Jack Heald

One of the things James Altucher advocates as a means of becoming a better person is The Daily Practice: a discipline you impose on yourself to address 4 areas of life every single day: spiritual, physical, mental and emotional.

I know from experience how hard it is to change from a sedentary to an active lifestyle. I started many “get-in-shape” goals with grand plans only to see those plans crash on the rocks of reality and every day life. I wanted this time to be different. So I reviewed my list of “daily goals” and threw out anything that I didn’t know I could do every single day. It sounds great to commit to an hour or 30 minutes of exercise every day, but that is a radical lifestyle change. I knew I wouldn’t stick with it.

Something Altucher said about meditation resonated with me here. In addressing people’s questions about meditation, he told them, “if you can’t meditate for an hour, then do 30 minutes. If not 30 minutes, then do 15. If not 15, then 10. If not 10, then do five. Anyone can sit and be silent for five minutes.”

That did it. I knew I could do almost anything for five minutes a day. So I committed to myself that I would exercise for 5 minutes every day. I started this practice on December 28.

There’ve been many nights the last three weeks when I was ready for bed but hadn’t done my exercise. Now if my plan was to exercise 30 minutes every day, and I was ready for bed, it would be so easy to put it off; 30 minutes is a big commitment when you are tired. But since my commitment was only five minutes, I’ve been able to keep that promise to myself. Rather than crawling into bed without exercising that day, I will do five minutes of something – crunches, squats, shoulder or tricep work, stretching, planks – something or anything – for five minutes. And I always am so satisfied when I get done.

So — why do I write about this?

Because it is working. I have objective proof that I am getting stronger, fitter and better with only 5 minutes of exercise a day. Here’s an example:

For most of my life, I loved playing basketball even more than eating. But about 10 years ago I had to quit because the pain in my knees exceeded the pleasure in my heart from playing. Ten Years. This past Wednesday night, after working out only 5 minutes a day for 3 weeks, I played my first competitive game of basketball in more than 10 years. And I played well. And I woke up Thursday morning without pain.

I know I won’t see any radical body changes in a short time from such a small amount of exercise, but I want you to know that I have more energy, I feel better, my mood is better and I am getting fitter. Maybe not fast, but this is working.

Five minutes. You can do it too.

2012 was a rough year. It’ll be good to have this one behind me.

The year 2012 brought unbelievable blessings and unthinkable wounds. But – like every year before and every year since – the only thing I have control over is my attitude. More than ever, I am content to focus my attention on those things that are Good, that are True, that are Beautiful. Among the people and things who brought me Truth, Goodness and Beauty in 2012 are, (in no particular order):

Caroline, Noa Maloney & Liam Maloney, Chris Heald, Bryanne Heald, Logan & Eli, Patrick Poole, Ashley Collins-Beltran, Fredy and Bella, Matt & Nancy Freeman Halle, Dave & Kim & the Az Jazz Festival, Dave Specht, Cambrian James, Dorman Smith, Hale Center Theater, Amazon, New Egg, Zappos, Dr. Thomas Kruzel, Dr. Casey Johnston, Gavin and his gang at Vintage 95 Wine Bar, Honda, Kathy and Ray Bilinski, Mike Littau, Fedora Linux, Thomas Martinez, Laphroig and Ardbeg single malt scotches, Fernet, Nick and Crystal Coones, Craigslist, HTC phones, Google, David Heald (Jr. & Sr.), Krystina Lynn Mooneyham, Josh Strodtbeck, Roman & Cilette & Gypsy Soul, Jim Nicholson, my folks, my property management company, Martin Guitars, Alesis keyboards, Ghiradelli chocolate, Sprouts Markets, Flag Property Management, Bryant Stanton, Amanda Brumley Holtz, Brian Daniels, Brad & Kadi Strong, Dennis Daniel, Bill Reed, Michael Kielsky, cotton t-shirts, wool socks, linen shirts, sunshine, dry air, a swimming pool in my back yard, good health, opportunities to grow, pain that proves I am still alive, fears that never materialized and love that doesn’t die.

