First, though, may I say, Indulgence Day upcoming! I would have indulged on some sweet, delectable treats yesterday but I think something might have been weird with the food I ate yesterday so my stomach was giving me problems. Remind me to never again eat green beans that have been sitting in the refrigerator for over a week since they apparently take a turn for the worse after that time. Eating rubbery, bland sticks of...unappetizing blandness is not good eats.
And it never will be.
Also, sleeping through your alarm clock for two hours is not my idea anymore of a good way to start off the day. I mean, what the heck was that about? I went sleep way earlier than I normally do and now I'm struggling to get this thing written and sent off (and with a keyboard that doesn't want to cooperate) so I can get to my exercises before it gets even later than it already is. Man is that frustrating.
So renovations are still ongoing so this one may be short since I need to get my exercises out of the way and hurry up to get everything ordered the way I want it to be.
It seems, my fair readers, that the drink industry is screwing us again (wait, was the precedent?). There is a long held belief that we are supposed to be drinking a certain amount of water each and every day otherwise our bodies will cease to function and we’ll all become mindless vegetables, bed-ridden and near death. Or something like that. I wasn’t necessarily raised on that, I don’t know if both of my parents being in the medical field had anything to with that (maybe they knew something everyone else didn’t), but there wasn’t a daily water quota to fill under any circumstances by the time we were put to sleep at night. I, of course, knew that drinking water throughout the day was probably a good thing to do but it certainly wasn’t forced on me or my brother.
So imagine my surprise when Patrick told us that all of that was a hysteria fueled fallacy created years ago that has thrived and still lives today when we are living in an age where we are supposedly more intelligent than we were when the eight glasses of water a day thing was concocted. Heck, it’s still alive on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water#For_drinking. Crazy, isn’t it?
So let me summarize Patrick’s enlightening lesson for all of you: it ain’t necessary. Sure drinking water during the day is undoubtedly good for you and I’m sure even strongly recommended--for we can’t survive on soda alone (although I’m sure Pepsi would like us to believe that)--but what everyone, including the Wikipedia article, forgets to mention is that while, yes, we do need approximately 2 liters of fluid a day, well, the key word there is fluid. Not just water but any kind of liquid beverage (well, besides, alcohol).
Crazy, right? I never would have known and now I do. So I can stop trying to consume bottle after bottle of water a day and just trust that whatever liquid I do take in will be enough when combined with all of the food that I have to eat while on the project, because food itself does have water inside of it which will make up for any deficiency that may occur during the day. I can relax and sleep easy now.
So there that is, off to floss now, you know, to keep my heart healthy. What am I talking about, you ask? Well, go ask Patrick because he can explain it better than I can, also I have exercises to do. Have a wonderful day.
Showing posts with label Learning. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Learning. Show all posts
Sunday, July 6, 2008
Monday, June 30, 2008
Day 47, Violent attacks of the noxious kind
Saturday afternoon was an uncomfortable time for me, yes yes, and I didn’t think I did anything to deserve it. But the human body has its own very unsubtle, and in some cases funny in retrospect, way of letting us know that what we’re doing to it isn’t what we should be doing. It has its own special way of asking, would you please stop doing what you’re doing? Thank you. Because that kind of stuff isn’t going to help in the long run and as a lesson for the future how’s about something you’ll never forget? Good.
Every so often I’ll buy a steam-in-the-bag bag of vegetables from the freezer section of the supermarket because chopping and peeling vegetables is definitely not my favorite thing to do. It’s just easier and sometimes I think I’m entitled to a little bit of ease (even if I haven’t been working too hard). Well, concerning this particular incident, I bought and ate one of those bags of vegetables for lunch on Saturday, an Asian Medley variety of vegetables consisting of broccoli florets, julienned carrots, mini corn (anyone else think that’s as crazy and weird as I do?), and sugar snap peas. I tend to get rid of the peas because I don’t think that those will react well to my body and its numerous allergies (take a look at my Day 17 entry for the reason for my concern).
That particular variety is also “Specially Seasoned”, meaning that it’s not PCP-kosher but whatever. Now compared to all of the other “Specially Seasoned” varieties of bag vegetables in the freezer section the Asian Medley is by far the least “Specially Seasoned” so I don’t feel bad about getting and eating it. The calorie, fat, and carb levels are almost exactly the same as any other mixing of vegetables so the problem isn’t there. There are only two differences, one is in the level of sodium listed which is obviously more than plain vegetables, not much more but more. The other difference is in the taste of the actual stuff: intensely noticeable right off but it soon turns into this mish-mash of indistinguishable flavors blending together to become something salty, unidentifiable, and eventually, admittedly, unsatisfying.
