“Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.” -Theodosius Dobzhansky

Editor’s note: This is a guest post from Mark Sisson of Mark’s Daily Apple.

As wild animals with massive brains and the ability to respond to sensory stimuli with more than just base instinctual behavior, we humans have the tendency to overthink pretty much, well, everything.

Don’t blame yourself. You can’t escape your head. It’s always there.

Everything you perceive or ponder is filtered through a dense network of constantly firing neural synapses. And whether you’re a strict materialist who thinks it’s all meaty wiring and circuitry up there, or you’re of the opinion that consciousness exists independently of your physical brain, we’re stuck with that consciousness filter – whatever its origin. It’s a blessing and a curse. Technology and science begat both the Internet and the atom bomb, after all. Or, both Youtube and the Youtube comments section.

Our hyper-consciousness often separates us from our surroundings. It erects a barrier that severs the pleasure and immediacy of visceral experience. Imagine the bird watcher who spots a rare woodpecker and immediately buries his nose in his bird ID handbook to confirm the find. The bird flies away. He gets to add a bird to his logbook, but he missed out on seeing a rare animal peck for grubs, stretch its glorious wings, and take flight in search of the next tree. Does a checkmark in a bird logbook compare to the memory of a majestic feathered beast? Ever take a literature course that was so chock full of analysis and essays that you were never able to actually enjoy the great books you were reading? Ever go to the movies with that guy who simply cannot suspend an ounce of disbelief and won’t shut up about the admittedly glaring plot hole the entire ride home? Seeking a deeper understanding of a fascinating and important subject is one thing; over-analysis is another entirely, and it can remove us from the enjoyment of a pleasurable pastime.

Human health and physical fitness are important, crucial things to consider, and millions find them fascinating subjects to discuss, analyze, and optimize. I’m one of them. Millions more overanalyze; they make things harder than they need to be, and they generally get poorer results in the long run. Or, they may get objectively good results, but their lives are consumed by the minutiae of calories, miles, reps, and nutrient counting. I’d say there’s got to be an easier way to do things. There has to be a path that utilizes our big brains without them getting in the way. There’s got to be a balanced, rational method to obtain optimal health and fitness that successfully marries our tendency to think with our animal instincts. Getting fit and being healthy should be simplistic, intuitive, and, most importantly, enjoyable.

Does wildlife obsess over calories eaten or reps performed? How do deer maintain their trim figures and impressive athleticism without a dietitian and weekly personal training sessions? Conversely, why does the house cat grow obese and lethargic, while a bobcat with nearly identical genes stays fit? It isn’t just the simplistic calories in/calories out model. It couldn’t be. Wild animals don’t count calories. They don’t worry about eating before bed, or getting enough exercise to burn off that squirrel they had for breakfast. They just are. They simply exist in an ecosystem hundreds of thousands of years in the making. Evolution has made sure, by its impartial, unconscious hand, that the flora and fauna live in harmony with each other and internally. The bobcat thrives on rodents and small birds because its digestive system and metabolism evolved eating these things; the house cat gets fat because its digestive system and metabolism aren’t suited for grain-based kibble. If the balance is upset in a given environment, organisms die out or move on, but things always reset. This is simply how nature works. When thinking about how to optimize our health and physical fitness, perhaps we should consider how animals do it – and how our ancestors did it.

We’re animals – no one disputes that. We are subject to evolution and natural selection – that one’s a bit more controversial, but it’s true nonetheless. If you keep those two facts in mind while noting the lesson of the fit, lean bobcat, a thread begins to emerge. Shouldn’t the same concept hold true for us? Isn’t there an evolutionarily suitable, effortless lifestyle for us humans, too?

There is, and I call it the Primal Blueprint. It eschews complicated workout regimens, tedious calorie counting, and weight loss gimmicks. My Primal laws are based on a rock solid foundation: evolutionary biology and anthropology mixed with modern human ingenuity. I take what worked for tens of thousands of years throughout human prehistory and incorporate contemporary science to confirm its veracity. When you go back and look at the fossil records of our hunter-gatherer, pre-agricultural ancestors, you find that they were healthy, strong, and largely free of degenerative diseases – especially compared to the health of post-agricultural and even modern humans.

The result is an incredibly simple, incredibly effective way to live, move, and eat: eat the things our ancestors ate, get the amount of sleep our ancestors used to get, and make the same movements our ancestors used to make before agriculture.

Take Action

If you take anything from this post remember these two action items:

1. The ideal human diet should consist of only whole, unprocessed foods – meat, fish, fowl, plants, fruits, and nuts. Whatever you can kill, pick, or dig up and eat on the spot. This is what your ancestors ate and what your body is meant to consume.

2. By the same token, the best exercise consists of natural, full-body movements – lifting heavy things, sprinting, walking, swimming, hiking, climbing, crawling. This is how your ancestors moved and how your body is meant to function.

Amazing Results

The results of following these simple rules are numerous and almost immediate:

• The weight melts off, if you have some to lose, or added muscle appears, if you could stand to gain a few pounds.
• You reset your taste buds. Sugar becomes cloying; processed industrial vegetable oil tastes unnatural.
• You realize you don’t need grains, beans, and potatoes to feel full.
• You crave real food, and you realize that real food tastes good – better than anything you could find on a convenience store shelf and more satisfying than anything in a fast food restaurant. Hunger no longer dictates that you eat every few hours.
• You get stronger and faster, sure, but you learn to move again. You regain lost mobility.
• You get sick less often as your immune system begins to function more effectively.
• You take pleasure in real movement and become more confident in your own skin.
• Eating and moving becomes intuitive, easy and fun.
• The world becomes your gym. Can’t make it to the weight room? Pick up a rock, toss it a couple times, pull your own body weight, then go running in the park. As long as you can manipulate your own body weight, you’re strong enough.

Man is an opportunist above anything else. We love the easy way out, but we tend to make fitness and nutrition so incredibly complicated. Just cut out the foods we’ve only been eating for a few hundred generations (and do eat the things we’ve been eating for thousands of generations), drop the ridiculous fitness contraptions to focus on natural movements, and streamline your health. And don’t be afraid to turn off that big brain every once in awhile.

Read more from Mark Sisson at his popular blog, Mark’s Daily Apple, or check out his new book, The Primal Blueprint.

Not long ago, I was against meal plans because I felt they were too restrictive. I generally prefer to stick to simple principles of eating whole foods, staying active, and eating moderate portions.

But I’ve had a change of heart recently as I’ve focused on losing the last of my bellyfat — in the last year I’ve lost about 35 lbs., and in the last 3.5 months of sticking (mostly) to a general meal plan, I’ve lost 18 lbs.

That’s a goodly amount, to be sure, and I don’t think I could have done it (healthily) without sticking to some kind of plan.

Diet is the biggest component to losing fat — you can burn 600 calories (for example) in a workout, but you can easily eat 2-3 times that much in one sitting if you’re eating junk food. As they say, you can’t out-exercise a bad diet. I’d still recommend getting active and burning calories as much as you can (with adequate rest), but if you really want to lose fat, you need to look at your diet.

So if diet is important, how do you stick to a good diet? The meal plan is often the simplest answer — plan out the foods you’re going to eat, measured for your calorie goal, and then just eat those meals (for the most part). You don’t have to track your eating because it’s already planned out.

Sticking to the meal plan is often the hard part, though. Most people aren’t used to it, and they often fail and feel guilty. So I thought I’d share some of what I’ve learned, what’s worked for me, in hopes that it’ll help you.

I’ve gotten pretty good at sticking to my plan, and I actually enjoy it. Go figure.

The Simple Method

So here’s what I’ve done, and what I’d recommend. Keep it simple.

1. Eat real, whole foods you love. Do NOT see this as a sacrifice. If you hate carrots or eggplant but you eat them because they’re somehow “virtuous” or you think that sacrifice is the only way to lose that fat, you’ll fail. You cannot stick to something you hate for very long. Instead, go for healthy foods you actually enjoy eating. For me, this is berries, fruits of all kinds, raw almonds, veggies cooked tastefully in stir-fries or chili or what have you. Your list will be different, and it could take some experimenting with different recipes you find online, in magazines or in cookbooks to find the healthy foods you like best. Main rule of thumb, though: try for real foods, not packaged ones (not even “healthy” convenience foods). In as natural a state as possible — meaning, not processed or extracted, not fried or smothered with cream or sauces.

