Eating Habits and Protein; Natural Body Development
Topics:
“Addressing Sleep Issues”
“Eating Habits and Protein”
“Tracking Food Intake”
“Body Weight”
“Hard-Boiled Eggs”
“Natural Body Development”
Thursday, February 8, 2024 (Private/Phone)
Participants: Mary (Michael) and John (Arry)
ELIAS: Good afternoon!
JOHN: (Quietly) Good afternoon.
ELIAS: And how are you proceeding, my friend?
JOHN: Pretty well. I did not sleep well last night so I am very tired, but I actually feel simultaneously very relaxed, I think, which feels kind of good. So I kind of want to jump back into the sleep conversation. And I don’t want to spend the whole time talking about it again, because there was a lot of that last time and I’m still kind of testing things and playing around with a lot of what you suggested. But overall, I would say I haven’t done all of the things you suggested but I’ve taken a few of them that feel easier and manageable and just flow well with me, and it’s definitely helped in terms of falling asleep.
I think two of the biggest ones were… I haven’t started taking baths per se, but I’ve basically pushed my… Because I usually shower at night anyway because I’m at the gym late most nights and I just generally prefer to shower at night. So what I’ve done is basically pushed that back until shortly before I go to bed or am planning to go to bed, and I’ve kind of morphed it into instead of just taking a quick, normal shower I basically turn the water a little bit hotter than I normally would, kind of following what you suggested in terms of a hot bath. And I just kind of sit at the bottom of the tub under the water and try to intentionally relax. And I reflect on my day and I reflect on what I’ve accomplished and I try to just like let the water help facilitate releasing all of the energy from the day and relax. And I think that’s been really helpful.
And after that, I’ve been reading a book that actually Lyla suggested to me quite a while ago. And since you suggested reading fiction, I decided to pick that book up and I’ve actually been really enjoying it. And I definitely have found that reading before bed, which I’ve done before and when you said that last month I was like, “Right,” I generally do find it really helpful to read before bed because I’ve gotten into the habit of just watching YouTube videos or you know, much more stimulating media as opposed to just reading. And so I think getting back in the habit of reading before bed has been very helpful.
So I think those two things have probably made the biggest difference and I’ve been the most consistent with. So, yeah, thank you for that (laughs) and—
ELIAS: You are very welcome.
JOHN: I still think there is a really big piece that’s happening right now that I’m curious to talk about more, but it’s in relation to food and just the overall quantity of food that I’m eating. And I still think that one of the things that’s been happening is getting to sleep has been easier this last month, since we talked, but I’m still also experiencing—
ELIAS: Have you increased your food intake?
JOHN: I have been. Yeah. I definitely have been. Not, obviously not to the degree that I think I need every day, but the days that I—
ELIAS: Why?
JOHN: Uh… (Laughs) Well, I’m still experimenting, I think, to some degree. And it’s hard to know, it’s hard to know because there are days when I have a long gym session for example and I clearly expend a lot of energy, and so I intentionally eat a lot. And some of those days have been relatively good. I’ve slept relatively well. And then there’s other days where for whatever reason, I just don’t eat as much or I just feel like annoyed that I feel like I have to eat that much. And I’m also still kind of curious to see well, if I eat this amount, will it actually impact my sleep? And usually it seems that it does. And so overall, it seems really clear that I need to eat more food and that’s definitely part of what’s impacting my sleep. Because it’s not just falling asleep now, falling asleep has gotten easier overall, but I do still wake up in the middle of the night and often have a really hard time getting back to sleep. And that usually almost always feels like a consequence of being hungry. And so I end up having to snack at night and that takes a while to kind of calm me back down.
So yeah, long story short, the sleep has been better and I feel good about that. And I’m still experimenting a little bit, but I have some questions related to that more, so I just wanted to say that as an update.
But one thing I wanted to touch on again, I’ve also adjusted my workout schedule because we talked about that a little bit. And I think that’s also helping, that I’m, even if I’m at the gym until later, I make sure to try to eat more food but I’m not, I’m not working out as late. Because I just spend a lot of time at the gym in general, it’s kind of a social thing, so… And sometimes I’m working, I’m training people, so…
ELIAS: Very well.
