Andy: [00:00:00] All right. All right. Welcome to the Gifu Marbled Beef podcast. 

Ryan: [00:00:03] Yes, that's a good beef. 

Andy: [00:00:06] If you're going to have beef, have some marbled beef.

Ryan: [00:00:09] That is some good stuff, man. The old wagyu. It's heavy. It's really heavy, which is  good.

Andy: [00:00:15] Or  as my friend in Honolulu, who has the restaurant that makes the best burgers in the state of Hawaii likes to call it, Wagyu.

Ryan: [00:00:22] Wagyu. That is the proper pronunciation if you're in the United States. I believe so. 

Reasons to Add Weight

Andy: [00:00:29] Yeah. So I hear. Anyway we are going to be talking today about how to add weight to unweighted exercises, which kind of sounds silly at first. So people talk about body weight exercises, and then they want to add weight to them.

And the first reaction I think a lot of us have is. Why? What are you trying to do? But then you look at things like pushups, right? After a while you can do a lot of pushups, shouldn't you add weight to it to make it harder to increase the stimulus, make sure you're still getting stronger.

Pull-ups another one, weighted, pull ups, weighted dips. Yeah. These things have been around for a long time. People have been doing them, even bodybuilders do weighted dips. It's not something that's specific to a style of training. So it's natural to wonder then. Well, at what point do I need to add weight?

How should I do it? What's the purpose? How does this fit? And so a lot of people have asked us about this. Should I be using a weight vest when I do my locomotion movements? It makes it harder and that's a good thing, isn't it? So this is what we're gonna be talking about today.

We're going to be talking about, answering these questions. Is weight the best way to make things harder? Is harder better? If you determine the answer to both of those questions is yes. How the hell do you make it work for you? 

Ryan: [00:01:51] Yeah. I think we can really lead into this with looking at the question or the statement, I should say, it's not a question, but just because you can doesn't necessarily mean you should. And then, like you said, when though is a good time that we should use weighted exercises. And so that's hopefully by the end of this chat, we will have covered that. 

First off though, I do want to say it, like everything, comes down to your goals and if your main goal is simply hypertrophy or just power, then yes, weighted moves are probably the best for you. If you're looking to just get huge, if you're looking to build just really as much power as you possibly can, and yes, you're going to need to move around some weight and that's a good thing. Okay, cool. Focus on that. 

What we're looking for is actually not trying to become the Incredible Hulk. That's not really what we're after right now. We're really actually looking at: are weighted movements going to help us in actually becoming better at the particular skills that we're after? And so with that in mind let's take a look at where weights come into play with things.

So the first I've already mentioned this before is if we're looking at progressive overload in terms of specific goal like hypertrophy. Basically, if you're trying to build excess muscle and that's really what it's about, if you need to get your muscles to grow. The other thing though that a lot of people don't, well, some people do, but not the majority of people think about when you're talking about hypertrophy is actually looking at rehab.

So rehabilitation of the muscle after a particular injury is something that I've gone through numerous times, but that's also another way of looking at this where weighted exercises. And it's not going to be an extreme amount of weight, but this is where weighted exercises do play a role in physical therapy in terms of rehabilitation after a particular injury, or sometimes even a prehab, if you will.

Another thing to look at could be endurance purpose. And so a lot of times in the military, majority of the military people in there have done ruck training is what they call it. So basically just weighted backpack for an extended hike. And looking at being able to carry a lot of stuff over an extended duration as well as period of time, not just a link, but also a particular time, or being able to actually do that in as less time as possible.

Power is another one to look at whether we're looking at that in terms of a sport or an activity. American football is a great example of that where being explosive off of a line in order to basically bump up against another person. Sumo wrestlers use this a lot. Sumo wrestlers do actually use weighted exercises, not just in order to get big, but they also use this as a preventative measure.

Looking at that prehab. I do a lot of shoulder work a lot of work to make sure that they can basically endure the particular movements that they're going to be doing this explosive, the power that they need in going up against force. 

So anyway, what are some of these conventional ways of looking at progressive overload? Basically just add resistance. That's really what we're looking at. That's the top one. So if you continuously add resistance in the terms of looking at weighted movements, so you start off with five pounds, add another five pounds to gradually work your way up. Then that's really where we're looking at additional resistance in terms of conventional thinking.

Repetitions is another way to look at that, of course. And so you start off with with the same weight, but then continue to add in repetitions increasing the training frequency how often you do that , the volume set, sets and reps, and then basically decrease the rest periods. 

