be inflammation,
cortisol-insulin seesaw, poor mitochondrial function,
right, poor protein synthesis, poor blood sugar regulation.
All sorts of things start to go haywire
when we're constantly giving our body a stress
that it's no longer making positive adaptations to.
So, this happens chronically in people that have
or that are extremely disciplined going for a goal,
because they kinda think that well,
I just have to keep chipping away.
I have to be consistent.
Sometimes, you need to take a break.
So sometimes the people that fall off the wagon
actually makes better results over time on accident,
because they haven't been staying in the grind
endlessly, you know, beating their head against the wall
regardless of what results they were or were not seeing.
So, if it's trainable, it's really simple, right?
Well, then let's train them
for whatever their goal happens to be, right?
So if they're, for some reason,
if they're just starting out,
you know, or whatever, then cool,
then let's train them for that, right?
If it's muscle growth, cool,
let's throw them an hypertrophy phase.
If it's fat loss, well, let's do a metabolic phase.
If it's strength, okay, let's do a neurological phase,
keeping in mind that this is relative to what is
neurological for them, what is metabolic for them, right?
Because what's neurological for one guy might be six reps
and for another guy, it might be four.
For another guy, it might be 12,
if they've just started training, right?
So, within the context of the individual, right?
We're gonna talk about that
in the assessment module a little bit more.
If it's not trainable, which is more often the case
in anybody that's already currently exercising, right,
then we wanna fall back on the stuff we were just
kinda talking about in potentiation, right?
We wanna figure out, okay, let's choose a system
that will improve the trainability
for whatever their goal happens to be, right?
So, if their goal is hypertrophy, I need to pick a system
that's gonna improve probably my recovery
and resensitize my body to that stimulus, right?
So I'd look at what they've been doing for training,
and I'd look at, okay, how can I decrease
the stresses that they've been doing, so how can
I get away from that with my current program design?
How can I do things to correct probably the health issues
that they've created with doing this particular type
of training too long, and then, this becomes more important
the longer they've been training, especially the longer
they've been training that particular type of stimulus.
It's like, okay, we may need to get away from this.
We may need to get away from it for a longer period of time.
There are people that have come to me to start like a,
you know, I wanna start a contest prep, and I'll be like,
the first thing you need is a week off, right?
Nobody wants to hear that, right?
You know, coming to you, I'm 12 weeks out from my show.
You know, I've been prepping for like three years
for this 12-week program, and like, oh, man.
Well, that was good.
That's a lot of work, you know?
I'm proud of you for putting in all that effort,
but right now, what your body needs,
the thing that's gonna make the biggest improvement,
is to not train for a week, right?
To, you know, take away your gym membership,
revoke it, and ban you from all fitness centers,
you know, within 300 miles.
That's the best thing for your body right now.
That happens in extreme cases, right?
So we gotta follow the rules of that potentiation, right,
or deload, whichever fits their situation the best.
So we're periodizing for that stimulus,
trying to find a way to improve that trainability.
If we do that, okay, if we potentiate at the beginning
of a long journey, okay, that's gonna allow them
to spend more time working in that goal,
or working on phases that align with our goal.
So if they come in, and their goal is to lose fat,
and they've been doing metabolic work chronically,
and you let them talk you into, like, you know,
oh, yeah, but I really like doing my HIIT training.
I don't wanna give up my HIIT training or whatever.
Guess what, they're not gonna resensitize
to metabolic work, right?
So, you're gonna go through, you're gonna get
minimal results and finally realize that you're
gonna have to take a break from that, right,
or you can starve them to death.
Those are your two options, right?
Actually most people go with the latter,
and that's one of the issues with coaching right now.
So, you need to do that,
and then that's gonna allow you to spend more time
on the metabolic stuff, because you can get
into what they need sooner by dealing
with what they need right now, right at the beginning.
And then our end goal phase will come much faster, right?
'Cause if we do that, we potentiate right at the beginning,
the first time we do the metabolic work,
it's gonna work, and it's gonna work well.
If we do metabolic work at the beginning
in the same individual that we're talking
about that's already overtrained, that first cycle's
gonna be kind of like wasted time, and technically,
we're exacerbating the problem, right?
We're actually making it so that now they're even more
untrainable in that system, which means we may have
to take even a longer break, or if we do take a break,
it's now, it's not gonna be as good as if we would
have taken the break before, because we've technically
damaged their trainability to an even further degree
so they won't resensitize back to the point
where they quit, had we done it at the beginning.
If you do this, your goal should be,
for any given client, that you always see results.
And so, if you get the person aligned right
with what they need to start with, and you program,
you periodize by potentiation, right,
if you do your programs well, you're writing it
and your stimulus is specific, it's individualized
to that person, you're giving them the nutrition support,
and then you're constantly potentiating the future,
you will always see results, okay?
You won't always see results if you overstay your welcome.
So that's rule number one.
You can't get greedy in any particular program,
and that's what everybody does, is when their goal
is aligned with a particular phase, right,
you know, I'm trying to build muscle, so I start
this muscle building program, and especially
if it's somebody that's like, coming off of the couch,
they get in, they're gonna see results.
Regardless of what training program, it doesn't matter.
They're gonna see results.
But because it worked when they started,
they're gonna do it forever, because it worked when we
started, regardless of the fact that it's not working now.
Instead of changing the program,
they're gonna do everything else except that.
Oh, I need to eat more, or I need to take this supplement
and add it in, right, or I need to, you know,
go down that dark path of anabolic steroids.
