How To Be “Forever Strong,” Creating The Right Amount of FRICTION In Your Life, Official Protein Rules & More, With Dr. Gabrielle Lyon

Ben Greenfield [00:00:00]: My name is Ben Greenfield and on this episode of the Boundless Life podcast.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:00:05]: As we get older, we become less efficient at this process. Therefore, age is my first decision in how much protein that we need. The older that you are, the more protein that you need.

Ben Greenfield [00:00:18]: Welcome to the Boundless Life with me, your host, Ben Greenfield. I'm a personal trainer, exercise physiologist and nutritionist. And I'm passionate about helping you discover unparalleled levels of health, fitness, longevity and beyond.

Ben Greenfield [00:00:39]: Doctor Gabriel Lyon, you probably heard of her, she's a very accomplished physician. She's New York Times best selling author of Forever Strong. She just wrote this book, Forever Strong Playbook. It's great. We talk about it in today's show and just unpack her super inspiring tips for protein, for muscle, for challenging yourself mentally, physically, emotionally, environmentally. All the shownotes [email protected] ForeverStrong. Enjoy the show. For those of you who have been living under a rock in the health and fitness world and may not have heard of Gabriel, she is a physician who's known for the whole muscle centric medicine approach.

Ben Greenfield [00:01:17]: I think even muscle centric trademarks. Do you actually own that term now?

Gabrielle Lyon [00:01:22]: Yes. Muscle centric medicine was not a construct prior to, to my fellowship training. So it's kind of cool, right?

Ben Greenfield [00:01:31]: And probably one of the most interesting things I heard you say this year was that the skin is not, as we all learn, even in college, I think we learned this, that the skin is the largest organ. I believe that's the way it was phrased.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:01:46]: But fake news. No, it's not. It's muscle. And listen, think about it this way. 40% of your body weight is technically supposed to be muscle. For you, it's probably 50. This is actually an endocrine organ. Just like the thyroid is an organ, like the heart is an organ.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:02:02]: And you know, we don't have physicians that focus and study on the science of muscle as an endocrine organ.

Ben Greenfield [00:02:12]: Oh yeah. I mean there, there was, you know, you, you say that. I even have this prep for the show notes, but this was literally a study that just came out. I just found out about yesterday. Physical exercise. Vigorous physical exercise allows for temporary transport shuttles to be upregulated for key hormone precursors to enter the brain. Shifting, mood shifting, anabolism, et cetera. There's 4x increase in hormone precursors to to the brain during vigorous exercise, including weight training.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:02:53]: I love that. And do you know what else actually happens which is so fascinating is this upregulation in Receptor density. So for androgens, for example, when we think about testosterone, the receptor density increases in the muscle. The availability will increase, which is extraordinary because, frankly, it's the only thing that we have voluntary control over is our movement. I mean, one could argue we can control our mind, but to a certain extent. But not to the same extent as if I say, okay, Ben, I need you to do 50 squats. You can tell your brain to do 50 squats, right?

Ben Greenfield [00:03:31]: Yeah. You hear everybody talk about increasing total T, bioavailable T, total T to free T ratios, modulating sex hormone binding, globulin, all of these different methods for. From an upstream hormonal standpoint, not a lot of people talk about increasing hormone receptor density. And it's weight training. And I don't know if you've probably talked about this before. The highest concentration is in the legs. So say goodbye to toothpick leg day at the gym.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:04:01]: That's right. Well, Monday's universal chest day, and then Tuesday is universal leg day. And actually, we just published a paper, my colleagues and myself at Baylor, I was a senior author on this paper that looks at the relationship between sexual function, muscle mass and strength. And I think what's really important there is we have a mechanism of action. You know, you've been. You have been in this space for, I don't know, should I say 20 years? I mean, at least me since I.

Ben Greenfield [00:04:30]: Was 14, 30 years.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:04:32]: Yeah, at least 20 years. Like the OG and by the way, we're going to circle back to actually when I first heard about you. I don't even think you remember, because we're going to talk about a crucible event, which is what I talk about in the playbook.

Ben Greenfield [00:04:45]: Oh, yeah.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:04:46]: By the way, I'll finish this statement. So there's a mechanism as to why having more healthy muscle mass improves sexual function.

Ben Greenfield [00:04:55]: Okay.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:04:56]: Which is, number one, endothelial health.

Ben Greenfield [00:05:00]: Right.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:05:00]: Incredible. Vascular health. Also metabolic health from, say, an insulin resistance perspective. Muscle is really that organ of longevity. So the more healthy muscle mass you have, the better insulin, insulin sensitivity you have. The more healthy muscle mass you have. The greater vascular health, the greater ability to produce no. 2, which is a vasodilator, hence the better sexual function.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:05:28]: And when you think about it, I'll just finish with this. 40% of men by the age of 40 have erectile dysfunction. 50% of men. 50% of men have erectile dysfunction by the age of 50. And again, it's a relationship problem. It's not one or the other. Right. It's a It's a couple's problem and it's fixable.

Ben Greenfield [00:05:49]: Not to mention the psychosomatic component of increased confidence if you are strength training. So, yeah, there's a lot there. I remember you. You. I think you texted me that finding a couple of months ago. Super interesting.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:06:00]: Ben, do you have a photographic memory? That's ridiculous. Do you have photographic memory?

Ben Greenfield [00:06:05]: A little bit, yeah. Although it's hard because you hear people say photographic memory and it's kind of like, well, I don't know exactly what that feels like, but it feels like I do. That's like one of the very, very few inherent skills I have is remembering stuff for better or worse. So it's the whole. I think it's probably related to like, comt pathways, dopamine pathways, the same type of pathways that results in being wound up, needing to close loops and not letting anything go from the bulldog mind until you've gotten it down paper or elsewhere.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:06:38]: I think I don't know what it is. Again, I've been a physician, a practicing physician. I graduated med school in 2006. I probably know three people with a photographic memory. I don't know if it has anything to do with pathways. I don't know. I think it's like a God inherent quality or like a gift. I don't know.

