Inspired by Matthew Bowen, I wanted to briefly discuss the concept of acute stress’s POSITIVE role in good human functionality. What is acute stress?? Acute stresses are things that are so damn cute it actually elicits a stress response in your body. I mean, look at those freakin? puppies. So acute.
Acute stress can also be stress that’s comes in at an angle less than 90 degrees. Or if you go around a curve that’s tighter than 90 degrees really fast in a car while riding in the passenger side. That’s an acute stress.
Okay, I’m not funny. Well, some people say I am, but I just assume they are the dorks that watch AFV and actually own post-Gilmore Adam Sandler movies. People who don’t find me funny typically put the letter ?u? in favorite and color. But I’m not hurt by that, as people who use such spellings are the same people who can’t seem to get enough Mr. Bean (alright alright, I like him too).
Anyway, acute stress, the most common that comes to people’s mind being a hard bout of exercise, plays a very powerful contribution to our health. We speak a lot here about the detrimental effects of stress, but stress is not completely avoidable, and if it was, we would all pay a severe penalty for it.
Strength training is perhaps the most classic example, as placing a ton of weight upon muscles, bones, tendons, and ligaments triggers improvements with these systems. Of course, it only improves those systems if you do not exceed your threshold to the point of doing more harm than good ? either with the intensity of it, or the amount of time and frequency that you do it. Many in the health nerdiverse liken this to getting sun exposure ? getting some sun causes the skin to adapt to become darker and more sun-resistant, and getting too much does serious, lasting damage to the skin. There is a fine line between acute stress that does harm and acute stress that makes us stronger.
I have experienced some of this recently while lifting extremely heavy loads, for example. When I first started the bones in my hand and my wrists hurt like hell. But after a couple of months the muscle-padding on the bottom of the palm has increased and I feel no more pain in any of those places despite using 80 more pounds.
So yes, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. Or, the saying should be ? what doesn’t harm you beyond the point of being able to achieve swift recovery and compensatory improvements will make you stronger. But that’s not as catchy.
As an example, here are two other systems in the body that I also find respond very well to acute stress ? glucose metabolism and digestion, concepts I’ve written about in 180 Diabetes and 180 Digestion, respectively.
With glucose metabolism (and by glucose metabolism I mean the system in the body that keeps blood sugar from going higher than is considered normal and ideal), one of the hallmarks of the problem is that glucose is cleared VERY slowly out of the blood after eating. So, let’s say you eat a 1,000-calorie meal. A person with great glucose metabolism might see blood glucose levels spike up to 95mg/dl an hour after the meal, and then quickly return to 65-85 mg/dl by the 2-hour postmeal mark. A person who looks to be developing prediabetes might eat the same 1,000-calorie meal and see blood glucose levels go up to 200 mg/dl after 1-hour, but?it’s’still at 170 mg/dl at 2 hours, 130 mg/dl at the 3 hours, and then a return to baseline at say, 100 mg/dl, doesn’t occur until a full 4-hours after eating. This is impaired glucose metabolism and sluggish glucose clearance.
Now everyone in the health field besides me tries to keep blood sugar from rising by eating lightly of foods, or combinations of food, that spike blood glucose levels ? forever avoiding pizza and potatoes. But there’s a huge problem with that ? this glucose clearance system, already out-of-shape, gets even weaker. If (not if but when) our prediabetic goes back to that 1,000-calorie meal after a few months eating ?raw? or ?low-carb? you’re likely to see blood glucose levels go to 250 mg/dl. And the thing is, everyone is likely to eventually return to eating ?normal.? Not just because of social pressure but because you can’t starve yourself of certain things indefinitely. Few people do, and most restrictions lead to binges later.
The solution of course is to CHALLENGE the glucose clearance system by consuming large, complex, gut-busting high-calorie meals with lots of rapidly-absorbed carbohydrates and work on improving your clearance numbers. If a half of a pizza and quart/liter of soda makes your blood glucose spike to 200 mg/dl in an hour when consumed at 1pm today, you should be able to eat that same exact meal at the same time every Saturday and see that glucose clearing faster and faster. 200 the first week, 190 the second, 180 the third, and so forth. That’s usually how it happens, and it is the ONLY yardstick for whether or not the functionality of this system is genuinely improving with whatever health interventions you are pursuing.
Speaking of large, complex, gut-busting high-calorie meals ? wow does this do incredible things for your digestive system. The human body, if not challenged, will atrophy. That’s true of the brain, the digestive system, the bones, the muscles?
