The ONLY 4 Things That Actually Get Women Lean After 40

00:00Lean after 40, what that means is a body composition that is characterized by relatively low body fat and relatively high lean muscle mass. It's not relative to a photo that you had 20 years ago. It's not relative to a woman that you see on Instagram who is either in their 25 or their 35 year olds and they're doing these types of XYZ diets and you're like, oh man, I should follow that same exact thing. No, it's relative to what you are experiencing right now and what is actually achievable and sustainable for the body that you are in right now. Lean after 40, it is entirely achievable.

00:34Hey, hey, hey, what's going on, everybody? Welcome back to another episode of The WarriorBabe Show with your host, Nikkie Stott. And today I want to talk about a word that almost every woman in this space uses. Like women say they want this, but then they're doing the counterproductive actions that are going to get them to that word. And it's not toned. You guys already know how I talked about the word tone before, but it's this word lean. Like I want to be lean. I want to look lean. I want to go back to the lean feeling I had when I was younger.

01:11And here's the problem with that. The definition of lean that most women are working from is a definition built for a 25 year old body. A pre-hormonal shift body. You know, like a body that has totally different estrogen levels, different muscle mass, and a different metabolic rate, and a completely different just overall hormonal environment than the one that you are living in right now. Like the one that you're thinking about from these previous years when you were like 25 or even in your early 30s is completely different than this hormonal shifts you've experienced

01:46and the body changes that you are experiencing and the environment that you're living in right now. And so when you chase that like 25 year old definition of lean with where you are now, like a 35, 40, 45, 50 year old body using the same approaches and the same, oh, well, the same diet mentality or doing the same cardio or doing like tons of workout, you are going to get frustrated. Because the body that you have now does not respond to those types of signals or inputs similarly in the way that the body that you had back then did, right?

02:22You conclude that with something that is that you think that this this thing that I'm in right now, this program that I'm doing, if it's not working in three weeks, you try and revert back to what you do know what works. And you think that, oh, maybe, you know, this maybe it's the program that's not working. Maybe it's the food that's not working. Maybe it's a workout that's not working or something like you think that is just what I need to accept now. But I need you to know, like you thinking about this lean definition of where it's coming from or like you want to be that, that type of definition that you have is wrong.

02:53And I want to help you guys replace that one with one that is actually going to be more in aligned with where you are now and also empowering on this journey moving forward because you're going to see it from like a different lens. I just want to be honest about what most women mean when they say that they want to be lean. They mean that they want to look the way that they look at their leanest, which or they want to have definition. They want to see lines in their abs. They want to, you know, have like their shoulder caps pop in like they want to be defined, right?

03:26As a definition of being lean. And most women, when that, when either if they ever experienced that or when they had it was probably in their younger years, right? And a specific body fat percentage, a specific level of definition, like a specific way that clothes fit. And a reference point that lives in like a memory that you have or a photo that you saw. And that approach that produced that result, usually some kind of combination of like, okay, you're probably eating less or doing less cardio. Like those things worked. That worked for you back then.

03:58But that's no longer true. So, you know, at 25, you had estrogen that was doing a significant amount of the work in the background that you are not aware of. Like you can't see these things just as much as I talk about that you can't see muscle being built until you're like a year into your journey. Similarly, you can't see these hormonal shifts that you're experiencing. And so back then at 25, estrogen was doing a completely different job. It was literally protecting your muscle during calorie deficits. It was directing fat away from your midsection.

04:29It was supporting your recovery. It was supporting your bone density, your insulin sensitivity, your body's ability to respond to training with relatively efficient adaptation, right? And at 25, your body mass was likely, it was likely at or near its peak. You're building through, you know, doing the types of movements or doing type of activity. And that muscle was running at a metabolism that can handle more of the restriction that you're putting it through or doing more cardio or more of the approaches that, you know, gave you those types of quick fix results.

