I was particularly intrigued by this summary of the ten key conclusions in Gary Taubes’s book Good Calories, Bad Calories. Based on other information I’ve gleaned over the years, and what I’ve observed in my own dietary changes, I’m inclined to agree with these.

1. Dietary fat, whether saturated or not, is not a cause of obesity, heart disease, or any other chronic disease of civilization.

2. The problem is the carbohydrates in the diet, their effect on insulin secretion, and thus the hormonal regulation of homeostasis — the entire harmonic ensemble of the human body. The more easily digestible and refined the carbohydrates, the greater the effect on our health, weight, and well-being.

3. Sugars — sucrose and high-fructose corn syrup specifically — are particularly harmful, probably because the combination of fructose and glucose simultaneously elevates insulin levels while overloading the liver with carbohydrates.

4. Through their direct effect on insulin and blood sugar, refined carbohydrates, starches, and sugars are the dietary cause of coronary heart disease and diabetes. They are the most likely dietary causes of cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, and the other chronic diseases of civilization.

5. Obesity is a disorder of excess fat accumulation, not over-eating, and not sedentary behaviour.

6. Consuming excess calories does not cause us to grow fatter, any more than it causes a child to grow taller. Expending more energy than we consume does not lead to long-term weight loss; it leads to hunger.

7. Fattening and obesity are caused by an imbalance — a disequilibrium — in the hormonal regulation of adipose tissue and fat metabolism. Fat synthesis and storage exceed the mobilization of fat from the adipose tissue and its subsequent oxidation. We become leaner when the hormonal regulation of the fat tissue reverses this balance.

8. Insulin is the primary regulator of fat storage. When insulin levels are elevated — either chronically or after a meal — we accumulate fat in our fat tissue. When insulin levels fall, we release fat from our fat tissue and use it for fuel.

9. By stimulating insulin secretion, carbohydrates make us fat and ultimately cause obesity. The fewer carbohydrates we consume, the leaner we will be.

10. By driving fat accumulation, carbohydrates also increase hunger and decrease the amount of energy we expend in metabolism and physical activity.

I rarely have time to read books lately, so I’m especially appreciative of good summaries like this.

It is my great pleasure to introduce to you a man and a program of stunning originality and practical results. The man is Jon Butcher and his program is Lifebook.

Lifebook launches you into its world by inviting you to deeply examine 12 separate aspects of your life that, in reality, are not separate at all.

In each category you are stimulated and inspired to clarify your beliefs, identify your goals and define what needs to be done to actualize them. You capture and document your thoughts and feelings along the way using the Lifebook software.

This step-by-step, highly structured process results in your own, self-authored Lifebook — a detailed description of the life you want to live and a strategic plan to guide you as you move toward it.

Although it does borrow from my work, this program is not psychotherapy. It is about self-actualization. As you work through the 12 categories, you get to know yourself in inspiring and challenging new ways. Consciousness, energy, and self-responsibility rise together. The future is experienced as unobstructed. You are witness to your own transformation.

The Lifebook Program is a 4-day seminar experience, held monthly in Chicago. Normally $2995, Lifebook has agreed to extend a $1000 savings to admirers of my work. (For the record, I have no financial stake in this offer — I pass it on to you because I believe you will find it to be a truly extraordinary experience, as I did).

To learn more about this special offer, please CLICK HERE.

I simply cannot recommend this program highly enough. If you wish to become the author of your own life, Lifebook may be exactly what you have been waiting for.

Sincerely,

Nathaniel Branden

If any of you have been to one of these seminars, I would be very interested to hear what you thought.

Thanks to Kirez for the tip.

I was impressed not only with what he made — a weight rack that’s both more ergonomic and more safe than what you find in gyms today — but also with his idea of making a video to demonstrate its use.

I’m just starting to climb aboard the video-marketing revolution myself, so it’s timely for me.

Valhalla weight rack from Kirez Reynolds on Vimeo.

But really, who wouldn’t trust a man in knee-pads and flip-flops?

Criticisms of mindfulness are particularly interesting to me, partly because I experience mindfulness, at root, to be a simple increase in awareness — and not even at the “synthetic” level of thought, but rather at the even more basic level of perception.

Since the practice of mindfulness is virtually synonymous with an increase in perception, or elementary awareness, I often find myself wondering, “How on earth can raising awareness be bad?”

So that is, perhaps, a philosophical bias I bring to the table, from the outset — I don’t understand how awareness can be bad. Ever. Not in principle, as a way of living.

Occasionally I get the impression that mindfulness is being criticized because the critic has something akin to a religious phobia, and their criticisms of mindfulness are just a by-product of that, since mindfulness therapies are derived, historically, from Buddhism.

I get that vibe, for example, in this quote from critic Scott Lilienfield in the article:

“What concerns me is the hype, the talk about changing the world, this allure of the guru that the field of psychotherapy has a tendency to cultivate.”