Ben Greenfield [00:06:57]: Yeah, yeah, I don't know. I don't know. Hardwired to see danger and remember things. So I want to talk about this. This book Forever Strong Play. I read your original book Forever Strong. I think we actually talked about it in our last podcast. But I was reading this, like, right as I was kind of getting ready for 2026.

Ben Greenfield [00:07:21]: We're recording this at the tail end of 2025, literally two days before Christmas. And when I got to page 13, it says, Are you sure you're climbing the right ladder? Are you sure you're climbing the right ladder? And there's like this list of. Of qualities in myself I want to work on in 2026. They're things like courage in the form of embracing new adventures, trust in the form of letting go, love in the form of seeing, hearing, and loving others better. And one of the qualities I wrote down was intention. Like having a great deal of intention and forethought behind everything I do physically, mentally, professionally, et cetera. So I thought this question was really interesting. Why did you get kind of asked that, like, early on in a book about mental and physical strength?

Gabrielle Lyon [00:08:10]: Yeah, well, I want to frame up as to why there's even a how to think section. And Many of us, and many of your listeners, many of your viewers, they probably read at least 25 health and wellness books. And the reality is, people have a ton of information, but there is a gap between being able to assimilate the information and then being able to actually execute on something that's really meaningful. And so I had to ask myself, if this playbook is going to really move the needle for people, then it has to address the most fundamental questions. And really our driver, our computer driver, which is the brain. And so this is when you open up this playbook. By the way, this is the book that I originally had wanted to write. It's how to think and how to process and put guardrails up for the way in which we think.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:09:04]: Because people can spend a lifetime working towards something, but that might not be the thing that they really want. And so it's the idea of, are you climbing the right ladder? And the right ladder is being very clear as to why it is that you are doing something and then understanding where your values and your attributes fit into that so that you can ultimately take the next right action.

Ben Greenfield [00:09:29]: So do you ever, like, share with people what your ladder is? Like, what ladder you're climbing?

Gabrielle Lyon [00:09:35]: No, but I'm happy to probably ever ask me. Right now, this is a ladder of contribution. I believe, again, we were talking beforehand. We're a military family, and I believe that if you have the ability to be of service, that you have a responsibility to do that. So right now, the latter, for me, is contributing in the way that I believe that I'm uniquely positioned to. And what that looks like is building stronger, more resilient humans. Because I'm a mom of two very little children. They are 4 and 6, and I want them to be able to grow up in a world that supports this.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:10:18]: I don't know, like, this little Spartan. This little Spartan family, which I think that we can all develop. You and I were chatting. And so for me, the latter right now is contribution to the general population. And then selfishly as to why that is is because I have two little humans that are growing up within this. And so I want them to be able to be exposed and sharpen their own sword and to really be able to focus on the things that matter instead of, for example, overcoming bad habits for 40 years.

Ben Greenfield [00:10:51]: Yeah, so they're already doing cold plunging. We talked about that before we started recording. What are a couple of other things that you're doing with your kids that most of the world would be like, whoa, it's a little extreme. Maybe a little bit too Spartanesque, but that, you know, is going to increase their resilience.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:11:08]: Well, our kids train. Our kids are extremely physically strong and actually mentally tough, which is pretty extraordinary to watch because we don't push it on them. But we've exposed them to hard physical training their entire life. I trained throughout my pregnancy and then after pregnancy when, you know, I had these, I have a little baby and then another little baby. I had them 18 months apart. As I was training there was, there was not really a huge amount of time not being physical. And so, you know, I came downstairs just recently and it was 8pm we have pretty strict bedtimes. Bedtime is 8pm and my son is on the Woodway, this curved treadmill, very.

Ben Greenfield [00:11:56]: Similar to what I'm walking on right now.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:11:59]: I'm not surprised. Doing sprints, full speed sprints. I'm like leonidas, what are you doing? It's bedtime. And he's like, well mom, I gotta get my training in. I gotta get my second training session in. He's four and wait, wait, his name is Leonidas? Yes.

Ben Greenfield [00:12:20]: Yeah, so you're full on Spartan.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:12:22]: So our son is Leonidas and our daughter is Ares Hunter after the God of war. And yeah, I was thinking that they might be wallflowers. That didn't really work out that way. And thankfully with names like that they are not. But the kids are training and my daughter doesn't like to cold plunge. We don't make her cold plunge. She doesn't have to. But my son, it's so interesting to watch when we think about the values and the attributes of both families and individuals.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:12:51]: He believes that hard work is good and he again, I mean it's pretty scary when your 4 year old is trying to learn how to swim and goes right under the water but instead of freaking out wants to try again and again and again until he can swim. So I think probably most parents are not exposing their children to hard physical work. You know, we do challenges and we make it competitive in the house. People might disagree with that, but we are all up for good, healthy competition.

Ben Greenfield [00:13:29]: I love that both mentally and physically. I mean our sons, you know, by the time they were eight they'd done at least a dozen triathlons, including a full adult sprint triathlon in Thailand in the middle of the heat. When they were seven years old, they did six years of spartan racing. During the time I was racing on the spartan circuit, cold plunging. Since they were three, some of the main elements for us was cold heat, kettlebells, Tons of barefoot hiking, barefoot sprinting, barefoot running and outdoor animal esque training. And then just because I was racing Until I was 37 and retired, they were on the triathlon and spartan racing circuit with me. So they were doing all of that. And it's so funny, people now are like, oh, are they playing football? Are they like, you know, are they, are they out, you know, competing on the junior triathlon circuit? And they basically started a card game company.

