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Why food shouldn’t be your prime concern to lose weight

Being in the fitness industry now for over a decade I can confidently say that the large majority of people that I talk to would like to be at least a little leaner.

 

This is the result of so many different things including (but not limited to): how we are educated around health and wellness, the medical  system (not health) we have, the conflicting interests of ‘health’ and supplement companies, the time pressures we face in the 21st century and mainstream media to name a few.  

 

This epidemic of our populations being overweight may be contributed to by the above but then on an individual level it seems to always come back to the notion that what we are eating is the problem and is making us overweight and unhappy.   

 

Although I am not here to say that what we eat does not in fact have a physical and psychological effect on our bodies – I am here more to say that there’s a deeper rooted problem than just eating too much.  

 

Our problem isn’t food..

 

What we need to understand is that our beliefs affect our thoughts, which affect our emotions, which affect our actions.   

 

You can think of eating as the end of the chain – our actions.  This means our eating is affected by our emotions, which are affected by our thoughts, which are affected by our beliefs.

 

So if we go back one level to our emotions it becomes clear that what we eat (the actions we take) is affected by how we feel.  I’m sure you can connect to this notion.  Perhaps when you are feeling down you reach for something that makes you feel happy (quick serotonin hit).    On this level we should be looking at all the parts of who we are.  

 

We all spend a large amount of time working so it makes sense that if we are not happy with our work our emotions will lead us to eating not aligned with how we would like.   

 

This is the same with our relationships – intimate and not.  If these aren’t in order and making your life better than it is likely you won’t be eating well.  

It’s not just about food..

This also brings me to the point that although everything that affects our emotions are going to affect our actions, I believe that this lack – be it connection, fulfilment, alignment or any other disconnect with your life is actually going to play just as big a role in your overall health as the food itself anyway.   

 

If we want to go right back to the root problem (always a good idea) instead of just dealing with the superficial band aid of ‘eating better’ we come up against our beliefs.  Who am I? What am I worthy of? What is my place in the world?  

 

These existential questions that place us in the world are largely answered by our child selves.   The problem is they are often not updated to help us as adults.  

 

 A good place to start is to bring awareness to how you are feeling when you reach for the food.   Is it a void that you are trying to fill? Is it boredom? Sadness? Even happiness we celebrate with food and drink in our culture.   

 

Once you start getting some awareness then look for some patterns and look at the areas of your life that you could be more satisfied with and start taking some small steps to head towards a more positive place in these areas.  

 

We all know that the salad is probably better for us than the burger and chips so let’s work towards understanding ourselves on a deeper level.   

 

If this article resonates with you please share it to anyone that you think it may help.   We want to help more people feel their best in a sustainable manner.

 

Written by Luke Sharp, Owner of The Wild Movement.

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The Journey of Health that took 10 years to start

The reason for writing this short blog is to highlight that one is never down and out.   There is always a way to better health, it’s just about looking for the answers and asking the right questions.
Justin George emailed me in August 2018.   He had been working with Emrys Goldsworthy, (Musculoskeletal therapist) for some months to help work on ‘a bad back’ that had been presenting with symptoms of sciatica pain. He had a disc bulge at 21 (at the time of reaching out Justin was 37) and herniated the same disc at 31.
From the above Justin was living in pain, which didn’t help his mental health but was fearful and didn’t feel ready to do any strength training for almost a decade.
I had a good relationship with Emrys and often referred clients to him.   I am thankful of his tremendous work he does as Justin trusted him when Emrys told him he was ready to start focusing on getting stronger.
Justin went through the extensive steps we use when someone is looking to train with us and from that we got some conservative basic starting points.
There were no red lights in terms of mobility. The major things we were working around were his history of disc problems, his fears around strength training and just his lack of training in the past.   His major goals were to increase strength and also positively change his body composition.
Some conservative benchmarks when we started was a Bench Press of 45kg x 8 reps and a Goblet Squat of 20kg x 8 reps.    Justin also had an inbody scan early on since body composition was a goal and he weighed in at 95kg and 32% Body Fat.
Justin has now been training for over 12 months.   It has been a total pleasure seeing his transformation of physical health, his willingness to learn and his sharing of his mental health.
Just like anyone else with any success the graph is never linear. There have been ups and downs as he and we have worked through different problems together.   The important thing to note is the consistency that Justin has had over that year.   Like with most things Justin does he goes all in and is approaching 250 sessions with us.   From that hard work, day to day or week to week might seem like it’s not always moving forward but when we look at the bigger picture now Justin is:
  • Down to 86kg at 21 % (9kg Body weight down and 10% body fat down, 2kg of muscle up.
  • Back Squatting sets of 80kg for 8 reps instead of 20kg Goblet Squats.
  • Bench Pressing sets of 62kg for 8 reps instead of 45kg
  • Deadlifting without pain
  • Learnt the Clean and Jerk and Snatch (two most technical exercises you can do with a barbell)
  • Been progressing and learning handstands
  • Fully immersed himself into our community and is now even Head of Social Events for The Wild Movement!

Justins Body Composition changes over time. The graph bottom right shows Percent Body Fat and Total Muscle Changes. He was actually heavier than this when he started too.

I hope from reading this it gives you some hope where their may be little.   One of the hardest parts is reaching out and trusting a professional (especially in the fitness industry) when you have been living in pain for a long time.   I’m grateful Justin did and I’m looking forward to where the journey evolves to.
If you want to have a chat about whether our Pack Strength training is right for you please feel free to contact us HERE.  

 

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