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Outside Magazine September 2003

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Mr. Big (Cont.)

IN GOLDEN, AS WE finish lunch at the cantina, Phillips is loosening up, divulging a little more about himself. He's currently single, though he thinks seriously these days about settling down. He'd like to host a TV show, and he's been developing a proposal that will feature him interviewing a steady parade of folks who have gone through successful transformations.

Lately, he's been consumed by his new books. In addition to Eating-for-Life, two more are slated for quick release: The Eating-for-Life Cookbook, a compendium of recipes due out this fall, and Energy-for-Life, which presents a Tony Robbins-esque plan for harnessing emotional power, scheduled to hit stores a year from now. Phillips is publishing the books himself, rather than through HarperCollins, because, he says, "New York is too slow." With the Atkins diet books topping best-seller lists, Phillips is anxious to enlighten devotees of this protein-heavy regimen about their misinformed ways.

"The Atkins diet is stupid," Phillips says. "It's not low-carb; it's no-carb. But people are flocking to it. Of course you're going to lose weight, since every gram of carbohydrate stores three grams of water. But do you want your diet to be without carbs? What kind of fuel are we burning right now, just sitting here talking? It's not protein or fat. It's carbohydrates. That's what our brains use for fuel. You want to not have any brain fuel?"

As if we're playing out a scene from Body-for-Life Theater, the waitress reappears and sets down a tempting basket of warm sopapillas—fried bread—and a honey bear. Phillips, Nagle, and I stare at it for a minute, then Nagle slides the basket to the edge of the table. "It's like we're living on Temptation Island," Phillips continues. "My house is only a few miles from my office, and I pass eight fast-food places on the way to work. There's a multibillion-dollar industry out there that's banking on the fact that you won't be able to resist."

He drums his fingers on the table.

"We're eating and eating and eating, but we're starving, because we aren't getting the nutrients we need. Think of Golden. It used to be a mining town. The first settlers came here and they'd dig through mountains of dirt to find one little scrap of gold. That's what our bodies do. Out of all the junk we're putting in it, we're asking our body to go through and find the gold it needs to fuel our metabolism and our mind and our muscles."

Phillips, the BFLers, EAS employees—they'll all tell you the same thing: Body-for-Life isn't just about getting huge and cut. And, in many ways, they're right. The regimen is widely adjustable, and EAS employs a large call-center staff to help you—24/7 and free of charge—fine-tune the program to your specific needs.

At the end of the day, what they really want you to understand is that BFL is not just a workout or a diet—it's a lifestyle, a game plan for coping with America's nutritionally ravaged landscape and waning physical activity. The bait is the promise of a beautiful body, but the larger thrust, the implied guarantee that accompanies your new physique, is that you'll also enjoy emotional health, increased vitality, better sex, and inner peace.

That's a tall order for any fitness plan, even one as malleable as Body-for-Life. True, it will help you sculpt your appearance, but therein lie its limitations. If the program is hard—and it is if you stick to the rules—it's largely because your approach to food and exercise has to become as rigorous, focused, and disciplined as your workday. That leaves precious little room for spontaneous culinary adventures, happy-hour margaritas, three-day surf safaris, or mountain-biking epics. Body-for-Life is a utilitarian solution to many of our fitness woes, but even Phillips agrees it's not the final answer.

"I know that 50 percent of everything I'm doing isn't working," he says. "But I want to know which 50 percent. People who do Body-for-Life help me. I learn from them. That's why I love doing what I do."

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