Ep 74: Bigger Gains, Tracking Your Food (or Not), and Fitness Principles with Carl Berryman
Today, I welcome back Carl Berryman, a friend, a peer, a mentor, a brother, and the host of Inspired by Impact - A Podcast for Men, for a fascinating conversation on crushing body composition and fitness goals. We explore vulnerability, taking action, and introspection in personal growth. Carl shares his experience with progress tracking, muscle building, and the impact of lean muscle mass. We discuss overcoming plateaus, support systems, and the mind-muscle connection. Touching on setting weight goals, self-acceptance, and daily gratitude, Carl introduces his "cookie jar" ritual for reflecting on accomplishments.
As one of the few men who genuinely inspire me to be better, I had the privilege of interviewing Carl on Wits & Weights Episode 47, and he interviewed me on Episode 37 of the Inspired by Impact podcast.
Tune in for an insightful episode that inspires you to tackle your fitness goals with determination and focus.
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Book a FREE 30-minute call with Philip here.
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Today you’ll learn all about:
[5:05] Vulnerability vs. taking action
[7:43] Principles and methods in managing energy balance, and tracking
[15:57] Sustainability, mindset, and goals
[19:40] Carl's story
[23:17] Longevity and health that come from lean mass
[25:01] Lifting heavy, progressive overload, and the right mindset
[27:29] Pushing through weight and lifting plateaus, and identity-based habit
[33:22] How his support system contributes to his process
[38:51] Measuring everything in the day-to-day
[43:21] How Carl is dealing with his weight stall
[45:03] The problem with tracking and a different approach to tracking
[52:22] What surprised Carl during the process
[55:16] Listening to music while working out
[57:32] How to know when you're done and when to switch gears
[1:01:22] The question Carl wanted Philip to ask him
[1:06:04] Outro
Episode resources:
Wits & Weights podcast Ep 47: Upgrade Your Fitness, Health Relationships, and Communication with Carl Berryman
Inspired by Impact podcast EP037 PREP Health & Fitness - Multiple Orgasms, Shedding Fat, One-Step Stress Relief, and Bringing Your Business to Life
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Transcript
Carl Berryman 00:00
I'm gonna be very careful to say that something has to be done all the time because I don't know everything about everything. What I'm saying for me is, if I don't track whatever it is, I'm not going to get the results that I want. That's what my experience has taught me if I am not tracking, I am working with my eyes closed. I don't know where I'm going.
Philip Pape 00:18
Welcome to the Wits & Weights podcast. I'm your host, Philip pape, and this twice a week podcast is dedicated to helping you achieve physical self mastery by getting stronger. Optimizing your nutrition and upgrading your body composition will uncover science backed strategies for movement, metabolism, muscle and mindset with a skeptical eye on the fitness industry. So you can look and feel your absolute best. Let's dive right in Wits & Weights community Welcome to another episode of the Wits & Weights podcast. Today's a very special day because I have on the show someone I would consider a friend, a peer mentor a brother and one of the few men in my life who pushed me to be a better man, the one and only Carl Berryman of the inspired by impact podcast. I invited him on or he invited himself or we mutually agreed to have
Philip Pape 01:09
to talk about the health and fitness side of his personal journey to build muscle to get strong to fill out his sleeves. Not only to become a better man, but a bigger man in the literal sense. And we're gonna dig into some of the methods but also more importantly, the principles of what it takes to crush your body composition and fitness goals. And many other topics to be revealed soon. Up. So Carl and I met so we met when we did a podcast swap. This was probably gonna say six months ago or so. And you can find his first interview on episode 47 of Wits & Weights, or my interview on his show inspired by impact a podcast for men, Episode 37. That came out around January. So stop right now follow inspired by impact in your podcast app, and then keep listening. Back then I had no idea we would develop such a close relationship like we have. And we continue to bounce ideas off each other, we spiral what we're doing our impact our work. And I didn't know that would happen. But we really pushed each other. So check out 47 for my original intro of Carl, he doesn't really need an introduction for today. So today, I thought it would be fun to have a more organic conversation. Because Carl is the type of man who is an expert at peeling back the onion, the mental onion, the layers, he gets to the core. But beyond that, he goes into a completely different dimension of reality. And that's where he excels. And I hope we get to today. So Carl, my brother, this is gonna be a fun one for us in the listeners as we were talking before pushing go. So thanks for making another appearance on the show, man.
Carl Berryman 02:45
Hey, man, like I said, before we even hit record I was. I've been looking forward to this all week. And like, it's funny because I take for granted the fact that I've got so many amazing people that I've met through the podcast. And it's funny because I mentioned in one of my podcast episodes recently that if you want to really build amazing relationships with people start a podcast, because you get such amazing depth conversations. But like you I had no idea it was gonna go like this. Like I'm not I'm not shy to reveal some vulnerable stuff with men in my life. And I'm very fortunate where I have, I'm going to say like six or seven men where we can go really deep on stuff that people don't normally talk about, I had no idea you were going to be at the top of that list like you and I communicate with you more than just about any other man now going back and forth. Like just running these ideas off each other and constantly giving each other spots and helping each other get stronger. And man like my, my life in so many different ways has has been leveled up as a result of our relationships. And I'm honored to be here, man,
Philip Pape 03:50
it's mutual. And I think we get that energy from each other. And I wouldn't have called myself the type of guy who is super open about my emotions. It wasn't that I was reserved about it, but just you pushing me to do that I am a man of action. So when I have this guy, like you come in who says, you know, we need to be vulnerable, we need to talk about this stuff. This stuff's important. And I hadn't really heard that message all of a sudden, it's okay, let me take action. That's important. And I understand that it is let me go after it. And then your comment about podcasting for relationships. Oh, I mean, I can't stress that enough car. Like even if you're not in a business, if you don't have a business, just start it for a hobby. Yeah, all of a sudden, it's like it's like dating or meeting friends. It's very hard to do like in the real world, but with podcasts, you're kind of forced into that in a way Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And you all of a sudden build this huge network. And they're like minded people like minded in terms of not necessarily agree on everything, but your, your passion for life and your passion for asking questions and having conversations. So you you've been like me, but you've also introduced me to people like Darlene Marshall, who I just recorded this week, who's making me think rethink just my Philosophy, you know my values. So yeah. Anyway, Carl, right now just to ground listeners you want to interrupt? Yeah, I do
Carl Berryman 05:08
you better get used to the swamp. Yeah, it's fine. I just I want to go back to something that you mentioned there, because you talked about how I kind of opened your eyes with regards to the vulnerability and the sharing and stuff like that. One thing I'm really starting to entertain more from, from an idea. And it's just, I do that too much. Like, I do it too much to the point where there needs to be more action. So I look at you a guy who's all about actions like, hey, I need to take more action, you're looking at me seeing a guy who's really vulnerable, saying I need to do this. While I'm not gonna say either of us is right or wrong, we need to try on what fits for us and make sure that we know where that destination is that we're going and seeing if we're actually getting there because I take a look at like, Yeah, I do a ton of journaling, I do a ton of meditation, everything like that. But at the end of the day, is it taking me closer to where I want to go? If the answer is no, then maybe I need a little bit more action. If the answer's no, when I'm doing a ton of action, maybe there is a little bit more introspection I need to do. So there's definitely no right or wrong. And I love that we are for lack of a better expression, kind of a yang yin and a yang, where like I'm feeding off of that energy that you put out from an action oriented standpoint, and then you can kind of feed off the peeling back the layers of the onion to get to the core things for me, so neither is better or worse than the other, we need to figure out what works for us. And then if action is that thing that works for you. And it needs to be like an 8020 split. Do that if introspection works for you. And it needs to be at in terms of introspection, so you can make sure you have a hyper laser focused 20% That gets you to where you want to go, then that works for you. But it's it's it's no different than what we're doing with our meal plans, what we're doing with our workouts, like really trying on what might fit for you give me time to see if it actually does and then running with it.
