64 - EP 64 with Coach Paul: The Perfect Muscle-Building Lifestyle, Bowhunting Rabbits and Spiritual Brogression

We are live. 3, 2, 1. Welcome, Paul. This is your second time on the Soulcast, I believe.

Yes, sir. It's a pleasure to be here once again.

Yes, IRL, in real life, with the ocean in front of us. If you hear that in the background, uh, listening just the audio, apologize for that. I'll try and cut it out, but it does sound pretty good to us. So looks pretty, uh, that is probably one of the best ways to meditate as well, is just listening to waves, the constant sound kind of coming in through your senses that you can concentrate on. But also the vibrational aspect of it, that constant sound wave coming through. What do you think about that, Paul?

Aside from the sound, I mean, the breeze, the air feels great.

Yep.

Breathe it real deep into your lungs through the nose. Yeah.

All right, everyone listening, let's do a few deep breaths before we, before we really get into this. As deep as you can, and then a little bit more. So that I think I picked up from Dr. Huberman. He said that, um, breathing to the 100%, let's say you feel like 100%, ah, it's the deepest I can possibly breathe, and then you stop, and then you go more, and you do that a few times over. That's one of the quickest ways to get into the parasympathetic nervous system. So you're freaking out, you're stressed out, deepest breath you can, hold it, and then go 10-15% more. There's always room left in the tank.

Helps a lot with cold plunge. I actually learned that from Wim Hof, except instead of holding the breath, you would take a shallow breath, exhale through the mouth, and then repeat, and then out the mouth. So it's very sharp inhale, sharp exhale, and you do that for maybe 30 reps, and you can do a breath hold for like up to a minute.

Wow. Yeah, Wim Hof is one of the OGs with cold exposure. Um, so I was reading about breath, the relationship between the rate at which organisms perspire or breathe. They have one breathing cycle in and then out. If you map that on average, how much an animal breathes per minute, you match that to their lifespan, what you'll find is the slower or the lower amount of breaths per minute, the longer the lifespan. And that's very, very consistent across the animal kingdom. Uh, the animal that has the slowest rate is— I think it was blue whales. So they're very, very slow breathers. I can— as you can imagine, it takes a while for them to fully expand and, and all the rest of it, but their lifespan is very, very high. And then you have things like little mice, they're going breathing all the time very rapidly. So what you can infer from that information, I think, is that the slower you breathe as an organism, the slower your, I guess, life processes, uh, take part or play out, and theoretically the longer your lifespan.

No, that makes complete sense. You look at a rat, they're always scavenging, turning their heads left and right, quick movements. You look at it, you feel bad, you know, their cortisol's, you know, on survival mode. So, you know, when you extrapolate that to yourself, how are you breathing? How are you living? How are you moving?

Very stressful life being a rat, probably. And they don't live— well, rats actually live a few years, I think, like Several years maybe if they're looked after. But yeah, the sea urchin is one of the greatest— excuse me— sources of iodine. Did you know that?

I did know that.

Of course you knew that.

Very common in the Japanese cuisine. I like it in miso soups, sushi. We just had sushi the other night. It's fantastic. I feel like not enough people get iodine. And, um, with my training regimen, it definitely helps with my central nervous system and recovery.

Cool. Yeah, I haven't really heard about it in term— in that context. Uh, iodine, at least for why I take it or why I've seen it taken, is for the pineal gland decalcification. So for people that don't know, uh, your pineal gland which a lot of people think, uh, and ancient cultures like the Egyptians thought was the— they called it the Eye of Horus. And in the hieroglyphs you can see it if, um, in, in some of the diagrams that they created. But the pineal gland, which is sitting up here in the brain, is the seed of your spiritual power. And that literal gland, that little bit of meat in your brain, can become calcified. It has calcium buildup or calcified by other kind of buildup, namely fluoride and other— what are the other things that, that can get stuck in that? Not entirely sure.

Yeah, I know fluoride is the main thing to look out for. Subtle lifestyle adjustments make a huge difference compounded over time, like a simple decision over which toothpaste to use.

Yep, exactly. That's, that's the big one for most people, is they put fluoride in the toothpaste, they put it in the water, because this is entirely intentional, of course, to lower the spiritual energy of the people. The pineal gland, when it is calcified and when it is built up with gunk, that decreases your connection to spirit, connection to God. And through meditation, when your third eye opens, that's the same position as the pineal gland in the brain. But the pineal gland, once that decalcifies and clears through things like, you know, eliminating fluoride from your diet and your intake in terms of toothpaste and water, because your pineal gland is connected to your teeth through the nerves. It's a very quick system through the nerves, through the teeth, boom, straight to your head. It's very, very straightforward there. So the quickest way is to get fluoride into your pineal gland is to go through your teeth, which is what fluoride in toothpaste and water— that's how that works. So use anything else really. Coconut oil is good for toothpaste. Van Man's eggshell powder I've used as well. Baking soda. There's a whole bunch of stuff. You don't need these super processed artificial mint blue sparkly fucking— I've seen some kids' toothpaste, it's like a science experiment in there, and comes in a plastic tube. That's probably not good as well. It's definitely not good as well. But these are the things that we kind of— it's, it's on autopilot. Maybe you're raised with, oh, you get your toothpaste, you get your body wash, you get these things, deodorant, which, you know, I could go on and on. Cleaning products, what you spray in your house, what you wash your clothes with. All of these things are essentially just chemical toxins that your body has to process, and none of it is needed. And that's a massive lifestyle change that I think most people should make.

