Tag: nutrition

on the train

I have not been training as hard this summer as last summer… and it took a while, but I’m fine with it. This summer I worked on my car, painted a couple rooms in my house, and took on various construction projects at home… not to mention a new job and a few gigs… songwriting… some family things… and yes, even some training.

Completing a good number of things things I’ve done have brought about a sense of accomplishment, but that sense of accomplishment is fleeting. I recently heard an interview with Light Watkins wherein he states that the level of happiness you are feeling right now is the same level you will feel after completing a task – and it resonated with me very clearly because I know exactly what that means. To tackle a problem is great – but another problem will soon obstruct you, and the only way you can truly increase your happiness is to pursue your purpose.

So yes, it was a great summer, but I am back on the training train – and if I’m completely honest, part of why I am okay with not training so hard through the summer is because I am back to it now, to the degree that brings me the most joy.

That’s not to say that training is my purpose, but training does bring about an alignment of values – of heart, soul, and mind – and conditions me to be at my best physical shape when I am realizing my purpose. My actual purpose is one of service in the arts, but if I am polluted and out of shape, I will inevitably short-change the recipients of that service, be it at my day job or in my songwriting and performance career.

All in all, It feels so good to have reclaimed my routine of endurance, even if it has cost me part of my evening routine by way of an early bedtime… sorta. (it will once the lack of sleep catches up with me).

I have a full life, with great hobbies and great people in my life – but if I am not at my best, then I cannot give my best, and nobody wants the fractional version of me.

the late bloomer

“A lot of my foolish teenage dreams came back when I got my health back, except now I’m 40, and I have the discipline and artistic fortitude to chase them. “

I know I’m probably not alone in this, but for as far back as I can remember, I’ve been misunderstood, or at best, taken out of context with some regularity. The fact that a person with those sorts of credentials spends any time uploading creative works to the internet is a mystery, even to me – but here we are.

I suppose somewhere between my 40 year old body and my brain that operates at the same level it did when I was 17, it can be expected. I’ve spent a good amount of time in my life being various forms of fucked-up, and have ultimately been hell-bent on consumption of everything from high-fructose corn syrup to pain pills, and washed them all down with liquor, beer & wine. I would say upsetting things, and the frequency at which I was resonating was so low I’m surprised I didn’t stop existing altogether. But that didn’t happen.

I cleaned up – in all the different ways. I got my health in check and my food sources in check and at this point I’ve never been so clear as I am right now, and I’ve also never been so misunderstood by so many people – and that misunderstanding likely either comes from the fact that (a) most of the people around me have only known the hazy, inebriated version of me, or (b) those people are hazy versions of themselves. Now; regardless of whether they fall under category (a) or (b), they’re gradually having to get used to the version of me that is driven, motivated, and disciplined. I understand that it’s a bit bewildering for those people, assuming they care enough to give it a second thought.

What can I say – I’m a Confusionaire.

Scattered throughout the fields of bewildered people are a few folks in my life who are excited by these changes. I keep these people close – or at least as close as an introverted guy like me can. I play it pretty close to the chest, which is either a natural inclination, or a defense mechanism – I’m not sure which, but I do manage to let a few people through.

I wasn’t joking when I said my brain functions the way it did when I was 17. A lot of my foolish teenage dreams came back when I got my health back, except now I’m 40, and I have the discipline and artistic fortitude to chase them. Some of you might be reading this and thinking “mid-life crisis” but I’m not talking about buying a sportscar and picking up women half my age. I’m talking about re-realizing my purpose – but when it feels like so many of my contemporaries are moving in the opposite direction, I am most certainly the outlier among my peers. It bothered me for a while… but I really can’t be too concerned with that anymore.

I like the term “late bloomer” – I subscribe to that.

If any of this resonates with you then you might be a late bloomer, too. I think it’s a thing to be proud of despite how easy it is to look and your low-frequency years as ‘wasted time.’ That’s not wasted time at all. That’s a blessing… and an incubation period. Truth-be-told, if I was always healthy in my body and my mind, I’d probably have taken it for granted – but since it’s a newfound hope and a new opportunity to push myself beyond my limits, it’s absolutely everything to me.