You know, that's the limiting factor.
In reality, you're just overstaying your welcome in that
particular stimulus, and you're fighting your biology.
And the biology's always gonna win in the long run,
even if that means you're dead, okay?
So, you need to make sure that what
you plan on is stopping that program
right before it starts losing its benefit, right?
And you don't wanna go all the way to where it plateaus.
When we hit a plateau, you've stayed there way, way too
long, 'cause what that means is you were getting results,
and then they started going down, down, down, down, down.
You don't wanna wait 'til you get
all the way to the bottom of that hill, right?
When you crest, when you're right here
and you are about to start seeing less results this week
than you got last week, that's when you should be switching,
'cause why would you stay in a program
as soon as it starts becoming less optimal, right?
Now you're on the road to getting less and less
and less results in each subsequent workout.
So, as soon as you reach that point where ugh,
you know, wasn't quite as good, definitely you don't
wanna stay there more than a week for sure, right?
So, if you hit a plateau,
that means you stayed there way too long.
It should be as soon as the results aren't spectacular,
it's like, oh, okay.
You don't go sit here and you're like,
looking through your book and trying to investigate it.
You're like Sherlock Holmes, like,
why did the results not work as good this week?
It couldn't possibly be
that we need to do something different.
If you stay in a phase too long, it can
work backwards in terms of your metabolic health.
So, if we get to the point
where we're not making metabolic adaptations,
the first thing that people usually do with that program
is, well, they do more, right?
Maybe they didn't work hard enough last week, right?
That's what it is.
I didn't work hard enough.
I missed a few reps.
I should have done an extra set.
I should have jumped on the StairMaster for 20 minutes
after my workout, whatever mental trick
that you try and give yourself to rationalize
being able to continue doing this program.
It usually ends up in metabolic damage of some way,
shape, or form, because now you're adding extra stress,
and you're not getting any positive adaptation to it.
So you're gonna start basically switching to that state
where now I'm gonna start partitioning nutrients
from lean tissue to fat tissue,
because I'm gonna be taxing my liver more.
I'm gonna be utilizing more cortisol.
I'm gonna throw off that insulin-cortisol balance
and start partitioning myself from, you know,
being metabolically efficient to metabolically inefficient
and from partitioning nutrients to lean tissue
to partitioning nutrients to fat tissue.
And that's the opposite of what you want.
That's what happens when people stay in a bulk too long.
That's what people stay in a cut too long.
It doesn't matter, okay?
The more advanced the person is, the worse the effects
are typically, because they're usually training
at a higher level, at a higher threshold, which means
their ability to impose stress on their body is higher.
So, once they start seeing diminished recovery and instead
of backing off, they step on the gas, they can dig
themselves a much bigger hole, and if they're
more neurologically efficient and they have more
muscle tissue, they can create way more inflammation,
way more metabolic stress than somebody that, you know,
is just rolling off the couch, and it's really hard to like,
do a lot of damage to their system, because their
training intensity just is not that high.
And then the last part here,
it affects the mental and emotional health.
And this is huge, right?
This could be a chicken and egg
situation to be honest here, right?
So, if you overstay your welcome,
and you go from getting great results
to not getting good results doing the same thing,
if you don't understand this concept
that the body is gonna stop receiving that signal
and the solution is to change, what you're gonna do
is you're gonna start internally reflecting like,
what do I need to do more?
What am I doing wrong?
You start to get into this self-defeating,
depressive-type state, right?
So, you start to beat yourself up, because now,
you're not getting the outcome that you were before,
but you're doing the same thing.
You're eating the same chicken and asparagus,
and you're doing the same amount of cardio,
and you're hitting the gym just as hard.
You're actually using heavier weights than before,
and you're on a higher incline than you were before.
Like, why aren't you getting results anymore, right?
Well, maybe it's I need even heavier
or I need longer or I need more, right?
You know, maybe I need some new yoga pants
and a new fat burner or whatever it may be, right?
So what happens is you get in this cycle where,
instead of giving your body what it needs,
you start breaking yourself down mentally.
You start beating yourself up and blaming the things
that you're doing for the outcome,
and you keep doing the same thing.
Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again,
expecting different results.
Well, really, you know, what we wanna do
is run the non-insane thing.
What we should think of is like, let's change things
often enough so that we can expect consistent results.
That's what we want.
If we always wanna see results,
then we need to change things often.
We need to get out of that insanity-type paradigm.
So, if you wanna see that, if you wanna see this,
following that logic of getting a good starting point
and then always be potentiating.
Always be potentiating, and most importantly,
never overstay your welcome in any particular phase,
regardless of how good the results were at the beginning.
You will never get slower results leaving a phase early,
because you can always come back,
and you can usually come back sooner.
You will always get slower results,
you will always have to take more steps back,
if you stay in a phase long.
So do not get greedy when it comes to staying
in a particular training phase that either
aligns with your goal, you got good results out,
or it's just the way that you like to train.
That's another thing with the mental health thing, right?
If you're only happy training one way,
you need to find ways to either enjoy other things,
whether you create yourself a challenge
in terms of a different goal, like, well, okay,
I'm trying to lose fat, but I'm also gonna set a goal
for how much weight I can deadlift or something,
so when I go to a different phase, right,
I'm still seeing results towards a goal; it just happens
to be a different goal for these couple weeks,
but that's gonna help me mentally on this journey
towards my end goal that maybe is losing, you know,
20 pounds of body fat and being able to see my abs
or whatever it may happen to be.