Sunday story...the Question

Sunday Story…the Question

I get the question every week if not every day. It really isn’t the question that someone is asking. Because the question they are asking is rarely the question that needs to be answered.
Usually the question is:
What do I need to do to lose 20 pounds?
How can I get in better shape?
What can I eat to enjoy better health?
How should I work out?
How do I communicate better with my spouse/child/significant other?
What do I need to do to be better at my job/career/school?
How can I make more money?

There is nothing wrong with these questions. They are perfectly valid and they do need to be answered. But almost each one is not asking the question that needs to be answered before the answer to these questions can be validated.

The reason for this is simple. Each of these questions simply does not make sense until we start measuring where you are in the light of how you live your life. And where you are in terms of the commitment to getting where you want to go?

Context Covers a lot of Area
If we look at context, or the availability your life is going to allow you to do the things necessary to get the goal done we start realizing that certain limitations exist.
Want to make a million dollars?
Want to bench press 300 pounds?
Want to date a super model?
How is that going to work in the context of your life? If I live in say, Fernley Nevada, which is not exactly the entertainment capital of the world, nor is it part of the fashion industry in any way shape or form, the likelihood of me even seeing a super model is pretty darn slim, let alone being able to date one. The “context” of my life is such that the possibility of that outcome taking place is just not going to happen. In another (maybe more realistic example) if I want to lose 50 pounds but I work 2 jobs, raise 3 kids by myself, eat crap food from fast food joints every day, don’t sleep well and have never worked out in my life and I think getting up from the couch for a glass of water is real exercise losing weight is simply not in the “context” of my life.

The bottom line on context is that if I have goals or quests that I want to achieve but they do not fit into the context of my life then they are not real and they are not achievable. We call things like this “dreams”. If I want to win the lottery but I never buy a ticket then winning is only a dream and not even a remote possibility. I have not made the changes in the context of my life to win the lottery. So if you want to do certain things you are going to have to shift some element of your life to get them done…you are going to change or shift or transform the context of your life to make room for getting the goal done.

Commitment is Compliance

You are going to hate this one. You must be committed to not just the goal or the quest. You have to be committed to the everyday, to the plan, to the nitty gritty, down and dirty daily work of implementation. You have got to do the work! Every day. Every moment. Unerringly committed to doing what must be done each and every day. If you want to lose 50 pounds but every Sunday you eat a large pepperoni pizza to reward yourself you have lost sight of your commitment. Yes I understand the psychology of rewards and all the rest of that blah blah blah. Guess what? I don’t care. Get a plan. Stay on task. Do the things every day the plan calls on you to do. Don’t cheat. If the plan needs to be modified, modify it but don’t quit, don’t take your eyes off the prize at the end of the quest.

So what’s the question?

If the question you are asking is not the question you should be asking then what is the correct question? Let me put it this way…The magic is not in the plan. It is not in the perfect diet, plastic surgeon or career, or work out plan. There is no magic pill. The magic is in how much you care. The magic is in how much you are willing to do the 2 things you must do to complete your quest…shift your life to make the quest fit into it AND commit to doing what needs to be done to move forward everyday toward the goal.

SO…the question is this: Are you doing or Have you done Everything you can do with what you have already? When you read all the words before this we come down to this: Are you doing enough with what you already have? If you are not then get after it first. Do the research, do the plan you already have. Then if you can say yes, I am doing all I can with what I have then we can start there. That is our jumping off point. When your commitment and your context have shifted to accommodate the quest then we can get to work. Want to lift 300 pounds off your chest? We can make a plan for that if you have the context and the commitment. Date a super model? Same thing. Lose weight? Enjoy better health? Same same.

I can help but only to the degree that you are willing to work. Not to the degree that I am willing to listen to your reasons for not being committed and contextual.
Want help? Call me.


Namaste
John
“Teaching Focus, Inspiring Transformation”
www.martialartsnevada.com

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Sunday Story...Couch Potato

Sunday Story…Couch Potato?

The other morning, after kickboxing class several of us were having a conversation about various exercise methods. The fact of the matter is that there are many ways to become more fit, especially if you are starting from zero, or less than zero (yes that is possible). I know of one example of over 100 pounds lost by riding a bicycle. We have all heard of people who lost weight and improved their physical fitness by running, swimming, walking, dancing, p-90x, zumba, crossfit, aerobics, tae-bo, or any of a number of other things. All of these things have one thing in common: they require you to get up and start moving. It is impossible to get fit lying on the couch bemoaning your health and fitness.

