The Daria Hamrah Podcast

Rewiring Health: Muscle, Mindset, And GLPs For High-Performing Women - With Rachel Godfrey

• Daria Hamrah • Season 7 • Episode 1

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Stop grinding through more cardio and eating less while getting softer and more exhausted. We brought in performance coach, physiotherapist and podcast host of "The Chase Life Podcast", Rachel Godfrey to map a new operating system for women in their 40s and 50s—one built on muscle, recovery, nervous system regulation, and the standards that make results inevitable. If you’ve been told to track every macro, weigh blueberries, and just “try harder,” this conversation will feel like oxygen.

We get specific about why old rules fail in midlife and how identity drives outcomes. High achievers often run on perfectionism, people pleasing, and completion addiction, which work for business but stall health. Rachel shows how to upgrade identity and build non-negotiables you can keep during travel, deadlines, and family chaos. Her minimal effective dose playbook—three strength sessions a week, protein-forward meals, planned “worst-day” routines—creates year-round consistency without burnout.

We also tackle GLP-1 agonists with nuance. Used well, they turn down food noise and help break dopamine-driven cravings; used poorly, they tank appetite, slash protein, and cost you muscle. Learn how to set dosing to preserve hunger cues, keep 30–50 grams of protein per meal, and align training so fat loss doesn’t become “smaller but weaker.” Rachel breaks myths about women and weights, explains smarter exercise selection, and connects real food to collagen, skin quality, and long-term health.

This is a clear, practical roadmap for women who lead, build, and care for others—and want a body that can keep up. Subscribe, share with a friend who needs a new OS, and leave a review to help more women find this message.

Rachel Godfrey links:

Podcast: The Chase Life Podcast

Website: Chase Life Consulting

Instagram: @therachelgodfrey

Tweet me @realdrhamrah
IG @drhamrah

SPEAKER_00:

Alright, everyone, welcome to the show. And uh this one's is for you. If you're a successful woman in your 40s and 50s, running a business, raising a family, which is much like a business, carrying everyone and still feel stuck in your body. This is your wake-up call. You're not broken, you're not lazy, and you don't need more motivation. What you do need is to stop living in the victim story. I don't have time, my hormones ruined me, it's just my age. Because the truth is, you're running high performance DNA on a broken operating system. And the fitness industry keeps feeding you old rules: more cardio, less food, light weights, rules that might have worked at 25 or 30, but in midlife they often leave you puffy, hungry, inflamed, and exhausted. Today I'm sitting down with Rachel Godfrey, a former physiotherapist, performance coach, and the A player's mentor, who helped high-achieving women rebuild health like infrastructure, not like lifestyle advice. If you want a new body in your 40s and 50s, you need a new operating system, which is muscle, recovery, nervous system regulation, and standards, not more punishment disguised as discipline. So let's get in. I'm really excited to have you here, Rachel. We worked a long time to make this happen. I know you're in Australia and I'm in the United States, so it's quite a time difference. What time is it there for you right now?

SPEAKER_02:

Well, I'm currently in Abu Dhabi, so it's like 3:30 in the afternoon. So we're all good.

SPEAKER_00:

3 30, okay. But it's early morning for you. Yes. That's the best time for me because I'm super fresh. So uh, Rachel, it we we live in a society where there's these myths like clouds hanging over most women when it comes to weight loss and exercise. And everything the playing field has changed slightly, not slightly, actually dramatically in the past couple of years, with uh the rediscovery of GLPs, GLP agonists, which are the weight loss drugs that used to use be used for diabetes, still are. But you've been in the fitness and bodybuilding industry for many years, for many decades, and helping women trying to transform their bodies, especially highly motivated women. So these are not women that sit on the couch every day necessarily. They're already high achievers in their life, in their business, but they're struggling with one thing, which is the changes that happen within their bodies in midlife. What is the biggest challenge that you have encountered in trying to help these women in being able to make these types of changes in their bodies and get over these victim stories that they feed themselves?

SPEAKER_02:

Well, the I mean, we're gonna open with a bang here because you've just dropped in GLPs, you've dropped in mindset, we're gonna talk about psychology, we're gonna talk about spirituality, we're gonna talk about everything. So I think the best place to start is this 30,000-foot view of what it takes to get a body transformation and actually what it takes to be in shape. And when I talk about being in shape, I talk about being in shape year-round, not just these sort of 12-week, you know, I'm gonna diet hard and I'm gonna do all of the things, or I'm just gonna go on a GLP and therefore my appetite's gonna be reduced. If you do that, you're just going to end up a smaller version of yourself and in a worse position because you're also probably gonna lose muscle mass. So we have to incorporate all of this. So I look at this and I say there's two ways to lose weight. We've got the fitness industry approach to lose weight, which is what honestly 99.9% of personal trainers will tell you to do. And that's to track your calories, count your macros, you know, weigh your blueberries and count grains of rice into plastic pots. Now, let's be honest here, most of us we are very busy, we have got very little time on our hands, and doing these things that honestly a monkey can teach you how to do that. That is not the problem here. What we're dealing with is a much bigger problem because we are five bodies, right? We are the mental, emotional, spiritual, energetic, and physical body. And the fitness industry is only dealing with the physical body. They're not dealing and they're not seeing the whole the person as a whole. And you must see this in clinic as well, where somebody comes to you. I mean, we both work in industries that which is like rife with poor self-worth. And I think, you know, being in the industries that we're in, we can do amazing things for somebody's confidence and self-worth. You know, I've got I've had plastic surgery myself, I've had my breast implants done, I've had an upper blaphroplasty, you know, and I know what that can do to my self-confidence, for example. But you've got to go about it the right way. And you have to come into surgery and you have to come into weight loss with the right mindset. So, that being said, we've got the fitness industry approach, and we've probably got the majority of the surgery approach to weight loss, right? And so then we have the other side, which is a much more holistic side of looking at somebody, which is where we look at the energetic, the spiritual, the mental, and the emotional well-being as well. And we have to do that in order to be able to get the body transformation. Because what I say is that we cannot shoehorn yet another diet and exercise program into an already chaotic lifestyle. So the translation for that would be you talked about an operating system earlier, and we're running, we we've we've got this DNA as high achievers that nobody will, nobody really seems to understand. And one of the worst things that you can say to a high achiever is, oh, just have a little bit more self-care. Why don't you just relax a little bit? Just put your feet up, take some time off. Like we don't understand what those words mean. So what we have to do instead is give somebody the foundation in which to operate. And so the way that we do that is upgrade somebody's identity and rewire their brain so that we can manage the traits that made them successful in the first place, but are often the glass ceiling when it comes to their health. So things like people pleasing, perfectionism, being a human doing. So basically having all of yourself worth, being tied up and being busy and achieving completion addiction. So that like that addictive feeling of, oh God, I've just got to, you know, tick the next thing off my to-do list, the campaign lifestyle, which is where somebody will go on a six-week body transformation program and then they come, and then they go on like a vacation and they like having a you know one too many pina coladas at 9 a.m. They come back in an abysmal state of health and then shit hits the fam when it comes to work. Then they're into a 12-week, you know, or a 12-month, you know, round of financing and it's just too busy to even contemplate going to the gym. They come home, you know, it's hardly an oasis when they get home because they've got two young kids, and but you know, we we we both know what that feels like. Yes, so that's the campaign lifestyle, right? So I've got two young children, I believe you've got four.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, I do. I just got a fourth one.

