Health – Auxiliary Memory

Breaking the Cognitive Decline Barrier

by James Wallace Harris, Sunday, September 16, 2018

2008-2018

The above two drawings by Grace Murray were taken from “20+ Artists Challenge Themselves To Redraw Their Old ‘Crappy’ Drawings, Prove That Practice Makes Perfect.” They are an example of cognitive increase. Murray’s mind/body skills have progressed over time by an amazing degree. We seldom see such perfect proofs of cognitive progress. I highly recommend everyone visit this site and look at all the before and after drawings – there are now 14 pages of them. Parents and teachers should use this site to show their kids and students.

What I want to talk about is cognitive decline. I am not a scientist, and I am not using this term in a scientific way. I’m appropriating the phrase “cognitive decline” temporarily for this essay. For my purposes, it means both the mental and physical decline in our countless abilities. I believe our mind and body are a single unit. How well our mind works is dependent on the well-being of its integration with our body.

I have a friend that is worried about cognitive decline and wanted a baseline to measure against. I thought that was a fantastic idea. I’m not sure doctors can easily provide medical diagnostics to do such a job, nor do I think we can easily invent one on our own. My theory is we each need to keep an eye on ourselves and develop a series of baselines to follow over time. We have to become our own psychologists.

The baseline I want to describe is the ability to apply myself to a task and improve. It’s exactly what Grace Murray is doing with her drawing skills. I would like to believe that at age 66 I can still learn a new skill and show improvement over time. However, I struggle to do this. There is a barrier that I can’t break through. But I don’t believe it’s age-related per se. I’ve always had trouble applying myself to a task. I give up too easily. The baseline is not the skill, but the willingness to work at a skill.

Persistence pays off. That’s what the article about how artists show improvement over time reveals. They keep practicing and improving. The first cognitive decline barrier benchmark I want to observe in myself is that quality that makes me keep working to improve. That’s a very slippery target. My theory, as we age, we give up trying. We fall back on comfortable routines, rationalize the enjoyment of our indulgences, tell ourselves we can’t do it anymore.

This is not the only baseline I want to track. I’m noticing plenty of problems with myself, but this benchmark is a critical one to me. Most of my friends tell me they struggle to remember words, especially names. And again, we laugh about how those names pop up hours later. It’s like we haven’t forgotten but just can’t find our memories right away. Could we also improve our recall ability with persistent effort?

And it’s not just memory. We make fun of ourselves for not being able to do physical things that we once found easy to do. And we compare the times we’ve fallen or left the car keys in the refrigerator. Getting old is loads of fun when you can laugh at yourself, but it can be mentally wearing. We can even give up on fighting the good fight.

The worst thing about my cognitive decline to me is giving up. It’s so easy to just let things slide, or tell myself I can’t do that anymore, or accept I’d rather take a nap than do something on my To Do list. Most telling to me is not finishing what I aim to write.

I’ve been thinking about the nature of cognitive decline. I’m not sure, but I think we’ve always experienced it our whole lives, at least at times. I remember being young and tossing in the towel when things got hard, or struggling to recall words for a test, or being mentally impaired on dope or drink. I remember days when I could convince myself to jog five miles instead of my standard two but on other days set out to run five miles and only make two.

Cognitive ability depends on a lot of factors. When we were young, healthy, rested, well fed, we felt like we could do anything. As we age, and our body wears out the cognitive decline barrier changes. Stress is a huge factor. Like the sound barrier varying with altitude and temperature, cognitive decline varies with health and stress.

I’d like to believe I’m not too old of a dog to learn new tricks. I feel by writing this essay I’ve discovered something I can track and work at. Will I make the effort? That’s the cognitive decline barrier I have to break through.

Just look at these amazing next drawings. It tells me people can learn a lot in two years. Could I do the same thing from 66 to 68?

2014-2016

Art by DVO

What made this woman stick with drawing eyes until they are so vividly real looking? I’m only guessing here, but here’s what I think. She’s willing to work at the task for hours on end. She’s willing to study tutorials and acquire a large library of techniques that she’s programmed into her mind/body with that practice. I’d also guess she works with tutors or teachers that can critique her work. She’s also willing to forego other pursuits and interests and focus on this task as her primary ambition. Being young is probably a significant factor, but I’m not sure how critical it is. Can older folks learn to draw this well if they make the same effort?

