Ep. #818: Q&A: Stronger but Not Bigger, Improving Recovery, Vaxx Mandates, and More

Howdy, and welcome to another episode of Muscle For Life. I’m Mike Matthews. Thank you for joining me today for an inaugural episode because it is the first time that I have recorded an episode like this one. So what is this episode going to be exactly? It is a q and a episode, but it’s a bit different than the q and a episodes I’ve posted in the past.

In the past, I’ve taken one question from Instagram or email usually and then answer it in an episode, and some people would say, Belabor it, because the answers can get longwinded and I just can’t help it. I just love the sound of my own voice, so anyway, I started doing these weekly q and as.

In Instagram stories, where you use the questions sticker and then pick questions and answer them in your stories. And it occurred to me that I could repurpose that content as the marketers say. It occurred to me that a. Many of you fantastic listeners of the podcast, might enjoy hearing these questions and my answers because instead of talking about one thing for 15, 20, 25 plus minutes, I am gonna talk about many things and some of the questions as you’ll hear are just for fun, just for the lulls as the kids say.

So if you want to ask me questions in my little Instagram q and a Delios, Follow me on Instagram at most for Life Fitness, and I put up the Ask Me Anything sticker post thing about once a week, and then I go through a bunch of them in one session and then usually have enough for another session of answers that get posted into my stories.

And if I answer one of your questions, then it might make it into. The podcast and also if you like this idea for an episode, if you like this format, if you like the episode, let me know. Let me know if you think I should keep doing this or not. Send me an email [email protected] or dm me on Instagram.

Also, if you like what I’m doing here on the podcast and elsewhere, definitely check out my health and fitness books, including the number one best selling weightlifting books for men and women in the world, Bigger, leaner, stronger, and thinner. Leaner, stronger, as well as the leading flexible dieting cookbook, the Shredded Chef.

Now these books have sold well over 1 million copies and have helped thousands of people build their best body ever, and you can find them on all major online retailers like Audible, Amazon, iTunes, Cobo, and Google Play, as well as in select Barnes and Noble stores. And I should also mention that you can get any of the audio books 100%.

When you sign up for an Audible account, and this is a great way to make those pockets of downtime, like commuting, meal prepping, and cleaning more interesting, entertaining, and productive. And so if you want to take Audible up on this offer, and if you want to get one of my audiobooks for free, just go to www.by Legion, that’s b y legion.com/audible and sign up for your account.

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Okay. Let’s start with the first question here, and I don’t have who asked me this question because it’s not included in Instagram’s little functionality for replying to questions or selecting questions and then replying to them. But going forward, I will make a note of the. Usernames and I will share those on the podcast too.

That’s fun, right? All right, so the first question is Republican or libertarian. Now, if you follow me on Instagram, you probably know that I’m not a woke liberal. I don’t identify as a woke liberal because I make fun of a lot of woke liberalism and many people. Assume that because I make fun of that stuff, I must be a Republican or maybe a libertarian, and I have never considered myself a Republican for as long as I’ve paid attention to American politics.

I have said that. I 

think 

it works like a two-lane street where both lanes are going in the same direction. You pick your side and you end up in the same place because the elites that run both of the major parties are marching to the beat of the same drum. So not a Republican and not a libertarian either.

When I was younger, I thought the libertarian utopias sounded great, and maybe I would’ve identified a libertarian. . But now as I have gotten older, and I would like to think wiser, maybe more cynical, I view libertarianism fundamentally as utopian politics. I would rather have that utopia than the communist dystopia, but it’s not a platform I can believe in or get behind.

And conservatism in general, as it is generally practiced in American politics is a joke to me. Conservatives have conserved nothing. They have not conserved science. They haven’t conserved law and order. They haven’t conserved educational standards, freedom of speech, job opportunities, American sovereignty, American identity, American security, the nuclear family, freedom to smirk, freedom to defend yourself.

School prayer. And with that, I ran out of room to type more things out on the Instagram story, but I think I made my point. Your average conservative today is just your average liberal 10 years ago, and your average conservative 10 years from now will just be your average woke liberal today. And I’m just gonna stop.

No tangent. Next question. Why am I getting stronger but I don’t look bigger? Good question. Something that many newbies have asked me about, and the answer is, strength always precedes size. It always comes before size, especially when you’re new to lifting. So for the first several months, you are going to gain a lot of strength, but very little size, and that can be confusing if you are new and you are not expecting.

Okay. The next question is, do you take all of the vitamins every day? So referring to legion’s, vitamins eight, triumph capsules, four, tri and soft gels, six immune capsules, et cetera. And yes, I take everything Legion. Makes every day except the fat loss products because I’m not cutting and the sleep product lunar because I don’t like the taste.

