Insanity

The Insanity Journey

On Aug 11, 2012. I began the insanity program. The program is a 60 day fitness program that focuses on very high intensity workouts. I am turning 30 in a month and at 5'5" and 165lbs I am probably 10 pounds or more overweight. Last year I was at 180 lbs, before I decided to change things up a little. 

Now I am hoping to hit 155 lbs before my birthday on 24th September. I am also doing Tae-Kwon-Do, and that was the reason behind my earlier weight loss. Before my son was born, I weight 155 lbs and swiftly started gaining weight in the five months since.

Day1: Fitness Test

Switch Kicks     138
Power Jacks      51
Power Knees    102
Power Jumps    30
Globe Jumps     9
Suicide Jumps  19
Push-Up Jacks 31
Low Plank Oblique 70

I thought I did pretty well for the first day. I struggled the most with the suicide jumps and globe jumps. Let me set a target for myself in 60 days:

Switch Kicks    160
Power Jacks     70
Power Knees    120
Power Jumps    45
Globe Jumps     14
Suicide Jumps  25
Push-Up Jacks 50
Low Plank Oblique 80

Week 1

I just got done with the first 2 workouts. I took it easy... not perhaps digging deep. I have a minor hip injury from TKD that is getting better and my shoulders a little sore..besides I dont see the point in pushing really hard for the first day and be sore for the next week. Slow and steady is best, IMO. The first workout was tough on my shoulders. The second was tough on my back. I am not jumping very strong for the latter half of the workout to conserve some energy. The power jumps are something I want to improve in. I think they are a very good indicator of overall fitness. Surprisingly, I am finding the moving push-ups to be quite challenging, since that is the one exercise I am somewhat regular with. And the last thing was that the overall "jiggle" factor on my body is a little embarrassing. I think that will change soon, in a couple of weeks I should tighten and tone.

Day 4 was cardio recovery. It was pretty relaxed compared to the usual pace. However, after TKD sparring last night,  I had a lot of trouble with holding the deep lunges. My quads are really fatigued. Lets see how challenging pure cardio is.

Day 5 was pure cardio. I had been warned about it. I started feeling really heavy and bloated, not at all in the mood for any workout.. I pushed through. I paced myself through the initial warmup. Things got looser and I felt a bit better. After the stretch I felt much better. For most of the workout, the sole of my left foot bothered me. I had to cheat several times. I paused the video on two occasions for about 10-15 secs. And several times reverted to a mild jog instead of what was asked of me. It was the toughest workout so far.

Final workout was nice. I pushed harder than usual and was drenched in sweat. Left feet and left hip still bothering me. Hope the rest day does me some good.

Week 2

The first 2 workout this weeks were really tough for me. On both days, I wasnt feeling too great... I was feeling lethargic and slow. Had way too much to eat on both days , and probably too high on salt/sugar. I am begining to feel that doing this without watching what I eat is not working. I am going to cut down on my high sugar cereal and swap in some protein. The other thing I have decided is to find a way to not do high intensity WO on the same day I have TKD. This unfortunately will require me to move the program around, exchange plyometrics with abs, perhaps. Today, I will get myself some arch supports on my shoes and see if it helps the arches of my feet. They have been a constant pain and stop me from pushing myself.

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Week 2 came to an abrupt end.... I am taking a couple of days of break from insanity... I am feeling injured and dont want to push myself into making things worse.
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Insanity 1.0 came to a sad and disappointing end.... too many injuries, not enough recovery.... I am not ready for this yet...

Sep 9th

Even though Insanity was a failure, I feel those 2 weeks did do me some good after all. I feel cardio-vascularly fitter than before... Over the past week or so, I have been trying to do some running. The last 4 times I ran:

4.34 Km - 30 mins - My feet hurt so I stopped
5 Km - 36:30 mins - Took it slow.
5 Km - 33:30 mins - Felt a little stronger...
2 day break
5 Km - 28:10 mins - Pushed myself.

