SO this week the major health news has been the classification by the IARC (part of WHO) of processed meat as a grade 1 carcinogen, meaning that it causes cancer and the classification of red meat as grade 2, meaning it potentially causes cancer. Now I’ve covered this on my social media feeds by sharing relevant explanations but felt it was worth covering here too.
To keep it simple these are the points we need to consider:

• The IARC classification system isn’t based on strength of risk, rather (and somewhat confusingly), strength of evidence. The reason that processed meat is classified next to smoking and asbestos is due to available data on the relationship between these and cancer (which we can argue about later). The media outlets that are running headlines saying processed meat is as dangerous as smoking are missing the point entirely. Just to give some perspective, sunlight is also classified as a class 1 carcinogen….

 

• This classification is based on a large meta-analysis of observational studies. This is important. The stories about eating 50g extra red meat a day increasing risk of colo-rectal cancer by 18% don’t understand the science. Unless you perform an intervention study where you actually feed people that extra 50g, control other variables, and compare to a control group over time you can’t make the claim. This is data from studies where individuals are asked to complete a food frequency questionnaire and are then followed for a period of time. Can you remember what you ate last week? What about last year? Safe to say the FFQs aren’t particularly reliable.

 

• We next need to consider what ‘processed meat’ actually means. In studies such as this pizza, sausage rolls, bacon sandwiches, pasties etc. are all classed as processed meat. This data isn’t based on health conscious people such as you & I having some pastured bacon without the bap for breakfast or some deli meat as a snack, instead it covers the carb and veg oil heavy processed food which we all know isn’t good for us.

 

• Now,  let’s go back to our old friends, absolute and relative risk. The media, as ever, reported 18% increased likelihood of cancer, which is the relative risk. If we take some figures on colorectal cancer risk from Cancer Research UK we can see, that in 2011, the risk of CRC was 43 in 100,000. Assuming the accuracy of the WHO data, if we were to eat 50g of processed/red meat a day this absolute risk would go up to 51 in 100,000. That’s an extra 8 incidences in 100,000. Not exactly terrifying is it? Can you see why we need to ignore relative risk on these things!

 

• And finally… Correlation vs causation. Unless you perform a randomised control trial on something you can’t even enter a conversation about causality. This is correlational data. All it tells us is that people who eat more processed meat seem to have a (very slightly) higher incidence of CRC. It doesn’t tell us that the meat causes CRC. If we keep our heads and consider this we shouldn’t be surprised. Where do we think the average person is eating their processed meat? Greggs or an independent local deli?

 
So to summarise. This is a classification based on strength of evidence, not strength of risk. It is weak, observational data, that isn’t able to comment on causality. The correlational increase demonstrated is tiny considering absolute risk. And it fails to take into account the differences between manufactured gunk and traditionally cured ‘processed’ meats.
So if you, like me, eat a wholefoods based, lower carb diet. You exercise, sleep well and limit classic ‘unhealthy’ lifestyle behaviours then you can pretty much ignore this report and carry on as you were. Nice to know eh.

I have always been an advocate of setting goals and have discussed doing so at length on this blog. I use goals, particularly short term ones, all the time and find them very helpful, especially with athletic or body composition endeavours. From a career perspective, however, I have always struggled to set goals. Whilst I know what I enjoy doing and what I’m good at doing there isn’t one defined career path, e.g. Doctor, that I could structure a goal around – if I don’t know the desired end goal how can I work towards it? This is something I’ve been mulling over for a while and it has lead me to the concept of using systems instead of goals.

Defining a system vs a goal is the process of working out what vehicle is going to propel you forwards and increase your odds of being successful as opposed to defining exactly what it is you want to achieve. So, for example, if you wanted to lose weight you could set the goal of losing 10lbs in 2 months or you could use a systems approach of educating yourself on healthy food choices. In this instance the system is substituting knowledge for willpower and, as we all know, willpower is always a poor bet for us.

Whilst setting a goal defines a clear outcome to work towards, critics point out that it leaves you in a state of near constant failure – you strive towards a goal and when you get there set another (This is something I’ve discussed elsewhere on the blog, describing success as fleeting and transitory, which may be part of its appeal).What’s more you may miss out on things better than your goal as you weren’t aware of it. Systems on the other hand can be immensely positive as you celebrate small win after small win and they open you to opportunities as you aren’t chasing one defined thing, instead your general progress puts you in the frame for success in areas you may have not considered if you were setting a goal.