I wish everyone felt this way.

I’ve been traveling this week, and working some long-ass hours with one of those people who got excited by the changes I’ve been making. If you are friends with me on Facebook then you might know that I’m leveling up in the company I work for, and that my band is releasing our finest album to date. Saying that I have a lot going on is an understatement.

Through that, I’ve been able to maintain a level of physical fitness in the fitness room of the hotel I’ve been staying in. I’ve maintained my weightlifting routine, and I have been running with the usual regularity, but not for the lengths of time I’d like to. That can change in the future though, because I’m largely rolling on someone else’s timetable this week…

My boss, a great man who’s had a lot of influence over my professional trajectory, is retiring, and the company has seen fit to offer me his role in the company. I’ve been spending the week training with him, and even though he’s a quarter-century ahead of me, and retiring… he’s not here to fuck around.

I’m proud of where I am, and where I am going… even though after the job is fully mine I’ll be able to go for longer runs. lol.

inspiration and discipline

“This moves into every facet of life, including songwriting. Inspiration might get you to pick up a guitar and mess around with a chord progression or a lick, but discipline is what makes you pick up your guitar every day, and discipline is also what really has the capacity to make a song great.”

I hope I’m inspiring.

Well, I guess know I’m inspiring. I’ve been told I’m inspiring, but that’s not the point. I hope I stay inspiring. One of the great many things I’ve learned along my path is that inspiration is fickle. Inspiration is a notion that something might be a good idea and it requires absolutely no follow-through. Good ideas are good ideas whether you follow through or not.

Once upon a time, I was inspired to do something for my health. I went to the gym. It felt good, and I elected to do it again the next day. This went on for a period of time – let’s say a week, until one day I didn’t feel like it… like I deserved a break. I did deserve a break. I’d been working hard and it was time to rest. One day inevitably turned into two or maybe three – until guilt made me feel like I should get back on the horse. It; too, felt good.

After a while my feelings on the matter – the question of whether I was due for a rest, were no longer part of the equation. My rest days were planned just as much as my workout days were. I’d developed a routine and I was doing alright with it. Then I started seeing things I wanted to see. Things like larger biceps, or a lower number on the scale. This resulted in a more consistent practice. Diligent follow-through.

At some point along the way I was no longer inspired. I know I wasn’t inspired because there were days my alarm went off and I didn’t want to go to the gym – but I went anyway. That’s not inspiration, it’s discipline.

To this day I really don’t know how to answer the question “what inspires you?” because I think inspiration checked out a few miles back, and discipline took over. At this point there are so many great things that happen in my life as a result of my practice of self care that skipping a day doesn’t even occur to me – and when the unforeseeable happens, I reschedule, and I adapt… because that’s what discipline gets you: resilience.

This moves into every facet of life, including songwriting. Inspiration might get you to pick up a guitar and mess around with a chord progression or a lick, but discipline is what makes you pick up your guitar every day, and discipline is also what really has the capacity to make a song great.

Ultimately, if I had to choose between them, I’d rather be disciplined than inspired any day.

I didn’t make an entry about training last week, but it’s not for lack of follow-through. I’ve been changing my approach a little bit, and it’s all based on that notion that got me to start running in the first place…

Running is hard.

I’ve adjusted my focus away from the stationary bike and toward running. There’s still place for the bike… and for the rowing machine, stair climber, swimming… all of it, but running kills me the hardest. It’s the most calorie-burning and exhaustive activity I do, and I feel that if I want to accomplish my goals that I gotta dig in on the hard stuff.

It’s made for some ass-dragging, over-cooked days but it’s been worth the effort so far. I’ve definitely overdone it a couple times but I wear that with a bit of pride. I oughta pace myself, I know – but if I know anything, it’s that I will adjust, and fairly quickly.