But what is fitness, really? How do you define fitness? How do I define fitness? What makes up an athlete or a state of athleticism? Who is an athlete? Is there some independent measure or benchmark that we can say makes someone fit? After all we can say when someone is unfit, or ill, or unhealthy. There are some objective measurements for sickness or disease…blood pressure, pulse rates, blood markers, and more. And, yes, some of those markers would also indicate a fit person as well.

We can look across a spectrum of fitness and find lots of different examples. For example, an Olympic marathoner can run 26 miles in just over 2 hours (120 minutes). That means they are going to average less than 5 minutes per mile. I don’t know about you but I cannot run 1 mile in less than 5 minutes let alone 26 in a row. This is obviously an athlete of some repute. But is he really fit?
How about a Triathlete? One of the folks who can swim 2.4 miles (in the ocean), ride the bike for 112 miles and then run for 26 miles. One after the other and do it in less than 8 hours. This is a feat to be reckoned with.
What about a power lifter. I recently met a man who can squat (put weight on his back and drop his rear down below his knees and stand up with the weight) over 1000 pounds. That is a strength I don’t have but is he fit?
How about the body builders and fitness models…the people who get their body fat so obscenely low so we can see every striation and fiber in their flexed muscles? Must be fit right?

All of these examples are of athletes who can be considered to be in good shape, have a decent cardio vascular response to exercise, and the potential to excel in their sports. But they are each different and they each have made a similar fitness choice…they have specialized in their “thing”. An Olympic marathoner is never going to be a power lifter. He just isn’t made for it. And that power lifter is never going to outrun the marathoner once they get past about 50 yards. His fitness is not going to allow for that.

So how are we going to define fitness? Because the definition we use will determine the method of exercise we choose. And the method will create the level of fitness and health we are trying to achieve.

Most commonly we are looking for the following characteristics: strength, flexibility, balance, coordination, agility, power, accuracy, cardiovascular/respiratory endurance and stamina. The ability to have all of these things is what makes an athlete. Obviously if I am going to be really good at running 26 miles I am going to give up on a few of those fields in favor of my chosen sport. The same holds true for power lifting.

Fitness by my definition requires me to be good at all of those things. I must have power and strength. The other day a man asked me to help him pick up his motorcycle that had fallen over at the gas station. He couldn’t do it. I walked over and lifted it up…this is functional fitness. I must have endurance and stamina to run or swim or bike or row as I choose. Even if that is a 4 or 5 hour hike or walk in the amusement park. I have to have balance and flexibility…too many people as they age can no longer move the way they did years ago and the primary reason is that they aren’t flexible any more. It is a practice to stay flexible and balanced.

If I am going to be an athlete I must work on all those areas without prejudice or specialization. That means I have to do 2 or 3 things frequently…I must train, I must practice, and I must push my body when I practice and train. Doing 45 minutes on the hamster wheel just isn’t going to get it done. Knocking out 3 sets of 10 reps of a specific body part isn’t going to get it done. I have to train which means I am increasing my cardiovascular/respiratory response, strength and flexibility in the activity. Training is an activity that increases performance in a measurable way. I have to practice which means I am improving coordination, balance, accuracy and agility. This activity results in changes in the nervous system…I am getting better at the activity. Power and speed are improved through adaptations in both training and practice.

The definition of fitness I use says that no matter what I am tasked with…picking up a motorcycle, mowing the lawn, hiking up the mountain, sprinting across the road, sitting down without a chair and getting up without assistance, jumping over the fence, climbing up a tree, or???...I will be able to perform. You see I want to be a life athlete. I want to be an athlete that can do what we wants when he wants and be able to say when it was over I am glad I train and practice hard so I was able to get that done. It’s pretty simple really. But it is definitely not easy. It takes sweat, effort, thought and fortitude to push yourself hard. And then come back tomorrow for more.

Come on and get fit with me. Unleash your inner athlete (and bury your couch potato)…they are just sitting there waiting for you to put them in the game…the game we call life.

