From the Hip #8 - Have Fun, Yo!

This one goes out to all the garage gym athletes, the weekend warriors, the casual competitors, the guys and gals who are training for the fun and love of it...

Why do you train? I think it's important to regularly ask yourself this question. It's far too easy to lose sight of why we spend hours in the gym, spend our paychecks on gym memberships or new equipment for the garage gym or hiring a personal coach, pore over fitness articles and athletes' social media accounts every spare moment, and constantly think about hitting that new squat PR or improving our 500m split. For 99.8% of you, the answer to this question does not include "I'm preparing to represent my country at compete against the most elite athletes in the world at the Olympics" or "this sport is my livelihood and my career." Most of us, after a moment of introspection, will answer something along the lines of "because it makes me feel good," "because training is fun," "because it helps me look better naked and I enjoy the friendly competition with my gym buddies," "because it's satisfying to work towards improving myself physically," or maybe even "because I am preparing for a local competition that I want to do for the fun and thrill of it." Most of us do this stuff because we want to, because we like to, because it's fun for us, not because we are trying to break a world record and become a legend, not because our lives depend on it. 

Now, if you are one of the .02% that is preparing for the Olympics or who makes a living off of your elite-level performance in your sport, feel free to stop reading and keep taking your training very seriously (though I'd argue that there's still merit to prioritizing enjoyment). But for the rest of us: your training should be fun. I bring this up because I've let myself fall into the trap of taking my training far too seriously, and I've seen it happen to countless other athletes as well. Missing important family and friend events to spend a few extra hours in the gym, kicking chalk buckets when you miss a PR, spiraling into a state of depression after you tweak a muscle in your back and you can't squat for a week, becoming a social recluse because you're too busy sleeping to recover for your next training session, letting a bad gym performance ruin your day, cursing, yelling, and crying at the weights—without even realizing it, this becomes par for the course for some of us, and the activity that we took up because it makes us feel good and puts a smile on our face is suddenly ruining our day, affecting our relationships, and stressing us out. You know that ass-hat who flips the table and storms out of the room in a fit of rage when he loses a game of Uno? That's what you're doing when you take your training too seriously (unless you're an elite, world-class Uno competitor). You're taking something that's supposed to be fun, satisfying, and enriching, and turning it into something that you can no longer enjoy, that others can't enjoy as much when you're around, and that loses it's original value and purpose. More important, I believe, than hitting that 5lb squat PR, is having fun with your training. Most of us got into this fitness stuff and stuck with it because we love athletic pursuits, we have fun with it, we enjoy the challenge and the reward—not to be #1 in the world. 

Now, this doesn't mean that you shouldn't be competitive, that you shouldn't strive to improve, that you can't get angry when you miss a lift, or that your training should all be a joke. Quite the opposite—being competitive, putting effort and discipline into improving yourself, and yelling a few choice words when you miss a lift can all be part of the fun. Competition can be fun. Improving yourself is absolutely enjoyable. Getting excited or even a little bit pissed, assuming you let it go and laugh it off after, is fun! But when your training starts to get in the way of relationships, starts to ruin your day, starts to turn you into a person that no one wants to be around, you're missing the point. 

The greatest piece of irony is that prioritizing fun in your training tends to yield better results (do I have your attention now, super intense garage athlete?). We tend to perform better when our head is in the right place, when we are not stressed, when we are confident, when we are excited about what we are doing and have a clear mind, not when training becomes drudgery and has lost all of its luster. So remember why you do what you do. Remember what's really on the line. Are you on the verge of setting a world record? Are you about to qualify for the Olympics? Are you going to win the CrossFit Games? Is there a multi-million dollar contract on the line? Is the safety of your family and friends dependent on how well you exercise today? Probably not. 

So lighten up, take the good with the bad, work hard, enjoy the journey, and keep getting better. Have fun.

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From the Hip #7 - Science and Nutrition

I believe that in this day and age, we tend to "over-science" nutrition. 

Now, before you run to grab your pitchforks, let me explain what I mean. The field of nutrition absolutely needs and benefits from scientific investigation and inquiry. Even though nutrition science is still seemingly in its early stages of growth and often subject to contradictory and see-sawing evidence (I have expressed some thoughts on this before), the scientific advances in nutrition thus far have helped humanity considerably. We are able to more efficiently, effectively, and confidently manipulate diet to improve performance, change body composition, live longer, fight disease, etc. Our lives have benefited and, I believe, will continue to benefit tremendously from scientific investigation in this field. Science is good. I love science. Please put your pitchforks away. 

