He's more
than twice the man
he used to be
By Preston McConkie
Webmaster, Envision Ogden
Ogden, Utah. City of second chances.
First time I came here, it was to get
a GED at the Weber State College testing center, so I
could qualify to join the active United States Army.
I bumped into a classmate from high school;
she was getting an education. Like countless others,
I was just passing through.
One war plus a few years later, I was
back to cash in my G.I. Bill at Weber State University.
The guy I’d been was a fading memory; I’d
been gassed in Iraq, and the years that followed had
not been kind.
As a soldier I was accustomed to running
3-6 miles a day to keep the pounds off. But with the
help of the not-so-fresh air downwind of an exploded
Iraqi munitions bunker, I’d lost my youthful joints,
and with them the ability to run. But I hadn’t
lost my appetite, and I’d swelled to 52 inches
around the waist.
The years at WSU were a time of renewal.
I spent all my time improving my mind and my body. I
slimmed down to 38 inches, benched 300 lbs. for the first
time and even started jogging on the rubberized track
at the Swenson Gym.
Then I got married, and it all went
downhill. Two divorces later I was 62 inches around the
waist, taking 7 medications to stay alive. My blooming
career as a reporter was on hold. I told my editor, “I’ll
be back when I’ve lost 200 pounds.”
I loaded my van with the basic personal
possessions and a few of my books and drove 800 miles
north, back to the town that, to me, meant the chance
to start over.
But poverty wasn’t enough to starve
me into thinness; bad food is cheap, and too many people
couldn’t stand to see me starve. Then I got a job,
and so much for the Raw Wheat & Homelessness Diet.
As my blood pressure spiraled up and
the machine I used to breathe at night cranked up the
pressure to keep me alive, I would look from my office
building toward what was once called the Downtown Dig.
A recreation center with a Gold’s Gym was rising
from the ashes of Ogden’s economic malaise, and
I dreamed of when I could slip away from the office to
bake in a sauna, or ride a recumbent bicycle.
Yeah, that’s what would save me.
People I worked for put together a grand
party for people to see the new Salomon Center. I spent
late nights in my office putting the web pages together
so people could read about it and buy tickets. I had
my own free ticket to attend.
I was too ill to go. While Ogden was
checking out the iFly, the FlowRider and the shiny ranks
of Precor fitness machines at Gold’s Gym, I was
lying on the couch exhausted. The most work I’d
done for a week was to walk to my car.
Two weeks later I still hadn’t
been inside the building that held the hope of my life.
Then one of the director’s of Envision Ogden asked
me to a planning meeting. At the end of our business
chat he said, “By the way, Preston, how’s
your health?”
“Bad. But that’s nothing
new.”
Well, not exactly. It had been bad for
a long time. The level of badness, though, that was a
new thing.
No need to give him a lot of
details, I thought; it was just a conversation.
I’d
get some advice, a hearty chuck on the shoulder and some
encouragement to straighten myself out.
Instead, I got rescued.
Ogden to the Rescue
In a day, the rescue was planned and
set in motion. Sponsors were lined up. My fate was spelled
out.
Abe Shreve handed me a Suunto
fitness watch, courtesy of Amer
Sports. Complete
with a heart monitor, it could time my workouts, track
my exercise output, calculate calories burned and distance
walked or run (in my case, walked. Barely.) With the
addition of a PC Pod, a gadget that made the watch
communicate with my computer, I could log all my stats.
In other words, I couldn’t lie
about my workouts. Not to myself, not to Abe. Not to
you.
Next came the Gold’s Gym membership.
Inside the Salomon
Center, I skipped the stairs and took
the elevator to the second floor and gaped at the rows
of treadmills, stair machines, stationary bikes and weights
stretching nearly out of view.
I walked past the machines and found
to the sauna, where I cooked for 40 minutes. an Arizona,
the summer heat had leached the sodium from my system
and kept me relatively heart-healthy. Back in temperate
Utah, my blood pressure
had jumped nearly 30 points. I
Now I revisited an artificial southern desert.
