The Genetic Factor

I have a good friend that recently visited me.  He was the Dean of the School of Medicine of the University I went to, an internist and nephrologist.  He also has a PhD in Physiology from the University of Rochester.  I love conversing with him.  He owns a Medicine Clinic in Michigan.  He always says I am crazier than him but I do not believe it.

 

Two years back he told me that he wanted to try Psilocybin to treat a chronic headache.  He visited me from Michigan and told me that he just had 36 hours because he was scheduled to return to work.  I said that I would do my best.  I tried to gain time because he called me two weeks in advance. I contacted people in town but they told me that the mushroom season was over.  I did not want to disappoint him and thought about mezcal, a local tequila.  It has some Psilocybin-lile effect in it.   He came down to Mexico and left feeling better and promising to come back.

He returned two years later.  He traveled with his family a month ago.  He sat in front of me and said, “I put an electrode in the brain to treat my headaches.”  I could not help it and laughed.  What did you do!?  You tell me that I am crazier that you and you implanted an electrode in your brain!  You are a physiologist that goes all the way for sure.  That is the meaning of believing in yourself and the grammar one lives for.  I discuss with him physiological training issues just for that reason.  He goes all the way.  I even joked and said to him that I can control him like a TV with a remote control.

I have written articles on electric regulation of the brain and my thesis agrees with what Albert Einstein wrote in 1921 called the Theory of Relativity:  “What two observers observed is not the same thing.”  Reality has different phases as illustrated by the saying:  “when one encounters an elephant in the darkness, what one touches appears to be a whole and it is totally different from what others touch at the same time.”  That is precisely why science cannot be applied to very complex situation as Albert Einstein said:  “To be sure, when the number of factors coming into play in a phenomenological complex is too large,  scientific methods in most cases fails us.” (47.  Science and Religion. Ideas and Opinion.)

Jack Daniels mentioned that there are differences in human races, even that he knows that he is not politically correct.

www.flotrack.org/speaker/38-Jack-Daniels/video/187249-1-4-Principles-to-Success-Thirsty-Thurday 

But I have seen differences in cultures more relevant for the outcome.  I have worked in Mexico, USA and Switzerland as a doctor and have helped coaching in those places.  My prejudice against physiologists is that they just see the muscles and for the same reason the Genetics.  But I like my friend and enjoy learning from him.  Seeing just the muscles and following physiology all the way has limits and consequences; remember my friend.  I wish he is right, but at least he had some relief.   I told him that I could spank him instead of putting an electrode in his brain.  The most, he could end up with the psychiatrist instead of in an intensive care unit.

For the same reason, I have seen many training plans with the same problem of reasoning, assuming that “Genetics” or some other assumption related to it plays a key role on performance.  As in the case of Javier Mon, advisor of the Mexican Triathlon Federation when speaks about the size of the triathletes to look for searching for talent.

Next time I will talk something “light.”

MENTAL FATIGUE

Once I had a Grand Rounds presentation at SUNY, Syracuse, Department of Psychiatry.  The title of the presentation was “Medicine in the Post-modern Era.” My case presentation consisted in filmed sessions of a young patient who was taking a benzodiazepine for Panic Attacks at a moderate dose. It is worth to mention that the doses I use in Mexico are half the amount the doses I prescribed in the USA.  Moderate doses in the USA are high in Mexico.  Why? I let “your free association” to come up with an answer because it is easier for you to follow me when allowing your free associations to come up with an answer.  Afterwards, you should try to “analyze” the free association without pity.  Our free associations play a major role in our mental fatigue.  The way one frames reality according to his/her belief system gives us advantages or destroys us.  It all depends on our experience of analyzing our free associations without pity from all the angles and the knowledge of science.  It is not a matter of having things on the unconscious at this point of the adult life and in our time, but the fear of looking at thing without pity to avoid lying to ourselves.  This young patient had mental fatigue as his main diagnosis.