2. Improve in iterations. Cut back a little at a time. You don’t have to go from Standard American Diet to a diet of Only Raw Carrots in one day (nor should you ever eat only raw carrots, but you know what I mean). Try a meal plan that’s a little better than the diet you’ve been eating for years — perhaps cutting out the liquid calories at first, or adding more fruits or veggies you love. As I said above, cut the calories just a little. This first meal plan doesn’t have to be perfect — just a little better. Then, once you get used to that, make a meal plan that’s a little better yet — maybe a couple hundred calories less, more veggies, less fatty stuff, less snack food, or more real food. With each iteration of your meal plan, get a little better. I’m still getting better at mine.

3. Look ahead for bumps, and plan. We all have those bumps in our routines: an office party, someone’s birthday dinner, going on a date with your honey, taking a trip, being on the road all day and not having access to your usual foods. The key is to think ahead — what’s going on tomorrow? How will I deal with it? Should I pack food, or find out what the menu is at the restaurant so I can pick something healthy, or should I use this as a cheat meal? Thing is, don’t just do cheat meals all the time — then you’re not on a meal plan anymore. More on that below. Again, plan ahead and prepare — as you keep doing this, you’ll get good at packing snacks or meals so you’re covered, no matter what the occasion.

4. Make it public. Use your blog or Twitter/Facebook or a public forum or just email to let people know how your meal plan is going (I use Daytum, but that’s only one way to do it). Or get a partner and report to each other. Making it public or having a partner gives you accountability and motivation, and works like a charm. Don’t skip this step.

5. Cheat, & don’t feel guilty. Guilt often derails people from meal plans — they indulge and then feel like they failed, and so they stop. Don’t fall into this trap. You’re not going to be 100% compliant to any plan — shoot for 90% and be happy if you come close to that. Know that you’ll cheat sometimes, and make this part of your plan. However, learn to control the cheating: only do it a couple times a week, perhaps, and even then don’t just pig out. Eat reasonable portions of things you’d consider cheating, eat them slowly and enjoy them, and then move on. Get back to your plan. Over the long term, a little cheating won’t stall you, but a lot might.

A few warnings

1. Watch out for sneaky calories. Liquid calories are a good example — sodas, teas, coffees, sports drinks, vitamin waters and more, all contain calories that many people don’t account for, and then wonder why they’re not losing weight. Other examples include salad dressings, sauces, little bites of foods that “don’t count”, smoothies, candies or chips you snack on from the break room, meals that are bigger than you realize. There are many others, of course.

2. Do not make it extreme. This should be clear from the above method, but I have to say it explicitly. People will try any diet if they think it’ll work — the Grapefruit Diet, the Cookie Diet, a liquid diet, a “cleanse” or “detox”, an 800-calorie a day diet, the Cabbage Soup diet, the Lemonade detox. Please don’t do these diets — they’re not healthy and you won’t get good nutrition. Remember: you’re in this for the long term.

3. Don’t starve yourself. A little hunger is OK — I’ve learned that it won’t kill me to go slightly hungry for a couple hours. But if you feel like you’re starving, you might be reducing too drastically. Again, it’s best to reduce portions a little at a time, get used to that amount, and then reduce a little more.

My 1800-cal meal plan

For most of the last few months, I created (with the help of my sister and running partner, Kat) a 2,000-calorie meal plan and have been sticking to it, varying it a bit when I get tired of the foods. Recently as I’ve lost a lot of weight I’ve cut the plan down to 1,800 calories, as my lighter body requires fewer calories for maintenance.

Calorie goal: You shouldn’t follow my calorie goal — use an online calculator to calculate your basal metabolic rate (or BMR — the amount of calories you need just to maintain each day), and then subtract perhaps 200-300 for your meal plan’s target. If you exercise, you’ll be adding to the calorie deficit, which is good, but even if you don’t exercise on some days, you’ll still have a 200-300 calorie deficit. My calorie goal is actually closer to a 500-calorie reduction of my BMR, but it’s usually best to start smaller and adjust as you get used to it and as you see results, after maybe 3-4 weeks. Please, don’t drop below 1,200 calories (women) or 1,500 calories (men) — it’s hard to get good nutrition if you go too low on calories. Remember, this is long-term, not a quickie fix.

Basics: For the most part, the meal plan is:

• measured for my calorie goal
• broken into 5 meals (although this can be varied to any number that suits you)
• made of whole, real foods I love
• pretty much the same every day — I don’t mind routine, though you might want some variety
• flexible — I can eat out if I want without guilt

My plan: Here’s my current plan — please note that it changes as needed:

• Breakfast: loaded oatmeal – whole rolled oats, blueberries, raisins, cinnamon, raw almonds, flaxseed + cup of coffee (450)
• Lunch: Typically scrambled tofu or lentil-spinach-squash curry or veggie chili, on top of quinoa (400)
• Snack: soy yogurt, berries, raw almonds (350)
• Dinner: Typically scrambled tofu or lentil-spinach-squash curry or veggie chili, on top of quinoa (400)
• Snack (whenever I get hungry): fruits & nuts (200)

You could use this if you like the foods, but be sure to measure all your foods at first to get the calories you want for each meal. For example, if you want a 1600-cal meal plan, you could cut 100 cals from two of the meals or skip the last snack. However, if these aren’t foods you love, don’t follow this plan — make your own or find one you like. This is provided for illustration only.
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He that can take rest is greater than he that can take cities. – Benjamin Franklin

Editor’s note: This is a guest post from Joshua Becker of Becoming Minimalist.

Ask any physician and they will tell you that rest is essential for physical health. When the body is deprived of sleep, it is unable to rebuild and recharge itself adequately. Your body requires rest.

Ask any athlete and they will tell you that rest is essential for healthy physical training. Rest is needed for physical muscles to repair themselves and prevent injury. This is true whether you run marathons, pitch baseballs, or climb rocks. Your muscles require rest.

Ask many of yesterday’s philosophers and they will tell you that rest is essential for the mind. Leonardo da Vinci said, “Every now and then go away, have a little relaxation, for when you come back to your work your judgment will be surer.” And Ovid, the Roman poet, said, “Take rest; a field that has rested gives a bountiful crop.” Your mind requires rest.

Ask most religious leaders and they will tell you that rest is essential for the soul. Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Baha’i, and Wiccan (among others) teach the importance of setting aside a period of time for rest. Your soul requires rest.

Ask many corporate leaders and they will tell you that rest is essential for productivity. Forbes magazine recently wrote, “You can only work so hard and do so much in a day. Everybody needs to rest and recharge.” Your productivity requires rest.

Physicians, athletes, philosophers, poets, religious leaders, and corporate leaders all tell us the same thing: take time to rest. It is absolutely essential for a balanced, healthy life.

Yet, when you ask most people in today’s frenzied culture if they consistetly set aside time for rest, they will tell you that they are just too busy to rest. Even fewer would say that they set aside any concentrated time (12-24 hours) for rest. There are just too many things to get done, too many demands, too many responsibilities, too many bills, and too much urgency. Nobody can afford to waste time resting in today’s results-oriented culture.

Unfortunately, this hectic pace is causing damage to our quality of life. We are destroying every sense of our being (body, mind, and soul). There is a reason we run faster and work harder, but only fall farther behind. Our lives have become too full and too out of balance. Somewhere along the way, we lost the essential practice of concentrated rest. We would be wise to reclaim the ancient, lost practice of resting one day each week.

To get back into balance, just consider the countless benefits of concentrated rest for your body, mind, and soul:

§  Healthier body – We each get one life and one body to live it in. Therefore, we eat healthy, we exercise, and we watch our bad habits. But then we allow our schedules to fill up from morning to evening. Rest is as essential to our physical health as the water we drink and the air we breathe.

§  Less stress – Stress is basically the perception that the situations we are facing are greater than the resources we have to deal with them – resources such as time, energy, ability, and help from others. We have two choices, either reduce the demands or increase our resources. Concentrated rest confronts stress in both ways. First, it reduces the demands of the situation. We have no demands on us as long as we have the ability to mentally let go of unfinished tasks. Secondly, rest reduces stress by increasing our resources, particularly energy.

§  Deeper relationships – A day set aside each week for rest allows relationships with people to deepen and be strengthened. When we aren’t rushing off to work or soccer practice, we are able to enjoy each other’s company and a healthy conversation. And long talks prove to be far more effective in building community than short ones on the ride to the mall.

§  Opportunity for reflection – Sometimes it is hard to see the forest through the trees. It is even more difficult to see the forest when we are running through the trees. Concentrated rest allows us to take a step back, to evaluate our lives, to identify our values, and determine if our life is being lived for them.

