Archive for July, 2011
Winning the War on Fitness and Lean
Posted by: | CommentsMost people wage a war their entire lives with false promises of getting leaner and in better shape.
It is frequently on our minds because we know it is important for various reasons. When we are young, we think looks are important to getting the desired mate. As we get older we know diet and fitness are important to feel good and stay healthy.
As people get into middle age they know health and fitness might be important to have the longevity to see their grand children and have a quality of life in their golden years.
Why are there so many battles in this campaign to win the war? Why do so few people think they have won? For one the objectives are not clear. There is no clear litmus for health or lean or fitness.
I would describe healthy as not getting sick for years. When our immune system is working we don’t catch what is going around. It probably means that as a daily process we are not accumulating the poisons that could later cause disease.
I would describe lean as our high school weight. At that age our metabolism is hyper active and afterward our consumption increases and physical activity tends to decrease as our metabolism slows.
For most people, to get back to their high school weight would require a different eating life style. Trying to lose ten pounds on a fad diet continues the battles without the war ever being won. A diet must get down to basics of fruit, vegetables, protein, nuts, seeds, grains, good fats and water. Fat producing foods such as sugar, flour, processed food, grease, and you know the rest will never allow the war to be won.
Fitness also has a wide range of variables. The most difficult aspect for most people is keeping it consistent. Great programs and the joining of gyms often flame out. Strangely, it doesn’t require much to keep the body loose, the brain stimulated, and muscles stabilized. Just like the body needs food, all the systems depend on physical activity.
If one were to maintain daily walks, a little stretching and some upper body exercise with push ups or cables or weights, we would meet minimum fitness requirements. Riding a bike, using a tread mill or stair master, hiking, swimming, tennis all take us to another level where we start feeling exhilarated after exercise.
The campaign has to be designed to include food and fitness. It doesn’t have to start out extreme. It can start in gradual increments with the eye on continuous improvement. If it takes 5 years to get back to your high school weight, as it did me, it is worthwhile in the end and has long term ramifications for winning the war.
Achievement is Like Waging a War
Posted by: | CommentsI personally cringe when I hear the word goals. It has so many good and bad connotations.
In normal life goals are usually too cut and dried. It is divided into success and failure. You reach your goals or you don’t. Not reaching your goals seems to mean you failed and therefore lost confidence and self esteem.
It is not the best approach. I think that achievement needs more avenues and flexibility. There are hills and valleys on the road to the big city. As long as we are still fighting, the battle is never lost. Sometimes we retreat and reorganize for another attack.
In “The Rivers of War” by Eric Clint which is about the War of 1812 between the U.S. and the British, he has one paragraph about a general entering the battlefield…”The hardest thing for a leader of men, was to understand when a battle was lost, sometimes even before it began. That the only think he could do that made any sense, as inglorious as it might be, was simply to retreat. Find another place, another ground, another time, where the battle might be won. Not to confuse a battle with a campaign, a campaign with a war…”
We shouldn’t hit the wall in one phase or hit one major obstacle and think the war is over for our goals. It is just one battle in an ongoing campaign to win the war we had set out to fight.
Why Failure is Never Necessary
Posted by: | CommentsIf you don’t quit, you haven’t failed.
I also look at goals as the end result of a series of objectives. I keep working to make progress or “kaizen” in Japanese. If I don’t reach my objective, then I had the wrong strategy.
Let’s say I wanted to lose ten pounds and I went on the Adkins diet. I set an objective for 60 days. At the end of 60 days I gained two pounds. I obviously had the wrong strategy and so I decided to try another strategy. I haven’t failed my goal of losing ten pounds, but I didn’t reach the objective of doing it in 60 days.
So I pick another strategy. I decide this time to eliminate my two biggest offenders. They are drinking considerable amounts of alcohol and eating hamburgers or pizza while I am doing it. In one week I noticed I have lost three pounds. I am on my way.
What I used to like doing is pick a physical goal and a second goal such as business or career to accomplish at the same time. I set a goal of running five miles instead of my normal one mile and a business goal of increasing my revenues by 20%.
As I increase my running, I have to win the battle of the mind which does not like the extra work or pain. When I make the next step to a mile and a half, I feel triumphant. When I dig into my business goal, I know that I may have to do something uncomfortable like call on more prospects. Just as I didn’t quit running when the going got tough, I have to keep on working when I would rather quit. Once again, I will have to triumph over my mind.
