Weekend Thoughts - 5.9.15

Image by Erik Eckel, courtesy of Creative Commons licensing.

Happy Saturday y'all! I've got a well-rounded selection of links for you to read this weekend. 

1. Something that is hitting hard for me right now is the myriad controversies in nutrition science. Questions like "What is healthy food?" and "How much of it should I eat?" have been ricocheting throughout my brain this week. Quartz has a thought-provoking article on how the cult of healthy eating has more in common with religion than science. The piece's author, Alan Levinovitz, argues that nutrition science is difficult to research effectively, and he cautions his readers to not fall prey to healthy "fad" diet claims. I admit that I have tried many different types of "healthy" diets, to varying degrees of success. I make sure that I never put complete faith in any particular diet, and instead use the experimentation phases as a method for testing the diets for myself. However, I agree with Levinovitz's main argument - finding a truly healthy diet backed by substantial and trustworthy scientific evidence seems nearly impossible.

2. This Sriracha Avocado Chickpea Salad recipe from Healthy Slow Cooking looks scrumptious! After all, it's got three of my favorite things - Sriracha, avacado, and chickpeas!

3. New research has come out showing that there may be bacteria from fecal matter in beards. The findings essentially show that there are bacteria in beards that resemble bacteria found in the human gut. This may be because beard hair is coarser and can trap germs and grease more effectively. First of all, as a man with a beard, I have no plan to shave my beard. Second, I have to wonder if this is more germ and bacteria fear-mongering that will result in overall decreased immune function, rather than the reverse. After all, over sterilization is a thing.

4. One of my favorite video games, Portal, is being turned into a hyperdimensional pinball game. Pinball is one of my favorite arcade-style games, so the combination may prove to be entertaining. For those of you not familiar with Portal, it is a first person shooter game that has mind-bending puzzles in 3D space. Highly recommended. I may actually purchase the pinball version of the game - it's only going to be $2.99 for consoles, Mac, and PC, and $1.99 for mobile devices. The game will be released on May 25th.

5. A fellow Reality Sandwich writer, Bernardo Kastrup, was featured on one of my favorite podcasts last week: Lorenzo Hagerty's Psychedelic Salon. The topic is incredibly intriguing and this was an exceptional episode of the podcast that I just have to share. Bernardo describes the concept of a cosmic nervous system in great detail that resonates with me on several levels. Here is an excellent summary by Lorenzo:

"Today Bernardo Kastrup returns to the salon with more metaphysical speculations. Supplementing his recently released book, "Brief Peeks Beyond," he touches on the so-called hard problem of consciousness faced by materialists. In his examination of the dominant materialistic world view, Bernardo reveals the forces behind our value systems, which in turn determine our behavior. He ends with some very concrete suggestions for five things each of us can do to make the world a little better. However, my favorite section of this talk comes when he suggests that cosmic consciousness at-large may actually be experiencing what we humans call multiple personality disorder."

6. As an Apple fan, I enjoyed this brief piece titled One day they'll understand Apple on Ken Segall's Observatory. He argues that pundits that don't understand Apple's behavior in the present must look to its behavior in the past, as Apple is one of the most consistent companies in the technology industry. I agree with Segall's message here.

That's all for this edition of Weekend Thoughts. See you next time - and until then, keep thinking wilder.  

Weekend Thoughts - 5.2.15

Image by Jason Devaun, courtesy of Creative Commons licensing.

Happy Saturday y'all! I hope the week treated everyone well. Let's jump right in for some deep weekend thinking.

1. One of my favorite resources for personal development, Steve Pavlina, published a superb post titled The Spiritual Path of Veganism that discusses the relationship between humans and our extended family of flora and fauna that share space with us on Earth.

2. Here is an interesting read on Newsweek about how Homeless Millennials Are Transforming Hobo Culture. A subject I have a fascination with but no personal experience, the article discusses how recent technology has changed a lot of things for the modern homeless wanderer .

3. Thad McKraken from disinformation published a post recently titled Why I Don't Do Psychedelics Very Often Anymore that resonates strongly with me. It serves as a wise reminder to tread lightly when it comes to psychedelics. 

4. Regarding the recent situation between police and community in Baltimore, The Baltimore Sun published an article about how Freddie Gray was a victim of the war on drugs. If you want to improve police/community relations in America, you simply must support drug war reform.