Sophisticating Movements

Ryan: [00:05:45] Now, again, this is. We're working going through the science of things. I don't want to go so deep into that because if you're looking at more of the weighted side of things and you probably already know about this, but let's move this into our kind of realm and what we really excel at, what we're really looking at.

And that is the way that we're looking at progressive overload isn't necessarily to add more weight, but it's by looking at the sophistication of a movement and the tempo performed of that movement. This is actually where we can work on  moving to that next level, getting better at that move and making it more difficult, but rather than just adding weight, rather than just saying, okay, we're going to do more repetitions.

Instead, we're looking at actually moving up to the next level of that movement, sophistication and, or playing with the speed at which we perform that movement. So in other words, the slower that you do it, at a higher level, the harder the movement's going to be. And so this is really what we're looking at.

And so this is also why I don't recommend people put on a weight vest and perform crawling patterns on the ground. One thing in particular is the amount of joint strain that happens when you're performing this, looking at the small joints. If we're looking at the wrists, especially the wrists. You're going to see and have a lot of issues with people when you start to weight locomotion.

So if you're looking at the Bear, if you're looking at any variations of the Bear, Spiderman, whatever you're doing out there. As soon as you start to weight those movements and put those into motion, you're not going to have the control just yet that's needed in order to properly perform that movement with the necessary mastery that you need in order to keep yourself from being injured. And really that excessive load over time, it's probably going to lead to injuries down the road and that's what we don't want. 

So coming back to what we were talking about before, if we're looking at the long run, really. It's being able to have mastery over your bodyweight of those movements, performing them at a slower pace, and then working on sophistication of that movement. By doing that using this smarter way of training, these particular movements, your body is then going to be able to adapt and it's going to be able to create the necessary strength, flexibility, the mobility needed as well as improving that control so that when you're going in and out of the movement, using these transitions, the body is not in a place where it has an "Oh shit" moment where it can't handle that load. 

And what happens when we can't handle the load? Well the load has to go somewhere else in the body. And so this is where, it's, maybe it's not your wrists but it moves up into the elbows, moves into the shoulders. That could be where you're not properly prepared for that load. You don't have the control. And when you place your hand down your hand rolls I'm looking at a sprain of some sort or heaven forbid a break.  

Just basically you've overloaded the system to a point where it can't handle and doesn't have the control because the necessary, well, the necessary control is not there. And therefore that strength and flexibility just goes out the window. So you can be a really strong person. But as soon as you load something beyond the point where you're very comfortable at doing it and put it into motion, that's where sh I just talked a lot there. You want to add anything in there?

Andy: [00:09:15] Well, I think this is something that it's important to understand is what kind of movement are you talking about here? Because when we talk about adding weight to something. Adding weight so you mentioned several ways that you can increase, with progressive overload, right?

Resistance, repetitions, frequency, decreasing rest periods, all of these things you can, these are training variables that you can manipulate. When you speak of adding weight to a movement, that is adding resistance. But this is a crucial point that is so easy to forget because it's so obvious. You're adding resistance in exactly one direction.

Ryan: [00:09:57] Yes. 

Andy: [00:09:57] When you add weight, you're adding resistance toward the floor only toward the floor, unless you're talking about like a cable or band system or something that redirects that resistance. But this is why this is important. When you look at something like weighted pull-ups. Yes, you are adding increasing resistance in the same direction that the resistance of that exercise was already existing.

You do unweighted pull ups, you're pulling in one particular movement pattern. You add weight to it. You're pulling in the exact same movement pattern. Dips, same thing. It doesn't change the mechanics of the movement.

 But here where you're talking about more sophisticated, more complex movement patterns that have a contralateral coordination of the arms and the legs and things like this. You add weight to it. Okay. You're actually, you're changing the direction and changing the distribution of the resistance. You're not doing the same exercise anymore. 

And so this is where you're talking about you add resistance in the wrong direction and that added force goes somewhere you don't want it to go. Or, and that might be in a direction that causes injury. It might just be in a direction that is counterproductive to the reason you're doing that exercise. 

Classic example for martial arts is back in the 80s, when people used to hold small dumbbells and practice punches. The thing is, in a punch, you want the resistance to be horizontal, not vertical.

All you're doing is training yourself to do slow punches and probably mess up your shoulders and elbows. This is something that I think is really important is, adding weight is one thing that can be really helpful, but in sophisticated complex movement patterns, weight is probably not the appropriate variable to be changing.

