Looking
Good
The lazy
guide to a better body
By
Jan van Rensburg
Copyright JVR 2011
Published by JVR at Smashwords
Smashwords Edition License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy - it's really not expensive. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
Cover design by JVR
Also by JVR, published at Smashwords:
Lyk Goed - Die lui gids vir 'n beter lyf (Afrikaans Edition)
*****
LEGAL NOTICE
The Publisher has strived to be as accurate and complete as possible in the creation of this book, not withstanding the fact that he does not warrant or represent at any time that the contents within are accurate due to the rapidly changing nature of knowledge and information, and the Internet.
The Publisher will not be responsible for any losses or damages of any kind incurred by the reader whether directly or indirectly arising from the use of the information found in this book.
This book is not intended for use as a source of medical advice. All readers are advised to seek services of competent professionals in the medical field.
No guarantees of any sort are made. Reader assumes responsibility for use of information contained herein. The author reserves the right to make changes without notice. The Publisher assumes no responsibility or liability whatsoever on the behalf of the reader of this book.
*****
PART 1: The Knowledge – What you need to know
Chapter 1: Surviving information overload
Chapter 2: Sorting out your head
Chapter 3: What you need to know about weight loss
Chapter 4: What you need to know about exercise
Chapter 5: What you need to know about nutrition
PART 2: The Method – How to do it
Chapter 6: Getting your strategy together
Chapter 7: Your nutrition program
Chapter 8: Your exercise program
Chapter 9: Keeping a finger on the pulse
*****
Do you struggle with your weight and body shape? Are you one of those unfortunate souls who gain weight easily and quickly, and then have to face almost insurmountable obstacles to lose it again? Have you always been this way, since your childhood, or did something start to go wrong at some point in your life, and just continued to snowball ever since?
A very large percentage of people can identify with these questions today. Overweight and obesity have become a worldwide epidemic, and are currently rated among the top-ranking causes of premature and preventable death in the United States and other countries of the Western world. Developing countries are not far behind, and are catching up rapidly as globalisation marches on.
There is, however, a lot more to being overweight and unfit, than just the health risks. An overweight, unhealthy and out-of-shape body can have a serious impact on your quality of life and your self-esteem – and your interpersonal relationships with others. Looking good is a desire all people inherently have and which the world spends billions on, every year.
One of the really cruel twists in the battle for a healthier, leaner body is the total absence of any form of fairness. Some people just seem to be able to get away with anything – they’re able to indulge in the pleasures of unhealthy living to the extreme, with very little ill effect to show for it. While others have to resign themselves to a lifetime of struggle and sacrifice to keep in decent physical shape. Or to just give up and let themselves go, and to live with the consequences.
A slow metabolism often gets the blame for this struggle, but most people don’t really know what a slow metabolism is, let alone dealing with it. And everybody seems to be making the same mistakes over and over again. If you have been through this before, you’ll know what I’m talking about. They say the difference between optimism and pessimism is experience. So, welcome to the Club of the Dissatisfied, the Disillusioned, the Frustrated and the Unsure! Be assured that you are not alone. You’re in good company, with everyone believing their own issues to be the worst, and the most difficult to fix.
Reality television shows about lifestyle change – where contestants battle it out to see who can shed the most weight – are all the rage at the moment. But you only need to follow a single episode of these shows to realise that what the unfortunate contestants are subjected to, is tantamount to serious boot camp training and major personal sacrifice. To receive this suffer-or-fail message as the only real way to success, must surely be very disheartening and depressing for millions of overweight people in the world.
No small wonder then, that people find the idea of a fast, easy solution for weight loss and fitness so appealing. Somebody discovering something really revolutionary, which really works. Preferably a pill of some sort, melting the fat away and firming us up while we’re sleeping. Make no mistake, the world has been teeming with products claiming revolutionary success for many years already, but unfortunately these quick-fixes and miracle cures all get discredited and unmasked as passing fads in regular cycles – someone making a quick fortune from a gullible market only to disappear from the scene afterwards. And then sometimes resurfacing with the same trickery under a new name, and going through the same motions as before, to get even richer.
Reality is that we all have a basic lazy streak in us, and that is what a very willing industry preys upon. Who in his right mind would purposely choose to do anything in the most difficult manner possible – requiring the greatest amount of hard work – if there were ways to save effort, time and energy? In this philosophical sense, laziness has often been the spark for ingenuity – for finding better, more efficient and innovative means to get things done.
When I was searching for a doable, bearable body reshaping strategy over many years, I always found it frustrating to follow top sports achievers’ weight loss and fitness wisdom. Simply because most of them seem to be a law unto themselves, and they all preached this same message of exercising yourself half to death. I don’t believe any of them really have any idea of what it’s like for the “others” – the folks like me – or maybe you – who don’t possess the luxury of a high degree of natural athleticism, or a lightning-fast metabolism, or living a very physical lifestyle giving you the ability to eat as much as you like with impunity.
It was always the same old story all over again. Working out in a gym twice a day, running and cycling without end, and competing in strenuous endurance events on weekends. Oh, and by the way, getting paid a small fortune by sponsors to do this, day in and day out.
