Dynamic Dialogue with Danny Matranga - 384: 10 tips to reignite your health motivation.

Episode Date: September 11, 2024

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Hey, everybody. Welcome into another episode of the Dynamic Tile Log Podcast. As always, I'm your host, Danny Matrenga. And in this episode, an episode inspired by one of the most common questions I get, we're going to talk about what you can do to kind of reignite the fire, the spark, or the motivation you have around your health, around your weight loss goal, around your physical. I often recommend pushing forward in the absence of motivation, but are there actually tools you can use or habits you can engage with that actually spike motivation? I think there's some stuff you can do. And so I'm going to share 10 things that I have used myself and I have seen my clients use successfully to kind of reignite the excitement around giving a shit about your health, which is a constant thing

that we all have to do, but very difficult to keep up across the lifespan. So enjoy the episode. This podcast has some awesome partners. And one of my favorite of course is Legion Athletics. Legion is my go to supplement manufacturer for what I like to call my big rock supplements. This would be my protein powder, my pre training formula, my post training formula and creatine, and my kind of ancillary vitamins and micronutrient protection. So why do I like Legion so much? What sets them apart? It's quite simple. Legion uses all natural ingredients.

All the formulas include natural coloring and natural sweeteners. No artificial sweeteners, just stevia. And every single formulation, be it a pre-workout or a vitamin, contains clinically effective dosages of ingredients shown to work in humans in clinical research supported by robust trials. No filler, just legit ingredients in each and every formulation proven to work. The whey protein isolate is so light, it's fantastic, it mixes in water, it tastes amazing, and I drink it every day even as somebody who's lactose intolerant. That's just how high quality this whey protein is and it's sourced from Irish dairy cows

that are raised well, eat their natural diet and packaged in climate friendly packaging. I love their plant protein too for those of you who like something that's a little on the thicker side and you aren't a fan of animal products. Also, I love Legion's pre-workout, but specifically the pre-workout that does not contain caffeine. That would be their Stem Free Pulse. I'm a huge, huge fan of Beta Alanine and L-Citrulline, but I don't like taking in wildly high amounts of caffeine. So if you are somebody who likes pre-workout with caffeine, you can try Pulse. Or if you like it without caffeine, because you maybe want to enjoy your morning coffee or monitor

your caffeine consumption, try the Pulse Stim Free. My favorite flavors there for sure are the New Grape and the Amazing Tropical Punch. As for my creatine, I get that from Legion's Recharge, 5 grams each and every day I take it on the days I train as well as the days I do not, because Recharge also contains L-Carnitine, which can help with promoting muscle recovery and decreasing soreness as well as some ingredients to help with creatine utilization. And of course, my favorite supplements for my ancillary micronutrient health are Legion's multivitamin and Legion's greens powder. Not only do these two products contain

a ton of high quality vitamins and minerals, they also contain unique adaptogens like KSM 66 ashwagandha and reishi mushroom, which I like to take each and every day to promote my health. If you want to cover all your bases with a high quality protein creatine post-workout or the ancillary micronutrient health stuff like greens, powders, and multivitamin, I encourage you to go over to LegionAthletics.com and check out using the promo code Danny. That'll save you 20% on your first order and you'll rack up points that you can use the same way as cash every time you use the code and you'll also be supporting the show. Okay, folks. So getting into the subject of just reigniting motivation is always a little touchy for me

because I'm so big on reminding my clients on Anyone who listens to the podcast or anyone who follows me on social media about the importance of just appropriately Categorizing motivation in terms of like how much of a fucking shit You really give about whether or not you're motivated and I think people make it so existential like oh I'm just not motivated to do this. And it's like, that's okay, but it's important to do, so you're gonna do it. And when it comes to your health and fitness,

I think a lot of you guys are motivated enough to do it or inspired enough to do it. Many days, but there's a lot of days you're not, but you still do it because it's important. And so on the note of just the general importance of motivation, I don't think it's the most important thing. I think consistency is way more important showing up, not necessarily with the best attitude or energy, but consistently showing up. Discipline, you could apply in the same context and say like, hey, I'm consistent.

