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Micro wisdom delivered to your ears every morning in voice notes ranging from 3 to 15 minutes long. Wisdom on how to live a healthier and more fulfilling life. Every podcast will ground you in the present moment to ensure you know what's important, the here and now.
Hello, everyone. Welcome back. So this is the first podcast of the new year. I hope you've all had a good Christmas and New Year's. And even if you haven't, then it's gone, you know, how it usually goes and you've consumed too much food and not done any exercise and you're not feeling great, just remember that January isn't a rush month.
Speaker 1:It's not to go and just bombard yourself with stuff. You have to be slow and steady with changes in January because it's not about the, you know, Hail Mary changes because they don't work. Anyway, this is a podcast. I'm doing it from Cape Town, actually, South Africa. I'm here for a wedding.
Speaker 1:So I had to go from New Year's Eve, which I went out with my friends, I had to go catch a flight, like, you know, to go to get to the airport, leave at 5AM and twenty four hour travels. It was it was hardcore. And I've arrived in Cape Town for my friend's wedding, which obviously is amazing to be invited to, and you can't turn those things down. But it does mean that when, you know, we run-in a fitness business and it's the start of Jan, you know that's probably the busiest time of the year. And it's really about resilience, stoicism, all this stuff start to kick in massively.
Speaker 1:And I just want you I don't want to share that with you guys because I think, look, whatever brought you in is kind of like we're all getting overwhelmed at the start of Jan, whether it's you going back to work and before Christmas, you know, people who maybe didn't finish things off and now you've to finish them off now. It might be that you're getting stressed financially and the paychecks at the end of Jan and it's only just the start of Jan. A lot of us are gonna be going through some real adversity in January and we feel like because everybody kind of does no drink, no they do it, we have to get everything sorted, which we don't. So I just wanna give some of my view on this because I'm actually going through that now. And like, you know, we think about the apps or some of the apps that had issues and you they can't be fixed immediately because you got the developers who aren't working all day, all night and you you want to fix it and you want the customers to have the best experience.
Speaker 1:And then you've got, like, no Internet connection and you're doing yeah. Then you're going back and forth. And you've got a lean team and it's our massive team of customer service represent representatives. You know, you got all these things happening. And it really what really helped me was I've been really enjoying actually my chat with Uber drivers down here in South Africa.
Speaker 1:Most of them have been from Zimbabwe. And one guy, I was asking him, so I said to him, you know, what made you come to to Cape Town? And he said, well, you know, I had enough in Zimbabwe. There was nothing going, and I just left. And I wanted to score where opportunity goes.
Speaker 1:If opportunity is in England, I go to England. Opportunity, I go here. He said that. I said, alright. So, like, what?
Speaker 1:So you you so you grew up he said he grew up with five people five people, five five siblings, and they used to walk 10 miles. Right? If if they wanted to watch a football game like Champions League, had to walk 10 miles to the nearest place they played it. And, obviously, they walked back in the dark and stuff. So they are this kinda like they love football.
Speaker 1:And he said to me that I said, where would you love to go if you could pick the place to go? He said, Taunton, Somerset. And I was like, what? Where did Taunton Somerset come from? But fair play.
Speaker 1:Anyway, back to the story. He was then saying to me, like, he just left and he came to Cape Town. I said, wow. And he said, yeah. I was, you know, on on the streets.
Speaker 1:I said, what? He said, yeah. Came here. I didn't didn't know anyone. I came on a bus.
Speaker 1:It took me three days. I didn't know what to do, and I was on the streets. And I was like, what how'd you get off the streets? And he was like, well, I just, like, started speaking to people. I ended up in one of those shanty houses, and he said it was horrible.
Speaker 1:Like, every night when it rained, when when it was rainy season, there was, like they had to take out, like, six to seven full buckets of water because it was just dripping in, and, you know, it would flood otherwise. So they couldn't really sleep well at night. Right? So you had to do this every night. And I said to him, like, didn't you feel like you wanted to give up?
Speaker 1:Do know I mean? Like, you've left everything. You've come here. Your dad's going through it. You're getting nowhere.
Speaker 1:You're not earning money. You feel like you give up? He said, no. Never give up. I never never give up.
Speaker 1:I never give up my child's education. You know? So his why was he wanted to get his children a good education. And one of his children, when I was 18, he said, and he's now going to university. I said, mate, you know what?