JOHN: My question essentially is, what would you say is the latest? What would be a good cutoff point for me in terms of I should be done actually working out by what hour in the evening, if I work out in the evening?
ELIAS: What time do you usually work, do you WANT to usually go to bed?
JOHN: I try to be in bed and falling asleep by midnight at the latest at this point, because I actually think I function better if I don’t stay up super late. So I’m trying to essentially be showered and ready for bed and kind of heading that direction by eleven. And I’ll take my hot shower and start reading and try to be asleep by midnight. That’s what I’m aiming for.
ELIAS: (Pause) I would suggest that you aim for being asleep at eleven.
JOHN: Mm.
ELIAS: And that you start all of that earlier. Therefore I would say the latest that you should be engaging working out would be about seven. And I would say that in relation to work or socializing, that you be done and perhaps heading home by about eight.
JOHN: Oh. So when you say—
ELIAS: I would express…
Now; obviously it’s your choice.
JOHN: Right.
ELIAS: I would also say that first of all, what are you eating more of?
JOHN: Well, before I answer that, just to clarify, when you say seven o’clock in terms of working out, is that being done working out at seven or starting at seven at the latest? If it’s a night that I’m actually working out.
ELIAS: How long is your workout, an hour?
JOHN: It depends what I do. I do various different things, but usually anywhere from an hour and a half to two hours, depending on what type of training I’m doing and how much resting I’m doing in between things. Whether it’s a climbing workout or a lifting workout. But generally, an hour and a half to two hours, with… That is including a lot of rest in between whatever it is I’m doing.
ELIAS: (Pause) I would say then be finishing your workout by eight.
JOHN: Okay. That’s… That’s pretty much what I’ve been attempting to do. It’s been an adjustment because for a long time, especially since I’ve lived here and I haven’t had to wake up early for any reason for the last, almost five years now, a lot of my friends come to the gym late and some of them don’t even show up to the gym until eight o’clock to climb. And so there is a big social element, but a lot of those people are people that I used to try to climb with more and so it was often happening that I would be climbing until the gym closed at about ten o’clock. And then I would go home and eat dinner at like ten thirty or eleven and then try to get to bed by midnight. And so I’ve really been changing that a lot since we talked, and I try to start my workouts now by five o’clock and try to be done by around seven, and I do think that’s been helping a lot. But I’ve just had to readjust my expectations and—
ELIAS: I would say that would be more optimal.
JOHN: Yeah.
ELIAS: But I would say that if you can’t do that, then finishing by eight o’clock would be acceptable. It’s important that there is ample time between when you are working out and when you go to bed.
JOHN: Yeah. Yeah.
ELIAS: There has to be time for you to eat and there has to be time between consuming food and going to bed. There should be at least two hours.
JOHN: Right. Yeah. That’s another thing that I’ve adjusted as well, is I’ve been trying to get for many reasons a lot better about pre-making all of my food so that essentially I’m kind of eating… I’m kind of eating and trying to… basically have my dinner with me at the gym so that I can eat immediately or even start eating while I’m still working out, because a lot times I’m… Eating while I’m working out feels fine and kind of helps me kind of stack those together. And then by the time I’m done working out, it’s not like I have to run home and then spend an hour making food, because I’ve already made it and I’ve already potentially eaten some of it. So that’s been helping a lot.
ELIAS: Good. Good.
JOHN: Yeah. So—
ELIAS: And WHAT are you eating?
JOHN: Yeah. (Laughs) Yeah. So… Um… We’ve talked about this a lot as well, and all of this combination of the sleep and the timing and other things that I want to talk about tonight in terms of my body. I still generally eat a lot of the same things, but my main… Clearly some things have not been working and have not been ideal, and I’m trying to change those, since we talked last. Because I think part of also what’s been happening is I have been not sleeping well, so I get up late and then I try to go for a walk in the morning, which I have been really enjoying that, that routine. It feels really good. But it ends up pushing my food back very late. And so I was eating… I wouldn’t eat until very late in the day, and then I wasn’t eating that much. And so essentially I would end up being very hungry at night, and I think that was amplifying my overall sense of hunger at night, was because I wasn’t eating enough during the day to fuel myself.
