#5 Get Fit

So, I know I said I wasn't going to go in order... but these two are going to be in order. So there. Take that.

The Tip gives three good reasons for getting fit: Better Health, Confidence, and More Success with Romantic Endeavors (read better sex life). It is pretty vague, I assume the writer is fairly fit himself, and getting fit has never been a problem, hence the "Just do it, you lazy jerk," tip.

Getting fit has always been a particular struggle of mine. I was a fat kid growing up, and it really informed my identity. As an adult I've found gyms boring and diets hard to keep to with my wildly varying schedule. Whatever. This is about improving my life! Let's go!

1. Jumping In: The 4 Hour Body by Tim Ferris. Great book on body hacking. I'm cherry picking from this, but particularly taking on the Slow Carb Diet, which he recommends for rapid body restructuring. Many of the other things I am doing are gleaned from and cherry picked from this book.

2. Accountability: I called up my buddy Jessie Wright, who's a personal trainer, and set up some time to start to train. We committed to three days a week, working out with Kettle Bells, among other things. We set up a commitment to each other. Jessie, fitness genius that he is needs a work out buddy as much as I need him to guide me out of doing it wrong. If you need a personal trainer, I cannot reccomend a better guy!

3. Technology: If you are an smartphone user, both Lose It (free) and Meal Snap are amazing. Lose It allows you to track calories eaten and burned and makes it into a sort of game. You should see how many calories sex nets you. It also allows for accountabilities like reminders, and setting you up in competition with your friends. Meal snap lets you take a photo of your meal and it logs it, estimating how much that food counts for in calories. An added bonus, if you are eating a triple order of fish and chips, you have to take a picture of it.

4. Measurement: I don't believe that calories are the ideal measure, nor do I believe that weight loss in pounds the way to figure out if you're fit, but they are points on a scale to measure, and they are measurable and let you track results.

So Jessie and I took some measurements. We measured BMI, body fat, weight, and took measurements from waist, chest, stomach, biceps, and both thighs. The plan is to track these numbers every few weeks to get an idea of what's changing. We also did some fitness benchmarks, like number of sit-ups and pushups in a minute, mountain climbers, 8 point jumping jacks and time running a mile. I'm not going to lie, my results were not fantastic, but these are starting points.

I also took a before photo. Me, in my underwear as unflattering as I can be. No, I will not post it.

5. Fun: Also, to keep it fresh, I have been taking Kali and Wing Chun classes with my buddy Free Carradine. It's a causal class in how to beat on, and avoid being beat on with sticks. Really fun, and it makes my brain hurt. I really love the martial arts, and I find that my body really reacts well to this sort of training. And learning to wield weapons, that's just fun. There was a moment when I was training with Art last saturday and he was spinning these two short staves and I was wailing away at him with a six foot staff... yeah, we became thirteen year old nerds again, seeing the awesome warriors we have become. It was kind of a moment.

For me, the making of this project into a game is key for me. It's all just numbers and exercises and food in. They are all just data points on a spreadsheet, until you start playing.

Who wants to play with me?

Secret #4: Remember Peoples' Names

Names have power. Each and every one of have a name that is a powerful distinguisher of us from the rest of humanity. Our own name is deeply tied to our identity, and is probably one of the most important aspects of self. There are no unimportant people. Everyone we meet is a real human being with a name, and a story and a deep, beautiful life.

I just worked a week and a half at a festival here in LA, called Lightning in a Bottle, where the staff went from about 50, some friends some strangers to about 12,000 festival goers. I had to learn my crews, I got to meet people's friends and loved ones, I met people in the middle of the night, or in the dark or while wearing elaborate feather headdresses.

I'm terrible at remembering names, and I often feel really bad about it. So, at LIB, I decided to take on really learning the name of everyone I came across. It was tough, and I did fail on some people, but I remembered names.

Some things that work for me:

1. Visualize the name written. I like to imagine it written over their head, like in a video game. So when you meet Penelope or Jeffrey, see the name written in bright glowing letters over their head. I will often ask a person to spell their name for just this reason, or I'll give it a try spelling it on my own. I find facebook is an interesting tool for this.
2. Get to know people on a whole name basis. I find it is easier to remember Jonathan Perterson than just Jon, and the trick here is to remember the name exactly as they say it. Listen to the inflection, the way they trail off when they say their "R's."
3. When you are getting their whole name, ask about them, and repeat back what you now know, Jonathan Peterson from Orange County, who's passionate about swimming and water polo, for example. Get to know their name and associate it with that name.
4. Look a person in the eye when you say their name. Let them know with your eyes that you know them, not just their name.
5. Re-introduce yourself. If you've forgotten, bite the bullet and meet them again. Say that you are committed to learning their name again and this time learn it. Hey, sometimes third time is a charm.

When you meet new people, you are always adding to the list of names you know. You will forget names. Maybe it's like RAM, and there is only a limited number of names you can hold in operating memory at a given time. We've developed external methods for us to remember names. Get their phone number, put it in your phone. Befriend them on Facebook. Take a photo. Use those things we have at our disposal to remember. How else are you supposed to manage hundreds or thousands of names?

This one is on-going. Let's see what happens when everyone is named in our lives.

Just Start.

So, when you haven't been blogging for a long time, what do you do?

You beat yourself up, naturally. You haven't been writing. You're a bad person. You never finish anything, and all your other writing projects have gone to shit as well. So take it. You may as well just give up on this whole writing business anyway.

No, no, no.

You just start again.

Hi. This is my blog. It's been a minute. I'm back.

I was inspired recently by a very cool blog post. I'm starting to write again, based on this.

One Secret of Life per week. For one year. With two weeks off for fucking off. I'm also going to redesign the view from space website. It's been so long, I'm not even sure if this thing works. I'm going to have to get back into the ping/fm stuff as well. Ohh-whee!

So yeah. Back.