Well, hello ladies and gents, Robertson keto savage.com to never get special guest Nathan Johnson on the line. He is the man behind Autonomy, which is a health and fitness program that he established for catering to South Asian and the Indian community. So I wanted to bring one of the podcast pick his branch to what it looks like in helping that cultural community from a dieting and nutrition standpoint, how to make things sustainable, what to do from a,
you know, fitness component. Like how, how do you go about training with a community that is less versed in, you know, having that just as an upbringing when you have a lot more of the cultural components with meals and the types of foods. I just wanted to pick his brain because that's that's something that I didn't know that much about the South Asian and Indian community as a whole.
Obviously the same rules apply when it comes to what to consume, the amounts to consume all that good stuff. But just how he went about it from a psychological component and working with that client demographic. So 3rd into the conversation of getting that you will take something from it. So for the delay, sit back, relax and do a podcast with Nathan and we are live. Nathan, how are you, brother? Yeah, good man. I'm really. Really happy to be here, how about yourself?
I'm good man, I'm good. I always enjoy talking with other fitness nutrition coaches online because everybody's got their own unique style and technique. So I'm kind of excited to learn from you, man. I'm excited to peel the curtain back and and dive deeper. So what gets you into this in the first place? So I was just one of those fat kids.
Yeah. It just ended up eating a lot, a lot of biscuits, a lot of ice cream, and then decided that I needed to do something about it. As I was going through that process, I had an injury, so I kind of got into the rehabilitation space first and then I needed a job to support that, so I became a personal trainer and that just escalated into then just enjoying that more. So ended up becoming a personal trainer by accident really. Nice, nice. Well, what's interesting about
you is that you're. Where are you located? I'm in Dubai. OK, you're in Dubai, yet the majority of your clientele are in South Asia, right? Yes, a majority are from India or Pakistan or Bangladesh, but most of them reside in the UK, the US West Coast, East Coast that mainly like Bay Area and and Chicago and and all of them are yes South Asia. So you're, you're I, I love business, man. We can talk about business, we can talk about nutritional, like good stuff.
But when it comes to to business, you know, you always hear about niching down on a specific target demographic and really appealing to them. So what made you cater to that audience? Do you know, it was never intentional, but it turns out to be really good is that seven years ago, I was working for a friend who owns another fitness company who special. He was Indian, so he got a lot of referrals through friends and family.
They have a massive community. So that when I started working for him, I was just this white guy working with these Indian people that I knew nothing about. I knew nothing about the food, I knew nothing about the culture. I had to learn very, very quickly and when I decided to make my own thing, I just simply people wanted to work with me because of my methods, how I treated them, the results they were getting, and then it just became a thing.
It took me a long time to believe that that's what I could put out, put out on social media. It was only maybe 2-3 years ago. I, I kind of niched in on, on socials, but I've, I've been doing the Indian community, South Asian community for the last seven years. It was just, it was never really a choice. It just happened by the clients that you're around.
Yeah, no, totally man. But when it comes to like South Asian and Indian cuisine, that is like, I don't I don't know how to I don't know how to track macros, know how to, you know, manipulate those. But I don't know, the first thing I had to like do meal prep when it comes to to Indian cuisine. So like, was that something that you were familiar with yourself? Is that, but what you were consuming that just kind of came naturally to you or how did? You know, having. That conversation.
Yeah, I mean, the the the best part about my job was that I just got to have to eat a lot of the food and lots of trial and error and the go around to clients houses and being like, oh, this is the thing that you've been cheating on your diet with Ohio. I can see why you've been doing that. So when we because it usually is the whole element of tracking macros and hitting protein
targets. And then this community, I guess really struggled with that concept, especially when they eat in home cooked food from home. When mum's making your aunties, making it with God knows amount of oil and you know, God knows levels of portion sizes. And within that community, the, the weighing scales or, or like metric, you know, using, using the way to waste off is not like not appropriate unless you're making a cake. The Wayne girls do not belong in the kitchen.
So we had to find different ways around catering to people who wanted to eat that food. And that's kind of how, yeah, we, we specialized ourselves where it's like, yeah, if you want to weigh food and track stuff, that's cool. But majority of people in that community will fail if they're eating home cooked food. Which means you just need a different method, you know, different, a different way of
doing things. Because a lot of what they're eating is like super, you know, sauce heavy and like soups and things that would be almost impossible to track with any degree of accuracy from like a weight standpoint. Like in America, you know, you're tracking like like a lot of people have broccoli rice and you know, chicken breast. So that's pretty easy to weigh out. But like a bunch of sauces and soups, that's that's a lot
harder. Yeah, really, really hard where, you know, we, we like to go on the, the, the concepts of like better and like overestimating as or underestimating. We even, we know from the research side of things, when people are largely overweight, they underestimate the calories they're eating. And then on top of that, you've got all of the things like cooking sauces and seasonings.
So we try to make AI guess more. If we're looking from a mechanical perspective, we, we ask for a larger deficit when we're setting clients up and we use that like kind of buffer of like like 1 to 200 calories is a bit of a, you know, a source source buffer, if that makes sense. Yeah, no, totally. How would you compare their average consumption versus like standard American diet?
Because like, I know, you know, in America there's all the fast food that the general population is not a very good spitting image of health by any means. Most people are overweight. And there's just a lot of, you know, seed oil consumption, a lot of processed carbohydrates. There's a lot of junk food. I'm assuming the same is true there as well. Yeah. I mean the IT, it kind of is, is
a bit different. So within Indian or South Asian community, the foods that they consume or that can be high in fibre can be somewhat nutritious, but they just over consume it in portion sizes rather than like kind of, I guess the, the processed nature or the high fat content. A lot of their foods, a lot of carbohydrate heavy. So they, they just tend to have a lot more in bolus doses.
