Josh Elledge - Chief Executive Angel
Hi! I’m Josh Elledge, the Chief Executive Angel of SavingsAngel.com and welcome to the SavingsAngel show! I’m podcasting to you from a windy and chilly Orlando, Florida.
I am an extremely busy consumer expert, money-saving advocate, syndicated newspaper columnist, and the guy that turns digital entrepreneurs into media celebrities with UpMyInfluence.com. I love what I do and can’t wait to get going on today’s episode.
In order to help you save more, earn more and live more abundantly on today’s show I’ll be covering:
- Exercise For Busy Parents
- Fitness Misconceptions
- Good Habits and Goals
- Deciding on a Routine
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If you’ve loved hearing everything on this podcast, SHARE THIS episode with a friend! People NEED this information. You and I, together, can change lives. I recommend taking a screenshot and posting on FB – or wherever you hang out most.
And as always, if you have any specific questions, or if there is something you’d like to hear me talk about, you can drop me a comment in the podcast feedback, write me on my Facebook group, or call my podcast hotline at 407.205.9250 and leave me a message. I’ll answer your question, write you back, or – with your permission – I might even share your question or story with others on this show.
Have a wonderful week – full of saving more, earning more, and living more abundantly – and thank you for listening!
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00:02
With us right now for our third Thank you Amanda by the way for doing this three amazing sessions if you haven't heard number one number two stop this episode go back and listen to my first conversation with Amanda because we lay down some groundwork in terms of weight loss and healthy living for busy parents in we talked a lot about psychology and accountability and why that works and, and and how to achieve these things for yourself. In episode number two, we talked about eating for busy parents, and you know, what are some of the things that you could do that are really going to help give you more vibrance in life more energy? And you know, we talked about calorie and calorie out we talked about, you know, eat less, move more. We busted a lot of myths. We talked about intermittent fasting we talked about a lot a lot of things Gracie, man, we talked about, you know, an anti inflammatory approach to eating and why that can really help with a lot of things. But in this third and final episode is the last one. So, by the way, if you love, if you've loved this conversation with Amanda and you have not yet joined him and his community, it's happened over there. And you can have 30 days for free. It's savings angel.com slash 2020. It's free. And if you'd like to stay beyond the 30 days, it's just $10 a month. And the most important like you're going to get education, you're going to get support, you're going to get community you're going to get accountability. And there's no I don't make any money on that. I just I love the work that Amanda does. Amanda is a friend of mine. We've been friends for many years. And Amanda helped me over the past in the first 43 days of me saying all right, Amanda, tell Went to eat and Ali. And I was able to shed three and a quarter inches off my waist in 43 days, I should say, Amanda, that I did this through a one week vacation through Thanksgiving through Christmas. Like I had all sorts of temptations all around me. But I just said, You know what, I'm just going to all I need is somebody just tell me what to do. And I will do it. And then you know, we had some accountability set up in there, and it absolutely worked for me. So before we get going into exercise, I just want to say thank you so much. I'm getting emotional because it's just it's so frustrating to live normal life, but look in the mirror or put on those pair of pants and or shirt and I'm like I don't like the way this feels. I don't like the way that I'm presenting myself. I don't have all of the health and vitality that I really deserve. I'm doing things I'm like crashing all the time in the afternoon. I'm not sleeping as well. Like all of those things for me have improved since since we started working together. So again, I don't mean to
3:23
Oh my gosh,
3:26
if you're watching our video, I
3:27
you just nailed why I do what I do
3:28
yeah
3:30
you know, we call it weight loss, you know, especially January brand new year weight loss is the goal. But the reality is, is that our daily experience of living is our goal and we want that to be as enjoyable and purse purposeful and impactful as possible.