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, congratulations.

SPEAKER_00:

Thank you.

SPEAKER_02:

But you know what that feels like, where we just can't get off this bandwagon of feeling completely overwhelmed. So the way that we deal with that is through somebody's identity because what got you here isn't going to get you there. So whilst we manage the identity of yes, we need to upgrade, we need to increase, improve your standards around self-perfectionism, for example. Perfectionism, you know, people say things like, oh, well, I'm just a perfectionist. Like it's this badge of honor. I'm like, hang on a minute. Just because you can't do something perfectly, you're not gonna do something at all at all. In my book, that's a really low standard. Now, and this is coming from somebody, I'm a former perfectionist, so I completely get it, but it's a very low standard to be had because if you can't do something perfectly, you're not gonna be doing anything at all. Low standard. So it's a lot of things like this that we do with our clients and a very holistic perspective in order to be able to transform somebody's body and therefore transform their life and their business as well.

SPEAKER_00:

You know, you you you hit on a great point, is that many people they intellectually they understand uh what they need to do, but they just fail. You know, right now it's what is it? Yeah, January 12th. Okay, so technically in two days, all New Year's resolutions they go overboard, and you know, people go on to their old lives. And so talk about this, how you train your clients to get over these false promises they make themselves, these fake stories they they they tell themselves, and these badges they wear that really don't mean anything, perfectionism. You know, I have patients they go say they they say I'm a sweet tooth, I'm a night owl, all of these labels. It's all about consistency and habits, isn't it? And how do you help uh because you talk a lot about it, how do you help them overcome these bad habits and teach them these systems where they can be consistent and actually follow through with the regimen?

SPEAKER_02:

Hmm, it's a good question. I mean, we have something that we call minimal effective dose. So, as an example, I we had a client the other day, and one of the things that we do with clients, whether that be in Onyx Performance, which is our our fitness app and our group training program, or whether this be with private clients, same thing. If somebody is, they've got, you know, several business or a business or several businesses around, your exec or C suite, you're very busy, you're high achieving, you know, this whole idea about training five days a week is probably not in your best interest. You've got a high level of stress already, you're probably swimming in a sea of cortisol. If we throw in additional training stress on top of that, which might be good training stress, but it's too much for your body to handle. So especially in early phases, we try and just we we layer the habits one upon one. So the one of the first habits we try to introduce is going to the gym three times a week and lifting weights and heavy weights. But I mean, heavy is heavy is a relative term, right? Because, you know, what might be heavy for me is very heavy, you know. But I've got 25, 27 years of lifting experience. Whereas for somebody else who, you know, I might look at somebody in their 60s who's never lifted weights before. Well, you know, pressing five kilos above their heads may be heavy for them. And that's good because we want to have that adaptation process. But so, so heavy is contextual. But what we really want to do is have these non-negotiable habits and non-negotiable standards that we can introduce into somebody's life. And what we want to do is plan for when this shit hits the fan days, not when we're planning for the best days. Because I think what a lot of people do is they plan for those times and those days that, oh, well, next Monday is the day I'm gonna have all of my ducks in a row. I've got a clear calendar, right? This is when I can do the thing, I can do the diet, I can do the food prep. And I'm like, baby, life isn't like that. And I think you and I'm like, good luck, yeah. And so good luck, good luck doing that, good luck doing that. So I think, you know, when it comes to minimal effective dose and having a non-negotiable, what we really have to do here is plan for the worst. So in those times and in those situations where work is at its absolute busiest, we have a non-negotiable, you still go to the gym three days a week. And I had a client the other day saying, Well, I'm struggling to kind of get into the habit of going to the gym three days a week. So I think I'll go seven days to try and make it a habit. And I'm like, what in God's, like, what in God's name do you think like how is that you can't even go three days doing something that you're trying to create a habit off? So you want to go seven? What? This is insane. So you know, one of the things that I say to I work with like the most intelligent women on the planet. And ladies, you're making such stupid decisions when it comes to your health, honestly. If we take the the high-level decisions and the problem solving that you do with your work and we apply that to your health, like, babes, you're gonna fly, you're gonna go really well. So let's remove the emotion from it. So minimal effective dose and planning for when things are at their worst, which is also why I like to, I don't like meal plans, for example. I like to be able to teach my clients how to build meals because a lot of my clients are, they're traveling, they're on flights all the time, they're in and out of hotels, they're entertaining clients. You know, you know, I'm not gonna give them a meal plan like they're a two-year-old, that they need to go and have like fish and broccoli for dinner, and yet they're going to a steak restaurant with their client, you know, and they're a, you know, they're a partner in a law firm. This is ridiculous. We have to give clients that level of education and confidence to be able to make the best decisions for them. So that's where I would start is plan for the worst and minimal effective dose. And then the integrity part of it, this is very important of doing what you said that you will do. If you say you're going to go to the gym seven days a week, you're gonna fail. Right? I can't go to the gym seven days a week. And this is this was my job for 20 years. You know, I now build systems and infrastructure for high-performing women, but it was my job living in a gym for a very long period of time. I couldn't go seven days a week, nor would I want to, nor is it necessary. So, you know, I think we have to plan for the plan for the worst and a minimal effective dose.