2012 was an awesome year. I’m sorry to see it go…

When your body is the tool of your trade, anything you do to make that tool perform better – by definition – is a performance enhancer. Drugs are chemicals. Anything the human body is capable of digesting, injecting, inhaling or absorbing is either a chemical element or a chemical compound. There is no objective scientific way to draw a line and put “Performance Enhancing Drugs” on one side and “everything else an athlete eats, drinks, injects, inhales or absorbs” on the other side.

The whole argument about PEDs is ridiculous. Aspirin and Mortrin are drugs which enhance performance by reducing inflammation. Protein drinks are drugs which enhance performance by providing the body with readily usable sources of amino acids to aid in the repair of overused muscles and to help build more muscle. Gatorade is a drug that enhances performance by providing a mixture of water and solids that enhance the cell’s ability to process toxins. Hell, WATER is a drug, (chemical formula H20), that enhances the body’s ability to perform. (See what happens to athletes who perform without it.) Literally everything an athlete ingests, injects or absorbs is chemical and will have some sort of affect on his or her performance.

Lance Armstrong survived testicular cancer by using drugs – “performance enhancing drugs” – and then used his superior athletic ability combined with a world-class competitive spirit and the best drugs money can buy to win the Tour de France seven times. He then leveraged his experience, fame and extraordinary will to win into creating a foundation that raised a half a billion dollars to fight cancer.

But wait – he cheated!

Nope. He did not cheat – even if he took the drugs. (And I have no doubt that he did.) For an act to be cheating, two things must be true:

1. the act must violates the rules and
2. the act must give the athlete an unfair advantage.

Armstrong certainly violated the rules of cycling, but it didn’t give him an unfair advantage since all his competitors were violating the same rules by using the same or similar PEDs. In other words, he beat the rest on a level playing field, even if the height of the field was elevated by certain chemicals which a supra-legal body decided athletes weren’t supposed to use.

The rule he broke was both arbitrary, (exactly what is and is not a PED?), and universally ignored in his sport. Armstrong was the fastest drug-aided cyclist amongst hundreds of other drug-aided cyclists.

Lance Armstrong’s mistake was that he didn’t confess once his career was over.

If I was Lance, I’d come clean now. America forgives scoundrels who don’t raise $500 million for charity. America will readily forgive Lance. We need people like him, regardless of what kind of chemical compounds he used on his own body to help him survive cancer and the Tour de France. Lance Armstrong is a hero.

Get over it, America.

When Arizona Diamondbacks manager Kirk Gibson was asked today for his thoughts on the suspension of Melky Cabrera for testing-positive for PEDs, Gibson said that apparently the current standards for punishment were not a strong enough deterrent to cheating. Then he made some noise about players and commisioner doing things “for the good of the game.” What does that even mean? What kind of motivation is that? I would think pride would be a better personal motivator than some nebulous impersonal concept like “the good of the game.”

At some point we will each be at the end of our lives. We don’t know when, but I know that I want to conduct myself now in such a way that when I look back, I am satisfied with how I lived. When I reflect on my life, honesty demands I acknowledge the lousy decisions – decisions I am not proud of making. Most egregiously I chose adultery over honesty – not just once, but twice. I paid a steep price for those choices, but I also learned things I am glad I learned. I know that I am making choices today that I will be satisfied with later in life.

It seems the same principle should hold true when an athlete makes decisions about his career. Mr. Athlete, when your career is over you will reflect on your career. Make sure you are satisfied with how you played the game. Win with class, lose with grace, do your best, don’t cheat.

I cannot imagine how Barry Bonds can face himself in the mirror. He was – at one time – one of the greatest players ever. But he cheated in pursuit of a record. He got the record, but he knows he cheated to get it. Mr. Bonds, (Maguire, Cabrera, Clemens, et.al) – is it truly satisfying to own a record you cheated to gain? Hank Aaron hit 755 home runs without cheating. That’s the number people remember. He won with class, lost with grace, did his best, and – most importantly – didn’t cheat.

I would think that players should be required to answer this simple question: “if you cheat, are you going to be proud of your choice 20 years from now?”

