Amino Man is a holistic approach to human health and performance. A behavioural philosophy. A set of principles that hold the keys to better eating, cooking, training, relationships and life. And to enable this, a range of some of the highest-grade supplements available on the market: completely natural, field-tested, performance and evidence-based formulas. Pharmaceutical grade and drug screened, these products are designed to supplement the lifestyle you’ve chosen.
Before we go any further, I want to share with you a story from a friend of Bruce Lee. This story will stay with me for life and its hidden principles capture the essence of Amino Man.
Bruce had me up to three miles a day, really at a good pace. We’d run the three miles in twenty-one or twenty-two minutes. Just under eight minutes a mile. [Note: when running on his own in 1968, Lee would get his time down to six-and-a-half minutes per mile.]
So this morning he said to me, “We’re going to go five.”
I said, “Bruce, I can’t go five. I’m a helluva lot older than you are, and I can’t do five.”
He said, “When we get to three, we’ll shift gears and it’s only two more and you’ll do it.”
I said, “Okay, hell, I’ll go for it.”
So we get to three, we go into the fourth mile and I’m okay for three or four minutes, and then I really begin to give out.
I’m tired, my heart’s pounding, I can’t go any more and so I say to him, “Bruce if I run any more,” — and we’re still running — “if I run any more I’m liable to have a heart attack and die.” He said, “Then die.” It made me so mad that I went the full five miles.
Afterward I went to the shower and then I wanted to talk to him about it. I said, you know, “Why did you say that?” He said, “Because you might as well be dead. Seriously, if you always put limits on what you can do, physical or anything else, it’ll spread over into the rest of your life. It’ll spread into your work, into your morality, into your entire being. There are no limits. There are plateaus, but you must not stay there, you must go beyond them. If it kills you, it kills you. A man must constantly exceed his level.”
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Amino Man founder, Matt Lovell
I was born to help people.
It could have been my parenting. Dad retrained as an acupuncturist when he was 30 and he and Mum ran their own health food outlet way ahead of their time. As a youngster, crunching up Chinese herbs and chewing on adaptogens was routine.
My normal way of eating comes from the way I was raised. I spend a lot of time getting people back to eating the right way for their metabolism. Food has to come first.
I started karate classes. Bruce Lee became a role model. I joined a weights gym aged 12 and started to realise that through training you could control how your body responded, adapted, got stronger and faster. The control over the training replaced the lack of control I – like many growing adults – had over my personal life.
Training has defined me as a person.
Meditation, Chinese philosophy and Thai boxing followed as the years unfolded.
I read labels in the health food stores after school, saved up for Arnold’s encyclopaedia, got the monthly muscle mags and read them like gospel. Trained, over-trained, recovered – developed deficiencies, supplemented, read, learned, experimented. All before the dawn of the internet.
And yet I didn’t respond as I’d hoped to, how I yearned to. Never got the full results I knew I deserved from the application and effort. This led me to dig deeper and retrain as a physical trainer, then as a nutritional therapist. My nickname at college was ‘amino man’
Amino acids became the subject of my dissertation. They were the saviour of my fatigue, the builder of my newfound strength. Then, the base for the success of my athlete programmes. Together with a whole food organic lifestyle and complemented by mineral and vitamin blends, they brought me better and better results with my clients. Something was starting to click.
And now? Well, now I’m bringing you the blends I’ve used for years. Blends I used to mix by hand, now pre-mixed in a GMP-approved facility for ease of use, for the quality of the ingredients and for the effectiveness of the blends.
And finally, I’m bringing you the ‘way’ I’ve learnt to live my life, approach my relationships, my friendships, business and my philosophy of living and thinking.
I’m bringing you Amino Man… Born to help you
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There are 12 principles that drive the Amino Man. These are the cornerstones of our DNA – the Amino Man DNA.
- Strength for Life
- One Life
- Self-awareness
- Attentiveness, mindfulness
- Bushido code and character
- Training ethic
- Clean planet
- Sustainability
- Family
- Body mind soul / spirit
- Performance supplementation
- Freedom
This principle is inspired by inner strength, physical strength, resilience and belief. Strength for Life™ is a sub-brand of Amino Man, encompassing blends focused on strength, performance and recovery.
ONE LIFE™One Life™ is inspired by the Tree of Life.
The Tree of Life is associated with knowledge and wisdom, strength, and immortality.
One Life™ also reminds us that we only get one life and have to make the most of it. Appreciate every moment. Nourish our body with good food, and be the healthiest we can be, so we can give back to our families and to the planet.
One Life™ is also a sub-brand of Amino Man, encompassing supplements and blends designed to nourish and help us achieve optimal health.
SELF-AWARENESS
Be aware of our impact on the world around us and on those we connect with in our daily lives. Self-awareness is also essential to attentiveness and mindfulness below, it’s essential to improving the self to following a ‘way’. Awareness of the present situation is need to make changes, reflect and learn from them and to become a better warrior. The constant journey of development requires an ability to assess character, behaviour but also on a more fundamental level assess for deficiencies, DNA, physiological state. This way we can know what to eat and which supplements to take.
