The most important truths about paleo

There’s an increasing level of attention given to paleo-driven lifestyles these days. For various reasons, as health research pours in and medical spendng balloons, the realities that the decades old condemnation of fat and meat, and the promotion of carb-rich grains are slowly, but surely growing in prominence. Paleo works and the evidence support it. That being said, there are many incredibly strong misunderstandings about what the pursuit of a paleo, primal, evolutionist or ancestral health driven lifestyle means and all of these misunderstandings confuses the case and deters people from understanding the real fundamentals of long-term health. Here are the most important truths about paleo living.

Paleo isn’t about weight-loss

Unlike most nutrition plans paleo is more of a lifestyle approach to stable long-term health rather than a means to losing weight. Sure, the pursuit of one will often lead to the other, meaning if you can lose weight you’re more likely to be healthier, but the priority isn’t on weight-loss, it’s with long-term health. This is a key distinction. If you approach you’ve just set a New Year’s resolution, or pursuing a long historical goal of improving your health, then of course, “losing weight” is a logical first step. This is reflected in the advertising of most programs whether they’re nutrition plans, books, gyms or personal trainers. Losing weight is almost always the first bullet point.

There isn’t anything inherently wrong with this, however this mindset does pose problems. Very simply, losing weight is short term and really, isn’t an absolute indicator of improved health. Paleo style ideologies such as the Primal Blueprint aligns closely with the long-term aspect of optimal health. Start eating the right foods, getting adequate sleep and finding the most effective ways to use physical activity to enhance your health, and your ideals will be met - whether that’s losing weight, gaining muscle, improving moods, enhancing energy and everything else around good health.

If dropping kilos is definitely on the agenda, paleo fundamentals can be geared toward this, but the key is still doing so in a long-term oriented health manner. Rapidly shedding 10 kg in a 6 week challenge, loving the results and positive attention, but hating every minute of the process, doesn’t say much for the sustainability of that path. If it’s a struggle to find the time, you don’t enjoy the food you’re eating, or are hungry and exhausted all the time, there’s a good chance that eventually, you’ll crash.

“Living like a caveman” is an over exaggeration

One of the most common sentiments attached to paleo is the metaphor of the caveman. Cavemen didn’t eat processed foods; cavemen ate fresh and local food; cavemen walked everywhere. Truth be told, “the caveman” does serve as a core symbolic figure of most paleo principles I’ve studied, including the Primal Blueprint which has gone as far as developing a distinguished mascot named “Grok”. That being said, using half-baked and oversimplified reasoning like “live like a caveman” should still be taken in consideration of the real world.

Cavemen didn’t see doctors, perform surgeries, drive cars, have electricity, stoves, computers or the internet. Cavemen also didn’t utilise vaccines or have to abide by 40-70 hour work weeks of various degrees of monotonous structure. If “would cavemen do this?” is your lead criteria for the decisions you make, odds are, you’re missing out on a lot of what the modern world, evolution and incredible human ingenuity has to offer - whether it’s relatively trivial like YouTube, or incredibly vital to health and wellbeing of all levels like vaccinating your children.

While most that follow paleo or primal principles are aware of this, criticisms usually target the oversimplified metaphor. Throwing out core ideals of a healthy diet,  such as estbalishing colourful vegetables as the foundation, because “well, cavemen died of diseases way more so it’s all bogus” is entirely ridiculous.

Reducing carbs isn’t the absolute goal

The reality that carbs should be limited is not the same as saying they need to cut out altogether.  Instead, carbs should be controlled, and the idea of them -- even complex carbohydrates in rice, whole grains and the like -- being healthy should be broken. This does not mean that “the fewer carbs the better”, but instead, that there is a threshold which should not be breached. Below is the Primal Blueprint’s carbohydrate curve. For the average person, daily consumption of 100-150 grams of carbohydrates is the zone of “effortless weight management”. In this zone, your body is able to smoothly metabolise carbohydrates without any excess carbs being converted into sugar, spiking insulin levels and producing harmful triglycerides. Creep above this zone and and insidious weight gain kicks in where te cycle of excess carbs and craving excess carbs kick in and the road to bigger bellies, energy roller coasters and food cravings begin. Consumption of under 100 grams of carbs daily is the path to ketosis where the body learns to burn fat for fuel rather than carbs leading to better muscle tone, better brain development and overall improved health.