I show up even when I don't want to, or I'm consistent. I show up even when I don't want to, or I'm disciplined. I show up even when I don't want to. I think that matters a lot more than motivation, which is like, I am inspired, excited, and have a positive affect when I show up. And maybe I do a little bit better work or have more effort when I'm motivated. I would still take consistency and discipline

and showing up over just intermittent spurts of motivation. But that's, I think, the right way to look at it. Isn't just like, oh, I can only take action when I'm motivated, which is the chief issue I'm talking about here. Like, people just, when motivation fades, they just kind of disappear from the process. And what I would rather see people do when motivation fades is double down on

consistency and discipline and be like, okay, I'm going to wait till it reoccurs. Or I'm going to do one of these ten things that I'm going to share with you that might help reignite your motivation specifically in the category of health and fitness. I'm not really qualified to speak to you about how to reignite the motivation you have to be better spouse or to reignite the motivation you have to be a better parent or to reignite the motivation you have to do better at work, but I can help you in the area of health and fitness. Some of these might have carry over to other areas

of your life, but for the most part, this should get you out of almost any fitness rut. The first thing that almost always makes me very motivated, and this is results agnostic. So whether the results I get back are really positive or whether the results I get back are a little more on the negative side, not exactly what I would like to see. And that is doing annual labs. Now, I have partnered with companies in the past, like Bloak's or Merrick, that I think do good lab panels. But now that my wife and I have like really fabulous insurance, we can get pretty much any lab panel we want done through insurance. It is a little expensive and there is no doctor follow up which often makes some of the direct

to consumer lab companies like the ones that I mentioned that are really really good worth it. Either way, you should probably get some annual labs done. Some important labs you could look at. And you can ask for these or find a panel that offers them again blokes and Merrick Are going to offer all of these but you definitely want to get a look at that lipid panel your blood cholesterol Now sometimes they're just gonna do HDL LDL and triglycerides. That's okay Some might do more and include other subcategories, but that's a great one to look at, a lipid panel.

Another one that's really important is A1C and fasting glucose to take a look at how you're doing in terms of like blood sugar regulation. For men, you might wanna look at free testosterone and total testosterone. For men and women, but definitely women, you might wanna have a thyroid panel added on there. Vitamin D status is one that tends to show up as being low for most people,

so you might want to flag that just to make sure. Odds are you probably are. There's a ton of different subcategories you can test for, like iron. That tends to be really important. You might just ask your doctor for the most comprehensive panel they'll allow you to get without it breaking the bank on the insurance side of things if it's gonna cost you anything. And the pre-loaded comprehensive panels are great. But every time I get a panel back, I'm motivated because I see areas of opportunity,

for example, maybe in my triglycerides. And I also see areas of opportunity, for example, maybe in my triglycerides, and I also see areas that confirm, hey, a lot of what I'm working is doing, like having really high testosterone, despite having some nights of low sleep, and I think a lot of that is bolstered by having a pretty good diet, being really lean, and I don't mean really, really high.

I just have high-ish normal above average, higher than average above maybe oneh normal above average, higher than average above like maybe one quartile above average testosterone. But that is hard to do if you have poor lifestyle habits. I tend to have like really good blood glucose. So it's nice to see some stuff that affirms, Hey, check it out. What you're doing is working. That is motivating. And then you also get some stuff on the back end and say like, hey, you got to work on this, this isn't perfect. And to me, that's a nice blend of a little bit of what I want to see and a little bit of what I need to see. This is specifically, this is a second tip, it's a great one for working out. And it's to get a workout partner

if you don't have one or occasionally grab a workout partner. I see this work so well for my clients in person who occasionally will bring a friend or a sibling to their workout and they work out really hard because they can compete with each other or they push each other while I guide them through their workout. And it's not that they work out better with a partner but it just adds a nice element. And I've seen this a lot in training with my friends, my friends of many of whom are trainers, so it's a nice, really nice pool of people from whom to find a workout partner,

and let me fucking tell you. But my brother-in-law too, he's great, he's not a trainer, but he's in super good shape, and he loves to work out hard. So those have been really great for me. Those workouts where I have a partner to push me and to just get a little extra out of me, because I don't want to be the like one who's