Speaker 1:Fair play to you. You're amazing. So you sacrificed. You did all of that, but your why was so strong that it didn't, you know, you staying on the streets trying to find a way didn't stop you. You living in a shanty house where you were just flooded in and waking up all the time getting the water out didn't stop you.
Speaker 1:You grinding. I would be an Uber driver. We can work his own hours. Can work as long as he wants well within the limit of the Uber things. But, you know, he he never thought about giving up.
Speaker 1:And I was like, you know what? People give up too early. They give up too way too early. And it just made me realize that we whilst you go through in go through some tough times in this January with health and fitness, with your work, with your finances and stuff, your why has to be so strong that giving up is not an easy option. Like giving up is not even in your oh, should I give up?
Speaker 1:It's not even there for a long while. There's some cases where giving up might be the right action when you're trying something, it's not working. But that just gave me, like, you know what? I looked at him and I thought, you're amazing. And I thank you.
Speaker 1:And he said, thank you so much for your chat, Scott. I said, man, thank you so much for your chat. Like, you've inspired me today. And, you know, again, these conversations with these Uber drivers coming over here from Zimbabwe is quite it's quite that's quite the common theme. They're like they they'll do anything.
Speaker 1:It takes them three days on the bus to get there. They don't fly. They don't have enough money to fly. So, you know, they they really go through it. And that's a lesson in resilience.
Speaker 1:They haven't read books, you know, they haven't read the best philosophers of all time. They haven't done this or that. They just know deep down in their gut if they want things to change, they have to change themselves. And if they wanted things to change for their children and give them the life they wanted, they're gonna have to really dig deep because they're starting so far behind. They're starting so far behind.
Speaker 1:You can't even see where they're starting from. And they're trying to get and they're trying to work hard. And for you guys, and this is never to say like, oh, well, compare yourself to this. Just take it as some inspiration. You know, these people are working from you know, I'm not sure how further lower you can get in terms of socioeconomic status, you know, it's not not much.
Speaker 1:I mean, there's not much lower you can go. So use his lesson. Do not give up this January. You know, things might get seem to get worse before they get better. Maybe is another lesson from I, you know, he left Zimbabwe to get to Cape Town.
Speaker 1:But when he arrived in Cape Town, know where to go. He was on the streets. And back in Zimbabwe, he's in the house. So he's in, well, I'm in the worst position now. But he knew at the end of it, if he kept going, there was gonna be more for him.
Speaker 1:And I think it's the same with you guys, know, it might get worse in your health and fitness journey and you might feel overwhelmed sometimes like I'm tracking my calories, I'm tracking my protein, I can't get my protein quite right. Oh my god, I'm even worse than this than I thought. I can't even get my step target up, I'm trying to do it. You might think I'm trying to do these, only doing these three targets of protein, collagen, and steps, and I still can't do it. What's the point of me trying?
Speaker 1:You know, you might think these things. But it's always darkest before the dawn is another saying. So these are important things to think about this January. You might be thinking, Scott, why am I listening to this podcast about but usually, maybe, by health and fitness, talking about this stuff because this is the stuff. You know, this is the root stuff.
Speaker 1:This is the stuff that changes you because there's no point changing on on on superficially in the branches. You've got to change at the root. And I think for a lot of you, you want to do the seven levels deep exercise to find out really what your true why is because your true why needs to be so powerful that it's not really hindered. And some of our whys are too weak, know, I want to look bad, want to lose some weight by, you know, some party in two months and this and that. That's not gonna stick it.
Speaker 1:Right? It's not gonna stick it. But if you look after your health, right, if you look after your health, you're gonna be able to be that person for your kids, your family, or whatever for as long as possible. Speaking to another lady from America on this trip and she knows the guy getting married through his auntie and she's 70 years old. She is travelling basically travels the world with the guys getting married to auntie, right?
Speaker 1:And she was saying, you know, like, my health is everything. Know? I'm walking. I can I can walk up these stairs? I can walk around places.
Speaker 1:I can do these things. I can fly. And I'm like, yeah, well, you know, when I was in Florence, I saw a lot of Americans and they were you know, a lot of them were were in the obese category. They couldn't walk around the streets, couldn't even take in the views and walk around because they were so tired stuff from walking. She said exactly, you have to look after your health, it's the core of everything you do.
