rawlife’s BodyBlog

  I think I got up 9 times.  No sleep for the hungry.  Anyway, I’m crushin this raw vegan diet like it’s nobody’s business.  It’s costing me about $80 a day-but for learning purposes, I"m willing to accept that.  At the moment, I’m trying to develop a base program(a control, in other words), so I know, in the future, if throw something else in the mix(a variable), I’ll be able to pinpoint the cause of cause of the results. 

   I’m honestly feeling pretty good; my energy is through the roof and my skin looks absolutely flawless.  It’s the NOT being tired in the middle of the day though that I really really love-so much so that it would be really hard for me ever to go back to a diet that ever had that effect on me.  It’s a little hard to admit all that, eating raw meat has actually been a part of my persona for that last five years(it’s even harder admitting that!).  I just have to think about doing what’s best though and let my feelings for who I am and what defines me go by the wayside.  Maybe in the future those things will be more important but right now, this is what has to be done. 

   On the downside, I am losing quite a bit of weight.  I’m lean as all get out, but I think I’ve dropped some muscle too-I know that I am sore for WAY longer than usual on this diet-so it probably needs some fine tuning, probably should throw some nuts in the mix(as of yet it’s been 95% fruit, 5% leafy vegetables).  If that doesn’t work, I may go back to meat but I don’t think I’ll ever go back to the combinations I was doing before as they were causing me obvious blood sugar issues.

   In other news, I’ve become a nudist.  Not really, but I am tanning in the birthday suit wherever I can these days.  It’s pretty damn nice-just got to find a spot without a lot of trafic.  I usually climb to the top of some local…rock formations, for lack of a better word, and lay out there.  Yesterday, some old lady sat about 10m away from me and read her book.  She was cool with it and I decided I was too, so I didn’t get up. 

  Moving on, I’m coming back to the states for a month on the 4th of July.  The plan is to do some filming for the new site.  The back is feeling really improved and I think I’m ready to give a month of intense workouts a try.  It’s been basically 2 years since I worked out regularly and intensely, so this should be good.  My only qualm though is whether or not my diet is going to support it.  My knee jerk reaction is no, but I have a goofy kind of feeling that it has the potential with a little fine tuning, like I said.  There are some people out there that seem to have broken the mold when it comes to diet and it’s relation to muscle building-I’d like to see if I can get a little bit of what they’ve got goin on.  As I crush my second head of lettuce for the evening, I think I can. 

   Last, I want to apologize yet again for being so bad with the blog.  No good excuses, just been busy being excited and stressed at the same time about other stuff.  Hope you’re all well.

   I’ve made another push towards the raw vegan end.  The more I read, the more I write, the more convinced I am that, at the very least, our bodies are vegan or real close.  For some reason the idea that there is more to it than that, that our own development as a soul plays a role as well, comes up quite often though.  I get the idea, and have heard it spoken about, that what we really take from food is it’s energy…or it’s life.  I wonder if the more developed or advanced a soul gets, the less dense food it needs, or lower on the food chain kind of food it needs.  One thing I can’t deny is that basically almost every person I would call a real master or close to it, was vegetarian or I suspect was vegetarian despite what ancient texts might imply-few actually go right out and say. 

   Anyway, my gut is killin me right now.  I don’t have the flora for this yet.  There’s only one way to get though, so here I am.  Which brings up another interesting point-studies have shown that an animal’s gut flora is a reflection of its diet-I guess that almost goes without saying.  I wonder then, though, if most people’s problems like candida and IBS and what not wouldn’t clear up if they just kept eating the same raw foods over and over again like animals in the wild do, instead of eating an entire Earth’s worth of variety on a weekly basis.  I think if they’re eating cooked, it wouldn’t make too much of a difference given that the food is sterile, but I think this works, in theory, with raw.  Interesting idea, I think. 

   In other news, I am still not done with this puzzle I am doing.  I’m not even 1/10th done.  This is suckee suckee. 

