Like A Snail Traveling Up A Slippery Slope

That's what my internet connection is like this morning. Slowww...And I have high speed satellite for criminy! Luckily I compiled a little something ahead of time to slap up today. Below are some links you might want to check out.

One the personal front: Last night's pizza and wine were de-lish-oh-yes-ous! No change in the scale this morning. And I'm so pre-menstrual I have cramps. That should go nicely with the cool pool...I shouldn't complain, at least I have a cool pool.

I'm reading the July 2008 issue of Iron Man Magazine - seeing as my internet reading has been nixed. There's some great stuff in this issue. (There always is, of course). In 'Smart Training' by Charles Poliquin there's information about controlling cortisol including this:

Step 7. Change your perception of your world. How you perceive reality has a lot to do with your cortisol output. If you perceive your world as unsafe, you'll make far more cortisol. ... There are many stress reducing modalities, such as yoga and meditation, that can help drop your cortisol and further your efforts in the gym. One study had Olympic lifters engage in so-called autogenic training, a form of relaxation through mental suggestion, after working out, and their cortisol dropped far more rapidly than those in the control group. That drop correlated with long term improvements in the snatch, clean and jerk, and squat.

I'm going to start meditating after my weight workouts.

Here's those links:

Time For Some Hot & Cool Links

Performance Nutrition Show

Dr. Jose Antonio and Carla Sanchez host the Performance Nutrition Show - a webcast/podcast for fitness enthusiasts interested in nutrition and training.

Dr. Jose also has an excellent article in Iron Man on "How Dieting Can Make You Fat" with research that backs up the importance of plenty of protein especially on a fat loss diet.

Volumize Your Diet-Eat Large, Stay Lean! Chris Shugart

Portion Control Sucks
It used to be low fat. Then it was low carb. Today it's portion control. And guess what? You're still fat. Or at least 66% of Americans are.

It's still junk food, fattie.

Sorry, mainstream media, food manufacturers, diet clinics, and TV weight loss gurus, but portion control — eating smaller amounts of the same ol' foods that made you fat to begin with — doesn't work. As I always say, portion control is about as effective as the "I'll only put it in a little" method of virginity preservation.

Oh don't get me wrong, the idea of portion control sounds great. Eat what you want, just in small quantities. Problem is, like a lot of ideas that sound good on paper — socialism, welfare, a sitcom featuring those Geiko cavemen — it just doesn't work.
It might work if people could actually do it, but most people can't. In fact, daytime portion control is often the catalyst for nighttime binge eating — one of the biggest causes of fat gain.

So why are we, the fitness industry, promoting it?

Telling someone to stop eating before they're satisfied is like telling someone to stop having sex right before they climax. That's not just a crude joke either. Appetite and the pleasure we get from eating are classified as "sensual desires" and fit into the same category as the sex drive.

Appetite and sex drive: different and not so different.
These are core, continuation-of-life drives: innate and powerful and often hard to control. Combine the natural urge to eat until full with abundant, cheap, and calorie-dense foods and it's no surprise people overeat and get fat.

A Better Plan

So if low-fat diets suck, and low-carb diets are often short-sighted, and portion control has a 95% failure rate, then what's the best nutrition plan for shedding excess body fat so you can have sex with the lights on again?

Well, here's a big part of the answer: volumetrics.

Now, I actually don't endorse most "volumetrics" diets because they often ignore the benefits of good fats like omega-3s. And some fat sources, like olive oil and almonds, are healthy and calorie-dense. Chances are if you see a "Volumetrics" book on the shelf, it's mainly just a low-fat diet that encourages you to eat a lot of soup. I'll pass.

However, we can take a page from the volumetrics approach and apply it to our bodybuilding and fat loss goals. We can learn to manipulate recipes and choose foods that get us full without making us fat. In short, we can get ripped and stay ripped with practically no dietary suffering or excessive hunger.

As a side benefit, volumizing your diet will make you healthier and increase longevity since the most filling foods are often the most health-promoting.
Let's take a look at a real life example. Read more.


20 pounds in 20 weeks-Muscle Building Meals by Dr. John M Berardi


If you've read my articles, then you know that the goal of each and every integrated training, nutrition, and supplement program I design is to find the intersection of the habits that lead to optimal body composition, optimal health, and optimal physical performance. I call this the "Sweet Spot."

Dr. John recommends finding the Sweet Spot.

Once I've found it, my next step is to make it practical for everyday use by giving you strategies for making it happen in the framework of 9 to 5 jobs, significant others, weekends at the cottage, tournaments on the road (for yourself or your kids), and any other scenario that presents a challenge to your health and nutritional habits.

