Hey!
Hope your weekend is going well. With the craziness that’s happening all around us, whatever is doing our bit, let’s try and do it. I think we all hear/speak too much about it already and I’ll steer clear.
Let’s get on with it - the 3 things for today.
on keeping score. I’ve written about this before and I think it is important for us to dig deeper. If you could go back to school and tell yourself, would you seriously tell yourself to score MORE marks? Or to learn some skills that you did not know needed to be learned back then?
3 quotes for this week - from Shane Parrish, Derek Sivers, and George Leonard.
on the endless cycle of losing weight and gaining weight. It is easy to lose 5 kilos in a few weeks. It is even easier to put it back on in a few weeks. Get out of that cycle. The slower the gains, the better.
on keeping score
In school, we were told that marks were all that mattered. If you studied hard and got good grades, everything would be straightforward.
All it means was one could game the system and/or learn by rote. It most certainly is not the skills one needs for life. But that's another story. The point is, marks were useful but one-dimensional. And the subjects taught were not the entire universe - there were just so many other things.
For example, civic sense. Teamwork. Leadership skills. Perseverance. Skill building. Problem-solving. 100s of others that maybe we learned by fluke or accident or through adventures with our friends. The subjects and marks in school were one tiny aspect of it.
You know that to be true. It is still true today. Even if the score is relevant, it is one data point. Not the only data point. And only you are keeping score (for yourself).
If you could go back to school and tell yourself, would you seriously tell yourself to score MORE marks? Or to learn some skills that you did not know needed to be learned back then?
Likewise, your health, your fitness, your nutrition - these are not about what you lift, what you weigh, how much kilos you lost, or your body fat percentage. These are all useful data points.
Of course, good health means you can do better things with your mind and body - that's why the data points are still useful. But just like scoring 95/100 or 93/100 or well, even a 60/100 didn't really matter as much as they made it out to be - you just need to move in the right direction and be above a certain level. Keep moving forward but don't obsess with the score.
Keeping score is useful. But it is not the point.
3 quotes for this week
In the short-term, you are as good as your intensity.
In the long-term, you are only as good as your consistency.
– Shane Parrish
I was pointed towards Shane Parrish last year by a student of mine (thank you KS!). And another reader shared this wonderful quote which I obviously love. I think this, like all quotes, is worth pondering. What does it mean FOR YOU? If you took this advice, what would you need to change?
A new day begins when I wake up, not at midnight.
...
Celebrate personally meaningful markers. Ignore arbitrary calendar dates.
– Derek Sivers, from his post over here.
More than any other person I've read, Derek seems to say things that are vague notions in my head that I could never properly express. I love reading his work again and again.
How do you best move toward mastery?
To put it simply, you practice diligently, but you practice primarily for the sake of the practice itself.
– George Leonard
Simple. Hard. Shifting mindset to this is easier said than done. Instant gratification, shiny objects, squirrels, fads, distractions. Instead, try to practice for the sake of the practice.
This is something that I am struggling with and I am slowly coming up with my own rules. In lifting, not worrying about the weight but at the same time, too low an intensity will not lead to skill improvement. As I keep practicing, my ruleset improves. Not sure if that's the way to go about it but it is the way I know now. Maybe in 6 months, I'll figure out something better.
on the endless cycle of losing weight and gaining weight
5 kilos off, 5 kilos on. Repeat.
You decide "this is it!" and start afresh with a new diet and workout routine. You bite through it and claw your way through all the cravings, the Monday morning blues, the "I don't feel like going to the gym" blues, and prohibit sugar and any treats from your life. A few weeks of this and all your hard work is rewarded - the weighing scale says you are 5 kilos lighter.
I've seen my share of people do this. What happens next is inevitably putting on 5+ kilos over the next few months. And then they do it again. And again. And again. It is not uncommon for a person who does these kinda drastic deprivation/prohibition-based diets to lose weight this fast. And putting it back on. And this is something they do EVERY YEAR. Sometimes, more than once a year.
Stop already!
If this is you, you need to stop. That's not working, it never has and it never will. Plot your measurements for the last 2 diets you did - where you started, where you ended. And then, let's get you into the habit of just measuring the first Monday for the rest of the year.
Until you get tired of being in the same place, nothing's gonna change. Until you stop fooling yourself that this works, nothing is going to change. Until you stop being defensive about this, nothing is going to change.
And until you start figuring out a new strategy, nothing is going to change. Because you keep doing the same thing, the same outcome is what will happen.
things to know
Listen, I am all for a quick blitz, a shot-in-the-arm to get you going. But even that has to be made via sensible methods. Jotting down my notes over here based on the patterns I've seen, see which ones are useful to you.
If a diet says you cannot eat one entire category of foods, walk away. The keto diet, for example, came by to treat kids with epilepsy. It is not meant for fat loss but every diet has been appropriated for fat loss. If you are going down this route, why not do the tape-worm diet? (That's a joke. Please don't)
Fruits did not make you fat. Eating fruits is not going to prevent you from going towards your results.
Carbs are not the enemy. The Indian diet just has way too many carbs in it - which means there's not enough protein, vegetables, and fruits. The point is not eating zero carbs but eating adequate vegetables and protein.
Fats are not the enemy. They are easy to over-eat though. Nuts, for example, are extremely nutritious but high in calories. Be mindful.
Protein is not the enemy. Most of you are in no danger of over-consuming protein - let's first get to eating 1g per kilo of bodyweight and those of you who lift, doubling that might be all you need.
Snacking could be an issue.
a way forward
Move away from rapid weight loss goals. Instead, understand what Coach Dan John means when he says to end the year 1 kilo lighter than you started.
Move away from cutting out an entire food group. It is silly and unsustainable.
Eat more vegetables. Eat what protein you can, based on what is in your diet. Eat more fruits. Drink more water. Sleep!
Log your measurements every month. Here's a simple tracker for you to download and do.
Half a kilo a month, while seemingly trivial, is 5+ kilos over the year. The key is keeping it off.
It is easy to lose 5 kilos in a few weeks. It is even easier to put it back on in a few weeks. Get out of that cycle.
The slower the gains, the better.
I know this is unsexy and I have nothing to peddle here. If all of this reeks of common sense, well, guess what?!?
Stop being a hamster on a wheel and grow up. You can do this!
Thanks for reading. Do share ONE of my posts with ONE friend/family member if you think they’d find it useful.
