The Come Alive Project

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  • Energy Bite 111 – Feelings of Pain and Pleasure

    “Nature has placed mankind under the government of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure. . . they govern us in all we do, in all we say, in all we think.”   — Jeremy Bentham, 1748 – 1832. British lawyer and philosopher.

    The topic for today’s article is: Feelings of Pain and Pleasure, Number seven in this series based on the 12 Attributes of Human Functioning put forth by Michael Murphy and George Leonard. When writing about pain and pleasure in this context, it’s not just about the actual physical feeling of pain and pleasure as an attribute of human functioning, it’s about how all human behavior is based on feelings of pain and pleasure? Pain or pleasure are the single most important motivators of all human behavior. Most people act to move toward pleasure, or move away from pain. Of the two, moving away from pain has been recognized by motivational philosophers as the strongest of the two motivators.

    “The aim of the wise is not to secure pleasure, but to avoid pain.”   — Aristotle

    Advertisers have recognized this for millennia, and use avoidance of pain and suffering as the basis for most pharmaceutical advertisements addressed to seniors. Yet pleasure seeking is the basis for so many of the travel advertisements in publications such as the AARP Magazine.

    How does pain and pleasure relate to Health, Fitness and Personal Energy for Active Older Adults?

    To some, exercise represents pain; to others, pleasure. Is it the exercise itself, or is it the feeling you get after exercise? I personally feel good when I exercise. I enjoy the actual exercise itself, as well as the good feeling I get after exercise. Other’s complain during the entire process, and complain further about how tired they feel, or how beat up they feel after exercise. Others like the feeling, but not the process.

    The same with food. Some get pleasure from cooking and eating good, healthful food. Other shy away from healthful food, turning instead to the short term pleasure of carry out or fast food. Sometimes a hamburger from MacDonald’s seems so enticing that you are physically and  mentally drawn to the Golden Arches with feelings of potential pleasure. But twenty minutes after eating that greasy treat, your stomach feels like lead, and the pleasure you derived from that convenient meal changes to discomfort and un-ease (you can spell that “dis-ease” after a lifetime of fast food). The short term pleasure turns to physical and mental anguish, usually for most of the afternoon.

    “The secret of success is learning how to use pain and pleasure instead of having pain and pleasure use you. If you do that, you’re in control of your life. If you don’t, life controls you.”   — Tony Robbins

     

    As long as we understand our motivations, we have the ability to control our actions. We then have the ability to make wise decisions about our Health and Fitness and to take full responsibility for our actions.  That’s why our feelings of pain and pleasure are important enough to be on the list of 12 Attributes of Human Functioning.

    Thank you for reading.

  • Energy Bite 110 – Capacities to Manipulate the Environment Directly

    Do you live in your own home?  Do you buy your food at the grocery store?  Do you do the things that will make or keep you physically healthy?  If the answer is yes, then you have demonstrated your Capacity to Manipulate Your Environment Directly.

    That ability to “manipulate” your environment is the 6th Attribute in this series of 12 Attributes of Human Functioning that Michael Murphy wrote about in his book The Future of the Body, and discussed in the much more reader friendly book, The Life We are Given, by Michael Murphy and George Leonard.

    What does Murphy mean by Environment?  He defined it, in an early TV interview, as: “physical spaces and the way they influence the way we think, and interact with the world; how natural and man made environments influence human behavior, and how we can manipulate those natural and man made environments to adapt to our evolving wants and needs.

    He includes our own bodies and minds as part of the “environment”, and goes on to write about how we change our physical internal and external environment as a means to evolve.  He uses the term “exceptional functioning” to see into the future as to how we, as humans, will continue to evolve.

    In simple terms, how we manipulate our minds, bodies, activities and surroundings, will determine how we live now, and how we will evolve and live in the future.

    Murphy suggests that even lower animals can manipulate their internal and external environments.  Beavers build houses of sticks and mud.  Bears hibernate in caves in the winter.  Some animals will grow thicker fur in the winter to protect them from the cold.

    Humans control their own internal and external environments on a much higher plane.  We build mansions, automobiles, fly at 35,000 feet above the earth, and some even leave the earth’s atmosphere for a while.  Humans learned to use fire for cooking and for warmth, and now we use electricity and gas for the same functions.  That’s evolving by manipulating the environment according to Murphy.