Well. It’s not too far-fetched to presume that anybody who follows such a physically strenuous and active lifestyle won’t have too many problems with staying in shape. But it’s not really a very practical solution for non-professional, non-athletes who have a life and career beyond the gym and track, and who aren’t getting paid to exercise either.
I have always been convinced that there had to be another way. A smarter way. One that actually gets you into a good physical shape, but with less schlep and effort. I’ve searched for it for decades, finding bits and pieces of the puzzle along the way until I was finally able to piece everything together into a workable, practical strategy. In this book I’ll take you through these important principles to get yourself in shape. With less effort and permanent results.
You will see the pitfalls and traps laid for you by an unscrupulous weight loss and health industry ready to take your money in repeatable fashion – where everything is designed to keep you away from success so you can come back for more and remain a paying customer for life.
You will see the confusion caused by information overload and information pollution, and how to cut through the garbage to the real issues, exposing a number of revelations which will change your outlook on healthy living and reshaping your body, permanently. And revealing the methods that really work, faster and better than anything else.
How can I claim they really work?
The reason I can be so confident is because I also used to be one of those unfortunate schmucks who could gain weight by just looking at food for too long. Although never obese at any point in my life, I have always carried far too much body fat for my own liking. I was never a naturally gifted athlete either, having to work my butt off for the meagrest degree of sports success, while enviously watching the luckier ones breezing past me effortlessly.
I always had to be physically active – more so than the average person – trying to keep myself fit and in shape. But it never seemed to help much, and in spite of my regular exercising, too much body fat was somehow always part of the deal for me. I was a classic example of what could be described as someone with a slow metabolism.
So, when I claim the approach I have found works, I do so because I’ve seen it work not only for others, but because it has also worked for me, where everything else failed. And it continues to work to this day, without ever backfiring on me since I finally got everything together and incorporated it into my life. It has been a good few years now, and I think by this time I can safely stick my head out to say that if it worked for me for this long, it can work for anybody – including you.
The most important aspect of this lifestyle approach is that it doesn’t consume my life, and it’s not difficult to keep up. Although I am currently in good physical shape, I don’t spend the bulk of my time exercising and working out. I have absolutely no compulsion to run marathons, climb Everest or pedal myself to pieces on a bike.
To the contrary, you’ll see that although I do have a formally structured exercise program, exercising takes surprisingly little of my time per week. I don’t diet anymore and I eat by no means small, yet I’m not gaining weight as would have been the case before I adopted this lifestyle strategy.
Most of what we are told today by the combination of mainstream science along with thousands of health gurus and quacks, only serve to confuse most people. And don’t offer them a workable, practical solution for successful, long-term improvement of their body shape.
Successful weight loss and body reshaping have 2 equally important components:
-- The first is sorting out your head – the issues in your psychological makeup that influence your behaviour and habits, translated into a lifestyle which may be holding you back.
-- The second is following a well-designed lifestyle strategy, based on principles which have actually been proven to work, over the long term. A strategy which deals effectively with devastating impediments such as a slow metabolism, and other conditions which are ready to derail your efforts at every opportunity.
You cannot even remotely think about tackling and changing an out-of-shape body without a good understanding of the real issues at play. And this means having enough knowledge at your disposal. Real and trustworthy knowledge, not hocus-pocus wishful thinking and old wives’ tales.
Knowledge gives you power. Power to change things. Power to be smart. In the final analysis, this is what this book is about. A new way of thinking – like a lazy person – to deal with these essential requirements for you to intelligently and successfully reshape your body, with the least amount of hard work and hardship.
The book is divided into 2 main parts:
-- In Part 1 it’s about the knowledge you need to have. Understanding the common denominators and real fundamentals of successful weight loss and body reshaping.
-- In Part 2 it’s all about the method – the “how to do it”. We get down to business, and apply the principles and knowledge of Part 1 into a practical, workable lifestyle strategy – giving you the details and approach to lose body fat, and to reshape your body to be lean and toned. Fast, with permanent success, and less effort. Doing it the smart way, not the hard way.
If you expected a regular diet-and-exercise book, this is most certainly not it. Neither is it a book for the faint-hearted – for those who are not willing to let their thinking wander outside the proverbial box every once in a while. Instead, be prepared to look at your situation a lot more knowingly, and a lot more untrustingly. Be prepared to see things for what they really are, instead of what hype and clever marketing would have you believe. And be prepared to discover amidst the confusion of it all, the smart, less-effort way for you to be able to get rid of excess body fat, fast and effectively. And to reshape your body into the one you always wanted – for good.
Although the book has been written from a male perspective it is most definitely not solely intended for a male readership. The perception is often created that the practicalities of weight loss and body reshaping are different for men and women, but this is plain untrue. The underlying principles of healthy living and body reshaping are exactly the same for men and women, in spite of notable differences in the physiological makeup of the sexes. It’s a matter of what’s good for the gander, is good for the goose also.
As in the case of most publications, the views expressed and reflected in this book are those of the author, based on analysis and evaluation of a wide range of health and fitness information, combined with experiments and experiences during investigation of this fascinating subject over the past 30 years.
*****
The Knowledge – What you need to know
"It is unwise to be too sure of one’s own wisdom. It is healthy to be reminded that the strongest might weaken and the wisest might err."
