Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 040: The boys share their insecurities

Episode Date: March 9, 2015

Up until now you have laughed and learned on MindPump. Now it is time to cry with us... What do Sal, Adam and Justin really think about their bodies? To take a look at their Instagram pages (especially Sal & Adam's) you would think these boys were born to preen. But this wasn't always so. In this episode they confess their body image insecurities as well as how they have overcome them.

Follow Justin's 98 transformation from Pudgey to Ripped, right here each week on Mind Pump. To get Justin's exact face workout and diet plan, go to MindPumpRadio.com and click the big yellow button's only one place to go. Mind, pop, mind, pop with your hosts. Salda Stefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. All right, welcome to Mind Pump. We put the sex and sexual harassment. We put the pump.

What? What is sex and sexual harassment? I'm here with Adam Schaefer and Justin Andrews and this is Sal the Stefano speaking. I want to talk about, this is a serious, I know I started that off kind of ridiculous, but this is a serious subject. This is actually one that touches home. They can't really do that. It started off with sexual harassment.

Sexual harassment. What did it say now? No. Sexual harassment. Why are you trying to say sexual harassment is not serious? No, it is serious. That's a serious subject. Maybe it is a good transition. Yeah, listen, I've been meaning to tell you harassment is not serious? No, it is serious. That's the serious subject. Maybe it is a good transition.

Yeah, listen, I've been meaning to tell you, you know when you talk and you always put your hand on my thigh when you talk, like you're trying to make it more. It makes you feel awkward. They play that state-scary. No, no, it doesn't make me feel awkward. What state am I thinking of?

It doesn't make me feel awkward. If you did it to other people, potentially it could be sexual harassment. Well, because I suppose to think you're been rubbing my feet underneath the table this whole time that we've been talking, I thought you were asking for. See, this is the shit that's been just my feet underneath the table this whole time that we've been talking It's not that you were asking for you girls See this shit is just like a moment just in the wrong signals. You look me right in the eyes. You touch my feet

You know that I grab your thigh and also you're gonna scream sexual harassment We need to stop joking around because Justin's getting jealous So touch me so let's talk After your 12 week transformation me. So let's talk after your 12 week transformation. Too fluffy. I like a thick. All right, so let's let's let's talk about this is a serious subject now for Reels because this is something that touches home for me and I would I would venture to say that the vast majority of people in the fitness industry, especially the people that are in the the cosmetic fitness industry,

the ones that present their physics on stage, whether it be a bikini model or a physique competitor, a bodybuilder, I'd say we, a good percentage of us probably have, or do continue to have to suffer from some kind of body image issue. Oh, okay. You know, and speaking from personal experience,

I'll tell you what, I grew up and I was very, very, very skinny. I was painfully skinny. And this is what got me into working out. But it was really, you know, it wasn't, I know some guys work out to impress women, this and that. I just felt, you know, I felt like I needed to, I don't know, I just didn't feel, I needed to get bigger, I needed to build more muscle. I needed to build more muscle. Maybe not manly enough, you know? And I did a lot of stupid things with my diet

and my training as a result of that. And it wasn't up until relatively recently that I kind of reconciled, you know, that it was an issue, it was a little bit of a body image issue. I mean, I don't know, can you guys relate to any? No, no, that's definitely. That's very close to home for me.

Like yourself, most all of my life, I was teased for being skinny. So you see me too? Yeah, I was the skinny kid. All kinds of great nicknames that we could go through all day about, but, excuse me. I dealt with that for a very long time. I mean, shit, all the way into my 20s too.

I mean, I struggled putting weight on for a very long time. And mean, shit all the way into my 20s too. I mean, I struggled putting weight on for a very, very long time. And I would attribute that same feeling to, just wanting to be more masculine, more manly. I felt like a boy, little boy, being skinny. And I always had a young looking face too. So I've always had a baby face and then being a real skinny guy and not feeling very big and manly.

And like yourself, I don't think I really broke through that completely until I got in this competing, which sounds weird because you would think that it would cause more or be worse. But the issue that I had is up until I competed, I've never really went on a true cut or like really. You were scared of losing muscle. I was so scared of losing muscle that I would never purposely try and eat in a deficit. Ever. I mean, I was always living in a surplus or trying to live in a surplus. I was always the guy who, I was a guy who couldn't never eat enough, who could just struggle.

