I Quit Sugar for Life (12 page)

Make these the night before and just add your bits in the morning. Or, better, keep nuts and yoghurt at the office for adding on top once you’re in there (see
here
).

30 seconds.

IT’S A CONTROVERSIAL IDEA, BUT HEAR ME OUT. Humans didn’t evolve to blitz and pump and boot camp themselves silly in a gym and there’s no
evolutionary purpose to running marathons.
Outrunning a sabre-toothed tiger for 2–3 hours was never going to be an accomplishable feat; we evolved to feed our
energy to our brains so we could outsmart said tiger. In fact, we evolved to burn as little energy as possible during physical exertion.

To this end, exercise is a highly inefficient weight-loss technique. It’s demotivating (it takes months to see a result), it sees us seek out more calories than we burn
and we’re programmed to return to our set-point, over and over (gosh, aren’t genetics recalcitrant buggers!). To burn off one chocolate bar, you’d need to swim laps for more than
an hour.

What exercise is best?

30 minutes,
no more
,
according to a Danish study, is optimal for fat loss, increasing aerobic capacity and reducing the risk of cardiovascular
disease.

Shorter intervals
are great too, found another study. Walking briskly for 10 minutes, three times a day, can be better than one long stint.

Mix it up
. Other studies, however, show that mixing things up (shorter and longer workouts) is best. I, intuitively, agree.

Plus, the ‘every day’ bit is what counts
. A 2012 study from the University of Wyoming found it takes three months of daily (moderate, casual)
exercise before it starts to affect appetite control (for the better).

Forget weight loss . . .
find another exercise raison d’être. Exercise for weight loss is not effective. Instead, think about using the promise of
a clear head, fresh skin, agility and a vitamin D dose (instant results) as your motivator every day. Me, I view my morning workout as my grounding time. This is what gets me tying on my sneakers
and out the door.

Less stuff, less time, less fuss is the deal here. Try this approach for a month and see if it makes things smoother.

Exercise in the morning.
It gets your circadian rhythms in synch and the greatest metabolic (and fat-burning) benefits are experienced at this time, and
‘then it’s done’ – there’s no risk of being too tired to do it later. You prefer afternoons? Cool, but I invite you to try mornings, just for a week as part of a
morning routine and see how it fits.

Commit to 20 minutes only.
This way you’ll do it, you won’t baulk (as you would if you bossily tell yourself you must do a 1-hour workout). Once
started, you can bulk it up to 30 minutes if you’re enjoying it. Or longer if it feels right for you.

Exercise every day.
Something weird happens when you say you’ll do it three days a week: you spend every morning deliberating whether today is one of
those days instead of
just doing it
.

REMEMBER: FEWER DECISIONS MEAN MORE SELF-CONTROL MUSCLE FOR MORE IMPORTANT THINGS.

Exercise outside as often as possible.
Studies show that our bodies respond better to the fresh air and connecting with nature. They call it the wilderness
effect. Also, vitamin D from the sun assists our metabolism.

Exercise as close to home as possible.
Don’t waste time driving your bike to a park when you can ride straight from the front door. It’s another
complicating bit of palaver. Flow!

Keep fitness equipment absolutely minimal.
And in one spot in the house, ready to go. No drink bottles, no fancy iPod carriers, no jangly keys (set aside one
house key and put it in your shoe, pocket or down your bra). Equipment (looking for it, assembling it) can slow the momentum down and might even leave you with an excuse not to get it done.

TIE UP YOUR SHOELACES, GET OUT THE DOOR!

That said, buy a pedometer or download a walking app on your smartphone.
This is a worthwhile investment. Counting your steps – and aiming for 10,000 a
day – will get you competitive with yourself! I use the Moves app.

In addition: walk some more.
For the rest of the day, find ways to walk more – to the supermarket, to meet friends for dinner, to get to work or
university. Use Google Maps to work out the route and how long it will take. Or factor in the average pace of 5 kilometres per hour. Multitask (listen to podcasts or talking books or radio or
return phone calls).

