Pete Wright:
If you spend ten minutes on the wellness internet, you’ll learn that women’s health is governed by a single vengeful hormone called cortisol, and that you should eat according to the phases of your own body like it’s a tiny moon, and that carbs are a personal betrayal. You’ll also learn that most fitness research was done on men. And all those things are kind of true. But somewhere between “the science ignored you” and “so here’s a protocol synced to your cycle,” the actual science may have slipped out the back. Today we try to find a little sanity. Welcome to Build for Health, the show that redefines strength, because muscle isn’t just for looks. I’m Pete Wright, here with trainer Srdjan Injac. Hello, Srdjan.
Srdjan Injac:
Hello.
Pete Wright:
Oh, it’s a very exciting day. It’s a red letter day.
Srdjan Injac:
Oh yeah.
Pete Wright:
Yeah, we’re very excited. We actually have two, not one, two guests. First, returning champ, Brooke Passey. Welcome back, Brooke.
Brooke Passey:
Hello, glad to be here.
Pete Wright:
And Kaila Gallion is here, first time joining us.
Kaila Gallion:
Yes, first time.
Pete Wright:
We’re very excited to have you both here, and we are going to talk about women’s health and strength and training and all of the things that are just plum different for men and women in the gym. So excited that you two are here to lead the charge.
Brooke Passey:
We are excited to be here.
Pete Wright:
I — it’s, I can hear it.
Kaila Gallion:
We are.
Pete Wright:
I hear the enthusiasm just bubbling over. Here we go. Let’s start with —
Kaila Gallion:
What’s starting today?
Pete Wright:
I think the durable answer for everyone across bodies is build and protect muscle and bone. We can all agree that everyone needs muscle and bone. What changes when programming for a woman versus a man in the gym? Somebody comes into you — what changes, and what stays the same? Can we start with that little bit of foundation setting? Brooke, OG, why don’t you start?
Brooke Passey:
Yeah, absolutely. So honestly, there isn’t a whole lot that changes if you were to look side by side between a program that I’ve built for a female client and a male client. It’s the same exercises. There’s no fancy “you should be doing these yoga things and doing more Pilates and this and that.” Actually, we need to do the same stuff as men. What’s different is usually the intensity and how much weight you’re lifting, depending on where you’re at in your cycle and how you feel energy-wise day by day. It’s going to be different. So that’s kind of my simple take on it. What do you think, Kaila?
Kaila Gallion:
I would say it’s also different with the levels of estrogen and your different cycles of your periods too. But a lot of times, most women I train, they kind of have a fear of, “Is it going to make me bulky? Is this too much weight?” And it’s a lot more about maintaining the weight and eating right. It’s not much more of getting bulky or looking a certain way compared to if a guy does it.
Pete Wright:
Yeah, we’ve talked about that before on the show. The idea of busting that particular myth — what it takes to really be bulky is not something that is a major risk factor across body types.
Kaila Gallion:
Yeah, because there’s not much difference between the men I train versus the women. Everyone is pretty similar, just different high intensity and impact on weight.
Pete Wright:
You guys sent a list of high-level topics that you wanted us to talk about, and the first one — with arrows pointing to it and bold print and everything, the orbit, the gravitational pull is strong with this one — is GLP-1. It’s okay.
Kaila Gallion:
It’s a huge one.
Brooke Passey:
Yes, it’s a big one, yeah.
Pete Wright:
All right, it’s a big one. And it is super trending everywhere.
Kaila Gallion:
It’s trending right now.
Pete Wright:
And we just talked about it last week. Srdjan has — you guys might be surprised to hear this — opinions. Let’s start with the headline, right?
Brooke Passey:
Oh.
Kaila Gallion:
He’s got many.
Pete Wright:
Our miracle weight loss drug. What’s the part that’s not on the box that you guys are running into in the gym?