Yeah, just speaking from my own experience and helping my friends and family out, I just want to let you guys know, if you are making that shift with toothpaste, it is totally normal to experience some tooth sensitivity at first. As you kind of adapt to it.

Yeah, that would be your nerves coming back online, like, hey, we're not being, you know, busted up by this fluoride shit anymore. Um, so, so coming back to the sea air has iodine, and iodine is one of the other things that decalcifies the pineal gland. Uh, other things— sun gazing. Do you sun gaze?

I wear contact lens, bro. So I don't think it works for me, but when I wake up, I try to get, you know, at least like a couple minutes in, um, really set that melatonin build up so I can release it later on.

Yeah, so sungazing— I mean, I'm sure you could take your contact lenses out for this particular practice, but for those that don't know, if you get sunlight in and on the eyes— and I look directly into the sun at sunrise and sunset specifically. So the sunlight filtering through there is very mild. There's next to no UV light coming through, which is the one that can burn you if you're not smart. And definitely don't look at the sun in the middle of the day when it's very high. But in general, sunset, uh, when you've got lots of red light coming through, and also sunrise, it's perfectly fine. I've told this to other friends and I do it myself. I'm speaking from direct experience of having done it. To look into the sun and get those sun rays directly into the eyes. It filters through and it can decalcify your pineal gland as well. And in general, it's a very spiritual experience once your eyes adjust. You know, of course, only start with 10-15 seconds to begin with. Uh, don't look at it straight for, you know, 30 minutes, but just kind of getting used to that feeling of your eyes focusing on the sun And what happens is it stops blinding you. It's, you know, all these rays that are shooting out when you kind of look side to side from it. But when you look at the sun, it becomes this perfect sphere, which is really cool to see. And then you can just look at it and there's no, there's no hurt or pain through the eyes, and it becomes this real spiritual experience, which is really cool.

Yeah, I think a good metric for that is to see how your muscles react to it, you know, are you squinting, are your eyebrows, you know, that area kind of sore, fatigued?

Yeah, it will feel kind of strange when you first start, just like anything really, but look into the practice. It's thousands of years old, it can elevate your spiritual energy, and can, you know, why I bring it up is because it can heal eyesight as well, because you're getting that beautiful red light, which is the healing light, into your eyes, where for most people, okay, never look at the sun is the advice given, blue light all day because they're looking into a, into a screen. And then physically, the eye only has to look at this thing that's, you know, maybe a couple feet at most away from you. And so you're only using— your eye muscles contract, uh, to kind of open and close the pupil or focus on things far away or close. Like, that's, that's muscles that are working or moving your eye left, right, up, and down. In the modern world, we're looking at this thing that's not moving— computer screen or phone. It's more— it's not more than a couple feet away for hours and hours a day. And what does that do to the eyes? Well, the muscles that would be used when we look at the horizon over there, over here, varying different things, or searching for a deer, moving through a jungle or something, moving through a forest, we don't use those eye muscles anymore, so they atrophy just like every, every muscle that you don't use atrophies. Then you lose the ability to kind of focus on those ranges. So that's what people call vision degradation in some, in some, uh, some circumstances. I know that doing things like focusing on the horizon, horizon gazing, sungazing, taking breaks when you're looking at a screen, using blue light blocking glasses, and eye yoga. Literally like, okay, let's do some sets of working out eye muscles. Look as far left as you can, then look as far right as you can, then look far up and then far down as much as you can. So that's really increasing your range of motion of using the eye muscles because you— yeah, as you look left, you're your eye muscles are pulling your eyeball around to look over here. So that's, yeah, a bit of cool information. And I know of people that have helped to improve their eyesight. This is another thing that people don't realize when they— I need glasses or, you know, any contact lenses. When you use magnification or some external tool to help your vision, yes, it works, but then your eyes don't have to work at all to access that level of vision. So they get weaker. It's like going to the gym and using like a super suit that lifts the weights for you, you know. You might, you might be lifting those weights, but is it actually you? And then you're, you know, your arms wither away because the machine's doing it. It's a similar kind of principle with eyeglasses, and then you just need more magnification. Oh, my eyes are getting worse because I'm using these glasses. And then further and further and further on, where I think there needs to be a kind of shift in how you look at it and a conscious attempt to strengthen the eye muscles through this range of motion and increasing the good levels of light coming into that.

Yeah, I appreciate you bringing that up because I feel like that is one of the most underappreciated muscles, and you know, no one really knows how to train it. No one even thought of training it. Um, growing up as an obsessed gamer staring in front of the screen playing Call of Duty 16 hours a day Yep, same.

A little bit closer on the mic. Yep.

Yep. And having to wear contact lenses, I— just hearing you talk about it, it reminded me of a time when I was practicing hunting, bow hunting rabbit. And at first it was so difficult, I thought maybe it wasn't sighted, something was wrong with the bow. But it just turned out I had shit aim. And, you know, these are little creatures in the jungles. They kind of blend in into the bushes. And after a couple weeks, I got pretty efficient at that. And, um, I continued over a span of 3 months with my friend. It was a really fun hobby for us. And later on, I considered LASIK eye surgery. Yeah, so to do that, you have to get an exam, and my vision's horrendous. It was like -5 on both eyes, but then when I went in, it was like -4. It's pretty interesting.

That means it's better.

Yeah, yeah, it means it's better.

I'm sure you could do the same thing. Were you actually bow hunting rabbits, like not just a target or something?

Yeah, no, real rabbits. It was, um, last summer, I believe.

