How to Train to Live, NOT Live to Train.
Building A Body That Can Say Yes When Others Say No
The health & fitness space is at an all time high of being the most sterile space that exists.
Bryan Johnson wanting to live forever & willing to stick things up his ass to do so.
Bodybuilding culture being incredibly cringe & a cess pool of fake naturals who abuse steroids and skinny young teens crowding commercial gyms while you navigate around the tsunami of selfie sticks set up for TikTok female fitness influencers.
How did we completely massacre the fitness industry to become so boring, so stale & so uninteresting?
Everyone obsesses over their blood tests, whoop & oura ring data and 40+ supplement stack….
Yet they both look & perform like absolute shit.
HEALTH USED TO BE THE VEHICLE, NOT THE DESTINATION…
Paul Newman racing cars well into his 70s.
Gianni Agnelli skiing the most dangerous slopes in Zermatt before running Fiat in the afternoon.
Steve McQueen riding motorcycles through desert terrain that would break most men.
These weren't men obsessed with "fitness routines." They were men with fucking interesting lives.
They were fit as a byproduct of an aesthetic lifestyle design, not the obsession of aesthetics.
Their physical capability wasn't their identity.
It was sprezzatura.
It was effortless.
It was the inevitable byproduct of pursuing adventure, mastering skills & squeezing every drop of experience from life.
THE MODERN FITNESS TRAP
Look around at the state of modern ‘fitness’.
Influencers who lie to the face of their audience when they are blasting gear & promising that if you buy their supplements, you will look like them too.
Run club culture where you have people spending $500+ on their running kit and are running embarrassing times.
Extreme diets like keto, carnivore, vegan & other ridiculous ‘health’ measures that have created cult like followings.
It is the most anti-fragile approach to living life.
If you don’t have your macros and supplements perfectly dialled at all times, you stress out.
If you go to your grandparents place & eat a hearty meal with seed oils, you are unbearable to be around.
You miss opportunities.
You being insufferable to be around providing unsolicited advice…
And unless you are getting paid to be an athlete, it’s completely fucking unnecessary.
DEVELOPMENT FITNESS & SKILL ACQUISITION SIMULTANEOUSLY
Fitness & skill acquisition are not mutually exclusive.
Develop a martial skillset requires you to develop high levels of cardiovascular fitness, strength, speed & power.
Being able to ski requires balance, reaction time & isometric endurance through the core & lower body.
Hiking & exploring new cities develops your base level of fat burning capacity & metabolic health.
Swimming in open waters gives you confidence in water, you get the mineralisation of the ocean & vitamin D from the sun.
There are so many physical skills that you can develop that also allow you to travel, explore & conquest.
Yet so many people would rather do the exact same boring weight lifting routine for the rest of their lives….
DEVELOPING ‘FUCK YOU HEALTH’
Everyone talks about "fuck you money."
But what about "fuck you health"?
The level of physical capability that gives you complete freedom of choice in how you live.
It's not about aesthetics. It's about options.
Fuck You Health means:
Having the gas tank to build your business & athletic bank account simultaneously.
Possessing recovery systems that process stress while others need days off.
Building joint integrity that lets you move pain-free when peers are getting replacements.
Developing metabolic flexibility that thrives in any environment.
Maintaining hormonal balance that sustains drive and cognition as you age.
Most men accept physical decline as inevitable while focusing on financial growth. They build assets that depreciate faster than they can enjoy them. They save for adventures their bodies won't be able to experience. They optimize investments while their most valuable asset, their capability...withers.
True sovereignty isn't just having enough money to say "no" to what you don't want.
It's having the physical capital to say "yes" to what you do.
Because what's the point of Fuck You Money if your body keeps saying "I can't"?
Build wealth. But build capability first.
That's Fuck You Health.
THE MEN WHO EMBODIED THIS PHILOSOPHY
Look at the men who actually commanded respect throughout history.
JFK swimming in the ocean and playing football on the White House lawn.
Theodore Roosevelt boxing in the White House and leading expeditions through uncharted terrain.
Ernest Hemingway hunting in Africa and fishing in Cuba, moving with the natural grace of a predator without ever stepping inside a fucking Planet Fitness.
These weren't men who optimised their supplements and obsessed over their sleep scores.
They were men of action who understood intuitively that capability is built through living, not through isolation exercises on machines.