§  Balance – Taking one day of your week and dedicating it to rest will force you to have an identity outside of your occupation. It will foster relationships outside of your fellow employees. It will foster activities and hobbies outside our work. It will give you life and identity outside of your Monday-Friday occupation. Rather than defining your life by what you do, you can begin to define it by who you are.

§  Increased production – Just like resting physical muscles allows them opportunity to rejuvenate which leads to greater physical success, providing our minds with rest provides it opportunity to refocus and rejuvenate. More work is not better work. Smarter work is better work.

§  Reserve for life’s emergencies – Crisis hits everyone. Nobody who is alive is immune from the trials of life. By starting the discipline today of concentrated rest, you will build up reserves for when the unexpected emergencies of life strike… and rest is no longer an option.

Properly developing a discipline of concentrated rest requires both inward and outward changes. Consider these steps to reclaiming the lost practice of weekly rest in your life:

1. Find contentment in your current life. – Much of the reason we are unable to find adequate rest is because we are under the constant impression that our lives can and should be better than they are today. This constant drive to improve our standing in life through the acquisition of money, power, or skills robs us of contentment and joy. Ultimately, rest is an extension of our contentment and security. Without them, simplicity and rest is difficult, if not impossible. Stop focusing on what you don’t have and start enjoying the things that you do.

2. Plan your rest. Rest will come only from intentional planning and planning rest will come only if it is truly desired. Schedule it on your calendar. Learn to say no to any tasks that attempt to take precedent. Plan out your day of rest by choosing creative activities that are refreshing and encourage relationships. Understand that true rest is different than just not working. As the Cat in the Hat wisely said, “It is fun to have fun but you have to know how.” Avoid housework. Plan meals in advance to help alleviate cooking responsibilities. And by all means, turn off your television, e-mail, and blackberry.

3. Take responsibility for your life. You are not a victim of your time demands. You are the creator and acceptor of them. Refuse to complain or make excuses and start changing your habits. Remember, you are only as busy as you choose to be. Leave “if only” excuses to the kids. If needed, alert your employer about your desire for rest and tell them you will be unavailable on that particular day.

4. Embrace simplicity. Embrace a lifestyle that focuses on your values, not your possessions. It is difficult to find rest when the housework is never finished, the yard needs to be mowed, or the garage needs to be organized.

5. Include your family. It is much easier to practice the discipline of concentrated rest if your family is practicing it too. The fact that this gets more difficult as your kids get older should motivate you to start as soon as possible.

6. Live within your income. A debtor is a slave to his creditor. It is difficult to find rest for your mind when you are deep in debt. The constant distress of your responsibility to another may preclude you from truly enjoying a day off. It is possible; it’s just more difficult. Don’t overspend your income, live within it.

7. Realize the shallow nature of a results-oriented culture. If you live in a results-oriented culture where productivity alone is championed on every corner, rest is counter-cultural. And thus, the saying goes, “If you rest, you rust.” Rest may even be seen as a sign of weakness by others. Unfortunately, that view of humanity’s role in this world is shallow. It is true that many of the benefits from concentrated rest are not tangible; but then again, only a fool believes that all good things can be counted.

Rabbi Elijah of Vilna once said, “What we create becomes meaningful to us only once we stop creating it and start to think about why we did so.” The implication is clear. We could live lives that produce countless widgets, but we won’t start living until we stop producing and start enjoying. Capture again the lost practice of resting one day each week and start truly living.

Read more from Joshua at his blog, Becoming Minimalist, subscribe to his feed, or check out his new ebook, Simplify.

I frequently tweet about my runs – including a gorgeous 8.5-mile run I did along the ocean this morning that just blew me away – and every time I do, I get asked running questions.

Today I thought I’d answer those questions, for a few reasons:

1. I love talking about running – and it’s your fault you got me started.
2. The more I can encourage others to enjoy this glorious pasttime, the better.
3. I’d love it if my passion for running could inspire others in some small way.

I should note that I am not an expert. I’m not even an advanced runner — aside from running track and cross country in high school, I’ve only been running steadily for the last 4 years. In that time I’ve done three marathons, a few half marathons, a couple of 20K races, a bunch of 10Ks and 5Ks and other road races, and have rarely missed a week.

Recently, even though I haven’t been training for races, I’ve run my best-ever 10K (44:30) and 5K (19:55), blowing away previous PRs done more than a year earlier. I’ve decided to run my first half-marathon in a year and a half – take a look at my training plan.

So take any advice I give with that in mind. And let’s dive into the questions!

Q: How do I get started running?

A: Slowly. Most beginner’s make the mistake of trying to go too long or too hard — being too ambitious. I did that, so I know. You think you can do more, so you do.

However, this is a mistake. You end up getting too sore (some soreness is normal at the beginning of any new activity) or worse, injured. Please, take it easy at first, I beg you.

If you’re out of shape, and especially if you’re pretty overweight (20-plus pounds or more), start by walking 20-30 minutes, a few times a week. After a few weeks of this, start doing some faster walking intervals — quick walking for a minute or two, alternated with slower walking.

If you feel you’re ready for running now, or if you’ve done the above walking routine for at least a month and are ready to incorporate running, I suggest run-walking. That’s warming up with walking for 5-10 minutes, then jogging for a minute or so, alternating with walking rest periods.

If you think you can run without the walking, do it for short periods at first — 10 minutes, then 12, then 15, and so on. Add some time every 2-3 runs, but don’t be too quick to add the distance. And don’t add faster paced running in yet.

The key principle is this: your body will adapt if you give it time. Start slowly, let your body adapt to that, then gradually gradually add time. Later, when you’re used to running (after a couple of months), you can add intensity.

You’ll be tempted to ignore this advice and be more ambitious. But listen to me, and you’ll have a much better experience with running.

Q: What’s the best way to motivate myself to run regularly?

A: Three things that work brilliantly for me:

1. Get a running partner. I can’t tell you how great this is. My partner is my sister Kat, who is a wonderful person to have a conversation with – I really look forward to our runs together. She’s pretty reliable too, and I make sure to wake myself up and head out the door on time to meet her so that I don’t stand her up in the dark. Find someone to meet up with, and you will rarely miss a run.

2. Make a rule: just lace up your shoes and get out the door. That’s all you have to do. The secret is – and don’t tell anyone I told you this – you’ll run once you get out the door. You don’t have to run long, but as long as you run a little, you’ll continue to build up the habit.

3. Focus on the enjoyment of it. Don’t focus on how hard it is, or you’ll never keep doing it. Think about the beauty in the surroundings as you run. Enjoy the quiet and solitude, or the conversation if you have a running partner. Use it for contemplation, for stress relief, for release.

Q: But I hate running! Why should I run?

A: If you really hate it, don’t do it. I’m not saying running is the best thing in the world, and that everyone should do it. No – instead, find an activity you really enjoy, like cycling or swimming or yoga or hiking or tennis or whatever.

Or, if you like, try starting out slowly, as I described above, and get a partner who you enjoy spending some time with. Running is very enjoyable if you don’t overdo it at first, and if you can have a great conversation while doing it.

Q: I’ve been running regularly, but how do I build up my long runs? I can’t run for more than a few miles (or maybe 5 miles).

A: If you’ve been running regularly, you might set your sights on a longer race, like a 10K or a half marathon or something like that. If so, the best way to do that is one long run a week.

Take note of that – don’t make all of your runs longer. If you’ve been running 3 miles a day (for example) 3-4 times a week, don’t suddenly make all your runs 4 miles. Just pick one day a week to go longer.

Gradually increase that long run by half a mile to a mile each week. But it’s not good to keep increasing without rest — so if you increase for 2-3 weeks straight, cut back on your long run one week before progressing the next. So, if your long run progresses each week like so: 3.5 miles, 4 miles, then 4.5 miles, take a cut-back week where you just do 3.5 miles on the fourth week. Then go back to 4.5 miles, then 5 miles, and so on. Cut back on every 4th week or so, or you will risk injury.

Another thing to note is if you’re increasing the duration of a run, cut back on the intensity. So do your long runs a little slower at first — later, when long runs aren’t a problem for you, you can do faster-paced ones, but that’s more of an intermediate/advanced tactic.

Q: I did a long run of 10-plus miles and chafed badly. Tips?

A: Yeah, that’s something every runner has to experience once. As you go past the 10-mile (or so) mark, you’ll feel things you’ve never felt on shorter runs: you’ll chafe in the crotch and nipples, which are not places most people like to have pain (with some possible exceptions among you).

It’s best to avoid this pain by using some kind of lubricant – Vaseline works well, or BodyGlide if you can find it, or in a pinch, if you’re a parent of a baby like I was when I was training for a marathon, diaper rash cream.

