Videos

Sweet, I look forward to it!

My personal take is that any kind of theory in self improvement is a lot more useful when you have an example to go along with it. It's like... if you are programming against a proprietary software, and find a new function you want to call, the documentation can tell you the idea behind it, but how you actually use it becomes a lot more clear when you can look at some example code.

Also, I watched a few more of your videos. Good stuff!

I notice you said you have a difficult time maintaining an exercise habit - I have a lot of thoughts here, but the main one is that the biggest issue most people have with maintaining an exercise habit comes from the vast body of fitness culture that has been pervasive for the last half century: in order to get in shape, you must beat yourself up in the gym for hours and hours. It's about discipline and hard work and blood, sweat, and tears. Waking up at 3am because you're a fucking Alphalete (an actual, literal activewear brand)! RAAAAAAWR!!!

Instead, my experience is kind of the exact opposite. I went from living a sedentary lifestyle to exercising regularly simply by having fun. I was in school at the time, and I started by going backpacking in the mountains sometimes on the weekends, playing ultimate frisbee during my lunch break, and joining the swimming team. Overall, I think this strategy is far more effective and sustainable for the average person who is starting from scratch than doing the typically recommended "fitness" things like couch to 5k programs or lifting weights. The three important components are (1) make it fun, (2) make it social, and (3) make it regularly scheduled. Some ideas for things to do are pickup team sports like ultimate frisbee or soccer (most cities have groups that regularly play in the parks), independent sports where people get together to train like running or cycling clubs, athletic arts like acroyoga, lyra, or unicycling, independent but social sports like bouldering in the climbing gym or skating at the skate park, or group training classes like for martial arts or spin cycling. And coming full circle back to the "working out in the gym" motif - this is why CrossFit has been so successful over the years. You show up at a designated time and place to see the same friendly faces, and then complete a series of novel challenges together. The fact that CrossFit regularly turns unathletic people into ripped monsters has far less to do with their specific training methodology, and far more to do with the fact that they cultivate a welcoming communtity with engaging workouts so that people keep showing up and trying hard. It is hard to keep an exercise habit when you think "ugh, its wednesday, I told myself I was going to go to the florescently lit gym and ride the exercise bike while watching TV like that one episode of Black Mirror". It is easy when you think "thank god it is Wednesday so I can look forward to having fun with my friends after work!"