04:59Or quick visible results, right? And then, I mean, I didn't dive deeper, but it's like everything is different at this. Your cortisol tolerance is different. That was higher. Your recovery capacity was greater. You could get away with less sleep. You could get away with shoving a caffeine drink or two, right? In your day. You could get away with having more stress on your plate. You get away with more training volume. Like, you could get away with doing those same things without the same consequences to your hormones and your body composition that you are experiencing now. But none of these things that you have experienced are the same now.

05:33And that is just a part of your biology and the part of how your body changes over time. The body that you have at 45, 55, even 35, they operate completely differently. Like, they just operate different. It's not like bad or worse or it's like a terrible thing that's happening. It's just that your body adapts and evolves over time and it's going to need different strategies than what you tried before. So, the lean that you're chasing was, right? It's built by this hormonal environment that supported it at that time but no longer exists.

06:05And so, chasing it with the same approaches of restriction and doing more cardio and working out harder is like trying to basically run. Like, think about an iPhone and you're trying to run a software on a system that is, it's not designed for. Like, you think about iOS, right? 13 is different than iOS 18 now. Or like the different, those things evolve, right? Or like when your phone, battery phone is at 3%, what does it do? It goes into reservation mode, right? And that's what your body is kind of somewhat adapting and changing into because it doesn't want to be in restriction mode.

06:36It wants to be fed properly as a good owner. So, the definition I want you guys to replace this with and I want to be very specific because like I don't believe in vague descriptions because they're going to produce vague results for you. So, lean after 40, what that means is a body composition that is characterized by relatively low body fat and relatively high lean muscle mass. So, for your age, for your hormonal stage and for your like individual body composition, it's not relative to a photo that you had 20 years ago.

07:06It's not relative to a woman that you see on Instagram who is either in their 25 or their 35 year olds and they're doing these, doing these types of XYZ diets and you're like, oh man, I should follow that same exact thing. No. It's relative to what you are experiencing right now and what is actually achievable and sustainable for the body that you are in right now, okay? So, I'm going to break this down, what this actually looks like in practice. It looks different in the mirror than that 25 year old lean you did.

07:37Like a lean body after 40 often carries a little bit more body fat than a lean body at 25 because the hormonal environment that allows for a very low body fat in young women does not exist the same way in post-menopause. But lean after 40, you can still have and you can still grow and build more muscle, more shape and change that like overall structural body composition that you will want to experience and like how your body actually looks. Because muscle is, it is that it's intentionally built, right?

08:10And you are following a program that is giving the workouts for you to intentionally build specific muscle. When you are following a specific program that is that end goal for every single woman, right? Because that is what is going to give you when you focus on building muscle, that is what's going to create those visible lines and the definition and the leanness. Rather than you seeing a number on the scale or like a body fat percentage, right? That muscle is going to be the one thing that's going to do that for you. Hey, while you're listening, if you're getting value from this episode, take a moment to tap that review button or share this podcast with a friend.

08:46It's a small gesture that goes a long way in helping more women find their way to feeling stronger and more confident in their skin. I appreciate you so much for taking the time to support this show. Then also leaning into the fact that as you get older, you cannot restrict as you once have restricted before. Because muscle needs food. So what I mean by that, and you can't restrict because lean at 25, like you had everything of which way, no matter what you did, it's still that your body was still being able to produce you temporary results through temporary restriction, through cardio, right?

09:22Lean after 40 cannot do that for you, at least not sustainably. And not without tanking your metabolism or disrupting your hormones or producing a result that disappears the moment that you stop restricting, right? When I think about that, when I say that, I think about the weight loss injections that are out there is like they're a tool and they're a resource for people and they're used to produce X result and they work. But that X result is mainly losing, it's losing both weight and muscle mass. And you need that muscle as you get older.

09:53If you're not giving your body a reason to keep that muscle, it's not going to keep it for you. If you're doing things that are not producing the results of you gaining and building and preserving lean muscle, then that said thing that you're following or programming or doing or injectables, it's just going to stop the moment that you stop doing it, right? Like there's so many women that I've heard are coming off of GLP-1s or these injections that have lost weight, yes, but they don't have the foundation of muscle because muscle is also attacked in the process.