Philip Pape 06:53
Yeah, this, this reminds because we're gonna get into principles and methods called what works for you is, is not just lip service. It's not just a buzzword, right, because I just this morning, there was a q&a on one of the podcasts I listened to. And the question was, if I don't like tracking, why should I track? Because I know we're gonna get into that a little bit. And and he said, Well, you don't have to, he said, for some people, it reduces decision fatigue. And there's other reasons for it. And I was but beyond that, then he talked about how the things that worked for him as a host in the past solve problems. Give him the experience and lens and maybe bias to apply to other people what might work for them. And that might not work for that individual. Right. So this is the difference between principles and principles and methods. I think we wanted to get into maybe we could just dive into it right now.
Carl Berryman 07:40
Yeah. Right. Absolutely. Because that's that quote. I can't remember who said it. But the quote with regards to the man who focuses on principles. Oh my gosh, yeah.
Philip Pape 07:52
Oh my gosh, wait a minute. Wait a minute. We're on the same wavelength. So Carl doesn't know my notes here. Carlos know my notes, but I have it. Is it the one by is it? Yes. It's Miss attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson. Okay. It was actually said by Harrington Emerson. He was a yes theorist. Yeah, he was like a pioneer of scientific management, which for people listening, actually, that's kind of ties into my career as an engineer. Scientific Management is just how do we do things in a data driven way? You can take that to extremes when it comes to people when you talk capitalism, you know, labor versus capital. Anyway. He said, quote, as to methods, there may be a million and then some principles are few. The man who grasps principles can successfully select his own methods. The man who tries methods, ignoring principles is sure to
Carl Berryman 08:36
have trouble. Yeah, that one got us. I used to have that on my fridge. And it is. Yes, principles. Go ahead, kick this one off. No, no, I
Philip Pape 08:45
mean, so on this show, we talk a lot about nuts and bolts things. And actually, you're you've encouraged me to also keep exploring the behavior change and mindset part of this, which is extremely important. But just take energy balance, for example, right? The relationships between the calories you consume, and the calories you expend, and to gain weight, which is something you're trying to do right now to build muscle right. Trying to do in a surplus. You try to do it right, you're doing it right. Oh, man, we can get into the definition of try. Yoda. You know, taking action is trying, isn't it? Yeah, yeah. Okay. So, so you have to eat more than you burn. And it sounds simple, right? But then we get into how do you do that? And how does your body respond? And what are the methods for that? So one method is to count calories, right? That's a method counting calories or tracking food or whatever. Others would be using a meal plan, using portion sizes, measuring your food, but not tracking it, estimating based on labels, estimating what you see, or just intuitively eating based on experience on hunger signals. Right, right. So my approach with clients, which you know, when Carl and I were first talk thing about coaching and things like that. He's like, I don't want to do this, and we're gonna get into it like my approach is use tracking because to me, it was a quick way to get awareness and precision for a lot of people who I deal with who've never had good understanding of their hunger signals or what they're consuming. So tell us about your view on that specifically,
Carl Berryman 10:20
and then we can branch off from there. My view on that specifically is that if it works for you, and it's taking you to where you want to go, and it's something you can sustain, like, stick with it, like why not? The other view that I would have on it to oppose myself because I'll I'll I'll play both sides of the fence here is that if you're not getting to where you want to go based on what you're doing, then you'd be insane not to try something else, regardless of how much you hate it like because just the fact that you hate it. If you then start getting results, as like, if you start get making the progress you want, as a result of doing the thing that used to hate, guess what, you're not gonna hate it anymore. Yes, you're gonna like it, you're gonna like it because all of a sudden, it starts to work. Now, for me, this is how I would phrase it, I haven't taken the time to develop a better relationship with tracking, like calorie tracking, because the stories that I play in my head with regards to doing that stuff, like I remember, like, there was a there was a few days there, I only did it for like three days, there's but like one of those days specifically, I remember I'd go in there. And since I'm eating the same thing, it was super easy to track, right. But then like I think about when I make my shakes, I think about when I make my pro U casserole like I'm trying to like to try to just do the math on that, like cooking is something that I use as a relaxation outlet. Like I it's downtime for me where I can just shut off not be thinking about my podcast not be thinking about spirituality and all this stuff. So for me to then take something that feels like work and put it into a space that I go specifically to not work. That's where the relationship kind of came to a head. So I'm like, Okay, well, if I'm not tracking via an app, or something like this, I at least need to be doing something. And it's, it's really interesting for me what I because like, I shot up weight pretty quickly, which was really, really surprising for me. And like I've had lots of people mentioned that they they noticed the difference is for my ego is that's nice to put my tires. But I noticed for me that I like you said I always want to unpeel the onion and get to the core. So it's like, okay, my I've hit a plateau. What does that mean? Does it mean I'm not eating enough calories? Probably. Okay, so then why am I not eating enough calories? Let's peel another layer. Okay, well, I'm not eating enough calories, because when I go to the fridge, I don't want to take time to prep stuff. Okay, so if I don't want to take time to prep stuff, what do I need to do? I need to have stuff prepped in events. So for right now, what I actually track is food prep, I don't track my calories, like I know the portion size I'm going for. But if I get food prep done three times a week or more, I don't have to worry about calorie intake, because the food is there. And not only there, but it needs to be delicious. So last night, I'm like, Man, I don't feel like eating. I'm not hungry. But I have to I'm going on the show tomorrow, I've got to be nice and bulk for fill up here. So I'm like, Okay, what's going to be quick? What's going to be easy? Tacos? Taco, so I'm like, okay, that's gonna be quick done, and I get my calories. And so really taking the time to figure out why I haven't been doing what I know I need to do has helped me figure out how to do things as simply as possible. So the principles, how do you make mistakes hard to make? That was the question I had to answer. How do you make mistakes hard to make?
Philip Pape 13:37
Yeah. So what you're telling me then is, through this process, you're gathering data of some kind, it's not seen data that I would have a new client do because there's a system I have. And that's that's kind of a reliable way to just dive into it right from the bat, because right tool for it. But you have, you also have a tool, and it's take the output, which in your cases, you didn't gain weight, which we can get into that, like that, and how you calculate that accurately, and so on. You took that output said, it's not where I need to be, I need to push it higher. You already have this reliable, or consistent way of eating. And now you know, there's a delta two that you need to make. Yeah, whether it's via prep, or the content or the quantity or what have you. And then you make it so it really does sound to me like you're you're tracking a different with a different tool effectively. Yeah, tracking something you're tracking?
Carl Berryman 14:27
is still it has it has to be done. It has been done. That's something that I would Yeah, that's right. It's the principle I'm never going to say actually. I'm going to be very careful to say that something has to be done all the time, because I don't know everything about everything. What I'm saying for me is, if I don't track whatever it is, I'm not going to get the results I want. That's what my experience has taught me if I am not tracking, I am working with my eyes closed. And I if I'm working with my eyes closed, I don't know where I'm going. And I'm not going to get there.
