Thank You, 2014!

There are so many beautiful moments that I lived in 2014 that, in its last day, I cannot but take some time to sit back and think about what made me the happiest, what made me feel alive, what heightened my emotions in all possible ways, what made me yearn either for adventure or for stillness. I wish I could share with you my most intimate memories from this year, but I'm sure I'll waste a lot of their charm in the translation from emotions to words. So, instead of this, I've decided to make a small list of the things that I've liked most in 2014. I invite you to do the same, as a token of appreciation for the joy that you've lived in this past year and also as a moment of reflection on your inner self.

Favorite 2014 book: What If? Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical                                                      Questions by Randall Munroe

The writer that I read the most: James Clavell

The poem that I read the most: If You Forget Me by Pablo Neruda

Favorite 2014 movies: The Grand Budapest Hotel and Guardians of the Galaxy

Favorite 2014 song: Counting Stars - One Republic

The song that I've listened to the most: Om Mani Padme Hum

Favorite place: Disneyland

Favorite quote: 'We are all rich peasants.' (Casey :), when I told him that I don't understand how most of the things that I use on a daily basis work.)

Favorite piece of research: 'Young Blood Reverses Age-Related Impairments in

Cognitive Function and Synaptic Plasticity in Mice'

                                               

Favorite physical exercise: Single Leg Deadlifts

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas, everybody, and may you have a wonderful time these days! Enjoy your presents, the company of your loved ones and, more importantly, stay true to yourselves! Don't give up your jingle bell food if you don't want to! Don't give up your muscle bell food if you don't want to either! Just take a moment to do what you like most doing and enjoy it properly!

Love,

Ioana

On Perfection

There are two kinds of people in this world: those who do something and those who seek perfection. Calling them perfectionists would be a misnomer. A perfectionist is supposed to be someone who is looking for perfection in an object of their creation. A perfectionist has already performed, whereas the seeker for perfection is still in the waiting. Constantly in the waiting. Transfixed by the prey that is getting further and further away.

Perfection is a drug, a hallucinatory disease. It leads to madness or maybe it begins in and with madness. But who could really tell? The point is that it is all-consuming and self-sabotaging. Nonetheless, it seduces the innocent and it lures her with its promise.

Now, what does perfection promise? Excellence, for once. And a spiritual sense of accomplishment, of unity with the divine. Perfection brings us closer to the realm of gods and strives at making us transhumans. It offers us the chance to evolve and to make a fundamental leap that could at best be matched, though never surpassed.

I don't know about you, but I, for one, have a flawed relationship with perfection. I yearn for it and I don't know how to go about it. I'm mesmerized and paralyzed by it up to the point that I have to actively pursue imperfection in order to do anything. What an irony! Dreaming of perfection and consciously and decidingly settling for its opposite. But, then, there is no other way. Imperfections abound in this world, whereas perfection is only one.

Sometimes I feel that I couldn't be able to spot perfection even if it were to hit me in the head and knock me off my feet. I have since wondered if I have ever seen anything that I would call perfect. Where is the perfection of the world hiding? After giving it some thought, I could tell you with a high degree of confidence that I have met perfection. Not in me, but in others who and which were genuinely oblivious to what they were standing for.

I have seen perfection in the skin of a baby. Not the very young ones, though, but those babies that are of 2 or 3 years of age. I have seen the perfection of coolness in elegant fish swimming in peaceful waters. I have seen perfection in the color red. I have seen perfection in a glass of water. Not the glass itself, obviously (not even the nicest glasses that I've seen so far are perfect), but in the calmness and comfort of the water as it spreads itself into all corners and leaves no spot unfilled. I have seen perfection in the way in which the light is captured and then thrown back out into the world by a diamond. I have sniffed perfection. It's in the scent of my favorite and oldest black scarf, the one that blends together all of my perfumes. I haven't tasted perfection. Maybe I didn't find it, but as I am nothing but a food lover and experimenter, chances are that perfection can't be fed by the spoon.

When in Doubt about the Prospects of Life Extension Research, Read This!