Namaste
John
“Teaching Focus, Inspiring Transformation”
www.martialartsnevada.com

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Sunday Story...Why I'm Fat

Sunday Story…Why I'm Fat

I am fat. I have to face it…like all 2/3rds of Americans today I am overweight. I am at least 10 pounds overweight and I have no one to blame but myself. I really need to stop kidding myself about this. Sure, I have some abdominal muscle showing which should indicate a particular level of fitness and body composition. But the facts are simple…over 66% of us are overweight and I count myself among them. Even worse…1/3rd or over 33% of us are obese. The world health organization (WHO) defines obesity as a “BMI” (body mass index) of 30+, and overweight is 25+. Mine is 24.8 but I am an athlete and as such my ideal weight would be about 10# lighter and a BMI of closer to 24.

Many years ago all the humans who walked the earth were fit and healthy and lean. They were taller than we are today, had fewer cavities, enjoyed better health and had bigger brains. So what happened? Why are we, today, in the face of having more than enough food to eat getting fatter and fatter as time progresses? You would think, in light of what we know, that we would be able to eat in ways that science tells us will make us even healthier and fitter. But the facts are in…in the last 40 years we have gotten fatter and fatter, our health has gone downhill, new diseases have come about related to diet and we are generally in poorer health. This just doesn’t make sense. Or does it?

Imagine for a moment what a lion living on the savannah of Africa eats. Meat. They eat lots of meat and not much else. We don’t see lions out foraging for a snickers bar or even sitting down to a nice breakfast of leaves and twigs. Nope it is pretty much meat all the way. The lion has developed this way over thousands of years. He is programmed by evolution to eat what it is that he eats. Imagine for a moment that we would try to turn our lion into a vegetarian. I am just guessing but I am willing to say we would probably end up with a pretty sick lion. The thought of him being a vegan is chilling.

On the other hand let’s talk about cows. Our happy cow living her life in a bucolic pasture, munching on green grass, chewing her cud and producing milk for her offspring, all of whom then eat more grass and get fat and happy. Our cow has developed a digestive system that works perfectly when fed grass. She takes grass and turns it into meat and milk. It is a beautiful thing. How about we start feeding her animal parts? How about we ask our cow to start running down a deer for dinner? But she doesn’t have the teeth, the stomach acids, or the digestion to make animal parts into milk and meat. She will get sick (by the way, this is why feedlot cows have to be given a regular diet of antibiotics to keep them alive).

Now let’s turn our attention back to us human animals. What were we meant to eat? How did we evolve to eat the foods we are eating? The fact is we don’t really know. Our pre-historic ancestors left no menus lying around for our anthropologists to decipher. There is a way to get some clues, however. We know they didn’t eat cereal, pizza, or drink milk. All of those things are fairly new developments. And in anthropological terms anything in the last 10,000 years is fairly recent.

We didn’t eat grain or legumes. In order to destroy the toxins the grain (a seed designed for one thing---propagation of the species) produces to protect itself we have to process the grain to make it somewhat palatable to our digestive systems.
We didn’t drink milk or eat dairy products. There were no domesticated critters yet. And if you have ever tried to milk an animal that didn’t want to be milked, well let’s just wish you good lick with that shall we?
We didn’t eat processed fats, sugars…they simply did not exist for those humans.
The tools needed to process those foods did not exist until about 10 thousand years ago. It was here that human civilization really began. We could take seeds, plant them, harvest them, and process them and feed people. And for the last 9,900 years grain has reigned supreme in the human diet. This allowed us to stay in one place because we had a constant food source readily available. Then we could create cities and roads, and have traffic jams and start enjoying all the wonderfulness of the non-hunter-gatherer lifestyle.

At the same time humans began to get shorter, have smaller brains and have more cavities. It’s a small price to pay for a Starbucks on the corner, right? Then about 100 years ago we began to industrialize our food system. We introduced processed oils and sugars into our diets but even into the 1960’s we were still pretty lean. The obesity rate was rising but not alarmingly so. Somewhere about 1970 we were told to avoid fat…that eating fat was making us sick, causing heart disease, and causing havoc with our arteries. So we all went on a carb-binge. It was OK to eat cereal with a 30 gram sugar filled yogurt on top. It wasn’t and our waistlines are expanding every year to prove it. Even worse all those grain based carbs began to work their magic with our immune systems and digestive tracts.

