Tag Archives: self help

The Weigh to Eat

A Very Illuminating Film: Thank you, Peter.

Leave a comment

This is the best film I’ve ever watched on why our will power is not enough. It is fascinating, discouraging and a call to arms. I highly recommend it:

ABCNewsstore.com: SPECIAL: Peter Jennings Reporting – How To Get Fat without Really Trying…

In this important hour-long special, Peter Jennings reveals how government policies and food industry practices are helping to make Americans fat. 

Obesity is fast on its way to becoming the nation’s largest and most costly public health problem. While much of the public debate about obesity has focused on personal responsibility, PETER JENNINGS REPORTING: HOW TO GET FAT WITHOUT EVEN TRYING reveals how federal government agricultural policies and food industry practices are contributing to America’s growing obesity epidemic.
In this program, Jennings demonstrates for the first time how more federal agricultural subsidies are going to foods Americans should be eating less, while few subsidies go to foods we should be eating more. Jennings investigates the type of food products the packaged food industry introduces each year and finds that the vast majority of new food products are those that dietary guidelines say Americans should be eating least.
Jennings also takes a bold look at the marketing of unhealthy food to children. Studies reveal that young children are not capable of understanding the intent of advertising and Jennings questions the ethics of such marketing, raising the question: should children be protected from junk food marketing—despite the economic impact that might have on food companies and broadcast networks?

This was a special program in 2003 and sadly every bit of it is still true today!
You can buy this film at ABC news or watch it in segments on Youtube.com OR here:

http://www.snagfilms.com/films/title/peter_jennings_reporting_how_to_get_fat_without_really_trying/

Living Deeper

Contemplation

Leave a comment


Haven’t been in the blogosphere for a long time. Life has been too good and too busy to bother but these long warm fall days are just too beautiful not to post a few pictures.
Seems appropriate to post some writing on contemplation here.

Contemplation: What we don’t have time for, may be just the thing we need.

Walk down any book aisle these days and you will notice a flood of titles all screaming that our lives have become overwhelming and we are way too busy in them. I don’t think we need anyone telling us what’s already in our face; no one is arguing that the pressure is on. Like an overbooked airline we consistently cling to the hope that some ticket holder on the next flight will be willing to take a later time or cancel altogether giving us the break we need. Yet, when we finally get some downtime, instead of relaxing, we tend to program that too, filling it up with “purposeful” activity.

As usual advertisers have caught on to what we dream about and the latest media catch word for selling anything is “simplify.” A lot of solutions are being sold out there, whole magazines dedicated to showing us how to do the quick fix simple thing in twelve easy steps. We may think we know how to combat craziness, but do we see is any detailed explanation as to why we should care? Other than being a bit tired and stressed, what’s the big deal about being over scheduled anyway?

We read about stress levels are significantly higher for the lowest worker on the corporate pole because he has the least amount of say over decisions in the workplace and beyond. The solution being offered seems to be work even harder, (demanding even more time and energy) and become some Big Cheese. I don’t really think that’s the answer most of us are looking for though. It isn’t that we have too many people telling us what to do, it’s the feeling that we are not in charge of our lives. We lack the security and the inner knowing that we are heading toward what we want in life. This is where our stress is coming from. If we were sure that everything we’re putting up with was carrying us to our own personal glory (whatever form that might take), I think we’d all be a whole lot more relaxed.

However (vague notions of wealth or fame aside), most of us just haven’t a very clear idea what goals to give ourselves. Our busy schedules are sacrificing more than quality time with the kids. Finding ourselves at the center of so much outside activity has created lives fraught with what I call: flitation. We flit from project to problem never getting much time to think anything through. In the process we’re not only losing a sense of accomplishment we’re losing the center of our SELF. We never seem to have the time to stop and see ourselves very clearly, to get a sense of who we are and what we need. If we could put our fingers on our places for a little while, we could hold a space in which to create some new ideas. As it is we aren’t able to stay still and focused for any length of time to know how we could make the changes we need to get us where we want to go. We must have some stillness and quiet to think and assess without an IPOD accompaniment.

The major themes of life may be family, home, money, and career, but minor details like: self knowledge, introspection, personal philosophy, and creativity, are extremely important nuances in a life well lived and they are getting left behind. Do you know what you believe and why? Do you have a personal code of ethics that you live by? What do you think you have an aptitude for? Do you understand your fears and how to ease them? How do you use your imagination? Do you give more to yourself or to others and why? How far would you go to achieve your goals?

Without clear answers to these questions and many more like them making personal plans and projections is harder if not impossible. It’s in the details of our life that we find our drive, the engine that lays down the tracks we follow to self actualization and satisfaction. If we don’t tend to the inside of ourselves: who we are, why we think what we do, how we feel and what we believe, then our outside life can fall apart. It comes unglued because there is no cohesion, no foundation or framework, nothing to give any personal meaning to what we are presently doing.

We need time for contemplation. Contemplation is an art that can be cultivated. If it’s been awhile since you sat still and quiet for any length of time without popcorn and a DVD it can get a little uncomfortable. It feels awfully foreign to be alone with nothing to do and the longer you stay there the chance that certain less than satisfying things about you or your life (once easily avoidable by way of distraction) float to the surface. You may have to acknowledge that you are in some depressing situation or even not (yet) the person you want to be. It could get pretty ugly. Don’t despair, it’s what you’re there for, to reassess and rectify, to clean out what you don’t like or doesn’t belong anymore. Then the dreaming and planning and restructuring can begin.

