8 - The Secret Weapon to your Fitness Goals: NEAT

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what's up and welcome back to episode 8 talking christian today we're going to talk about steps

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neat one of our very favorite topics i think right yes we're both very big on this uh i mean

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personally but also with our clients so we'll we'll also get into like the personal stuff in a sec but to kind of

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recap already or summarize what we're going to talk about today first of all we're going to get into the actual benefits of increasing your step count

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i'll say this right off the bat like when we're talking steps or daily movement or need

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let's consider that all being like one and the same just to make things easier right so when we're talking steps or

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need same same yeah we're going to talk about walking for fat loss and how you can really help you

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maintain fat loss as well but also just general health and how to get them up because i think

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getting your steps up like okay we can talk about all the benefits but let's also apply that to you right

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let's figure out how we can get your daily steps up um but yeah let's just get into kind of like what

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we've been doing because we're both big on this um personally i'm not applying this right now because i'm still in the fat

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loss phase you just went on a hiking trip now before we start real quick if you don't yet follow us at talking nutrition

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podcast on instagram for some shorter reels if you want to check them out if you

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want to submit any questions you can do it there as well now for me personally in this cut like i really

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gotta double down on my steps i noticed that uh at one point my step count is low and i

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thought it was the iphone step counter you know because i was like you know it can't be right anyway it's like it says

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something like 4k or whatever i was like that's not right i know i'm moving you know because my actual step counter my fitbit

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broke and i was like you know what like let me actually get one of these uh like the portable ones like the ones that you can

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put in your pocket i should have here yeah so i have like a old school one though i saw you post that

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i've had clients who've had to use those because they work in certain areas where they can't have their phone

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yeah and uh yeah they're they're great i mean like it was like 30 bucks at something whatever yeah you can get them

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right off amazon exactly and that's where i got it like but that's the thing i thought it was my

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iphone steph connor you know and i see this can't be right like i'm moving you know turns out i was just [ __ ] i was

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barely walking you know so my step count was actually low but i like this one anyways i'll keep it

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um but i really like to double down cody actually recommended me doing that and he said like yo just gotta get your tiny

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steps in or 10k steps um he's like you have no excuse really you know

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we can always get that in and it's a matter of priorities and actually doing it and that's what i've been doing i've

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been doing more emails while walking taking calls sometimes when i struggle writing you

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know articles and stuff i go out i try to brainstorm i write stuff down sometimes i thought i stopped because

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i'm like so much into it you know what you have something to do your brain starts to work like better you know

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you get more clarity it's crazy it really it really does a whole lot and

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sure we talk about this you know for fat loss reasons too we'll get into that but it's it's just big in general for

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your mind for your overall health and so last weekend

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reason i want to talk about this i just played two festivals with my band a lot of traveling flying to europe

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day one we flew in picked up a drummer crazy delays

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we made it to the festivals we had traffic like everything was like it was a [ __ ] show you know

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we get there like 15 minutes before set time so we have to like unload yes

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get on stage and pretty much just play right away but we made it happen

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but long story short a lot of driving a lot of traveling a lot of craziness i still hit my 10k steps that day

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even though i was like doing the driving and you know like we didn't walk that much i just went for a walk

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i texted my girlfriend i'm like no i'm just walking around the festival terrain there's a real fitness yeah

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to hit my steps you know but i still made it happen you know i'm in the current fat loss phase

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i'm pretty much i'm just done you know i just want to get it over with so that 10k it has to happen that next day two

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still hit my 10k yesterday too i had two flights a long layover still getting my snapshot i was walking

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around the airport you know so i'm still trying to prioritize that on a daily basis it's really one of the

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number one priorities i have currently yeah what about you you went to the mountains

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right yeah so for me with steps i

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will give myself a minimum okay so i give myself about like 7 500 as a

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minimum for the day so every single day i need to be hitting at least 7 500 and then i try to get 10

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maybe even more okay um and this is really important i make it a

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priority um and i do for clients as well when we're on vacation if

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we're not working out you know still getting in some movement and doing that by

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steps right um so prior time same type of thing like 7 500 to 10k steps just so we are moving

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um i went on a hiking trip well i hiked some of the days in like

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all day long so i was like 30 000 step range that's that's getting

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into that's getting out of neat and more into exercise like there's kind of an upper

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limit there with me where it does or walking your steps that does

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go more into exercise um but then you know the other days i still