I was a breakfast skipper in the morning and, you know, my first meal wasn't until noon or one. And then by that time I was, I was always under eating what I needed for protein and calories in order to grow and, you know, I just struggled putting weight on, you know, and if I would put a few pounds on it would, it seemed like if I fell off my routine or fell off of eating just for a week or two it would just also become right off again. So because of this I was always living in this surplus and it wasn't until I did the whole transformation thing. So those are listening and didn't don't know this part of the big social media following that I attribute is to my YouTube channel. I started a

YouTube channel a couple of years ago when I got out of shape. I fell out of shape for two years. I ate really bad and had a job change where I was sedentary. I sat on a desk for like 10, 12 hours a day all day long. And for the first time, I actually, I felt fat. Like I've never felt fat. I've always been skinny or felt, you know, in shape. Fit, I had some decent amount of muscle. I've never looked at myself as a really big buff guy. And I've never thought of myself as somebody

who's ever been fat. And for the first time, I felt fat. I was a 19% body fat and, you know, somebody is saying, I'll fuck you out of them, like cause they're nowhere near that, they're way above you. But you were in the fitness industry for a long time.

So 19% is high if you're in the fitness industry. Exactly. For a male who's been a personal, it was a person who was a personal trainer actively during that time, right? So that was a big deal for me. And I thought, my whole career, people always used to tell me, like, oh, you

don't know what it's like, you don't know what it's like to be overweight and try and lose weight. And, you know, because I was always talking about how this skinny guy trying to build. And for the first time in my life, I looked to myself and thought, man, I'm way out of shape. I'm fat. I need to get, I need to get lean. I need to cut. And I've never actively designed a program for myself to lean down. Always because I was so afraid, I was gonna lose this muscle. And it was amazing because when I decided to switch gears and do this,

I went from 19% down to 7% body fat when I did the final, the final dunk or body fat test. And it was crazy how many people, I'd gotten the most big. You look cute, man, you look huge. You look buff compliments that I ever had in my life going through this whole cutting process. So you kind of helped you get over that whole. It did not big. And it made me go like, well, this is crazy. You know, this is the most compliments I've ever gotten on my physique. And and size related too.

Not just like, oh, you look really good or you look really fit or you look ripped. It was like, man, you look big. You look yoked. What are you doing? Like, everybody I know what I was doing and what was I doing to get so big? And I'm like, I'm not. I'm losing weight every day. I'm leaning out.

And so one of the best advices I can ever give somebody that has this similar complex is you would be surprised nothing will make you look bigger and more buff than dropping 10 pounds of fat Wherever you're at. I mean obviously if you're 3% body fat already that's not the case But anybody who is above single digits body fat even if you consider yourself a lean person like I was always carried my body fat percentage Somewhere between 10 and 13% as a personal trainer. And yet still I would never had a desire to try and go low. I guess I was always trying to build. I always need to be bigger, I always need to be bigger. But yet I wish I would have known this because I would have done like we talked about before. These mini cuts and mini bulks all the way through

my program versus just always being on this bolt. Well, see people when they think of body dysmorphia, they instantly think of women or girls, right? That suffer from this. But this happens to men also, and it's just not, we just don't talk about it as much. But you look at the magazines, you look at action heroes. I had a role model, I have a fantastic family. My father's a very physical person. He was an athlete when he was a younger, very strong guy,

and I just wasn't like that. And so I felt incredibly insecure as a result. And I was always much more of an intellectual, and I never really truly embraced it until much later. I wanted to be more of the athlete. And so I know what it's like. And I get clients who will come train with me and they've got these body images and I can completely relate to them.

And they look at me and they think, oh, you never understand what I'm going through because I always feel fat or I always feel a certain way. And you know what I tell them is, you know, and this is so cliche, but you have to, before you can solve that, you do, you really do have to accept yourself for really who you are. And when that happens, it's the most beautiful thing in the world. And I'll tell you, I started to, for myself, when it really started to, to, to, I guess, that transformation started to happen for me was when I started, I went back into competing in, in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. And up until then, I had lifted lots of weights. And in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, it's all technical.

