Lessons from Logotherapy: You have a Choice!

Good Morning Internets! 

Today I’m going to talk about the lessons I have learned from reading about “logotherapy”. What is logotherapy? Well it’s a stream of psychology developed by Viktor Frankl that is based on the premise of Existential Analysis and the will to meaning as a motive for human behaviour.

Basically, logotherapist will define the search for meaning in one’s life as the singular, most powerful, motivating force that we can possess. Some other traditional psychologists will argue that other “wills” are more influential, such as the will to power (i.e., Alder) or the will to pleasure (i.e., Freud).  

Why the hell am I talking about all this stuff? Well, I’m half way through Frankl’s book “Man’s Search for Meaning” (which I highly recommend) and I think his philosophy on life and psychology fits VERY well when it comes to health behavior change psychology (i.e., what this blog is based on).

For the purpose of this post, and my general(evolving) view point in life, the will to meaning leads to the best “mental hygiene” (according to Frankl), and thus the impetus needed for meaningful changes to one’s life (i.e., health behaviour). 

So what are some lessons I have learned so far from logotherapy and how it pertains to maintaining a healthy lifestyle? Well I am going to cover two today, so read on if I haven’t totally lost you already!

1. Life has meaning in all circumstances, even the most miserable ones: 

Frankl will often refer to his experiences during the Holocaust when talking about this premise. Although adopting a healthy lifestyle can NEVER be compared to the suffering endured by Holocast survivors, I think this point offers some insight into changing you behaviour in this regard.

This may make sense, or may just be an example of how my biases will take anything and make it into something, but from my experience, the primary reason(s) I hear that people can’t/won’t be physically active that want to be are a) I don’t have enough time or b) I don’t have enough money.

If we take the premise “life has meaning in all circumstances” as truth, these two minor barriers would not prevent you from being physically active. Alternatively, at the moment being physically active just does not mean enough to you to overcome these perceived barriers. 

I know this may seem blunt and hard to digest, but regardless of your circumstances, if you derive meaning in your life from being active and healthy you will do anything to achieve that goal. 

Now, if despite your best intentions you are currently struggling to start and maintain positive health changes in your life, I’d like you to ask yourself, “do I derive meaning and a feeling of accomplishment from doing these behaviours?” If not, you’re probably not going to start or continue doing said behaviours. The problem is (obviously still in my opinion), health is the single most important thing we have in this world. By being healthy we can love and help others and lead a fulfilling life full of happiness, sorrows, and experiences.

So how do you make these beahviours a priority to you? Well no one can tell you the answer, you just have to “do it”. I know that sounds simplistic, but a mere change in perspective and your own psychology can be a very impactful tool to change behaviour. However, from experience, this is very hard to do and takes a lot of patients and acceptance of failure. 

If you believe this may be a route of why you haven’t been able to start and maintain a regularly active schedule and eat healthy food I would recommend devoting one-two day(s) of the week to health. You have to think of these days as a necessity for you to have meaning in your life (i.e., these days are of importance to your well being as a person). If you achieve successfully completing your health day(s) on a regular basis (i.e., 2-3 weeks), re-assess then “up-the-ante” if you deem it necessary.  

2. We have the freedom to find meaning in what we do, what we experience, or at least in the stand we take when we are faced with a situation of unchangeable suffering.

Again, this postulation was advanced by Frankl as a result of his Holocaust experience, but it can be very applicable to our more “mundane” and “comfortable” existence that most of us are lucky enough to experience.  

You, yes YOU, have 100% control of a) your thoughts, or at least how you interpret them, b) your choices and beliefs, and thus c) your behaviours and experiences. If physical activity ISN’T important to you, despite what everyone is saying, don’t do it. You have that choice. 

Again, I am bias as I derive a LOT of meaning in my life from physically active pursuits, but we must acknowledge that with every choice there is a consequence, and the only person responsible for that is you. So, you decide you do not want to be physically active or eat healthy, then you have to accept yourself as a physically inactive person. If you get heart disease, become over-weight, or develop insulin resistance you have to acknowledge that you are the only person responsible for these ailments, and you have a choice to change it. 

