Revised Intentional Overeating

What was intentional at the time may have encoded and is now part of us. We now have to overcome our nature. That is the essence of the real problem. 

So is eating food that I like, intentional overeating? Liking food is part of the problem. So perhaps the stoics are right... Hunger should be the only sauce.  Simple food is best. Barley portage. Barley cakes. But where can one get barley grown without fertilizer and chemicals? Oh well, in the end we just die anyway.

I expect that most obese people do not want to be obese but they want to eat well, like the food, enjoy life  or perhaps cannot stop eating. They both know that they must reducing eating to lose weight. There is where the problem lies most of the time, and that is following that direction. The resistance to calorie reductions comes from hunger or a mental drive; of the mental drives there are at least three, physical or physiological memory, automatic memory, and conscious memory.

Any reduced calorie diet will take the weight off. Hunger is less if we keep insulin low, that is eat a higher fat, normal protein, low carbohydrate. Our body balances our need with fat taken from the reserves, so to our body any reducing diet is higher in fat to our body. We will experience hunger if we have been living on a high carbohydrate diet. It will take considerable time to adjust to a more Paleo like, Atkins like, low carb diet, but you may suffer if you do it quickly. Those carb that we eat should be slow carbs only, that is greens and a few cooked unprocessed vegetables, high in fiber and slow to digest.

Now those mental drives need to be addressed. These need to move to the conscious decision making area of the brain. That is where the difficulty is. We are not taught to unmake automatic behaviors, and we will always revert to our old automatic behaviors if we ever let vigilance slide or lapse. This vigilance must continue to death, and that will come soon enough. There is no need to hasten death by overeating.

There are many reasons that eating may have become automatic. These include liking food, environment, food addiction, emotional eating, stress, or trained in overeating. Many of these were trained in by parents, environment, conditions, rules or desires of self as children. Some of these only became a problem as our metabolism slowed with age, or with other body or chemical changes. But what do I know. We all die in the end.    

The Disease is Overeating

The Disease is Overeating, the symptom is obesity. The degree of the problem can be measured by BMI, metabolic syndrome, and the like. Some damage is permanent, some can be released by not eating specific food groups. Reduction of carbohydrates removes much of the blood glucose issues, and related weight issues. Restrictive food lists and behaviors provide relief from food addictions. Psychological treatments can remove stress, emotional, personality driven overeating. Philosophical approaches can remove other reasons, and give some relief to the cultural and physical driven overeating, and to intentional overeating, even after it has become encoded and automatic.  To obtain this recovery, we need clarity of mind to understand the actual cause of the specific overeating case.

To me it is now obvious that recovery from overeating is a much bigger undertaking that most undertakings. Certainly much bigger that simple weight loss.  I have been reading and researching this issue for all my life, but seriously since 2008. I have read 8 feet of books on the subject, and about the same on recovery attempts, philosophy's, and other things that have been suggested as possible sources of the solutions. Some helped, some defined the problem better, some gave me insight into my specific problem, and some was just a waste of time. The difficulty comes in a wrong definition of the problem causes. That is just misdirection, which is likely the biggest problem with recovery from overeating. We are simply not addressing the real problem, but rather a symptom of the problem.

It become obvious at this point that treating someone problem must come from the inside, for only we can treat our problem, or even figure out the cause. Yet that is a massive undertaking, and we do not get much help from the medical establishment. Anyone who is unable to follow their prescribed diet is simply noncompliant and no further help is available. Admitting that we do not know the answer can be the first step in developing the knowledge to fix the problem and know the answer. 

To fix intentional overeating, we first need to realize that overeating was intentional at one time and overeating became encoded and automatic. This has become part of our personality, character, our psyche, part of what make us us. We are not even aware of the intentional aspect of the past. It is a natural instinct in overdrive. Now what? How does one fix this? We need to change our character, our personality, our behavior, our outlook on our culture, change even our belief system, what ever we need to change, sufficient change to recover and sufficient change to not slide back, that is the difficult part. That change must be continued for the remainder of life. 

Now evidence based change is difficult to argue against. Trying to figure out what the evidence says is the hard part. Once we understand, duh, it is obvious. So why could I not see it before? Misdirection is likely culprit. Now we are left with changing our behavior, but after we know the truth of the evidence, that should follow. Most try to change the behavior without understanding the cause of the behavior. If the cause remains, backsliding can be expected. I do not need to be self-sufficient, I can ask for help when help is available. When it come to cause of my behavior, who is there to ask? Me and rigorous honesty, guess and test or ?.  In the end we all just die anyway.