I personally attended a training in Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (the gold standard in mindfulness as a clinical intervention) and I don’t recall anything about gurus or changing the world. If anything, the approach being taught seemed systematically stripped of it cultural underpinnings in Buddhism and the various Zen traditions from which it originated.

So I wonder where this concern of his is coming from; does it relate to the empirical treatments being offered, or is it something he picked up elsewhere?

Also, sometimes people criticize mindfulness meditation because they do not recognize the difference between mindfulness meditation (which involves increasing one’s awareness of reality) and transcendental meditation (which involves entering a trance and, essentially, temporarily decreasing one’s contact with reality).

The latter was quite popular, and controversial, in the 1970s, but is fundamentally dissimilar from mindfulness meditation.

On the other hand, there are certain criticisms of mindfulness that appear to have undeniable empirical merit — assuming the results upon which they’re based can be taken at face value:

A case in point is mindfulness-based therapy to prevent a relapse into depression. The treatment significantly reduced the risk of relapse in people who have had three or more episodes of depression. But it may have had the opposite effect on people who had one or two previous episodes, two studies suggest.

Why would mindfulness help people with three or more episodes, but hurt people with two or fewer?

Understanding the dynamics involved, it seems to me, could do much to increase our grasp of the human mind, as well as mindfulness therapies.

Could it be that, for patients with two or fewer episodes, the mind’s natural defense mechanisms are more safe or useful, at least in the short term, than an increase in awareness?

I would enjoy hearing theories from anyone with some grasp of the dynamics involved, and preferably some first-hand personal experience with mindfulness practice.

Why would mindfulness — even when removed entirely from any religious trappings — help certain patients, while hurting others?

Contrary to what you may have heard, the only sort of character suffering builds is the ability to suffer — a useful ability in a world where suffering is the routine nature of life but not a virtue that makes the world a better place.

I say “somewhat-throwaway” because I don’t think her overall argument stands or falls on this point.

But on this point itself… Do you agree with her? Or do you see ways in which suffering builds character?

Do you feel that suffering has built your own character? Do you know friends or loved ones whose character has been improved somehow through the process of suffering?

Now this is an interesting topic, folks. For anyone with even a slightly spiritual bone in your being, this is a topic rich with significance.

So I guess that kind of gives away my answer. But only partly.

One reason for this, no doubt, is the fact that there is so little good information available about how to safely conduct a water fast. I’ve tried to address this topic, to some extent, in my own posts.

That said, despite the fact that I’ve conducted 8 or 10 fasts personally, I don’t consider myself an expert on fasting, and I strongly encourage my readers to consult with a doctor before undertaking any kind of fast.

So I was particularly pleased to field this question from reader Megan:

Question for anyone with fasting experience…I am planning my first fast to begin in about a week. I eat a plant-based vegan diet and feel I have adequately educated myself on the topic of water fasting. My goal is 10 days, but I will see how I react. Dr. Fuhrman and many others stress that fasting should only be done under a doctor’s supervision. Are any or all you seeing a doctor during your fasts. I hadn’t considered it until today, but now I am wondering.

While I’ve never had the luxury of being “fully” supervised by a doctor, at a fasting facility or elsewhere, I have consulted with doctors before and after my fasts.

It is often hard to find an M.D. who has experience (or even comfort) with fasting, so you might consider consulting with an N.D. (Doctor of Naturopathy), D.O.M. (Doctor of Oriental Medicine), or an Ayurvedic (traditional Indian medicine) doctor.

It was my D.O.M. (our family’s “primary care physician”) who told me about adding sea salt to the water I drink during my fast. And it was an Ayurvedic doctor who pointed out that it’s downright crazy to conduct a water fast without using enemas along the way. These two suggestions, alone, have increased the comfort level of our fasts incalculably.

So, in sum, I strongly recommend finding an alternative-medicine doctor with experience in water fasting, with whom you can talk with before, after, and (if necessary) during your fast.

From a LiveScience article about a new study to be published in the June 30 issue of Science:

It was expected that those who made less than $20,000 a year would spend 32 percent more of their time in a bad mood than those that had an annual income greater than $100,000.

In reality, the low-income group spent only 12 percent more time in a bad mood than their wealthier counterparts. This suggests that the link between income and mood has been perhaps overstated.

The researchers once again surveyed another group of women in 2005. In this study, participants not only recorded their overall satisfaction with life but a moment-to-moment account of their contentment.

The results showed that higher income had less of a correlation with momentary happiness than with overall life satisfaction.

“If people have high income, they think they should be satisfied and reflect that in their answers,” said study team member Alan Krueger, an economist from Princeton University. “Income, however, matters very little for moment-to-moment experience.”

This is, of course, no news flash to anybody who understands how to actually cultivate happiness.

Read the full article for more information about the study.