Speaker 1:You have to realise this, it's not just about looking better and stuff, it's about making sure that your back pain is reducing because you're walking more, making sure that you're eating a good level of calories and protein so you're maintaining muscle mass and you're not putting too much weight on or you're maintaining a good weight so you're not putting enough stress on the body, you know, then you're in a position where maybe you can take on one or two workouts a week, where strength workouts and that's got a lot of benefits beyond this, especially as you age to retain bone mineral density and muscle mass and these things are huge. They might not seem huge right now, but they are huge things. And it's a lot easier to maintain than to try and regain lost things. So don't when it comes to maintaining, you have you can do less than you think as well. This is this is really good news for us.
Speaker 1:Like, if you wanna maintain the strength gains from the workouts you've been doing, you can do one or two workouts a week and use some weights and you'll maintain it. You know, if you're used to walking 10,000 steps a day, you know, making sure you're doing at least 6,000 or 7,000 for a week or two is fine, go back to 10,000, you likely will retain that kind of cardiovascular and being able to walk 10,000 steps easily, you know. So it's not about over pushing stuff, it's about looking at what we can retain, what we can work on slowly over time, and those are the big changes. You know, you gotta plant seeds. It's all about planting seeds.
Speaker 1:And January is more about planting seeds. We're not trying to grow the trees right now. That's not how it works. We're just planting trees in January. A lot of you have been planting trees before Christmas and they are really gonna be helping you now.
Speaker 1:But some of you maybe didn't, it's fine. So you plant some seeds now. I'm gonna plant my awareness of food. I'm gonna track my calorie intake. I'm gonna track my protein intake.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna plant all seeds. I'm gonna try and aim for my step count and I plant plant those seeds, you know, that's it, maybe if not, I'm gonna plant the seeds and listen to this podcast every morning, I plant our seeds, see if one seed is giving it to me every day, then maybe in a few months some of those seeds start popping. And I have a lot of people who say, Scott, you know, listening to your podcast, listening to stoicism, listening to this, didn't click immediately. But when it did click, wow. It changed everything.
Speaker 1:And that's true. And the stoicism is, you know, only focus on what's in your control. Nothing else. There's no point focusing on anything outside your control. And the only thing in your control is your voluntary action.
Speaker 1:Remember that. So your voluntary action is that I want to go and do this. I wanna go on a walk. Maybe you can't go on a walk because there's a storm outside. So you couldn't go for a walk but you said I'll put my shoes on, get ready to storm, can't do it so you don't go oh my gosh, bad I didn't go for a walk you say no, I did everything that I could to go for a walk and it didn't happen you must let go of the end result, it's not about the end result that will come over time But the more you try and chase that end result, the more it doesn't happen.
Speaker 1:You know, that's another key thing to think about this January. The more I try and force four, five, six, seven pounds of weight loss, the more I and force I have to do this, have to do that, it likely will slip through my fingers. But if I got a this is good enough for now, I'll do the small things and it's good enough for now, I'm telling you that is the secret everybody's looking for. The secret is the small things done every day. But the problem is the small things done every day are very easy not to do at the same time.
Speaker 1:So it's very easy not to drink water. You know, got water from now. It's very easy not to drink that. It's very easy for me not to go off my walk. It's very easy not for me to track, but it's also very easy for me to do these things.
Speaker 1:And because it's so easy not to do them, we think, oh, they might not be that important. No. No. Those are the things and remind yourself of that. So I hope that story helped you today.
Speaker 1:Put a bit of energy behind you. What's the word I'm looking for? A bit of a behind your step. I don't think it sounds like looking for a bit of a beat behind your step. Can't remember.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean? So hopefully, it does help. Focus on the things you can control one day at a time and just do it today. Just do it today and pick one thing today. If you're on a roll, happy days.
Speaker 1:Carry on. If you've if you're feeling stuck, you're like, oh, I'm miles behind. What am I gonna do? I'm so stressed. Do one of these things today.
Speaker 1:You're either gonna track your calories today. You're either gonna go for a long walk today. You're either gonna track your protein today. You're either gonna go for and drink two liters of water or you might be you say, I've been eating chocolate every day for two weeks. Today, I'm not gonna eat chocolate.
Speaker 1:That's it. Eat whatever food you want. I'm not gonna eat chocolate today. And then the next day, might feel like you don't need the urge to eat chocolate, and then you'll go from there. So pick something small today.
Speaker 1:Go with it. But if you're on a roll, keep going. Never give up. Like my Uber driver, never give up, and things will work out ideally in the end. So keep going, and I'll see you all back here tomorrow.