We got sicker and fatter than ever. And today I am fat. I am fat because I swallowed the party line hook line and sinker. And I will continue to be fat until I change my diet. It really is that simple.

Now, those of you who know me already think I am a fringe foodie. I don’t eat grain, sugar, legumes, or dairy. The problem is simple. I am not 100% compliant and that is where my last 10 pounds are hiding…in that glass of wine, shot of tequila, chocolate bar, and piece of cheese. I may be 90% compliant but until I take that last step those stubborn last few pounds will remain with me.

I am going to get 100% compliant. I am not willing to put myself in the overweight category anymore. I will be the lean human machine I was created to be. How about you?

Namaste
John
“Teaching Focus, Inspiring Transformation”
www.martialartsnevada.com

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Sunday Story...The Urge to Purge

Sunday Story…The Urge to Purge

About 3 years ago I “down-sized” my life. I moved into a house 1/3rd smaller than the one I was living in. A 1 one car instead of 2, one bedroom less, everything was smaller. I even lost so much stuff I could put the car in the garage (what a concept)! But lately I have been feeling stuck and cramped and just generally weighted down.

When I look around my world today I see a lot of stuff. I seem to have spent a lot of time (and money) acquiring stuff. Some of this stuff is left over from things I used to do. Clothes, food, books, cds, knick knacks and bric a brac are all there.

I have one cupboard in my kitchen filled with food I will no longer eat. Rice, flour, prepared and boxed stuff, loose stuff, it’s all in there. Yet for some time I have resisted getting rid of it. Honestly a great portion of it is probably waaaay past its expiration date. I will never eat any of it. It’s perfectly good but for some reason I have resisted cleaning out that cupboard. Maybe I am thinking of the day the world crashes down and I will need some weird Thai box food to eat? I have friends who would eat this food. I could give it to one of the food pantries. So what is the stop?

Although my closet today is smaller than the one I had 3 years ago, I do have 2 closets full of clothes. And some of those clothes are still bagged up from the move, so I have not worn them in 3+ years! Again I have friends who would wear some of these things. There are shelters that would take them. There is probably a clothing exchange somewhere that would take them. I could sell them. The fact is that many of them don’t fit anymore, others are a style I don’t wear anymore, and others may never have been right but they looked cool and the price was right. So what is the stop?

My garage is the place where all the orphan stuff goes to live. There are 3 boxes of empty mineral water bottles. I saved them because they need to be recycled somewhere and in California they have an actual cash value. There is an old stereo system that is probably 20 years old including a turntable with no needle and a cassette player…yes a cassette player. And somewhere there is probably a box of cassette tapes which haven’t been played in 10+ years. All of it needs to be gone through and trashed, sold, recycled, given up, or burnt. So what is the stop?

Obviously I have the urge to purge yet I don’t. When I look around I feel stifled and stuck. It is almost like being in a closed up room with no air flow in the summer time---really uncomfortable and hard to breathe. The answer is…just do it.

Just throw it out.
Just give it away.
Just recycle it.
Just burn it.
Just get rid of it somehow, someway.
We all know the answer yet we don’t do it.
We all know the lightness that will come when we unburden our life from these things.
We all know that by getting rid of the old we make room for the new…the new experiences, the new, possibilities, the new people that can come into our lives when we make room.
We all know that purging our junk is good for us once in a while.

Yet it is so hard to do. The task is daunting. When I look at that cupboard I cringe. Yet I know in my head that it will take less than an half an hour to clean up. So what is the stop?

The clothes feel worse. It feels like I have to decide that I am never going to wear that again. That I will never be that size again. That the style no longer suits me. Then when we add in the memories of the clothes…where they were last worn, who bought them, the compliments received while wearing them, it feels as if I would be giving away those memories as well.

Then there is the garage. And that feels just impossible. A huge task. And I am not talking about the work; I am talking about putting the memories away. Taking books I have been carrying around for 40 years and doing something with them. It just goes against my training. On the other hand I haven’t even looked at them in over 3 years, let alone read them. They have been sitting in boxes all that time. The same thing goes for cds…I have hundreds yet today I keep all my music on various hard drives and I wouldn’t have room in the house for the 500 gigs or so of music I keep on those drives. Yet there they are in boxes all over the garage.

