At the end of the day,

Y’all know I’m killin’ this lift,

I know damn well,

Y’all feeling this lift.

– Kanye (probably)

If you wish, you can grab the N.W.A. Newsletter Playlist on Spotify here, all of the songs that have been featured in the newsletter are on the playlist.

Happy Friday, Coach J here from Anyman Fitness – and welcome to the latest edition of The N.W.A. Newsletter.

Each week with the N.W.A. Newsletter, I give you the best Nutrition, Weightlifting, and/or Attitude advice for you to start to use in your life today.

Tens of thousands of people have used this exact newsletter to gain muscle, lose fat, and become a better version of themselves…

Without any further ado, let’s get started..

N.W.A. Tip Of The Week

Mindset is everything when it comes to fitness.

Without a proper mental framework, everything becomes so much more difficult.

It’s hard to win the game of fitness with straight up “effort”.

Being able to mentally handle the ups and down and stay in the game separates the wheat from the chaff, so to speak.

In my 20’s I lost and regained the same 30 pounds a half dozen times.

I would go “all in”, training 6 days per week, doing 90 minutes of cardio per day… just to burn out, stop working out, and slowly regain the 30 pounds.

It was demoralizing.

But I was lucky – I was self-aware enough to realize my ‘balls to the wall’ approach wasn’t working.

I needed to mentally approach fitness… differently.

More analytically and introspectively.

And less “suck it up, no pain, no gain” like.

Here are 3, distinct mindset shifts I had to make in order for fitness to finally “click” for me:

Mindset Shift #1: Stop thinking of fitness as a “problem to solve” and start thinking of fitness as a “skill to acquire”.

Skills take time to develop and learn.

It doesn’t happen overnight.

When you first learned how to ride a bike, you started with a tricycle.

Then, you moved onto a bike with training wheels.

Eventually, Dad took the training wheels off, and you did okay… for about 10 feet, then the bike wobbled, and you fell down, scraping your knee.

After enough tries, sure enough, there you went, riding down the street with a big, goofy smile on your face.

This is how skills work.

You suck at first.

You learn what works and what doesn’t work.

You slowly get better.

But as with any skill, if you stop, you will lose your skill level, and you will need to start over again from scratch.

You need to develop a system for fitness.

As my client and friend James Clear famously said, “You do not rise to the level of your expectations, you fall to the level of your systems.”

Create a baseline system that works for you.

It could be as simple as “train 3 times per week using progressive overload, and track your calories and protein”.

Once you have that down, start to add things in as you see fit.

See what works.

Tinker and adjust over time.

Just realize it won’t all happen “today” – you’ll need to first get good at the skill of fitness before things really take off.

Mindset Shift #2: All you need is a proper calorie deficit to lose body fat, forget about “dieting”.

“Diets” follow arbitrary, useless rules, which make you feel restricted.

When I was yo-yo dieting, I would follow silly dogmatic advice that never got me anywhere.

I avoided all carbs.

I religiously fasted.

I never allowed myself treats.

I feared “GMO’s” and processed foods.

Honestly, I was borderline orthorexic.

This guaranteed my “diet” never actually stuck.

I was in a near-constant state of deprivation; I was “dieting”, not creating a nutritional system I could adhere to.

You should work on develop a method of eating that you love, and ask yourself the hard questions.

Do you really think you can go for the rest of your life without carbs?

Do you actually enjoy skipping breakfast each morning?

And ultimately – can you eat this way forever?

If the answer is “No” to any of those questions, you need to re-evaluate your nutritional system.

All you actually need to do to lose body fat is create a calorie deficit.

All macronutrients are healthy for you, believe it or not.

You can eat 2 meals per day or 10 meals per day.

Fast, or don’t.

High carb or low carb.

It’s YOUR call, not anyone else’s (and certainly not your social media news feed’s).

You need to find out what your body prefers, and what you need to do in order to be successful.

Mindset Shift #3: Find your “MED” (minimum effective dose) and stick with that FIRST, then add more later.

When I was going from 300 pounds to 250 pounds… to 300 pounds to 250 pounds… to 300 pounds to 250 pounds…

I would always start by killing myself in the gym just to lose weight.

I would lift for over an hour, then hit the treadmill for over an hour, every single day.

Did it work?

Yeah, sure… for a bit.

But then I’d get burned out, every day would turn into 4 days… then 2 days… then pretty soon I’d be back on the couch, regaining everything I had lost.

It wasn’t until I realized your diet is for fat loss and your workouts are for strength and muscle building that things really started to click.

I scaled my workouts back to 3, 45 minute sessions per week.

I eliminated all cardio other than walking.

I focused on being on top of my diet.

And my strength and fat loss both exploded as a result.

My hunger subsided.

My energy levels returned.

I stopped getting burnt out.

And I finally stayed consistent with my fitness for the first time in my life.

From 2011 – 2013, I didn’t miss a single workout – not ONE – for a 3 year time span.

If I started thinking about skipping, I could now re-frame my thoughts.

Instead of thinking, “You do this every day, dude, just take a day off”…

…my brain started saying “It’s only 40 minutes, 3 times per week, stop being lazy and go train”.

It worked like a charm.

It felt like such a “small” amount of working out… I felt like I was cheating the system!

After those 2 years were up, I started adding extra days.

By then, the habit was fully built, and I was “hooked” on fitness, so adding in extra days wasn’t hard to do.

I hope you find these 3 Mindset Shifts useful.

Oh, and one more thing… a Bonus Mindset Shift, if you will.

The ONLY way you can be successful in fitness is to never stop.

Take it from the guy who used to start and stop more frequently than an Uber in rush hour traffic.

Find what works for you.

Be reflective, thoughtful, and analytical.

And develop that system that will bear you fruit for years to come.

I currently have a few spots open on my personal, 1:1 roster for coaching.

I team up closely with my 1:1 clients and we work together on an individualized approach for success.

Here’s an example from a recent 1:1 client who lost 68 pounds in my program:

To learn more about this unique, “All In” experience, tap here and fill out this quick form – it will go directly to my email inbox.

Looking forward to speaking with you.

December-5-2025

N.W.A. Tip Of The Week

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