– Mahatma Gandhi –
"Either you think - or else others have to think for you and take power from you, pervert and discipline your natural tastes, civilize and sterilize you."
– F Scott Fitzgerald –
"You can't live principles you can't understand."
– Stephen R Covey –
"Get your facts first, and then you can distort them as much as you please."
– Mark Twain –
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There is a reason why quotes and sayings are so popular. It’s because they all contain elements of truth – things we deep-down believe. When something instinctively rings true, we all nod our heads and can immediately identify with it, reinforcing our belief or stand on the matter. And the real beauty of quotes and sayings is that they give us a multitude of perspectives and angles from which to view just about any aspect of our lives.
Of course, with all the different perspectives we can find many famous quotes and sayings in clear contradiction to one another, which is a constant reminder that not all people think the same, or have the same take on any specific subject or issue. And that is the very first important thing for you to keep in the back of your mind when investigating anything, or trying to expand your knowledge of any subject. There could be more than one way of looking at things.
The four quotes on the previous page are a very good case in point, illustrating four very important aspects of knowledge and the search for information. First of all, Gandhi tells us we need to recognise that we don’t always have a firm grip on all the necessary knowledge and wisdom. One man’s wisdom is often another man’s folly, and just when we think we have everything figured and sorted, we can suddenly be faced with contradictions flying in the face of everything we thought we knew.
Secondly, F Scott Fitzgerald tells you in no uncertain terms that you are the master of your own destiny. If you allow others to think for you and dictate your life for you, you surrender your fate to be decided for you by people who might not always have your best interest at heart. We all need to think more for ourselves, and use our own brainpower for our own good.
Thirdly, Stephen Covey underlines the fact that if you want to apply certain principles in your life, you have to know what they’re about. If you don’t understand the issues you’re dealing with – if you’re just blindly following a set recipe without any supporting knowledge – then you will find it difficult, if not impossible, to stick with those principles. Especially when things go wrong and you’re stuck with no idea on how to fix the problem.
Finally, the famous tongue-in-cheek quote from Mark Twain reminds us that the line between fact and fantasy can often be blurry, depending on how enthusiastic people apply their own spin or angle to the knowledge they accumulate. In the world of weight loss, health and fitness, you’ll come to appreciate that facts are very often distorted to suit somebody’s self-interest or philosophy. As you will see, the entire health industry is fraught with contradictions, wildly varying opinions by many “experts”, the persistence of outdated ideas and – to be frank about it – loads of pure, unadulterated bullshit. There are many questions you have to deal with when you decide to make changes to the way you look and live, and we focus on the most important of these during the following chapters.
In Chapter1 we start off by taking a hard look at information overload and information pollution, and the need for you to survive the onslaught of a relentless health- and weight loss industry, hell-bent on taking your money without giving you much in return. You get a glimpse of the traps and pitfalls, and the many opportunities to become side-tracked and misled, if you are not careful.
In Chapter 2 we discuss the head-issues involved if you want to embark on a lifestyle change towards improved health and looks. No lifestyle plan can be expected to be successful unless it is supported by sustained motivation to see it through. This chapter shows you the steps necessary to build and maintain motivation, and also takes a look at the power of your lifestyle, and how your physical shape can either hold you back or catapult you forward on many levels of life. You will see how your lifestyle is the window through which other people see and perceive you, and make value judgements about you.
Chapter 3 deals in more detail with the real issues surrounding weight loss. We delve into concepts such as energy balance, your metabolic rate and how that can be a real stumbling block for many. We also look at medical conditions, dieting and all the other usual suspects when it comes to weight loss. Prepare to be surprised by a number of interesting revelations, somewhat off the beaten track.
Chapter 4 deals with the real issues surrounding exercise and training. We’ll be looking at the different exercise types, myths and exercise hype, and show you how you can get away with the best exercise benefits for the least amount of time spent in the gym.
Chapter 5 is all about your nutrition, and the real issues at play when trying to lose weight and eat yourself into better physical shape. We’ll discuss some pretty controversial stuff here, and give you some insight on a number of hotly debated current issues.
All in all, Part 1 of this book presents you with a more realistic way of looking at the underlying knowledge about weight loss and body reshaping, focusing on those things which really work, which will make the job easier and reduce the effort.
*****
Surviving information overload
"Be careful about reading health books. You may die of a misprint."
– Mark Twain –
How many times have you seen, read or heard something about health, diet, exercise or anything about lifestyle in the last week alone? I’ll bet more than just once. Following a healthier lifestyle has become a gigantic issue over the last few decades, and it is set to become even bigger in the years to come.
The widely publicised health risks associated with overweight and obesity, a sedentary lifestyle and other factors such as smoking and HIV/AIDS, are causing more and more people to become concerned about their prospect for a long life. Premature death and failed health of economically active people in their prime, are major concerns for all countries. And, needless to say, the annual costs related to this are staggering.
As you could expect, these health issues have also brought with them opportunity for business, and the making of serious money by providers of products and services to this growing market. Every Tom, Dick and Harry got onto this bandwagon very quickly, and many more join daily. The result is that the media are today flooded with lifestyle issues, and the health & fitness industry has now established itself as collectively one of the biggest players when it comes to dishing out information – in books, magazines, radio, television and also the Internet.