In six sessions the patient stopped taking the benzodiazepine and was freed of Panic Attacks.  He changed his mind set.  Of course, he was willing to do so. He needed the right guidance at the right moment.  I had the right timing because I was with him at the right moment.  This situation does not happen frequently.  I had patients and family members who are not in the “THERAPEUTIC MODE.”  I could say regarding this matter, allowing my free association to speak based on my experience:  There are patients who are not in need of a change, because they are still meeting their goals.  Sometimes the goal is simple survival and that is when we try to help, even against their will, because we believe “they are suffering.” Interesting cultural concept but I do not hear such assumption in Russians or Chinese people. “Le bon sauvage” in need or not of civilization is a corner stone of our thinking.  I do not know if I am saying it right but I heard that a Buda’s disciple asked Buda for help and wanted to speak to him.  He replied, “Speak to me when you feel well.”

Sergio Santos was asked if he uses a psychologist for athletes.  He replied:  “if they need a psychologist they are not good for the sport of triathlon.”  I am assuming he was referring to another phenomenon that I see in my athletes and workers.  Athletes' lack of tools to be a fighter.  This lack of tools brings mental fatigue rapidly.  It is related to our upbringing and the tools we speak about are teachable at a very early age.  “Values” are the forming elements to create a fighter.  “Hard work, persistence, passion, reflection on our own experience to form new knowledge,” are part of those “values.” Our heroes should have these “values.” The reflection in our experiences called science should guide us to flourish.  Our Albert Einstein, on Physics and Reality, in the Journal of the Franklin Institute (1936), mentioned: “The whole of science is nothing more than a refinement of everyday thinking.”  (290.  Ideas and Opinions). The better the reflection, meaning the least amount of lies (or errors, depending on the idiom used) in our judgments; the better is our science.  We need to read, to see, to reflect, and then, there is a chance to improve our science to have an edge.  Listening to Jack Daniels, without Jack Daniels, pointed me to what I try to convey about living with science.

www.flotrack.org/coverage/234673-Saucony-Thirsty-Thursdays-with-Jack-Daniels/video/336107-5-Getting-Confidence-Back-Thirsty-Thursdays

    Saludos, Dr. Nivon

   

WANT IT BADLY: SUCCESS

The Jack Daniels' four ingredients of SUCCESS are:

1. Ability

2. Motivation

3. Opportunity

4. Direction

http://www.flotrack.org/coverage/234673-Saucony-Thirsty-Thursdays-with-Jack-Daniels/video/187249-1-4-Principles-to-Success-Thirsty-Thurday

As a coach you do not motivate your athletes. You do no try to sell them motivation to be the greatest. You create an environment.  Culture and education are part of this environment. As written previously in this blog, culture and education are the biggest handicap of this country. Direction in another culture can o can't be important. In our culture, DIRECTION IS FUNDAMENTAL. You can have ability, motivation, and opportunity, but with no direction you will go no where. Structure, values, strong basic education are essential components of it. Direction is everything in a culture like ours.

Once somebody told me that triathlon was not everything in life. Well, they never understood that life was the only important matter in this world. And triathlon was an opportunity and maybe the best environment for those highly motivated young I coach to LEARN ABOUT LIFE.

BE PRODUCTIVE: JUST DO IT!

Taken from the video:
http://www.goswim.tv/entries/6494/just-do-it.html

A lot of people in this world search endlessly for some complex, magical formula to understand why some people are successful and why others are not.

But it really just boils down to the concept of Productivity.

That you're gonna apply the MOST amount of effort to the BEST of your ability in the allotted time that you have.

All successful people realize that TIME is the most precious commodity out there. It's the one thing that you can't buy, or ever buy back. So these successful people realize.... that they have an allotted time to perform a given task, so they have to give it their absolute all in doing that task.

Going through the motions is the most disadvantageous thing that you could do.
 

Often, when you do something wrong the first time you have to go back, and do it right the second time.   

Whereas if you did it right the first time, you never have to do it again.
All successful people realize that.

That they're going to give it their absolute all, and put in their Heart and Soul to any task they do, no matter how small, or how large it is. That they're going to be the best person they can be while doing it. That they're going to do it RIGHT. 