So from a cultural perspective, when they go around to someone's house, it's accustomed to eat food, it's accustomed to have multiple plates, it's accustomed to not say no because it means that they're being disrespectful. So I tend to see that they, they go through waves rather than maybe the average American or through someone from the UK eats, you know, consistently 3 thousand 3500 calories.
Whereas I think with the, the Indian community, South Asian community, they might do two or three or four days on, you know, lower than that. But then they have these outbursts, should we say, of large consumptions because they are social creatures. They are always around their auntie's house, they're always around their uncle's house, they're always with family, which then in those moments, that's when food is everything to them and that then becomes
the largest spikes. You know, it wouldn't be uncommon for a meal to have two 2 1/2 thousand calories in once you've had second portions of things. So it can get, it can get very caloric very quickly. Yeah, no, totally. So the quality of the food's probably better than just having these massive bolus spikes of it from time to time on a regular. Basis, Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And I think also that's a trap that they also fall into because they believe it's healthier or they believe that it's more nutritious. So they will have more of it because there's also that rationale, right? Who it's like, Oh no, this isn't as bad as that ultra processed stuff that we get from Chick-fil-A or Wendy's. So we can have more of this. And, and then they over consume and, you know, first rule of fat losses, you know, make sure that you're not eating loads and loads of calories.
So they, they do fall into the trap. Just a different navigation route. Yeah, and that makes total sense. Is there like a specific type of, you know, diet or philosophy towards nutrition that is that is popular there? Like here in the States, you know, we've kind of gone through courses, it kind of depending upon which circles you're hanging at in. But like there's, you know, the the Paleo diet was popular and then keto and then carnivores
really popular. Now, are those in the conversation there at all, or is that not so much a thing? Yeah. So it's really like it's, it's split between I guess it's like the the word that they use for people that are not in India, they're called Desi's or people that have we call them expats. Like I'm an expat to Dubai. I come here, I've got my visa, my my residency here.
Whereas if you're Indian or South Asian and you go to, you know, Bay Area for a tech job, for example, you're called a Desi. And within the Desi community, they're a lot more per SE westernised. So they will have, you know, we have a lot of clients that, you know, intimate and fast and, or they come in towards intimate and fasting. They come in towards trying the quote UN quote, Mediterranean diet or low carb diet.
But then actually within India itself, the more traditional you go, the more higher verdict that there is. There's no, you know, medicinal medicine based diets. So it's almost like a very location based rather, but then like kind of cultural. Interesting, very interesting. Now that you've been kind of experimenting with with that cuisine for quite some time now, what what is an Indian dish that's very prominent there that you'd never heard about prior to to get into that, but. Here we go.
I've just had dinner so I'm luckily I'm not hungry. So there's there's one called a pal baggie. So pal baggie is basically a bread roll with potato, like a Mashed potato in the middle with various different seasonings. Basically, it's a it's a carb carb sandwich. That's what it is. But it, but it's also like it's got like a chili in the middle of it. The sauces come very, very sweet. So you got like a, if you like your taste profiles, Indian food
is the best for that. So it's got like it's softness on the outside of the bun. It's got the spiciness of the, the sauce. It's got the potato in the middle that's quite filling and texturous. And then sometimes they add what we call Chevro on the top, which is like a crunchy, crunchy flavouring, which is it hits all of the spots taste sweet, salty, crunchy, soft. So yeah, take take sensation. Nice, nice.
I just got back from a like 10 day stint in Brazil and there's obviously like a lot of meat in Brazil. So getting your protein and fats and are not really challenged there. Is there like a lot of meat consumption by default in India? Is that not so much the thing? So I, I get when you split it into two, like there is a large religious element to the cultural dynamics too. So there is even small parts that are not small parts are actually rather large, but there's different religious
diets as well. So there's, there's what we call a Jane diet, a Jane Swaminorian diets were like, they're not even allowed like garlic and onion within the house. They won't eat certain foods. They'll have particular fasting days where they have they're only allowed to eat certain
types of food as well. So not only is consistency hard normally, but then when you Chuck in a few of these days where you can only eat these 10 foods or you can't have it in the house first, you can't have it in the house, it becomes very challenging. And it's primarily veggie like
really at home. Traditionally in in India is much a veggie diet, but there's a large amount of large populace that do eat the meat from a religious perspective, They don't, most of them don't eat beef, although there are multiple outliers that do like a good steak in New York or whatnot. But yeah, there's there's a lot more people eating meat now, but there is a big 5050 split on veggie diets versus like meat eating. But the majority of them will stay away from beef.
What about like fish? Is there like fish and seafood consumption higher? It's it's actually much less like to be honest, like I've been doing this seven years with India South HP. I haven't heard anyone really say to me, Oh, you know, I've really enjoyed that salmon this weekend. So it's normally probably potentially when they go out for dinner and stuff while they're having it in the salad. But I've never really heard, you know, many of our clients go like I've made a good fish dish
today. So I guess it's it's independent individual dependent, but that's not something that is a massive thing where where I've experienced. So I would imagine from from your standpoint, just simply getting your clientele pool to eat enough protein is probably one of the bigger challenges. Yeah, it's, it's absolutely massive. I think there's like a massive overcorrection now within the Desi USUK community where like everyone knows that they haven't eaten protein for the last 50
years or whatnot. So they're going super hard on it. They're, you know, they're, they're trying to get as much in as possible, which can be to detriment to, to go over and over over their calories. But yeah, majority of our work is telling people that, you know, chickpeas and lentils are not going to grow your muscle and trying to over consume then trying to chase your protein.
