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🚨 Welcome to this week’s issue of Generation Xcellent. I’m Stephen Perrine, New York Times bestselling author and former top editor at Men’s Health and Maxim. And like you, I’m doing all I can to survive the moshpit of midlife. Thanks for joining me on the journey! If you like what you see, send me an email—and share this newsletter with another guy who could use our help. (And as always, we’re 100% Organic Intelligence: Written by guys like us, for guys like us.)

📩 Thanks for joining the conversation!

- SUCCESS -

Jay-Z’s 8 Rules for Living Your Best Life

Are you pursuing your dreams—or just drifting? Run your day-to-day through this Shawn Carter–approved checklist

By Jeff Stevenson

3. Focus on Process, Not Results. “People get consumed by the trappings of success. They forget the reason they wanted to do what they do in the first place. Whether you have zero money or a million dollars, it doesn’t change who you are. Keep yourself inspired.”

4. Never Act Out of Fear. “Card players have a saying: ‘Play the cards, not the money.’ If your hand is good, it doesn’t matter if there’s $2 on the table or $2,000. You determine your outcome. Don’t make decisions based on fear. People can be jealous of you and bait you, but you can be mature and handle the situation.”

5. Understand What Money Is For. “For some people, money can be a burden and lead to bad decisions. But money should make you comfortable so that you don’t have to compromise yourself or do anything just for money. It should give you the freedom to do what you love.”

6. Impress the Right Person. “I collect art and I drink wine…things that I like that I had never been exposed to. But I never said, ‘I’m going to buy art to impress this crowd.’ That’s just ridiculous to me. I don’t live my life like that, because how could you be happy with yourself?”

7. Be the Trend You Want to See. “All my businesses are part of the culture, so I have to stay true to whatever I’m feeling at the time, whatever direction I’m heading in. And hopefully, everyone follows.”

8. And Keep Growing. “The whole thing is to learn every day, to get brighter and brighter. That’s what this world is about. That’s what you should be doing your entire time on this planet. Growth doesn’t stop when you’ve become successful. That’s when it starts.”

—Jeff Stevenson has written for classic magazines including Men’s Health and Maxim.

- FITNESS -

A Flat Belly at 45+? You Need to Know THIS

If someone promises to “boost” your metabolism, they’re either misguided—or they’re lying to you. Here’s why.

By Stephen Perrine

>Let’s say you’re an average guy in his 50s. (Because probably, you are).

Yesterday, you woke up late, drove to your office job, ate lunch at your desk, came home and binge-watched Severance, and hit the sack. In that case, your body probably burned about 2,000 calories.

Today, you got up early, spent an hour on the stair climber, worked in the garden all day, and squeezed in 9 holes before the sun set, then helped a buddy move some furniture before heading to bed. Today, your body burned about…2,000 calories.

Wait…what? How is that possible? What about that calorie counter thingy on the stair climber? It says you burned 500 calories before breakfast! What’s going on?

Well, by midlife your daily metabolism is pretty much set: whether you surf the waves or surf the couch, the number of calories you burn today isn’t going to change.

So how the #$%& are you supposed to lose weight?

Exploding the Metabolism Myth

“When you exercise more, your body simply lowers the number of calories it burns performing other functions, such as inflammation or hormone production,” says Herman Pontzer, associate professor of evolutionary anthropologist at Duke University and author of Adaptable: The Surprising Science of Human Diversity. “So the number of calories you burn per day—your metabolism—remains constant, whether you work out or not.”

Related:  The Very Best Flat-Belly Workout for Men

Perhaps you’ve read about workouts or even diets that supposedly “boost” your metabolism. Bullshit, Pontzer opines. Think about it from an evolutionary standpoint: Our metabolism is set by the number of calories we need to survive. If we turned up our metabolism, we’d be increasing our risk of starvation. So nature protects us from that by keeping our metabolic rate constant, despite our attempts to burn calories through exercise.

And here’s why trying to lose weight by cutting calories is such a bad idea: When we face a dramatic shortage of calories, our bodies are capable of turning our metabolic rates down, causing us to burn fewer calories. After a time, your body resets to that lower metabolic rate permanently. As Pontzer says, metabolism can only go down. It can never go up. A study of 14 Biggest Loser contestants, who lost an average of 128.5 pounds each, found that on average, their resting metabolic rate had dropped by more than 700 calories a day—and stayed there.

Why Exercise Matters

So if the little readout on the treadmill is meaningless, why should we exercise? Well, as Pontzer explains, a lot of weight gain comes from our body doing stuff it shouldn’t—primarily, creating inflammation, which plays a major role in weight gain (especially dangerous belly fat) and just about every other health risk you can imagine.

Think of that 2,000 calories as your body’s daily energy budget. Out of that budget it has to pay for breathing, moving, thinking, digesting, rebuilding tissue, eliminating waste, scrolling TikTok, and yes, creating inflammation. But if you use up 500 of those calories on exercise, and your body has to keep doing all those other things to keep you alive, then it’s going to run out of calories before it can start with all that inflammation mischief. Inflammation declines, and that’s what results in flatter belly. (And if you eat more than 2,000 calories? It doesn’t impact the daily budget—remember, in most cases metabolism can never go up, only down. Those extra calories just get stored in the muscles and liver as glycogen or, once those are full, around your waist as fat.)

