“Metabolic Syndrome”

Posted on May 10, 2012 by Sean

I often state bluntly in these blogs that we, as a society are surrounded by and immersed in the problem that is causing us to be increasingly fat and sick. Unfortunately, most of us have no idea just how deep, complex and pervasive the real roots of our problems really are. The vast majority of the public is not aware of exactly “why” this is happening to us. Thus, we are unable to stop it. I write this blog as an attempt to correct that.

Back in 2006, Wired magazine published a ground breaking article called “The Thin Pill”. This article strongly re-enforces and exposes our lack of understanding regarding the underlying reasons for our body fat and ill-health problems. It provides a rare glimpse at some of the perpetrators and mechanisms of our problems at work.

Read the Wired article here

This article outlines the movement to have five common conditions recognized as one disease. These conditions are: high blood pressure, high blood sugar, high triglycerides (fats in the bloodstream), low HDL (“good”) cholesterol, and last but not least, obesity. The name of the proposed disease embodying these 5 symptoms is now commonly known as “Metabolic Syndrome”. This collection of symptoms is also referred to as “Syndrome X”. You may have heard this term before because in the ensuing years it has definitely joined the growing lexicon of contemporary medical conditions that are increasing at alarming rates. This great piece of journalism exposed the motivation and ongoing progress to have “Metabolic Syndrome” accepted as a legitimate disease by the FDA, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the medical community in general.

This is a dangerous notion to many. Here is why – there is overwhelming evidence that our modern diet, especially with the changes introduced in the last 30 or more years has created the huge rise in these co-related symptoms of disease, especially obesity. So, if our medical community gives their consent to this newly named malady that is actually a collection of preventable conditions – one has to wonder where this new method of diagnosing disease will end. One also has to wonder about the integrity of our medical establishment if this happens. This is especially true since there is overwhelming evidence that we know exactly how to prevent these conditions.

We have all noticed the proliferation in recent years of drug advertisements for all kinds of common issues many or all of us experience in life. You see them on television continually. There are drugs for sleeplessness, for low libido, low energy, depression and even the most common states everyone experiences on occasion, such as anxiety. The next condition in line is obesity along with the other four risk factors, all under the umbrella of “Metabolic Syndrome”.

To me and many others, this would be no different than naming a new disease after the practice of jumping off of 20 foot cliffs. We could call it “Acute Cliffitis” and the symptoms would be unmistakable; broken ankles, and shinbones among other specific leg and back injuries. The medical industry would then prescribe drugs to strengthen bones, drugs to make our tendons more elastic and perhaps special boots to cushion the fall – everything but the simple advice to stop jumping off of the damn cliffs!

If the medical establishment were to accept “Metabolic Syndrome” as a legitimate disease, they may just as well also accept any other such ridiculous idea as a disease. You may ask; how could they possibly consider this course of action? What would cause such a seemingly irrational decision? The answer is money – the root of all evil when it comes to this topic. There is an enormous amount of money to be made in the anticipated treatment of this new disease. It is no surprise that the biggest proponents of the acceptance of “Metabolic Syndrome” as a bona fide disease are those with the most money to gain – the pharmaceutical industry.

In the drug industry finding new disorders to treat with their products is known as “developing new disease markets” or “branding a condition” The pharmaceutical industry has spent millions of dollars developing an arsenal of drugs aimed at this new malady and are lobbying hard for the FDA to formally recognize Metabolic Syndrome as a disease. At the time Wired published this article the industry had over 350 obesity drugs under development, many under clinical trial. The market potential for these drugs in 2006 was over $18 billion – that’s quite a motivator. So, the drug companies have over 18 billion reasons to convince – lobbying, and enticements also work really well – medical institutions such as the American Heart Association and the National Institute of Health that we are dealing with a new and authentic disease here. Then they get the nod from the FDA; then the HMO’s and insurance companies fall in line and voila, a multi-billion dollar industry is born. Updating, in February of 2012 I called the FDA and received verification that thankfully, they have not yet granted “metabolic syndrome” official status as a disease.

Here is where this story gets really scary how it relates directly to the true originators of our problems of being so fat and sick. You see, they are pushing for a situation where there is a new and general acceptance of the idea that “You’re not fat – you’re sick”. People like me who don’t accept this condition as a legitimate disease worry that doing so constitutes “medicalizing” a lifestyle condition which we already know how to treat; with the correct diet and some exercise. Okay, in previous blogs I have strongly put forward that our obesity and health problems are pushed on us by industry and they are not entirely our fault – I wasn’t kidding. Stay with me here, I promise I am going somewhere really important with this.

Clarifying, those of us who don’t agree with defining obesity as a medical condition consider it to be a lifestyle issue. By that, we mean that prevention of this so-called disease involves nothing more than personal choices regarding diet and exercise. Now this seems to be a simple enough position and one which is relatively easy to defend, but here is where things truly go off the rails.

In the late 1990’s the CDC (center for disease control) initiated an experiment called the Diabetes Prevention Program in the hopes of proving that lifestyle changes, namely diet and exercise, can work as a weight loss strategy and prevent the obesity and health issues in question. Diet and exercise have always been standard, common sense approaches to these problems and should work just as fine now as they always have in the past, right?

In this experiment 3000 overweight participants received gym memberships and were given personal trainers. They were also provided with their food and were coached daily by nutritionists for 2 years or more. The net result was a 7% loss of body weight. With all of the time and attention the 3000 study subjects received it is very difficult to look upon this experiment as anything but an abject failure. Worse – especially for the sake of comparison to the general public – these test subjects were administered the anti-diabetes drug “Metformin” during this study. This is hardly something the public in general would self-administer.

