Activity 1.1: Where Are You On Your Health Journey Right Now? Self- Assessment and Analysis

Before we start your journey, it's important to assess your current status by checking in with your current food intake, exercise program, and daily routine. Complete the following questionnaire so you can choose the best plan of action to reach your goals right now.

Name: Date:
Gender: Age: DOB:
Job title: Work hours per day (average):
Livingarrangement:
Health issues:
Height: Weight: BMI (body mass index): Body fat
percentage:

Waist girth (measure in line with your belly button, using a measuring tape):

Hip girth (measure in line with the widest part of your butt, using a measuring tape):

Waist-to-hip ratio (waist girth divided by hip girth):

Goal: fat loss / improve energy / gain muscle (Circle one only.)

Need help with deciding which step of the journey you're currently on? Think of it as a step-by-step process. If you currently have any excess fat mass you'd like to shift, start with fat loss. If your body composition (defined here as muscle-to-fat ratio) is healthy and where you want it to be, your focus should be to improve energy. And if you're a string bean, struggling to put on weight/muscle or you train at a high volume due to being an athlete, you're probably looking to gain muscle as your main focus right now. Note: eating this way should improve energy regardless after a few weeks but if you have another focus right now, make that the main focus as your energy will improve as a by-product.

Goal weight circumference, and/or body fat percentage?

If you're not sure, use the guidance in the analysis section to help you with setting realistic and health-related goals. We encourage you to focus less on aesthetics (what you looks like) and more on your health (how you feel and your health markers).

Do you currently prepare/cook any meals at home and take them to work/out with you? Yes / No

Do you have any known food allergies/ intolerances? Yes / No

If yes, explain:

Do you eat regular meals throughout the day? Yes / No

Have you made any changes to more healthful choices in the last month? Yes / No

Are you ready to make change to commit to your health? Yes / No

How to analyse your answers

If your job is sedentary, are you taking regular standing breaks to walk around the office and get some fresh air?

If you work more than eight hours a day, are you taking regular breaks to eat balanced nutritious meals and drink plenty of water?

Do you have access to a fully functioning kitchen within your living arrangements? And are you in complete control of what you eat? In other words, do you cook the food or is someone cooking for you? If someone is cooking for you, is he or she open to cooking something different?

Health issues may require you to work more closely with an allied health professional, such as a dietitian, nutritionist, naturopath, or functional medicine doctor.

BMI (body mass index)

Don't use BMI as the be-all and end-all. It's best to use this along with other health measures and markers because it doesn't take into consideration your body composition (again that is, your muscle-to-fat ratio). To calculate your BMI, take your total body weight in kilograms (for example, 65 kg), divided by your height in metres squared (for example, 1.63 × 1.63). So for this example, BMI = 65 / (1.63 × 1.63) = 65 / 2.66 = 24.4.

The healthy range for BMI is considered to be between 20 and 25, with anything less than 20 considered underweight and anything greater than 25 being into the overweight/ obese realm. Now, my opinion is that BMI cannot be taken as a stand-alone measure of health because, during the course of my time working in the health and fitness industry, I have seen healthy people with a BMI greater than 25 due to the high level of muscle they have. This means that BMI should not be the only measure used. BMI used in conjunction with waist and hip circumference measurements are essential in determining whether you're in the healthy range or not. Please see the next few sections for more information on how to assess these circumferences and use them to calculate your waist-to-hip ratio.

Body fat percentage

This is the percentage of fat mass you have compared to your total body weight. Body fat percentage is a very useful measure of how your body composition changes beneath the skin when you make alterations to your diet, lifestyle, and environment. Seeing your body fat percentage decrease and your muscle mass increase is a great way to know that your new health program is moving you in the right direction. The gold standards for determination of body fat percentage are a DEXA (dual energy X-ray absorptiometry) scan or a BIA (bio-impedance analysis) scan, both of which provide fairly accurate readings. However, like all measurements concerning the human body, they can still be affected by water / hydration level, time of day, salt concentration, sleep, stress, and whether you've eaten a higher fat meal. So it's important to understand but not be fixated on the numbers. How you feel is super important. And if you are making better choices the majority of the time, you are likely on the right track.

Eating and living for optimal health is a long-term change, not a short-term fix. So don't expect to do a crash diet for four weeks and see massive changes in your body composition at the end. We need to take all factors on board and make positive change in all areas, not just with food but also with mindset, sleep, breathing, movement, outside time and hydration. Health is a consistency game, and we need both physical and mental health to really thrive.

We're in this for the long haul.

The ranges for female body fat percentage are:

Essential fat 10%–13%
Very lean 14%–20%
Lean 21%–25%
Normal 26%–31%
Overweight 32%–39%
Obese 40% and over

The ranges for male body fat percentage are:

Essential fat 2%–5%
Very lean 6%–13%
Lean 14%–17%
Normal 18%–22%
Overweight 23%–29%
Obese 30% and over

As you can see, there is a vast difference between male and female ranges. This has a lot...