   My back has been acting up a bit lately, mostly I think because of the excess sitting I am doing writing this manual.  Also suckee suckee.

   My shoulder has also been acting up.  This, too, is suckee suckee.  I don’t have a great reason for it either.  There are A LOT of nuances in anatomy and biomechanics that I’m not aware of that I know are affecting my structural health.  I have to study more.  All the external rotations, shoulder adductions, cervical retractions and extensions, and lumbar extensions in the world are not making too much of a difference right now in regards to my back and shoulders.  I know I’m missing a piece or two somewhere and I don’t have too much of a choice other than to find it.  Having said that, I’d like to point out: I think the motivation people have to do what they need to do often stems from the fact they they are, simply, very uncomfortable. 

  Everything has been going pretty well, but it’s been a bit much lately-and I think it’s showing in my blogs and even my personality.  I’ve been a little more aggressive than I feel like I really am lately.  That’s usually a sign of some kind of disomfort.  On the other hand, I’ve really been making a conscious effort to not ’put people in their place’ when a disagreement arises.  Lately, coming out a loser doesn’t bother me all that much.  In fact, it’s really what I’ve been longing for, for a while.  Throughout my life, I’ve put a lot of pressure on myself to win and be the best and to come out on top(especially in arguments) but even more than that, to impress people.  I need a break from that, at least from it’s intensity.  People don’t like it and I don’t either.  It’s a little difficult though to swallow your knee jerk reactions and do something that you think is theoretically better though.  Even more difficult is doing it if you are pretty sure that you are in the right, but think that in this situation what’s best is to just avoid the negativity of the argument.  I’ve been particularly bad at this my whole life.  Most of the time I’ve been in the wrong though-so that makes this quality of mine even worse.

   In other news, I was late to a client the other day and a ruined my whole 1 minute at a time running program.  I ran all the way to work which took roughly 10 min and my back was through for the rest of the week.  I’m still feelin it.  As is usually the case, it worked out for the best because I ended up finding a major leak as a result of it, but it was still damn uncomfortable.  You know, I always kind of thought these people were full of it, but I’ve had two dreams now that, upon awakening, immediately gave me the answer I was looking for in regards to my back.  I went right to the gym after waking up, did what I needed to do and it felt awesome afterwards and now I also have a fuller understanding of the problem.  Pretty cool.  Anyways, I’ll talk to you guys later, hope everyone is well.  My brother is living at my place for the next two weeks or so and I’d like to get some cuddling time in before we go to bed, you know how it is.   

    Might not sound like anything to you, but to me it’s a lot.  I experienced only very minimal leg and calf pain afterwards and my back was basically fine.  That’s exciting to me!  I decided that there is a lot of potential in running in regards to therapeautic value for my back.  One the one hand, it’s a very intense hip extension which is gold for me.  On the other, it’s very many intense bounces for my discs to take and they almost always do not take them lightly.  I’m looking at that as a good thing though-specifically because of the discomfort it gives me.  It leaves me somewhat uncomfortable and sensitive in my lumbar spine which keeps my motivation to improve high, all the while being muscularly therapeautic…so it’s a win win situation here.

   In other news, I’m putting the finishing pieces of my book together now.  I can’t really say finishing touches yet, but I’m getting there.  Most of the rough draft, which isn’t that rough, is done.  Currently, I’m training both my best friend and my sister to see how big of a change we can induce between now and the release of the book.  I took the before pictures this past weekend and am going to do a full assessment on both tomorrow, hopefully. 

   In regards to diet, I’ve been crushing almost a whole jar of raw, unheated honey daily this past week.  It’s insane, but I’m craving it like mad.  This happens every now and again-I’ll crave something really intensely and eat it in inordinate amounts and feel pretty damn good afterwards, whereas I would normally feel like cow dung.  Anyway, a jar of honey daily and no candida breakouts.  Pretty damn good, yo. 