The dire conclusion here: traditional diet and exercise simply don’t work anymore. Given the dismal results it would be impossible to think that our commonly accepted diet and exercise programs are going to help obese people in general. This is especially unlikely in that they would not get the personal attention and support that those on the study received. Allow me to re-iterate: our popular diet and exercise ideas for losing fat – even when the subjects have their own personal nutritionists and personal trainers – ARE ABYSMAL FAILURES!

Now this is exactly why I am constantly criticizing conventional advice on diet and nutrition along with popular fitness industry ideas for “getting into shape”:

THEY DON’T FREAKING WORK!

That is precisely why I promote the hell out of uncommon, iconoclastic diet and exercise ideas in this blog and in this book that in fact DO WORK! They are absolutely proven, effective ideas that are distinctly different alternatives.

Note: Because of my strong convictions on helping people lose fat and get healthy, I sometimes get asked by registered dieticians and trainers who defend our modern diet and fitness industries: “Hey Wise-guy, if you are so down on our government nutrition guidelines and our fitness industry, why don’t you prove that they don’t work? Where is your research?” Aside from the obvious answers of simply looking at rocketing obesity and disease statistics or witnessing the ballooning size of average people at your local grocery store, my answer is: “I don’t need to do any research, the American Center for Disease Control (CDC) did it for me!”

My point here is that our commonly accepted methods of diet and exercise have been proven to be useless. They are no match for our ubiquitous modern processed foods – addictive and hyper-dense with fats and sugars – even when consumed according to our government food guidelines. Consequently, our general population is becoming more and more overweight at astounding rates. That means most of the public are about to be caught in a trap where they are clinically diagnosed as untreatable with anything but drugs or perhaps surgery. Regarding losing fat, this is why the odds have been stacked against you right from the start. This is exactly why it seems so inescapably difficult to get lean, strong and healthy.

The food industry and our own government are making us fat and sick and now the pharmaceutical industry wants to make us pay for drugs and medication as the only real alternative to treat our condition. Why? Again, traditional diet and exercise programs have simply not been effective. This has been demonstrated clearly in studies like the one conducted by the CDC. It is also clearly shown in the statistics showing obesity rates rising simultaneously with our wildly desperate expenditures on diet and fitness products. The very governmental establishments and institutions we depend on for the truth are getting closer to officially approving this ugly, expensive and dangerous cycle which they have allowed to exist.

So, let me get this straight. We will ignore the overwhelming and demonstrated proof that our modern food industry’s food products are making us fat and sick. We will then admit that our common, popular methods of diet and exercise are now useless weapons against this cause of these problems – our modern foods. Instead, we will treat its consequences of obesity, chronic disease and often pre-mature death with expensive drugs. Worse still, these drugs will never be as effective as simply not eating the awful processed foods which are causing the problem. So, even though they may make some of us slimmer, we will still be stuck with ill-health caused by not completely removing the cause. We will pay for these new drugs and will also be exposed to all of these drugs’ side effects.

We will now be herded into the solutions provided by the pharmaceutical and medical industries – drugs, gastric bypass surgery, catheters for our failing hearts, more drugs for the drugs’ side effects and on and on. These are all imperfect and expensive treatments for symptoms of a problem we know exactly how to cure completely – but refuse to. By the way, these medical solutions pose some other statistically proven risks. Many people are unaware of the fact that physician error, medical error and adverse events from drugs or surgery kill well over 200,000 people per year in the United States. That makes the health care system the third leading cause of death behind only cancer and heart disease. This is hardly a confidence booster. If it’s any consolation, they are making an enormous amount of money from us.

Summarizing:

We know precisely what the problem is: Our modern food supply
We know who created the problem: Our modern food industry
We know who allowed this to happen and actually helped the problem and its perpetrators grow wildly out of control: Our governments, medical, and educational institutions
We know exactly why this happened: Money and power
Finally, we have a PROVEN solution to the problem – Stop eating dangerous processed food from our modern food industry, and instead eat primarily our original, unprocessed, evolutionary foods – naturally raised animals, fruits, vegetables and nuts & seeds. These foods are proven to keep us lean, strong, and exceedingly healthy

Hallelujah! Finally! NOW we know what happened to us! Great news! We also have a clear solution! Okay – all together now! …AND OUR OBVIOUS NEW COURSE OF ACTION WILL BE…?

Uhhhmmm….. we’ll keep eating more and more of our modern crappy foods and just take expensive new drugs and have surgery or whatever else we can think up as dismal attempts to deal with the dire consequences of our obesity, chronic illness and death.

WHAT THE &%!?


…..REALLY?

Yup! The vast majority of your friends and neighbors will do just that. Unfortunately for them, the “Paleolitic eating lobby” is very small…scratch that…it doesn’t exist. The power and influence and monetary, educational, and cultural hegemony of modern food will continue rolling right along. This will be assured by our own government. Further, the simple truth about exercises and muscle relating to fat loss will also be drowned out by overwhelming cacophony of useless misinformation from our modern diet and fitness industry. Why? Because the wonderfully simple and easy to apply solutions to get us slim and healthy…

….WON’T MAKE ANY OF THESE INDUSTRIES ANY $ MONEY!

On the contrary, the truth will in fact cause them to lose huge amounts of money. Therefore, it won’t be common public knowledge any time soon. Because money drives everything – even our collective chronic ill-health!

This is a classic case of treating the symptoms – ineffectively – instead of the cause. Worse still, we know the cause and we know the exactly how to stop it completely. What seems to be preventing these truths from becoming government sponsored is a grand compromise for the sake money and industry. To me, treating the public this way is insidious. For the folks making all the money it’s a little like shooting fish in a barrel.