The mind is the real key to success. Developing control over its tendency to want the easy way out is the key to making progress when the going is tough. Changing strategies when one clearly didn’t work is the key to reaching goals.
Finding a passion and never quitting is the way to find out who we are and forge a strong self identity. If we desire to be lean, finding a way to get lean is as great as going to the moon. If we want to run a 10k from our current sedentary life style, finding a way to get there is a giant triumph.
I have never been great at staying at one job for a long time. I get restless feet. I have to keep setting new goals that are worthwhile to me. I have several pursuits right now that include surfing, writing, website building, staying lean, reading great books, and writing e books.
Setting goals that are meaningful and can take a life time is also helpful in giving ourselves time for several strategies. Trying to achieve something major that may be impossible in 30 days, may not be realistic and is a test more than a goal.
The goals are open ended. I don’t quit and most of the time I am making progress. I have learned that it is often necessary to overcome short term disappointments or set backs, but if I never quit, I have never failed.
Being passionate about the pursuit is helpful. Then the activity is the reward and the goal is not necessary. If we love doing something it is not work, work. It may be toil, struggle, frustration, and exhausting, but it is investing in ourselves and so the sweat equity does build residuals.
Pace is important. If I over train I know I get very tired and often have to stop my routine for days. If I hit the wall on a project, I know I can give it a rest and come back with a fresh mind set and look at it again. What is important is to keep attacking. Nothing can stop the human will.
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Is Google Using Gestapo Tactics?
Posted by: | CommentsToday when using my Internet Explorer browser, a Google message popped up from the tool bar asking if they could follow all my searches.
It didn’t have a close option and I couldn’t proceed to use the browser or even close it.
I promptly shut down my computer and when it restarted I went to the control panel and in “add or remove programs,” I eliminated the Google Toolbar from Internet Explorer.
How did they get the control to take over my browser and activities?
Learning to Surf and Finding Your Passion
Posted by: | CommentsThose who love to surf identify themselves as surfers.
If you ask them what they like to do or who they are, surfing is going to be key.
If you ask most people to state who they are they will begin with their job or maybe the fact they are a parent. After that they will get into some personality traits. It might go like I am an electrician, a father, a good friend, a generous person.
Why is surfing which becomes a passion so tied into our identity? I backed into it by moving to the beach and wanting to include it as part of my fitness routine. I had no idea what it was really all about although I had surfed in high school and a few times in Hawaii.
I certainly had forgotten the paddling, the struggle with the surf on a sand bar beach, the wipe outs, and the thrill of being on top of a board pushed by Mother Nature. If you add the environment of water, sun, blue skies and being outdoors, you have a great mix.
It became an instant challenge. I could go either way. I could say this is more work than I wanted. I could get hurt. This is going to test part of me that has never been tested. I could fail. Or I could do this and become one of the people who are out there having an unbelievable time and coming out of the water completely exhilarated with a self satisfaction that they had won.
Now, when I come out of the water, I feel my day has been made. For whatever reason God put me on earth, I have satisfied my own need of fulfilling my life by the simple act of pitting myself against Mother Nature’s waves.
When I come out of the water, I am thinking of the next time I get to go in. I have to pace the energy demands so that I can go each day and my routine of exercise, nutrition, yoga, aerobics are all focused to keep me healthy and surfing every single day. I only miss a few days a month.
Surfing not only challenges me to succeed, it challenges me to get better inch by inch. There is always something you can add. There are always bigger waves. There is always better conditioning that allows you to stay out longer or go more times in a day. There is always me against myself to find the ceiling.
What other kinds of pursuits can totally wrap up what we are and fire us into the fray like coming out of a cannon? People have lots of passions. There is certainly work or trying to build a business around something you love and want to share.
There is certainly being an artist, writer, chef, musician, teacher, or social worker. Each one is an opportunity to see just what the total combination of our mental, emotional, psychological, and physical traits can paint on our canvas.
Some may be determined to do something in the public spotlight or that public recognition creates the level of achievement. A quarterback or politician needs accomplishment and votes to establish the highest tier of success.
Others need their own self stamp of approval to acknowledge that they have achieved what they were looking for. In most experiences we are looking for a feeling. In finding a mate, love is a feeling. In having children, pride is certainly a feeling. In our careers, a net worth might deliver the feeling.