SPEAKER_00:

I think either even professional athletes they take one day off. But how do you how do you reconcile the fact that you know I'm just thinking of my own patients? And by the way, in my early days, I used to be a personal trainer, so I have a but that was in the 90s. The the the the training, the fitness industry was completely different. The one thing I struggled with is helping my clients back then, or now my patients hold themselves accountable. In other words, when I made a recommendation, I I came up with a plan, I even laid out the system, and I love the fact that you talked about minimum effective dose because the minimal effective dose is important just so to create consistency, otherwise, it's gonna be like the New Year's resolution, they put too much on their plates, they try it for one or two weeks, and then life happens, like you just beautifully described, and then everything stops. It's not just they don't do it seven days, they don't do even a single day. So the accountability part is the part that to me is a hard nut to crack. And you know, I put people in two different buckets. I put the highly motivated, the self-motivated, the ones that don't need a coach breathing behind their back and telling them do it or let's go. You know, I'm personally like that. Uh, you don't have to motivate me if I make a decision to do something, I just do it. But a very few, uh a small percentage of the population is has that self-motivation and inner drive. And I don't know where it comes from, but for the others, for the majority, how do you deal with accountability? How do you deal with that minimal effective dose? How do you come with that, come up with that minimal effective dose? And in your experience, what's the success rate, even with the minimal effective dose with your clients?

SPEAKER_01:

Hmm.

SPEAKER_02:

It's a good question. This is probably gonna lead us on to talking about dopamine and GLPs, because if I start with I'm the same as you, so I do not understand the mentality of somebody who says they're going to do one thing and then they do something else. Like I don't, I don't, I don't, I can't, I've really have a tough time understanding that mentality. And so I have two ways of dealing with with clients like that. The first way is that when I talk to them, I will say there are going to be things that I say to you, and there are going to be times where I'm gonna tell you things that you don't want to hear. Are you okay with that? So I get from the outset like permission to basically hold up a mirror and tell it how it is. And I'll say, I cannot want this for you more than you want it for yourself. And so whilst it is partly my job to, because a lot of the clients that we deal with, like they they really have struggled for decades with their health and their weight, and a lot of the time they're they're terribly overweight by the time that they get to us, or they have managed to stay within, you know, five to ten kilos and fluctuate five to ten kilos their entire life, and it's so utterly stressful. They are burned out, they are exhausted, they have no self-belief left. And so it is partly my job. Whilst I, on the one hand, I say, look, this is your responsibility, it's not your fault that you're here, you've been misguided up until this point, but it is your responsibility now to do the work, and I will hold your hand every single step of the way, but I can't want this for you more than you want it for yourself. On the other hand, I have to create, help this person create an idea a new identity for themselves. So they're here now, and I have to create this identity over here, which is strong, bold, resilient, courageous, audacious, sexy, hot. Like a lot of these women, they've not felt hot for decades, if ever, which is so sad for a woman not to feel good about herself that she thinks, you know, I look really good today. And you must see this in clinic a lot. Women who want to feel better about themselves and they want to feel hot. And I think we should start celebrating this of, yeah, you know what? Women want to feel hot. And when one when a woman feels hot, everything just works better, right? Men are happier, women are happier, we all have better relationships. Like we should start encouraging women to be hot and feel hot again. And so I have to create this identity for them because right now, if they're sitting here, they don't believe this. And so I hold this identity for them. I talk to them as if they are already this person. Because then slowly but surely, I like getting weight off them as well very quickly, which we'll come to we'll come to in a minute. I like to get weight off someone as quickly as possible because by the time they get to me, they've lost all belief in themselves. I need to start creating that belief very quickly. So I do a combination of the two. I hold this new frame for them, this new identity, and I believe and I talk to this identity as if they are already that person, right? And because my frame is stronger than theirs, right? And because I my influence is bigger than theirs, right, they often fall into that. And then it's their responsibility to obviously continue that. So I that's kind of my approach to things. And I mean, yes, look, I also do have some lazy clients, and I say to them, you are so lazy. I'm just gonna have to chase your ass every single day, and I'm gonna be on your back like a hound. And it's gonna be really annoying for you, and it's extremely annoying for me, or it's extremely annoying for my, you know, for my trainers to have to chase you, but this is the way that it's gonna be. And sometimes that is the level that is required to get somebody over that initial hurdle. Because I think if we look at, you know, any form of like addiction, like this, like this dopamine thing of, you know, whether it's like picking up your phone or, you know, people have like really bad sugar addictions. You know, sugar, alcohol, drugs, sex, whatever it might be. It takes about four weeks, four to five weeks, six weeks maybe to kind of like really get rid of that that that dopamine depletion and restore normality when it comes to your brain chemistry, which is where I think potentially GLPs can come in and be very effective. It'd be interesting to see actually how like how you use them in clinic, like on what is your criteria for when would you consider a GLP?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, it's it's definitely been a game changer. And I think the GLPs are now being also researched actually for addiction because they inhibit this impulsive behavior, this addictive behavior. Studies have shown that people that were on GLPs, primarily for diabetes or weight loss, have less of these addictive behaviors. Less if they were smokers, they started smoking less. So a lot of those habits that were hard to break because of this dopamine addiction are much easier now with the GLP. So it opened up a whole new paradigm and a whole new opportunity for behavior management, not just for weight management or sugar management. But just before we get into the GLPs, I wanted to discuss that the part that is many are struggling with, which is you said you make them believe that they are the person that they want to be, and that your framing is much more impactful than theirs, and they end up and and I have experienced that with my own patients. And I think when you have a good, when you have great communication skills like you, when you have come from a point of conviction like you do, just because you know what you're doing, you can truly influence someone, you can truly make someone believe that they improve their self-worth, you can give someone confidence. The question is, how long does that last, though? That emotion that you invoked in that person, how long will it last? Because transformations, especially body transformation, don't happen overnight. Both me and you know that. They don't happen overnight, and that's something we even discuss with them. We tell them, hey, this is not gonna happen overnight. This requires consistency, this requires discipline, and you have to give it some time, at least a month or two. How do you help them throughout that period so that they don't fall off the cliff? They say they don't go to the gym, do one push-up, and they still don't see a difference, and they go, like, well, I don't think that's gonna work. It's almost like they're waiting to prove you wrong. How do you deal with that person? Do you continue coaching them? Do you is that like actually a normal thing, or do you even tell them, you know what, maybe I'm not for you. It doesn't seem like you really want it. Like you said, if I want it more than you want it, I don't think this is gonna work. Like, how do you handle that? Yeah, transition period.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, it's funny. Like, I don't really generally tend to, we don't generally tend to have a lot of clients like that. I'm just trying to think of the last client that was like that. I mean, sometimes, you know, I think sometimes what can happen is that clients will come in, especially to our app, for example, and they're not working with us one-on-one, and they'll kind of like cherry-pick information. So, oh, I think that's what I need. And so they'll cherry pick. Well, I'll do that and I'll do that and I'll do that. And the problem is that they've been doing this for 15 to 20 years and they're still in the same place. So you think you know what you need. When actually, I'll be honest with you, you've got absolutely no idea because if you knew, then we wouldn't be having this conversation. And so I'm obviously very direct with my clients, and so as you can imagine, any anything that that that's what I love.