I would love to suggest that this is some form of mass hypnosis or some kind of grand spell we have been cast under, but it really isn’t. Once you see all of the pieces of the puzzle come together and realize what the underlying force behind this really is (money) you begin to really understand our dilemma. You also understand that it really isn’t our fault for getting fatter and less healthy. Is it our fault for trusting our elected officials, our food guides, our registered dieticians? Is it our fault for trusting the large companies and huge industries that many of us work for and rely on?

While we were living in a faster and faster world; where food was concerned, we became asleep at the wheel. All the while these industries and our governments literally created this problem. Like some kind of a bad dream this dilemma has crept further and further into our lives especially over the last few decades. Unfortunately, things are only going to get worse for the unenlightened.

It’s wonderful thing that the truth always seems to set you free. I believe the reason this information is so arcane and fractious is that to really figure out the scope of the problem one needs to read at a lot of clinical books and additional research. The truth about our chronic health and fitness problems is certainly not readily available nor is it common information. Nor is it exciting reading. Further, it is from completely different and often unrelated areas of study. Nonetheless, the facts bluntly lead to the inescapable conclusions and subsequent solutions to our problem. This blog and the book it represents are attempts to summarize those facts and solutions.

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Personal Training-Muddied Waters

Posted on May 9, 2012 by Sean

Many folks who go to big gyms have bought personal training packages. This is a major revenue generator for the big fitness gyms and the packages they sell can include 50, 100 or even more one-on-one sessions. At often $80.00 per session or more, you can see why the fitness industry tries to sell the hell out of these one-on-one personal training sessions. They even finance them.

What exactly are they selling though? What is the real value of this proprietary knowledge and its dispensing at close to $100.00 per hour? It is true that the science behind the best information on physical improvement is painfully scientific, clinical, and voluminous. As such, for the uninitiated much trust is afforded to personal trainers and their expertise. Unfortunately, these clear waters are often unnecessarily muddied.

I know for a fact that the correct knowledge is really quite elegant to communicate. Instructing someone on exactly what to do for great results can be surprisingly straightforward. As such, if you are trying to lose body fat and you are paying for personal training, I would strongly suggest you get a new personal trainer if any of the items on the following list prove true:

  • Permanent dietary change has not been thoroughly addressed
  • The dietary advice involves total/daily caloric restriction (this won’t work)
  • The dietary advice is meant to be followed temporarily to get you to a target weight
  • Workouts are boring
  • Workouts are well over an hour
  • Workouts are very difficult
  • Your trainer abides by the adage “no pain – no gain”
  • You are told to work out for hours on cardio machines or running – “like it or not”
  • You don’t see any results after at least 2 weeks, but have followed all instructions
  • Their long term plans for you invariably involve you giving them more money
  • Your trainer is not training you to train yourself (After about 10 sessions you should have a good idea of exactly what to do, and also exactly why and how)

Please remember that our contemporary fitness industry has one primary goal – to make as much money as possible. You succeeding and finally reaching your health and fitness goals would in no way be conducive to their goal because you wouldn’t need to buy any more of their crappy fitness training or products. In short, you wouldn’t need them anymore. Ever wonder why every day there are new books, programs and fitness gadgets that absolutely promise success? It’s strange though, how we just keep getting fatter and unhealthier.

It gets even more confusing because even the nutritionists and trainers with good intentions are taught, programmed and borne out of this same industry – their incorrect methods and information doom us to failure.

Please, discover the true, elegant solutions which are the product of real science and human evolution. These truths have nothing to do with making other people money and everything to do with solving your diet, fitness, and health problems – for good!

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Working Out, Micro-Economics, & A Couple of Beautiful Women

Posted on May 5, 2012 by Sean

A buddy of mine introduced me to his friend the other day. You couldn’t really miss this lady. Joan was definitely physically striking, with what most people would consider a perfect body. She was wearing a summer dress and you couldn’t help notice the perfect feminine muscle tone of her arms and back – she simply exuded health and vitality. More importantly, she was absolutely charming and just a pleasure to chat with.

We were at my friend’s restaurant and it didn’t take long for the conversation to turn to food and then to fitness. Joan loved to eat, loved to workout and kept very busy trying to take care of her two infant sons. She described her workouts and the “cardio” program her trainer had recently put her through. This cardio exercise consisted of water skiing and wake boarding, beach volleyball, and just splashing around in the water swimming. There was no real time limit, these were just the activities her trainer put her and a small group of other ladies through daily during their previous week of training. They loved every second of it. She told us how “it was so much fun”. This guy also had the ladies doing short, intense bouts of resistance training with free weights a few times per week on an ongoing basis. Prior to all of this though, he had changed their dietary philosophies for the better.

When she told me who her trainer was I quickly realized why she loved working out and why she looked so great. I know him and he’s a fantastic personal trainer. He’s also a really nice guy, former Olympic athlete and I completely agree with all of his philosophies. He goes against the grain relative to workout regimens broadly prescribed in the fitness industry. I think the biggest difference with respect to the results his clients achieve is that they actually pass a finish line. Most people struggle with these issues, lost in confusion and effort, never achieving their physical goals. With this trainer though, there is no carrot and stick, just enlightenment. His clients actually reach their goals and are able to just maintain their great condition permanently. Joan was a perfect example.

I strongly believe the key is to introduce people to the basic physiological truths behind diet, exercise, and building muscle. Having a person fully understand the simple unity between all three areas and then applying them always delivers success. The key seems to be the successful explanation and then comfortable exposure to these principles. People then experience success without hardship, pain or sacrifice. The benefits always highly outweigh the costs. They soon become autonomous and are able to control their own physical destiny for good.

