The Proof is in the Pudding
July 4, 2011 | Filed Under Micah | 1 Comment
I haven’t jogged in about 4 years. And generally, I’m philosophically opposed to the activity. Ironically, during this same time period, I’ve become more physically fit than at any other point in my life.
I’ve embraced the notion of aiming for optimal human fitness: to minimize stress, minimize workout time, yet maximize my overall functional abilities. Generally, I workout about twice a week for about 20 minutes each workout. Lately, I haven’t even gotten my workouts in, but my functional base is still present, it just hasn’t been called on in a while.
Today my brother was running a July 4th race so I decided to join in. As I said, I haven’t jogged in about 4 years. My only preparation for this event was to eat some brownies and ice cream yesterday and some pastries this morning for breakfast (I am at my parents after all, and they find ways to get me to consume more carbs in one week then I do the entire rest of the year).
I didn’t stretch. I didn’t warm up. I just started jogging with everyone else. And when I say everyone else, I’m talking a fit group of people. These people were mostly under 25, and I didn’t see a single obese person. There was one very brave blind man running the race, and seeing him inspired me to give my best.
I also noticed that I was about the only person wearing heavy, cumbersome cross trainers. Everyone else was ramped up for the jogging activity. They had nice running shoes and many looked like they had jogged a few times leading up to the race. I suspect most of them did.
The race was only 4 miles. Not a marathon. I’m not even suggesting that I could have run a marathon nor that I would have wanted to run a marathon. I was doing this to share an experience with my brother, and to challenge myself.
I ended up finishing in the top 25% out of 800 participants. I’m a 32 year old man. I had done no preparation. I don’t think I had worked out a single time in the last 3 weeks (maybe a few sets of pushups and pullups which I just do randomly when I feel like it) and as I said, I hadn’t jogged a minute of the last 4+ years of my life leading up to the race.
Finishing in the top 25% of the race, and seeing myself improve by about 30 seconds each progressive mile, brings a huge smile to my face. The proof is in the pudding. Functional fitness works. Preparing your body to handle any physical challenge the world throws its way is a lot more rewarding and a lot less time consuming than training your body to do just one specific task (jogging).
Framboise Raspberry Lambic Beer
June 15, 2011 | Filed Under Micah | Leave a Comment
Note to future self: you sure did enjoy this stuff in your late 20′s and early 30′s.
Note to current self: let’s learn how to make it.
I’m usually not into super sweet drinks (unless it’s American Honey). But ever since I can remember I’ve been a sucker for Framboise Raspberry Lambic Beer.
My Farm
June 6, 2011 | Filed Under Micah | Leave a Comment
Now has… 7 chickens. 5 goats. 2 cows. 1 dog.
Fun times.
Tweaking My Diet
June 4, 2011 | Filed Under Micah | Leave a Comment
For a while now I’ve known that I need to consume less cashews and more fish. Instead of thinking about it, this week I’ve taken the plunge and started acting on it. And I feel better already.
Here’s to doing!
Nothing To Say
May 30, 2011 | Filed Under Micah | Leave a Comment
Surprisingly, this little personal blog that was created with the sole purpose of capturing snapshots of my mind over time, receives over 300 daily visitors. For those of you who are regulars, and are now tiring of visiting my blog without updates, just know that at the moment I really have nothing to say. I know this fact risks me losing you as a reader. But since my goal with this blog was never to acquire readers, I am not willing to post to the blog out of drudgery simply for the sake of retaining readers.
I only blog when I feel motivated too. And lately I just haven’t felt like blogging.
There are three ideas that I’m working on at the moment, that you can look forward to, but which I’m giving time to take shape in my mind.
1) Christian Whole-ism / Christian Completeness
This is my view that at the core of Christianity is the notion of a “full humanity” – that notions like “holiness” and “sanctification” and “salvation” are deeply rooted in the idea of fully realizing our created natures. We are creatures and we were created good. But we are dislocated from our proper home, our proper environment, our proper mode of being. Our task in life is to work towards and become more fully human, where “fully human” is the intended state that God has for mankind. This can be as simple as learning which fuels are best for our bodies. It can also be as profound as re-learning how to be thankful to God and how to stand in a awe of him (something I need to relearn every day). Becoming Christian is nothing more than becoming fully human (don’t take this as a tame version of Christianity, as I believe that the Gospels report historical events that were absolutely necessary for human beings to once again become fully human, which entails the ability to commune with God). The main error that I’m addressing is the way many modern Christians have such little sense of what God wants us to become, and almost go to the extreme of rejecting humanity and floating in some self-delusional, unrooted land of magical pixie dust. A true Christianity must have a robust cosmology. A sense of being rooted in reality. But the roadmap has been lost/distorted by our modern, ungrounded context.
2) The Art of Being
In this post I’m going to address the way that for some people, there can be no interaction without an agenda. That instead of simply enjoying the company of others, there always has to be a purpose. A meeting. Decisions made. Beliefs imposed. Other people become objects and one’s satisfaction comes through imposing power upon others and manipulating them. These are the people who, when they knock on your door, you know they want to get something out of you, rather than just being together. I strongly believe that human beings need time to just commune. To be. To love one another. To enjoy each others’ presence.
3) The Art of Becoming
In this post I’ll suggest that the healthiest way of “being” is to recognize that we are always “becoming.” We are not static beings. One of the greatest illusions we live under is the one derived from static propositions. For example: “I am Christian” – For moderns, this is an example of a final, static state. The end goal. But really, our propositions should be starting points. Launching pads. “I am Christian” should mean: I am not done. I am still being made. I am on a journey, along with God and the created universe. The journey’s end goal is for me to be made into a complete, properly located human being. “I am Christian” means – I recognize that I am somewhat dislocated from my proper environment, my proper state of heart, my proper state of mind. With God’s grace, and the gift of Jesus’, I am committed to the process of being made whole. Being made holy. And I look forward to that journey with the confidence of trust.