Which brings me to my Saturday afternoon. Let me start by telling you about the e-mail Patrick sent to us all on Saturday afternoon (well, Saturday afternoon for me, at least). This particular e-mails topic was about salt and why we are all limiting our supplementary salt intake to as little as humanly possible before we start going into salt withdrawal and die (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt#Health_effects). (Also, how weird is it that I have a problem concerning my salt intake on the exact same day that I get an e-mail by Patrick about our salt intake? It’s creepy, almost).
In the e-mail he enlightened us as to why we are trying to limit our salt intake and the basic gist of it was this: there is already enough sodium in vegetables and fruit and etc. in our diets that we don’t need any additional salt added to it, either by the manufacturer of the food we eat or by our own hand. There is enough in all of the PCP foods that any extra is superfluous. Now since we are on low sodium diets and have been for forty-seven days now any extra sodium we put into our systems that isn’t already in the vegetables we’re eating will certainly make itself known to us.
Hence this posting. It seems that the extra sodium in the Asian Medley bag of vegetables was enough to slightly tip my new daily required amount of sodium over the edge, enough to send me on a slippery slope of gastrointestinal displeasure. Yippee skippee, eh? One of the side effects of going over my new limit of sodium, according to Patrick, is an uncomfortable bloating sensation and, boy, is that what I ended up with about three or four hours after I ate that Asian Medley. The bathroom never looked so inviting.
So, touche, body of mine. Lesson learned. But how about next time you just “accidentally” cause me to burn up that stuff in the microwave or on the stove where I’ll be forced to eat something tastier and healthier for me, instead of putting me through that crap again because that was almost unbearable.
Are we cool on that? Let’s hope so.
Every so often I’ll buy a steam-in-the-bag bag of vegetables from the freezer section of the supermarket because chopping and peeling vegetables is definitely not my favorite thing to do. It’s just easier and sometimes I think I’m entitled to a little bit of ease (even if I haven’t been working too hard). Well, concerning this particular incident, I bought and ate one of those bags of vegetables for lunch on Saturday, an Asian Medley variety of vegetables consisting of broccoli florets, julienned carrots, mini corn (anyone else think that’s as crazy and weird as I do?), and sugar snap peas. I tend to get rid of the peas because I don’t think that those will react well to my body and its numerous allergies (take a look at my Day 17 entry for the reason for my concern).
That particular variety is also “Specially Seasoned”, meaning that it’s not PCP-kosher but whatever. Now compared to all of the other “Specially Seasoned” varieties of bag vegetables in the freezer section the Asian Medley is by far the least “Specially Seasoned” so I don’t feel bad about getting and eating it. The calorie, fat, and carb levels are almost exactly the same as any other mixing of vegetables so the problem isn’t there. There are only two differences, one is in the level of sodium listed which is obviously more than plain vegetables, not much more but more. The other difference is in the taste of the actual stuff: intensely noticeable right off but it soon turns into this mish-mash of indistinguishable flavors blending together to become something salty, unidentifiable, and eventually, admittedly, unsatisfying.
Which brings me to my Saturday afternoon. Let me start by telling you about the e-mail Patrick sent to us all on Saturday afternoon (well, Saturday afternoon for me, at least). This particular e-mails topic was about salt and why we are all limiting our supplementary salt intake to as little as humanly possible before we start going into salt withdrawal and die (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt#Health_effects). (Also, how weird is it that I have a problem concerning my salt intake on the exact same day that I get an e-mail by Patrick about our salt intake? It’s creepy, almost).
In the e-mail he enlightened us as to why we are trying to limit our salt intake and the basic gist of it was this: there is already enough sodium in vegetables and fruit and etc. in our diets that we don’t need any additional salt added to it, either by the manufacturer of the food we eat or by our own hand. There is enough in all of the PCP foods that any extra is superfluous. Now since we are on low sodium diets and have been for forty-seven days now any extra sodium we put into our systems that isn’t already in the vegetables we’re eating will certainly make itself known to us.