Without enough digestive ‘stress? of having to perform a very difficult task of properly handling a huge load of food all at once, the digestive system becomes weak and pathetic. If you do something stupid like ?food-combining,? which ironically means to NOT ever combine foods together, eating a normal meal that combines all the components that make a meal complete (starch, meat, fat, salt, vegetables, drink, dessert) will ruin you. If you want to make your digestive system weaker, put fewer demands on it.
What I want everyone to ?get? from reading this article is that stress, in the right context, is extremely beneficial. The main thing is that you are not exceeding your capacity to handle that stress and breaking down from it ? but rather rebuilding with a greater capacity to perform. If you take on stress with a good attitude ? one of seeking to build greater strength and resilience from rising to meet various challenges in life ? physical, mental, emotional, and edible, and give yourself enough recovery time to insure constant progress, you may very well find that the stress you’ve been trying so hard to avoid is actually your greatest catalyst to a better life.
How do you know how much is too much? If you are making progress in the system you are stressing, it is probably not too much. If you stop making progress or start to regress while really working hard, it’s probably too much.
Hey, like anything it depends COMPLETELY on the person we are talking about and their unique situation and their unique capacity to handle stress and sufficiently recover from it, but hopefully this message will hit the right pairs of eyes and be a powerful spark to pursue many forms of badassery.
?During both eustress and distress the body undergoes virtually the same negative stimuli acting upon it. However, the fact that eustress causes much less damage than distress graphically demonstrates that it is ?how you take it? that determines, ultimately, whether one can adapt successfully to change.
?A certain amount of stress is needed to tune you up for action and keep you on your toes. This is especially true of eustress, which is enjoyable in itself and actually gives purpose to life. On the other hand, we must learn the limits of our endurance before we exceed them dangerously.?
~Hans Selye; The Stress of Life
Nice! I am enjoying the current blog posts you’ve got going. About overloading the digestive system, i have been doing it. Mixed meals seem to everything run nicely, but I do have joint aches,muscle pulls more often. Plus desire to exercise not back yet.
and TMI but bowel movements kinda loose and explosive ( sorry! ) is it because my body is not digesting well?
i did have to take antibiotics a month ago due to a stomach infection and that time my blood work showed a severe deficiency of vitamin D and B12. I started supplementing but not feeling great yet. I will stay on the path of high calorie and carbs and see how it goes.
Keep going for a while. I would guess you digestive system is atrophied and this is how it is catching up to speed. That’s happening to me now, and I’m guessing it will take a while.
Matt — I agree most are best served with the sun burn analogy but it falls apart to me for the experienced lifter/body builder. Training “too much” can be a strategy for gains. It needs experience, perfect technique, and razor sharp spidey-sense of when you’re risking injury. But training through general fatigue, or training the same muscles on consecutive days, or doing legs 14 times in a month for example is not all bad, even if the trainee gets weaker and is starting to feel drained as hell. It’s about trade-offs, compromises, goals and knowing your general baseline of health. But working quads 10-14x in 1 month and doing them only 2-3 times the next month is an example of ‘over-reaching’, extreme training followed by a period recovery. Many report this as a technique for getting through a plateau in performance or bringing up a stubborn body part. Lately I’ve tried a funny 6 body part split, 3 days on 1 day off. And the order is funky. The last of the 6 days is arms. Then you start back with arms after one day off ending with hamstrings. Then you start back with hamstrings after a day off. So even though you’re sore as hell you still train that same body part and then you get a ton of time off…
I think you are over analyzing the metaphor. Where did Matt say that you shouldn’t find new ways to stress the system you are training to over come adaptation?
Those trees live in a forest, dude. ;-)
Dang, it took 3 paragraphs to actually start the article, nice job Matt! :)
It’s a new record. Thanks for your congratulatory sentiments.
Another awesome article.
I have the feeling your article and book drafts have pizza grease and root beer stains on em. Or maybe your keyboard does?
Digestion training: No pain, no gain
Your next book maybe?
Pooperstar
Awesome article. When you mention eating the same meal every week and getting a better result each time, is that just from eating that meal once per week or from working on something throughout the week as well..if that makes any sense…
I was wondering that too.
“That’s usually how it happens, and it is the ONLY yardstick for whether or not the functionality of this system is genuinely improving with whatever health interventions you are pursuing. ”
seemed to imply other interventions besides eating that big meal once a week.
Sure. Things like raising metabolism through sleep and food, maybe some exercise interventions but with the proper dose. That kind of stuff.