Ben Greenfield [00:14:23]: Right. And they're, they're still just like rugged, tough, physically and mentally resilient boys. But, but yeah, it doesn't, it doesn't mean that your child has to be like a savage for their entire career.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:14:33]: I think that that's so fascinating. I don't know if I knew that about you, that the kids, you know, I known that they were always really physically active. I didn't know that they were.

Ben Greenfield [00:14:42]: Yeah, they logged a lot of miles. They logged a lot of miles because they just, I mean you probably know this. Every event you go to, there's, there's usually a junior version or a kid's version. So they did those and the mental piece, because again I like this about you, that you're not just about physical brute meathead strength. And you get into the mental strength. In the book there's a section, I have it circled, there's a three A's of mental strength awareness, assessment and activation.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:15:13]: Yeah. So we have a lot of thoughts that are happening all the time and most of them are not actually really relevant. If you do not treat your mind and train your mind the same way and to the same degrees you train your body, you're leaving a lot on the table. And when I say leaving a lot on the table, muscle and strength, all of that is the entry point for being ultimately the best version of oneself. And so awareness is there's all these thoughts and many of them are completely irrelevant. You have to be able to then take the next step, which is assessment. And quite frankly, A didn't actually go with D. This is essentially discernment.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:15:58]: Is this a valuable thought or not? And you have to be able to take stock in the perspective of I'm thinking all these things, is this relevant and is this in line with my values? And then activation is actually the action you select a response of being able to build into your own identity where you want to go as opposed to just being pushed around. You know, it's not really about habits that you want to break. I think in our culture there's a lot of focus on loss. I Have to lose weight. I have to do this. As opposed to really focusing on the positive, which is how do we build ourselves up and what are the choices in both words, thoughts and actions that really have a positive outcome? You know, the other part about the kids is our kids pray before every meal. They go to chapel every Thursday. We tell them five things and they have to also exhibit those five things.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:17:02]: And the five things are the following. I am strong, I am kind, I am worthy, I am courageous, and I am loved.

Ben Greenfield [00:17:11]: I love it.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:17:12]: And this is just a, again, a tactical way of how we use it for our little kids versus if you think about the adult version of these things, you might hear adults say I'm just not that athletic or I'm just too old or it's my genetics or I could never X, Y and Z. And number one, are any of these thoughts true? Probably not. And number two, are any of them relevant, which is really the assessment part. And then finally, number three, what is the outcome or the action that you're going to take to choose to move into a more powerful version of oneself? Again, how do we train the body that's easy. How do we train the mind that also requires very specific structure that is easy and accessible for people.

Ben Greenfield [00:18:02]: Yeah. And as you're describing this, I think one thing that leaps out to me is how much confidence it takes to do that. Because self awareness means you're looking more internally than at what the world expects you to be. And then when you're looking at the assessment or the discernment part, you need to be connected enough to yourself and confident enough in yourself to know that you can kind of listen to the conscience and you've formed enough wisdom to be able to do so. And then activation is of course the courage and the confidence to do it. And I'm assuming as someone goes through an average day, that this becomes almost like unconscious competence where it's just decision is awareness, assessment, activation, go over and over again throughout the day.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:18:47]: That's exactly right. And ultimately that's what you want. You don't want to have all of your mental energy tied up in having to course correct yourself. And again, are you climbing the right ladder?

Ben Greenfield [00:19:00]: Yeah.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:19:01]: We all have a limited amount of time here and what we do and how we think matters because it informs also the next right action.

Ben Greenfield [00:19:10]: Now, you and I are probably like a little bit biased when it comes to the action piece in that like I think we embrace physical challenges and increasing mental and social challenges, but you present this as almost like friction. I think A lot of people flee from friction to a certain extent, the discomfort that comes with it. And this was honestly one of my favorite parts about the book, because I live by this philosophy that every year you need to have something on the calendar that kind of scares the hell out of you. This year, it's spearfishing, free diving, hog hunting, and gator hunting down in Florida in May with my sons. So over the next few months, we got to be shooting the bow, we got to be working on wrestling skills, our knife skills, our breathwork skills, our diving skills, and you grow a ton when you have something like that on the calendar. But you lay out all these different ways to increase friction. You go beyond the physical. So.

Ben Greenfield [00:20:11]: So tell me about your thoughts on friction and why we need it and how you kind of like, think about the different categories that we could increase friction.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:20:18]: Yeah. So the idea of friction I. I think is obvious. The idea of friction is putting yourself in an uncomfortable situation. And that could be mentally, physically, or spiritual. People really feel like friction is the thing to avoid. We develop lives around seeking comfort. And again, part of this might be cultural, but I think that seeking friction really refines you, and it helps an individual grow.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:20:46]: It creates resistance. And, you know, you don't grow when things are butterflies and rainbows. You just don't. You must put yourself in positions to be just, you know, uncomfortable, and that is creating friction. And oftentimes people think about friction as just this physical in the way, which is where I first heard about you many years ago. Do you know where this was? I'm just curious if you remember.

Ben Greenfield [00:21:11]: Oh, man, I don't know if you're gonna remember. I was like Iron Man.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:21:17]: No, it was actually Mark Divine's kokoro camp.

Ben Greenfield [00:21:19]: Oh, kokoro. Okay. You might have to tell people what kokoro is.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:21:24]: Ben doesn't know this, but we've known. So Mark Divine is a former Commander seal. Mark is a very special human. His. He's cloaked in this SEAL way, but really he's this meditation yogi, which is very unusual. And many years ago, at least 10. So how many years ago? It was probably actually closer to 20. He designed because after 9, 11 is when my husband joined the Navy.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:21:53]: He designed something called kokoro camp. So kokoro camp is a Japanese word for. I don't know exactly, but maybe it's like finding your spirit. Whatever it is.