10:26And when they stop the thing, they gain the weight back. And sometimes even there's studies out there that have doubled the weight gain in 12 months. So what I'm saying here is a lean muscle, lean after 40 is built on muscle foundation. It requires you to have enough muscle to create the definition that you want and also to run a metabolism that doesn't require 1100 calories to maintain. What else this looks like in practice is that this is all measured completely differently. This is not measured on the scale.

10:56It is measured in how your clothes fit, what your measurements are, what your strength looks like over time, and what your energy and your hormonal health feel like. The scale is just telling you one aspect of the story, but it's also not showing you the one thing that's being built. Like you're using a tool that sits in your bathroom that is going to weigh everything in your body and that includes your body fat and includes muscle as well. But it can't show you you're getting smaller, but you're also getting more defined because you're building that muscle.

11:30You're getting more lean because you're building that muscle. That scale isn't going to show you that. So take the pictures. Wait, look differently with your clothes that you're wearing. Take measurements. See it from like the way that you are getting stronger over the months of you being on this journey rather than just solely relying on the scale because this all has to be measured differently. Now, I want to be direct about some of the approaches that are not going to get you lean after 40 no matter how consistently you execute them, no matter how much effort and work you put into them because most of them are exactly what women are doing when they tell me that nothing is working.

12:04So you cannot be in a significant calorie restriction without also having adequate protein because eating very low calories will tell your body, hey, food is scarce and it's going to respond by protecting fat and it's going to start burning muscle, which is that expensive tissue that it cannot afford. At this point, if you're not giving in enough food, it cannot afford your body to maintain it. And so you lose weight, but you also lose muscle. And then your metabolism does slow down because your muscle is an active part of your metabolism. And the body that you end up with is it's lighter and it's smaller, but it's not leaner, like less of what you had before,

12:44but you don't have a different body composition. Doing high volume cardio as like your primary source and primary means to getting X result. I need you to understand that there's nothing wrong with cardio and it's good for your heart and good for your, you know, endurance. But cardio burns calories only while you're doing it and does not, it does not meaningfully increase your calorie burn after. It does not build the muscle that creates a definition.

13:16And high volumes when you're not giving your body enough food, it actively contributes to muscle loss. So it's just not the strategy to you getting a lean body, right? Doing training without doing any type of progressive overload. If the weight on the bar is not increasing over time, then your training looks the same that it did a year ago, then your body has no reason to build muscle. And without you having a reason to build new muscle, that visible change that you are after is not going to come. Like your training has to be progressive.

13:48It has to be increasing. And I have tons of podcasts on progressive overload. So I'd recommend that you go back and listen to them. Progressive overload has to ask more of your body and tell more of your body that, hey, we need, this person needs this muscle. So keep it on there. Keep it on this body. And one thing that I will also just pinpoint that you can't really focus on, and I kind of alluded to it already, but it's you chasing that same body fat percentage that you once had before. Because for many women, that body fat percentage that felt lean at 25 is not optimal or achievable at 50 without approaches that are actively damaging to hormonal health, to your bone density, to your metabolic function, to your current muscle mass.

14:32The leanest version of your body at 50 is not going to look exactly like the leanest version of you at 25. And pursuing it with that type of expectation will produce you to give up. And it's going to produce you to not get the results that you want to. So that's more of like a mindset strategy that I want you guys to think about. Because even though you've had success before, yes, feel the feeling of the success, but know that the outcomes are going to be different in terms of what your body composition looks like. Okay? So practical things to take away. And what works is building muscle and focusing on that.