About True Stories. This is my story, my experience of life with a woman who has borderline personality disorder. The Borderline will deny most or all of this, but that too is typical borderline behavior. I tell my story because it is true and because there are many who will read this who also live with a borderline. I want you to know you are not alone and you are not crazy.

The questions come from the book “Stop Walking on Eggshells” by Randi Kreger.

Q. After you try to explain yourself to the other person, does she use your own words and contort them to prove her own point (usually that you are “bad” or doing something wrong)? Does this person blame you for all the problems in her life (and your relationship) and refuse to acknowledge that her own actions cause problems for other people and herself?

The Stop Walking on Eggshells Workbook

 A. Yes, this was an ongoing problem.

One of the most maddening things about living with my ex was not that she never made a mistake, (she didn’t), not that she never did anything wrong, (she never did), but that she never ever took responsibility for her own emotions and her own life.

I lost count of the number of times she’d get out of bed in the middle of the night, stub her toe on the bed, (which hadn’t moved in years), and get angry with me – apparently because it was my responsibility to make sure her toe never got stubbed. I lost count of the times she woke up in the middle of the night angry with me because of something she’d dreamed about. Apparently my power and responsibility extended into the realm of her subconscious. I lost count of the number of times I’d leave the house in the morning with her happy, come home in the evening to find her angry and be blamed for it because of what happened to her during the day – while I was at the office!

When she was afraid, I was solely responsible for eliminating the source of her fears – even if her fear was completely irrational. When she was angry – which was often – then I had done something wrong or failed to do something right. When she was depressed – her second-favorite emotion behind anger – it was my fault. When she couldn’t sleep through the night – I was to blame. When she gained weight – I was to blame. When the kids misbehaved while I was at work – I was to blame. When the grass wouldn’t grow under the pecan tree in the front yard – and it wouldn’t – I was to blame.

It was a hellish way to live.

What makes it worse is that I agreed to her rules for the game: I accepted without question that I was responsible for her happiness. For some twisted, stupid reason, I believed it was my responsibility to make her life problem-free. Talk about a god-complex! What a moron. I freely admit that I share half the blame for the dysfunction in  the relationship. All I had to do was say, “you are responsible for you; I am responsible for me.” But the thought never even occurred to me. (Apparently this is a common experience of people in a relationship with a BPD.)

Had I been willing to continue being the scapegoat for every pain she experienced in life – real or imagined – I suppose the relationship would have continued. But after 24 years of this madness I reached the point where I was no longer willing. I finally understood that making her happy was her job, not mine. I had more than enough work to do on me.

When I realized that I was the only adult in the relationship; when she made it clear that she would continue to blame me for everything “wrong” in her life, I knew that the marriage was over.

Life with a borderline is not really living. It’s just a constant struggle to keep from drowning under the weight of her out-of-control emotions. I chose not to drown.

Brad said this morning that he wants to write a book called “Lie!”. The impetus is his realization that – with few exceptions – everyone, everywhere lies all the time about almost everything. We all know that the government lies to us, our employers lie to us, our vendors lie to us, our customers lie to us and we lie to one another in our personal relationships. Lying is so pervasive that it seems at best quaint or naive to expect honesty.

A little less than a year ago, I realized that I was not as honest as I thought. I really didn’t like that. In fact, I hated it so much that I made a promise to myself to always tell the truth.  I’m not doing this for anyone but me. I just decided that the person I want to be is a person who is 100% honest. When I look back on my life, I know it will give me satisfaction to know that I lived, talked and acted honestly.

Looking back on it, I realize that I never actually liked lying – it just seemed to be the best of several bad alternatives. Now that I have made a commitment to myself to always be honest, I like myself better. And that makes me wonder – are there really people in this world who are not bothered when they lie? And if that is so,  wouldn’t that be the very definition of a psychological pathology?

How is it that we are able function with so much dishonesty in our world? What toll does it take on us mentally, emotionally and spiritually to be so saturated in lies? Is lying necessary?

I’d love to hear your thoughts.