Brooke Passey:
Well, okay, so this is what I ran into recently. I actually just started working with a client who has been on GLP-1 for nine months, and she had to get off of it because it was making her very ill. She was saying how she just was having all of these issues that she never had before taking it. She couldn’t eat. She was throwing up all the time. And she’s going through perimenopause, so her cycle is going to be completely different and look different than a 20-year-old like me. Something that we have been really focusing on together is rebuilding what was lost, because she lost a lot of muscle mass on this GLP-1. It’s something that she kept track of. She did the InBody scan. Her doctor actually did not recommend it, but she decided to do it because it was trending, and regrets it. Now we are rebuilding that strength back up, muscle back on her body, so she can start feeling a little better.
Pete Wright:
So this is where Srdjan is like — you can see him in the video — he’s literally biting his tongue.
Kaila Gallion:
I actually had a similar situation too, but the client’s body fat went way up.
Pete Wright:
Wait, wait, what?
Kaila Gallion:
Yeah, and she wasn’t really continuing with her workouts.
Pete Wright:
That’s literally not on the box. So she took the weight loss drug and then proceeded to clearly take in more calories somehow, and stopped working out.
Kaila Gallion:
Somehow her body fat went up and she stopped working out, and she’s been kind of on and off with the drug. I know getting off it, you can gain a lot of weight if you don’t have a consistent routine with your workouts.
Pete Wright:
Right, right. Well, that’s really consistent.
Brooke Passey:
Absolutely.
Pete Wright:
The gaining weight part while on the drug, I think, is counter to broad experience. But what we do see is that roughly a quarter of the weight lost is lost to muscle, but bone density drops too. And especially when you’re talking about women in the gym trying to maintain during a cycle of GLP-1, that can be not only unhealthy but dangerous.
Kaila Gallion:
Mm-hmm, especially with your cycle.
Brooke Passey:
Yes. Well, when you talk about GLP-1, what it does is it makes it so you’re not hungry. It messes with your hunger signals in your brain. And if you look into what happens over time when women fast over a prolonged period of time, it directly correlates with reproductive hormones and issues with lower estrogen, lower progesterone, delayed ovulation, irregular periods, and the loss of periods altogether. A lot of women, just from the fasting, will have worse PMS, worse luteal symptoms, more anxiety, sleep disruption, and fertility challenges. And that’s just with that.
So when you think about what happens when you’re not lifting weights and you’re not eating regularly like you’re supposed to, and the GLP-1 messes with that in itself, the bone density becomes a big concern, because estrogen is protective of bone. When your estrogen drops, bone breakdown increases and bone building decreases. Over time, osteopenia can develop, which eventually leads to osteoporosis. In my opinion, the next 10 to 20 years, we’re going to start seeing women coming in with all these different issues with bone density and joints.
Pete Wright:
You think this is the non-trivial outcome of this wave of people on these GLP-1 drugs —
Brooke Passey:
Yeah.
Pete Wright:
— that we’re going to have a generational cost. A generational bill comes due, which is loss of calcium and bone density that we won’t see.
Kaila Gallion:
Yeah. And I feel like they just want to do it right away, just to not do it the right way, so they can get faster results. But it’s not always right.
Pete Wright:
Well, this was what we were talking about last week, right, Srdjan? The idea that once you lose a little weight — let’s say you absolutely need the drug. And the drugs, for what they’re able to do, are magical, right? The magic of modern pharmaceuticals, that they’re able to do this stuff. But they’re also behaviorally a little bit addictive. And where we kind of landed was that clients come in and they say, “Okay, I’ve lost a hundred pounds and I only have 60 more to go and I’m in my weight zone, but I don’t want to get off it. I don’t want to get off it because this has made it easy.” And that changes the behavior in the gym too. Have you guys run into this?
Kaila Gallion:
Just a lot of the muscle mass too — that’s a huge part, because that’s burning your fat. So I just feel like you’re not maintaining the right, healthy diet and physique-wise too.
Brooke Passey:
Yeah. I think it’s a mindset thing too. When you have somebody who has learned to rely on a pill for their results, there’s a lot of instant gratification that happens with that, and that’s not really how health and fitness works on the long term, right? So delayed gratification is something that our generation really struggles with. We have the reels, everything is instant. Somebody who’s not seeing results fast enough, they want to get something that’s going to get them results really fast, and they don’t really care what it takes to get to that point. But it’s dangerous.