You gotta be very, you have to have lots of technique and stamina. And what I did is I took one obsession, which was to get big all the time. And I just moved my obsession from there to getting good at Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. And although it wasn't a cure because I still had an obsession,

it did allow me to break free from that, you know, that whole, you know, I need to get so big stage because then now I'm competing in Brazilian Jitsu and it's all about, you know, being technical and being... I guess that's real similar to what I was saying with the bodybuilding. Yeah, it helped me brace. I guess I did go from one extreme to another extreme, but doing so... You broke that chain. Yeah, it caused me to look at it completely different. And then finally, I probably, I'm 35 now, maybe about five years ago,

I had this kind of a sapiphany. And about five years ago, I started getting into things like meditation, I got into looking inside, and I had nothing to do with body image issue. It was just, it was a stage of my life that had met some good friends who were doing, who were, you know, really teaching me about these types of things. And so I started doing that. I just started, I would look internally and I'd start meditating.

And I realized my son is a spitting image of me as I, like I was as a child. He's the same exact thing. You know, he's thin. He's probably gonna have a tough time getting lots of muscle Really smart kid and I have absolute I have nothing but Absolute what's the word? I Unconditional love for him and and I'm proud and pride that he's my boy and Disappear and you kind of hit me when I looked at him and I thought to myself, holy cow, that's me, you know. And so then I reversed that on myself

and I realized that I need to be able to feel that way about myself as well. And that's when I finally kind of broke free of that. And that's when I was able to really develop my, the fitness philosophy that I have now, which is really based around. And I still have that performance background because I still have a passion for it,

but it's now, it's a wellness and health. It's kind of melded with wellness and health, and that only happened after I was able to fully accept myself, so. I'm looking at, we're both looking at Justin, because this guy puts on muscle like, like nobody's business, but I've never, no, yeah, it hasn't always.

Tell us if you've cried yourself to see him. No, it's just such a somber episode. This is horrible. Yeah, no, no, no, no. I'm so back, back, I want to go back to elementary school in junior high. Let's say I, I was actually a really skinny kid too, if you believe it or not. And I played a lot of sports, so I was just immediately into sports. So that's where all my energy was spent. But I actually was very self conscious because I had

these I was really bony. And so what I mean by bony is on my shoulders, I have like on the acromion process where my collarbone sort of connects there with the shoulder, it's really pointy. And so when I'm really skinny and this is the thing, this is why I don't like being skinny, okay? Because when I get skinny, it's very pronounced, okay. My brother, you know, and I both share this issue.

And so we would kind of like, it could solely each other with this. Like, not only we had that going on for us, but we were also like stark white, you know, so I was never like, you know, I'm like that, that self-conscious guy that's like, you know, I can't get a tan unless I work at it for like the entire summer. And then at the end, I might start getting something. But I'm freckley and, you know, all these kinds of things. But, you you know at a certain point I think it was high school. I just I just didn't I didn't care anymore And I started fueling all that energy like because I would take my share of people would notice the bond

They'd say stuff otherwise I would have forgot about it But people would kept saying What's wrong with your shoulder kids are looking for Anything different right kids are mean They just want to find no filter no filter. Yeah, so that was one of them that kept you know being brought to my attention and I I At one point actually and you guys like I

Talked to my parents about I was like, you know, I want to cut them off I was like is there a way I can cut these off? You want to resect your AC joint? That's a surgery. I actually had that on my left shoulder because I heard it. They had to resect it. Oh really? Yeah, I didn't even know if it was a test medical.

Yeah, I was cause medically. But that's how I thought, because people kept bringing it up. And so I just, you know what, I'm just going to get bigger. And I'm going to start lifting weights. So I start fueling all my energy into that. And it really didn't take me as long as it took me maybe one semester and I started gaining and putting some weight on it, putting some muscle on. About senior year, I was pretty muscular. And then from then on, it was was just like whatever, yeah, they're

still there, but you know, I put on enough muscle to where I didn't care anymore. And then that mentality kind of drove me forward where it was like, you know what, I am who I am and this is what I have. And I'm so confident in what I'm bringing in from all these different things like athletically, you know, I put all my emphasis there academically, I put my emphasis there, you know, I put all my emphasis there. I academically I put my emphasis there. You know, that same mentality carries me to this day where, you know, if you put me in a room with anybody, I feel like, you know, I'm going to want to, you know, I'm going to do okay, you know, for myself.