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prioritize getting at least like the 7 500 to 10k steps it's just it's a priority to keep me moving um while i'm

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away and every single day so that's something that i just prioritize every single day depending doesn't matter

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where i am um and it's because it has so many benefits

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which we'll talk about for sure yeah like i said even even like just for

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mental reasons right and especially since you went out in nature it's it's so much better even like oh

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yeah it's like doubles the benefit you know it does it does yeah um

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why we focus on step count there's many reasons to it but

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from a fat loss standpoint or body composition standpoint or metabolism standpoint

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um it's really important so when we look at tdee which is total daily energy

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expenditure which is essentially how many calories or how much energy we burn

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in a day there's four factors that play four main factors that play into that so

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we've talked about this before but the main one makes up about 70 is bmr so basal metabolic rate which is

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how much you burn at rest like doing nothing that's 70

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15 is neat so neat is non-exercise activity thermogenesis so that's

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all activity outside of exercise so

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walking is a big one this is the one that we can essentially

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track right so we can see other parts of neat or like if you see

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me if you're watching me i talk with my hands um that's neat i'm moving i'm fidgeting

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blinking cleaning your house dancing like those kind of things are

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considered neat they're just movement outside of activity then we have

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uh 10 which is thermic defective food which is the energy we burn digesting food then we have exercise activity

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which is like five percent so exercise activity makes up the least amount as we can see

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and neat non-exercise activity makes up for

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the second largest aspect of our energy expenditure so

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with johan and how he's keeping up his steps is because naturally like in a fat

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loss phase your neat will decrease because your body's trying to conserve energy so you

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will get up slower you'll blink slower um you'll just move

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less so we track steps to keep

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knees high and keep that metabolism higher through a deficit so that can like really helps in in regards to that

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um but the benefits of step slash walking there's

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many as many um one big one is it can help with digestion so

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like going on a you know 10 minute walk following

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a meal can be really helpful in regards to digestion it it's a parasympathetic

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movement so you're tapping into the rest and digest and that's really

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important when we're trying to digest our food if we're in a fight or flight response the

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body just doesn't prioritize digestion so the walking can

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help that um it also can help with blood sugar regulation

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um again post meal walk using your muscles they're going to uptake that glucose okay so

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really good from a blood sugar regulation standpoint and i have my mom who's diabetic i have

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a client who has type 2 diabetes well they're in the

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they're thinking it's type one i don't know there's a whole weird thing happening there but anyways we track obviously her blood sugar levels and

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one of the most powerful tools we've used is post meal walks it helps

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to lower her glucose levels immensely and the same with my mom um

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so morning walks this can help with circadian rhythm it's

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getting you in the sun morning sun which can help with

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sleep at night it helps to essentially increase melatonin production

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so if you're getting morning sun we can see that benefiting your sleep at night and just

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helping overall circadian rhythm which is like your wake and sleep cycles i don't know if you notice this i'm

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pretty sure everyone notices this but when they get outside it doesn't even matter if you're technically like in nature but just

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getting outside going for a walk you feel better right that's because it's increasing dopamine

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it's increasing serotonin and then typically because it's a parasympathetic

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uh movement it's gonna decrease cortisol so you just are in a better state overall

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but mentally it helps so so much just relaxes you and it's

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because of this it's increasing the dopamine increasing the serotonin and this can really help with people who

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have um the seasonal like effective disorders where like in the winter

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i mean you you must deal with this like a lot the people over there

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yeah um but when it's like really gloomy all the time things like that

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actually just getting outside in nature again can help with this i have a client who deals with it and this is really

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beneficial for him um as well so we have this

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study that was done in 2020 and it was basically talking about step

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count and all-cause mortality we both made a post on this

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right so there's 40 basically 48 000 participants in this study

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um well let me just pull this up okay

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so 48 000 participants in the study the results essentially were

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compared with taking 4 000 steps per day taking 8 000 steps per day was

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associated with significantly lower all-cause mortality as was taking 12 000 steps per day

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so it is so beneficial um for overall health in

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so many different ways obviously um i think that concludes the benefits

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section but yeah yeah i mean it's it's really cool and i

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just got to correct you there for a sec it was 4 800 but what did i say like i said 48 000 yeah but i mean either way

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that's a that's a shitload of people you know so like you know but the reason why

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i made a post on on the on that study is the fact that you actually have that graph right you can

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clearly see that like four thousand steps or two or whatever is a high risk of all hospitality and