So when you have somebody who comes in and they’ve been on GLP-1 multiple times because they saw that it worked, and they’re not paying attention to or even learning about what that could be doing to them in the long run, it can be kind of a challenge to work with somebody who hasn’t learned how to eat properly and do these things, knowing that they can do it on their own, versus thinking they need that assistance from a medication or injection.
Kaila Gallion:
And it becomes kind of like an obsession too.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Srdjan Injac:
Well, we talked about last time how people are just focused on that number on the scale, because that’s all they do. They just stay on the scale, they look at that number, and they just want to lose weight. They’re not realizing what they’re losing, what that weight is. They’re automatically thinking it’s all fat. “I’m losing weight, this is a good thing.” And that’s what they get addicted to — getting those fast results, not realizing they’re losing the muscles. And then they’re making things actually worse. They’re actually getting more unhealthy than they were before that. So it’s creating all the problems. But the addiction is they’re so fixated on that number on the scale, which — I’m like, you’ve got to stay away from that.
That’s why we have the InBody measurements here, and we take the measurements to look at your body fat and your muscle mass at the same time. So we see the weight that you’re losing and what needs to be gained, because they’re focused on the wrong thing. They’re always thinking about what they need to lose instead of what they need to gain, right? So that’s why they’re so addicted to that drug. If you use it for a medical reason, it’s great. It’s a good drug. I’m fine with that. But if they’re using it for the wrong purpose altogether —
Brooke Passey:
Right.
Kaila Gallion:
Agreed.
Srdjan Injac:
So if there’s somebody like 300-pound obese, of course you give them a little bit of it, but you have to cut them off. You want to decrease their appetite because they’re eating probably three, four, five thousand calories. But then during that process you’ve got to teach them and educate them on nutrition — how to eat, what to eat, right? So that way, when they get off, they can continue that journey of losing weight, but the right weight, and not be so addicted to the drug. This drug is not a solution.
Kaila Gallion:
It’s like a mental thing too.
Pete Wright:
This drug might take weight from your femur, I think, would have a different warning signal. I want to transition, because I think this is a good place to do it.
Kaila Gallion:
I love that right now.
Pete Wright:
Transition to this whole concept around fasting and keto. And I’m putting those intentionally in the same bucket because they both produce a fast scale drop, right?
Kaila Gallion:
Yeah.
Pete Wright:
Which is kind of the segue here. But the same question applies: what are you actually losing by focusing on that number, doing it through this fasting and keto strategy? So what are you seeing when people come into you to talk to you in the gym?
Kaila Gallion:
Well, I actually have an example with myself. Before I really got into fitness, I heard about a lot of keto diets — that’s the way to do it. So I did it myself, and I actually risked a lot of muscle mass loss, like 30 pounds, and my period too — I lost that for almost a year. I was just so about the scale. That’s why I always tell my clients the scale isn’t always going to reflect how much weight you lose, because you’re also losing muscle mass too.
Pete Wright:
Thirty pounds ain’t nothing. Holy cow.
Kaila Gallion:
It was a rough time. I had to wake up and just realize that’s not how you do it. And then it actually really got me more into personal training.
Pete Wright:
Okay, weird silver lining flex, but yeah, I’d be like, welcome aboard. But holy cow.
Kaila Gallion:
Yeah, for a little change there.
Pete Wright:
So maybe we should peel apart fasting versus keto, because they are different specific strategies, right? Are you seeing fasting as a strategy that works in parallel with the gym? And how does keto play into that? Can we define some terms? Who wants the baton?
Brooke Passey:
I will hold the baton a little bit. So keto is when you cut out carbs from your diet for the most part. The keto diet is very much like, “I want to cut out things that are bready items.” You want to eat lots of veggies, fruits, whole foods. From my standpoint, it’s good to do those things, but not cut out the carbs, because your body thrives on carbs. It needs carbs for energy. So that’s with keto.