So yeah, we have a lot of like, I guess culture behaviour, psychological kind of conversations about how they need to change some of their favorite dishes or the way that they cook or even that the kitchen dynamics of getting more
protein in their diet. You know, a prime example of this is most like Indian, South Asian dishes normally come with a bit of yoga on the side of the plate, maybe 4050 grams if you're looking at the weigh in metric, whereas no decent serving of protein in, in, in, in yoga is, you know, 2 to 300, you know, grams. And getting someone to eat that amount of yoga doesn't feel natural for them. So it become that that becomes the most like kind of big
challenge. And we're like, oh, how do I get them to eat these dosages of protein? And some of them, you know, have even from a younger age have been taught 01 egg is enough. You know, the, you know, 1 egg is, is making know it's going to be 6 crunch protein Max. So trying to get them to eat three eggs or, you know, egg whites or various different egg dishes is also quite challenging
as well. So, yeah, a lot of our job is, is incorporating wherever they sit on that spectrum of protein and just trying to up it by 1020% at a time until they get to a point where they're comfortable making it a part of their lifestyle. As opposed to, you know, me just telling them you need to go and hit 200 grams tomorrow because that's, that can become quite a shock.
And adherence is, is obviously the, the, the major factor that we try and look at. It it's interesting man, like so many people are so just delusional with regards to how much protein they actually need. And I feel like that overcorrection is taking place here as well. I mean, I see people consuming, you know, way too much protein and at the detriment of not ample dietary fat, for instance. But like with when it comes to people that are not generally eating enough protein, it's strange.
Like they think, OK, I'm eating an egg. Egg is known for having protein, so my protein requirements are met for the day. They they assume that as long as it's got protein in it, they've had protein. Like there's no thought as to how much protein they should be targeting a day-to-day basis, but just that a fact that it has protein seems to be sufficient for them, which is definitely not the case. No, it's.
I think it's like there's a difference between applying effort to something and doing enough of it to get a response. You know, it's that dose response thing. Most people don't think about the dose response. They think about is it more than I was consuming before? Yes. Then it must be good.
We're actually like, if you're chasing protein through peanuts, you know you're going to be, you're going to be waiting a long time to hit your hit your numbers, and therefore the effort could be well spent somewhere else with adequate information. Totally. Totally. So how do you, when these people are coming to work with you, where, where are they typically coming from? Like are they coming from a
place of just unhealth? Like are they struggling with some type of metabolic syndrome currently or like what? What is your typical client avatar I guess? Yeah, client avatar, I guess is 35 to 45 looking at having kids or or having already one to two of them mainly working in the corporate or their own business and then coming towards on that back of maybe having or being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes.
That are large populace within the community, which is unlike recognized within the research of PCOS. A lot of the females have that and then coming to us being like, hey, like I've got this method, I've got this metabolic thing, I've got this health thing. And also my weight is hindering not only my confidence, but my ability to have kids or, you know, to, you know, to, to play that big role in, in, in the whole relationship side of
things too. So that's where they mostly come in. We rarely get the younger generation just because of how we do our coaching. We, we, we generally work with people that are, you know, 30 plus. Gotcha, gotcha. And how do you structure your coaching like you have them come in, do a questionnaire, kind of get some some baseline topics from how do you how do you typically organise that?
Yeah. We, I think that from what I've experienced in the past, I think we're quite thorough because we our, our business is called Autonomy. So we want to give people choice and control. So we never really give plans or things based on questionnaires. I used to do that in the past, maybe at my other companies that used to work at it just was really, really difficult to actually diagnose what the person needed.
So we, we do questionnaires, we do detailed responses, but then we most importantly just hop on a call with them. And as we go through the call, we're we're very much designing the plans together to get to a point where they're happy to do something and it. Also fits with their lifestyle. We we use like the the the rule of like the. Three CS within nutrition, which is like, it's not really AC, but
I just coined it this way. It's like home, home life consistency, work life consistency and you know, social life consistency. So we make plans for all three of those areas when they first start. So, you know, I don't believe that most people have a seven day plan. They, they work in like different environments. And if we can create the right plan for that environment, they're more than likely be
consistent in that environment. So we set it up like that with a full level of commitment where they are deciding ultimately what they're going to do right now and if what, what they can commit to right now. Yeah, I feel like the regardless of the type of dieting protocol someone's following, I think most coaches will agree that the sustainability factor is, is
key. And I mean, you could have everything dialed in perfectly, but if it's not sustainable, you're not going to see the results with it. And I would imagine with a community that is so, you know, heavily culturally based with regards to their food consumption, finding ways to make that sustainable is going to be first and foremost the most important thing. Yeah. Yeah, because happy mum, happy
life. You know, if you're living with the parents and they rule the kitchen, you know, it doesn't matter what the diet says, if mum says it opposite, then mum wins, you know, so we try and play with the cards that we've dealt and, and ultimately everyone has their own situations. We've got people that cook, we've got people that eat their parents food. We've got people that, you know, live in Central New York and eat, eat their their local restaurants every single day.
So, you know, ultimately their situation will govern the ability to adhere to a certain plan. So we we look at the situations and scenarios that they're placed in and then plan around it. How do you how do you get through to people? How do you work around the cultural component of not wanting to appear rude? Like if you're going to one of these these festivities and it's it's customary to have multiple portions, but they don't need to consume multiple portions.
Like how do you address that? Like a lot of people here in the States, you know, they'll have they'll have celebrations for everything drop of a hand. There's a celebration a lot of times that gets people in trouble because it just gives them an excuse to eat and excess and eat the wrong things.
So I've kind of taken like an approach of look, you know, if, if you really and truly want this goal, like if you're unhealthy, if you, if you're suffering from metabolic syndrome, then you seem to be like honest with yourself and those around you. It's like, look, this is where I need to take things. This is where I need to prioritize my health. Hopefully you're in support of that and we can move on to the next chapter. But that that's often times harder in different different
cultural settings. Yeah, yeah, I, I think totally depends on the, the pain of which the, the particular thing they came in for is, is governing their life. Is that the more pain someone's in, the more they're willing to make that big jump of saying no. And I think they're less pain someone's in or they're more be encouraged by other people around, the more influenced by them. I think you have to take a look. Maybe a different approach. So we, we like to present the options.