The next work day, Abe introduced me
to Sidney Reeves. I’d sort of met Sid nearly four
years earlier, a couple of times over the phone, when
I was running a North Ogden newspaper. I'd assigned a
reporter to interview him for a story. I was impressed
by what I edited (with the story, that is. The editing
wasn’t
bad either.)
I’ll tell you more about Sid, but
later. There’s a lot to tell. Sid looks like he
comes straight out of a Calvin Klein advertisement, but
his life isn’t a commercial. He’s been on
Oprah.
One of the first things Sid told me is, “Everything
happens for a reason. Everything’s coming together.
This is your time.”
He became my shadow. Five days a week,
a personally supervised workout. Seven days a week,
six reports from me via text message telling what I ate
for three meals and three snacks.
“We’re going to do it like
this for a year.” Then he said the same thing Abe
told me: “I need your total commitment . . .”
My head was already going nod, nod. Of
course. Commitment.
“ . . . to honesty.”
Ah. Honesty. Not commitment to show
up and work out; anybody can do that. Commitment not
to lie about the times I screw up.
And I did screw up. Every day. Two perfect
meals and three perfect snacks with all the right stuff,
in the right portions. Then, evening. Back at the throne
of the marvelous, magical Burger King. Afterward, feeling
like an alcoholic who has to call his sponsor and confess.
Even so, I started feeling better. Not
slowly, either. And not just a little.
With my blood sugar steady from eating
every two hours, my mind cleared. With portions reduced,
my sleep became deep and uninterrupted. My guts stopped
hating me.
The first day at the gym, Sid spent an
hour talking to me about food (I’ll talk more about
that later, too). Then it was time for my first measured
workout. Just a 20-minute walk on the treadmill. I came
to the gym wearing flip-flops. When I got on the treadmill
barefoot, Sid looked like he was in pain.
“Shoes are important. I can’t
stress that enough.”
Yeah, but I can’t bend over far
enough to tie shoelaces. I’ve got slip-on Skechers
for church and business meetings. I’ve got flipflops
for everything else.
Sid was adamant: he sends all his clients
to Peak
Performance at 5739 Harrison Blvd.
So he sent me down to see John Montoya, who asked me
to please put socks on, then told me to stand with my
ankles flat while he analyzed my gait.
For a guy my size, it was no small demand.
Still, John concluded that my feet tend to roll to the
outside as I walk, and he hooked me up with a pair of
Nikes with sole support concentrated in the outside edge.
The third day on the treadmill, I came
in with shoes. Sid tied them for me. The first two days
I’d left with ankle pain. With the Peak Performance
Nikes, there was no pain. For a guy who usually walks
with a cane, that’s a big deal.
Day four, I rolled out of bed
an hour late but had my protein bar and V-8 breakfast
and headed out the door. On the way to the car, I had
a shocking experience.
I was walking fast.
I haven’t walked fast in at least
four years. Actually, I don’t even remember the
last time I walked fast unless I was jaywalking and hurrying
to keep from getting killed. On July 12, 2007, I walked
fast just because I wanted to be somewhere and my body
was lurching along like it wasn’t in pain. And
for the moment, it actually wasn’t.
I’m still absorbing the shock.
Three days of diet-by-Sid and exercise-by-Sid, one trip
to the Sauna, and I was remembering what it was like
to be a regular human. Of course, after the workout I
needed the cane again.
Other feelings faded, too. That same
day Sid put me on the weights, and at Gold’s the
wall next to the weight benches is wainscoted with mirrors.
Just as I was feeling high, thinking I’d rejoined
the human race, I saw my behemoth belly rolling and jiggling
my gray workout tee. Like it was trying to escape.