Sandbagging that's a really cool way to do it And so I would definitely recommend that if you have not yet tried that Definitely try that especially if you can think of somebody in your fitness level Okay, this one might seem a little off the wall, but it's super personal to me And I think that a lot of people would benefit from this and you probably have someone in your family or know somebody close to you who could make this easy or and maybe even know somebody who lives in a situation like this, but my dad's Parkinson's has gotten so bad that he lives in a like full time facility

that takes care of him despite the fact that he's fifteen to twenty years younger than most of these people who are like, let's say, permanently checked in. And a lot of those people have dementia or Alzheimer's. My dad's Parkinson's has kind of made it so that his body is effectively almost incapable of doing anything, but his mind still works pretty well. But when you go to facilities like this, you see what happens to the human mind, the human body, when illness sets in. A lot of times it's illness we have no control over,

sometimes it's illness we do have control over. How much we do or don't have control doesn't matter. It is in these facilities that you see and are kind of put into contact with some of the most challenging visual representations of human failing you're ever gonna see. You see people unable to go to the bathroom without assistance, you see people completely

and totally unaware of where they are. People who live in the facility, who are having an episode with their neurodegenerative disease, that's so powerful, they are they think they've been kidnapped despite having lived in the facility for quite some time. Like you see a lot of really powerful stuff and honestly, frankly, kind of sad stuff. And it puts so much perspective, it just gives tremendous perspective on how fortunate many of us are to have the health that we have. Even if we aren't totally in good health, I know so many of you might have arthritis or you might be diabetic or

you might be a little overweight compared to the way you'd like to be or maybe you have something like rheumatoid arthritis or type 1 diabetes where you might not have a perfect bill of health but very few people are suffering the way that people who live in these facilities suffer with disease illness and decline that may well be avoidable with the right lifestyle behaviors and taking really good care of yourself. Might not, but we should try. And I just am very, very reflective when I see my dad and I see the people that live there.

And I am often left thinking about how much I take my health for granted. What's going on guys? Taking a break from this episode to tell you a little bit about my coaching company take my health for granted. What's going on guys? Taking a break from this episode to tell you a little bit about my coaching company, Core Coaching Method. More specifically, our app-based training. We partnered with Train Heroic

to bring app-based training to you using the best technology and best user interface possible. You can join either my Home Heroes team, or you can train from home with bands and dumbbells or elite physique Which is a female bodybuilding focused program where you can train at the gym with equipments designed Specifically to help you develop strength as well as the glutes hamstrings quads and back I have more teams coming plan for a variety of different fitness levels But what's cool about this is when you join these programs you get programming that's updated every single week the do, the reps to do, exercise tutorials filmed by me with me and my team. So you'll get my exact

coaching expertise as to how to perform the movement, whether you're training at home or you're training in the gym. And again, these teams are somewhat specific. So you'll find other members of those communities looking to pursue similar goals at similar fitness levels. You can chat, ask questions, upload form for form review, ask for substitutions. It's a really cool training community and you can try it completely free for seven days. Just click the link in the podcast description below. Can't wait to see you in the Core Coaching Collective, my app-based training community. Back to the show. Okay. The fourth thing is to hire a coach, be that in person or online to handle either fitness or nutrition.

And we'll also come back to this in the fifth point about different styles of coaching. But hiring a personal trainer, fitness coach, whether it's in person, online, is absolutely going to immediately reignite motivation, help you take whether it's in person online, is absolutely going to immediately reignite motivation, help you take your training to the next level, help you take your buy-in to the next level. Not only do you have skin in the game, you have something written for you, you have somebody who's going to push you or you have something that's going to pull you through a workout you do on your own.