EVERY. SINGLE. DAY.
For weeks. For Months. For Years. For Decades.

The major difference is that the successful people do every task RIGHT, while those who are not successful do it wrong.

To get to where they are. They decided that they weren't just going to go through the motions, but break through ALL mental barriers to get to where they wanted to be. And that's the difference between the successful people and those who are not.

A lot of people think what they do in life is beneficial, but then they get frustrated when they don't see the results that they want, that other people are getting. You could say to yourself "I went to the gym today, so i'm better because of it.". Maybe so. But the question you have to ask yourself, is "What did I do in the gym today?". You know? What DID you do in the gym today, and how did you do it? You could complain that... you can't build up your chest muscles. Or you can't get a nice set of abs. Maybe you can't burn fat, or build muscle. It's your genetics that's preventing you from getting what you want, right? But it's really not about genetics as it is about EFFORT, and doing the activity RIGHT.

This transfers throughout all aspects of life.

Whether it's working on your school work, or the business proposal at your job. Even the small things in life, like doing dishes, or cleaning the house.

If you can't clean the house right, how are you expected to run a Fortune 500 company right?

All successful people understand this. That they are going to give it their all throughout every single task that they have to do.

Because Time is so precious. And they are going to do it right.

There's a certain redemptive power that making a choice has. We all wake up in the morning when the sun rises, and we have an opportunity that lies before us.

We can either be PRODUCTIVE, or we can seek instant gratification.
And that choice is up to us.

I sincerely hope you understand this concept of Productivity better, for it truly decides who will be successful in life.

TO RISK

To reach out for another is to risk involvement.
To expose feelings is to risk exposing your true self.

To place your ideas, your dreams, before a crowd is to risk their loss.
To love is to risk not being loved in return.

To live is to risk dying.

To hope is to risk despair.

To try is to risk failure.

But risks must be taken, because the greastest hazard in life is to risk nothing.

The person who risks nothing does nothing, has nothing, is nothing.

They may avoid suffering and sorrow,
but they cannot learn, feel, change, grow, love, live.

Chained by their attitudes, they are slave
- they have forfeited their freedom.
Only a person who risks is FREE

 

BORN AT THE END OF THE WORLD

To my team and my family:

I am not ''Santa Teresa of Calcutta'' as my good friend Gloria suggested once. I believe everyone should do something for this country to live better.  Everyone should inspire the community with his/her labor. Everyone should give a part of him/herself. 

I did not discover the boys I worked with, as somebody asked me recently. I invented them like the Invention of America of O' Gorman. I work every day as my roots taught me long time ago.

I was born at the end of the world, a place called Fionnay, ideally the English people Summer Alps' retreat at the beginning of the last century... And here I am.

Fionnay used to be and still is in the middle of no where. It was never really part of ''Switzerland,'' neither of the valley it belongs to. The values acquired by living there in the 60s are quite foreign to the Swiss I know today. Fionnay was just so wild, maybe not like Siberia, but somewhere similar.  I grew up six months a year under tonnes of snow isolated from the world. The road to the village was often closed in winter.

The summer was just a place between silence and solitude.

Growing in such a place has been a privilege in my formation. I believe there was only one life, the one ''within.'' I grew up strong  believing everything was possible. You don't survive so many months isolated without developing a strong relation with yourself. I learnt the Art of the War before knowing the book. Humility, integrity, courage, hard work, responsibility, passion and perseverance are some of the values I owned to this place, my teammates, my parents and our leader at the time, Madame Denise Gabioud.  She was an incredible teacher who was avant-garde in her concepts. She taught us teamwork as nobody really taught me after that in Switzerland. She hated mediocrity and was so exigent that success was the only option.

I own a lot of myself and my character to this wild place. I am not Santa Teresa and I did not discover the boys. My mission with them is what I learnt from the nature I grew up and from this very special teacher. And as Sun Tzu says: Know your enemy and know yourself and you can fight a hundred battles without disaster.

part 2. (coming soon)