If you’re ready to build muscle properly — including glutes that actually fire — join me here:

👉 www.musclemonth.com

And if you’re supporting your metabolism alongside your training:

⚡ 5-Amino-1MQ & SLU-PP-332 available at 👉 www.joanneleestore.com

I keep hearing the phrase “lazy glutes.”

And honestly… it makes me twitch a little.

How can the strongest, most powerful muscle group in your body be lazy?

It can’t.

But it can be badly recruited.

And that’s where most people go wrong.

Because here’s what I see over and over again:

You’re squatting. You’re lunging. You’re hip thrusting.

But your hamstrings cramp. Your lower back tightens. Your quads grow.

And your glutes? …not so much.

That isn’t weakness.

That’s mechanics.

Your glute maximus is a powerhouse. It was built for:

✨ Sprinting ✨ Climbing ✨ Explosive hip extension

When was the last time you sprinted?

Exactly.

We sit. We drive. We walk on flat ground. We live in hip flexion.

Hours of sitting shorten the hip flexors, lengthen the glutes, and tip the pelvis forward.

Your nervous system adapts to whatever you repeat most.

So when you go to the gym after sitting all day, your body doesn’t suddenly switch patterns. It keeps using what it’s practiced — hamstrings and lower back instead of glutes.

That’s not laziness.

That’s adaptation.

Most people live in anterior pelvic tilt — hips tipped forward, lower abs disengaged, glutes already at a mechanical disadvantage.

Try this:

Stand up. Push your hips back. Arch your lower back. Now try to squeeze your glutes.

You’ll feel quads.

Now gently bring your pelvis back underneath you.

Boom. 🔥

Glutes switch on.

That tiny shift is massive.

If you squat and lunge in anterior tilt, you’re training around your glutes — not through them.

As we age:

⚡ Fast-twitch fibres decline ⚡ Muscle mass drops if not trained properly ⚡ Dieting shrinks glute tissue ⚡ Rapid weight loss without loading = muscle loss

And here’s what most people don’t realise:

Your glutes are one of your largest glucose storage tanks.

When you shrink them, you don’t just lose shape.

You reduce:

• Insulin sensitivity • Metabolic capacity • Skeletal protection

This isn’t just about leggings.

It’s metabolic. It’s hormonal. It’s structural.

Feeling isn’t required for activation.

But if:

– Your hamstrings cramp in bridges – Your lower back burns in deadlifts – Your quads grow while your glutes stay flat

Something is off.

Most people never reach true hip extension.

They arch their back to fake it.

Real hip extension means your thigh moves behind you and your pelvis comes through under control.

That last 10% of the movement?

That’s where the magic lives.

Great exercise.

Common mistakes:

Too heavy too soon. No posterior pelvic tilt at the top. Bouncy reps. No real lockout.

The exercise isn’t the problem.

The execution is.

And the devil lives in the details.

Nobody builds muscle accidentally.

The people walking around with strong, developed glutes did not stumble into them.

They had strategy. They understood mechanics. They respected progression.

Once you understand this, training becomes fascinating.

Every rep has purpose. Every meal has direction. Every adjustment matters.

That’s when it becomes fun.

Inside Muscle Month we fix:

✔️ Pelvic positioning ✔️ Hip extension ✔️ Glute recruitment ✔️ Midlife muscle strategy ✔️ Progressive loading

No random reps. No guessing. No wasted time.

📅 March 29 – April 25 👉 www.musclemonth.com

And if you’re serious about metabolic support alongside your training:

⚡ 5-Amino-1MQ & SLU-PP-332 👉 www.joanneleestore.com

Weak glutes aren’t lazy.

They’re under-recruited.

Fix the recruitment… and everything changes. 🍑💪

Hello hello — welcome back to Midlife Mayhem.

Quick update first:

🔥 Muscle Month is back on. 📅 March 29 – April 25 👉 www.musclemonth.com

This is my favourite program to coach because we build muscle properly. And after today’s topic, you’ll understand why that matters more than ever.

Think of your skeleton like a savings account.

You do most of your depositing before age 20.

👉 Up to 90% of adult bone mass is built by 18–20. 👉 Peak bone mass happens by 25–30. 👉 After that? You’re mostly maintaining… then withdrawing.

Bones respond to load.

Lift. Jump. Sprint. Carry.

Muscle pulls on bone — and bone gets stronger.

No load? No signal.

Childhood and teenage years are the aggressive investment phase.

Modern kids:

• Move less

• Sit more

• Scroll more

Bones don’t respond to scrolling.

If little gets deposited early, withdrawals later become dangerous.