And I just want to carry myself that way. Well, I think ironically, if you don't, you know, if you have this, and I think a lot of us do have kind of some kind of body image issue, whether it be you're sticking out a little bit or there's going to be something. Ironically speaking, if you don't address that, then your progress in the gym, your progress with nutrition, it's never going to be the best that can be because you're always going for a goal that you can't get to. You're never going to be big enough if you want to build muscle or you're never going to be lean enough or you're never,

you know, I can't tell you how many times I had clients, female clients that would comment about, you know, when they were in their 20s and be like, oh my god, I thought I was so fat when I was in my 20s, but now I look I look at those pictures and I looked amazing. I can't believe I thought that. So much of it is in your own perception, you know, and the things that you think stand out that are these horrible things, even if people point them out, it's not that big of a deal.

Yeah. Most of the time, it's not that big of a deal. And confidence, Jesus, confidence makes up so much. It trunks everything. Oh, you know what, I have this, we have this buddy in common. I'm not gonna say his name because he's gonna, he might get a little offended,

but he's not the best looking dude. He's not tall, he's not ripped, but I'm gonna tell you something right now, he's the most confident guy you've ever met. You go into a bar with this guy within five minutes, every chick in that bar wants to go out with this guy. I didn't know you'd turn him out with that.

Yeah, you know exactly what I'm talking about. He's, and it's all about that context. Mad game. Mad game. And it's, you know, you have to really just kind of accept yourself for who you are and what you are. And what'll end up happening when you do that is you'll automatically find yourself taking care of yourself

in a better way. You'll find yourself exercising more efficiently. My workouts now are so much more effective because I've addressed that body image issue. And you would think before, because my body image issue would drive me more, but what it did is it made me do things that were unhealthy. My diet would be crazy.

I'd bulk to ridiculous weights and I'd lift, stupid, and now it's so much more effective because I'm much more confident with who I am. And so this is something, I mean, as trainers, we encounter this all the time. I think most or did you, I was like Justin too, I had specific things in my body that drove me crazy or I felt like I was too, were you like that? Did you have, I, you know, yeah, my legs were super, super skinny, which is funny considering now that's probably one of my most

responsive body parts. I still have areas of my body that I don't think are perfect or whatever, but it's a different relationship with them now. Whereas before it was like these glaring, horrible things that are on my body. Whereas now it's like, well, it's just how I look. It's not that big of a deal.

So I think if you can address, and this is a very, it is a very somber kind of, you know, serious episode, but I, you know, I wanted to do this episode because in our industry with the, the amount of trainers that I know that have these kind of body image issues, the people that I see on Instagram posting pictures of themselves constantly, because they need that to feel good about themselves, or even the horrible things people will do to themselves from the cosmetic surgeries to the drugs that they'll take, or the fat burning pills that they'll take, to look a certain way. We need to address that in our industry because I think it's going to destroy the fitness industry and it's already taking it so far away from health. And

it's time we bring it back, I think, a little bit. Have you guys ever trained, I'm sure you guys have trained clients who've had to deal with major obesity issues. Yeah, no. And those, those, those big, you know, body image issues. Tons, one thing though I want to say on the flip to that though is this is I there's also the other extreme I feel that people use that as the oh I don't want to become this narcissistic person right there put people down who are yes that's getting in really good shape. Exactly. See but that's a false that's a false front. It is but it's and let me tell you it's very common.

It's just as common so you've, you've got these two extremes. You've got the ends of the spectrum. Yeah, you've got the insecure guys like us who, you know how it issues, like I had the ribcage, the bones sticking out, like I was weird. I looked like I had a shifted ribcage, like I was so skinny, you could see my ribs and one stuck out, you know, abnormally tiny small calves in this huge cock.

And like this. Just imagine how that look like. You know, just kidding, just kidding, just kidding. Just kidding, just kidding, just kidding. Take it a shower with these small calves. That's why you cut, that's why you cut in half. Yeah, I'm normally huge. It's only 12 inches now.