SPEAKER_00:

I I love that about your style because our clients are patients, they want us to be their coaches, they want us to help them. They don't want we're not supposed to be their friends. We have to tell them the stuff that no one tells them. And what I like about you, you tell them everything they need to hear, not what they want to hear. And I think that's why you're so effective.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, and I mean, you know, the the thing is as well, I mean, I do have conversations with clients and I I mean I frame it, right? I don't intentionally just go in there and you know just get go straight for the jugular, but I will frame it and I'll and uh, you know, if I'm having a difficult if I'm having a difficult conversation and if anybody's there as a coach listening to this, you know, the way that you can have difficult conversations with your clients would basically be to say, to frame it and say something like, I'm just curious to know if, you know, I'm just curious to know if you've been doing a bit of this and a bit of that and you know, kind of bending the rules here, and they'll often say, Oh, yes, actually I have, you know, so it kind of takes it removes the judgment and the shame. And I think we have to remove that judgment because you know, if you're judging anybody as a coach or as a doctor, like we're not going to be effective practitioners.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

So removing the judgment is is one of the first things. But honestly, I just tell clients as it is. I mean, there are clients sometimes who, you know, they they do the the one degree, one degree, one degree off. And then it's it would be like, for example, um, putting, you know, you put your destination into Google Maps, and then you think to yourself, well, I kind of know a quick way to get there, so I'm gonna take the back roads, and you end up in a completely different village. And this is what sometimes happens in fat loss is that you think that you can accelerate the process by not taking the road that you have paid to take and that you have been guided to take, and you take the back roads instead and end up somewhere else. But I think one of the most dangerous things, and nobody talks about this, one of the most dangerous things when working with high achievers is that complacency is a really big factor in why people don't lose weight. And I'll explain. So by the time you get to your 40s, for example, you know, life kind of tends to get a little bit easier in some respects. Like, you know, your kids by mid-40s are like a little bit older, you're generally out of the newborn phase. You know, work tends to be, you know, you're you're earning well, you tend to be senior management, C-suite exec, founder. So you're the boss, generally speaking. And you're you're kind of you're very good at what you do, and especially as a high achiever, you get very good at almost box ticking. So you can consume a lot of information, you can output a lot of information. But the problem is that you don't embody it. And this is one of the things that I see frequently in high achievers. I will ask them, you know, we've got an education platform, for example, and I'll ask some questions about, you know, what's gone on in the content. And they can often like rattle off, you know, oh yeah, I watched it probably on 2x speed. I watched it on 2x speed whilst I was doing something else, whilst I was doing a report, blah, blah, blah. And I'll ask some questions on it. And technically they've got those questions right. And I'm like, okay, so how's that translated to you, you know, prepping your meals or getting your, you know, your your staff or your EA to go buy a meal for you? Well, I haven't communicated that to the EA yet. And I'm like, right, well, you haven't done the work and you haven't embodied it. Right? So so this is where because I'm a high achiever, I know what you do. Well, well, that that that's that's what they catch you out.

SPEAKER_00:

That's what you mentioned, is that they tried to check a box. That's that person that just goes and checks a boss, uh, a box and is not necessarily result-oriented, just just wants to check a box and says, I've done that, and that's that's a danger. And I 100% agree with you. So, how do you confront that person and keep them accountable?

SPEAKER_02:

I talk about complacency just like I've talked about it here, because a lot of the time that they're not aware of it. And I think the the the I first this this first came to me when uh I I would have been it was a couple of years ago, and I remember being in Spain and the my kids were you know 18 months and three years old at the time. And I remember I was doing something for work and I was literally box ticking. And I said to David, my husband, I you know, I said, Oh, I've done it now. And he's like, How did you do that so quickly? And I was like, Oh, well, I just you know, I figured this isn't it. So can I kind of connect the dots? And he was like, right, so what was the outcome? And I was like, hmm, complacency, right? And so I kind of, you know, I use myself sometimes as these like guinea pigs, and so I explain this to clients and I say, Here's something that I found to be true. Does this resonate? And often they say, Oh, yes, that's me too.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, it's I like the word that you use complacency. Here in America, we say bullshitting oneself, and yeah, that's right. I think a lot of us do that, just it makes us feel better, it makes us like we achieved something without having done, and that goes back to the dopamine. We're so used to this easy gratification in in this world, you know, not holding ourselves accountable enough and quick fixes more than anything. I think I'm old enough to know that what it meant to work hard for something, but today everybody wants a shortcut, everybody wants a quick fix. And almost expects us, if you're an expert, they expect you to give give they expect you to give them a quick fix. And when you don't, they get all confused. They're like, What do you mean? It's almost like they can't wrap their head around it that no, you actually have to work for it. There is no necessarily a pill that builds muscle. And but back to your your strategy of combining diet and exercise. What I like about what you're doing is you also talk a lot about proper food nutrition, which is so integral. And explain the audience why exercise alone won't be effective without proper nutrition. And just uh that is in the frame of just a couple of days ago, the HHS flipping the food pyramid upside down and making protein and healthy fats as top of the pyramid, and just throwing out grains, carbs, and processed sugars out, which used to be since the 60s, the mainstay of, at least here in America, the mainstay mainstay of the American diet. So talk about a little bit about the the importance of diet nutrition and exercise and why they have to go together and without each other, it's just simply not gonna work.

SPEAKER_01:

Hmm.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, apparently this is another hill I'm required to die on talking about this. The the importance of real food. And I just I I really, you know, you and I were chatting the other day, and I was like, Diary, is it's not common sense? And you were like, I don't think there's much common sense left. But it's true. The number of times that I've you know looked at people's nutrition plans and they're like, Yeah, I have enough protein in my diet. And I'm like, really? Isn't it? And I'm like, send me a food diary, and it's like protein shake. Listen, we'll come, we'll come on to whey protein and protein shakes in a minute, but you know, some kind of like weird whey protein fitness-y bunny pancake concoction with you know, sugar-free maple maple syrup and cheer seeds and whatever else goes into their breakfast. There's in like a protein bar at their snack, and then it's some kind of, I don't know, like whatever it is for lunch. And I'm like, where's the real food? And no wonder you are struggling with physical hunger. And it's like, well, I can't lose weight, you know, my calories are only like 1200 calories. I'm like, darling, there's not 1200 calories there, there's probably about two and a half thousand calories there by the time that we've added on your binges, the binge restrict cycle, etc. etc. So I've been saying my entire career, you gotta eat real food. And honestly, I don't know if you've ever tried this, but if you have, for example, I mean, I'm a big advocate of obviously high protein, 30 to 50 grams of protein three times a day. I mean, these are just general guidelines that I'll use with clients. And I always say, look, a vegan diet is great, just add meat. You know, if we can have lots of fiber, lots of fruits, lots of vegetables in our diet, this is fantastic. And I think the food, the new food pyramid is great. We're definitely heading in the right direction. I think, you know, when it comes to like lots of like various different fats, of course, within moderation, you know, you don't want to be having like, you know, a full saturated fat diet, although some people do and they can thrive off it, good for them. It's not necessarily what I would do with my clients. I like variety, lots of variety in your meats, lots of variety in your vegetables, lots of variety in your fruits. And then, yes, sometimes we would include things like the grains, but you know, preferably, I mean, if we're gonna have carbs like, you know, rice and potato, we can't go too far wrong with those. But I think the importance of these raw materials, these building blocks of health. And I'm not, I'm not just talking about aesthetics here, because you know, we're both in aesthetic, but we're both in the longevity world as well. And it's very clear to me those people, especially after about 40, and I think 40 seems to be this pivotal point for a lot of people, where you see those people who have looked after themselves and those who haven't. And those, and I, and including in that, you know, people who have been thin all of their life and they may have had a lot of surgery and on the outside that they, you know, they look good and they might look good on Instagram, but you see them in the flesh, their skin, their hair, their nails. Like these are not, they're not glowing from the inside. And when I look at people who are really glowing from the inside and who have fantastic skin, great hair, good nails. I mean, we've all got fake nails now, but you know, good nails, but really good, good, strong, right, good, strong elasticity to the skin. We we're all eating real food, and this is so important. This is why we have like a high protein diet, because we need the collagen, we need the building blocks in that in order to be able to generate the collagen in our skin.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I I I you know, you're you're preaching to the choir. It's just so hard. You know, I I do that for my patients, and it's part of actually my pre-operative regimen because I compare someone undergoing major plastic surgery or cosmetic surgery as someone preparing for marathon. And when you look at the data, the nutritional requirements of a marathon runner or someone that is undergoing surgery is very close, about 70-80% close to a marathon runner from the caloric intake and protein demand compared to the general population. So, preparation is key for my patients, and it's not any different for your patients going to the gym. How do you go around teaching? Because you most of your clients are women, and women traditionally aren't big protein eaters. Something that I've learned that now integrating diet into my regimen for my patients, that just like women are not big weightlifters or more into cardio and all that kind of stuff, which I want to talk about a little bit, they also not big protein eaters. And it's as if they think they're not supposed to eat much protein or it's even bad for them. How do you how do you uh teach them or re-educate them? Because for me it's been a very uphill battle.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, I'm very pleased to say that you know, now it's becoming trendy for women to lift weights. You know, when I first started my career 20 years ago, I think I was one of very few female trainers. I was certainly very few female trainers online, and I think now a lot more women are getting in the gym. There are a lot more, you know, orthopedic surgeons coming out talking about the importance of lifting because they're seeing like osteoporotic patients much, much younger. You know, unfortunately now we've got this like this skinny trend coming back. And I think, you know, this is this is this is like doing so much damage to the work that we've done and getting women healthy, lean, and strong. And I thought that the myth had died about, you know, you pick up a weight and you're gonna get bulky. I mean, I'm sat here at you know 54 kilos and I've been lifting very heavy weights for the past 27 years. This is as big as I'm gonna get. And so I think, you know, we have this myth that, you know, Pilates makes you long and lean and like lifting heavy weights is gonna make you bulky. I'm like, darling, your femur's your femur, and that ain't stretching, honey. So, you know, we really have to we really have to think about the mechanics. But what I will agree, what I will say here, caveats, what I will say here is that it is important for lifting technique because I do see some clients who genuinely have been lifting weights and they have been lifting heavy for quite some time and they don't like their physique. And the reason they don't like their physique, I have often found, is because they've been improper exercise selection. So, for example, they've been doing like heavy back squatting, they've got like really big traps that their quads are imbalanced over their glutes and hamstrings. So, you know, we do have to be appropriate with exercise selection. You know, if you don't want a thick waist, for example, well, then stop doing a thousand crunches because if you're doing a thousand crunches to get a flat tummy, how do we hypertrophy a muscle and make it grow? Well, we train it. And so if you want a flat tummy, well, then you've got a diet, first of all, lose fat, and we have to get you know, we have to tone. If we're gonna use the word tone, we have to tone, which means basically building muscle. So I really feel that these two go hand in hand, but you know, the the whole myths around training are just uh a nonsense. And I think a lot of women, I I will always say this is that, you know, if you don't want to get bulky, deal with that problem when you're close to that problem. Because going in with that attitude of, oh my god, I'm scared to touch a weight, I'm gonna get bulky. I'm like, it's not the weights that are making you bulky, it's the fact that you're not eating protein, you're then physically hungry, right? So you you're then dealing with the binge restrict cycle, and you've got emotional cravings that you need to deal with, right? So when we're dealing with cravings, if you want to stop being bulky, quote unquote, it's because you're eating too many calories. How do we do that? Well, we need to make sure that you're physically you've got satiety, satiation, and we've got thermic effective food as well. So that's why protein is really important. So for physical hunger, and then of course we deal with the emotional hunger in knowing who you are, what you stand for, and what you're going in life when we do the identity work.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I think you talk a lot about cravings, and that's something that a lot of women are struggling with. And, you know, I think that's where GLPs can help. They have actually shown to significantly help with help with cravings. And I think now in 2026, I don't think there is a day when someone comes to my office and they're not on GLPs. I can't think of the last day where I did it. Yeah, I don't know how it is in Australia or rest of the world, but in the United States, at least in my demographics, I would say over 50% of my patients are on GLPs. And this is not the patients that I put them on GLPs. They already came in with. So I think it helps as far as the cravings, but where it hurts is when you're on GLPs, you have less appetite, and you already were struggling with protein intake before you got on the GLPs. Now you're eating less than you ate before. Now your protein intake. Intake is even worse than before, which is the very thing you actually need and need more on, more of, and especially when you exercise. And there's two things that these people haven't really quite understood, or if they have understood, they're struggling with, which is increasing their protein intake, where the response is, Well, I'm not that hungry. I can't eat that much. How am I gonna eat a chicken breast, a burger patty, three eggs, and a cup of yogurt? I don't have that much, which would be most for most people, their protein requirements based on the uh 1.6 to 2 gram per kilogram body weight. And that is if they're not exercising. So when they're exercising, the protein demands go even higher, as you know. And then how do you my challenge has been to motivate them to eat more, but then the objection is well, I don't have an appetite. So GLP ones are great for that help with cravings and weight loss, get them to the finish line maybe sooner, especially for those who have to lose a significant amount of weight, let's say 20 and 30 pounds or more, but then it backfires. Have you had that experience with your clients and how have you tackled that problem with GLPs?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, we I see this all of the time. And I think there are two issues with the two major issues with GLPs. The first one is that people take a GLP and they think it's like this magic pill, this magic formula that's gonna transform their body and change their life. Now, in some circumstances, that is true, but you do end up just a smaller version of yourself. And if you're going to take that approach, you're gonna be on this GLP for the rest of your life. Now, there are obviously there, I mean, there were recent reports come out that you know, if you stop these GLPs, then you know you're gonna rebound, you're gonna gain all the weight back and more. Well, that's what the GLP is supposed to do. Like the drug is doing its job. It's like taking a blood pressure tablet or you know, trying to lower your cholesterol and taking statin. It's like they they lower your cholesterol and they'll lower your blood pressure whilst you're on the drug. And if you stop taking it, you don't change your lifestyle. Well, then of course it's going to rebound. Like the drug is doing its job, like that's what it's supposed to do. So this is not the fault of the GLPs. And I don't think we should be spreading misinformation of, oh, well, if you go on a GLP, you're going to be on it for the rest of your life. That's not true because you can titrate off. Likewise, if you stop it and you don't change your lifestyle, then yes, you're going to put back on the weight. That is obvious. And that is the law of thermodynamics and that is science. Like we cannot get away from that. But the other thing is, is that I think a lot of doctors, I would I'd love to discuss this and have your opinion on it. I think a lot of doctors are misinformed when it comes to the use of GLPs and nutrition and exercise, because a lot of people, doctors, and patients look at the efficacy of these drugs on how not hungry somebody is. And actually, when we're looking at a GLP or how not hungry or how nauseous somebody is, or the types of side effects that like make you don't want to eat. Now that's that's really bad because if somebody's not eating, their cognition is going to go down. Like these are people making high-level decisions in work, but your energy is going to go down. You've got the sex drive of a castrated field mouse. This is terrible news. Like you feel awful about yourself, but yet you're thin. And so many like women are paying this price of being thin and yet feeling absolutely shit. And that's not how a GLP should be used. A GLP should be used with, again, minimal effective dose, proper doctor education on actually, it's not about how not hungry the person is. You should still be able to be hungry on a GLP. And we need to get away from it. This is where we need to work on a psychology of somebody. It's okay to be hungry. You shouldn't be afraid of being hungry. It's normal to have a physiological response of when you wake up in the morning, you are a little bit hungry. Great, we're going to fuel you with a high protein breakfast. So my approach is that quite a lot of clients come to us, they're on a really high dose of these GLPs, exactly as you've explained. They're not hungry, struggling with their protein intake, struggling with their food intake in general. Or they're having like shitty proteins, like these, like these yoga yogurt pots, and they've got like 15 grams of like protein. I'm like, that's relationship. What is up on it? That's just gonna stake into you. It's terrible, right? It's terrible. That's not gonna get your face looking good. That's not gonna get your body looking good.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, no, it's not good.