Ben Greenfield [00:22:03]: I just thought I meant beat your ass down for three days.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:22:06]: That's exactly what it was. So it's a mini hell week. Hell Week, for those of you guys who are unfamiliar, is what the seals go through. It's a selection process. My husband, so my husband was a seal for 10 years. Recently retired. Now he's in his third year of surgical residency as a urologist. And he, before he went into the SEAL teams, went to Mark for the experience of Kokoro.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:22:33]: Okay, which is so interesting. And this is where I first heard about Ben. There was. You must have been in the first handful of classes of doing this Kokoro camp, which is this 50 hour beat your ass down. And that is an example of creating friction. So, so it's cloaked in the entry point is physical friction. But ultimately it becomes much more of a mental. A mental challenge.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:23:01]: And that's a big friction event as opposed to a small friction would be. I love to train to loud music and caffeine. Give me all of it. You take that away. Now you're creating problems for me.

Ben Greenfield [00:23:15]: Turn the music and the caffeine into a sometimes drug and you build mental resilience pretty fast.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:23:20]: So that's an idea of creating more mental friction. Something that I use a lot with patients because I still actually see patients and I take care of a lot of, you know, CEOs and people that are really looking for something more. And one of the things that we do is we build out ways of creating mental friction in their day. For example, you flip a coin, heads you get that Starbucks, tails you don't. And so for five days you can imagine how annoying that would be to go to Starbucks or whatever your place of choice is. You flip a coin, heads, you get the order that you just ordered entails that you have to pay for it and leave it.

Ben Greenfield [00:23:54]: Wait, are you leaving it for somebody else?

Gabrielle Lyon [00:23:56]: Yeah, but it's annoying. Yeah, it's annoying. And you do that over time. But by the, the seventh time of doing it, you care less whether you get it or not. You become a bit impartial to all of this external. And it doesn't have to be these big crucible events. You don't have to jump out of an airplane, you don't have to wrestle a gator to create small amounts of friction that ultimately add to a more robust human. And then emotional and social friction is also a way of friction which is can be really uncomfortable.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:24:29]: For example, making yourself call that person that perhaps you don't want to or you know, might be my mother in law, but you know, whatever. And you put yourself in positions where it's a bit uncomfortable and you have to be able to Ride that, that wave.

Ben Greenfield [00:24:49]: Call them, not text them. When I was growing up, if you wanted to be courageous and have a hard conversation with someone, you'd have it face to face. And then smartphones came along and now it's hard enough to call someone versus text them. I'm shocked at the number of people who will try to resolve something via text. It's almost like easier to hide behind text messages compared to phone. And of course phone compared to face to face is something altogether different. But you know, and I don't want to like throw anybody under the bus, but I work with a lot of young people, you know, kind of like Gen Z and around that general age range, and it's hard to get people to pick up the phone to like make shit happen, like to do a deal or to follow up on something versus like text and email. So even that is, what do you call that? Emotional friction, environmental friction?

Gabrielle Lyon [00:25:41]: That's emotional friction. And you bring up a really good point because we are creating and fostering a way of somewhat of emotional disconnection. And while people experience that to be easier, that's not how humans were designed. We're not designed for that. And it's a skill. I actually really like that you brought that up. Because if we do things via text and we do things in a way that's digital, it's somewhat of a cop out. And you don't have the same experience that it was actually required to resolve something which is either face to face or a phone call.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:26:18]: And to really be able to work through that. And now more than ever we have to really consciously live. Otherwise I think a lot about AI and AI is wonderful. So for example, we use AI in medicine all the time. I use something called open evidence. Open evidence allows me to look at the most up to date anabolics or the most up to date way of utilizing testosterone replacement therapy or any of these things. Right. And it allows us to look at all of the data or what are these randomized controlled trials.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:26:52]: And it's very valuable. But on the same hand, it allows humans the opportunity to think less for themselves and rely heavily on a computer thinking for them. And that, that is scary because thinking and discernment, these are all perishable skills.

Ben Greenfield [00:27:12]: Back to the, to the children thing. Also like it is, it's pretty easy, let's say you just want to like have a conversation with, I don't know, somebody you're interested in, like a member of the opposite sex. It's easy to slide into the DMs it's a lot harder to actually ask somebody out to coffee and go there and sit with them and make eye contact. And I tell my sons, how old are they now?

Gabrielle Lyon [00:27:37]: How old are they now?

Ben Greenfield [00:27:38]: They're 17. They're twin boys. I tell them neither of these situations are ideal, but compared to smoking weed and watching porn in their bedroom, I, I would much rather them be like hustling to get a fake driver's license and sneak into a bar to meet girls. I would rather them be doing the courageous and dangerous thing than the easy way out that so many like halfway sterilized, I think especially males engage in in today's digital culture.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:28:10]: Yes. And it is exactly that. It's a digital culture in which we've removed. Removed. We've removed all frictions, physical, emotional, mental. And in order for us to really reorient ourselves to that, we have to put moments in place where it's challenging, truly. Otherwise I have a lot of concerns. I think that what's going to happen is the generations are going to separate and it's going to be generations like us, where we think about how our children are being raised, where they should be both tough and vulnerable all at the same time, but also a very conscious way of living or the easy way out, which is reduce frictions at all costs.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:28:54]: And I, I think that that's, I think that that's a real challenge and I think it's really dangerous and we don't even know what the repercussions are going to be.

Ben Greenfield [00:29:02]: Yeah, yeah. And like we gotta talk about protein and muscle and we will. But to put a bow on this idea of friction you have, this is probably one of my favorite phases in the book, self led crucible challenges. And then I think on the next page you have actual like structured crucible challenges like kokoro. So some of these are pretty fun. I don't know if you remember all the ones that you wrote down, but things like 30,000 steps a day challenge for 30 days, which is great. I could maybe do that because I work on the treadmill, but that's a big one.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:29:38]: My, my 74, my 74 year old dad, he's just killer, man.

Ben Greenfield [00:29:44]: He do that.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:29:45]: So. Yes. And my dad lives in Ecuador. The deal is if it's over four hours, we get to take a car. If it's four hours or less of walking to get to the location we have to walk.

