Let me start by saying I’m not 100% vegan, but for the past 5 or so months I have been at about 85%. I’ve gone from being a huge consumer of meats (4-5 times a day) to maybe eating it once or twice a week. I make a conscious decision to try to eat more vegan and for me, this process is all about learning more about eating vegan and seeing how my body reacts. This is an experiment, to learn more about my body and the human body in general, more specifically when it comes to fitness and how (if any) impact it could have.  I want to continue to improve on that 85% as I know it is not only a healthier option for my body but also the impact of the environment.

This post is not about trying to cram vegan life down your throat (food analogy) but more share my experience, my research and my continued learning process, heck I still do eat animal products- be that a lot less. I’m not one to tell you how you should or shouldn’t live your life, but being open to learning about new things is always good for the mind, body and soul.

Vegan food has long copped the stigma of being boring and bland. In the fitness world where “PROTEIN” is king, it’s often considered detrimental to be vegan. I mean, how do you get protein without meat? I’m speaking from experience because for so long I thought that I couldn’t hit my daily protein intake without eating animal proteins, and if I could I would have to eat a huge amount of fats alongside it (nuts etc) which I just didn’t want to do. I also worried about the accessibility and the ease to which I could get vegan protein from, I mean I could just throw a stack of chicken breasts in the oven and have days worth of meals ready… I can’t be bothered prepping and making every meal. But as I learnt more, opened my mind to different methods (as I did with my training, ditching weights for bodyweight), spoke to friends, researched products, it became more and more obvious that it wasn’t so hard to hit protein numbers and even more importantly eat fun, delicious foods.

Veganism is definitely becoming more mainstream, companies we know and trust are now putting out vegan ranges. From ice cream and candy to ‘meat” alternatives there really is a wide range of foods to eat that won’t hinder your variety.

I wanted to share a recent comparison photo showing two meal options;

1: Plant-based vegan protein meal

2: Animal-based protein meal

As you can see the calories and macros are pretty much both the same, no lack of protein on the plant-based side either. The difference here is the amount of food and also the extra greens and vegetable-based foods which would also provide more vitamins, minerals and generally good stuff. Me, being a hungry person who loves food and ALWAYS wants to eat, plant-based food gives me just that opportunity without the food coma/sickness/bloating you normally get after eating a huge meal. There is no denying that our body brakes down plant-based based food easier than meats, that’s a scientific fact! If that’s the case then it also means that our body has more time for other important functions rather than using huge amounts of energy to simply digest a single meal, let alone meal upon meal.

It’s also a scientific fact that red meat does increase inflammation in the body and on top of that fact, both red and white meat (poultry) has a very murky past (and present) of adding harmful chemicals to the food the animals eat which in turn, get passed on to us, think crazy animal steroids, antibiotics, and other cancer-causing nasty stuff. Again, let me remind you that I’m not 100% vegan and I still eat meat, just be it less and less as I keep experimenting, it purely comes down to convenience for me as I am learning.

I will choose vegan options over non-vegan options and that is based on the above facts, they cannot be denied. Animal products do contain dangerous chemicals that directly impact us, and even if you’re confident they haven’t been juiced up- there is also undeniable facts of how long the body takes to process this type of food, it’s just common sense which option stresses your body more. Throw dairy into the mix and the fact humans are the only mammals who drink another animals milk and still drink milk after infant development is a little gross. So regardless of where you stand on harmful additives, you cannot deny that it stresses our bodies more, we are already so stressed, run down and tired in today’s go-go-go lifestyle, why would we want to add to that if we had the option otherwise?

The prevalence of diseases in humans that are becoming more and more common, specifically stomach and digestive diseases. Cancers of the colon and stomach, skin diseases, all which are becoming more and more obvious to what can contribute to these and in turn, what can help heal, cure and prevent these. DIET. More specifically, higher amounts of plant-based foods, less of animal-based foods!

Another positive in my mind that comes from veganism is the impact it has on the environment. A good friend of mine has to be a major player in helping me learn more about this side of things too and something I may not have selfishly cared about if it wasn’t for my 2-year-old son, Harley. What type of world do I want him to grow up in, climate change, pollution and the total demise of the plant and eco-system as we know it today- are all directly impacted by our farming of animals for food. We aren’t that far off from a world where oceans become fishless, just ask millions of fisherman worldwide who are coming home with less and less and that is a scary thought.

Humans have directly caused extinction to countless animals species while destroying forests worldwide which actually help us live (think air pollution), which again if you think about it, is just insane. We destroy forests and huge amounts of nature which help clean the air we breathe, to farm animals for us to eat, which have a negative impact on our health so who are we really looking after?