It's going me tripod. I don't know, it's only two inches. But you said you had these two extremes, right? You've got these, you've got these fitness professionals like yourself that that's how we fell into this profession is we had these body images that we were so hard, I thought so hard to become this bigger guy and get fit because I had that and that's what propelled me here.

Which I wouldn't change that for anything because I felt like that is what kind of was the early motivation. I think the maturity and getting older and stuff and realizing that like we talked about very similar, I had the same type of awakening where you sort of accept who you are, you have a different, like yes, I still look at parts of my body as unsymmetrical,

I need to work on it, but it's not enough to where I feel insecure. I was so insecure, I wouldn't wear shorts, you know, I wouldn't wear shorts because I don't want to, I don't want to pants and be like 110 degrees outside and wear jeans and a tank top, you know, like you just, you won't catch me,

oh, wear shorts now in the wintertime, if it's warm enough to go outside or work out totally different mentality. But that's one side, and then you have this other side when you're trying to motivate a client or talk to somebody about getting in shape and fit, and they're like, oh, well, I just want to be healthy. I don't want to be one of those narcissistic trainers where all you do is take pictures of themselves and they'll they care about it as their body,

and I feel like they use that as an excuse to not be disciplined and eat, and make decisions, healthy decisions and stuff. Well, you know, when you see someone that you... That's just as bad, okay. It is, you know how it is, you get jealous, you see the person that you want to be like, and so to make yourself feel better,

you call them names, and you say things about it. Or you watch my 600 pound life on TV and yeah, yeah, my, my, anyway, that shows on like in my house and like the hoarders, I can't stand those shows. I just, it just, it gets at my, just just the psychology of everything going on and how, you know, detrimental it is. Like it's like a cancerous thing. You don't like watching who watches it in your house. She loves it. So I watch, I can't watch, you know, 16 and pregnant. And I watch hoarders and those things. For some, I do that whenever I'm sick and I'm home

and I'm stuck and I can't get out of that. I feel downed about it. It makes you feel better about yourself. I think it does. I don't know what it is. Katrina always calls me. They're like, me day to check up on me. And she's like, what are you doing?

She's like, I know what you're doing right now. You're watching 16 and pregnant, aren't you? I'm like, shh, don't tell anybody that babe. You know, people are gonna think of you for that meeting. Well, see that's 4,000 listeners. Yeah, that's such a hard thing though. I always feel for the doctor and that situation.

That's where I'm coming from. Like, he's trying to make all these breakthroughs and really, really get into the psyche of it. The pursuit of 600 pounds? Yeah, that was long gone. Yeah, I'm saying, there's nothing to be pounds to go. It's so beyond hopeless at that point.

And it is, there's things that some people have some breakthroughs, but you have to think about the amount of time it takes to get that big. Well, I think at the end of the day, really if you're dealing with something like this, or you're not even aware that you're dealing with something like this, the ability to be objective to look inside, to be honest with yourself. God, that's fucking hard. To truly be honest with yourself, to actually sit down and be like,

wow, I have an issue with this, is one of the hardest things to do. But if you can do that, if you can really be honest with these issues, you will go so much further in life. And I don't care what it is. I'll tell you what, you can apply this to business. I have friends that will try and start businesses and they'll fail and it's everybody else's fucking fault. It's never their fault.

It's always. I'm the big devil. It's the economy or the market or the internet. That's what you are. Yeah, you know what, if you take ownership and you say, okay, what can I do? Maybe it isn't your fault, but at the end of the day, even if you believe it is your fault,

you're gonna constantly try to improve and succeed and you're gonna constantly revisit those things and be objective about what you're actually doing. That's a great point is because, I mean, it really revolves around your personal, empowering, like you empower yourself to make changes. And I just, I can't get one of the most frustrating things that I've dealt with with some people

that have that main victim mentality. It's just like they never have a breakthrough because it's always reliant on somebody else to infuse that for them. And so, you know, for me, you know, if they can't reach that place, there has to be, there has to be a different approach, you know, necessary for that. Some kind of psychological breakthrough, like we really need to, we really need to address that. Like why, why is it that you can't, it that you can't look for that within yourself?