Especially for women.

When estrogen drops:

• Bone breakdown speeds up

• Rebuilding slows

• 10–20% bone loss can happen within 5–7 years post-menopause

Layer in:

• Low muscle

• Chronic dieting

• Low protein

• Vitamin D deficiency

• High cortisol

• Sedentary habits

And bone loss accelerates.

GLP-1 medications reduce appetite and body weight.

They work.

But physiology doesn’t care about marketing.

Lose weight rapidly → reduce skeletal load → reduce bone stimulus.

Add:

• Low protein

• Low calories

• Muscle loss

• No resistance training

Now you’re accelerating bone loss.

Is it inevitable? No.

But it requires intention.

And most people aren’t being coached on this.

We already have drugs like:

• Prolia

• Fosamax

And new osteoporosis drugs are in development.

Why?

Aging population. Sedentary youth. Rapid weight-loss pharmacology.

I am not anti-medicine.

I am anti-ignorance.

Awareness changes behaviour.

Build muscle. Load bone. Eat enough protein. Maintain vitamin D. Train properly.

Nobody builds muscle by accident.

Gyms are full of people who never change because they have no strategy.

Muscle building is a skill.

And muscle protects bone.

Bone isn’t cosmetic.

Hip fractures in older adults dramatically increase mortality within a year.

This is about:

• Mobility

• Strength

• Longevity

• Quality of life

Your bone bank is a 40-year project.

You can’t go back to 14.

But you can start now.

If you want to:

• Build muscle properly

• Protect your bones

• Train with strategy

• Stop guessing

Join me.

📅 March 29 – April 25 👉 www.musclemonth.com

Muscle does not happen by accident.

And neither does strength in midlife.

See you inside. 💪🦴

🔴 Red Light Therapy — The Bit Nobody Explains Properly

Red light therapy is not one thing.

People hear “red light” and assume a face mask, a mat, a sauna, and a $3,000 panel are all just different price points of the same thing.

They’re not.

They are doing different jobs in the body.

And if you don’t understand that, you either overspend… or you buy the wrong tool and feel disappointed.

So here’s what actually matters.

When we talk about red light therapy, we’re really talking about specific wavelengths of light interacting with your mitochondria — your cellular batteries.

That part is the same.

What changes? How deep the light penetrates.

This stays relatively superficial.

It’s brilliant for:

• ✨ Collagen stimulation

• ✨ Skin texture

• ✨ Wound healing

• ✨ Post-procedure recovery

That’s why face masks work.

They’re not nonsense. They’re just skin-focused.

But red light alone doesn’t reach muscle tissue in any meaningful way.

This goes much deeper.

Now you’re influencing:

• 💪 Muscle recovery

• 🦵 Joint irritation

• 🧠 Nervous system regulation

• 😴 Sleep quality

• 🙂 Mood stability

This is where things become systemic.

If your goal is skin? Red light may be perfect.

If your goal is recovery, inflammation reduction, deeper sleep, better resilience? You need near infrared.

Different again.

Saunas use heat.

Heat improves circulation and sweating. That’s thermal stress.

Helpful? Yes. The same as mitochondrial signaling from red/NIR light? No.

Sauna = heat adaptation Red/NIR = cellular signaling

Completely different mechanisms.

A small mask treats a small area. A mat treats a local region. A panel or bed treats the whole body.

And mitochondria don’t live just in your face.

If you want:

• Better sleep

• Whole-body recovery

• Nervous system calming

• Systemic inflammation reduction

Surface area exposure matters.

This is why Kevin and I ended up with the larger setup.

What started as scar support turned into something much bigger.

Yes, his healing was remarkable.

But what surprised us most?

The sleep. The depth. The calm. The way training stopped feeling like it drained me and started feeling like it rebuilt me.

That’s not magic.

That’s improved cellular energy and lower inflammatory load.

Red light therapy is a support tool.

It enhances recovery. It regulates the nervous system. It improves resilience.

But it does not replace intelligent training.

If you’re not:

• Stimulating muscle properly

• Eating adequate protein

• Managing recovery between sessions

No amount of light will create the body you want.

We start March 29.

This is not random workouts. This is structured hypertrophy training for midlife physiology.

Inside Muscle Month we cover:

• How muscle actually builds in midlife

• How to stimulate it properly

• How to protect your joints

• How to recover intelligently

• How to create a body that gets stronger — without the bulk

Red light can support recovery.

Muscle changes your metabolism.

If you want to build the foundation properly:

👉 www.musclemonth.com

Let’s build the body that doesn’t need constant fixing.

Joanne 💪