"People too tired to lead healthier lifestyles, UK survey finds" - Fatties make excuses

Lots of people are making excuses about why Bongs aren't living healthier lives. Long covid, depression, gyms are scary, running is too expensive, healthy food is too expensive.

I absolutely live a healthier lifestyle now. In the Spring and Summer months I take my lunch to the park and once I am done, have a walk around the park and then back home. In the winter months I don't tend to go out for lunch as much but working from home allows me to meal prep, exercise around work commitments and that sort of thing. On the financial side, WFH has freed up a lot of time & money I would have normally spent on commuting which can be redirected to buying better quality, healthier food and with more time available to me, to prepare that food.There is a mountain of other things I could say but I think I have made my point.

No wonder the government is vehement about returning to the work place. A fit, healthy and happy populate is hard to brainwash and control

Stupid comment. An unhealthy population is one that cannot work, pay taxes, or grow the economy.

STV last night was trying to frame people working from home is causing more long term sick. I laughed at loud so many times. Show a graph of long term sick increasing over the pandemic. Must be because working from home apparently. They even after the entire segment threw an off hand comment of "or it might be that people have to wait longer for medical care" Yeha right on STV must be working from home that's causing increased sickness. Not the global pandemic or the impact that and the tories have had ok healthcare.

They really don't want to talk about the consequences of long covid.

What consequences

100% the opposite for me. I've gained so much weight and am doing so much less exercise since WFH. It has its advantages absolutely, and they outweigh the disadvantages largely, but for physical health its worse.

Only if you let it.

Well sure. Exercise is still possible. But you're not forced into it the way you are with going to work.

In other words, it's a you problem, not a work from home problem.

No?

If you have to walk a mile then you're walking a mile. No getting out of it.

If you don't have to walk a mile then you have to make an active choice to do so. Its extra on top of the bare basics of living your life.

"If you have to walk a mile then you're walking a mile. No getting out of it."

Yeah so you are actively making the choice not to exercise using the time you save when WFH. That is undeniably on you.

"If you don't have to walk a mile then you have to make an active choice to do so."

That is usually how it goes yes, if you want to be healthy then you have to make those choices. If you don't make healthy choices then that is on you, that isn't WFH forcing you out of healthy living.

Another person who doesn't understand basic psychology here. Having to do something tends to make for a habit that is far easier to keep than choosing to do it.

Yes. You could choose to go for a half hour walk in the morning anyway. But do you seriously think everyone will keep that up as well as if they had to do it to get to work?

What do you mean I have to make an effort

“It’s the question many of us ask ourselves: why don’t I exercise more, eat better food and generally lead a healthier lifestyle?” And the answer simply is : I’m working all hours god sends to combat raging inflation leaving no time nor energy for it. That and the fact that eating good quality food is too expensive.

Do you believe the attitude of 'blame everything except myself' is an issue?

There's only so much one's self can do.

One could run for 20 minutes 2 or 3 times a week though right?

Most people don't though.

In my office there are loads of fat people who are eating takeaways multiple nights a week and driving 20 mins to work when they could bike it in 25.

Better on physical and mental health, better on the wallet and better on the environment. I guarantee you people crying on reddit about the same thing will be in the same situation and don't want to improve things themselves.

It just seems so futile and cruel to look at something that clearly affects the majority of people, statistically, and instead of saying "WHY do people not eat better and exercise more--what are the deep underlying reasons that this happens?", just taking an attitude (as many do) of "this is a moral failing and these are less worthy people."

You can say "just eat healthier and exercise" all day long, but the fact is that for most people that won't change a darn thing. So asking questions about why, with compassion and curiosity rather than judgement, is essential to finding out what it is we CAN change.

Honestly, at the very deepest level, the answer is likely to be that we are still animals, beholden to instincts and programming, and humans aren't programmed for the lifestyle of abundance and lack of necessary movement that we have today. People are following deeply ingrained instincts and desires inherited from a time when those made sense. You can't just magic that away by informing people that it's bad. People KNOW that. Some people are better at overcoming it then others, but there are a massive number of factors that are going to make people revert to those instincts because doing what our brains are programmed to want to do feels good. People who are depressed are going to seek what feels good because it staves off the dark feelings a bit. People who are tired are going to seek what feels good because they don't have the energy to hold out. People who have adhd are going to seek what feels good because it compensates for what their brains are not giving them. So on and so on. Looking at it from the perspective of "these people need to shape up and get better habits" is the wrong approach. How do we empower people to overcome these habits ingrained from millennia of evolution is a better question to ask, though it's a really fricking difficult one without simple answers.

If you won't help yourself the don't expect help from others.

Kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy. It is easier to start a healthier lifestyle when you are better rested, a healthier lifestyle helps you feel better rested and more motivated to maintain healthier habits. It does not help that there is a lot of advice and a lot of people touting their ways of doing things. Trying to find out what works for you and trying to separate the fact from the fiction takes a lot of mental energy in itself. No wonder people look into it and give up before doing anything.

Also people are poorer and there us less out there. My local pool have been closed if you enjoy swimming it's 30 min drive to next one now so that is 2 hours out of your day so you don't bother. My local gym went up from £25 to £45 in space of 2 years. Etc. As options are more limited then you bother less and less

A lot of parks have free outdoor gyms, all you really need are pullup bars, dip bars and a set of resitance bands and you can do so many exercises. Here's a map of outdoor calesthenic parks in the UK. Maybe there's one near you.

The weather in the UK is too crap to exercise outdoors

If you're always looking for excuses not to exercise, you'll always find one

Over 10 years of jiujitsu and lifting since I was 21, I’m not making excuses, I’m just not doing chin ups in January in some random park. You do you though.

Sounds like you can afford access to a gym. If you couldn't, would you sit on your fat arse complaining, or make the most of a bad situation?

I’d make excuses, ain’t no way I’m getting mistaken for some guy doing parkour because I’m swinging about on bits of kit in the park.

You can do this at home too. Once it gets warmer then it's no problem.

Working out from home is hard to get motivated and in the summer it’s too ‘ot

Do you have a book of excuses for this, or what?

There's also this exchange that I can't be bothered to format where a poor copes that they can't run because running shoes are too expensive

And this one where some guy complains gyms are too scary