Philip Pape 14:58
Yeah, and you said to get the results you want So your result right now isn't wellness, it's gaining muscle. Like, let's be honest, I mean, you might have other microbes and problems you're trying to solve. Yes. Which
Carl Berryman 15:08
is, which is why I switched back to eating, like I got off of my plant based diet. Because I know right now the goal is to put on lean muscle, right. And in order to do that, like I was just getting so tired of beans and lentils and tofu, which I still eat, for sure, I still eat. But as soon as I started adding chicken and dairy and ground beef and ground turkey back in there, that's when I started to get excited about eating again. I'm like, Man, I missed this stuff. Alright, so
Philip Pape 15:39
you're just saying just from a psychological standpoint of and enjoyment standpoint, yes, you
Carl Berryman 15:43
are getting huge back to that. Yeah, huge factor that people completely downplays? How much are you going to enjoy the thing that you need to do to get you where you want to go? Because if you don't enjoy it, as soon as you can stop, you're gonna stop.
Philip Pape 15:55
Great. Yeah. And we talked about sustainability, which again, is another buzzword that gets thrown around, sometimes lightly. And what you're telling me is that even during the muscle building phase, which we know can last a long time, it can last six, nine or more months. Yeah, it's not a short term process. So you have to make it enjoyable, but also not make so many trade offs that you don't get your results. That's that's the thing. Yes. You know, you're not looking at maintenance, you're trying to push your weight. And what's happening is, I sent you those graphs by text yesterday of like, my personal last time I did a building phase. Right? My expenditure went up by about 600 calories over six months, which is not, which is actually pretty typical. Yeah, my size, and then, which is about 25 calories a week that I would have to increase my, my daily intake to keep up with that. Which 25 calories isn't a lot, but you know, it adds up over time. Right? Yeah,
Carl Berryman 16:44
it's like anything like when you're if you're going to do bench press, when you start from one end, and then you start making your gains and all of a sudden, you get to that point where it's really heavy. Now, you've got to start going up by like, five pounds instead of 20 pounds, or even two and a half pounds for some less instead of Yeah, so it gets tough. I trust me I know right now force feeding myself is I'm looking for ways not looking for ways around it. I'm getting very, very strategic about how to how and when to force feed myself. So.
Philip Pape 17:15
So do you is force feeding? Do you see it as force feeding or be?
Carl Berryman 17:22
Okay? Okay, so language language is really important. So I'm really glad you brought that up. I actually, I don't see it as force feeding, I see it as eating when I'm not hungry in order to in order to get to where I want to go. Yeah, so this is a part of the process. It's no different than meat. So today at bench, I was super pumped about it, I want to make sure this happened today. So for the longest time, I was stuck on 185. Right for bench I do it, I do it five. And when I was doing it by myself, I couldn't I didn't even try a sixth time. Even though I made sure I did them in the squat racks. I was just scared. Okay, a couple weeks ago, I get a buddy to come help me with 190, we get 190 times up five, next week could do 195. And we get that up five, the fifth one was really hard. So today, I tried something different where sets one, two, and three, I didn't go all out, or set sets one and two, because I do three sets, sets one and two, I didn't so got up to 205. And like four was I'm not gonna say easy. It was very manageable. 195, the second set that I did for four, super manageable, like super manageable because I changed my mindset around what heavy was. So with regards to force feeding, it's not gonna be force feeding. It's like, No, this is me just feeding my muscles and being the person in the man that I say I want to be. That's what this is. So I'm gonna choose to entertain that story as opposed to it being a painful story.
Philip Pape 18:38
Yeah, and I think that's important for people listening, because there are different types of coaches out there, right. There's some that focus on wellness and health. There's some that focus on longevity, others that focus on performance, and some of that focus on aesthetics, right. And these are all different goals. And what you're going after here is, ultimately it's going to be an aesthetics goal once you lean out, but you're really aiming for performance right now. Like you just said, trying to get push your lifts and eat to fuel and perform. It's okay to do that. Like the fact that you don't feel hungry is your body telling you you this is a slightly unnatural state, you know, and physiological Yeah, pushing yourself away from homeostasis, same thing on the other end. We have hunger. I get questions all the time, like how do I avoid hunger during fat loss? The answer is you can't you don't you can't avoid it. And you don't want to be playing tricks. But you can make it manageable. You can learn about hunger, you can learn what hunger means and separate physical from physiological hunger and so on. So yeah, yeah, man. So let's see. Tell us so tell the listener what you're actually trying to do and where you came from before? Because I understand that you maybe in the past struggled with gaining weight or the thought of gaining weight or you did you kind of quit too early in the process. Tell us about that.
Carl Berryman 19:53
I struggled with the commitment to put on weight. That's just all there is to it. I gave up way too soon. So ever since I'm 43 Now ever since I was man. Oh no 10 I've wanted to be one of those bigger guys because like, my older brother would have the muscle and fitness magazines, he'd have the benches at home with like, the brown plates with the sand and, and whatever. Yeah, I always wanted to be like, I want to be big and jacked. And then I guess around probably I'm gonna say 35. So not all that long ago, relatively speaking, I kind of gave up on that. And I'm like, You know what, work with it, you got current, like you're leaning guy, you're super agile, you're fast. Like, let's just let's dive into that and do the best you can with that. So back in 2021, early 21, I made a really radical transformation, I didn't lose very much overall weight at all. And my body fat percentage only went down by 3%, from 15 to 12. And I went from like 151 to 148. And I looked jacked like I looked, I looked great. And then fast forward a couple years, and my regular weight is around like 139 to 141. And I remember Jenny Lee had talked about pictures that I when we first started dating, like 10 years ago that I would send to her and I looked bulkier, like I looked, I looked good. But I was there was a lot more masks on me. I'm like, Man, I want to get back to that. But every single time I would go on a bulk. And I couldn't see my six pack. I was like, forget it. Yeah, forget it. Like I'm I'm not doing this because I want to see my six pack. completely forgetting one of the main principles I preach all the time, which is half of getting what you want is knowing what you have to give up to get it. And for me, I'm like right now, sure if I flex hard enough, in my six pack, but I'm not. I'm just not about that right now. Because the reason why I want to put the reason why I wanted to put on muscle mass before it was for aesthetics. The reason why I want to do it now is because I'm realizing and I've learned this from you, Phillip, just how proportionate longevity and performance in later years is with the amount of muscle you have body and the quality of that muscle. So it's like, Hey, this is only going to keep getting harder for me to put on muscle. So if there's any time regardless what age you are, the time is now so I need to put this muscle on. Now I need to get up and get his heavy from a muscle standpoint as I possibly can right now and just stay 100% dedicated to that. Because yeah, I'm a lean guy. I imagine, it's probably not going to be that difficult for me to shed some stuff if I want to. But more importantly, like I want to be that personal trainer in my 70s who is school in the punks, like in every category like like walking up to the bar and doing three plates for for for a warm up, I want to be the guy who's doing box jumps that still up to my shoulders, like I want to be that guy. And that's never going to happen. If I'm not willing to make this very short term sacrifice, like think 12 months may sound to a lot of sound long to a lot of people. But if I've been trying to do this, really since I was 16, if I'm being honest, we're going almost three years there. So So 12 months compared to 30 years. That's pretty
Philip Pape 23:09
short. Yeah. And yeah, in there are several principles in there that the listener should understand that we do cover it on the podcast a lot, but in case they haven't heard about it, and one one is the longevity and health that comes from having lean mass, it really is the crux of so much of if you think of the opposite of what happens, what happens with most people, you get older, you get more frail, you lose significant body mass, I mean, Carl has been been working out for years. So you've kind of maintained or at least done a little bit of body composition over the years. You know, I could tell from your physique, right? Whereas most people just haven't even done that, right? They've been living a sedentary life, myself included until when I was almost 40. And at 40 at 50 at 60. I've seen people time and again, start to strength train, and everything just starts to get better. All right, I hear this all the time from clients, where we start with like a weight in their mind, they need to lose weight, right? They need to lose weight. And I'm like, Okay, well hold on. We're not going to do that just yet. Right? We got to figure some things out first and, and have some fun with these new tools and processes and habits. Let's have fun with them. We always gamify things try to have things that we track and whatnot. And I tell you almost to person, what's my PR becomes like the driving question.