And you mentioned that last time, in terms of eating a healthy, a heartier breakfast and lunch. So I’ve been trying to get better about doing that and eating earlier. So essentially I’m trying to shift my entire routine to going to bed earlier, making sure I’m getting quality sleep more consistently, waking up earlier, do my walk and potentially even meal prep breakfast, just pre-make some oatmeal or something for breakfast so that I don’t have to spend more time cooking, which takes time, and so that I can eat and fuel myself more early in the day. And then also pre-make my meals for lunch so that I’m eating a hearty lunch.
But when I really look at it, what I’ve been doing before more recently is just eating, you know, again going back (laughs) to the protein shakes. I’ll eat something like an oatmeal for breakfast. I would try to make it fairly hearty, but it would be something like oatmeal or eggs and bread for breakfast and then protein shake and sometimes honestly just bread for lunch, and maybe a snack at the gym. And then I would make food later in the afternoon for the rest of the day, and then I would come back to the gym and then I would eat that later.
So what I’m trying to do now is cook more meals, not eat so much just bread, kind of snack foods, and definitely stop doing the protein shakes as much as I can. So what I’ve been doing the last few weeks is essentially usually oatmeal for breakfast and/or eggs and bread. And then I make a dish of usually either turkey or chicken and usually about a half a pound of that, and I make a cup of some type of grain, whether that’s… I’ve been experimenting with different types of rice. Sometimes I do like wheat-based grains like farro or other types of wheat-based things. So I’ll do half a pound of some type of meat, usually fish or chicken, a cup of dried grains, which makes quite a bit of cooked grains, and then a vegetable, which is usually, almost always greens, some kind, kale or spinach. And then I mix in like broccoli sometimes or zucchini sometimes, sometimes pepper and then garlic and some type of sauce. And I alternate the sauces just for variety because I kind of eat the same thing all the time.
So that’s usually what I eat. And what I found is the more that I move away from eating the bread and the protein shakes and all of that, that one meal is definitely not enough to cover lunch and dinner. So I think what I’m going to experiment with now is basically have the same breakfast but make a bigger portion of some variation of grains, meat and vegetables that will last through the day and give me all the calories that I need. And then sometimes I do mix that up. I really like root vegetables. I really like potatoes and sweet potatoes. So some nights I’ll do like a sweet potato or potato and vegetable and egg combination for dinner. But essentially that’s about it. I usually do some variation of that every day.
ELIAS: Do you like hard-boiled eggs?
JOHN: I do. I just don’t ever like to make them. I know you recommended them multiple times. (Laughs)
ELIAS: The reason I recommend them is because they are protein, and because you can make many of them at one time and you can eat those throughout the day, and they are fast and easy.
JOHN: Right. Yeah, when I was in my car living, I was buying premade hard-boiled eggs, just because they were convenient and simple and relatively healthier than a lot of other snack options, so… I just haven’t got back into the routine of hard boiling them, but I should add that to my list to help with that.
ELIAS: I would encourage you to do so, because in that, it’s something that will definitely help in relation to your food intake and satisfying that hunger. When you are generating so much physical activity, it is important that you increase your protein. Therefore this is something that is quick, easy, convenient and also will fill you up.
JOHN: Yeah. And I’ve been… I have on and off for a long time and I’ve been doing it very consistently now, I do track my food using an app. I track my calories, macros and all of that. And at least in terms of protein, I definitely, I’ve been consistently getting usually like 120 to 150 grams of protein a day, which I think is plenty for me and my activity. But…
ELIAS: Good.
