So apparently Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin ‘consciously uncoupled‘ over a green smoothie. Wow we knew kale was pretty powerful stuff but making or breaking a marriage, that’s heavy! Before you ditch the spirulina for a Big Mac in a bid to improve your chances of a successful relationship please hear out our case for how being healthy is actually totally awesome, exciting and anything but a reason to uncouple anyone.
Pizza -Loving Vs Clean-Living
A recent media feature hinted that clean living Gwynnie was potentially ditched for her healthy ways. Articles like this are frustrating for us. The takeaway message is that being healthy equates to obsessive behaviour, dull lifestyle choices and a higher risk of divorce. It essentially pigeon holes people into those that care about health and those that don’t, making the latter appear spontaneous, attractive and living life to the fullest. In our opinion it’s irresponsible media coverage, especially if you take a look at our obesity and chronic disease statistics which suggest we’re guilty of living life a little too much if anything.
The article is suggests that Gwyneth and her 5am gym sessions have been traded in for a “pizza-loving smoker” otherwise this hugely successful, multi-millionaire, platinum selling artist has ‘missed out’ on life. What about the middle ground where people feel energised and fuelled by the healthy choices they make, they’re out and about making the most of each day, not burdened or tied down by orthorexic and obsessive behaviours. It absolutely exists, many people thrive on it.
Food = Foundation of You
We recently wrote a post on depression and discussed how what you eat and do in life affects how you think and feel. The point is pretty applicable here in that when we think of attractive qualities in people such as kindness, generosity, confidence without arrogance, spirit and wisdom, they can all be nourished by healthy food and exercise. Firstly, being healthy provides us with the energy and drive to fulfil our dreams and achieve things in life, leaving us confident in our ability and happy that we made a difference.
Without the building blocks of nutrition fuelling our brain we would struggle to learn and grow personally, making a difference to anyone or anything in life. Without healthy levels of good mood chemicals like serotonin we don’t have a sense of positivity or the ability to lead or influence others.
Compromised blood sugar, poor digestion, stimulants and nutrient deficiencies can actually lead to a lack of confidence, self doubt and increase our levels of anxiety. Plagued by negative thoughts we might then demand constant attention and reassurance from those around us, which compromises personal relationships as you begin to drain their own positivity. Your health is the foundation of you and therefore determines and impacts upon the relationships you have with other people. Feed it with healthy food and the outcome is a fitter, happier, healthier you that people love being around.
Learn How Tasty Healthy Is
In the years that we’ve been running Fitter Food we’ve hosted loads of dinner parties with friends and family, on every occasion without fail the food is healthy and goes down a storm. If you take a moment to educate yourself about the most nutritious foods you’ll see that many are in fact incredibly tasty, way beyond any kale smoothie for sure. All it takes is quick read through of Fitter Food where we detail the latest need to know nutrition info, a little practise in the kitchen and the rest is easy, leaving you to focus on just being awesome. Don’t take our word for it, try cooking up Matt’s Mighty Scotch Egg with some sweet potato wedges for anyone and see how irresistible you become.
Make Time To Move Not Train
Physical exercise is awesome! It makes you look and feel hot and improves your confidence and vitality, however, as a former gym junkie I can vouch for how annoying you are (or I was!) religiously setting the alarm at 5am to hit the gym and making no exception for any occasion whatsoever. Becoming obsessive about exercise, selfish about your need to train and seriously agitated when you don’t hit your target number of gym workouts each week makes you nothing but a pain in the backside to anyone who’s company you keep. However, body composition and performance are governed by a multitude of factors including stress, sleep health, nutrition and rest/recovery. On our Fat Loss in 42 Plan we actually ask people to abstain from exercise for one week to focus on all of the above. Many are surprised at how their body composition and energy levels improve considerably. If you take some time to educate yourself about the importance of this it’s liberating, I promise! To fully understand that looking and feeling healthy does not require hours in the gym nor does it need to steal precious time away from friends and relationships. In fact if we just made an effort to move every day, throughout the day, a few sessions a week is all you really need. So try walking part of your commute, doing stand up desk work or setting yourself some 100 Rep bodyweight challenges (Check out ours here) all of which don’t need a gym, showers, warm up sessions or other faffing about, you just get the job done, freeing up more time for fun stuff. Mark Sisson’s Primal graphic say it all for us:
Strike A Balance
One of the biggest influences on our health today is stress and putting yourself on a mission to eat clean, train hard and sleep deeply every single day throughout your entire existence will in time become an added stressor. Take a moment to step back every now and then to check yourself. When did you last have a ‘sod it!’ moment, at the right time with the right people? Sometimes what you need is a night where you stay up past 10pm (growth hormone can suffer for one night), drink a little more than you should and maybe eat some peanut M&M’s. Being rigid with your health goals can lead you to lose perspective on the important things in life and the people that matter. As long as you’re making sensible choices the majority of the time your health won’t be affected by the odd night off and as you’re so awesome to be around no one will uncouple you when you refuse the bread basket the other 80% of the time.
If you want to know more about health, fat loss and performance, including the essentials on digestion, hormone health and workout nutrition you can check out our Fat Loss in 42 Plan here.
