Bob Greene's Webcast Transcript

  

Oprah: Why are they omitted? Wider streets.

Bob: You get wider streets. More—more yard. More house.

Oprah: Yeah.

Bob: It's just telling you that we're not a society that likes to move. And quite honestly, most diseases are what we call hypokinetic. In other words, if you don't move, you're much more prone to get that from headaches to colds to flus to heart disease to cancer. All hypokinetic. When you don't move, you increase your risk of doing that. What's that tell you? We were made to move.

Oprah: Okay.

Bob: And the point is, when you say how much, it's so bad that we need to recommend so much exercise you turn off so many people. But if you can commit to 20 minutes a day—30 is even better—you're going to overcome and give yourself the buffer where you can eat and still enjoy your meals. Because the worst thing you can do—we'll talk about food a little bit later—is think that you're on a diet.

Oprah: Okay. So the exercise plan. Starting with at least 20 minutes a day five times a week.

Bob: Yes.

Oprah: Because there's so many people who—you know, we've heard everything. "You only have to work three times a week or 30 minutes on this and you can change your abs." You can do—this works with consistency.

Bob: Yeah, a minimum of five days a week. A woman, you hate to generalize, but women most likely won't have significant, long-term weight loss if they're exercising less than five days a week 20 to 30 minutes.

Oprah: Gotcha.

Bob: That's extremely important. Men have a little bit more grace. You have to move three times a week. Sometimes you don't even have to correct some of their eating. It's the unfortunate part of the process—the male hormone tends to prevent the laying down of body fat.

Oprah: Right. And our hormones do the opposite.

Bob: And your hormones do the opposite.

Oprah: That's what the estrogen's all about.

Bob: But you do make it up in the emotional side of things. Most women, and I've had male and female clients. Women in general are much more in tune with the rest of their life in saying, "Oh, yeah, I'm vulnerable." And vulnerability is extremely important in starting this process. Where a male will sweep things under the carpet, not admit weaknesses in any part of their life, and from that they won't write in journals in general. And so, emotionally, that's a more difficult client to get—

Oprah: Yeah, but they also lose weight faster because of—they don't have the hormones laying down the fat.

Bob: Very true.

Oprah: Yeah. All right. So is Tiffany up there? Who's up there? Okay. Our next question comes from Tiffany near Corona, California, who is joining us from her living room. Tiffany, your question?

Tiffany: Hi, Oprah.  

Oprah: About metabolism. That's very good. Hi.

Tiffany: My question is, for the last four years I've been gaining weight and losing weight, and I have a treadmill in my house and I've been working out three times a week, but I don't feel like I'm making any progress. And I was wondering if you had any suggestions and how I could rev up my metabolism.

Bob: Number one way, you know, we always read every six months there's a supplement or some type of food. Nothing pales—they pale in comparison to simply moving. And you mentioned three days a week. You need to step it up to at least five. That's a guarantee. I can promise you that you'll start to see success if you do it five days a week. More specifically, the number one mistake people make, they get on their treadmill and they don't work hard enough. You don't challenge your body. And why? As I said before in this webcast—

Oprah: Because it's uncomfortable.

Bob: —it's discomforting. Especially to someone that dislikes exercise which to be honest with you, most of the population.

Oprah: Yes.

Bob: There you go. The truth is, you're going to avoid that discomfort. And when left on your own, you will pick an exercise that avoids discomfort. The belt will be moving, and you'll just be right under that area where results start to happen. My recommendation is never exercise on a flat treadmill. Always have a grade. That's why the treadmill is probably my favorite piece of equipment, because you can manipulate the grade. And the bigger the grade, the harder the work, and it actually allows you to slow down the belt and still even work harder.

Oprah: Yeah.

Bob: And slowing down the belt avoids all the pounding to your body.

Oprah: Yeah.

Bob: So five days a week I'd like you to get at least 30 minutes because you're active. You've been doing it. But you've got to step it up to five days a week. And if I were right there next to you and were talking to you, you could still talk to me, but you wouldn't want to talk very long because you'd be slightly winded and you can feel the chest heaving a little bit and needing some air.

Oprah: Yeah. So you sound like this when you're working out. (Indicating.)

Bob: And that's what we call the results zone. Right under that, you're not wasting time because you're having some health benefits. But you're just not changing the blood chemistry in a way that's going to change your physiology.

Oprah: If you can carry on a conversation comfortably with somebody, then you're not working out hard enough. What is your incline on the treadmill when you're working out?

Tiffany: You know, I haven't been using the incline, so maybe that's something I need to start doing.

Bob: I would have bet on that. The incline is going to change your life. It's going to perspire. It's going to make you a little bit of discomfort. But we know that people that struggle with this issue in particular don't like discomfort. They really hide from it.

Oprah: Yeah.

Bob: Great athletes, on the other end of the spectrum, the great ones can tolerate more discomfort than the average person. And so you need to start not being an elite athlete but getting toward that where you can start to tolerate smaller amounts of discomfort, being a little bit winded, perspiring, and you will see results. I've never seen someone that went through this and you pushed them hard enough within their own abilities, they always lose weight and you will too.