Frankl says (which I love), your actions on one day do NOT or should not influence your actions on the next day, as every day presents different challenges. Just because you have neglected your body and want to make a change doesn’t mean you’re a less a person for letting yourself slip into poor health (despite what North American culture will tell you), it just wasn’t a priority for you in the past, and thus, poor health was the consequence. Now we can get into the politics of the “burden on the health care system due to inactivity” but that isn’t the point of this post, the point is that YOU HAVE A CHOICE no matter what you have done in the past. 

So you’ve been overweight your entire life, your parents taught you to eat like crap, you've never stepped foot in a gym, and you’re depressed. Well you have a choice as a free person to change everything despite your past circumstances…

If you’re unsure how to make that transition from past to present, I can tell you the first step is to acknowledge and own that you have a choice and complete control over every action you make and everything you say, and thus must take responsibility for the results. I know this because I have been on top of the world, and at the bottom of it, and the only difference between the two “lives” I have lived is how I handled my circumstances in terms of my choices psychologically and behaviourally.

If you’re still unsure what I am rambling about, watch the video below. It’s not directly pertinent to physically activity, but outlines the premise of freedom of choice and finding meaning in life.

So I’ll leave it there for now. As always, if you have questions, concerns, or comments leave them below or if you’d like you can e-mail me at byntraining@gmail.com

Stay Strong!

~Byn

Why being physically active is one of the best things you do……period.

Word-up people of the Webverse

 

I’m writing a post due to recent requests/pestering from my readers, the fact I haven't written anything (in this blog) in Jan 3rd, and (more likely) because I’m having a major writing block trying to finish my thesis (I literally have like 2 pages to go). 

This post is about why physical activity is the best thing EVER and is for pure entertainment and/or practical life information. I’ll let you decide.

 1. It’s the closest way to feel like, and actually become, a real life superhero. Specifically, when working out a regular basis you are likely to start to refer to yourself in your superhero alter ego (i.e., Byn), where colourful costumes, recruit sidekicks, and talk like a superhero (“Let’s do this!”). Sure, taking LSD will give you probably a “higher” feeling of super-hero-dum, but I hear isn’t the best thing to do to your brain, and you’re more likely to –actually- try to fly, which I also hear isn’t a good idea.

2. You meet sexy ass, awesome superheros as well. Physically active people are pretty cool (and not too bad to look at either). Don’t get me wrong, we complain about how much our legs/biceps (Scott)/lats/glutes/forearms/fingers hurt all the time, and there are a fair share of physically active “douchebags”, but generally active people are fun and like to do fun things…. Maybe with you! Wink.

… Wait did I just call myself hot? Damn right!

3. It gives you an excuse to touch/fondle/molest your friends in public and in a socially acceptable manner. “Oh, your pecs are sore? Come here. Let me message that for you”.  I’m actually pretty sure that’s how 99% of fitness relationships start… I’m talking to you Josh and Robin.  

4. It gives you something to talk about. “That crazy spin instructor destroyed my quads last night…Guess what, I’m the instructor!” *creepy smile*, “I just benched my own body weight”, and “I like rock climb pretty much any time I can”, are great conversation starters, despite what the people on the bus say.

5. Self inflicted pain helps you deal with unexpected pain. Just bashed your knee against the toilet after you dropped your cellphone in it, fell off the lawn chair trying to reach your beer that was obviously out of reach to everyone else watching you, or somehow wedged yourself in a log and had to be pulled out by your legs? That’s nothing compared to the 70 lunges/burpies/boulder problems you did yesterday.

6. It helps you be fucking awesome(er) as you age. Everyone loves a muscular old person - they’re cute AND terrifying at the same time! Imagine your grandkids being all like “yea, well my grandma is stronger than your dad”….. “thanks grandkids.. I AM a pretty bad ass old person!” (here’s some money)…Yea that’s what I thought, you want that in your life. I also hear riding motorcycles can give you the same “bad ass” appeal, but let’s be serious- I’m a pretty terrible driver at 26.