This description really hit it home for me as I realised that so many of my career jumps have come from areas that I didn’t expect and couldn’t have predicted, instead of setting a goal of reaching certain positions, general improvements in my ability, visibility and network afforded me larger opportunities. This was a great revelation as it confirmed that I had been operating with an accidental systems approach in my career for a while now.
Regular readers may remember my post on ‘Staying in Motion’ where I actually ended up laying out a reasonable description of a systems approach, even if I didn’t realise it at the time. On reading around the systems concept I came across an implementation idea that fits nicely with this theme, known as ‘no zero days’. This is essentially the commitment to doing something, no matter how small, every single day which will move you forwards in your development. This could be as simple as one pull up or one line of writing but will typically turn into a full gym session or chapter. I love this idea and will be implementing it from here on in. I encourage you to do likewise.

So how to pull all this together? Am I saying we should all abandon our goals and just use systems from now on? Not at all, if you have a distinct goal then define it and work towards it, where I see systems as having huge potential is where you know your purpose and your strengths but aren’t clear yet on how to apply them. Here you can define a system for improving your crafts and in doing so increase your chances of successes down the line. I also see no reason why the two can’t work in harmony, define a goal and create a system to get you there. Move towards that goal whilst being aware of other opportunities, redefine goals as you go and stay open minded. Progress is rarely a straight line!
Remember a systems approach is just moving you from a place of low odds to a place of high odds and this process requires daily dedication. So define your system and commit to no zero days. I’m sure you’ll be amazed by how ‘lucky’ you start getting.

If you’d like to read more on the systems approach then have a look at the following:

• http://blog.dilbert.com/post/102964992706/goals-vs-systems

• http://jamesclear.com/goals-systems

It’s been a little quiet on the Breed Blog recently. A combination of a hectic travel schedule with work and battling some concussion symptoms from rugby has seen me have to take my foot off the gas a little, both with my writing and training. As ever I’ve been trying to stay reflective and learn something from what would otherwise be a frustrating experience and this has nicely teed up today’s topic of acceptance.
Acceptance is an area that I find myself doing a lot of work on in 1-1 situations and there are two components I regularly look at which I will cover today. The first piece is understanding, that is understanding where our emotions are coming from and why, this allows us to move out of reactivity and gives us perspective over our natural emotional reaction. The second piece is about sitting with these emotions and being conscious of where you are at and whether that is a useful place for you.

If you’ve read any of Steve Peter’s ‘Chimp Paradox’ work or maybe any evolutionary psychology then you may be familiar with the first aspect. The idea, in its simplest form, is that we, as humans, have evolved with a brain designed to survive in situations that we are now unlikely to find ourselves in. Looking at our brain we have the ‘new’ cortex that gives us our human qualities, this sits above the ‘old’ brain and brainstem. This ‘old’ brain is where our innate drives live and our ‘fight, flight, freeze’ responses. Now whilst this hugely oversimplified description of our brain may be interesting to know, what does it tell us about acceptance? The crux of this is that we are still basic creatures under the ‘humanness’ and this inner chimp often dominates our interactions in life without us realising it. If someone cuts you up in traffic what do you do? Chances are you wave some gestures in their direction with a few choice words. Ask your passenger what you look like in this situation and they’ll help you realise where the chimp idea comes from. Acceptance comes into this as we need to have the knowledge that we, in certain situations will have a natural reaction to behave based on our drives and our fight, flight, freeze responses. If we battle this then we will quickly find ourself in internal strife. These ‘old brain’ mechanisms are the root of our survival as a species, they are very strong and you cannot outwit them with will. Instead you need to understand and accept where these are coming from, why they were once useful and why they perhaps aren’t here.

This understanding piece creates perspective for us. We can view those unhelpful responses through a different lens, separating ourselves from them and moving us out of reactivity. Perspective is at the heart of managing and shaping our thinking.

The next layer builds upon this perspective by asking you to sit with these emotions, naming them, working out why they are there and then whether they are useful for you. In many Eastern practices you hear this piece of acceptance being referred to as courageous. This is because it isn’t easy to sit with emotions, it is much much easier to be the chimp, throw your hands in the air and be angry that the world is against you. Instead what is more helpful is to pause and recognise the emotion, it can be really powerful here to actually name it in the 3rd person, for example ‘Jamie is angry’. This immediately pulls you out of reactivity and gives you perspective. From here you can now ask the question ‘Why?’ It may be that it is just a case of someone aggravating your chimp as we’ve discussed above, however, the chances are that there is something else going on which you can explore. Understanding the ‘why’ behind your emotion gives you the opportunity to find a solution. This sounds simple but requires effort and courage. A great motivator for this is, using your perspective, to ask yourself ‘what is most useful for me here?’ Considering things in this light it is unlikely that the emotional response will come out on top as so many of these are self-defeating.