Travel Experience

Travel Experience... it is the stories of the returning travelers that excites the next wave of travel. Those stories have turned quite negative in the last bit from those returning from Europe. Hoards of black assumed refugees around the tourist attractions hawking trinkets, gang mobs of in your face pick pockets, swarming at tour buses. Hotel ripoffs... well built up expectations only to find run down dirty bug infested rooms. Airport security searches- of the seniors getting out of hand, and of the ladies getting physical. And the cost of some places... If one chooses to go, you need to be willing to pay the prices... gouging anyone... Oh well it was only a discussion group, and a few fresh stories. The odd thing is that everyone had similar stories in the last years. So why would I want to travel? I have long held that travel was much overrated anyway. Is it fear or practical reality that keeps me home?    

I have been on quite a few long trips in my life; I have felt ripped off by ever one; why would I travel?  Oh well, we all just die in the end.

Camping, in Alberta is not any better. The rates in some campgrounds is outrageous. Walmart parking lot, here I come, and move ever day... Retirement has become enjoying life as best we can until... well OK, we all just die in the end.

Then there is the US joke; mass shootings and democrats filibuster on gun control. http://freethoughtblogs.com/affinity/2016/06/17/democrats-filibuster-on-gun-control/   
You have trump as a presidential candidate. How can we Canadians keep a straight face? We have religion... all those who think it is right to kill those who will not agree that your pigshit beliefs...Christians, Muslims, Trump, Ken Ham, Flat earth society... etc. Oh well, we all just die in the end.

   

Sharma's Just Wrong

Sharma has a long series cutting down the arguments against obesity as a disease.  http://www.drsharma.ca/arguments-against-obesity-as-a-disease-7-medicalizes-a-behaviour?

Sharma is just wrong about what the disease is. Definition:

dis·ease

dəˈzēz/

noun

noun: disease; plural noun: diseases; noun: dis-ease; plural noun: dis-eases

1. a disorder of structure or function in a human, animal, or plant, especially one that produces specific signs or symptoms or that affects a specific location and is not simply a direct result of physical injury.

   
   

   "bacterial meningitis is a rare disease"

   
   

   synonyms:

   illness, sickness, ill health; More infection, ailment, malady, disorder, complaint, affliction, condition, indisposition, upset, problem, trouble, infirmity, disability, defect, abnormality; pestilence, plague, cancer, canker, blight; informalbug, virus; datedcontagion "herbal preparations to treat tropical diseases"

   • a particular quality, habit, or disposition regarded as adversely affecting a person or group of people.

     
     

     "departmental administration has often led to the dread disease of departmentalitis"

 OK, so it may apply but obesity is a symptom of the real problem. That is why treatment is not effective, he is busy treating a symptom. The real problem is philosophical/psychological and has been produce by the modern society concepts over running natural satiety regulation. Eating is such a important biological function that there has never been needed in the past a physical off switch, the mental/emotional off was sufficient. But modern society, and mainly the relentless advertising has locked the satiety switch on on. Full speed ahead. It may have first been switched on by emotional/stress/food addiction/habituation, but that is irrelevant after the lock is encoded into the primary or unconscious automatic mind. The "stuck on" on switch must be first released, and the other problems fixed, as well, for recover to take place.

Alberta does not pay for philosophical/psychological services, so until someone is willing to do the work and dig into there own pocket, the problem will continue. As long as those "at the public trough" need substance, they will argue the wording to keep the money flowing. So what is the point in arguing with Sharma's "Livingston Pig"? 

The best thing one can do for ourselves is to shut off radio, TV, and stop paying attention to society that "feeds the Pig(s)" period. Learn to cage the Pig. Ignore the Squeals, or listen to the Squeals as noise. Three moderate meals each day. It is society that has brought us to this point. Society will not get us out of the problem. It is up to each one of us to learn what we must do and get ourselves out of this mess. We are on our own. No government will help. They each have their own "Livingstone Pig" to deal with.

If you do not understand this read Never Binge Again by Glenn Livingston. This aggressive irritating book is right but does not contain one word of the psychology behind the workable philosophy. It is something one should force oneself to read. It is like forcing the self to read the building code, but it has the power to change your life.

So what is a Glenn Livingston Pig? Not to be confused with a Johnathan Livingston Seagull, our hopes, dreams and aspirations. A Pig is a belief or drive that has outlived it's usefulness, and it need to be discarded, however it is stubborn and will not go away. It is a desire to eat for no other reason than to eat. It is a sow or a problem, and just will not go away. The pig must be dealt with. It is a belief that thinks it is right, contrary to all evidence. A negative damaging meme, a instinct run amuck.  

Understand the Pig

Problem of Immediate Gratification, the Pig. Once we like food a bit too much, what do we do about that? The desire to eat is physical or encode into the brain, primitive or unconscious (automatic) part, now what? The Pig must be beaten into submission, caged, penned, put into his stye, but he will not go quietly. Expect squealing of many forms.

