Maximizing Effort in Daily Life: Your Most Powerful Health Lever
We know we need to move—a lot—to stay healthy. But our instincts and social norms constantly push us toward the opposite: minimizing effort at every turn. There’s a simple (though far from easy) mindset shift that can turn this around: Consciously seek to maximize effort in your everyday activities. A Real-Life Example: My Commute Each […]
Why does health require so much movement? Or: your body is dependent, not just adapted.
Why does health require so much movement? Why Does Health Require So Much Movement? Last week, we went over the official WHO’s physical activity guidelines, which are much higher than people generally. But why is that? Why does our body require such a high level of physical activity to be healthy? To answer, we must look […]
You’re Not Extreme. The Sedentary Norm Is. And the WHO backs you up.
Ever been called “obsessed” for taking the stairs? Have you ever been called “obsessed” for taking the stairs? Or “extreme” for choosing to walk a short distance instead of driving? I’m sure most of you are familiar with family and friends being subtly (or not so subtly) judgemental about our “obsession” with movement. But are […]
How Your Everyday Clothes Silently Sabotage Your Health (And Why Merino Wool Is the Antidote)
Your clothing is a better predictor of your physical activity than your motivation is. Read that again. We invest time and energy trying to build willpower, but often overlook the most immediate obstacle to moving more: our own wardrobe. Most of our “normal” clothes are quietly working against our biology. They are a form of Castwear: […]
Why are our societal norms so unhealthy?
The Insight: Because they reflect the triumph of our natural instincts We all know the rules of modern life are hurting us — but what’s less obvious is that they’re not random. They’re the fulfilment of instincts we evolved to survive a radically different world. If we want to be healthy in our modern world, […]
Don’t think “normal” clothes. Think castwear.
There is a hidden cost in not having additional clothes categories where we have Activewear. Let’s rectify that.
The Quality vs. Impact Dilemma for Sustainable Brands (and their customers)
How should small sustainably produced makers and brands (and their customers) approach scaling up production?
Do you need a chair to sit on the floor?
Yes it seems silly. No, it might not be. Read on and tell us if you agree!
Stimuli to get across domains and the strategies to get them
As we’ve explored in previous posts, our bodies require specific stimuli to stay healthy, similar to the ones our early Homo Sapiens ancestors experienced through their lifestyle and environment. To better understand and incorporate these stimuli into our modern lives, it’s helpful to classify them into four domains: physical, nutritional, mental, and environmental. The Four […]
Principles for a Foresighted Lifestyle: the Environmental & Mental domains
What are the target stimuli to achieve? Apart from the lack of pollution of all kind of course, here are other stimuli that were part of the environment: Strategies & Principles to adopt Get more connection with nature Spending time in nature has demonstrated benefits, most of them on our mental health, with countless academic […]
Principles for a Foresighted Lifestyle: the Nutritional Domain
What are the target stimuli to achieve? The nutritional stimuli that have shaped our biology can be summarised as: Omnivorous Diet Early Homo sapiens were opportunistic eaters, consuming a wide variety of foods available in their environment. This varied diet included: Nutrient-Dense Foods The foods available to early humans were generally more nutrient-dense than many […]
Principles for a Foresighted Lifestyle: the Physical Domain
First, what are the target stimuli to achieve? We know we need to give our bodies stimuli so they stay healthy and strong. What are they? The physical stimuli needed Our bodies are literally designed to operate in a lifestyle that has high volume of physical activity in general, with a high variety, and varying […]
WHO Guidelines on Physical Activity and Sedentary Behaviour
The WHO guidelines on physical activity and sedentary behavior align perfectly with those recommended for a foresighted lifestyle!
Our societies & norms are also the results of our instincts
In our previous discussions, we’ve explored how our natural instincts and modern social norms work against our health. Now, let’s step back and look at the bigger picture. How did we end up in this situation? The answer might surprise you: our current lifestyle is, in many ways, the product of our instincts’ triumph. The […]
Breaking Free: How Social Norms Limit Our Health and Movement Potential
Our current social norms reinforces the impact of our misguided instincts. We really are up against both as significant obstacles to stay fit and healthy.
Our Natural Instincts are a Major Obstacle to Health & Fitness
Our natural instincts still operate as if we lived in a hostile world of calorie scarcity and (forced) movement abundance. And it’s having dramatic impacts.