Consider the example from earlier about being cut up in traffic, if you get angry who does that actually damage? The person that cut you up has driven off, none the wiser, where as you are sat stewing in your car and then have that emotional baggage which you will likely unleash somewhere else, damaging yourself and others you care for. Far better, instead, to recognise that it’s ok to have an emotional reaction, your inner chimp felt threatened by the other drivers behaviour, you can then name the emotion and explore where it came from, chances are that, as a human, you didn’t like it as it didn’t feel fair. However you can then remind yourself that one of the unfortunate truths of life is that it isn’t fair. Recognising this you can then ask ‘what is useful for me here?’ and hopefully decide that acceptance rather than anger is the best option.

Whilst this may sound a convoluted process it can quickly become 2nd nature with a little application and practice. I don’t think I am overselling acceptance by describing it as one of the most transformative mental habits you can develop. I urge you to start applying it to your life and recognise the benefits that come with it.

Please share your thoughts and experiences in the comments below. Whilst I have based the above around application to daily living I hope the athletes amongst you can recognise the potential for application in a sports psychology context.

If you’d like to read further (and better) on this subject then have a look at the following resources:

• Steve Peters: The Chimp Paradox

• Russ Harris: The Happiness Trap

• Tara Brach: Radical Acceptance

I always find it amusing when certain new ideas seem to find you at the moments you need them. The topic of today’s post is a prime example of this. I was driving back from a training session where I had narrowly held onto my place in the side that I am now player coach at. This was not a situation I envisaged when dropping down from the Championship into the national leagues yet here I was, a couple of below average performances followed by a poor one had put serious questions over my place in the team. My reaction to the conversations that followed this were typical and familiar, having observed them many times before, I let my inner chimp vent somewhat, whilst it spouted excuses and fabricated explanations, and then tried to box it with some logic, saving the energy for more productive uses later in the week. I then sought distraction strategies and plugged in the latest Tim Ferriss podcast featuring Navy Seal Jocko Willink, it was here that I came across the idea of ‘extreme ownership’ and put it to work.


The context that Jocko introduced this was that in command meetings with the General (I’m likely using the wrong terminology but it shouldn’t matter), each of the Seal team leaders were asked what they needed, typical answers were new pieces of equipment or improvements in technology, Jocko’s answer was “we’re good Sir”. He never asked for anything in these sessions, instead taking ownership of what his team needed and sorting it himself. As he explained this served a few purposes, first a principle that I’ve discussed at length in past posts which is ‘control the controllables’, that is tick the boxes that you can tick before asking others to do it for you, second that it develops you as an individual – taking on new challenges rather than deferring to others and finally that if you genuinely do need something, because you never ask, you will tend to get it, and fast.


Whilst the use of this approach is clear in a military setting I hope that you are starting to think of some ways that you can apply it in your own civilian life. For my situation it really struck a chord, my natural reaction would be to offer excuses, I’m carrying knocks for sure but show me a rugby player who isn’t, or to blame the transition period between full time and part time sport but then that doesn’t excuse individual errors. Instead I chose to take on this idea of extreme ownership, when asked about my performances I’ve simply responded that I’ve not been good enough and I’m working on it.

Whilst this approach seems a little daunting to take on I’ve found (and it’s still early days) that it is actually empowering, you are essentially taking control of your own world and, rather than hiding behind the shitty little excuses we all tell each other all the time, it forces you to front up to your reality, see it for what it is and make the appropriate changes. I’ll often feel stiff and tight and the chimp wants to whinge about this, extreme ownership makes me ask myself what I’ve done about. Can I be honest with myself and say that I’ve done enough mobility exercises to change that situation? The answer is typically no the vast majority of the time so I’m challenged get after it and make the changes.

What all this essentially boils down to is having an internal locus of control and taking charge of your own life. It seems straightforward but how many of us actually do it? I hope that me sharing a personal example here has helped bring it home a little. Our natural reaction as humans is seemingly to project blame outwards when something doesn’t turn out as hoped, if more of us can take extreme ownership then we will likely get the outcomes we want in the future. Next time you feel the blame monkey getting involved think like the Navy Seal, say “we’re good” and start taking extreme ownership of your world.