I think if you are really wanting to reignite the passion you have for working out the juice Bring some intensity back to it bringing somebody on board to take over your training your nutrition to up Upgrade your lifestyle to really just help you level up in a lot of areas kind of simultaneously Pretty hard not to fucking rise to the occasion for that. So That might seem a little obvious, but that's a really great way to do it. The fifth one, now this I see a lot, is to take up a new physical hobby on top of the ones you already have but it's got to be something fun. So for example, this could be golf, this could be pickleball, this could be boxing, kick boxing. And so the reason this tends to reignite motivation is

because you go to the very bottom of something and you go to sucking at something and when you suck at something, you start looking for all the ways you can improve. And so let's use golf as an example. You're like shit, I can't hit the ball as far as my buddies and then you're like, okay, now I can hit the ball in the air. I'm starting to hit it, but I don't hit the ball as far as my buddies. And then you're like, okay, now I can hit the ball in the air, I'm starting to hit it, but I don't have a strong swing. Maybe I'll add some work into my workout that will improve my swing strength.

And when the next time I'm doing my split squats, I'm gonna grab these 80s instead of these 60s because I'm working on my strength. Like the inspiration to be a better athlete or to improve just a little bit. And these even oftentimes games we play can be incredibly motivating and inspiring when your training gets a little dry. And so it might seem strange that I'm saying, hey, to reignite your

passion, add something new into the mix. But I think it makes a lot of sense and it's always worked for me. Anytime, like I get, so I'll give you an example. Recently, I got super stoked on working on my Olympic lifts and we were, I've been doing tons and tons and tons of power cleans and hang cleans. And recently I've kind of down shifted into doing more dead lifts. And today I was dead lifting with a friend and we were just like, hey, no squats today. We're just going to do leg press and dead lifts. You know, we've taken almost three weeks off clean. So I was like, okay, cool. Those deadlifts fell so fast, so explosive, so twitchy from all the cleans I did.

It's a great example of how just working on something different can, you know, change your physical capacity in the gym, picking up a sport outside of the gym, a hobby, something physical, something different, even if it's hiking, you know, change your physical capacity in the gym, picking up a sport outside of the gym, a hobby, something physical, something different, even if it's hiking, you know, it's gonna make you a better athlete, more fit, well-rounded. And I think being more fit, well-rounded, more athletic, and having another thing to work on

is a great way to bring some more inspiration back into the mix. Okay, the sixth is to commit to competing either in a bodybuilding competition, some type of body focused thing could be like a photo shoot you schedule for yourself, could be a powerlifting competition, a CrossFit competition, a Spartan race, a 5K, 10K hiking event, backpacking, whatever. So commit to some date bound competition. And you know, I have tons of

clients who have done bodybuilding shows. They would be more what I would categorize as bodybuilders. But I've had a lot of clients who want to like do a bodybuilding style prep who prep for like a photo shoot or a wedding, right? Or a vacation. They find something on the calendar and they go, I'm going to look sick for that. So that's like a bodybuilding competition style goal, looking the best you can by a certain date with balance, of course, no judgment like the competition, but a form of that. So that can be powerful.

A lot of my clients have done Spartan races or 5Ks or 10Ks or even marathons. And they come to me because the weight training is the missing component. And I find that those are insanely fun for people who are already really fit. And it just adds another thing to add inspiration to work on. You add the thing in here, but you catch the general drift. Something where competition and camaraderie

and going up against other people or going up against the version of yourself or trying to find a version of yourself you've never seen before that can be really compelling. Number seven is to begin tracking your nutrition and follow a dietary protocol some sort. So this could be trying the Mediterranean diet. It could be trying tracking your macros. It could be trying being a vegan or carnivore, even though I wouldn't recommend a whole lot of that. I would just recommend tracking your macros. God, that makes a huge difference, making sure your first and foremost