3:45
You know, Amanda, you dropped a bombshell in our second conversation when I asked about when it comes to losing weight. What percentage do you think it's related to diet or the food we eat and what percentage is exercise and you said that It's about 98.9% what we eat, you can't out exercise a bad diet, I think is the is the common saying and I can tell you it's absolutely true in my experience, and this is kind of the the the numbers I give myself because sometimes and here's, here's what I see myself doing. And I know a lot of other people do this as well is, and I just saw this in a TV show. I've been watching encore on Disney plus, by the way, I don't know if you've seen this, if you like theater in any way. It's just such a wonderful show. My wife got me hooked into it. So it's Kristen Bell is the producer. And so she has these people that do like a High School Musical. And then like 1020 years later, they go back and they redo it as now adults so you have a lot of this reunion type stuff and it's it's so great. Anyway, I bring that up. There was one scene where a couple of ladies a walk on a treadmill and I've been So guilty of this, right? And so I go, they walk on a treadmill for 30 minutes while they're talking. And then they say, Oh, that's great. Now let's get good. Go get cookies. Yeah, they're being humorous about it. Like, come on, like everybody does this you. Here's what I know, right? You if you burn, let's say, let's say that, let's say that the calorie estimate was even accurate, right, which we all know, like, I can tell you like, I've got a fitness bike and the built computer. Oh, come on. It's like, off the numbers like in terms of like, how many calories I actually burn.
5:39
Right?
5:40
Even if that were accurate. In my experience, you don't get anywhere near 100% like you can't burn 200 calories and then eat 200 calories worth of sugary cookies and have it be like a net zero. No way.
5:56
No, that's not how the body works.
5:59
So tell us how the body works and then we'll go exercise.
6:02
Okay, well I mean with regards to that specifically there is there's so much that goes into keeping the body in, in survival and comfort zone and homeostasis, you know so there are different ways to look at your metabolism like how you know how much energy is required for you to stay just like you are versus how much energy Do you need to run a marathon versus how much energy Do you need to lose some weight and so there's all these different levels of looking at what's going in versus what's coming out. And you know, the energy required to to eat something is less than the energy required to work out. If you worked out and you burn and this is just totally general surface level speak right now but be worked out and you burn 200 calories. It's probably you know, even if 200 is the max number like that's like a lot of effort you sweat other parts of your body were working. There was a lot of heat. generated, there's all kinds of stuff going on, well, then you and your girlfriend walk down to the corner cafe, have a seat and take a bite out of a cookie. Like, first of all, it's not gonna take very many cookies to get to that 200 and second volume, and even, there's no residual effort. So that's just one way of me explaining like those, this, the whole calories in calories out thing doesn't even make sense when we really stop and use our common sense. And there's a lot of science behind that. But that's the one of the ways that I explain it is you got to think about the level of effort and intention going into an activity and then recognize it. There's a little bit of a double standard there.
7:36
So there's, there's couple ways I want to talk about this next part and the fast part, you know, just in terms of exercise and why we should exercise but I want to start by talking about if your goal is to lose weight. And a you don't eat healthy currently or you know that it's not optimal, and be you An exercise that all I should prop my thinking would be like, what, what will don't stress about beating yourself up at the gym just yet, like, that's not a phase one thing you need to really focus on. Maybe your goal for the first 30 days would be like, you know, go ahead and walk your dog around the block a couple times every day or something like that. Just like and that's, that's good. Like, that's, we're just we want to set up habits, but and we'll we'll get it first let's talk about that just in terms of like getting started.
8:36
Yeah, so I think you're 100% right, you need to start where you are with what you have not where you want to be. I talked a lot about the gaps versus the game mentality in the group coaching program and you know, we all have somewhere we want to be right whether it's a magazine picture how we used to look in high school or whatever, there's, there's there's kind of this vision in our head of where we're headed, what losing 30 pounds, looks like etc and A lot of times without appropriate coaching, accountability, support influences, we get fixated on that thing. And all we see when we go look in the mirror every day is that we're not there. And so all we see is the gap. And then it gets pretty daunting after a while. And that's one of the reasons people give up so quickly, you know, over 90 90% of people give up on their new year's resolutions by February. So that's one of the reasons is we just get tired of feeling defeated all the time. We're humans, we're not just doers, not just eaters, not just Movers. And you know, the, the other piece of that is I have to train myself to get where I want to be and that's where these small start small start simple, consistent actions create habits over time and not to boil this down to a psychological experiment. But we are creatures of habituation. Like we do what we do every day because we built a skill set out of it. We know we get up we walk to the coffee pot we go to the you know we do the things and All all you want to do is apply that principle to what you want in life. And then you'll get what you want in life. You know, if you want to lose weight, you have to slowly train your body, your mind, your metabolism, how to get there, and over time you get there.
