How’s your list coming?  Did you write it out?  If not, STOP right now and take the time to actually do it.  Action steps are so easy to gloss over with the idea that “I’ll get to it when I have some free time”, but free time is often hard to come by these days.

When Gavin first asked me to do this assignment, I was overjoyed!  Here I had a world class consultant, and someone who was far more successful than me at the time, willing to share his time and expertise with me all because I called him at 6:00am.

Little did I know that this list would radically change the course of the rest of my life.  I know, you’ve probably bought and read some self help books with the same promise.  Well, this one is free, so saddle up and grab your list.

My initial list, which took me about an hour to put together, ended up looking something like a billionaire’s shopping list.  I wanted multiple houses, multiple Porsche’s, maybe a plane or two and a host of other toys and accessories.  The list was two pages long of such material and lifestyle enhancing items and then maybe (big maybe here) the last item on the list was – “to help people”.

I emailed my list off to Gavin, proud of the time and energy that I had put into it and eagerly awaited his advice on how to acquire said accoutrements.  What I got in reply was something like the following, “Great list, please rewrite and send it back.  Remember, you truly have unlimited resources, so after acquiring your items, what would you do?”

Crap, this was actually going to take some consideration.  What would I do once I acquired all of those items?  Well heck, I would drive my cars to my various houses, eat the foods my chefs prepared for me, fly places and you know, do fun stuff!  I reluctantly took my old list out, grabbed a pencil and really gave it some consideration.

In all honesty, I would love to own a Porsche (cough..e-store…cough) but I don’t think that even if I had the funds, I’d want two of them since I really like my Tacoma and you can’t really fit a surfboard (or a girlfriend) in the back of such a small car.  So I crossed one of them off.  While I was at it, I crossed off the Lamborghini’s for the same reason, decided that you can only live in one house at a time and renting vacations homes was pretty easy, so my list got smaller and smaller. 

At one point I simply put my papers to the side and asked myself to start being more honest with what I truly needed in my life to be happy.  I don’t need a Porsche, as I said; I was a really happy guy with a pickup truck.  I don’t need 12 houses; I was a really happy guy with a one-bedroom apartment.  What I needed to be happy was very little, but here’s the rub – it had to have meaning and it had to have meaning to me. 

Check your list and see if what you’ve written really will lead you to fulfillment, to a sense of purpose and to happiness.  If not, cross it off. 

See you all on Monday for more on this.

Updating...

Last week’s conversation about Po Johnson’s book got me thinking about an exercise that I’d like to share with you.  Back before CrossFit Pacific Coast and Alki and this blog, I spent a fair amount of my free time engaging with last week’s question – “What the heck should I do with my life?”

I sought out the counsel of psychics, astrologers, and people of influence in my life, the whole gamut.  Little did I know that divine timing exists and that certain events would have to take place before I would get the real answer to this question.  However, there was one particular conversation that I had that I would like to share with you as it had a profound effect on the course of my life at the time.

My old boss, Gavin de Becker is a world traveler and generally a big deal.  Therefore it came as no surprise when I got an email asking me to provide Gavin with a wakeup call the next morning as he had a plane to catch.  I was working a shift that began at 6am and would be awake anyway so it was no skin off of my back.

I called Gavin at the predetermined time and we got to chatting.  Somewhere in the conversation I was asked how I liked the work that I was doing and I answered honestly that I enjoyed it but it wasn’t my life’s calling.  Gavin said that he understood and asked me to continue to give my best effort while in his employ. 

Then about 15 minutes later he called me back.  Gavin asked if I was willing to do an exercise for him that would involve making a list and emailing it to him.  I agreed as I am always game for insight developing exercises and felt fortunate that I had someone with his experience and skillset willing to engage me in this manner.

I was asked to make a list of everything that I would want to have and do if I had unlimited resources.  Simple enough right?  Think it through though as I’ll ask you the same question.

What would you do with your life if you had unlimited resources?