And so that's why adding complexity, adding sophistication is one way that it actually makes sense for these kinds of movements. And then the next which I think you were about to get into is changing tempo. These things don't change the mechanics or the purpose of the movement, or they do in ways that are intended.

Ryan: [00:12:06] Exactly. And so we're going to get a little bit more in depth in terms of what are the particular times, I guess you'd say, or what would be some appropriate exercises when adding weight? You already pretty much mentioned it there, but again, bringing it back to the tempo that you just mentioned. And this is really something drive people crazy in the beginning when they hear me say this, but I'm constantly telling people to slow things down.

And that is for one, just to bring more awareness to it. But not just simply to make the movement harder per se, but actually being able to have control throughout the transition of the entire movement. So if this were the pushup, yeah, you can do them slow. It's going to be harder. But what I'm talking about is actually going from one movement to another. And this is what we're talking about, and this is what you brought up as well is when we're looking at moving and going in between different planes of movement.

This is really where the purpose of that movement comes into play. Again, if it were just hypertrophy, if you're just looking to get big and yoked, staying in the same place, doing squats, doing pushups and things like that, where you're actually doing a single movement, the same movement over and over again,  weighting that, sure. 

It makes sense to get bigger, but again going from one movement to another, just really, honestly, it doesn't make sense if you were to weight it. It's really taking the purpose of that movement away from what's going on. 

Owning the movement is something that I like to talk about a lot. And having mastery over that movement. And again, all comes down to those, strength, flexibility, and control, but how beautifully can you perform a movement? And looking at doing it slow and sophisticating that movement to me is really going to be more applicable over the long run to other activities that you're doing in your life. Instead of simply just doing weighted pushups. Just going to throw that out there. 

Now, speaking of pushups. If you are at a point where pushups are easy for you, then as mentioned before, great. You can slow them down. That's another way to make them more difficult. 

And let's say you can do 10 super slow pushups. Fabulous. Let's start working on a sophistication of that movement.  This could be for example possibly leaning forward a bit more. So a pseudo planche pushup. This could actually be looking at staggering hands. It could be looking at actually going from a pushup position into a different locomotion movement where you're going in and out of that pushup via another movement so by doing this also focusing on endurance. 

Also training your brain to look at different patterns in the movement. So it's not just about, again, just getting strong. It's also looking at using the brain in a different way that's going to allow you to grow in that way as well. This can be done everything in terms of, the Bear, the Monkey, Frogger and the Crab.

If you feel those are too easy for you, then my question is really? Because even nowadays I still use those and I can make them pretty difficult for myself by slowing them down and sophisticating. So bringing this back to just the fact of thinking, "how beautifully can I perform these movements?" is really a good place to start.

And the majority of people out there just hurry through movements. And they really miss the movement if you will. It's not a matter of just saying yep. I can do it. I'm done. 

It's really taking a look at okay. For one, what is my goal? Why I'm performing this movement? And how can I adjust that movement to bring more purpose into that movement for whatever I'm doing.

Sophistication and tempo are really where it's at in terms of locomotion movements for that. So that's why I don't feel that you should be weighting any of those movements. 

 Andy: [00:15:54] So I think that's really important stuff is to understand that when we talk about doing exercise, part of the whole purpose of that is to get better and to get better over time. So we're talking about progression, talking about progressively increasing something. And in traditional training, that's usually weight, speed, duration, but for us, we also, we've added, we "invented" this new variable called complexity or sophistication or whatever.

We just think that this is another variable that you can use. It's just another way of doing it. And this is the point is that I think that people have seen so much where progressive overload means adding weight or adding reps. And that's the standard and that's fine. It's not wrong, but it's also very limited because the only thing that gets you better at is adding more weight and adding more reps. 

And so that's why we're here to give you more options. That's why GMB exists. If just adding more weight were sufficient for all people in all purposes, we wouldn't need to be here.

So hopefully if you're listening to this. You take that for what it is and you find that these are some things that you can try. We're not saying that you don't want to add reps. If you can only do one rep then yeah. It's great to get to two and to three. And this is part of, this is part of things.

When to Add Weight vs. Sophisticate 

Andy: [00:17:19] So what comes next then is: how to determine this, how to determine is this a situation where you need to add weight or is this a situation where you need to add complexity or do something else? So we're going to go over  some cases where maybe adding weight is the best thing and some cases where we really prefer adding more complexity.

And at what point that becomes the right choice. 