The stop is not wanting to deal with the memories of all that stuff. If I keep it all locked away I don’t have to deal with it. I don’t have to sort and sift through the experiences and the good and the bad that all that stuff represents.

We all have stuff. We all have more stuff than we really need. I know I do. And I know I am going to get the stop off and get rid of the stuff that no longer serves me. This stuff is holding me back from what I really want, from the things that will really serve me in my life as it is right now.

Anyone want any of this stuff?


Namaste
John
“Teaching Focus, Inspiring Transformation”
www.martialartsnevada.com

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Sunday Story...Tribes

Sunday Story…Tribes

A long, long time ago in a place not all that far from here there was a very young man who taught at an early age to like people and make friends. And if someone new came into the school or the neighborhood he went out of his way to make the new person feel like they had a friend in him. It was part of who he was; part of what he thought was expected of him. He brought them into his friends and his groups and treated them like they were important and welcome in the community. It felt like the right thing to do.

Someplace along the way, probably around age 9 or 10 this young man noticed a couple things happening. And these things had him feel sad, lonely, isolated and ostracized. What happened was pretty simple; the new friend left often taking some of the community or group with them, branching off and creating a new group or a sub group that our young man was not welcome into. In other words after bringing the newcomer in, he was forced out by the newcomer.

What this young man made that mean was this: I don’t belong. Even when it looks like I belong I really don’t. And if I befriend someone they will leave after using me to gain access to the people and groups they really need access to. And if I am welcomed into a group or a tribe I will always be the outsider, the interloper who will be expendable once his gifts, skill and talents have been replaced or used up.

Just because you make something mean something it does not make it true or a fact. It is just the meaning you have assigned to those events. Someone else may give those same events a completely different meaning. It is part of our nature as humans…to create meaning.

As I might imagine you have already guessed that the young man in the story is me. As I look out over the past years (and there have been more than a few) the realization has dawned that I have been living out of this “story” for most of my life.

In other words this has been a theme in my life…not belonging. For a long time I have felt like I didn’t have a home. Not a real one…one where people see me and appreciate me. I have spent so long keeping different parts of my life from touching one another that it feels like 4 or 5 jigsaw puzzles that are somehow connected but I am missing the pieces that will connect the puzzle into a cohesive picture. Each puzzle is complete but I know that when they are all hooked together there will be a new and more impactful picture. The question is now: what do you do to find the pieces that will connect the whole picture?

I have been looking for a “tribe” for a long time. I have found many tribes that I fit into at least partially. These are the places and people who seem to welcome me (at least the parts of me that are visible to them). But after awhile I start feeling like I really don’t belong. Like I have missed the “joke”, the inside information that the rest of the group is privy to. Again this is not the truth; it is only the story, or the meaning I have given to the events.

The fact of the matter is until I allow my own truth to be seen and heard I cannot really be present in any place I show up. Until I advocate for myself clearly and with power there is no way to belong anywhere. I would just be floating along, like a piece of flotsam on the tide, showing whatever face needs to be shown at the moment. So that would be the first connecting piece: be my own advocate.

The first piece is closely tied to the second piece: show up fully without fear of approbation. What that means is that instead of a toll bridge between the different elements of my life we are going to bring the borders right up next to each other. My life should be connected not disconnected. When all those disparate pieces become a complete picture it will be easier for the tribe to accept and understand and appreciate me. Or not. Because not all tribes are the right fit.

The last connecting piece is: give up the story. The story that says I don’t belong. The story that says I am not worthy of this or that tribe. That is all that is: a story. This is where we get to change the past. What happened is what happened. What I made that happening mean is all about me. I get to change the story. I get to decide what those events mean to me. And doesn’t it make more sense to tell a story that will serve me in beneficial ways?

So now the end of the story might go something like this: I am a connector. One of the most useful things I do in any group is to connect people in ways that serve them and the greater good. I help people find the places and tribes that will serve them and their chosen vision and goals. I belong and I show up fully and I am accepted for the gifts, skills and talents I bring to the table.

What’s your story? Does your story help you or are you living out of a story a 10 year old told him or her? Wouldn’t it be better if you told yourself a grown up story? A story that has the kind of meaning that will truly serve who you want to be tomorrow?