Finding a passion is often finding something that delivers the feeling we are looking for. Or in reverse, it is finding something that delivers the feeling that we want to experience over again.
A passion does require us to lay it on the line. Even if no one else knows, we know whether we made the grade. If you want to pursue mountain biking and you decide it is too tough or dangerous, no one would judge you poorly. Only you know what happened.
If you enjoy finding your physical limits, connecting with nature, living outdoors, being in the water, then surfing delivers a lot of the feelings you find gratifying. Gratitude is the end result of finding and enjoying your passion. You are thrilled you have the opportunity and you want others to have their opportunity to feel the same way.
Why We Fight Being Lean
Posted by: | CommentsI can’t think of too many personal ambitions that are higher than being lean. It’s just that people are not really committed to being lean. 
A motivational guru who used to rule the commercial and residential real estate industries said you could tell a commitment by the result. If you were committed, you reached it. If you were not committed you bailed.
It brings into question how many of our desires really lack commitment, but I can only address one at a time. So many people say they want to lose 10 to 20 pounds, not that they want to be lean. They feel they are pretty good and could reduce a few clothing sizes by reducing that little bit of fat.
What is the pain of being lean and what are the benefits? The pain of being lean is that you cannot eat the normal American diet. The normal American diet seems to rely on convenience as a first priority and then exaggerated taste as a second priority.
When we consider eating as a necessity to keep our active life styles moving instead of a means to reach an end in itself, we fall prey to convenience and good taste. The first issue with convenience is that most of these meals cater to tastes we are addicted to which include sugar, salt, and fat.
When we decide that lean is our end we have to eliminate sugar, fat, heavy salting, grease, processed foods, fast food, many snack foods, most desserts, and restaurant Mexican and Italian food.
We have to get used to and then learn to enjoy foods that are more bland and don’t pack the taste bud punch we are used to. My daughter has asked me whether the food I eat tastes good or do I just eat it because it is good for me. I think that is the million dollar question and condemnation of the lean life style in one sentence.
To the person who eats to be lean, the food tastes good. We do season to our taste buds. To the person raised on American “tastes”, they continue to desire taste over health.
One problem with the lean commitment is that most people would have to change their diet. The obstacle people face is that the impetus to lose a few pounds usually comes with a deadline. They figure they can only stand to starve or avoid their favorite foods for a certain period of time.
I made my goal a life time one and changed gradually over 4 years. I lost 45 pounds in that period of time with the last 25 coming in four months when I adopted a raw food diet. Now I have returned to eating meat and cooking, but I haven’t changed the basic daily nutrients.
The nutrients the body needs to look and feel great are vegetables, fruits, grains, nuts, seeds, good fats, eggs, and lots of water. You can get protein from vegetable, meat, and powders. I do eat chicken, eggs, fresh hamburger, tuna, and protein supplements. I also get protein from beans, rice, 10 grain cereal, and peanut butter.
I don’t eat dairy, fried food, packaged food, canned food, bread, cake or foods containing white flour. I do make banana nut muffins and have cacao treats as my main two desserts.
There is a point where the mind wants what the body should have. Once you reach the plateau that the body wants what it should have, you have arrived at the plain of synchronicity with nature. Your mind and body are at peace with creating peak performance, peak health, and many would say peak appearance.
Is There a Congress, Drug, Food, & FDA Conspiracy?
Posted by: | CommentsNatural News reports on the FDA’s newest intention to make vitamin and supplements difficult to market.
Going retro to a 1994 law passed by Congress, the FDA is announced its intentions to regulate ingredients which would make supplements difficult to market and sell.- Natural News
http://www.naturalnews.com/032912_FDA_dietary_supplements.html
Who would benefit if people cannot use nutrition to stay healthy?
By the same token, the government (Congress) is cracking down on people growing organic products. So if you would like locally grown food not exposed to pesticides and perhaps grown by farmers into sustainability, it is getting more difficult as government agencies raid these farms.
Who would benefit by organic products disappearing? The large food cartels that control most of the food distribution in the U.S.? Do they need more control?
How about the Congressman that can run great campaigns from the money received for knocking out something as meaningless as organic food and supplements?
Are we continuing down the road of extreme supervision and regulation for our better good? The government decides we need health care, shouldn’t eat organic food nor take vitamins, super foods, or supplements?