   Last on the bill for the evening is my secret hobby: puzzles. I’m working on one right now that’s 5k pieces and it’s crushing me.  It’s an old antique map from the 1600s, I believe, and for the first time ever while doing a puzzle, I feel pretty down and out.  I’m not going to quit, but this thing is hard.  Lots of pieces fit together perfectly but don’t belong together-I’ve never experienced that before.  It’s pretty sucky sucky, if you ask me.  I’ve had to take apart the border a friggin hundred times because I have extra pieces at the end or not enough or one side ended up longer than the other or bla bla bla…and it’s still not right!  Thing’s friggin impossible.   

    Went pretty well, about thirty people came, I’d say.  Ate some cooked food for the first time in quite a while and am not feeling excessively sluggish today.  I didn’t go overboard though, which is nice.  I’m actually taking it as a real good sign that I can eat cooked every once in a while now without going ass over ankles and binging on a whole bunch of other crap.  It’s still hard, I’m still a junk food junkie, but I’m winning this battle.  I think what’s helped the most is introduing carbs back into my diet.  Now I almost feel silly calling myself or anyone a sugar addict…that’s like calling them a human being.  Of course they are a sugar addict, take them away and they’re going to go overboard and do something stupid, keep’em in from the right sources and in the right amounts and life is easy peasy. 

   In other news, my back is being a real arsehole right now.  Probably because I’ve been a lazy bastard lately.  Really been enjoying having dramatically less back pain for so long now that I have been doing things that I still shouldn’t be doing-like excessive sitting and holding very heavy things on just one side.  Anywho, it’s alright because it’s just more stimulus for a push towards health.  Everytime this happens, as I think is the case with most people, I get a new fire in my butt to get in the gym and whoop up on some weak links. 

   Last, the IRS has contacted me and informed me that I owe them $8,445, and I can’t figure out why. 

   What an incredibly healthy post that last one of mine was.  It really felt good to get all that out in the open actually-kind of like a deep breath out ’ahhhh, I’m shallow.’  And it was ok.  Felt nice, like it’s ok to be me and to be how I am even if it’s unlikely that I’m going to be happy being that way forever.  Right now, it’s ok and I’m cool with it. 

   In other news, Damn there are a lot of leaks in training today.  I’ve said this in past blogs but I want to see if I can say it more eleoquently now: Training in theory in generally well understood; training in practice, specifically for already well trained individuals, is so full of holes it doesn’t hold water any better than a goddamn sieve.  The understanding is up to date but the application is still based on exercises that were made when the understanding was much less advanced than it is now.  Worse is the fact that for the general public the old exercises and their application hold up just fine.  They’ve been tempered by the new better understanding enough that their are a good deal of results backing therapist’s attempts to improve their clients’ well being-making people think that they have hit the nail on the head. 

     Unfortunately, this isn’t the case and it becomes painfully apparent in the well trained individual such as myself and many of the people reading this.  It does so via the length tension relationship or the balance between the muscle groups.  A non-trained individual gets great results because he/she is almost always doing an exercise that puts him/her in postive balance again.  On the other hand, a well trained individual might be training the right muscle group but they are doing an exercise that doesn’t have the ability to deliver them the result they need-specifically because it was created by feel and not by thought.  Rotator cuff exercises are a great example, they often start in the completely wrong place to help anyone dramatically with major impingement issues from heavy pressing movements-big surprise there, there are 10 million huge powerlifters and bodybuilders out there not getting anything out of their countless external rotations, shoulder adducting movements, and retractions. 

   Again, the problem is usually not that the trainer or the therapist doesn’t know what needs to be worked on, the problem is that the trainer or therpist knows exactly what needs to be worked on and then chooses and exercise from the old catalogue of exercises that are already out there.  This is also why it often yields better results for a therapist to treat someone with an unusual injury-because they have to make up an exercise and in doing so they apply their good understanding to their creation; whereas they usually apply their good understanding to their diagnosis and their laziness when choosing an exercise.