Ah. Should’ve known.
You know what this makes me think of? How I used to eat fast food when I was a kid, like no problem. But I stopped eating it when I was 14 and when I was 16 (and very stoned) I decided a Number 2 from Micky D’s for old time’s sake was a great idea. So I ate it, felt like I had a brick in my stomach for three hours, slept for twelve and finally had another Number 2- this one was more explosive and took place on the toilet. And the whole time I’m wondering how the fuck I managed to eat twice that amount of fast food without incident not too many years prior. I was so sure it was because I was like so totally healthy that all the “toxins’ were offending the pristine landscape of my innards. But it’s just a matter of conditioning. Same reason someone can smoke a pack a day and feel fine but a non-smoker can have three drags off a cigarette and come down with temporary bronchitis. Not that I’m suggesting smoking. Or even eating McDonald’s, for that matter. I guess I’m just sayin’ that practice makes perfect!
If you have a chance, go back into the 180 archives, 2009/2010 ( I recall spring ’09 and early ’10) when a fellow, BruceK would often post. He had his 10 rules of HED (high everything diet), but what really stayed me were his comments in that the digestive system really has to be trained. If you want to be able to handle any type of food in any reasonable quantity(well at one sitting anyway!) then you have to let go and……EAT THAT FOOD! Maybe a tad uncomfortable at first, but your system will adapt and strengthen.
Good Post.
Hopefully some of the people who refuse to do any physical activity while wondering why their weight won’t budge will start doing something.
I truly enjoy bodybuilding, but I’m metabolically run-down, cold and tired….should i force myself to workout or cud this set me back further?
Marcus that to me is a definite sign you need a break!
That’s how I get as well with too much volume in my strength training. You may be pleasantly surprised that doing fewer sets, less frequently yields even more improvement.
I put a ‘u’ in colour and I still find you funny…. mostly….
Hi Emma,
I’m Emma also. I’ll change my name to EmmaW so that people do not confuse us. :)
Matt, when is Mr. Bean guest posting?
Marcus, being run down is a sign you are not recovering. Fast metabolism = Fast recovery= More strength/muscle. Unless this is a planned “over-reaching” effort, then back off some. That means you can still lift, just cut the volume and intensity until your body springs back. Add in some diet recovery.
There is an alternative view to this promoted by John Broz and few people from the Bulgarian school of thought where they just believe in pushing it to the max everyday. You will get rundown for periods but your body will adjust (supposedly). I think this view would be in conflict with the 180 Health view of stress, but there are many theories out there. There is the old adage of “there is no such thing as overtraining, only under eating”. Body builders have a bulk cycle and a “cut” cycle but I’d bet Matt would have something to say about the metabolic effects of the hardcore dieting those guys do to lose weight and get to insanely low body fat levels.
I have experimented around with training a lot, and I dont think the body does adjust to continous overtraining. Not mine anyway.
I have tried it and I do get run down- start getting weaker, more injury prone etc;
and my body doesnt adjust from persisting in this path!
The thing that fixes it is training less often and less volume overall- more food helps too.
I cant push it to the max every day- though it is a nice idea!
Matt, this post makes so much sense, it’s scary. Say we look at this from the viewpoint of the symbionts that make up 90% of our cells (i.e. our gut microbes.). Back when I took ecology in college, decades ago, we learned about “facultative” herbivores, and “obligate” herbivores. So, there are organisms that will only eat plants (the obligates) and there are organisms that will eat plants when there’s nothing else to eat (the facultatives). If this principle applies in the microbiotic setting, then there will be organisms that are “facultative” or “obligate” carbivores, depending on what’s around in the gut. If you don’t eat carbs, gluten, or whatever, you starve out the obligates, and you don’t give the facultatives a chance to branch into that food source. Challenging the system with carbs/glucose/whatever as you say, would grow the numbers of organisms that could use that food, and would thus improve your ability to digest those foods. But, that just takes us back to the idea that antibiotics can only screw things up – and should only be taken with extreme caution.
Nola, I agree. On the opposite end from overtraining are books like Easy Strength which, while its a somewhat complicated book at times since its in conversation format, the concept of not killing yourself with exercise is a smart one. The problem I see are the people with New Year resolutions who decide to exercise hard and diet all at once. No wonder people can’t stick to their resolutions.
Yes, I agree David.
What is taught in the gyms about exercising hard and eating less leads to burnout for most!
I have killed myself in the gym and found it not productive-
so now I am trying the easy way! – and spacing out my workouts more, less volume and not retraining a muscle until it is fully recovered.