While we are concerned about wars, taxes, global warming, energy, and jobs, the distractions are also allowing other monopolies to chip away at our quality of life and maybe the longevity of life. What happens to our cost of living when the only beneficial supplements are controlled by big pharma?
The real issue is that lobbyists need to be eliminated so that it is a government by the people and for the people.
Too bad food and nutrition are so far down the list of priorities that they can’t become political issues that count.
The Quality of Food is Crucial for Weight Loss and Vitality
Posted by: | CommentsWe become so focused on calories we forget that the best quality food serves all our purposes. 
If you are sports oriented, like I am with surfing and exercising, I know I only have so many opportunities to provide the energy and recovery requirements of my body for peak performance. I want a diet balanced with carbohydrates and protein, but need the essential amino acids, omegas, fiber, fats like olive oil and avocados, potassium, anti oxidants, and hydration.
What we rarely consider is that each of these is also important for brain function. The brain is two thirds fat, mostly omega 3 fat. Eating avocados, fish, and olive oil, clean protein and getting anti oxidants creates more alert, energetic, and capable brain function which affects our mood, personality, capability, and creativeness.
If your brain operated at its highest potential, it would be calm, quick, facile, balanced, and spiritual. You would be the star at social functions and at the office not to mention more capable in pursuing your passions. Concentration on your passionate activities blocking distractions creates flow or operating in the zone.
Mike Adams of Natural News brings up a great point about whether red meat is good or bad for us. It is not the meat that is the problem, he says, but the chemicals that are found in factory raised meat such as hormones and antibiotics. We’re leaving out the stress of the conditions in which the animals may be raised.
http://www.naturalnews.com/032890_red_meat_food_additives.html
If you eat any meat from grass fed or non factory farms, you could be getting excellent protein as enjoyed by any of God’s creatures that hunt for their fresh dinners. Fresh is important. There are no preservatives in fresh meat raised by a local farm. This is the kind of meat I buy from my local market. The bigger the market from which you purchase the meat, the more likely it has all the bad stuff.
Think about the rest of the food. If you ate super foods first, you might be eating things like green algae, hemp seeds, chia seeds, quinoa, 10 grain cereals, blue berries, bananas, apples, avocados, kale, broccoli, cabbage, garlic, onions, almonds, peanuts, chicken, tuna, water, and green tea.
Going for the foods that have the most impact leads you first to super foods. They have more protein, necessary fats, and anti oxidants per volume than any other foods on earth. That is why they are called super foods.
Next you want to go for foods that are the best in their category. What are the best fruits, vegetables, grains, nuts, seeds, fats, and proteins? If you can’t get everything you need, what are the best supplements? Are the best supplements powders, tablets, or drinks?
Eating the best foods will guarantee you get lean. They will also provide the mental clarity you need to perform and fight stress. They will provide the nutrition your body needs to exercise and recover. They will develop the best immunity system and eliminate sickness and debilitating diseases (not counting congenital and already developed symptoms). Societies on earth that follow these paths live to be 100 years old, disease free and capable of work, sex, and clarity in their later years.
Focus on getting the building blocks your body needs for each specific activity that is important and you will be on the path to leaner, healthier, and happier.
The Myth of Weight Lifting Increasing Metabolism Debunked
Posted by: | CommentsThe Myth of Muscle Metabolism Burn
We have all grown up on the theory that one can lose more weight by lifting weights because our metabolism is increased while we rest. Seems this theory is being debunked.
In an article by James S Fell of L.A. Times, life long research Claude Bouchard says:
“Brain function makes up close to 20% of RMR,” he said. “Next is the heart, which is beating all the time and accounts for another 15-20%. The liver, which also functions at rest, contributes another 15-20%. Then you have the kidneys and lungs and other tissues, so what remains is muscle, contributing only 20-25% of total resting metabolism.”
That doesn’t mean you should not lift weights. It should still be a part of an over all program to develop fitness. It can still be used to develop sport specific strengths. Surfing for example requires great upper body strength that can be developed with weights, yoga, calisthenics, aerobics, or good old fashioned push ups and cables.
As Fell says: “Don’t think I’m down on weights; I lift four hours a week because it’s awesome. It makes me stronger, increases my bone density and improves the strength of my connective tissues. It hardens me against injury from other activities. And my wife says that it makes me pretty from the neck down.”
