So as I sit here writing this blog, I’m currently reminiscing my past when it comes to my approach and mindset to exercise and nutrition. Right now I can honestly say I have never been more satisfied with everything as a whole:
– Energy levels
– Confidence
– Flexibility
– Strength levels
– Body composition
Are all, at an all time high (Notice how the aesthetics goal was last… I will elaborate more futher down)
But first let me back track to my younger, more inexperienced days.
LIVING TO TRAIN
I’m naturally an ectomorph build (skinny and struggle to put on weight) so at a young age training was all about lifting heavy weights fast regardless of good form thinking I was working the targeted muscles. Then eat as much protein as possible but neglecting the carbohydrate source and let fats come as they come.
The goal? To get buff and lose fat at the same time…. What a ridiculous approach.
And when I think about it I was a 16 year old trying to get lean when I was naturally skinny already….. Shocking I know.
I did just about every FAD there was like the Ketogenic diet, intermittent fasting I even got sucked into that acai berry tablets nonsense which I think if I had persisted with more than 1 tablet they would have killed me. Luckily my dad realised it was a scam as they were taking daily debit charges out of his account!!
I was a 16 year old worrying;
- that if I didn’t eat something out of a Tupperware box it was bad,
- anything less than 6 meals messed around with my metabolism,
- drinking alcohol was the devil and
- carbohydrates were a 1 way ticket to obesity.
When really I should have been going out with mates enjoying my youth and not getting so caught up in something that quite frankly didn’t matter.
This is not the mindset I am trying to promote here. I was one of many who went through the gears, which now supports (and was the motivation) the position I am in now.
I started to realise that carbs weren’t bad, (although I still thought that cardio had to be done on a running machine or cross trainer otherwise it didn’t count and I was still convinced that alcohol could not be consumed in correlation with meeting goals). My motivation to train was purely for aesthetic reasons and nothing else and this was my biggest downfall. Something that I’m going to explain further down the line.
So you could once say my relationship with exercise and food was unhealthy in a different sort of way… I was obsessed. Not going out for family dinners because I was scared of what content the food had in it. There was no “MyFitnessPal” back then. It took a further three years for my new best friend to arrive!
Now you may recognise some of these behaviours in yourself and I am not saying that they are all wrong but for me it didn’t work. What I have described is what you would call LIVING TO TRAIN.
Now onto the more positive mindset
I am now in a place where I can say I’m fully content with my life. Having a healthier relationship with food and exercise makes life that more enjoyable. I now see food as fuel and happiness, not sinful and cheating. The second you start labelling your food as ‘cheat meals’ or ‘sins’ you will never truly be comfortable with eating those foods you love so dearly without feeling so guilty.
I am now someone who has calculated calories for so long I’m pretty much a walking MFP so i have the privilege of not logging, but does that mean i am always right? HELL NO! When i eat out i now guestimate as best as possible and if i feel i have eaten too much i’ll eat a little less the next day or skip breakfast. But most of the time i plan these things and choose to eat lighter in the day of the evening im going out for.
In doing this i don’t force myself to get up the next day to do 30 unneeded HIIT. You then won’t have to train to punish yourself as exercise should not be seen as punishment but should be seen as self care and improving longetivity.
As stated above, at first i trained purely for aesthetic reasons chasing washboard abs and rock hard pecs and this only did one thing for me, set me up for a hell of a lot more failure than success. The holiday would come and go in seconds and I would feel empty and hollow after it not knowing what to do upon my holiday blues. The time i started putting everything else first as a reason to train:
– Improve length of life
– Increase bone density
– Improve sports performance (biggest reason)
– Improve day to day performance (most people above 40 can’t squat down to reach the fair liquid in the kitchen sink)
– Boost self-esteem and confidence
– Improve sex drive
– Improve body composition
Then the results of a better figure i saw as more of a bonus by product. Not getting caught on the fact that one day i could see 20 vascular veins on my forearm and the next only 19. By placing body image goals at the bottom of the list you soon realise you’re ticking a lot more of the list than you actually think.
Think like this and i promise you exercise will feel a lot more enjoyable, achievable and self rewarding.
Am i saying i don’t train for a better body? Definitely not as anyone who says that is lying, but don’t make it a sole priority and open your eyes to the other reaping benefits you gain from positive foods and moving a lot more.
And this is what you call…. TRAINING TO LIVE!
But exercise has also aided me in a massively differently way. And that is through the power of moving in association with mental health. In the past 4-5 years since leaving for Australia and coming back from my travels and starting my own fitness business from scratch i managed to get inside my head a lot without realising the damage it was doing to me. Working for myself was awesome and getting paid to train clients on Bondi Beach was a dream but it has that 24/7 thought of ‘i have no one to fall back on, no one to turn to and i’m all on my own’.