Joan reminded me of one of the ladies who started at my gym about a year ago. That was the first time she ever did free weight strength training exercises. Recently, she approached me with a question. Her dilemma was what to do now? She explained that she was now squatting, dead-lifting and bench pressing well over her body weight for repetitions. Her body had responded very well over the previous year and she had quickly become very strong. Like Joan, she couldn’t look much better. She is a physically stunning girl, tall, lithe and gorgeous.

My strong suggestion was to simply get out of the gym and do other physical activities that she really enjoyed. After a break from the gym, and to maintain her excellent condition and tone, I suggested one or two workouts per week at the most. I also suggested that she take off a week or even a month every now and then to do other stuff she liked. She had no plans on changing her dietary philosophy which was seminal to getting her into such great shape and health. Much like Joan, she too had achieved permanent control over her physical state.

In our conversation, Joan had also lamented, “I wonder, where do I go from here?” She had read in a fitness magazine that for her height and weight she should be at 12% body fat and that perhaps she should try and attain that. My buddy and I looked at her and just laughed. We knew very well that there was no additional “traffic she could stop”. She was already “turning every head” in the room. In other words, she shouldn’t give something as inconsequential as a body fat percentage a second thought. The mirror, her radiant health and vitality and anyone who laid eyes on her told her everything she needed to know. We strongly suggested that she simply maintain her healthy diet and active lifestyle and ENJOY HER LIFE! (Including taking occasional time away from the gym and enjoying cheesecake every now and then)

So, from a practical standpoint, both of these ladies had quite obviously “arrived”. No one I know would question it if they were told that either one of them had posed for Playboy. Regarding getting as toned, lean and healthy as possible – they had demonstrably achieved permanent victory. They had won.

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How We Hurt Ourselves-Consider The Logic

Posted on April 30, 2012 by Sean

The following metaphorical story may sound crazy, but I promise I am going somewhere with this.  Please stay with me!

Imagine a boy who is given a hammer and made to hit himself in the head with it.  Let’s say he is instructed to do this 3-5 times per day.   This is a generally accepted and required act of daily living.  It is just what everyone does.  One of the first things he would need is a good supply of bandages to help stop the continuous bleeding.  His head would begin to hurt and he would need to take aspirins or some form of pain killers.  These problems persist.  Years pass, but he just keeps whacking himself in the head every day.

Eventually a specialist makes him a metal cover for his forehead and a few months later even modifies it with padding to cushion the blows.  The specialist is heralded as a genius and wins a Nobel Prize.  Yet, this young man still gets headaches because of the thumping.  A couple of years later some more specialists come up with a smaller hammer, roughly half of the size of the first one, it’s expensive, but worth the money.  This is a great invention and really helps.  Nonetheless, as years pass and after all of that pounding, even from the smaller hammer he is becoming dim witted.

A new company has a great solution.  They sell you amphetamines to help stimulate your brain.  This guy still keeps banging his head with the smaller hammer but is plagued with these problems.  Not only that but one arm is twice as muscular as the other because of the constant swinging of the hammer.  Another large pharmaceutical company has come out with a wonder drug promising that anyone can hammer more and still live a normal life.  Their stock went crazy and they made a fortune.  Yet, after a few years on the drugs, he has continual bad side effects and the wonder drugs get pulled from the market.

Over the years, in his continual efforts to improve his situation he tries many programs and even hires people who have a plethora of ideas on how to swing the hammer so it doesn’t hurt you quite as much.  These experts also train him on the latest ideas and methods to counter the terrible side effects of perpetually hitting himself in the head.  They sell a great deal of programs and get much publicity.  He pays a ton of money for these training sessions over the years, but they help very little.  Still, every time he tries a new idea, he is convinced it will help because of the testimonials he hears on their commercials and ads.  Still, after paying to try them all, none of this stuff ends up working and his suffering continues.

As decades pass, he has developed terrible rashes and skin problems from the countless metal head protectors and the padding, open sores envelope his head.  He is also required to wear a neck brace due to the constant pounding.  Unfortunately, over the years this has resulted in a chronic sore back.  He is forced to increase the doses of pain killers, anti-depressants, anti-inflammatory, and antibiotic drugs and experiences all of their nasty side effects.  So he takes more drugs to counter those side effects.  Finally, he is forced to use a wheelchair.  Still, he keeps his banging his head with the hammer every day.  The small hammer was a life saver, though.  He probably wouldn’t even be here without it; worth every penny, saved his life.

A couple of years in the wheelchair and his situation has resulted in one final option – brain surgery.  It’s just something he must do.  Thank God he paid for only the best health care during his working years and can afford it.  His family must of course endure this along with him.  The surgery goes well.  In the recovery room he continues to bang his head with the hammer.  Unfortunately, he will be bed ridden for the rest of his life.  He is so ill that for weeks at a time the nurses must bang him in the head with the hammer as he is at times too weak to do it himself.

This poor guy lives two more years in absolute pain and discomfort.  He must take a plethora of drugs and has little quality of life.  His family goes along for the entire unpleasant ride.  Unfortunately, they had to mortgage the house they live in to pay for the last year of his life in the hospital.  Turns out the medical insurance only covered the surgery and one year of care.  Insurance coverage has risen immensely, since over two thirds of the population (and growing fast) are now stricken with the same hammer-banging related expensive health problems.  He dies in bed, exactly 17 minutes after the final bang in the head he gives himself.  Only then does the hammering stop.