5. As a fan of the jam band genre of music, I thought this article about Why Music Needs More Phish on Windpanther was spot on.

6. If you're interested in trail running you simply must check out The Ultimate Resource Guide for New Trail Runners from Doug Hay at Rock Creek Runner. It is an amazing resource guide that includes book, podcast, movie, and website suggestions, as well as gear advice and nutrition recommendations. Highly recommended.

7. Some new trend data that has been reported on Food Navigator-USA.com is showing that the vegan diet is becoming more mainstream, especially among millennials, whose values include environmental preservation and a sense of social responsibility.

That's all for this edition of Weekend Thoughts. Have a great week next week and we'll all reconvene here next Saturday for another thought session.

The Benefits of the 30-Day Challenge

Image by Philip Chapman-Bell, courtesy of Creative Commons licensing.

A 30-Day Challenge is a highly-effective method for personal growth that involves trying something new or developing a new habit. The concept is fairly simple: choose something that you would like to do every day (or another specified frequency) for 30 days, commit to that action, and stick to it!

The first time I heard about the concept of a 30-Day Challenge was from Steve Pavlina, one of my favorite personal development bloggers who has been a huge inspiration for my continued personal development. I have attempted several types of 30-Day Challenges which have resulted in newly-formed positive habits, the stoppage of detrimental habits, and a range of new worldviews and perspectives.

Some of my favorite 30-Day Challenges that I have experimented with include trying vegetarianism (which eventually led to a 30-Day Vegan Challenge as well), committing to a daily meditation practice, writing every day, giving up coffee, flossing my teeth every day, waking up at 5AM every morning, and studying a foreign language, Not all of my 30-Day Challenges have been completely successful, but they have all taught me about myself and allowed me to experience something new for a short period of time. This can be a helpful tool that allows the participant to gauge whether or not he or she benefits from the new behavior.

We all know the challenges of starting a healthy habit or breaking a bad routine. Most of us have had this experience with New Years Resolutions, for better or for worse. Before the resolution starts, we are excited and motivated, but that positive energy can wear off before the habit itself is established.

One benefit of the 30-Day Challenge is that it is a (relatively short) medium-term commitment. It isn't difficult to try something for 30 days, because there is no need to commit to a lifelong change (which can be overwhelming and stop you before you even get started!). It's possible that the new habit will stick for longer than 30 days, but that will not happen in every case.

30 days is enough time to get past the beginning stage when the habit feels unusual and is not fully ingrained. There is less of a chance that you will prematurely stop the habit when you commit upfront to the new behavior for a minimum of 30 days. Getting past those few initial weeks when the habit feels strange can be difficult, but after about three weeks many habits begin to feel routine.

If you are interested in attempting a 30-Day Challenge of your own, here are some ideas:

1. Go vegetarian for 30 days. If you don't feel comfortable with that, how about trying to participate in Meatless Mondays for a full month?

2. Start a daily yoga or meditation practice.

3. Read or write an hour per day.

4. Unplug the TV or shut off Internet access for 30 days.

5. Give up caffeine or alcohol for 30 days.

6. Wake up early every morning.

7. Write in a journal every day.

8. Do a 30-day fitness challenge.

9. Turn off your cell phone for 30 days.

10. Go out every night to a new place. This is a great way to explore a new city or reconnect with a familiar one, and will definitely make for a lot of fresh memories!

These are just some ideas to help you get started. I have found 30-Day Challenges to be extremely beneficial for me and will continue using them to better myself and experience things that I wouldn't normally have the courage to try. I hope that this post encourages you to step out of your comfort zone and try something new. The new you could be right around the corner, just waiting for your current self to come around the bend!

Reality Sandwich V2.2 is Now Online!

Reality Sandwich's About page describes it as "a magazine of ideas for the transformational community. We cover subjects like shamanism, non-local consciousness, visionary art, alternative economics, psychedelics, permaculture, transformational festivals, meditation, democratic engagement, near death experiences, and tantra, to name but a few."

I have been a fan of the web magazine Reality Sandwich for many years, after learning about it by reading Daniel Pinchbeck's book Breaking Open The Head and following Pinchbeck's work online. I began volunteering at the magazine as a news writer and interview transcriber in September 2012, and have continued as a Contributing Editor for the site since then. Having met Co-founder, Publisher, and Editorial Director Ken Jordan and Associate Editor Faye Sakellaridis at the 2013 Horizons: Perspectives on Psychedelics conference, I can say that the magazine is truly a labor of love led by two amazing people.

