Nowadays

January 16, 2012 in Clouds and Rain | Tags: , , , | Leave a comment

Nowadays I keep to myself
Everybody else can look some other way
Things I say seem to get me into trouble
That I’ve been through for too many days

And trouble is a friend of mine
I’d like to leave behind
I like my friends more refined

Things I lose
Weighing on my heart
Every time I start to think
Maybe it’s through

A little lie
Goes a long way when you can’t say
Quite for sure what’s the truth
The truth is something no one really
Wants to hear you say
Just how you doin and have a nice day

Nowadays you go for a walk
Better not stop and wave or say hello

Just this song
People will spit, give you shit
Just for looking at them
And for walking too slow

Slowly and methodically
I’ll lock the world away
Haunted by my better days

Music and Lyrics by the Eels

What Nature S.A.I.D. part 1

January 16, 2012 in Rules of the Game, User's Manual: Version 2013 | Tags: , , , | Leave a comment

Anyone who has had any kind of run-in with addiction knows that the idea of personal ‘free will’ is in most cases as substantial as smoke, blown downwind from a fire that has gone out.

Science has put the lie to it, showing us that the ‘you’ that decided to engage in behaviour that stimulated a change in your brain chemistry is literally no longer ‘there’. Your brain has been changed by the action itself (see Ghost and the Machine), and though you may have ‘freely’ chosen the action the initial few times, after that you’re playing follow the leader, and it’s your brain chemistry in front.

We are, belief systems aside, evolutionary individual organisms, being acted on outside of our ‘free will’ by much larger forces than we can control. Nature’s clock keeps time not in hours, or even stages of life, but in adaptations. This process is outside our overall control, but not outside our influence, or we wouldn’t be down here in this stuck place to begin with.

The same process that we engaged to dig this hole can be used to begin to tunnel out, using something called the S.A.I.D. principle.

Heart Rate Monitor

January 16, 2012 in Starting exercise program | Tags: , , , | Leave a comment

Get one like this. Simple is better. Stay away from the ones with all the add-ons.

Amazon.com: Polar Heart Rate Monitors – FS3 – Basic Fitness – Model 560139: Health & Personal Care.

This is how to establish your own personal Heart Rate settings:

Top Working (Maximum) Heart Rate:   220 – your age   ( example: if your age is 35 yrs old;  220 minus 35 = 185;     185 is your top HR)

Recovery Heart Rate:  60% of Max HR    ( example: 60% of 185 = 105;     105 is your Recovery HR)

Using the 12 week jogging program outlined in the Post One Small Step for a Man(found below), you will need the HR monitor beinning in week 7.        Jog until you reach your Max HR, then walk until your heart rate falls to your Recovery HR, then jog again till it reaches your Max HR, then walk….like so until you’ve completed the recommended time in the program.

Using the HR monitor allows your body to override your expectations and daily flucuations in fitness. It gives direct feedback on how much you can do on any particular day. As you progress your HR will take a longer time to reach your Max HR, and shorter time to reach the recovery HR, and that basically is all there is to areobic fitness.

The most difficult part by far is just getting yourself to the track.

One small step for a man….

January 15, 2012 in Starting exercise program | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

The Trick Is to Keep Going Back

The Trick Is to Keep Going Back

Eventually you’ll run. Especially if you start by walking.  With a small amount of jogging intertwined. The best way is to go to the local High School and use their track. Follow this program:

1.   Jog the straights; walk the corners. 6 times maximum. If this is too difficult then walk the straights; jog the corners.

Do this every other day for 3 weeks = 10 times total.

Tip: Don’t do more than this, the classic mistake is to think you can get to health quickly by going quicker, actually that way basically guarantees failure, as your body and will break down under the sudden demand.

2.  Jog two straights plus one corner; walk the other corner  6 times maximum

Do this every other day for 3 weeks = 10 times total

Tip: All training is interrupted by weather, sickness, transportation problems; is doesn’t matter if you miss a session, just keep plugging…nobody cares, so there is nothing to prove,  this is a completely private war you’re waging….

3. Put on your Heart Rate monitor and jog the whole track till you reach your target Working Heart Rate (see Heart Rate Monitor blog entry); Then walk till your HR goes back down to your target Resting Heart Rate

Do this every other day for 20 minutes for 3 weeks

Tip: Use the HR monitor as your guide, as soon as you hit the target, on either end of the scale, change activities. Your heart rate gives you a direct feedback on your daily condition, some days you’ll be able to do more, others less.