Maintaining the weight lifting for a total of about 45-60 minutes, twice a week, and I hit the rowing machine, stair climber, and bike once a week each – the rest of the time I’m running. It looks like this:

Monday – long run (60 – 75 minutes)
Tuesday – stationary bike / weightlifting
Wednesday – rest
Thursday – long run (60 – 75 minutes)
Friday – row machine / weightlifting / stair climber
Saturday – bike (30 – 45 minutes) / run (30 – 45 minutes)
Sunday – rest

I’m undergoing a job-change right now, so there’s more than one kind of adjustment happening in my life, but it’s all for the best.

trauma

“Trauma is not just bad things happening to you.
It’s also good things not happening to you.”

Trauma might be the biggest 6 letter word of 2022… and maybe 2023 since we’re right in there now. I’m not sure if it’s my own algorithm treating me to a nice, shiny shovel with which to dig into my own psyche or if it’s actually everywhere, but it’s certainly a thing to be aware of.

Trauma is most often defined as anything that guides or reroutes neuropathways in the brain, and is completely experiential. That means: a thing happened to you and it changed the way you think. Typically a trauma response is something you implement to prevent yourself from experiencing that situation (or one like it) again, and it’s an understatement to say that most of these situations happen to you as a child or some other variation of young person. This is a time of great brain development and it’s a given that your brain has adapted to your bad experiences just as it has your good experiences and your educational experiences.

But trauma is not just bad things happening to you.
It’s also good things not happening to you.

The hard part of acknowledging trauma in your life is concluding that your parents had something to do with it. And basically, you’re right – they did, just as you as an adult likely have something to do with the trauma of your own children, perhaps your nieces & nephews – but assigning blame isn’t the point. Well, not always. To be trauma-free would make you an outlier in this world.

*** if you’re dealing with serious trauma from childhood you should talk to a professional who can guide you through it.

We’re all sculpted by our experiences in this life, and we’re all graced with a unique view of the world as a result. Often times our world view is what limits us and prevents us from success, just as there are many people who are propelled forward by those same factors.

My personal challenge has been to change my world view. I obviously can’t change my experiences, but I can change my reactions to them. I can use them to grow and see things in a new way, I can redefine what terms like success and growth mean to me after years of simply accepting the status quo. I won’t say it’s easy and it’s certainly not instantaneous.

But… I choose growth.

room for the miracle

“Personally I love this notion. If I have a plan and I need to change it in order to navigate the terrain of a tumultuous day, I can do so. It’s when I don’t have a plan at all that this change becomes a massive disruption.”

I like to have a plan.

I didn’t always like to have a plan, but then again I didn’t always get everything done that needed doing. In truth, the first positive thing I ever got a grip on was my health, and even then it was a loose grip in the beginning – but slowly & surely I made bigger progress followed by smaller regress… 2 steps forward, 1 step back until I learned enough about myself to optimize things.

It took me the better part of a decade to get done what I set out to do, and the most successful part of that (almost) decade was the fall of 2018 leading all the way through 2019 and into the pandemic. I consistently lost 1-2 lbs for a year & a half.

I’ve also been able to apply the principals of that weight loss to other aspects of my life, everything from home improvement projects to artistic output. I’ll spare a lot of the rhetoric and sum it up: Do the work.

Doing the work is methodical and consistent more than anything, but the work requires rest and periodic analysis, too – and it’s within that rest and analysis that we can take a step back and figure out what’s working and what’s not, and how to make things move more efficiently in the direction we want them to. Now, the term isn’t mine, but the concept of ‘making room for the miracle‘ has been pretty constant in my life as of late. The idea that having a plan is great, and knowing that plans change.

Personally I love this notion. If I have a plan and I need to change it in order to navigate the terrain of a tumultuous day, I can do so. It’s when I don’t have a plan at all that this change becomes a massive disruption.

In the context of songwriting, songs show up in my whenever they please… but if I don’t have a guitar and a pen on hand with some regularity then those moments are sure to be further and fewer between – even less so if I insist on exclusively working on scales and rudiments without allowing for any experimentation. Similarly if I want to develop muscle, I’m going to have to spend some time in the gym – and consider trying a new sport or game. If I want to lose some weight then I’m going to have to put some effort into selecting nutrient dense foods, but it’s bound to be more exciting to try some new recipes.