Apply the lubricant to the areas in your crotch that your running shorts touch. I use Band-Aids for my nipples. Or if you’re a male, run without a shirt for those longer runs. Females will want to also put lubricant around the edges of their sports bra.

Q: Any advice on running clothes and shoes?

A: Runners don’t have to buy a lot of equipment, but investing in good clothes and shoes is important.

Actual running clothes really help. If you’ve tried running in cotton, it’s uncomfortable – it can chafe, it’s heavy once you start sweating, and just doesn’t feel great after rubbing against your skin over and over. Running fabric is light, doesn’t chafe until you go over 10 miles, and magically wicks sweat away from your skin. This includes real running socks.

I’m not qualified to give advice on running shoes – go to an actual running shoe store if you can and get the advice of professionals, who can watch you run and tell you if you’re an over-pronator or a supinator or neutral or whatever. Failing that, do some reading online to figure out what kind of shoe you need. It’s important – wear the wrong kind of shoe for too long (months) and you can get an injury.

After that, it’s trial an error to find the brand that works best for you. I personally love Asics.

Q: What about pre- and post-run nutrition? What should I be eating and drinking before and after a run?

A: This is something runners worry too much about. Honestly, unless you’re doing a marathon, pre- and post-run nutrition isn’t that important.

I usually don’t eat anything before I run, even on runs of 8-10 miles. Even when I do sprints or hills. Sometimes I’ll have a banana or a handful of raisins.

For a run of 15-plus miles, you’ll want to get some carbs before and during and after the run, either in the form of a sports drink or gels, or some kind of easily-digested food like bananas or gummy bears.

After a run, I don’t worry about getting anything. It’s not that important unless, again, you did a really long run. After a half marathon race (or longer), it’s good to get some carbs and protein. Chocolate milk is perfect for this.

If I’m really hungry after a run, I’ll eat. My favorite breakfast is oatmeal with nuts and berries and flaxseed.

As for hydration, it’s important, especially for longer runs. I always, always have a glass of water when I wake up, before I run. I usually don’t need to hydrate during a run unless it’s 10 miles or longer. Hydrate immediately after a run. You normally only need water.

Q: I heard steady-state cardio isn’t that healthy for you. Does it erode your muscles or something?

A: It’s healthy. Most people into fitness who bag on “cardio” or endurance running just had bad experiences with it. They would rather do weight training or shorter, intense workouts, and that’s fine.

But they usually say running is not that healthy because they see fat people on treadmills who never get any fitter. That might or might not be true — are they sure it’s the same fat people, month after month? – but even if it is, it’s probably because of diet. Those people are on the treadmill but are eating junk food.

Studies have shown that running improves health, time and time again. Sure, evidence shows that while you’re running a marathon, you’re at higher risk of things like heart attacks, but … duh. You’re putting yourself under a lot of stress, and you should be sure you’re pretty healthy before attempting a marathon. Also, after a marathon, you’re at higher risk of a cold, because of a weakened immune system. But regular running actually improves your immunity, as long as you’re not taxing your system as much as a marathon.

Some people worry about losing muscle because of running – mostly because they look at marathon runners like the Kenyans and think that means running will make you skinny. This isn’t something to worry about unless you run as much as the Kenyans do – 100-plus miles a week. For the casual runner, your body won’t make adaptations this extreme.

To save muscle, be sure to do resistance training with weights. I do weights three times a week, but I think twice a week would be sufficient. I recommend basic compound lifts, going heavy once you’ve gotten used to them: squats, deadlifts, bench press, overhead press, lunges, pullups, dips.

Strength training helps running, in my experience. Since getting stronger, I’ve been running better than ever, despite minimal running training.

Q: How can I stop from getting shin splints? Or other injuries?

A: I’ve been lucky to have been running injury-free for most of the last four years, with a couple of exceptions (a twisted ankle once, pain in my heel during my first marathon training, back injuries a couple times from weight training).

Shin splints usually happen to beginners, and it’s usually just your body not adjusting quickly enough to the demands you’re placing on it by running so much. The answer is almost always rest. Rest a few days, or a week, and start again slowly. If you still have pain, rest a little longer. Don’t overdo it when you return.

Most other running injuries are a result of overuse, in my experience. Meaning, you’re running too much, or you’ve added too much running too quickly. Our bodies need time to adapt, and even if we give it adequate time, every person’s body has its limits.

The answer for most injuries is just rest, and when you return, to cut back on volume of training.

Some injuries are the result of using the wrong kind of shoes, in which case it’s probably smart to get a professional to look at you – either to get the injury treated or to get the right kind of shoe. I’m no doctor, though, so don’t take my word on injuries.

Q: Should I only do steady-state runs? Or should I mix it up somehow?

A: If you’re just starting out, just start with regular running – don’t add intervals or other challenges in yet. Your goal is to let your body adapt to the basic activity of running, and you should do that gradually.

But after you’re past that stage, you’ll definitely want to mix it up. There are too many ways to mix things up than I can mention, but to name a few: long runs, sprint intervals, longer intervals, hill runs, hill repeats, tempo runs, tempo intervals, faster-paced long runs, fartleks, and more. I’ve done all of these and love them all.

I recommend you add these different types of runs into your training one at a time, and that you go easy at first. Adding intensity needs to be done with caution – if you do intervals, for example, don’t do them all out at first. Just do them at a lower intensity, and after a few weeks, increase intensity a bit, until your body is used to them.

What kinds of runs you add into your training depends on your goals. Longer runs build endurance for longer races. Hills help you build strength. The other runs add intensity for various goals – increased VO2 max, the ability to run faster for longer, and so on. I’m not going to outline a pace or plan – that’s what online running sites are for. :)

Q: Any recommendations for reading about running?

A: There’s so many good ones out there that I can’t be comprehensive. But I’ll name a few to get you started.

Any books by Hal Higdon or Jeff Galloway are good for beginners. Once you’re into the intermediate phase, I recommend The Competitive Runner’s Handbook by Bob Glover and Shelly-lynn Florence Glover. For intermediate to advanced marathoners, you can’t do better than Advanced Marathoning by Pfitzinger/Douglas, though be warned this is not an easy plan.

My favorite running philosopher is George Sheehan, and you must read Running To Win, no matter what your level.

Runner’s World magazine, website and forums are great, though the tips can get repetitive once you’ve read them for awhile. I also like coolrunning, completerunning and a bunch of other blogs (like Mark’s).

Q: What about a good diet for runners?

A: I don’t buy that runners need a special diet or need to eat anything other than what’s healthy for most people: real, whole foods. Some people think runners need a huge amount of refined carbs, like pasta, but this is a myth based on the idea of carbo-loading for marathons or other longer endurance events. If you’re not doing a marathon, you don’t need to carbo load, and you don’t need sports drinks either.

If you’re running, you can eat a little more calories than most people, but it’s not an excuse to pig out. And if you’re trying to lose weight by running, you might actually eat more if you get really hungry from your runs. I would resist the urge to eat more if you’re trying to lose weight. Eat moderately, and don’t think you can pound down those donuts just because you did a 3-mile run. You’ll gain weight this way.

A better plan is to eat a nutritious diet of real foods: whole grains if you’re going to eat grains (whole oats, sprouted grains are my favs), lots of fruits and veggies, nuts and seeds, beans, and if you’re not vegetarian or vegan, lean meats and dairy. My diet has limited grains (basically just oats), seeds like quinoa, beans and nuts, lots of fruits and veggies, and some soy (tofu, soymilk) but not too much.

On a diet like this, you’ll be healthy, and adding in an activity like running will only make you healthier. Like I said, I’ve been running better than ever on this diet, losing weight, and feeling great.

Q: Does continuous jogging help in reducing weight?

A: Yes, it can help. It’s not a silver bullet, though — jogging won’t cause you to lose your gut overnight.

Losing weight is simply burning more calories than you eat, over a good period of time. Not a week or two, but more likely a few months or a year or more. As running burns a good amount of calories, it’ll help you get into a caloric deficit, especially as you increase your endurance and can run for a longer time.

There’s a school of thought, especially in weightlifting circles, that sprinting intervals is better for burning fat. And if your workout time is very limited, this is true — if you can only work out for 20 minutes, you’ll burn more calories sprinting or doing some other intense exercise rather than just steady-state running (or jogging). There are a couple of problems with that thinking, though:

1) sprinting is very intense, so if you’re not in good shape it’s not smart to just start sprinting;
2) the intensity of sprinting means you need more time to recover — so you shouldn’t do it too often, and if you try to do it every day (or even every other day) you’re risking burnout or injury;
3) sprinting can’t be done for very long — it’s usually limited to about 20 minutes or so (otherwise you’re probably not really sprinting), so the amount of calories you burn are limited — while you can run at medium intensity for much longer, meaning you can burn many, many more calories running instead of sprinting, and thus burn more fat.