Thanks to Glenn Livingston for the explanation of a possible solution. More if it works. These are two different Pigs. Glenn's Pig is a part of the mind/ego that we can detach from and beat into submission.

Contradiction.

Churchill said something like "Success is stumbling from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm."

Or the stoic concept - success is living well until we die well.  Well is being virtuously, so that we can say if there was wrong done, it was not by us. 

It feels like there is an inverse connection between weight loss and willpower. I am more successful at weight loss and maintenance when I do not care and do not try.

That suggests that overeating is a willpower driven property, the greater the willpower expressed, the greater is the drive to overeat. It is physically and unconscious driven, and it is up to the conscious to overcome. Most of those who I see recovering are obsessed with measuring, recording and similar weight loss obsession. Is that the only release from this problem?

So if we are truth seeking, what is the truth with respect to overeating? Who knows? All we can say for sure is CICO is the physics equation of the whole problem, but metabolism and Atwater factors change with CI and CO. So where does that leave us? With our asses hanging out in the wind and no government cares enough to understand or provide any workable solutions or funding for workable solutions. They do fund a system that is a failure for most, where information is doled out individually for a fee, by the elite (Capital Health). It make me think that they do not know the solution either. Anyone with ongoing weight loss/ maintenance knows as much as they do.  

Trying to understand behavior in general, big picture?

 Social / Cultural Anthropology is the study of human society / cultures, their knowledge, beliefs, practices, values, ideas, technologies, economies and other domains of social and cognitive organization.

Social-cultural anthropology traditionally dealt with kinship, political economy and other social dimensions of non-literate, non-western and often isolated communities, which could be observed in their totality. Today, many social anthropologists also study “western” culture and such aspects of complex societies as gender, sexuality, peasantry, ethnic minorities, and industrial work groups.

Knowledge, beliefs (social, religious, cultural) values, practices, economic, political, at the band/tribe/village level is not uniform, but much more uniform as the group gets smaller (from the sub-subspecies level of groups). That is reasonable for the individual has only one set of beliefs, and there is often only one or two senior in the smallest social unit. OK,  the typical family has two parents, and grow from there. 

So any sub -subspecies is built up on the learned beliefs of the previous generations. If it was wrong, it is still wrong, if it was right, it is still right. Ever generation must learn everything, and pass on what is proven or demonstrated relevant to the next generation. On the individual each subsequent layer of education adds and subtracts from the relevant information passed on. 

The first 7 years of life set a child's personality, learning fields, memory, interests in broad sense, speaking ability, confidence, etc. So those child minders are the ones that give so much guidance the young, and to a large extent heavily influence child behavior. That is what causes the differentiation in behavior between the working poor and the rich children. The extreme poor do not display this setback. Odd. The difference can be found in the amount of time that child spends with adults in those formative years, 0 to 7 years, in active learning environment.  Is that why a child who grows up isolated is low social need adult? Makes sense. All those unused cross linked neurons get pruned. Oh well, life goes on, and it becomes difficult for us to learn in those areas. 

So those of us with personality disorders and learning deficits can blame it all on our genes and early development; if there was wrong done it was not by me; and we are left to pick up the pieces and move on to a rational and useful life, full of purpose or production. There is no purpose in life until we paint one on. Shall I change colour today?  

One more point on understanding. I am not a natural writer, it is a forced habit which I came to get pleasure from. As you all know, I am not good at it, but enjoy it, therefore am of the dangerous sort, if it were of importance. On this light, I have three active blogs, and this one has the least hits, yet draws the most phishing. Moderation of comments requires more effort as deleting the comments that I do not want, therefore, for now, I will leave the comments as they are. Some of the phishing is quite humorous word usage, likely the result of English as a second language results. Oh, well, it is a struggle for some to scratch out what passes as gainful employment these days. Living off advertising is just another form of prostitution, but what do I know?          

but it is the truth

http://www.newyorker.com/humor/borowitz-report/stephen-hawking-angers-trump-supporters-with-baffling-array-of-long-words

Hawking called Trump “a demagogue who seems to appeal to the lowest common denominator,” a statement that many Trump supporters believed was intentionally designed to confuse them.

dem·a·gogue

ˈdeməˌɡäɡ/

noun

noun: demagogue; plural noun: demagogues

1. a political leader who seeks support by appealing to popular desires and prejudices rather than by using rational argument.

   synonyms:

   rabble-rouser, agitator, political agitator, soapbox orator, firebrand, fomenter, provocateur "he was drawn into a circle of campus demagogues"

   • (in ancient Greece and Rome) a leader or orator who espoused the cause of the common people.
     
     
     
     
     Not to be confused with a demigod although they sound similar to we hard of hearing  tinnitus types.