Do stair climbs.
Got a park with steps nearby? Live in an apartment block or staying in a hotel? Do 20 minutes of laps, mixing up taking two steps at a time,
jogging,
etc.
Alternatively, do laps up and down a steep hill.

Try a home workout on rainy days.
There are heaps of short workout downloads on the Internet using everyday items such as tins of veggies, chairs, walls and
your own body weight.

This is my exercise kit. I keep it in a pile in the laundry so I can grab it and ‘literally’ run. No hunting around for my sports bra.

FACT: THE CONCEPT OF EATING ‘SIX SMALL MEALS A DAY’ AND SNACKING WAS DEVELOPED BY NUTRITIONISTS IN THE 1990s IN RESPONSE
to everyone on the planet riding a blood-sugar rollercoaster and needing to fuel themselves every couple of hours.

The research that backed this approach pertained to diabetics. You could say it’s a myth born as a paltry fix for sugar addiction. But most of us aren’t designed to
eat this way – it’s inefficient and taxing on our bodies, which don’t get the opportunity to rest between meals. An increasing number of studies are showing that bigger breaks
between meals have big health benefits. Plus, there’s this:

FULL MEALS TEND TO BE NUTRITIONALLY DENSE; SNACKS RARELY.

The good news: once you’re off sugar for several months, you’ll find you don’t need to snack. Once again, it’s about throwing a solid log (meals full of
protein, with plenty of good fat) on the fire, instead of papery sugars. And getting on with the rest of our lives without the constant need to attend to our appetite.

LET’S TRY THIS

Most of the time when I think I’m hungry between meals it’s more a case of my not being quite satiated . . . yet. In such cases I find it helpful to:

▶
Wait 15–20 minutes.
Sometimes my metabolism is slow to react. Wait a little – go for a walk, run an errand
– and then see if you’re still hungry.

▶
Drink some water.
Quite often hunger is actually thirst.

▶
Eat a tablespoon of coconut oil
(see
here
). This works 100% and for a good few hours. Promise!

▶
If I’m genuinely hungry between meals, I eat.
I recommend nuts, cheese or yoghurt. They can be found most places (even
in service stations) and they work fast.

LET’S TRY THIS

I believe most people do not eat enough – at least enough dense nutrition – and particularly at lunch. I was the same for years. I’d get all modest with my
midday meal, then turn to snacks (sweet ones) around 3 pm. It took several visits to Europe to get a good feel for how a meal should be eaten. Over there, women and men alike commit to a proper
lunch that fills them up until dinner. They don’t do afternoon tea and snacks are not de rigueur. Some things to try:

▶
Eat a handful-sized serve of protein at breakfast, lunch and dinner.

▶
Include at least 2 cups of vegetables at lunch and dinner. If it’s a salad, it should be 3 cups.

▶
While adjusting to this ‘three meals only’ way of eating, add an extra boiled egg (or two) or feta cheese (a proper slab) to your
meal if you get hungry. Throw on some seeds, nuts and, of course, a good glug of oil or dressing like the Europeans do.

▶
Don’t be shy about including several elements. I’ll often eat a soup or broth
and
a box of leftover roast vegetables
and
a leftover chop.

Cinnamon and all things nice

Why do I add cinnamon to my ‘sweet’ recipes? Along with turmeric, cloves and bay leaves, it stimulates insulin activity (indeed, triples it) and helps process sugar
more efficiently.

Why the French don’t get fat

Sitting at a cafe in Paris recently, I heard an old man next to me comment on a couple walking past eating pizza on sagging paper plates. ‘Pfft, they are obviously not
European,’ he said. The French (and most Europeans) don’t eat on the run, It’s seen as
déclassé
(a promenade stroll with a gelato or glace is the
exception). I see it as unhealthful. Full meals are packed with nutrition and satiate. On-the-run food is junky and leaves us wanting more. The lack of mindfulness and commitment also means
we’re not aware of what and how much we’re eating. Again, no satiation.