Do me a favor and take out a piece of paper and a pen and do some brainstorming.  Would you quit your job and move to Hawaii?  Would you start a non profit to save kittens?  There is no right or wrong answer.  Come back on Thursday and we’ll keep the exercise going.

Be well this week.

“To *want* and to be ambitious and to want to be successful is not enough. That’s just desire. To know what you want, to understand why you’re doing it, to dedicate every breath in your body, to achieve . . . If you feel that you have something to give, if you feel that your particular talent is worth developing, is worth caring for, then there’s nothing you can’t achieve.”  - Kevin Spacey

You may wonder what a quote about acting, by an actor has to do with health and wellness. If you scroll down a bit and find the post about stagnation, this quote fits in in a similar fashion. When I was making a living in the protection business, I spent a lot of time on the road and a lot of time travelling with the same group of my client’s support staff. There were nannies for the kids, a chef, a personal trainer and all manner of assistants. On one particular trip the book “What Should I Do With My Life?” by Po Johnson floated around our group. It was common to pass on the latest Jack Reacher Novel or John Grisham story among the security staff but most of the time the books that we were reading weren’t that interesting to the rest of the party.

What was fascinating about Po’s book was that everyone, from the 68 year old nanny down to the 22 year old assistant, wanted to read it and was vehement about getting their opportunity to do so. At one point there was an 8 person waiting list for this particular book! Now what does this tell you?
For most people, a significant amount of their time and energy is still spent “figuring out” what it is that they really want to do with their lives. This isn’t something that we get handled in junior high school and get to move on from after some reckoning!

I really appreciate the above quote by Kevin Spacey because it speaks not only to the underlying reasons that we all should make sure are clear before embarking on a life path, but more importantly, it’s a great reminder that no matter what it is that we’ve chosen to do we must put ourselves into it fully. I work with people on a daily basis, many of whom are still on a path that they haven’t necessarily chosen to be on, but are responsible for keeping themselves on even to their own detriment.

Are you living the life of your dreams? Would you do the work that you are engaged in in the world if you had to do it for free? Even better, would you actually pay to be able to do what you do? I know that I would and hope that you would as well.  Be well this week.

Ever wonder what the world’s healthiest foods are?  Check out the website for the World’s Healthiest Foods and their complete list of the 130 of those foods.  What are the criteria for making this list?  Per their website:

1. The World’s Healthiest Foods are the Most Nutrient Dense
2. The World’s Healthiest Foods are Whole Foods
3. The World’s Healthiest Foods are Familiar Foods
4. The World’s Healthiest Foods are Readily Available
5. The World’s Healthiest Foods are Affordable
6. The World’s Healthiest Foods Taste Good

Sounds pretty good to me!  Enjoy the list and the site; both are extremely valuable sources of nutrition information.

For those of you that haven’t had a chance to attend an Alki Wellness Night, I use the two pictured boxes of cereal as props in my nutrition talks. Take a look at the boxes and more importantly, take a look at the captions on the boxes. How do the captions make you feel?

Personally, they made my blood boil. Cocoa Krispies may actually be a brilliant source of Vitamin D, but I highly doubt that they are a better source than an hour in the sunlight or some good old fashion fish (salmon, cod, tuna, and mackerel). Even if they are a great source of Vitamin D, why does Vitamin D have to be obtained along with so much sugar? The Chocolate Cheerios Box says that the Cheerios may help fight heart disease since they are made from “whole grains”. Really? So they want me to believe that eating Cocoa Cheerios, laden with sugar and high density carbohydrates is going to help someone minimize their risk of heart disease?

Although the claims may (and may is a very loosely used term here) have some validity to them, the rest of the product can in no way be described as healthy. Why not add Vitamin D to cigarettes while we’re at it? What hasn’t been touched on yet though either and is the main issue in my mind is the fact that these products are primarily sold to be eaten by children.

