My friend Mukesh told me today that I have “gained one round.” In local terms, this means that I have gained a size, which is to say more plainly that I am getting fat. While I have not yet verified this observation with a scale (I think I weighed 70 kilos before), I have been waiting for this to happen for years. I love looking at myself in mirrors, so one might have thought that I would have seen this coming, but slow and slight changes like are perceptually slippery. Perhaps I am less fat than soft, but the warning light is definitely on either way. I've been lucky to have made it this long living as I do. I am getting older and I have always known (without others telling me) that I generally eat more than most people my size. Only the genetic gifts of a fast metabolism and muscled physique have kept me from gaining weight. I lead a extremely sedentary lifestyle these days because I ride a motorcycle instead of a bicycle and I rarely find myself walking much more than a mile a day. Sometimes I do yoga and kickboxing calisthenics to break a good sweat before taking a cold shower, but as those of you who know me are well aware of, this doesn't happen every day.
I've never really been that active since I was a teenager when I was lifting weights and carrying lounge chairs up and down the beach all summer long. Last May's East Coast adventure sports trip was an exception to this, but a very short lived one. You may find that it is especially ironic that this has happened in the last few weeks (since I left vegan food and manual labor in the forest behind), when I have been busy trying to get a website for physical fitness up and running. Anyway, while this might have been inevitable, it is most certainly reversible. I have always prided myself on my claims to self discipline, but I really have not been put to the test very often. Try as I did in my early teens, I never could get myself addicted to any substances and I never could gain any weight. However, I generally took for granted the conventional wisdom that other people fell into these traps only partly because of genetic predisposition, but mostly because of a specific lack of knowledge in a few areas: the consumable substances in their environment, the effects of their daily lifestyle on their health and well being in the long run, and the perception of themselves and potential strength of their self-control mechanisms. I did a number of fasts when I was younger just to prove to myself that I could do food deprivation and understand its effects. I can do one again of course and surely drop a few pounds, but this will not solve the problem entirely.
I need a lifestyle change. The problem is, as it is for most people, that I have become comfortable being sedentary. As I have reported in other blogs, I can sit comfortably with my laptop (in nice environments) for upwards of ten hours at a stretch. This has ruined my eyes, my posture, and now my waistline. Still, do I have the willpower to do yoga everyday when I get up in the morning? Despite years of aspiring to that goals and living in an environment where that is actually culturally acceptable (even if you aren't a brahmin), I probably couldn't do it unless someone else made me. I might call this laziness, but I'd rather take this opportunity to be in solidarity with the ranks of overweight people it seems I may have now joined (hopefully only briefly - sorry guys) to cop out, or opt into the fight against “blaming the victim” of societal forces. I'm bored of the same routines... that's why I'm making YouFitter. Indian food is goddamn greasy and the drinks are always overly sweetened, but they sure taste good. It seems urban Indians across the age and gender spectrum have been getting fatter every year. Now, I like eating lots of different things everyday because I know I won't have access to it (at these prices or this level of authenticity) for quite some time. However, I know how I should be eating.
It's a pretty simple formula to follow around here: fruit for breakfast, whatever for lunch, salad for dinner, and some little sweet for dessert. Drink lots of water all day and have black coffee if you get hungry. There's tons of variety to be had here, but I consistently deviate form the course and find myself eating lunch type food all day long. And when I was in Hyderabad... my god, things got way out of hand. I will stem this tide for a number of reasons: I must prove to myself that I can do so with my resources and discipline, I am looking forward to reassuming my adventure travel lifestyle back home this summer, and I am building YouFitter – a project that requires me to be fit and do engage in fitness activities to sell the idea, and finally because I take my health very seriously and I want to make a good run at living forever like that futurist promised me last year on the Diane Rheams show. In sum, keeping with my long held commitment to arrogance and narcissism, I consider myself smarter and freer than most people afflicted with fat, so I think I've got a better shot at beating this. Hell, while I'm at it, I might even start shelling out some cash for some anti-aging supplements... wait, can I get generics cheaper here?
