Chakras and joggling

One of the keys to joggling is to access more of your vital life force, or “prana”. Your chakras are centers of vital life energy, sort of like batteries, and accessing the trapped quantum energy from them can strongly influence how well you perform.

How can we access this energy? By opening up an extra chakra and the infinite wisdom they contain. Most of us have one or more of them closed. But by opening up an extra chakra, you will not only be able to joggle, but will be able to do so for miles and miles in a powerful quantum chakra state. Remember that all energy is infinite wisdom transformed through self-love.

To open up an extra chakra, you must:

1) Stop eating all garlic and onions. These foods divert prana away from the arms and legs and toward the stomach, and will make it difficult to open up the chakras that will allow you to joggle, besides bad breath interfering with the desired quantum state. In scientific terms, halitosis interferes with quantum superposition. Eating garlic can also interfere with your dating life, unless you are dating an Italian, but this is a whole other issue.

2) Stand upside down on your hands or hang upside down for 15 minutes a day. This will draw blood to the head and upper body and help to force open the extra chakra you need to be able to joggle. This will allow your wisdom to be liberated.

3) Punch a man with red hair in the face. The red hair must be natural, and he must be at least 5’6″. You must punch him hard. You don’t have to fight him, you can run away very fast afterwards. The very masculine, very hostile energy coming from the angry redhead will help to completely open the closed chakra. If he punches back, it still counts. Remember that chakras are like wheels, and this act will cause the wheels to turn as quickly as possible, helping you toward advanced quantum phasing.

Only by doing these 3 things will you be able to joggle. If you do not go through with them, you will never be able to joggle.

The above is a satire.

No pain no gain

Who hasn’t heard this a billion times? I’m sure many of you reading this have even said this phrase, or repeated it like a mantra to yourself during difficult runs or workouts. It’s such a cliche. But more importantly, is it true?

On this blog, I do my best to avoid making assumptions. I prefer using skepticism when it comes to health and fitness. No idea is beyond question. If this means overturning what is considered “wisdom” by many, due to lack of evidence, then so be it. If it means offending people, then so be it, though offending anyone isn’t the intent. This is why, for example, I almost never do any stretching exercises and do not advocate it. There is no unequivocal scientific evidence in favor of stretching when it comes to preventing injuries or improving performance. See my “You don’t have to stretch!” post for more info.

As for the “no pain no gain” idea, it really is an overly simple dictum, to the point that it’s rather difficult to evaluate in any meaningful sense. And surely, few people actually take it literally. Obviously, beyond a certain pain threshold, few of us can continue exercising.

The subjective nature of pain also renders this saying not particularly meaningful or helpful. Not to mention the fact that we all have unique biochemistries, unique fitness goals, unique history of injuries and illnesses, and unique personalities. And while challenging yourself physically is a worthwhile goal that boosts health in ways that no drug can compete with, we have to know our limits. And to a large extent, even our “limits” can be highly subjective.

Like many people, even I believe a little bit of soreness after an intense run is generally a good thing. Note the “generally”. Sometimes the amount of pain we feel can be misleading; sometimes we don’t feel any pain or soreness until the day after the heavy workout.

All this ultimately boils down to yet another cliche – “listen to your body”. Unfortunately, many of us aren’t very good listeners, and our body, as alluded to before, isn’t always the best communicator. Sure, we know when we feel too exhuasted to go on, but we don’t often deal with extreme exhaustion after exercise; there’s a large grey area, and little objective criteria with which to make proper assessments. There’s a “little” pain, and “too much” pain on opposite sides of a pain continuum with so much grey area in between. This is one of the reasons I don’t use caffeine or other drugs – they cloud our judgement to the degree that they can make it almost impossible to listen to our body’s with any accuracy.

Knowing our Vo2 Max can be helpful to some degree, but it isn’t all that accurate and there are many other measurements. There’s also the “talk test” – if you can’t hold a conversation while doing intense cardio, you “may” be pushing yourself too hard.

So what can we do? Perhaps a more reliable “test” is to pay attention to our heart rate. If it isn’t back to normal after even intense exercise, this is usually a good indicator you are overdoing it. Or you are out of shape. Being fit means your body and your heart should have adapted to your fitness program. If it still beats fast well after(an hour or more) working out on a consistent basis, this may be a useful warning sign.

Besides this, avoid working out if you are in any kind of pain beyond minor soreness. If your legs hurt, exercise your arms and vice versa. Try to avoid becoming addicted to exercise and don’t try pushing yourself to your limits every time you exercise. Do this maybe once a week or a few times a month. Question every bit of fitness advice you receive and go ahead and make your fitness routine uniquely you; don’t try to be someone else, just because your friend benefitted from some new fitness program, doesn’t mean you will too. It seems everyone is an “expert” when it comes to fitness. Be careful who you get advice from, consider their credentials and experience. Unfortunately, even some people with multiple degrees and certification will spout pseudo-science.

So while “no pain, no gain” may have some truth to it, don’t take it as a commandment. It may even be harmful to follow it too literally. Whatever the case may be, now that it is spring, take advantage of the outside weather and get back into shape! You don’t need a gym membership. A park or the woods is way better.