Its coming towards the end of January.

 

Well done for making it through and the last few days are going to fly by.

 

I’ve been doing some research into how things work around social media and the like, and from what I see blogging and new letters are the way forward, and I’m sure I was doing that back in the early 2000s. Cycles eh? So, efficient newsletter and blogging.

 

This last week I’ve been fasting, 500 calories a day in drink form. I tend to do this every three month or so. The last was just before Lisa’s birthday in November. So… I’m kind of due it. What I noticed this week is that fasting is HARD during the winter, it was great for the first couple of days, and then I got cold.

 

No calories, no protein, no carbs. I was cold. What was good is that I noticed my wimhof breathing is getting better fast, from 1min 30 to two and a half to three minutes. This implies to me that my body is liking the fasting.

 

It also does not like being cold.

 

This go me thinking about how my body work and what it likes doing.

 

One thing that I’ve learned about myself is that I love to be prepared. It’s part of my youth that I’ve kept going. I was a scout, and something I love to do is collect tools and skills. Taking the be prepared motto to the extreme. This is great when it comes to some random situation where I can say, ‘A-HA! I know how to do that!’ for most of life is not so useful, as the basic tasks of everyday life.

 

I realised this when I was planning the activities for the scout troop I volunteer with, I love a skill.

 

I was thinking what is the took kit, the sills set that is needed for life now? What skills do we as humans need to live our lives in the 21st century?

 

Primitive stone age Rich had a very different set of skills that he needed to survive, make fire from flint, catch the deer, avoid cholera etc. These skills are kind of the ones we’ve evolved to have. This is how our bodies work. To hunt and gather and live a very primitive life. Its only been a few hundred years since we’ve had the infrastructure in our world to have to look at other skills like, for example, remembering to turn the bathroom light off, or driving or replying to the email.

 

What I’ve seen is that our minds and bodies are not quite there yet with catching up with modern human behaviour, our intellect is there, but the wiring is not. Therefore, we are getting stressed, tired, and depressed. Our bodies have a skill set for hunting, gathering, and living life in the wilderness of sub-Saharan Africa 20000 years ago. A skill set that we are trying desperately to fit to our modern world.

 

This applies to me feeling too cold while fasting in January too. The ecology our bodies are made for no longer exists for many of us. Like my body liking fasting, I have to go out of my way to fast, as there is lots of food around. The world is different now, and we have to learn skills and collect tools to make it work for us.

 

What do I do to help myself in this? Being as I’ve collected loads of tools and techniques? Well.

 

1.     I Do my wim hof breath every day, along with a cold show. This makes my body and mind better at dealing with discomfort.

2.     I fast every 8-10 weeks. For five-seven days. This helps me make sure my body is not getting bunged up.

3.     I do a spiritual practice every day, part of it is meditation. I’ll go over what I do in another post.

 

There are other things I could/should be doing, like more dedicated exercise, and consistently wearing my blue blocking glasses at night. Those three things are what I do every day.

 

Do you have any non-negotiable practices?

Big love

Rich xxx