Carl Berryman 24:30
Absolutely. Good feeling
Philip Pape 24:32
it is and then then what'll happen is maybe after two three months, we've done all this and gotten super strong and we do a fat loss phase just to we gotta learn that right. And they're like, Wow, this is way easier than I thought wow, why is my body responding this way? Wow. Wow. And it's like you're lifting heavy like it really comes down to that. Stuff is is important like sleep and stress and stuff but the big change you never did before was telling your body muscles important.
Carl Berryman 24:59
Yeah. No. And you think that you think that's so? Not solely but you think one of the main driving factors of that is lifting heavy? Yeah. Okay, lifting heavy. It is a few reasons physiologically Well, it's lifting heavy and progressing, you know, progressive overload.
Philip Pape 25:19
So I want to be clear because you you can lift in a higher rep range and still have progressive overload and still develop muscle mass for sure. But, and you've probably learned this yourself, like with deadlifts and things like that building, that base of strength makes working in all the rep ranges easier. Ways. Yeah. And the heavy lift and we're talking, you're at 80 85% of your max, not maxing out necessarily. We recruits bigger muscle fibers that normally would stay somewhat dormant, they just would not get recruited. So that's super important. Especially if Hey, women, you want to bigger glutes, guys, you want you know, bigger back, like all that stuff, you got to dig deep, and lift super heavy to get those now once you've built that base, then you can start having fun, right? You can do the body building the power building the the endurance stuff, throw all that in there, because you've built the base that you can very easily maintain compared to what it took to build it.
Carl Berryman 26:10
Yeah. One thing I want to add to that, too, is I was thinking about this today, like, it's amazing, the mindset shift from when I did 185 on the bench today to say even three weeks ago, like 185 would have made me nervous three weeks ago. But now since I did 195, the previous week, I'm like, there's no reason I can't do 185. And today, like 185 for four, if I were to go all out there and I had a spot, there might have been eight reps there. Like it was it was not hard. And so where I'm going with that is now I've conditioned my mind to redefine what is hard for me. So after I'm done this strength phase in this building phase, however long this is going to be imagine what's going to happen when I go down. And I'm doing higher reps, but I'm doing them with a heavier weight now because it's like no, I've, I've done I've done to 25 for bench now. And I'm using that for sets of four. Now all of a sudden when I'm going to do my eight to 12. I'm using my 185 Yes. Because just the mental idea that now this is this is like compared to what I normally do.
Philip Pape 27:15
Yeah. Yeah. And, and it translates into all the accessory movements. Like if you go after all these deadlifts like months of progress, then do some rows. Just watch how much heavier Yeah, yeah, yeah. So what now let's turn that around and understand that at some point, you may. So you have a weight plateau right now that you're pushing through? Yep, you may at some point have a lifting plateau. Just because the more advanced you get, the stronger you get, the farther in between the PRS come. And you're a little bit more sensitive to recovery to stress and sleep. So if you have just one day where you get six hours of sleep, or one day where you do you lift earlier than later, these little variables can make a difference. And all of a sudden, you may or may not be able to hit the reps yet. How are you going to handle those situations?
Carl Berryman 28:02
Oh, it's it's the same way that I that I handle, handle anywhere else, it's knowing in advance that it's going to happen? Yeah, knowing in advance that it's going to happen, and making sure that I have tools in place that are going to enable me to emotionally manage that. Yeah, like say, for example, squats right now. I can squat about as much as I bench because the thing is, with squats, I'm always super concerned about my back, which means I'm just I'm going into it with the wrong mindset. So I'm trying out different different variations of the squat as well, like the back squat, for sure. But in terms of like, when those plateaus come just knowing in advance, okay, this is this is exactly what I need. Because what this is telling me is that what I did to get where I am is no longer working. So I need to grow in some way, shape or form in order to get to that next level of me. So that's like, I'm really starting one of the questions that I've really gotten the habit of asking, that's kind of annoying, actually, is when like shit hits the fan and things start going wrong. It's like, what am I supposed to learn here? Like, what am I what am I missing? What do I need to do differently? And I start really diving down and I say annoying, because there's a part of me that wants to play the victim. But it's just the had I give myself a little bit a little bit of time for that sometimes, but not really. It's like no, Kay, you're stuck and you're stuck for a reason. What are you missing? How can you expand your like this? Is i I hate saying cliche stuff like the whole thing like look at as it as an off failure as an opportunity. Yeah, and everything like that. But the reason like cliches are cliches for a reason. Right? So there's some truth. Sure. Yeah, there definitely is. So yeah, just knowing the plant says okay, I'm stuck. Not only what can I do, but who can ask for help. Which is what you and I do all the time, right? Yeah, it's like who can ask for help? Who who can give me a spot on this? Who is Who knows more than I do, which I've done a lot of people know a hell of a lot more than me. What can I ask them in order to help me get through this? So you can lean on right now? Who do I need a spot from? Like, mentally, emotionally, physically, in any way, shape or form?
Philip Pape 30:15
Don't you find that, and I totally agree both wins and struggles reaching out to people. And I want to make I want to bring up both because, like, this morning, you know, a guy said, yes, he's gonna be my podcast, I was super excited. Like, I want to tell everybody, you know, like, I want to get that validation and support from people who know that I'm trying to do this, and that this is a successful outcome of what I did. But similarly with the struggles, if, like you just said, reaching out to your support structure, sometimes information online, Google, whatever, that's that you can look that up to try to help there's nothing like another human being that you connect to? Who could just raise that up to the next level, right? You think that?
Carl Berryman 30:53
Oh, that 100%? Like there's a time and place for both? The latter in terms of reaching out to somebody because what I'm going to find is I actually, you know, Bobby T, I had a really good conversation with him yesterday. And he pointed out something to me with regards to my language, that if I'm struggling with something, and I go and google it, I might not be asking the right question. Because I'm stuck in some type of tunnel vision that this is the problem I need to solve. Whereas having a conversation with somebody like you or somebody like Bobby t, what they're gonna say is Carl, do you realize what the real problem is here? Like, it's got nothing to do with what you think it is? Like? Did you hear what you just said? So you've got that outside observer, which Google will never like friends will always be able to give you answers. He can't go. Yeah. So that's why it's so important to have those people in your life that that a are willing to step up and say que this is what's really going on. Like you're you're looking, what you're seeing right now is not what's actually going on. So I'm going to first I'm gonna give you the truth here, it's going to hurt. But you know, they're doing it with love and compassion in order to help you. So yeah, friends over Google 10 times out of 10 Any day
Philip Pape 32:09
until the until AI gets to that level. Just kidding. I don't want to get in there. I want to I want to rephrase what I just heard you say, right, because I think of it also as challenging the premise of the question, mean, you're asking a question. I'm struggling with this. How can I fix why x y? And it's like, well, you're asking, you're asking the wrong question, right? You have the channel, your struggle, isn't this, it's this and I can just give a very practical example that comes to mind and somebody asked me the other day, how do I, how do I do these, like exercises for some muscle group? And, and I said, Well, why are you asking? Well, because my, my, I can't squat? And I'm like, Okay, well, that it's the wrong question.
