Sisyphusian Vignettes

- You, Sisyphus, are so stupid that futile work could be named after you!
- You know what, Oedipus? Go fuck your mother!

Let's play a little with the thought of how many things we start in life, and a large part of them either come to nothing, or catastrophic work slips out of our hands, just because the approach was wrong, we didn't put in enough energy, the right amount of work, or simply didn't have enough information. Let's turn back the clock a bit and I ask everyone to review their lives and answer the question of what they would do differently if they could start over, or simply make different decisions now in certain situations than they did in the past. You have a few like that, don't you? I believe it, because I have no idea who reads this blog, but I'm sure that 80% of them regret many things in their lives, including me. Some would continue their studies elsewhere, or choose another job, or a completely different path for their livelihood. Dreams were born and crumbled over the years, while others' stars soared upwards thanks to a good decision or hard and persistent work. Indeed, many would take a different path on the branching paths of choosing a partner, at the end of which a different girl or a different boy would stand. A series of decisions and bad decisions that we would not make again. My life, in particular, changed radically because of one bad decision that I regret to this day.

Let's turn back the clock even further, say to when we were 10-12 years old. Everyone's school and studies turned out the way they did. You can cry later about the crappy job, blame others for why things turned out the way they did, that you're a salesperson in a shitty shopping mall or a cashier at Match. You had the opportunity, the help from teachers, you didn't take it, and we see the result. Then there's the average person who does their best from the beginning, high school is followed by college, and in the best case, university. They live an average but relatively happy life without any major extremes. Let's climb further up the class ladder, because here come those who realize that if we spend 15-16 years in school, and moreover receive all the help, all the information from the right people, from teachers, then we should take it seriously and lay the foundation for our lives. Let's achieve results that will later place us at a level where we can buy our ticket to lifelong existential well-being, social respect, and a relatively happy and secure life.

Which is the easiest path and which requires the least effort, thereby leading to the darkest pit? Obviously the first one, but you can mess up your life for a while, you can enjoy the freedom and lack of consequences that youth offers us, but then brutal hardships await us, because you can't bluff your whole life. It will be a rotten life, but the path leading to it is easy and comfortable. There would be another option here. We can decide differently, but that will be somewhat more difficult than the masturbating idleness. This is a bumpy road full of renunciations, human trials, and character-forming challenges, but it promises a future full of results.

I hope by now everyone has figured out what I'm talking about, and how this train of thought relates to diet and healthy eating, and what I'm getting at, because I didn't intend these few thoughts to be some pub philosophy. Whatever we start, we either try to do it well, listening to someone we assume wants to help us, or even better, someone who *can* help us, or we'd rather not do it at all. But then everyone should bear the consequences and the condescending glances, the cynical, mocking remarks, and not resent the other person when someone says to them, "Hey, my God, what happened to you?"

The average age of the blog's readers can't be much over 30, so the body will only present the bill for an unhealthy, shitty lifestyle in 15-20 years, but no one should doubt that the price will be damn high + service charge. Just as you can mess up school, you can mess up a diet and everything I talk about in this blog. You can cheat yourself by cramming, but in the exam, if it's serious, or later when you have to account for your knowledge or possibly perform somewhere, you're guaranteed to fall flat on your face. You can sneak in cheat meals and junk food days into your life that you think is a diet, but the mirror and the scale will never lie. The emphasis is not on whether you can lose 4-6 kilos before summer or not. But on the fact that because of your unhealthy self-destructive eating habits, you'll suddenly find yourself at 38 years old already on blood pressure and cholesterol medication, then you'll look stupid like a fish and won't understand why you're showing symptoms of Alzheimer's Disease at such a young age. Because of years of consistently shitty, greasy, sugary eating, that's why.

So, it's a dead end, and the reason this whole post came about is none other than 3 blogs I found recently. The blogs' mission is similar to what I started, which is to change lifestyle and body within x time, documenting all changes with illustrations. What I saw really pissed me off, and not just because they have no idea what or how they should be doing things, but because they put their mile-long blunders on display and are capable of writing things like...

I hope it screams stupidity to everyone, but the worst part is, what if someone interprets this as "this is what a diet really looks like"? But the most painful thing in all of this is that these blogs only reflect what 90% of people do under the guise of a diet. Completely thoughtless workouts piled on top of each other, meals considered diets, without the slightest spark of consciousness. This cannot be done this way, because it is a waste of time and unnecessary self-torment. With diets like these, only one thing can be achieved. It makes us hate dieting and exercise for life, because what happens? The decision is made, you google the word "diet". The first one that seems appealing, you start, regardless of whether it is suitable for your body type, goals, metabolism, simply relying on it being sympathetic or having a catchy name. You start, but how the hell do you start? Do you shop for it in advance? Do you plan your meals in advance? Do you even have a minimal idea of how many calories what you eat contains, and how much you would need for weight loss or muscle shaping? Of course not. You start in a great fog, planning the whole thing to the extent that you don't eat, and salad is definitely good, and you have to exercise, but what, and how much, that's the biggest fog. You torment yourself for 2-3 days, you don't see any results, because why would you from this, and of course, you feel terrible, you don't have the strength to exercise, and anyway, you've been on a diet for 2 days so now you can eat. And it goes on and on like this for years. Instead of at least once reading up for 20 minutes on how it should roughly be done, or perhaps asking someone.