JOHN: Yeah. I think generally the overall theme is just I need to eat a lot more, so also in the last few months I have been training more and I’ve been following training, I follow a training plan from a coach that I… that’s kind of, I kind of consider a mentor in the climbing and training realm. So I followed a program with him for a few months and now I’ve kind of been doing a slightly different one that… It’s definitely a bit more than I’ve done, and it just seems pretty clear that I need to be eating a lot more food than I thought I would. Because there’s days when I feel like… When I track the days where I actually eat a lot of food, I feel like I’m eating a lot of food to make sure that I can sleep well and I’m not super hungry and I don’t wake up ravenous… I mean, I can easily eat 27, 2800 calories. I could easily even eat more if I allowed myself but I kind of feel like wow, it’s really surprising to see how much food I can eat. I’m not a big person by any means. I’m a small individual. I don’t have a ton of muscle. I don’t have a ton of body mass. But it’s kind of surprising me how much I can actually eat, how much I need to eat to feel as good as I want to feel, if that makes sense.
ELIAS: Yes. I very much understand.
JOHN: Yeah. Well, yeah, so… One of the questions that I was curious about and there’s kind of… So there’s a whole piece around, related to this topic that I kind of want to talk more about and I’ve brought it up in the past, and that’s just in terms of my body composition, and I’m curious to delve into that a little bit.
But before that, since we’re talking about it, I mean most of the time it feels helpful for me to track my food because I think it’s easy for me to under eat and it’s easy for me to maybe not get enough food or not get enough protein or whatever. It’s just helpful for me, with my personality, to actually know objectively at least as much as I can, because these things are not 100% accurate, but at least have a sense of okay, today I had 2300 calories and yeah, that was not enough. And I woke up and I slept bad and I was hungry and ravenous. Great, that’s good to know. Or I ate 2800 calories and a ton of protein and I slept better and I felt better and I performed better, and that’s good to know. So in general it feels overall like a positive thing for me, but I also know it can definitely become… I don’t want it to become some type of obsessive thing or something that I feel like I have to constantly monitor and control. So I guess I’m just curious what your take on that would be or what your suggestion would be. Is it beneficial for me to continue that, maybe just for a time? Or is it better to move away from that and just follow my intuition and make sure I’m just eating enough based on how I feel? I don’t know. What would you say about tracking my food?
ELIAS: I would say that it’s a good idea and it’s something that can be beneficial to give you information about what is adequate and what isn’t. I would say that once you know what is successful for you through that experimentation and tracking what you’re consuming, then you don’t necessarily have to monitor yourself every day. You have the information. You know what to do. Then it’s a matter of simply implementing it. Which I know I’m saying, “Simply implement,” (John laughs) and I understand that it’s easier said than done, and I recognize that, but it’s something that is important, especially because of the direction that you’ve chosen as what you are doing for a living.
JOHN: Right.
ELIAS: And in that, it’s important that you are expressing in a manner of health and well-being, because that’s what you’re coaching other people in.
JOHN: Yeah. Yeah. Well, that makes sense. I mean I feel like one of the ways that I like to do things, it’s kind of become a running joke that I always make my food for the day and then I put it in big mason jars. So I’m always like eating food or drinking something, or drinking a protein, whatever. I’m always like bringing these mason jars to the gym and I always have food in them. And it’s like every day people walk up and ask me what’s in my jar today. But I feel like the more that I do this, the more that I especially get better at kind of meal prepping and making sure that I have all my food ready for the day and just get better at managing that, that that in itself will give me a good indication, or just the way to track it without having to think about putting everything into an app and tracking all the calories and all that, but just say okay, this is a big day, maybe I’ll eat two. I’ll make two jars of this. And maybe on rest days I’ll have a jar and a half or whatever, and just keep it that simple. But I feel like I could see getting to a point where it becomes easier to kind of manage things in that way, in terms of having a sense of the volume of what I need on any given day.
ELIAS: Definitely. I definitely agree.
JOHN: Especially when I’m cooking the same types of things, you know. It’s pretty easy to track that. So… Okay.
ELIAS: I very much agree.
JOHN: Yeah. So—
ELIAS: Now; how are you proceeding with your clients?
JOHN: (Laughs) I will say really well right now. And that’s… I want to focus this on other topics, so I don’t want to get stuck with that, but—
ELIAS: Very well.