Once we know what we really want again and why, we have to keep our lives going in the direction that we intend and that too, requires the constant vigilance that regular contemplation can provide. Any time a rash of outside concerns demand our attention the more trivial any life on the inside will appear, making contemplation seem like a total time waster. Yet without it we lose our central core and the personal order we keep that helps us make sense of our lives. It takes a lot of discipline, fortitude and even courage to consistently go against the current flow of flitation.

After a few hours a month of this quiet: Awareness will develop naturally or deepen because we now have a more defined sense of self, we know more clearly why we make the choices we do. We are operating from a focused, organized center of our being. We have our mission statement. We are conscious. With our newfound awareness, that is: the ability to simultaneously hold on to all that we are and take in what is going on around us and see how these two things fit or don’t fit together, we can go about living our outside life. Armed with the knowledge we acquire during our downtime, we are better able to make decisions that bring us closer to our personal objectives.

Finding a time for personal contemplation may seem old fashion and a frivolous waste of something so finite but carving out some space to mentally regroup each month gives us perspective and the peace of mind that comes with understanding our true purpose. It isn’t an inconsequential interruption in our life; it is an invaluable resource for it. It is what’s known as living life deliberately.

Living Deeper

The Importance of Vision

1 Comment

February 2007

“…Live the life you have imagined…” -Thoreau
“Be the change you wish to see in the world” -Gandhi

The second day of February is historically more than the Groundhog’s Day. On the old pastoral calendar it was the first day of spring! Now, we may have a foot of snow on the ground, but underneath the soil the seeds are stirring. When I walked out the other morning I heard the Chickadees singing “Say Phoebe” the translation of which must be something like, (among other things,) “Hey! Want to build a new life together?” Every year the hardy little birds lead us all in pushing nature’s restart button. In support of them (and breaking with tradition,) this is the time of year I am most likely to make personal resolutions or plans. This is time of year to have Vision.

For me, having Vision is an extension of being awake and aware in life. It is the simultaneous melding of accurate present circumstances with an imaginary future for the purpose of achieving my desired goals.

The first part of Vision is to periodically run reality checks on all our operations, to see things as they are in order to embrace what is really going on. To tell ourselves the absolute truth, we need some understanding of who we are, what we want and why. We don’t need to be psychic to see that when we take what has manifested around us and add our feelings and reactions to it, we project a future. It’s just like watching a movie where the leading man (or woman) has a peculiar attitude that you just know is going to propel them into certain circumstances for good or ill.

The other half of having Vision is holding onto a picture of the future as we imagine it. Where do we want to go? Picturing your life as you would like it to be means understanding who you would be in that life and that is the key to getting there. To overtake that future requires being that person right now. It is good to have some steps in mind for the journey but remember over-planning will get in the way of any unforeseen yet fortuitous happenings. We are interested in the result, not attached to the process. We must be willing to balance our idea of how we think things should happen and having faith, for the universe delights in unexpected short cuts. With that in mind have all the long range goals you want.

Now we stand back and marry both sides, asking ourselves: do they mesh? Are we headed for the future we want? Or is our Vision skewed in some way and why? What are we willing to do differently to get there?

Vision is our mooring in life, without it we drift on a tide of reaction and indifference. It’s another of those things I think is sadly lacking at the moment. We have mission statements, business models, projected sales and financial planning, but, I don’t see much Vision at work in our world, not positive vision anyway.

An example of global Vision would be for a country to have an accurate sense of the outcome on any action it may take. Governments especially, must have Vision; all good leaders should have a positive vision for what can be achieved. It’s not about who we have been but rather, what are we capable of? To be sure, always something far better than what we were. As a country called the United States: who would we like to be tomorrow? A kind-hearted people working toward peaceful coexistence? What kind of circumstances will be living with in 10 years? Prosperous and respected? Our present government never took this into account. True Vision in a governmental body organically produces responsibility for any outcome is a direct result of their viewpoint. Here, more than anywhere else we have the obligation to promote and preserve positive action at all times, preventing reckless reaction.

The ability to follow a present course of action to a thoughtful and logical conclusion is paramount. If our “leaders” could have skipped ahead to the idea that fighting, instead of working with enemies only breeds more animosity, and at the same time, held a vision of a world where countries could connect to what we have in common instead of fighting over what we don’t, well, we might all be living in a very different time.

Vision in a society or culture is seeing all the motivations that a group of people may possess in the pure light of day and then imagining, going beyond, to all possibilities of what they could be. Can they work through their fear of change, for instance, and learn to accept the variations of nature? Can they “see” a time when they are not afraid but confident and empowering to all? How will their new philosophy affect their infrastructure and their laws?

Vision in a community is being able to see how the town of Sandpoint’s present attitude can affect the way we will all live forever more. What do we want our town to look like, to feel like? We must understand how every decision we make today effects Sandpoint’s beauty, character, wealth and people for many decades to come.

At the foundation of all these though, remains Personal Vision, the most important of all. Everything begins at the individual level. To address your present attitude and circumstances with honesty and accuracy is to project a realistic result that one can study for acceptance or rejection. To then create and imagine a life experience that speaks more intensely to who you really are and what you are capable of is to see your life the way it should be and then, holding it in a stop frame use the image as a template to, like the Chickadees do, build a new life.