Update on the title of the book: after some feedback about the original book title being too boring, I’ve changed it (for the last time!) to Spandex Not Compulsory. Just getting the cover designed now, wait until you see it. It’ll be mad.

Here’s another clip from the book. Enjoy.

Ps. if you have a friend who finds spandex irrelevant, please share.

Why Is Health and Fitness Confusing

Often we get ourselves pigeonholed into a strict, biased camp of a certain approach to fitness. I am the first to put my hand up to say that I’m guilty of that, too. We end up treating our diet and training methods as a religion. But out of all the fitness celebrities and diet book authors in the world, who has the right answer? Well, it depends on what you enjoy doing. You should do whatever gets you moving while keeping you healthy. Vague? That’s sort of the point.

You have to experiment with what’s right for you for the long term. Despite what the most recent science (or advertising ) might say is the “best” diet and fitness regime, it is useless for you if you can’t follow it. Whatever it is that you decide to follow, here’s a principle as your guiding light: Does this get me to where I want to go by the safest, most sustainable way possible?

Pick up any reasonably sane diet book in the bookshop and they usually have few things in common: eat four serves of protein a day, plenty of vegetables, focus mostly on wholefoods and don’t drink your calories. At most times those recommendations work for most people. The remaining with specific conditions, goals and certain illnesses mighteed the super-specific, special and advanced high-carb, low-carb, high-fat, low-fat, only eat during the high tide, only use one chopstick while eating a soup diet, and so on. That is beyond this book and my scope of practice. If you follow the basic principles for three months (most people don’t) and don’t see results, it might be time to consult a dietitian.

But what often happens is that one of these super-specific, special and advanced diets works for a certain group of people, they go on morning television to talk about it, and then everyone starts doing them. If one of these diet followers is a celebrity, this is often how a new diet cult/religion is born. Once again we’ve made something very simple into something more complicated than it has to be.

Stick to basics and keep it simple. Stop chasing all things new and shiny. Don’t try to force a square peg into a round hole. Don’t follow the herd after the latest magic solution. Step aside and observe and you’ll notice over time how this same cycle repeats itself over and over again. Each time, it seems we’ve learned nothing.

If something doesn’t feel right, it probably isn’t right for you. However, just because it feels challenging doesn’t mean it’s not right for you. If you’ve lived your life so far eating cornflakes for breakfast, lunch and dinner, moving away from this habit will be hard. The magic solution? Hard work, dedication and surrounding yourself with supportive and like-minded people.

We all think we are the special snowflakes who need special approaches. Fortunately, it’s rarely the case. Don’t worry about the super-specific, special and advanced diet information until you’ve thoroughly tried the simple stuff and gotten as far as you can go. I went from simple to complicated to back to simple because it just worked better.

Focus on the basic. Most of the other stuff is just fluff. And it’s with this fluff that the diet industry and the marketers thrive on. Maybe I am cynical, but there’s a lot of money to be made when people are unhappy and vulnerable to the deception of “miracle cure”.

There’ll be a deal on the first week the book is out. If you are not a email subscriber yet I recommend you get on that off-white horse now and sign up  so you don’t miss out. As a subscriber you’ll also have a chance to get an advance copy for free pre-launch and be part of a super-special launch group.