And then with fasting, I think that people kind of intermix the two, because when you’re on keto, it feels like you’re fasting. It feels like you’re starving, because you are. But with fasting, it’s choosing to go without eating entirely for a period of time. Intermittent fasting is very common for people to do. It works for people. I wouldn’t recommend it to any female in the gym or trying to lose weight or any of that. I would think if you’re trying to build mental toughness, intermittent fasting can work, as a woman. But there’s so much that can go into that. Just kind of a simple baseline with that.
Pete Wright:
From my own experience with women in my life, what I know about those who take the keto track — and maybe, Kaila, this is kind of where your life relates to this — is that it can have a very dramatic impact on thyroid in women.
Kaila Gallion:
Yeah. Mm-hmm. And even how you feel with your energy levels.
Brooke Passey:
Yes. Yes, it can.
Pete Wright:
Sure. And more so in women, and in lean active women too. So the more fit you get, the worse the impact — the greater the negative impact fasting and keto diets can have on you. Which is —
Brooke Passey:
Yes.
Kaila Gallion:
Yeah.
Pete Wright:
— the grand, cruel, ironic joke of these strategies to lose weight. You are almost guaranteed to be less fit and have less energy. Is that a fair assessment?
Brooke Passey:
Yes, yes, it is.
Kaila Gallion:
Oh, totally.
Brooke Passey:
When you decide to go without proper nutrients in your diet — when your calories are too low for too long — muscle protein synthesis decreases, your recovery worsens, your strength gains are really slow. Eventually muscle loss can occur, and workouts are harder, you have more soreness, and everything is plateaued at that point.
Pete Wright:
Srdjan, are you fasting right now? Is that why you’re so quiet?
Srdjan Injac:
No, I’m not, actually. I’m eating a lot of carbs. But if I’m giving the macros to somebody who wants to cut the carbs, that’s fine. So low carb is a reduction. Keto is a complete metabolic shift.
Brooke Passey:
Correct.
Kaila Gallion:
It is no carb at all.
Srdjan Injac:
Okay, so I don’t think any woman should be eating less than 150 grams per day.
Brooke Passey:
Yes, takeaway, yeah.
Srdjan Injac:
So going down lower, more extreme, like keto diets — it can affect the reproductive hormones. The carbs do play a role in supporting hormones like estrogen, for example. And when intake is too low for too long, some women may experience irregular cycles or even miss periods. So that’s pretty much your body essentially saying, “Hey, we don’t have enough energy coming in to support normal function.” So it’s not that keto is inherently bad, but it can be too aggressive for many women, especially if the goal is that long-term health, performance, and balance. So the key is finding a balance, not going to the extreme.
Brooke Passey:
Exactly.
Srdjan Injac:
Right? So —
Kaila Gallion:
Because your body goes in fight-or-flight mode too.
Pete Wright:
You’re starving it of the stuff it really, really needs.
Kaila Gallion:
Mm-hmm. Starvation mode.
Srdjan Injac:
By dropping the calories too low, it can impact the thyroid function, by lowering the active thyroid hormone, which can lead to feeling tired, cold, just sluggish. It can also increase the cortisol, your stress hormone. So that combination of low carbs, high stress, and activity can start to work against you instead of for you. So you’ve got to make sure that you’re at the right carb intake.
Brooke Passey:
Balance really matters when you’re a woman.
Srdjan Injac:
Yes.
Kaila Gallion:
Yeah. Especially in fitness. I feel like, with me personally, I need just like two days where I’m not on track. I just need a —
Pete Wright:
I know it seems like Kaila just dropped off in mid-sentence, but that was when the internet decided to put a hex on her and she left the show quite suddenly. Now, in fact, she did come back, but her recording never recovered. So from now on, Kaila’s gone — but she’s gone with love, and she said some really nice things, and unfortunately we’re going to have to have her come back to say them again at some point. We miss Kaila very much. But for the rest of the show, we’re not actually ignoring Kaila — she’s wonderful, and her audio just did not come through for the rest of the show. I’m sorry. And now back to the rest of us.
