25 Years, 25 Things I’ve Learned
Today is my 25th birthday! I thought I’d flip the tradition on it’s head and give a gift to you instead to say thanks for following and supporting me!
Here are 25 tips and little tidbits of information about health, fitness, diet and lifestyle that I’ve learned in my quarter of a century.
JB living the thug life chilling next to his sandpit and car!
Enjoy!
1. Calories matter, regardless of whether you count them or not. Whether you lose fat on a Paleo diet, Weight Watchers, Double Decker Chocolate Bar Diet, the Cabbage Soup Diet or counting your macros, the underlying principle is that you’re in a calorie deficit.
2. The correct make up of these calories (macronutrients) determines the best outcome possible, i.e. burn more fat than muscle mass, and do it whilst keeping you in a better mood.
Keep protein high (1.2-2g per kg bodyweight), fats at 20-30% of your total calories and make up the rest of your calories via carbohydrate.
If you don’t know how to set these then ask me or sign up to my daily emails and as a free gift I’ll give you my diet cheatsheet that works it all out for you!
3. Carbs are not the enemy. Far from it! They fuel our workouts, allow us to make more of a variety of food choices and they are f’ing tasty.
4. Consistency and adherence are the most important things in any diet.
A diet won’t work if you can’t stick to it!
5. Speaking of adherence, incorporating your favourite foods into your diet is one of the best things you can do to keep you on the wagon. Don’t deprive yourself!
6. Food snobbery and shaming is currently rife amongst trainers and nutritionists.
I hate to be negative but it’s near the top of my list of things about the industry that annoys me!
I believe that when they are constantly putting up pictures of their ‘perfect’ meals, green smoothies, and generally portraying a rather unrealistic pattern and way of eating, it pushes potential clients away and makes people who are often in a vulnerable, confused state even more so!
7. Bar a select few, most supplements are a complete scam and are utter crap!
Arguably the most beneficial are very basic and inexpensive; creatine, fish oil, multivitamin and MAYBE a whey protein powder if you struggle to get sufficient protein in your diet via whole foods.
There are other supplements that may help support or alleviate other conditions but the scientific evidence is often inconclusive and of poor strength.
8. We are incredibly bad at ‘winging’ our diets (e.g just thinking that we’ll try and eat less) when it comes to fat loss. This is because we massively underestimate the calories and amounts that we eat.
In light of this, I strongly recommend tracking at least a week’s worth of food into MyFitnessPal or a similar app. You’ll learn what’s actually in your food, how much you truly eat and have a new appreciation for what you’ll have to eat to lose body fat.
9. Some people often like to defend their dietary habits as militantly as their political and religious/ethical beliefs!
Now obviously everyone has the right to eat in whatever way they want, but I do take issue when people try and push advice on others that is plain wrong, or is close minded in the face of scientific evidence.
This is ridiculous as nutrition is a science, and therefore its primary principles should be based on evidence, not belief or emotion.
By following my blog and choosing to receive my daily emails, you’re receiving scientifically evidence based guidelines that are open to scrutiny and criticism.
10. One of the best ways to reduce your daily calorie intake is establish sensible portions and of calorie dense foods such as cooking oils and other fat sources, rice, pasta, etc.
Once you’ve established a sensible portion size, weigh it out/measure it every time you have that food for a fortnight or so. After a while you’ll be able to wing it and make a sensible estimate.
11. Do what your parents once told you and eat your vegetables. They are filling, low calorie and are packed full of nutrients.
Learning to make them tasty will give you a serious leg up in your fat loss efforts! Here are a few easy and tasty ideas:
Cauliflower rice. Blitz a head of cauliflower in a food processor until it’s in rice sized pieces, add a tiny bit of salt and turmeric, mix and microwave (30-1 min) or steam (2-3 minutes) and serve with your favourite curry for a great lower calorie alternative to rice.
Courgettini, Using a spiralizer or julienne, cut a courgette into long thin strips. Microwave (1 minute) or steam (2-3 minutes) and serve with your favourite sauce. I like bolognese or make a carbonara with this. Lovely stuff.
12. If you are ever stuck for a training routine, you could do a lot worse than performing a squat based movement, a hip dominant movement, an upper body pushing movement, an upper body pulling movement and a core exercise. Load them up heavy and do 3-5 sets of 5-10 reps each. Simple, nothing sexy, but it damn well works and you’ll be surprised how far this will get you!
