The Original Sin

Eve was the first recorded overeater; she took the apple. I am non-religious, not anti religions, and certainly not christian. I prefer a magpie approach, pick the shiney bits, and leave the rest. I do beleive that the concept of the original sin is wrong, not a shiney bit. Eve caved to temptation, or was it greed or envy, I do not remember what the old preacher said, but I think the original sin was pushing the apple at Eve. Had the Christians defined sin as pushing products rather than the weakness of needing or accepting produces, we would not have the issue of obesity today. Today, I choose to define sin, or lack of virtue as pushing food on others. I will not cook for other beyond family, and will not offer that which I do not think it is proper to eat, either quality or quantity.

Note that they, christians, defined accepting a product to fill a physiological need as sin. Their concept of god created the need for food, and accepting a solution, food, is sin... not rational, I think. Just like computer virus companies today.

So is the original evil to offer food to others? So what happened to do no evil?

This simple change in philosophy would destroy the advertising industry, or at least beyond a low pressure offering of there products. It would also change the way sales are conducted, it would be on the effort of the buyer to find products, that would likely be produced on demand, not ready for purchase. Middle quality, rational supply, Custom built if you prefer. We would need to order groceries ahead, not make the choice at the store or refrigerator. Is there room for an empty fridge diet? Or perhaps the only freshly cooked food diet.

Oh, well, are philosophy and definitions necessary in our life today?  

Black and White, Expecting Perfection

One of the frustrating things I see in program, after hanging around 20 some years, through thick, thin, thick, thin, erratic, half sane, and stoic,  is seeing the mistakes that I made being repeated by others. 

One common mistake is making big changes fast without failsafe system in place, and expecting not to fail. What does this mean? When we are in the process of changing a habit, addiction, or negative behavior by adopting a new philosophy of life, errors are likely. It is our first time. We need to expect that for a time, several months, and likely for years, we may almost unthinkingly slip back to our subconscious way of reacting to some stimulus. We need to consciously entrench into our subconscious the "new behavior." When we suddenly change a bunch of things, we are going to slip, sooner or later, and when we do, we must immediately stop, get up, dust ourselves off, and get back onto our new program. We may need to add more to our philosophy, or do more subconscious reprogramming, to cover new situations. We may need to adjust our environment. We may need a bigger hammer. Whatever.

We need to know that we are the most important person to ourselves, and we must do what we must do for survival. No ands, if, or buts. The bottom line. Survival is necessary for anything to matter. Other around us may not recognise nor accept the seriousness of the situation. If we want recovery, we must do what is necessary.

If we pray for potatoes, we must be willing to pick up the hoe. We also must plant them, water them, and not allow others to plant weeds in them nor pull them out. 

To me the program is just a guide. Some of the steps or the words of the step are dull pointers to the underlying necessary concept. They show one way, but miss the necessary concept underneath, which is essential.    

Are we willing to stop practicing our characteristics when those characteristics produce negative behavior? So how do sort by outcome? So we need to stop practicing some characteristics all of the time. Now I need to know what negative behavior looks like, and what good behavior looks like.

We also must recognise that there will be times when we have no support, and are "fighting a strong current". It may be best to make way to shore and walk away. 

Faith, the Secret Weapon

Does faith alone, regardless of what that faith is in, protect against addiction, and relapse?

Faith is a blind and strong adoption of some principal. It is easy to see that some principal -- Thou shalt not eat processed food.-- or --Thou shalt eat three time each day, no more, no less. --- can have a strong influence on lifestyle. Now if we never question that faith, and keep the faith up, religiously, scaredly even, holding to that view and action, then recover will happen. It is the act of faith, rigidly holding the belief and action that produces recovery.

Now many of us had religion drilled into us, but little in the line of education as to why it is necessary. Today, it may not be necessary, but it would have been in short life expectancy periods of development. It is the quick way of learning proper behavior ( or just a strongly held opinion) , before we have developed the capacity of making good decisions. Religion should be the sum of good behavior, but it has become the sum up to the point it became fixed, not necessarily good.

Faith, moderated by reason, should be the norm. But if faith alone is used, and the parental behavior is obviously wrong, faith will be ditched by some of the offspring. Now what? Life as a hedonic based person? Answering to the excessive call of nature and Yetties, eat, eat, eat. I use Yetties as the the word for Polish grandmother, Yets, yets, yets (eat, eat, eat).

Now to find relief:  faith in the correctness of good logic and knowing that faith in ourselves, science and logic can find an answer, even when that answer is really just faith. Circular logic, but that may be the answer, short term. It may be the availability of food, and our genetic programing in a time of excess that is the problem, and faith that gets us through the problem.

Should Believe vs Believe

The government and others in authority keep trying to tell us what we should believe. Carbohydrate diets are good for us. Equal opportunity. No racism, even if the only thing those people do are lay around and collect welfare. So now where is what we are told to believe, and what we actually believe.

So gay are gay and married, color and white intermarry, and the children grow up in a living hell, in neither culture, and we all smile and have our silent beliefs and know the government position.

We see cops looking to shoot someone, with their guns in hand at every traffic stop, and a young lippy doctor from down the road got beaten. (with me, an old bearded codger in Alberta). The young gaffer who has not figured out that they are looking for any opportunity to shoot, and had a knife in hand. The cops only know increasing force, and are looking for any opportunity to use violence. Be aware. They are out of control. Do not resist, else you will be damaged. Keep silent, or you will be next.

Then they say we must comply with all their dictates. French, immigration policy, preferential government hiring in terms of visible minorities, gay, interracial, Speed tax, (if it were a safety issue, they would be watching where the accidents occur).