Ben Greenfield [00:29:59]: That's like when I travel, you probably run into this too. You, you might travel with a group of people and you got to whatever, do like the whole food stop. And if Whole foods is anywhere 2 miles or less from where I'm staying, I run, ruck or walk there and then ruck all the groceries back. And most people are like, wait, we don't have time to get groceries, we gotta go to the gym. And I'm like, this is our workout, we're going to get groceries. But you got to like think it a different way.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:30:29]: You do. You know, my husband, he runs to work and back every day, rain or shine.

Ben Greenfield [00:30:35]: It's awesome. Yeah. Yeah, that's funny. That's what I used to do when my office was 10 miles down the road. I lived in Liberty Lake, Washington. It was in Spokane, Washington. And yeah, every morning and I was trading for Ironman, so I had a reason. But ride to work, snow, rain, ice, didn't matter, ride back.

Ben Greenfield [00:30:54]: And if you paint yourself in that corner, we were just like a poor one car family, you know, it's just do it and then yeah, you've got other ones in here like mental Murph, 60 minute workout in silence which would torture a lot of people. Followed by a 30 minute meditation and then journal about discomfort. So yeah, I love that page of the book by the way. You guys get the book just for these two pages alone. So you get some ideas and then you have structured crucible challenges. Besides Kokoro, what are some ones that you really like that people could just like go to the website look at and maybe sign up for something scary this year?

Gabrielle Lyon [00:31:30]: Yeah, a goruck would be great. High rocks. A lot of people are doing High rocks or Ironman Ultra or just a regular marathon.

Ben Greenfield [00:31:40]: Yeah, those are all I was looking at. Before I decided to do the bow hunting spearfishing challenge, I was looking at the, the tactical games. That looks like another pretty cool one.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:31:51]: Oh, that looks cool. I mean that looks amazing. I would love to do that. And the other thing that you know I would love to do, which I again have to really think about the time coming. You guys do have to really think about this. Cause you have to train up for it would be adventure racing. I would love to do adventure racing.

Ben Greenfield [00:32:10]: Yeah, yeah, I used to do that. It's, it's the best piece of advice for adventure racing is it doesn't matter how fast you're going, if you're going fast in the wrong direction. Because I made that mistake a lot in adventure racing. And then the other one, they used to do more of these. They still have a couple of them, but they're kind of like the tactical Games with a bow. There was one that I used to compete in called Train to Hunt. There is another one that's called, I think it's called the Top Pin Challenge. And then tactical games are with weapons.

Ben Greenfield [00:32:40]: I think you have a carbine equivalent and a handgun. And you're doing things like the sled pushes and sandbag carries in between getting your heart rate down to shoot, which just sounds like a great challenge.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:32:51]: Wow. I mean it sounds amazing.

Ben Greenfield [00:32:54]: Yeah. Okay, so let's talk about the, the thing that you're probably really well known for and that's the protein muscle piece. I just, I want to get into some specifics on the nutrition piece. So how much protein, and this is a two parter, does that change if you're trying to build muscle or maintain.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:33:20]: This is a really interesting perspective that I don't think people talk about. And to be fair, Ben and I have known each other for, gosh, a while now and I've been talking about protein, I don't know, for the last 20 years. It's now finally getting the attention that it deserves, which is also hysterical. And I'm very grateful. And the protein conversation goes like this. How do we make protein decisions? There are three main ways in which we make them. Number one. Well, I would say first, understanding that protein is the only and most important essential macronutrient.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:33:56]: As we age, you need like 3 or 4 grams of essential fatty acids, carbohydrates, you can make all of them. When it comes to an actual need, an essential need, meaning your body cannot make it, protein is the most important. But what's interesting about dietary protein is that we turn over between 250 to 300 grams of protein a day, which means the body replaces itself roughly four times a year. As we get older, we become less efficient at this process. Therefore, age is my first decision in how much protein that we need. The older that you are, the more protein that you need. And that number, really the range, how we like to think about it, is between 0.7 to 1 gram of protein per pound of target weight.

Ben Greenfield [00:34:49]: Thank you for not doing kilograms since most of our listeners are in the US newsflash. Okay, so.7 to 1 gram per pound.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:34:59]: Of target body weight.

Ben Greenfield [00:35:00]: Not body weight.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:35:01]: Okay, target body weight. Again, if, and I imagine that most people are very into fitness that are listening to this, there's actually a U shaped curve. If you are sedentary and over 40, or let's just say maybe even in your 60s, you need more protein than someone in their 40s. The older you are, the more protein that you need. If you're training as much as Ben, you can go to 1 gram per pound of target body weight. Your activity is really high, so you probably are utilizing carbohydrates. And maybe a one to one ratio would be great for you. But the protein amount should not go below 0.7 grams per target body weight.

Ben Greenfield [00:35:47]: And just to contextualize that, what. What would be the current governmental guidelines for protein intake compared to not going lower than 0.7 gram per pound?

Gabrielle Lyon [00:35:58]: The current recommendation, which is the RDA, is set at 0.37grams per pound.

Ben Greenfield [00:36:04]: Oh, so like half of what you're recommending.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:36:06]: And also it's probably a completely irrelevant number. You know, everyone talks about the rda, the Recommended Dietary Allowance. Yeah, it's an irrelevant number. It's based on nitrogen balance studies from the early 1900s with no known health outcome. People are saying, oh, is it more than the rda? Do we need more than the rda? Do we need less than the rda? And that's the wrong question. The right question is, is the RDA even a relevant number? It's not. It's not even a relevant number.

Ben Greenfield [00:36:33]: Just crazy. Okay. And for reaching that, I know, you know, obviously whole food sources are good, but you talk about protein forward snacks in the book, and those are cool, but like supplements, do you like, add supplements in, like, rice, hemp, pea protein, whey protein, amino acids, things like that?