SPEAKER_02:

And so we try to just like titrate the dose down to a minimal effective dose where somebody is feeling natural hunger, but we whilst working in identity in the background and the emotional cravings, because unless we deal with, remember, the mental, emotional, spiritual, energetic bodies as well as the physical body, we're still going to be having this problem and it's being masked by super high dose GLPs right now. So bring down the dose. Let's use GLPs. I think they're, you know, they're I do think they're overused, but I also think they're a wonder drug in the same sentence. So contact dependence. So, you know, if you're a doctor listening to this and you're prescribing, like use the minimal dose whilst educating your client that the efficacy of this drug is not based upon how not hungry you are, how nauseous you feel. What often happens when we get the dose right is that we get enough protein in. So we're we're satisfying physical hunger, we're managing the emotional hunger with the identity and a mindset work. But what the GLP does is just turn down the food noise a little bit. It just manages that dopamine response, that addictive thing around food, and you start to enjoy life instead because it gives it then frees up your brain space to add more into your life. So rather than focusing on I just don't want to be fat anymore, I don't want to feel like this anymore. Oh, the habit was usually after dinner I'll have a bowl of whatever it might be, your food of choice, that noise isn't there anymore. You just forget about it, you just immerse yourself in life. So that's where I think the pros and the cons um with with Jeff.

SPEAKER_00:

You know, you know, you are so much ahead of the doctors out there. I think because you have your perspective is from a fitness and health standpoint. I will tell you the truth about GLPs as someone that prescribes GLPs, and I'm gonna drop this bump and I'm probably gonna get a lot of shit for it. But the problem is our medical system, especially as it come pertains to patient education. Unfortunately, our medical system doesn't allow us, is not designed for educating the patients, but rather designed again for quick fixes to give a prescription, and we are thereby enabling the patients that are looking for shortcuts in perpetuity. It's almost like we are the part of the problem in creating new habits for the patients by giving them a quick fix, and GLPs is a classic example. Let me explain. So a patient comes, they want to lose weight, but they don't just want to lose weight, they also want to be healthier. So we kind of hide behind the curtain of, yeah, GLPs have all these health benefits, but we ignore the fact that if we don't educate the patients properly, don't put them on a proper nutrition and fitness program at the same time, not only are we enabling that behavior, the quick fix behavior, but we're also causing more harm to the patient potentially by losing muscle mass, not managing the behavior. Like you said, now the patient has to be on GLPs in perpetuity because we haven't even used the opportunity in working on behavioral changes, in educating them about diet and nutrition and how to exercise, how to build muscle. So then, therefore, of course, studies will show that over 70% of patients will rebound after they come off of GLPs. It's the same way as if you stop working out, you know, you see all these top athletes. You know, best example is Michael Jordan. In his peak, he had only 3% body fat. I mean, it's not as good as you. I think you have zero body fat. And for those of you who don't believe me, just go check out the real Rachel Godfrey on Instagram and you know what I'm talking about. But Michael Jordan had 3% body fat, but you look at him now, I mean, he has probably 20, 25% body fat. Why is because he abruptly stopped working out, and of course, his metabolism might have changed, but also it has to do with diet. I mean, there's not a time you don't see him with a glass of scotch and a cigar hanging out on his yacht, and I'm sure he doesn't play basketball seven days a week. So you stop something abruptly, of course, you're gonna gain weight. And the same thing with GLPs, the same thing with going to the gym. So there has to be a behavioral management, a consistency, and just change of just poor habits into good habits in combination with prescribing GLPs. The problem is in the healthcare industry, in medicine, not only do we have the time, we don't take the time to explain these things, but also, more importantly, most physicians just look at them. They're not the fittest themselves. So, in other words, they they don't even understand these things about nutrition, health, and fitness themselves unless they're a health buff themselves. And so that is part of the problem. And prescribing, I have colleagues, they say, yeah, patients should be on GLPs for the rest of their lives. I'm like, why? You know, why can't we use lower the dose so we don't enable them? We we teach them that, hey, it's not just the drug, you have to do other things too, which is exercise and nutrition. Hold them accountable, not make it too easy, not to torture them, but just to do it the right way. I mean, didn't we say first do no harm? Well, what where why why why is that falling off the wagon suddenly? So I think that's the problem. Hopefully, now with social media, even healthcare providers or internet healthcare providers learn more about this stuff. Just like myself, you know, my interest came, and I was always interested in fitness, but my interest in health and wellness came because I ended up when I turned into my when I got into my 40s, things changed health-wise. You know, aches and pains that I didn't have, uh, puffiness, tiredness, fogginess, all of those things started creeping in. And that's why I started looking into, and that's why I know what I know today. Otherwise, I didn't learn this in medical school.

SPEAKER_02:

Right. And so, like everything I've talked about today, I've been my own guinea pig and I've learned through experience and clients. So, I mean, one of the things that you said before we started is that you know you're very evidence-based. Like I would say that I'm evidence informed, but I'm not necessarily evidence-based. A lot of what I do is different, right? Because I'm not prescribed, I'm not a prescriber. And so I can be evidence informed, but I'm not evidence-based. And the reason I'm evidence informed, I mean I'm aware of the evidence, but I also use it my intuition and my experience in 20 years in this industry. And so, you know, when I'm dealing with like nutrition and training, it's a little bit different, right? I don't, I don't, I can look at the the data. And and in what I do, if I'm waiting for data to to tell me I'm right in doing something, I think I'm gonna be behind the behind the ball because what I do sometimes is based off experience and intuition. And I mean, I can't teach that, but that's where I think that the gray areas. And I think there needs to be, and I would love to have more collaboration between you know the fitness industry, especially the educated side of the fitness industry and the wellness industry and longevity and the medical industry, because I'm like I've got so many of my best friends are doctors, right? I went to physio, I'm I'm a physio, so you know, in med school, I had lots of doctor friends, and you know, in now I'm very close with so many of you in the medical field. And you know, you it you've got a really tough job because you don't have time with patients. Like I have time with my clients, and I can I have long, long conversations with my clients, and it's something that you know, I I do have to partner with with medics because I need to we need things prescribed sometimes. And so we've got very close relationships with with doctors, and I think that if we can have that partnership, then it's su then I think we can do a I don't think we can do it alone. I think this is this is a multidisciplinary thing to really improve the health of of everybody.