That's awesome. Can you go into that a bit and what that was like? Cuz I mean, yeah, I haven't hunted any animals. Uh, that's a failing of mine so far. It's something I want to get into, maybe not bow hunting straight away, whatever. I have some friends that do it, but I really think there's— I know that there's value in being able to just go out somewhere and get your own food rather than, you know, plastic wrapped in a supermarket. But that experience of bow hunting, for you, bow hunting rabbits seems quite savage. Like, well, you just wake up, decide to do that one day?

Yeah, I actually had a friend that got me into it. He was more experienced, so it was nice to kind of learn from his errors and, you know, kind of take that shortcut on the learning curve. But the first hunt, ineffable feeling, for lack of better words. Um, you kind of get a rush throughout your whole body.

Yeah.

And, and when I was bow hunting, it's, uh, it's kind of hard because rabbits move really quickly.

Oh yeah.

You know, one hop they can jump maybe like 10 feet. So yeah, um, so it takes an extreme degree of focus and you're engaging all your muscles. As soon as you pull back, you know, there's a lot of pressure. You gotta control it all. And when you take that shot, you gotta be ready to rush in with a knife or an axe or whatever, or your hands in a glove to like snap its neck because You know, if you like, I did a shot where it pinned its front right leg into its left back leg, so almost like a skewer.

Wow.

And you know, you just gotta sprint up and just put it out of its misery. Yeah, as soon as possible. But, um, it's really fun. I, I think the first time I did it, I got home and immediately made rabbit curry, which was phenomenal.

It was good.

It was good. Potatoes, carrots, mint leaves from the garden, and rabbit.

That's awesome. I don't think I've actually eaten rabbit before. What does it taste like?

It's like a really lean chicken. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Whole Foods is closed. Go get some rabbit from the forest.

Yep. Would definitely advise anyone to go out there and just experience it for the one time at least. Just get into hunting. I have big aspirations.

What's next?

Elk.

Yes. Yes.

That would be pretty badass. Just take a bite of the liver straight up.

Straight up.

Can you imagine the feeling?

I can imagine it, but I'm sure it's not the same as what that feeling would actually be. Shout out Hunter Wise. He went on his recent elk trip. He hunts his own elk and he's shown me the liver. He's also— the heart of an elk that he had was enormous, enormous. And he just straight cut that up, chucked it on the grill. Heart, I think, is, uh, closest to muscle meat because obviously the heart is a muscle. Yeah, but it's still, you know, classified as an organ. So it's, it's pretty interesting. Uh, and he was saying the— there's the feeling you get from eating an elk because, okay, so elk very, very mobile, agile, but also strong, big units. I mean, huge, uh, especially if it's a big one. And they've been moving their whole life, outdoors all the time, completely organic, of course, no human interaction, which is what meat is meant to be like. I think no matter how well that a cow is raised in captivity, it's never going to be the same, you know, maybe better in some ways when humans are looking after it. But in general, a wild animal is just going to be much more pure. And, you know, if you believe in the metaphysical aspects of you becoming somewhat of what you consume, which I do, then, you know, what's better, a supermarket chicken that's been, you know, locked in a cage its whole life, or a fucking elk in the wild?

So yeah, I, I remember going to a farmer's market and The lady there worked at the place there were, um, raising these bisons, and they would massage it before they put a bullet between its eyes.

Yeah.

And, you know, these, these folks have years of experience, so, you know, if they say it lowers the cortisol, it makes the meat more tender, I believe it.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's quite a life for some animals in captivity, getting massages, get good food, grass, and then, you know, before you know it, it's happening to your out to pasture, so to speak.

Yeah, organs are a great option. If you are timid of eating it raw, I would suggest using lots of herbs and olive oil to marinate, salt and pepper of course, and using lemon, garlic, and onion. It's quite tasty.

And still having it raw?

No, cooking it. Okay. A little bit of nutrient degradation, but at least you you know, you're introducing yourself to it.

Yeah. Uh, what's your favorite organ meat to eat? Because you eat all the organs, really.

Yeah, mostly, mostly liver, testicles, and heart. Haven't, haven't done too much with spleen, pancreas, but my favorite would probably be a liver pâté from a veal, or, or a marinated heart over white rice.

Beautiful. Um, I think— well, I, I did have my first testicle, beef testicle, recently raw. Yeah. Um, ever since you told me that before you hit— was it 405 bench?

Yeah. Your, your pre-workout meal was testicle and, uh, was it pineapple or, uh, beet and watermelon slushie?

Beetroot and watermelon slushie and also raw testicle. Yes, Giga pre-workout there. Um, it was an interesting one, you know, once you get over the hurdle of, uh, yeah, I'm eating, uh, some testicles. Uh, it's, it's not even— doesn't even feel like a meat, like it doesn't chew really.

Uh, very, very mild taste.

Yeah, very mild taste, nothing too intense. I think some people get freaked out because they think it's like full of parasites and whatnot. Yeah.

The most important thing is where are you sourcing it from.

Yeah. The one that I had was frozen as well, so it was defrosted but frozen when it was shipped to me. And that in itself kills a lot of parasites. It's not as like pure as completely fresh and raw, but it does help if you're not eating organs because you're worried about that stuff. Freezing is a way to, you know, just like freeze drying is better than desiccating things if you're taking them in supplements. Freezing does kill some of the bacteria and parasites as well if you're worried about that stuff, but I don't think it's worth worrying at all.

Yeah, everyone's got parasites to some degree.

Yes. Um, so let's, let's talk about the workout that we had this morning. Uh, we hit back workout which was great. I was saying that I'm gonna definitely gonna be sore tomorrow, but, um, let's go through it. What did we start with and why did you choose to set it up this way? This is Paul's workout.