ATTENTIVENESS / MINDFULNESS
Embrace consciousness. Being present, in the moment, the here and now, is difficult for many to master.
Perhaps at the centre of this principle is accepting and acknowledging that the past has gone, whilst simultaneously learning and realising that what we do now – in this present moment –impacts the future.
Without fear or dark lingering thoughts, we tackle the present, remain in the now and define the future. This is how we pave the way ahead.
BUSHIDŌ CODE AND CHARACTER
The Bushidō code (meaning ‘Way of the Warrior’ in Japanese) is the samurai code of conduct that originated in the Kamakura period of Japanese history (1192–1333).
My readings into samurai text were inspired partly through my first martial art, karate, and then my study of Bruce Lee. Around the same time my father gave me a key text, The Sword of No-Sword written by master Tesshu. Many hail him as the last samurai.
The Bushidō code is the truest form of living each day as if it were your last. But this does not mean reckless hedonism; it means always giving the best of yourself.
It means living each day as if it were your last, but engaging in projects as if you were immortal. Tesshu was respected in his lifetime for the thousands of pieces of calligraphy he created. A story that stands out in my mind was when one of his students said to him, “you’ll never complete that task of copying all that master’s work,” to which he replied, “I’ll just carry on in the next life”. No task was too big to consider or even complete.
Not everyone can be a ninja. Nor do you need to be. For me, martial arts and the training ethic I gained from the discipline associated with them have defined me as a human. We can use the same code throughout other forms of training; and business, too, has obvious ways it can benefit from using a code such as the Bushidō.
For more on the Bushidō code, see this article.
SUSTAINABLITY and 7. CLEAN PLANET
Think about burden here. Think about being a facilitator rather than hinderer.
It’s our planet and therefore our responsibility to treat it with care. It’s also about sustaining your own life and your legacy, as well as that of the earth.
Whilst Amino Man isn’t perfect, he desires the choice to breathe clean air, drink clean water and have access to organic foods and produce.
Sustainability, recycling and doing a bit more each day than you are comfortable with is the only way we can collectively work to reduce pollution and increase the life cycle of this planet. We can all work a little harder in our choices, be it simply using less water, buying locally or avoiding plastics, to growing our own veg or even generating our own electricity.
There’s a lot we can do. But if all of us do just a little, then a lot can still change for the better.
It's almost impossible to shop without piling up the plastics. We all have a responsibility to do better. Part of the amino man ethos is to give back and try harder to reduce the stress we are placing on our planet. We're part of the 1% for the Planet scheme, putting our money where our mouth is. Sustainably is also about our impact, our energy consumption and our charity to the world and to others.
TRAINING & WORK ETHIC
Train hard or go home…
“Feel like you are dying [in training] so you feel like you are alive” – Bruce Lee
This quote from Bruce Lee reflects the story I related above. The Amino Man pushes his boundaries and constantly strives to be better in everything he does – otherwise it’s not worth being alive.
I’m a long-term Bruce Lee fan and I’ve often taken pieces of his philosophies and added them to my own life. When things are not going as well, it’s normally because I’ve forgotten some of his wisdom and magic.
Next time you’re feeling small, ask yourself: ‘What would the Amino Man do?’ Be the Amino Man. And support the Amino Woman.
BE THE DRAGON
Chinese dragons traditionally symbolize potent and auspicious powers, particularly control over water, rainfall, typhoons, and floods. The dragon is also a symbol of power, strength, and good luck for people who are worthy of it. Dragons do not give up. They protect and serve the people around them to death. Next time you think about giving up, BE THE DRAGON. Never give up.
FAMILY
The Amino Man puts his family first.
BODY MIND SOUL / SPIRIT
This principle is not about religion. It’s the knowledge that there is something greater than ourselves. Something that connects us all to each other and to the planet. It can also be described as the feeling we get when we’re out in nature: the realisation that life and growth are magical things – and that there are forces at work that we’re not aware of.
PERFORMANCE SUPPLEMENTATION
The Amino Man range is one of the best ranges of supplements available to you at this time. Honest, detailed formulas that deliver. Expert-driven products that work. Completely natural, field-tested, performance and evidence-based formulas. Pharmaceutical grade, traceable and where possible fully organic ingredients.
FREEDOM
Freedom to choose. Ultimately, you are free to read this, to act, to choose what you do next. To plan, to focus.
And if you choose to include our products in your journey, we are happy to have you as part of our family. If you do, be assured that you are choosing the best.
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LASTLY…
What does it mean to be a modern man or woman in today’s world? How do we stay strong and preserve our identity as physicality is being progressively removed from our environment?
Our jobs are often highly sedentary, our harvesting to ingesting calorie ratio is completely out of balance and many of us are ill equipped to withstand the pressure to give in.
Amino Man’s philosophy is here to help you:
- Adventure
- Laugh
- Play
- Cry
- Embrace life!
- Be here now
You are not complete until you have given up or resisted the very things all people crave and enjoy. Moderation, perseverance, patience and discipline.
- Relax
- Sleep
- Give
- Respect, honour, integrity, compassion, courage, duty and loyalty
- Family first
- Support your Amino Women and Men