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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. A bit of a pep talk today I think about health. I've seen a few things online I wanna talk about first. One of them is that sugar is bad, fruit contains sugar, therefore fruit is bad. You should avoid fruit.
Speaker 1:Now the problem with this is you don't eat the sugar from the fruit apart from the fruit. You eat the fruit. You have to eat the full fruit, the the the thing. Do know what I mean? So if that's happened, you eat the fiber that comes with it and the other micronutrients that come with it.
Speaker 1:You don't just eat the sugar from the fruit. It's silly to say this. We don't this is not how we eat as humans. We eat a mix of micronutrients when we eat. We don't eat isolated compounds.
Speaker 1:You don't eat a 50 gram protein meal, just protein usually. You don't eat just 50 grams of carbs as a meal because the foods you're eating contain different percentages of different macronutrients. So you can't isolate things like this and eating sugar anyway is not bad. So what we do here is we look at things this way and it's the complete wrong way to look at it. It's like me walking down the street and someone shuts out the window.
Speaker 1:Scott, mate, is that you from the one of the fitness apps? He asked me, mate, yeah, why why are you eating an Oreo ice cream sandwich, man? Well, it's like, yeah, you know, it's it's part of my it's within my calorie intakes, my protein intake, I hit that as well. If that's bad for you, no? It's fattening.
Speaker 1:No. Not really. Because the rest of my stuff make sure that my calories are on target and my protein's there. You know, eat a lot of fruit, vegetables. So overall it's fine.
Speaker 1:There's no problem. Yeah. But that that makes it bad. No? No.
Speaker 1:It doesn't outpower the rest of my diet. No. It doesn't. But surely it is. I mean, said sugar's bad.
Speaker 1:Good on his path. You're like, no, mate. Listen. In the context of my intake of food, I am within the main things I focus on are my energy intake and my protein, okay? Like if that's in check, the rest of my choices can be whatever they want.
Speaker 1:Of course there's foods you can eat them to give you maybe more energy, they're less on your stomach and that's for you to find out. But for you to say just because you've had this one singular item that your diet's bad or this bad and this stuff, it is silly. A lot of people do this like lone ranger, lone gunman approach to nutrition, it's like this one thing is the problem, this one thing causes that. It's not how it works. We have a certain lifestyle, we have a certain collection of foods we eat.
Speaker 1:The collection of foods we eat determines the energy we eat. If we control the energy we're a consumer which is the main thing and we control the protein, really we've hit really two big massive milestones there, the rest of the stuff is really nice. Like I can have three Oreo ice cream sandwiches if I wanted to but I decide not to have three. Why? Because there's more bang for my calorie buck with having an actual meal because they're 240 calories per one.
Speaker 1:If I had two of them, you know, it's 480 calories. I I could have a really good meal for that. I could have chicken. I could have a lot of veggies and stuff I love. Maybe gravy.
Speaker 1:I could have all that. I could have that instead. And I think I'm obviously not gonna have three Oreo ice cream sandwiches when I can have one and then a meal because the meal is filling and I want to have a meal. I want to make sure I hit my protein intake, you know? But some days I might have three.
Speaker 1:But again, one day in isolation doesn't see the full picture either. So we need to stop looking at things singularly and as good and bad because it's not how it works. It's never worked this way. It's never worked in anything this way. Like, it's like judging someone off a mistake.
Speaker 1:One mistake, I see you judged not forever. We don't do this. You look at the full person. Well, you should be anyway. You shouldn't be looking at one individual thing and determining if they're good or bad or right and wrong.
Speaker 1:You know? You have to look at the context of it. You know, the classic one is stoicism is like Epictetus talks about, you know, someone say, oh, someone's burgled my someone's burgled me, stole food, and then it's bad. And everybody said, well, that person's good because they needed to feed their family and they were dying. But you think it's bad because you've lost some revenue.
Speaker 1:You know? So when you look at the context of it, is stealing good or bad? Well, you know, morally in society you say it's bad. But then when you have some exceptions like that, say, well, they have to do it. They were they've been pushed into this position through war and farming or whatever, and they have to get that food or their kids would die.
Speaker 1:You think, well, that's a good thing because you don't want the kids to die from losing 10p of sales. You look at the context of this, very different picture. So the context of the foods we eat becomes a different picture when we look at it from a bird's eye view. The bird's eye view is what's energy my intake over time? What's my what's my, protein intake?
Speaker 1:And what's my step count over time? And if you hit those three things, okay, things will move in the right direction for you. And you don't have to worry about the minuscule details then, oh, did I have too many biscuits today? I have too many takeaways in Jan or Feb? You look at the wider picture, you go, does that matter if the trend is going this way and I'm hitting my targets and stuff?
Speaker 1:No, it doesn't. So you let go of the small stuff. You don't sweat the small stuff as they say. Or as Jim Rohn says, you don't major in the minor things. You're not spending all your time in the minor things that don't matter.