"Man will never reach the moon regardless of all future scientific advances." Dr. Lee DeForest, Father of Radio & Grandfather of Television

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943

"640K ought to be enough for anybody." Bill Gates, 1981

"There is no likelihood man can ever tap the power of the atom." Robert Millikan, Nobel Prize in Physics, 1923

"Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons." Popular Mechanics, 1949

"The bomb will never go off. I speak as an expert in explosives." Admiral William Leahy, US Atomic Bomb Project

"We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out," Decca Recording Co. rejecting the Beatles, 1962

“This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us," – Western Union, 1876

"Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible," -- Lord Kelvin, 1895

"Drill for oil? You mean drill into the ground to try and find oil? You're crazy," When Edwin L. Drake tried to enlist funds for his project to drill for oil in 1859

"The abdomen, the chest, and the brain will forever be shut from the intrusion of the wise and humane surgeon," -- Sir John Eric Ericksen, British surgeon to Queen Victoria

"Louis Pasteur's theory of germs is ridiculous fiction." Pierre Pachet, Professor of Physiology at Toulouse, 1872

You Are What You Don't Eat (Part 2)

I'll just jump straight into today's topic: AGEs and methionine. If you feel like you have no clue about what I'm saying here, please go check the first part of this post, which was published last week. One thing's for sure, though! We're discussing serious matters, like longevity-promoting diets and nutritional problem-makers, aka those compounds that we cannot realistically eliminate from our diets, but which we should really try to keep an eye on. So, as A's go first...

Advanced glycation end-products (AGEs)

Glycation is a metabolic process in which a sugar molecule attaches itself to a protein or lipid molecule, impairing its function. In plain English, we'd probably call this hijacking. Glycation is usually followed by all sorts of reactions that culminate in the production of advanced glycation end-products or AGEs. Such an appropriate name, as AGEs have been associated with many age-related chronic diseases, like cardiovascular diseases, cancer or Alzheimer's. Interestingly enough, glycation can be formed both outside, as well as inside of our bodies. 

Exogenous glycation is produced by cooking proteins or fats at high temperatures and/or for a long time. Think about grilling meat, baking cakes or roasting chicken. On the other hand, endogenous glycation occurs after the absorption of simple sugars in the bloodstream. That is, after dessert. If by now you don't hate glycation as much as I do, do not forget about wrinkles. Skin proteins like collagen and elastin are also threatened by sugar molecules and their glycation potential.

In order to optimize your diet it would be preferable to monitor your AGE intake. Here is a table that lists the AGE content of 549 foods, based on carboxymethyllysine content and which might come in handy for grocery shopping and cooking.

Methionine

Methionine is an amino acid whose dietary restriction has been associated with several health benefits, including an overall life span extension. Here is an excerpt from a study conducted in 2003 on the effects of methionine restriction (MR) in rats.

MR has repeatedly resulted in life span extension comparable to that seen in energy restricted animals. In one of our typical studies using Fischer 344 rats, MR resulted in a 42% increase in mean survival and a 44% increase in maximal longevity (Fig. 1). While living longer, animals on MR grow significantly less (Fig. 2), and consume more food when food intake is expressed on a per body mass basis. This latter observation has led to some controversy, since when expressed on a per animal basis, MR rats, being smaller, consume slightly less food per animal than their C-fed counterparts. This has left open the possibility that the effect of methionine restriction on life span is secondary to a restriction of caloric intake, and not due to methionine deficiency. In order to examine the

proposition that MR might be an effect secondary to CR, we have pair-fed rats, so that animals consumed control diet in the same quantity as consumed by methionine restricted rats. Since animals fed in this way will consume exactly the same energy levels regardless of which diet they consume, this would exclude caloric intake as an explanation for the MR effect. When C rats were fed in quantities equivalent to that consumed by MR animals they consumed all of the food offered, and there was a modest reduction in weight gain relative to ad libitum fed C animals. However, there was no prolongation of life span (Fig. 3) associated with the slightly reduced food intake and body size (Fig. 4), indicating that life span extension associated with restricted methionine intake is not primarily due to reduced energy consumption.

(J. A. Zimmerman, V. Malloy, R. Krajcik, N. Orentreich, 'Nutritional Control of Aging', Experimental Gerontology, 2003, Jan-Feb: 47-52.)

Furthermore, the effects of a methionine deficient diet on glucose, T4, IGF-1 and insulin levels have been depicted in a 2005 study on mice.