The most important thing is to remember that this is all dependent on the rest of your lifestyle. This curve aligns pretty closely with how my weight fluctuates. I have comes to love knowing that my weight stays the same even if I feast on roasted chicken, ribs or a wonderful medium-rare steak and all the beautiful vegetables I can handle, but soda and popcorn combo at the movies means I’m a little heavier the next day. Of course, I’m not elite athlete. If I were to return to my running and basketball training days, and even more so if I was competitive, the curve would may need to be adjusted to accommodate the greater demand for fuel.

Meat isn’t the foundation food.

As much as the rhetoric around paleo and primal living professes a long love affair of bacon, the prominence of meat, fish and fowl has been largely overblown. Even though the Primal pyramid has animal products at the base, vegetables are the most important component of healthy eating. For those that are into counting calories, animal products represent the bulk, but in terms of volume of food, or the space on the plate, colourful veggies reign supreme.

Meat fish and fowl are essential for many reasons. Everyone knows protein acts as the building blocks of muscle strength, but it’s lesser known that the fats as well, including the falsely maligned saturated fats provide satiety and the essential slow-burning energy source the body prefers as well as optimises cell and hormone function. There’s no need to steer clear of chicken thighs or cut fat off your steaks - not only is this delicious, but it’s actually best for you.

Paleo is too expensive

We live in a budget driven culture and it is because of this that adjusting to higher initial costs of healthier food of a paleo variety may the most difficult task. Fresh, local, grass fed or free range animal products from a local butcher is likely to be more expensive than highly processed, hormone-fueled products that have been forzen and shipped in bulk across thousands of kilometres before getting to your big box grocery chain. Per net weight, in-season colourful vegetables have a higher price tag than mass produced bread, crackers and pastas. Unfortunately, there isn’t really much of a path around this. The whole reason food is highly processed and injected with harmful ingredients and additives to begin with, is usually to make more for cheaper with growing profits at a higher priority than health or sustainability.

So, while paleo, or primal modifications to one’s nutrition may be more expensive in a vacuum, it’s best again to adjust the mindset. Increased consumption of healthy vegetables, animal products and quality fats provide more satiety meaning less food can be purchased in volume. While pastas, breads, crackers and chips an frozen junk foods are cheaper, they lead to more cravings which in turn lead to more grocery shopping. My parents always used to half-joke that, growing up, the cereal-budget alone was equal to an extra 5 years of early retirement. There is also the reality that in the long-term, a healthier lifestyle means less spending on doctor’s consultations, medication, surgeries and expensive health care bills in the future. When the other option is increasing the likelihood of needs tens of thousands of dollars in medical treatment as we age, a few extra dollars a day is our preferred choice.

There’s an incredible amount of flexibility to paleo

Above all else, the worst misunderstanding surrounding a paleo lifestyle is that it is strict. Yes it is built on fundamentals as all lifestyle approaches are, but inherent in these is a realistic and practical need for adaptability. One thing that is often ignored when the “caveman” metaphor is used is just how big the world in which the caveman, or cavemen lived.

Our ancestry traces back to all sorts of different landscapes, climates and environments - desert, arctic, tropical, prairie, coniferous forest, and everything else literally under the sun. Indigenous tribes in west Africa would have a completely different lifestyle than the peoples traversing northern Europe or South America. Those in arctic environments would’ve had to thrive on fattier animal products from cold water and wouldn’t have much options for colourful vegetables. Aboriginal peoples of the South Pacific would have lived off of more insects, fish and tropical fruits than those in the mediterranean. This is what evolution is. Foods themselves don’t have to be consistent, but the fundamentals are - fresh, local and in-season.