Ryan: [00:17:43] Absolutely. And just to continue a bit more on that point, I still look at rep numbers as well. I'm still looking at using weight. And so I don't want anybody to think that we're poo-pooing on any of this. So again, it all comes back to your goals and understanding that there are different ways to do this.

And to be perfectly honest, better ways to do things. And so if you understand the purpose and the reasoning behind these things, then you're going to be able to make smarter choices, which is going to lead to better growth in your game, whatever that might be. So when are we going to be using weighted moves?

We talked before about the hypertrophy point of this. And so if that's really what you're after, good, stick with it. If it's working for you, stick with it. But the first thing about this is making sure that you assess and you determine what is your need. So what do you want out of this? 

So if you are looking at locomotion and let's say you're doing the Bear, the Monkey and the Frogger, and you say, "You know what? These are too easy for me right now. I think I'm just going to throw on a weighted vest, a weight vest." Well, then let's take a step back and really look okay, why are you even doing this movement? You might not need those movements anymore, to be honest. 

You don't need to do Bear, Monkey, Frogger if you feel that you need to weight it, find another movement where you can do that. That's where for example, a way to push up might come into play. That's where barbell squats might be more beneficial to whatever your need is. And so that's the real thing that we're after is again, just because you can do something doesn't mean that you should do it.

And again, I can't stress this enough is that if you feel that you need to be doing weighted Bear walks, then those Bear walks are probably not the move for you at that point. And then you need to look at what you really need and then use a different movement in order to address those needs. 

Andy: [00:19:34] Yeah, this happens so often. You decide that you really enjoy square pegs. And that's great. The square pegs are wonderful because they don't roll off your desk and shit, but you cannot hammer them into round holes. It just doesn't work. And that's the thing that I think happens a lot of times when people decide that they want something, but their actual goal is something else.

Ryan: [00:19:59] Yes, that's it. 

Andy: [00:20:00] And you need to change your tool. Just because you like a tool does not mean it's the right one for the job. That's right. 

Ryan: [00:20:08] So here's really, I wouldn't say this is the all end of everything, but here's how I determine whether or not I should be weighting a movement or not. Under load do you have control over that movement if something were to go wrong? 

So let's say for example that you're doing barbell squats, would you think it would be safe for you to get into the bottom of a heavy ass barbell squat and try and go in and out of that squat by walking around? The answer's no, okay? We know that.

Andy: [00:20:37] I love barbell duck walks. 

Ryan: [00:20:39] Okay? Yeah. It's not to say those can't be done. If you're at a point where you've actually built up to do it, my next question would be why the hell would you want to do it? But anyway. 

But really if something were to go wrong and you're under load in terms of having that barbell and it's, you got to plate it up. If something went wrong, would you have control to make sure that your knee, your ankle, your hips are not going to literally blow out? Okay. No, that's probably not a good thing to do. And so this can be a very good way to look at, "Is this something that I really should be doing or not?" Coming back to that Bear walk, under load, at that time you might feel in control, but again, what if something were to happen?

If you're really weighted down, literally weighted down. Do you have the necessary control to be able to make sure that you're not going to injure your wrist, your elbow, or your hips? I don't know how that would happen, but these are all the things to look at. And to consider when you're thinking about adding weight.

So again, remember it places more weight on the small joints. You're looking at the wrist, you're looking at the ankles. And so you might be thinking, "Well, I'm just doing a bodyweight squat with weight." Okay, great. Well, that'll work. Okay? Because a body weight squat with weight equals just a squat, that's it.

Nothing has changed. Okay. It's just still a squat, but if again, are you going in and out and transitioning in this movement? If so, then you need to take a look at your ankles and your hips and your lower back when you're under load. 

Body weight training to me is absolutely fine. And you really, trust me here, you can get a very high levels and build a great body with just body weight. Okay? If you want to get yoked, if you want to get huge, you're going to have to add in weight. You're going to have to eat a lot of food. But if it's just a matter that you want to weight an exercise to feel good about yourself and the ego, then I'm just going to ask you not to do it. 

Instead, look at sophisticating that movement. If you think that the Bear is super easy to do, then I suggest that you do the Bent Arm Bear, gradually work on even sophisticating that movement more working towards hand balancing type moves. 

Look at going beyond. Look at doing, if pushups are really easy for you, work towards a planche push up. I guarantee you it's harder than a bench press. I guarantee you.  And it's also going to probably be more beneficial to you if that's something that you want to work on. Okay. But again, use the tool that is going to help you to get the job done for your particular goal. Don't just add weight just because again, you feel like you want to add weight.