The difference with being older is having the energy and stamina to work at anything for hours. But there’s also a difference between giving up completely, and working an hour at a time.

Since high school, I’ve dreamed of writing science fiction stories. I’ve taken a number of writing classes and even spent six-weeks at Clarion West. I’ve finished dozens of unpolished, unsold, stories, and a couple crude novel drafts. I have not succeeded in my dream because I haven’t stuck to the work. I haven’t taken my stories from 2014 to 2016 like the drawings above.

I wonder if I worked at writing short stories again could I make myself persist? Could I show improvement over time like this artist? Am I just too old? Or is the cognitive decline barrier too great to break through at 66?

Saying one of my baselines is the failure to finish is rather vague. If I can return to churning out 12,000-word stories of the same quality as before, then I haven’t declined. If I can’t, I have. What I’m really interested in, is if I can actually improve like DVO. Not just write a better story, but improve my baseline on trying, on being persistent?

(Writing this essay took more persistence than usual. That’s a good sign.)

JWH

Retirement Fears for the 2020’s and 2030’s

The Road

by James Wallace Harris, Saturday, September 15, 2018

I’ve been retired for five years. I’m almost 67 and the Social Security Longevity Calculator claims I’ll live to be 85. That will be in 2036. I need to financially survive another 18 years (or 216 months since we pay bills by the month). Of course, I could die this afternoon, or live to be 116. Judging my own health and psychology, I tend to think I can make it to 78, which would be 2029.

My financial security comes from a pension, social security, and a 401K. All three are under threat from conservative political ambitions. Plutocrats want to siphon off all the remaining wealth they do not control. As long as Republicans run the government, anyone who is not wildly rich should worry about their economic future, even the moderately wealthy.

Wealth inequality has been a hot topic for years, but what I’m really worried about wealth siphoning. The insanely rich are looking for large pools of money to target for acquisition. All the main sources of traditional capital investments are within their control, so they are looking at large social pools of money like Social Security, Medicare, pensions, welfare programs, public healthcare, and so on. If you look around to any large body of wealth that’s not in private hands, it’s in the crosshairs of the plutocracy.

I tend to believe, and hope, that Social Security and Medicare will be around for the rest of my life. However, the success of the greedy under Trump has been startling. Trump quickly transferred a tremendous amount of social wealth to the rich, and he’s working hard to do it again as often as possible. The conservative’s goal of shrinking the government is really a way to siphon off trillions of dollars by the wealthiest of citizens.

If they get their way, we’ll lose Social Security and Medicare, two programs I depend on, as do tens of millions of other people too. I could survive without Social Security. But I know plenty of people who couldn’t. I could survive without Medicare as long as I was willing to die when I got expensively sick. Without Medicare, having a heart attack will kill either me or kill my 401K.

As a consequence the rich siphoning off social wealth, the federal deficit is skyrocketing. Ultimately, this will destroy the economy, which will destroy everyone’s 401K savings. Without Social Security and 401K savings, I could probably still survive in the poorest part of town with just my pension as long as I didn’t even need moderate healthcare.

As the federal government comes apart, it puts the squeeze on state governments. That will threaten my pension. Of course, by then, almost everyone will be destitute, and it might not matter.

The one thing I hope comes out of the 2018 midterm and 2020 presidential elections, is stability. Of course, this is like wishing I’d win a billion dollar lottery. Too many people are casting votes simply because they don’t want to pay taxes. I don’t like paying taxes either, but all those deductions I made for fifty years is now providing me an income and medical care. I bitched then, but it’s truly wonderful now.

JWH

Losing the Battle of My Bulge

by James Wallace Harris, Wednesday, August 22, 2018

I believe we all have multiple personalities. The person writing this is my thinking mind. There are two others beings sharing this body, maybe more. Neither of them speaks English, so I can only guess at their mindsets. The other two are my animal body and my unconscious mind.

Puzzled-Pug-Dog

People are deluded by assuming their thinking mind is the whole shebang. Their egos falsely assume they’re the master of their domain. Well, ask yourself, “Who ate that whole carton of Ben & Jerry’s?” when you trying to lose weight. Anyone who had struggled with hunger, lust, addiction, compulsion, fear, depression, anxiety knows their thinking mind isn’t the boss of me.