Of course, there is the argument of the farmers, what will they do? How will they be able to provide a living for themselves, communities, families? This debate along with the environment could go on and on, but when it comes down to it, industries adapt and change. Video shops got wiped out when DVD’s came along, DVD’s became almost extinct when Netflix came about and still industries move along, Think electric car industry in only the past 3 years, think companies who have switched to manufacturing plant-based milk (coconut, almond etc) who are now making 10 times as much as they were from selling cows milk. There is always the ability to evolve.

I hope this blog post has given you some more insight, even just adding more vegan options as replacements to your current diet will make a world of difference to your body. Do it for selfish reasons such as your own personal health if you don’t care about the environment, because, just like me, the difference felt is real, and that too can’t be argued!

PS. Don’t forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel HERE and Follow me on Instagram HERE

Matt

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If you’ve been following my journey for a while now you would know that It has been a few years since leaving the gym and weight lifting behind for a new fitness beginning with solely bodyweight training!

Switching to calisthenics was one of the best decisions I’ve made in my life, not just my “fitness” life. It has allowed me to pursue my passion for helping others achieve the best version of themselves, travel the world and meet and connect with like-minded people.  If you’re a new reader or stumbled across me, WELCOME! I hope I can give you value in whatever goals, fitness, health and personal you have set.

Back to the podcast…

In this interview, I get some great questions and speak about some things I have never personally opened up about, a bit more on overcoming cancer, how my mindset shifted and what calisthenics training has really done for my overall level of fitness. My advice to people looking to add more calisthenics to their workouts or make the full switch and never look back (like me and the boys doing the interview!). More muscle, strength, endurance and functional fitness have been achieved all without needing a gym or gym equipment, I speak about injuries I once had and how this all changed for the better when I made the switch.

I’m sure you can take something out of the interview and use it to propel you forward in the right direction.

Have a listen by CLICKING HERE 

It would be great to hear your feedback and thoughts on this and if you would like me to do another one covering a specific topic, reach out and let me know!

Until next time,

Matt

The post Podcast with School of calisthenics appeared first on Matt Fox.

But, what if you want more? What if what you are doing right now is fine, but you know you are worthy of more, you want to challenge yourself, learn something new and create another level of life experiences? Chances are that will require you to push yourself, take a leap of faith and get UNCOMFORTABLE. One of my favorite sayings goes: “If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always gotten” and its right on the money! If you don’t change, things around you are more than likely going to stay the same, I’m not talking about the weather- that changes! I am talking about your life, whats in it and the circumstances around it. The same things will keep happening, you’ll find yourself in the same situations where you might constantly ask yourself, “why me?” and this won’t change until you do.

We are creatures of habit, so we naturally don’t like change, but learning to embrace change, push yourself to change is where the magic happens. Getting out of your comfort zone will lead to amazing experiences. I struggle with doing this almost daily still, as new things arise for me, but if I didn’t get out of my comfort zone originally, I wouldn’t be writing this article today. I remind myself of why I push myself to become uncomfortable and all the positive outcomes that have come with it.

Recently, I took another step outside of my comfort zone by giving a Podcast interview on the WHITE PONY NETWORK. Going onto a podcast and sharing my story was something I have wanted to do for a while but always felt uncomfortable talking about myself and facing some questions I might not have ever answered before publically (or even to myself). Getting asked to come on the show was this opportunity to do something I have wanted to do for a while even if it made me feel uneasy, nervous and UNCOMFORTABLE- that is why I knew I had to do it!

Sharing my story and answering some interesting questions about myself made me think about how I have progressed and overcome some difficult times in my life, in particular, fighting off Cancer at 21/22 years of age and starting a business pursuing my passion to help others achieve maximum health and fitness. The common questions of ;

How do I lose fat?

How do I become better?

How do I get stronger?

How do I become smarter?

All those are answered with the same response- Push yourself, get outside of what is comfortable for you. Learn how to do it, when we are “learning” we are experiencing and taking in something we previously never knew and that in itself gets you out of what is your comfort zone.

If you would like to hear my podcast interview you can CLICK HERE TO LISTEN, it’s a great insight into how I all started and kept moving forward, learning new things and following my passions. You can see the show notes and a brief summary of the interview HERE and it’s also available for free download on the Podcast app under “White Pony Network”.

PS. Another part of getting outside of my comfort zone is to become more involved with YouTube and creating videos and vlogs to share with you guys about my training and fitness philosophy as well as sharing some tips and things I am sure you will find value from.

Please check out and SUBSCRIBE TO MY YOUTUBE CHANNEL BY CLICKING HERE

Until next time.

Matt

The post Getting out of your comfort zone – Podcast with Wes Petit White Pony Network appeared first on Matt Fox.

My name is Matt. I am a husband, new dad, cancer survivor and a fitness lover!

I’m on a mission to help everyday people transform their health and fitness, by sharing my knowledge and experience with people worldwide. My goal is to positively impact and change people’s lives like I have my own! To teach people how to have the body they’ve always wanted, overcome adversity and bring mindfulness into their life.