    Physically, we learn to take care of our bodies , . . or not.  If we do, we feel good, stay slim, and live longer as a rule.  If we don’t . . . well, you know.  We have evolved from foraging for plants, nuts, berries and vegetables, to buying prepackaged food at the grocery stores.  Sometimes manipulating our environment is called “progress”.  Sometimes it’s not.

    As we age, we begin to lose some of the control over where we live and what we eat, and sometimes our ability to drive and stay mobile and independent.  But we can do things for ourselves, physical and mental, that will allow us to control where we live, how we eat and how we get around for much longer than just a few short decades ago.  We have the ability to “manipulate” our personal environment so we live longer, healthier, and happier lives than at any time in history.  It’s up to each of us to do the “manipulation” that will keep us around longer, and to get the most from The Life We are Given.

     Thank you for reading.

     

     

  • Energy Bite 109 – Movement Abilities

    “To restore life to your life, to defeat aging, to regain the youth you still possess, get your body in motion.”
    —  from the essay Act Your Age, by George Sheehan.

    That quote from George Sheehan, the essayist, leads nicely into The Fifth Attribute in this series of articles about the 12 Attributes of Human Functioning, referenced in the books The Future of the Body by Michael Murphy and The Life We are Given by Michael Murphy and George Leonard.  That Fifth Attribute is Movement Abilities, those abilities of moving your muscles, joints, and body, in a way that keeps you agile and mobile.  Again, I’ll relate the topic to ourselves as we get older and our desire to remain active and independent.

    If you don’t move your body the way nature intends you to move, your body will deteriorate. Your muscles will atrophy and become small and weak.  Your bones will become brittle and susceptible to being easily broken.  Your circulation will slow and your blood will pool like water in a stagnate pond.  Your breathing will become shallow and you will lapse into poor breathing habits.  Your body will become bent and you will shuffle when you walk.  Well, that doesn’t sound very pleasant, does it?

    Unless we continue to move our bodies as we age, we will actually lose the capacity to move.  Arthritis comes along and rears it’s painful head.  Osteopenia, and later Osteoporosis may occur if we don’t do something for our bones, both by moving our bodies and by watching what we eat.

    Keeping the joints young and the muscles strong is critical as we age.  We tend to sit down whenever we have our normal age related aches and pains, rather than actually moving and stretching.  Remember what Art Linkletter said:  “”if you wake up without any aches or pains, then you’re probably dead.”

     You can find everything you would ever want to know about the importance of moving your body, as well as how to do it, in material that has already been written in books, magazines, the internet and just about anywhere you would care to search.  I’ve devoted a number of these articles to the importance of moving the body, whether as formal exercise, or as just part of your daily routine.  There’s no point in repeating here what is so easily available in the library, bookstores and on the supermarket newsstands.

    Just this last Sunday, the Washington Post published a great review of the book KEEP MOVING, And Other Tips and Truths About Aging by Dick Van Dyke.  The reviewer, Jen Chaney, writes:  “At age 40, Van Dyke recalls, he was told by a doctor that he had such severe arthritis that he probably would be in a walker within five to seven years.  His response: ‘I lit into a dance, as if proving to myself I could still order my body to do a soft shoe anytime I wanted, despite the pain in my leg.’ “ 

    Apparently, Van Dyke has also recently recovered from pneumonia and multiple lung collapses.  But he says that his ability to dance has kept him young and filled with Personal Energy.  Dick Van Dyke will turn 90 next ,month.

    I haven’t read the book yet, but from the review, it looks like something all seniors would benefit from reading.

    Several years ago, when I first started writing these Energy Bites, they were published as PDF newsletters.  I used to insert appropriate quotes in the sidebars.  Here are three more of those quotes that relate directly to the subject of “moving your body”:

    “Lack of activity destroys the good condition of every human being,
    while movement and methodical physical exercise save it and preserve it.”
    -Plato

    “Inactive people give aging a bad name.”   – George Sheehan

    “To maintain good health, normal weight and increase the good life of radiant health, joy and happiness, the body must be exercised properly (stretching, walking, jogging, running, biking, swimming, deep breathing, good posture, etc.) and nourished wisely with healthy foods.”
    – Paul C. Bragg

    Keep your body moving.  You’ll grow old happier, and feel young, mobile and independent, longer.

    Thank you for reading.