So how come, even though our very own First Lady has said that one of the main goals of her First Lady-ship is to lower the childhood obesity levels in the U.S – why hasn’t she taken aim at claims like this? Why are we, as Americans, ok with this kind of advertising? We went ballistic when we thought that Joe Camel was being marketed to children (he was), so how come it’s ok to sell children a product that will, in my opinion, have a directly negative effect on their health, yet label it with a health claim?

19.6% of children between the ages of 6 and 11 in the United States are obese (per the CDC). That’s not just overweight, that’s obese and that’s completely unacceptable. Next time you’re in the supermarket, take a look at the products and how they’re being advertised. A good rule of thumb is that, if the product makes a health claim, leave it on the shelf.

Enjoy the above video on burn recovery folks.  Eric sent this to me last week but I didn’t have a chance to view it until early Sunday morning.  Technology like this ties into what I wrote about a few Monday’s back with regards to watching the lovely Lisbeth Salander recover from taking a round to the dome.

It should be inspiring to us that we as human beings have created a technology that will allow immense amounts of pain and misery to be avoided by burn victims and secondarily by their loved ones as onlookers.  This is truly remarkable and something that should be celebrated to no end.  My hope is still that here in the US, where technology like that shown in the video is available, the same brilliant minds can come together and find a way to promote a healthy lifestyle here as well.  I said it a week or so back, but if we can take someone from second degree burns to burn free skin in a weekend – we can figure out how to eat in accordance with good health, move in accordance with good health and live in accordance with good health.

To the creator of the skin gun – God bless you.

-thb

Are Americans addicted to soda?  (“The United States ranks first among countries in soft drink consumption. The per-capita consumption of soft drinks is in excess of 150 quarts per year, or about three quarts per week.”James A Howenstine M.D. A Physician’s Guide to Natural Health Products That Work)

I recently read an article that quoted the Journal of American Medical Association and it’s study linking an increase in soda drinking to an increase in both weight gain and the subsequent likelihood of said soda drinker to therefore contract (funny word in this case) Type 2 diabetes. 

To me this is a no-brainer.  I don’t really understand the desire to drink sugar and find it even more unconscionable that people actively give this crap to their kids on a regular basis.  Thirsty?  Here, drink some sugar.  Seriously?

What got me wasn’t the article, what shocked me were the responses in the “comments” section under the article.  People were adamant that the study was incorrect and were shocked themselves that the JAMA had the audacity to infer that an increase in drinking a sugary substance could begin the cascade of weight gain leading to diabetes.  Is this concept really that hard to grasp?  Some of the comments were geared towards the other factors that increase the likelihood of ending up with Type 2 diabetes such as a sedentary lifestyle (I agree), a genetic predisposition (I also agree).  Let’s call a spade a spade here though folks.  Yes, genetic factors and other lifestyle habits will most certainly increase or decrease your propensity to end up with something nasty – but there is no benefit to drinking soda.  None.

That being said, how about we just stop drinking sugar and calling it soda?  How about we stop serving it to kids in lunchrooms?  And more importantly, let’s stop make the drinking of it part of our national identity so that maybe we can shift another part of our national identity – that of being ranked #29 in the world with percentage of our population having diabetes.

Does this look like the office of a healthy person?

Everyone is concerned with stretching out their healthcare dollars these days.  So what’s a really cheap and easy way to take the first step towards a healthier day?  Well, you may be surprised that it has nothing to do with microbes, nothing to do with vitamins, diet or any of the usual health suspects.  It has to do with your brain, your life and clutter.

Chinese Medicine speaks extensively on the subject of “stagnation”.  Prior to acupuncture school, I hadn’t heard this term before and to be honest, I wasn’t all that impressed with the concept when it was first mentioned to me.  Now I have a deep understanding of the role that it plays in my daily life, my daily health and my overall well being.  Sounds pretty interesting huh?