Examples of When to Add Weight

Ryan: [00:23:24] Okay. So I do understand though that some of you are probably going to want to use weight. I use weight. I enjoy doing that. So when will we want to use this? Well we hinted at this already. Basically look at, is this a static movement? And in this case I'm not talking static in terms of you're not moving.

Andy: [00:23:43] I was going to say static movement is a tall order, dude. 

Ryan: [00:23:46] Exactly. Because in this term when I mean static, I'm not saying that you're standing still like a statue. Basically what I'm trying to say is that your hands and or your feet don't move. So this would be an example of a squat. 

So in a squat, your feet are in place. They're set in a single position that you've predetermined and you're simply keeping that position. And moving in that way in terms of not moving your feet. So in that terns, it could be a squat. This is also where it could be, for example, like a shrimp squat or a pistol. 

The other way to look at this is where your hands would be in place, and this would be like a push-up. So during the push-up, you're just bending the elbows and lowering yourself and then raising back into the starting position. But your toes and your hands are in the same position. So that's what I mean by static. Now let's see, like again, weighted squats, sumo squats, dead lifts, kettlebell swings, shrimp, squat, pistol squats, push-ups, pull-ups.

There's another great example, pull-ups. Your hands are not moving at all. Okay. You're connected to the bar or rings and you're moving in the same plane. That's where it would be static. Okay. And that's not the best word I could use, but hopefully that kind of makes sense what I'm saying with that. 

Now the other thing where I do consider using weight, and this is something that I do as well as when we're looking at leg based locomotion. And locomotion in terms of the general idea of locomotion where you're simply walking. So for example, you could do weighted carries. This could be like waiter carries. This could be farmer carries, suitcase carries, walking lunges, rucking. As we mentioned before, military does a lot of that. I just call it hiking, but just throw your backpack on with a bunch of weight and walk around. 

So that is where yes. That is something that I do that I think is still safe, but the thing is. We sophisticated our movement in terms of walking. We own that. Okay. As long as you're not, as long as your gait is not completely messed up. And as long as you're not carrying so much weight that it completely hampers your gait as well as your posture. Well, then I think you're going to be just fine. 

Andy: [00:26:11] You can add weight, it would make sense to add weight to walking. But we wouldn't say, you know what? You should take up weighted salsa dancing.

Ryan: [00:26:20] Yes. Great. Thank you for bringing that up. So, very specific in terms of hiking. Why would we want to weight ourselves when we're doing a ruck walks and things like that? A great example would be if you're going on a big camping trip or hiking trip where you're going to have to get up every single day, and you might only be carrying a 20, 25 pound pack.

But the thing is you're going to have to do that over a period of time. In other words, from sunup to sundown.

Andy: [00:26:48] And over all kinds of terrains. 

Ryan: [00:26:50] Exactly. And you're going to be hiking in the mountains and things like that. So that would be where you would definitely benefit from making sure that you get in weighted walking and make sure that you're doing it over different terrain. So this is very specific. 

But if you're just trying to improve your salsa dance and think that you should put on ankle weights and do that no, you're looking at a specific skill in terms of movement, different transitions in that way, I suggest spending more time dancing. And do it in your high heels, cause that's what I do. I love to dance my high heels. Yeah. Merrill just came out with those, the super-duper hiking high heels. They're pretty sweet. 

Examples of When Not to Add Weight

Ryan: [00:27:28] So where would we not want to use weight? We already talked about this before: any locomotion where your hands and feet are coming up off the ground at the same time. We're looking at the Bear walks. We're looking at Monkeys, we're looking at Frog or Crab. Spiderman, we like to call the Spiderman. Everybody has the lizard crawl, things like that. I really don't suggest weighting those movements. 

Again, focus on sophisticating the movement. In other words, making it more difficult, working on the next progression and/ or working on tempo, slowing it down, speeding it up, playing with different tempos, trying to pause throughout the movement and really just focus on getting better at those particular movements. 

Now, the other place that I don't suggest using weight. And, I mentioned this before is, you have your hands on the ground and they're in the same place and shouldn't move are certain movements where you're inverted. So if you do have the strength and the control to do this, these can be beneficial. And there are times where I have put on weight vests and done handstand pushups. But you've got to have complete mastery over everything prior to that. So I think that, to be honest in the long run, this is one of the things where if you just happen to fall and you've got weight on you, it can do more damage than good.