Why Our Bodies Need Specific Stimuli to Stay Healthy
Our bodies evolved to require these stimuli to function optimally. When we don’t provide our bodies with these necessary inputs, our health suffers.
The lifestyle & environment of the early Homo Sapiens shaped our anatomy and instincts
Human bodies were shaped to perform the tasks of a very specific lifestyle in a very specific environment. Not for different lifestyles or environments.
The mechanics of evolution: the link between natural selection & health
Our bodies have evolved for a single purpose: reproduce. While we don’t need to retrace the full story of human evolution, understanding its fundamental mechanics is crucial.
Running My First 50k Ultra in Barefoot Sandals: Embracing the Blue Mountains Challenge
When I signed up for the 50k race at Ultra Trail Australia in the Blue Mountains, I was excited to take on a new challenge. With a longest run of 36k under my belt, I knew I was maybe pushing my limits, but I was ready to run the race in my trusted Earthrunners barefoot […]
Ohne Project: Another Fresh Take on Barefoot Sneakers
Another new entrant in the Barefoot Sneakers category comes from Spain. Ohne Project recently funded its Kickstarter over 300% and we understand why: these sneakers are stylish, retro and the production is sustainable at one of the highest standard. They’re definitely listed on Foresighted. Ohne Project’s Approach to Barefoot Footwear Ohne Project entered the barefoot […]
Into the Future: The Mukishoes Journey of Sustainable Barefoot Shoes
Into the Future: The Mukishoes Journey of Sustainable Barefoot Shoes
Your reliable guide to minimalist / barefoot school shoes in Australia
Are you searching for minimalist / barefoot shoes options that match your school’s shoe requirements? We detail the models available in Australia and where to find them.
Complete guide to the best Barefoot Shoes in Australia: all you need to know & where to buy and try
The best barefoot shoes brands and the exhaustive list of where to buy them in Australia. Women, Men & Kids!
Let’s turn Black Friday into Foresighted Friday
Black Friday is a dark day for the planet as we collectively binge-buy things we may not need and throw perfectly good items being replaced long before they reach their end of life. As an example, consider that before the pandemic, in 2019, 24.3 billion pairs of shoes were produced in a single year, with […]
Mark Wildman’s cool down routine
Mark Wildman’s Youtube channel is a goldmine of fantastic advice on all things strength and mobility. His tutorials for Kettlebell and Club work are some of the best (if not the best) you can find, and he’s producing top quality content daily for free. He’s a very nice guy to boot… One thing we can […]
Mindset shift: consciously seek and relish physical efforts
Our bodies have evolved in an energy-scarce environment and our instinct and physiology are geared towards conserving as much energy as possible, which make us expend the least amount of effort each time we do a physical task. That was adapted to our biological needs when we had to do a lot of physical activity […]
Become invulnerable to social awkwardness
We’re social animals whose instincts value immensely social recognition. Being rejected from your nomadic hunter-gatherer group in the past essentially meant death, so evolution selected us to value social conformity. Unfortunately, conformity in our modern western societies also means poor general health and poor physical and mental capabilities. So we have to become comfortable with […]
Movnat®: the perfect fitness practice when you have kids?
When you have kids, your life changes in many ways, some universal and some specific to your family and lifestyle. Among the changes that seem universal though, are the following two: For both reasons, Movnat (primer here) becomes even more attractive as a fitness practice if you are a parent because it allows you to […]
Why is Movnat® one of the best training methods to develop Mental Toughness?