7. You can be a screaming crazy person. It’s the only socially acceptable situation where you can scream like you (a) are having sex, (b) are really angry, or (c) just discovered that the leafs blew a 4-1 lead in the time it took you to get a sammich and go to the bathroom, (too soon?). Helps ya’ get rid of all that pent up emotion and such. It also helps you deal with the previously mentioned situations… well, except for (a) it helps you deal with a lack of that usually.

8. It gives you an excuse to wear spandex pretty much every day. We all know spandex is comfortable as fuck and makes your butt look faaaannntttassstic,  yes even for you too men. I’m pretty sure Scott’s didn’t think I owned anything but spandex for the first year we were dating, not that he complained.

9. Letting everyone else know how awesome you are. Finally, it gives you feelings of self entitlement to tell everyone about how active you are, how awesome being active is, and why everyone in the entire world should work out.  Not like I ever do that…..

Seriously though, if you need help being active respond to this blog post or e-mail me at byntraining@gmail.com

Yup being active is pretty much the greatest thing ever. Enough of this, I should be writing my thesis.

Stay Strong

~Byn

Happy New Year? Are you Tired?

Good New Years to you People of the Interverse!

Although it would seem appropriate to write a New Year’s resolution post, I feel that cake has been made by many other fitness and health bloggers. So my first post of the New Year will be based on something my cousin reminded me of today, which can be crippling when it comes to wellness. This is feeling tired, exhausted, and generally run down a good portion of the time, what can be causing it and how to deal with it.

Why is this topic important? Well, if you are tired all of time, you are not exactly going to be motivated to tackle that resolution you have made for yourself. Maybe what I call the “resolution high” will carry your behaviour change for a couple of weeks, but if you do not deal with the fatigue you experience daily/on a regular basis, then you are likely to relapse. Also, if you are tired all the time it means your body is not operating at maximum capacity, and yes, this can be changed if you figure out where the lack of energy is steaming from. 

So how do you know you are tired? I know it seems like a simple enough question, but (in my opinion) there is “normal tiredness”, which can be dealt with by changing simple behaviours, and “abnormal tiredness”, which is usually doing with something deeper and medically based.

I will deal with normal tiredness in this post and will touch on when being tired becomes abnormal in a later post.

“Normal” Tiredness:

What I deem “normal” tiredness (if being tired is ever normal) is something that is not regularly occurring and is associated with acute/short term aspects of your schedule and beaviours. (Note: any of these examples can become chronic and abnormal if you engage in them all of the time)

Problem #1: Dietary Tiredness:  This occurs when how you’re eating affects your moods and energy levels and is often linked to being unaware of your sugar consumption. For example, if you eat a lot of sugar or high glycemic index foods (for more about this click here) during the first half of the day, or a big lunch and then crash at 2pm, this is a relatively easy fix.

If you think this problem sounds familiar I recommend the following.

•   Eat Breakfast! If you do not eat breakfast you are setting yourself up for a very tired day. If you are one of those people who don’t like to eat in the morning (I used to be one of those people), start small (e.g., eat a banana) then work your way up.  You should be eating a relatively large meal for breakfast. I’m 130lbs, 5’2 female and I eat 1-2 eggs, half an avocado, and 1-2 English muffins, sometimes a banana.

• Make sure you have protein for breakfast: This can be in the form of eggs, natural nut butter, almonds or cottage cheese. Having protein first thing in the morning will keep your blood sugar level throughout the morning (see glycemicindex).

• Go low carb during the day: This takes some time to get used to but try and stay away from breads and sugars during the day (even in the form of juice). Eating protein and veggies instead will leave you feeling a lot more energetic

• Avoid too much caffeine and sugar in the form of drinks: I’m a graduate student, so yes I have caffeine, but I always try to limit it to 1 or 2 cups a day. If you are finding that you need 3 or more cups of caffeinated/sugary drinks to keep yourself going think again. Yes they will give you a quick “pick me up” but once your blood sugar crashes you’ll likely feel worse off than before. 

Too much caffeine have you crashing?!

Problem #2: Lack of Sleep:  

This is as, if not more common, the dietary tiredness. Although the recommendations are 8 hours of sleep/night for adults, in my opinion, how much sleep you need is a very individual thing. For me I work best on 7-8 hours. The only way you will find this out is to experiment. However, if you are getting less than 6 hours of sleep/night you’re probably not running at full capacity. 