40 before 40

As my 30th birthday approaches, I am compelled to make myself one of them "40 before 40" lists. I thought of the list for my 30th a bit late, so here it is:

1. Istanbul
2. Hawaii
3. Grand Canyon
4. Drive up to Canada on the pacific coast
5. Bhutan
6. Alaska
7. Japan
8. Niagara Falls
9. Experience the countryside of Europe. (England/Cote De Azur/ North Italy)
10. Boat house trip in Kerala.
11. Cambodia or some location in South-east asia.
12. Do a cruise.
13. Get a Tae-Kwon-Do black belt..
14. Run a half marathon.
15. Do Insanity and do a before and after shot.
16. Get a six pack  hopefully as a consequence of 15 :)
17. Pull weight below 70 and keep it there.
18. Pick up a new sport
19. Learn to snowboard.  
20. Learn to surf.
21. Buy another house. - Done
22. Diversify investments.
23. Setup a retirement plan. - Done.
24. Buy a nice car.
25. Learn to sweep (Guitar)
26. Play tornado of souls
27. Join a band.
28. Take voice lessons
29. Take Guitar lessons.
30. Learn a language - french?
31. Climb a mountain
32. TBD
33. TBD
34. TBD
35. TBD
36. TBD
37. TBD
38. TBD
39. TBD
40. TBD

On Power

I start with the disclaimer, that I form my thoughts as a rank of a student on these subjects. Minds of ponderous weight have contributed to these issues and I hold their intellectual ability in the highest regard. I just want to exercise the process of rationalization to the multitude of information on this topic that plagues our modern world.

Of late I have pondered over the idea of "caution against the undue concentration of power". To me it appears that a lot of social issues arise from disparity in power. Power works in many ways, and although , it has beneficial outcomes, when used in a paternalistic manner, I will focus on the issue of excessive power, which despite its outcome, appears ominous to me.

As a child, you may encounter the use of excessive power in the form of an over-bearing teacher. I vouch that the Indian schooling system is sprinkled with them. You also encounter power in your own parents. Excessive power almost always has the effect of undermining the ability of the less-powerful party to negotiate. This ends up making them feel helpless & disgruntled. Hopefully, some of the cases, listed above, that kind of power is mediated with benevolence and love, which makes it bearable, perhaps, to the degree, that one does not think about it.

But, I did not start thinking about the subject due to repressed memories of childhood.  I thought about it because of the tumultuous political storm that has gripped the world over the past 5-6 years. I am interested in political power. I have heard, and have been enticed by many ideological philosophies regarding the matter. Essentially, there are two flavors - One which states that political power should be dismantled and another which is convinced of the benevolence of "Big Government".

I wonder if the believers in "Big Government" think of it as a countermeasure to what they perceive to be the concentration of  "private economic power". I think that is a valid assumption, in that, most government policies pander to the masses in a democracy at the cost of those who can pay - which happens to be a minority in many cases. However, it has been pointed out to me that once assembled , the power center of government is coerced by economic power centers to be a proxy for capitalists and special interest groups. This seems reasonable to me, since I think politicians like any individual are profit-motivated, and once elected, there is little "monetary profit" in uplifting the masses.

In essence, I see the world as a collection of entities, each desiring to maximize its profit. Some of these endeavors are considered "good" and others are loathed- largely determined in some sort of consensus driven by the populous. And what comes of this is the desire to prop up power centers to protect what one sees as their interests.

I see the great usurpation of liberty once we allow government to intervene in things that one may hold sacrosanct and beyond the realm of governance. But, I am not certain that "free markets" solve the issues of disparity either.  I am told that a free market is the perfect system, wherein the competing forces balance each other. I am also told that there is incredible efficiency in the market that always keep prices at the lowest level possible. This, I find, very very difficult to grasp. What are the initial conditions here?

Let us talk about the element of competition. The assumption is that in a free market, it is this element that serves as internal system of measures and checks, and hence does not need any scrutiny from a third party - a benevolent government, for e.g. But I find this assumption deeply flawed, I know of only one system that was ever truly a free market - the system of evolution. Over billions of years, organisms of all sorts competed openly for resources without any "regulation", without any "control". I think we all agree that "competition" is a process of selection and not that of co-existence. It appears man has come out on top of this process. The competition between the other participants and man is over -  Man has monopoly of every resource available, other participants have no ability to negotiate.

The other element is efficiency. What does this mean? I have heard, that the market always distributes resources to those who value it the most - and this is efficiency.... Hmmm? Now what does "value" mean?
Are we saying that a man dying of hunger values food less than a man who can afford it? Well, we need to revisit efficiency and if thats really the way to go.