So if someone goes, are you going to this event, it's going to be OK. Are you prepared to no say no to AB and C? And if they say we're not at this time, it's a big event or no, I feel quite rude. OK, awesome. So here's what you can do in the rest of the day to make up for it. Or we will make a course of the coaching processes to change psychological behaviours rather than just like offering
techniques for calories. So we, we like to make sure that even if today you're having that second plate and we've factored it into, you know, your lunch or breakfast steps, what you're doing tomorrow in terms of your output, that over the course of the next three to six weeks, you bring more nose into the equation to the point where you feel a lot more comfortable to do so. And at some point I feel like, you know, the hard arsing me who's not as not as fair
sometimes just says like you just need to get one over the line of just being a little bit more hard nosed and all of those feelings will go away. You know, the, the most of the clients that I've had that have been really successful at some point stop caring about the alternative opinion because of where that's LED them. And I think once you get someone in that position where their actions are not serving their goals, you can have that conversation and that they're
willing to change. Some people that's at the beginning of the journey for somebody else that's, you know, 5 to 1020 lbs down and you just can't get the next 5 lbs because of those situations. They're a lot more open to change when it's in direct competition to their goals. So we, we give them all the strategies.
And then when they're ready to take that plunge on making that big change, then we'll just, you know, even down to the words of like, we'll script out something that they're going to say to their family members and we'll help help them like say those particular words. Because sometimes it's, it's never really about the nutrition strategy. It's actually about the communication.
I think from when you mentioned about the cultural dynamics that it majority comes down to the weight in which the the family members are seen, but also the communication styles that are utilized within the community often doesn't lead to somebody being a lot more open with their dialogue. So we'd helped even people just communicate their feelings more openly, which then leads to people understanding and then giving them a bit more license to, you know, leave them the
fuck alone basically. It's it's tough, man. Like like us as a species is a strange phenomena because like you don't really experience this in any other animal species. Like if you get a bunch of, you know, lions out in the wild and you got one big fat lion like the other fat lion, the other lions don't make fun of the fat lion. They just like, it's not conducive to be fat if you're
trying to hunt your own food. Whereas like when you're, you know, a human and being, you can easily get food. Most situations allows you to easily get food. So like you don't have that risk. And then it becomes this, this psychological emotional component that comes to the table. And it's strange because you can look at the people around you that are unsupportive of your goals, yet you do not want to emulate what they have done with their life.
So why would you give a shit what they think in the 1st place? You know, like it's very, it's very strange scenario. Yeah, it's a it's a it's the complex being of, of, of personalities or psychological
subsets. And especially within, within the community idea with the within, like the research in the way that the, the upbringing is, there's a lot of guilt and shame that's utilized in the leverage point of the older generation to get what they want to exhibit control, to exhibit structure.
You know, even down to what university you go to, what occupation that you go and do. Like my clients or who are like 35 plus and I speak to them, they've been funnelled down a path of, of a different occupation than they kind of wanted to because that was what their family wanted them to do.
So all of these then come into those food situations because they've been told what to do for the last 10 years with their who they date, who they eat, what they eat, who they marry, what job they go and do. And that same person is the same person telling them to eat the two to three plates.
So they're just conditioned to listening to the person that provides them with some level of guilt and shame to do the thing they want them to do. And it's almost breaking 20 years worth of trauma to just say no to a plate of food. And that might sound dramatic, but it you know, when you when you. Look at the the levels of like.
In those moments, the way that they're talked to, the way they're demanded, the way that they're expected, it can be quite hard for that person to break that mould despite the most level, the highest level of willpower or motivation, you know it. Towards their goal because. Sometimes family to some people and their and their their relationship with that person mean more to them than the 5 lbs that they want to lose. What happens when they do start
breaking that mold? I mean, do they start letting that transcend just the food they're putting in their mouth and they start, you know, becoming more independent in other areas of their life? I would imagine like that. Would probably cause some. It's a it's a beautiful domino, like maybe their their parents don't think so, but they do seem
to get on board with it later. But it's a beautiful domino because once someone has a little bit of quote UN quote autonomy, where the decision making, they're a lot more happier. They're a lot more free will and a lot more free spirited to try new things, which then, you know, transcends and moves into the realm of them doing things that they like and enjoy and, and get the benefits from those like kind of new newfound things.
You know, we've had, I've had a lot of people who have gone through their own fitness journey and decided to career switch or, you know, change the dynamic they're in, in terms of relationships or environments because of how funneled it was previously or how rigid and structured it was to now thinking about what that what's better for them. And it's that transition of where they start controlling their food and prioritizing themselves in that format.
And then they use that framework to govern the rest of their lives too, you know, is it beneficial for them? Do they want to do it? Does it have a benefit? Is it, you know, what I want or is it someone, what someone else wants? And that moment where, you know, I've never really had a client that hasn't improved their their other areas of their life went by not taking it, by taking control of their food. Yeah, I feel like it all. I feel like that's like the baseline, man.
Like whenever my life's going crazy, like if I at least maintain my, you know, principles with regards to my nutrition and my training, then then I'm solid and I can, I can climb out of whatever hole I'm in. But like, if I'd look, if I let those go on the wayside, then then I'm really lost, you know? Yeah, I'm the exact same.
When I am going through a really busy part with like the business or, or I want to improve my golf game or what I'm trying to do, I normally go back into like a more structured diet. Like I'll even if I only want to lose a couple of kilos, that little level of like mental focus, that mental clarity, that structure, that routine, that more inward thinking and what do I need to do? When do I need to do it a little bit more? You know, self structure, it always tends to do really, really well.