A diet deficient in the amino acid methionine has previously been shown to extend lifespan in several stocks of inbred rats. We report here that a methionine -deficient (Meth-R) diet also increases maximal lifespan in (BALB/cJ x C57BL/6 J)F1 mice. Compared with controls, Meth-R mice have significantly lower levels of serum IGF-I, insulin, glucose and thyroid hormone. Meth-R mice also have higher levels of liver mRNA for MIF (macrophage migration inhibition factor), known to be higher in several other mouse models of extended longevity. Meth-R mice are significantly slower to develop lens turbidity and to show age-related changes in T-cell subsets. They are also dramatically more resistant to oxidative liver cell injury induced by injection of toxic doses of acetaminophen. The spectrum of terminal illnesses in the Meth-R group is similar to that seen in control mice. Studies of the cellular and molecular biology of methionine-deprived mice may, in parallel to studies of calorie-restricted mice, provide insights into the way in which nutritional factors modulate longevity and late-life illnesses. 

(R.A. Miller, G. Buehner, Y. Chang, J. M. Harper, R. Sigler, M. Smith-Wheelock, Methionine-deficient diet extends mouse lifespan, slows immune and lens aging, alters glucose, T4, IGF-I and insulin levels, and increases hepatocyte MIF levels and stress resistance, Aging Cell, 2005 Jun:119-25)

You can check the methionine content of a large number of food products at this link.

Finding your path through the valley of calories, glycemic indexes and loads, AGEs and methionine is not easy, but, in time and with the right amount of determination, it will eventually work out for you and for the goals that you have set for yourselves. The good part is that it's not rocket science. The bad part is that it might be even more demanding than that. But, in the end, what matters is that you stay true to yourselves and if living a long healthy life is what you care about, then reviewing these lists every now and then might be one of the tools to help you reach just that!

You Are What You Don't Eat (Part 1)

I cannot stress this enough: a good diet won't add much time to your life. Exercising and eating clean might add, on average, a couple of months to your life span. However, what it can do for you is something of an unparalleled importance. It might add life to your years by extending your health span. This in itself is a great achievement. Who wouldn't want to be in tip-top shape and enjoy life's offerings for as long as possible? Also, by maintaining your body as young as you can or, at least, by not prematurely aging it, you're giving yourself higher chances to benefit from the rejuvenation therapies that are bound to exist in the near future.

An optimal longevity-promoting diet is certainly a very personalized diet, which takes into account a lot of individual factors, like one's most recent blood tests and medical check-ups, personal and family medical history, the output of genome and microbiome sequencing. In spite of being very self-contradictory when it comes to human nutrition, research does point to a certain general direction which might lead to an overall boost in the quality of our diets. Apart from eating vegetables, there is little consensus on what else we should be consuming. Nonetheless, there is much more agreement when it comes to the bad guys, to those compounds that we should either eliminate or reduce. Here is a small list focused on the things that we should cut back on in order to enhance our chances for exceptional longevity.

Calories

There are many studies related to the effects of calorie restriction (CR) on the aging process. Some of them dismiss  CR as capable of slowing down aging. Most opinions, however, converge around the idea that CR is probably the most powerful tool that we have right now in the fight against senesence. The evidence in this latter direction is also quite compelling.

Calorie restriction (CR), which entails reduced calorie consumption without malnutrition, is the only natural regimen shown to extend maximum and mean lifespan, as well as healthspan in a wide range of organisms. Although the knowledge about the biological mechanisms underlying CR is still incipient, various approaches in biogerontology research suggest that CR can ameliorate hallmarks of aging at the cellular level including telomere erosion, epigenetic alterations, stem cells depletion, cellular senescence, mitochondrial dysfunction, genomic instability, proteostasis imbalance, impaired nutrient sensing and abnormal intercellular communication. Currently, the NAD + /sirtuin pathway is one of the few mechanisms described to mediate CR effects and sirtuin-activating compounds (STACs) mimic many effects of CR. (S. Michan, 'Calorie restriction and NAD+/sirtuin counteract the hallmarks of aging', Front Biosci, 2014)

In order to embark on a CR regimen, you'd have to first calculate your daily caloric requirements and then reduce your actual caloric intake by 20% or even 30% from this previous figure. You can use a calorie counter to estimate your caloric needs, as well as your daily caloric intake. My favorite one is My Fitness Pal. You can learn more about CR regimens from the CR Society website and materials.

Glycemic index and glycemic load

The glycemic index (GI) is a measurement of the rise in circulating blood sugar triggered by a carbohydrate. Basically, a GI value tells one how rapidly a particular carbohydrate turns into sugar, without taking into account how much of that carbohydrate is in a serving of a particular food. Here is where the glycemic load (GL) comes into play and it is meant to fill this gap. Thus, GL accounts for both the carbohydrate content of the food, as well as for how much each gram of carbohydrate in the food raises blood glucose levels.