getting adequate calories and protein intake for your specific goals. A lot of people are just fucking off and like totally going through the motions and don't get me wrong. You don't have to track your calories, but like for a lot of you from the amount of time you put in at the gym, not giving a shit about your nutrition is kind of embarrassing because you like continue to say like, oh, I have this goal of look, I need, I really want to look a certain way and it's like, okay, sick, like cool. And then I know people, they go to the gym five days a week, six days a week, and'm like damn you're always in here. Sure I am and they got muscle

and strength, but they're never they're always trying to get leaner and you have to wonder okay, what's going on with the diet because I hate to say this, it's not that hard to lose body fat in a calorie deficit and if you only track your calories and protein, you're fucking tracking two things and you can make sure you're in a deficit and not losing muscle. So if you're just like struggling to find a little bit of friction or traction on on the feeling better, moving better, looking better, like the speed at which locking in on your

nutrition can make a difference is so much faster in my opinion than training, and I would just start with tracking something or just trying to get on a nutrition protocol of some sort that cleans your shit up. Number eight, this is a luxury option for many of you, but it's to get some new supplements. To try a new pre-workout, try a new creatine, try a new protein powder flavor. Now if you're like me and you have brands that you already know are pretty much the best like legion, just try different flavors of the shit that you already have or try different versions, but it is remarkable to me how wildly exciting it still remains to

get a new flavor of protein. For example, I just got an email from legion about two new pop flavors of protein powder coming out and I was like. I would normally never buy those, but I'm like so excited to try them when they come out and work them into my rotation for like a month. And I know the first time I rip open that protein shake, I'm going to be so pumped. I'm going to try it and I'm probably going to like it and I'm going to be like, whoo, that was so cool and I'm going to I don't know it has like such a positive effect on all the downstream fitness things

That I associate with that little protein shank or with that little pre-workout and it's always hit me that way Number nine is super similar and it has to do with playlists It's actually you just build a new playlist now This can be a playlist with some songs you're already a big fan of but you definitely want to work some new materials with some songs you're already a big fan of, but you definitely want to work some new materials, some new heat into the mix, okay? The goal there in which being like to motivate you, to inspire you, to be like, oh shit, I fucking like this song, this is a banger, this is a banger, this is a banger, and to move on from some of the stale shit. Now I know this is just like basically hyping up your nervous system, but if the number one problem you're facing is like, I'm not motivated to train hard, a good playlist can change things in a heartbeat.

The last one kind of fitting into this category, this is number 10, is to just get some new gym clothes. If you're in the position where you haven't upgraded your gym kit in a while and you are somebody who is particularly enthusiastic about your drip, quote unquote, your aesthetic. I am not very stylish. It is not something that I particularly care for. So this personally would not motivate me, but I work with a lot of guys who are younger and definitely motivates them. I see it a lot of times with my clients, even the older ones, when they get new sneakers, it's like, Whoa, who is this? You know, fucking Ronnie

Coleman in the house today. So there's definitely some cool things that happen when you get some new gym sneakers, a couple new sports bras, maybe some new tank tops, new pair fucking yoga pants, whatever you wear to the gym, you get the point, but all ten of these things over time have really helped me find it again. That path, that juice, that energy. And again, just to go over them. Number one, getting some labs done.

Number two, finding a good workout partner. Number three, just getting some perspective on how lucky you are to have your health by being around people less fortunate than you. Number four, hiring a coach or a trainer. Number five, picking up a new hobby. Number six, committing to a competition or fat loss phase or body recomposition phase that has a date on it.

Number seven, tracking your nutrition or following a diet. Number eight, buying some new supplements. Number nine, getting a new playlist. And number 10, getting some new gym clothes. All right guys, I hope these tips help you find some motivation. If they do, be sure to share this on your Instagram story. Leave me a five star rating and review on Apple podcast and Spotify

so more people can find the show and thanks for listening. I'll catch you on the next one.