It's the moments when I lose those control is more when I when I feel less in control. Yeah, totally. I think like when I'm in a prep, I'm eating pretty much the same thing every single day, every single week. I'll change the quantities from week to week, but the the day-to-day meals are the exact same. And I think removing the choice and the decision fatigue is, is
monument. Like if you get a hard time going on your life and you are constantly being battered with decisions and thoughts, some positive, some negative, but they're just taking up all your mental bandwidth to also throw on food choices on top of them is what often times knocks
people out their rocker. But if they know, OK, and this is what I'm going to eat, this is what I'm going to eat, and this is how my body's going to respond to it, and that's just never even a question, then they've got all that bandwidth opened up to do everything that is more important at the time. Yeah, it's the dichotomy of choice. Everybody wants choice, but performs worse with it. Yeah, like I like I I get my food delivered to my door every
single day. And since I've been doing that, you know, there's there's never been a point where I'm like, oh, shall I order a take away tonight, you know, or about a bad day at work. Should we be should we go and go for drink or whatnot? It's like my foods that the decisions already done. All I have to do is just open up it take a spoon and and eat my food. So I actually, I think clients or go in that, that that loop as well. They they yearn for more choice
or more freedom. They get that choice and freedom. It doesn't really end well. And then they end up like raining in and and self regulating their choices because of those. They, I guess they prioritize headspace over, you know, the, the flavours. And that comes from having ten different breakfast options or 20 different meal options for dinner. Yeah. And it's interesting because just kind of look at this from a cultural standpoint in, you know, South Asia.
Like if if they are, you know, forbidden a lot of choice in other areas of their life, I would see how it would make sense for them to want more choice with their food. But freedom doesn't. I mean, choice and freedom aren't necessarily the same thing. Like I like, I love Jocko's quote of discipline equals freedom. Like when you are disciplined, you oftentimes self restrict a lot of choices. So it may seem limiting in that regard, but it's still a choice.
But you just chosen to have fewer options. But that in doing so, that allows for much more freedom on the grand scale, which I think is the the overall goal. Yeah, Yeah. No, I totally agree. And we have a lot of like our South Asian plants that are more like from Pakistan. They're they're primarily Muslim and in that in that community in itself, which is a whole different ball game towards compared to India, is that their only real like outlet they have is food.
They don't, you know, smoke, they don't drink or, you know, from a from a true practice perspective. So when they get told to, you know, cut down the portions or, you know, limit the take away that they're eating, that was like the only free choice that they had to expand, enjoy and, you know, live life through it. And I think that that also then present presents a really hard barrier to to kind of be more
adherent long term. If it's the only thing that you seek in joy and you only have enjoyment from it, it's really hard to restrict something that you literally yearn for because it represents so many other things just than other than just food. So how do you how do you work with them then? How do you come back then? I think the it's more like a, those conversations are more like, I guess sales conversations rather than like like fitness and nutrition conversations.
It's like, you know, are the things that you're doing right now producing a positive or negative, you know, result, you know, do you think by changing this, it's going to improve or, you know, contribute what, what benefit are you looking for? Like what is it that you're looking for out of food? And then trying to find that middle ground between what they say that they want versus like what's going to move us in the
right direction. So, you know, they might say, you know, I really want to have, I want to go out with the boys and I want to have a mixed grill. OK, perfect. So let's go and give you a mixed grill or a chicken, you know, shawarma, for example. Then here's the here's how you factor in the rest of the day.
So you give them that guest, those short term tactics of like the buffering, the, the calorie management strategies to 1st get them on board with, you know, reducing their, their intake and, you know, seeing some tangible results. Once you get those results and you see that the, the weight is going in the right direction, I think you have a lot more ability to play those more habitual cards later down the line, once you get some like kind of trust and some authority
that a, this thing is working. I just need to now make some further tweaks to amplify those results. That makes total sense. Do you actively push away clients from America, for instance, or are you like like what do you kind of do with it? Like you do you factor them out? Do you work with everybody? You just had the majority of your clients coming from South Asia, Pakistan, or or do. You actively avoid most of them are UK or US based.
So like we, we only have like one rule is like if you're South Asian or you're Indian, we work with you. If you're white or black or Hispanic, we, we don't. So we literally, if you fall into that category, we'll, we'll work with anybody, anytime, any place. Like we're here to help. So as long as you're part of our demographic that we know that we do great things with, then we're good. So yeah, we have a few clients in India, but majority is, is West Western, Western clients
just. Because of the I guess the the. The, the gap to finances or you know, you know, money is, is a large part of, you know, the, the wealth versus poverty in, in India is a large gap, which is like a very, very wealthy 1% and they're very, you know, poverty stricken 99%. So we just don't see a lot of our client base coming from
there. But a lot of our clients are more the people that have lived in the US now for what their their parents are the 1st generation that moved over they've, you know, had a business or they've, you know, moved into a different kind of occupation and now their kids are gone through medical school or, you know, dentistry. Or or Law law for. Example And then now they're overweight because they're they've gone through Med school and they've got some poor eating habits.
Gotcha, gotcha. So let's talk about some some tangibles when it comes to like, if you're, you know, reducing your caloric intake and you're trying to stay within cultural, you know, realms of the types of food you enjoy and are, you know, often times in the the family setting there and it's not easy to weigh the food. They don't really have food scales. Like how do you typically go about that from a very practical standpoint?
Are you doing kind of like a reduced just the meal frequency throughout the day, kind of like a OMAD approach and push your, you know, one feeding back to to that festival setting? Or how do you typically structure that? So we, we like to take more of that the the long term approach 1st and then move it down to something a little bit more
aggressive. Like I think for us, if we, if we started with like the one meal a day, a lot of those people would fair that because they would get these larger consumptions of their favorite foods and then have one meal where they could have, you know, below 1500 to 2000 calories.
But I think long term, trying to move people away from that once they've got a bit of a taste of that is really like it's problematic for most people because most people can't really stick to one meal a day for the next 10 years. So we like to do the precision nutrition stuff without the hand portion. So we're like what we call it
the one plate rule. So like pick a carb sauce, it's have a rice or it's roti or nawn bread and then pick, you know, pick if there's a protein because most dinners within the, the Indian culture come in like it's either a Curry based dish with sauce, then it'll have a carb. And then if you're lucky, there's, there's green things on the side. So we encourage them to get more green things, you know, by themselves.