15:05Some of you guys don't even need to go into a fat loss phase. Some of you guys don't have enough mechanisms internally to go into a fat loss phase. Some of you guys really need to just focus on building muscle first. Because that visible definition, that lean look, that comes from muscle existing underneath of your skin. You cannot create that definition by removing fat from a body that does not have adequate muscle underneath. So focus on building that muscle first. Or you can do it simultaneously. So you have to be doing strength training and you have to be eating at or near maintenance in order to achieve that simultaneously.

15:41Then you also have to eat enough to support that muscle that you're building. Like this is the part that goes against everything that most women have been told. To build lean muscle after 40, you need to be eating enough protein, at least one gram per pound of your body weight every single day. And you need adequate total calories to fuel the training and recovery that building muscle requires you to do. A couple of the other things is protect your hormonal environment. Like you need to make sure that you're managing your stress, you're getting good sleep, you're getting so important that yes, while protein is important, fat is also important.

16:16These aren't just like, oh, Nikki is giving me lifestyle suggestions. Like these are direct inputs into the hormonal environment that determines whether your body builds muscle, whether it burns fat, or whether it does neither. Because you being in chronic sleep deprivation and just having a high stress lifestyle makes lean after 40 nearly impossible to achieve and nearly impossible to maintain at the same time. So you need to be making sure you're getting, I would focus on at least the sleep component first. You guys can turn off the TV earlier, you can stop the TV show, you can pick up a book, you can go read in bed, you can get seven to eight hours of sleep.

16:51I know you can do it. It's just changing your behavioral habits. That's it. You got to give it a real timeline. Like it is six to a 12 month period, not like a six week challenge that this is going to be achievable for you. Not like a 90 day program. Like focusing on it as a sustained, progressive, consistent effort over time. That's the way the muscle gets built. And that body fat can be reduced. And that body fat and that body composition to fundamentally shift. The women who get there and do that are not the ones who found a faster approach.

17:23They're the ones that were actually patient and stayed consistent in their journey. So if there's anything that you guys take away from this conversation today, lean after 40. It is entirely achievable. But it is not the same as being that lean you at 25. It cannot be produced by the same approach of the things that you were trying back then. It is going to require a different strategy. It is built on muscle, not restriction. It's measured in composition, not the scale weight. It's produced over months, years even sometimes.

17:57Not you being like a daily or weekly type of mental framework here. And it requires working with the body that you have right now. So you got to let go of the old definition. That was built for an old you, a past you. That lean is totally, you getting lean is totally achievable. The version of your body that is actually possible in this chapter is built differently. In many ways, honestly, it's more impressive in my opinion for the women that I've seen in our worry bay program who are like 55 plus, 60 plus, who have built new lean muscle tissue and have completely changed their body composition.

18:31It is impressive of what they've accomplished. Because most importantly, when I say that, not that they have the right, they have the right workout, they have the right nutrition strategy, but it was built with intention. It was built with knowledge. It was built with a full understanding of what their body is actually capable of now, what they need. And this is so worth building. And you guys, every Thursday at 7pm Eastern Standard Time, I go live doing a live training that covers this more in depth than a 20 to 25 minute podcast will.

19:02I do two and a half hours of hanging out with you guys live, giving you education, giving you guys tips, giving you guys reasons of why this is really important. And also the key takeaways that you can take away and implement into your life. You guys can register at that link below this podcast right now. And just be there, show up. It'll be the best two hours spent gaining so much knowledge that you guys can start implementing right now. All right. With all that being said, you guys, I hope that you enjoyed this podcast. I hope that it was helpful for you. I hope that it gave you some light bulbs or just opened your mind up.

19:35Just being aware that this journey is going to look different for you. And that's okay. All right. I love y'all and I'll see you in the next one. Peace out. Hey, really quick before you go, I have one small favor to ask. If this episode brought you value or sparked something in you, take just a moment to hit that review button. Your rating and review make all of the difference. Helping more women discover the tools they need to transform the fitness and their confidence. It takes less than a minute, but it can change the path of someone else's journey.

20:06Thank you so much for leaving that review. I appreciate you so much. Thank you. Thank you.

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors.