Health and Fitness.

I workout in the gym near to my office. There you see some people running in the treadmill as if they are angry at their own body. Then there are some ladies who walk in the treadmill in 1 mile/hour speed, even slower than their normal walk, all the time reading Cosmopolitan, People and other similar magazines. The other day the lady next to my treadmill was reading “10 crazy things you can do to improve your sex life” and commenting about it to the lady other side, who is also walking in ‘negative’ speed. In the locker room, men walk around naked. I am afraid some of them are gays! But overall, I like the gym, it gives me a sense of fitness after each workout. I started out in August with a high intensity workout thinking that I could lose 5 pounds in one day. Eventually (in few days!), I learned to agree with the reality that the pounds I have gained in past many years is not that easy to shed off. But more than the weight lose, it gives me a healthy feeling which is worth the pain.

The other day I told my wife that the reason I work out is to sweat, which is a ‘commandment’ of God. God told Adam: "By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food". My job is working on the computer and no matter how aggressive I type on the keyboard or move my mouse I wouldn’t sweat. So I take a break and go to gym, do some workout to sweat. She thought I was crazy.

I remember reading a book called Maker’s Diet, written by Jordan Rubin. This book was highly promoted by TBN and during those days my wife and I were huge TBN addicts. We watched TBN as if it was a ‘holy’ thing to do. We ended up buying this book and read it eagerly. In the book, the author tries to extract eating principles from Bible and provide a diet plan for everybody to follow. For example, in the Book of Leviticus God gives the dietary laws and said not to eat shell fish. So as per Jordan, it’s better not to eat shell fish such as Shrimp etc. He is not promoting it as a legalistic thing, but as a good thing for health.

We both stopped eating shell fish, pork and inorganic meat and poultry; and started buying organic milk, yogurt, fruits etc. Our grocery bill went through the roof. Since John the Baptist ate wild honey, we too bought raw, unprocessed honey from health store. Bread without yeast, and everything organic etc are few other suggestions by the author.

Later on, we have come to a realization that unless we grow everything in our own farm, we can't afford these. We eventually gave up and returned to 'normalcy' (Well, I don't know what is normalcy). By the way, I felt so good while following this diet but it was very expensive. I am left with no other option than eating all the processed, chemically modified junk food, because that's cheap.

My ideal place to live is a farm. And grow everything we need there including vegetables, fruits, birds and animals. Running in the open air would be a great, refreshing workout. Riding a horse through the unpaved farm trails would be adventurous. I love the sound of crickets in the night. I am naturally drawn to earth, it's smell and it's beauty and wildness. I am looking forward for that day to come...