The tongue-in-cheek quote from Mark Twain about being careful when reading health books, is unfortunately very real. We are today bombarded with a wide variety of often conflicting information when it comes to anything to do with our health. How do we know that we’re dealing with trustworthy and valid information, and not with souped-up hype that’s only geared for lining somebody’s pocket?
In this chapter we’ll be looking at where the information in this book comes from, how I went about getting it and giving you some background about a few of the underlying principles I had to apply when I was searching for, retrieving and evaluating loads of information. Information overload is a very real threat, and becoming overwhelmed by it is something that can happen very easily to anyone. How do we deal with it?
The 80/20 principle
You have probably heard of a buzzword called the 80/20 principle, also referred to as the Pareto principle or “the law of the vital few”. It’s about focusing on the important 20% of things in order to get 80% of the results, or 80% of your business comes from 20% of your customers, or 80% of almost anything is useless and only 20% will be useful, and so on.
When I first started with my own quest for finding a satisfactory lifestyle solution for myself 30 years ago, I was fortunate that my formal university training as an engineer introduced me to the 80/20 principle as well as Murphy’s Law early in my life. These are 2 very important rules to consider when you want to do or examine anything.
The 80/20 principle is the driving force behind what this book is all about – finding those few important things I needed to focus on and take care of, which would enable me to sort out a slow metabolism, help me to lose weight and keep the fat off, and keep me in a good physical shape. Successful application of the 80/20 principle means getting through all the unnecessary and less important information, and cutting through the chase to the real issues which will have the greatest impact, and produce the best results.
Murphy’s Law, on the other hand, was also ever-present in the back of my mind because I also learned that the potential for anything to go wrong, is always there – and we always have to make provision for unintended consequences and things not always going as planned.
Information references in this book
The information you find in this book comes from a very wide variety of sources, collected over a period of 3 decades – most of which are today echoed by the Internet. You can imagine that quite a lot has happened in the world of health and fitness during the past 30 years, and the accumulation of information has been staggering.
To give credibility to any information, especially when it deviates from mainstream conventional accepted thinking, referencing the source is the best way. And also the best way to indemnify yourself and shift the blame if the information backfired on someone and they’re looking for somebody to sue. When you read certain information which looks either interesting or suspect, following up on references gives you the opportunity to check things out for yourself, and to make your own decision of whether to regard it as trustworthy or not.
The reality of the matter, however, is that in the past very few people followed up on the references so prudently given and listed in the literature they read, simply because it was too much of a bother. Checking references meant that you had to go find the literature at an academic library, and painstakingly work through a list of books to see what was cooking. The mere fact that the author gave a list of references was – and still is – for many people an indication that they’re dealing with bona fide trustworthy information. Which could be a very risky assumption, of course.
The Internet, however, changed all that. If anyone nowadays wishes to check out anything anybody says or claims, they can, and mostly will, dive into the Internet for more information. What I did not want to do in this book was to clutter the chapters so full of references and links that it would impact negatively on the readability of the book, ultimately spoiling your reading experience. The best way for you to check out and verify any information, is to use the subject under discussion as a keyword or key phrase, and perform a search on the Internet. You’ll notice that whenever I touch on a contentious subject I purposely give you examples of search terms to use for digging into the matter yourself.
I really encourage you to follow up on anything you’re unsure about. The big problem you will encounter, however, will be exactly the same as what I encountered when using the Internet to get all the information sorted and my facts straight when I started to assemble the chapters of this book. And that was dealing with information overload.
It is very important that we discuss this issue before getting to the specifics of the lifestyle information and knowledge contained in the following chapters. It not only shows how I went about to gather information, but will also show you what to look out for when following up on anything you read in this book. The most important matter is, however, to come to the realisation that with most information about health and lifestyle, we’re dealing with opinions rather than facts, and that it’s sometimes very difficult to distinguish between the two.
Information overload on the Internet
Searching for information on the Internet has become exceedingly simple. You proceed to your favourite search engine (Google, Yahoo!, AOL, etc) and you start typing your search phrase. When you hit the search button, cyberspace opens up and your information request is fulfilled in an instant.
Or is it?
When you execute any search on the Internet, there are two distinct things you really want: Finding useful and valid content. By useful content I mean not just a web page swarming with sponsored links and ads and flashy graphics, selling you something instead of telling you something. No, useful content will usually be a document or text page containing information related very specifically focused according to your search words, hopefully conveying enough for you to read and study, to get you better informed on the subject and expand your knowledge.
But useful content alone is not enough. The content has to be valid, too. By this I mean that the information will be balanced, reflecting the real issues at hand, will hopefully be properly researched and referenced, in short, that it will be trustworthy, representing the reality of the situation. And it’s right here where all your alarm bells should start ringing, and where everything can explode in your face – sending your information gathering off in a wrong direction and polluting your knowledge. When the information you dig up is based on fantasy rather than reality, that’s when you get so-called misinformation.
If we look at the ratio between garbage and useful content on the Internet you’ll find that 80/20 is optimistic, to put it mildly. When you search for information on the Internet you can be sure that you’ll find a heck of a lot more than you needed or bargained for, almost immediately. But you can also be pretty darn sure that whatever results you get from your search, most of the zillions of references and links will be garbage as far as your search is concerned. Information overload in action.