After I had a heart stent put in back in 2013, I took up a plant-based diet and lost weight. Dropping from 242 to 208. I believe even my body was afraid then. When I got to 208 I thought for sure I’d get below 200 soon. Something happened. My body rebelled, claiming it felt better, and I lost the battle of my bulge. I went up to 222. My doctor scolded me to lose 10 pounds. I got down to 211. Then she insisted I lose 10 more pounds. My body threw a tantrum and began binging on ice cream, peanut butter & jelly, chocolate and all its other favorite yummy foods, We’re back up to 231. My body is happy and doesn’t care. My unconscious mind isn’t sending any signals. And I’m in a panic.

Why do I let my body have its way when I know better? Why can’t my body understand the concepts of health? Sometimes I believe I can get my unconscious mind to help out. Of course, I might be nuttier than a Payday candy bar. Normally I can eat almost anything and my stomach is fine. Other times, my stomach suffers painfully from what I eat. My thinking mind has recently concluded that ice cream and chocolate hurt my stomach. Since I’ve stopped eating them my stomach has gotten better. My intellectual mind wonders if my unconscious mind has decided to trick my body. The unconscious mind is a wonder, but hard to understand.

By the way, my body might be an unthinking clod, but I have to admit my thinking body is easily deluded, confused and shanghaied. My body is very stupid. It will eat anything it wants. It’s only after it’s conditioned lots of pain will it stop eating a certain food.

I really need to lose weight. This extra weight is an obvious burden. Somehow I need to come up with a new battle plan that will conquer my body and make it surrender. There are zillions of articles on the internet about losing weight. Some people seem to win their battles, but I often wonder for how long. No matter how well I do or for how long, sooner or later my body grabs control again. How can I stop that?

It’s going to take a maximum effort to win this war. Somehow I’ve got to put everything I learned into my battle tactics. It would help if Purina made People Chow, and all I had to do was eat three bowls a day that left me feeling satisfied.

Here’s what I’ve learned and hope I can apply again:

Don’t keep tempting food in the house!
Plan all meals ahead of time!
Never eat out!
Don’t run out of healthy foods to eat because I’ll eat unhealthy foods to satisfy my hunger!!!
Go back to a plant-based diet.
Go back to intermediate fasting (eat between 10-6).
Solve the protein problem.
Make a list of acceptable foods and only eat from that list.
Remember, I can’t make exceptions!!
Eating holidays never work!!!!

JWH

Am I Too Old To Ride My Bike?

by James Wallace Harris, Thursday, July 5, 2018

The other day I nearly fell off a ladder. A tree limb had fallen, spearing a hole in my workshop roof. I got out my ladder, climbed up and leaned over to pull out the limb. The ladder started falling away, and I caught myself on the edge of the roof using my elbows. Luckily, I was able to catch the ladder with my foot and pull it back. I would have been in a pickle hanging the edge of the roof without a ladder.

When I told my wife about this she told me I couldn’t climb on ladders anymore unless she was there. I doubt she could have caught me if I had fallen. I’m thinking my ladder climbing days are over, at least for my two tallest ladders. Maybe I’m okay for my little 4-foot step ladder. But I’m not sure.

I’m 66 and will be 67 in a few months, and I’m beginning to notice incidents of being clumsy or losing my balance. Lately, I’m been bumping into things too. Twice this week I’ve knocked my left shin quite hard. I was shocked. I’ve always had good balance and spatial awareness. What’s wrong with my body?

When I was younger I used to tell old guys they shouldn’t climb a ladder and let me do it for them. Now I’m wondering if I’m one of those old guys who shouldn’t climb ladders. I found this very revealing chart at the CDC about causes of deaths by various kinds of accidents. For folks over 65, it’s falling. I hope they don’t mind me copying it here:

leading_causes_of_death_highlighting_unintentional_2016_1040w800h

Notice how “Unintentional Fall” isn’t even in the Top 10 for people under 15? It’s only #10 for ages 15-34. Then it starts climbing up the charts, making #4 for 55-64, and then #1 for 65+. Is there a correlation to declining balance, spatial awareness and reaction times?

I tried to find statistics for bike accidents, but couldn’t.