Because what I experience day after day is just not right. A 24-year-old girl is on a diet, what else would a woman do after turning 13? Then she says the following, but listen carefully, because what women do and think is simply unbelievable.

I'm on a diet, so I'd rather eat less of normal foods so I can eat more sweets, because I really love them, so I don't have to give them up!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is it. Where's a Xanax, because this literally killed me, but goddammit, such a thing doesn't exist on Earth. But let's go back to the 3 blogs mentioned, because there are quite a few lessons to be learned here. Our next contestant started his endeavor in November 2010. He didn't skimp, he casually planned a 365-day training program for himself. Judging by his posts, he's been doing it continuously, and if I count correctly, the course has been running for 4 months, but despite this, he's only on day 40, I don't get how this is, oh well. According to his own account, he has several years of sports experience behind him, but now he's gained weight from office work, well, that's great. He doesn't say a word about what he eats, but I think that's better for everyone. Let's look at a few of his days and since he documents his results with photos, let's see how much he's changed in 150 days.

After 60 days

After 90 days

Let's see how successful it is then…

         November 17, 2010                   March 1, 2011

Let everyone decide for themselves how useful and effective what they are doing is. I thought a lot about whether to link the blog titles, but my goal was not to trash them, but to show how useless a waste of time it is if you don't do dieting and workouts the way you should. I left the third person for last, he's the biggest character, but don't forget that I'm quoting from a blog by someone currently on a diet, wanting to lose weight and achieve results by the end of May.

I'll start tomorrow, I'll quit smoking tomorrow, today I'll have this pizza, tomorrow I'll diet, today I won't go for a run, tomorrow I'll run more. I guess these are familiar sentences for everyone. One thing needs to be understood, but it really needs to be understood. You either do dieting and workouts properly, mentally preparing for it first and foremost, or there's absolutely no point in it whatsoever. The short-term effects in this case are just that you don't lose weight, you stay in that body where you feel extremely bad, and which you confront, or even worse, are confronted with multiple times a day, and because of your self-esteem, you remain under the frog's ass in every area of your life. The long-term effect of your unhealthy eating for years is a heart attack, a stroke, diabetes, thrombosis, irreversible damage to your organs, and at 50 years old you realize you've become a huge human wreck taking 6 different medications, watching RTL club, and it will even be strenuous to drag your pathetic body up to the third floor. Zero sex life, even less self-esteem, and the source of most of your problems will constantly be with you even in the meanest times, as you're currently shoving a cheese pastry into your face right after taking your blood circulation regulating medication.

You still have choices now. You're still in what you might call school, and it's absolutely up to you how you complete it, that is, how and in what quality you live the coming years. I'm not saying you only have to eat lean cottage cheese and plain chicken breast from now on. NO. But to eat smartly and not immediately devour every piece of junk you see or crave. I will also eat chocolate, pancakes, lángos by Lake Balaton in the summer, cake on birthdays, and pizza at get-togethers with friends. Of course, I will, but not daily or even weekly. Living healthily means looking at what you eat every day, giving up white bread, potatoes, and sugary drinks, and not eating greasy junk. If you would do that much for yourselves, we'd be done. A hard, meticulously planned diet only needs to be done once in a lifetime, but then, damn it, do it properly. The first radical diet, with which you lose all the excess weight you carry, is much easier to maintain afterwards, and all it requires is minimal attention to food and 2-3 lighter workouts a week, because it's a life, a future.

There are many false prophets, and a deluge of miraculous diets and eating, exercise, and lifestyle advice pours over us from everywhere. There's as much of it as there is garbage, and most of it is just as worthless. We've already chewed through some of it, and in one way or another, we've touched on the topic. The most important thing, however, which I will always highlight whenever it comes up, and this applies especially to women, is: NEVER, EVER read any diet advice, exercise plans, or dietary suggestions in women's magazines, and most importantly, even if you do read them, DO NOT FOLLOW them, and DO NOT TRY any of them. Professionally and in every way I look at it, it's unfounded, stupid, idiotic, worthless, superficial, glossy trash lacking any background knowledge. I'm talking about Joy, Glamour, Kiskegyed, Nők Lapja, Maxima Cosmopolitan and their ilk.

The blogger boys just wanted to change their lives, because they feel something is terribly wrong. This is certainly commendable, but the execution is as bad as it gets. From here, I want to tell them that it would make more sense to headbutt a wall every 2 minutes, because this is catastrophic and completely useless. Proper diet selection and strict adherence to it, sourcing ingredients, a professionally sound and technically correctly executed training plan, and providing or supplementing the body with necessary vitamins, proteins, trace elements, and minerals. With this, and only this way, can you achieve results that are worth giving up food for months and dying during workouts. Everything else is just a grotesque something that might bring momentary success, but the result, if it can even be called that, will only be a pale imitation of what you could achieve with less time and effort if you did it well and followed the rules. If you don't believe me, look at the guy after 4 months, and me after 36 days.

           Day 0                                    Day 36