100- This is Exactly How You Get in Shape and Stay There

Explicit content warning

07/29/20 • 33 min

Today we celebrate our 100th episode and I thank each of you who have taken the time to listen to what the Fit Dad Nation is all about.

As a thank you, I'm offering free access for 30 days into our accountability program called Fit Dad Nation Inner Circle. Email me at [email protected] and I'll send you the info.

Today I want to share my core beliefs on fitness and how simplicity is the key to your results. I've learned a great deal over the years and I can tell you honestly that all the fancy diets, programs, and supplements don't mean sh*t compared to the basics of good health.

Honestly, you really only need a few things to succeed regardless of your goals.

The honest desire to change
The commitment to making it happen
A plan to make it happen
The hard work and consistency to see it through

I speak from experience here and I’ve shared my story many times here. If you don’t care about your own health, neither will anyone else.

Here are the things to focus on if you want long-term progress:

A healthy and sustainable diet that gets results for you. Stop eating sh*tty foods. You know McDonald’s is crap. You know veggies are good. Apply this information.
Progressive resistance training. Train your a** off, sweat every day and push yourself daily.
Move more and sit less.
More fresh air and sunshine and less cubicle and lamp.
Less stress and more happiness.
Commit to being better every day. Long-term results require long-term consistency.
Get more sun, sleep, and sex and less stress, anger, and apathy.
Kill negative self-talk, excuses, and procrastination. Now is literally all you have.
Use your f*cking head. Stop using supplements to try to hack your results. Stop looking for shortcuts, there are none.

It’s not as easy as just following a few basic principles because most of us are full of excuses why we can’t do it.

Here's how I look at fitness and I use these as my benchmark for progress:

1. Stop using f*cking excuses. We all have busy lives, kids, jobs, and dozens of other things to do daily. 2. Make your body a priority. It’s selfish to put yourself behind everyone and everything else. Take care of #1 and you will be a better husband, father, and man for it. 3. Life is hard, get over it. I struggle every day to keep my business afloat, to keep my emotions in check when I can’t see my daughters, and to keep myself from eating a box of honey buns. It’s hard, really f*cking hard, and some days it seems impossible. But it’s not. 4. Put work in every day. Stretch, walk, take the stairs, get more movement in. Lift heavy weights until they aren’t heavy anymore. Train hard. Be committed. Do the work especially when you don’t feel like it 5. Eat like you actually care about your body. Remember, nobody ever got fat from one meal. You did this to yourself over time. 6. Find your “why” as in why it’s so important to be healthy and fit. 7. Realize that life is immensely short. Do you want the best years of your life to be spent just trying to make it through another day? You can still live an amazing life while looking and feeling the best you ever have. It’s there. Take it.

Thank you for all your support!

Today we celebrate our 100th episode and I thank each of you who have taken the time to listen to what the Fit Dad Nation is all about.

As a thank you, I'm offering free access for 30 days into our accountability program called Fit Dad Nation Inner Circle. Email me at [email protected] and I'll send you the info.

Honestly, you really only need a few things to succeed regardless of your goals.

The honest desire to change
The commitment to making it happen
A plan to make it happen
The hard work and consistency to see it through

I speak from experience here and I’ve shared my story many times here. If you don’t care about your own health, neither will anyone else.

Here are the things to focus on if you want long-term progress:

A healthy and sustainable diet that gets results for you. Stop eating sh*tty foods. You know McDonald’s is crap. You know veggies are good. Apply this information.
Progressive resistance training. Train your a** off, sweat every day and push yourself daily.
Move more and sit less.
More fresh air and sunshine and less cubicle and lamp.
Less stress and more happiness.
Commit to being better every day. Long-term results require long-term consistency.
Get more sun, sleep, and sex and less stress, anger, and apathy.
Kill negative self-talk, excuses, and procrastination. Now is literally all you have.
Use your f*cking head. Stop using supplements to try to hack your results. Stop looking for shortcuts, there are none.

It’s not as easy as just following a few basic principles because most of us are full of excuses why we can’t do it.

Here's how I look at fitness and I use these as my benchmark for progress:

Thank you for all your support!