Speaker 1:Like should I eat this fruit because it's got sugar in it? Maybe not. Was gonna stress myself out about this. People have anxiety with these things all the time. They never truly enjoy the moment, enjoy any food, whether they think it's good or bad because they think they should be eating someone else.
Speaker 1:You know, this is people have this health anxiety or food anxiety and it's not something we need to take it seriously. Okay? And when it comes to nutrition as well, you've got to remember on your goal, on your weight loss goal, and this is one of the reasons we don't put in the app like how much do you want to weigh and by when. Because this makes you think short term, it puts a lot of pressure on an end result. And the closer you get to that time, the the deadline, the more stress you're gonna have.
Speaker 1:And even if you do make a certain weight or you have changed your physique, you're never gonna truly be happy because you think you should have had more time. Right? You think there's never been enough time. So even if you look at your best you've ever looked, you still won't feel happy. And this is because we're trying to force a certain change by a certain time when actually what we should be doing is I'm gonna live a certain lifestyle and as a byproduct of this lifestyle I'm gonna lose weight over time.
Speaker 1:And whatever happens, whatever event I have at certain parts of the journey, I'm gonna embrace it. Oh, maybe you say I'm size twenty two right now and you go on this journey but you're size twenty by your next social event and you think I wish I was size twelve. That's the start of the pain because you wish you were something different to where you are now. Because you know what, I'm proud of myself. I'm living a healthier lifestyle.
Speaker 1:I'm looking after my calorie intake, my protein, get my steps in. I've even tried some workouts. I've got a bit of bounce back in my step. I'm proud of myself. Yeah.
Speaker 1:I'm not where I wanna be exactly size wise, but that's not that's not what I'm here for. That I'll eventually get there, but I wanna get there in a slow, steady manner. It's ancient wisdom, slow and steady. You know, this one day at a time. These things aren't just catchphrases for you to think, well, that's quite cool and cute.
Speaker 1:No. No. No. These are genuine ways to live passed down through times of the ages because it actually is the way that is best lived. Right?
Speaker 1:So then you think, okay, well, it will be what it is. I'll be who I am at that time in terms of how I look. But you can't always be trying to create this image of yourself in the future that you're gonna achieve because the realization who you are now is enough is important. The realization that this image you create of yourself in the future is an illusion and you'll never reach it. Because when you do reach a certain milestone there's a new milestone.
Speaker 1:So you say I wanna be fifty pounds lighter, I'll be more confident, I'll be happier, I'll be amazing, I'll be the best thing ever. And then you lose the 50 pounds in whatever way, maybe it's an extreme way, and you realize actually you aren't the person you wish you become. Because weight loss doesn't make you the person you wish you become. There isn't a person you need to become, the person you are now is enough. The person you are now is who you are.
Speaker 1:The real self of yours is there now today. You don't have to wait to reach a certain state of being. You don't have to wait to be this fictional, this illusional self in the future. That striving always to be this perfect self you think you can be causes a lot of anxiety, pain, depression and stuff as well. So let's accept today, I am where I am today.
Speaker 1:I'm here. I weigh x amount of pounds. Okay? That's a fact. But is it your opinion on top of it that makes the problem?
Speaker 1:But because I weigh this much, I must be lazy, I must be this type of person. No. You've simply over consumed energy. You've eaten too much energy in too many weeks in a row leading up to this moment that has caused an accumulation of energy to be stored as fat in your body. That's all has happened.
Speaker 1:Many cases it's an emotional driver. Many cases it stresses. Many cases it's not intended but it just happened as a byproduct of a stressful emotional time and that's what it is. There's nothing you need to add more to that. And you say, for me to have less accumulated energy, I must start consuming less energy than I need each day.
Speaker 1:And that does come with some side effects. It does come with a side effect that sometimes I will feel a bit hungry because I'm not giving the body exactly what it needs. Sometimes I might need to say no to things because before I used to say yes to everything environmental pushes, friends say need this and that and that, and it's leading me down a path of consuming too much energy. If I just tie those in a bit, I can still enjoy my life, but I'll tighten it up. And over time, this excess energy will be used.
Speaker 1:Amazing. And this excess energy will be used over time which means I'll have less energy stored in my body and I will look leaner. But it doesn't guarantee I'm gonna be a better person or feel better or anything, but I'll just have a leaner physique. And a leaner physique with less body fat stored is likely gonna be healthier because the research shows that if you are overweight or obese and you do lose weight, it does have a big impact on your health markers. But this is same thing about you as a person.
Speaker 1:Don't judge yourself on this. Even when you've lost a weight, it doesn't make you a better person than anyone else, you've managed to maintain, you've managed to control your calorie intake, you've managed to do these healthy behaviors, but I hope the journey itself has revealed some form of like moments to you, who you are to yourself, know, like what's your self image? There was a really good video I saw on Steve Jobs the other day and he was saying about there's a lot of people that got good ideas but he doesn't like ideas people. Because the idea is fine, it's great, you can have an idea. But what is the magic is that you get an idea and you work on the idea.