Gabrielle Lyon [00:36:56]: Yeah. So no one should be going below 100 grams of dietary protein a day. What we found is that when individuals go below this, it seems to not have the same metabolic effect. Protein does a number of things aside from rebuild and repair. It's made up of all of these 20 different amino acids, all of which do unique and various things. For example, threonine is an amino acid that's essential for gut health. And when you eat to target muscle, you hit really the optimal number for all of these other amino acids. We need methionine for glutathione production.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:37:35]: Glutathione is the master antioxidant. And really our needs triple as we age in order to make enough glutathione. And while we think about dietary protein as this overarching one thing, it's not. It's 20 different amino acids, all of which have unique biological inputs for overall health and wellness. But if we target the needs of muscle, then everything else falls into place. So the minimum amount of protein, people should not go below 100 grams of protein a day.

Ben Greenfield [00:38:07]: Yeah. My son is Trying to go from. He's about 165, he's trying to get to 180 right now. He's pulsing three separate times throughout the day. 10 grams of essentials of essential amino acids. And I've done that before with some people who are really trying to put on size for sports or for a screen role. And that pulsing with protein throughout the day, especially things like a supplemental form like whey protein or amino acids, seems to make a big difference.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:38:38]: Yeah, the whey. So I love whey protein and I also love essential amino acids. And the way in which we use essential amino acids in our practice are for the following ways. If someone is thinking, okay, well, one gram per pound of target body weight. That's a lot of food and a lot of calories and I'm not interested. Right. Especially with the use of GLP1s. Perhaps someone's appetite is not there.

Ben Greenfield [00:39:06]: Oh, yeah.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:39:07]: So what we use is, we'll use, say, for example, a smaller piece of fish because let's say an individual can stomach that. But if that is a two ounce piece of fish and maybe it has, I don't know, 10 grams of protein, we know that that's not enough to support our overall goals and muscle health. So we'll add in an essential amino acid scoop, 1 to 3, depending I use Body health, but depending on which brand you use, this is how we do it. And so that 10 gram of protein from fish now registers to the body as a 30 gram meal or a 50 gram meal, which as you age, it becomes more important, especially if your caloric intake is low. Now, your boys are highly anabolic. And essentially what you're doing is you're keeping them highly anabolic because you are providing them, you know, they're probably extremely active. So you're providing these basic building blocks to be able to repair and rebuild in the way necessary.

Ben Greenfield [00:40:09]: Plus it means there's more steak leftover for me because I eat everything in the freezer. So I'm like, here, take aminos. So speaking of, like the pulsing, um, you know, maybe this is old school and I'm sure you've addressed it, but, you know, I think there's this prevailing theory that, oh, you can only absorb 20 grams at a time, so you gotta, you know, never do more than 20 grams of protein. Some people say 30. Hence there's lots of recommendations to pulse it throughout the day. With those recommendations, is it really like an absorption issue or is it just an issue with getting like multiple anabolic surges throughout the Today, well, the data.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:40:52]: Would support that you can absorb all of it, whether it's 30 to 50. There's a belief that you max out the muscle effect at around 50. Okay, but the minimum, 30 grams of protein is the minimum required to stimulate muscle For a more mature person. There's really two groups. There's the 18 and younger or the people that are still growing, maybe it's in the mid-20s and then there's 40 plus. And those individuals we have to really think about at one time. How do we optimally stimulate muscle if body composition is what we're after, if or that person is not eating a higher protein diet, we have to become more strategic about how we do it. So you can absorb all of the protein.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:41:41]: Protein from a muscle effect that maxes out around 50 grams. The data, actually the only data we have really and have well, is at that first meal. And that first meal could be any time because you're coming out of an overnight fast. So the data is very supportive of that first meal being between 30 and 50. And then beyond that, it's how do we then design a diet to get all of the rest of the protein needs met? And I would argue that that last meal is also more critical. And here's what we know there, there's a group, Arnel et al. Which is a French group, and they looked at protein pulsing throughout the day and they looked at, it was the same group of individuals and it was older, more mature women. And one meal was 50 grams of protein and the rest was say sub threshold, like 10 grams.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:42:33]: And then the other arm of the study, so it was a crossover design, was all sub thresholds. So 10 grams of protein pulsed throughout the day. The group that had the 50 gram amount actually maintained the most muscle, the most quote, lean mass. And I think that that's really important. So if someone is going to do protein pulsing, the one thing that they absolutely have to do is to make sure that they have a 50 gram meal.

Ben Greenfield [00:43:03]: Okay, interesting. So, and that 50 gram meal could be any time. But I think you said like before bed is a pretty good time for the big protein bolus.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:43:11]: It could be the first meal or that last meal.

Ben Greenfield [00:43:15]: Okay, okay, cool. All right, so we got to put the protein to work. And you of course talk about exercise in the book. You don't have to go do kokoro. One thing, and that's my whole background, I think, you know this, Gabriel is exercise physiology and biomechanics. And so I love to see some people's thoughts on muscle Growth. You talk about old theory versus new understanding. What's the old versus the new?

Gabrielle Lyon [00:43:44]: Yeah, I think that for the longest period of time, people felt like muscle damage was the way that muscle group, but really it is the tension. So it's the mechanical input or the mechanical stressor, the stimulus that is the most important and that's the new understanding. As opposed to muscle damage being the primary driver. It really is mechanical tension.

Ben Greenfield [00:44:13]: What's that mean for people who might not understand the difference between. Because some people hear tension, they're like, well, yeah, I'm damaging the muscle. Same thing. How do you differentiate the two?

Gabrielle Lyon [00:44:21]: Well, from our standpoint, we can differentiate it, but what I think becomes important is it really highlights the idea that a well designed training program is incredibly important because people talk about progressive overload and progressive overload is really the theory that you're always having to add more weight. And you and I both know that the fastest way to get injured is to, to outpace what you can possibly do. So it really is about progressive stimulus. Progressive stimulus can happen in a number of different ways. Progressive stimulus can be adding another day, can be utilizing tempo, it can be.