There are two types of apologies:

1. An apology for what you did
2. An apology for what you are

Sometimes the first type of apology is appropriate. Sometimes what you did was wrong, or thoughtless or self-indulgent and it hurt someone. You could have chosen differently.

But the second type apology is never appropriate.

It is wrong to apologize for something beyond your control. And it is wrong for anyone else to expect it.

Never, never, never apologize for what you are.

I used to tell my children as they practiced their daily jam writing – I insisted that they practice writing in spite of their resistance – that you often do not know what you are thinking until you start writing.

 Around the time of my divorce, I stopped keeping a journal and I guess I quit being aware of what I am thinking. Do you ever experience that? Do you ever start to say something – either verbally or in written form – and then begin to open your heart and mind and be surprised by what is coming out of you? That’s the reason to journal, to jam write, to just write – to know yourself.

I think one of the most challenging things about keeping a journal is the pain of finding out what you really think – and perhaps the dissatisfaction with the person you find staring back at you from the pages of your diary. Sometimes it is too disappointing, too painful, to face that person – and perhaps that is another reason not to journal.

But really, that is likely the best reason to journal.

Here I am, 51 years old, shocked that I have reached that age. It honestly feels like I was 35 just a few months ago, but it was actually more like – uhmmm – (quick calculation in the head) – about 200 months ago. That’s a lot of moon cycles. When I think about the reality that I have less time in front of me than I had behind me, it makes me more serious about making the time count. I used to think “making the time count” was all about doing good and honoring God and all that blah-blah but I realize now that the only thing that will really count – to me at least – is to look back on the life I was given and be satisfied with what I did with that gift. Frankly, it really won’t matter what anyone thinks of me if I am disappointed myself.

I think that is one of the blessings of getting older – I care less about what anyone thinks of me than I used to. I’ve lost friends and had relationships fracture – sometimes because I’ve been insensitive or a jerk, but just as often because I refused to be anyone other than who I am. I hope that going forward, people reject me because I am me, rather than because I jerky. Although I suppose one may argue that if the person I am is fundamentally “a jerk”, then they are rejecting me both for who I am and for being a jerk. Meh.

Sometime soon I am going to write about the story in Science that compared intuitive versus analytical minds and their respective inclinations – or lack thereof – towards faith. Stay tuned.

I’m losing hearing acuity in my right ear. It’s very odd. I have high-frequency hearing loss, apparently from sort of genetic nerve damage/sickness/failure, and I am really starting to notice it. My dad and his two brothers are both wearing hearing aids, so clearly it runs in the family. With the high-frequency loss, it means that I can hear vowels just fine but have trouble with consonants. I never realized that the frequency of a consonant differed from its surrounding vowels, but that has been my experience.

It’s pretty bothersome to me and to those I live with and try to understand. The high frequencies are what allow me to discern pitches that are out of tune from those that are in tune. The thought of losing my musical “ear” is fearful; I’ve always had a gift for music, and this stupid genetic thing threatens to mute that gift. Of course, if you ponder it logically, I was born with both the gift for music and with the propensity to lose my hearing. If I take the one for granted, it is only reasonable to accept the other.

I always thought going deaf would be like someone just turning down the volume, but its really more like someone put a low-band-pass filter on my right ear. I still hear fine at the lower frequencies, but the higher the pitch, the less I hear. Who knew that consonants happen in the upper part of the hearing range? Not me. I still hear pretty well out of the left ear, and I recognize now that I clearly favor it.

Another odd thing – I have zero trouble with music, other than the higher frequencies being muted. It’s not such a problem when the “message” of the music occurs across the entire spectrum, but my trouble hearing consonants makes it much more difficult to understand speech – especially if my good (left) ear is turned away from the speaker.

Anyone else out these dealing with this? What do you do to compensate/fix it/deal with it?

Because stuff like this seems to just keep happening.

And the reason I think it is important is because the people who are committing these frauds ALSO want to circumscribe our lives and tell us what we can eat, where we can live and how we can spend our own money.  (I inherited my mother’s radical independence and my father’s stubbornness and persistence. I think it’s a pretty useful combination.)