Hence this posting. It seems that the extra sodium in the Asian Medley bag of vegetables was enough to slightly tip my new daily required amount of sodium over the edge, enough to send me on a slippery slope of gastrointestinal displeasure. Yippee skippee, eh? One of the side effects of going over my new limit of sodium, according to Patrick, is an uncomfortable bloating sensation and, boy, is that what I ended up with about three or four hours after I ate that Asian Medley. The bathroom never looked so inviting.
So, touche, body of mine. Lesson learned. But how about next time you just “accidentally” cause me to burn up that stuff in the microwave or on the stove where I’ll be forced to eat something tastier and healthier for me, instead of putting me through that crap again because that was almost unbearable.
Are we cool on that? Let’s hope so.
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Day 42, Alright, point proven
There’s no need to tell me more than once what I should or, in this case, shouldn’t be doing.
I suppose I should be happy, though. I’m beginning to gain a better understanding of how my body reacts to all of the food I’m putting into it and all of the strenuous exercise I’m subjecting it to.
Yesterday, in an effort to get everything done and settled away as quickly as possible so that I could get out and to the stores to spend the cash that was burning a rather large hole in my pocket, I do believe that I overdid some stuff. I sped through everything I was supposed to do so that I could get to the stuff that I wanted to do much earlier. While it did work I was left feeling sore and unpleasant.
I again woke up about a half hour earlier than I usually do and after putting in my contacts and using the other bathroom utilities I rushed into the kitchen and, in a veritable tornado of activity, made a vegetable burrito, glass of fruit juice, and morning protein powder drink. I honestly may have set some kind of eating record as I scarfed that whole meal down which is never good because if you can’t sit back and savor what you’re eating then what is the point of eating at all?...I mean, besides not dying a slow, horrible death.
Yesterday was my Day 3 exercise routine that consists only of jumproping. I knocked that out in record time too. That was definitely a big mistake because if I can get through all of that stuff without breaking a sweat or even getting slightly winded then all of that exercise work is for naught. For naught, kind sirs and ladies!
On the plus side I was able to get all that I wanted to do done and out of the way before lunch time and was able to sit and actually enjoy that meal while watching a new movie that I thoroughly enjoyed. Yeah, not much of a plus side.
Much to my surprise my body did not like all that I was doing to it. Who would’ve thunk it, eh? I mean I was able to get everything done faster than I ever have before and I was able to do everything that I wanted to do before noon. So what was the problem? Well that was exactly the problem, I went through everything so quickly without paying attention to the signals and cries my body was giving me that I was left with something that felt like somebody was slowly grinding their balled up fist into the right side of my stomach, right below my ribs (the “oblique” section of my torso).
The body gives you those signals for a reason. Those signals are a desperate sign emanating from your body telling you to SLOW DOWN, for pete’s sake, and to not overdo it because overdoing it could potentially be very damaging, perhaps permanently, to your body. Who would possibly want that? Not me, not anymore.
So yesterday was a bit of a learning experience for me, I learned that while speeding through everything might get me to what I want to do quicker but at a much greater cost than I should ever be willing to take. It was an uncomfortable lesson to learn but I am glad I learned it. I only wish that I learned it sooner and wasn’t so closed off to realize all of that earlier on in the project.
But that’s what this is all about.
Have a nice day :-)
I suppose I should be happy, though. I’m beginning to gain a better understanding of how my body reacts to all of the food I’m putting into it and all of the strenuous exercise I’m subjecting it to.
Yesterday, in an effort to get everything done and settled away as quickly as possible so that I could get out and to the stores to spend the cash that was burning a rather large hole in my pocket, I do believe that I overdid some stuff. I sped through everything I was supposed to do so that I could get to the stuff that I wanted to do much earlier. While it did work I was left feeling sore and unpleasant.
I again woke up about a half hour earlier than I usually do and after putting in my contacts and using the other bathroom utilities I rushed into the kitchen and, in a veritable tornado of activity, made a vegetable burrito, glass of fruit juice, and morning protein powder drink. I honestly may have set some kind of eating record as I scarfed that whole meal down which is never good because if you can’t sit back and savor what you’re eating then what is the point of eating at all?...I mean, besides not dying a slow, horrible death.
Yesterday was my Day 3 exercise routine that consists only of jumproping. I knocked that out in record time too. That was definitely a big mistake because if I can get through all of that stuff without breaking a sweat or even getting slightly winded then all of that exercise work is for naught. For naught, kind sirs and ladies!
On the plus side I was able to get all that I wanted to do done and out of the way before lunch time and was able to sit and actually enjoy that meal while watching a new movie that I thoroughly enjoyed. Yeah, not much of a plus side.
