I love my sidcha to wake up, make my bed, cross the room, and turn off my alarm within sixty seconds. Loving the sidcha doesn’t mean I love every moment of it. On the contrary, the first few moments of it feel the same as they always have. I start with the same thoughts. Over the years, my inner monologue has come to change to purposeful enthusiasm faster. But I[…] Keep reading →

Pairing hot with cold Cold showers are hard to start, even in the middle of the summer, though rewarding, so I you want the benefit of taking them. Getting sweaty from running, rowing, or other vigorous exercise feels good in some sense, but who wants to stay sweaty? When you’re hot you want to cool off, even in the middle of winter. Pairing getting hot and sweaty with a cold[…] Keep reading →

Say you exercise in the morning. When is the best time for it? First, what’s the point of morning exercises? Fitness? Yes, you can’t leave fitness out, and if you don’t impose on yourself a healthy daily challenging activity, you might expect the point of the specific activity to be the main goal. It’s not—not in the long term. The goals of daily morning exercise include in the long term[…] Keep reading →

The last time I emptied a load of household garbage, and therefore started filling this load was September 2018. The time before that was, I think, June 2017. I figure I’ll also empty my recycling. I see from when I put my high school love letters in the recycling that I started filling this load in late October, meaning I’m filling my paper recycling faster than I expected. I don’t[…] Keep reading →

On December 22, 2011, a friend and I challenged ourselves to do ten burpees a day for thirty days. As I had aged out of playing ultimate at the level I wanted to, squeezed enough sense of accomplishment from running marathons that I wanted, and didn’t want to pay to use the gym down the block, which I might not go to in the rain and required changing, reshowering, and[…] Keep reading →

The manufacturer of my rowing machine, Concept2, created its annual holiday challenge. In honor of anyone rowing at least 100,000 meters between Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve, they would donate to a climate charity of your choice. Something got into me to do it. 26 days meant five of my workout cycles (day 1: lifting, day 2: Turkish Get Up (TGU), day 3: rest, day 4: cardio, day 5: rest). I[…] Keep reading →

I don’t know how long it takes time for depression to take root — that is, for someone feeling fine to feeling depressed. A quick web search didn’t show anything and I’m sure it differs from person to person. I imagine it rarely happens overnight. The reason I thought about it was a conversation with a friend about sidchas and my twice-daily burpee-based calisthenics. As he put it, motion creates[…] Keep reading →

If you don’t think personal action makes a difference on big things like elections or the environment, try looking at it this way. I’ll put it in terms of the environment, but it applies to diet, voting, self-expression, and more. Many people do many things against their environmental values. Not just in general, but many times daily. They buy packaged food, they eat packaged food several times daily. They drive[…] Keep reading →

I write a lot about cold showers. They may sound crazy, but bear with me and you may find them more helpful than you could have imagined. After taking a few in Shanghai because the water took five minutes to warm up that I couldn’t stand wasting, in December of 2013, I took thirty days of cold showers. I can’t tell you how much the discipline, dedication, and so on[…] Keep reading →