That said, I think sprint intervals are a great compliment to any running or fitness program, as long as you don’t overdo it.

Back to the original question about weight loss: the biggest component of weight loss is really diet. You can burn 600 calories in an hour of running, but you can easily eat 2-3 times that much (or more) at a restaurant in one sitting. So if you don’t control your diet, almost no amount of running will help you lose weight.

Have more running questions for me? Ask me on Twitter, and I’ll try to add some of my answers to this post.

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At the moment, I’m in the last phase of my Bellyfat Challenge — I’ve lost a good amount of fat but I have about 10 pounds to go (or so).

I’m enjoying getting lean, but those last few pounds are always the toughest.

And so, I’ve called in some experts.

Last week, I shared my favorite fitness bloggers and, in turn, the fitness blogs they read. This week I’ve called on them for tips on getting lean.

Now, let’s look at the question I’ve posed to them:

• I asked for their top tips for getting lean. Not every tip, just the best.
• Assume the person isn’t obese but has a bit of a spare tire
• Assume the person already exercises regularly and tries to eat “healthy” most of the time.

So, if you have a lot of fat to lose, this guide won’t be for you. I’d suggest some other posts:

• 4 Simple Steps to Start the Exercise Habit
• How to Make Exercise a Daily Habit
• Five Simple Exercise Programs for Beginners
• The Building Blocks of a Super Healthy Diet (with a sample meal plan)
• A 12-Step Program to Eating Healthier Than Ever Before

If you’re looking to get rid of that last bit of stubborn fat, here are some great tips.


1. Mark’s Daily Apple. Mark Sisson is one of the leading advocates of a return to the diet and activity style of our primal ancestors, and the author of The Primal Blueprint. Here are his tips:

• Cut out grains. This may sound crazy at first, but try going without them for a month – at the very least. For one thing, grains come preloaded with anti-nutrients, chemical defenses like gluten and lectins that are designed to dissuade animals from eating them by causing digestive issues and “leaky gut” syndrome. Grains are seeds, and if a plant’s seed is eaten and digested, it doesn’t get to propagate any new plants. Because reproduction is the ultimate goal of life, plants will do anything to ensure their seeds survive. They’re also packed full of carbs, which should also be minimized in a cutting, leaning-out phase. (Note: There is no requirement in human nutrition for carbs.) Consuming carbs stimulates insulin secretion, and insulin promotes fat storage. Too much insulin (read: from eating too many carbs at once) will reduce the sensitivity of your insulin receptors. Your pancreas, in turn, thinks you need even more insulin, and releases even more of it, and the cycle continues. To avoid this and really lean out, and if you really need the extra fuel, limit your carb intake to the immediately post-workout period, when your muscles are starving for glycogen and the glucose from the carbs will go straight to your muscles, instead of to your midsection. And when you do eat carbs, avoid grains and sugars; opt for starchy vegetables, like squash or sweet potatoes, instead.
• Make your short, fast, intense workouts even shorter, faster, and more intense, and your long, slow workouts even longer and slower. A common impediment to real leanness is overtraining. We’re inundated with the idea that “more is better” when it comes to working out, but the reality couldn’t be more different. Excessive exercise gives your body the “danger” message; throughout the course of our evolutionary history, high levels of activity – running, lifting, throwing, climbing – generally meant something was chasing us or we were chasing something else. When you spend an hour jogging on the treadmill or cranking that elliptical machine, your body goes into that flight or fight mode automatically. When you weight train seven days a week, your body thinks you are in mortal danger. Why else would you be subjecting your body to that kind of stress on a regular basis, if not for survival’s sake? Cortisol is the stress hormone, and too much cortisol leads to insulin resistance, weight gain, and muscle waste. Overtraining is the classic way to secrete excess cortisol. That said, intensity is important, but only in small doses. Instead of spending two hours in the weight room, keep it to a maximum of forty-five minutes, but make it a good hard all-out effort. Even twenty-five minutes will work. Push yourself harder and faster and shorter, and you’ll get better results in less time. By the same token, instead of running at 85% of your maximum heart rate for an hour and burning primarily glucose and glycogen, go for a three-hour hike, or even just a walk around the neighborhood. By keeping your heart rate at no more than 75% of your maximum, your body becomes a fat burner. If leanness is your ultimate goal, there’s nothing more effective than limiting the secretion of cortisol and maximizing the use of fat for fuel. Then pick one day a week where you do a series of short, all-out sprints, with the heart rate at max for 15-40 seconds. Short, intense workouts improve insulin sensitivity and minimize cortisol, while long, slow workouts optimize the use body fat for energy.
• Intermittent fasting. My last tip is my personal favorite, and it might just go against everything you’ve ever heard about proper fitness and nutrition: fast once or twice a week, preferably before your workouts. Intermittent fasting – going 18-30 hours between meals every once in awhile – can actually stimulate fat burning while maintaining muscle mass and conserving strength. It’s an old holdover from the early hunter-gatherer days, when the hunt wasn’t always successful, but we still had to develop a way to extract enough energy till the next meal. Our bodies always turn to body fat for energy first; in fact, that’s why we store body fat in the first place – to save for energy for later, leaner times. For the person who’s almost lean, but not quite there yet, throwing in a fast once or twice a week can really be the difference maker. I’d even try ending each fast with an intense weight training session and waiting an hour after to eat to really get the full benefit.

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2. Fitness Black Book. Rusty Moore is an authority on creating a lean, slim, athletic look. Rusty, btw, has a new ebook out that I’m reading now called Visual Impact: Mastering the Skill of Gaining Muscle Without Bodyfat. Here are Rusty’s tips for getting lean:

• Focus on Creating a Weekly Calorie Deficit, Not Daily. I love the holidays, parties, picnics, social gatherings, wedding receptions, etc. The thing in common with all of these major life events is that they have good food (usually a ton of good food). You can still enjoy these events and eat all of that good food and lose weight. The way to do this is have days in the week where you go quite a bit below maintenance. By the end of the week you can still create a calorie deficit, even if you enjoyed plates of great food. Life is too short to miss out on pies, cakes, and homemade food made by loved ones.
• When Eating Alone, Go Strict and Low Calorie. My rule of thumb is to eat lower calorie meals when I am eating alone. When I am not around friends and family, I treat eating as purely functional and eat pretty bland. This gives me much more wiggle room when I do meet up with friends or family. It works really, really well in keeping the calories down while still enjoying good food and couple of beers in a social situation.
• Go Into Your Workouts in a Fasted State. Your body is in either a “fed” or “fasted” state. When your body is in a fed state it primarily uses carb-energy for fuel. It is the body’s preferred method of energy. When your body is in a fasted state it releases HGH. This hormone helps release body fat from stored fat cells into the bloodstream so you can use that for energy instead of stored “food energy”. Intense exercise also raises HGH levels. When you combine exercise with this fasted state, you create a great synergistic condition for fat loss. It works extremely well. Obviously you can’t overdue this and fast for way too long or exercise too hard, but done strategically this works wonders.
• Avoid Insulin Spikes. When insulin levels are high, HGH levels are low. Insulin is a “storage” hormone. It helps store the nutrients from the foods you eat. A high level of insulin means a high level of storage (not what you are after if weight loss is your goal). You can avoid insulin spikes by eating foods with a low GI rating. Another method is to never eat carbs by themselves. If you eat a bit of fat and protein with your carbs there is less of a chance of a large spike in insulin. That is why I would recommend a bit of cream cheese or butter on a bagel than eating a bagel alone. I make it a point to never eat carbs without some fat or protein.
• The Amount of Meals Per Day Doesn’t Matter. I think people should stick to what feels natural as far as how often they eat. Some people do better with 6 small meals and some do better with 2-3 meals. It really is the total calories that matter as far as weight loss goes. The idea that you metabolism will drop if you skip meals is slightly “old school”…research has proven that idea to be out dated. I am not saying that 6 meals per day is bad either, but it certainly isn’t necessary. If you do eat 3 times per day they have to be much smaller portions than the person who likes to eat 3 times per day. I have always been able to reach my lowest body fat percentage on 3 meals or less per day. It kills me to eat tiny portions!