10:15
You know, our neighborhood has a community center, and as if when we're recording this right now, it's the first week in January I know if I pop in there right now, it's going to be a madhouse, and you know, because people when you go to the fitness center, or you you know, start a you know, a hardcore you know, you bought a peloton, which by the way, I'm gonna talk about, you know, a little bonus session, I'm gonna talk about how I was able to get a pilot and experience for about 25. And I love the experience for about 25% of the of the cost. So if you're interested in that, hang tight, I'm going to get that to you. But the people like the idea of working out on January 1 to hit Their new year's resolution goals because they feel like they're doing something. Right. And so, but the problem is like, you will probably experience some results in week one. This is I'll speak for myself. You experienced some results in week one because you're all like eating healthy and stuff and like, wow, oh my gosh, I dropped like two pounds this week. And then week, two hits. You're like, Oh, I didn't lose two pounds this week, like I did the first week. And then week, three hits, you know, like, why completely plateaued? Like, this sucks. And then sorry, that's not a good word, just in case there's children listening. Don't say that. But it really stinks. And so and so the, that's I think when you know, for me, that's when I would throw in the towel. It's like when I told for too long and again, you know, exercise and not eating with 100% accountability is, is just, you're going to get those plateaus and you're, you're gonna have other things that are going to be like, Oh, this is a little bit more work than I thought. I guess what I'm getting to Amanda is this idea of proactively eating versus exercising, eating is something you have to be mindful of, say, 24. Seven, but at least Yeah. Right, as opposed to, well, if I'm exercising, I don't have to think about that 30 minutes every day.
12:28
Right, right. Well, I think the thing to really go in on here is if we are exercising to lose weight, at some point that is set up to fail, we, you know, and if you are, if you're looking for healthy to be the way you feel looking act, then working out has to be for another reason, you know, and so I tried to develop in people the idea and the adherence to the idea that moving is how we were made. So we need to Move on a daily basis, we don't necessarily need to go kill it in the gym every day. But you need to be giving your body what it was designed to do. We're cellular masses, I get really sciency about things but like we're not static. Like if you put a microscope on me at its highest level, like you'd see a bunch of little cells bumping into each other like we are moving. And so we have to parallel that and get into alignment with the way that we were created to live. And so movement becomes the goal as opposed to work out until you've burned 400 calories or spend an hour in the gym every day like those very rigid, externally motivated goals. They might get you started, but they're definitely not going to keep you going. And they're definitely going to Peter out after a period of time, especially when you bring the other aspects of being human in, like needing rest or feeling discouraged or not having time or being busy like all these things come to play. So if your goal is to move every day because it's good for you and it also who you are, then you're going to be a lot more likely to not just benefit from working out but but reap all of the other benefits that come with it and then start to love it as much as it loves you. You know one of my favorite things to tell people about exercise is that it actually promotes the degeneration of BDNF, which is brain derived neurotrophic factor. It's a protein that is made in the prefrontal cortex of your brain. And it helps you think better. It helps you make better choices, it helps you like log memories better. So a lot of times we talk about exercise and the group coaching program as a strategy for achieving wellness goals because working out will help you do the things that that gets you there. It's not just that that equals that.
14:52
It's not that simple. You know, Amanda I can speak for myself as well is when I make that Time for myself to exercise emotionally like I have much better mental health. I don't get into those weird funks where you know it to me it feels like you know minor depression from time to time or something sets me off and and, you know, I start ruminating over things I feel like I'm able to just be much more resilient emotionally. When I'm giving my body it has more of the you know, the happy hormones and I, I don't, I don't stay stuck in in negative emotions as well or I just generally feel happier. I feel more confident as a result if I give my body the movement that it's craving.
15:49
Yeah. So So what you're really explaining there is a couple of things. But yes, exercise is going to promote that happy healthy neurotransmitter hormone balance in your brain you're going to develop more serotonin and more dopamine and things like that. But you're also simultaneously going to be detoxing the stress hormones and you know, the the less happy feelings and that is, exercise is a form of catharsis and it's a very physical process. And then simultaneously, third little tear here is you're teaching yourself how to manage stress in a way that you are choosing and in control up, you know, stuff happens every day all day, and we have to deal with it. Well, exercise is kind of like going into training for stress management, it's saying, hey, doing five push ups is hard, but if you do one more, you'll get better. So you put yourself in a stressful situation that you are in charge of. So that perceived level of stress and your mind is less, but you as a human are developing the ability to go harder, go longer, you know, put up with more adapt around things problem solve better You know, think differently. It's an amazing mind body spirit, like transformation that happens when you get into this exercise habit. Yeah.