I’ve been really enjoying biking this year until my bike broke. I was trying to decide if I should get it repaired or buy a new one when I nearly fell off the ladder and wondered if biking was as dangerous as ladder climbing. My biggest worry is falling off my bike and not being hit by a car. I ride in a very safe neighborhood away from traffic. But I’ve occasionally slipped on wet leaves or sand, and I’ve had to do some last minute veering because of squirrels, dogs, kids, and cars backing out of driveways. So far I’ve always recovered without falling, but I’ve had a couple close shaves this year. When I’m zooming along on my bike I’ve often wondered what it would feel like if my 230-pound body flew over the handlebars and smashed into the pavement. Would my blubber protect me? (I do wear a helmet.)

I feel I’m still young enough to bike, but then I recalled three people my age who’ve had bad biking accidents recently. One broke a collarbone when he veered to avoid a woman stepping in front his bike, one who got two front teeth knocked out, had a bunch of stitches, a concussion, and lost 30 minutes of memory so doesn’t remember how it happened, and finally, and one who lost his brakes, hit a sign, punctured his pancreas, damaged his liver, and ended up in ICU for four days.

I love biking for exercise. It’s the only aerobic exercise I can handle. I do have an indoor bike, but it’s not as fun. I thought about getting a 3-wheeler, but I don’t have a garage, and getting a 3-wheeler in and out of the house would be difficult.

Up till my ladder incident, I was thinking I’d bike until I had an accident. But I figured having an accident would only involve cuts and bruises, and maybe a broken arm or leg. Those other bike accidents are making me think that waiting until I have an accident to know when to quit isn’t a great plan.

I had to make my mother stop driving. I’ve had friends that had to step in and make their parents stop driving. I want to believe I’ll know when it’s time to give up car driving, but now I’m getting a taste of that decision with bike riding.

I believe I’m healthy enough to bike ride for many years. But I’m starting to realize that my reflexes are not what they used to be, and my spatial awareness and reaction times are dwindling. I’m trying to place my bet where I don’t seriously injure myself, but I’m not sure of the odds. I wish I could find statistics on biking accidents. What are the common injuries for a 65+ person falling off a bike? I’d gamble on stitches, maybe a broken arm, but I don’t want to lose teeth, and my brain is already acting rather iffy, so I probably shouldn’t risk a concussion.

JWH

Prioritizing My Ambitions

by James Wallace Harris, Tuesday, June 19, 2018

Being 66 and retired gives me a lot of free time, yet at the end of every day, I always wish I had more. My lifelong, no-so-secret ambition has been to write a book. I’ve had plenty of ideas, and I could have found the time, even during my nine-to-five years. Yet, I haven’t. Why? Because I fritter away my goddamn time. I have a personality that loves to do what I want when I want. Some people call that laziness, but it’s essentially poor time management. Somehow I need to learn how to prioritize my time to succeed.

Most people must achieve their ambitions before forty. Most big ambitions required the peak performance of youth. Generally, writers must also succeed in bloom, but there are a few outliers that give me hope. Writing is one endeavor where late bloomers have an outside chance. So, if I don’t want to go to my grave still fantasizing about the books I want to write, I need to conquer time management.

All that’s required is focusing, working diligently, and ignoring all the distractions. Of course, that’s easier declared than lived. I’ve mind mapped how I spend my time. What I need to, is Marie Kondo its branches.

Time Mind Map

I write best in the mornings, but to maintain my health I must exercise. My self-control wanes quickly during the day, so if I don’t do my exercises in the morning, there’s little chance I’ll do them at all. In fact, I’m skipping my morning bike ride to write this. That bike ride gives me vitality, something in short supply. And if I don’t do my physical therapy and Miranda Esmonde-White exercises, my back will go out. Maybe one reason people don’t succeed after forty is that we have to spend too much time on body maintenance.

I need to completely get over this ingrained habit. I need to write in the mornings and exercise later in the day. I doubt I have the mental and physical energy to write more than four hours a day, maybe only two, even if I give it my best hours. Somehow I need to make those writing hours the #1 activity in my day. After that, I have to make exercise #2.

I have a friend whose life-long ambition is to live abroad. She’s finally getting to do that because she’s getting rid of everything she owns here. Part of my time management problem is possession management. According to minimalists, owning less is more freeing. That’s true, For example, I’ve been spending a lot of time and mental energy researching buying a new television and computer, or what books and magazines to collect. I need to stop that. It would also help to get rid of all the stuff I must spend time maintaining.