Speaker 1:And on this journey of working on this idea you notice there's limitations, you notice there's things you've got to overcome, there's problems. By overcoming these problems and limitations, you eventually lead down a path where the idea is in the original idea, it might be close but it's not the original idea, you come at the end of it with a different type of product, a different type of outcome. And the process makes the magic. And that magic at the end, that post, that image at the end or that idea that has come to at the end has to go through that process. You can have as many ideas as you want.
Speaker 1:You can have as many self images ideas as you want. But when you go through a lifestyle change, you'll quickly realize that this image, this self image idea you have of what you think is the end product doesn't become the end product. Because you realize maybe it's I'm after the lifestyle change actually. I'm after like something I can maintain, that I can live happily longer. I'm not after this perfect sculpted end game.
Speaker 1:Over my journey and process of learning about myself I've realized I'm not gonna be a hundred and forty pounds. I'm happier near a hundred and fifty pounds because that means I can eat more calories. I can have food out with my friends or my husband and wife. I can have my Oreo ice cream sandwich a day. I've come over an allowance somewhere more than happier.
Speaker 1:Yes. I don't look like model, but I don't care anymore about that stuff. That's not who I am. I am me. This is who I am.
Speaker 1:I'm happy. I'm not trying to be someone else. And then my body's in a healthy place, you know, scientifically in terms of the date, my BMI is lower and it's not the be all end all the BMI, right, it's just sometimes useful. And I'm in a place now where my body is in a healthy place, great. And I'm fine with not being the thinnest person.
Speaker 1:I'm fine with not always trying to lose weight to be this person. I'm fine with all that, it's all gone. But you never come to this person, this type of person, and I've met many people over my years working fitness who've gone through this journey and this has become the end result. There is a flexibility to it, there is no end physique goal or end weight anymore, it's like I understand my weight will go up and down seasons, through lifestyle, I'm happy with it. I know I need to tighten up sometimes here and there and that's who I am now.
Speaker 1:I'm really happy with who I am, I don't have any more food prison stuff, I'm not stuck with food, I'm not demonizing food, I'm no longer looking up on Reddit Google of new diets, this and that to lose weight. I am free from all our nonsense and I can't tell you much has changed my life. I'm free from all of that. I no longer look up for more fitness recipes, more fitness experts, more special plans, more training plans. I just do the basics well each day and I get on with my life.
Speaker 1:My time goes to my friends, my family, my work or whatever, my hobbies. That's a completely different product to the idea at the start where I should be this ex weight, x person. Like Steve Jobs says you don't find that until you go through the process. And that's what I think a lot of you need to realize is that this journey you're on that you're you're not gonna end up wanting to be a certain weight specifically. Okay?
Speaker 1:Even though you might have an idea of a zone you wanna be in, it doesn't necessarily mean you're gonna end up with that weight and that's gonna make you happy. You you you're not gonna be pulled in online anymore. Like I can't tell you how freeing it's gonna be for you where you're longer being pulled in by different influencers on TikTok and Instagram and different products and different supplements and this and that. That no longer has any pull on you anymore. Think of free you are in that state because there's nothing they can give you.
Speaker 1:You're like, you're not giving me any secret. There is no secret. I'm just doing the basics. It's like I'm doing the basics. Calorie intake protein steps.
Speaker 1:I'm doing some resistance training as well. I'm doing the basics. There's nothing you can tell me that I should be doing more than this. So you no longer have this pull on me. You're no longer pulling money out of me.
Speaker 1:And you no longer give me anxiety about things. Think about that state of being. And obviously what needs to happen there is you need evidence that the basics work and that's why you have to give it some time. I'm gonna touch upon this next week but you need to give it some time, bird's eye view, time. Say to yourself, do know what, I'm not gonna judge my weight for four weeks, I'm gonna measure my weight every day or as many times as a week I can.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna track my intake as accurately as I can and I'm gonna give it four weeks. And at the end of the four weeks I'm gonna look at my data objectively, not subjectively with my own opinions. I'm gonna look at it like a scientist would and go, okay, I was one eighty pounds four weeks ago, my average weight in week four is one seven six. Great. My has dropped and therefore, happy days.
Speaker 1:But you have to give it some time. You have to delay judgment. You can't give it days and weeks. That's what the quick fix diets did. They told you you could lose 30 pounds in seven days or 20 pounds in ten days because you're judging the speed of fire, you give up too quickly.
Speaker 1:Give things time, delay judgment, be an open book, work hard, look at things one day at a time and give it the time it needs to show itself to you, then you'll be free. And I can't tell you the price, that's priceless. Being that freedom is priceless. And I wish it all on everyone. I hope you all get freedom that I certainly have.
Speaker 1:And I hope a lot of you end up having when it comes to your food and weight and body and stuff like that. So, yeah, have a good day. Hope you enjoyed this podcast and it was something to think about, little pep talk. See you back on the podcast on Monday.