Also returning home and starting from the bottom again wasn’t easy and almost seemed impossible. There would be plenty of nights i would stay awake for hours on end not being able to nod off worrying about the certain things and 99% of them thinking back now were the smallest pettiest problems but i had developed a knack of making mountains out of mole hills. It started to take effect of my social life with constant over compensating with people and reluctant to say no in order to please. And as Holly Stone of all people will tell you that the negligence of sleep to anyone will affect you in every single way possible with indirect links to fat loss, heart disease, decrease in performance levels and even contributes to the development of Alzheimer’s as well as many other diseases.
It wasn’t till last year where i seeked profressional help for what was called general anxiety disorder. Nothing major but something i soon came to the realisation that isn’t normal. And here i get to my point, through the number of sessions i attended we came up with activities that helped me relax and take me away from worrying.
One of those activities was dog walking/walking whilst listening to podcasts. Now i know what you may be thinking, ‘but that’s obvious because you know that, you’re a PT and constantly exercising’. Which is true, but i somehow completely underestimated the power of walking in how therapeutic it is and allows you to be taken away from an environment where cortisol levels (stress levels) were once so high.
I am on my phone a lot and that isn’t down to scrolling through Facebook but more so for my business whether it be programming sessions, contacting clients or posting on instagram for business benefits. And little did i realise that all of this information our brain has take in and process is putting us under so much stress than we realise with a constant fluctuation of our parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous systems. Going for a walk, putting my headphones in and listening to a podcast of some sort just erased all of that stress and allowed 1 hour of total freedom from the viral world. This is something everyone should and can apply to their daily routines. It is said the average person spens 7 HOURS A DAY ON THEIR PHONE…. think of what could be getting done in those hours.
So to conclude on how exercise and nutrition can improve a positive mindset, you have to think of it as a long term journey and not a destination. Don’t go low carb for 4 weeks before a holiday to look like the anabolic roided up celeb on a fitness magazine. Think of it as your job you currently you have, when you started out you probably weren’t as good as you are now but you kept at it because you wanted to improve and you made mistakes and may still do. You may have had jobs you quit because you were so unhappy, those were your FAD diets. You’re now in a job where you are happy and you have stuck at it. The exact same applies to nutrition and training, even the best of us get it wrong sometimes but the ones who keep consistent are the ones who will find satisfactory. Strive for consistency not perfection.
Here’s a list of key things i have adopted in the years of my development:
– It’s all a lifetime journey, there is no destination
– Carbs are good
– Calorie deficit is main goal to fat loss (though there are external factors that contribute but can be controlled)
– Realise that training for performance, increase energy, improve general health and longetivity, boost personality is just as important as body image goals
– Increased flexibility (we don’t lose flexibility as we get older, we just move less)
– There is no 1 right diet, exercise, or approach (different individuals require different demands and needs)
– Cardio doesn’t have to be on a machine
– Walking is the most underrated yet powerful tool to aid in calorie deficit alongside exercise
– Food is to be enjoyed and not labelled bad (there is no bad diet just a bad food, if you screw up let it go eat less the next couple days. If you go out and spend a lot at the weekend you don’t go hell for leather and carry on spending do you, no you reel it in a bit and spend less the next week, same as calories)
– Exercise is for self care not punishment
– Weight training should be implemented into everyone’s was of life (there are no total barriers. Get a PT, if you can’t afford one join a gym, if you hate a gym environment join a crossfit or bootcamp to add that social security side)
– Sleep and hydration are one of the most under looked points when it comes to improving health and wealth loss. Something that isn’t noticed when you get sufficient levels of it but it will take a huge toll on you if you reduce it below your body’s requirements
So if you are someone who is on one end of the spectrum who lives for training, little flexibility with nutrition and will never miss workout whatever the case. Just think that there is no bad food, just a bad diet. Eat 70-80% whole and nutritious foods with 20-30% being more of your comfort craves. The gym is a process and really should not be thought of as a deadline but more of a process, miss a workout because you’re tired? Listen to your body the gym will be there tomorrow.
However, if you are on the other end of the spectrum, poor diet, little exercise and don’t feel awesome then I could not stress enough how important it is to change that.
Dont go throw yourself into 5 gym sessions a week because that’s like throwing a child who’s never swam before in the deep end.
Go once or twice or get a PT, join a bootcamp, test the water.
Get the fundamentals right first like sleep, hydration, fruit and veg and move as much as possible.
If you take on board all of this you will begin to be more patient with your expectations of results and appreciate what may seem as the small things but trust me they have the biggest benefits.
Thank you for reading this blog and i hope this has helped you in any way.
James