If you think this story is ridiculous, I heartily agree.  If there is any real difference between the daily hammering and our daily intake of modern food that has been proven dangerous to our health I would love to hear it.  We have been marketed, socialized and fooled into eating dangerous, unhealthy and sick food.  The analogy I have made regarding this entire process may seem oversimplified, facetious and quite insane.  I stand by it anyways.  In fact, I openly invite any criticism of it not being directly analogous to our current, ridiculous predicament.  Just like the crazy example of a guy smashing himself in the head with a hammer every day, the modern food we eat relentlessly punishes our bodies with horrible consequences – yet we continue.

Obesity, diabetes, heart disease, heart disease, and hundreds of other maladies plague us at an ever increasing rate.  The physical, psychological and monetary costs are unimaginable.  Yet we continue when the problem and the solution are as easily identified as in the hammer story I just presented.

Really, think about it.  This is just how ludicrous and bizarre our situation has become.   Ants, rabbits and squirrels are smart enough not to purposely eat themselves into horribly debilitating illnesses and often death.  As a society, we are so “smart” we have figured out how to deliberately and at immense cost to ourselves, our environment and fellow animals create and eat food that makes us chronically ill and kills us.

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Why We Are So Lost

Posted on April 27, 2012 by Sean

The other day I was watching CNN on television and Dr. Sanjay Gupta was hosting his television show and giving advice on healthy living.  I really like that guy.  He’s very understated, and smart as hell.  He’s a brain surgeon for crying out loud.  Really though, I think it’s intellectual charisma; when he speaks he just seems so wise.  Unfortunately, I knew full well that I couldn’t trust most of what he was saying, especially where diet was concerned.  My convictions were strongly upheld when his show’s sponsors were revealed.  The first commercial came on and it was for Honey Nut Cheerios.  The next one was for a new pharmaceutical drug that promised to help prevent heart disease.  Unfortunately, one of the many dangerous side effects of this drug included that it could quite possibly kill you.

It’s not Sanjay’s fault.  He’s sort of helpless here.  He cannot tell you the truth about how to achieve optimal health through the healthiest diet, even if he wanted to.  The paying sponsors, the people that allow CNN to exist would never allow that.  General Mills, the pharmaceutical company and a host of other gigantic and powerful companies will ensure that the information that this influential man doles out is compromised, corrupted and in the interest of selling their products – it has nothing to do with optimizing your health.  In fact, these products  and this information will cause mostly the opposite effect.

It took me years of reading many books and research papers – some that were exceedingly scientific and clinical – to get to the point where I could discern unadulterated bullshit from the truth where our diet and health are concerned.  I know that most of the public are not aware of the real science and truth behind how to be lean, strong and healthy.  That’s a shame, because this enlightenment also allows us to avoid the endless array of dangerous pharmaceuticals increasingly pushed on us.

Watching television, I also heard Oprah Winfrey talking about her experience with gaining back a lot of the weight she had lost.  She blamed herself.  Specifically, she blamed her low will-power in not being able to get her daily “cardio” exercise done.  She spoke to her audience talked of getting back into shape by “just doing her cardio work, like it or not.”  Now, like Sanjey, Oprah Winfrey is a wise, charismatic individual who millions of people look to for advice.  Unfortunately, where exercise is concerned, even Oprah is lost. To reinforce these tired, ineffective old ideas of discipline, denial, and hard work regarding the simple act of “moving your body” is to further confuse the public on a massive scale.

It’s not only these two well respected media celebrities who are adding to the confusion and failure.  There are many others.  Diet and fitness information in America is a strange, convoluted mixture of carnival hucksterism, religious-like fervor, opinion and marketing – all driven entirely by money.  Conversely, the truth that has been proven to solve our problems is purely scientific.  Hidden by the massive cloud of profit-driven confusion, unfortunately these wonderful truths are known by only the few and not the many.

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Enjoying Repetitive Exercise

Posted on April 23, 2012 by Sean

My philosophy on cardiovascular exercise is simple:  if you enjoy it – do it!  Otherwise, don’t bother.  I have scientific proof to strongly reinforce this idea as a permanent solution to exercising.  Still, there will always be temporary situations when we want to move our bodies but for whatever logistical reason are unable to do what we love.   And so we must face the idea of doing some repetitive form of exercise we otherwise would never bother with.

I will use running as my example here.  Surprisingly, I have applied this philosophy to something as mundane as running with great success.  In the past I hated running.  Before I embraced my current philosophy, I considered running boring work that “needed to be done”.  I would count the seconds.  I would run 4 or 5 times a week for a few weeks and then stop because I just couldn’t make myself do it any longer.  Over time, and with some experience, all of that changed.

I love the smell of sea air, girls in bikinis and sunshine.  I love being around people having a good time, hearing people laugh and watching waves crash on a beach.  I also like the feeling of my feet in the sand and a gentle warm breeze.  I never grow tired of these things.  These other factors have overtaken the generic activity of “running” and turned it into something that I have really enjoyed for over 10 years.  I go outside and run on the beach at a pace where I never get uncomfortable or out of breath.  Here I can experience all of those things I love.  Sometimes I figure I am one step up from a fast walk.  I lean forward so that my feat must catch up to prevent me from falling down.  This creates a slow comfortable jog.  This makes my stride very relaxing and almost effortless.  When I get tired I stop.

I still hate running, but I love the other stuff.  So much so, that the running has become an incidental and virtually unnoticeable part of the exercise.  Running is like the empty glass and these things I love are the drink that fills it.  It’s funny, because my slow jog is now a relatively fast paced run.  I have been made aware of this only by others who I occasionally run with.  This happened slowly and without notice.  The keys are consistency and enjoyment – one feeds the other.  This I know because unlike years ago, I long to go for a run if I haven’t had the time for a week or two.  I contrast my current perspective to the generic act of running.  Even now, the most time I can do on a treadmill is 10 minutes and only if there is a television to watch.  If there is something very interesting on TV I can occasionally go for as long as 20 minutes, but that’s about all I can take.

