Those who pay the toll know the road

Some of the sharpest looking people give great sounding advice about how to succeed in life. But the best advice may come from those who bear the wear and tear of battles well fought and won.

Life takes a toll. The best advice about life comes from those who have paid that toll.

The Downside of Mental Alertness.

...especially if that activity is due to drinking coffee all day long

Here is a Bible verse that helps me during these times: 

"Except the LORD build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the LORD keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain 2. It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so he giveth his beloved sleep."  Psalms 127:1-2

No Such Thing as Unnecessary Medical Tests

Unnecessary medical test? No such thing.

Doctors and their hospitals have bills to pay, just like you. They need so many patients a month to pay for that MRI, CT-scan, Ultrasound, X-ray and other such equipment.

Besides, boat payments and green fees aren't cheap either.

Is it Really Insomnia If...?

People say they can't fall asleep, yet they seem to have no trouble at all falling asleep in church, during movies or during classes in school.

Maybe if we slept less in places where we are supposed to be awake, we could sleep better in the place designed for sleep.

Sanctified Insomnia

Try using the time you cannot sleep to talk to God about your insomnia. Read your Bible. 

If the insomnia is from the Devil, he might give up on it if it just brings you closer to God.

Psalms 127: 2 It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so he giveth his beloved sleep.

Where Tinkering isn't Childsplay

The more researchers experiment with genetics, the closer we get to the day when the unintended consequences of that research will do more than just wreck an experiment.

Pandora's box will be nothing compared to what might be unleashed once clumsy human hands begin to tinker with the divine design.

The 5 Second Rule and Me

When I was younger, I pretty much followed the 5 second rule. I mean, how many germs can jump on your food in so short of time.

This rule states: "...that food (or sometimes cutlery) dropped on the ground will not be significantly contaminated with bacteria if it is picked up within five seconds of being dropped. "

As an older person who has been to the hospital more times than I have wished to go, I no longer follow this guideline.

"When it hits the floor, it goes in the trash" is my new rule.

It is shame to waste food. But it is also a shame to damage my health over a dropped piece of pizza.

Pizza may be expensive, but so are medical bills.

A woman actually studied this and got a Nobel Prize in Public Health for her findings. Other researchers also pretty much say that the rule is bogus and your health is in danger as soon as that food hits the ground.


Five-second rule - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Getting Better Answers

Actually, it makes more sense to ask that question in this setting. 

We think about our looks when we get dressed and not when we eat. Got to switch that around.

Food choices, not clothes choices, are the key to looking and feeling better.

Does "Natural" mean "Safe?"

Health food stores and alternative medicine also teach that "Natural" means "Safe."

Nope.

Whatever it takes, but within reason

Sleep aids do have side effects, but sleeplessness causes direct harm to our body, mind, emotions as well as impacting the work we do. I don't think sleep aids should be written off because of their side effects, but they should be monitored to insure that the medicine doesn't cause more damage than the malady it is designed to solve.

The 5 stages...

Bargaining worked for me for a while. When I had to get up early to go to Grad school, I used to promise myself a special treat if I got up some of those difficult mornings:  a stop at Winchell's Donuts for coffee and and a large, hot, apple fritter.

This worked pretty good, until my wife found the receipts.

Diet Lies We Tell Ourselves

One benefit of being married is that when you vocalize your diet rationalizations to your spouse, at least one of you hears how stupid it sounds.

PS. Pop-Tarts don't count as a serving of fruit either.

Self-loathing Not So Helpful...

Plenty of people hate themselves when they fail big time. It wouldn't be so bad if all that self-loathing could rebuild a better you in place of the one you have to deal with now. But it doesn't.

Self-loathing only marks the building that needs to be demolished. Tearing down the old you and rebuilding a better one in its place requires more than just you and your emotions. It requires a lot of hard work and the help of someone outside yourself to lift you up to get the job done. 

So feel the feelings, but find the help you need and do the hard work. All the pity parties in the world won't do a thing for you, except make you worse off than before.

How Following Your Feelings Works in Real Life

Disney movies and other media often carry a message that tells us to look inward, follow our hearts and be in touch with our feelings. 

But when I do this, I look inward and find I am hungry, then I follow my feelings to the fridge and clog up my heart arteries with what I find there.

My health and waistline are better served by looking outward at empirical evidence, such as what the tape measure, scale, mirror and current belt notch and then deal with what those outside indicators tell me about myself. 

Tomorrow's Workout Won't Erase Today's Binge

Tomorrow is that place where we plan to work out and pay for the indulgences of today. But when tomorrow becomes the new today, we want to have our play time then also, and pay for it in another tomorrow. The problem with "play now and pay later" is that we do a lot more playing than paying.

Taking off the wrong things...

When I weigh myself, I take off everything that I can without violating the law.  But the numbers on the scale come down faster when I subtract food from my plate, rather than clothes from my body.

Bipolar Bears

The real reason Polar Bears aren't in Antarctica: they couldn't bear being bipolar.

If you spend half of your time being bipolar, does that make you monopolar?

Diet Doubter

If the Paleo Diet was so great back then, why are we living longer and growing taller after having abandoned it? It seems that leaving that diet behind was when our life-spans and health improved.

Exercise Alone Leaves the Scale Unchanged

You can't out-run or out-swim or out-any exercise poor eating habits. If you need to lose weight for health reasons, portion control and food choices make a quicker change than exercise will.

Exercise is important, but it just can't get the job done by itself. A change of diet is needed to accompany exercise if you hope to see any dramatic changes on the scale or from the tape measure.

Diet May Have an Expiration Date

Sometimes the expiration of a diet closely coincides to the expiration of dating. 

But should diets have an expiration date? I think a true diet is a change of eating behavior that should be sustainable for the rest of your life. If not, it won't be sustained.

Towel Awareness and You

Be aware of heavy towels when assessing your weight loss progress.

When the Medicine is Worse than the Malady

Beware of meds that change the numbers on medical tests, but also lower the overall health of your body.

On a cold day, you could put a match under the thermometer and change the readout, but not only would it not change the temperature, it could also ruin your thermometer.

If you never want to feel bad, you will never feel better.

Tacos make me feel good. Exercise and diet make me feel bad. The sad truth of the story is this: if I never want to feel bad (no taco binges and sore muscles from that Planet Fitness workout) I will never feel or look any better than I do now. 

If you never want to deny yourself a pleasure, there are some pleasures that you will never have. 

When you are willing to feel bad now in order to feel better later, progress can be made. And then you can eat a taco to celebrate. Just not too many.

Managing Diabetes: Subtraction Works Better that Addition

Type 2 diabetes, and pre-diabetes are best managed by what you SUBTRACT from your diet, rather from what you ADD to your medicine cabinet.

Instant Gratification Meets Exercise.

The problem with designing exercise programs and diets to appeal to the masses is that you might succeed.

When you make a practice or product popular, what is actually effective and life changing about it has been altered.

Practises that lead to health are seldom popular, that is why so much of the populace is in trouble. To be healthy and in shape now a days means that you have rejected what is popular and are swimming upstream, against the flow and the status quo.

If you are waiting for an activity to be fun before you begin it, you will wait for a long time.

But don't worry, you and your expanding waistline will not be alone.  You will be in the company of the vast multitude that please themselves today, yet are unhappy with the consequences of their yesterdays.