JOHN: The general, the general update is things are going well and I’ve been enjoying the clients that I have. I’ve been managing. I think the conversation we had in December, I think, in terms of just managing expectations with people and all of that stuff was really helpful and I’ve been really practicing that a lot more. And I feel I’ve gotten significantly better about how I manage that in myself. And… So yeah, the clients that I have, I feel like it’s been going great. And I did finally sign the contract with the climbing gym so we’re going to open that up here any day now. So—
ELIAS: Excellent.
JOHN: I’m going to be starting to get clients through the gym and do more climbing training, and you know. So basically everything’s going well and is on track, so that feels really good.
ELIAS: Excellent.
JOHN: Yeah. So the other piece I wanted to talk about is sticking to the theme of my body, I’ve brought this up before and asked the simple question, but it still seems like… I am generally very comfortable with my body, in terms of my body composition. I’m not, you know, hugely overweight by any means. I am generally very fit. I’m very active. I feel generally in very good health in most ways.
But I do feel like there has been… There has been a bit of discomfort. I do feel like… I have noticed that if I don’t really pay attention and (chuckles)… I’m trying to think about how I’m trying to say this. Essentially my body seems to want to carry more body fat than I would prefer. I’m not hugely stressed about it. It doesn’t really bother me or my body image or anything like that, but it’s just something that I’ve always found kind of curious. And there has been times in my life, and this is going back over ten years now, I was always super skinny as a kid. When I started getting more into exercise, I definitely put on some muscle. But yeah, I’ve always seemed to carry a little bit of extra body fat for myself, for basically my adult life.
And there has been times when I have done various things to try to alter that, you know through diet or exercise, and I have. But it’s always kind of been temporary. And one of the things that I’ve noticed in the last few years is when I was living in my car, I gained ten, fifteen, twenty pounds I would say. And maybe some of that was muscle, but I feel like that was essentially all just fat. And that was basically because I was living in my car and I just wasn’t able to eat at lot of fresh food and I was eating a lot of processed food and I was not tracking my food by any means. But yeah, so I gained weight, which makes sense. When I moved back last year to Charlotte, I started tracking my food again. I got back in the habit of cooking meals and I… You know. And I also just for other health reasons, through our conversations and other reasons, I started doing more cardio and adding that into my fitness routine. And sure enough, I lost about fifteen pounds over the course of six months. It was not any type of crash dieting or anything. It was very sustained, very sustainable.
And then I just kind of reached a point where I felt like the tracking was kind of getting annoying, and I didn’t want to feel like I was restricting myself so I took a break. And that was a few months ago now, and again with all the sleep stuff and everything we’re talking about, I’ve essentially gained all that weight back again. And so I’m just… I’m really curious how the interplay of all these things is happening, because I would think that with how hungry I am a lot of the time, I guess I’m kind of confused. Why is it that if I honestly, objectively feel like yeah, I’m probably carrying an extra ten, fifteen pounds of body fat, which you know is not… I’m not obese (laughs) or anything. I’m not… I understand the relativity of that. But why is it that I’m still so hungry? Why is it that my body doesn’t just use that? Why is it waking me up in the middle of the night to eat food? Or why do I feel so ravenously hungry if I have this extra reserve of fat?
And I understand the science of all this, and I understand what the scientific literature would say, and I listen to a lot of people in this field and… I’m curious for your perspective. And a long time ago, I basically asked you this question and you said it was related to me shielding, or I don’t remember the exact term you used but essentially my body was holding on to extra fast because it was a form of shielding and it was a way that I was shielding my energy in some way. And so I’m curious. Am I still doing that? And is that what’s happening? And is that related to this? Or is this something else? Or…
ELIAS: No. Not at this point.
JOHN: Okay.
ELIAS: And I would express two things in relation to this. One is (pause) it’s not only how much you’re eating, it’s what you’re eating. (John laughs) It’s a matter of not simply paying attention to what you think of or what you read or what you study in relation to nutritional facts and eating in relation to that. It’s a matter of paying attention to YOUR body. The factor that you are so active and that you work out so much and that you aren’t sleeping or that your sleep is interrupted or that it’s choppy, in a manner of speaking, that also, with those things combined, you should be losing weight.
JOHN: Right. Exactly.
