Starling Fitness: Daily writings on Fitness, Diet, and Health

I know this is a commercial for batteries, but I still LOVE it.

I love that line:

They didn’t call my name. Told me it was over. But I been deaf since I was three. So I didn’t listen.

Made me cry and inspired me to keep going. Thanks, Derrick Coleman. I sincerely had never heard of you before this Duracell commercial, but good going! I heard you won that Super Bowl thing, so congratulations.

I saw this image on Funeral For My Fat and I had to know what was going on.

It reads:

No f-ing gym. I will f-ing lift the whole earth!

It looked so strange that I had to watch the video that it came from, a video on YouTube called “Chinese New Year St. Rampage”

As funny as that temper tantrum was, he actually got a pretty good workout from it. There was one time in my life when I asked, “Does anybody love their gym that much?” Apparently, one guy does.

I was fascinated by this animated GIF I found on Funeral For My Fat:

When I looked at it, it looked like she had a suitcase/duffle bag in her hands, and I imagined myself doing that exercise in a hotel room. This exercise has a complete perfection to it as far as travel is concerned: quiet, full-body, and uses items on hand.

Of course, it’s FAR too intense for me right now, but it was nice to watch it and imagine a day when a workout like that would be something I could actually do.

The next time you use the fact that there is no gym in your hotel as an excuse to let your fitness regime fall by the wayside, remember this quick and simple (but not easy) exercise. Don’t let excuses get in your way.

I was looking through my old screenshots and I found this from a magazine:

It is a review for S2H Replay, a wristband device that I actually bought because of this ad. I wore it for a while, hated it and stuffed it into a box. I actually saw it the other day when I was cleaning out a box and tossed it aside in disgust. I never earned even one “reward,” and that stupid little bracelet didn’t seem very accurate.

I was curious if S2H is still around, but when I went to their website, this is what I found:

So, if you did like them, it didn’t matter because they were deleting all your information. It seems that they were closing up shop so they could offer their services to corporations.

• S2H Challenge: The Wellness Program for your company

After only a month with my Fitbit, I absolutely adore it and would be devastated if they closed up shop. Where did S2H go wrong and Fitbit go right?

• GOOD website: The Fitbit syncs seamlessly with my iPhone and my computer making everything easy to read.
• No false promises: Fitbit never promised to give me rewards for completing my daily steps, so I don’t feel ripped off when all I earn is a 20% off a product I don’t want.
• Fashion sense: I can change my band on my Fitbit to match my outfit. I know that shouldn’t be a big deal, but for me, it was.
• Compatibility: My Fitbit works with Lose It! and My Fitness Pal, so any activity I do, automatically syncs over to my food program. This was the deciding factor for me when I chose the Fitbit.

Honestly, I liked the little smiley face and frowny face on the S2H. Considering how little the LEDs on the Fitbit tell me, I liked them better. In the end, S2H was SO close. A little band around my wrist that keeps track of activity for me is a brilliant idea and they were doing it way before any of the other companies.

This advertisement from Asics is amazing!

It reads:

Sound Mind Sound Body: Running releases more than just sweat

It’s true. There is one moment in every run where I feel a huge sigh of relief. I have to be paying attention to notice it past all the jiggling, puffing and sweating, but it’s there with every workout.

In fact, there are times when running has actually SAVED me time throughout my day. When I’m running, my mind wanders over the things I need to do. If I take a second and write down all the things I remember on my run, I have an instant to-do list that has saved me more time than it took to run.

Don’t let excuses get in the way of your workout. Remember that exercise helps your mental health as well as your physical health and get your butt off the couch.

One of the biggest stumbling blocks for atheists and twelve-step programs are the first few steps. In particular, the requirement to believe in a Higher Power as you know it. I may not be able to believe in an omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent being who actually CARES about my inability to stop eating, but I can lay all my trust in science.

The idea that we only use 10% of our brain is actually a myth, but I DO believe there is an untapped portion of my mind that can be called upon as my Higher Power. I imagine it to be quite childlike, but eager to help and please me. I imagine it to know what is the best for me, but at the same time, it can be suppressed and silenced with no more than a cookie. It craves gratitude and appreciation, but it will withdraw if I refuse to acknowledge it.

When Twelve Step programs recommend that I “make a decision to turn my will and my life over to the care of God as I understand Him,” I have a problem with that. I am ok with the idea of turning over my will and life over to that part of my MIND that has been with me my entire life, just desperate to help, but unable to be heard past the din of bad food. Every day in meditation, I can feel the weight of food being passed to that part of my brain and I am far more peaceful.

This part of my brain is very much like the typical god-like figure. It is certainly omni-present. I’ve had this part of my brain with me since I was very young. In fact, the reason I feel that it is like a child is because that is when I first had the feeling that I could never get full. No matter where I go, my brain is there as well. There is no escaping it.

In some respects, this part of my brain is also omniscient. It knows EVERYTHING that has happened to me and EVERYTHING I’ve thought. It’s not truly omniscient, because it doesn’t know what everyone else thinks or knows everything that could possibly be known. In the realm of my experience, however, that part of my brain IS omniscient.

Strangely, I’m even beginning to believe that this particular part of my brain just may be omnipotent as well. I have just handed over the decision-making about food and exercise to it every day, and every day I have been able to follow through. It’s not a struggle like it was before. It has been miraculously serene and livable. As far as control over my seemingly uncontrollable body and hunger, this part of my brain feels pretty damn near to omnipotent.

In Speaker for the Dead, a sci-fi novel written by Orson Scott Card, Ender has a computer AI in a device in his ear called Jane. She has been with him since childhood, but at a critical moment, he turns her off as a sign of good faith to the people in the room. For her, time is not like time is for us and she feels rejected for the equivalence of lifetimes while the device is off.