SPEAKER_00:

100% well said, and that's something I do. I collaborate a lot with my fitness colleagues, and you know, thank God for technology. We have apps and everything, and something you you have made a created a built a business around and helping so many people at scale, which you know, only 10 or 20 years ago, it was it would have been impossible. Now, how much time do we have? I know you have a hard stop, right? Is this your hard stop?

SPEAKER_02:

10 minutes.

SPEAKER_00:

10 minutes. So just so to close up, we'll do some rapid fire questions. Let's do it. And I think that'll be really fun to close this. And we might have to do another one because normally my podcasts are uh longer. So I'm gonna just do rapid fire. I'm gonna start the sentence and you're just gonna finish it. Cardio doesn't build an amazing physique. Okay. Women over 40 should train for blank, not just for blank.

SPEAKER_02:

You should train for strength and health, not just for aesthetics.

SPEAKER_00:

Love that the scale lies when you're building blank.

SPEAKER_01:

The scale lies.

SPEAKER_02:

Ooh, see this is a so this is a hard one for me because it requires context, but I'm not allowed to provide context here. So I'm just gonna go to the code.

SPEAKER_00:

Context is body composition. The context is body composition.

SPEAKER_02:

Okay, so in a context the scale lies when it comes to body composition. However, we should be on a downward trend if you're on a fat loss plan, because I think what a lot of people have been sold is that oh, well, if you're going to the gym and building muscle, then you know it's okay for the weight to stay the same. That is not true. You're not losing fat.

SPEAKER_00:

Got it. So another one stress plus high interval uh intensity training and low calories equal.

SPEAKER_02:

An absolute clusterfuck.

SPEAKER_00:

Love it. Can you can you quickly explain? Because I don't think we talked about it uh uh too much, just very briefly in like one sentence or two sentences.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, so what happens is uh you know you you're already like swimming in this sea of cortisol, but basically meaning like you've got like dysregulated cortisol. Like cortisol is not bad. Everybody thinks, oh my god, I've got high cortisol, it's such a bad thing. It's not bad. Like cortisol is an amazing hormone, it's your up in energy hormone. But when it's dysregulated, then we've got a problem. And so sometimes I say swimming in a sea of cortisol, meaning that you've got a dysregulated pattern. And what happens is if we add in high intensity cardio on top of that, it really just burns out your adrenals because you know, you're going in, you're doing this high-intensity stuff, it feels good, right? Because you're getting these endorphins going, but you're also getting your adrenaline going, can kind of like fry your adrenals. So that's why I say unless we've got somebody who's regulated in their nervous system and in their hormones, like high-intensity cardio probably isn't the best thing to be doing.

SPEAKER_00:

I think that's the biggest problem for uh most women, and I'm I hope that will change soon. Next question The victim story says blank, the victor story says blank.

SPEAKER_02:

The victim story says everyone else is to blame. The victor's story says it is not my fault, but it is my responsibility.

SPEAKER_00:

If you want to feel younger, stop chasing blank and start building blank.

SPEAKER_02:

If you want to feel younger, stop chasing. This is a hard one. You don't want if you want to feel younger.

SPEAKER_00:

The context is health, wellness versus quick fix.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. So if you want to feel younger, stop chasing taking life so seriously. Stop chasing and stop taking life so seriously. And what was the second half of that? And start building and start building a life of alignment and a life that you love based on a health conscious identity.

SPEAKER_00:

I love that. That is the best advice. And uh last question the best fat loss strategy after 40 is actually blank.

SPEAKER_01:

It is actually so easy. Right?

SPEAKER_02:

It is it is doing the basics. Yeah, it's doing the basics that I talk about for free all day long. If you come on to my Instagram, or if if somebody comes onto your Instagram and and actually do what we tell you to do, which is eat 30 to 50 grams. If you do nothing else from this, if you do nothing else and you just eat 30 to 50 grams of protein three times a day, you build your meals around vegetables and fruits with your 30 to 50 grams of protein, you do 10 to 15,000 steps every single day, you sleep eight hours a night, right? And you fix the psychological habits that are keeping you stuck. Hey, presto, you'll have a body transformation and your life will turn upside down in all of the best ways. But the problem is people don't do that, they think it's too easy.

SPEAKER_00:

I love that. And I think for any one of you who wants to learn more about, just go check out Rachel's Instagram. It's at at theraachelgottfreed.com. And I could tell you the reason why I invited you on my podcast is because when I stumbled on your page, I don't know how, I mean, it's it's my algorithm, I guess. Your your feed is so motivating that I love going on it and just listening to your 20, 30 second clips. And I get juiced and amped up, and I forget about all the negative thoughts, and it's almost like Apollo. Creed trying to motivate Rocky to train for his next big fight and getting in his face and telling him the things he doesn't want to hear. It's one of the most motivating motivating and transformative pages. So I highly recommend you to get on there if you want to learn more. If if you want to have a coach that can literally help you transform your body, and if you don't believe me, just go on there, just look at her body, and then you will understand what that means. So thank you so so much, uh Rachel, for coming on. I will definitely have to have you on again. Uh and um thank you for all you do, and I'm really looking forward to collaborating.

SPEAKER_02:

Thank you so much. So, like you're you're so kind, your words mean a lot because you know sometimes it falls on deaf ears, and I really, really appreciate that. So that's all I want to do. We've got a mission to change the lives of a million women through health and fitness. So thank you so much for being part of it and um having me as a guest on the show.

SPEAKER_00:

Alright, everyone, episode's over. I hope you enjoyed the show, and I hope uh Rachel got you good insight on lots of tips on health, wellness, fitness, weight loss, and more. If you enjoyed the show, please don't forget to leave me a review on Apple Podcast or comment on Spotify and just share it with anyone that needs to hear this. Thank you very much, and until next time, bye bye.