However, nutrition is more than just science. Or really, I should say, the relationship between humans and our food is more than just nutrition science as we approach it. When I assert that we "over-science" nutrition, I mean that we treat nutrition strictly as a mechanical energy exchange system—a straightforward process of consumption, conversion, assimilation, biosynthesis, and excretion. We treat nutrition much like we treat fuel for our cars. People (mostly people on internet message boards looking to sound punchy and smart) love to quote the first law of thermodynamics as if it's all we need to know about nutrition. Yes, at its core, food is fuel. But our relationship with food and how it affects us is much, much more than basic thermodynamics. It's more than macronutrients and micronutrients and calories. It's more than metabolism and hormones and antioxidants. Because eating is also a fundamentally personal and emotional experience. We focus on the scientifically measurable elements of nutrition, but ignore the other half of the equation. We forget that food is more than just fuel coming out of a hose and into our engine. We forget that human nutritional habits are largely defined and influenced by ritual and emotions and spirituality. 

To your car, fuel is fuel. To you and to me, food is a tradition, a memory, a pleasure, a lifestyle, a point of pride or guilt, and all of this affects how our food affects us. Two nutritionally identical meals won't necessarily yield identical results. And this is why it's a problem when we "over-science" nutrition: we give nutritional advice and prescription to treat the machine, but ignore that the machine is a complex human. This can be frustrating, because it means that often there will not be a "right answer," or that the "right answer" might not work out as neatly of planned. But that's the nature of dealing in the human sciences. Damn these big ol' prefrontal cortexes for making us so complex.

So should we ignore the science of nutrition? Should we abandon it? Absolutely not. However, we ought to consider nutritional science and what we can glean from it in the larger context of being human. 

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From the Hip #6 - "...like it's your job."

Have you ever stopped to consider the phrase "like it's your/my job" and what it says about our culture? 

"Holy crap, I'm out of shape... I'm going to start running every morning like it's my job." 
"This new book is so good I'm gonna spend the next week reading it like it's my job." 
"If you really want to lose weight, start following a balanced diet like it's your job." 
"I feel like I haven't spent any time with my wife in weeks... I'm going to spend start spending time with her like it's my job." 
"Man, he's chowing down on that burrito like it's his job!"

What's the message here? That "your job" is the most significant thing in your life, apparently. Any time I've heard this phrase used, it's applied to something personal: a personal fitness goal, personal health, a passion project, an enjoyable hobby, a personal venture started long ago. Lurking behind this phrase is this idea that personal endeavors should be secondary to our "job"—that whatever it is, it's not that important unless it's making us money, or unless someone with a bigger salary and fancier title than us is telling us to do it. Is that how we want to live? Is that the metric by which we wish to define importance? I, for one, believe that we ought to be prioritizing ourselves, our health, our passions, what we care about, what we believe in, what satisfies us and enriches our lives to the greatest degree. You should be doing what you do because you want to. Turn the tables on how you perceive what's important. If you really want to commit your efforts to something, tell yourself and your friends that you're going to "start running every morning like it's my passion," not "...like it's my job."

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From the Hip #5 - Big Changes Make Big Changes