ELIAS: But it’s also a matter of paying attention to your body. Everyone is individual. And in that, it doesn’t matter what all of your physicians and your nutritionalists and your books say. Those are guidelines, but they’re only that. They’re guidelines. They’re not absolute, and it’s important to take into consideration the individual body. And in that, there’s two factors in relation to this situation, is that at this point, no, you’re not shielding. And you’re also not putting on or haven’t put on as much weight as you did before. What I would say to you is, as I expressed, it’s not only what, how much you’re eating, it’s what you’re eating. Which is also the reason that I keep reminding you about the hard-boiled eggs (John laughs) which will help you to continue to eat more, but aren’t going to be contributing to weight. Also, the intake of bread and grains that you consume is, for your body, too high.
Another factor is, at the age that you are now, your body has shifted and your natural expression is to have slightly more fat than you did previously when you were younger. This is not about aging. This is about different stages of life that the physical body engages. It changes. It’s not a matter of aging. It’s simply a matter of body chemistry and that everyone’s body changes. Your body is not the same now as when you were ten years of age, because it has gone through many changes. It develops. And in that, that’s the difference. It’s not about aging. It’s about development. And in that, at this point in your life your body has developed in a capacity in which it naturally is incorporating slightly more fat, not tremendously. I would say that you looking at weight, I would say if you’re looking at actual weight then ignore seven to ten pounds. That your body has moved in a direction of development in which it’s incorporating that extra weight in body fats because it can draw on that. Therefore that’s not necessarily bad.
And I would say that between those two factors, it’s understandable that you have gained weight instead of losing weight. But the latter, in relation to your body naturally developing and moving in a direction of incorporating slightly more weight and body fat, that piece is something that obviously requires some adjustment (John chuckles) because you’re not accustomed to it and you automatically think it’s bad, and you automatically think you should lose that weight. Although it becomes more and more difficult to lose that weight, and the reason is because your body is actually establishing itself as this being more of its new normal. And in that, it’s a matter of being more comfortable with your body.
This is also very good information for you in relation to your clients. In this, it’s good information because it’s important that yes, you have your guidelines and that’s good, but it’s also important for you as their coach to recognize that in coaching them in relation to nutrition, it’s important to take into consideration the individuality of each person, and that they may not entirely fit the textbook ideal. And they likely won’t. They likely don’t (John laughs) (inaudible) either.
JOHN: Most people don’t. (Laughs) Right.
ELIAS: Precisely. They don’t either. And in that, it’s important.
Now; you may not be comfortable with an additional ten pounds. I understand that, but it may be a matter of becoming accustomed to an additional seven pounds. And in that, I would say that it’s also a matter of genuinely paying attention to what you’re consuming, because you require consuming more. Therefore you’re going to be generating a losing battle if you’re trying to consume more, but the things that you’re consuming are holding weight.
JOHN: Well, so yeah. So let’s talk about that (laughs) before I run out of time. So yeah. Oh… (Chuckles)
ELIAS: How often are you, how often are you consuming rice?
JOHN: Every day at this point.
ELIAS: There is one contributant.
JOHN: Plus a lot of bread every day.
ELIAS: That’s another contributant.
JOHN: (Laughs) Plus protein shakes with honey and… Yeah.
ELIAS: Therefore you—
JOHN: So if I’m— Go ahead.
ELIAS: I expressed therefore you have your answer. You know what the things are that you’re consuming on a regular basis that are contributing to holding the weight.
JOHN: So if I’m getting into the habit of making more whole foods and eating more whole foods, and getting away from the protein shakes consistently and just making food for me, I mean should I not be eating oatmeal in the morning either?
ELIAS: No, that is entirely fine.
JOHN: Okay. Then what would replace the bread?
ELIAS: It’s not that you shouldn’t be having any grains. I would say that the bread and the rice every day is too much.
JOHN: So is it the fact that they are high carbohydrate or is it something specific to them? Because could I swap them out for say the potatoes and sweet potatoes and that would be fine? Or is that essentially the same thing because they’re all high carbohydrate foods?