17:10
So I really listened to my friend who's listening to our conversation right now. I know what it's like to, you know, have those that you know, whether it's, you know, those feelings of depression come in or you know, it's I really don't like it. I don't, I don't that's not what I want for myself. I want to be more resilient. I want to live a happy and fulfilling life. And so, if hopefully, if our conversation between Amanda and I and and yeah, you're in the room with us here, if that can inspire you to some movement that can help facilitate more joy and resiliency in your life. That is honestly 20 has been a successful year for me then. But Amanda, I want to talk about the Different types of exercise and what we're talking about, like resistance training or strength training versus, you know, cardio versus just general movement. And kind of just give us a quick overview of the main benefits or why we might want to lift weights, for example, or resistance training in a way. And also if you want to dispel the myth that a woman is going to get bulky if they lift weights, you're welcome to discuss that.
18:32
Yeah, absolutely. Well on that first and foremost, I have to say that I am a firm believer in balance when it comes to the different types of exercise depending on what phase of life you're in. And depending on what your goals are, it's definitely better to have a little bit of each thing versus just do one thing. And then also, the second thing I'll stress before diving into each one of those things is that you know, starting where you are with what you have is bottom line, the best thing you can do for yourself if you don't work out right now and Start taking a walk around the neighborhood every day, that's the best thing you can do for yourself. You know, it doesn't actually matter that you have this perfect routine, and they have the right balance of the right type of exercise at the right time. You know, it depends on where you are. But anything that you do now is going to be more than what you were doing. And that's an amazing gift to yourself. So that being said, Yeah, I'm, I'm a runner. So a lot of people think that I'm like a cardio queen. But um, but no, I think I like I said, I think it's important for each one, but what it really boils down to is your fitness, your physical wellness is not made up of one component. So just like humans, it's not just one thing. So you are not just muscles. You are not just cardiovascular health, you are not just flexibility. You are all of these things and so it's not going to benefit you very long. Just like we talked about calorie depletion before it's not going to benefit you for very long to just do it. One type of exercise, there's gonna come a point in time where if you were only lifting weights all the time, that muscle snaps because its flexibility hasn't been taken care of right? Or maybe your heart health goes down the toilet because you're not doing cardio, like there's going to be a period of time where anything is good but over the long haul, you want to develop some balance based on your goals and periods of time in life when you go all in on one area or the other are great and I help people do that. But in general, we want a little bit of everything and and weightlifting and strength training, resistance training is really a great place to start because it's going to have the greatest impact. Your your muscles need to be stressed and to be taxed because your muscles support your bones and they support your joints and they support your ligaments and muscles take up more energy. So then that brings in the metabolic component that is that 1.1% part of weight loss is you know, you You have to work harder to train your muscles. And so you're going to be putting in more energy more effort, and there's going to be more output as well. So, so strength training really benefits the entire body. cardiovascular training, just we'll call it steady state cardio, getting on the elliptical, getting on the treadmill, riding a bike and just a steady fashion. That's great movement. It's amazing for you. And it's also really good heart rate training, to get yourself to like that middle zone where you're not unable to talk but you're also definitely exercising that middle zone is a great place to spend some time in, because it's conditioning. It's teaching your body that it can go a little bit further than it wants to and that life is still going to be okay and you can achieve things in that in that zone. And then I hit on flexibility because I think it's something that gets neglected a lot or it just gets chosen exclusively. You know, there are plenty of people who only do yoga, and that's beautiful. There are usually very beautiful people but you know, they They have a hard time carrying the boxes when they move their kid into college. Right. So we haven't developed holistic wellness when we only do one thing but but stretching and recovering and building strength from a standpoint of stability, which is often what something like flexibility training will give you the ability to, you know, to hold a plank forever, it means you're strong from the inside out. And so it taps into like tiny or fast twitch muscle fibers that get stronger behind the larger muscles that we see. So each one of those components is definitely a part of balanced fitness. But if I were going to tell somebody who was already moving a little bit to dive into something that would benefit them the most, it would be weight training and the whole women bulking up when they lift weights thing, right. I have an interesting standpoint on that because I'm not going to tell you it's not going to happen, because it happens to me, but there are multiple different ways to train with weights that will either promote larger muscles or promote stronger muscles, you know, there's muscle endurance and there's muscle size and strength. So there's there's different techniques to lifting that gets you different results that you can see physically, but but the internal benefits are the same.