And then we'll then portion out that protein, whether it's the lentils Curry or it's the chicken Curry, for example. And then we'll, we'll pick one carb sauce on the side. So for most people, that's like the starting blocks as they get further down, you know, if you've got 120 LB female, most of those meals are still not going to be to the, to the standard of the chloric needs that they need. They're going to be have to be reduced.
So for some meals in the day, if they're eating all of those foods cooked by somebody else, we'll probably, we'll probably do like, you know, 300 calorie breakfast and then we'll do like A1 plate rule for lunch, but without the carbs. So it's just protein veggies and then we'll have like a protein carb veggies for the evening. And maybe if we can fit in a snack, depending on the variables, we'll do that.
But most of the time it's teaching them what a real portion size of carbohydrates and protein and then working back off those once. You know, I do favour something that has more about two to four feedings across the day just because I think from a pattern perspective, teaching people that they can blow 1500 calories in one meal is feeding the problem. Probably not, you know, increasing the ability for change. Yeah. Do they, do they drink a lot of
the calories? Do you like a lot of sodas or anything that is it mostly just water? Most of it is juices and Chai, which is tea with sugar. So you know, a Chai Chai tea would be anywhere between 50 to 100 calories depending on the sugar. So we have to factor that in before normally it's one of those like you would probably talk and talk to to me and you about how many, how many coffees you have a day and how many lattes and can you move down to black coffee.
Whereas in that community you don't have Chai without milk. So it's like a basically you have in the milk and, and we just have to figure out how many we're going to have.
And then with the fruit juices, normally that comes when people or the juices did the caloric intake from drinks normally come in when they start a healthy thing because they think like orange juice or watermelon juice is healthy or, you know, these variables and it just leads to them consuming more calories than they need to. So we try and get them to eat as
much of their food as possible. And then if they do say, Hey, can I have some orange juice or can I have more tea or whatnot, then we'll we'll look at factoring that around the the meals that they've got. What about sweet tooth? Like they typically have a sweet tooth. A lot of desserts. Yeah, that's a, that's a that's a cultural dynamic there as well. Like every meal like the favorite saying is like a have to have something sweet after a meal.
So. Again, it's the same conversation as the before about, but the, the willingness to change. Like obviously the the easiest way to do this is not to have something sweet after a meal like a Coke cereal or something like that might be useful. But like if they, if the no, for most people, it's like, okay, well, how much are you having as a sweet after a meal? Like you're having a full dessert.
That's not you want it in a suite, that's you want in dessert to speak different, different, different in factor. So we're trying to minimize it as small as possible to something that's maybe less than 50 calories and then we'll then. You know, either, you know, we like trade-offs, you know, we like to like give them something, but also get something back in return. So and then teach them that
there's nothing for free. So if they want to have something sweet after a meal, we'll then also look at probably a higher step out and be like. Hey, if you want these things, these are not, you know, normal, you know, dietary protocols or they're not things that you want to kind of have in because of this impact or this impact. We will, we will just then trade off for something different. So maybe more workouts, less, more steps, you know, minimize, you know that.
Or the niceties that they might like to have like, you know, off time meals or you know, their toast in the morning for example, or their savoury sweets. So we'll do those trade-offs for the real things that they really want and then teach them. About that kind of psychological
trade off. What I've, I've seen a lot of people in the US and I've kind of played around this as well, but for people that for clients and I've had that don't really know, you know, Mac Tracro tracking macros, weight training like that, there's not well versed in that. Simply having them wear CGM, even if they're not diabetic, just so they can see that, hey, the foods you eat does have an impact on you metabolically. But that's pretty eye opening
for a lot of people. Do you think your demographic would be receptive to that or not so much do? You know, I think it would be the only demographic that that I would say the majority would are quite desensitized to that. The only reason why I say that is because the the population with family members that have got type 2 diabetes and.
But when I asked them about if they're concerned about things like that, they're like, no, I'm not really concerned about it because it's just in my genetics. So they're, they're very much like, unless like you had someone that was open to data, like we have a lot of very, very clever clients who are like business owners and open to more analytical behaviours. They would be perfect for that.
And often they get caught up in like the boot bog or blood tests or, you know, the, the, the, the Dutch testing, for example. And they absolutely loved that, which we more than happy obliged because it's always good to get more data. But for the people that are more ignorance is bliss. I feel like you know that that's that'll go that'll fly over like their ears and weigh in one out here in one ear and out the other just simply because they've heard it for 20-30 years
beforehand. Oh, don't eat that. It's bad for your Type D diabetes. And yet they still do. That's crazy, man. Like it's crazy that people can just allow themselves to fall victim to this belief that hey, it's in my genetics, I'm going to wind up getting diabetes anyways. Yeah. And and as soon as you it, it becomes less impactful when you get it, because if if the sum of the 10 people that you're around, they've all got type 2 diabetes and then you get it, you don't feel not normal.
You feel like you're part of the. Crew, which is. Which is less than ideal. So I, I feel like it's, it's more like, like we call it the, I call it like ditching the pill culture. So like if your aunties, your uncles, your own, your, your, your family members, they're all on Metformin, for example. And then that now some of the doctors suggested you for you to
have metformin. It's not a big deal because everyone else around you has it. It's only when that one of those people die is that's when the trigger, you know, one of those, one of those two people, the three people that were eating whatever they wanted to were not super active or active at all and taking all of these pills now pass away.
That that's where I feel like that's where the moment start triggering because there's a lot of people passing within the community because of those factors, because of the cardiovascular disease that comes, which is at higher risk anyway. That's when people really, really start to change. But unfortunately at the moment it's it's more towards that latter phase as opposed to pre emptive which is I guess it's prevention is always better than
the cure. What about the like the semi semiclutide and what Govi and all the like the weight loss drugs that are running rampant right now in the states are though? Are those in the conversation at all? They're not so much. Do you know what they're very much highly like westernized topics, New York Bay Area and we do get a lot of people ask about them or we get somebody at least get people that have like, you know, I've done the exact done the Ozempic.
