Fear Mongers

[JimC]

Jared Diamond wrote a book and made a documentary, Collapse, about previous collapses of civil order in history, and potential sources for new ones. Unfortunately, I got bored and didn't watch it, but that may be a place to start.

I read it, and enjoyed it quite a bit.

When I finally got around to reading Guns, Germs, and Steel, I realized he'd essentially written the same book twice.

That's useful information, as I've already read Guns, Germs, and Steel, and seen the documentary. My impression of Diamond is that he's pretty much played all his cards.

You may be right, but they were pretty good cards, IMO...

[Gawdzilla Sama]

[hadespussercats]

Jared Diamond wrote a book and made a documentary, Collapse, about previous collapses of civil order in history, and potential sources for new ones. Unfortunately, I got bored and didn't watch it, but that may be a place to start.

I read it, and enjoyed it quite a bit.

When I finally got around to reading Guns, Germs, and Steel, I realized he'd essentially written the same book twice.

That's useful information, as I've already read Guns, Germs, and Steel, and seen the documentary. My impression of Diamond is that he's pretty much played all his cards.

Well, it's a good trick, even if it's his only one.

[hadespussercats]

Ah, I see Jim beat me to the sentiment.

Well. Minds think alike.

[Seth]

Type II, and it's getting much better as I continue to lose weight and get in shape. I can survive quite nicely on a high-protein diet such as that eaten by those who forage in the back-country for wild game, thanks. Medication is just a convenience.

You take medicine just for the convenience of eating bread and candy?

Pie. And bread. No candy. Don't like it, never have. But essentially yes. My diabetes is caused by and exacerbated by my preferred lifestyle and eating habits. Better living through chemistry I say. Using meds, I can eat bread and potatoes, have pie occasionally and not have to eat tasteless low-carb crap while still controlling my sugars and losing weight.

But, in a pinch, I can eat a proper low-carb/low sugar diet and probably dispense with the medication entirely. Already things have improved radically (I've seen sugars holding below 100 in the last two months) simply by breaking the 250 barrier and getting down to 235, with a goal of 210. That's down from 310 twelve years ago. All the weight loss has been through small, gradual lifestyle changes and exercise, not radical diets or surgical intervention. That makes the weight loss sustainable.

I can now do six miles with a 45 pound pack in two hours easily. Twelve years ago I couldn't walk up a flight of stairs without running out of breath.

[hadespussercats]

Wow. That's an impressive weight loss, Seth. Congratulations. It's not easy.

[Seth]

Wow. That's an impressive weight loss, Seth. Congratulations. It's not easy.

Thanks, and you're right. I plateaued at 250 for more than 5 years. Just recently I broke that barrier and I'm on the way down again.

But it wasn't as hard as I thought it might be because I didn't go for the quick band-aid solution, I took it very slowly and resolved to make small, incremental, achievable changes in my behaviors that became habit. I learned that diets and weighing yourself obsessively are counter productive.

I resolved to revel in my victories over my bad habits and NOT beat myself up about my failures. So, if I left ten french fries on the plate, I reveled in that. If I ate them all, I said "Oh well, next time." If I had a piece of pie at dinner, I didn't berate myself, I forgave myself and resolved to eat less pie in the future. I went from eating a whole baked potato loaded with everything to eating a whole baked potato with only sour cream, and then I cut off a fifth of it, then I cut off a third. Now I'm down to half a potato.

But it's taken years, and that's okay because I know the change is permanent and I don't have to sweat the yo-yo effect.

[Clinton Huxley]

Sensible. I've been lucky with weight but as I've two young girls I find the obsessive dieting promulgated by the media infuriating. There are no miracle diets. The only way to lose weight and keep it off is softly, softly catchy monkey. Good grief, I agree with Seth. 2013 could be weird.

[hadespussercats]

Sensible. I've been lucky with weight but as I've two young girls I find the obsessive dieting promulgated by the media infuriating. There are no miracle diets. The only way to lose weight and keep it off is softly, softly catchy monkey. Good grief, I agree with Seth. 2013 could be weird.

I've been known to agree with Seth once in a while.

Seriously, though. My weight's been really getting me down, and while I love exercise, I'm not so keen on dieting. I hate how it seems to take over my whole brain and make it about food. So, I've been thinking about the sort of approach you describe, and cultivating some patience, while kicking up the exercise more.

It's good to hear that it can work out. Great work.

[Clinton Huxley]

It changes your perspective, having girls. You start to see the body fascism and poisonous size zero fixation everywhere. That and the brainless promotion of fad diets. My children aren't remotely overweight but I regard it as not too soon to educate them as to the fuck- stupidness of, sorry to say, the female- oriented escapist media.

[Warren Dew]

Type II, and it's getting much better as I continue to lose weight and get in shape. I can survive quite nicely on a high-protein diet such as that eaten by those who forage in the back-country for wild game, thanks. Medication is just a convenience.

You take medicine just for the convenience of eating bread and candy?

