Yoda | Wellness Secrets of a SuperAger

I am resending this on the blog as my Christmas present to you. My girlfriend gave me a Yoda hoodie for Christmas with the quote – “Try not. Do, or do not. There is no try.”

Those were Yoda’s words to Luke Skywalker in The Empire Strikes Back when Luke was stuck, unsuccessful and becoming frustrated with his failure. Luke precipitated that fabulous quote when he said, “Okay, I’ll give it a try.”

I always liked Yoda’s words. There seemed to be a deep meaning to them. How can you do something without trying? I never quite got what it was, but I always sensed there was a profound meaning in there some place. I don’t know how many years ago I heard that quote. It was in a movie theater when that particular installment of the Star Wars Trilogy was showing. Surely more than 10 years have gone by, maybe 20. Anyway, I finally got it.

I was riding my bicycle yesterday afternoon and just kind of playing with the idea of trying. What does it mean to try? That happens a lot when I am riding. I have told people that riding is my meditation. It just happens to burn calories. I don’t ride the bike for that, though. I do it because I love riding. Everything else is just gravy.

That’s how I finally got Yoda’s message.
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What’s that?! What kind of “… Food, Exercise and Living Longer” blog tells you to stop TRYING to lose weight? That’s the whole object isn’t it? Well, not exactly. Stick around, you might find out something worth your time.

I tried to lose weight for most of my life, my weight went up and it went down, but more up than down and I was overweight and out of shape more often than not. Some years ago I started writing this blog. At that time I had my weight down to 165 pounds. That was the lowest in about 15 years and down from a peak over 220 pounds. I felt happy about my success. But starting to write about eating healthy and controlling my weight changed something for me. I realized I was no longer struggling in private. I felt responsible to the blog’s readers and also to myself for eating intelligently and maintaining my good health and weight.

I started reading about aspects of weight control like serving size and portion control. I learned that a serving of pasta amounted to 220 calories, BUT, a single serving amounted to about the size of a fist or a baseball. This astonished my Italian eyes. To me a serving of pasta was a ten inch plate mounded over with pasta. So, if I planned to set an example for my blog followers, I needed to confine myself to true serving sizes.

This concept carried over into snacking, too. I would check the calories on a snack and see a reasonable 180 calories, but with my new awareness I would also read how many servings were in the package. If there were three servings included, that meant my eating the whole package, would amount to an outsized 540 calories, not the reasonable 180.

I didn’t realize it at the time, but I was no longer trying to lose weight. I was simply eating and choosing my diet in an intelligent fashion. I had begun doing it. Continue reading →