StansWorld

Category: All Posts

  • Recovered

    Recovered

    I am a recovered diabetic.  A few months ago I found out I had full blown type 2 diabetes.  I began cutting back on eating carbohydrates (carbs).  I experimented with intermittent fasting and restricted caloric intake from 0 to 1800 calories per day.  In two weeks I was down to less than 30 grams of carbs per day and my blood chemistry normalized.  I easily lost 50 pounds (23 kg) in the first two months on 1200 to 1500 calories per day.  It was too fast.  I have slowed weight reduction and am working on building endurance, muscle mass and hopefully resorb the folds of skin hanging all over my body.  I am currently low-card, one meal a day (OMAD), 1800 calories per day. 

    I have similar stories of being recovered from other forms of self abuse.  It has always been the same story.  It does not matter if it’s sugar, dysfunctional relationships, materialism or heroin.  One day I realized that too much was never enough.  Going cold turkey was not always easy but I have never relapsed.  I have never fallen off the wagon or looked up an old flame.  When I am done, I am done and never look back.  That is why I say “recovered” and not “recovering.”

    “Recovering” implies an inability to control an addictive personality/physiology as if it is a genetic defect or being trapped in a dysfunctional culture, suffering severe trauma, cancer and so forth.  It does not matter the cause.  A way must be found to overcome situational adversity and personal weakness.  Am I morally superior or just lucky to have the right body chemistry and have access to resources to escape misery?  I don’t know and don’t care.  I just know I have always recovered.  Will I always?  No, someday I will be destroyed by adversity and everyone dies.  Until then, I am recovered and moving forward.

  • Human Value

    Human Value

    Why do I value other humans?  It Is not the income, infrastructure, goods and services they provide me.  These are impersonal exchanges of things.  There is nothing innately human about them.  I value others for the emotional and intellectual sustenance they provide for a full life.

    I am told my social needs are abnormality minimal. I have no family, significant other or pets.  I have fond feelings for people and places but I call no place home.  Social media has no appeal.

    Although my needs for human interaction may appear minimal they do not feel minimal.  People are important.  People category posts are about how and with whom this old nomad enriches his life.

  • Financial Fundamentals

    Financial Fundamentals

    This is not financial advice or a sales pitch for lifestyle or financial planning resources.  I have nothing to sell. Everyone’s financial path and circumstances are different. This was my path to financial freedom.

    My lifetime sources of income and wealth include:

    • Non-fixed Income
      • Salaries
      • Wages
      • Tips
    • Fixed Income
      • Social Security
      • Pensions
    • Investment Returns
      • Dividends
      • Interest
      • Capital Gains
    • Inheritance

    I was self sufficient and living on my own at sixteen.  For 47 years my income was non-fixed.  I either worked full time or part time while attending school.  I was mostly employed by others and had a boss.  I have little experience with self-employment, property management, real estate speculation, trading financial instruments and other income sources.  I have fundamental knowledge and experience in long-term buy-and-hold investing which I began doing in 1987 with passive contributions to deferred compensation plans offered by my employer.

    I transitioned from non-fixed income (salary) to fixed income (pension, Social Security) when I retired in 2010 at the age of 63.  My employer-managed deferred compensation plans were consolidated and rolled over into to a single self-managed IRA account.  I inherited liquid assets and real estate n 2012.  I did not need the money or want the house.  The real estate was sold and the entire inheritance was invested in self-manage investment accounts.  All my expenses are meet by my pension and Social Security benefits with money left over to add to my investment portfolio.  I have never withdrawn any money from my investment portfolio.

    I feel fortunate to have had a stable job with a defined benefits pension, deferred compensation plans and Social Security.  In other posts, I examine:

  • Lonely Hammock

    Lonely Hammock

    I am a hammock hanging in the shade of two palm trees on Sámara Beach.  A gentle breeze sways me on a perfect Costa Rican day.  I should be a happy hammock.  But, I am not.  I am lonely, incomplete and unfulfilled without a human partner.  So many stroll by on the beach.  How can they not want we?  Is there something wrong with me?  Is something wrong them?  How long must I wait?  I am a lonely hammock hanging by the beach.

    I am a hammock hanging in the shade of two palm trees on Sámara Beach.  A gentle breeze sways me on a perfect Costa Rican day.  I should be a happy hammock.  But, I am not.  My aching hands and feet grip the palm trees rough bark.  I dread human weight collapsing into me, stretching my limbs and joints as if on a medieval torture rack.  Please pass me by.  Do not notice me.  Do not use me.  Do not hurt me.  Leave me alone.  Let me be just another lonely hammock hanging by the beach.

  • Spreadsheet of Health 

    Spreadsheet of Health 

    “That which does not kill, only strengthens” is nonsense.  Numerous forces destroy people leaving them alive but permanently weak and miserable until they die.  Survival is not enough.  The correct expression is, “that which does not destroy, only strengthens.”  Although more logical, it leaves undefined things that do not destroy (stressors), what is not destroyed (stressed) and what is strengthened.  Does the expression imply direct connections between stressors, the stressed and resulting strengthening?  Examples are recovery of stressed but not destroyed body tissue, finances and relationships.  What if parts of a person’s life are actually destroyed but the whole person becomes stronger by compensating mechanisms and use of alternatives?  It’s complicated.

    It is useful to break complex phenomena into discrete understandable parts arranged on spreadsheets.  The most familiar are numeric spreadsheets like financial balance sheets.  They can be incomprehensibly complex but the basic concepts are not. They are collections of numbers and ridged mathematical relationships between them used to calculate outcomes called bottom lines.  Bottom lines let one know where they are today and might be in the future.

    My health is a complex phenomenon that I cannot break down into numbers and calculate precise numeric bottom lines on a spreadsheet.  However, I can identify things that I know affect my health.  They are not discrete and the relationships between them are complex, fluid and individual-specific.  It is not possible or necessary for me to assign numbers or rigid relationships between them.  It is only necessary for me to know what they are and what their effects are. A pseudo-spreadsheet can be made up of things with positive, negative or neutral effects and how they affect the bottom lines of my health.