Pie. And bread. No candy. Don't like it, never have. But essentially yes. My diabetes is caused by and exacerbated by my preferred lifestyle and eating habits. Better living through chemistry I say. Using meds, I can eat bread and potatoes, have pie occasionally and not have to eat tasteless low-carb crap while still controlling my sugars and losing weight.

Low carb foods are tasteless? Steak? Prime rib? Bacon and eggs?

But hey, more power to you if that's what you want to do. At least you understand what you are doing, and are making your decisions consciously - and getting back to the topic, you can change those decisions if you need to, for example if the medicine becomes unavailable.

[Seth]

Sensible. I've been lucky with weight but as I've two young girls I find the obsessive dieting promulgated by the media infuriating. There are no miracle diets. The only way to lose weight and keep it off is softly, softly catchy monkey. Good grief, I agree with Seth. 2013 could be weird.

I've been known to agree with Seth once in a while.

Seriously, though. My weight's been really getting me down, and while I love exercise, I'm not so keen on dieting. I hate how it seems to take over my whole brain and make it about food. So, I've been thinking about the sort of approach you describe, and cultivating some patience, while kicking up the exercise more.

It's good to hear that it can work out. Great work.

It really can. The key is, for me, that I got into weight trouble early in life and struggled with it for a long time, and was defeated by a long period of physical disability when I couldn't exercise and eating was one of the ways to lessen the depression associated with chronic pain.

Once I took care of the pain, and started taking happy pills to ameliorate the depression, I found I wanted to do things I hadn't done since I was a teenager. So I decided to take control of my eating without the endless cycle of self-doubt and self-loathing that comes with dieting. You have to hate yourself and the way you look to diet. I decided that I would forgive myself for my bad life choices and learn to like my body the way it was while desiring to make it better than it was. Accepting my own body by rejecting the body-image expectations of society was the greatest breakthrough I made. But it really had to be soul deep, not superficial and not something that I paraded as an ego booster. I just said "Oh well, I'm fat and out of shape and I'm not likely to find a woman looking like this, so I'll just set that expectation aside and focus on making myself able to do what *I* want to be able to do."

It's a long hard road, but I've found a good deal of peace in accepting that I'm never going to look like Tom Cruise or be a world-class athlete. But I do like being able to go for a hike, go hunting, shooting and backwoodsing and suchlike outdoor interests.

And interestingly, once I gave up on the whole Russian mail-order bride thing and became satisfied with my life as it was, a very, very beautiful woman half my age chose ME as her life partner, and we're engaged to be married.

I guess there is such a thing as trying too hard.

[hadespussercats]

Sensible. I've been lucky with weight but as I've two young girls I find the obsessive dieting promulgated by the media infuriating. There are no miracle diets. The only way to lose weight and keep it off is softly, softly catchy monkey. Good grief, I agree with Seth. 2013 could be weird.

I've been known to agree with Seth once in a while.

Seriously, though. My weight's been really getting me down, and while I love exercise, I'm not so keen on dieting. I hate how it seems to take over my whole brain and make it about food. So, I've been thinking about the sort of approach you describe, and cultivating some patience, while kicking up the exercise more.

It's good to hear that it can work out. Great work.

It really can. The key is, for me, that I got into weight trouble early in life and struggled with it for a long time, and was defeated by a long period of physical disability when I couldn't exercise and eating was one of the ways to lessen the depression associated with chronic pain.

Once I took care of the pain, and started taking happy pills to ameliorate the depression, I found I wanted to do things I hadn't done since I was a teenager. So I decided to take control of my eating without the endless cycle of self-doubt and self-loathing that comes with dieting. You have to hate yourself and the way you look to diet. I decided that I would forgive myself for my bad life choices and learn to like my body the way it was while desiring to make it better than it was. Accepting my own body by rejecting the body-image expectations of society was the greatest breakthrough I made. But it really had to be soul deep, not superficial and not something that I paraded as an ego booster. I just said "Oh well, I'm fat and out of shape and I'm not likely to find a woman looking like this, so I'll just set that expectation aside and focus on making myself able to do what *I* want to be able to do."

It's a long hard road, but I've found a good deal of peace in accepting that I'm never going to look like Tom Cruise or be a world-class athlete. But I do like being able to go for a hike, go hunting, shooting and backwoodsing and suchlike outdoor interests.

And interestingly, once I gave up on the whole Russian mail-order bride thing and became satisfied with my life as it was, a very, very beautiful woman half my age chose ME as her life partner, and we're engaged to be married.

I guess there is such a thing as trying too hard.

The positive self-talk is hard. Especially if I catch a view from the side. But...
My husband loves me. My baby loves me. And there are still times I think I'm pretty. So...
the rest, hopefully, will come, with practice.

Heh. A whole different kind of fear-mongering, eh, Clinton?

[MrJonno]

Well done on the diet Seth (pains me to say anything nice but there you go)

[Gawdzilla Sama]

I'm officially down 40 pounds since the Train Wreck in July.