No Bread, No Dairy, No Sugar

It is officially one week until I leave for Louisville, Kentucky and I am on a strict diet, its called the Paleo Diet! Have you heard of it? Well, yea! I started this blog initially to document my Paleo journey and along the way have opened up many other topics that have interested me.  To be honest, I have found the diet difficult to stick to, only because my cravings turn me into an eating machine.  Mind over matter, I must tell myself.

To rejuvenate the diet and make it new and exciting I have been eating a lot of fish, crab and lobster.  I have always liked that stuff, but never knew how to prepare it.  I finally bought some snow crab and steamed it and used butter and lemon juice to enhance the flavor.  So yummy and suprisingly filling!

Of course I have been cooking bison regularly, I swear I think I am the only person that buys it from Ralph's.  It is so lean and good, I make it into meatballs and pour tomato sauce all over it.  Top it off with a giant salad and you've got yourself one hell of a protein, paleo meal. 

Generally my weekdays go like this: No breakfast, salad for lunch, and high protein dinner.  I don't think that skipping breakfast is bad.  You really think cavemen prepared breakfast first thing in the morning? They had to go out and hunt to get it.  I have trained myself to only be hungry enough for a salad around 11:30-12pm and then eat again at 5:30pm when I get off of work.  For a snack, I like to eat organic popcorn with just a dash of salt. 

It is amazing how good it feels to eat right, and when you exercise on top of that its almost like a daily transformation!

Escapism

Escapism has become a daily occurrence in our lives.  We have mulitple ways to create this escape;  anything from watching a movie to getting drunk on a Saturday night.  What are we escaping from? Is the world we live in not enough?

Eckart Tolle describes watching TV as living through the unconcious.  It is almost a mindless state. Unless we are watching something informative, we are really like a vegetable. Not engaging the mind is relaxing and a form of escapism.  Like TV, alcohol and drugs have a similar effect.  They allow you to think and act on an unconcious level.  Why do we need to mask and submit our mind? We all do it in one way or another, but why?

During the daily grind we are placed in a repetitive routine, and society hinders our inner desires and personality traits.  We suppress a lot of what we actually want to do versus what we need to do.  By bottling all this up thorugh a 5 day span, the weekend comes and we need to release our inhibitions and be free.  We want to watch movies that we know can never happen in real life and we want to get a buzz on so we can sing at karaoke in front of a crowd.  We also carry our past on our shoulders and, when supressed, can create an unhealthy outburst and the need for a strong and fast escape.

I thought of ways that I escape in my own life and I narrowed it down to three.  Sleep, alcohol, and exercise.  When I sleep, I can sleep away the pain of what I am going through.  This happens through dreams or just the general time that passes so that when I awake I feel different about a certian situation.  Alcohol definitely allows me to surrender to my unconcious and release inhibitions that usually hold me back.  Exercise, which I don't do as often as some people allows me to "black out" during that moment and let my body do the work.  I focus on the task, whether its a personal goal or completing a crossfit workout and nothing else. 

In short, being able to escape is liberating.  We are running from social norms that confine us.  Constant escape is not facing reality and not escaping is becoming a slave to your responsibilites. 


ESCAPE-

–verb (used without object)

1.

to slip or get away, as from confinement or restraint; gain or regain liberty: to escape from jail.

2.

to slip away from pursuit or peril; avoid capture, punishment, or any threatened evil.

Kava Kava and Belladonna

During my childhood I had a rough time with anxiety and had ulcers as a result.  When I was taken to the doctors I was given antibiotics for my ulcer and belladonna for my anxiety.  I generally am not a fan of any kind of medicine, being that natural or pharmaceutical but I tried them anyways.  Belladonna comes from a toxic plant and has been used for anything from motion sickness to menstrual cramps.  I only took it a couple of times and it did, indeed relax me, almost made me sleepy. I'm definitely not condoning it, but rather, being open-minded.