Well, speaking of hormones, let’s get to the whole discussion of fitness and getting to the gym and thinking about just your cycle. How do you strategize around that? And I’ll tell you, you guys, I don’t know if you know this, but there’s a lot of propaganda around this topic on fitness social media. I don’t really truck in those circles, but oh my God. I talked to my wife about it, and it’s crazy. It’s crazy.
Brooke Passey:
Mm-hmm.
Pete Wright:
So what’s real, what is nonsense? What I’m hearing is that there is a whole lot of research that hasn’t been done around this, but they sure went straight to “here’s a forty-dollar cycle calendar that will tell you when to lift heavy things and when not to,” and that it largely is debunked. I don’t know. What is your experience? What are you dealing with?
Brooke Passey:
Well, the problem with these things that women, or even men, are claiming is that most women are very different from each other. My cycle is going to be completely different from Kaila’s, and how we feel. There are things that are very similar, where I can provide my professional advice to another female who is trying to lose weight and work out regularly, but her cycle and her needs are going to be completely different than mine. So a lot of it is mapping and personalization, which is why I love what I do, because I can’t do these things unless I get to know somebody. So selling a forty-dollar mapped-out workout plan for your client that you haven’t —
Pete Wright:
Yeah, it just says, “Hey, do yoga on day 22.”
Brooke Passey:
Yeah, it’s not going to do them any good unless you know how they are through their cycle, right?
Pete Wright:
Like, what does that even mean?
Brooke Passey:
It can get kind of crazy and woo-woo. But as long as you stick to — well, one, if they’re having the regular four phases, if they’re in perimenopause or not. And a lot of women are on birth control and don’t have a regular period, so they don’t even know where they’re at half the time, and that can be a battle in itself.
So I will map out, okay, your menstrual phase — you’re going to feel, this is when your hormones are at an all-time low, and you’re going to want to rot on your couch. So move, eat whatever you want, and movement is going to be your best friend. Feel your body, try not to give in to the cravings too much, but don’t go too crazy.
And then your follicular phase, which is the next phase, you start to feel better. Your estrogen rises most of the time, if you have a healthy cycle, and your body prepares for ovulation. That’s usually when you can start hitting PRs in the gym — between follicular and ovulation, you’re your strongest. That’s the best phase. So my female clients, when they’re in this phase, they’re usually like, “Wow, I feel really strong today, I feel really good.” So we’ll take advantage of that, let them lift heavy.
And then luteal is kind of your worst nightmare. It’s the PMS phase. It’s the scary phase for most women. You feel psychotic. You’re more tired, you’re more emotional, you have higher progesterone. That’s where the more tired comes in. The cravings are there. It’s when you feel the most weak, and it’s when showing up is the hardest — in your luteal phase. And that’s actually when you need the most support in your diet, is in your luteal phase.
So these things kind of go back to your question: you can’t just give it to somebody you haven’t really had a full conversation with and experienced that with them. I can’t give this to somebody in the beginning of working with them. It’s kind of like a month in, at least. Does that make sense? Every woman is different. So it’s all about balance.
Pete Wright:
It’s all about balance. Now, you’ll note Srdjan and I are predictably quiet when addressing most of these issues.
Brooke Passey:
Back to that. He’s like, so silent.
Pete Wright:
Yeah, we’re just going to be real quiet, let you guys do it.
Brooke Passey:
Crickets.
Pete Wright:
But part of it is — you say there is one of the phases where you’re like, “Okay, let’s take advantage of it and lift heavy.” I don’t think I heard you say at any point, “Stop coming to the gym any other time,” right?
Brooke Passey:
Yeah. Correct.
Pete Wright:
So what’s your strategy for people who know they want to stay active and fit? How does the actual gym routine change your expectations of them as a trainer, beyond “okay, we’re only going to lift heavy one week”?