So far it feels good;
my strength is starting to come up again,
and my right knee which has been precariously strained for months is returning to normal.
I am also taking part in Matts static contraction experiment- so we will see how that goes!
I think there’s a name for what Matt is describing — hormesis (from wikipedia: “generally favorable biological responses to low exposures to toxins and other stressors”).
Here’s a site/blog devoted to the idea… http://gettingstronger.org/ A few of the things that that site recommends is high intensity exercise, intermittent fasting and cold showers.
I tried the 10 mns cold showers for a year, following gettingstronger.org’s advice (I had done the faster ones for a year before, but 10 mns of freezing water in the winter is something else…), and though it was very interesting, I think it might have been too tough for my skinny body to handle. Also it was just in my paleo era, and after one year I found out that my immune system was low.
I don’t know if it was the paleo, the cold showers, or the combination of both.
But the cold showers felt amazing.
Dan, I really like that guys site and I think someone should link this post in the comments section for him. Gettingstronger.org focuses on “diet” stress but the author only looks at reducing calories, intermittent fasting, low carb and other ways of “not eating.” As far as I know he has never considered strategic overeating. I’d have to find the specific log post but his diet is very strict and he sees eating as a stress whereas most people on 180 see eating as a way to reduce stress.
The gettingstronger.org site is a fascinating read for more information about how stress is good for us. However, it has fallen victim to over-complicating things and has far too much text, rules, steps and superfluous information. This is where Matt’s posts are far superior in being concise and more focused.
I’m also unconvinced by the use of a restrictive diet for the masses. Intermittent fasting just doesn’t work for me and I don’t think I’m alone here. I agree with David that we shouldn’t shy from stress, but let eating be relaxing and de-stressing which usually means not restricting consumption.
Unfortunately I think the reaction to the stress of fasting or otherwise restricting the diet is to add more body fat! Whereas the stress of a hard workout or something like that is to get leaner.
Interesting to find mention of the gettingstronger site. The guy that runs that site lives near me here in Silicon Valley. That site is what turned me on to Paleo :( Luckily I never got into the Intermittent Fasting that he touts. Given that the traffic over there is low, you can probably still find my posts.
Hormesis is an interesting concept. Somebody should probably post about strategic over-eating. They might be interested in it over there.
Ha, speak of the devil! Check out this post that I did to gettingstronger a few years back: http://forum.gettingstronger.org/index.php/topic,78.0.html
In point number six (6) I wrote this:
Seems like a lot of people here eat a quasi-paleo diet (me, too). What would happen if a couple days a month you gorged on high-carb food?
Good article but I had plenty of digestive stress for the first 35 years of my life and anymore just results in blowouts or constipation… thank you.
Matt, I agree this post does make a lot of sense and I have experienced much of what you describe regarding weight training and glucose clearance. However I am still very confused regarding the glucose clearance thing. I was a low carber for years and was prediabetic previously. I have been experimenting with introducing carbs back in my diet and am seeing gradual improvement in the readings which is fascinating to me. But what does this say about the type 2 diabetic or prediabetic that was already eating carbs? What is the game plan for them? I started out as a prediabetic which is why I went lc in the first place. My readings are getting better, but seems I can only get under 100 when I omit carbs again.
Most prediabetics spent their entire adult lives having coffee for breakfast and a light lunch with diet soda and then pigging out on high-fat foods (cookies, chips, pizza, french fries, popcorn, etc.) all night. Being on and off diets. Subjecting their bodies to chronic stress. Not sleeping well. Watching tons of tv and not doing anything physically. Living an uninspiring life. These are the things that elevate the hormones that raise blood sugar (glucocorticoids). An increase in blood sugar itself is a healthy adaptation to this lifestyle, trying to compensate for the lack of sugar at the cellular level. Forcing blood sugar down probably does even more damage.
Anyway, you have to take the full organism into account, not myopically focus on one number such as fasting glucose levels – especially knowing that those who omit carbs typically resume eating carbs later on. I think when you comprehensively look at the whole situation of the disturbance in glucose metabolism a whole different approach arises.
Hey Kris I was also wondering if you ate high processed foods and PUFAs when you were per-diabetic.