You get thousands of repeats on different websites of exactly the same text. Hundreds of “referral” sites with zero content, just bouncing you from one link to the next. And my personal favourite – a web site purporting to have the answer exactly according to your search term, and then they only end up asking you to fill in the answer for them, so they can spread any rubbish you tell them, further. And just to make things more interesting, you also get a good mix of endless ads and sponsored links, popup windows and completely irrelevant stuff spiced in between, even a porn site or two sneaking into the mix.
I remember some years ago I read about a guy who was looking for information on new water-skiing equipment and made the mistake of entering the search term “water sports” into one of the search engines. Imagine his surprise to be suddenly swamped with websites and images of strange fetishes and kinky sex, of enemas and colonic irrigation tools used during sadomasochistic bondage rituals. Oh, yes, and also a string of popup windows with lusciously menacing leather-clad beauties, inviting him over for some unforgettable spanking- and other punishment encounters, all just a mouse click away. And all he wanted was information about a damn water ski.
Anyhow, back to Internet searching, and let’s assume you were lucky enough to have no ambiguity or a misinterpretation of your search term or keyword. The search results get listed in order of relevancy according to the search engine ranking, and most people typically only look at the results listed on the first few pages. Many won’t even look beyond the first page of results.
Now, if you could weed out all the useless, off-target and repeated search results from the total number listed (usually running in the millions for most searches) it’s not too conservative to guess that you’d be lucky if more than 1% which are specific to your search, will remain. For all intents and purposes, as far as the Internet is concerned, the 80/20 principle should more appropriately be renamed to the 99/1 principle. Given my personal experience over many years, my own feeling is that even 99/1 is probably flattering.
This is what we talk about when we use the term information overload. It’s not just about the sheer volumes of information available, it’s about the volumes of information dumped on you which are not specific to your search, as well as the misinformation and other garbage which come along with it.
Although there could be a lot of distractions, finding useful content is generally not too difficult, but that is only the first part of your mission. Now we get to the more interesting part. Let’s assume you were able to find a good listing of websites specific to the search term you used, and you start browsing through them. You get the details and answers according to… whom? According to the website you selected from the search results, of course. Just take your pick. If you don’t have any prior knowledge of the subject you are researching, that will be your first exposure to such information. The truth according to Website A.
Then you can (and really should) look at some of the other results, too. Maybe websites B and C have different takes on the matter. Second and third opinions. Like you get when you’re not satisfied with one doctor’s diagnosis. When we discuss specific health, fitness and medical matters later on, we’ll get back to this issue – the implications of different viewpoints and interpretations of research results can sometimes be no less than utterly confusing.
But why so much garbage and clutter on the Internet?
The Internet gives everyone read/write capability. And on the Internet everyone gets an equal opportunity to pimp their stuff. A web site is a web site, no matter if it is presented by a reputable outfit or some shady shyster. In most cases it’s almost impossible to tell which is which. You’ll only know if you happen to have inside info about the website owners or the company, which will rarely be available from the website itself. With the Internet growing bigger by the day, things aren’t fixed on getting any easier either. With the advent of information overload we are all forced to become more sceptical of anything we see and read. Is it fact or interpretation? Whose interpretation?
I read an article some years ago about how the Western lifestyle impacted on the general health of previously isolated forest-dwelling tribal communities. They were driven from their isolation and habitat by forest clearing and agricultural/urban development, and found themselves uprooted and thrust into a completely new situation. No hunting for food anymore, and part of a government relocation and “upliftment” programme, with the Western lifestyle on tap.
In line with similar research studies carried out elsewhere, the researchers found an emerging pattern of deteriorating health and a dramatic increase in the incidence of overweight and obesity among the community, after their exit from the forest. The larger part of the population started out by all accounts, in a fairly healthy state. But within a relatively short period, a significant percentage of them became overweight, and along with it came all the health-related problems and risk factors commonly associated with overweight and obesity elsewhere in the world. Not to mention the disastrous impact on their cultural heritage and social order.
These research findings give us a lot to think about when it comes to how we are supposed to live in order to maintain good health. There is a lot to learn from situations like these which we can apply for the benefit of everybody struggling with overweight or obesity.
But just how trustworthy are the results from these studies? In this particular case, how do we know the research program was conducted properly? How do we know we’re not dealing with misinformation?
You can see that the most important foundation for any research study is for it to be conducted in such a manner that we can trust the outcome. And know that everything was done in an unbiased way by people who were interested only in the reality of the specific situation under investigation, and they had no vested interest in the outcome. The only real acceptable way to be able to do this is to follow all the rules of proper scientific research.
Scientific research
I believe in scientific research. My own profession – engineering – is deeply rooted in science. Scientific research demands that you follow certain rules and protocols when it comes to setting out the terms and framework of any research you want to do. This includes that you clearly define what it is you’re researching, the data you’ll be using and how it will be gathered, the methodologies for analysis, and a host of other stuff I’m not going to bore you with. But, most importantly, the idea is that whatever it is you’re researching, that the outcome will be unbiased and free from any possible influence in any particular direction.
In short, doing proper scientific research is usually not something you can rush, it invariably is expensive, but it will hopefully be worth it in the end, because if everything goes according to plan, lots of people can benefit from it. And everybody will be able to trust it, because it has been scientifically proved, free from bias.