And so that's why even now I don't weight do weighted handstand pushups. I really focus on sophistication that movement by doing one thing, and that is focusing on tempo. I slow it down. And so right now is a good example where I'm working on my 90 degree push-ups.  It's basically where you go into a bent arm lever, and then you press up into a handstand and continue doing that.

I'll slow it down. So rather than putting weight on where I could actually fall out of it and  just basically be unsafe. I instead slow it down and it makes it a lot harder. 

So yeah, lots that we talked about right now, but basically it just comes down to really one thing. Don't be stupid. And it's just as long as you can make sure that you're being smart and say, is this safe? Would I have control  if something went wrong? 

And then getting rid of the ego. This, I see this a lot with a lot of people. It's that ego, we all have it. We will always have it. But the thing is, I think, as we age and after having multiple injuries, you soon, you learn pretty quick that putting that ego to the side and just saying, you know what, I'm cool with where I am right now. I'm just going to work on making it more beautiful. I'm going to focus on sophistication of the movement. I'm going to work on that tempo, slowing things down, and then. I'm really looking at the goal. Why am I doing this? And thinking about again, is it going to be safe if I happen to lose control in this movement?

Adding weight is a good thing. I think it is appropriate in certain matters, but again, I really keep it more to the leg dominant movements  myself. And for example, walking lunges and really just keep that movement very simple. A lower level of that particular movement when I'm doing it weighted. And again, just being safe with it, focus on tempo, focus on sophistication, and you should be good to go. 

Andy: [00:30:45] Yeah. And you talk about being safe and probably anybody under 30 is like, "Ah, safety, man." I know. I get it too. Because I look at things and I think, yeah, it would be bad-ass to do weighted handstand pushups. That sounds really cool, man. I want to be like Ryan, but the fact is that eventually, it's not just because we've gotten older that we've become more conservative.

It's in the process of getting older, we've also fucked our shit up a few times. That's the thing.  I know it probably, for anyone under 30 is, "Oh, these old guys are talking about injuries and safety and shit. And I don't want to hear it." But anybody who's not in that situation, you're probably like "yuuup." 

Injuries make you more conservative. And this is one of the things is that we want to make it clear that being conservative with safety doesn't necessarily mean that you have to sacrifice effectiveness or fun or lots of opportunity for doing some pretty bad ass shit and getting plenty strong in the process too. Safety is the least sexy thing that Dudley Moore movie, crazy people where it's "Volvo: boxy but safe," you know?

Yeah. It's not sexy, but who wants to be sexy in these days where there's all these new diseases going around. If you haven't seen this movie, it's great. It's one of the best of all time. But we talk about these things because they're important and because you absolutely do not need to risk things that will come back to haunt you later.

There are so many safe and effective and fun and just wonderful ways that you can practice using your body and training yourself that you don't have to do the old stupid things that were the only options we really knew existed back when we did some of these stupid things. So regardless of your age, don't take this as a bad thing.

If you're, even if you're a good bit older than us, then, preaching to the choir with this stuff. But you also know now that you don't have to try, you don't have to feel like you're missing out because you're not adding weight to something, that there are other ways to do this. 

Weight is a tool, it's useful, it's great, just like any of the other things we talk about. But it's just like Ryan said all throughout this episode is really think about what you're trying to do and is this the right thing? And there's lots of things where adding weight is great, but there's a lot of things where it's just completely unnecessary to.

Bonus Tip

Ryan: [00:33:14] We'll leave you with the last thing here. So a little secret technique. Andy and I live in Japan, been here for quite awhile and we spend the majority of our time without shoes. Okay. We're indoors. And you always leave your shoes at the door. They don't go into the house. That's a no-no here in Japan.

What I would like to throw out for all of you out there listening. If you're at your office and you have to wear shoes, that's fine. But what I would suggest is today, spend some time moving your toes around and working with your feet. Okay? Go barefoot. If you have the opportunity to go outside on the grass or something like that, do that, but move your feet around.

Move your toes, try and pick something up off the ground with your toes. Just basically try and see what's going on with your feet. And I think the more time you can spend on just becoming more aware of what you can do with your feet, the better your feet are going to feel. And then also the better you're going to feel.

So these play a huge part in the rest of our body. And when your feet are uncomfortable, you're basically going to be uncomfortable. So give your feet some love today and yeah, it's about it. Move those toes around. 

Andy: [00:34:31] All right. Thanks for listening. 

Ryan: [00:34:33] Thanks.