But as far as, you know, the conversation that we have, like I'm having with people, it's, it's not really the, the priority for them. Like they're, they're still in that phase of were I guess they're edgy. They're, they're too educated to know that the, the downfalls are from nutrition and their activity in that lifestyle, but
to like stubborn to change. So they, they know the Azempic or whatever they, they term it as like, you know, they still have, they luckily and still well have it as like a fat, fat thing as opposed to like more of a type 2 diabetes something. So I guess we don't really, we don't really actually have that conversation that much, which is I guess a good thing sometimes. No, that's a good thing for sure.
It's, it's crazy, man. Like I get so disheartened to see how quickly people are to turn to a pill or a drug or a potion try and solve the problem that they've created for themselves after just decades of doing the wrong thing. It's like you got a. You got a correct course internally before any external implications are going to solve
your problems for you. Yeah, I think do you know, we're speaking before about like kind of how the culture of like being so restricted to do one thing then make sure outburst in other areas. I think they there's something mythical about the health and fitness world for some reason within the community and and just generally everywhere. Is that the same rules people don't think that apply, You know, the, the whole rule of like, you know, there's no magic
bullet for anything. You know, most of them, our clients went through Med school, they went through, you know, college, they went, did a law degree and they worked their arse off for four years or five years. And yet they're the ones that are still like faddish or more susceptible to fads, even though the same principles applies for your law school or training for the bar.
Or you know, that process is what gets you the results of like showing up every day to a certain task, being consistent and, and doing the right things over a long enough time horizon get you the the results that you want to get. Or sometimes when it when the rest of your life is so structured and organized, you just want this one to click your fingers and go away. Yeah, there's there's no nothing. There's no easy button with
anything. I think the sooner we embrace that, the the more peace will be. It's like look it just it does not exist. Yeah, and we'd be a billionaire if that was the case, right? For sure. What about like weight training, cardio, like the physical component of it? Are they all receptive to that? Do you know a lot? A lot of the people that we work with are still like anti gym to
a degree. Like there's a large amount of that had look and it all the reason why it comes like this is because from a childhood or from a young age, sports is not really prioritized or exercise not prioritized. So they still only start the gym really when they do this fitness
thing. So when they're 30 or 28 or even 35. So then I think when most people start at that age, they go in with their apprehensions of what this gym is a particular thing for the particular people that they have a lot of like misconceptions about the gym
itself. So there's a, there's a large amount of people that do go to the gym or they have access and they go to these classes or or whatnot, and they're very, very receptive to doing it. But we had still have a large amount of our client base that are non gym goers because of they, they, they, they just simply at the point where they don't really know what to do, how to do it and don't look stupid at the age of 35 in a gym by themselves.
So we have to, we have to work a lot of people up from non gym goers to home gyms to home workouts to then go into the gym. But that does take a little bit of a while. But it then, yeah, we have that both, both ends of the spectrum really. But I think the biggest commonality between either both of them is that especially within the Western community, especially in the US, exercise and training is completely over
utilized. It's like this thing that's going to solve all problems and equally not done in the right format. So people will, you know, spend a lot of lot of money on Orangetheory or Barry's boot camp to go and get a sweat on because they're quote, UN quote burning 1000 calories per workout and never used more than
a 4K dumbbell. And then wonder why they're still not, not changing their no, not changing their physique or building muscle tissue or, you know, really getting anything more from it because you know, our body is an adaptive machine. It will adapt to the stimulus you give it. So if you've been using those 4K dumbbells orange theory for the last 12 months, if you know you're going to be, you're going to be burning less calories or less, less metabolically adaptated because of it.
No, totally agree, man. I feel like the here in the states at least, it's like people, there's this apprehension to working out as well, but it's it's weird because the people seem to know that, you know, moving your body is important and healthy, but like the the disparity between those that love it and those that don't becomes that much broader. It's like we all know, like we we know that that is good, but some people are just not receptive to it for whatever reason.
But it's weird because here like the, the sports side of things is oftentimes just in our culture, like people hear all about their sports, they, they grow up and doing sports and it's like in the public school system to some degree. So it's like that's always kind of brought on pretty young, but then people just stop doing it once they graduate from school.
And then like the 30s, forties, 50s, people started getting their dad bonds and everything because they just stopped doing it and they're living in their glory days. So you got to kind of like reacclimate them, but they've always got some, some basic primitive, you know, understanding of it from early childhood, it seems.
Yeah, yeah, I have that too. I have a lot of like, you know, a lot of US clients that are like back in my day when I was at college, I used to debench this amount or I used to used to curly the the 35 LB dumbbells or whatever it is. I think especially more for females is like it's more of a case of that they, they, I don't see it as exciting as other
forms of exercise. So if I don't know like from your sporting background, but like, you know, sports and playing competitive sports and doing more activity like that is much more exciting sometimes. And lifting weights up and down for 10 reps three sets. And I think most people want to be excited by the gym as opposed to fulfilled by the gym. Like fulfilling is, you know, increasing your numbers week on week and seen that progression progression.
But most people see it as more of an exciting thing about his boot camp and Orange theory were you are getting entertained for an hour at the same time. And unless you take that avid interest as imagine you doing your preps, were you like, I've got to beat my log book. I've got to make the progression. I've got to see these changes. I've got to, you know, make sure that my elbows go in the right position because my if I don't, I don't activate my chest
properly. That type of level of interest normally leads to curiosity. Curiosity normally leads to, you know, some level of like development in that area, whereas I just don't think most people have a level of curiosity and level of like interested in the finer details of, you know, you're, you're lifting weights because it's much like running a feeling like most people believe that they can run, but not
everyone should run. So they believe that they can put the foot in front of the other. So they do it, but they don't take an interest in the technique, the pacing, you know, your your gels during it to keep hydrated and, and keep fed. So I think they're most people just don't have a a level of interest that's required to make it exciting or make it fulfilling. Yeah. And I totally can see that being the case. And for me like like I am a bodybuilder, so I'm certainly not the majority.
