A little bit about me and my health journey

  I'm a vegan.

 

Alright great, now we got that out of the way. There are alot of things I could say about myself and my life, but I think you guys probably only wanna hear about the cool stuff. Well, everybody likes transformations so let's start there.  

 

 The picture on the left is from 2011, the picture on the right is from 2016. Bit of a difference huh? Back in the day I never really care about health too much. I would play computer games all night and sleep in the day. I ate alot of crap food, very few fruits and vegetables. Got stoned alot and had very poor work ethic and motivation. I almost never exercised, maybe just bike to the dairy to get some energy drinks. I had recently graduated from university with a degree in social science, and was unemployed and struggling to find a job.  

 To be honest at that time I was a poor combination of idealistic, lazy and apathetic. I had high ideals, but no motivation to persue them. I felt like the world of business was all corrupt bullshit, and I was dreading becoming an "adult" and joining the "real world". Fast forward a year or so to 2012, I had decided to go to South Korea and teach English. The overseas experience is a big past time in NZ, because we are a small island nation somewhat isolated from the rest of the world. I figured "yeah fuck it", it was decent money, and it sounded like it could be fun. 

 I know it sounds cliche, but I really changed in the two years I was there. I lived in a small town of about 15,000 people called uljin (uljin-eup). It was a bit different from other small towns, because the entire district (uljin-gun) was bankrolled by a massive powerplant in bugu (bukmyeon). I could go on and on about that placebut that’s really its own post in itself, which I will probably get around to at some point.   

 To summarize, some of the things I did there… I learnt Korean language and created “Korean club” with my friend Erik (kind of rival with the local “English club”). I got into parkour and tried to make a club to teach kids but it failed, was fun watching the looks from old grannies at the park though. I got into calisthenics and volleyball… volleyball I think has to be my favourite sport. They called me  청소 which means “clean”, because I would make big slides to get the ball. I also hung out with some older Korean guys and went to bars and karaoke with them. That got kinda crazy sometimes because Korean life is all about hard work and being stoic for men, so night life is where they release all of their pent up feelings. Oh and I also studied the bible with Jehovah’s Witnessess. And I met my first girlfriend there.    There were some things that were not good though. Here is a video of my friend Erik in the 너래방 with some co-teachers:

My lifestyle was kind of exciting, but at the same time partying was quite tiring and lost its novelty quite fast. Smoking a pack of cigarettes a day, drinking every second night, staying up late, eating crappy food, no cardio at all. It takes its toll. I definitely wasn’t putting in much effort at work. I would put all my energy into partying at night, wake up, and just feel shattered. It created a kind of cycle were it made by day kinda suck, so I would drink at night to feel better etc. There were times when I would stop drinking, but I kept going back to it.   It got really bad when I started getting gout, which I had never had before. When that gets bad, it’s very bad. It’s like a little demon critter is in your foot biting it. It makes life a hassle. It was embarrassing hobbling around town like some disabled person. It was difficult to teach a class of kids with a big pain in my foot and low energy. Sometimes when it got bad I would research how I could treat/cure gout... and then when it subsided I would go pack to drinking, smoking etc. 

On a basic level I knew what I was doing was unhealthy, but I was unwilling to change.    So all of those thing were happening simultaneously, good things and bad things. I think one of the things that happened was as a traditionally introverted person, I was living a very extroverted life. I never used to like being the center of attention (I used to be a very shy person). But being a foreigner in a small town within a very monocultural country, there tends to be a lot of eyes on you. And I started to like that feeling of being able to captivate others attention, and enjoy being an exhibitionist.    I think basically my reason for living in such an unhealthy way was unhappiness. I suppose what I mean by that is a lack of inner peace or lack of fulfillment. I had finished 18 years in total of education, and it felt like I had wasted my time. I had taken two seperate gap years, and it felt like I had wasted my time. So instead of sitting on my ass being a loser playing computer games and wanking all day, I was gonna enjoy life and “live life to the fullest”.  

   I was doing so many things, constantly searching for novelties. I was saying to myself “it’s good to do this, because life is here for us to enjoy, and a good life is an enjoyable life”. But then I found myself in a place where I would wake up and feel “this is not enjoyable”. And of course by all means, I enjoyed a very good standard of living, as I still do. But like many western people find, just having lots of shit is not actually that fulfilling. And even a step further, having lots of experiences is not necessarily fulfilling.    I like everyone work on a pleasure/pain principal. I, like a lot of guys, was raised to be stoic, and to this day I value stoicism. 