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3. Zen to Fitness. Chris shares all around good advice for getting fit and finding balance in life. Here are his tips:

• Stick to wholefoods 80% of the time. Nothing from a packet (lean meat, fruit, vegetables nuts and seeds. If your a vegetarian eat more protein packed legumes in place of the meat. Cutting out grains and dairy is also big for fat loss)
• Go to bed slightly hungry (works a treat for leaning out).
• Increase the intensity of your workout and aim to break a sweat (Checkout Crossfit.com for inspiration and Turbulence Training programs).
• Relax more to bring down stress hormones and burn fat (Meditation, Visualisation, Deep Breathing).
• Make sure you’re getting 7-9 hours of deep sleep each night.
• Have a few cups of High Quality Green Tea a day.

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4. Fit and Busy Dad. Chris Lopez lives in Toronto and shares some great tips, workouts, and strategies for dads (actually all parents and anyone who is busy) who want to get and stay in shape. Here are Chris’ top tips:

• Come to the acceptance that getting lean is incredibly simple to do, but very difficult. Once you reconcile your feelings towards getting lean and accept that you have to work your tail off, then you’ve overcome a huge barrier and will be ready to start.
• You must plan everything: from your time, to your workouts, to your meals … everything must be meticulously planned.
• Follow the rule of 165: it doesn’t matter as much what you do in the 3 hours you train per week as long as you’re working hard. What matters is what you do in the other 165 hours remaining. That said, here are the things that you should be focusing on are…
  1. sleep 8-9 hours per night.
  2. eat whole natural foods (known as Real Food) preferably mainly from plants.
  3. train with intensity as opposed to training solely for duration (more does not necessarily mean better).
  4. balance your high intensity exercise with complimentary practices such as yoga, tai chi, qi gong or mediation to manage stress.
  5. keep a journal of what you’ve done and try to break records each and every time.

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5. Fitness Spotlight. Excellent fitness and health articles throughout the week, jointly written by two bloggers — Mike O’Donnell and Scott Kustes. Since I like both bloggers, I’m featuring both of their tips here.

Scott Kustes:

• Ditch the alcohol. While I have nothing against a few drinks now and then, I find that after a drink or two, my food choices go downhill somewhat (in direct proportion to how much I drink). I’m more lenient about the kinds of food I’ll eat after drinking, even if just having one or two. Further, alcohol is just empty calories and isn’t doing you any favors in losing those last 10 pounds.

Mike O’Donnell:

• Know that stubborn fat is stubborn for a reason. It usually it does not get enough of a hormonal signal (catecholamines) at the fat cells to start lipolysis (the release of stored fat to be burned up in the muscles). This is key, as you can’t burn stored fat if it never comes out of the cell in the first place
• Having a calorie deficit state is needed of course in the overall equation to burn more fat than store over time. Although you don’t want to starve yourself in the process (and that will not lead to better fat loss in the longterm). Aim for a reasonable deficit such as around 12x/ideal bodyweight (this is just a rough number of course and you can adjust as needed).
• Keeping and building muscle is a strong boost to your resting energy expenditure (up to 48 hours after training). Use resistance training with compound exercises, full body workouts and reps around 5-10. Any isolation work should be done last in a workout. Also using supersets of antagonist (opposite) muscles with short rest between sets (30-60 sec) will result in a greater post workout hormonal response and less time working out.
• Keeping insulin stable is important all day long, so avoiding all sugar and anything that breaks down quickly into glucose in the body is the goal. High blood sugar will slow down/stop any reason the body needs to keep releasing fat to be burned.
• The use of intervals is a good way to help boost adrenaline/noradrenaline (catecholamines) to help release fats to be burned. This should be done after using resistance training or an off day, but not every day. Going too hard too often will result in the body becoming overstressed and not recovering (which will lead to more muscle loss and more stubborn fat gain). After a short interval session (like 10 min) adding more slower intensity exercise such as walking will help burn the fat now released into the blood stream (and not overstress your body’s ability to recover).
• Take fish oil as it will keep inflammation down, and result in more weight loss and quicker recovery. Also don’t discount the need for a good night’s sleep as the most powerful spike of Growth Hormone (catecholamine) comes in the first hours of restful sleep. Having less sleep or a stressed out lifestyle will only result in more muscle loss and stubborn fat gain.
• Try adding caffeine (cup o’ Joe) 30min prior to a workout while in a fasted state (first thing in the AM, 2-3 hours after your last meal) to boost more intensity during the workout and adrenaline/noradrenaline release.

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If you liked this guide, please bookmark it on Delicious or share on Twitter. Thanks, my friends.

I don’t know about you, but sometimes I need some inspiration along my journey.

Pretty much every day, if I can get it, in fact.

I usually turn to blogs for that inspiration, for whatever I’m doing. When my wife and I need inspiration for unschooling, we look to blogs. Same thing for blogging, writing a novel, simplifying my life, quitting smoking, anything.

Lately my journey has been focused on fitness, and of course I’ve turned to some of the best blogs out there to give me my daily dose of motivation.

Today I’m presenting some of the best of those fitness bloggers — the ones I truly treasure. I’ve asked each of them to list their favorite fitness blogs (up to 5 of them) so that we could benefit from what they read. Of course, everyone’s list is subjective, and there are lots of other great ones out there (share yours with me on Twitter). And of course, there’s some overlap among their favorites.

I need to give a nod to my sister, Kat, for introducing me to many of these blogs. She’s a personal trainer and nutritionalist, my running partner, one of my best friends, and definitely one of my fitness inspirations. Keep rocking, Kat!

Next week, I’ll feature these same six bloggers but ask them a different question: best tips for getting lean.

1. Mark’s Daily Apple. Mark Sisson shares his unique philosophy of “primal living in the modern world”, and while he wasn’t the first to advocate a return to the diet and activity style of our primal ancestors, he’s become one of its leading proponents and spreaders of the idea. In fact, he wrote the book: The Primal Blueprint. He’s a must read, even if I ocassionally disagree with him (on vegetarianism and endurance running, both of which I do for reasons other than health). Here are Marks’ favorite fitness blogs:

1. Theory to Practice.
2. CrossFit.
3. Fitness Spotlight.
4. Conditioning Research.

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2. Fitness Black Book. Rusty Moore advocates the “Hollywood” type of fit body, rather than the “bodybuilder” type. Meaning: slim, athletic, sexy. Nothing wrong with that, in my book. And Rusty delivers, with great posts on different types of workouts and eating, breaking down conventional wisdom, and showing us how to stay fit year round. Here are some of Rusty’s favorites:

1. Fitness Spotlight. Mike O’Donnell had a site called “IF Life” a while back (about intermittent fasting). Scott Kustes had a site called “Modern Forager” about healthy eating and healthy fats. On their own, these were two of my favorite fitness blogs. When they joined forces over a year ago and formed “Fitness Spotlight”, it was a complete No-Brainer…this site rocks for great info!
2. Conditioning Research. Chris over at “Conditioning Research” is like the news source for the fitness industry. He is really dialed in. My guess is that he has a million “Google Alerts” set up and other tools for him to stay on top of what’s happening in health and fitness. His site is the first with the story A LOT of the time.
3. Adonis Lifestyle Podcasts. John Barban is a gentleman who was Head of R&D for a large supplement company. He was also a professor of Strength and Conditioning for the Florida Gators. I like to listen to his podcasts from his blog as I work online. I have a pad of paper and jot down notes for future posts and content for my blog. I consider this like a weekly lecture and always have more clarity about a subject after he talks about it. Incredible info.
4. Feel Good Eating. Marc is a guy who lives in a beautiful part of the world…Naples, Florida. He has a small little blog that is just filled with amazing low carb recipes (with awesome photos). I love his blog, because it is 100% pure. He simply does it for the enjoyment of sharing and connecting with people. I am not sure what he does, but he looks like he does very well in his chosen career and just does this blog for the love of the subject matter. I am not against blogs that make money (I make a full-time income from FBB)…I just love these little “pure” blogs.

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3. Zen to Fitness. Chris writes about a lot of common-sense fitness topics — or maybe they’re just common-sense to me because we have similar philosophies. Either way, great stuff. Here are his favorites:

1. Mark’s Daily Apple. An obvious one but great content consistently.
2. Theory To Practice. Extreme workouts, good discussion and regular input.
3. Arthur Devany. The pioneer of evolutionary health/fitness.
4. Fitness Spotlight. Overall a real winner, packed with great articles on a good level for every kind of reader.
5. Turbulence Training. Great workouts and podcasts from Craig.