    Another issue I can’t seem to get away from is this one of ‘changing it up.’  Seems like it could be bunk. If you have specific attachment sites, then you have specific functions as well within the confines of specific ranges of motion.  There don’t seem to be 20 different exercises for each muscle group like most bodybuilders and 15-25 yr old guys would have you believe.  There seem to be anwhere from 1-4, with four being on the real high end-muscles with unusually high number of different functions.  There might be a million different ways to load the movement and a million different apparati to do the movement with, but the movement should still be within the range of motion that is most applicable to it’s attachment sites-whereas most different exercises for the same muscle group definitely are not-what they are, are different exercises for different degrees of the same muscle group. 

     I’ll give you an example: An incline curl and a barbell curl.  The long head of the bicep attaches at the supraglenoid tubercle=up in your shoulder.  If you do a bicep curl on an incline bench and let your arm hang all the way back, you do the movement from the fully stetched position.  If you do a barbell curl, you can go all the way down until your arms are hyperextended if you want and the long head of the bicep still won’t be in it’s fully stretched position, which, in my mind, makes this an inferior movement.  Not only do you not get the development from going through a full range of motion, but you heavily load a movement that is destroying the length tension relationship between your bicep, forearm, and delt(along with the rest of the body to a lesser extent)-so you get a worse length tension relationship, faster!  Now all the hard core guys are whining that you can use much more weight and build more size with the BB curl, but to that I say grow some balls and get strong in the incline curl, or the drag curl, or any number of different ways you can do it. 

    In other news, I went to the physical therapist the other day and she kicked me back a few notches, which I desperately needed.  I went in kind of cocky about having found a lot of leaks and although I had, she found a lot more in my(surprise surprise) application.  It was good for me because it was embarassing and it gave me a couple more things to think about upon leaving.

   My whole life has been centered around superficiality; bodybuilding leading the way.  I don’t think I’m that far along in spirit to be honest with you.  I’ve come a ways in a couple of different areas of life but I’m still dependant on having money and an exceptionally hot girlfriend to make me happy.  The one thing that makes me think otherwise is that I’m not really on an endless search for these things, really just ‘need’ them to ground me so I feel like I can breath and go on with the rest of my life.  It’s like these are the things that allow me to feel ‘ok’ so I can move onto the things I feel like I really need to do.  I know it sounds rediculous but it’s the case and the denial path only gets me a certain degree of progress.  It has to be combined with acceptance as well so I can learn from my desires and subsequent actions. 

   You know, it’s kind of goofy in that saying what I just said(especially about women) would and will often knock me down a few points in quite a few people’s eyes but what they don’t realize is that where I am deep they are often shallow and vice versa as well.  These are my two things.  On the other hand, I do not worship certain physical senses and so called ‘creature comforts’ like most of my peers do.  I worship these two much more though, I would say-especially women.  It’s like I feel like my life will be a total bore if I am not with someone rediculously hot.  It’s likely because I don’t feel like I ever have been-although I think a lot of people would disagree…which is pretty damn rediculous on my part.  It’s actually a chore for me to go out with an 8, even if she has an awesome personality(which is the only reason I got out with her).  I actually told people at work the other day that I could see myself being one of those guys that leaves his wife and kids when he’s like 45-50 for a hot 24 year old with a smokin body and a great personality. 

    I don’t know how this will pan out but, the truth is, I’m not in a hurry to get rid of these superficialities, I want to play them out.  I’ve never had a girlfriend that’s been hot enough and I’ve never had a lot of money.  Right now, these are big motivators for me.  Part of the thing with the women, I think, is the fact that I’m so nervous around the ones I want.  Usually, if they are off the charts hot, I will force myself to approach, but otherwise I’m usually a pussy about it. 