There are plenty of excellent paleo and primal resources that can be found with simple Google searches. I am a personal favourite of MarksDailyApple.com by Primal Blueprint founder Mark Sisson, but if you’re interested for an approach more personal to me, I’ve written a short series on what primal living means in our house here and keep a Google+ collection of our efforts on being healthy forever here.

The 4 most important exercises.

There are likely thousands if not millions of various exercise programs out there. As fantastic as it is to have so many options when it comes to exercising and maintaining an active lifestyle, there can be a certain level of apprehension leaving many overwhelmed. Should I look into team sports or a fitness class? What about hiking? Should I buy equipment or sign up for a gym? Should try to link up with others or go it alone? Whether it’s been eons since the last time we deliberately did anything to improve our fitness, or if our current, workout regimen has just gone a bit stale, not knowing where to turn, what to add, what to remove and what to focus on is a common problem many face in the long-term.

At the core of exercise is performing any movement effective in increasing muscle strength, flexibility, agility, balance and all other aspects of a healthy physical body. The functional purpose of movement is my favourite way to simplify the wealth of exercise options out there. Not only does “function” create a practical element to, i.e., “what exercises will help me do the everyday things I need to do?”, but it also allows more muscle groups to be engaged at once, drastically reducing the types of exercises, and most importantly, the time needed. Reducing time is key since it’s well documented that on the whole, exercise is relatively ineffective for health, and while beneficial is not nearly as essential and doesn’t warrant nearly as much attention, to healthy living compared to food.  Primal Blueprint founder Mark Sisson emphasises this approach characterising the most basic movements as fitness plans even cavemen did.

These basic movements are pushups, pullups, planks and squats. As far as strength building goes, these cover the most whole-body, yet functional, natural physiological movements. Lifting heavy boxes, climbing trees, stairs or ladders, moving furniture around, or carrying babies engage all of the same muscle groups and involve similar movements as these four exercises. This is in contrast to other common exercises that are not nearly as practical such as bicep curls which are more about body building and appearance than the strength of a physiologically important movement. Add in sprinting once and a while, and moving frequently at slow paces and you have the entire gamut of essential exercise to base the active aspects of your healthy lifestyle around.

Pushups

Pushups, along with running represent perhaps the simplest and most “default exercise” there is. Everyone knows what pushups are, has tried to do them and has an understanding of their place in physical fitness. Whether they are elite competitive athletes, or people starting to exercise for the first time in decades, their program incorporate pushups, or moves that mimic pushups (i.e., the bench press). Simple as that.

When done properly, pushups engage your arms, chest, shoulders and core (abs and back) making them one of the most efficient and beneficial bodyweight movements there is. One of the other benefits in pushups is in the variety. There are many different forms of pushups allowing the movement to be adjusted for level of ability, pace, range of movement or even environment.

At their purest form, pushups are done lying face down on a flat surface, starting with your hands at shoulder height and just wider than shoulder width. I find that placing my hands at a width at which my forearms perpendicular to the ground when I’m I’m at rest (lying down) is the most comfortable, balanced and strong position. Feet placement can also very. The closer they are together the more difficult they are since wider feet make maintaining balance and a solid core easier, your trunk (abs, bank and hips) are crucial. You want to keep your whole body as rigid as possible. I have known people to place a broomstick on their back while they do pushups to make sure they remain solid. If you’re doing this, your heels or calves, butt, space between your shoulder blades and head should all be in contact with the stick, if not, odds are your trunk is sagging below. WellnessMama has a fantastic simple breakdown of the perfect pushup and many of the ways to modify the exercise depending on level of ability.

Pullups

Despite being a very basic movement in theory, pullups are commonly regarded as one the most challenging exercises there is for many reasons. Your body weight affects your ability to do pullups more than pushups, situps and most other basic movements since unlike those, with pullups, your entire body counts as the weight. With most others, only a fraction of your body is being directly lifted and with squats, your lower body is naturally better equipped and more accustomed to supporting your body, than your upper is.

