Dialogue: Don't worry, just be happy

Nothing stays the same for long, the only constant in the world being change. Forty's the new thirty, black's the new black (again) and prosciutto's the latest in luncheon sausage. What's not hot one week could be boiling over the next, which is why it's natural to be confused about what's good for you.

One of the instructors at my gym was looking quite glum because no one had turned up to her pump class. Pump, involving steps, weights and pounding music, is not the vogue regime it once was. By contrast, people practically had to be turned away from the yoga class I was there for, which is understandable considering that it improves muscle tone, flexibility and strength and brings about a sense of wellbeing and calm.



It's hardly surprising, though, that the fashion for intense exercise is losing favour. One of the first modern proponents of jogging for health dropped dead of a heart attack at 48, which I can believe given the looks of pain on the faces of some endurance athletes during the Olympics.

As for Jai Taurima, the silver-medal-winning long jumper, he just loves junk food, had about 15 minutes' sleep the night before his big match and claims to smoke a pack of cigarettes a day. Not what you'd expect of a world-class athlete, but look where it got him.

Also constantly changing is what's considered fashionable nutritionally.

Israeli Army diets, grapefruit for health, food combining and cleansing our livers; what is one supposed to believe? I remember when bagels were the answer to every dieter's prayers. That boiled and baked wonder food of the 90s could be eaten freely because it contained almost no fat; then people who were scoffing up to three or four a day wondered why they began to swell up.

The answer now lies in proteins and veges, leaving carbohydrate-laden bagels out in the cold. Is olive oil the new elixir of youth?

Herbal remedies, hypnotherapy and acupuncture are enjoying a resurgence, but who'd have thought leeches would ever return? Once employed to cure every medieval malady from madness to haemorrhoids, they're being used again as natural anticoagulants, to clean gangrenous wounds and relieve congestion of the veins after microsurgery. Although moderation is the key with leeches, George Washington over-dosed on the little suckers - he died 24 hours after being treated with them for laryngitis.

Biggest surprise, though, in the health comeback stakes, is the practice of trepanning, which involves a hole being drilled in one's head with the aim of expanding consciousness and relieving depression. Popular in the past for releasing pressure in the brain, it has taken the fancy of various cranks lately. A couple in London even did it to themselves and made a film of it.

And while most modern doctors consider trepanning to be useless and terribly dangerous, a doctor in America (where else?) recently gained notoriety by saying he would perform the operation on anyone over 18 prepared to sign a consent form, and now there's a queue for his services.

Therefore, due to the continual evolution of opinion regarding health, I've come up with some simple tips of my own. For what it's worth, I say enjoy yourself. Guilt will surely make you unwell, so do what you do with gusto.

Sure, you could try trepanation or enduring a course of leeches, but actively pursuing pleasure might provide relief from what ails you.

As for food - if you like it, eat it, although try to include some vegetables in your diet, and a few glasses of water probably won't hurt.

Remember that with exercise there is good pain and bad pain - learn to tell the difference and you should be fine.

With just a bit of a walk and a stretch now and then, you probably won't win any awards for muscle tone, but do you really care that much anyway? If you wanted to be Mr or Ms Universe, wouldn't you have done so by now?

Moderation might well be the key to most things and even moderation in that.