Another similar natural drug is Kava kava and has been used in the polynesian islands for centuries.  It is an alternative for being drunk, without the hangover.  It can be chewed, in pill form or even Kava Cola.  It is another drug that is good for anxiety and is meant to relax you.  Just like with all drugs, kava kava can have adverse effects and if overused it can lead to a puffy face and a scaly skin rash-yuck!  Everything in moderation folks!

Taboo as it can be, natural drugs come in many forms with multple effects.  They started with the purpose of healing or curing, and all the way up to mind-altering.  I always wonder, who was the first person to light up a plant or shove it up the nose? Regardless, in my opinion drugs are used as a way to escape.  Whether your life sucks, or you just want to see the world in a new way it is escapism at its finest.

Things I'm Excited About - Volume 4

1.  YOLO
You Only Live Once. My reminder to jump at new opportunities and have fun!

2. Honey

The only food that never expires! Perfect for a fruit topping when you get a sweet tooth!

3. Outlaw Country and Westerns

There's something about the deep voices, and no shit taking attitude.

4. Technology Backfiring

iPhones are tracking people, internet hacking getting easier then ever, not to mention carpal tunnel, texting while driving, etc.

5. Fish Restaurants

Come get your Omega-3's!

California Fish Grill-Anaheim Hills

OC Fish n Chips- Orange

A War Within Ourselves

I find it interesting that as you get older, what seemed to be little problems turn in to much larger problems.  Becoming at peace with ourselves is now a chore that we much invest energy into.  Anything from meditation, yoga, self-help books and seminars are all geared to make YOU a better YOU.  Why do we struggle with this so much? And pay money for others to solve our own problems?

Do a lot of our social conflict and wars stem from our inner wars? If we are all individually at peace with ourselves would we be a more peaceful society? 

I believe the way we interact with others is a direct reflection of within.  We all know those individuals that constantly have a chip on their shoulder, looking for a fight everywhere they go.  It's obvious they are suffering from inner turmoil.  They feel bad and want everyone else to suffer too.  The only reaction we can give them is to not do a thing.  We are directly responsible for the way others make us feel.  It is a very hard concept to grasp, and even harder to act in this manner.  If someone really gets under our skin, the first reaction is to defend yourself and stand your ground and get upset.  They don't even deserve that reaction. The best thing is to take control of the way you're feeling and turn it into a peaceful acceptance. 

It is a fact that we cannot cure everyones inner demons, nor can we avoid international wars.  The only true way you can grasp chaos is to bring peace to your inner self. 

We have conquered basic survival, now we need to conquer the war that takes place within. 

The Neander Diet?

What about our silly low-browed cousins the Neanderthals, can we possibly learn from them too? I think so!  They were giant, strong, and smart. Their downfall, however, is that they didn't last.  Could have been their harsh living environments, or they didn't catch on quick enough with advanced tools.  Either way, they were more muscular than modern humans and had a significantly bigger brain.

Their diet consisted mostly of meat, but a recent article states that they ate their veggies too. It got me thinking, what fruits and vegetables were even around during this time?  Did they even have the luxury to taste the sweetness of an apple or did they get their fiber from digging up stale roots? In the article, it says that on plaque found on a tooth they detected plant materials so it can be confirmed that big game wasn't the only thing on the menu.

The Paleo Diet is hard as is but The Neader Diet (patent pending, ha!) was truly grueling.  Meat meat meat, all day long with the occasional plant.  Not only that, they had to hunt in extreme cold and find plants that weren't exactly pre-packaged and in abundance.  Could this be why they didn't last? Not enough options? What about another extreme. Meat only.  Ok, now I'm just pushing the boundaries.

My New Kicks!

So the past month I have purchased two pairs of training shoes, the Nike Free's and the Inov-8's.  Both are designed to be flatter than your average running shoe and very lightweight. 

                                     INOV-8 

NIKE FREE'S

Will see how they compare! I was told the Nike Free's are good for running and Inov-8s were good for CrossFit and short, intense workouts.