ELIAS: Actually you could. You could. No, it is the manner in which different things metabolize in the body, and in YOUR body specifically because we’re speaking about you, the rice and the bread on a daily basis are contributing to holding weight. That is not to say that you should never eat rice, and it’s not to say you should never eat bread. It’s simply a matter of balance and recognizing that rice is something that you should more be consuming occasionally. And that bread, you can be consuming, you can consume it every day if you are only engaging one slice of bread a day.
JOHN: (Laughs) There’s days I probably eat a half a loaf, so… (Laughs)
ELIAS: That is your answer again.
JOHN: Yeah. Okay. So if I’m looking to… Basically the daily meal that I described earlier, so if I make some version of a half a pound to a pound of meat of some variety, a bunch of vegetables and greens, and I replace the daily rice or grain with something like sweet potatoes or potatoes, that would be more beneficial?
ELIAS: Yes.
JOHN: Okay. And in general overall, again we had talked about this before but would you say that it’s… Because again I’m still trying to make sure that I eat enough overall, which making enough food overall has been hard up until now, which is why I end up just eating bread for snacks or for entire meals, because it’s easy. So if I make a big meal with meat, a bunch of vegetables, a bunch of root vegetables, is it, just in terms of overall macro nutrients, would I do better with more of a moderate fat and moderate carbohydrate, as opposed to a high carbohydrate and low fat?
ELIAS: Yes.
JOHN: Okay. Because as we’ve talked about before, this is many years ago, but I did do a year and a half of the whole Keto experiment. And I did feel like in some ways that did feel very good for me at that time, to just almost completely eliminate carbohydrate, at least for a while. It definitely reached a point where I felt like okay, I was ready to switch out of that. But I don’t want to go in that direction again, but I have experimented with the opposite, which is doing a lot more high carbs and a lot less fat. But so in general, if I maybe do a big meal… Eat my normal breakfast, oatmeal or whatever, eggs, and then make a big meal that will last me essentially all day and I make sure that it’s plenty hearty with lots of vegetables, meat and root vegetables, and then maybe just add some olive oil or something just to… Because there’s actually not that much fat in a meal like that, because I typically eat very lean meat and so there’s just not that much fat in those meals. So would it be helpful then to kind of balance that out with adding some additional olive oil or something?
ELIAS: Yes.
JOHN: In addition to what you said with eating more eggs would definitely help that as well.
ELIAS: Yes.
JOHN: Okay. Will do, boss. I can do that. (Both laugh) This is helpful. Yeah, I’m curious to weave all of these conversations together and hopefully get to a point where I feel much more balanced and I’m eating enough in general through the day and I’m still performing well, and hopefully my body composition does get a little more optimal and I am sleeping a lot better. And I definitely still enjoy all those foods, so that’s not… It doesn’t feel restrictive by any means to think about that. So thank you.
ELIAS: Excellent. Excellent. That is very good, my friend. I would say that it’s important that you are genuinely paying attention to you and your individual body. I would say you already know some of this (John laughs) though, yourself.
JOHN: Yeah.
ELIAS: That you already know that bread, especially in large quantities, how does that metabolize in your body?
JOHN: Well, I mean ultimately it all turns into sugar at some point.
ELIAS: Precisely. Precisely. And if your body isn’t using all of that, it’s not that sugar is necessarily bad but in large quantities, if your body can’t use it, then it turns into something that you end up carrying.
JOHN: Yeah. Well, I forgot actually about this as well. I was going to say as another alternative, I haven’t made any yet but I just bought some more, a couple bags of lentils. Would lentils be a good replacement for grains?
ELIAS: Definitely. Yes.
JOHN: And then I feel like there was another one I was going to ask about that I can’t remember.
ELIAS: And barley also.
JOHN: Barley, you said?
ELIAS: Yes.
JOHN: Yeah. I mean in general, would you say that the hardier, like the farro grains would be a better choice if I do a grain meal or a grain day, as opposed to rice?
ELIAS: Yes.
JOHN: Okay. All right. I assume beans would be fine as well, similar to lentils?
ELIAS: Beans are excellent.