Ben Greenfield [00:45:02]: Adding more reps, angles, apparatus. Yeah, like I. Right now I'm in the middle of a six week landmine training program. Program and three days a week I'm on the landmine for like almost an hour. And part of it is I'm in a little bit of a muscle growth phase. So I'm looking for the new stimulus, but something like that. Just like switching from machines to kettlebells or freeways to landmine. Huge difference in terms of the stimuli.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:45:33]: And the growth and that's exactly right. So what you're doing is rather than just lifting heavier, you're allowing for your tendons to catch up with your muscles. The fastest way to get injured is to just build strong muscle and then not recognize that there is a tendon aspect as well.

Ben Greenfield [00:45:52]: Yeah, yeah. By the way, you ever do much with the landmine?

Gabrielle Lyon [00:45:55]: All the time.

Ben Greenfield [00:45:57]: Yeah. Yeah, it's like I. So my original impression of it was you've got like, you know, you got, you got like your lunging presses and you have your torso. It's with those are the two that people are most familiar with. But oh my gosh, goblet squats, deadlifts, single arm deadlifts, RDLs, rows. You do a ton with that thing. I got a book and just like it was kind of funny. My son and I set the book down on the gym floor and spent like an hour and A half doing every single exercise in the book.

Ben Greenfield [00:46:24]: And then we put a program together. But yeah, super versatile tool. And pretty. If you own a barbell, pretty cheap, like 40 bucks on Amazon, you've got a landmine.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:46:34]: And what you're talking about now is adding in rotational movement and adding in things above and beyond what people would traditionally think about. So in Playbook I designed, there's the foundation 5, it's prehab, so there's movements that people can do that add in rotation. Because it's not just about building strength or focusing on hypertrophy. There is a rotational aspect, there's a balance aspect of. There's a stability aspect. All of which is really critical from the standpoint of, you know, what we're looking for is longevity. We're looking for being able to be physically capable and do all the stuff that we love for a really long period of time. It's not just about going hard or going home.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:47:14]: And so what you're saying is really beginning to think about the body in motion as to how it is designed to be. And I think that that's ultimately what it is that we are all hoping for.

Ben Greenfield [00:47:28]: Yeah. Now what do you do for cardio?

Gabrielle Lyon [00:47:31]: Now this is interesting. There is really two camps. There's this idea of long, slow, steady state, which is zone two can totally be valuable. As a mom of two little children, I do more high intensity interval training.

Ben Greenfield [00:47:47]: Oh, come on. You don't have the double jogging stroller and the double bike trailer?

Gabrielle Lyon [00:47:51]: Frankly, no, because I don't have time for that. But what I do do is I add in vilpa. So it's vigorous, intermittent physical activity, and that is in multiple times a day. And actually, you were the first person that I heard talking about exercise snacks.

Ben Greenfield [00:48:05]: Yeah.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:48:06]: Essentially it's the exercise snack component, which is very valuable. And then also there's the high intensity interval training, which is focused. It can be 20 minutes. Where. And there's a. And you know, I put in multiple protocols as to how to do this. It's about 85%, your VO2 max. We are not talking about 100% effort, which is very difficult to get to mentally.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:48:30]: And also, you know, that might be a four minute workout. That's. That's a sprint interval training. Zone two is also important. You know, what we're talking about is why would we do zone 2 versus high intensity interval training? Or are we doing both? And ideally, you're doing both. The way that I think about it is there's the muscle standpoint of building muscle mass Strength, hypertrophy. The mass piece is important because it's your amino acid reservoir. It's the site for your metabolic health, whether it's insulin resistance, insulin sensitivity, muscle burns, primarily fatty acids.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:49:09]: So there's the. The muscle mass itself is important, and then there is the plumbing aspect. We talked about endothelial health again. We just published this paper on sexual function and muscle mass and strength. So we use muscle to improve endothelial health and vasodilation. It's essentially the plumbing and that is really important for cardiovascular health, for brain health, for all the other organ systems and the way in which our body is dependent on the plumbing. And also removal of waste and increasing blood flow and improving oxygen and nutrient flow to all other tissues. And so zone two cardio is great, great for mitochondrial health, but also if someone doesn't have the time for that.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:49:57]: So, for example, for me, I rely on high intensity interval training, which also improves my VO2 max.

Ben Greenfield [00:50:04]: Okay. Okay, got it. All right, so a few, few quick, fun ones for you here to finish up. You're traveling. You're recording this in a hotel right now, which is why your kids bust in on you.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:50:16]: Yes.

Ben Greenfield [00:50:17]: Let's say I don't imagine you stay at that many crappy hotels, but let's say you check into the hotel with the rusty, squeaky elliptical trainer and some old chipped dumbbells and you want to do some kind of a gym free workout. What do you do when you don't have access to a gym and you're traveling?

Gabrielle Lyon [00:50:36]: Okay, great question. First off, if you are going to a hotel, don't go to a hotel without a gym or don't go to a hotel without a gym in the vicinity. So you have to plan and prepare, otherwise you're setting yourself up for failure. Number two, if that is not possible, you are going to a remote area or you're stuck on the airplane or whatever it is. I do two things. I always travel with bands or blood flow restriction.

Ben Greenfield [00:51:00]: Yeah.

Ben Greenfield [00:51:02]: No.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:51:04]: Space in a suitcase. Even if it's one band, you better believe I'm traveling with it. Body weight, I do 100 push ups a day. If for me, if, for example, I know that I'm not like yesterday, I was exhausted, what did I do? I ended up doing push ups. And you should always do. And you know, you think about it, you plan it out. So for me, I do a hundred push ups a day. You can do a hundred push ups, 100 squats, 100 burpees.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:51:28]: Pick 100, pick 100 of your favorite things. Pick three exercises. And the other part that I will say is you're training smart and intensely so when things don't go as planned, you're not dependent on that training session.