   Another real goofy thing is that I just can’t seem let these two desires pan out in a way that a normal guy would let them pan out.  If I talk to anyone that is anything less charming, and fun, and smart…then I have a hard time standing her and almost immediately cross her off my list of possibilities.  I have a little bit more give when it comes to money but nonetheless I’m still very apprehensive of making it in a way that could harm the environment or society, or jeapordize the good direction that I see the world going in.  I am as I have been saying that I am…right in the middle, seeing truth in my mind but not yet feeling it to the extent that a more advanced soul would. 

    And the absolute goofiest thing of them all is that it all breaks down to experience and learning.  Everything is a symtpom of these two things.  Everyone is ****ing bitching and moaning about this being this and that being that and this meaning bla bla bla.  None of it is good or bad.  It’s doesn’t mean a goddamn thing other than it being a reflection of our development thus far.  So today, I’m going to feel good about my superficiality and maybe hit on some hot women if I see’em. 

…is sugar.  Someday I’m going to take this blog down, put it into a short ebook and sell it but right now I feel like getting this off my chest.  Pretty early on in my candida problems after a 1.5x bout of antibiotics, I realized that there was something seriously wrong with the current candida diet paradigm.  I only realized this because I was, at the same time, making my own probiotic cultures from store bought probiotics.  The anti candida diet is just that-a diet focused on minimizing yeast in the blood and intestines.  The reason people have to stay on it for upwards of a year or even two years is because it’s totally worthless at repopulating your own intestinal flora.  Our own gut flora grows fastest on sugar as well.  If I fed my cultures fiber, like the establishment says you should do when you have candida, they would take forever to grow.  A candida overgrowth problem is first and foremost a gut flora undergrowth problem.  If you are on a diet that starves you of sugar, then you are on a diet that is also keeping your own gut flora from really flourishing like it should. 

    The problem probably isn’t that you’re eating sugar, it’s that you’re eating either way too much, the wrong kind, or it’s staying in your blood stream for way too long because you’ve been eating like most everyone else does-that being a combination of fats, carbs and protein, like you normally should-unfortunately, the fat blocks the sugar’s access to the cells it needs to get into, resulting in a blooming of yeast and possible diabetes in the long term. 

   Here’s what you do: You stay away from all white sugar and refined carbs.  You do not, on the other hand, stay away from fruit.  You also stay away from fats and anything but the leanest protein.  You start by eating a little bit of fruit, then wait.  You let it digest completely, wait maybe an hour or two hours.  Then you eat a little bit more.  You do the same.  So on and so forth.  There two problems with this though: 1st, your gut flora is not ready to digest it, so it might be uncomfortable or likely will be uncomfortable.  You know your gut isn’t ready to digest it because you are in the situation you are in.  2nd, your cells aren’t ready to assimilate such a high proportion of carbohydrate with nothing else.  You’re not going to function as well and that’s also going to make you feel uncomfortable.  It is for these two reasons that you then have to back off the sugar and go back to a typical ‘anti candida diet’ to get you back to default, giving your body what it currently needs to function properly and healthfully.  Then once you’ve done that, you go back to the slow sugar build.  And everytime you go back to default, you do so in exact accordance to how much you feel you need-protein and fat that is.  After several weeks, you should have an entirely new gut and cells ready to function on a high percentage of carbs. 

I’m having a great time with these workouts.  My left glute, especially mede and min, are dying along with my left tricep and my right bicep.  I don’t know how I ignored all this for this long.  Anyway, the back is feeling much better as well.  I’ve come up with a couple of great exercises for the thoracic and cervical areas to help take some load of the lumbar, along with the extra glute work in the left to do the same. 

   In regards to the grub, I’m still bouncing back and forth between high fruit/very low fat and almost no carb, high protein/high fat.  I have to say, I am really leaning towards the high fruit nowadays.  Especially the acidic fruits-starchy ones, like bananas, don’t sit too well with me…thus far anyway. 