4. Same as the previous period; using the HR method

Do this every other day for 30 minutes for 3 weeks = 10 times

Health Rebuilding Exercise Program (Won’t work for Exercise Addicts)

January 15, 2012 in Starting exercise program | Tags: , , , | Leave a comment

A few rules for using exercise to rebuild your health;

Simple is best

Slow beats quick

Some is better than none

A hundred beginnings still adds up to one hundred repetitions

This is a 12 week program.

It is most effective if completed in 12 weeks, but most people won’t get it done in 16.

It is not better to get it done in 8 weeks, it is actually less effective.

Follow the program as if you are walking up a flight of stairs, don’t skip any steps, and if you stop for any reason go back to exactly where you stopped before continuing.

When lifting weights remember to start light and perform fewer repetitions. As your strength builds add more repetitions before adding more weight.

When jogging/running always use a heart rate monitor and stick to the heart rate values suggested. The HR monitor allows your body to give you direct accurate feedback on your fitness outside of your conscious thought or preconceptions of how fit you think you are.

Want to do more? Add the abdominal breathing practice found here: ( see the Breath Restoration link on the Home Page Menu)

Rogue Wave

January 15, 2012 in If Only You Could Turn back Time | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

for·give  v.

1. To excuse for a fault or an offense; pardon. 2. To renounce anger or resentment against.

 for·get  v.

1. To treat with thoughtless inattention;  2. To banish from one’s thoughts  3. To disregard on purpose.

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Addictive urges come like waves on the ocean, pushed by the deeper hidden currents of Nature working through the chemistry of your brain and body, and to a person trying to stop the repetition it can be like building sand castles on the beach at the high water line.

Eventually all the work you’ve done building walls and digging moats is compromised by a sudden wave that is just a little stronger than the rest, and within minutes, it’s all been swept away.

Ashamed of nature? Disappointed by wind and tide?

Forgive it. No blame, no shame, just another day at the ocean’s edge.

But don’t forget it.

Some waves are naturally bigger than the rest.

To build a lasting castle stay away from the ocean’s edge.

Stages of Change

January 15, 2012 in Stages of Change | Tags: , , , | Leave a comment

Circular Nature of Behavior Change

You Can’t Quit If You Really Want

January 13, 2012 in If Only You Could Turn back Time | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

You can quit ‘Cold Turkey’, any time, you just have to want it enough. People quit smoking, drinking, binge eating, masturbating to pornography, you name it, they’ve quit doing it, ’Cold Turkey’, no help, just the decision to stop backed with willpower and a strong constitution.

Don’t believe it. It’s not true. Literally, one person in ten thousand, maybe. The rest are forgetting the little slip ups, the couple of puffs, a few sips, the bags of chips, releasing the stress…

The reality of addiction is that the person who is trying to quit is not who they used to be, so how is ‘Cold Turkey’ possible? There is no ‘old you’ to come back to, instead a different you, through a filter of the effects of your changed body chemistry. The changed chemistry calls out for the stimulus that caused the change, a cellular compulsion that feels like an urge, getting stronger the longer you go ‘without’, it’s a war every addicted person fights when they try to quit, whether you want to or not.

Win some, lose some, hope you develop a winning streak…

Shared Wisdom

January 13, 2012 in Clouds and Rain | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

“Opportunity may knock only once, but temptation leans on the doorbell.”    Author Unknown

“The chains of habit are generally too small to be felt until they are too strong to be broken.”  Samual Johnson

“Just cause you got the monkey off your back doesn’t mean the circus has left town.”    George Carlin

“When you can stop you don’t want to, and when you want to stop, you can’t…”       Luke Davies

No remedy, no rescue.

January 13, 2012 in Rules of the Game, User's Manual: Version 2013 | Tags: , , , | Leave a comment

rem·e·dy  n.  1. Something, such as medicine or therapy, that relieves pain, cures disease, or corrects a disorder. 2. Something that corrects an evil, fault, or error.

res·cue  1. To set free, as from danger or imprisonment; save.

You have to do it yourself. If there were a pill you could take to stop addiction, they’d be selling billions. If there were a number you could call, a person you could see, a service you could use, there would be lines out the door, around the block, over the horizon. But there is not. There is no remedy, no rescue. There is no stage to grow out of, no light to step into, no special way, or lucky day. No diet, no quiet space, no ancient practice, no healing place. No transformation, no shoulder patch, no realization, no escape hatch.

There is basically nothing you can do to quickly effect or change the fact that you’re addicted. If you are waiting for a quick solution you won’t find it here, and by here I mean not only this site, but on the planet Earth.

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Are you searching for a solution, any solution?

There are some ways to go, paths that others have gone down before that seem to have some probability of success in the long run. But it’s a long run. If you are ready to make another attempt at kicking it, this site will help.

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