Insidious Adaptation

Why must it be like this? Why can I not just have my cake and eat it too? Why must there be this tether to the middle preventing me from going too far in one direction, no matter the motive, yanking me back with a painful reminder of my imbalance? I only want to eat a little more, or workout a little less, things that my logical mind knows it has to do, but the other part of me, my emotional side, says “no.” This battle, like two divorced parents fighting for custody simply to spite the other, weighs in my mind like a stone unmovable. No, I will not wake up one day, skip the gym and lack anxiety about getting fat later, and no I will not go to the gym excessively and not be fatigued or consumed by old behaviors, no matter how much I romanticize a return to the 2-hour gym sessions twice a day. Neither of these will occur, nor will I ever rid my mind of this part of me, as apparent as my own personality. In fact, it is my personality, my temperament even, for man does not compartmentali...

"A bold move." Some will say.  "I don't agree, and F that guy pushing his views on me with a title like that!" Scream others.  "Ah, what a nice young man." Say those who might know of me, yet wouldn't read the post.  "I don't like his writing." As more scroll by with enough on their wall today to write their own books.  What are we missing here? Where is that Lego block we thought we had, misplaced, the piece of the puzzle, critical to the complete picture, we just can't find? What did we just spend four hours on, if not to finish this thing? Why did we wait until the last piece to figure out if there is even a possible conclusion?  Life is such an all expansive view of an entire existence summed into these four little letters. For some, they decide to equate their life to four larger, more adult letters, the first one s and the last t, yes, there it is. Whether we are choosing to have this s--t life o...

The call of a donut, the freedom of a bag of chips, the nostalgia of holiday cookies, the bulk of a bag of candy, all things that once were, are no more.  It was in the first Matrix where I learned how ignorance is "bliss," and once you give it up, the consequences that ensue. For me, the problems that obtaining nutrition knowledge caused was the loss of innocent pleasure food once brought about resulting inn a sort of sadness. The reminders of boxes of cereals, bowls of ice cream, or bags of candy, all enhancing a good time. I loved the textures, the smells, the tastes, of food. Real food too, real ingredients as well. I like them all, though I tended to seek more stimulation thus averting from satiation, for they all do something different to the brain, preventing any lackadaisical boredom.  The problem is that early in life, due to what I believe to be a combination of environmental components and genetic predisposition, I relied on food for something else, some...

A catch in the lower back, aesthetically, in the butt, for the pain is below my waist band. When I push on the area I can feel the tighten ball of inflammation, a spot and feeling I am very familiar with. This pain was self-induced, for I went too far, too long, "too hard?" shall I say. It comes and goes like a pain in my trapezius or the upper portion of my back. Never anything major, just a pain, a sensitivity reminding me of my limits. I had no plans for a change in routine for I get aches and pains often and figure if you let those stop you in life then you might as well just stay in bed. I went to the gym with the intent to lift the lower half of my extremities, legs. Now, the legs portion of a workout involves, though it is not necessarily supposed to, a lot of lower back. Simple things from shifting weight to an initial oomph to get the bar off the rack, more prevalent than one would take note. What I noticed on this trip to the ever-so-busy gym, even at 4:30 in t...

In a house recently purchased, heated to comfort, in clothes recently cleaned, with a sippy-cup full of organic cream and milk, while a pure-bread dog sleeps at the foot of a recently purchased couch, as a 55-inch TV displays the high definition cooking show, a child, healthy in both brain and lungs apparently, throws down her baby in what her parents can best describe as “boredom.” This child’s evening has not gone so well thus far, from getting picked up by a mom whom is understanding, healthy, beautiful, from a day care that is caring, loving, intimate, this child demanded stimulation due to having an abundance all day. It appears to no longer suffice merely haveing people listen to what ever jumbled sentence a 2-year-old’s mind can put together, but she requires stimulation as well. No longer does mere existence excite the family, but discipline and progression past fits of tantrums are the new standard.   An evening of ups and downs the child seems easily agitated by thin...

Fuming in a meeting or annoyed at what I feel to be provoking comments in the hall.The parts I see, I am unaware specifically as to what they are, but I notice something, something I don’t like, something rather, distasteful.  “Why don’t you just…”  I’m not sure how to finish that sentence because I am not exactly sure what it is you are doing, or what overall quality you exude that I just cannot stand. Maybe it’s the way you dress differently than I do, or the way you cut me off in mid sentence. Yea, that’s what it is. You are rude, inconsiderate, and well, wait, you are just being honest, your words aren’t really there to “cut me off.” OK, so you do have some genuine parts to you, authenticity that I lack, that I will admit.  OH MY GOSH! Now I am embarrassed. You are more of what I lack, and it took me months of justifying me right and you wrong to see what was right in front of me. I see in you what it is I want to see in myself, being authentic in al...

A bit of sarcasm rings from the wall of Face as I read comment after comment indicating relevance. I am the most guilty, for I do not even produce organic material. Instead, I regurgitate partially digested pieces of information I have gathered from everything from C.S. Lewis, to the Bible, all the way to the new 2 Chains song. I am a fellow of many hats for I had learned to adapt early on in life. My authentic self now, a softer, milder, less-demanding version, for I no longer rely on your attention to complete me, combats the inauthentic or prideful self, daily, hourly in fact. Self-Promotion is not my strong point, however when a book is published and there were a lot of people involved in it's development, I owe it not only to me and the numerous hours of work and sacrifice, but to the researchers who contributed their time in both phone and email responses, a spouse and daughter whom received a more tired version of their man, the publisher who found the work and decided t...