Most of us who are steady exercisers and eat healthy will attribute weight loss to a steady diet of heavy exercise. When I was running 25 miles a week in daily 5 mile sessions at 7 minute miles, my body accommodated the exercise and I did not lose weight after the initial drop.
When I joined a track club and jumped the mileage to 40 a week, I still did not see a weight drop. Once I hit 60 miles a week, the weight fell off like a snake shedding its skin. When your body is under an increased stress, it is amazing how you also start changing your eating habits automatically to survive the endurance required.
The light this article might shed is that the mostly stationary individual or even the active exerciser cannot expect to lose weight by adding a weight regimen. Once again the emphasis is put on the foods selected to change the body composition and reduce fat.
As I have stated in previous articles, once you start eating natural non processed foods the body recognizes from nature, it will start releasing the fat used to store non recognized, man fabricated foods.
Start adding natural foods and eliminating the most offensive ones to eliminate fat weight from the body. It can be accomplished in a slow process that allows your mind to accommodate the change. Once you start seeing results, the mind will jump on board and start attacking you when you make bad food choices. Yea mind!
http://www.latimes.com/health/la-he-fitness-muscle-myth-20110516,0,7417131.story
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Losing 10 Pounds a Month Without Dieting
Posted by: | CommentsReal weight loss comes from food selection not deprivation
The problem with calorie counting and starving is most people can’t sustain it for very long. They usually lead to quitting or binging. Any 10 pounds lost on a diet is soon regained because you haven’t really changed your permanent eating habits.
What choice do you have when you have finished your diet but to go back to your regular routine? Maybe you start cutting down on a few desserts, but you don’t really know anything else but what you were doing.
Losing weight is not about exercising it off. Very few mostly sedentary people can exercise enough to burn off a pound of fat. Most people who start exercising hard feel they need some food to reward them selves and put the pound back on.
The way to lose the pound is to have the body release the fat and not just burn it off. To burn off a pound you have to burn approximately 3300 calories. A jog is worth about 600 calories an hour, giving you the benefit of the doubt. If you jogged everyday your body would increase its metabolism which would help burn more calories.
The best way to lose weight is to eat foods that the body recognizes causing it to release the food encapsulated in fat that it did not recognize. Most of your fat is holding onto foods that are acidic that would poison the organs if they were released. Those are the bad foods that lead to obesity, heart problems, disease, and early death.
The answer to weight loss, health and looking good is very simple. Eat the right foods and eliminate the bad foods. The only real trick is if you can get your mind to accept the regimen. Your mind has its own ideas about what you should be eating. It thinks you should be eating food to reward yourself for all the trouble and pain you experience.
The mind does not care if you eat healthy until you start eating healthy and it realizes this is a good thing. Then it will be your ally in eating the right foods and avoiding the bad ones. The mind enjoys the body having more energy, feeling healthy, and having better mental capacity.
So what do you eat? Fruits, vegetables, lean meats, grains, seeds, nuts, eggs and good fats 85% of the time. What do you eliminate? Sugar, white flour, processed foods, and bad fats. It’s that easy. If you can start with 70% to 85% compliance it is a good first step. I don’t eat dairy because it usually has fats and I am mostly lactose intolerant.
If you jump into 100% compliance the fat will leave your body like rats fleeing a sinking ship. If you add an hour of exercise a day, you will certainly accelerate the process.
What can you eat? For breakfast you can have eggs, oat meal, fruit, and meat. For lunch you can have salads, tuna, chicken, soups, and fruit. For dinner you can have meat, rice, beans, salads, soups, avocados, and wheat pasta without cream sauces.
What are you eliminating? Mexican food, Italian food (pizzas), hamburgers, desserts, sandwiches, sweet rolls, sodas, and as much alcohol as you can live without.
But once you change, you are likely to change for life. Then the pounds you lose don’t come back. Over a period of years I have lost 45 pounds and am at my high school weight of 175. When I moved to the beach, I lost the last 25 pounds on a raw diet regimen in a few months.
You never have to starve. I eat as much as I want whenever I want, but I am basically eating foods without calories or fat. I have my desserts each day which are banana nut muffins or cacao squares which have nuts and seeds. Like most people on raw diets or sustainable healthy diets, I try to keep it at 85% but am closer to 90% plus alcohol.
