"Take care of your body. It's the only place you have to live." — Jim Rohn (Jim Rohn was an American entrepreneur and author whose work on personal development influenced a generation of writers and coaches, including Tony Robbins. He died in 2009.) I've read two key books on nutrition: The Magic Pill by Johann Hari and Ultra-Processed People by Dr Chris van Tulleken. Both are must-reads, and both say a similar thing: the obesity epidemic we're experiencing in the west is due to processed food in our diets. There's significant scientific evidence that exercise does little compared to a healthy diet for losing weight. This hit home for me, so I decided to try it. For a month I ate only steak and eggs, and the weight flew off me. The more I investigated it, it wasn't due to the carnivore diet, it was due to the lack of processed food. I want to be clear: I don't recommend the carnivore diet. Carbohydrates are the body's primary fuel source and cutting them out entirely isn't sustainable or necessary. What made the difference was removing processed food, not removing carbs. This changed my outlook completely. Now I aim for 80% of my diet to be made up of one-ingredient foods. There are days when you must have that Indian takeaway, or the alluring smell of Gregg's steak bake draws you into a shop, but overall, aim for 80% single ingredients: meat, fish, butter, cream, cheese, eggs, vegetables, and fruit. Don't be drawn in by the myth that fats are unhealthy. The corporate demonisation of fat is one of the most successful marketing campaigns in modern history. When flawed research in the 1970s suggested saturated fat caused heart disease, the food industry didn't just capitalise on the fear, they amplified it. Cereal giants like Kellogg's led the charge to reframe breakfast from eggs and bacon to bowls of processed grains. They funded studies that conveniently favoured their high-carb products whilst positioning themselves as the healthy alternative. These companies poured millions into marketing campaigns that painted fat as the dietary villain, plastering "heart-healthy" and "low-fat" across packets of sugar-laden flakes and loops. The result? A multi-billion-pound industry built on convincing generations that processed corn with added vitamins was somehow healthier than the eggs humans had eaten for millennia.

The day after I lost my job, I went to a 7am Jiu-Jitsu class. I was terrible. Heavy, slow, uncoordinated. My body moved but my mind was underwater. I came home, collapsed onto the settee, and that old familiar weight settled back over me. That specific kind of darkness, not dramatic, just numbing, crept in around the edges. It was as if my two year depression had been tracking me like a bloodhound. It had found my new address and settled in. I didn't want to move. Not even to take my little dog out. I just sat there. Hours passed. Ten hours later I walked through the front door with the dog. Twenty minutes. But I had done it. How? It wasn't motivation. It wasn't some breakthrough moment. It was just a task. One small task I had set myself when I was feeling okay and saved for when I wasn't. Leave instructions for your future self. Not big ones. Nothing ambitious. Ten small things, each doable in ten minutes or less. Nothing that requires you to leave the bed if that's where you're stuck. Some days you won't shower. Won't reply to messages. Won't eat properly. But maybe you'll tap through a few French phrases. Solve a chess puzzle. Write three lines nobody will ever read. You'll have done something. There's a strange little spark that comes from finishing even the smallest thing. It doesn't fix anything. But it interrupts the slide. I never thought I'd walk the dog that day. But I did.

In 2016 I worked for someone who was unpredictable in a way that made every day feel uncertain. I never quite knew what version of him I was going to get. I started keeping a record of conversations and decisions so I would have something to refer back to if anything became disputed later. I did not want to keep a paper diary because anyone could read it and I would probably have lost it anyway, so I used an app instead. At first it was just protection. Later it became something else entirely. When I walked out of that job due to my boss being too much for too long, the journal mattered. I had a record. More importantly, I had a timeline. After that I began using it differently. I started noticing patterns in my mood. I could see what triggered difficult periods and what helped me recover from them. Off an on for 10 years and everyday for the last 3 years. It has become one of the most useful habits I have. Journaling is not complicated. It is just a place to put things when they are too noisy to keep in your head. Research supports this. Expressive writing has been linked with reductions in symptoms of anxiety and depression in multiple studies, including work published in the Journal of Affective Disorders examining structured writing exercises over several weeks. Example review evidence: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15094266/ Getting Things Out of Your Head Writing things down changes how they sit in your mind. Thoughts that feel overwhelming when they stay internal often become clearer once they are on the page. They stop looping in the same way. You can look at them instead of being inside them. It does not need to be structured. It does not need to make sense to anyone else. It just needs to be honest. Spotting Patterns Over time a journal becomes a record. You start seeing what affects your mood. Certain conversations. Certain environments. Sleep. Exercise. Stress. Isolation. Digital mood tracking research suggests that people who record emotional patterns are more likely to adjust behaviour in ways that support mental health.