Grip-strength in my hands wrists and forearms is what poses the biggest difficulty for me personally. This is why without pullup counterweight machines many find it difficult to begin them if they haven’t tried them in a long time. Another simple way to progress through pullups is to simple use your legs to lightly support your weight. By gauging the effort required, you can gently press your feet against the ground or bench if the bar is too high, and slowly stand, making sure your effort is targeted on your back, shoulders and arms to do their fair share of work.

These variations are where the beauty of pullups lie. As challenging as they can be for beginners, there is plenty of room to make them easier or more difficult depending on your level and all approaches are fairly common sense. The wider your grip is the more difficult they are. Personally, I’ve spent a lot of time building up the ability to do the easiest form - narrow grip, palms facing backward. As 10 become regularly achievable, I started to widen the grip.  Adding more weight to your body makes them harder, and adding more support to your body (a bench to stand on, a counter-weight machine, muscle-ups) make them easier. Slowing down is also harder, as being able to pause mid motion is a true mark of strength.

Planks

Planks are the outlier movement here as they are the only one which doesn’t actually involve movement. Planks are an isometric exercise which means it involves holding steady position for a set period of time. Isometric exercises are more effective for your core due to the prolonged tension - staying flexed for a very long time rather than for repeated short bursts. Research shows this prolonged tension promotes strength and builds muscle-mass which is essential for a stable core that can support movement and steady posture for the entire body.

The most common plank form with face down, with your body supported only by your forearms and toes on the ground - the rest of your body in the air. It’s incredibly important to maintain a straight body from head to toe - like a plank of wood. Similar to pushups, a broom stick should be able to rest along the backs of your legs, butt, shoulders and head. Once this position is started, the goal is then to hold it for a set period as the burn settles in. If you can hold it for a full minute 2 or three times with short breaks in between to rest, you’re in pretty good shape. Aiming for shorter times, or going with your knees on the ground, so that less of your body weight is active are simple ways to scale the challenge back if you’re just starting out.

Squats

When done properly squats engage more of the entire body than any other single movement. Of course, the primary benefactor here is the lower body from the glutes all the way down to feet, but maintaining balance and control requires an immense level of effort from the core, back, shoulders and arms, especially if modifiers such as extra weight, single leg, or explosive movements are made. Squats have a reputation for being dangerous, but if proper form and controlled progression is emphasised, the potential for injury is as minimal as with any weight-bearing movement. The risk-factor does rise quite quickly if you overdo though, so no loud, eyes-closed wiggling around to make sure you push more weight than you should.

The basic squat involves a starting position of standing with your feet greater than shoulder-width apart. I generally set mine as wide as possible without it feel like I’m stretching - still comfortably standing. Then ti’s a matter of lowering your body bending at the knees to a target of 90 degrees which brings your thighs parallel to the ground, then rising back up to standing just before your knees lock straight. The difficult part is to maintain an arched back. Holding your torso upright rather than hunching or leaning forward is the most important factor in preventing injury. I try to make sure my torso changes as little as possible from standing to squatting - look forward, ideally at my reflection, with the chin up, shoulders back and my back straight enough so I don’t have to crane my head up to look straight.

The other key point to remember involves preventing your knees from bending inward or outward laterally. Your knees should be above your feet directly, so that they are not any closer or further from each other than your feet are. In other words, conscious effort should be given to ensure your shins are perpendicular to the ground rather than leaning to either side.

Conclusion

This is it. Regardless of where you decide to go as you chase an admirable health-related New Year’s resolution, or where to turn to next as you fall out of love with cross-fit, as long as you remember to keep these 4 essential exercises as the foundation, your workout program will be effective, efficient and practical in the real world.

Google Fit app review: a free and excellent fitness tracker

If there's one piece of technology that has really exploded in popularity in recent years, it has to be fitness trackers. As recent as 3 years ago wearing devices around your wrist, clipped to your clothing was a niche market. At the same time, using phone app to track your runs or rides were common for enthusiasts and competitors, but the average person didn't care all that much. Since then however, it's difficult to be in a public place, a shopping centre, office, or busy pedestrian street without spotting many a lot of these devices on people's wrists.