Their workout wasn't a separate part of their day, it was woven into the fabric of their existence.
And their physiques? Functional. Powerful. Capable. Not sculpted under perfect lighting for Instagram likes.
You think Hemingway gave a fuck about his body fat percentage when he was running with the bulls in Pamplona?
You think JFK was worried about hitting his protein macros while sailing through storms?
These men carried themselves with the quiet confidence that comes from knowing they could handle whatever the world threw at them.
No need to flex on social media. No need to mention their training routines at dinner parties.
No need to turn down experiences because it might interfere with their "recovery."
And guess what? Women were magnetically drawn to them. Not because they had visible abs year-round, but because they had stories. Skills. Experiences. The intangible quality of having lived interestingly.
These men were remembered for what they did, not how they looked doing it.
Can you say the same?
THE SHIFT: MOVING FROM FITNESS-OBSESSED TO LIFE-CENTERED
Here's how you reclaim your physical capability without making it your entire personality:
1. Train with purpose, not obsession
The Lethal Gentleman protocol exists for a reason – 3-4 sessions per week focused on building transferable strength, power, and endurance. Not 6-day bro splits that consume your existence.
This isn't about doing less. It's about doing what matters.
Heavy compound movements. Explosive power training. Endurance work that transfers to real life.
Not isolation exercises for body parts no one but you will ever notice.
2. Make skill acquisition your priority
Pick up a combat sport. Learn to rock climb. Start swimming in open water. Take up skiing.
Anything that requires you to develop physical capability while simultaneously giving you experiences worth talking about.
When you're learning jiu-jitsu, your fitness becomes a byproduct of pursuing mastery.
When you're hiking mountains, your cardio development is just what happens when you push yourself through beautiful terrain.
This is how men developed physical capability for thousands of years before commercial gyms existed.
3. Let your diet support your life, not restrict it
Eat quality protein. Consume vegetables regularly. Get enough carbohydrates to fuel performance. Don't drink like a college freshman.
The rest is details that matter far less than your consistency with the basics.
You don't need to weigh your chicken breast or measure your broccoli florets.
You don't need to swallow 40 different supplements every morning.
You need to eat like an adult who values both performance and pleasure.
4. Integrate movement into your lifestyle
Walking meetings. Bike commuting. Taking the stairs every single time. Outdoor activities on weekends.
This isn't "cardio." It's living like a human being was designed to.
Not segregating "fitness" into a special hour of your day where you put on special clothes to go to a special building.
But making movement part of how you navigate through the world.
5. Measure what actually matters
Not your bicep circumference. Not how many abs are visible. Not your Hyrox placement among other fitness hobbyists.
Measure:
How many new experiences you've had this year
How many skills you've developed
How many stories you've accumulated
How often you say "yes" to adventure without hesitation
Because these are the metrics of a life well-lived, not a body well-displayed.
THE ULTIMATE TEST
When you're 80 years old, sitting on your porch reflecting on your life, what will you remember?
Will you fondly recall the perfect macronutrient ratio you maintained in the summer of 2025?
Will you tell your grandchildren about your impressive sleep scores from your Oura ring?
Fuck no.
You'll remember that time you hiked through the Swiss Alps with friends.
You'll remember learning to sail in the Mediterranean.
You'll remember sparring with fighters in Thailand, experiencing cultures through their martial traditions.
You'll remember leading expeditions and adventures that others talk about years later.
Your physical capability made those experiences possible. But it wasn't the experience itself.
Ask yourself honestly:
Is your current approach to health expanding your world or shrinking it?
Does it give you more options or fewer?
Does it connect you to others or isolate you?
Does it add experiences to your life or subtract them?
The Lethal Gentleman doesn't train to post transformation photos.
He trains to transform his life.
To be capable when capability matters.
To say yes when others must say no.
To live interestingly, for as many years as possible. True longevity.
Health without purpose is just vanity wrapped in virtue signaling.
But health with purpose?
That's the foundation of a life worth remembering.
Build your body. But build it to serve a life of experiences, not to be the experience itself.
Train to live. Don't live to train.
And if you want to learn how to train to live?
Click the button below
Brilliant post all around but the fuck you health section was the best. Love this perspective. Assessing that Why and reflecting on what matters. Good shit
Gold one