Sounds perfectly good in theory, nobody can dispute that. But then practicalities can start chewing away at all the good-sounding theory, as so often happens.
When doing research, one of the key issues will always be the assumptions and previous research that researchers include in their research project. Nobody wants (or needs) to reinvent the wheel every time something new is researched or investigated, so it’s logical to make as much as possible use of existing research already completed, in any new study. In many cases the need for data gathering in a new research project may be completely unnecessary, simply because there is enough existing information available which is suitable to be used in the new study.
We build our knowledge like laying bricks in a wall. Certain research results become the building blocks for other, subsequent or refined studies. And the results from these studies are used again in other research, like adding bricks to the rising knowledge wall. We save money, we save time, and hopefully our knowledge increases faster than would otherwise be the case.
But what if some of our knowledge bricks are flawed? What if the lack of appropriate technology or some other issue saw to it that some of the basic, generally accepted assumptions we make based on previous research, are wrong? And we use these wrong assumptions in future research projects? It doesn’t require you to be clairvoyant to see that if something like this happens, you’re screwed. In a worst-case scenario the entire knowledge wall can become seriously compromised, or come crashing down, like a house of cards. There is a lot of interdependency in the world of scientific research, and it represents a very real weakness in the system.
It is precisely this inherent weakness that can cause everything to go belly-up, we can get completely bogus results because of some seemingly insignificant detail we forgot to take into account, or incorrectly assumed, or wrongly determined from previous research. This is how fickle the process of scientific research really is.
The important point I want to make here is that even hard-core scientific research can never be completely immune to errors, no matter how many checks and balances, and how sophisticated the research charter and protocols. Omissions, mistakes and incorrect assumptions get in, some slip past the safety nets, results get buggered, dangerous medications are approved, and people can die as a result of it. All because somebody missed something small, somewhere. This is unfortunately how we learn – by making mistakes.
The fact that the drug Vioxx was properly researched and scientifically tested and passed according to all the protocols and regulations, won’t be much consolation to those who may have suffered a heart attack or stroke after they started taking it, prescribed by their trusted doctor. The manufacturer Merck pulled the plug and voluntarily withdrew Vioxx from the market in 2004, unfortunately not before it was reported that a number of people suffered and died, allegedly as a result of using the drug.
So, what do we learn from this?
The most important thing to know is that researched validation of anything can never truly be cast in stone. You always have to leave room for possible error, however small, and the possibility that future discoveries may invalidate or modify some of your current assumptions and knowledge.
Only when everything there is to know about any particular subject is known and proven, will you be able to completely trust applied research based on it. In the case of health, fitness and all matters medical I’m afraid we still have a long way to go. We are getting better at it, and one day we’ll hopefully be advanced to the point where there is a lot more certainty and clarity. But for now it’s still pretty much a minefield out there, in spite of the dramatic advances and progress we have seen since the Industrial Revolution.
After all of what I’ve said here, you may think that I have a deep distrust of scientific research, in spite of any noises I may have made about believing in it, earlier. Well, I certainly don’t have any distrust of the principles of scientific research, and if I have a choice, I will always go with scientifically researched stuff first.
Why? Because the methods, checks and balances are still the best we currently have. There is no real alternative, the only things we can do is to see that methods improve, and that we learn from past mistakes. Never forget – although proper scientifically based research is the best we have, it’s not perfect. And sometimes we have to challenge the validity of even very basic and generally accepted stuff, especially when validated claims and practical experience don’t match up.
Now we get to the most critical aspect of research, and this is currently a big issue worldwide. I mentioned before that research is mostly an expensive endeavour, and somebody has to foot the bill for it. In all that we have discussed so far about scientific research, I have assumed the research to be unbiased, without any premeditation or hidden agenda. The problems I pointed out to you are just those presented by the research process itself, and human error.
But now we get to a much more sinister part, where bias and hidden agendas enter the equation. Who can really afford to undertake large and expensive research studies in the world today? People with money. Large, rich corporations, mostly. And this is where scientific research so many times falls flat on its face. I believe that not many of all the research projects undertaken by a multitude of corporations worldwide are truly unbiased, particularly when the research is done in support of their own product, service or philosophy.
When research sponsors put scientists under pressure to steer results into any direction besides one which is truly and completely unbiased, the outcome becomes tainted and corrupted. The reality of the matter is that big money has a lot of clout to thunder ahead and steamroller anybody and anything in disagreement with their objectives. Well-paid scientists on their payroll will find it very difficult to justify biting the hand that feeds them, and will – happily or reluctantly – partake in these exploits. The industry is littered with examples and rumours of this sort of foul play.
Research results and claims nowadays have a strong legal look about them, with clever lawyers and semantic experts phrasing everything in such a manner that will allow enough loopholes to ensure virtual untouchability in the event of lawsuits. Yep, bring in the lawyers and everything becomes fuzzy and confusing. The more confusion the better.
We see this everywhere – claims of scientific backing for just about everything concerning health and health products. But when bias enters the equation we cannot regard it as pure scientific research anymore – we are moving into the realm of pseudo-science and quackery.
