Skip to main content

Posts that Could Change Your Life

What if one or two little tweaks could transform your life? Instead of spending years in therapy, hours a week on the treadmill, gagging down whole grains every day, or tearing your hair out over a positive test for an illness, it's possible that making a few little changes could change everything.

I've added a list of posts that could do this for a lot of people (see the list below my profile). Don't worry, there's nothing to buy. You might need to check out a library book and do some N=1 experiments on yourself. Overall, these should save you time and decrease your aggravation.

Cardio: A Waste of Valuable Dance Time. Actually, there's a school of thought that cardio is a waste of any kind of time (unless you enjoy it). Sure, you burn calories, but you move less later and get hungrier. Studies have shown that it's not effective for losing weight. I don't do cardio (I lift weights instead) and don't need to lose weight. That wasn't the case when I was on a higher-carb diet: I was working out hard six times a week (three cardio sessions and three weight lifting sessions) and I was gaining weight! (See photos here.) Just think about all the time you could be napping, reading or playing video games--I mean, helping science instead of pounding the treadmill. If you want to sweat, take a dance class at a night club. If you need some flow in your life (flow being "the mental state of operation in which a person performing an activity is fully immersed in a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and enjoyment in the process of the activity, according to Wikipedia), this is one way to get it. It's even more fun than it looks.

Lousy Mood? It Could be the Food. It's counterintuitive, but your mind is really your brain, which is part of your body. Without the proper nutrients, it doesn't work properly. It might make you dumber; it definitely affects your mood. Ever notice how your coworkers are lethargic around 2:00 or 3:00 in the afternoon? It's likely falling blood sugar from a high-carb lunch a few hours earlier. Ever feel depressed on a low-fat diet? It's not just you--even comedian Tom Naughton said it happened to him. It happens to me on anything but a high-fat, low carb diet.

Positive Test? Avoid a Nightmare by Using Math. Here's one that even regular readers might not know about. Suppose you're asymptomatic but have a positive test for an illness. What are the odds you actually have the illness? It actually depends on some statistics and a little arithmetic (don't worry, it's not as hard as it sounds). Check out Calculated Risks by Gerd Gigerenzer. If you've had a positive test, you may have reason for cautious optimism.

Why You Can't Cure a Sugar Habit with Starch. Here, chemistry meets common sense. Those lovely complex carbohydrates are made of sugar molecules, which is what your digestive system breaks them into. Health-conscious people want to avoid sugar. Yet so many of them eat complex carbohydrates. If you're spinning your wheels substituting starch for sugar, it isn't your fault.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Dana Carpender's Podcast; Dr. Davis on YouTube; Labor Day Sales

Dana Carpender, who's written several recipe books and other works on low-carb, has a podcast and is still writing articles at carbsmart.com. She's a terrific writer and amateur researcher (otherwise known as reading , as Jimmy Dore jokes ). I use her book 500 Low-Carb Recipes all the time and I'm looking forward to hearing more from her. I've embedded her podcast on my blog (click on the three lines at the top right if you don't see it, or go to Spotify or other podcast source if you're getting this by email). Carbsmart.com doesn't seem to have a blog feed, so if you want to see the latest posts there, you can sign up for notifications at their site. Dr. Davis has been putting a lot more videos on YouTube, so I've added his channel to the lineup. Click on the three lines on my blog if you don't see it, or go to his channel here .  * * * * * Primal Kitchen is having a Labor Day sale-- 20% off everything. They sell high quality collagen powder, con...

Lousy Mood? It Could be the Food

Here's a funny AMV(1) on what it's like to be depressed, apathetic and overly sensitive. Note: explicit (but funny) lyrics in the video. Hearing this song brought a startling realization: I used to be emo, but with normal clothes. Sulking, sobbing and writing poetry were my hobbies. When I was a kid, my mother said that she wouldn't know what to do to punish me if I had done something wrong. And yet things got worse. Over a two-week period in 1996, my best friend moved away, I lost my job and broke up with my boyfriend. I lost my appetite and lived on a daily bagel, cream cheese and a Coke for the next few months. I had tried counseling, and didn't find it helpful; in fact, I found reviving painful memories was pointless. Not thinking about them, on the other hand, worked wonders. Later on, so did studying philosophy and learning to think through emotions instead of just riding through them. But what's blown away all the techniques is diet. Since I s...

Carrageenan: A Sickening Thickener. Is it a Migraine Menace?

Let me tell you about my ride in an ambulance last night. I woke up at six o'clock from a nap with a mild headache. I ate dinner and took my vitamins, along with a couple of extra magnesium pills. Since magnesium helps my TMJ flare-ups, I thought it might help my headache. Then I went to see my mother. A few hours later, I had a severe headache, sinus pain and nausea. During a brief respite from the pain, I left for home, but less than a mile later, I got out of my car and threw up. A cop, Officer Fisher, pulled up behind me and asked if I was okay. He believed me when he said I hadn't been drinking, but he said I seemed lethargic and he wanted the paramedics to see me. (Later he mentioned that a man he'd recently stopped was having a stroke.) Thinking I had a migraine headache, the paramedics wanted to take me to the hospital. But since I knew that doctors don't know what causes migraine headaches, and I didn't know what effect their medicine would have on m...