It’s important to stay consistent without being too precious about the action because it can be easy to lose sight of the goal, in the ‘can’t see the forest when you’re looking at the trees‘ sort of way.

When I did my first vegetable juice fast in 2014, I wasn’t thinking about triathlon, or home ownership, or my musical trajectory – but all of those things were ultimately set in motion at that time.

Training this week, has been exactly as written above. The week started out well, but since I’m out traveling and playing shows from Wednesday to Sunday, working out and running have been challenging. I am doing what I can when I can, and through some measure of magic I’ve been able to do a little more than I’d anticipated.

And ill be back on track in no time.

his dying wish

“Comments sections being the fountains of bootless insight that they are, the majority of commenters stated that they would grant a man his dying wish but since the 12-steps of Recovery tend to get well-battered by onlookers who don’t understand addiction and compulsion, I’m inclined to disagree with the majority.”

I recently happened upon some writing about William Griffith Wilson, often known as Bill W. who is credited as one of the founders of Alcoholics Anonymous (12 step) and was the author of ‘The Big Book‘ which detailed how to successfully recover from alcoholism. Bill W.’s lifestyle leaves a little to be desired, as the lifestyles of many men in the first few decades of the 20th century might. I’m addressing it because there’s potential for some know-it-all to try and devalue my point by muddying it up by with irrelevant facts, but I won’t dwell on it because it’s not important to my statement.

The story that got me digging was the documented four (4) requests for a bottle of whiskey to be brought to him in his hospital bed as emphysema gradually dismantled him. Each request was made roughly a week after the previous one, and he was denied every time. When he passed, he was 36 years sober.

Comments sections being the fountains of bootless insight that they are, the majority of commenters stated that they would grant a man his dying wish but since the 12-steps of Recovery tend to get well-battered by onlookers who don’t understand addiction and compulsion, I’m inclined to disagree with the majority. What limited knowledge I have of the 12 steps indicates to me more that it’s a guide toward spiritual enlightenment more so than it is a fleeting attempt to prevent early death or lobbing a metaphorical grenade into all your personal relationships – but that is a discussion for another day, I reckon.

Anyway: The reason I; too, would have denied him has nothing to do with the power of addiction and everything to do with the power of legacy, and the fact that even the slightest rumors of that simple slip-up in the twilight hours of his life would have completely deflated the AA movement and may have shaken the ground on which many recovered addicts stood, and continue to stand now. It may be a documented 20% effective, but that’s still millions upon millions of people.

There are things we are part of that are important, and that are so much bigger than ourselves that deserve our respect even at our weakest points. The 12 steps of Recovery are steeped in this idea. We are artists and creators, and by association to our communities are contributors and groundbreakers, creating a legacy that will one day overshadow our small contributions. In my purview Bill W. is no different in this situation and I’m glad he was able to rely on the people around him at his weakest moments.

Maybe I’m wrong. Lemme know what you think!

Training this week was good. I adhered to my program without wavering and pushed myself as planned.

Monday we swam 750m, and spent a little over half an hour doing it. Neither of us had been in a pool since May so we figured that was a good place to start – and ultimately I don’t think either of us lost much in the way of speed, though we’ll see what happens when the distances increase.

Tuesday I rode 45 minutes on the stationary bike before spending another 40 minutes weightlifting, focusing on my chest and biceps (the ‘pushing’ muscles)

Wednesday was a rest day, and Thursday was a 30 minute jog with my heartrate sitting around 136 beats per minute, hovering consistently between 8.5 and 9 km/hour. Zone 2, babies. I didn’t get my 10 minutes on the stair climber due to running out of time, but I pushed hard on Friday to make up for it.