If you study that mind map, you’ll notice I consume a great deal of fiction. Generally, I rationalize television and reading by claiming I only do it when I’m too tired to do anything else. I need to make sure that’s true.

Looking closer, I also realize I spend a great deal of time socializing. I’m not sure I can give friends up, but I need to make being with them more efficient. People are just as essential as food, but some of my social activities are junk food.

Many of the activities listed above are mostly ambitions I just piddle around with at best. Maybe it’s time I give up thinking I’m a programmer. I spent my work years programming, and I think of myself as a programmer, but I really don’t program anymore. I want to. If I gave up writing I’d want to program. But I can’t have two ambitions. There’s not enough time.

If I’m really serious about writing a book then I need to prune the crap out of that mind map above. Meditating on it is very revealing. I should print it out and study it first thing every morning when I wake up. I should reread this essay every morning to remind myself of the lessons I’ve learned writing it.

I find it most rewarding on waking up if I make two goals for the day. It used to be five, then three, and now two. They can’t be too big either. And sometimes I have to waste one on things like grocery shopping or seeing a movie.

If my mind map was smaller, with fewer branches, it would be easier to be ambitious with my limited resources. It’s going to be painful to give up so many possessions and activities. But if I really want to succeed with my goal, I can see from studying the mind map, that’s the price.

Afterward:

The two goals that came to mind this morning, were to write a new blog, and finish a scanning project and submit it to Internet Archive. This accomplishes one of them. I think of blogging as writing. I’ve always said blogging was piano practice for writers. Yet, I see it’s not working on a book. I’ve got to start blogging outside my morning writing hours. Blogging is essential to my my mental agility. It has to be #3 after morning writing and exercise. But I positively have to stop blogging in the morning.

If I can’t make writing in the morning my #1 activity every day, I should Marie Kondo my ambition to write a book. To be honest, I must prune my ambitions too.

Maybe I’m really doing what I want, and the desire to write is what I should give up.

Not yet.

JWH

Am I Ill, Or Just Getting Old?

by James Wallace Harris, Sunday, May 6, 2018

When I was young I thought growing old meant going bald and getting wrinkles. That didn’t seem too bad. I assumed I would stay the same mentally. When I was young I felt great most of the time, hardly ever got sick, and I wasn’t bothered by heat or cold. We didn’t have air conditioning until I was a senior in high school. At sixty-six I go years without getting a cold or the flu, but I do have chronic heart, stomach and back problems, and cold and heat annoys the crap out of me. I keep my chronic conditions in check with diet and exercise.

The trouble is, I don’t feel like I used to. Is that illness, or oldness.

Getting old

In recent years I’ve felt my vitality run down. I can’t decide if something is wrong with me, or this is what it feels like to get old. And I’m only young old. What will it feel like to be really old?

At my last physical my doctor said all my blood work looked good. My testosterone was at a proper level, various vitamins were on the mark, my protein level was fine, and a bunch of other numbers I didn’t understand were where they were supposed to be. She said I was doing pretty good. I needed to lose weight and lower my cholesterol, but she’s been saying that for decades. For years I’ve been eating healthier, lost some weight, and lowered my cholesterol. The only time she praised me for my cholesterol and weight were the periods I went vegan. However, I can’t keep that up.

The thing is I feel best when I’m eating sweets. Ice cream makes me feel younger. Junk food gives me mental energy, but it eventually makes me feel sick too. I constantly struggle with my diet to find the right mixture of healthy eating that gives me the most vitality, yet doesn’t lead to feeling bad.

Recently I started wondering if my problem wasn’t disease or diet, but I’m just aging. At my last physical, I asked my doctor, “How do you tell the difference between feeling old and feeling sick?” She laughed at me and gave me some sympathetic words I’ve forgotten. Besides feeling rundown, I can’t remember shit. And I was told that is normal too.

My wife thinks I’m a hypochondriac. I used to feel normal all the time, now normal is a rare few hours in the week. Is this the real reason why people hate getting old so much? Not for the decline in appearance, but the decline in feeling good?