High-glycemic load diets and, to a certain extent, high-glycemic-index diets are associated with a host of chronic diseases, ranging from diabetes and cardiovascular disease to obesity and are conducive towards inflammation, oxidative stress and other markers of aging. Thus, a longevity-promoting diet should aim at eliminating as much as possible high GI and GL foods and at consuming medium GI and GL foods in moderation.

Here is a rating chart for both GI and GL values.

Source: http://www.mendosa.com/gilists.htm

You can find at this link a chart that offers the GI and GL values for more than 100 foods.

Stay tuned for part two of this post, where I'm going to write about two other nutritional problem-makers: AGEs and methionine.

Books that I Like: Josh Waitzkin's 'The Art of Learning'

Josh Waitzkin is no stranger to excellence. An International Chess Master and a Tai Chi Push Hands World Champion, Waitzkin has a tremendous insight into what excellence presupposes and into what it requires. Moreover, he manages to expose this insight brilliantly in The Art of Learning. Many of his stories are so deeply intimate and so vividly described that it is impossible not to produce a strong reaction in both the mind and the heart of his readers. There is so much that one can take from this book, but I guess that what really stuck with me was the idea that excellence can only be achieved when one stays true to one's nature. Know thyself. Yet again, this is the key.

My favorite quotes & guidelines to achieving excellence

[A]ll situations can be handled as long as presence of mind is maintained.

The key to pursuing excellence is to embrace an organic, long-term learning process, and not to live in a shell of static, safe mediocrity. Usually, growth comes at the expense of previous comfort or safety.

Disappointment is a part of the road to greatness.

The fact of the matter is that there will be nothing learned from any challenge in which we don't try our hardest. Growth comes at the point of resistance. We learn by pushing ourselves and finding what really lies at the outer reaches of our abilities.

When uncomfortable, my instinct is not to avoid the discomfort but to become at peace with it.

Problems set in if the performer has a brittle dependence on the safety of absolute perfection or duplication. Then an error triggers fear, detachment, uncertainty, or confusion that muddies the decision-making process.

I believe that one of the most critical factors in the transition to becoming a conscious high performer is the degree to which your relationship to your pursuit stays in harmony with your unique disposition. There will inevitably be times when we need to try new ideas, release our current knowledge to take in new information - but it is critical to integrate this new information in a manner that does not violate who we are. By taking away our natural voice, we leave ourselves without a center of gravity to balance us as we navigate the countless obstacles along our way.

Depth beats breadth any day of the week, because it opens a channel for the intangible, unconscious, creative components of our hidden potential.

One thing I have learnt as a competitor is that there are clear distinctions between what it takes to be decent, what it takes to be good, what it takes to be great, and what it takes to be among the best. If your goal is to be mediocre, then you have a considerable margin for error. You can get depressed when fired and mope around waiting for someone to call with a new job offer. If you hurt your toe, you can take six weeks watching television and eating potato chips. In line with that mind set, most people think of injuries as setbacks, something they have to recover from or deal with. From the outside, for fans or spectators, an injured athlete is in purgatory, hovering in an impotent state between competing and sitting on the bench. In my martial arts life, every time I tweak my body, well-intended people like my mother suggest I take a few weeks off training. What they don't realize is that if I were to stop training whenever something hurt, I would spend my whole year on the couch. Almost without exception, I am back on the mats the next day, figuring out how to use my new situation to heighten elements of my game. If I want to be the best, I have to take risks others would avoid, always optimizing the learning potential of the moment and turning adversity to my advantage. That said, there are times when the body needs to heal, but those are ripe opportunities to deepen the mental, technical, internal side of my game.

The unconscious mind is a powerful tool, and learning how to relax under pressure is a key first step to tapping into its potential.

Dirty players were my best teachers.


I learned from this book that...

... the unconscious mind, which can be tapped through conscious effort, is our biggest ally in the search for excellence.
... the biggest potential for growth comes from adversities.
... excellence requires self-introspection and psychological finesse.
... excellence, which in itself is very close to perfection, can be achieved once one becomes at ease with imperfection. 