Pseudo-science and quackery
If you thought scientific research can be a bummer, “you ain’t seen nothin’ yet, baby…” – to coin a phrase from a 70’s pop song by Bachman-Turner Overdrive.
The word “pseudo” literally means “almost”, or “masquerading as”, or “pretending to be”, or “false”. Stick any of those meanings in front of the word “science” and you know exactly what you’re dealing with here. And quackery? The word is derived from the word “quack”, which is described as “an untrained person pretending to be a physician and dispensing medical advice and treatment”.
You can clearly see that pseudo-science and quackery are very closely related and the common keyword really nailing down their root definition is “pretend”. With both pseudo-science and quackery we’re dealing with someone or something pretending to be someone or something they’re not.
To show you what I mean, let’s take the example of a simple remedy for, say, cracked heels. You buy a small tub of well-known moisturising heel balm at the grocery store. Let’s call it Product A. It is cheap, contains a few basic ingredients such as lanolin and urea mixed up in a fatty cream base. Product A has never been really researched to any scientific extent, but was commercialised from somebody’s grandmother’s recipe decades ago. Through the years it grew to become well known and widely used, everybody knows it to be of acceptable quality, and to sort out cracked heels in about a week to 10 days.
Now you also get another new heel balm, Product B – a new “revolutionary” competitor product. This one purports to contain a long list of herbal ingredients, and claiming a healing time of only 3 days, backed up and proven by scientific validation, of course. Oh, and I almost forgot to mention, only available from a few select health shops, or – worse still – through so-called multi-level marketing, at several times the price of Product A.
If the research is all legit and it really proves the stuff works in 3 days, everything is kosher. No damage done. If the customer is prepared to pay much more for the benefit of a faster healing time, it’s their own prerogative, and a vindication of the free market system offering people wider choice.
But what if the claims are false, and there was never any proper validation research conducted? And this Product B performs no better, or even worse, than Product A? It’s all about deceiving you to pay more, and nothing about giving you a superior product.
In any industry, the manufacturers always strive to charge the maximum price for their products they think they can get away with. This in itself is not a morally suspect issue, it’s a general business principle. And it’s not really a secret that price is often determined by demand based on consumers’ perception of product quality and performance, more so than a simple profit margin added to what it cost to produce and distribute.
But then the plot thickens. Demand usually has to be created by marketing efforts, and it’s right here where pretence and deception enter the scene. They claim scientific research and testing that prove dramatically superior product performance. Now, because of this superior quality, they can sell it for a skyrocketed price and even use the price to strengthen the perception of superiority, convincing you that it has to be better, somehow.
Unfortunately, there is mounting evidence that the research validation claims for hundreds, maybe even thousands, of health products currently on the market, are bogus and cannot be scientifically substantiated. Everybody just sticks the wording “Research has proved…” on the label and an eager market will swallow it without much questioning. How can I make such a seemingly wild statement about a multi-billion dollar industry?
Very simple. It’s not me who is making this statement. Go google a search term such as “health product false claims” and get about a million results you can start working through. It’s one sad tale after the other. There will always be enough desperate and gullible consumers around to keep this gravy train going indefinitely.
And now, just to make things more complicated, a curved ball regarding some of these “questionable” health products: Even though the claims of scientific research may be completely false or based in pseudo-science for many products, statistically there will always be – and there are – a good number of these products which do actually work over the long term, or at least provide some of the benefits they claim. The trick for the consumer is to be able to find and identify them, and it can sometimes be more difficult than finding a needle in a haystack. Here we are right back at the 80/20 principle. Or is it more likely a 99/1 principle in this case?
Just a quick flashback to Marketing 101 to remind ourselves of the prime force at play when people buy (or believe) things: People buy with their emotions and feelings. Buying (or believing) anything is largely an emotional thing.
Yes, sure, product technicalities and specs (facts and your intellect) do play a part, but when it comes to the crunch at decision time when you have to say to yourself “yes, I’ll buy this item now” and bring forth the credit card or cash, everything boils down to your gut feel, how comfortable you are with the purchase. All of it reduced to pure emotion and feeling.
You probably know the term “buyers regret”. It’s a feeling you sometimes get immediately after buying something, a sort of deep-down dread that the purchase you just made might be a serious mistake and you wasted your money, or paid too much. That feeling will turn out to have been spot-on, more often than not.
See, we’re talking pure feeling and emotion here – both before you buy and after the purchase is made. Why do you think hardened salespeople use all the ammunition and tricks at their disposal to close the deal and get you to pay right there and then, before you have too much time to think about it? Because when the emotions and feelings of the moment cool down, it will enable you to let more rational thinking take over, letting go of some of the excitement and hype, maybe wondering if you can’t get something better elsewhere, at a better price.
Let’s dig a little deeper and take a look at the most powerful and common deception method that is widely employed across the health & fitness industry. This deception method is not limited to products alone, but also used in wider context when they try to convert you to any particular type of lifestyle philosophy, and beliefs about healthy living.
Remember, deception can be direct – flat-out lies and unsubstantiated claims – but these can often be recognised for what they are. However, when people come across information containing known facts or anything generally regarded as truthful, the factual parts have a tendency to rub off on everything else that comes along with it. A kind of vindication by association, like a few droplets of ink changing the colour of an entire bucketful of water.