Sid reads bodies. He always knows just
how much I can do. He hands me a certain weight and assigns
me a number of reps, and it always turns out to be a
challenge, but never quite impossible.
Sometimes he seems to read minds, too.
“Don’t worry about how much
you can pump out. We’re building momentum. We’re
building a wave here.”
Yeah, I’m on the wave. I’ve
watched the young, normal folks riding the FlowRider.
Looks like fun. Give me a year, I’ll be down there
too. Some time I’ll be riding a cushion of air
on the iFly. Heck, when I do that, I’ll fulfill
a lifelong dream and jump out of a decent airplane wearing
a perfect parachute.
After the workout, on the way to the
locker room, Sid discovered the one thing we hadn’t
found yet: a digital scale that could weigh me. Regular
balance scales, like you find in most gyms, go only to
350 lbs. This one goes to 999.
“Okay, let's
find where you’re at,” Sid said. “Then
we can start measuring your progress.”
So, I committed to honesty, didn’t
I? Here’s the unvarnished truth. After whatever
weight I’d lost from four days of workouts and
reduced intake, I tipped at 476 lbs.
Yeah, I’ve got a long way to go.
But with the help of Sidney Reeves of
Northern Fitness Personal Training Studio, the good folks
at Amer
Sports and Gold’s,
with shoes from Peak
Performance and distilled drinking
water from Herbs for Health, and the encouragement of
people from City Hall to Keller-Williams,
I think I’m
building a wave.
I’d be grateful if you came along
with me on my journey. I'll need your encouragement.
July 20, 2007
Look, mom! I tied my shoes.
I’m
serious. You taught me how to tie shoes back when I started kindergarten. You
never let me wear tennis shoes to school until a year later when I jammed a
pitchfork through a cowboy boot and a couple inches into my foot; ’til
then you made me wear leather shoes with thin, black
laces that had to be polished at least once a week. Like
what people today call church shoes, or business shoes.
Anyway,
you taught me to tie shoes, making sure I didn’t do “granny knots” with
the loops pointing the wrong ways. I learned to make
the left loop with my right hand and wrap the left lace
over and under with the left string and it through the
middle and pull it through on the right.
But about three
years ago I quit tying shoes. Bending over is one of
those basic actions people don’t associate with gymnasts and acrobats. It’s
something normal people do. But somehow around the 400
lb. mark I lost that talent.
By the time I hit four-hundred
eighty pounds, it was a cherished part of my past life.
Around 350 I converted to nothing but slip-ons. With
new shoes, a two-foot shoehorn comes in handy. When shoes
are broken in, you can just find them with your feet,
kick them straight, slip a toe in and then wiggle and
kick your foot inside.
Socks? Yeah,
socks are something else. You sit on the edge of the
bed and use both hands to haul a knee up. Lay the knee
on the bed. With the foot sticking off the side of the
bed, grab a sock, let out your breath and lunge. If the
foot doesn’t
escape, wrestle the sock down. And you wear ONLY ankle-length socks; when each
calf looks like a Honey-baked Ham, long socks simply can’t stay up. They
can’t even GET up. White bootie socks are okay even for church, if you
loosen your suspenders so your cuffs hang down over your ankles. Walk in a
slow shuffle so your cuffs don’t flap about and
give people glimpses of shameful white cotton.
No, I’m
not ready to start buying long, dark socks. My calves are still big enough
that it’s not safe for me to hang out with people
from New
Guinea.
But let me tell you about Saturday. I
was kicking my way into my brand-new Nike running shoes
from Peak Performance, but the ankle folded under my
heel and wouldn’t
straighten out. In forgetful annoyance, I leaned down
with a grunt and grabbed.
And caught!
Not just
the toe. I grabbed the whole shoe. My hand was down there
feeling whole, massive lengths of size-twelve sole and
cover, and I could feel the laces under my fingers.
Holy
smokes. Could I possibly . . . ?