Activity trackers likes Fitbits were among the most popular holiday gifts for the last couple of years. Whether it's dedicated devices or specific apps, it's become incredibly common, extremely easy and debatably useful for people track their steps, weight, distance travelled, energy burned and overall physical activity in pursuit of better health and well being. There are so many options with a wide range of features, form factors and price points, but if you're just starting out and testing the waters, Google Fit may be what you're looking for.

Google Fit is an activity tracker created and managed by Google, in the same vain as Gmail, Google Photos, and Google Calendar. Like all other Google Apps, Google Fit is at its core, web-based which means all information is stored and sorted on Google’s services and therefore accessible across all internet connected devices. Google Fit’s ability to automatically track steps, distance and all other typical use-case information, requires your phone to run Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) if the phone itself is going to be the primary tracker. The Android OS version shouldn’t be a worry as over 90% of all Android devices run at least 4.0 - if you have an Android device younger than 5 years, you should be good.

What Google Fit does

Google Fit is an app which tracks all of the basic markers of physical activity - steps, distance, active time and energy burned. It also allows you enter goals for each on a daily or weekly basis, and enter your weight measurements. The ring is usually the first graphic you see which fills as you build your activity each day with different colours differentiating between different information. The app is able to intelligently distinguish between walking and running, so if you forget to identifying a run, it will still log your steps, energy and the rest as your pace picks up. It's needy, but fun, to go back and find out that it identified those times you quickly scurried across the road or ran around the yard with the dog for a few minutes. Of course, for deliberate workouts, you can select your activity from a massive list (A-Z, Aerobics to Zumba) and the app will smartly configure energy burning, steps and active time for you. You can also enter an activity afterwards - in case you forgot or didn’t have your phone, or any tracking device on you at the time of your workout.

Google Fit then sorts all of this information and presents it to you in real time and with next to no effort. Simple rings and bars show progress, icons are clear and the overall interface make scrolling through past activities, entering new data, changing settings or viewing progress trends easy and fast. The app is designed incredibly cleanly and refrains from bombarding you with menus, options and other elements that could create a cluttered and distracting user experience. Everything you could want to see is incredibly easy to find.

Google Fit is free and available everywhere

The best things about Google Fit are it's price and availability. As alluded to before, like most Google services it is entirely free and accessible anywhere. Download the app to your Android phone, spend 5 seconds activating it and you're good to go. There's no need to turn it on or off when you want to use it, once you're setup it just just keeps working. I am pretty deliberate with tracking my activity, it's fun for me, so I'm always looking at the app on my phone, or on my laptop (fit.google.com) to see how things are going. My wife doesn't care so much, but does like to see from time to time. She remembers her phone does this maybe once a week and very simply she can get a solid idea of how active she's been over the last few days, weeks or months. Of course, this depends on your phone being on you, unless you have a tracker or smart watch.

The availability is where I find the most piece of mind. Apple Health requires an Apple device, there is now Web version, so if you one day move to Android or Windows phone and your history is locked within Apple's walls. As said before, Google Fit being available via a browser adds a greater layer of openness for the long term. It's so handy to be able to look at my activity on my phone, tablet and laptop, and it pulls from most other notable fitness trackers to combine everything in one place is incredible. The value increases exponentially as I'll still be able to do so when I upgrade all of those devices. IT should be noted however that synschornisation isn’t perfect - at least not in real-time. Below is a photo of the web-site screen, my tablet and phone and as you can see the information is close, but not exactly the same. Past results all seem to be consolidated, for example the logs are all identical as of 2 days ago and earlier, but real-time and the day before seem to be be slightly conflicting.