So we started out with cable rear delt flies, just kind of to pre-exhaust the rear delts. And anything you're lacking in, it's a good idea to prioritize it, right? So before going into your compound movements you are pre-exhausting your rear delts, or whatever muscle you want, uh, prioritize. So think about pre-exhausting as isolating it as much as possible without any assistance of other muscles. So in this situation, it was rear delts, and then we went ahead and got into weighted chin-ups. So now your rear delts are still engaged, but you're getting assistance from your brachialis, your lats, all those muscles. So now your red delts are kind of working overtime. And after that, we did dumbbell rows where delts still firing, but again, we're getting a lot of help from, uh, other muscles. And then we went to close grip.

So the, the rows, the dumbbell rows, uh, was set up in a good way. We had a chair in front of us which was, I would say, incline.

Yeah, an incline bench, and we kind of use it as a support.

Yeah, so it's about like a tripod, right?

Yes, exactly.

Yeah, yeah.

And then I like to do staggered stance, so that way you can really incorporate some oblique activation and you can get your elbows behind your body a lot easier.

Yeah, staggered meaning what exactly?

So the side you are working, you're going to use that leg in the back and then decide you're not working. You're going to use that front leg slightly forward. Yes.

Yeah.

Yes, exactly.

And it felt great. We were using the heaviest dumbbell in the gym.

Yeah.

Which was, you know, it's, it's not a, you know, it's a chain gym. It's not a really hardcore gym, but it feels good to use the biggest dumbbell in the gym for something, you know?

Yeah.

120 pounds. Decent, decent lifting.

Heavy, it, it does something to you. It definitely boosts your testosterone, that's for sure.

Yeah.

Um, and it's just a quick way of being efficient in the gym. Yeah, just bring that intensity.

Yeah, which is the main thing, I would argue. Um, we were still working, uh, you know, Paul was doing a few more reps than me, but I was still hitting 6 to 8, uh, within that. I don't particularly enjoy or do any lifting in the 1 to 4 range. I know you have, but why don't you speak about why really that's not that optimal unless you are going for those heavy numbers for some reason.

Yeah, I was working the 1 to 6 rep range a lot, prioritizing strength just to really see what I was capable of. And you know, if I'm helping clients and they want to gain strength, I should have experience in that. So yeah, yeah, so I prioritized the strength training, and over time it's just— there's so many variables, and it's just not a good option long term if your goal is, you know, health and longevity and functionality. That's more so what I'm more concerned about nowadays. Yeah, yeah, but, um, Yeah, I mean, whatever style you want to train, you can achieve anything you want. You're not destined for one style of training. A lot of people live and swear by CrossFit or powerlifting or weightlifting or calisthenics. It just depends on what you want, but the most important thing is knowing that you can do it all. And from there, you know, it's pretty cool to to set these goals, execute them, and then move on to the next. And, um, that 405 milestone, that was it. That was actually the All-American record for my height and weight. I would be second place. I think first place was 425.

Wow.

But, um, yeah, I called it quits after that. Yeah, I, I just didn't want to risk it. Like I said, there's so many variables. One day you're dehydrated or you know, lacking in sleep, and then next thing you know, you blow out your shoulder.

Yeah.

And you know, you're done.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, risk-reward for those real tail-end lifts is, again, if you have a specific— you're doing powerlifting, then all power to you. But just know that for the most people listening, it's not really conducive to anything apart from massaging your ego, which is how you get injured in the gym. Uh, that, that whole idea of having different goals over time, I think, is pretty cool. within the framework of fitness, but it also applies to life, uh, because you can have variation in the goals that you're going for. Hey, I want to have a really nice V-taper, so I'm gonna work on my vacuums, bring my stomach in, and then I'm also gonna charge out my delts a bit more. And then once you have a bit more of a V-taper, okay, hey, I want to build up my legs, and then that becomes your focus more so for a few months. And A lot of people think there's one routine and that's it, and then what's the best routine for me to do? And while there are routines that are better than, uh, other routines for your particular goals, that's what you have to realize is there is no one thing. I've done a lot over the years, as I'm sure you have as well, Paul.

Yeah, I've switched it up. I've, I've done calisthenics, I've done powerlifting, I've done bodybuilding. And that is such a huge misconception. People always ask me, what is the best way? As if there was a shortcut.

Yeah.

And I just tell them, sign up for coaching because, you know, it's a very individualized thing. It depends on your goal, your time that you're willing to devote into this.

Yeah.

How much experience you have, where you want to go. So, you know, there really is no Absolute answer.

Yeah, um, that's very important because the person that has to work a bit more versus someone that has a lot more free time to do things, the whole approach is going to be different. And it requires someone that has a bit of knowledge at least to realize where you're at in your journey and what would be the best recommendations for you. Uh, so dumbbell rows, we got into— that was, uh, the third exercise. So We did 3 sets of however many we could lift for the 120 pounds, which—

yeah, probably like a rep or 2 shy of failure. And then after that, we went into a close grip lat pulldown to the sternum, and we really didn't go heavy. We did like 15 reps. Yeah, but the cool thing with cables is that you can really build a nice mind-muscle connection. Yeah, with the constant tension that it provides. Yeah, so, you know, first thing I'm thinking of headed into this set is retracting my scapula and bringing my elbows back until I feel the muscles engaged. And then that's really when your rep starts, because as you let the weight go back up, that's, that's kind of like a, um, like almost like a tug, a tug of war.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, true.