When it comes to health and fitness, people tend to look for "the solution" to their ailments or "the step" to health and wellness. Basically, this comes down to laziness. It's a case of "okay, I acknowledge that I need to improve my health, and I guess I'm willing to do one thing to fix it, but that's it." The reality of the matter, though, is that there is no magic bullet. Health and fitness are not one-step, one-solution matters, and that kind of thinking is, frankly, foolish. Do you really think that the status of your health and fitness is going to do a complete 180 because you started eating some açaí berries? 
It's much bigger than that. It is a product of all aspects of your lifestyle. To varying degrees, every single thing you do contributes to your health and wellness. To make sweeping change (in your health, fitness, etc.), you must make sweeping change in your life choices. The magic bullet mindset is a massive detriment to anyone who falls into its trap (and a massive money-maker for supplement, "health food," and drug companies who love to sell you their proprietary secret pill or powder or superfood to give you everlasting life and superhuman performance). This mindset keeps us bouncing between feelings of erroneous and misdirected hopefulness and feelings of resigned hopelessness: we enthusiastically try whatever magic bullet Dr. Oz or our friends' Facebook feed is featuring this month, find that it makes no appreciable difference in our life, give up on self-improvement, continue with our old habits and feel helpless and powerless, see an add for a new magic bullet, and wash-rinse-repeat. 
I guess "take responsibility for your own health, make better decisions, and put in the hard work every day" just doesn't have the same selling power as "drink this juice and you'll be a living god!" 
We all know that making massive turn-arounds is possible. We've all heard the stories of people who went from being obese and tumbling towards death's door to being healthy, active, and happy. We've all heard stories about recovery from disease, about turning life around and walking away from addiction, about regaining health and fitness against all odds. We know it's possible. We just need to accept and embrace that it takes more than a magic bullet. Big changes make big changes. 

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From the Hip #4 - Time is Made, Not Had

One of the most common excuses I hear for not exercising, not being fit, not meeting health goals, not following through with a plan, etc., is the classic "I just don't have enough time."

But how much time you have doesn’t matter one bit. Everyone has the same amount of time in their day. The world-class Olympic athlete who trains for 7-hours per day, runs a charity organization for inner city youth, and cares for her family has the same amount of time in her day as the obese layabout living in his parent's basement who single-handedly keeps crappy daytime television programs and the local supplier of Doritos afloat. Having time is not what matters; what matters is how much time you make. 
I believe we should all ban “I don’t have enough time” from our vocabulary. That simple phrase turns the onus away from us and puts it on someone/something else. When I say “I don’t have enough time,” I make myself the unfortunate victim of the cruel constraints put on me by the all-powerful time gods. My fate is not my own, but that of whoever took all of my time away and gave it out to everyone else who magically seems to “have” more time. We ought to replace the phrase “I don’t have enough time” with “I don’t make enough time.” Our time, or at least what we do with it, is made, not had. It is a matter of prioritization and management, not accident and fortune. And when we tell others and ourselves that we “don’t make enough time,” we must face the reality that the distribution of our time is a choice. Didn’t get to the gym yesterday even though you told yourself you would? That’s because you didn’t make the time to do it. Didn’t spend the time to do meal prep for the week, and now you’re eating freezer meals and fast food? That’s because you prioritized something else. Didn’t get enough sleep all last week? That’s because you let something else take precedence over sleep. And sometimes this is okay! Sometimes you should prioritize something else over working out or cooking your own food or getting 8 hours of sleep every night. Sometimes family takes priority, sometimes an important and time-sensitive opportunity comes up, sometimes it’s okay to make the choice to skip your workout. The key is that it is a choice, and it is a choice that you made consciously and that you believe was the right choice. However, when you have to tell yourself or your coach or your partner that “I didn’t make enough time to come to the gym,” knowing that your time that should have been spent working out was actually spent browsing Facebook posts and watching bad reality TV, that should be a gut check for you. That should make you reconsider your priorities. Is mindlessly scrolling through social media and watching Snookie go snookie-ing about more important than your health and your goals? 

Our time is a choice, not an accident. Treat it that way.

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From the Hip #3 - Basic Principles for Healthy Eating