I think what I fear, is that free markets although allowing competition, will eventually destroy it. That eventual victors always emerge and can prop up barriers that have nothing to do with legislation. Barriers can be propped by secrecy, by force, by association with others who prop barriers. There is nothing in the free markets, in my opinion, that will stop this kind of concentration of economic power. And in such a world, despite small government, and the celebration of liberty, nothing will prevent the lopsided nature of negotiations between those who wield power and those who dont, not much unlike today.

It might appear that I am making a classic Marxist argument, except that I started with the observation that usurpation of power by the public is eventually self-defeating as well. I believe the contribution of "liberty" to your well being is over-rated. In itself, liberty means nothing without the ability to participate in a market. Your freedom to participate and your ability are two very different things.

So far, in what I understand, as appealing as I find the idea of personal liberty , and as unfair I find the notion of progressive taxation and all other elements of heavy-handed governance, I am not quite bowled over by Milton Friedman. I am not proposing answers but highlighting my lack of conviction in what I understand of extant economic-political ideology.  I am still looking for many answers, especially regarding the never ending battle for personal liberty and the "common good".

"End the Fed"

I had an interesting read of this one. I learned several things. I was convinced of many of the points that Ron Paul made, others not so much.

In essence what I understood was that Ron Paul claims that the system of fiat monopoly and the unethical standards of direction and leadership of the Fed is the root cause of pretty much all of America's economic woes - these include the housing bubble, all bubbles before that, the following depression and all of the ones before that. The argument made is fairly easy to grasp, i.e. inflationary monetary policy provides false sense of security to participants in an economy and just perpetuates a cycle of boom and busts.

One of the points that hit home with me, was the lack of oversight with which the fed acts. I am not convinced that government oversight would somehow fix all the problems, but still, the fact that an institution that is supposed to behave in the best interest of the people, is shrouded in secrecy and lacks any transparancy.

Ron Paul goes to some length to explain some of his libertarian views as well. I found the idea of the sanctity of personal freedoms very appealing.  In that sense, I found myself seeing the problem of too much governmental power and the degree to which statism limits personal liberties. Not to mention that the people in government are corrupt and are influenced by special interest groups. What I lacked clarity on was the alternatives to big government. Big governments arise from the need of the majority to be given security blankets. I am not sure if I understand how we can circumvent this fundamental issue of democracy. i.e. How do we address poverty and hunger and the desperate circumstances of the severely dispossessed and uphold personal liberties at the same time? To me those two seem to be at irreconcilable odds.

He goes on to say that the powers vested in the fed are un-constitutional . Although I was convinced of this argument, I am not sure that in itself it is a morally strong one. That would imply that the constitution dictates a doctrine that is perfectly moral. Or a template of  "perfect economy" , for that matter.

In any case, I would like to summarize:
I see that low interest rates can spawn speculative behavior leading to unrealistic prices of assets and subsequent realizations of the speculative nature can lead to precipitous drops.
I feel that certain personal liberties are sacrosanct and should not be held hostage to the whims of the masses. However, I am certain that in the entire history of humanity, these boundaries of personal liberties have been drawn, encroached and re-drawn.
I am still not sure what exactly happened in 2008.
I felt that Ron Paul does not present a balanced view. i.e. he does not criticize the gold standard at all. He presents it as a solution for all. This I find far-fetched.

I will probably go on to read either the work of an economist from the "Austrian School" to further deepen my understanding of Ron Paul's position or perhaps read Paul Krugman to get a Keynesian POV. At least, I understand that, those schools of thought are in direct constrast to each other ( at least in parts)...

Staring into Voids

Beyond the quagmire of the intellectual pursuit for meaning, lies the profound fear of the dissolution of the soul.

When I gaze at the sky, I feel wonder and awe. I feel divine for it is I who peers into the universe and ponder its mysteries and not the universe, despite its age and size which has the gift of thought. And yet, I feel so incredibly insignificant, that I am certain that I am nothing more than a probabilistic certainty - a blip in time and space and nothing more. I witness the unraveling of the threads of the fabric of creation with our sciences, and what is revealed is marvelous. The order of the universe is incredible and the sheer probability of life, no matter how infinitesimal, flowers all around me with prolific diversity. The grasp of our mind fascinates me, and yet, so overwhelmed am I , that I cannot even begin to understand the great scale of 'existence'. I struggle with my fascinating but feeble mind to grasp the edge of our sciences, and wonder about the corners we have painted ourselves into - where we struggle to reconcile our understanding into a consistent theme. And, I wonder, what's beyond this wall? Would our purpose be any clearer if we are able to see that the fundamental forces of our nature are indeed facets of the same multi-dimensional object?