I feel like that part of my brain that I have been forming a bond with is a little like that computer, Jane. I have turned off that part of my mind for YEARS, squelching it out with food and binges. Its feelings are hurt, but at the same time, it desperately wants my attention. It wants to help me. It doesn’t feel like what I am asking it to do is a burden. It feels as if it should have been there to help me all along, but I just never gave it a chance.

I believe that the concept of God is so real to people because they have hidden from that aspect of their brains for so long that it literally feels FOREIGN to them. Despite the fact that this powerful aspect of our minds has been there all along, it can feel like an other being because we have shut it out for our whole lives.

If you have decided that a Twelve Step program might not be right for you because you can’t believe in God, then there IS hope. You don’t need an imaginary friend living in the sky because you have your own brain that has been there all long and is eagerly willing to help you finally conquer your uncontrollable eating.

Overeaters Anonymous does not endorse anything on this entry or blog.

Image via: Mashable: Obama Unveils Bold Plan to Map the Human Brain

Over five years, Sharee lost 121 pounds. She was featured on People magazine in their yearly “Half Their Size” issue. She writes daily on her Funeral For My Fat Tumblr. Here is an interview with her that is really nice.

For a lot of people who lose weight, there is that extra skin, but after a year or two, it usually snaps back. I understand Sharee’s decision to have the surgery, and while I was reading her blog, the recovery time didn’t seem like it lasted three months. Her swelling went down quickly and it felt like within just a couple of weeks, she was back into her routine. I’m just terrified of surgery, so I would rather deal with extra skin flopping around than go under anesthesia.

One thing that I have found to help keep my eating under control is daily meditation. It’s not easy for me. In fact, over the years, it feels just as hard to keep my mind free from distractions as it was when I started, but I’ve noticed that when I meditate for about 15 minutes every day, eating healthy is easier.

The app I have used for meditation for over the last couple of years is Ambiance. I like that they are cross-platform, with apps for iPhone, iPad, desktop and Android. It’s not a free app (the price is currently at $2.99), but it has worked better than anything else I’ve used for meditation.

I love that there are so many free audio clips to choose from. And, you can also record your own favorite sounds, like the redwing blackbirds on your walk by the stream or the cackling magpies outside your window. There is probably a audio clip of any of your favorite sounds already in the store, though, so you don’t have to be a brilliant audio engineer.

I use the Quickstart feature that knows that I do fifteen minutes of meditation and like the app to cycle through the sounds randomly every minute. All of that, I set up in the settings menu and makes it literally a one-tap action to get the app going for my meditation.

You can also use Ambiance to fall asleep. You set it to the amount of time you want and have the audio slowly fade out until it turns itself off at the end. It’s wonderful for a peaceful way to fall asleep.

My sister even used Ambiance when they were living in a hotel to keep the dogs from barking at every little noise. They would turn on one of the White Noise audio clips and the sound would drown out the other hotel visitors. It worked wonders.

I have been using Ambiance for a LONG time, so I was surprised that I hadn’t spoken about it here. It’s one of those things that has helped me stay sane, so I feel as if I haven’t been grateful enough because I haven’t told the world about it. I don’t think I could meditate without Ambiance anymore. It has helped me keep my mind free of distractions and my life free of binges.

I found a study at IOPScience that describes a breathalyzer that measures the amount of acetone in your breath.

• IOPScience – A prototype portable breath acetone analyzer for monitoring fat loss

According to them, acetone is a by-product of fat burning and excreted through your breath.

Acetone contained in our exhaled breath is a metabolic product of the breakdown of body fat and is expected to be a good indicator of fat-burning.

They can measure this with huge spectrometers, but that would be too difficult to carry around with you, so they have developed a small device that works with your smartphone to analyze your breath.

Here, we prototype a portable breath acetone analyzer that has two types of semiconductor-based gas sensors with different sensitivity characteristics, enabling the acetone concentration to be calculated while taking into account the presence of ethanol, hydrogen, and humidity. To investigate the accuracy of our prototype and its application in diet support, experiments were conducted on healthy adult volunteers. Breath acetone concentrations obtained from our prototype and from gas chromatography showed a strong correlation throughout the experiments. Moreover, body fat in subjects with a controlled caloric intake and taking exercise decreased significantly, whereas breath acetone concentrations in those subjects increased significantly. These results prove that our prototype is practical and useful for self-monitoring of fat-burning at home or outside. Our prototype will help to prevent and alleviate obesity and diabetes.

This study was sponsored by NTT Docomo, the largest mobile phone provider in Japan, so the idea that your phone could tell you if you are burning off fat may be a reality in the near future.

But is this information helpful?

At this moment, I would say no, but, way back when, I said the same thing about wearable fitness technology, which I ADORE now. More data certainly opened my eyes to my slug-like ways as far as activity is concerned. Perhaps something like this would help me know more about my body.

Or, perhaps it would be just a distraction. I can’t tell right now, but I am excited to see this fat burning breathalyzer show up on the market.

Image via: BACtrack Keychain Breathalizer

This video shows just how food becomes so addictive.

Researchers are working every day to create foods that will taste so good that we physically CAN’T stop eating it. It’s not just marketing, it’s the science of the taste and texture of food.

They quote the author of the book Salt Sugar Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us. I was unaware of this book before I saw this video, so I have a bunch of reading in front of me.

If you want to avoid food addiction, MAKE YOUR OWN FOOD. Cook your food from whole ingredients: meat, veggies, fruit, and grains. You will crave their food for a while, but keep eating your own food. You will eventually feel much better.