Carl Berryman 32:54
What's wrong with my squat?
Philip Pape 32:56
Anyway, that's a very, very high level example. But it's a good one. Hey, this is Philip. And I hope you're enjoying this episode of Wits & Weights. If you're finding value in the content and want to stay up to date with all our latest episodes, be sure to hit the Follow button on your favorite podcast platform. By following you'll get notified whenever a new episode comes out. And you won't miss out on knowledge and strategies to level up your health and fitness. Alright, let's get back to the episode. Yeah, so then. So speaking of your support system, then if you think of just this, this muscle building phase, because I've seen a lot of change in you, mentally? I mean, obviously, physically, I haven't been monitoring your physical numbers.
Carl Berryman 33:33
Oh, you have the selfies? No, no, I
Philip Pape 33:36
have it. You're not like submitting check ins or anything. But mentally How have your brothers in the support system contributed or detracted from I know, they're not detracting I hope but how are they contributing to this process since you started,
Carl Berryman 33:50
I'm mainly like the the guys that have here in Winnipeg, it was just, it was just really nice to they're not shy to give a compliment. So we all went out. And we went to this place called activate where you do kind of like these skill games, but they're also physical games, right? So there can be climbing. There could be basketball, there could be lasers like your Yeah, yeah, it's awesome. And when we got back, I was making burgers for everybody. So I'm in the kitchen. And they're like, Carl, your arms look jacked. And then I was like, Oh, cool. Like Jenny Lee tells me that all the time. But that's, that's a biased opinion. Right? And so they tell me that stuff and it's like, yeah, okay, it's like it. I see myself every day. So I don't really know the difference. So that's how they support me there. But then also just something as simple as like Bobby T, for example, asked me how it's going. And this is the one of the things that I really, I found, I need to shy away from with regards to online communities. Because I know online communities are all about like one of the main reasons people go there is for accountability. And yet people don't hold each other accountable for In my experience, some do some don't. And the way you hold people accountable is simply by following up with them. And so I've got brothers in my life who are following up with me with this stuff. And just note, like you, I know, we're going to be talking about this not just today, but all the time. So it's like, if ever, I feel like not doing the food prep of thought, and that actually, I'm really hoping we can get into that muscle up I did the other day, because this is a perfect transition into it of how you inspired some change. So inside, like, whenever I'm having my do it almost seven days a week, but I do my journaling experience, right every morning. And so the whole point of it is to, if I'm having a problem, I want to find a solution, and I want to be able to take action on it like today. So problem I wrote down was I plateau with my weights, which means there's something I need to test track and manage to get back on track, what is the smallest and simplest adjustments I can make that will have the biggest impact. So for each area of the prep work, for me, this, in this case, be in physical health and fitness, right? I have usually like I've got a lot of sources I go to for inspiration, but I'll have one book for each that just is like the Bible for that area. Atomic habits is for physical health and fitness. So the quote I got from there was many people begin the process of changing their habits by focusing on what they want to achieve. This leads us to outcome based habits. The alternative is to build identity based habits. With this approach, we focus on who we wish to become. So really long story short, with this one, I decided who I want to become is a success story for Philip. Because I don't want to let you down. I don't want I don't I don't want to let you down. I want I want to come on your podcast a year from now. And be able to say this is how Philips health this is how field helped me. I followed his advice in so many different ways like not just with the nutritional advice, not just with like what weights do and exercise and stuff like that not but just so much more like just mental and emotional support and love and compassion, everything like that. I want to be the type of person that follows through for my brothers to help my brothers out. So this has to be more this has to be about more than just me I don't I don't want to let you down. As soon as I make it about somebody else. For whatever reason. We have a tendency to to stick to the things that we want to do a lot more. So I don't want to let you down so I did something the other day that I haven't. I've been trying to get myself to do for months. I don't know why it's so stupid. It was just making shakes. Like prepping shakes having those prep because I know when I'm not hungry, they're super calorie dense. And I can get them in and it's it's good. If I if I like all of a sudden something comes up and I don't have time for anything. I can bring it with me. Yeah. So I said okay, as soon as I'm done this, my one small physical and simple action was go to the grocery store, get what you need come home and prep before I do anything else. And I did it. So now I got four more shakes sitting in the fridge. So long story long story long ago. I don't want to let you down.
Philip Pape 37:56
No. And that's that I'm thinking about that as well now that you brought it up, and I knew we'd learned things on the show and I hope people listen to this take that. It's I think you took the identity based habit and then you enhanced it with his Astros of let's let's make it about somebody else that we care about in our life and and just make it so deep. And so driving, that any deviation from that means we're letting that person down in addition to ourselves, which is really powerful.
Carl Berryman 38:20
Yeah, it's like, rather than just be so the I am statements isn't just the identity thing isn't just about who I want to be. It's who I want to be for this person, or for this community. Like I, the way that I look at it, I have to be the guy that is leading the way for all the brothers, I have to I the the only way I can do that is by just living by example. Right? So if I just don't make the shakes, or I stay where I am. That's not That's not me. Cool.
Philip Pape 38:50
So now let's let's let's get into the day to day here, right kind of process to achieve that. Because you mentioned the shakes. And we talked about tracking and things like that. How do you measure everything going on. So besides besides scale weight, which we talked about on the show, and just to recap, at least my philosophy is your daily weight on the scale can fluctuate tremendously based on fluid and based on inflammation and other factors for women based on their cycle, bloating, how many carbs you had, et cetera, et cetera. There's like 20 different factors. So it can go up and down. And guys that are kind of in our weight range. It can go up and down. Three, four, even five pounds in a day, depending on what's going on our weight range. You're giving me a lot of credit. Well, yeah.
Carl Berryman 39:30
How much are you? How much are you right now?
Philip Pape 39:32
I'm still down at like 170 something low.
Carl Berryman 39:35
Okay, so you've got 20 something pounds on?
Philip Pape 39:37
Yeah, it's in the ballpark. We're in the same alright, I'm flattered. The thing about human beings is like there's a normal curve, right, like most people fall in the similar weight range, similar height range and so on. So you end up getting used to these numbers and kind of making the connections. So where was I going with this Karl Popper tucked away day to day? Yeah. So so like one measure is your weight? then you have to be careful to, to use the right aspect about like, so for me, it's a 20 day moving average and that and I use a food logging app to see that, but you can just calculate that. What else are you measuring? Because I was thinking, if you felt like you were interrupted Sunday, and you didn't have the shakes, or you did have the shakes, but you didn't feel hungry? or what have you? How do you know at the end of the day, you got what you needed to get.
Carl Berryman 40:25
So for me, the main thing that I'm measuring right now, from a physical, I guess, a weight standpoint is I use the Renfrow scale, right? So it's got it gives you everything, some of the things on there aren't very accurate. I know that the body weights and the lean muscle are accurate. So that's what I'm doing. And since, man, it's been, it's been a couple of months now, where before, I was only doing it once a week, right. And then you suggested doing it every day. And I'm like, I don't want to do this every day. But I'll do it. Because I don't know everything about everything. So I started doing it every day. And it was it got really interesting, because what I would notice is the graph, if I were to pull it out, it goes really slow like this, and then bump and down. And then a little bit higher, boom, and down. So there's always a dip before and up. But I've noticed like it's very, very, very incremental. But like this, like this straight line right here, actually isn't a straight line. It's, it's like this, right? So say, for example, this this past weekend, when I was just, um, man, my emotions control the way I eat a hardcore. So and for me, I don't I don't binge. When I feel like crap emotionally. I do the opposite. I don't eat. I don't eat. Okay. So but since I've been getting on scale every day,
Philip Pape 41:49
which is a problem now, and he's trying to get away. So it's just yeah, yeah. All right, yeah.