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then as those steps go up you really see that risk go down and then around like 10 to 12 k it kind of like flattens out

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a little bit which also gets into you know when you mention 30 like people always make everything a race

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right but like once you're at 12 or something you can walk more 100 percent it's fine

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but it's not going to be even better you know yeah yeah it's kind of nice to get to that sweet spot yeah so once you're

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there like you're good kind of thing you know and it's so cool to see that and

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i mean this study is like a more recent one which is great and it has a lot of people to kind of show you know that

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walking is really one of the number one things you can do for your health yes and that everyone can do as well

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yeah and i have people where you know they're just starting into their fitness journey

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i will have them simply increase their step count first before even you know going into the gym right like just to

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get them moving um and this is a habit that sticks with you

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that you just continue to i hope you know do for as long as you can

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right just because it has so many benefits yeah technically

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i think i think i want to point this out like so neat like going for a walk on purpose technically isn't neat because

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then we're like planning and then people on social media kind of make turns into discussion you know it's like oh it's

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like a planned exercise like yeah sure yes you are right however let's just

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keep it simple and see this as a way to get our daily movement up our needs you know whether

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it's a planned walk or not we're just trying to do this for our health right it's a it's a non-stressful movement

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yeah right so that's why it's so great it's increasing your energy expenditure

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but without the added stress of exercise right so

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yeah i guess you could call it exercise i even if it's planned i still consider it

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neat yeah but for some people it is exercise no

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yes that's something i will say that's something i will say so

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say you're just starting to like track your steps and you're at like 3 000. you

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don't want to just jump up to 10 because yes that would probably be for someone

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who's so low that would be considered it would be

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somewhat stressful on the body i guess you could say um so if you're at like 3 000

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you know bump it up to 4 500 you know and then slowly bump it up like don't

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just go from 3 000 to 10. yeah because that would be unsustainable yes

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like you you wouldn't be able to stick to that yeah it's like anything else you want to just slowly progress with it it's like you

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don't want to go to the gym zero and then go six days a week yeah

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right it's the same thing yeah but we tend to think like that right like oh i'm going from not from not

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exercising to wait hang on let me do a marathon even though my steps are not like 3 000.

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let's take it easy like let's slowly build it up you know yeah for sure walking is really

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important guys and um getting into our next point like also for fat loss

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like you mentioned 15 of your tdee your daily calorie burn that's neat

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which is very easy to influence by walking it's also very easy not to do so i feel

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like that's one of the reasons why we kind of tend to be like okay you know but it has a big impact and it's

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actually the biggest toggle that you can directly influence you know when it comes to how

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many calories you're burning because at 70 percent you know your your bmr

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you can influence that by building muscle but it takes months years you know in the short term it's going to be

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that daily step count if you're usually around 8k which i am probably worthless to bring that up

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during a fat loss phase it's going to definitely help you burn more calories keep you in a deficit

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it's also the most adaptive component of your metabolism right when people diet when you're in a

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deficit those steps kind of tend to go down that's for sure what i noticed right i

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thought it was my phone which is dumb actually but but like my step count was like around 4 000 at

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one point not for that long but i was like oh [ __ ] like you don't like you really don't notice

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and i know this obviously as a coach and i tell people this here i am in a deficit and all of a sudden my steps are

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like half of what it was you know right and exactly like you don't really notice

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that much you might be talking with your hands a little bit less getting off the couch less

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i didn't want to go for a walk you know i would take the car to the gym a lot etc

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now walking as cardio is kind of like one

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way to approach fat loss right but it's not really the same either i want to briefly touch on this because

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i see this a lot too right like i'm doing just walking for cardio like

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i guess it depends and what's maybe cool to point out too i'm a little bit all over the place now but go back to that

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study the intensity of walking actually did not seem to affect the benefits oh right

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which is actually a good point to bring up because i want to touch on this cardio thing so technically when we talk

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about calories burned we could do walking as cardio right

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but when we think what actual cardio is which would be more intense right the heart heart rate goes up

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we're working on our cardiovascular health that would happen at higher intensities right

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so in a way sure we could do it instead of cardio but it's not going to be actual

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cardio which is okay because cardio doesn't have to be the main driver of fat loss

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shouldn't be at least big misconception but okay that's what i'm doing right now i've

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been dieting i'm hitting my 10k steps i'm actually not doing any cardio i will do that again however because i'm

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noticing i need that for other reasons cardio reasons