Ben Greenfield [00:51:42]: Yeah, I love that. The only thing that's different between us because I'm the same way, £2 or less, right? Elastic band that's thick enough that you can't press it overhead more than 10 times, blood flow restriction bands. And then the last one for me is just a cheapo door frame suspension strap so you can get some of the pulling rhomboids, scapular retraction, some of the stuff that's harder to get with push ups and that's it. And then like you people often look at my hands like why are your hands beat up? Why are your fingernails chipped and your knuckles are all worn out? I'm the same way. I hit 100, 250 push ups a day so my hands are always down on the gravel, fist on the concrete and yeah, that's a free and easy one. Okay, so next question. You are on a road trip. For some reason you rushed out super fast and you don't have your fancy upgraded pemmican sticks or whatever in your car and you stop at the convenience store and you want to get some kind of protein forward snack walking to the average 7 11.

Ben Greenfield [00:52:45]: Um, what are you going to grab?

Gabrielle Lyon [00:52:47]: Hard boiled eggs, yogurt. And most people have, most places have a protein shake. Also beef jerky. And quite frankly I keep beef jerky packed in my bag. I keep my stuff packed. So I again I'm planning to not be in that situation but if I am, those are my go tos. Hard boiled eggs, yogurt, they almost always have Greek yogurt. Always have some kind of shake or some really gross hyper salty preservative filled beef jerky.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:53:19]: Again, if you had to choose between you know, some high carb, non valuable, no nutrient density option versus something that's not perfect, you can't get let perfection get in the way of. These are the standards that you've set for yourself. You know, we're not talking about goal setting, we're setting physical standards. And those physical standards are again what you put into your body, how you move. And it doesn't have to be perfect, that beef jerky might not be perfect. Again, you're in the convenience store in the middle of Arkansas. It's not going to be perfect but it falls in line with your standard. And I think that that's a good way of thinking about things because People will go, well, I'm not eating that.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:54:04]: That is a bunch of preservatives. And so I'm just going to eat the. I don't know. I don't know what that other option is.

Ben Greenfield [00:54:09]: Yeah, there's always the birthday cake flavored quest bars too.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:54:12]: So there you go.

Ben Greenfield [00:54:14]: Not half bad. You don't want to be on a road trip with me if I've had a couple of those though. Okay. Last one. You're stuck on a plane. Let's say it's a cross the pond flight. Eight hours, nine hours, whatever. Top moves to stay fit or at least stay somewhat healthy on a plane.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:54:32]: So I bring a heavy resistance band. So not the. Because I plan for it.

Ben Greenfield [00:54:37]: It.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:54:37]: I just recently went to Australia. Here's what I brought on the plane. I brought a thick band to put around my knees for. They're like clamshells or you can do. It's almost like a kickback.

Ben Greenfield [00:54:51]: Like while you're sitting in the chair.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:54:53]: Oh yeah. And then also standing up. I have no shame. It's okay. Yeah, I do it in. In the aisle.

Ben Greenfield [00:55:02]: All these are little powered up devices. These are kind of cool too.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:55:05]: Oh, it's that. Yeah.

Ben Greenfield [00:55:07]: They're surprisingly strong for. For like an electrical muscle device that's. I think therabody makes those. Those are pretty good too. Just for a little bit of quad stimuli or put them on the arms on the plane.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:55:18]: Yeah. So what I've used is. I've used Firefly. I've put them on my quads and my calves. I also. Okay. So the. The exercise component is the really thick bands as well as a thin band to do any kind of like a row.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:55:34]: Again, it was 13 hours. And you don't feel. I personally don't feel good sitting in one small confined space to do it. And then I'm a smaller person so I can do push ups in the aisle and it doesn't matter. You can look at me crazy again. It. It doesn't faze me. That is one is one way to do it.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:55:53]: And then also I bring small compression sleeves that actually inflate and deflate.

Ben Greenfield [00:55:59]: Oh, those are awesome. Yeah, I have those. Those are incredible. That's a game changer for a long flight. We did Australia. We did Australia last June. So long. And you just.

Ben Greenfield [00:56:08]: Yeah. You got to keep moving. Okay. So. BenGreenfieldLife.com ForeverStrong this is the playbook. Oh. This is the advanced readers edition.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:56:23]: The real book is bigger glossy pages.

Ben Greenfield [00:56:28]: I always get the crappy review version, folks. So BenGreenfieldLife.com ForeverStrong I will link there also not only to everything we talked about, but my original podcast with Gabriel where we also talk more about protein, muscle, muscle centric medicine, and a whole lot more. Gabriel, you're amazing as usual. Thanks for doing this.

Gabrielle Lyon [00:56:48]: I really appreciate your flexibility even with crazy kids running in and out. So I I really appreciate you.

Ben Greenfield [00:56:53]: That's right. All right, well, Merry Christmas everybody. Get the book. Pick out your crucible for the New Year. I want to hear what it is. Leave a [email protected] foreverstrong I read them all. Have an incredible week.

Ben Greenfield [00:57:05]: To discover even more tips, tricks, hacks and content to become the most complete, boundless version of you, visit BenGreenfieldLife.com. In compliance with the FTC guidelines, please assume the following about links and posts on this site. Most of the links going to products are often affiliate links, of which I receive a small commission from sales of certain items. But the price is the same for you, and sometimes I even get to share a unique and somewhat significant discount with you. In some cases, I might also be an investor in a company I mentioned. I'm the founder, for example, of Kion llc, the makers of Kion branded supplements and products, which I talk about quite a bit. Regardless of the relationship, if I post or talk about an affiliate link to a product, it is indeed something I personally use, support and with full authenticity and transparency recommend. In good conscience, I personally vet each and every product that I talk about.

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