Carl Berryman 41:54
So, but since I was weighing myself every day, when I hopped on the scale, after not eating, I actually had my highest weight. And so and so there's just, there was no rhyme or reason to that, which is why it's so important to have that data. Because when you can go the data because I don't want to, I don't want to base how like the results I'm getting on how I feel. Because just like when I used to take the glamor shots, like I take one every week, there'll be weeks where it's like, oh, I had a bad work week, I wasn't eating that good. These are gonna look horrible. I compare it to the last week, it's either the same or better. So you need that data there. So for me the primary one right now yeah, I'm looking at that every day so that I can make sure I'm managing that. But then the the bigger one is inside the gym. Like I want my lifts to be going up every single workout in some way, shape or form. Like if I'm doing the same number of reps was Rep Number Five cleaner than last week? Am I going up in weight? Am I getting to six reps instead of five today? So just those are what's most important, but also, like third on the list, there is the aesthetic part of it, right? Like I'm just how are my clothes fitting, I've got the one shirt that I the arms are definitely tighter. And that's that was that was my goal going in. So now I'm gonna have to buy a bigger shirt, because I thought it would take me way longer to fit into this shirt. But it's it's, it's tight now. So that that is also important.
Philip Pape 43:18
Okay, so if backing off a bit, so you're going by your lifts. But what if it you said you were in a weight stall for about a month now? Yeah. Okay, so what's going on there?
Carl Berryman 43:30
What's going on there is I haven't been accurately so I've got my food prep down. Okay, so that's good to go. And that worked for me to get me to where I am now. And now I'm at that point where I need to try something different. So starting next week, I'm going to be tracking something different. So the thing I'm going to start tracking is my shakes plus three, how many and by shakes plus three, I mean, three meals, if I get in my shakes, and three meals, I'm making a hypothesis that that is going to help me break through the plateau. Because that's going to be that will up my calories. So but I want to have data on that. So and for me when I say my meals, my meals are I know even without tracking them that they are the same because I've done my food prep and I'm only eating out once a week the only option I have is to eat what I prepped so those meals are done in advance so it's not like oh no I am eating three more meals but I went out here and I went out here and there's there's no variation in what I eat. I eat the same three things every single day. Every single day.
Philip Pape 44:34
Yeah, and that's important the routine is important so for folks listening and here's the thing having that routine for some people will drive them crazy. Right For me it's
Carl Berryman 44:43
super easy. Don't get me wrong though. Like it's not every single day for months like the whole it shifts I enjoy Yeah, like so the menu will shift so yeah, like spaghetti is on the menu. Pierogi casseroles on the menu this week and tacos are on the menu and then I've got my breakfast burrito and So anyway,
Philip Pape 45:01
so I'm so hesitant to like want to challenge you, Carl here.
Carl Berryman 45:05
That's the point of this conversation and this ship is the host.
Philip Pape 45:09
Yeah. And it's the going back to the tracking thing. I'm like, I hear Oh, hold
Carl Berryman 45:14
on, before you before you. Why are you challenging me? What is your intent?
Philip Pape 45:18
Okay? My intent is to have you think of all the different perspectives of why or why not you're using but why and specific tools so that you get more precision and progress. Okay,
Carl Berryman 45:29
so you were looking out for me by challenging? Oh, there
Philip Pape 45:31
you go. All right.
Carl Berryman 45:33
Where are you going with this, so I should be inviting this. And that's, that's one of the things I was really looking forward to here. I know I'm in a plateau. I know Philip is going to challenge something I have. In other words, he's going to cause me to step outside my box, which is only going to lead me to where I want to go. So challenge me only one.
Philip Pape 45:48
So just going back to the tracking thing, because I hear I hear I don't want to call them rationalizations I want to call them they could be their techniques, or you're trying to come up with and be clever and think and, and solutions to the problem of why is the weight stalled, knowing that you need more calories, like just break it down very simply any more calories without actually measuring the calories. Right, right. You're indirectly as we proxy measures, measuring the calories. And if you are eating like a robot and literally the exact same thing every day for months on end, like bodybuilders do. I could see that that almost having a meal plan, which is its own box for some people, right having a meal plan, that I could see you making the progress, but then I hear that what you're doing right now isn't working right. So then I go back to track and I'm like, what is the real problem, you have a tracking, one of the problems you said was you don't like the stacking that on top of something that's relaxing, which is prepping your food or cooking? And then and then I might ask, Well, is there a different way you can track that doesn't do that, like tracking it afterward, like tracking it an hour later as part of your journaling or documentation or looking at your other numbers? or what have you, you know, it could be taking a picture in the moment of what you eat. And then later on tracking it does separate from that activity. Just just one little thing that came to mind. Is that the only problem? Or are there other things about tracking that are just not going to work for you
Carl Berryman 47:10
know that? I don't know if that's the only problem. But that already starts to make sense. Like what if I just if the problem is for me doing it while I'm doing something that I'm supposed to enjoy? Why don't I have a specific time for doing these things? Then like why don't I do it another time. So my cooking is done. But then it's like, hey, maybe when I've got some downtime, I go back, I grab all the boxes, I grab the labels, and I figure it out. So like that makes sense to me. So that's something that I'd be willing to try. Now, to answer your question, is there anything else that is stopping me from doing it?
Philip Pape 47:50
Like if you did that, if you hypothetically put yourself in that position of okay, I'm gonna do it later. And maybe there's an easy way to do that, without even having to grab all the boxes, it could be like what I do when I go to a restaurant, I just put in the basic common foods into the app and ballpark it. And that's actually that actually results in a more accurate number than not doing it is what the science shows and what kind of experience tends to show even if you're within 30% plus or minus, it tends to average out and at least gives you a box where you can up it each week knowing that you have that target. So
Carl Berryman 48:24
there's a story playing in my head, that I'd be willing to investigate and see if it's not accurate. I just, there's something about me that is very resistant to making, eating. It's it almost doesn't even make sense trying to try to say it out loud. I'm not quite sure. See, I'm trying to I'm not making eating a cold, like, data driven thing. Yeah, like I can do it like I can because it's a human experience. Yeah, I can do it inside the gym, so I'm not sure. The question I'm gonna have to ask myself is how do I still keep this as much of an enjoyable human experience while still getting accurate on the data? Like that's the question that's a question I need to ask myself.
Philip Pape 49:08
It's a fair question when you when you look at the end analogy so you mentioned the gym being on you're kind of your advocate here at the gym, going to a gym and lifting weights is not really a natural human experience. We've we've created these boxes with these, you know bars and plates and like in real life, quote unquote real life our ancestors would have just lived their lives and picked up you know, heavy stuff and and they wouldn't have gotten as jacked as we're trying to get let's be honest, it'd be somewhere course.
Carl Berryman 49:34
Yeah, there's so
Philip Pape 49:37
you look at, you know, hunter gatherer tribes or what have you. And then another energy analogy I often use is banking. And you can argue that it also is an artificial construct of like having money and having budgets and stuff, and it's, so we need to treat it that way. So I get all that I get all that. But I also go back to you wanting to build muscle efficiently, effectively, to get to this goal. What's the best way we can do that and what are the best tools for it and you will said doing something you don't like you could eventually, either like it or at least not notice it if it's part of your routine,
Carl Berryman 50:05
right, but Okay, so you're going back to what we said earlier in conversation. And the other thing I'm going to challenge myself on, is what if I started doing it and all of a sudden, I got to my goal way faster than I expected. Like, what if instead of me saying, You know what, I don't like doing this, because of this? What if I said, you know, what, what if this actually gets me to where I want to go faster, like that might be able to change because really, it's my emotional connection to the activity that I need to address. It's not the activity itself. It's my emotional connection. And the stories I'm telling myself about that. Because there is a way to make it fun. Like, I love doing burpees. How, like, that's insane. That is insane. Why does? Yeah, why do I love doing burpees? Because I have different stories and emotional connections associated with them. So maybe now it's me looking at my stories and my emotional connection I have to tracking diligently that I need to address and who knows, it might end up being one of those things where I do it. I'm like, I hate to say this, but I should have listened to Philip.