So think of exercise not as a calorie-burner, but as an inflammation-buster. The more work you put in, the healthier—and yes, leaner—you’ll be.

—Adapted from The Full Body Fat Fix: The Science-Based 7-Day Plan to Cool Inflammation, Heal Your Gut, and Build a Healthier, Leaner You! by Stephen Perrine (St. Martin’s Press).

Ask Jen: The X-Rated Files
“Is My Girlfriend ‘Emotionally Cheating’?”

>Got a question about sex, marriage, dating, or whatever’s happening in your DMs? Ask Jen X. She’s blunt, crass, and mature enough to remember what “second base” meant before Tinder. Write in with your romantic dilemmas—she’ll sort it out, no judgement. (Well, maybe a little.)

Q: My buddies think my girlfriend is “emotionally cheating” on me with some guy she works with. From what I’ve seen, it’s mostly emojis and inside jokes, stuff like “haha you get me.” Is that shady, or am I just being a jealous old man? — Randy L., Chicago, IL

A: Bless your confident little Gen X heart, Randy. You’ve clearly watched enough Melrose Place to know that flirtation doesn’t always equal an affair. Sometimes it’s just a survival strategy for enduring conference calls and those awful free bagels in the break room.

Look, a little workplace banter? Fine. We all need someone to make us feel hot in bad lighting. But if your friends are picking up on vibes you’re ignoring, you might want to take a closer look. If she’s leaning on this guy for all the emotional stuff you used to handle (talks, support, inside jokes, memes you should’ve seen first), then yeah, that’s something to pay attention to. You don’t want a coworker getting promoted to boyfriend-by-proxy.

Here’s a thought: Reconnect with her. Be curious, not accusatory. And maybe flirt with her a little. It worked in 1994. It still works now.

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- GEN X CULTURE -

The Last Animatronic ShowBiz Pizza Band on Earth

How one Mississippi man built a virtual shrine to our Generation X childhood

By Bob Larkin

>Just off a dusty road in Sandy Hook, Mississippi, you’ll find a pair of ancient gas pumps beneath a sagging tin roof. The pumps haven’t seen unleaded since Clinton was president, and the handwritten signs taped to them declare in fading Sharpie: Smitty’s Super Service.

But this is no ordinary service station. Step inside and it’s 1984 again. Specifically, a parallel-universe version of ShowBiz Pizza Place, complete with flashing arcade lights, vintage signage, and the familiar bouquet of burnt circuitry and mediocre pizza.

At the center of it all? The Rock-afire Explosion, blasting pop hits with the joyful denial of a cassette tape that doesn’t know it’s obsolete.

There’s no Big C's Combo on the menu. No screaming children. No prize counter stocked with cheap plastic whistles and slap bracelets. But if you call ahead, owner Damon Breland will welcome you in, fire up the animatronics, and for about an hour, you’ll believe in time travel.

Breland, 47, is the man behind the madness. By day, he works a regular job (yes, he has one), but by night, he’s a Generation X nostalgia preservationist, a mechanical impresario, and an unofficial historian of the Chuck E. Cheese extended universe.

“In the 80s, there were no cell phones, no computers, no internet, no Nintendo,” he says. “Going to a place like ShowBiz was a real treat. It was like a mini vacation.”

For him, that vacation often meant long drives to the nearest ShowBiz outposts in Jackson, Gulfport, or New Orleans. Good grades meant tokens and animatronic bliss. Now, decades later, Breland has rebuilt it all from scratch, one salvaged robot at a time.

ShowBiz Pizza met its untimely demise in the early ’90s, when corporate suits decided America could only handle one animatronic pizza empire. In a hostile takeover that felt like the Infinity War of family entertainment, ShowBiz absorbed its rival, Chuck E. Cheese, only to then become Chuck E. Cheese. By 1992, Billy Bob and his bandmates were booted offstage, replaced by a smug rodent in a backwards cap and a much tighter marketing budget. It was the end of an era, and for many of us, the first time corporate consolidation truly hurt.

But inside Smitty’s, the Rock-afire Explosion is alive and well. There’s Billy Bob Brockali, the affable banjo bear; Fatz Geronimo, the Liberace-esque gorilla pounding away on the keyboard; and Mitzi Mozzarella, the cheerleader mouse with big mall energy and the deadpan mystique of early Winona Ryder.

“It represents a simpler time,” Breland says. “It’s an escape to childhood. Especially for us middle-agers.”

For Gen Xers, who now find themselves somewhere between 401(k) contributions and TikTok-induced migraines, Smitty’s hits like a warm hug from childhood. It's a place where time stopped in a good way. Where you can forget your mortgage, your boss, and your cholesterol meds, and just vibe to a robot bear covering “Sweet Caroline.”

It’s also proof that you can’t always measure magic in dollars. Damon doesn’t charge admission. Appointments are made by email. There’s no donation box, no Patreon, no corporate sponsors. Just one man, a pile of animatronics, and a mission.

“You bring the pizza,” he says, “I’ll bring the past.”

—Bob Larkin has written for Men’s Health, Esquire, The New York Post, and other outlets.

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