Also, if there are things which could be important but may be damaging to the message they are trying to convey, easiest is to simply omit it. Let sleeping dogs lie. So, here we have the grand recipe – the most powerful way to be able to deceive and convince even some sceptics, is when fact, fiction and omission are blended into a smooth mix, with everything soaked in credibility and respectability.
Blending fact, fiction and omission
While gathering information for this book, I read a promotional leaflet for a back-to-nature lifestyle plan, which was aimed at getting people to buy a specific range of vegetarian (vegan style) supplements and fresh foods.
Interestingly, the proponents of this lifestyle plan referred to a very similar type of case study I mentioned earlier, namely that of a previously isolated tribe who were uprooted and now were degenerating under an urbanised lifestyle. They then used the results from that study as base for their argument for us to live more “naturally”, and used that to make a strong selling point. With quite liberal use of poetic license, as it turned out.
Anyhow, they paint a picture of healthy bush dwellers living an active lifestyle and eating a natural diet of forest fruit, berries, nuts and greens. Everything, of course, organically available from Mother Nature via the forest, uncontaminated by fertilisers or pesticides. Then they explain the devastating impact of the new urbanised lifestyle, quoting the research findings ad verbatim, and pointing out all the main culprits: lowered activity levels, alcohol and a junk-food diet rich in fat, and devoid of all the good nutrients.
Then they present the punch line of their lifestyle philosophy, scientifically backed up by the results of the case study. In short, they propose a vegetarian lifestyle to “get back to how we originally lived in our natural state”. No alcohol, and everything you consume, has to be vegan style. Else it won’t be “natural” anymore, and you’ll find yourself back on the slippery slope of the bad Western lifestyle, very quickly.
You also get the promise that if you follow their proposed lifestyle, you can look forward to a long, healthy, prosperous life. Your brain will be more actively tweaked and alert, sharpening your senses and giving you an unassailable edge over everybody else. In business, in health, and – you guessed it – in bed. Be ready to launch your partner to new levels of ecstasy and fulfilment.
Finally, they provide physical evidence of their case by using the example of one of the founding fathers of their movement who lived to be 100 before dying peacefully in his sleep, active and healthy to the very end.
A very powerful message. The solution they propose seems reasonable enough, and the information they provide looks valid at face value. The research data shows clearly that the former tribespeople were obviously better off in their natural state, and there is a lot of corroborating evidence that the urbanised Western lifestyle has many shortcomings and exposes people to serious health risks anyway.
With this case study they give you a “before” and “after” situation to prove it. Before the urbanised diet and lifestyle, all was well with the folks from the bush. Afterwards, everything went to hell. A slam-dunk, open-and-shut case.
So, what is wrong with the manner in which this particular back-to-nature lifestyle philosophy is presented? Only when you start digging a little deeper, will you find out. As this one turned out, it is a classic example of blending facts with a little fiction, and leaving out rather important information which doesn’t support their sales pitch. Let me pick the contents of this particular promotion apart so you can see how subtle and almost unnoticed this happens.
First of all, they present the case study. They quote the figures, and list the interpretation of the results by eminent scientists, even giving a whole list of references so you can go check it up yourself. Convincing stuff. They list the foodstuffs the tribe gathered and ate: fruit, berries, nuts and greens. All of this information factual and above-board.
They just forgot to mention meat.
The tribe were hunters, too. Actually, they were primarily hunters. And the active lifestyle they led was not borne of a sense of keeping healthy and fit, but mostly related to the pursuit of some or other hapless forest creature, fleeing for dear life to escape the cooking pot. These guys were no vegetarians, much less vegans, but that’s just a snippet of unnecessary detail which will confuse the customer and torpedo the vegan message. Best to ignore it, then.
From here on forward everything pulls apart at the seams, if you’re alert enough to pick it up. To “get back to how we originally lived in our natural state” like the forest tribe, also means no alcohol, according to their proposed lifestyle philosophy. Here they conveniently ignore the fact that many forest tribes still living in their “natural state” are certainly no teetotallers, and indulge quite heavily in their traditional home brews at every opportunity.
Another inconvenience better left out is that some of the tribespeople’s recreation isn’t limited to alcohol, either. Some tribes are known to make prudent use of a number of other natural forest substances to cook up potent hallucinogenic cocktails that will make any drug addict’s eyes water. If this news were to leak out, there would be an exodus of half the world’s druggies, packing up and heading for the forest. So much then, for getting back to natural, healthy living.
But they’re not done, yet – the vegan lifestyle tweaks your brain, makes you more alert and competent, and “gives you the mental edge”. Oh, yeah? There is absolutely no proof of this, at least not in any scientifically accepted research study I could find anywhere, then or since. In fact, the best supporting reference I could find for this particular claim was something along the line of “the proponents of this lifestyle claim…”. Which means they say so. Nothing more. A little fiction has just been introduced into the mix.
There is the inference to “proof” of one of their organisation’s 100 year-old patriarchs, finally expiring peacefully in his sleep, and how you too, can follow suit if you convert to their lifestyle. And, of course, buy the products they’re offering. No need to elaborate much here, save to note that one centenarian following any particular lifestyle, statistically doesn’t prove anything either way.