1. Elan, when did your Healthy Living journey start?
It was November 2011 and I was going on holiday with my, then girlfriend, to Zanzibar.
I looked at myself in the mirror and I couldn’t comprehend spending a week in boardshorts on an island, because I looked like a beached whale. When you don’t like your body, you tend to avoid seeing it; and on this occasion when I did, I was bit horrified.
So it started by accident, I didn’t kick it off saying I’m going to start a healthy life now. I just wanted, from a vanity perspective, to address that issue. The difference was, for the first time in my life, I never stopped. I found something in that experience that made me feel better about life and it motivated me to carry on wanting to feel that way.
And the results were fairly instant. Sleeping was better, I had no more Heartburn, improved sexual health and my quality of life in general improved. Eliminating processed grains, dairy and sugar led to my body saying “Hey, This is Awesome”.
2. Was there a specific moment you realised it was time for a change?
There was one defining moment when I ended up in hospital with Pneumonia; after being
an Olympic Chain Smoker for a number of years. As the doctor pulled out the X-ray from the envelope, I was expecting lung cancer, and in that second I thought to myself, if you take all your habits, where you going to end up?
Luckily it was only Pneumonia. That was at age 35 when I realised that if I continued with all my habits, I was on a one way ticket to being that overweight, chain smoking, unhealthy person, filled with disease not being able to be a decent parent. So I think that was a defining moment for me.
3. What have you learnt about people after helping so many SleekGeekers reach their goals?
I’ve learnt that it’s not so much about what plan you’re going to follow; whether you believe in Banting, Paleo, Mediterrean Diet, a Balanced Diet or whatever it is. The key ingredient is your Mindset.
“You can have the best plan in the world, but if you can’t stick to that plan, that plan is worthless.”
You’re better off doing a mediocre plan that you actually do, than a brilliant plan you don’t stick to.
I think a lot of this stuff is steeped in emotion for people; body image, overeating, comfort eating, but also a lot of these foods like sugary foods and junk foods have addictive properties.
I know, if I have some sugar, the next couple of days are difficult. A lot of
people think it’s just because they have no willpower, but there’s a lot things at play.
For me, the most important, is mastering your mindset. Once you’ve mastered your mindset, it doesn’t only apply to your health and fitness, you can conquer anything in your life, that’s the key.
4. What has made the SleekGeek movement so successful?
I think what has made SleekGeek so successful is that it’s about real people, and
we’ve tried to create a culture of non-judgement and acceptance. We create a positive space where people feel safe to share their experiences. We’ve also tried to make being healthy, sexy and fun.
Another thing is that many people are fixated on weight loss, but we always stress health first, and the weight loss will follow.
Thirdly, we really stress that you’ve got to equip yourself for a healthy lifestyle. There is no one-size fits all, peoples’ bodies respond differently to different things and you’ve got to take personal responsibility for the time, effort and dedication required to figure out what works for you.
5. Your goal is to help 100 000 South Africans live a sustainably healthy lifestyle, where are you going to hold that SleekGeek Party?
This is the question I have the most trouble with. I’ve always pictured some massive beach party where everyone can come and show off their new bodies. That said, I’m also mindful that not everyone’s there yet. In our community everyone’s at a different phase of
their journey. So I wouldn’t do something that would alienate people.
SleekGeek is now national, we’ve got good representation in Cape Town and
Johannesburg, we’re growing in KZN and starting to get good traction in the Eastern Cape.
So I think we would need to do a Roadshow where we hold a different party in each city
showcasing what each city has to offer.
It would definitely be a nationwide celebration.
6. What can SleekGeeks look forward to in 2015?
They can look forward to our normal SleekGeek Challenges which we do 3 times a year; they can also look forward to more Resources to help with the 30 Day Reboot Challenge. Then there’s a SleekGeek Health Directory coming soon.
There’s also lots of Free Tools to Download on the SleekGeek website and obviously a continuation of the SleekGeek Dinner getting bigger and better. We’re introducing a Membership System, plus we’re producing an old school Discussion Forum, where you can see what everyone’s said about a specific topic e.g. Paleo or Banting.
We’re launching more niche communities, for example we’ve got a new Weightlifting group and a Banting group. We’re also launching a more comprehensive Recipe database, where people can upload their own personal recipes.
Then we’ve got Educational Programmes e.g. The Upgrade Your Life Course with Dr Greg Vennning, Brett Shuttleworth’s Course and I would like to offer a Course to do with Quitting Smoking; as it’s quite close to my heart.
Overall in 2015, SleekGeek will continue to be a platform for holistically addressing your health – looking at how you eat, how you move and how you think.
7. What’s the one piece of advice you have for someone making the change to a healthy lifestyle?
Never Give Up. There’s going to be winds in the road, you’re going to stumble, you’re going to fail occasionally, but the only thing that is really failure in my mind, is if you give up on yourself.
The other point is to value your health. Everyone has a list of values in life and if your health is one of them, you will prioritize your health and make important decisions to support that.
For me, the turning point was when I realized that living a healthy life meant I was gaining not losing. That I was not making a sacrifice, I was giving myself a gift.
That’s a personal realisation people have got to come to, once they’ve done that and made a decision to value their health, we provide the know-how and support to help them reach their goals.
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Elan Lohmann is the Founder and Creator of SleekGeek. SleekGeek’s aim is to inspire 100 000 South Africans to transform themselves and live a better quality life. Connect with Elan and the SleekGeek Team Here and on Facebook Here.
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