Much to my surprise my body did not like all that I was doing to it. Who would’ve thunk it, eh? I mean I was able to get everything done faster than I ever have before and I was able to do everything that I wanted to do before noon. So what was the problem? Well that was exactly the problem, I went through everything so quickly without paying attention to the signals and cries my body was giving me that I was left with something that felt like somebody was slowly grinding their balled up fist into the right side of my stomach, right below my ribs (the “oblique” section of my torso).
The body gives you those signals for a reason. Those signals are a desperate sign emanating from your body telling you to SLOW DOWN, for pete’s sake, and to not overdo it because overdoing it could potentially be very damaging, perhaps permanently, to your body. Who would possibly want that? Not me, not anymore.
So yesterday was a bit of a learning experience for me, I learned that while speeding through everything might get me to what I want to do quicker but at a much greater cost than I should ever be willing to take. It was an uncomfortable lesson to learn but I am glad I learned it. I only wish that I learned it sooner and wasn’t so closed off to realize all of that earlier on in the project.
But that’s what this is all about.
Have a nice day :-)
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Day 27, All you naysayers...
“Be who you are and say what you think, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.”
That quote above is usually attributed to Dr. Seuss even though he never actually said it originally, that was Bernard Baruch. I like thinking that Dr. Seuss made it what it is today because it makes him seem more fatherly and wise than you can normally come across.
And it ties in pretty perfectly with a phenomenon that I’ve noticed happening ever since I started this project--the tendency for people to fight you, ridicule you, and generally try to make anything good you do for yourself as hard as it possibly can be.
I have never understood this way of acting and I don’t think that I ever will, really I don’t think that I ever want to because understanding something like that makes me think that I’d be more inclined to accept their close-mindedness and almost even empathize with the people who don’t want to improve themselves.
Being a vegan, I come across this way of thinking (or non-thought, rather) almost on a daily basis. People--not all people but a lot of people--don’t understand why I do what I do and why I believe what I believe and and can only meet my beliefs with ignorance. That sort of thing can lead people down a bad road.
Sounds crazy and like I’m lashing out at people but that is, very unfortunately, the way of people. That which is new or different to a person or society is very commonly met with ridicule and sometimes even hostility. It’s caused a whole heap of problems in the world and it will continue to forever.
I’m sounding pessimistic and preachy here and that’s not really my intention. Despite all of that bad energy coming our way there are always people that think the opposite and will fight to keep rationality and compassion in the world and our actions. You, my fellow readers, are some of those people and I’m eternally appreciative and grateful for you guys. By taking the time to follow Patrick, Corry, David, and I on our journeys you’re showing that you are interested in turning yourselves into better people and that you are not susceptible to falling into the tempting destructive thought patterns that poison the people who will fight something as harmless as the PCP.
Because really when it comes down to it the peak condition project, being a vegan, etc. are all personal things that in the end don’t hugely affect anyone outside of them--except for for those people who are interested in bettering themselves. Perhaps it’s that others feel threatened by the positive changes that one makes and the positive things that happen to a person because of those changes that those threatened people lash out verbally or physically but when it comes down to it there is nothing inherently threatening about those things.
I’m not really going anywhere with this because I can’t solve something like this; it’s to be expected from certain people. So what can you do? How’s about this: think of it not as an impediment to your goals but as a driving force. Your main reason to better yourself should not be to show everyone that their negativity doesn’t matter and that you’re better than them. That would be walking down the wrong path. Think of those negative things you happen upon in daily life as reasons to do something, if you make yourself better than you’re another step further away from becoming like those toxic people who spew out negativity. As for those poisonous people? Keep away from them because they aren’t worth your time or energy and never will be.
I’ll have to start paying more attention to that advice, too.
That quote above is usually attributed to Dr. Seuss even though he never actually said it originally, that was Bernard Baruch. I like thinking that Dr. Seuss made it what it is today because it makes him seem more fatherly and wise than you can normally come across.
And it ties in pretty perfectly with a phenomenon that I’ve noticed happening ever since I started this project--the tendency for people to fight you, ridicule you, and generally try to make anything good you do for yourself as hard as it possibly can be.
I have never understood this way of acting and I don’t think that I ever will, really I don’t think that I ever want to because understanding something like that makes me think that I’d be more inclined to accept their close-mindedness and almost even empathize with the people who don’t want to improve themselves.
