Blog – What’s The Game Changers Movie All About?

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So I reluctantly watched the much-hyped ‘Game Changers movie’ on a recommendation from a friend one Sunday night. If you don’t know what it is about, Game Changers is a movie that explores the plant-based diet and whether eating meat is really as good for us as we’ve been told it is. 

I had seen other people discussing this Game Changers movie for some time on social media, and I had assumed it was just another vegan documentary. 

“How could I actually give up meat, especially with Christmas just around the corner?”

Another Vegan Documentary?

I was happy to eat meat, many of my vegan friends would tell me of their experiences giving up meat and it always seemed something that seemed too hard a concept from the outset, like, how could I actually give up meat, especially with Christmas just around the corner? It just seemed like something I wasn’t ready for.

A number of my friends who are vegan made the switch after they had seen a documentary on YouTube or Netflix focusing on how animals are treated so badly during the farming process and the disgusting truth behind how animal meat is prepared for things like sausages and chicken nuggets, so I thought that this film was going to be another one of them. It really wasn’t.

I knew the importance of animal welfare in farming, so I would only buy free-range chicken and meat that seemingly came from a good place. As a meat-eater, this felt like the best way to go about it, going for meat from animals that I was told were kept in better conditions. Also, free-range scrambled eggs taste a whole lot better than non-free range.

Main thing about this movie

• This movie is told from a fitness and health of the individual perspective (not saying the plight of animals during the farming process is insignificant at all), it’s not telling you to become a vegan. This movie is about shifting to a plant-based diet with a focus on athletic achievement and performance.

After watching the movie I was kind of pumped and fascinated. James Wilks the ex UFC fighter who leads this movie makes a strong case for the idea that you can get adequate amounts of protein from non-animal sources, feel more energy and improve your life. He recently made an appearance on Joe Rogan’s podcast where he batted down several misconceptions with the movie that is well worth a watch.

I wanted to try it out and see how long I could go on with this new way of approaching my nutrition.

After the movie ended I decided to try one week completely without meat and getting all of my proteins carbs and fats from plant-based sources. 

I wanted to see how it would make me feel. Up until this point in my life, I had eaten meat every single day pretty much with almost every meal, I guess this film made me realize that maybe it’s time I try something new.

This is where my journey began…

A Whole New World

The week went by pretty swiftly, for the first day my diet was very limited, mainly because I had never attempted anything like this before and I didn’t know what high protein options to go for.

I had some vegan pea protein in the cupboard that I did a review on some months ago, but that was it!

Surely I can’t spend the rest of my days drinking pea protein shakes!

Veggie burgers have been around for decades but the burgers out now are on a whole other level.

After I found some good recipes using protein sources like beans, legumes, lentils, shelled hemp, soy, tofu. The plant-based idea became much less of a novelty idea and more of something I could realistically see myself shifting to permanently. 

Delving into this meat-free world I realised that the food industry is currently changing, more and more restaurants are offering meat-free/vegan options.

Also, in the supermarket now you can buy burgers that look and taste EXACTLY like meat but don’t contain any meat.

Veggie burgers have been around for decades but the burgers out now are on a whole other level.

I wasn’t shivering with cold sweats like a junkie going cold turkey (excuse the pun), I was still enjoying mealtime and I still had more than enough energy to do my workouts in the gym, so I just kept going, and most days I actually forgot about it.

Another thing I noticed is I was getting more than enough protein from plant-based sources than I thought I would, my meals took less time to prepare as well so I’d actually eat more. 

My initial knee jerk assumptions such as the diet being really limited were soon proven wrong. As the film shows you, the diet really isn’t that limited when you look into it. 

For example, tofu, something I had tried some years ago that I remember just tasting really bland can be bought and prepared in a number of different ways.  

My main go-to meal at the moment is bean curry – I can easily hit my needed 30g of protein per serving, but when I cook I don’t measure my ingredients, so I actually end up with a lot more than 30g of protein per serving.

There are of course hundreds of recipes out there..  

The movie also highlights how the advertising industry has made us believe that eating meat is somehow connected to the idea that ‘real men eat meat’, and contains a case study from Arnold Schwarzenegger himself discussing his decision to go plant-based.

The First Month…

I went through a whole month of doing the plant based diet and coming out of the other end, I would actually say, it wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be. 

After two weeks of plant-based eating, I realised I didn’t actually miss meat at all. It was the seasoning and flavouring used on the meat I ate that made me love meat, and not the actual meat itself.

My thinking at the end of the full month was if I can get everything I need from a plant based diet, then why do I need to eat meat, especially with how awful mass farming is for the environment? It just seemed like a no-brainer to continue doing it.

I’ve been more open to trying new things than I was before I had watched this movie. I tried falafel for the first time after being closed-minded towards it for years, I now can’t get enough of the stuff!

3 Months Later… Where Am I Now?

Right now my diet is MOSTLY plant-based. I eat meat twice a month now and only meat of a certain quality.

Quite a change considering before I used to eat meat with every meal.

Something has definitely clicked and I’m thinking of my diet in a different way. 

I didn’t think my Sunday evening reluctant watch of a documentary would push me this far. But it was for the better.

There are plenty of options around, you just need an open mind and a bit of adventure in your soul. 

The journey is fun, and as long as I’m getting enough high quality protein, I’ll continue. 

Why not share my journey with me? Follow me on Instagram @listedfit or Facebook.