A brand-new 2.2 version of the website has launched recently, which includes some upgrades to the browsing experience and community section.

To cut down on spam content, contributors have been temporarily disabled from posting to the Community section, however readers can still create a free user account to keep a collection of favorite posts, save posts to read later, and comment, as well as participate in the social aspects of the site (which include comment and share karma points).

New features include:

• A selection of related articles that appear when reading single posts.
• Clicking on the thumbnail image of a post in a feed will launch a modal window for quick reading. Readers can press the left and right arrows on their keyboards to easily switch between posts.
• An updated, easier-to-read font for post content.
• Commenting is now integrated with Facebook Comments, allowing readers to tag Facebook friends directly from Reality Sandwich.
• The site's servers have been relocated to New York City (thanks to Digital Ocean).
• Various bug fixes.

Forthcoming updates within the next month will include:

• An enhanced mobile browsing experience, which I am greatly looking forward to!
• "Leaked information about what a Reality Sandwich might actually taste like."
• And more!

If you haven't already checked out Reality Sandwich, I urge you to do so now. I have gotten so much out of the site, ranging from amazing post content to a sense of community to friends that I now connect with in "meatspace".

Book Review - Acid Test: LSD, Ecstasy, and the Power to Heal by Tom Shroder

I originally discovered this (then-unpublished) book in an email from MAPS (the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies) that was requesting support for the Legalizing Psychedelic Therapy campaign on Indiegogo. Being a supporter of MAPS' efforts and intrigued by the book's premise, I jumped on the opportunity to donate right away.

The book came in the mail just before I had the opportunity to see author Tom Shroder and one of the main characters in the book, Nicholas Blackston, speak at the 2014 Horizons: Perspectives on Psychedelics conference in New York City. I was moved by their presentation and looked forward to reading the book, although I wasn't able to make time to read it until this month.

Shroder is an editor at The Washington Post Magazine, an acclaimed journalist, and the author of Old Souls. As a fellow writer, I look up to him although I was previously unfamiliar with his work prior to this book. Acid Test weaves several non-fiction narratives together into a page-turner tale that includes a fairly in-depth history of psychedelic research, explores some of the various characters in the psychedelic community, and describes the current state of psychedelic research with a focus on MDMA-(also known by its street name "Ecstasy") assisted psychotherapeutic treatment of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).

I was familiar with many of the characters in the book. These include (but are not limited to) Rick Doblin, the founder of MAPS, Michael Mithoefer, a former emergency room physician-turned psychiatrist at the forefront of modern psychedelic therapy, Albert Hofmann, the Swiss chemist who first synthesized LSD in 1938, and Stanislav Grof, the creator of Holotropic Breathwork therapy. However, I wasn't familiar with the story of former Marine Nicholas Blackston.

Before I began the book, I thought I would be more interested in the descriptions of psychedelic research and its various characters, but as I continued to read on and on, the story that really pulled me in and kept me coming back was Blackston's. As a former Marine, Blackston witnessed horrors in war that most of us cannot fathom, and when he returned stateside he was tortured from the inside-out by reoccurring nightmares, uncontrollable flashback hallucinations, a temper with an increasingly short fuse, and physical pain from shrapnel wounds acquired during his combat missions.

Blackston ended up being one of the lucky ones, however. Compared to the majority of our returned military personnel who are currently suffering tremendously from PTSD, he was fortunate enough to seek and receive help from MDMA-assisted psychotherapy and has experienced many positive results from his treatment. Although his PTSD is not completely gone, it is greatly diminished due to the healing power of MDMA and the wisdom of his experienced therapeutic guides. Acid Test argues that our veterans deserve the right to receive reliable and effective treatment, rather than the typical, dangerous, and fruitless hodgepodge of pharmaceutical drugs that they receive from traditional sources of help like the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.

MAPS is on track to reach its goal of legalizing MDMA by 2021, and books like Acid Test go a long way toward supporting that effort. As a person who is well-educated on the psychedelic research side of the book, I can vouch that it is well-researched and presented in an easy-to-understand manner. The personal stories that make up the book make for a fascinating and personal reading experience, and I hope that the message continues to reach as many people as possible.

5/5 stars. 426 pages.