A short instructional video by Ronan Oliveira (Mindvalley) explaining the central role of dietary protein for weight loss maintenance, muscle preservation (preventing sarcopenia), neurotransmitter synthesis (happiness), hair/nail health, and longevity. The video compares protein sources for omnivores (lean meats, eggs, dairy, fatty meats) and plant-based eaters (legumes, grains/seeds, soy, vegetables), quantifies protein ‘caloric cost’ per gram for several sources, and gives a practical rule: include a protein source at every meal. Implementation tips and supplements (whey/vegan blends) are briefly discussed; a follow-up video will address exact per-meal protein amounts.
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I want to make sure that you are really smart about your protein sources. And in this video I want to tell you what the main sources, the best sources are and how to get more of it. I'll get less excited. I'm Ronan from Mindvalley and I saw that applying this rule about protein or having protein in every single meal is one key action that starts to solve most of the problems that we see in nutrition. Whether you want to lose weight or to expand your longevity. You know that we see the impact of the presence of protein, of the intake of protein in your diet. When we look at it, at what happens, for example, with people who lose a lot of weight in one go. There's a lot of people who do a bariatric surgery, that is when they decrease the size of their stomach. And when you go under that surgery, you can lose up to 30% of your body weight. But after two years, we see that more or less 60% of these people start to regain at least a fourth of what they lost. And in Brazil, the University of Brasilia decided to study this and they got two groups of people, one that regained weight after two years and one that didn't. And they saw one key difference. The people who regained their weight were the ones who had a low protein intake. But then you think, I thought the protein was only for bodybuilders. But it turns out there's more to protein than that. The lack of protein, protein, your diet not only contributes to gaining weight, as we have many adverse effects. One of them is sarcopenia. It's a health condition when you start losing your muscle mass and with that goes your strength as well. After you're 30 years old, you can lose up to 8% of your muscle mass per decade. And after a couple of decades, it gets to a point that you lose functionality of the body, you cannot stand up from a chair anymore. And later on in your life, this may decrease your life, life expectancy. And also there's another impact. If you hear about neurotransmitters called dopamine, oxytocin and serotonin, you know that these names are connected to those chemicals that gives us the feeling of happiness and joy and all these kind of things. These chemicals, they are made of, guess what? Protein. So no protein and no happiness. And also if you lack protein, you start to see that you start to lose hair and nail, for example, and then you think, alright, if little of amount of protein will make me gain weight, die early, feel miserable, and now I'm losing hair as well. How wonderful. So where do I get the amount of protein that I need? There are different sources of protein and I want to show you what are the best sources that you can have available. The main difference here is whether you eat animal products or you don't. If you eat animal products, you have a couple of options that will be probably your main sources of protein. The first one is a group of lean meats. So things are think about chicken breast or a lean cut off of red meat or fish, for example. They give a very concentrated amount of protein. And we see this by a caloric cost. That means how many calories from the food I get to get each gram of protein. And for lean meats, each gram of protein comes at more or less 6 calories, which is something that is very protein concentrated. And then you also have eggs, that is a great source of protein. But you can see that they come with the quote unquote cost of 12 calories per gram. So that means that you're getting not only protein, but you're also getting more things inside it, like fats, for example. Then you have fatty meats. Things like chicken thigh or a ribeye steak, for example, give you protein, but at a higher caloric cost. That means that you're getting more fat together with it, which means you can have them for your protein sources, but not as your main option. Your main option will probably be something like lean meats if you eat animal products. And dairy is also a source of protein. But we know that a lot of people are intolerant to dairy and even the ones that are not may have some inflammation response out of consuming the dairy protein. So it's a source of protein that it can use to complement, but it's not going to be your main option. Then if you say I don't eat animal products, so what are my main options? Your main options will be a combination. If you saw, if you watched the video about how to get started on a vegan diet, if you didn't, it's here, go check it out. Because there I talk about the combinations of protein that you need to make. And based on that we know that from a plant based source we need to