Mental Toughness (MT), defined in detail here, is one of the main benefits of training within the Foresighted Fitness System because the Movnat Method is incredibly useful in developing and improving it. Mental Toughness defines a combination of being results-driven, persistent and resilient. You can readily see how that mental skillset is going to be […]
Developing Mental Toughness
Mental Toughness is very powerful, as illustrated by its central place in Special Operations Forces (SpecOps) training, but is often misunderstood for persistence, which is only a part of it. It forms the backbone of what it takes for US Navy Seals (USNS) candidates to go through the BUD/s selection course, arguably the most intense […]
The Mental Benefits you get from Natural Movement
Mental capabilities you can use in your life By adopting a more Foresighted lifestyle, you will become more resourceful, results-driven, tough, adaptable, resilient, efficient, innovative, creative and confident. Yes, all that. It’s hard to see how that would fail to improve your performance at work or academically, and even in your personal relationships. Mental Toughness […]
A short primer on Movnat®, its benefits & advantages as a fitness practice
What is Movnat? Movnat is a fitness training method and physical education system that was developed over 12 years ago by Erwan Le Corre and which has grown exponentially since then. Below is the 2008 video that first popularized his ideas: the workout the world forgot. A repertoire of movement based on evolutionary biology Movnat […]
A foresighted lifestyle : taking advantage of progress while accounting for our human nature
Since the human body requires many of the stimuli it naturally got through the hunter-gatherer lifestyle of our early Homo Sapiens ancestors to simply stay healthy, and since our typical modern lifestyle doesn’t provide it with enough of them, what should be our approach? We’re not advocating to go back to a hunter-gatherer lifestyle, but […]
Our modern lifestyle: the victory of our natural instincts over our biological needs
Our current modern lifestyle is making us sick That our current modern lifestyle is making us sick is becoming less and less debated. The only question is how sick and how much of it is preventable through lifestyle change. It’s well known that the health trends in our modern societies are more negative than positive. […]
Our specie, Homo Sapiens, appeared around 300.000 ago. What are the implications for our health today?
Evolution is a game of reproduction, which is in turn a game of health Every single human being on the planet today belongs to the animal specie named Homo Sapiens, which diverged from the other Homo species around 300.000 years ago. Our body is, for all intent and purposes, essentially the same as the one […]
Is “natural” always beneficial for our health?
What is natural for us, as Homo Sapiens? And is everything natural automatically beneficial for our health? These two questions are key to adjusting our lifestyle to improve our health. What’s natural for us? To answer the first one, we need to go back to the time Homo Sapiens diverged from the other species in […]
Reframe your definition of training: you’ll train more and more effectively
How do you define fitness training? This is a question worth asking yourself as it is almost certainly limiting the total volume (and the quality) of your training. Most people view training as either working out or specific sports training. That’s it, there isn’t much to it. And I get it, we’re encouraged to view […]
How to prepare and train for an OCR with the Movnat® method?
If you’re planning (or envisioning) to run an obstacle course race in the near future, you have to decide on a preparation plan. There are countless plans and strategies out there but I want to focus specifically on examining if the Movnat method could improve your overall preparation and what are some of the benefits […]
Add intensity to your physical activity with contextual visualization
One crucial aspect of maximizing training performance is to maximize the Volume and Intensity of your workout (without compromising recovery). In plain English, you should train past your self-perceived limits and push through the moment when you think you cannot go any further. Because in fact you can. Let’s see how. Contextual visualization versus rehearsal […]
Know the incredible value of training in non-fitness environments
Training or working out is generally seen as an activity that should be done in a gym, at an outdoor fitness station or class, or at home. And it should be done with the appropriate fitness equipment, otherwise it’s not “real” training. In other words, it should be done in an “appropriate” location with the […]
Don’t train for specific movements, train for broad physical capabilities
Most people have training goals in the form of: achieve my first pull-up or reach 10 reps of perfect form pull-ups achieve my first muscle or reach 3 reps in a row etc… The problem with this approach is that it automatically limits your training volume because you try to get training time that will […]
Daily physical activities of the evolutionary lifestyle
If we are to try and get our bodies some of the physical stimuli they had through an evolutionary lifestyle, then we need to understand in a quite detailed way how our ancestors moved. I have tried to summarize below the most salient features, based on a numerous sources. I have indicated at the end […]
Training many times in small amount of time throughout the day is as beneficial as a 1h workout
One of the most limiting beliefs for most people is that they need to do a 1h workout session to get significant fitness results, and of course 1h of dedicated time to fitness training is very difficult to find, so most end up doing nothing. But if you seize all the opportunities to get some […]
Get more physical activity with Simultaneous Training
Similar to Opportunistic Training, Simultaneous Training (ST) is a training type that doesn’t require dedicated training time in your schedule, since you do it while doing other activities. Mastering ST is a very powerful way to actually increase your training volume even while trying to cope with a Frankenstein schedule. There are 3 main ways to get […]
Train more with Opportunistic Training
Opportunistic Training (OT) is the training type that is closest to your typical “gym workout time” and refers to those occasions where you do have time to train for more than 10 mins in an uninterrupted block of time. What you don’t have, and what distinguishes OT from normal structured training, is the possibility to plan […]