After getting
the shoe all the way on, I sat and leaned and, heart
in mouth, UNDID THE LACES. That’s right, I’d burned my bridges. Crossed the Rubicon. Walked
onto the highwire without a safety net.
Then, mashing my belly against my knees, I pulled the
loose laces snug, and still had enough maneuvering room
to loop with the right hand, loop over and under with
the left, grab the second loop with my right finger,
and pull it through—and tighten!
Yes, I shouted
with glee. You would have, too.
Then I tied
the other shoe. THEN I sent super-trainer Sidney Reeves
the first text message of the day. If you remember, a
week ago Sidney was tying my shoes for me.
So anyway,
Mom, I hope you’re proud of your 38-year-old son. Give me a week or two
. . . maybe I’ll be riding a bike!
Workout summary for Saturday, July 21,
2007
Exercise: Treadmill
Distance: .90 miles
Pace: 2.0 mph
Incline: 1 percent
Avg. heart rate: 161 bpm
Calories burned: 798
Steam room session: 20 minutes
Avg. heart rate: 154
Calories burned: 450
July 25
MSG is of the devil, and I’m
a moron.
Shall I explain?
Back in the days when Japan was
still struggling to recover from WWII, there was a
great invention that revolutionized Oriental cuisine.
In 1958 Momofuku Ando (yeah, that’s his real
name), founder of Nissin Foods, invented what we now
call the ramen noodle, which became so popular in Japan
that it was actually more expensive
than other noodles for a while. But eventually it acquired
the local nickname “student
cuisine,” which is what it is here, too.
You might call it bachelor food.
It’s definitely
been a staple of my diet. The results are visible.
But before there was ramen, there
had to be monosodium glutamate, also known as glutamic
acid. Mmm, makes you hungry just to hear the name.
Anyway, the world-shaking invention of the savory flavor
enhancer also took place in Japan, in 1909. Because
glutamic acid occurs naturally in small amounts in
some plants such as seaweed, as well is in small amounts
in meat broths, we get unscrupulous food makers who throw
vast quantities of synthetic material in soups and
call it “natural
flavors.”
Right. Like crack is a natural substance
from coca leaves.
Problem is, I got addicted
to ramen during my two-year stint in Korea with the 2nd
Infantry Division (actually, they call it ramyon in Korea).
When we went out on field maneuvers, local entrepreneurs
followed us in Daewoo trucks with mobile kitchens and
would sell us a hot bowl of noodles for 50 cents. Or,
with a piece of black market American cheese melted into
it, $1. During the winter, for a guy who didn't drink
coffee, it was the only hot stuff I could get. And it
was full of nice carbs and fat--and savory flavor, too,
courtesy of some enterprising Japanese chemists.
But that was in the days when I ran three
to six miles a day, and before my nervous system was
weakened by cyclosarin. A fit body absorbs a beating
with less obvious damage.
Fast forward nine years and I was at
Weber State U, eating beans and broccoli and oatmeal,
working out twice a day and definitely NOT polluting
my body with ramen, I had a puzzling experience.
In a ravenous fit for something meaty, I bought some
breaded chicken patties at Smith’s
and snarfed them down. The next day I woke up with
a hangover.
I’m not kidding. I couldn’t
think clearly, I walked around in a fog, my muscles hurt.
I didn’t
know what brought it on. There is so little alcohol in
chicken patties that, if food makers wanted to, they
could advertise is as “alcohol-free chicken.”
So a week or two or three went by,
I was feeling
normal and clear-headed. I’d dropped a few more
pounds, and I figured it was time for another well-earned
gastronomic orgy. This time, as I recall, I chose a bag
of breaded fish portions from the freezer section. The
next day, it was like I’d been knocking back soju with the boys back in Tongduchon.
That time I pulled the package
from the trash and read the ingredients, then called
my girlfriend, who was actually the one responsible
for me eating right most of the time (she was what
you might call a "health nut." I worshiped her.). When
I told her the fish had “natural
flavors,” she
said, “That means MSG.”