While the slight glitch in across-device consistency isn’t perfect, this flexibility is the greater plus. Maintaining a healthy lifestyle is forever, so if you're in the camp that finds value in activity tracking, being locked into whatever device you're using in a given moment, and the possibility of losing everything if and when you change to something else is a big deal. You may use a step counter now, then take up running next year and therefore want a different device made by a specific running brand like Polar, change phone makers 2 years later, and who knows what else in the decades to follow. It pains me that the biggest line, Fitbit is refusing to partner with Google (or Apple) on this. Fitbits are great, but on a  personal level I don't like services that are built to lock me in.

There's no iOS app yet

The unfortunate and frankly, un-Google aspect is that there currently is not iOS app. The Google Fit app is exclusive to Android, just like Apple’s version, HealthKit is exclusive to iOS. This means that iPhone users can use Google Fit to keep their records, but the phone’s sensors can’t feed into Google Fit directly. That being said, Google has allowed access to developers for anyone who chooses to use their APIs, which means that most of the well known fitness apps, Nike, Strava, Adidas, Withings, Runtastic, RunKeeper, and MapMyFitness can all synch to Google Fit. So, if you use Strava to track your bike rides, Nike+ to track your runs, plus want a place to log your weight each week, Google Fit can be your one-stop-shop. It is bothersome that Google Fit is not available on iOS. Google Apps are usually written for Apple devices (Gmail, Drive, Google Maps, Google Play Music and Google Photos are all on iOS), as Google’s model is built on allowing everyone to use their services, so Google Fit may be coming. Long story short, if you have an Android device, you’re all set, if not, you’ll need a fitness tracker otherwise you’ll be entering things manually.

Overall

Google Fit is a free application for logging and tracking your physical activity and workouts. There’s no iOS app yet, but you can still access the app via the website which is a very big advantage. This, plus the fact that it can link to almost all other fitness tracking devices (i.e., Withings, Runtastic, Strava, Nike+, RunKeeper, etc) means that your activity will stay with you regardless of what watch, phone, wristband, tablet or laptop you find yourself using as the years go on. And, given that maintaining an active and healthy lifestyle isn’t a temporary endeavour, the ability to keep tracking your workouts, if you find so beneficial, regardless of what watch, phone or wristband you’re using is incredible.

The link to the website is fit.google.com and you can find the

Android app here

Is it healthy? Exercise

Here's a witty quip from The Guardian back in 2010, “since the days of the Green Goddess, we've known that the healthiest way to lose weight is through exercise. It's science, isn't it?

Well, science has some bad news for you. More and more research in both the UK and the US is emerging to show that exercise has a negligible impact on weight loss. That tri-weekly commitment to aerobics class? Almost worthless, as far as fitting into your bikini is concerned.”

While it may be outrageous to those spending hundreds of dollars and close to as many hours a month on classes, early wake ups, equipment, workouts and memberships, but at the end of the day, this is excellent news. For those that don't love strenuous, boring, painful or expensive exercise, science is on your side - you don't need to put yourself through torture just to be healthy.

The key to steady, long term health is food by a large margin. As the Guardian points out, there is an astounding amount of research pointing out to the relative insignificance and ineffectiveness exercise has compared to diet when seek health gains. Even further (and better), exercise that is typically more time consuming, boring and taxing on the modern  routine is even less worthwhile and especially if the main goal is weight loss.

Interestingly enough, this is not commonly believed. The unfortunate truth is high strongly the food industry tries to downplay the important of healthy eating as it promotes sugar drinks, carbohydrate-rich cereals, and whatever other chemicals or preservatives behind modern industrial food production. It’s been highly publicised that US First Lady Michelle Obama’s once admirable national healthy campaign was lobbied and negotiated down to emphasising physical activity and undercutting any message toward reducing sugar, processed foods and healthy eating all together. Out of curiosity, I posted a survey on Google+ asking people how important they believe exercise is in relation to food. While the science points to food being the definite key factor, the public believe otherwise. In other words, only about 20% have it right. Exercise is not as important as food when it comes to maintaining long-term health.