Some people have challenged me on this philosophy.  They have indicated that I live beside a beach and that anyone would love running there.  Then they tell me to try living in Toledo Ohio, or Buffalo in January and enjoy my “sea air and bikinis”.  I reply by telling them not to sell this philosophy short.  The fact is, I live and spend the majority of my time in another big northern city and enjoy running there just as much if not more.  How?  The answer is real estate.

I love old houses.  I really love the ones that look like old castles, 3 stories high and covered with ivy.  The part of the city I live in is very old and half way gentrified.  There are endless streets of these beautiful old homes; some in need of restoration and some completed.  Many may be purchased for surprisingly little money given the area, but they need refurbishment.  Most of these houses have the huge original wooden doors and stain glass.  Some have spires and beautiful balconies on every floor.  Even though run down, the craftsmanship involved in the ornate hard wood trim and masonry stands out like a lost art.  They are from another time roughly a century ago.  When they were built, that part of town was the most exclusive area in the city.  Every one of these houses has a dramatic history.

Occasionally, one of the nearby stores in this run down area will have a front sign changed.  When this happens often an old sign will be revealed from a store long since closed up decades ago.  Like the nearby homes, to me this is a bit of history creeping out like a passage in time.  There are also beautiful old churches built entirely from stone.  Many stand dark and quiet, closed up; their congregations long since moved on or withered away.  I get lost in this stuff.  For me it’s like a hypnotic, haunting journey into the past.  At the same time my mind wonders at the future possibilities for these beautiful old buildings.

Sorry, I forgot for a moment, we are talking about my love for beautiful old buildings and the topic is supposed to be running.  That’s my whole point.  I actually forget while I’m running.  This happens every time.  For me it’s like running into history, or through a beautiful architectural museum.  It’s the same mental journey as on the beach, just different subjects.  I hope these examples help you to understand the pre-eminent importance of your brain in any form of exercise.

The other day, I went running with a very competitive friend of mine who I hadn’t seen in quite some time.  I know this guy well and for him this was a battle to see who was in better shape.  In the end this little challenge clocked in at over an hour and we had run over 7 miles.  For me, this was an unusually fast and physically taxing pace.  I kept up with him the whole way, but it was hell.  This served well to jog my memory.  I remembered why I hated running!

Let’s suppose one of your true joys in life is simply watching television for hours on end, movies, news, soap operas or just flipping from channel to channel.  Let’s also assume you have fully embraced what is primarily an evolutionary diet.  Try this; replace your easy chair with a very comfortable seated recumbent stationary bike.  Recumbent bikes are the ones where your legs are out in front of you and you can lean back into your seat.  Get a few cushions or some foam padding and make it super comfortable.  Put it on its lowest resistance setting and carry on watching television while doing this extremely slow and passive aerobic activity.  If you love reading, simply replace the television with a book stand.  Remember, you are not losing your breath and perhaps not even breaking a sweat, but your heart will beat faster, oxygen will fill your lungs and you will simply feel better.  Even this extremely low intensity activity will produce results since your diet has ended the source of your body fat problem.  Now you are chipping away at the prior damage and watching as your body visibly improves.

I strongly believe those sports, hobbies and physical activities we are passionate about should always define our “exercise”.  Nonetheless, hopefully these thoughts will expand the possibilities to include some of the stuff we normally wouldn’t consider.

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Generally Recognized As Safe (GRAS)

Posted on April 19, 2012 by Sean

“GRAS” is an acronym for the phrase Generally Recognized As Safe. This term applies to all of the long, mostly unrecognizable chemical ingredients on our processed cakes, cookies, frozen pizzas or snack food and fast foods. All of those ingredients making up that processed food item must get GRAS approval before they are allowed to be sold by the FDA. Specifically:

Under sections 201(s) and 409 of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (the Act), any substance that is intentionally added to food is a food additive, that is subject to premarket review and approval by FDA, unless the substance is generally recognized, among qualified experts, as having been adequately shown to be safe under the conditions of its intended use, or unless the use of the substance is otherwise excluded from the definition of a food additive.

Under sections 201(s) and 409 of the Act, and FDA’s implementing regulations in 21 CFR 170.3 and 21 CFR 170.30, the use of a food substance may be GRAS either through scientific procedures or, for a substance used in food before 1958, through experience based on common use in food.

  • Under 21 CFR 170.30(b), general recognition of safety through scientific procedures requires the same quantity and quality of scientific evidence as is required to obtain approval of the substance as a food additive and ordinarily is based upon published studies, which may be corroborated by unpublished studies and other data and information.
  • Under 21 CFR 170.30(c) and 170.3(f), general recognition of safety through experience based on common use in foods requires a substantial history of consumption for food use by a significant number of consumers.

Now, quite obviously this acronym has never needed to be applied to the following examples of naturally raised foods: an apple, a steak, pork loin, chicken breast, an egg, oyster, a pineapple, tea leaves, coffee beans, brussel sprouts, berries, spices, a lobster, almonds, pistachio nuts, venison, celery, rutabaga, rhubarb, tuna, watermelon, cantaloupe, lemon, lime, Kiwi, lettuce, brisket, onion, a pineapple, carrot, avocado, lamb, grapes, etc.

The idea of applying GRAS to these or any other highly nutritious and natural foods would be totally absurd. Almost (but not quite) as absurd as actually eating the processed, crappy, industrial foods that comprise most of our modern diet and that continually require GRAS certification for their ingredients.