Brooke Passey:
It depends on how they feel. There is a genuine “I cannot get out of bed today,” and then there’s lazy, and you kind of have to find where that line is with them. I’m a victim to that myself, and if I push myself too hard, everything backfires. So as women, we have to learn to adapt to what we’re given and not to push. Sometimes it’s like, okay, you’re dealing with these things — yes, you didn’t lift as many times this week as I would have liked you to, but I want you to go for a walk, I want you to get outside, I want you to move your body, I want you to stretch, and I want you to follow your nutrition plan. Because ultimately that’s going to make you feel better. What you’re not getting with exercise, you still need to support from your diet. Your body, with all these hormonal changes, needs support from your diet no matter what. So you don’t need to change these things just because you’re bleeding. You have to adapt with that. Don’t push PRs on your period. Just move your body, do what feels good, but still move.
Pete Wright:
Okay, let’s transition to our last major topic here, and that is cortisol. Who do you — necessary daily rhythm, enemy, who’s to know? So where do you want to start, your perspectives on cortisol and its impact on the gym?
Srdjan Injac:
So the thing is, most people don’t actually understand what cortisol does.
Pete Wright:
And yet they blame it for everything, right?
Srdjan Injac:
Yeah, but the truth is that cortisol is not a bad hormone.
Brooke Passey:
Yes.
Srdjan Injac:
It’s actually essential. It helps you regulate your energy, your blood sugar, your sleep-wake cycle, and even your ability to handle stress in the first place. So you do need cortisol to function. The issue isn’t cortisol itself, it’s when it stays elevated for a long period of time, because now it’s a chronic stress, where you get poor sleep, under-eating, or just constantly running your body into the ground. That’s when it can start affecting everything — recovery, energy, just overall health.
So cortisol by itself, like I said, is not a bad hormone. It’s chronic stress. That’s what people don’t understand, and they blame cortisol for everything. You’ll see all over social media where they say stress alone is causing fat to accumulate, especially around that midsection. There’s just a small piece of truth there, and it’s chronically elevated cortisol — it can influence fat distribution and is often associated with more abdominal fat. What really happens is that chronic stress affects your behavior. It can increase the cravings, disturb sleep, lower recovery, and make it harder to stay consistent with your training and nutrition.
Brooke Passey:
Right.
Srdjan Injac:
So it’s not that cortisol is the direct cause —
Brooke Passey:
Right.
Srdjan Injac:
— but it can contribute to an environment where fat gain becomes more likely, especially around that midsection.
Brooke Passey:
Yes. Right. Like with everything that we talked about — the fasting and the GLP-1 and the hormone cycle and everything — with women, everything has to be about balance, right? And when things are out of balance, that’s when stress increases. And like Srdjan said, when stress is increased for a prolonged period of time, that’s when you have cortisol levels going up. A lot of the time, if somebody is high cortisol, that’s usually not their biggest concern. It’s like, “I literally feel like I can’t get out of bed today, I’m so low motivation, I’m so low energy, I feel like my body is going against me, I feel so out of control with my emotions and my cravings.” Those sorts of things are what you’re going to be dealing with — not so much “I can’t lose this fat that is here.” That can happen with high cortisol, but it’s not something that we should be jumping the gun to.
Pete Wright:
Yeah. I think there are two angles. First of all, the issue of cortisol as it relates to mental and emotional health, right? And chronic stress.
Brooke Passey:
Yes, yeah.
Pete Wright:
That’s number one. And number two is making assumptions around cortisol — and this is where I would love you guys to dig in just a little bit — making assumptions around cortisol as it relates to the monthly cycle and water retention. We talked about carbs and keto; those things also impact water retention and bloating and all of those things that you deal with that can impact performance in the gym. And certainly they have to impact your mood and your willingness and ability to hit the gym and be at your best.
Brooke Passey:
Absolutely. I also think it kind of goes in with itself. You have somebody that’s so unmotivated but has all these things, and exercise is what they need — just get in the gym and you’ll start to feel better. But it’s getting here and moving your body and moving some weight. And that happens in the cycle, like the luteal phase that I talked about. This is the phase where you would have the most water retention and bloating, like you mentioned. So you’re already feeling low about yourself as a woman, because you don’t like what you see in the mirror when it’s just your body doing what it’s supposed to do.
