I’ve always been massively into fitness.
What I mean by that is the marathons, ultramarathons, and more that I’ve done. Right now at aged 33 – I’m probably living the most sedentary lifestyle I have lived in many years – and I’m training 3x a week to move into amateur boxing.
However, I want to walk through some of the changes I’ve made over the last 6 months of my life thanks to Scott Henderson, Amir Bormand, Strawberry Colognesi, Patricia X, and more.
One of the critical things for me is in relation to making incremental changes.
I want to walk you through some of the poignant moments that have happened over the last several months:
ONE – NUTS AND SEEDS (since April 2019)
This again has come from Scott Henderson. And Strawberry has played a strong supporting act – but in my cupboard, at home, you’ll find a variety of nuts and seeds.
My dad is actually heavily into this stuff and will soak almonds the night before and then eat them in the morning.
He’s 63, trains for an hour each day, and is in great shape so he does know what he’s doing.
When I had my ‘moment’ of inspiration I took to Amazon and just spent a bunch of money buying a variety of seeds which have been:
Chia, hemp, sunflower, fennel, coriander, pumpkin
TWO – KICKING COFFEE (since July 2019)
I had a WhatsApp exchange with Amir on the 18th July 2019 which he told me how giving up coffee had changed his life.
He felt superior levels of focus, felt that he slept better and that his short term memory had improved…..
This was enough for me and I blurted out – f*ck it – I’m going to give up coffee as well. I seized the moment of inspiration he had provided me and decided there would be no turning back.
It’s now coming up to the 7th-month mark and I’ve still not had a cup of coffee.
I still drink caffeine but my coffee consumption which was my biggest source of it has disappeared – and I hope to make it to a full year before I come back to this again
THREE – 1.5 LITRES OF WATER A DAY (since October 2019)
Scott Henderson got me to increase the amount of water that I drink each day. I now do a minimum of 1.5 litres and have been doing so since around October 21st, 2019.
Again this came as a consequence of the various conversations Scott and I have had. He’s a PT, ex-squaddie as well as a police officer – and in the last few years he’s become way more interested in nutrition – so this is where the simple water intake comes from
I can say that since I’ve increased the amount of water I drink – I get fewer headaches, my skin looks better, and have a more balanced sense of mind.
FOUR – TAP WATER REDUCTION (since Feb 2020)
I recently watched Dark Water – you need to watch it and read up on history. Simply put there are more chemicals than any one of us are aware of that float through our drinking water from the taps (of London at least where I live)
Given I’ve been steadily guzzling 1.5 litres since around October – Strawberry alerted me to the fact that simply – water from the taps is filled with all kinds of treated chemicals – so bottled water as a rule of thumb (and ideally glass bottles) is much healthier.
This blog supports the notion that there are lots of chemicals in the water so best to drink less of it.
So right now I’m in the process of going through a 50% tap water reduction
FIVE – PROCESSED FOODS (Feb 2020)
I went to an amazing event by these guys about a ‘gut-based diet’ and actually had my mind blown.
It focuses upon the whole connection between mind-body-spirit and how they should not be seen as separate systems but in fact, are all connected.
I took a boatload of notes at this event but there are some fundamentals I’ll share with you:
Food processing includes anything that changes a food’s original form.
When you change a food’s original form you basically destroy many of their main properties.
Imagine taking a football and mangling it up into a tennis ball.
Throw out parts of it, reduce the size, adjust the colouring – test to see how it bounces – oh it doesn’t bounce enough let’s add a little bit of something else to it.
And then after all of that – you still call it a football OR a tennis ball….
And proclaim it has the same ‘density/size/etc’ of each of them.
Now imagine that’s all you’ve seen given all your life – it’ll naturally lead you to believe that this is how ALL football’s or tennis ball’s are…
When in fact it’s neither – the properties of both have been warped, reduced and other stuff has been added..
So in short – reducing processed food consumption is going to be part of the next new journey for me.
SIX – 80% COW MILK REDUCTION (since Dec 2019)
I watched Game Changers on Netflix and it made me realise how much rubbish there is in cow’s milk.
Upon sharing this with Scott Henderson he recommended that I watch Land of Hope and Glory which then went on to talk about animal farming in the UK and how much cruelty there is towards farmed animals
I watched 15-20 minutes of it and it was absolutely horrible.
In combination with this, I spoke to my cousin Shiva and he told me the 20% of milk is pus or something close because of the number of antibiotics and growth hormones they give to cows (especially in the US if I understand correctly).
Since then I’ve stopped buying cows milk and Strawberry has introduced me to the range of milk alternatives you can get such as Almond and Coconut milk – which is all you can see in our household as of Dec 2019.
SEVEN – 50% SUGAR REDUCTION (since Feb 2020)
I’m pretty good with sugar already – I don’t add any in any of my drinks – tend to only drink water when I train and stay away from Lucozade and anything with added sweeteners.
My current vices have been a bag of grapes a day (for a few years now) as well as hot chocolates.
Since going to this event run by Patricia Lopez I learned more about the dirty dozen as well as following on (via a random guy in the queue at Costa) about sugar being the biggest killer of humans.
This coupled with Strawberry deciding that she eats too much sugar and deciding to detox/reduce her sugar intake meant I followed her into this journey.
My biggest sources of sugar are grapes (1-bag per day), hot-chocolate (1-2 per day), ice cream (3-4 per week).
I’m now moving into half a bag per day of grapes, 1 hot-chocolate per day or less and ice-cream 2x per week in a bid to slowly kill sugar from my diet.
EIGHT – 60% RED MEAT AND PORK REDUCTION (since Dec 2019)
Since watching The Game Changers I’ve discovered also how much crap is put into meat in general. Alongside watching the documentary mentioned above I did ‘try’ for a week or so to become vegan.
That failed.
Where I did settle upon though is to stop buying pork (I did love sausages and would have them 1-3x a week) as well as beef burgers (I’d have them 1x a week also).
That has immediately cut down the amount of meat I eat.
I continue to each chicken and fish (in the home) and outside of the home, I’ll eat beef from time to time (usually via spaghetti bolognaise).
But the whole emphasis is on meat reduction and management in this case.
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I could continue with the series of changes I’ve made over time but the whole principle of introducing a series of sweeping transformations into your life is focussing on consistently small but important changes.
And together they build a lot of momentum.
Momentum – funny word –
I’m actually returning to this blog on Nov 2nd 2020:
ONE – Seeds (I still do)
TWO – Kick Coffee (I still do)
THREE – 1.5 litres of water per day (I don’t do)
FOUR – Tap Water (I still do)
FIVE – Processed foods (I still do)
SIX – Cow Milk reduction (I still do)
SEVEN – 50% sugar reduction (I don’t do)
EIGHT – Pork / Red meat reduction (I still do)
Anything else that’s new since that time?
I’m not sure entirely when it comes to my diet – ah yes – I have increased my plant based eating as I order from a vegan food prep company (I’ve also started a vegan food prep company as well haha)
It’s extremely interesting looking back on this – happy that for the most part, my habits have remained intact and moreover – they’ve become normal.
I actually forgot all these changes have been made – and that’s when you know things have moved from the active conscious part of your mind – to the subconscious.
And this is forever the goal with any lifestyle changes you attempt to implement
It’s ultimately about the one’s that stick – and no one sticks 100% – so it’s about going all out – and then seeing what sticks over time ;P
Oh also I’m 34 now :p