13. As a bit of a meathead, I used to think unless you’re weight training you are wasting your time.
However, I’ve come to realise something is better than nothing! Always do exercise that you enjoy and don’t ever think that some extra activity isn’t worth doing or doesn’t count. Even if it is just a quick walk or doing a bodyweight exercise circuit.
14. If you want a good set of strong abs then first make sure your diet is in check. You won’t see those washboard abs if they’re hidden away!
Done that?
Now consider incorporating the chin up/pull up into your program. It stimulates the abdominals to a very high degree, all whilst targeting the back and arms. Some serious bang for your buck.
15. K.I.S.S: Keep it Simple Stupid.
People tend to think that they are more advanced than they actually are and try and follow complicated approaches, perhaps in the train of thought that it will bring them advanced results.
Take it from me that unless you’re a bodybuilder who needs to look their leanest on stage, you have no business trying to manipulate your subcutaneous water, having complicated supplement programs or training routines or anything similar.
Stick to the basics and do them well!
16. Sugar may not be so bad as the media tells us. Provided you are in good health (e.g. no diabetes or similar metabolic disorder) then there is no reason that sugar can’t be part of your diet in moderation.
This is of course not a green light to go ape-shit in demolishing a catering sized pack of Gummy Bears but the odd dessert, chocolate bar or bag of sweets is fine, as long as it fits into the greater context of your diet and reflects your goals (i.e. all your nutritional bases such as protein and vegetable intake are covered).
17. Sugar is not toxic, at least not in moderate amounts.
When people say it is a ‘poison’ this is total bollocks (quite a lot of ‘normal’ things can be toxic in large amounts) and I recommend you never listen to any person who tells you this ever again.
The lethal dose of sugar is way beyond what any sane person would eat in one sitting.
For those interested, the lethal dose of table sugar (this is based on rats so may not be 100% accurate) is 29g per kg of bodyweight. So a 70kg person’s lethal dose would be 2030g of sugar, or 2kg. You’d be hard pushed to even get CLOSE to this!
Source: http://www.healthylivingheavylifting.com/is-sugar-toxic/
18. The point above also holds true for artificial sweeteners. They are only toxic in abnormally large dosages so don’t fret about obsessively avoiding them.
There also seems to be some sort of weird belief that they make you gain body fat. This is completely and utterly wrong!
It is obviously completely your right if you want to avoid them but you’re likely not gaining any health benefits from doing so.
19. Chronic lack of sleep can ruin our training, motivation, sexual function, likelihood of injury and body composition.
Get your sleep, or at least work on improving your sleep quality!
20. As long as you are in a calorie deficit, increasing your insulin levels by eating carbohydrate does not automatically mean you store body fat.
Only consuming more calories than you burn/expend does this.
21. Focus on the process rather than the outcome when working towards your goals. You’ll be happier, more motivated and certainly more pleased with the results.
22. If you’re working towards a big performance, body composition or health goal, get yourself coached.
It’s so hard to be objective and trust ourselves when doing it alone. Having someone to be accountable to, take you through the process, educate you and the knowledge that you’ve got someone there when things get hard is absolutely priceless.
I’ve had two coaches myself. The most recent, Mike Tuchscherer (World Champion Powerlifter), took me for a year’s worth of prep leading up to the Great Britain Powerlifting Championships. He helped me add 75kg on my powerlifting total in a year, ending up in me taking 7th place.
Me about to take my final squat attempt at Nationals (Image credit: Dave McWilliams)
Now I could have programmed myself to a decent standard but the true value came in having someone to put my complete trust in and not second guess any of his decisions. This got me to where I wanted to be!
23. So many of exercise’s benefits are not related to appearance.
Just because someone doesn’t look what we’d traditionally perceive to be fit doesn’t mean that they aren’t in good condition ‘under the hood’ so to speak.
24. Too many people give advice out of their area of expertise. This is both unprofessional and potentially dangerous.
Have faith in real medicine and don’t take advice for anything that actually matters to your health from homeopaths, naturopaths and the like.
25. Stop looking for quick fixes to get you to your goals!
There are things we can put in place to make it as easy as possible but the the road to them will still be long, arduous and full of obstacles.
Take action, embrace the challenge and enjoy the process!
Much love,
JB
