My Accidental Journey to a Six-Pack

In the last few years, I have gone from this to this.

I’ve written about my weight loss before, but, just in the last two or three months, something has really accelerated, and I’m not quite sure what.

I’m now 54. I’ve suddenly got a six-pack. Well, sort of. A four-pack. I’ve lost 48 pounds (22 kg). My metabolic age has come down from 57 (when I was 51) to 49. I am super fit and bursting with energy.

Even at the age of 22, when I had just left drama school and won a British Open Martial Arts Tournament (BOMAT 1991 - I’ve got the trophy somewhere if you don’t believe me), I don’t think I was nearly as defined. I’m the same welter weight as I was then too.

What’s the secret? There isn’t one. I’d love to say this was all deliberate, but really, it has happened by accident. I was overweight, started fasting to lose weight, and it spiralled from there. Normally, I put the weight back on, but this time it’s not only stayed off, but I have lost more weight and got into better shape.

I thought I should describe some of my habits here, in case you find them beneficial. I don’t think it is one thing that has done it. I think it is the aggregation of everything.

So here we go: 12 habits to transform your health. If you are interested in following me down this route, don’t try and do all of these at once. Do one, then gradually add others. Baby steps …

1. Fast

Do the 5:2 diet. It takes effort, but it works. It is probably the single most effective thing you can do to lose weight. Fasting brings mental clarity too. Watch videos, listen to podcasts, read, indoctrinate yourself, then do it. After a while, you look forward to the feeling of being hungry and the good feeling you get after: I call the morning after a fast the inverted hangover because you feel so good.

2. Avoid Seed Oils

By seed oils, I mean all the industrial oils that have only entered our diet in the last 50 or so years and that human beings were never supposed to eat - vegetable oil, sunflower oil, rapeseed oil, canola oil, palm oil - all that stuff. These things were invented to be industrial oils, and they’ve made their way into our food supply and they are poison.

Why is obesity such a problem? Look no further than seed oils for your answer. 100 years ago, Americans got zero calories from seed oils; now they make up a third of their daily intake. In this case, correlation is causation. Things like olive oil, butter, tallow, and coconut oil are fine.

Seed oils are in everything. Assume what you are considering eating contains seed oil and only eat it when you have ascertained that it doesn’t.

Tell someone you know about this.

3. Dead Hangs

I think these might have been the transformer, as I’ve only been doing them a few months. Get a pull-up bar. You can get ones that you hang in your doorway or, better, get one outside for your garden and hang from it. At first, you will only be able to hang for a short time, but keep hanging every day so that eventually you can hang for two minutes. Then do two two-minute hangs per day.

I only started doing dead hangs to cure my various neck ailments (too much computer), but they have had all sorts of unintended, beneficial side effects. They improve your posture, they stretch out all the evils of sitting in front of a screen all day, they sort out your neck problems, your shoulder problems, they stretch through your torso. I can’t think of a more physically beneficial way of spending two minutes than a dead hang.

4. Get a Whoop

Whoop is a health and fitness tracker watch which focuses on sleep and recovery. I got one to improve my sleeping habits. Sleep is the new exercise, as I’m sure you know. It measures, among other things, heart rate variability (HRV), which plummets when you drink. You then get a big red warning which puts you off drinking.

The unintended consequence, then, of getting a whoop was that my alcohol consumption has gone from having a couple of drinks or more most days - half a bottle of wine a day kind of stuff - to almost zero. I now crave not drinking. It’s not just the calories in alcohol, it’s the bad decisions you make after drinking, particularly late-night bingeing. Not drinking also improves sleep and general health. I did not plan to give up booze. I like booze. I love beer. I love wine. I like drinking. If you told me I had to give up drinking, I would’ve said no. But that’s what happens when you get a Whoop. So get a Whoop. Plus your sleeping habits improve too.

5. Have a partner you want to look good for

I had one - now sadly no more - but I’m sure it made me generally up my physical game. She was also extremely health-conscious and got me into all sorts of good habits. It helps to have a partner with whom you can eat well and exercise well. It makes you accountable too.

Sometimes splitting up with someone you like or love can be great for your weight too. Maybe that’s what happened to me!

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6. Cider vinegar

It’s better for you than Ozempic. It’s cheaper than Ozempic and it reduces your appetite. More here on the glories of cider vinegar.

7. Supplements

I’ve gone from taking zero supplements to taking so many so that I don’t know which ones are actually doing good. But I’m pretty sure Tongkat Ali and Fadogia Agrestis have had an impact. I sometimes think the act of taking supplements is more effective than the supplements themselves.

8. Water

Don’t know if it did anything, but I stopped drinking tap water where possible and only try to drink mineral water. (Next worry is microplastics).

9. Exercise

I try to do some form of exercise every day, and I mix it up between cardio, stretching, and weights. I probably could do more weights: I only do one session per week with some dumbbells at home. I need to join a gym. I find cycling good because it doesn’t hurt your joints. When I run, I usually only run two or three miles, but I live near a steep hill, so I do four 30-second sprints up the hill at the end. I play a bit of tennis and a bit of footy. Swimming is also good, but I don’t like chlorine, so that is more of an occasional summer pastime when I can do it outside .

10. Two meals a day

Do you really need three? Skip breakfast, have an early lunch, and go to bed early. And no seed oils.

11. 15 Minutes of Sun

The first thing I do every morning is drink a pint of water, make myself a cup of tea, then go and sit in the garden for 15 minutes and get some sunshine. This is supposed to help regulate your circadian rhythms and sleeping habits. I have been getting to sleep much more easily since I did this. Even if it’s cloudy and it’s winter, go and sit outside for 15 minutes first thing in the morning.

12. Count Calories

I have only just started counting my calories using the Calorie Counter app. The thought of putting your calories into this every time you eat deterred me from doing it sooner - yet more time on my wretched phone - but I’m actually quite enjoying it and I keep it probably 85 or 90% accurately. Eating discipline definitely improves if you get one. Ultimately, losing weight is basic maths: fewer calories in than out, and you lose weight. Net immigration is the same.

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A Bruce-y Bonus. Learn to stand up from the ground without using your hands

This is supposed to be an indicator of longevity. A few months ago I was hopeless. I could barely stand up from a yoga block. But now I can do it. Here’s the proof.

So there you go. I hope this helps. As I say, don’t try to do everything at once. You can’t. Baby steps. This is a case of the power of incremental gains and compounding.

Diet is the most important thing. If you don’t get that right, it doesn’t matter how much you exercise. You can’t outrun a bad diet.

Until next time,

Dominic

PS Don’t forget the mining show - the Edinburgh link is here. And the London link is here.

Plus -

Charlie Morris is one of my closest mates and he writes what I think is one of the best investment newsletters out there, in fact a suite of them. I urge you to sign up for a free trial.

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