Being a vegan, I come across this way of thinking (or non-thought, rather) almost on a daily basis. People--not all people but a lot of people--don’t understand why I do what I do and why I believe what I believe and and can only meet my beliefs with ignorance. That sort of thing can lead people down a bad road.
Sounds crazy and like I’m lashing out at people but that is, very unfortunately, the way of people. That which is new or different to a person or society is very commonly met with ridicule and sometimes even hostility. It’s caused a whole heap of problems in the world and it will continue to forever.
I’m sounding pessimistic and preachy here and that’s not really my intention. Despite all of that bad energy coming our way there are always people that think the opposite and will fight to keep rationality and compassion in the world and our actions. You, my fellow readers, are some of those people and I’m eternally appreciative and grateful for you guys. By taking the time to follow Patrick, Corry, David, and I on our journeys you’re showing that you are interested in turning yourselves into better people and that you are not susceptible to falling into the tempting destructive thought patterns that poison the people who will fight something as harmless as the PCP.
Because really when it comes down to it the peak condition project, being a vegan, etc. are all personal things that in the end don’t hugely affect anyone outside of them--except for for those people who are interested in bettering themselves. Perhaps it’s that others feel threatened by the positive changes that one makes and the positive things that happen to a person because of those changes that those threatened people lash out verbally or physically but when it comes down to it there is nothing inherently threatening about those things.
I’m not really going anywhere with this because I can’t solve something like this; it’s to be expected from certain people. So what can you do? How’s about this: think of it not as an impediment to your goals but as a driving force. Your main reason to better yourself should not be to show everyone that their negativity doesn’t matter and that you’re better than them. That would be walking down the wrong path. Think of those negative things you happen upon in daily life as reasons to do something, if you make yourself better than you’re another step further away from becoming like those toxic people who spew out negativity. As for those poisonous people? Keep away from them because they aren’t worth your time or energy and never will be.
I’ll have to start paying more attention to that advice, too.
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Day 4, The most cursed of days!
Oh yes. Yes it is.
I've never been able to really explain it but for every diet, exercise plan, project, job, etc. the fourth day of any of those things has always been the most difficult monster day to fight my way through. I have a feeling that it's caused by your body waking up out of the dazed stupor of the first three days of any of those things and saying, "Whoa buddy! What the heck are you doing? Look, I'll forgive you for the past few days, I know you like trying new stuff, but now it's time to stop messing about and get back to business. Now where's that bag of tortilla chips?"
It's very annoying.
I can remember four times in my life where I've tried to get down to a slimmer, muscular figure and every time the fourth day had been my undoing. Although, more accurately, the first two times I just got bored with what I was doing and fell back into old habits. First was following the daily serving sizes on the food labels. Didn't work for me. Second, the Special K diet which was about the closest that I'll ever come to eating cardboard two times a day for a week. Those two seemed to make sense at the time and they did work slightly but at the time I didn't have the drive to see them through to the end (whatever the end was).
The third and fourth times were decidedly more stupid. Third was Christian Bale's diet for "The Machinist" which, depending on where you look, consisted of an apple with cups of coffee throughout the day. As you can see things were getting much more desperate. The last one I tried before the PCP--which was over a year ago so you can see what kind of an effect it had on me--was the fasting diet. I tried to convince myself that only doing it for seven days would be healthier than some Gandhi-esque three week thing but you can see that I wasn't thinking it through clearly. I got through those seven days of constant torture and never tried another crazy fly by night diet again.
For each of those four bouts of delusion (I say "delusion" because I was thinking that they would all magically turn me into something like my hero, Stephen Chow) the fourth day was the most unbearable. That fourth day was when giving up on those things seemed like the best thing I could do for myself which, considering what I was doing, probably would have been a good idea. Ah, the rash thinking of a young teenager, there's really nothing like it.
But things are feeling different with the PCP. For all of its difficulties it's been fairly easy so far and I'm sure it will stay that way as long as I'm always aware of what I'm doing and putting into my body. I'm sure I'm right on target with saying that the hardest part of the PCP, or any diet plan, is the breaking of old habits but with the diet plan Patrick and Chen have us on where we're forced to really think about what we're eating and what we're doing things seem to be just downright peachy.
And I'm learning that no matter how difficult something might be if you stick with it you will be a stronger and better person because of it.
Of course, I can't forget about all of the outside support from you readers and commenters because, well, you guys rock!
This fourth day doesn't seem so bad now.
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