Philip Pape 51:05
You never know, man. But but you'll have information you'll know, you'll know. Truly just despise this with all your passion. And it's just not something for you. And you know, there's there's things like that in our lives. How can you say, Yes, you know, I still don't like Squatch I'll be honest, I'll say it out loud. I love deadlifts with back squats. And maybe it's not that I don't like them. I just look forward to them with a little bit of dread every time. Why? First several reasons. It's one is the back issues I used to have. And I know you mentioned something similar, which gets me to be very focused on my form and do things the right way. But the other thing is, it's I'm not as strong in the back squat as I would like to be. So that's one of the things I know I have to do it to push it. And that's what drives me to do it. And I do that. Yeah. So I'm fine with that though. I'm fine. Because I know, in the moment, I'm like, why am I doing this? Why am I doing? But you know, I focus and I do it, and I push? And then when I'm done. I'm like, Ah, so glad I did. But
Carl Berryman 52:01
this brings up another interesting argument, though, or discussion, I should say in terms of, at what point do we stop trying to fix our weakest weaknesses and just accept our strengths and run with that? So that's I don't know. Yeah, that's a whole note. We don't leave that for the audience to answer. Yeah, they can they can give you some feedback on that one. Give us some answers.
Philip Pape 52:20
Yeah, man. All right. So what else? What is anything really surprised you about yourself? During this process?
Carl Berryman 52:28
Yeah. The deadlifts for sure. I didn't, like just, I was looking to get back up to so the most I've ever done in my life. And this was just a challenge for one rep was three plates, right? So 315. And that was like the first time I tried it. I didn't get it up. And then this guy who was much taller than me, and much thinner than me, got it up. I'm like, Yeah, this isn't acceptable. So I stepped back up to the bar, and I got it up. But I know that was a one time thing. But what actually, this is what surprised me the most so far throughout this experience as it relates to this is both inside the gym and outside the gym. And I'm really glad that I had the experience that I did. I had an inside the gym and then outside the gym experience on the same day. So I'm going to do dad's, and at that point, I think the max I was doing for six reps was, oh, no, I did 235 for five one week. Okay. So then the next week, I'm like, Okay, well, we're gonna go for 240 For sure, if not 245 On the third set. So second set on my cane, put on what you did last week, and let's get it for six before you go up in weight. Let's Max up our reps before we max out the weight. And so I go up to the bar, and I'm like, I'm getting myself all psyched up and everything like that. And I go and I lift it. I'm struggling. I get it like halfway up my shins and then just put it back down on the first rep. Yeah, yeah, kind of first step. So and then I sit down afterwards. I'm like, Carl, you did this five times last week, you're telling me you can't do it once now. So then a strategy that's always always worked for me, in every single one of my workouts is just have a nice relaxing workout. That's it, I just remove expectation, I have fun, I go up to the bar, make sure my form is good. So I waited about two minutes, I went and I pulled out six reps. And then I put 240 on the bar and I did six reps. And so it was just it reminded me to just relax, not put so much pressure on myself. And it's funny because later that day, I was about to have like one of my emotional breakdowns and what that looks like for me as I get anxious, I get nervous and then I cancel things and I just shut down I'll either watch Netflix or I just totally seclude myself. And it was a date night with Jenny Lee the last day that I want to be doing that. I said, Carl, you know what, just have a nice, relaxing evening which anyway, just focus on relaxing. That's it. You'll do what you need to do, and it ended up being an unbelievable date night. All because I just I remove expectation. I let the unconscious takeover Like, pardon me, I've been training diligently for over 20 years, I let it take over and trust that it's going to do what I need it to do. And that's exactly what the body did in that situation in the gym. And that's exactly what my mind did when I left the gym. So that was fun.
Philip Pape 55:14
That's like the this is the the epitome of mind muscle connection, because it's, it's your psychological state. It's not even in the moment. You know, what comes to mind, there's I lived in, I lived in my home gym by myself. And I know a lot of people like to get psyched up when they go for a lift, or they listen to the loud, you know, heavy rock music, or they get the camaraderie of the competition. And I don't like all that stuff. I like when I when I go for my set, I turn off everything. And I just listen to myself, my body and tell them give myself cues. And that is kind of a form of relaxing, I think, if people listening are wondering if they've been struggling with their lives, and maybe it is putting too much pressure on themselves. What Carl just said could be game changing for you.
Carl Berryman 55:55
It's a form of relaxation, but it's also a form of strength in that like, because for me what I do now whenever I'm working out, I always listen to a podcast episode that I'm going to be posting because I listen to the nuggets. But as soon as I get ready to my set, pause. Yeah, put it on pause all the time. And it reminds me of something that Goggins said, he said, if you're listening to music while you're working out, you're cheating. Yeah, yeah. Because you need like, when I say at strength, it's because fewer places where you will you be introduced to the demons that are really inside you than in the gym. Yeah, like if you shut everything else off, and listen to the voices that are coming up, when you're getting ready to do a weight that you didn't think you can lift, man, you're gonna be surprised at some of the shit that those voices talk in your head just and then being able to defeat those demons like today when I did the 205. Like, I told my buddy was give me a spot him like, Hey, I'm going for two. We'll see if we get we'll see if we get four. And then as I'm sitting on the bench, and I go to lie down, I'm getting myself position. It's like, you've never done this before Carl, or I haven't done it for like 10 years anyways. Yeah. And it's like, you know what? We are. We're gonna crush this and then sure enough to was easy. And we got to four. So it was nice after the fact being able to say like, yeah, those voices in my head. I'm gonna turn the volume down on those guys. Yeah,
Philip Pape 57:19
man, enjoy it, enjoy it, because you've got months ahead of you.
Carl Berryman 57:22
I know. I know. Two plants on the bench is coming right around the corner. For sure.
Philip Pape 57:28
Yeah. So what I mean, how do you know when you're done? How do you know when you're done? And then like, you've captured the flag on your muscle building process? And then you have to switch focus? Potentially,
Carl Berryman 57:40
I think you know my answer. Oh, switch focus. Okay. Because you're never done? Well, I mean, not gonna say never done this. For me. Um, I have a number in my head, like, I would like to, I've always wanted to be 165. I've never been 165 in my entire life. So for me, it's about getting to that number. Irregardless of performance, even muscle aesthetics, anything. It's all about proving that I can do something that I never thought was possible. Yeah, that's it. So like, that is the number one goal for me. And just proving I could do somebody didn't think was possible. But in terms of switching gears,
Philip Pape 58:22
well, when you when you get there, are you going to stay there for a while?
Carl Berryman 58:26
That's a good question. Yeah. That's a good question. Um, I'm going to see how much Jenny Lee can not keep her hands off. Now. If, if my if the amount of physical attention I get from Jenny Lee goes up with my weight, then who knows? Maybe 175. But if it starts going down, I know I need to cut so
Philip Pape 58:45
there'll be more to grab. Yeah. So and I asked also for a practical reason, because when you hit that weight, if you just stop and go back to maintenance, you may drop because of the Oh, yeah. ARBs. So overshoot it by like, a couple pounds or three pounds.