Mystery solved. I learned to smell
the stuff in buffets and avoid it. I learned not to
eat any type of canned soup except tomato (for some
reason MSG doesn’t
go with tomato, I guess).
The stuff is everywhere. I can’t
imagine why it would be in a McDonald’s Double
Cheeseburger (and maybe it isn't; it could be any manner
of neurotoxin), but if I want to just PRETEND I spent
the previous night tearing the town up with
Johnny Walker, I snort down
a couple of those dollar-menu lovelies.
You think I’d learn. But
something happened when I put on 200 lbs. My brain
got so constantly dull, I stopped noticing the difference
when I had something with the evil MSG in it.
Then along came Sidney Reeves, whom I shall refer to
in most references by his superhero name, Dr. Fit. He
mapped out a diet where everything meaty was organic,
and where most of the other ingredients were leafy or
nutty or whole-grainy.
I have already noted how fast I
started feeling better. Have I mentioned that my mind
cleared up, too? I had energy and inspiration? Sure,
I was cheating most every day, but I was avoiding
the Mickey D Dollar Menu and the bottom shelf in the
Oriental foods section at Wal-Mart (am I supposed to
call that Asian foods now? Forget it, there are lots
of Asian natives who aren't what we call Asian. I'm sticking
with Oriental.).
Then my money ran out and the groceries
ran low, and when the urge for something savory hit I
reached to the back of the shelf, where I found several
boxes of stroganoff-flavored Hamburger Helper.
With the help of some tuna, it made a nice meal. I was
cheating by having noodles, but I congratulated myself
that I was having fish flesh and using Canola oil to
liven up the gravy.
Okay, now you’re starting to understand
the second part of my opening statement. The part
me being an idiot.
Despite my earlier trips to Burger
King, I’d dropped
10 lbs. in seven days. But come Sunday night and I was
mainlining Hamburger Helper. Of course, the stuff has “natural
flavors.” Vestin. Accent. Ajinomoto. EU Food Additive
E666 (oops, I mean E621). Stuff that dissolves in saliva
into free sodium ions and glutamate (glutamate is described
as “the anionic form of glutamic acid, a naturally
occurring amino acid.” Yeah, well, beef lard is
natural too, and it makes much crispier French fries
than you get with veggie oils that haven’t been
turned into artificial lard through hydrolization. Note
to those concerned about their health: beef lard is bad
in large amounts.)
Then came Monday and my workout under
the supervision of Dr. Fit. I went slowly up the stairs.
My brain was dull. And while I added a minute to my
distance on the treadmill, I didn’t
feel like I’d gained any strength over the weekend.
I barely burned 10 more calories than I had during my
Saturday treadmill walk, because
I couldn’t
push as hard. Then, for the first time, Dr. Fit gave
me a resistance exercise I couldn’t do. After two
sets of exercises my legs gave out and I couldn’t
stand to do arm curls.
That night, naturally, I had more Hamburger Helper.
This time I added some canned veggies.
Wahoo.
The next day, the 24th, I was on my own
at Gold's and so sore that I decided to skip the treadmill.
With a knowledge of my stupidity and sins weighing heavily
on my soul, I dragged myself to the steam room and cooked
for 47 minutes, until I noticed the familiar symptoms
of heat exhaustion (I learned those in Korea during
cross-mountain road marches in the monsoon heat).
Then I stood on the scales and
received my true punishment. Four hundred
and seventy-two pounds! Just days before, I’d
been bragging how I’d dropped from 476 on July
13 to 466 on July 20. In four days, six pounds had jumped
back on my body.
Now, you’ve got to understand what
happened on July 18, when I saw I was down to 468. Being
a foodaholic,, naturally I celebrated my weight loss
at Golden Corral with three plates of creamed potatoes,
country gravy, fried mushrooms and roast beef. I drank
five glasses of milk. The next day I went back and contributed
to the shocking mortality rate among American chickens.