To this end, for all of you guys and girls transfixed by big muscles, today I'm gonna get as practical as we can. No fancy science here. Just one real-world eating plan straight out of the nutritional journal of one of my most successful clients. This guy, in 20 weeks, packed on 20 pounds of lean body mass, with more to come.

The Plan

Ok, 20 pounds in 20 weeks is a big friggin' deal. I imagine you're trying to guess what sort of "prescription" ol' Dr. John put this client on. You may even be wondering where you can buy some. Shame on you, my cynical friend. This client simply followed the training and supplement ideas laid out in my muscle-building guide Scrawny to Brawny and the recipes provided in Gourmet Nutrition. Read more.


Can Diets Make You Fat?

I've never been a big fan of diets (see: Reasons to Quit Dieting Forever) and now I've got some support in some new information by Dr. Len Kravitz.

Kravitz evaluated nine data-based research studies to find out what happens to our bodies when we diet. Here's what he found:

* In women who dieted, BMR was lowered up to 20%, even more in very low-calorie diets
* There was an average weight gain of 0-5 kg (0-11 lbs)
* The women in these studies experienced a rebound effect after going off the diets, gaining much of the weight back

Read more.

And if you're after the elusive six pack check this out:

5 Facts You MUST Understand if You Are Ever Going to Lose Your Belly Fat & Get Flat 6-Pack Abs by Mike Geary - Certified Nutrition Specialist, Certified Personal Trainer (CPT)

Brain Wave Entrainment, Neuroacoustics & Subliminal Messages

"Be transformed by the renewal of your mind..." Romans 12:1-2



I've always had an avid interest in everything metaphysical, spiritual, psychological, neurological and where they meet and interact. In elementary school and junior high my best friend's mother was a psychic. I witnessed her gift and accuracy first hand more than once. We often accompanied her to psychic faires and church gatherings. (In California some churches like Unity and other non-denominational churches embrace the metaphysical unlike bible belt and evangelical churches).



One of my biggest realms of interest has always been visualization, meditation, prayer, positive thinking, the mind and the brain. The mind-body connection which has been proven by scientists like Dr. Candace Pert author of Molecules of Emotion. Thoughts and their influence on us is real. Metaphysicians recognize thought forms, and their connection to formation of personal reality, and their value in creating happiness and success. I'm particularly interested in their role in sports performance, weight control, and achieving fitness or any other goals. Many studies prove athletes (and everyone else) can improve their performance by practicing visualization.



The human brain does not know the difference between visualized 'events' and actual events experienced in real time and space. This means your mind and your thoughts can set you up for success or failure depending on your mental patterns. Negative thinking begets negative results, positive begets positive.



"The brain doesn't make different between an imagined event and a real one, providing that you are able to visualize things with clarity and intensity, something imagined or visualized in your mind can have the same value as a real experience, it is why you can mentally train for any ability and even for body change, it was demonstrated by studies at the Manchester University that people were able to have muscles growth during one week of sessions of hypnosis, during hypnosis sessions the group were asked to visualize themselves having bigger muscles."



In the world of science, the fact that matter is actually a perception has been verified by both experiments and theoretical studies.



In the 1980's I began meditating, communicating with my spirit guides, as well as using subliminal message tapes and guided meditation tapes. But in the last eight years since I had Bruno I've had very little time for such practices except meditation and prayer first thing in the morning before I get up and occasionally in the bathtub (the only place I can be alone some days).



Well, just recently I've been researching subliminal tapes and hypnosis for the weight loss eBook I'm working on. And for a week I've had some trouble sleeping after 1:30 am (when Jerry leaves for work). My dogs started barking right under my bedroom window. Not constantly but just spaced out enough to jar me awake every hour or so. In the summer this isn't an issue as we run the air conditioner all night and the hum is like a white noise machine and a wonderful way to mask outside noises.



But it's still chilly at night so I tried playing the stereo - the sound was too uneven and disruptive. I tried a few nature sounds CDs - same thing. So yesterday I dug up a set of Theta Meditation System CDs - a clinically proven audio technology by Dr. Jeffrey Thompson, founder of the Center For Neuroacoustics Research. I popped one into my laptop and listened to it with headphones. Then popped one into our bedroom stereo in case the dogs woke me up. (They didn't of course. Naughty beasts slept all night).



But I did sleep notably sounder and had lovely dreams (maybe it's the power of suggestion but who cares why. More on how these CDs work below). I've got another of his CD sets, Awakened Mind System and I'm going to look for it today (a bunch of my CD sets are on a shelf behind my Urban Rebounder and Twist N Step so I have to move some exercise equipment to get to them). I'm also looking at other CDs at Amazon and plan to try The Delta Sleep System and Creative Mind System.