And we’re working on that. I’m just gonna make it a simple fruit punch flavor. I’m gonna get rid of this weird tasting attempt at a night tea. Okay, next up. Why do you do so much cardio? Is it necessary? Is it helpful, or do I just like it? And just for some context, I do 30 minutes of cardio, six to seven days per week, sometimes five days per week.

If I’m otherwise very active on the weekends, and it’s moderate intensity, maybe four out of 10, I just usually save it for phone calls that I have to do. Usually work related phone calls. So I. Pedaling so hard. I’m doing it on an upright bike. If I didn’t mention that. I’m not pedaling so hard that I can’t have a conversation, but I am a little bit winded and so I just let whoever I’m talking to know I’m on a bike and I’m gonna be breathing heavily.

And so I don’t do that because it’s necessary, but it is. Helpful and even as a weightlifter. And if you wanna learn more about that, head over to legion athletics.com and search for should you do cardio and look for an article called, or the title is, Should You Do Cardio If you Lift weights? Science says Yes.

Good information as to why we should all be doing some cardio even if we. Lifting weights and lifting, doing a lot of weight lifting. And then also in that article, it helps you put together a very simple regimen for your cardio, which you can really just treat as exercise as moving the body sweating.

You don’t have to treat it with the same level of rigor as you do your lifting. It doesn’t have to be training. It doesn’t have to be systematic progression toward goals unless you want it to be. All right. Next question. How to improve recovery. I wish I could say, Oh, just take legion’s, recharge, supplement.

That’s all you need. I wish I had some weird trick. One weird trick for recovery, but unfortunately it’s the fundamentals. If you want to improve your recovery from where it’s at right now, you want. To eat maintenance calories or more. You want to eat plenty of protein. You want to get plenty of sleep.

Very important. You want to take a couple of days off of weightlifting every week, at least one day off of vigorous physical activity. You can still do lower intensity stuff, but give your body generally a break at least once per week. You want to be deloading every. Four to eight to maybe 10 weeks depending on your circumstances and what you’re doing and moving on, yay or nay to VAX mandates.

I’ll say this. The data clearly show that they are highly effective at boosting pharma revenues. For example, Forbes reported that Pfizer expects 33.5 billion. With a bee in vaccine revenue in 2021. And just to put that number in perspective, in 2020, Pfizer did about 42 billion in revenue . So you’re looking at almost doubling the size of a company of that size of a fortune, I’m guessing 100, certainly 500 business in one.

Okay, moving on. Were you lucky enough to catch covid this pandemic? Yes. Apps, a fog in loot. I’ve had it twice. It was mild congestion both times. The first time was mild congestion for about four days, maybe five days, and maybe one out of 10. In terms of a head cold, like I felt a little bit off. I didn’t feel sick, just a little bit off, and I was generally congested for about four or five days.

And then, Two was mild congestion for three or four nights. I only noticed it at night in the day. No congestion and no feeling of sickness whatsoever. Maybe I felt a little off the first day, and by day two I didn’t feel anything. By day three, I was doing cardio. I took car. I took a break from the gym, obviously, because I don’t wanna go give it to people.

And then I wasn’t doing cardio the first couple of days cause I was like, eh, alright. I have covid again, rest. I’ll take a couple days off of cardio. I tend to do that every few weeks anyway. So by day three, I was doing cardio again, didn’t notice anything. I just did my normal thing and by the end of the week it was gone, and that was it.

Horrifying. I can’t believe I’m alive. All right. Next question, exercises that you might as well eliminate from your routine. So we can turn that into a question, which exercises or what exercises might you eliminate? So here are a few that I used to do randomly that I no longer do at all. So side bends, especially weighted side bends.

No thank you. Hyper extensions, which can have. A use, of course, if you are rehabbing or if you are a, maybe a power lifter and you are really trying to build up your lower back strength. But for most of us, we don’t need to be doing hyper extensions. Anything on a bosu ball, bosu, anything, just don’t do it.

Ab machines hate them. Triceps back, it’s just a shitty exercise cause you can’t load it. Anything under 10 reps gets very awkward. A Yates Row, just not a fan of the much reduced range of motion. I know some people say they feel it more in their lats and they program, or they include it in their programming specifically for more lat training.

Okay, fine. But I would not replace a Yates row, or, sorry, I would not replace a barbell row with a. Yates row and then a partial squat. So a half squat, a quarter squat. Just don’t do it. Next question. Why do I lift my head up when I am benching, which you will see if you follow me on Instagram at most for life fitness.

The reason I do that is I just tend to naturally do it when I’m. Pressing the bar upward. But it also prevents me from pressing the back of my head into the bench, which if I don’t lift my chin up a little bit, I will tend to do the opposite and jam my head into the bench. And that’s bad. You can hurt yourself that way, so don’t do that.