Now it is up to us to understand that we are the most important person in our lives, and we must know what is right, and do right. At the same time we must provide lip service to what the government says, even when they are wrong. Avoid all processed foods. People are not rational, only a small number are rational which includes sociopaths, and OCD personality disorders. The remainder are a mix, small amount rational, but often controlled by their agenda, or emotion, greed, hurry, animal instincts, or lizard brain.

For those of us who are controlled by our lizard brain, the primal part of our brains, with some logical- intellectual input, now we need to learn to get ourselves to do the logical things - such as to follow a reasonable food program, but without setting off the primal part. I do have free volition - the ability to go away, more so than free will.

End of rant, but then what do I know?   And today, I can hardly write.    Also note :  http://www.addictioncapetown.blogspot.nl/2013/08/a-christian-and-addict-walk-into-meeting.html

I am what I am

This post is all a about the I for I am what I am. I am trying to suppress ego, and at the same time not crush my self-esteem, for I am the most important person to myself. This is self preservation, knowing that I am primary, and must look after myself, no one else will, infact, they work against my best interests.  Self preservation is a basic instinct, as is attachment and authenticity.

Attachment can vary widely in strength as adults, from zero of the  sociopath or the negative of the recluse, to high of those who cannot stand to be alone.  I am a low attachment person, but not recluse. A few hours per week is enough human contact, beyond wife, which is minimal contact. How does all this tie together?

Authenticity is basically knowing who and what we are, which changes with time. Now we partly rational animals can choose to live within a set of virtues, beliefs, values, and if we clearly understand these and know these, we can live well, happily, and at the same time, know where we are likely to end up. Knowing our virtues, our beliefs and values takes self reflection and study and/or adopting virtues. But the important part is knowing them intellectually, in order that we can use these values for adjusting our decisions.

We may not have free will (with respect to food) but we likely have free violation, that is we can go away from the food when it is calling. The craving may be a natural phenomena, and the only solution may be to keep moving, where food is not available and in front of us, if we are unable to remove the cause of the cravings. It may be self preservation, and virtue that keeps us moving to our ultimate final goal in life and toward the end.    We also have a choice of early termination.

Also an quzi OA post at http://philosophyofweightmanagement.blogspot.ca/2013/08/some-do-not-understand-eating-disorders.html

Abiding Commitment to Change

A deep and abiding commitment to change, a willingness to change significant fundamental personality behaviors is the essence of  recovery. The program suggest that a god is required, which is bullshit. We need to develop or adopt a philosophy of life to enact real change. Acceptance of a god could be a change, but that is not dealing with reality.

Removal of our drug of choice leaves a hole in our lives. Our best solution to life so far has been our drug of choice, our best solution yet, to get us out of our dissatisfactory {(replace with any one), sadness, boredom, anxiety, suffering, frustrating, meaningless} thinking and lives. The work of recovery is to find {any one of... pleasure, meaning, purpose, joy, satisfaction} in an active balanced life.

If life has a purpose, it may be to create or develop the species, or support the same. This assumes division of labor and acceptance of our role in that endeavor. It is what most of us do, a job that someone is willing to pay for, or grow a bit of food... whatever we do.

Life after death is a concept that removes the finality of death, but it is only a concept, beleive it and it will help you mentally, but nothing changes in reality. Do not believe it and now we need to leave our mark on the world in life. The standard mark is our name chiseled in a rock, but if we want to leave a bigger mark, write a book detailing what we learned along the way that is not written elsewhere. I have written engineering reports that will not likely survive, but oh well, I will likely have the standard mark in the world, a grave stone.

Now that I have depressed everyone, there is only up to go. Desires are necessary to drive us, else we would just sit, and do little. But which desires do we need to develop? not the ones for food, we cannot be satiated, that is the problem. We do not need more consumer goods, electronics, or the like. We can hardly use what we have, and find little value, utility, or satisfaction in them or there use.

Desire to learn is always available, but this should be an instrumental desire, not a terminal desire. What utility or interest is there in the classic greek and roman philosophy other that to pick it over, magpie style, for bits and pieces that can be used today, or religion for that matter?

Do we have free will of just free violation? Can we manipulate our will or just our violation? If it is only violation, I could walk away, or drive away, but if I could control my will, I could will myself to not eat. Therefore, in my case, with respect to food, I do not have free will, but must bow to the subconscious, physical or physiological demand for food, or go away.    

Change 1

As I go through life, relationships have always been difficult. Now I know the cause. Relationships are all about learning to tolerate and fain interest in noise. It is about tolerating high noise to signal ratios, 100% noise, most of the time. In relationships, signal is "that which I am interested in", and noise is all else.

Having delved into Buddhism and Stoicism, my interest do not include sports, political beyond those that effect me, and the like. Life becomes limited to that which I consider important.

I am not tribal, unlike jews, black, natives, and the like. That characteristic is the major cause of so much difficulty. I believe in working... in some form... and little else. Everything must have practical value, else it is up to someone else. My priorities are physological survival, saftey, knowledge-utility- esteem, self-actualization, love belonging. Note the difference with Maslow... I am low social need person.  

Now when it comes to change, and levering off my values, social pressure is not as effective as for some. Survival is the best to lever off. But in the change cycle-cognition, preparation, action portion, we can only change the things we have control over, and then only if we want them to change. We cannot, long term, overcome cravings, hunger, insulin resistance hunger-cravings, or the like. Note that I have cravings in there twice. I can separate two types of undifferentiated cravings, and each seems to have separate type of treatment. One is the result of too much, an addiction type craving, and the other is too little, a deficiency type craving. Both are ugly, but the deficiency craving is most difficult, I do not know what I am deficient in... inositol... leptin... some mineral, vitamin... We can only change that which is up to us.

With respect to food, we can change the quality, quantity, and frequency of consumption, of the available choices. That is all, and then we must make a decision what to change, and how, without triggering a craving. There in lies the difficulty. What fun.