Matt Heath: An article on giving up on your summer body

To enjoy long-term health and fitness, we need boring, doable, permanent change. Photo / 123RF

OPINION

It’s late October, and time to face facts. We’re not going to get our beach bodies ready for the summer. It’s too late. There is no point in trying. What we need to do is accept it and look to the future.

Most New Zealanders want to be fit and healthy. There are times in our lives when we get it together and work towards that goal. Sometimes, we even succeed. Unfortunately, a few months afterwards, we end up right back where we started, or worse.

It’s the circle of life. After demonstrating great discipline over a period of time, you reach that goal weight. You feel proud of yourself. You have energy to burn. Throwing your clothes on in the morning is a pleasure, as everything fits like it should. Then, through a thousand little slips, you find yourself back where you started, disappointed, tired and heading along to AS Colour to upsize your T-shirts. Like most of us, when I reach a health goal, I celebrate by leaning into a six-month orgy of fried food, alcohol and sitting on my a***. The thought process goes like this: ‘I am in great shape; what difference will a pie make?’ Then I repeat this thought every day until the old lard and more is back. Too often, we win the war and lose the peace. We feel mad at ourselves for letting it happen. It would have been so much easier to maintain in that good place rather than climb the health mountain again.

If we want long-term fitness and health, we need to give up on summer and focus on the rest of our lives. A slow burn is the way. This means sustainable changes forever.

A scientist was recently talking on the great Huberman Lab podcast about weight loss. He said something like this: “If you go on a diet, ask yourself, can you do this for the rest of your life? If not, it’s not going to work.” I have spent hours going back through transcripts of Huberman episodes, but can’t find exactly who said this or when. It’s possible no one did. But even if I dreamed it, it’s still a brilliantly obvious thought. If you change your life with some crazy, unsustainable regime, you will eventually return to your old ways and end up the same as you were.

A recent study found most Australian women spend more than 15 years of their lives on diets. Yet obesity rates are through the roof. This is because fads don’t work. The last time I lost weight, I did it by eating nothing but packaged meals designed for weight loss that I got delivered from a specialised company. These were carefully assembled frozen lunches and dinners. It was a fantastic programme. I lost 15 kilograms. It was beautiful. But I was never going to eat pre-packed food for the rest of my life. It was too expensive, anti-social, weird and repetitive. Sitting down and eating food with friends and family is the best part of life. Human interaction is more important for our mental health than anything. Eating with people is one of the key ways we spend time together. You can’t be over in the corner microwaving your humiliating little package while everyone sits around a table. You don’t want to make meal choices that isolate you. You have to eat like a normal human. Unfortunately, these days, normal humans eat like pigs.

Other stupid plans I have tried and failed at include having one meal a day, the soup diet, and only having shots of vodka when at pubs. The latter is a terrible idea. A quiet beer and a chat with a friend doesn’t work when you slam your drink instantly.

In our hearts, we know there is no quick fix. So forget this summer. If we are going to enjoy long-term health and fitness, we need boring, doable, permanent change. We need to find a lifestyle we can keep up forever. This is my very boring, long-term snail-like plan. No scales, smaller servings, slower eating, drinking water, walking, running, lifting weights, mostly avoiding sugar, drinking less booze and choosing not to slam entire packets of crisps while sitting on the couch. Repeat the plan every day until I die sometime in my mid-90s. Who’s keen?