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you know i noticed that that's definitely been you know going down a little but that's okay i'm gonna reverse

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soon gonna have more food again and then i'll start cracking cranking that up as well

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now you already touched on the additional stress management benefits so i don't have to really get into that um

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other than the fact that in a deficit which is a big stressor you want to manage that that overall stress load and

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i mean we literally just did a stress podcast on that so go back if you haven't checked that one out

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but even in terms of like fat loss maintenance like one of the number one things you can do

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to keep the weight off to eat at like a normal amount you know is keeping your steps up

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because what happens if you work yourself up to 10 12k steps and then go down once you have maintenance you might

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be gaining weight you know don't want that right so long story short try to get your steps up and try

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to keep them up you know and um try to like look for excuses to move

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more i really noticed when i was at the airport i went up and down a couple

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flights of stairs not a single time i saw anyone else on those stairs

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they're all in the escalator right i really noticed because usually like just some people you know i would like

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i was like the only one i was like [ __ ] you know like

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i would be on that escalator if it wasn't for me like paying attention to my stuff count you know

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but it makes a big difference because think about this if every time you go for that more

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convenient option right the escalator the elevator driving whatever

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in no time your steps are going to be like half of what it was what it could be that's gonna have an impact on health

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fat loss etc okay enough about the benefits and all that i already kind of share mine with taking

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the stairs but okay how would you kind of apply this with clients like bringing their step count

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up um something that's maybe not even a purposeful walk

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yeah so a little touching touch on the airport thing so i

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was in the airport recently uh if you get there early enough

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walk just walk around you know it's a good time to like people watch

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right like i increase i think i i i like to people watch creepily but

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um like i increased my steps there by like three thousand right versus sitting and then now i'm

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gonna be on the plane sitting for another two hours right so it's a really

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good opportunity when you're at an airport to get in more steps um

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as far as how i implement them with clients so everyone again it's schedule wise what they can

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do um i'm always encouraging them to like when

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you're at the grocery store you're like you're going shopping or something like that park far away right park far away from the door you

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can easily gain a pretty significant amount just from that you know going back and forth with that

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i'm always doing that literally parking at like the end of the

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the parking lot um to get in more steps um people

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clients who are working from a computer like people are really stuck to their

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computers and like i understand so if we can just a few times over the course of the day

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whether it's five to ten minutes just get up like set some reminders get up

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and just walk around the house or walk around the office or wherever you're at

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and increase a little bit from there it's better than nothing right it's better than just sitting down

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for six hours straight um that also is gonna help with productivity and that's

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you know that's been shown um and proven essentially so outside of

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that what i do suggest too is like on their lunch you're kind of you're kind of what is it

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two birds one stone here where you're taking like an hour lunch if you

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have it if you have 45 minutes whatever it is take the first half to eat and then take

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the second half and go for a walk outside that way again it's gonna help with productivity then you're also going

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it's gonna help with digestion too it's a post meal walk um so that's an easy

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way to get a little bit more in um you could if you have the ability you

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know go for a walk in the morning again you're getting that morning sun that is going to help us sleep at night

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but i mean it could be like half an hour like me i have the ability

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i haven't been doing it recently because i have my i have my treadmill under my desk

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so while i work i'll just be like taking really slow steps but when i did have

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this i would get out in the morning and do you know a 10 to like half an hour

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walk it's a pretty good chunk um and i would like set a goal for myself

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and i do this with clients like set a goal for yourself like x amount prior to noon

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right that way you're getting some out of the way um you don't have like a bunch to do at the end of the day

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um like johann said you know taking the stairs um anywhere you can

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another little hack i implement i also implement with my clients is pre and post workout so getting in a thousand

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steps pre-workout thousand steps post-workout whether that's on a tread or outside

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whatever so like i'll do it on my assault runner um again you're

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prepping for your workout and then again it's helping you recover from your workout too right you're getting kind of

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a cool down in that way and then taking calls

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on walks that's a big one those rack up really quick um if you have the ability to like

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obviously if you're on zoom might be a little bit harder um but if you can be on zoom and you're

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in a meeting you can shut that camera off you go on a walk

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might as well um but the calls that will those rack up really quickly because like i could be

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on like an hour call right just think about how much how many steps i'm getting in right so

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um even just five to ten minute calls yeah so those are some is there anywhere

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else i mean you mentioned before and after your workouts like i've been doing it

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during my workouts yeah yeah i was like i was like too on my phone too much you

