Craig Constantine

Elet Hall: Not training, risk, danger, and Lyme disease →

Published March 1, 2018 · All posts on Mar 1 · Movers Mindset

Elet Hall: Not training, risk, danger, and Lyme disease

What motivates and shapes individual approaches to physical training, risk management, and personal growth?

Elet Hall takes time out from a motorcycle engine rebuild to discuss his approach to training (and not training), challenge, risk, danger, consequences, and why he walked away from American Ninja Warrior. Along the way, we talk about Lyme disease, and his work with the Bay Area Lyme Foundation, before he shares his four words to describe his practice.

Strength of character is what I’m looking for in almost everything that I do.
~ Elet Hall (30:00)

The conversation begins with reflections on Elet’s experiences in Ninja Warrior and parkour, emphasizing the importance of meeting people where they are in their personal journeys. It touches on how perceptions of these activities differ and how they can be bridges rather than barriers for people seeking self-improvement.

Further, the discussion moves to Elet’s personal training philosophy, rooted in nature and holistic approaches. Topics like the subjective and objective impacts of training, footwear choices for outdoor activities, and the biological and psychological effects of connecting with natural environments are explored. He highlights the value of understanding one’s own body and tailoring training to personal goals and limitations.

The latter part delves into a life-threatening incident that prompted Elet to reassess motivations and commitments. This leads to discussions on Lyme disease, its impact on energy levels, and the necessity of intentional training. The conversation ends with a reflection on building strength of character through thoughtful engagement with challenges, whether in parkour, life, or other pursuits.

Takeaways

Training for personal growth — Physical challenges can be transformative when approached with the right mindset.

Risk versus consequence — Every action in parkour and life involves balancing potential risks and consequences.

Connection with nature — Training outdoors provides unique challenges and rewards, fostering a deeper sense of fulfillment.

Minimalist footwear benefits — Choosing less structured footwear can enhance sensory feedback and overall physical awareness.

Holistic health management — Balancing exercise, diet, and self-care is critical for managing chronic conditions like Lyme disease.

Motivations for participation — It’s vital to understand why someone engages in a practice and to support their journey.

Strength of character — Facing and overcoming challenges builds self-confidence and personal resilience.

Reevaluating goals — Life events can prompt reassessment of what truly aligns with one’s values and passions.

Resources

Bay Area Lyme Foundation — An organization raising awareness and funding research for Lyme disease.

Merrell Trail Gloves — Minimalist footwear favored by the speaker for natural training environments.

Old Rag Mountain — A popular hiking spot mentioned in the discussion.

(Written with help from Chat-GPT.)

Kinesthetic Literacy →

Published February 28, 2018 · All posts on Feb 28

Dr. Hans Selye called it the General Adaption Syndrome. You are going to try to adapt to the new situation that is presented to you. If you don’t, your body goes through first alarm, “How do I make this work?!” and then resistence.
You realize you’re not going to bridge that gap and you resist that fact. “It’s ok!”, “It’s ok that I’m in an unhappy marriage!”, “I’m gonna make it work!”, “It’s ok that I’m in a bad job!”, or “I’ve still got seven hours to drive to new york!”, or whatever it is…
That’s the resistence phase. Then your body goes into exhaustion. And I meet more and more of my clients, more and more people in the world, are facing this exhaustion. They’re showing up with what we would call diseases of the autonomic nervous system– that I think include lupus, arthritus, fibromyalgia… Very many of the autoimmune diseases are the body turning on itself because it has reached a stage of exhaustion because we cannot make the gap between how they’re supposed to be in the world and how they are in the world.
~ Tom Myers from, Are you Kinesthetically Literate? – Tom Myers #101

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This is a wide-ranging podcast (you may want to skip over a bit of Daniel-specific Q-and-A up front) with the creator of the Anatomy Trains system of looking at anatomy as an integrated whole. They start on the basics and origin of Anatomony Trains but their dicussion travels VERY far afield discussing human domestication, parkour, birth, death and the future of our species. Two and a half hours well-spent in my book.