Go ahead change your past and create the future you choose.

Namaste
John
“Teaching Focus, Inspiring Transformation”
www.martialartsnevada.com

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Sunday Story...Get Up, Stand up

Sunday Story…Get Up, Stand Up

Yesterday two of my students were fooling around in class. This is not unusual for these two young men. As a matter of fact it is pretty much the code of the day. However, one of them almost always blames or finds that the other one is causing the disruption. He refuses to take responsibility for what is happening around him. He gets mad and frustrated when the discipline is meted out to both of them. The other one, on the other hand, takes responsibility for what is happening and accepts the consequences. He just would rather goof around than be compliant. So…which position is better?

Personal Responsibility doesn’t mean it’s my fault or I am to blame. Personal responsibility means I am not going to blame circumstances or fear or fate or failure for the way my life looks. Personal responsibility means I am going to stand up and be counted for what is happening in my life.
When I do something wrong, I stand up.
When I do something right I stand up.
When I do something that hurts someone else, I stand up.
When I do something that helps someone else I stand up.
When I do something that hurts me I stand up.
When I do something that is right for me I stand up.
When you choose to live this way the constant is that you stand up…constantly and consistently.

I often write about changing your life and about changing the world. I write about being the person you were put upon this earth to be. I write about being kind, about creating the life you want to lead. I write about living in a way that serves you and serves the people and the world around you. I write about optimum health and fitness. But all of those things take a back seat to personal responsibility.

Personal responsibility is the keystone to living life on your terms. Way too often, way too many of us are just taking what life gives us. We are trying to surf on an ocean of waves with a 2x4 and getting beat up for the effort. I don’t know about you but that just isn’t a lot of fun. I have done this. You have done this. We were just trying to get by, just trying to do what we had to do to get through one more day, month or year, thinking that if we just did x (whatever x is) everything would be ok. Guess what? It isn’t going to be OK. It isn’t going to get any better. Haven’t you noticed that every time we get x life throws us another curve ball? Just when you thought you had it all figured out the game changes? Just when you got all your proverbial ducks in a row someone decided that having your ducks in a row was the wrong thing to do. So what did you do? You chucked the ducks for the next thing it looked like life wanted from you.

How long are you going to continue this way? Aren’t you tired of it yet? I know I am. I can blame the economy for this or that. I can blame this President or the other one. I can look at my life and say I got some bad breaks, that is isn’t my fault, not really, and I can figure that I just need to tough it out a while longer.
OR I can start by standing up. I can stand up and take responsibility for my life, for what has happened to me and for what is going to happen to me in the future. I can stand up and begin to put my life in the order I want it to be rather than allowing life to shove me around like some flotsam in the ocean.

I am not saying this is easy by the way. Because it is not easy. It may sound simple but it isn’t easy. It is going to require a shift in how you view the world and your place in it. You must begin to believe that you are the captain of your ship. You must begin to believe that life is an ocean and if you don’t sail on it with purpose and direction you will end up wherever the currents and prevailing winds push you. And honestly, unless you are very lucky, that is probably not where you want to go.

The direction personal responsibility will send you will be one of your choosing. And just like sailing on the ocean you will need to make course corrections from time to time. You will need to check your compass, recalibrate where you are in reference to where you want to be and make adjustments. You might even have to change destinations to achieve what you really want. But the keyword in all of those sentences is you, I, me…the personal pronouns of personal responsibility.
I am responsible for my life.
I decide where I want to go and how I am going to get there.
I stand up for me.
I stand up for what is right and what is wrong in my life.
I do the work to fix it.
I am powerful because I am the captain of the ship that is my life.

It is never too late to take your power. No matter where you are today. No matter how old you are, no matter how poor, or rich, no matter the state of your health, unless you are dead and in a box, you can take the helm of your ship and start piloting it. So go ahead, decide that your life belongs to you and take the wheel.

Get up and Stand up.

Namaste
John
“Teaching Focus, Inspiring Transformation”
www.martialartsnevada.com

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Sunday Story...Sweetness

Sunday Story…Sweetness

There is a drug so powerful that it addicts almost 100% of the people who use it. It is so insidious that the effects can only be seen over time. Yet the short term effects are immediate and noticeable in almost 100% of users. Long term it has been linked to cancer, diabetes, heart disease, neurological disorders, digestive issues, high blood pressure, lever disease, dementia, depression, and epilepsy.