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4. Fit and Busy Dad. Chris Lopez lives in Toronto and shares some great tips, workouts, and strategies for dads (actually all parents and anyone who is busy) who want to get and stay in shape. Great videos, fun to read. Here are some of Chris’ favorites:

1. Jason Ferrugia.
2. Brad Pilon.
3. T-Muscle.
4. Turbulence Training.
5. Ross Training.

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5. Fitness Spotlight. This is an excellent blog jointly written by two bloggers — Mike O’Donnell and Scott Kustes — who previously had blogs I enjoyed separately. Those two blogs — the IF Life and Modern Forager — seemed to have been abandoned when they created Fitness Spotlight, but those losses are more than made up for with the new blog. Excellent fitness and health articles throughout the week. Since I like both bloggers, I’m featuring both of their favorites here.

Mike O’Donnell: I have cut down on my blog reading, but the ones I do keep around and check up on once in a while on my reader are:

1. Mark at Mark’s Daily Apple.
2. Rusty at Fitness Black Book.
3. Stephan at Whole Health Source.
4. Ross at Ross Training.
5. Chris at Conditioning Research.

Scott Kustes:

1. Mark’s Daily Apple.
2. Robb Wolf.
3. PaNu.
4. Whole Health Source.
5. Speed-Endurance.com.

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If you liked this guide, please bookmark it on Delicious or share on Twitter. Thanks, my friends.

A couple of 5th graders named Michelle and Casen recently asked me:

What advice would you give us when we know we should exercise, but we just don’t feel up for it?

My answer to them is what I’d tell anyone, child or adult:

Don’t look at it as exercise — instead, play games and sports and have a ton of fun! The main thing is just to get outside every day and do something you think is fun. You can play sports like soccer, basketball, baseball, or badminton. You can play games like freeze tag or ride a bike or do running races with your friends or family. You can go on hikes with your family or go swimming or paddling. Do lots of different things, and again, focus on having fun, and doing it often.

Michelle and Casen’s class, which has created the excellent Kids Read and Ride program, took this advice to heart and came up with 48 Fun Ways to Exercise. This is a good list for anyone:

1. Aerobics
2. Ballet
3. Baseball
4. Basketball
5. Biking
6. Boating
7. Bowling
8. Boxing
9. Canoeing
10. Dance Revolution
11. Dancing
12. Double Dutch
13. Field Hockey
14. Football
15. Frisbee
16. Golf
17. Gymnastics
18. Hiking
19. Hockey
20. Hopscotch
21. Horseback Riding
22. Hula hooping
23. Ice Skating
24. Jogging
25. Juggling
26. Jump rope
27. Laser tag
28. Paintball
29. Ping-Pong
30. Playing catch
31. Rock Climbing
32. Roller Blading
33. Roller Skating
34. Running
35. Skateboarding
36. Skiing
37. Soccer
38. Softball
39. Swimming
40. Tae Kwon Do
41. Tennis
42. Trampoline
43. Treadmill
44. Unicycling
45. Volleyball
46. Walking
47. Weightlifting
48. Wii sports games

My recommendation is to choose one of these activities, most days of the week (4-5 days perhaps). If you go out, have fun, enjoy the activity, it won’t feel like “exercise” … but you’ll be getting fit and healthy in the meantime.

Make the workout the reward.

“There is a meditation exercise in which you place a raisin in your mouth. You do not eat the raisin. You meditate and allow it to sit in your mouth unmolested. The raisin plumps up and becomes a juicy fruitness in your mouth, tempting you to bite it. This is a powerful example of how eating is different when you are truly aware of each morsel.” - Thich Nhat Hanh

Post written by Leo Babauta. Follow me on Twitter.

When my family and I visited Tokyo earlier this year, it was a bit sad to see the rise of fast food in Japan.

It’s a beautiful country with a rich history of a traditional lifestyle, incredible food, and good health. They’ve perfected the art of food preparation, using the freshest ingredients to create small portions of beautiful dishes.

And while there still aren’t many fat Japanese people, especially compared to the U.S., I’d bet that will change with the insidious growth of fast food restaurants on many a street corner. McDonald’s is prevalent, of course, but so are many other Western food chains and an increasing number of Japanese fast food outlets.

It’s been awhile since I’ve written about the Slow Food movement, but I really believe it’s the answer to many of our problems: health and obesity, the hectic and stressful pace of modern life, and the lack of happiness in a complex and often burdensome world.

This is the Anti-Fast Food Diet — a way to not only lose weight and get healthier, but to change your life to one of simplicity, moderation, and joy.

Abandon fast food, and all the values it brings: mass consumption, mass production, the exploitation of workers, the destruction of the environment, the destruction of small local businesses, the corporatization of our culture.

Instead, embrace Slow Food. Here’s how.

1. Stop rushing to eat. Set aside more time for eating, for shopping and preparation, for enjoying life. Stop rushing to fast food places because it’s convenient — because it’s not so convenient to be hospitalized. Instead, make time, and take things a bit slower.
2. Prepare your own meals. I know, who has the time? You do. Make the time, and cook simple meals without a lot of ingredients or preparation time. It takes 10 minutes to whip together a healthy and tasty lunch or dinner. And it can be a lot of fun (get the family or your partner involved). Preparing your own meals is healthier, frugal, and you know you’re eating good food.
3. Eat real food, not processed. Buy fresh ingredients such as fruits, veggies, whole grains, nuts, beans, and the like. Use ingredients you can recognize, not things filled with chemicals. Don’t use prepared food if you can avoid it — microwaveable or boxed foods are not the best. Avoid processed food at all costs.
4. Eat slowly and mindfully. Too many people stuff food down their gullets these days. It’s not healthy, and you’ve just consumed food without enjoying it. Instead, take the time to chew your food, to taste it, to be present as you eat.
5. Enjoy the food. Fully savor each bite. Appreciate the miracle of the food you’re eating, and be grateful you have that bite at all.
6. Take time to breathe, and smile. Before you begin to eat, smile, and take a deep breath, reminding yourself to be present and enjoy the food. Between bites, instead of rushing to the next bite, breath, relax, enjoy. Savor the moment.
7. When drinking tea, just drink tea. When eating, just eat. Be fully present. Don’t read a book or surf the net or drive or work or anything else but eat and drink.
8. Good conversation. OK, the exception to the above rule: eating with friends and family. Fast food has destroyed the good meal and conversation, because we’re rushing as we eat and don’t have time for a good talk. Bring it back.
9. When you do eat at a restaurant, make it a good one. Avoid the fast food places, but also the chain restaurants (Chilis, TGI Fridays, Lone Star, Olive Garden, etc). Go to locally owned restaurants where they use real ingredients and really make good food. These may be more expensive, but you’re not supporting a corporation and your food will be better, and even if it means eating out less that’s OK — quality is more important than quantity.

“There are some people who eat an orange but don’t really eat it. They eat their sorrow, fear, anger, past, and future.” - Thich Nhat Hanh

“When you eat with awareness, you find that there is more space, more beauty. You begin to watch yourself, to see yourself, and you notice how clumsy you are or how accurate you are. … So when you make an effort to eat mindfully…, you find that life is worth much more than you had expected.” - Chogyam Trungpa

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If you’re interested in a life of minimalism, check out my new ebook: The Simple Guide to a Minimalist Life.

Or find more of my other books and ebooks.

We can’t control the future. I wish we could, but we can’t. There are simply too many variables and uncontrolled factors at play. Even the best-laid plans are no match for unforeseen circumstances.

Sure we all enjoy the security of attempting to predict, plan, and control our futures because it’s a way for us to attempt to reach our goals, but in reality this control is nothing more then an illusion.

A perfectly planned vacation can be ruined by the weather (out of your control), a flight cancellation (out of your control) or a sickness (again, out of your control).  At some point we are going to fail while attempting to control the future in order to reach our goals.

In fact, when it comes to reaching our goals we fail ALL THE TIME.  But this is perfectly all right because this is the only way we learn.

The problems arise when we fail to learn from our mistakes and overlook the big picture, and then grasp for even more control by concentrating on the little, small, and insignificant things that don’t really matter.

This desire to guarantee the future by controlling the small insignificant parts of our lives seems to be human nature, and this fact is extremely evident in the field of health and nutrition.

Think of the insignificant gimmicks that you’ve been told will help you drop
pounds:

• Eat breakfast every single day: If you don’t, your body goes into ’starvation mode’.
• Drink Coffee to speed up your metabolism
• Drink 12 glasses of cold water every day
• Eat protein for lunch
• Sip Green Tea all day
• Take your Fish Oil Pills every day.

In reality NONE of these things are going to result in significant or long lasting weight loss results.

Each one is either a misuse of scientific fact (confusing an association with causation), is an exaggeration (the ‘metabolism boosting’ effects of green tea or caffeine) or is simply repeating common myths as facts (protein for lunch).