mix things. We need to mix legumes and grains and seeds to get a complete profile of amino acids. What are our main sources? First we have legumes and here we talk about lentils and chickpeas and beans and things like that. Each gram of protein comes at more or less 17 calories. That means that you're getting protein, but you're also getting carbohydrates in the source. A lot of fiber also comes with them. And then you have grains and seeds that you see that they are not really concentrated on protein because you have each gram of protein for 30 calories. But they are a good complement because they come with the complementary amino acids to legumes. And then you have things like soy. You see that soy products like tempeh and tofu, they are, they have a good quality of protein. But I don't put them as a first option because even though they are concentrated in protein and they have a good quality of, you know, amino acid profile, it's difficult to find soy that is good quality. And you don't want it to be your main source of protein. You want it to be protected, present in some meals, but not to be the main bulk. Same thing happens for vegetables. People say ah, but I get protein from mushrooms and broccoli. They are vegetables that are rich in protein. Yes they are. But if you need to get all the protein from vegetables, you need to have a huge volume of them. So for example, if you wanted to have 20 grams of protein that is a average meal coming from broccoli, you need to eat more or less a pound and a half of broccoli or more or less 3 kilos of broccoli in one meal for a little 20 grams of protein. So yeah, they are rich in protein before a huge volume of vegetables. So this is why it's not our first option. If you have a, if you're following a vegan diet, most likely you will stay with legumes as your first choice. Combining with some grains and seeds and then adding some little nuts to complete the amino acid profile. And then you always have supplement as a, as an option. It will also not going to be your first option. You're not going to get all your protein from whey protein or from a vegan blend. But they work as a very convenient source if you are on the go. There's nothing really special. People think that if they drink whey protein they're going to build muscle and all that. But the protein that you get from there and the protein that you get from other sources are more or less the same thing. The only difference is that this is a sweet source because a processed type of product. So if you want to have something that is sweet and rich in protein, it is a good option. And it's also convenient, you can carry with you if you're, you know, out and about or of your traveling. This is also a Convenient way of getting protein, but it doesn't give you any added value. Based on whole foods, you have whey protein that is something animal based because it's a dairy product. And you have vegan blends that they blend already. You know, a pea protein and almond protein and rice protein in one product. That makes it very convenient. Then with these sources and making sure that we are prioritizing whatever is on the left. Now comes the practice. How do I implement this? The main rule here that will start to solve most of the nutritional problems is have one source of protein in every single meal. If you have breakfast and lunch and dinner, look at this chart and find a way to add some of these ingredients to each one of those meals. If you eat animal products, then lean meat is going to be your first choice. So having the base of your meal as something like a chicken breast or a lean cut of meat or fish is going to ensure that you have protein, good quality and very easily. But then you say, you know, but it's break fast. I don't want to have chicken breast. Well, then you have other options. For example, egg combinations. You're not gonna get all protein from eggs, but you can combine eggs with fish, for example with tuna or with tofu, and make an omelette in the morning. But if you want something sweet, then you can have something that combines for example a whey protein source, a protein powder with either oats or dairy or yogurt, for example, or even have a shake that is something very convenient to have after your workout, for example. And if you don't have animal products, then you always be combining legumes with something else. So either beans and or lentils with rice or quinoa. Or even if you have meat but you want to have a meal that is based on dominant on vegetables. You can have something like beans and some type of meat that complement the protein that you get from your legumes. Now if your question is how much protein should I have in each meal? Then there's a different question that is also a very good one. And I'll cover that in details in the next video. So if you like videos like that, subscribe and hit the bell button so you know when the next video will come. And if you want a program that takes you by the hand for three months and guides you to all these transformations in your nutrition that will increase your longevity and make you lose weight, then Wildfeet will be something that is unbelievably good for you. I'll leave a link in the description for you to check out. I see you in the next video.