What is stagnation?  Good question.   Stagnation to the ancient Chinese medical philosophers is the idea that energy gets “stuck”.  Bear with me those of you that might have tuned out thinking that we’re going to delve into some new age hippy concept.  “Stuck energy” or stagnation takes on many forms in your life both in and out of the health arena.  How much better do you feel after cleaning out and washing your car for instance?  I argue that that’s the cheapest self esteem boost that you can give yourself.  How much better do you feel at the end of a weekend where you’ve crossed off those dozen action items that you’ve been meaning to get to but simply haven’t had the time?  Personally I believe that this is a palpable feeling, I actually “feel better” once completing those tasks even though the acts of performing them hasn’t drastically altered my physiology. 

What does this have to do with health?  Even better question.  Chinese medicine views illness, or dis-ease as coming from a variety of easily identifiable sources – there’s either a lack of something (deficiency), too much of something (excess), things are going in the wrong direction (counterflow) or they’re stuck which is stagnation.

Stagnation occurs in our muscles and tendons and causes cramps and pain.  Stagnation occurs in our bowels and causes constipation.  Stagnation occurs in our heads and causes headaches.  Stagnation occurs in our central nervous system and we feel stress. The list goes on and on. 

Will cleaning your apartment immediately heal an injured shoulder then?  Probably not.  However, what it will do is put your whole system more at ease.  It will free up the energy that your body is using to hold onto the thought “crap, I should probably clean this place up.”  and lets it use that energy for healing.  The effect may not be profound, but it does exist and since most major problems began as small problems, why not nip things in the bud.

Stagnation is the enemy folks – de-clutter your daily existence and see how this spills over into your everyday health.

I was watching Stieg Larsson’s “The Girl that Kicked the Hornet’s Nest” the other night (fantastic series btw, highly recommend it) and came to the scene where Lisbeth Salander gets a bullet removed from her brain. While bearing witness to Hollywood’s version of brain surgery, I had a thought. We, as a culture, have figured out how to keep someone alive while removing parts of their skull, further removing a lead object, replacing the skull and sewing the patient back up. This happens, right here in the U.S of A.
So, my question is, “how can we live in a country where medically we’ve advanced to the point where we can perform brain surgery, yet we have yet to make the public correlation between the food that we’re eating and lifestyle that we’re trying to pass off and the chronic diseases such as diabetes and heart disease that are killing 70,000 of us a month?”

Think about the question honestly. We have created robots that can perform surgery, yet we still overfeed ourselves and our children to the point where over 70% of Americans are either overweight or obese? How can these two polar opposite concepts be part of the national identity of the same country?
Part of me says that there has to be some kind of conspiracy in play here as the answer to all of our questions seems to be staring us in the face. Doctors must know that nutrition and lifestyle are the main shapers of day to day health. Where are the riots in streets – where is the War on Soda? I’m not a big conspiracy theorist as it makes the world a really hard place to live in if you can’t have just a little bit of faith. Plus I don’t think that human beings are very good at keeping secrets, so someone would have slipped.

If it’s not a conspiracy theory though, what does that leave us with? Are we as a nation so uneducated about the basics of living that we’re taking an active role in killing ourselves? Or are we so emotionally attached to our way of life that and to being able to do things our way that even when faced with the truth we can find some way to ignore it? Please don’t tell me that it’s un-American to be healthy.

Michael Pollan says, “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” I have a feeling that right here in America that advice would save us billions of healthcare dollars a year, countless lives and more needless suffering than any of us can imagine. How about we start there and see where it takes us?

Check out the trailer for the great documentary – “Food Matters”. This film raises some very interesting questions about the ways that we practice medicine in the western world. It also begins to delve into the underlying causes (lifestyle and diet) of the majority of our current health problems, causes that have yet to be addressed by our current medical system. Food does matter folks, and to think that it doesn’t play an extremely integral role in our daily health and longterm wellness is both foolish and naive. Ask any 5 year old and they’ll tell you – “you are what you eat!”