And while the health marketers that push these info tid-bits may or may not mean well, convincing you to focus on the minor and mostly irrelevant tasks can not only prevent you from losing weight, it can also affect your health.

Successfully losing weight seems to be one of the most difficult life-problems to solve.

Yet it can be solved with one of the easiest solutions: Eating less.

Spending too much of your time concentrating on the insignificant parts in an attempt to control the future will cause you to lose sight of the big picture – In this case the big picture is that your body is perfectly capable of burning fat and losing weight without you needing to obsess and stress over learning how this happens.

The exact details are out of your control. Obsessing about them does not change them.

But if you continually try to control the things that are out of your control with the small insignificant part of your life, you end up spending almost all of your time obsessing about health, nutrition and fitness. Recording your meals in a spread sheet, twittering about how ‘healthy’ your breakfast was, spending an extra 5 dollars to have a 90 cent chicken breast added to your salad at lunch and fretting over the timing of your next meal.

Too much of this and you can end up in a very bad place:  Spending every single waking moment of your life thinking, talking and stressing over your health.

And this is NOT healthy.

It’s nothing more than a mind full of insignificant health and fitness clutter.

In essence, by thinking that we can guarantee our future by controlling insignificant day-to-day things we end up sacrificing the enjoyment of our lives for some far off distant goal.

And remember, we can’t control the future, so we end up hopelessly grasping for control with more and more of the insignificant things, the ‘fluff’ and clutter.

And herein lies the big picture that we end up missing: Health is a lifestyle. It is a process. It is not a reward.

You should enjoy the process. It should be easy and sustainable. And in the best of situations, it should be mindless.

Enjoying the process means finding a simple and manageable way to enjoy eating less, and then eliminating the mind-clutter and the obsessive attachment to the insignificant little things. By doing this you eliminate the need to control the future, because you are enjoying the process.

The bottom line is that If you can’t sit down with a close friend for twenty minutes and have a good conversation WITHOUT talking about nutrition or your workouts, you need to take a step back and breathe.

Concentrate on getting the best results in the most comfortable and enjoyable way without worrying about the insignificant fluff.

Enjoy the process.

Read more from Brad Pilon at his blog, or check out his ebook, Eat Stop Eat.

We live in an information overloaded society. There has not been a moment in history when information has been this available, right at our fingertips. By typing one simple phrase, we now get hundreds, thousands, sometimes even millions of answers to our most desired questions. And now it seems, because of the abundance of information available to us, that a lot of us are confused.

No more confusing has been our struggle with living excessively. As a result, many of us are in debt, have too much stuff and are overweight.

There are too many questions on how to exercise, how to eat, or how to live healthily – cardio or weights? How much protein? Does fat make me fat? Will situps give me abs? Am I going to get big, bulky muscles?

I don’t profess to know the answer to EVERY question out there, but I do know that all things being equal, the simplest answer is most likely the right one (Ockham’s Razor). That holds true in life as much as it does in weight loss, exercise and general health.

So in saying that, I have devised a list of The 7 Essential Rules to Optimal Health.

You may read these rules and be turned off that I’m insulting your intelligence. But let’s face it, now more than ever, do we need to get back to the basics in order to save our waning, unhealthy & obese society.

We’ve veered off the path of “simple” and have really made things more complicated than they are.

1. Eat REAL Food.

For a busy population who doesn’t have time to count calories or how many grams of protein or how much sodium or saturated fat, this is your answer to health and weight loss.

Anything that Mother Nature put on this earth in it’s simplest form is real food – unpackaged, unprocessed, unpreserved fruits, vegetables, legumes, naturally raised meat & fish.  Steak from a cow that has been allowed to eat from a pasture, not an all-beef hot dog. Water, not soda. Apples, not apple fritters.

Here’s the truth … if you eat nutritious real food then your body feels nourished and doesn’t feel the need to consume more. If you eat the common processed food products of today with empty calories and little to any nutrition value, then your body needs to 1) work harder to digest and assimilate what you’ve eaten thus using energy 2) still feel hungry because what you’ve eaten provides no nourishment and 3) throw your systems out of whack because your body has no idea what you just ate.

2. Live Life Actively.

Our society was the healthiest when there were no such things as treadmills, ellipticals and Pec Decks. We used the gym to support our activities (like what athletes do).  We rode our bikes, skied, surfed, played pick-up basketball and walked everywhere.

Now, we go to the gym. We run on treadmills like rats in a cage, partake in bodybuilding programs that give us bulky, unuseable muscles and create imbalance & injury, and do aerobic classes that give us little to no benefit with the way we look.

As our society transitioned from an active culture to a gym-going culture, obesity, heart disease and diabetes slowly started to increase. Coincidence? Maybe. But staying active and trying new things – playing a sport, going for a hike, being active with family, playing frisbee with the dog- never killed anyone.

Ask yourself these questions…When was the last time you got excited to go to the gym (to actually workout, not to see the hot aerobics instructor or personal trainer)? And what about when you knew that the weekend was just around the corner and you were going to the beach to play some volleyball?  Or out to the golf course with your buddies to play 18 holes?

Live actively and use the gym to support your efforts.

3. Get outside.

This goes hand-in-hand with the point above.

True that some of us live in a climate that isn’t always condusive to outdoorsy things. Hogwash.

Unless it is 110 degrees in the shade or sub-Arctic temperatures outside, there are always options for us to be active outdoors – even if it’s just for a walk after dinner. Our bodies crave the outdoors and being with nature.  It’s hard-wired into our systems. Being outdoors gives us a feeling of freedom and calm that no gym, mall or office building could ever provide for us.

4. Constantly strive to improve in order to see change.

If you are doing the same thing, day in and day out (lifting the same weights, running the same distance for the same time, etc) without any change or improvement, then nothing is going to happen to your body.

Your body wants to stay the same, and it is only when you decide to venture outside of your comfort zone that you will actually see any improvement – and that rule holds true with life as much as it does with exercise. Set goals, break records and constantly strive to get better. If you ran 5km in 30-minutes yesterday, then the next time out, aim for 29-minutes.  If you did 10 push-ups yesterday, then aim for 11 the next time you attempt them.

Force yourself out of what’s comfortable and you will change – both in body and in mind.

5. Get some sleep.

Often the “missing link” to everyone’s weight loss quest is their lack of quality sleep. Healthy adults require 7-9 hours of uninterrupted, good quality sleep EVERY night.

Sleep helps regulate your hormones. It kills off bad bacteria that has accumulated in your gut throughout the day and it’s the primary time for your body to repair its tissues – especially your muscles. Don’t get enough of it and your immune response will suffer (your ability to fight off disease & sickness), you gain belly fat (because of the higher amounts of the hormone cortisol) and you’ll experience lows in energy.

6. Practice Active Recovery .

This is the Yang to intense exercise’s Ying and is probably the most overlooked rule. You were not designed to “go hard” 100% of the time.

Regardless of what you may believe, exercise, with all it’s benefits to your body and health, is still stress. Any response that produces an adrenalin rush will also produce a stress response in your body. Because of this, we must balance our intense exercise activities with calming, stress management exercises. Traditional yoga, tai chi, qi gong or some form of deep breathing or meditation are the most common examples of ways to handle stress.

Try to incorporate at least one of these activities into your weekly (if not daily) practice. Only a few minutes of deep breathing or mediation is all you need to regain balance move on with your day without anxiety or nervousness.

7. Use Natural Movements.

There are 5 natural movements – Squatting, Lunging (which includes walking & running), Pushing, Pulling & Rotation. If you want to save time, increase results and live healthy, then all your exercises should incorporate at least one, if not more, of these movements.

Is there a need to stand in front of a mirror holding dumbbells and lifting them up to the side while standing on a ball? No. Is there a need to sit on a machine, strapped in and squeeze your thighs together or push them out? No. These movements are unnatural. They force you to break your body up into individual parts, when in truth, your body operates as a network of nerves, bones and muscles to move you and the objects you lift or carry from Point A to Point B.

Exercise naturally, move naturally, be healthy.

So Now What?

Use the above rules as a checklist and try to incorporate and adhere to one rule per week, introducing a new rule each time you have mastered one.

Try not to get overwhelmed. This isn’t a “shotgun” approach. We’ve gotten away from the basics of health and it will take time to get back. Just keep at it and be consistent and you’ll get there.

By just living with these 7 rules in mind, you’re sure to become a healthier, happier and more fulfilling life.

Read more from Chris at his blog, Fit and Busy Dad, or subscribe to his feed.