In this absence of a solid understanding of our creation, must we turn to god for salvation? Is it not a web of lies meant to console and numb our minds? For it is one thing to see the hand of a creator in the incredible juxtaposition of circumstances that make this rant possible, but it is quite another to peddle fiction of the elaborate stairways to heaven, and all the fine ornamentation of a god-fearing life lead on the way to eternal bliss .

It's my hypothesis that fear above all other things drives our conception of a creator - specifically a benevolent creator - purveyor of all things that provide said bliss. Given our infinite curiosity, we peel back the layers of our universe one thin sheet at a time, but forever aware of the dark shroud that separates us from absolute truths. And in this darkness I fear that my soul will extinguish with so many questions unanswered. And that old man , dying in his bed, will be all too aware, that in the 10 billion years of known existence there will never be anything like that tiny blip ever again. And in the end, will another one of us embrace one of the many hands that reach out with false tales of a 'chance to persevere' beyond his last breath?

The coin I once tossed....

The excitement is palpable as I count down the days to our trip to Roma. I was there once before in 2007, but it seems like a lifetime ago. I was working in Munich for a few weeks for Infineon. Munich was cold and covered with snow. I dont recall with absolute certainty how I got from Munich to Rome, but given that my first memories of Rome were of the Termini stazione, it would be a safe guess that I took the green and dilapidated trenitalia.

I had known little about the city, other than the pop culture reference to Julius Caesar and the catholic church. I had visited the wikipedia / tripadvisor website and prepared a list of places to see. This was, after all, before the airing of ROME on HBO. I spent a day and a half in Rome, staying in a hostel for some 20-25 Euros a night. The hostel, whose name escapes me, was perhaps a few miles north of the Vatican City. I checked into the hotel first, and then with my backpack walked to St. Peter's Square, I remember walking past the door of 'Museo Vaticani', there were no lines, I assumed that it was closed that day. I made my way past busy city squares and turned the corner to behold the Magnificent Piazza San Pietro. There were massive lines to get into the bascilica, so I got in line and waited .

On Power

My thoughts on this topic are immature at best, but I hope that I aspire to ground myself in some of the ideas that I will ponder upon today.

Power - What is it? Is it acceptable to say that, for better or worse, it is the very thread from which the fabric of human history is made? Is there any inherent justification for power? Is there any benefit to the greater masses to submit to power? Is it simply a consequence of the natural order of things.

Whatever I read of history, I find the same pattern, and the same question. How is it that history is the story of so few? The story of many following a few, to death, to greatness, etc. How did this come to be? When was nobility conceived? Was it on the basis of wisdom or might? Of aggression or kindness? If I were to make conjecture, I would say nobility must have had its birth in military might. A family or group of individuals that protected, or perhaps a group that pillaged. But either way, the threat of violence is central.

Hypothesis: Violence is central to our history.

This is not that far fetched to believe, since, this is clearly the natural order of things. Nature is violent, that is in its mechanisms there is little room for the frail misgiving of human kindness. Just the clockwork of survival. So building on this hypothesis, we can also assume that, at least, in part, our beginnings were inspired by fear of violence. The agents of violence could have been nature itself or other humans. Whatever may have transpired seems to have lead to the result that many agreed to the dominance of few. And eventually this lead to the notion of ownership of land. Land as the primary resource must have only become important in terms of the produce. So in providing protection, the leaders of men must have felt a natural sense of ownership to the realm they had control over.

So a natural affinity to family groups and ownership of land must have led to the first distinction of the first noble family. But was it rational to think that the protection provided by the previous generation would be held intact by the next. Or did the mantle of leadership pass fluidly to the next best protector/pillager? Which brings us to the another question? What would those in power do to retain power? I mean they already clearly proficient in the crafts of violence. Political strife aka the struggle to retain/ or assume power is also therefore a function of violence. (TBC)