Yeah, so you want to start with the contraction, and I feel like that's That's the best way to build your mind-muscle connection. And a lot of people complain like they might not have heavy enough weight, but I would say that it's your lack of capability to make the weights heavy. The best bodybuilders know how to make light weights feel heavy.

Yep, Frank Zane, I think, said that the key to longevity—

excuse me—

in bodybuilding is to make a light weight feel heavy. And that can mean slowing it down so that your time under tension is very high.

Higher reps, different angles, different equipment.

Yeah, it's really— again, that's something that you learn when you're deeper into the bodybuilding world or lifting world. But the 3 sets of 6 of dumbbell press, that's, that's, that's like the bird's eye view almost. And then you get into that and you realize you can take a full 4 seconds to do that dumbbell press and then up like that, or the reverse, 4 seconds up and then quickly down, still controlled. Um, you know, supersets throwing into that. Um, there's many ways to skin the cat in terms of saying 3 sets of 6, and that's the beautiful thing about it. And each kind of different facet of this diamond, all the different cuts that you can go into that exercise is going to bring you different levels of muscularity, hit your muscles differently, which will contribute to a physique. And that is all going to come only from literally putting in the reps, is the expression, but you're actually doing reps in this case, uh, and spending time in the gym and experimenting.

Yes, experimenting is crucial. I think the worst thing you can do in the gym is sticking to your old habits. You know, when you're a newbie, anything works.

You Yeah.

So you learn that, okay, I'm seeing progress, I'm just gonna keep on doing the same thing. And then next thing you know, you hit a plateau.

Yeah.

So, you know, you're just practicing bad habits, bad form over and over. Practice doesn't make perfect.

Yeah.

Um, perfect makes perfect. So really build a solid foundation with the way you approach your training. Um, a good rule of thumb here is if your goal is hypertrophy— for most people it is— yeah, 30 to 60 seconds of time under tension per set. So think about like this: instead of just hitting X amount of reps, think about time under tension. So maybe each rep takes you 3 seconds, 6 seconds. So let's say 3 seconds, you want to go for 10 reps, so that's 30 seconds. Yeah, maybe it's a heavier weight and you're going for 5 seconds on dumbbell bench press, try 7 to 10 reps and see how that feels, really controlling the weight. Because when you're just going for strength and explosiveness on 3 to 6, there's a lot of risk.

Yeah, um, so where were we at? So yeah, this— when we were doing that, uh, lat pulldown close grip to our sternum What I found was that my forearms were giving out. The forearms were just burning, and we were using straps as well at that point. Straps help your forearms, but it just, you know, that was what was making me stop.

That's, that's a good indicator that you're actually training hard because you're doing an exercise designed for your back muscles and your forearms are giving out with straps. That means your back is totally fatigued. Yeah, and, um, yeah, that's good.

Uh, so what was next? We hit shrugs, I believe, after that.

Yeah, the, the rest was kind of just killing time, just doing little accessories, right? Um, isolating the shrugs, a little bit of rear delt work. But yeah, that's essentially it.

We, we did shrugs in the Smith machine, which is great. People— some people think the Smith machine is cheating, but again, just a different tool. Yeah, you can use free weights. I think barbell shrugs specifically are better on the Smith machine because they're a bit more controlled and, you know, you can treat your shoulders a bit better than just a free barbell.

Yeah, the, the bar path is kind of there for you. Yeah, um, well, some Smith machines, but the one we had was fixed, so so the bar path makes it a lot easier. And just barbells, Smith machines in general, you can really overload the weight. And with straps, you know, yeah, you can really burn out.

Yeah. Um, so we hit shrugs, and then I believe you did some extra rear delt stuff.

Yeah, so I did a bent over dumbbell rear delt fly, and once I hit failure around 10 to 15 reps Again, this is kind of like isolating the rear delt. And then I just did bent over dumbbell rear delt rows. So just—

oh yeah, we both did that, right?

Yeah.

So that was an interesting— I don't think I've done them before. Yeah.

So you do the flies into the rows because it's like the same kind of concept I mentioned earlier. You're getting assistance now from your biceps, from your traps to really make that stubborn rear delt grow.

Yeah. Uh, rear delts will really They kind of fill you out from the back, so they make you look thicker. And you might not think that, oh, someone's looking at you face on, but they really make a difference in, again, that V-taper. And the lats as well are probably the main one that kind of— when your lats start wrapping around the front, that's a really cool feeling.

Yeah, I'm wearing Sol Brah's XL hoodie right now.

Yeah, it's bursting at the seams. You can't see, but it's exploding at the back here.

Yeah, the, the rear delts give the shoulders a bowling ball 3D effect.

Yep.

But also just from a functionality standpoint, most people push more than they pull, so they always have rounded shoulders. Yeah. So, you know, it'll definitely help out your posture, the way you stand, the way you carry yourself.

Yeah, uh, in general people say, uh, pull twice as much as you push because One of the main things that people, uh, run into when they're pressing all the time— chest, arms, shoulders day— uh, you get all this front delt action. And the stronger a muscle is, the easier it is for that muscle to pull on your body. So if your shoulders and chest are strong, everything gets pulled forward like this. But your rear delts, training your lats, boom boom boom boom, and that is You know, most people are spending time compressed in the front chain, rolling their shoulders over, and that's when you end up injuring yourself. So if you are lifting, which is already probably not the best in terms of— it's great, but with over-repetition, um, with the kind of forward motion, then you can run into problems. So pulling up to your back, training that more often, especially if you're more developed in the lifting world, is super important. And I do that now, nowadays.