@David and Matt – Much of this does sound like me. Have been an insomniac for most of my life. I have dabbled with IF and have also done a long term 6 month fast diet to lose pregnancy weight years ago. I was a vegetarian for a decade. I also have a tendency to binge while being close to perfect the rest of the time. Trouble area is at night while eating very little during the day. Have always been sensitive to additives and preservatives, believing they were causing my insomnia, and have always been health conscious, so as a rule have not eaten a lot of highly processed foods except for the occasional binge. But that could be a box of devil dogs, trip to McD’s or whole bag of chips etc. Introducing carbs back in my diet seems to have curbed the binging. Still do McD’s around once every 2 weeks though. I am not a couch potato however and do exercise, even excessively at times but not consistently. I could go a whole winter without exercising. I have felt stressed much of my life and don’t think that will change much. Never realized before confessing all this how much of a mess I was! ha. Guess I could be the poster child for metabolic disorder.
Matt, you just described my life to a ‘T’. This comment is inspiring me to rethink how I am approaching my health problems. I too want to lower BG levels, increase thyroid hormone etc. But at what cost? And why is my body doing what it’s doing? You really got me thinking…
Your conclusions on diet and nutrition are right on because they’re so translatable to other aspects of life. Thinking about how avoiding dietary stress can atrophy the systems reminds me of my distaste for advice like “avoid all negative people and situations.” Great idea. That way, you can create some imaginary paradigm where everything is pleasant and then you get hit with some real shit like a break up, job loss, death- and bam, you’re fucked. You’re fucked because you let your deal-with-the-tough-stuff muscle go all limp and flaccid and now you can’t handle anything outside of your specially tailored diet of bullshit and butterflies.
I think there’s much to be gained through challenges- but it all depends on your attitude, for sure. If I could sum it up I’d say “what doesn’t harm you beyond the point of being able to achieve swift recovery and compensatory improvements will make you stronger”, but I think maybe someone else already did.
I’m about to head out for work. I’ve been at this job for over 2 years.
When I first started, I was hardly eating anything. I was really messed up. Wouldn’t eat white rice, only brown rice, and it had to be soaked specially to get rid of the phytic acid, wouldn’t eat white sugar, was avoiding gluten on and off, and just plain wasn’t eating enough calories at all. Felt dizzy and tired all the time and would get REALLY pissed off at work, especially since it’s a manual labor job that just stressed me out even more.
The history of that goes WAY before I got this job, but I just wanted to share this little anecdote. It’s taken me about 2 years to really start getting better, to the point where I can eat ice cream without having severe gas/bloating/diarrhea, I rarely get constipated or have very, very loose bowel movements, which were the only two things I had for quite a long time. I’m eating bread/flour products again, have been using white sugar again, drinking orange juice and grape juice and some soda here and there, eating fast food whenever I’m feeling run down and have nothing ready to eat instead of simply skipping a meal and passing out to conserve energy.
It’s pretty sad to look back on a lot of my life and see how messed up my relationship with myself has been, especially considering how desperate I was to help myself but how that desperation distorted into destructiveness, neuroticism, obsessiveness etc.
But yeah. I’m still getting better and recovering, and it’s been 2 years for me. I was anorexic for a while and over-exercised and obsessed about nutrition/diet, ran the whole block with that thing. But don’t give up. There was a time where I was having problems swallowing and almost choked to death quite a number of times when I was at my worst. But I kept at it and my calories are back up now, I’m doing a bodyweight version of Body by Science once a week, am getting more sleep, etc.
There is hope. It might take a long time for some people like me, but the body’s pretty amazing in how much it can recover.
Hi Matt,
This article rings true for me – theres a good article you might like the look of that I got linked to by Alan Aragon: http://dyenutrition.wordpress.com/2013/01/17/the-porcelain-doll-diet/
Think it is driving at a similar point.
If you get chance to respond to this, I’d like to ask you one question:
I’ve bought the book and been RRAFing for some time now. Despite this my basal body temp is still 97.1 at best and I’m pretty symptomatic. I’ve even added in 50mcg of Cytomel for the past 2 weeks and still no increase.
However, having not been drinking for some time due to it being a supposed stressor (in the region of 8 months), I had several drinks on Saturday and wake up to find my basal temp 98.1 and it even got up to 99 later in the day. Despite being hungover I felt great – a lot of the symptoms such as dry eyes, poor libido, poor focus were much better.
Could you give me a clue as to what mechanism this might be working on? Noepinehpherine increasing body temp possibly? Obviously drinking every day is not a solution but it is interesting neverthless and maybe highlighting the fact that body temp has other factors than thyroid / adrenals?
Cheers in advance!
I would think it probably has something to do with liver glycogen restoration. Have you been avoiding sugar?