But if I was to look at weight training from the masses perspective, like I would, I would assume that I would look at training as just simply the, the, the lowest hanging fruit to provide the best outcome from a longevity standpoint. Like weight training, you know, consuming ample nutrition is like the single easiest and best thing you can do to ensure that you live a, you know, healthy, vibrant life as you age.
Because like when you look at people that are aging well and those that are aging poorly, it's like it, I mean, it's, it's very apparent who put in the work and who didn't throughout
their lifetime. But if you, you know, weight train, even if it's just like 30 minutes three times a week, like what that does for you compounded over time, like once you crush that like 67, 7080 year old mark and you've built your body over, you know, decades like that is going to make sure that you aren't falling downstairs breaking all your hips and bones and, you know, rapidly declining in your later years. Yeah. 100% I mean my my like I said, my background was in rehabilitation.
One of my first ever like kind of work experiences was that an oldly, oldly person's like home and the the people that recovered from like femur fractures or neck of femur fractures better. We're always the people that said that they were, you know, active. They go to the shop every day, but it's one of the biggest things like can they raise their leg to the next step, step up? And even people will, you know, most people in the 70s or 80s
were too weak to even do that. And so they had a high risk of falls. And from the research, we know like higher risk of falls leads to higher risk of mortality too, because once you fall over, once you break a bone, then you go through that whole process and it's less likely that you're going to come out of the other side in a positive format. So most people don't see those those later years until again, someone else goes through that or you're going through that.
So it's a wish, you know, everyone was just weight training three times a week, knowing the progressive nature of it. And most people, a lot of everybody, would be much better off because of it. Yeah, I mean, think about it like like insurance, like if you're, you know, older in years and you're and you know, I don't know, 1000 bucks a month premium for your health insurance, banking on it coming in at some point when you have some
ailment. Like if you can accomplish, you know, roughly the same thing or obviously much better than the same thing by just simply weight training 30 minutes three times a week to prevent the need for that insurance in the 1st place. Like that training becomes the more efficacious insurance. I feel like if people took that approach psychologically it would make the, you know, apparent non excitement of the gym still worth it if that makes sense.
Yeah, for sure. And I think it takes those actual those conversations with the insurance company to make it really viable. A lot of a lot of people do come to us and say, hey, my insurance's premium is going up because my weight's been up 20 lbs and they won't insure me unless I go into the next bracket. So I'm not going to do that. So let me lose my next 20 lbs. Yeah, financial incentive is quite the incentive for sure. If you can like make a tangible like that, people tend to be,
they perk up quite a bit faster. Oh yeah, like everyone loves a return on investment. So if you can, if you can correlate your own fitness goals with some type of IROI, they normally get on board very, very quickly. That's why I think business owners and entrepreneurs when they, when they can see that their fitness endeavours, I don't know if you might have seen it the other day, but I
don't know who it was. But they, they, they, they did like a plotting graph of like CEO earnings and business growth and the relative levels of deadlifts that CEO's and entrepreneurs could, could deadlift. And they did, they cross pollinated. And he said that the more that someone deadlifted, the more that they earn in their career and the better the business did.
So people should be looking at that graph going, OK, well maybe I should deadlift and work out when, when you can see that your business improves because your fitness improves, then a lot of people do buy into that hard. No, that makes total sense, man. Like I, I'm, I'm 100% a big believer in that. Like if you get your fitness, nutrition dialed in, then everything else in your life will flourish and stem from it
for sure. I mean, that's like the, the temple that you exist in. Like that is, that is the base. Because if you look at everything else in your life, if all of that is dialed in, but you have no health, you've lost your mind, you've got the Alzheimer's dementia and you, you know, you, you can't even, you can't even move. Then then that's all for not like you have to have the basic fundamentals. Absolutely. The the you've got to, you've got to live in this, in this
body forever, right? So. Yeah. It's going nowhere. Well, Nathan, what else you get cooking, man? What are you working on? What are you excited about? What's the future hole for the training like? How's how's the future looking? Yeah. And I mean we've, we've really grown in the last year. So for us, it's, it's actually more about getting more, some community basis here. So we're, I'm launching, I'm
launching a school community. I've launched it last week for our clients, but we're, we're launching it in the next couple of weeks for anyone that wants to join, who's South Asian, who wants to understand a little bit more about their genetics.
And I've gone into the, the science of, you know, the, the cardiovascular diseases, why it's more prevalent, what you can do about it. So really excited to see how that education piece does because a lot of people who even, you know, are South Asian, who are trainers don't express the, the differences and needs to, to change. So that'd be really, really exciting. And outside of that, it's just keep on doing what we're doing.
You know, we've been doing it for four or five years now and it'll be, you know, another five years and, and helping more, more people. I love it, man, I love it. What's awesome to see, you know, people from all different walks of life, all different cultural backgrounds, getting taught the right message to just move them closer to health. Because like you get so stuck in your information silo your, your
own, you know, little circle. And it's like, this is a far reaching problem where as a species, obviously not getting much healthier. Like we're on the decline. So the more people preaching the good message about getting healthier, eating the right foods, eating the right amount of the right foods, and being more active and moving more like I'm 100% on on board with you man. Absolutely appreciate it and you're doing some good but yourself. Appreciate it man.
Where do people go to find out more about you and that school program? What's the link to that? So I would just go to my Instagram at Nathan dot autonomy and if you want to get on the school stuff, it'll be on my bio at that point. And if not, then just just drop us Adm and we'll, we'll, we'll add you to the group. Awesome, man. Well, I'll definitely get to that. Make it easy people to find you. There's everything I can do for you, man. You just let me know. Appreciate it dude.
I really, really appreciate it. You bet. See you, Nathan. Cheers dude. Thank you.