100%. You would think if I want to get a stronger bench, I just got bench more. But also what I was doing during that 405 phase was barbell rowing 315 to 405 as well. Yeah, really try and match the strength, you know. Doing lower body work will even translate to your bench press. Yeah, so it all goes hand in hand.

Yeah, I mean, it's a full body exercise. You're pushing it up in the front but you're locking your whole body in. I mean, your feet are pressing off the ground somewhat, and you want to retract everything so that you can engage the chest and shoulders better. So that's, that's another thing that you learn with time, is that— I mean, I'm still discovering things where, oh, that muscle can help support me if I properly engage it while I'm doing a curl, and, and so on, so forth.

So train everything. Word to Lobo.

Word to Lobo. Train everything. Uh, so that was our workout. One thing I did want to run through with you, uh, which would be a cool little exercise, is if you had a person that they had unlimited free time, limited free money, let's say, and you wanted to create their day to be as to how they would get the most muscular as possible. So everything they did was based around the perfect day for nutrition-wise, supplement-wise, lifting-wise, rest-wise, uh, what would you do? And we, you know, we can both contribute as to from morning to night the perfect day would look like.

So, so your whole life dedicated to building muscle. I lived that life.

Yeah, yeah, I'm sure you did. Um, and I did sometimes when I should have maybe been studying a little, a little bit more. But, uh, so So let's start with the start, of course, start of the day, morning. When you're waking up, no alarm. That's probably key. You want to rest as much as your body needs for what you did yesterday or the day before that, and resting— and sorry, sleeping and waking up according to how much your body needs. Yeah.

So I look at this in 3 pillars: recovery, nutrition, which kind of both go hand in hand.

Yeah.

And then your training. So if your goal is complete hypertrophy, you want high frequency, probably do a split, 6 sessions a week. And then you can do, you know, maybe 3 days on, 1 day off, 3 days on, 1 day off, and really isolate the muscles that way.

So this guy wakes up, what's he doing? Or what did you do in your, your giga muscle stacking days? Um, what's the first thing that you're doing when you wake up?

I was waking up stretching, which is huge. Ideally in the sun, get some sunlight. Yeah, that will also help your sleep. Yeah, so some yoga, some mobility work, kind of do a body scanning meditation.

Nice.

Um, a lot of it was intuitive and varied day by day, but yeah, I would do that, hydrate myself. Get some electrolytes, Soul Salts, yeah, chilling. And, um, whatever supplements I felt was appropriate. I'd probably have like 20, 30 supplements, and it would kind of just be contingent on what I felt like I needed. Yeah, but some of the main ones I would always do was black seed oil on an empty stomach, kind of wake up your metabolism. Shilajit, Tongkat Ali, Yeah, a lot of these herbs and roots, and shilajit being a mountain resin, are known for boosting testosterone. And there's so much research that says X and Y, and you know, everything's counteracting each other, so you don't know what to believe. But just try it for yourself, and anecdotally speaking, that worked for me. Obviously, NoFap And, um, yeah, yeah, nature walks was huge. If I was not in the gym, I'd be moving with, um, you know, getting my feet moving into nature, just breathing a lot, clearing my mind. And a really underrated aspect of just overall wellness is stress management. You know, some people can't really manage their relationships or work, and I address that with meditation and getting out into nature. It's a well-known practice in Japan, forest bathing. Do that for 20 minutes at least without your phone and see how you feel when you come back home.

Yeah, so I like to think about this as The total energy that you have available during the day, usually set by the previous days, but you have this pie chart of energy that's available to you. X amount is already dedicated to the energy that requires to go about your day, power yourselves, it's fairly unconscious, it's all the processes that are going through, the walking around and all the rest of it. The more of that pie chart that you have available and freed up that isn't spent on other things, that's more energy that you have available for recovery, muscle repair, uh, and all the rest of it. If you have a large chunk of that pie chart kind of taken up by mental stress, mental rumination, uh, work stress, your relationships that you're constantly thinking about, that is all burning calories, you know. You have to be chill in order to get more jacked in that way, if that's your goal. But you know, it's, it's a good life goal even if that's not your, your number one priority, is to decrease wasted energy on stuff that doesn't really matter, which is, you know, worrying, anxiety, because of situations that you could just as easily, through meditation and understanding philosophy, not worry about. Right? So you need to maximize the amount of energy that you're getting from your sleep and recovery and eating, but then you got to minimize all the extra BS that you're putting yourself through, which isn't really necessary. So the guy wakes up, he's mineralized, he's stretched, uh, what does he have for breakfast? I would say my personal favorite is to have eggs, uh, close to 6 eggs every morning. Having them scrambled is great, not cooking them too much, but if you're trying to get the most nutrition out of the egg, cook the whites and then leave the yolks raw. You can do that fried, but only cooking one side so that the yolk is still runny. And then some easily digestible carbs such as fruits, sourdough toast, raw honey, They're the kind of usual ones that I have in the morning. And then you can accompany that with some raw butter on the toast or just on the side over the eggs, or raw milk is another great one. Great source of carbohydrates, great source of energy. And that pretty much sorts out breakfast along with some other supplements. For me, we went through Paul's, but for me, I love shilajit as well. Great boost of minerals. And I take bison liver, obviously, SolSupps Bison Liver is a great one. Um, what else am I taking in the morning? Theanine sometimes. As far as muscle building, uh, yeah, I mean, that, that's a very solid breakfast. Um, do you then train in the morning?

