To be Fit, Stay Fit

Fitness for me is happiness. If you are happy doing what you do, you are fit. If you look great but don't feel great then you are not fit. The greatest sports people in the world, you'll find use their fitness as a tool to get better.

The last 10 per cent of achievement doesn't happen in the body, it happens in the mind. So if your fitness routine isn't making you feel good whether you are a sportsperson or a banker or whatever what's the point?

So for me anything that makes me feel good through exercise is great.
Today you're with me for a game of squash. A lot of people don't seem to know enough about this sport. I'm not going to tell you about the technicality of the sport. What I will tell you is what squash does for you.

There is no sport in the world that you get so much out of in half an hour, certainly no racquet sport. And I would venture not very many sports in 30 minutes could tire you the way squash does.

It's easy for beginners to start, then as they learn they get better and better at it. So what happens is there is a lot of emphasis on physical mobility.

It's all to do with your quadriceps, your gluteus, your back because you are constantly bending down, reaching out and hitting.

Squash players ideally have very thin and whippy upper bodies and strong lower bodies and a very good back. That's the classic squash player's body.

So when I'm playing squash, I also make sure I'm working the upper body so I don't lose the proportion.

The other great thing about squash is that it's competitive. It's not something you do in a gymnasium, or you're doing on your own, it's not watching television and running on a treadmill.

The competitiveness, the fact you are playing with somebody else in an enclosed space creates a kind of pressure cooker atmosphere.

I grew up in a culture where sports was massively encouraged, in school, in a community, in a family. So I can't think of a single week in my whole life, where I haven't done something.
Maybe a single three days, I won't say everyday, because when I'm shooting I can't play.

From the age of four or five, I can only remember playing all the time. My summer holidays used to be – Wake up in the morning, go to the Bombay Gymkhana Club, play squash, go for a swim, have some lunch, play snooker, go down and play badminton, then tennis, then go onto the field.
Literally, four or five sports a day.

I come from a sports-crazy set of friends and even now supposing people say- “Lets go to Goa for a holiday,” for me Goa is not about the drinking and the partying.

It’s you wake up in the morning, you swim, you play volleyball, you play water polo, you do all that stuff and you are constantly active, because that’s what really makes me happy.

I don’t like gymnasiums, I don’t like the air-conditioned gymnasium culture. When I was boxing for the Junior Nationals in school, you just had to get in there and do your stuff.

We were taught between the ground and you, you can have a fantastic body. Except for your biceps, ‘cause then you have to carry a load.
Honestly, between the ground and you, you can have an excellent body without touching a weight in your life, so I come from that culture.

I love my exercise, I love playing a sport. So what I do is wake up very early in the morning and go for a swim. Swimming is a great form of exercise as it also rehydrates you. You never get dehydrated when you are swimming.

The other stuff I do is my yoga. I carry my yoga mat with me and I go and do my yoga either at the end of shoot or before it.

And when there is time, when the shift is at a decent hour, I pick up my squash racquet and play for half an hour.
Then go for a run or get into the gymnasium and do a bit of cardio.

Whatever you do, there are three things that will help you stay healthy if you keep long hours: One is to sleep well, not sleep a lot. The quality of your sleep must be tremendous.
Secondly, you must exercise every single day and third, when you eat, taste your food.

When you taste your food, sleep well, sleep peacefully, finish your problems for the day, have a larger more peaceable outlook to the world, forgive yourself and exercise even if it is a 45-minute walk after your meal, you are happy.

To be fit, you have to stay fit – body, heart, mind. And if you have fitness in all the three places, your fitness will transform to magical happiness.