Claim Your Happiness

If you ask a random person on the street if she'd be happier after winning the lottery, finding the perfect partner or landing the job of her dreams, chances are that the answer is yes. If you ask yourself the same question, you might just say the same thing, provided that you are unacquainted with the emerging field of positive psychology, also known as the science of happiness. According to positive psychologists, people do get happier after winning the lottery. But this happiness lasts only for a short period of time and they soon return to their initial state. Similarly, indiviuals who experience traumatic events and major personal losses, like the amputation of a limb or the death of a dear one, have a period of adjustment to the new situation in which their level of happiness decreases. However, after a certain amount of time, these levels  bounce back to what they used to be. 

Positive psychologists trace the roots of happiness or lack of to three major components: external circumstances, intentional behavior and genetics. Now, believe it or not, external circumstances, like winning the lottery or going through an unexpected divorce, are accountable for only 10% of your happiness. 50% of it is explained by genetics, while the remaining 40% can be attributed to intentional behavior. As we don't have much control over external events and genetics (at least right now), we should aim to increase our happiness set points by working on our thoughts, attitude and overall behavior. 

So, what kind of behavioral changes should one consider? The answer suggested by the scientists of happiness is strikingly simple: imitation. More specifically, the imitation of the behavioral patterns that happy people usually exhibit. After several studies in this direction, compassion, gratitude and mindfulness appear as favorites in the search for happiness. Many practices revolving around the cultivation of these three traits have already been shown to work, so let me give you a few examples from Sonja Lyubomirsky's The How of Happiness:

• expressing gratitude
• cultivating optimism
• avoiding overthinking and social comparison
• practicing acts of kindness
• nurturing social relationships
• learning to forgive
• increasing flow experiences
• savoring small joyful moments
• committing to your goals
• practicing spirituality
• meditation
• physical activity 
• acting like a happy person

The science of happiness and its focus on the cultivation of compassion have managed to capture the attention of the Dalai Lama himself, who has even co-authored a book in the positive psychology vein, called 'The Art of Happiness'. Now, this book might come as a surprise, given that Buddhism has its own theory of happiness and of happiness boosting practices, which focuses on a deeper understanding of the self and which does not really look for much help from the outside. Thus, while positive psychology asks us to be happy by imitating happy people, Buddhism asks us to reflect on the source of our unhappiness and try to eliminate it. The Buddhist philosophy identifies attachment as the main obstacle to true happiness. As this thinking goes, happiness is the lack of unhappiness and unhappiness results from being attached to material things, other people, ideas and even to your self and to your body. Once you get rid of attachments, nothing can hurt you and, thus, all that remains is an unhappiness-free state, which might as well be called happiness.

The search for happiness is not easy and, at points, it might even get confusing. The tenets of positive psychology and Buddhism, which represent the main directions in this field, do not exactly overlap and it could even be argued that they aim for different goals. The happiness pursued by psychologists is of a more joyful kind, while the one referred to in Buddhism is focused more on individual peace and calmness. In spite of this, the science of happiness and the Buddhist philosophy agree on one major thing: happiness is not outside of you, but inside. Unless you're among the lucky few who just happen to be born happy, you have to decide to be happy, to be willing to be happy and to get ready to work for it. This is the first step and everything else will just follow naturally.

So go ahead and claim your happiness!

Is There Such a Thing as Autoimmunity?

Autoimmunity occurs whenever the immune system attacks host tissue. The number of autoimmune diseases is believed to have reached the staggering figure of 80 and, mind, this is only according to the most conservative counting. The reason for the wide spread of autoimmune conditions is that any part of the body can become a potential target for destruction: from organs like kidneys and hearts, to glands like the thyroid and the pancreas, and even individual cells, as in the case of the red blood cells.

Now, the dominant framework for understanding the pathology of autoimmunity used to rely very much on the idea that, due to a certain environmental trigger and genetic predisposition, the immune system gets a bit confused and wrongly attacks certain parts of its host's body. Thus, autoimmunity was conceived as a malfunctioning of the immune system and most therapies have been designed as a way to fight against the activation of the immune response and to neutralize its effects on the body. Like inflammation, for instance. According to this perspective, the immune system, in its ignorance, is the villain.

But what if this was not the case? What if the immune system didn't wrongly attack the host tissue? What if it had a reason to do it? So many 'what ifs', but actually recent research does emphasize more and more the correlation between viral and bacterial triggers and what we call autoimmunity. In this sense, what falls under the label of autoimmunity is essentially a normal immune response, in which the body is expected to build a defense against external pathogens.