Next question. What books am I currently. . So these days I only read one book at a time. I used to read two at a time and just split my reading sessions, my morning and nightly reading sessions between those books. But then I found that I actually prefer to just get through one book faster than two books slower.

So now I just read one book at a time and currently I am reading a book called Wired to Create and I am liking it. I really liked the first 80 pages or so, and. Now the next 40 to 50 pages are a bit less interesting, fewer highlights, but overall I do like the book. I do recommend it if you are a creative person or if you are interested in creative work and figuring out how you can do better creative work.

It’s good information. . Next question, Lunges or step ups for a leg workout, I prefer lunges. Step ups are a great exercise, but I think lunges rank a little bit higher in terms of efficacy. Okie doki. Next question. How can I make all of this fun? Make sure to start with diet and training plans that fit your goals, that fit your preferences, that fit your lifestyle.

Don’t try to stick square pegs into. Holes, which is also gonna be the opening of my sexual tell. All next question. Do you suggest a pre-workout and fat burner holiday ever? So do I suggest that you stop taking pre-workout and fat burners while if you are taking Legion pre-workout and fat burners?

No, Of course you take them. Seven days a week forever, no days off. No joking. So fat burners. Yeah. I don’t take fat burners unless I’m cutting. So that’s what I’d recommend to all of you. And you don’t have to cycle on and off of pre-workout unless you want to reset your sensitivity to caffeine.

And there’s not a great reason to do that unless you are going to use caffeine very strategically for your training, meaning you are just gonna. Large amounts once or twice max, three days per week before your biggest and hardest workouts. And then you are going to take, you’re gonna have none on the other days, which most of you probably don’t want to do.

But if you do want to learn about that, head over to legion athletics.com and search for why caffeine stops working, and you’ll find an article that explains why we quickly become desensitized to it and how you can resensitize yourself to it and why you might want to do. Okay. Next question. Now that you are in shape, do a lot of women flirt with you?

No, no women flirt with me ever. Now I don’t go looking for it. I’m not flirting with women. So maybe that’s why. And I don’t interact with many women other than my wife really, and a few other people who are just a part of my. Normal weekly routine, so to speak. So for example I see a massage therapist once a week and she’s a woman and she doesn’t flirt with me and I don’t flirt with her, but I don’t interact with many women otherwise.

But I thought this would be a funny question to answer because generally, and this is more for the single guys out there, women, they do not care nearly as much about our big muscles as we do. We do this mostly. And other dudes in the gym. Those are the guys who are gonna give us the looks. Not your average woman.

And there’s research on this where women have ranked what is most important to them or what they find most attractive in a potential male partner. And I would have to pull up the paper. I didn’t do my prep for this. But physical looks, especially. Physique. It was in the top 10, but it was relatively low.

It was, I wanna say maybe six or seven. Somewhere around there. Much higher up were what you would expect, financial considerations, ability to provide especially for a family social status that was up there. And I don’t remember the other factors. Certainly some personality related stuff like sense of humor and charisma.

But muscles, Muscles specifically, that wasn’t even in the survey that was a part of this research, but I’ll bet you with most women, muscles specifically don’t even make the top 10. Next question. How many days a week do you train? I lift weights five days a week right now, Monday through Friday, about one hour, and then I do six to seven cardio sessions per week on my upright bike for about 30 minutes.

Moderate intensity. I can still have a conversation. On the phone and I play some golf Sunday afternoons, which counts. I burn a few calories. I go out on the range and bang some balls for a bit, and that burns a fair number of calories. Actually, if you get out there doing a bunch of driver swings for 30 minutes straight, you’re burning some energy.

But on the course, In a cart, not so much. All right, that’s it for this first installment, this foray into the Rapid Fire Instagram q and a format. And if you are still listening, let me know what you thought. Shoot me a DM at most for Life Fitness on Instagram. Send mean email [email protected].

Should I keep doing these? If you want to send me your questions, you can of course follow me on Instagram at Muscle Life Fitness and just watch my stories. That’s one way to get questions to me. You can DM me your questions on Instagram as well, but the best way, if you want a rapid. Ish answer is email me mike muscle for life.com, and you will hear back one way or another.

But I am able to stay on top of email the best. I hope you liked this episode. I hope you found it helpful, and if you did subscribe to the show because it makes sure that you don’t miss new episodes, and it also helps. Because it increases the rankings of the show a little bit, which of course then makes it a little bit more easily found by other people who may like it just as much as you.

And if you didn’t like something about this episode or about the show in general, or if you have ideas or suggestions or just feedback to share, shoot me an email. At Muscle for life.com, muscle f o r life.com and let me know what I could do better or just what your thoughts are about maybe what you’d like to see me do in the future.

I read everything myself. I’m always looking for new ideas and constructive feedback. So thanks again for listening to this episode, and I hope to hear from you soon.