I constantly read books about diet, health, and exercise. Many authors promise renewed vitality if I’d only do what they say. The problem is I don’t have the discipline or the vitality to consistently follow their advice. I was able to stick with a plant-based diet for several months. I lost thirty pounds, and my LDL went to 90. However, my energy levels dwindled away. I’ve since added yogurt, kefir, and eggs back into my diet and mental energy has returned, but not like it was. I’ve been a vegetarian since the 1960s, but always ate a lot of junk food. I’ve never been a high-energy person, but I was fine for a bookworm.

In my sixties, I’m feeling the creep of decay. I’ve fought it believing it could be cured. Now I’m wondering if it’s actually normal. Now I know why Ponce de Leon searched for the fountain of youth. Now I know why old people in my youth swilled Geritol. Now I understand my mother’s addiction to pain pills in her later life. Now I know why people hope B12 shots will give them a boost. It’s a shame that snorting cocaine is self-destructive because it sounds like a perfect drug for the Social Security years.

JWH

Free Will and Exercise

by James Wallace Harris, Sunday, January 28, 2018

I’ve always been doubtful about the concept of free will. As I’ve gotten older I’ve become a complete skeptic. If we had free will would anyone be fat? If we had free will would anyone be self-destructive? Maybe I lack free will and other people have it because some people always do the right thing. Or maybe, those people who succeed have other internal motivating factors pushing them. For example, it could be all those men and women who faithfully work out at the gym are compelled by relentless mating impulses and not free will.

I have found that pain is an effective but imperfect motivator. I have chronic back pain. I also have clogged arteries. Both will nag me incessantly if I don’t eat and exercise properly. Chest pain and shortness of breath is a wonderful motivator, but I inconsistently obey its commands. Immobilizing back pain will also get my attention but I don’t always listen. In both cases, I do just enough to get those two nags off my case. Why don’t I do more?

The Thinker

If I truly had free will I’d exercise regularly and diet until I got down to a healthy weight. Intellectually I know making those choices could rid me of my pain burdens and even give me freedoms I haven’t had in years. So, why don’t I do what needs to be done? Obviously, a lack of free will.

Other folks might say its a lack of willpower, but I disagree. I say free will is where willpower should come from. Let me use an example.

I have spinal stenosis which causes numbness in my leg that can lead to back pain. I also have some bad discs in my lower spine that can cause dull back pain. And if I let both get out of hand I get tight muscles in my lower back that causes very sharp back pains. I can’t handle anti-inflammatory drugs or NSAIDs. If I eat a healthy diet I can keep my inflammation in check and reduce the numbness in my leg down. If I exercise and maintain a symmetrical posture for sitting and sleeping I can keep my discs happy. If I do both I don’t experience muscle pain. It’s like walking a tightrope.

My doctors have always told me my spinal stenosis would get worse but I’ve been able to keep it in check by faithfully following my diet, doing physical therapy exercises, and working out on my Bowflex machine. I’ve been doing this for years, and have kept the numbness and pain to a minimum. It never goes away completely, but I keep it at a level I consider okay.

Everyone once in a while I’ll rebel and skip a day or two of exercising. I just want to have a vacation from my routine. But it always costs me. If I vacation too long I pay severely where I’m laid up using heating pads and taking drugs that upset my stomach. Interrupting my routine starts a downward spiral and I have to fight hard to regain control.

Recently I took a vacation, lost control, and couldn’t get it back. I thought I’d finally reach the point where things would get worse like my doctors told me. That was depressing. I had to take drugs that totally tore up my stomach. At which point I had to stop taking the drugs. I figured I had to do something different. I remember I had started doing Miranda Esmonde-White exercises last year and they helped.

Here’s the thing. When I feel good I do less to help myself. If I had free will I would always know never to stop doing what’s good for me. I don’t decide to do right because of my willpower or free will, I do it because of pain. At least I respond to pain. I know people who don’t. They do nothing to help themselves and just suffer.

My current free will crisis is the knowledge that doing the Miranda Esmonde-White exercises is the best thing I’ve done for my back in years. In fact, for a few days, I felt no pain whatsoever. That was remarkable. Of course, the first thing I did when this happened was to start eating bad food and skipping my exercising. And the pain came back.

The Miranda Esmonde-White classical stretch exercises showed me that I had a lot of tight muscles I wasn’t stretching in my normal physical therapy exercises, and when I loosened them up my back felt wonderful. I could sit with my legs crossed. I could slouch while sitting. I could sit in chairs that usually hurt my back.