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Please Summarize the Underlying Reason Our Society is becoming So Fat and Sick!

Posted on April 12, 2012 by Sean

Sure!

No problem…here ya go!

The food and agricultural industry, the diet and fitness industry, and the medical and pharmaceutical industries all REQUIRE YOU TO BE AS FAT AND UNHEALTHY AS POSSIBLE. Otherwise, they will have fewer “customers” and will make far less money. Unfortunately, these immensely powerful industries highly influence – they pretty much buy, sell and control – our government. They also fund and highly influence most of our major schools, universities, colleges, and health related institutions and organizations. The result is that YOU and your children are going to be as fat and sick as they can possibly make you.

That’s right, our government – laws, regulations, and guidelines, the media, schools, many of the institutions we rely on for facts and advice, and even our cultural norms all work to ensure that we will continue to be fat and sick. Even most of our confused dieticians and fitness and health professionals (many of whom actually wish us well) unknowingly keep us fat, sick, and confused by promoting foods and ideas that simply perpetuate our problems.

I can promise you that this is the underlying reason we are so fat and sick and getting worse every day. I can also promise you that if you take the time to tediously uncover the facts you will reach this same, sobering conclusion. It’s just money – your money! It’s nothing personal. This situation isn’t going to change any time soon. In fact, based on statistical estimates regarding diet and disease it’s going to get much worse. Our society will become increasingly fat and ill with diet related diseases because these industries employ a huge percentage of our population, are a massive part of our economy and have immense global power and influence.

THAT is the underlying reason why we are becoming so fat and sick.

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Who The $#@! Cares?

Posted on April 9, 2012 by Sean

There are literally thousands of novel “fitness” alternatives out there that are marketed to us every day. Working in the fitness industry I see them all of the time. We are all bombarded with these offers just by turning on the television or checking our mail. When I was 40 pounds heavier, the question of which one of these activities to choose was as confusing as picking one of the thousands of diet books available. We are told that these activities are solutions to our physical problems. Whether they are some form of aerobics, new type of fusion fitness class, a new type of treadmill, elliptical machine, spinning classes or some new fitness “program”; each one screams out to us that they are the promised way to get us slim and attractive. These activities rarely if ever address the underlying problem of our excess fat which is: THE FOODS WE ARE EATING! As such the idea that these activities and their promises will solve our problems is an illusion. So, it’s like you have a bad leak in your ceiling. Instead of fixing your ceiling and permanently stopping the problem, when it rains someone just keeps handing you attractive buckets of different styles and colors that you keep putting under the leaking water. Each bucket quickly overflows and you need to keep using new buckets because the damn leak hasn’t been fixed! I want to move my body! I want you to move your body. Constantly putting these mostly trivial and silly alternatives in front of us tends to obfuscate our view of the far more useful, rational and effective exercise choices available. By that I mean sports or activities in which you will actually enjoy participating. How is it that these other choices are more effective?

BECAUSE THERE IS A CHANCE IN HELL YOU WILL KEEP DOING THEM WITHOUT REQUIRING WILL-POWER OR DISCIPLINE.

Why would you keep doing them? BECAUSE THE BENEFITS OF DOING THEM OUTWEIGH THE COSTS OF DOING THEM. I would ask you to answer the following question (start by answering this yourself) when you are considering engaging in some form of exercise:

WHO THE @!%#% CARES IF YOU ARE ENGAGING IN, OR IF YOU ARE GOOD AT THIS PARTICULAR FITNESS INDUSTRY ACTIVITY?

Do you care that you just did an hour on the elliptical machine at your local gym on the “fat burn setting”? You just did that yesterday. You also did that the day before yesterday. The day before that you did an hour on the stair climbing machine and the day before that you attended the spinning class. Do you really care that you completed any of these activities? Other than generally burning less than the caloric equivalent of 3 Oreo cookies for an hour of your hard work and valuable time, what else was accomplished here? Did you get better at the activity? Does it even matter if you get better at it? Did you enjoy it? Honestly? Was there a new and useful skill learned? Were there people involved who were equally excited and passionate about this activity? Please consider the following examples:

  • I was at an Argentinean steak house one night a few years ago. I noticed the staff was moving tables and chairs off the floor and I figured they were getting ready to close up and start cleaning. Actually, the owner of the restaurant was clearing a space on the floor and encouraging one of the patrons to do an impromptu performance. Suddenly, a slender lady in a red dress stood up with her partner and began to dance. She and her partner danced the Tango – exquisitely. The owner turned up the music a little and everyone who remained in the restaurant was fixated on these two people; completely awestruck. Watching this woman dance was like experiencing liquid, physical poetry. When the dance ended everyone in the restaurant erupted in applause. I will never forget that evening or that woman. Her fitness activity was dancing, specifically the Tango. I cared; everyone at that restaurant that night cared and by the look of elation on her face I’m quite sure she cared.
  • A friend of mine’s father one the World Hockey championship in his division in a huge international “old-timers” tournament in Denmark. He was almost 60 at the time. There were actually some ex-NHL players in this league. He was now a “world champ”. His team cared, his wife and kids cared, his friends cared, the fans cared, and he absolutely cared.
  • A friend of mine named Dianna volunteers at an inner city homeless shelter 3 times per week. She has been doing this for many, many years. Despite the season, the temperature in this place is always high and it can get very hot for the 2 hours required. Close to 400 people per day are served a free meal. The work is very physical and very fast paced. It includes cooking, preparing and serving lots of food and the constant cleaning of the premises. As a long term volunteer, Dianna is not only appreciated, but truly needed for her exceptional philanthropy. Over the years she has made hundreds of friends associated with this shelter who look upon her humble, saintly behavior with great reverence and respect. Regarding her work – they all care, the thousands of homeless people she has helped care, the other volunteers care, and Dianna most definitely cares about this important form of exercise. She is over 70 years old and never misses a day.
  • A friend of mine’s brother, after many years of practice and learning recently achieved his black belt in Kenpo Karate. His brother and family cared, his girlfriend cared, the other members of his dojo cared, and he absolutely cared. Anyone who tries to pick a fight with him in the future will likely also take notice.