In 2003, I went to my first Jujitsu class. I had been playing rugby for 15 years as a second row. My job was either to smash into people with the ball in my hands or smash people who had the ball in theirs. Not exactly a role that prioritised flexibility. At the time, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu had not reached my area yet, so I started with traditional Jujitsu. I was bigger and stronger than most of my training partners and enjoyed the physical side of sparring, but I kept losing matches because I was so stiff. My joints felt like boards. Even light submission pressure forced me to tap. It was frustrating. Then I came across a book called Real Men Do Yoga by John Capouya. If you think yoga is only for the ultra spiritual or not for men, this book makes a strong case otherwise. Through interviews with professional athletes and practical routines, it explains how yoga improves strength, flexibility, endurance, and focus. It also helps prevent injuries and manage stress. If you train in any sport, it is worth reading. I genuinely enjoyed yoga from the start. I had done stretching in rugby before, but yoga felt different. Deeper. At first I struggled because I was so stiff, but my flexibility improved faster than it ever had with traditional training. My strength improved because I could move through a better range. My recovery improved. My breathing improved. But the biggest change was mental. The Power of the Present Moment For years I dismissed mindfulness as nonsense. Learning to stay present turned out to be one of the most useful skills I have ever learned. Someone once explained meditation to me like this. Imagine you are standing beside a busy road. The cars are your thoughts. Your job is not to stop the traffic. Your job is to watch it pass. When you try to control your thoughts, it is like stepping into the road. Everything gets louder and more chaotic. Meditation is not about having no thoughts. It is about not getting pulled along by them. The same applies in everyday life. At work. In sport. During stressful moments.

In The 33 Strategies of War, Robert Greene tells the story of an ancient warrior who trained his soldiers by taking them out to sea and forcing them to fight in deep water. The lesson was simple. Learn to be comfortable with drowning. Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (BJJ) is a lot like that. It constantly puts you in situations where you feel like you are drowning. Pinned under someone heavier. Caught in a choke. Exhausted but still expected to move.At first you panic. Every instinct tells you to thrash and fight your way out. But the more you struggle, the worse it gets. Then something shifts. You stop panicking. You slow your breathing. You think. And suddenly you realise that if you relax, you can survive. You can find an escape. Eventually you can even learn to enjoy the chaos. That is why BJJ is more than just a sport. It is a system for dealing with pressure, both on the mats and in life. It teaches you to stay calm when things feel overwhelming. A Community of Weirdos BJJ attracts a particular kind of person. It is not a mainstream sport, and that is part of its charm. You will meet computer programmers. Bartenders. Ex military. Artists. People who would never cross paths anywhere else. There are no flashy uniforms. No big money prizes. Just a bunch of people trying to strangle each other and laughing about it afterwards. To outsiders it probably looks ridiculous. Try explaining to someone that you spend your evenings letting people sit on your chest and twist your joints the wrong way. You will get some strange looks. But inside the gym it feels different. For many people it becomes a sanctuary. One of the few places where ego disappears quickly. Getting Your Ego Smashed If you think you are strong, BJJ will humble you. If you think you are fast, it will slow you down. It does not matter how big, fit, or young you are. On the mats, technique beats everything. In your first year you will lose. A lot. You will be dominated by people half your size. You will tap constantly. Sometimes to the same move again and again.