Friday I rode another 45 minutes – this time paying closer attention to my rpms and watts as I rode in a gear I haven’t been comfortable in since starting back up a few weeks ago… but I’m there now. So I’m pretty consistently pushing 150 watts at 60 rpms. After that I spent another 45 minutes primarily working my back & triceps (the ‘pulling’ muscles) and digging in hard on those muscle groups.

Today is Saturday, and I’ll be biking another 45 minutes and running 15 minutes – I’m possibly doing that as you read this, really. These numbers start to increase next week though.

All in all, I’m good with how this went and I’m looking forward to the increases in effort over the next week when I add time to a couple of those bike sessions.

the seasonal shift

“With the advent of Halloween being earlier this week, I don’t mind saying that I’ve been on borrowed time for a while, and as of earlier this week I moved my fitness efforts completely indoors for at least the next 5 or 6 months and I’m really pushing to keep my attitude positive about the impending weather – but know that I struggle.”

When I first started running in 2017, I set out to complete a couch-to-5k program that started on July 4th and stretched into August. The running bug got me real good, and I ran outdoors into the dark & cold months as late as I possibly could. The calendar date escapes me, but I’d surpassed Remembrance Day of that year, and I’d continued outdoors until the temperature reached -14 degrees Celsius (or about 6 degrees Fahrenheit).

I had a lot more “natural insulation” (as I’d gotten DOWN to about 265 lbs) back then, and these days I’m much more inclined to cop to being a wimp when it comes to the weather.

With the advent of Halloween being earlier this week, I don’t mind saying that I’ve been on borrowed time for a while, and as of earlier this week I moved my fitness efforts completely indoors for at least the next 5 or 6 months and I’m really pushing to keep my attitude positive about the impending weather – but know that I struggle.

Zone 2 heartrate training is the primary focus this winter as we gear up to do the Canadian Death Race with our relay team of Rad Moms & Dads. Kristian, the man behind Rad Dads is about to hit round 2 of fatherhood and is on our team. Naomi; my friend from way back, has been through the ringer with injuries upon accidents and is still running and still smiling through it all. Then there’s Lu and I – the 2 vegans on the team and the two who had the furthest to come; physically speaking over the past few years, to rise to this challenge.

The race is in August, which is both really far away and right around the corner. We aim to have a fruitful winter full of discipline and focus, and to grow as the spiritual being we are amid our human experience.

The only thing that could hang this up for me would be if Confusionaires secured a festival date for that weekend, in which case I’d have to sweet talk the team into relaying another ultramarathon… or, As Lu has suggested, just go do the course (or part of it) unassisted – which is kind of our M.O.

A side note about Zone 2 – this is a scientifically determined heart rate zone in which an athlete can increase their capacity for performance by spending time with their pulse between 60% and 70% of their max capacity. It’s determined by lactic testing of the blood, but for my purposes (read: budget) I’m defaulting to a range that I’ve determined using a number of different calculators including this one and have determined a common range using them. Eventually I’ll get tested but for my purposes, this will have to do.

With that, training this week has been pretty solid. In lieu of posting an active training schedule, perhaps more of a week-by-week approach is more ideal. That will allow me to stay more immersed in what’s happening and prevent me from the daunting number of weeks there’ll be snow on the ground.

Tuesday: 45 minute stationary bike ride (+20km) followed by back/tricep weight training
Thursday: 30 minute treadmill run (+4 km), 10 minute stair-climber
Friday: 45 minute stationary bike ride (+20km) followed by chest/bicep weight training
Saturday: 45minute stationary bike ride (+20km) followed by 15 minute treadmill run (+ 2km)

The distances indicated are not something I’d consider special, but as indicated in the side note about Zone 2, the important part is that I’m keeping my heart rate around 133-136 bpm for the entire duration (or close to it).

… Rest days are typically Wednesdays and Sundays and this week will start with a Monday swim, followed by roughly the same program, with slight changes to follow in subsequent weeks.

The acceleration of efforts and time spent will be gradual, primarily because I have all winter to work through and although I know I can handle more than I’m doing at the present moment, efforts will be pretty lofty in the spring and I want to take my time getting there… progressively.

Every day is a gift.