No plan B →

Published February 27, 2018 · All posts on Feb 27 · Quotes

There’s no reason to have a plan B because it distracts from plan A.
~ Will Smith

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Honesty →

Published February 26, 2018 · All posts on Feb 26 · Thought and Philosophy, Society

Humans are the most communicative species on the planet, but we’ve come increasingly to rely on the very cheapest signals: words. The problem with words is that they aren’t a scarce resource. Which is a more honest signal of your value to a company: when your boss says, “Great job!” or when she gives you a raise?
~ Kevin Simler from, Honesty and the Human Body

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I’m not sure I have a take-away from this. I don’t mean, “I’m not sure I have a take-away to share“, I mean I’m not sure I have a take-away, for me personally.

I’m sure only that this made me think.

Digging into Ketosis and the Ketogenic diet →

Published February 25, 2018 · All posts on Feb 25

Dom D’Agostino — The Power of the Ketogenic Diet (#172)

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This is a superlative question-and-answer session where Dr. Dagostino answers questions collected from Tim Ferris’s listeners.

It’s not so much a pitch about why you should do it (ketosis / the diet), but rather, it’s a deep discussion of all the details. What exactly is ketosis, how does it work, how do the systems in your body interact (at the various levels of organ, glands, hormones, cells, biochemics, and molecules.) Dr. Dagostino is obviously very much in favor of ketosis, but there’s a ton of useful information here.

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Nutrigenomics →

Published February 24, 2018 · All posts on Feb 24 · Society

I always think back: We were in these small foraging groups of 30-to-50 people who were part of a larger tribe, who were part of a larger language group, and we were very connected to these people. We carved that 30-to-50 up, down to nuclear families, and we carved them up into neighborhoods, and now we’ve carved that up into even smaller units, and broken families, and now individuals, and everybody’s plugged into the internet with everybody, but they’re all alone.
~ Daniel Vitalis from, Eat Like A Centenarian: Culinary Genomics – Amanda Archibald #95

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Daniel’s guest, Amanda Archibald, discusses what Centenarians (persons 100 years of age and beyond) eat. It’s a fun and wiiiiiiide ranging discussion about food, human civilization and society.

Dead end roads →

Published February 23, 2018 · All posts on Feb 23 · Society

Masculinity-as-cultural-construct is one of those beliefs that sounds good in the abstract, perhaps. But I think most folks, men and women alike, feel deep in their gut that it isn’t so, isn’t desirable, and isn’t working. As someone who has examined the research and history of masculinity, I find the idea of it being wholly a cultural construct utterly untenable. It is a conclusion one can reach only by willfully ignoring large swaths of the data and the human experience.
~ Brett McKay from, The Dead End Roads to Manhood

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Masculinity is not — not “entirely”, nor even “mostly” — a social construct. I believe one is free to attempt to take on whatever role one wishes. (I see that as one of the big benefits of our current level of human progress.) But if you attempt the role of a “Man”, you do not get to simply make up what you think a Man should be.

Eclipse photography 2/4 →

Published February 22, 2018 · All posts on Feb 22

The mostly eclipsed solar disk is in the middle of this photo– just a bit above the center. Normally, at this stage of the eclipse, the partly exposed solar disk would cause retina damage if you look at it directly. But thanks to this cloud… ok, fine, yes, clouds don’t block UV light so looking at this is a BAD idea. I looked quickly. A few times. It was TOTALLY worth it. Here, you can look all you want, but you might need to zoom in a bit…

The entire eclipse was very “busy”. It was clear, then some clouds, then clear, a cloud… the viewing conditions changed second-by-second. Truly a rare event to see.

Witch hunts →

Published February 20, 2018 · All posts on Feb 20 · Society

If you ask anyone who’s read [Fahrenheit 451], that hasn’t read it in like 20 years, “What do you remember of how that came to be in the book?” They’d say, “There’s this totalitarian government.” The truth is, it was the people. It was the people who decided that any dissenting opinions that would offend specific groups in society, ought to be burned. So it was self-inflicted. I think that’s what we are doing right now. We are slowly torching the first amendment and free speech by, basically, going on these witch hunts. I think it’s the most dangerous thing in the U.S. right now.
~ Tim Ferris from, Jamie Foxx Part 2 – Bringing the Thunder (#167)

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Normally, the Tim Ferris show is Tim interviewing his guests. But this episode is a rebroadcast of Jamie Foxx interviewing Tim.

First, great book. Second, I’m a huge believer of the marketplace of ideas. (That’s a significant part of the reason behind my Movers Mindset podcast project.)

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