23:18
And but that being said, it's also about body type in general, and you getting aligned to what's best for your body, you know, I'm a mesomorph, my body responds quickly to resistance. I have a more athletic build, you know, then there are ectomorphs and, and what's the other one? I'm completely just flew out of my mind. But you know, you have people who look a certain way because of genetics and demographics and all these things. And so you you want to appeal to what your body is good at, and give it what it needs. And that's really more about alignment than it is about aesthetics.
23:51
Yeah, so is I guess for someone who's like, well, what should I do? I mean, should I get a peloton should I start running should I start Lifting weights? I mean, should I beach bodies fan another fantastic program? How does someone decide?
24:09
Yeah, well going back, start where you are with what you have, which you know if you have a budget in place to go after something to implement and, and there's something you feel inclined to do go for it. If it is, you know, I'm really pumped that you're going to share this deal on this bike with everyone because if that's something that interests you go for it. That level of movement, you can do a lot with a bike, you can you can pump up the resistance and get a little bit more push pull out of it than just steady state riding. So there's a lot of versatility there. If you don't, but you have a pair of tennis shoes and you want to go out start and start, walk jog in your neighborhood do that. There's actually you know, if budgeting is a thing, finances are limited. There's tons of free resources where you can start, and I offer also offer some of that in my community. But then something like you know, you meant Beachbody on demand and there's a couple others where there are like digital libraries of every type of fitness program you could want. And you all you have to do is press play in your basement in your living room, you know, push the kitchen table out of the way, and you've got access to the ability to do first maybe bodyweight stuff, you know, bodyweight squats or resistance if you haven't been lifting weights, and then you get to a place where you can, you know, buy your first pair of 510 15 pound dumbbells.
25:48
Yeah, but I think someone should know that. Listen, it's you don't have to spend thousands of dollars you don't have to get a gym membership. And I would argue that it it really, you know, save that for what i would i do is i say, Look, I'm kind of excited about that right now. It sounds fun. So here's what I'm here's the deal I'm going to make with myself. If I can commit to running for 90 days a than or whatever it is right? That's that fits that I have within my means right now. And I show that I'm committed to it, then I can earn that that's kind of a little trick that I've played with myself. And I mean that's that's maybe that will help for somebody who I think
26:22
that's a really smart idea. Because the reward there is something that's going to perpetuate the desire.
25:28
Guys they make me smile and I you know, you get a little a little off guard there but just a couple. One one person dropped 30 pounds and ran a marathon within a year had had Yeah, and it's so fun. The reason that one pings in my mind so quickly is because I also teach fitness classes locally and she happened to be a local but also a member of the virtual community. And, you know, every time she picks up a 30 pound dumbbell, she'll go, Oh, this used to be me, you know, so that one sticks very close to my heart. Several marathons have come out of the coast. coaching group. That doesn't have to be your goal, but you know,
26:30
Yep, yep. Well, Amanda, I want to share again, your your group, coaching and community and accountability program that that that you have, and someone can go to save, you can go to savings angel.com/2020. And if you'll do that, then you can actually join Amanda's community. Totally free for 30 days. Check it out, watch the videos download all this And if you like it great stick around because it's only 10 bucks a month, and you'll be part of a great family, a great community of support people that will help you achieve your goals. I can again speak firsthand from following mandus program. I just ate what she told me too. He just ate what you told me. And I was able to drop three and a quarter inches off my weight. Now interestingly, like I lost 10 pounds, which is great, but I thought like I would have maybe lost more pounds in that but I'll take that I listen, I'd much rather have the inches last than you know, whatever the scale says. And that's it man. That's a conversation for another time. I do want people to know again savingsangel.com/2020 get 30 days free with Amanda's program. And Amanda Ward Thank you so much. This is a third of a three part series we covered on Lot of ground and listen, we could we could have this conversation every week for the entire year. Yeah, but we only have so many resources. And if you want that conversation with Amanda every week for the rest of the year, well then again, you could just look into Amanda's program savingsangel.com/2020. And Amanda is going to take good care of you, I promise. So Amanda, thank you so much again for these three epic conversations. I feel like we've done a lot of good my friend.
28:31
Yeah, thank you so much for the opportunity to talk
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