I’ve been doing episode 1003 (Season 10, third episode) “Spine Stretch for Posture” daily since January 1st – 28 days in a row. There are 29 other episodes in the Season 10 DVD set I bought. Intellectually, I know if I systematically did more Miranda Esmonde-White episodes I might get much better. Yet I can’t make myself try them. I’ve been faithfully doing episode 1003 every day because it keeps the pain at bay but I can’t push myself to do more. Why?

Free will is an iffy concept. But I think of it this way. I don’t believe in souls, but let’s use the concept of a soul as an illustration. Think of the body as an automobile and the soul as the driver. I would say free will is the ability of the soul to decide where to drive the car. I don’t believe in souls or free will because our conscious and unconscious minds are completely integrated into our bodies. They can’t be separated. My conscious mind is only a fraction of the whole. Evidently, my body and unconscious mind also want to drive.

If we had free will we’d have complete say over our body and unconscious mind. At least that’s my theory. Sometimes I think my conscious mind can trick the other two.

My body and unconscious mind don’t like eating healthy or exercising. They constantly try to con me to quit being good and doing what they want. But I’ve learned that I can fool them by repetition and conditioning. I’ve been able to muster up enough free will and willpower to make myself do episode 1003 every day this month. Sometimes its a struggle. I’ve discovered it helps to do it first thing in the morning. I just tell myself I can’t do anything fun until I do my Miranda exercises.

At first, it was really hard. My muscles were tight, I lacked the stamina. And the exercises seems confusing to my uncoordinated ways. I can’t dance because I can never remember the steps. So following Miranda always feels clumsy. Even after doing this routine 28 times I still struggle to remember the order of the exercises. This is another revelation about my lousy memory. At first, I thought it might be another sign of aging, but then I remembered I’ve never been able to remember song lyrics or melodies, even to songs I’ve heard a thousand times.

I’m reminded of Howard Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligences. He started out with eight, but eventually added a ninth, but others have suggested even more mental abilities. Free will or lack of free will might be due to a combination of ability levels.

Types of multiple intelligences

My solution has been to relax and just go along with the DVD. Over 28 days I’ve gotten much better at following Miranda’s moves, and even learning routines I hated. And the routines I hated were always the ones I had the most trouble following. But persistence has paid off. I realize Miranda was right, stretching all my muscles helps do the routines and erases my chronic pains.

Now, you’d think learning this powerful lesson would allow my free will to decide to do the right thing every day. It doesn’t. It’s a constant struggle. I resent giving up those 23 minutes. My unconscious mind and body like total freedom to be lazy and wanton. They hate that my conscious mind is always wanting to do something that requires discipline. For my whole life, I’ve hated to put anything on my calendar. Even if it’s something fun and exciting like a great concert.

My conscious mind is trying to fight this though, to trick my unconscious mind and body. I keep thinking if I could only remember the Miranda Esmonde-White routines I could do them throughout the day during odd moments. They say sitting is this new smoking, so doing something every hour would be great for my overall health. And, I wouldn’t feel like I have to follow a set routine. The trouble is I can’t remember the routines. Oh, I can remember them in a haphazard way, but I really need to be organized and stretch every set of muscles through the day.

Part of the problem is I follow the routines visually and I have a very poor visual memory. I wish each routine had a name. I’ve thought about watching all 30 episodes and trying to create a total list of routines and give each a name to memorize. And then work to condition my unconscious mind and body to do a few routines each hour during the day. That might fool them I’m not having to dedicate myself to regular exercising period.

I’d love to give up having to exercise every morning before I can start my day. I hate losing an hour to a scheduled routine. I tell myself if I would stop once an hour and do a few minutes of stretching I’d end up exercising more and I might be able to give up the morning routine and even the Bowflex machine. Miranda claims her stretches is all the exercising an older person needs, and that might be true. I feel like I stand taller, have better posture, and have more strength in my arms.

Which brings us back to free will. If I had a choice this is what I want. (Well, what I really want is to eat anything I want, never exercise at all, and still be healthy.) If I had free will I should be able to say, “This is something that works and I’ve decided to do it.”

Getting old is a pain in the ass. Wearing out is a pain in the ass. I recognize I must work harder and harder to maintain my dwindling vitality and wellbeing is just how it’s going to be. I just wish I had the free will to do what I need to do without having to fight sloth and gluttony.

JWH