JOHN: Yeah. They’re just such a pain in the ass to cook, so… (laughs) but I do do beans. Sometimes I just do canned beans because I just… I’ve gone through phases where I try to incorporate more fresh beans and they’re just such a pain to cook. It takes so long and I just don’t have the patience, so I accept that I don’t have the patience. But lentils essentially are very similar but they’re a lot easier to manage for me, so…
ELIAS: Very well. And in that, canned beans are also entirely acceptable, or frozen.
JOHN: Yeah. Yeah. Well, that was the main thing that I wanted to talk about today. I think we have a few more minutes, but… I’m honestly kind of surprised in a way that you said that I’m not actually shielding at this point.
ELIAS: Why does that surprise you?
JOHN: (Laughs) Because I feel like I still am, in some ways. Maybe not in the way that I was when we talked about it last, but… I mean, I do want to talk about this again soon. It’s… I feel it’s time to come back to the whole relationship topic (laughs), maybe next month or sometime soon. Because I’m still very much avoiding that whole topic and not pursuing that by any means in my life, but I feel like as my business gets more stable and things with the gym become more stable and I get into more of a routine with work and business and I feel more grounded in that, like I’ve been saying for a long time, I do want to be in a relationship again at some point.
And I feel like I very much feel myself craving that a lot and I feel like there’s definitely… There’s definitely a way that I feel like I’m resisting that or holding back from that, and specifically like… How it relates I guess is I feel like there’s a way that I’m definitely holding back my sexual energy. And if I think about that in like energetic terms or energy center terms, definitely at times I wonder… You know, I’m kind of, I feel this sense of restriction in my body in that region, right? Like in my trunk, in my core I feel this sense of like oh, I can’t, I can’t pursue that yet, I can’t do anything in that realm yet. I have to like try to get these other things settled or I’m just scared to move in that direction again or whatever. I do at times feel like there’s a sense of restriction there, so some part of me was wondering how much that was contributing to the weight gain or just contributing to these things we’ve been talking about, but maybe I’m misinterpreting that, or maybe they’re just not related in the way that I thought they were.
ELIAS: I would say that… I would definitely say that you’re not shielding, but that doesn’t mean that there isn’t still some apprehension in relation to relationships and apprehension in relation to sexuality. Because when you introduce sex into a relationship, it changes the relationship (John laughs) and—
JOHN: It sure does.
ELIAS: The reason that it changes the relationship is because then you begin to express expectations. And even if YOU don’t express expectations, which is highly unlikely (John laughs), you’re aware that the other individual definitely has expectations. This is what changes in relationships.
[The timer for the end of the session rings]
People can incorporate very intimate and close friendships and they feel very free. They feel unhindered and they can express very genuinely in regard to said friendships, but when you move in the direction of a romantic relationship and you introduce sex into the relationship, what changes is then you begin to express expectations. And you have expectations of yourself, of the other individual and then everything becomes complicated – or so you think. But expectations do complicate relationships. I will definitely give you that. And in that, I would say that it’s understandable that you would be apprehensive.
JOHN: Yeah. Well, maybe next month I will be ready to delve back into that and explore that some more with you. We’ll see.
ELIAS: Very well. Very well.
JOHN: Well, this was very helpful. I will start incorporating these changes very soon and I will report back.
ELIAS: Excellent. And I will be looking forward to our next conversation, regardless of what the content is. But I will leave you with one piece of information that is unsolicited, but that may be encouraging to you. You remember that I expressed some designations to you about being a teacher and about the role of a bodhisattva, yes?
JOHN: Honestly I’m not remembering that in this moment. (Both laugh)
ELIAS: Very well.
JOHN: But continue. I’m very intrigued.
ELIAS: What I would say, that the reason that you are a good teacher is because you’re a good student. And how that is expressed and the meaning of that is that you pay attention to you and you ask questions for yourself. You’re not inclined to ask the same questions that other people ask. You are more inclined to ask questions for yourself, which is significant, my friend.
JOHN: Well, I will gratefully accept that.
ELIAS: Very well. I shall greatly be anticipating our next meeting, and your accomplishments. (Chuckles) In wonderous love to you and in very dear friendship as always, au revoir.
JOHN: Bye.
(Elias departs after 1 hour 4 minutes)
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