As a former professional athlete, I was fortunate to travel around the world doing what I loved from the age of 15. From the age of about 6, I was involved in almost every sport there was, from basketball to athletics, swimming to long distance running and everything in between. I loved being on the move and keeping healthy and active – that was my passion.

At the age of 22, I was diagnosed with testicular cancer, requiring an operation to remove the tumor and a round of chemotherapy. Being told you have cancer at any age is obviously a shock and something I wish no one on the planet ever has to be told in their lifetime. However, to a young man in his prime, seemingly healthy and full of confidence, having an operation to remove a testicle can definitely dent your confidence and sense of identity. Digging a hole and never coming out seemed like a good idea for a split second, but I quickly snapped out of it. I wasn’t raised to have negative thoughts. I was competitive – extremely competitive, so I decided to view the diagnosis as a challenge, for me to see this adversity as one of life’s challenges and in turn, teach me to help others see that too…

Mindfulness is defined as A mental state achieved by focusing one’s awareness on the present moment, while calmly acknowledging and accepting one’s feelings, thoughts and bodily sensations.

If it wasn’t for a feeling inside of me that something was wrong, then who knows if I would be telling my story today? The doctor I went to for a check-up told me everything “felt fine” and I was wasting my time wanting to get a referral for an ultrasound. Knowing everything wasn’t “fine’, I persisted and had an ultrasound (against his belief). A few days later the doctor confirmed what I had known myself, through being in touch with my body and recognizing the tiniest details of how I felt. The lump was cancer.

Being diagnosed put a dent in continuing to pursue my career as a professional athlete, something I had worked towards for the best part of 10 years. Identity crisis hit once more. It was all people had ever known me for. What would I do with my life now? There were definitely some dark times, I felt lost and didn’t know what I would now do with my life.

Chemotherapy is a word most people have heard before- it’s mainly associated with fear, death, and baldness. I remember associating it with a painful yet crucial challenge, but not much else. I wasn’t to lose my hair from one session of 6 hours (but I wasn’t going to feel too great) and I was very confident with the fact it wasn’t my time just yet, however, the fear of the unknown was still there. One of the biggest fears was not being able to have children one day, something chemo and testicular cancer greatly diminish.

I have two huge moments from this period in my life which I think will stick with me forever; 1: Sitting in the big armchair with an IV drip in my arm pumping the chemo drugs into me and the burning/fire sensation it gave my body as they do a “flush or blast” for the final moments of the treatment. And 2: jumping on the exercise bike at my friend’s house 2 days after the treatment and lasting barely 2 minutes before I felt like I was going to faint and be sick! These two moments are something I often think about when life seems like it’s hard. The fact there are millions of people out there who have gone/are going through worse than I ever have, help put every day, smaller worries into perspective.

Fast forward a few years where I felt lost but settled, with a regular full-time job in the family business in the building industry. Somewhat happy but not satisfied, this life wasn’t for me, not after everything I had experienced, learned and overcome. I knew I had to share my experiences to help others.

My passion for fitness and health had never left me and throughout this time I still exercised as hard as ever.

Eventually, motivation stalled once again, this time from the same boring gym workouts, wrestling for use of machines and equipment at overcrowded gyms, paying for expensive lock-in contracts and feeling trapped by being constantly indoors. Due to this, my progress and results stalled and I hit a plateau where no matter how much gym work I did, nothing changed.

In January 2016 I married my amazing wife and became a father to a beautiful boy for the first time in November the same year. With a new family, full-time work and studying online, exercise time was limited. I no longer had hours to spend in the gym every day, nor did I want too! Family time, lack of sleep and everyday life gets in the way and exercise can take a back seat.

So…

That’s when I decided to use all the knowledge I had learned through 7 years as a professional athlete plus another 10 years of training to help transform my fitness, to help others do the same with my personal training business. I created the business based on what had become so successful for me – ditching the gym, getting outdoors and working with my own body weight – to give clients complete freedom and independence with their exercise regime. People love it and the results my clients are achieving are nothing short of incredible.

My sense of fulfillment in helping others gives me what I was looking for, a sense of satisfaction and purpose. I needed to reach more people – help others see adversity as something anyone can overcome. Whether it’s from illness or injury, a busy work life or the stresses of parenthood, I designed Bodyweight Built with all this in mind – to be able to help and teach people that there are no limits to creating a healthier life for yourself and those around you through exercise.

In May 2017, I launched my website- www.bodyweightbuilt.com allowing me to reach people worldwide, with the view to helping to transform not only their bodies but their lives as a whole. I offer customized monthly programs, as well as a 12-week body transformation program, 8-week program and a 6-week chest and abs focused program all revolving around bodyweight workouts and not needing any gym equipment. Both require no access to a gym, fancy equipment or machines.