Carl Berryman 59:01
So 165 is my overshoot right now. Okay, because because I know I hear well, I know when I cut, like, even if I were to drop down to 155, that's 15 more pounds on me than I was walking around with for years. So okay, in pounds on a frame this big, is, that's gonna be healthy. That's gonna be pretty healthy to
Philip Pape 59:22
165 is just that that one day, you get it on the scale, boom, you hit that number,
Carl Berryman 59:25
right? As soon as I can already tell because as soon as you said, I'm like, No, I can. I would love to see a one seven, a one seven, something would be all that would be solid.
Philip Pape 59:36
Well, that's the cool thing about this is like you have a lot of runway honestly, you do because you started pretty darn lean. So you have that runway to keep pushing, pushing, pushing, pushing. And I mean, I would say go until you just feel like that's it you know, it's okay to go to a hotel. I
Carl Berryman 59:50
started hating the process. 18 months. Yeah, it's like a long way. Yeah, if it gets to the point where it's like just every single time I eat I'm like, Just too falling out of my mouth that forget. So
Philip Pape 1:00:03
I know if and when that starts to happen because sometimes it doesn't happen. It depends on how many calories you have, like if you're leaner and you're not up in the four something range. What do you think you're eating right now?
Carl Berryman 1:00:14
Calorie wise, calorie wise? I can't even give you a number. Yeah, okay. Okay.
Philip Pape 1:00:19
So if you start tracking, I'd be curious. It's not
Carl Berryman 1:00:22
if it's like, that is what I'm taking away. Okay. Is many things I'm taking away from this conversation I, I will begin tracking and I will begin taking a look at my emotional relationship to tracking Awesome, so yeah, give it give it a month, like commit to a month. If you can't, don't give me what I tell you tell you what a strategy, or a principle that works for me and kind of principles slash strategy is a lot of times not thinking too far down the road. Like, say when I'm doing my 500 burpees? I can't think about the 500. I've got to think about those first 25 Got it. That's so for me, like I'll do 30 But I'm just going to focus on the five. Okay, focus on five
Philip Pape 1:01:00
start today. But tomorrow, whenever you're starting. Okay, it's partway through the day. So
Carl Berryman 1:01:05
no, no, but no, it doesn't though. Because remember, what we said is I just need to track stuff like you need to track it after the fact true if you have the information from what you ate earlier apps, right, which, which I do, because all I've had was a banana and a protein shake. So let's see. Okay, we'll start today.
Philip Pape 1:01:21
All right. So Carl, man, you know what I'm gonna ask next. I want to ask it of you again.
Carl Berryman 1:01:25
Oh, man, I can't believe I wasn't ready for this. What question
Philip Pape 1:01:32
did you wish I'd asked? And what is your answer?
Carl Berryman 1:01:34
What question do I wish you had asked? Let's see. I'm gonna go with the same question and give you a different answer. Because the question I asked last time, that was, what am I embarrassed about? That I am ashamed that I'm embarrassed about that I wish I wasn't embarrassed about. And it's how little I appreciate and love myself for the work that I'm doing. And the reason I say that is because there's this awesome guy named Mark that comes into the gym. Super nice guy. He actually works there, too. I see him there this morning. hadn't seen him a couple of weeks. He comes in, he's wearing a tank top. And he looked he looked good. Like he looked any he hadn't even started working out. Yeah, like, his shoulders were pop and he had some good size. Like he looked. He looked better than the last time I saw him. So I went up to him. As soon as I was done training my clients. I'm like, Hey, dude, like, you're looking good. He's like, Oh, thanks, man. I'm like, you haven't even started yet? How do you look like that? Like, that's like, I want to look like that when I have a pump. But and he's quite a bit bigger than me too. So I was jealous. And as I'm walking away, I'm thinking, Carl, like, you look at all these people that you say they're doing good. And you'll even go up to them and say they're doing good. And you're comparing yourself to them saying I should be more like that. Like, what is it going to take for me to finally accept myself? What is it going to take for me to finally accept that all this work I'm putting in is, is doing something good? Like, what is it going to take for me to be able to accept a compliment? Like I, as soon as people give me compliments? I, I've gotten better at it. But I just shrug it off. Like I make some type of joke or excuse. And it's because I'm super uncomfortable with it. I'm super uncomfortable acknowledging the fact that all the hard work that I dedicate myself to is actually paying off. Is it any wonder why I don't like the process sometimes, because I'm not taking the time to acknowledge myself for the hard work I'm putting in. So I, I wish I didn't shit on myself as much as I did. And I really wish that I took time to acknowledge the work that I'm putting in. And is
Philip Pape 1:03:35
this a? Is this a practice that you want to do more of for yourself? Or is this learning to accept others compliments,
Carl Berryman 1:03:42
it's a practice I want to do more for myself and I already have things in place that I've just postponed. So I've got like, I think I've talked to you about my cookie jar. And my cookie jar is just for those who don't know, it's, it's literally wooden cookies, and you you paint dots on them. So it looks like chocolate chips. But on the other side, you write down the date and something you've either accomplished, or something that you at least had the courage to try and Jenny Lee got me this cookie jar, and she put like 60 cookies in there for me. And there's all these things in there the day I quit Canada Post my very first for our boot camp. And there's a lot of stuff in there that I tried and failed that but I had the courage to try. And I went and bought 60 More cookies like two months ago. And I haven't made another one yet. Because to me every single when I used to go in the cookie jar, I'd pull it out and it was like I use them for bookmarks or in the morning right before I leave. I was just going there to remind me like Carl, you've done some pretty amazing shit. Like you need to stop and just take a breath and reflect on the fact that you are you are literally being the change you wish to see in your world. Like I've got it tattooed on my arm. I am being the man that I want to be and I'm not I don't have I have the practices set up for it and I haven't taken the time to implement those practices.
Philip Pape 1:04:52
Well, dude, you've impacted my life for the better. And I know individuals you've impacted and you know that you know, they cuz there's people that are in our circle. I want you to text me with that first new cookie you Okay? There we go.
Carl Berryman 1:05:07
Okay. Okay. All right, I promise you, I will have one Dental. Yeah. And that's
Philip Pape 1:05:12
great. I mean, this is a form of gratitude for yourself, honestly. And you know, and I know you talked to Darlene just like I didn't have daily gratitude practice is a good thing to have. And I liked that idea. I might, I might steal that idea as a way to do it for myself in some way. So thank you, Carl. Man, I think this was just what we expected and more, I hope, and
Carl Berryman 1:05:32
always, buddy, this is you know, thank you for the amazing questions. Thank you. Thank you for having the courage to challenge me because that's what I talked about earlier. Right. Like that's, that's what I love about our relationship is we're not shy on challenging others perspectives. And at the same time, we will defend where we know our truth is so I love that for us,
Philip Pape 1:05:48
for sure. And I hope the listeners feel like they can challenge themselves challenge each other look for their support structures. Listen back to the episode with you know, whatever resonates with you and take action on it today, because that's really what we're all about. Always a pleasure talking to you, my brother.
Carl Berryman 1:06:05
Thank you remember.
Philip Pape 1:06:09
If you've been inspired by today's interview, and are ready to take action and build momentum on your health and fitness journey, just schedule a free 30 minute nutrition momentum call with me using the link in my show notes. I promise not to sell or pitch you on anything, but I will help you gain some perspective and guidance so we can get you on the right track toward looking and feeling your best
