M & S

So I went into M& S for a chicken, since I am reliably informed their chickens are very nice, and I wanted some of their very organic lets save the poor farmers and the world coffee. In the basket paying queue I found myself following a woman who was rather wobbly of butt, but not a total weeble yet – then I saw her son who was, I guess, about 10 years old. Well, he was well on the way to weebledom. Poor lad. Then I saw The Shopping. Out of an unladen basket was poking 2 packets of Jammy dodgers. Good Grief. What on earth is going on?? Can she not see her son is fat? Soon she will have to also buy him a bigger mirror so he can see the full magnitude of himself. Why can people not connect eating sugary things with wobbliness around the middle bottom? Since you are all convinced a Balanced Diet works – which set of scales are you using?? Those of an elephant?



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So let’s examine her Jammy Dodger. White flour, lots and lots of white sugar, poor quality fat (this is M&S, so presumably not transfats), more sugar cos there is the Jam. The deluded you thinks that because Jam is made with fruit, it is in someway a Good Thing. So you eat a biscuit (or 3 or 10). It is sweet, blood sugar rises – this is dangerous for the brain, so the body produces insulin to lower blood sugar. Insulin, incidentally, is the fat storage hormone. Weeble weeble weeble. So immediately on eating the biscuit, you get a high. This is why you eat sugary things. Then you get the most dreadful low because insulin is efficient and lowers your blood sugar – it lowers it too much, which is also dangerous for the brain. So your brain makes you feel really really really hungry – and you need your next sugar fix. Don’t blame your brain for this – you do have to stay conscious. So you have a nice fruit juice – or you raid the fruit bowl. Good good, you think. No FAT in this – and not a Jammy Dodger. But hey, it is still nice and sugary. Insulin, that Fat Storage, hormone rises, etc etc etc.
And sooner or later you have to buy that bigger mirror. And guess what? Children’s bodies work in the same way as ours. Yes, there will be a BLOG on packed lunches.... In the meanwhilst, no doubt you are well stocked on those nice fruit yoghurts. Low Fat, of course. Must keep that insulin up. Weeble weeble weeble.

Grotwoski

We like to be "scientific", by which we mean discursive and cerebral, since this attitude is dictated by the course of civilization. But we also want to pay tribute to our biological selves, to what we might call physiological pleasures. We do not want to be restricted in this sphere. Therefore we play a double game of intellect and instinct, thought and emotion; we try to divide ourselves artificially into body and soul. When we try to liberate ourselves from it all we start to shout and stamp, we convulse to the rhythm of music. In our search for liberation we reach biological chaos. We suffer most from a lack of totality, throwing ourselves away, squandering ourselves.

Jerzy Grotowski - Toward a Poor Theatre

Acton No, Biosig Yes

I've just spent a week in a hotel room in Acton, which really is one of the least important places in the country. From my window I could see such anti-climatic sights as the Carphone Warehouse head office, which standing proud in the drizzle next to the A40, welcoming our friends from Slough and Reading as they whizz into London in eager anticipation of an afternoon waiting on the slip-road listening to Chris Moyles.

Despite this backdrop, I had not been kicked out by my husband. Nor was I on holiday. I was spending time with Charles Poliquin, over from America, at a course for Biosignature Practitioners.

Biosig is great. Its principle is simple: take off your clothes, then let me pinch your flab with my callipers. Ok, not all your clothes. Just your t-shirt will do – I’ll let your body fat tell me what's been going on with your internals. Love handles, for instance, are the result of too many carbohydrates. A big stomach suggests a life of stress fatigue. Fat around the knees is the result of liver problems.

Since finding this out in 2005, I haven't had to faff around making my poor clients run on the treadmill if their problem is to do with their hormones. I can stop them having to neck handfuls of dangerous thyroid drugs or anti-depressants too. When I first incorporated Biosig into my training, I noticed that certain clients who often wept or complained about low energy suddenly perked up when they started taking enough magnesium (a supplement which is very dear to my heart, having rescued me from both fatigue and insomnia). This meant we could focus on their fitness, instead of blowing our noses into soggy tissues.

So, with their higher levels of pizzazz and my callipers to guide them, my clients find themselves more in control of their lives and much perkier too. Our work seems much simpler. If this means having to spend the odd week in a rainy Ramada hotel in suburbia, so be it...

Why I Run

Running's not for squares. I don't wear a spandex body suit. I spit. I stare down cars. I swear at builders. I master the technique of blowing air down one nostril. And, in the fray, I get to think things through.

I've just run. After a tough start, I arrived at the following conclusion: New Year's resolutions don't break.

The classes I teach, which always swell straight after Christmas, have stayed swollen for the third year running. There are even men in them now, right at the back, twice a week and proud. They're not leaving. My mum still gets remedial massage, my aunt refuses to take her mis-prescribed statins. Clients curb their workaholism. Some cycle to work, play sport, drink too much, but feel better. New Year's resolutions don't get broken. It's just a comforting myth. When we feel crap, we change our habits. When we change our habits, we keep them changed.

This is why I run.

Client of the Week

It's been a tough fortnight. Mis-spent cash, mis-placed jokes, merciless mothers, Schindler's List, sausage meat and a glass of Merlot spilt on the Bravia. Weeks like this, it's a challenge to dedicate time to your ham-strings.




Meriel. You did this.




Even though you had an extended family to look after. Even though your conscience was in constant, boozy turmoil. Even though your husband had fallen prey to a geneaology addiction, you still found the time to come and get some Ednacises happening on your calfs. That's dedication.




Meriel. You are client of the week.