Previous Episode

099 - Why Eating Healthy Is So Hard And What You Can Do About It

I can hear you already muttering under your breath "what is Steve talking about? Eating healthy isn't hard!"

And I agree.

But if it was easy, why are 200 million Americans overweight or obese? It's not because eating quality food is easy, it's because food companies are making it their mission to feed us garbage.

And that's exactly what we're doing; eating garbage.

But we can't just blame the food companies for this mess. We need to take ownership of why we're overweight and can't seem to control our diets for more that a few months at a time.

We all know the key to losing fat, how we feel, and much of our general health is directly tied to what we eat.

Yet we continue to struggle with weight year after year and despite all the information and resources available to us, we aren't getting fitter.

We're getting fatter.

We also know how to eat healthy, yet we choose not to. Why?

Well, there is a lot that goes into the psychology of why this is and a single podcast can't even scratch the surface, but I want to share a few things with you that might help.

First you need to understand that you don’t need more information, more recipes, or a meal plan walking you through every single meal.

You already know how to do it. You just aren't.

Eating healthy isn't complicated. You don't need fancy supplements, any particular diet, or coaching from an Instagram guru. You need to put the effort into eating better food.

Here's what I'll tell you:

Don’t eat like an a**hole
Stop being lazy. It takes work, yes. If you want to change your results you have to change what you're doing.
Find what works and stick with it. Stop diet hopping or trying whatever is working for your buddy.
Take it one week at a time. Don’t think you can never eat certain foods again. You will fail.
Limit foods with zero benefit like alcohol, soda, fast food, and sugary crap.
Keep it overly simple. Stick to the few same meals if that works. Eat as many one ingredient foods as possible.
Remember that there is no best diet. The "best" for you is the one that is healthy, sustainable, and gets results.

The bottom line is you already know what is bad for you and what isn’t. You know eating a diet filled with lean proteins, veggies, fruits, nuts, and oils is healthy. You know a diet filled with Panera sandwiches, Big Gulp's, Cheesecake Factory, and Kit Kat's isn’t.

But yet we still opt for the latter, which is why most of us are overweight and constantly trying to lose more weight.

We know the answers. Bad food tastes amazing and we want it. We are a society that gets what we want, when we want it, and doesn’t want to work for it. And that’s a problem.

It's on you to break out of that trap.

I’m here if you need help.

Next Episode

101 - How To Stop Your Uncontrollable Late Night Snacking

Before I get started, I will tell you that late night snacking is not inherently bad. The time of day in which you eat is pretty much irrelevant and the main factor in whether or not you lose weight is tied directly to the number of total calories you're eating.

However, many of us find ourselves staring at our pantries a few hours after dinner scanning the shelves for that sweet or salty treat.

This snacking can lead to the one thing that might be sabotaging your progress; over eating. It's incredibly easy to consume 300-400 calories or more from late snacking and because most of the time we're eating junk type foods, it's all empty calories.

So your calorie deficit that you worked so hard for all week can be wiped out with a few handfuls of kettle chips or a bowl of chocolate ice cream.

These things are fine to eat in moderation, as is anything, but they can mean the difference between you losing the weight and you not.

Snacking is a highly emotional thing and is caused largely by triggers, whether you know them or not. Rarely are we physically hungry but rather want to reward ourselves for a hard day or we're in the habit of eating at certain late hours.

Here are a few things I've learned over the years:

The habit of snacking on junk can be unlearned like any other habit.
It's possible to reward yourself with things other than junk food and sugar.
You likely have (deep) emotional ties to certain times, smells, feelings, and foods that make you feel like you have to eat them.
We tend to make poor eating decisions when we're tired, stressed, anxious, or dealing with fear.

And some of the things you can do are:

Get the junk out of your house.
Eat enough throughout the day.
Make sure you're eating enough protein with every meal, especially at night. Protein will leave you feeling fuller than carbs or fat and less likely to snack on crap.
Don't eat while watching TV.
Learn your triggers and avoid them.
Track your calories to see what you're really eating.
Practice fasting and include the time you normally snack as part of your fasting window.

Hopefully these tips and ideas help you with your late night snacking and be sure to join our private Facebook group at FitDadNation.com/Community