Fujinami et al. (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1360274/) present three mechanisms through which infections may initiate immunoreactivity: 

1. Molecular mimicry: shared immunologic epitope (the part of an antigen which is recognized by the immune system) between the microbe and the host.
2. Bystander activation: activation of antigen-presenting cells, which leads to a T-cell response.
3. Viral persistence: constant presence of the viral antigen driving the immune response.

The most compelling evidence, however, for rethinking the concept of autoimmunity and for accommodating better the role that infections play in relation to it is to look at the long and non-exhaustive list of autoimmune conditions that are correlated with bacterial and viral triggers. 

• Cardiomyopahty: coxsackievirus B; Streptococcus pyogenes; Trypanosoma cruzi, Borrelia burgdorferi
• Herpetic stromal keratitis: herpes simplex virus
• Uveitis: Escherichia coli
• Type 1 diabetes: rubella
• Guillain-Barre syndrome: Campylobacter jejuni; Mycoplasma pneumoniae,; Haemophilus influenzae
• Multiple sclerosis: Chlamydia pneumoniae; herpes simplex virus; human papillomavirus; adenovirus
• Alopecia areata: H1N1 virus; Epstein-Barr virus; hepatitis B vaccine; Helicobacter pylori 
• Atopic dermatitis: Staphylococcus aureus 
• Celiac disease: rotavirus
• Hashimoto's thyroiditis: hepatitis C virus; human parvovirus B19; coxsackievirus B; herpes simplex virus
• Narcolepsy: H1N1 virus
• Psoriasis: human immunodeficiency virus; streptococcal infections in the upper respiratory tract; an uncommon strain of human papillomaviruses, called EP-HPVl; Helicobacter pylori 
• Rheumatoid arthritis: Epstein-Barr virus; human herpes virus 6
• Systemic lupus erythematosus: Epstein-Barr virus

I have presented only some of the most spread or well-known autoimmune conditions. The complete list, however, is much larger than this.  What it shows, nonetheless, is a certain direction in the study of autoimmunity. Thus, any successful advancement in the treatment of autoimmunity would have to rely on the following considerations:

1. Focus on really treating autoimmune conditions and not only on the alleviation of their symptoms. This can only be achieved if we understand their root cause, which brings me to points 2 and 3.

2. Map out the exact environmental triggers for each autoimmune condition.

3. Find out which genetic markers are associated to autoimmunity.

4. Deliver personalized medical advice to the people that present a certain genetic marker, especially relevant when it comes to the types of vaccinations that these people could receive or not. It is especially tricky nowadays to manifest any concerns related to the effects of vaccinations or refuse to be vaccinated, when there are so many organizations and individuals militating against vaccinations on pseudo-scientific or even completely non-scientific grounds. In spite of this and looking at the available evidence, people suffering form autoimmune conditions or having the genetic predisposition for autoimmunity should have personalized vaccination schemes. Which means that, in some cases, they would have to forego vaccines.

Further reading:

L. G. Delogu et al., 'Infectious diseases and autoimmunity' (2011)
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21997935

A. M. Ercolini and S. D. Miller , 'The role of infections in autoimmune disease' (2009)  http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2665673/

R.S Fujinami et al., 'Molecular Mimicry, Bystander Activation, or Viral Persistence: Infections and Autoimmune Disease' (2006)
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1360274/

V. Molina and Y. Schoenfeld, 'Infection, vaccines and other environmental triggers of autoimmunity' (2005)
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16126512

Caffeine-Free and Headache-Free

If giving up caffeine without experiencing headaches or too big of a fatigue is your Rome, then let me tell you that it can be built in a day. Now, the question is why would anyone want to give up their favorite caffeinated beverages, which apart from the energy boost that they provide, are also pretty delicious. I won't argue here in favor or against the health benefits of our top caffeinated drinks, coffee and tea. There are both pros and cons related to their consumption and, most importantly, the balance is always individually tilted for each of us, depending on many factors that we need to take into account.

However, taking a break from caffeine might prove to be beneficial.  I, for one, like to do this every once in a while because I am pretty sensitive to the effects of caffeine and I really enjoy rebooting my  response to it whenever I get the chance. I don't believe in reducing my daily caffeine intake gradually. It's supposed to help us cope with the withdrawal effects better, but honestly I still feel lightheaded and unable to focus. Apart from this, the entire withdrawal symptoms are prolonged as compared to just going caffeine free cold turkey. So, if I have to choose between a gradual or a radical approach to a decaffeinated lifestyle, I'd certainly opt for the latter. Until recently, I would just give up tea and coffee without doing anything that would alleviate the lack of energy and general dizziness that I would experience. I just bit the bullet, ignorant of the many effective caffeine replacements that would restore my usual relatively energetic self. 