JD- you may notice that the link at the top of the article under the words ‘Matthew Bowen’ links to that very article you mention.
Just FYI :-D
Haha sorry completely missed that! Oh well great minds.. :)
Thanks for the speedy reply. I eat a fair amount of fruit along with other carb sources like potatoes, s potatoes, oats etc but haven’t really been consuming refined sugar?
Have been getting >= 400g of carbs per day though for the last 2 months, so wondering if there is some other mechanism it could be working on. Just find it odd that body temp isn’t budging with T3 but then does with a couple of drinks! Most of the literature I’ve read suggests alcohol lowers core temp as a depressant. Odd..
JD,
Thanks for comments. I had asked a question on a earlier post regarding the effects alcohol has on my body temps. Whenver I drink either a bottle of beer or some shots of liquor, my upper chest area feels very warm and eventually I perspire a lot (more like I sweat like a Rainforest). Do you get warm to the point of persperation? Just wondering.
I don’t get warm to the point of perspiration – no. I wouldn’t even say noticeably warmer, just measurably!
And without meaning to clog this comments section, my little N1 study this afternoon.
All temps underarm:
97.1 Basal
98.0 @ 4.20pm
1 25ml measure of Johnny Walker @ 4:30
98.5 @ 5pm
“I think the reaction to the stress of fasting or otherwise restricting the diet is to add more body fat!”
Matt, just don’t tell Chief that ;)
What a timely blog!
I have been low carbing it for the last 2-1/2 years. I went from full-blown metabolic syndrome complete with fatty liver disease, hypothyroid, pre-diabetes, high bp, high chol, high trigs, gout, and sleep apnea at 250lbs (5’10/46yo/m) to a 5’10/48yo now at 170lbs and completely ‘cured’ of all the met syn problems I had. On no meds, don’t need CPAP, no gout in 2 years.
Anyway, here’s what’s going on now. I got off my thyroid meds (150mcg Synthroid) about a year ago. Last fall, my TSH was a bit high and T4 a bit low, so they started me on 60mg of Armour (I definitely do not have Hashi’s).
About Jan 1st, I started reading you and some others and started adding potatoes and rice everyday. Within the last couple weeks, my body temp has gone from 96-97 to 98.something consistently.
I’m eating oranges, bananas, blueberries, potatoes and rice every day.
Last week, I felt a little woozy and checked my FBG at 8am. It was 120. A few hours later, still fasting it was 100. After a big lunch of potato, veggies, and meat it spiked to 160’s then down to 100 within 2-3 hours.
This morning I checked my FBG and it’s 120.
During my LC days, I would rarely see an FBG above 95. In my pre-diabetes days, eating total crap and half alcoholic, I was in the 110-120 range, but HbA1C was always normal.
I have an appointment with an endocrinologist scheduled for 15 Feb.
Any advice on what to do right now, and what to talk with Endo about?
I’m thinking I am probably hyperthyroid right now, which seems to cause high FBG, but also have a f’ed up metabolism thanks to my LC days. Any advice appreciated, and consider the waiver signed–I’m only looing for discussion, not medical advice, but I think my situation is not that uncommon.
Thanks
I think you’re funny Matt, and I spell things the proper way ;)
Good read. Any diet that allows me to eat some pizza is ok with me LOL.
This is so funny cause, I just got an email from Jon Gabriel talking about how stress will make you fat and trying to get you into Meridian tapping. He was talking about the kind of cortisol-producing stress you get from traffic or working with a terrible boss. Not dead lifting.
Reminds me of what Ori Hofmeckler says. He thinks big, high calorie meals “teach” the body to burn more calories and that they should be cycled and combined with exercise. I did some 3,000 calorie meals last winter. I didn’t gain a lb but did starve a lot between meals. Now I’m so freaked out about gluten I don’t think I can do the 2-3 slices of pizza thing. I really worry about allergies, like what if its making me sneeze or if I have to wait years to get it out of my system. So much for high calorie night.
I think you’re hilarious Matt. Generally I feel like my humor is very unique, but I surround myself with those that have the same sense of humor, so I don’t feel so weird :)
I usually laugh out loud reading a post of yours, so stay with it.
Oi Matt, I put the ‘u’ in ‘favourite’ and ‘colour’ and yet I think you’re hilarious :P
I dunno what you think of smoking? (ie. tobacco) I never seem to get addicted to it, but I feel that 1 (additive-free) cigarette every couple of months actually does me some good. Could this be considered an acute stress…..