About Brain Waves



Brainwaves are categorized in 4 categories : Beta, Alpha, Theta and Delta.



Beta (13- 40 cycles per second)

Beta is associated with our waking activity. During a day we experience all the brainwave patterns with a predominance of Beta.



Alpha (8-13 cycles per second)

The first pattern discovered in 1908 by an Austrian Psychiatrist named Hans Berger. Alpha pattern appears when in wakefulness where there is a relaxed and effortless alertness. Light meditation and day dreaming. It is recommend to practice your creative visualization and auto-suggestion technique in alpha state.



Theta (4-7 cycles per second)

Associated with creativity, dreams and Extra-sensory perception for the student the theta state is something to learn to go at will. They are countless ways to reach theta



How Neuroacoustics Work



Brainwave synchronization, commonly referred to as "brainwave entrainment," is the practice of entraining one's brainwaves to a desired frequency, by means of a periodic stimulus with corresponding frequency. The stimulus can be aural as in the case of binaural beats, monaural beats, and isochronic tones, visual, as with a dreamachine, a combination of the two with a mind machine, or even electromagnetic radiation.



How Subliminal Messages Work



Subliminal messages work with virtually no effort on your part. Here is some essential information about it.



When messages are flashed in front of you at a very high speed, your eyes don't see these messages, but your subconscious mind instantly understands and accepts them.



Used wisely, by consciously choosing the best positive affirmations that you need to impress upon your subconscious mind, whether it be adding a new attitude or skill or dropping an addiction or a phobia, you can improve your life quickly, easily, and effortlessly, with no effort at all when you use subliminal technology.



You can understand how subliminal messages work when you understand that the mind is like an iceberg, with 10% being the Conscious Mind and 90% being the Subconscious Mind. Any message that is not filtered out by the critical Conscious Mind slips into the uncritical Subconscious Mind and has a massive effect on attitude and behavior.



Benefits of Meditation



The brain waves of meditators show why they're healthier. Neuroscientists have found that meditators shift their brain activity to different areas of the cortex—brain waves in the stress-prone right frontal cortex move to the calmer left frontal cortex. In other words, they were calmer and happier than before.



Maybe meditation isn't so mysterious after all. Neuroscientists have found that meditators shift their brain activity to different areas of the cortex - brain waves in the stress-prone right frontal cortex move to the calmer left frontal cortex. This mental shift decreases the negative effects of stress, mild depression and anxiety. There is also less activity in the amygdala, where the brain processes fear.



Jon Kabat-Zinn, Ph.D., of the University of Massachusetts Medical School, recorded the brain waves of stressed-out employees of a high-tech firm in Madison, Wisconsin. The subjects were split randomly into two groups, 25 people were asked to learn meditation over eight weeks, and the remaining 16 were left alone as a control group.



All participants had their brain waves scanned three times during the study: at the beginning of the experiment, when meditation lessons were completed eight weeks later and four months after that. The researchers found that the meditators showed a pronounced shift in activity to the left frontal lobe. In other words, they were calmer and happier than before. The study will be published in the next issue of Psychosomatic Medicine.



More Links:



Mind Body Techniques, Meditation, Hypnotherapy, Biofeedback



Mind and Body Connection



Stress: The Mind-Body Connection



Christian Guided Meditation



The Brain During Meditation



Visualization and Healing



Brainwaves and state of consciousness



Brain Wave Training - Biofeedback and Neurofeedback



Neurofeedback Wiki





About Dr. Jeffrey Thompson:



Dr. Thompson has been experimenting with sound scientifically since 1980. He first started in his Holistic Health Center in Virginia which grew to be the largest Center of its kind in Virginia at the time. His experiments were in using exact sound frequencies to make Chiropractic spinal and cranial adjustments, to stimulate and normalize organ function and to balance Acupuncture Meridians. He developed a very gentle and effective method of making adjustments and continues to use this approach today. His gentle and effective method is much appreciated by his patients.



Fortune 500 Companies and Private Consulting -

Dr. Thompson’s clinical work has also led to the development of programs and consultation work for Fortune 500 Companies like Cisco, Nike and Mattel. These programs are designed to boost creativity, lateral thinking and “out-of-the-box” new and original solutions and product design. Dr. Thompson’s work with group creativity at Mattel was featured on the front page of the business section of the Wall Street Journal. These programs empower employees and boost bottom lines.