I have started a water fast and have yet to decide how long I will be doing it for. I know you can lose weight by fasting, but I’ve heard you nearly always put it all back on. I was wondering how you can keep the weight off once you finish fasting, and what’s the best way to come off a fast. [edited for grammar]

I typically lose about two pounds for each day that I fast, and rarely am I eager to return to my original weight. Fortunately, you don’t have to.

When you finish an extended water fast (3 days or more), your stomach will have shrunk considerably, which means you will not require as much food to make you feel satiated. Also, your metabolism will have slowed, causing you to need fewer calories to get through the day.

Take advantage of the opportunity to eat smaller portions of high quality food rather than larger quantities of lower quality food.

Good foods to use when breaking your fast include steamed veggies (yellow squash, broccoli, etc.) and fresh fruits like watermelon and blueberries. Stay away from anything spicy or sour or acid.

Breaking your fast with whole foods (rather than juices) will help stimulate a bowel movement, which is very good. Hopefully you were doing daily water enemas while you were fasting, to help remove all the old stuff from your guts along the way.

They say that, for each day of your fast, you should devote one day to breaking the fast. So, if you fast for five days, you should spend five days gradually re-introducing food into your diet, beginning with the easiest foods to digest (cooked veggies, yogurt, etc) and finishing with the hardest (meats, spicy food).

Using this strategy — particularly the part about sticking with small portions of higher-quality foods — I gained only about two pounds when I broke my most recent fast, and I have stayed at that weight for more than a month, which means I can probably stay here indefinitely as long as I’m eating healty foods.

The original questioner asks:

How do you deal with Chronic Severe Pain? It takes energy to have patience, and long term agonizing pain disrupts the spirit, makes meditation impossible, sends shock waves through the whole body constantly, relaxation cannot happen. Enlighten me.

For help in this area, I highly recommend the book Break Through Pain by Shinzen Young. It is the best book I’ve read on the subject.

I can relate to all these frustrations. My own pain, however, has not been severe. I have had chronic low-grade facial pain (3 on a 10 scale, normally) since I was a child.

Still, I have a couple suggestions that might be relevant.

Regarding what the Buddha said, what comes to mind is a teaching that goes something like this: “Ordinary people have an arrow in the mind and an arrow in the body. The enlightened person has only the arrow in the body.”

So, the idea is that, through mindfulness practice, you can remove the sources of pain that originate in the mind.

A logical next question is: Which of our pains originate in the mind and which originate in the body?

My own experience suggests that more of our pain originates in the mind than we realize. In its purest essence, most physical pain is like a grain of sand in an oyster, a small thing unto itself.

But through our reaction to the pain, its becomes bigger, more imposing, more painful. We react to the pain, often at an unconscious level, and our painful reaction adds to the pain rather than reducing it.

Through careful meditation, we can learn to tease apart these two things, our pain and our reaction to the pain. Once we clearly see the reaction, we can begin to reduce it, by relaxing our mind and body, and thus enjoy the benefits of reduced pain.

I would think that the more challenging the pain, the more challenging this task. Since I don’t know what severe long-term pain feels like, I’ll leave that discussion to someone else.

First, though, I’ll point out some useful leads for anyone with an interest in the topic. Several people have written capably on this topic. The two with which I am most familiar are Jon Kabat-Zinn and Eckhart Tolle.

Jon Kabat-Zinn has created pain management programs for people with a wide range of incurable health problems. He describes his program in the book Full Catastrophe Living, which many people have found helpful.

Courses based on his teachings are offered around the country. They’re geared toward people who have little or no experience with meditation, but who typically have exhausted their options from western medicine, and are willing to try anything that might improve their quality of life.

Kabat-Zinn’s courses have helped many people, and even form the basis for much of the research on the healthful benefits of mindfulness meditation. (For information about this research, see Ruth Baer’s excellent meta-analysis of all the studies published up through 2003.)

In my own path, I’ve found Eckhart Tolle’s teachings very helpful. Tolle has an idea that you can transform yourself through pain, by going deeply into the pain and allowing it to “burn up” unhealthy states of mind that cause you to suffer more than you need to suffer.

A good place to begin exploring Eckhart Tolle’s teachings is his book The Power of Now. I also recommend his subsequent books Stillness Speaks and A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose. I encourage people to buy his audio books first, as the sound of his voice can be very instructive itself.

Finally, Shinzen Young (who I mentioned at the beginning) has written very capably on the topic of acute chronic pain. Last year I looked through his book Break Through Pain: A Step-by-Step Mindfulness Meditation Program for Transforming Chronic and Acute Pain, and it was absolutely terrific.

Shinzen Young is one of the rare people who has first-hand experience with using meditation to dissolve even acute chronic pain. His story is powerful and inspiring, and his insights into the healing process are without peer, in my experience. (I actually meant to order a copy of his book last year for myself. Just ordered it now.)

I hope this bread crumb trail is useful for others who have run into chronic pain and are seeking ways to help themselves.