Srdjan Injac:
I have a lot of clients that come in — women especially — they see that scale go up a couple of pounds and they immediately assume something’s wrong hormonally and they’re gaining fat. But the reality is that body weight can fluctuate a lot from day to day, especially for them, and most of it has nothing to do with fat. It’s completely normal to see those swings of two to five pounds in a single day, literally, just from things like — like you said — water retention, sodium intake, carbohydrate intake, digestion, and hormonal changes throughout the cycle. So even though the workout can cause temporary inflammation and water retention, people say, “I gained three pounds overnight.” It’s not fat. That’s your body adjusting.
Brooke Passey:
It’s doing what it’s supposed to do. And in your luteal phase — for example, when you have higher progesterone, which is in your luteal phase — that’s what’s supposed to happen. You will have more water retention. It affects your sleep, it affects cravings, your energy, and it also slows down your digestion. So just those factors can create that perfect storm for bloating, which is when women are like, “Oh my gosh, what’s wrong with me? I’m putting on five pounds overnight, I’m going backwards.” And it’s like, no, no — I’m going to hold your hand when I say this: you just need to give it another week. I promise you are on the right track. Just keep doing what you’re doing.
Pete Wright:
Yeah, those — I eat a good sandwich and I wake up three pounds heavier, but it’s pretty predictable. I know where that came from. That whole mystery ten-pound swing across three days is something I just — it’s unrelatable. So just saying again and again that it’s totally normal is really important to reinforce.
I would love it if you would share just one thing. Women listening to this — what do you recommend, each of you? One thing a woman can take from this conversation and ignore everything else online for a month. What is the one thing that you would have them do, number one, Monday morning? Here’s a thing — you should ignore everything else that you see online, do this thing.
Brooke Passey:
It would be to not listen to the things that you see on social media, and to be intuitive and listen to your body, and kind of find that middle ground of “what am I feeling today? Can I push myself? Where can I improve? But where can I give, so I can adapt to what’s going on?” Don’t push yourself when it feels like you shouldn’t.
Srdjan Injac:
Just make sure that you don’t look for shortcuts.
Brooke Passey:
Sorry, go ahead.
Srdjan Injac:
That’s the thing. Stop looking for shortcuts. Nothing that’s going to get you there fast is probably healthy for you. Stop depending on medications, looking for a medication to get you there. Fitness is a lifestyle. And don’t fall for all these diets and not eating and starving yourself and going on such a low-carb diet and things like that. It’s extreme.
Pete Wright:
Hallelujah.
Srdjan Injac:
Everyone’s looking for that shortcut. Stop doing that. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. So make sure you focus on your nutrition, educate yourself, and stop looking for all the trends that are going on.
Brooke Passey:
Yep. Do the work.
Srdjan Injac:
Exactly.
Pete Wright:
This is awesome, you guys.
Brooke Passey:
Do the work.
Pete Wright:
Thank you. Yeah, do it the hard way. I’ve got to go, because I’ve got like 400 clavicular clips I need to go watch. I’ve got some looksmaxxing I need to be working on right now. But this has been really great. Thank you, all of you, for doing this.
Brooke Passey:
Thank you.
Pete Wright:
And everybody listening to this — in the show notes, swipe up, you’ll find the little link to send a question. You send a question, we’ll get it answered by anyone who’s on this show today. I might answer it wrong, and then someone else will answer it right. It’ll be absolutely great. You can find us at — Elevate Fitness Hillsboro dot com, right? Is that still right? Did I just get that right?
Srdjan Injac:
It’s ELEV8 Fitness PDX dot com.
Pete Wright:
Elevate Fitness PDX dot com.
Brooke Passey:
You almost had it.
Pete Wright:
That’s where you can find us. Almost had it.
Srdjan Injac:
Close.
Pete Wright:
And it is in Hillsboro. You come in, you can work with any one of these fine people. They’re all fantastic, and we would encourage you to do so. Brooke Passey and Kaila Gallion — which is like a superhero name if I’ve ever heard one. I’ve been saying it all day. There is a superpower hidden in this woman, and I can’t wait.
Brooke Passey:
That’s amazing.
Pete Wright:
And Srdjan Injac. I’m Pete Wright. Thanks, everybody. We’ll see you next week in the gym.