Baby Pygmy Goats Playing
April 17, 2011 | Filed Under Micah | 1 Comment
Lightning, Snuggle and Sassafras playing on rocks.
Lazy Magic versus Deep Magic
April 10, 2011 | Filed Under Micah, Small Talk | Leave a Comment
There are two types of magic. One is limiting, and can be harmful. The other is formational, and brings joy.
The first type of magic, I will call lazy magic (one might just as well call it Disney magic). It is the magic of our fantasies. It is the magic that expects the universe to conform to the perfect scripts we lay out in our own minds. It is the magic of the princess who gets swept away into a perpetual heavenly existence by the perfect prince. It is the expectation that the campfire will light itself.
Common forms of this sort of magic in today’s society include: the American Dream Myth (follow the corporate script, and you’ll be happy), the Soul Mate Myth (find the right person, and love will sustain itself), the Youth is Everything Myth (you can’t be fit, learn, grow, thrive and be deeply in love beyond your twenties), the Love Is A Feeling Myth (once the dopamine high is gone, love is gone), the Pill For Everything Myth (pill popping to solve all of our problems).
Lazy Magic fails to take reality seriously, and inevitably fosters disappointment.
The second type of magic, I will call Deep Magic. It is the magic of reality. It is the magic of a chicken emerging from an egg. The magic of a tree producing fruit. The magic of grass turning into beef. The magic of lovers making love. The magic of a man building his own home. Or of a woman knitting her own clothes. The magic of a father teaching his son how to fish.
Deep Magic is the magic that pervades reality. It is the magic whereby one perceives reality in all it’s glory and mystery. It is the magic that science describes, yet cannot explain. It is the magic that G.K. Chesterton alludes to in the Ethics of Elfland.
The choice between lazy magic and deep magic is a choice between which world one wants to live in: the finite world of one’s own mind, or the infinitely glorious universe* that one actually inhabits.
*if you need reminding of the magic in this universe, go read a fairy tale. That’s what they’re there for.
30 Pull-ups
April 3, 2011 | Filed Under Micah | Leave a Comment
This post is not to brag. 
It’s to celebrate.
Today I did 30 straight pull-ups for the first time in my life. I’m 32 years old.
All the way to the bottom. Pause. All the way to the top.
I couldn’t do a single pull up 3 years ago.
100% credit goes to P90X and Mark Sisson’s Primal philosophy for showing me how.
An Appeal To Mark Sisson, Re: Primal Blueprint Fitness
March 27, 2011 | Filed Under Micah | 2 Comments
Dear Mark,
In my mind, most people interested in fitness want maximum results for minimal effort. That’s what the Primal Blueprint and Primal Fitness are all about.
Unfortunately, the most successful fitness programs out there in terms of sales volume (P90X and Insanity come to mind) require too much work and take too much time. I know that these defects benefit the company that produces these programs because they can upsell their recovery drinks and various other supplements to fill calorie deficits created by long, intense, daily workouts.
The thing is, these successful fitness programs have four things going for them: 1) they are well produced / well marketed 2) they are motivational 3) they require very little mental energy above putting in a dvd (no need to create a workout plan) 4) they are conducive to those of us who can’t get outside year round.
Because I believe that Primal Blueprint Fitness is the most optimal form of exercise available to modern human beings, I want to see its widespread use. In order to achieve this, I want to encourage you to strongly consider working with a top-notch company (such as BeachBody) to create a series of Primal workout videos (Primal X would be a catchy name). Your friend Tony Horton would be a great, motivational instructor. The videos should be a max of 20 minutes each. Very little stretching. Lots of variety. Maybe even a video full of outdoor workout ideas to pay homage to the primal brand. The marketing should focus around the idea of “Max Results, Minimum Effort”
The basic message I’m trying to communicate is just that you really have something special and should put a lot of effort into building a full fledged workout program that can work for and appeal to the masses – those of us who don’t really want to think about what to do, but just want to put the DVD in and do it. And I think the key to achieving this is going to be working with a big fitness production company.
At the end of the day, I really want to see Primal Fitness made accessible to as many people as possible and, whether we like it or not, I think the four things I mentioned above are key (especially production/marketing).
Good luck!
Reconciling Two Christian Beliefs & Finding Peace
March 15, 2011 | Filed Under Micah | 2 Comments
Most Christians are familiar with the Great Commission. The call to go to the corners of the earth and proclaim the Gospel.
For some the Great Commission feels like a burden. It feels unnatural. Simply because some of us do not have the mental or verbal skills or perhaps the right sort of personality to go out and “save” people. It can make us feel like we are letting God down. But it shouldn’t.
Rather, there is a very basic fact that such Christians should be mindful of:
Vocatus atque non vocatus, Deus aderit
Translated this means something to the effect of: Acknowledged or not, God is present.
Remember that God is not placing a burden on us with the Great Commission. He is asking us to share Joy. That’s it. To share Love. To proclaim Love. To live Love.
The first step then in the Great Commission is not becoming great at rhetoric or memorizing arguments or learning to have a likable personality. Rather, the first step is trusting God’s sovereignty and then doing the hard work of living the two most fundamental commandments: Love the people around you and Love your God. Fully. Deeply.
Focus on these two things and you will be taking part in the Great Commission without doing a single altar call.