Why do you need sleep? Well, during the day we use our brains quite a bit (some of us more than others) and we need sleep to repair/rest our brains. This is why REM (rapid eye movement) sleep is very important. It is believed that in this stage of sleep your brain basically repairs itself and forms new connections. So if you are not sleeping deep enough to get to REM sleep or not staying long enough in REM sleep, waking up and trying to operate is like trying to run a marathon right after you ran a marathon with no rest. 

So how do you get more sleep, or quality sleep? Well there are some ways, and if you’re one of those people who are all like “Robyn, I just can’t get to sleep at a reasonable time, I’m not TIRED” I have some tips for you indeed!

• Go to bed at a reasonable time: If you get up at 6am you should be going to bed no later than 10:30pm (if you need 7-8hours). You have to take into account that it will take time for you to fall asleep, which sometimes be up to half an hour. If you have trouble going to bed earlier because you are not tired try the following

o   Not watching TV/being on the computer 30 minutes before you go to sleep: This will keep your brain super active and not ready for a good night’s sleep

o   Engage in progressive muscle relaxation once in bed. To find out what that is click here, for a YouTube tutorial click here

o   Listen to relaxing music and read or write half an hour before bed

o   Mediate half an hour before bed: To find out more click here

·         Make sure your bedroom is dark and quiet:  

      This can be a really good way to mess up the quality of sleep you are having. This can really be a problem if you live in a condo or apartment building (or if the girl above you walks around in high heels all the time while her dog runs back and forth…….). 

      To make you bedroom super dark you can just buy really dark curtains. If that’s not an option try an eye mask. It’s amazing the difference it can make. Ear plugs can help with noise, but can take some time to get used to, a white noise machine can also help.

Problem #3: Not getting enough exercise: 

So now you are saying to yourself “Ok Robyn, I’ve been hearing this since I was a little kid, make sure you eat right, get enough sleep, and exercise.” Yes, I know you have Internet person! This is because to feel your best and thus perform your best you need to do all of these things. If you are eating well, getting enough sleep, and exercising regularly and you are still exhausted (or are doing the first 2 and can’t workout because you are exhausted) there is probably a bigger problem to why you are tired. 

So before running to your doctor and asking them to fix you, ask yourself honestly, are you taking care of your body the best way you know how? If not try to change your eating, sleeping, and activity habits first before popping a magic pill and hope everything will get better. I have lots of advice on my blog of how to starting eating better and exercising, so do some diggings!

Tired of being tired?

I digress.. As for exercise. The truth is, you don’t have to be following a fitness model’s workout to be getting enough exercise to boost your energy levels. This is a common misconception that we have in modern society. It goes along with the all or none mentality we are brought up to believe in of “if you’re not going 100% then why bother?”  It is also pushed by fitness professionals that you must be working out 5-6 days a week lifting heavy, doing burpies, and complex programming to be “truly” healthy. Why is this incorrect in terms of health? Because you’re not trying to be a fitness model or professional athlete, you want to feel better and be healthy, and that’s ok!

So how much exercise do you need to boost your energy levels? Well, just like sleep, this varies from individual to individual. For high stress people (aka Me), more exercise may be needed than less because releasing tension is one of the goals in boosting energy in these people. For easier going people, 30 minute walk every night after dinner may be more than enough.

The Canadian recommendations are 150minutes/week of moderate to vigorous physical activity, which should be broken up into bouts of 10min or more. So, if you take a 10min brisk walk everyday of the week and two, 30 minute brisk walks on Saturday and Sunday you are meeting the Canadian health recommendations. Pretty reasonable eh?  I would start there if you are unsure if you are getting enough exercise. 

So there you have it, some ways to help you with your energy levels if you’re finding they are kind of low these days. If you’re reading this and are saying “I do all of this stuff and I still feel like crap” a good place to go is your Dr. I will touch base on what abnormal/chronic tiredness could be caused by, but that will be a later post.

As always, and questions, comments or concerns are always appreciated, and feel free to E-Mail me at byntraining@gmail.com if you have any questions you’d rather have answered in private.

Stay Strong and all the best in the New Year!

~Byn