Nutrition (i.e., food) is way more important than exercise

There are many surveys and studies out there that create a clear cross-section of the research around the “diet vs exercise” relationship. “Which is more important - food or exercise?” is a fairly common Google search and the results seem to be definite. Of course both are necessary for good health, but food is way more important. A general rule of thumb seems to be evident where food intake dictates at least 75% of body composition with everything else (not just exercise) making up the rest. When thought about more deeply, the ratio is even less in favour of exercise. Many push this more towards an 80:20 rule. Food is 80%, and the remainder is exercise, plus things like sleep, stress, chemical and environmental exposures,

This 80% is largely influenced by insulin, the master hormone which is the engine behind metabolic and hormone function by transporting nutrients such as cabs, proteins and fats through the bloodstream to cells and organs throughout the body. Insulin response is almost entirely controlled by food intake and especially carbohydrate intake when it comes to weight management. The logic behind this makes sense when examining the numerous studies evaluating the effects of various levels of exercise when nutrition levels are equal across controls. If nutrition is the same, exercise doesn’t change much, but when exercise is the same, different food plans have immense effects.

Casual everyday activity is most of what’s necessary

Life is becoming increasingly sedentary these days. Few would argue against the growing difficulties in finding regular daily time for large chunks of traditional exercise like recreational sports, an hour to jog, or early morning or gym classes every other day. As a response, many take on the “weekend warrior” lifestyle of making up for 5 or 6 days of being seated in front of a computer with 1 or 2 hours of punishment via running or cycling. As much as people would like to think you can make up for a work-week of inactivity with a weekend of torture, most research suggests not just that this is ineffective, but also more harmful than good.

At first glance, walking may not seem to all too important as a form of exercise, but the body benefits most from activity - any activity, if done comfortably as much as possible - much more than prolonged painful exertion interrupted by days of inactivity. Walking intermittently totally up to an hour or two each day is far better than not, but running an hour 3 times a week.

More strenuous workouts can be quick and sparse

When it comes to exercise, frequent, slow and comfortable physical activity, such as walking is absolutely the most important ingredient. However the body also thrives when pushed to extremes. Strength training (Law #4 Lift heavy things) and high intensity workouts (Law #5 Sprint once in awhile) have their place as well and should be done regularly, but not nearly to the frequency most expect. Hitting the weights 5 times a week, each for a different isolated muscle group has it’s benefits to body builders and sculptors, but for those who would rather spend time on other things, a 30 minute set of pushups, pullups, planks and squats (modified for personal ability), once or twice a week is all that’s needed to be healthy and look great.

The effect of sprints or high intensity interval training (HIIT) is also incredibly useful. These extreme instances of distress jolt all of the body’s metabolic processes into high gear. The key is not to prolong them. Hill sprints, cross-ft, spin class and any other type of extreme heart-pumping session should be capped at 15-30 minutes with plenty of rest throughout to keep the body from going into survival mode. Sprint sessions that are too long lose their benefits and tend to risk injury, induce hunger, and deplete energy stores for more than is optimal.  Crafting a balance of these forms of physical activity that fits with personal circumstance is key, but the point still stands regarding which one is first.

For the majority of people that believe strenuous, painful, time consuming, boring and expensive exercise is a necessary evil in the pursuit of long term health, it’s not. For those that believe they have to eat tiny, unsatisfying meals that are pre-planned every 2 hours or risk headaches, starvation and irritability at the severe risk to your own and your co-workers’ well-being, is a necessary evil in the pursuit of long term health it's not. Despite conventional wisdom, while exercise is an important part of healthy living, it’s nowhere near as important as food and is actually insignificant and ineffective when it comes to managing weight.

It may be anecdotal, but many fall into the trap of eating a certain way so that they can workout as hard as they believe they need to in order to be healthy. A sugary bowl of carbs in the morning on the way to a torturous gym session is usually followed by a protein shake and meticulously planned fuel packets to make sure the next workout goes well. If this sounds harder than it should be it’s because it is. Optimal health is not about being able to run the fastest or the furthest. Nor is the person who wakes up an hour before sunrise 5 days a week for a 30km bike ride the epitome of physically fit. If you’re a competitor, or you love it, or a bit of both - then by all means do what makes you happy.