In these and thousands of other examples the activities have meaning. They have relevance on so many levels. Of course, this relevance is most dear to the person undertaking the sport or activity. Remember, as long as the person’s diet is under control then the activity – like all the other fitness activities relentlessly pushed on us - is burning off the same fat calories! Earlier I posed the question as to whether we or anyone cares if we are undertaking any of the mundane fitness activities we are typically offered by the fitness industry. If you can honestly answer “yes” then you have indeed found your way. I know there will always be some people who will really find value in these activities. For other folks they will represent valuable assistance work for endurance sports. I honestly believe though, that for the majority of us, the answer will be a resounding “NO!”

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The Modern Food Crisis

Posted on April 2, 2012 by Sean

The messages from the media are clear – gas prices and the cost of food are about to increase dramatically.  Just yesterday, while listening to the news this information reminded me of the ominous words I had heard from a small farmer just outside of New York City before the last large scale food shortages hit in 2007/2008 resulting in a global food crisis.

A few years ago I completed a price study involving the cost of eating truly organic, farm direct food in New York City.  One of the small farmers I had the privilege of talking with at the time suggested that I do another price study 6 months later.  He talked of the inextricable links between fossil fuels and modern agriculture and that the price increases in oil were about to ripple their way through the agricultural system.  He reminded me that this simply wasn’t the case for small, non-industrial farmers who create food naturally.

I’ll never forget his words “Last time I checked, the soil, fertilizer (natural), grass, sunlight and rain on my farm were all free…no price increases expected”.  It turned out that this farmer’s predictions were far more ominous than we could have ever imagined at the time.  The global food crisis of 2008/2009 resulted in never before seen commodity food price increases and many countries experienced a food crisis of epic proportions.  Its spring of 2011 and here we go again!

The farmer’s wisdom reminded me of the economics behind the surprisingly low cost of the local farm-direct healthy food I was pricing.  These small, local farmers simply do not have the expensive inputs and outputs of the modern, industrialized food industry.  As a simple example, they pay for both the feed and the transportation of the feed to the animals in their massive commercial farming operations.  This is also true for their fertilizers and the unusable, toxic waste their tortured animals produce.  Also, their animal and produce products must be transported out comparatively long distances to huge regional distribution centers.
In contrast the local farmers’ animals wondered around eating grass, grubs and other free food courtesy of the sun and soil.  There simply were no major feed or transportation costs.  As such they were largely unaffected by fuel and corn price increases.  This was a simple example which could be applied to the entire cost chain of both types of farming operations.  The same negative results for big industry and the same hyper efficiencies for the small farmers glaringly reveal themselves.  Where the local farms were concerned this was another reminder of the sanity of it all.  Their inputs of their natural system are largely free.  This beautiful system (I think its called nature!?!?!) operates in a perfect feedback loop where the outputs of the system become the inputs.  In contrast, it was stark recognition of the sheer madness and inefficiency of our modern industrial system of agriculture.

Summarizing, our modern food industry or agro-industrial food complex or whatever you wish to call them provides us with the following laundry list of disadvantages:

  • Low grade, low nutrient food which makes us fat, sick and generally unhealthy
  • This food is made with hormones, chemical additives and increasingly, genetically modified organisms
  • Their methods of production torture animals, ruin the land, create dangerous new microbes and produce huge amounts of pollution causing untold damage to our environment
  • They have recently adulterated and come to monopolize the term “organic” (among other terms) lowering the overall quality of production of the food allowed to be sold under this name.  This lower grade “organic” food is extremely expensive.
  • They discreetly take our money in the form of tax subsidies in order to accomplish the above
  • Roughly 10% of every dollar you spend on this food pays for the actual food causing it’s relative cost value and quality to be inherently low
  • To follow this food from its origins to your grocery store you would need to travel thousands of miles, sneak past multiple levels of security, and break trespassing laws.  The average person would still be unable to figure out many of the industrial processes this food is subjected to.

Then we’ve got the guys I met in New York, the small farmers who quietly exist all over the country.  They provide us with the following comparative list of advantages:

  • Fresh, high quality, high nutrient, naturally produced food which will keep you healthy and strong
  • The food they produce is made in conjunction with the processes of nature, as such there are no dangerous chemical inputs or outputs and they let nature handle all of the genetic evolution
  • Their farming enriches the land, produces no pollution and preserves agricultural landscapes
  • These farms create a net tax gain – they contribute more tax revenue than they use
  • They have nurtured, perpetuated and protected the true meaning of the original “organic” idea through their simple and natural farming processes
  • 100% of every dollar you spend goes to those actually growing your food giving you the most relative value in terms of your food’s quality, purity and nutrition.
  • The farming and creation of this food is entirely transparent.  Almost every farmer I have encountered proudly invites customers to their farms to witness their plants and animals at every natural stage of life.

This journey of discovery also confirmed my belief that we, as consumers and as a society, can no longer afford to sleep-walk through the process of procuring our food.  We simply must wake up to the ugly realities of our current modern system now and embrace and strengthen the alternatives while they still exist.  We must support our small, local farmers.  Over the last few decades especially, our food has come to seriously control us.  Clearly, it is time for us to once again control our food.

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