By Guy Lawrence

‘For all but the last few hundred years (a heartbeat on the genetic evolution time scale), really sweet foods have been difficult to find.’ – David Gillespie

Sugar… It’s a delicate topic. Unless you’ve been living in a cave lately, you will know that sugar has been copping a lot of flack from the media over recent times (and rightly so I feel). But even with all this media attention, it still washes over many people’s heads and gets thrown into the all too hard basket, with my mate included.

I’ve been guiding my mate now for quite some time with the misconceptions of weight loss and his health kick. He felt that eating fruit salad would help his weight loss plan, counting calories and drinking diet sodas was a healthy choice, following the food pyramid was  beneficial and hours and hours of running a week was going to improve his health. Then I challenged him and his way of thinking and asked him to reconsider his approach, and thankfully he has so far.

We caught up for a cuppa and a chat recently, and as he puts a great big spoonful of honey in his tea, he looks at me and says “this is ok isn’t it? I mean, it’s natural right?”

He then tells me he’s stirring lots of agave syrup into his porridge in the morning too. O’ dear… Continue reading →

By Guy Lawrence (Image courtesy of termlifeinsurance.org)

Know anyone who drinks soft drinks? If you do, tell them to spend 5 minutes going over this extremely well put together image. (Click image to enlarge.)

If they still persist and continue to drink the stuff, then shine a torch in their ear and see if you can see light the other side! Soft drinks are bad for you plain and simple!

Some of you might be reading this and say that’s ok, I only drink diet soda. Well think again! Diet sodas contribute to weight gain, obesity and ill health just as much as sodas.

I wrote a post recently on the effects of diet sodas – Are diet sodas a health choice?

The message is simple really. If you care about your health, kick the soft drinks all together!  Continue reading →

By Guy Lawrence

          “Health is a resource for everyday life, not the objective of living.” -
… Health Promotion

My mate was faced with something that he felt was a serious problem, his job demanded lot’s of hours, blood, sweat and tears on a weekly basis. He loved his job but his health was beginning to suffer. He’d been at it for four years and whenever he fitted exercise into his routine it became too much and simply exhausted him.

When we met up one evening, he told me that he had a 6.30am spin class that morning with a jog lined up for the following night. He also looked like he was going to have to crawl home like a lizard as he was that tired! I did feel for him.

After discussing the food pyramid at length and coming to the conclusion it sucked, I really felt we’d need to look at his exercise regime too.

I asked him why he was exercising?

After a bit of a dumbfounded look he said he wanted to be fitter, leaner, toned and healthier. He was feeling like a slug with no backbone when he sat in his office chair and he desperately wanted it to change.

From where I was sitting, his road to greater health wasn’t looking pretty. All I could see for him was fatigue, burnout, frustration, possible injury and an attitude that said ‘screw you’ to exercise with a million justifications on why he can’t do it anymore.

Do you like the idea of exercising less & becoming a lean mean health machine in the process?

He did… Continue reading →

By Guy Lawrence

One fine Saturday morning in the Coogee Tropicana Cafe after a very enjoyable ocean swim…

Friend: May I get the muesli fruit salad and a freshly squeezed apple juice please…

Me: Uh?? What happened to the big brekkie and long black you always order?

Friend: This is the new me mate… I need to drop a few kilos so I’m on a health kick!

I order an omlette and congratulate him on his new found enthusiasm for his health kick and weight loss plan. At this point I have two options:

A) I could sound like a food nazi and tell him my thoughts on what he just ordered… or B) Keep my mouth shut and wish him the best of luck.

I choose the latter… the last thing I wanted to do was dampen his spirits with my thoughts with weight loss and fruit, so I thought I’d put into a blog post instead and mail it to him… Continue reading →

By Guy Lawrence

Are you are about to roll into the New Year on a health kick? Why not do it with a little support and community to encourage you on?

Every once in a while something comes along that I will happily and shamelessly plug, simply because it’s really that good!

In my view, one of the most fundamental actions you can take to improving your overall health is kicking the sugar habit. Sarah Wilson’s eBook: I Quit Sugar has captured this beautifully.

Not sure if you have ever tried getting off the sweet stuff, but as simplistic as it sounds, Continue reading →