I think so. Arnold once said that you can kind of shock the muscles by training different times of the day, but if this guy's main focus is building muscle, you want to get in into a pretty militant routine. So you take out all the thinking and measuring and whatnot, which is also why it's a good idea to have your staples so you don't have to think about what you're going to eat, when you're going to eat. It's kind of just into a routine.

Yeah.

For breakfast, I would do raw liver almost as a supplement. It's like, okay, I'm getting almost all my micronutrients and minerals. Covered. And from there, I don't have to worry about it for the rest of the day. Yeah, just really set the tone for the day. And I would set my carbs— if we're talking about building muscle with minimal fat gain, I would center my carbohydrates either or before and after the workout. So, you know, just enough to fuel your workout and just enough to recover your workout. And I never measured anything. If you think about, you get extra couple grams of carbs or fats or whatever, it's just stored in your body and you're gonna use it later. So what's the stress about?

Yeah, that's an important point. Calorie counting and macro counting, I've never really done it. Like, there's some intuitive knowledge of, okay, how many calories does this have? Am I hundreds of calories off my particular bodily needs? But if you're within in that range and you know how to guesstimate that, there's going to be some level of education to, to understand that balance. But once you have achieved that knowledge, really worrying about it to the nth degree is, it's not really, you know, unless you're a giga IFBB bodybuilder level, it's not really going to help.

Does more harm than good.

Yeah, but the stress— again, if you're stressing about, oh, I'm, I'm 60 calories off what I think I would, you know then by worrying about that, you're actually burning more calories and increasing your cortisol. And if your goal is muscle and recovery, then worrying about those calories that you might have just missed that day or didn't measure the thing out, didn't have your fucking scales with you, that's— it's pointless.

One thing I heard a lot was about the anabolic window. Paul, is it true? One hour after the workout, like, I need to get my protein powders in?

Yeah.

Oh, I forgot my It's like, bro, you're tripping. I would just focus on the fundamentals. Yeah, I, I never really— like, after our workout, we, we still haven't even really eaten. It's like 3, 4 hours past. Yeah, because the breakfast was so satiating. Yeah, I'm not hungry. I could eat, but yeah, I'm chilling. Yeah, and it's not gonna have an effect on me. Maybe on a micro level, but again, uh, research versus life experience, you know, you do what works for you.

Yeah. I think, um, in terms of that anabolic window, as long as your protein is good for the rest of the day, then you're fine because your body takes nutrients in throughout the day. One thing I will say about post-workout nutrition that's really helped me and makes me feel better, uh, is some sort of simple carbohydrates pretty much directly after the workout. I usually take a bit of fruit with me to the gym to have after because— excuse me, I just burped into the microphone. That will help blunt the cortisol level and the cortisol spike that you get after a particularly intense workout, help replenish the muscle glycogen pretty quickly after that. It doesn't have to be much, just, you know, a banana, an orange, a bit of raw milk. That really helps.

Don't think of things like carbohydrates. Think about ways you can prevent brain fog.

Right.

That, that's gonna have the most effect on your regimen. And along with every meal, I would have some kind of probiotic via sauerkraut or kimchi. It's going to help you digest your protein.

Yeah, cool. So we've worked out, um, main principles of working out if you are looking to be maximizing hypertrophy is intensity, probably 45 minutes of actual lifting, and if if it's more than that, you're really kind of just doing junk sets, which you're fatiguing yourself to the point where it doesn't really add anything to your muscles, but you're just decreasing your ability to recover. Would you, would you agree with that?

Yeah, overtraining, um, it's a problem that most people won't really ever face, right? But it can happen, and at that point it works towards a detriment to your goals. Yeah, um, a lot of it, like I mentioned before, it's always kind of intuitive because there's so many variables. You gotta know when to take a rest day.

And how do you know when to take a rest day?

When you are just weak, like everything feels heavy, your strength decreases by 20-30%.

Well, well, how would someone know waking up before they went to the gym, how they feel. For me, it's usually if two muscle groups of mine are sore.

Soreness, yes.

Um, you're not going to get sore after every single workout, um, and that's not necessarily a gauge of how good the workout was, especially if you're new to a routine and your body's getting used to it and you're still increasing in strength but not getting sore. You might not think you're making progress, but if two groups of my my muscles are sore, then I usually take a rest day. Like, again, it's intuitive now. I know what my body needs, but I usually— 3 days in a row of lifting, and I— that's probably the max. It's usually 2 days, and then I have 1 off, 2 days, 1 off, so forth.

Yeah, a really good indicator is if you're lifting and you're not getting a pump, pump.

Yep.

Um, that is your body preserving its energy because it doesn't have anything to give you. Yeah, um, so a lot of bodybuilders on PEDs will take Cialis or Viagra to get pumped, and what that is doing is it's taking your future preserves and using it. So the lack of pump you're having, it's signaling you to chill out and recover. It's trying to save you from a heart attack or a stroke. That's why so many famous bodybuilders You know, rest in peace John Meadows, one of the legends, um, taken away too soon. But that's how those things kind of happen.

Yeah.

So, you know, too much stress. Take, take your recovery as seriously as you take your training.

Yeah.

And, um, you know, do cold plunge, meditate, get in the sauna. I know it's like a pretty trendy thing, but, you know, it's been known for decades and, you know, The world is kind of just learning more about it, but yeah.

So we've worked out, had a bit of fruit, we've come home. Um, post-workout stretch is, is pretty helpful to— when you're working out, it's, it's a lot of contraction, maybe shortening your range of motion, and then you want to get everything out and, uh, release all the, uh, built-up lactic acid and things like that. So you know, 5 minutes, doesn't have to be long, of stretching out the muscles that you worked out is pretty important. Um, what does the rest of the day look at— look like? You're recovering, maybe you hit the sauna after your lift at the gym, that's a really good one.