This substance is so innocuous that it is virtually everywhere in our modern world. It appears as a dangerous and addictive white powder. It is available virtually anywhere and it is cheap. So cheap, in fact, that it is used in great quantities throughout our country. We manufacture tons of it and it does not occur naturally in nature.

It is everywhere. It is in our schools, our homes, our workplaces and our recreational centers. And it is killing us. We allow the schools to give it to our children as a reward. We give it to our children without thinking. I grew up on it and so did virtually everyone we know.

Most of us are addicted to it. We crave it and will ruin our health for it without thinking. The cravings are so powerful we will ruin our health before we try and quit. If we try to quit we will have withdrawal symptoms just like a crack or a heroin addict. It may be the hardest addiction to leave behind because we have been brainwashed to believe that it really isn’t ”that” bad.

The drug in question, the white powder I am talking about is sugar...the stuff that sits in the bowl on your kitchen table. You probably have a whole container of it somewhere in your house. Right now your children may have a whole bag of it stashed somewhere in the house. Of course their bag isn’t just pure sugar; no, their bag is worse. Brightly colored wrappers, fascinating logos and combined with other things to make it even more appealing and addictive they went out and begged on the streets for it just the other evening. And we, the adults, the grownups encouraged them to go. And some of us even shared in the spoils when it got home.

You may think this is radical thinking. How can a food be addictive? How can something that we thought was so good be so bad? There are lots of studies and books and articles that prove this out. And it isn’t just excess consumption, although excess consumption is very harmful. It appears that even a bit of consumption can have far reaching effects. And it is in almost everything you eat, if you eat any kind of processed food. For the record processed food is pretty much anything that isn’t meat, vegetables, fruit, seeds, or nuts. Bread, pasta, yogurt, chips, or pancake batter all have sugar.

And yes, fruit does have naturally occurring fructose (a monosaccharide sugar). This is one of the reasons fruit intake should be limited and fruit juice should not be ingested. Fruit juice has had the mitigating fiber and “food” removed from it and results in a pretty plain drink of sugar and liquid.

You have been conditioned to eat sugar your whole life. If you don’t believe me, if you think I am full of it just try to stop eating sugar for 30 days. All of it. 100% clean. After all if I am wrong you can always go back to eating it again on the 31st day. Oh and artificial sweeteners are probably worse. They act the same way in the body, they affect the same beta sites and they create the same insulin reaction as sugar. Except there isn’t any calories, no sugar for the insulin to act upon so there is a large probability that your insulin resistance is going to get worse (this is what helps create type II diabetes by the way)

You will experience withdrawals. You will have headaches, fatigue, cravings, and generally feel bad. Yet if you stick it out you will feel better in just a few days. It is going to be way too easy to fall back into the sugar abyss. Sugar is ubiquitous…it is everywhere. And the real challenge will be over the next 2 months.

This Monday marked the start. Not the start of winter, although winter is certainly trying to arrive. Monday was Halloween and the start of “treat” season. The next 2 months will be filled with candy, irresistible deserts, favorite comfort foods, and a wink and a nod to overeating. Guilt and pressure to “try everything” will be paramount. So much of the food we associate with comfort, and home, and the holidays are sugar laden bombs just waiting to go off to the detriment of your health.

Is your health important enough to you to stop eating sugar? Or have you dismissed me as some kind of crazy, a fruitcake who has fallen into the soup of crazy nutrition advice? You don’t have to believe me. You can do the same research I have done. Go ahead and Google it…sugar addiction. Or just about anything with sugar…sugar and diabetes, sugar and obesity, sugar and hyperinsulinemia, sugar and depression the information is readily available.

Or you can stick your head in the sugar bowl and say it just isn’t true. After all the government and the major food companies only have your health interests at heart. The only person who is going to suffer is you not the FDA or the USDA or Monsanto, or Pepsi, or Coca Cola. And really you have nothing to lose by stopping for 30 days. Just 30 days of no added sugar. C’mon you can do it!

Namaste
John
“Teaching Focus, Inspiring Transformation”
www.martialartsnevada.com

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