But it’s not manly or stoic to abuse yourself/health, and this is one of the false impressions of masculinity I was under. For example, I might go out drinking till 3am, eating a lot of meat for example. Then wake up at midday feeling tired, hungover, and with gout. And I would rationalize it like “Pleasure is good because it’s enjoyable. Pain is bad, but a real man endures it”. And in the end this attitude was extremely detrimental. And I believe it’s an attitude that to this day is detrimental to many men around the world. And it’s unfortunate that many men are practically forced to be this way, because deep down, nobody wants to see a man showing weakness.    So what I am trying to say here, and why I am including that detail, is that over time, to get where I am today, I didn’t just change what I did. We don’t change what we do without changing how we think, and we don’t change how we think it having some effect in our conduct.  

So fast forward to now and it’s been over two years since I got back from Korea. Today I can honestly say that on the whole I have more energy and feel healthier than at any other point in my life. After having written a bit about my personal journey towards health, I would like to make some remarks on how I think people can be healthy.    

1. Sleep

Sleep is very important. Human beings are not nocturnal creatures, we are crepuscular (daylight) creatures. For most of history most people wake up around sunrise and go to sleep around sunset. Many of our biological rhythms are attenuated to daylight or lack thereof. An example could be melatonin which is a hormone. The nurses health study found that nurses who work a lot of night shift have lower longevity, and one reason is low melatonin, which is dependent on serotonin production during the day (which is very dependent on sunshine). If you sleep well at the right times, you will have more energy.    

2. Hydration

 Many people think that unless you have a dry mouth, your body must be hydrated. The book “your bodies many cries for water” explains well that this is not the case. For example histamine is a hormone in charge of water regulation, and its production increases under dehydration. Many people take anti-histamine when proper hydration would also help.    A point worth considering here is that just drinking water is not necessarily hydrating. Just like many people with crons disease can eat a lot without gaining weight. For example many people think that beverages like coffee, beer or fizzy drink counts as water. But it certainly doesn’t, in fact these have a dehydrating effect.  

 3. Exercise

 It is important to move your body regularly. Our body is meant to be moved regularly and needs this to be healthy. There is the lymphatic system for example which requires muscle movement to be effective at transporting metabolic waste. It doesn’t have to be intense P90x either. It could just be gardening or walking. I prefer low intensity cardio like jogging, hiking, cycling and swimming.   

4. Sunshine

 Contrary to what some people believe, sunshine is as important to human health as it is to the health of the whole planet. A glaring scientifically backed example of this is vitamin D. Vitamin D has hundreds of protective effects for the body. In fact vitamin D is more important than a vitamin, because it is a hormone. Vitamin D can help protect against many diseases, especially for pregnant mothers. It’s a shame so many people are deficient these days. But sunshine also helps with other things like serotonin production, and helps us feel happy. Everyone is afraid of skin cancer, and yet the sun protects us from cancer through vitamin D.   

 5. Diet

 This is a more controversial subject. I think we can all agree junk foods are unhealthy. In my opinion the evidence is overwhelmingly clear… whole plant foods are the healthiest foods we can eat. In short, whole plant foods are very calorically light, but highly satiating, so good for weight management. They are also very high in vitamins, minerals and also phytonutrients. You ever hear that red wine is good for you? Yeap, that’s because it has polyphenols, a phytonutrient. You know where polyphenols comes from? From grapes. I wonder why you never hear people talking about how grapes are good for you… Probably because no one needs to justify a good habit to themselves or others.    The other point is animal foods. Animal foods are overall unhealthy because of it’s negative components. These include the animal protein (methionine amino acid), heterocyclic amine production (from grilling), heme iron, saturated fat, cholesterol, hormones like IGF1 or estrogen, and things given to the animals to make them grow i.e. arsenic. The EPIC-PANACEA study shows that meat consumption is co-related with weight gain compared to a plant based diet. Vegans have the lowest BMI of any diet group, and that includes vegans who eat junk food.    

6. Mind

 Mind also plays a role in health. Many people have mental health problems these days because modern life is so stimulating. A lot of people aren’t aware of how their mind is their own worst enemy, because the mental chatter is considered so “normal”. Taking care of the basics I have mentioned will help you to have a better state of mind. But to be healthy, you need to be in charge of your mind, use it like a tool. Turn it on or off like a cellphone. People who are always on their phone, addicted to their phone are ruining their life. For some reason though people don’t feel the same when it comes to mind. If your mind is in charge, you will never be at peace, because the mind is never satiated.   

Hope you enjoyed this article. You can see some stories from Korea on my old blog [here](http://bondaegiseudamonium.weebly.com/whats-up.html). You can also check out my youtube channel where I share my comments and criticisms [here](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCmWIK9VTY9bCgBBoOAAKTUQ/videos).