Yeah, so you would want to replenish with 2 things: glycogen and minerals, so you don't cramp up.

Yeah.

And you're not depleted. Yeah, that is where people mess up. They think, oh, maybe I'll just you know, kind of screw off for the rest of the day, hang out with friends, but it carries over into your next day 100%.

Yeah.

Um, yeah, so, so simple carbs like you said, fruit, rice, get that protein up.

Yeah.

Um, ideally something lean just so your body absorbs it a little bit quicker.

But lean proteins absorb quicker because they have less fat.

Yes, fats are slow digesting, but yeah, 2 to 3 meals a day for me, and then just like a little bit of this, a little bit of that, some fruit, whatever.

Yeah, that's an interesting thing. Like, I feel good now and I'm still getting improvements in my physique and getting bigger from really having a big breakfast and, you know, maybe a snack, snacking throughout the day, but a lighter lunch and then a large dinner. So like, yeah, maybe 2.5 meals a day, but even 2 meals a day with snacks, when you have high mineral intake throughout the day, high micronutrient intake throughout the day from liver and shilajit and minerals and things like that, and just high quality food in general, you don't necessarily need to force your body to have 3 massive meals a day.

Another misconception people have, they will come up to me and ask, how many meals do you eat, 6 or 7? I'm like, bro, like 3 tops. Yeah, I think that eating that many meals will fatigue you. Digesting is one of the most, you know, fatiguing operations in your whole body. Yeah, and to be in a constant stage of digesting, you're gonna feel sluggish. Within 2 to 3 meals. Also, people think I can only absorb 40 grams of protein per meal.

Cap.

Cap. If you're healthy, if you got your probiotics, you should be absorbing these nutrients pretty well and feeling good after. Yeah, walking after eating too will also help your metabolism.

Um, so yeah, I mean, at the same time, Dave Draper, legend of the game, golden era bodybuilder, rest in peace as well. He would recommend eating every 1.5 hours. So he was bigger than me, stronger than me. That was his recommendation. Maybe you try that, maybe that helps, but that's always going to be smaller meals. So you're not, you know, 6 massive meals a day is impossible for your body to work through. And then that also adds another layer of complexity in terms of, you know, am I packing meals with me wherever I go? If you have larger meals, then it's easier to just take some snacks with you. So again, what works for you? Have time where you have 6 meals a day and they're just a few potatoes and a bit of fish or whatever it is, and see if that works better for you. Uh, because again, it's all a big experiment and that might work better and make you feel better. Um, for people that are smaller, that probably helps constantly, you know, if they are not physically capable of having a massive meal that functions to fulfill them the whole day, maybe that smaller, more frequent meals, if they have the capacity to, is, is going to help.

So yeah, the, the main takeaway from this podcast, I would say, is to look into what you're giving your energy— what takes your energy and what gives you energy. Not even just from a health standpoint, yeah, of nutrition, but also who are you hanging out with.

Yeah.

Um, does this person give you energy? Do they stress you out? Or does this person kind of help you relax and chill?

Yeah.

Are they aligned with your goals? Are they, you know, hitting these walks with you and, you know, lowering your cortisol, just having a silly grand old time?

Yeah, a silly goose time. Silly goosing around will increase your hypotrophy, I think. So that's, that's a big one. Um, So, you know, you've had your main meals today, you've lifted, you've stretched, you've maybe done a few things, recovery, meditated, you've cut out all the assholes that are annoying you. Um, what does the pre-bed routine look like and what does sleep look like if you're trying to maximize muscle gain?

Anecdotally, gratitude.

Gratitude.

Gratitude. Wow, just stretching and meditating, of course, but really think about all the people in your life, how lucky you are to kind of live this lifestyle. It just does something to your mood. There's an experiment where it was in Norway, I believe, but it had a group of people over here and a group of another group of people, and they would experiment with their emotions and their thoughts. The people that had more negative thoughts were always strong, high stress, and their physiognomy was like, you can tell they're pissed all the time. Yeah, kind of like a cold look.

Yeah.

And the people that were happy, smiling those people lived longer. And I'm sure, you know, I don't need to get into the details, but yeah, that's the main idea of it. So, you know, even when shit hits the fan recently for me, I kind of went through a stage of my life where I felt like it could have destroyed me, but it did not really faze me in that way. And the way I handled it, it's like, life goes on. What can you do? Practice gratitude. I have so many people around me that love me. Yeah, and it's empowering. It's, uh, your reality is your perception.

Yeah, that's, that's a really critical core point to life in general, you know. Throw bodybuilding out the window. If you want to have a great life, you've got to be grateful for what you have. Try to exist in a state of gratitude and appreciation for even being here. Look at the sky, look at the sky behind me. Blue, beautiful painting from God. Like, it's, it's incredible that we're even in this reality, talking on this thing which records our voice, and then you guys get to listen to it. Like, that's incredible. There are 100 things I could, I could point to in this moment that is incredible and beautiful. And if you focus on those, you're gonna be happy and skipping through life, and you're literally gonna be healthier, stronger, and all the rest of it. Um, so that's, that's like you said, core takeaway from this podcast. Um, thank you, Paul. I think that'll, that'll do us here. But thank you guys for listening. Uh, thank you, Paul, for sharing your wisdom. This has been Soulcast, and I'll see you next time.

Pleasure. Take care, guys. Peace.