Launching this business right before my 30th birthday recently makes everything I went through feel like a lifetime ago. Cancer and the bouts of depression and identity crisis are no longer front of mind. My business has allowed me to rediscover my purpose and the reason everything that happened – because it was meant to happen. I believe this set me on a path to give back to people all I had learned; through my experiences, from what I overcame and from my health and fitness journey.

Flexibility and freedom are key to anyone adhering to an exercise regime. The easier exercise is to fit into your daily life, the greater chance of success you give yourself! I’ve found that when people are busy, stressed, tired or all of the above – exercise takes a back seat.

This is where Bodyweight Built comes into its own!

Bodyweight Built is a lifestyle – it is functional fitness that helps with everyday movement – no machines stressing your bones and joints with unnatural movements and causing injury – super time-efficient workouts that combine cardio and strength, increase flexibility, challenge any fitness level, dramatically increase your core strength and TORCH FAT FAST! The workouts can be done anywhere, without needing a gym membership, giving you the flexibility and freedom required to succeed in your exercise regime.

I am incredibly proud to be able to share this experience with you; to watch you gain back your time, independence and health and fitness – in addition to a greater sense of overall happiness and confidence in YOURSELF! If you want to bring freedom to your fitness and change the way you’ve viewed exercise please go to www.bodyweightbuilt.com

The post My Story appeared first on Matt Fox.

Getting told I had cancer was, for some reason, not a huge shock. Well before I went to the doctor to get a check-up for a lump I felt in my testicle I knew it was something bad. Even when the doctor said otherwise (he told me I didn’t need a scan and all felt normal), I persisted and wanted an ultrasound to follow this up further. I knew something wasn’t right in my body. I didn’t feel unwell, weak or even sore, but it was a feeling hard to describe. Apart from a small lump which could only be felt in certain positions, the feeling I had was more mental than anything. It was a feeling in the back of my mind of a dull ache or something numb floating in my body. I still can’t to this day fully describe the feeling and some people think I’m crazy when I try to explain it- you may be thinking the same thing now while reading this?!

WHY DID THIS HAPPEN TO ME?

A few months after my 22nd birthday, I had an operation to remove a testicle and a round of chemotherapy treatment, 5-6 hours sitting in a chair with an IV drip in my arm watching this liquid seep into my veins. It sunk in more at that moment. How the hell am I having chemo! It wasn’t so much the physical issues but more so the mental side of things. Testicular cancer is one of the most common cancers in young men. It has a very high survival rate if detected early and confined (as mine was) which gave me a lot of confidence that everything would be ok in that sense. However, I still asked the question as to why me? Had I done something wrong to deserve it? Will I ever be able to have children? (I had to freeze sperm prior to the chemo and already had a very low sperm count) I also did some research and found that Denmark had the highest rate of testicular cancer in the world (I lived there for the better part of 4 years prior to turning 21). Although I don’t think it’s been determined why Denmark has that title, it’s a strange coincidence.

FINDING MY SPARK AGAIN

My career as a professional athlete was on hold, soon to be dead due to the huge loss in motivation I found myself with. I had no interest or desire to travel and compete, living out of a suitcase year round. I wasn’t really sure what I wanted to do. I did know it should be within health and fitness – it was my passion and my life. I was just stuck in what was easy at the time and content with what I had. I was working full time in the family business, involved in the building industry – something that definitely didn’t excite me. It took me years to finally snap out of simply living and being content. I wanted to realise my full potential and help people improve their lives! I knew I had a lot to offer others with the experiences I had been through and the knowledge I had gained in all this time.

I kept my fitness levels at a decent standard, working out at the gym mainly, but the spark I had for exercise wasn’t there anymore. Going to the gym became boring, injuries happened a lot and the passion to improve wasn’t there. I forced myself to go for the sake of it and to some degree I burnt myself out more.

THE SPARK

The spark to re-invent myself, or follow my passion came when I found my driving motivator again. I think without an internal driving factor, we as people are all simply coasting through life and content. What drives you? We all have external drivers, the fear of what others will think, the fear of losing our jobs or not having the nicest clothes, but without the internal – something we do for ourselves – nothing else will flow. My driving factor was my passion for body weight training, the desire to free myself up from the gym, change my routine and allow myself more time to be with my new family. The will to transform my body and get into the shape I had always dreamed of became my pull or force to get up early and go to bed late. I found a spark inside I hadn’t had since I was 18. I could train for hours and never get bored. I constantly thought about getting outdoors and doing my workouts – and still do. It has changed my life – something I am so passionate about and want to help others see the life changing results body weight training can give you. It has allowed me to spend more time at home with my family. It’s allowed me to remain injury free and it’s allowed me to transform my body into something I had never previously achieved, all with the freedom to workout anywhere!

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