   In other news, I haven’t worked too much on the book this past week.  Been working on another project, one that will hopefully lessen the pressure of the book making process.  The only other news is that I went out to a club last night.  It was real good times.  I’d forgotten how much I like the release of partying and good music-and to be honest I didn’t really even let go.  I’ve been feeling for a while now that I’d like to mesh my old life with my new lifestyle and it seems like that’s happening more and more these days.  I’m not drinking, I’m not doing stupid shit, but I’m becoming progessively more social and more open to partying at the same time.  That paints a very cool future in my mind-one that’s much more focused on the whole.  It allows me to have fun, while still being physically healthy-trying to eliminate the negative while maintaining the positive. 

     Another reason I’d really like to go out clubbing more often now is because I’m painfully aware of how uncomfortable I am in that environment.  That’s a big weak link in my chain.  I only talked to one girl last night and that was only because I recognized her from a, roughly, 3 minute conversation we had 8 years ago in LA, where I met her just the once and approached her on the grounds of my school.  Absolutely crazy to see her, and recognize and remember everything about her and our meeting, here in Stockholm.  Anyway, I have to iron out this wrinkle, if you will.  I simply can’t be as lacking as I was last night. 

   In keeping with my decision to just hit my weak links until I have no pain any longer, I decided that I also have to even out a lot of muscle groups.  Today’s training was dedicated to just that.  I did single legged squats with my left leg, deadlifts bilaterally, unilateral stiff arm pulldowns with the left arm, external rotations with the right arm, bicep curls with the right arm, dumbell tricep extensions with the left arm, and then back to some glute work for just the paralyzed left glute.  Felt pretty great afterwards actually, got that kind of ’click’ that I get when I know something is right.  Not a strong one, but getting there.  What I really felt a click after was a conversation I had with my napprapat which resulted in me figuring out what the problem was.  Here I’ve been dilligently working on isolating one tiny ass square inch portion of my left lumbar spine, trying to stengthen it as it is my weak link and I’ve totally ignored my own advice-that the pain is the summation, the symptom of the underlying problem.  It’s the leg that’s the F-ing problem!  I’m blaming a tiny tiny tiny piece of body for something that only a much bigger muscle group could cause.  My left leg is dramatically smaller and weaker than the right-it’s been that way for as long as I can remember, I’ve always leaned on the right while squatting.  As the left leg get’s weaker, so does the left portion of the lumbar spine as it is forced to do more work than it should and then in the end, the opposite happens-the weakness of the left leg and the reliance on the right keeps it from ever getting strong again by way of ignorance.  Big click. 

   In other news, my goal is to do a one arm chin up.  I’ve done 2 workouts thus far including them.  The first consisting of only a 1 negative rep per side.  The second being a 1 rep neg for two sets.  So two reps total.  Now, three days later, I’m still sore.  I even think I am pushing the limit on the strength of my right pec-I feel like I’m close to a tear, like I did something extranormal that last rep-it’s the second time that’s happened and I’m not waiting for a third; I’m going to go to work on that as soon as I feel better.  It’s not that bad though, should be back in action in a few days.  

   In regards to diet, I am still leaning towards the vegetarian side.  Having whole days on lots of mono fruit meals, vegetables, and a bit of nuts.  Feels really good, but not perfect.  My skin is a whole lot better and I need roughly 2 hours less sleep at night, which is very cool.  I also don’t really feel the urge to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night as much either.  In fact, I think that might just be on it’s way out, which would be nice given that I have had to get up once a night every night for the last 8 years or so.  I’m almost positive that is going to boil down to a blood sugar issue and the fact that I’m eating so little fat is allowing the sugar into the cells as it should rather than being stuck in the bloodstream with oil coated cells not able to recieve it.  Very interesting, not perfect yet, but interesting.  I can’t say that I am particularly drawn towards becoming a raw vegan to be honest, but if it is the best path for me I’ll take it.