CHRONICLES OF A WELLNESS CHASER

Buddhists say that humans are the best creatures at suffering. It’s human nature to move away from pain and move towards pleasure. Since I was little, I’ve always sought to either feel better, perform better and understand why I was different. A simple “what if” rather than a “it-is-what-it-is” was the determining factor in my personality that turned me into a success story.

I was born with a congenital curvature of the spine, I was treated for it most of my early teen years and I was a child of the medical system. I was chronically ill, traveled regularly to Toronto’s Sick Kids Hospital from my native town of Timmins ON, I was pulled out of class often and was instructed to sit out of gym class. Aside from having to work through forming my identity (my parents said I was cool) I never felt “good”. Somehow, without any other vantage point, a little voice inside of me knew that there was something better for me. So the journey began.

The most successful changes in my life came from the place of intuition.

I have a lifetime of being tested for disorders and dysfunctions, and implementing recommendations and action plans and prescribed protocols. Changes I made based on the recommendations of someone else, yielded lesser results than those that originated from myself. A good coach can help you sift through all the garbage, provide suggestions about your health but I truly believe that convictions can hurt someone.

I’ve always hungered to find a sport that I was gifted at and I dabbled for years, avoiding strength sports, because they weren’t recommended by “the medical system”. Innately, I’ve always been curious about veganism, yet ate very high protein diets, high calorie diets, all kind of diets and I’ve reached new levels of strength eating a diet primarily of raw fruit, vegetable, oils and a bit of organic meats. Will these things change? Without a doubt. I’ll change, life will change, science will change, my convictions and my experiences will change.

Struggling with a particular goal? What does the little voice tell you? Maybe you should listen.

That little voice is your survival mechanism. Your body is designed to survive. If your body is telling you that it craves sugar, you have a powerful message to work with (not normal). If your body tells you to sleep, maybe you need sleep and less coffee or less obligations. If your body tells you a relationship is toxic, it might be!

In the end – you are the authority of your own body. 

Here are my two rules for success:
1 – Experience everything – the good the bad and ugly:
Every good, bad and ugly experience in life is relative your experiences of them all. You can’t know happy without unhappy, hot from cold, movement without inertia… If you only ever experience one thing, you can’t know that another or combination of all the things is your magic formula. Can you experience recovery without injury, can you learn success without the failure of that traumatic event? Everything is relative and exists within a duality.

2 – Don’t believe anyone including yourself:
“I have opinions of my own, strong opinions, but I don’t always agree with them.” – George H. W. Bush

I’ve had so many convictions throughout my career that I’ve refuted with new convictions that I now chose to be open to anything.

Examples:  High protein diets are best, high fat diets are best, include cardio for fat loss, hypertrophy training is the sh*t, bodybuilding is cool, only 8 hours of sleep is best, only 6 hours of sleep is best, eat immediately post workout, only consume whey isolates post workout, New Zealand whey is God, soy is the devil, Justin Bieber isn’t a real musician (he isn’t, this is a fact somewhere I’m sure).

When hiring a coach, you can shop by credentials, but some of the best coaches I’ve encountered in my career have been those with rich life experiences. When shopping for a hairstylist, don’t hire the girl with the nicest hair, hire the one who did hers. I’m not suggesting that science doesn’t have its place, on the contrary I think science is the shizzle to support your own experiences. A good coach will be able to back their claims by either experience or successful track record with clients AND some credz.

As for me – the grass is always greener on the other side, I will always find places I’ve never been and attain levels of health I never knew existed.