As regular readers of this blog will know, at RISE we are a lot more about ‘supporting people on a journey of change’.
Not just ‘telling them what they need to do’.
People often say when they first start that they just need someone to tell them what to do.
But, as we point out, if this was all they needed, it would’ve worked the previous however many times they’d tried.
Gyms, slimming clubs, diets, etc all do work if people do them fully and permanently.
But the fact they so few (5%) do manage to ‘keep it up’ and fully integrate it into their lives, suggests the approach of just ‘being told what to do’ isn’t the most effective.
The purpose of these blogs, the videos, podcasts, time we spend with our ninjas and so on is to, over time help them change those habits and their lifestyle to lead to lasting change.
We try and reverse to normal approach of Do – Have – Be.
You know – where people try to make themselves do X (diet, gym, etc) to have their new Y (body, health, etc) and be what they want to be (happier, etc).
To helping them become that person who then automatically does and has those things.
Having said that though, we appreciate that, every now and again, it’s useful to get a little reminder in of what we actually believe is the best thing
We’ve had a few questions in recently and the fact that people are asking them shows we haven’t made some points as clear as we could.
So, here are the answers we would give if we were just purely talking about the ‘do’:
Q: What should I eat?
A: A balanced diet of real foods – about one third natural carbs, one third healthy fats and one third proteins
Q: Should I cut out carbs?
A: No – you need carbs. But you probably have a mega high carb diet at the moment, so addressing the balance of carbs:fats:protein would be beneficial
Q: If I eat less carbohydrate where will I get my energy?
A: Your food and fat stores (50,000 calories stored in stone of body fat on average). Protein has the same energy content as carbohydrates, fat twice as much.
Q: Where will I get fibre from if I eat less pasta and bread?
A: Veg is a great source of fibre. And it probably has the fibre reasonably intact – much of the fibre in processed, grain based foods will have denatured (died) between the field and your stomach.
Q: Isn’t more fat bad for me?
A: No – if it’s good fat. Fats are essential parts of our diet and affect things as deep as inter brain cell communication. We NEED fat.
Q: Isn’t too much protein bad for my kidneys?
A: Yes – if you go anywhere near that level of consumption I will eat my trainers (I don’t own a hat).
Q: Isn’t porridge / All-Bran / Granola a good breakfast?
A: It’s better than Frosties or a Pop-Tart sure, but it’s still not very balanced – more healthy fats and protein would be even better.
Q: What sort of exercise is good for fat loss?
A: We find higher intensity intervals to be good – going from higher intensity to lower intensity.
Q: Isn’t low intensity cardio best for fat loss?
A: In some cases, maybe, but the vast majority respond better to (and enjoy more and save time on) interval based stuff.
Q: I can’t work at high intensity because I’m old / injured can I?
A: It’s all relevant – high intensity for one person will be very different to another. For some walking up stairs is high intensity. Working at a level that isn’t maintainable for more than minute then resting is cool, whatever that may be.
Q: Isn’t drinking lots of caffeine good for fat loss as it speeds up your metabolism?
A: Exact opposite I’m afraid – it will usually elevate cortisol production and put you in a fat storage mode. Shame really, because I do love a good coffee.
If you have any more questions reply on this email and we’ll let you know 🙂
Much love,
Jon ‘Q&A’ Hall and Matt ‘M&M’ Nicholson
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