So, without further ado, I will proceed now to outlining the structure of a typical caffeine-free day, emphasizing those moments when I would normally have a cup of tea or coffee, but choose instead caffeine-free energy boosters.

1. Waking up in the morning: ginseng drink (do not choose ginseng teas; they are not  nearly as efficient as a concentrated ginseng drink) 

2. Before work (which, in my case, amounts to reading and writing a lot): ginkgo biloba 

3. Before physical exercise: turmeric and cinnamon drink (the more concentrated, the better)

4. During physical exercise: coconut water

These drinks can be consumed anytime throughout the day, but I've noticed that for me they work the best in this format. Also, they might come in handy when your aim is to reduce and not completely give up caffeine.

Good luck, dear ones, and may caffeinated beverages be a pleasure and not a painfully unshakeable habit!

Impressions from Okinawa

Okinawa is the cutest, prettiest island one could imagine. It won't strike you like that because of its architecture, cleanliness or general development. But it will definitely impress you through the air that it surrounds itself with. It's an air of kindness, of going back to the roots of what a beautiful life is ultimately all about: cultivating virtue in yourself and in others as well.

Okinawans are extremely friendly and genuinely caring. They will say hi to anyone that happens to look their way. They will engage in conversations about trees and their roots with total strangers that might not even understand their language. They will spend quality time with their family and friends, but they will also spend quality time with themselves, leaning against the water front with a book in one hand and a can of soda in the other.

The reason for which I was really excited to be going to Okinawa is that Okinawa is a blue zone, an area that exceeds the upper limits of human longevity. In all honesty, I expected to see people eating raw fish and drinking green tea all the time, to exercise and maintain a good state of mind.

Almost all my predictions were confirmed and the notable exception was one that I hadn't in the least anticipated. Okinawans do not eat exactly right. The youngsters on the island have visibly heavier body frames as compared to the people in Tokyo, for instance, though most of them are certainly not overweight. The old people, who constitute most of Okinawa's population, are slim but not frail. During my stay there, I could only observe the lifestyle and habits of the inhabitants of Naha, the capital city. In spite of this, I did encounter a couple of centenarians and I could not be more surprised when I realized that the type of individual that constituted until then an instance of righteous eating in my mind - the (super)centenarian - does in fact eat a lot of sugar.There are many more types of sweets in Okinawa than in Tokyo. Apart from the sugar, Okinawans eat quite a lot of deep-fried food and pork. Add to all this high quantities of white rice and noodles, and you won't get what I would normally consider a longevity promoting diet.

But if the Okinawans do not excel at eating perfectly correct, they do excel, nonetheless, at taking care of each other and at protecting each other's peace and happiness. Where else in this world, except for Okinawa maybe, could two foreigners ride a bus without paying for the tickets, all of this taking place under the eyes of the driver? Now, don't get me wrong. It's not like in Okinawa people don't pay for public transportation. But, as it happens, bills that exceed 1000 yen are unusable in buses and the payment is done when you get off. So when I hopped in the bus without any appropriate money to pay with I couldn't have imagined that I could get away with my honest mistake so easily. But that's what the rule of thumb is there and that's what it should be in any place that would like to call itself a civilized society: mistakes are honest and should be treated as such. On top of this, embracing any other course of action would've certainly led to delays and everyone would've been worse off.

People take things easy in Okinawa. They breathe and live the moment. They take time off to look at the water or at a tree, to always be in touch with their dear ones and to improve themselves. I genuinely love this island and would really like to go back. The sunsets are incredible and simply impossible to capture in pictures. The air is perfectly humid, not too much, not too little, but just the right amount to give you a healthy glowing complexion.Okinawa changed my view about the centenarian lifestyle. What you eat or drink is not nearly important as to what kind of person you are. I could notice on the faces of seemingly old people the spark of curiosity, of intellectual alertness and of the serenity that comes only with an understanding of the deeper intricacies of life.

Books that I Like: Roy Baumeister and John Tierney's 'Willpower'

In a world that values instant gratification, high self-esteem, a rule-breaking attitude and a general departure form the strict Victorian ethics, it is worth being remembered every once in a while about the virtues of self-control and willpower. From an early age we are being taught that we are unique in uniquely different ways and the paths we take, unless openly outrageous, need to be accepted as uniquely ours. Good and bad seem to have lost face while confronted with the impending storm of diversity and its multiple shades that derive from the singularity of our selves. 