And the day after that,
I weighed in and learned that I'd lost two more pounds!
But a couple of pots of Hamburger
Helper down the hatch, and I
regained six pounds. My body ached. I could no longer
tie my shoes. And my brain was still even duller than
when I’d made the stupid, gut-driven decision to
eat pasta a la poison .
I did my best to counteract the
effects. I cooked vegetable soup and had that for a
couple of meals. I poured vitamin C powder and lemon
juice into my drinking water and chugalugged enough
to keep me up all night visiting the
bog (that’s
British for the toilet. Fun word, isn’t it?)
On Wednesday, Sid called and asked what
my weight was. In shame, I reported the truth, and the
cause. He ordered me back to the gym and told me to report
the results.
By the time I made it, it was 30
hours since my last workout and about 42 since my last
dose of "natural flavors." First, I did something I
hadn’t
done for a while: I broke out the Hamilton
Beach juice extractor and ran two apples, four carrots, a large
lemon, and four celery stalks through it. The result
was nearly a quart of smooth-tasting juice that even
a child would love.
Then it was off to the gym. I started
with a 20-minute cook in the steam room, then stood
on the scales. I was disappointed to still weigh between
471 and 472. So almost nothing had changed.
However, when I got on the treadmill
I was surprised and pleased to feel energy like I hadn’t
felt even before my dalliance with MSG. When my 28
minutes was up I wasn’t
tired, I had no pain, I wanted to keep going (I didn't
keep going, by the way. I do have SOME discipline.)
And somehow, I’d managed
to sweat off three more pounds. The scale blessed me
for my efforts by pronouncing me a mere 469 lbs.
My heart soared. Redemption was possible.
I’m
still three pounds over my low from last week, but I’m
doing better now. I picked up a check from a client,
then hit Wal-Mart where I got more organic milk (it doesn’t
make me phlegmy, and that’s a first!), some goat’s
milk, rice milk, whole-grainy cereals, loads of cottage
cheese and a half-dozen foil packs of pink salmon (canned
salmon tastes like sulfur and wet sawdust, but this stuff
is great), bagged cut greens, onions, six bags of organic
carrots, broccoli crowns, apples, and a plastic-wrapped
slice of watermelon.
By the way, I hate watermelon.
Always have. But it’s
probably 20 years since I tried it last. Tomorrow, I’ll
report on that new experience.
Also, in case you haven’t
been paying attention . . .
DON’T EAT ANYTHING WITH MSG!!!
July 25 workout summary
(I forgot the heart monitor in the car, so my Suunto
fitness watch couldn't calculate the calories burned
and I had to rely on the heart monitor on the treadmill.)
Minutes walked: 28
Distance walked: .96 miles.
Incline: 1 percent
Probable calories burned: about 900.
Probably average heart rate: about 164 bpm
July 26
Hi, I’m Preston M, and I’m
a foodaholic.
I’ve never really denied it, I’m
just a lot more ashamed of it now than I have been.
Yesterday Abe gently prompted me
that I need to be reporting my workouts, my eating,
my progress (and, I presume, any lack of progress)
every day. No skipping. People are helping me, they’ve put themselves out for
me, they’re counting on me.
I made some excuses about major
changes to the web site being in the works, how the
mass email list isn’t
working yet, etc. But that wasn’t the real reason
I haven’t been checking in with you guys every
day.
The fact is, I’m afraid of
two things: Lying, and the truth.
The truth is embarrassing. I’ve tried to make
the truth funny, but it’s not funny any more. Yesterday
I’d made a lot of progress—well, really I’d
regained a lot of the ground I lost from eating four
boxes of Hamburger Helper. After writing my report it
was nearly midnight. I had money, and old habits demanded
to be followed.
The goofy thing was, I wasn’t really craving anything.