I recently watched “Forks Over Knives,” a documentary-style advocacy film promoting a low-fat vegan diet (or, as they phrase it, a “whole foods, plant-based diet”) as a panacea to America’s rampant health problems: diabetes, obesity, heart disease, etc. The movie states, in no subtle terms, that all of our health problems are linked to the consumption of animal products. It covers the stories of a few everyday people who had great success with adopting the prescribed low-fat vegan diet (as well as other significant lifestyle changes) and the work of two of the main players in the medical and scientific community that are at the forefront of the push for these dietary prescriptions, Dr. Campbell (the author of the infamous “China Study”) and Dr. Esselstyn. Overall, the evidence cited in the movie is far from scientifically sound. I won't go into great detail about it in this post, but I will say that most of the cited evidence provided to support the film's recommended diet and to condemn the consumption of all animal products is either grossly misinterpreted or rests on scientific procedures of a caliber that would maybe crack the top 10 at a 6th grade science fair—not great. 
But the film was not all bad. In addition to making a few very good general points that we could all benefit from hearing (namely: the power of diet in the prevention of disease, and the fact that we should all be eating more plants), it really got me thinking about how we think and talk about diet today. While many of us have every intention of making well-informed, scientifically-based decisions about our own dietary choices, the reality is that sifting through all the dietary science out there still does not leave us with a clear-cut “ideal” diet. Perhaps this is because there is no ideal diet (I’d put my money on this option); perhaps it’s because the scientific community is still working to hone its testing methods and understanding of human biochemistry (I believe this is part of it as well); most likely it’s some of both. Regardless of the reasons, even the scientists who are most immersed in nutrition research find themselves juggling handfuls of contradictory pieces of evidence as well as unclear and ever-changing ideas. Certainly there are some principles that are well-established and supported to the point that we can safely consider them substantially conclusive universal prescriptions: the ill effects of consuming massive amounts of processed sugar, large amounts of alcohol, and diets extremely deficient in certain nutrients would fall into this category. But beyond this, we are left in the center of a shouting match between different parties arguing for their dietary beliefs and interpretations, and often it sounds more like a squabble over cultish dogma than a discussion rooted in scientifically-substantiated principles. Vegan, raw food, vegetarian, high-carb, low-carb, high-protein, low-protein, high-fat, low-fat, Paleo, Atkins, IIFYM, Keto, fruititarian, Mediterranean, etc. Everyone seems to think they're right and everyone else is wrong.

Taking a good hard look at the science and a nice big dose of common sense, I think there are a few basic principles that can set us on the right path to developing our own healthful dietary habits:

• Eat a balanced diet of whole foods rich in nutrients. If you eat whole foods (minimally processed) rich in nutrients—things like vegetables, wild-caught seafood, eggs, whole-food starches, fruits, and pastured meats—you’re going to be doing better than about 98% of the population. Eat these foods in balanced proportions (in other words, if 90% of your diet is fruit, or meat, or any one food, you’re probably doing it wrong) and be reasonable about it all (if you’re following a diet that says eating fruit is going to kill you or a filet of wild-caught salmon will give you cancer, it’s time to change).

• Experiment with what works well for you. Isolate foods to eliminate from your diet for a week or two, reintroduce it, and see if you notice any positive or negative changes. Do the same with relative proportions of protein, carbohydrates, and fat. Do the same with supplements, liquid calories, meal timing, etc. Everyone is different, and there’s a lot you can learn about yourself with a bit of self-experimentation. Don’t think that you’re intolerant to gluten or don’t handle animal fats well because someone else is. Experiment, listen to your body, and see for yourself. Also, if something serious happens (i.e., you can’t breathe, you turn purple, your joints seize up) every time you eat a particular food, stop experimenting for a second and see a doctor. There’s a time for self-experimentation, and there’s a time where anaphylaxis is about to kill you.

• Stop worrying. (Extreme food allergies withstanding) I maintain that stressing and worrying about the minutiae of your diet can undo all of the good that a healthy diet does for you. If you are having a full on crisis because you accidentally ate some gluten, or avoiding social situations that may have some of your no-no-foods, or putting yourself on an incredibly restrictive diet for no reason other than the internet told you to, all to the point where you’re left feeling isolated, distressed, and hugely inconvenienced because of how many things you won’t allow yourself to eat, you're doing it wrong. Does this mean you should just eat McD’s and Coldstone every day and not give a damn about it, and you’ll be healthier for it? No. Don’t be dumb. Follow the above two principles, eat well, be happy, and stop freaking out when you find out that the low carb dish you just ate actually had some brown sugar in it. You're gonna be okay. 

Maybe some day the nutrition science community will finally be able to “crack the code” and figure out, to the most intimate detail, exactly what the human body needs to thrive, and then we’ll all eat specially-formulated nutrient packs and live forever, but probably not. So while you’re waiting for science fiction to happen, follow the above principles, be smart and self-aware, and be happy and confident with your choices. 