Like what's holding you back from accepting the fact that you have control because it's your body? Well, it's Windows and Mirror. Have you guys ever heard of that? Can't is such a weak ask word. Have you guys ever heard of that Windows and Mirror? No. So this is from a book I read from Good to Great.

I think it was the name of the book, fantastic book. But basically a good leader, or let's just talk about just a regular person, right? When something goes wrong, the average person looks out the window and looks out to see who they can blame. And when something goes right, they look in the mirror. Like, oh, I did everything right. A good leader does the opposite.

When something goes wrong, they look in the mirror. And when things go right, they look out the window and look at all the people around them that help them to do that right thing. And that's the right attitude to take in life, and to take ownership and to feed to empower yourself. And with it, and again, this is bringing it right back to, what we're talking about with these body image issues,

is you have to be honest with yourself. Why am I taking things to such an extreme or why is this such an unhealthy? Am I like this person? That person affect me, you know, all these things. Right, yeah. And once you can address that, I promise you the side effect of that

is you'll probably get to your goals better and healthier. Oh, yeah. So, you know, in that scene of the day, I mean, and I tell you what, we welcome you. If you want to be honest about this, go on our Instagram page, tell us your stories. There's a lot of people who are afraid to talk about these things. Yeah.

But they're going to read your comments, and it's going to help them out. It's going to strengthen them. They'll feel strengthened by it. Absolutely. I think that's the thing. We're a community, and we want to build the community. And we're here to give you not only just advice,

but we wanna be there to listen as well. And we joke around a lot, but at the end of the day, man, I tell you what, if you're trying to get better yourself, I don't care what your problem is, you're gonna get all the respect in the world from the three of us. Number one quality found on a human being is self-awareness to me.

There's nothing more attractive. Male, female, doesn't matter than somebody who has genuinely has embraces and bodies self-awareness and can, like you said, look at your reflect, look at yourself. Anything goes wrong. Anything and everything. I feel like it doesn't matter how much a situation looks like it's somebody's fault or everything, the world could just not be lining up for me. What doesn't matter? It's what, what am I doing or what can I do differently always? You know, it's something to that, you know, we talk about those extremes for people, something

that may help those that struggle with, with getting started or the body issues or staying consistent or whatever it may be. Something that I always challenge myself and this is me. It's me how I compete against myself to better me is whatever it is I'm setting off on it, whether you're working on something internally spiritually like, so I was talking about, or if it's something aesthetic and cosmetic for yourself, or if it's just energy strength, whatever it may be, and you've set out a plan for yourself. So the first thing is to set up a plan.

You got to have a plan for something. If you don't have a plan for anything and you're just kind of at it, and you're wondering why you're continuing to fill, that's probably the first step. And if you need help with that, that's where you hire a professional. But what I would do is I would set like this goal for myself that, okay, and it could be like, like you said, so I'm working on something internally, I could also be working on myself cosmetically, and I'm going, okay, this is what I need to accomplish daily in order to achieve this and I start trying to string as many days I can in a row and let's say I get nine days of eating right on my diet my workouts getting my reading and doing all these things that Help grow as an individual and better myself and then boom I had a hard day or something happened hit a brick wall

Instead of crying over spilled milk and beating myself up over it or blaming the world on why I didn't go my way, you know, you pick your ass right back up and now my goal is to get eight days in a row. Because I've only gotten seven now. Now I'm going to get eight and I bust my ass till I get eight and then the same thing happens, let's say 15 days down the road. Now I've made 15 days and then yet nothing, something else happens. You know, I think that's where a lot of people fall off

is they sit on, they sit towards whatever, they're trying to accomplish. And then as soon as they hit that, all of a sudden the blaming happens and the feeling sorry for yourself and it's like, no, it should happens. What happens for all of us, all of us have imperfect days.

We're all human. Yeah, and when it does, you don't dwell on it. You pick yourself back up and you get back on and you challenge yourself to beat that, to beat what your best record was last time and you continue to improve. You have that attitude. We got your back all day long.

Absolutely. Here, we love you. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. For more information about this show and to get valuable free resources from Sal, Adam, and Justin, visit us at www.mindpumpradio.com. Until next time, this is MindPump.