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know so like a minute rest or two minutes turn into like five i was like [ __ ] this let me

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figure out something else and then i forgot what podcast it was i remember someone mentioning hey

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they they looked at i think it might have even been a study don't quote me on this but i think it might have been a study

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um where they actually have people walk in between sets right and it adds up and that's what i've been

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doing too like i do that yeah i've been doing that for a while it's not a crazy amount but like it helps you know it keeps you from sitting on your phone

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because you know how it goes you start scrolling and it's like half an hour later it's not good

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oh i was thinking about the mentorship we did with the deal walking around on zoom like maybe

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is that why you were laughing i'm like why is he laughing i was just like visualizing that for a

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second yeah make sure you shut your phone off because people

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i think there's i think there's like this tick tock dude who has like a crazy setup he has like

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the the laptop like a thing on his body with a guy i've seen that

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and he goes like rugby fields and stuff i think oh that's funny it's like a ticked dude

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he's taking a step seriously yeah but like there's a lot of easy ways to get your

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steps up right i think we we tend to sometimes over complicate things once again and it's almost like hitting your

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protein right i really like that step count goal for like before noon

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which i've been trying to do as well like i try to hit 5k just to be like halfway done yeah

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yeah because a couple weeks ago i might be idiots for doing this but like i was walking up and down the apartment

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just to like finish my 10k stuff yeah yeah people do i used to do that too like during the

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during the pandemic yeah i was going up in like i lived in my loft and i didn't have this

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at the time or the travel i was just going up and down the hall

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and sometimes you got to do it you know yeah you gotta there's a uh a coach on instagram as

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well and uh or not not just on instagram but i follow him on instagram darren cartel

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from the uk do you know him no yeah oh wait wait is that john smith

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yes and um yeah i started following him when he was on his way to australia this is like

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2020 and he wasn't quarantined for two weeks in a hotel room which he was not allowed

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to leave like food was delivered to his room i've seen that yeah he had a friend like deliver like a soul bike to the

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hotel room which was sick but like he would actually get 10k steps like in a tiny hotel room

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every single day for like two weeks i was like [ __ ] yeah this is really that's commitment and dedication love it yeah

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100 and maybe that's an extreme example but it is possible right

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and it's one of the easiest things we can do for our health to fit this in general yeah and you have to try not to look at

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it as like all or nothing because people tend to do this where it's like if they can't get a half an hour walk-in

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they don't go it's like they'll just go for five you know yeah so it's better than nothing

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yeah better than nothing and you get used to two so if you're like at say 3 000 then you got to bring it up to four

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it might sound like a huge change it's not that bad right in the beginning maybe sure i agree

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but then the 4 000 becomes normal and you're like hey you know what let me let me try to hit 4 500 and 5 000

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and in no time it adds up and you're like feeling better better energy mentally

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you know uh fat loss becomes easier just so many benefits as you mentioned

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i'm always looking i was laughing about this with my one of my mentees we're like we're always thinking about steps

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how can we get more steps and i was like gotta take the garbage out steps gotta go to the mailbox steps and we were done

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she's like more on the lawn steps for sure i purposely went up and down to take out

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the trash or like twice yeah when we were when we were renovating the house uh

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he's like you're on dumpster duty i was like yes tons of steps

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and what i really like um even without tracking like macros like i'm big on macro still

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you know and yeah i do like food wise i believe that that's the best way to do it but yes

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yeah but what i also do is tracking habits with our habit tracker and with a lot of people we just set

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that goal same steps or it's like daily steps and your macros

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even if it's those two things like that's huge already if you can hit your microphone every day you can hit your

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steps every day you're actually killing it you know it's a little tip as well if you want to

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do that you know it's difficult to get your steps up like try to track it with the habit tracker you know right right exactly

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actually i have a client i have a few clients where getting out on walks

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is one of the their main stress management tools

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and if they are really stressed right or they're they're struggling

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i literally will ask have you been going on your your walks have you been going on your daily walks and

32:45

they'll be like well i've been lacking a little bit so we increase it and again the stress then starts to to

32:51

reduce or the the stress how it's affecting them you know affects them less

32:58

it's it's such a powerful tool when it comes to stress management

33:04

that's the best yeah we talked about all the benefits we talked about how to get your steps up

33:11

how great it is for fat loss for health etc so uh

33:16

a little takeaway for today a lot more go outside

33:22

go inside go get your steps in and we will talk to you next week thanks guys