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From the Hip #2 - Read More

You should read more. And I should read more. Everyone should read more. Why?
1. Reading gives you a chance to "visit" another person's mind. And if you're reading the right things (translation: not Internet message boards), it can be a chance to "visit" the mind of a great thinker. Most published authors have something valuable to contribute—certainly some more than others—and when we get to go inside and poke around the mind of a great thinker, there's a good chance we might be able to walk out with something of value. For the same reasons, I think it's important to read different things. If you only ever read from the same few authors or from one genre, you're going to be exploring the same mind, the same cluster of ideas, the same viewpoints over and over. This is certainly better than nothing, but exposure to new ideas, challenging ideas, and new perspectives and ways of thinking provides the opportunity for more growth and discovery.
2. Reading gives you a chance to pick up on patterns. This ties in closely with my first point. The beautiful thing here is that patterns tend to be universal. This means that whatever you're reading, there's a good chance you'll be able to pick up on some patterns and relate it back to what you care about. If fitness is your shtick, you don't need to just read books about fitness. In fact, you shouldn't just read books about fitness. Read fiction books, read non-fiction books, read scientific tomes, read fantastical fictions, read historical biographies, whatever. Expose yourself to more ideas from more people (again, preferably not the people on Internet message boards), and some of these patterns will start to pop up and stick in your mind. These patterns will rise to the top of your consciousness and you'll start to see them in everyday life, see how they work, see why they matter, and use them to better yourself.
3. Reading forces you to focus on a single thing. When you read, you really can't do anything else. And if you're trying to read and listen to the radio and brush your teeth at the same time, stop. Part of the beauty of reading is that it's an activity that, by nature, requires near full attention. If you're doing a bunch of other things while you read, then I'd say you're not really reading—maybe you're 1/3rd reading if you're lucky, and you're really selling yourself short. Reading requires stillness and attention, and in this way it is a very meditative activity (and for this reason, it can sometimes be a very difficult activity, too). It requires your mind to shut out all the other crap that's bouncing around and to immerse itself in concrete ideas, in a fictional world, in a character, in a philosophy, etc. In this sense, reading is a type of training for the rest of life. It is an exercise in making you a more intentional, aware, and focused being, and this skill can be applied elsewhere. Am I saying that reading can make you better at squatting or a better spouse or a better businessperson? Yes, maybe I am. So do it.

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From the Hip #1

This begins a new series of posts, which I am dubbing "From the Hip," in which I post something brief on a regular basis—perhaps a few per week, I've yet to officially decide on that. It will be, as the title suggests, shot from the hip—a quick shot of whatever's on my mind, whatever I've been thinking about lately, what I've been trying, what I've been inspired by, questions I have, or answers that I think I've discovered that I will surely realize I was completely wrong about in a few months. It will generally be short, to the point, and without much of a filter. Some days may just be a sentence or two, others may snowball into something much bigger. But the point is, it'll be regular and it'll be from the hip. 

I'm doing this for two reasons:

1) For me. I tend to go through cycles of self-confidence and self-doubt in my own writing. By committing myself to posting something that I am acknowledging and defining up front as short, unfiltered, unrefined, and frequent will "force" me to sludge through my periods of self-doubt and keep producing content, and I recognize the immense importance of that.

2) Also for me. Writing makes me a better person. Writing will make you a better person (so do it, every day). The act of committing a thought to ink (or, in this case, pixels) compels us to think critically about things, to look inward, and to become more comfortable with ourselves. One of the hardest things about writing is looking back at things we wrote a long time ago. It's a snapshot of who we were at the time. Though others may not see it as clearly, between lines of text lie volumes about struggles you faced, doubts you had, triumphs you wanted to parade about, ideas you were focused on, changes you were chasing after; and if you're the type of person who is constantly pursuing positive change in your life (and you should be), looking back at who you were a year ago, two years ago, ten years ago can be hard. It can be downright painful—that red-in-the-face, hot cheeks and clammy hands, "my God, what sort of foolish monster was I?!" feeling of embarrassment. It's almost as bad as looking back at pictures from your freshman year of college when you had braces and grew your hair out and wore a faux-fur-lined denim jacket you bought at the thrift store (no, just me?). But it should really be looked at as a tool and as a privilege, not something painful or embarrassing. A tool to learn from yourself, past and present, to propel you forward faster and with more drive, a tool to learn to be okay with yourself, okay with who you were and who you are (because after all, when you're okay with yourself, looking back at an essay you wrote in high school is hilarious); and a privilege to see how you've grown, how much you've changed, and how much you look forward to changing and growing more. 

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