Dash of indulgence key to fitness recipe

Here's a fantastic article about the realities of the fitness struggle many people face:

I'M not proud of my health and fitness record. I remember many a night sitting up late, eating Tim Tams, watching those infomercials about fantastic mechanical monsters that tighten butts and strengthen abs, and feeling as if by watching all that exertion I was somehow getting fit.

Then there were my day-time viewing habits, where I'd turn on to people puffing on treadmills and doing aerobic things, whilst eating my last unhealthy meal before the health diet, which I was always going to start tomorrow.

It is unbelievable how much weight I put on in those pre-fitness binges, how many cigarettes, coffees and alcoholic beverages I downed before giving up for good, before beginning those fitness campaigns that were invariably delayed by life-trauma, work pressures, or simple laziness.

When I did finally start, I'd go to the other extreme -- approaching fitness with the severity and rigidity of an army lieutenant, taking my aberrant side under control.

Hup, hup, hup I'd breathe down my own neck, forcing my feet to pedal on those exercise bikes, forcing my body to lift and twist and pant.

No alcohol, no chocolate, no meals out, no fun. Not able to go to parties because the temptation was too great. Losing weight, losing friends, losing life-force.

And then, feeling deprived, feeling lonely, bullied, and cut off from pleasure and joy, I'd find myself at a party having not one drink but three, and in my drunken state eating half the chocolate birthday cake, and later, at home, another few Tim Tams.

Which then made it impossible to get up and exercise the next day as guilt and feelings of worthlessness crept in.

This is the real health and fitness treadmill that many people I talk to are on -- which is why so many fitness related illnesses rule the Western world...

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