Wasn’t really hungry. Even so, I went to Burger
King and ordered three sandwiches. Double Whopper with
cheese, chicken sandwich (add mustard and pickle), fish
sandwich (plus mustard and pickle). Came home and ate
them. They tasted okay. But just okay.
Then I stayed up until 8 a.m. to finish reading Harry
Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I was supposed
to be proofreading a
novel that hits the press next month, because the publisher’s regular proofreader
was busy reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
But since I’d already thrown responsibility to
the wind, I figured I might as well make a night of
it.
I didn’t sleep too long; I managed to get some
daily duties done. Then it was off to the gym. Dr. Fit
was out of town and he doesn’t want me to lift
weights without his guidance, so it was just another
treadmill day. First, I went into the steam room. I can’t
handle as much time in there after a workout, so I frontloaded
the easy part. I burned 850 calories sitting on my ample
buns.
Then I was on the ’mill. From repeatedly leaving
things in my car, I’d had to make three trips out
to the parking lot, and I already had a pretty good workout.
But that didn’t account for the pain in my body.
I’d gotten out of bed feeling like that.
July 26 was the hardest workout
I’ve had since
I started nearly three weeks ago. Everything hurt. For
a moment, I contemplated quitting and making excuses
to Sid (Dr. Fit). But Sid is the Master. The Rabbi of
Fit. And a truly nice guy. He is, in short, someone
I can’t bear to disappoint (let alone lie to).
That’s why I’ve quit text messaging Sid
like I’m supposed to, six times a day, to report
my meals and snacks. I can’t lie, and I’m
ashamed to tell the truth. I haven’t got the heart
to keep to my sleeping and eating schedule, and I haven’t
got the guts to keep telling him I’ve failed.
But now I’m telling all of you. No more jokes.
It’s not funny. Certainly, today’s 29 minutes
on the treadmill were very unfunny, because I ached in
my back, my legs, my arms, and I never got a second wind.
Most days if I start off hurting, the aches start to
ease after ten minutes or so. But today, at least eight
times I had to lean my whole body against the rails,
taking all the weight off my legs while I barely kept
them moving. I’m sure I wasn’t an inspiring
sight.
But I stuck with it, because I
knew I deserved to hurt. People are giving me all types
of free stuff, personal attention and moral support.
They’re bothering
to check in and read, and leave kind comments. And I,
meanwhile, am making jokes about my trips to Golden Corral.
I’m in a situation just like I was in back in
1991. Sid and Abe are handling me the same way Mormon
mission presidents manage 19- and 20-year-old guys who
are supposed to supervise themselves and work 14-hour
days. They’re required to make plans, set goals,
and report their work every week.
Yeah, they can lie about it. Some
of them do. Many are tempted to stretch the truth.
I remember the encouragement given by one of my leaders
in England: “An increase
in accuracy is an increase in honesty.”
There are two kinds of results. An honest missionary
evaluates himself every week and sees where he can improve.
Either he decides to improve so he can report without
fear, and he becomes a better person; or he decides to
lie and becomes accustomed to being a lying slimebag.
I really don’t want to turn
into a slimebag.
I want to go stick a spoon in a
quarter-section of watermelon and find out if I can
gag it down. If I can’t,
I want to have shredded wheat for dinner and then not
eat another blessed thing until tomorrow morning.
It’s what I want. But will
I do it?
I promise you just one thing. Whatever
I do, I won’t
lie to you about it.
Steam room session: 31 minutes
Avg. heart rate: 138
Calories burned: 850
Exercise: Treadmill
Distance: 1.02 miles
Pace: 2.1 mph
Incline: 1 percent
Avg. heart rate: 160 bpm
Calories burned: 853
Weight: 467
9:44 p.m.
I ate almost two cups of bran flakes
and an equivalent amount of organic reduced fat milk.
I can't face the watermelon right now.
I want chicken!
I want KFC! AAAAARGH! |