In this context in which video games have been  deliberately rendered easier so that more people could excel at them, when trophies for different sport competitions do not stop at the third place but go beyond, when parents flamboyantly praise any art work of their offspring that is not in itself artistic nor close to it, Baumeister and Tierney take on the difficult task of reminding us that willpower and self-control are valuable traits to be developed in order to build one's character and achieve personal success. The cultivation of  willpower and self-control go beyond the stream of current personal development techniques due to its emphasis on the need to respect rather than break rules and to develop a generally disciplined attitude towards all aspects of life. It encourages 'if then' algorithms for thinking, precommitments and delayed gratification.

The book is marvelously written. It is abundant in experiment descriptions and references that help unravel the essence of willpower and self-control, the way in which they work and the methods through which they can be trained. I don't usually say this easily, but 'Willpower' is a must read for any person of any age, as it covers both general and specific topics that we are confronted with everyday, among which parenting, dieting, procrastination, just to name a few, are brilliantly exposed.

My favorite quotes

The point of self-control isn't simply to be more "productive". People today don't have to work as hard as Ben Franklin and the Victorians did. In the nineteenth century, the typical worker had barely an hour of free time per day and didn't even think about retiring. Today we spend only about a fifth of our adult waking hours on the job. The remaining time is an astonishing gift - an unprecedented blessing in human history - but it takes an unprecedented type of self-control to enjoy it. Too many of us tend to procrastinate even when it comes to pleasure because we succumb to the planning fallacy when we estimate "resource slack", as behavioral economists term it. We assume we'll magically have more free time in the future than we do today. 

Self-control is ultimately about much more than self-help. It's essential for savoring your time on earth and sharing joy with the people you love. 

Your supply of willpower is limited, and you use the same resource for many different things. Each day may start off with your stock of willpower fresh and renewed, at least if you've had a good night sleep and a healthy breakfast. But then all day things chip and nibble away at it. The complexity of modern life makes it difficult to keep in mind the all those seemingly unrelated chores and demands draw on the same account inside of you.

"Me, I wait for inspiration", [Raymond Chandler] said, but he did it methodically every morning. He believed that a professional writer needed to set aside at least four hours a day for his job: "He doesn't have to write, and if he doesn't feel like it, he shouldn't try. He can look out of the window or stand on his head or write on the floor, but he is not to do any other positive thing, not read, write letters, glance at magazines, or write checks." This Nothing Alternative is a marvelously simple tool against procrastination for just about any kind of task.

Dieters have a fixed target in mind for their maximum daily calories, and when they exceed it for some unexpected reason, such as being given a air of milkshakes in an experiment, they regard their diet as blown for the day. That day is therefore mentally classified as a failure, regardless of what else happens. Virtue cannot resume until tomorrow. So they think, 'What the hell, I might as well enjoy myself today' - and the resulting binge often puts on far more weight than the original lapse. It's not rational, but dieters don't even seem to be aware of how much damage these binges do [.]

People working in what Flynn calls elite professions, like physicians, scientists, and accountants, generally have an IQ above a certain threshold. For white Americans, that threshold is an IQ of 110, but Chinese-Americans manage to get the same elite jobs with an IQ of only 103. [...] The pattern is similar for Japanese-Americans. By virtue of self-control - hard work, diligence, steadiness, reliability - the children of immigrants from East Asia can do as well as Americans with higher IQs.

After reading this book, I've decided to...

... train my self-control and willpower by taking a cold shower everyday. To say that I love cold showers would be a gross exaggeration, but I do love the way they make me feel about myself, my strength and my determination. No matter how the day turns out, I have this one achievement that cannot be matched by other healthy habits that I've developed throughout the years. The act of gasping for air after the first contact with the icy cold water doesn't come close to the general state of relaxation and well-being that I have, for instance, after meditation or physical exercise. It's anything but pleasurable (at least, for me) and this is what makes it all the more valuable.

...train my self-control and willpower by brushing my teeth with my left hand once a day. Basically, this boils down to decomposing an automatic process, which leads to increased awareness and brain plasticity. 

...train my self-control and willpower by checking and adjusting my posture every time I happen to think about it. This is not an especially difficult task. Its value, nonetheless, resides in its uninterrupted continuity, which may lead in time to a slower rate of willpower depletion.