Underground Wellness » Blog

The Podcast About Scientific Fat Loss Facts and Stuff…

UW Sean — Wed, 16 May 2012 21:30:53 +0000

by Sean Croxton It doesn’t work. I wonder at what point will we collective realize that the calories-in/calories-out approach to weight loss is a ginormous FAIL. Consider this for a moment. According to last Thursday’s UW Radio guest Jonathan Bailor, people who quit smoking cold turkey have a 5.5% chance of success. Meanwhile, losing fat long-term by eating less and exercising more has a success rate of 4.6%. Ouch. In other words, the odds of losing weight and keeping it off are worse than if you quit a highly-addictive substance with zero assistance, treatment, or strategy. Good luck on that 1200-calorie diet and endless treadmill program! In fact, both factors -- the low-cal diet and chronic cardio -- are sealing the deal on your eventual rebound weight gain, as they create hormonal turmoil -- and malnutrition -- within the body. And fat loss has a whole LOT more to do with hormones than it has to do with calories. That’s what Mr. Bailor -- a former frustrated personal trainer like myself -- found while spending ten years of his life hanging out with top researchers and reviewing over 11,000 articles and more than 10,000 pages of fat loss research. He found the facts. Fortunately for us, he wrote them all down in a way that just about all of us can comprehend in his mind-blowing book The Smarter Science of Slim.

The Podcast about Autism, the Brain, and Infant Formula…

UW Sean — Thu, 10 May 2012 04:50:22 +0000

by Sean Croxton I couldn’t imagine having a child with autism. Just the thought of it gives me a bit of anxiety -- the unpredictable behavior, the tantrums, the head-banging. If I had it my way, I’d have two kids -- a boy and a girl. But knowing that -- according to the latest figures -- one in 54 boys is affected by autism, kinda scares the bejesus out of me. It should scare the heck out of you, too. Because even if autism does not impact you directly right now, you’re not human if the statistics don’t make you wonder what the heck is going on here. Statistics like... * One in 88 children are diagnosed with autism by age 8. * The rate of autism increased 23% between the years 2006 and 2008. (I wonder what the 2012 numbers are!) * Autism has increased 1000% in the past 40 years. To give you more understanding as to the magnitude of this issue, the rate of obesity has increased 300% in the past 30 years. Again, autism is up 1000% in the past 40. We have an epidemic on our hands, folks.

The Book Review (and Rant) about If Naturopaths are Quacks…Then I Guess I’m a Duck

UW Sean — Tue, 08 May 2012 23:53:45 +0000

by Sean Croxton Quack. It’s a name I’ve been called one, two, maybe 597 times since I launched this website. To be honest, I’ve embraced the term as my own little badge of courage, as I patiently await the day when I have my own profile page on Quackwatch.org. Sometimes I wonder what’s taking them so darn long! I’m so looking forward to throwing myself a party where we all dress up like ducks. Considering how dear I hold the word quack to this big heart of mine, you can probably imagine how geeked up I was last week when I opened up a package and found inside of it a book entitled If Naturopaths are Quacks...Then I Guess I'm a Duck: Confessions of a Naturopath by Dr. Shauna K. Young. If you know me, you know that I have a stack of at least 30 books in what I call my On Deck Circle, each waiting to be read and blogged about. But with such an awesome title, this particular book jumped to the front of the line. Creativity and a sense of humor go a long way with me. Speaking of a sense of humor, Dr. Young’s wit and rib-tickling personality quickly become apparent through her writing style. Think Robb Wolf’s The Paleo Solution or even my own The Dark Side of Fat Loss. She’s got quite a bit of edu-tainer in her. Which makes for a fun and engaging read. Comedy aside, If Naturopaths are Quacks is also a serious -- and quite surreal -- look at the state of our health care system: the quarreling among different kinds of doctors (even those who would appear to be on the same side), the laws that dictate what an alternative practitioner can and cannot say and do, the cost of losing a prescription drug user to a natural protocol, and the ever-growing tension between those solely concerned with empirical evidence and those who care more about getting results. If you’ve ever wondered what an alternative practitioner -- naturopath, chiropractor, acupuncturist, etc. -- must go through on a daily basis just to pursue his or her great passion of coaching clients back to health through natural means, Dr. Young pretty much sums it up. The miracles. The frustrations. The stigma. The you’ve-gotta-be-friggin-kidding me moments. They’re all in there.

The Podcast about Going Beyond Diet and Exercise to Reach Your Health and Fat Loss Goals

UW Sean — Fri, 04 May 2012 15:58:25 +0000

by Sean Croxton I know! I know! I'm about a week late with this post. My team and I have been busy, busy, busy piecing together the upcoming Real Food Summit set to launch on Sunday, July 8. It's gonna be MAJOR! Stay tuned. A little over a week ago, my main man Dean Dwyer -- author of Make Shift Happen -- CRUSHED his appearance on UW Radio. I can talk about mindset, success strategies, and personal development books all day long. If you don't know Dean's story already, he spent 19 years of his life as a vegan/vegetarian but with little success in terms of his health and fat loss. Eventually, he realized that fat loss went far beyond diet and exercise. And he began to incorporate personal development and success strategies to not only his fat loss goals but to his life in general. In this episode, Dean reveals a handful of the 20 shifts and strategies he outlines in his outstanding book, including: * How to step away from the fat loss gurus and instead become an expert on YOU! * Why you should Log Like Captain Kirk in order to collect the necessary data to uncover what works for you. * The importance of Getting Your Beta On, or why thinking like a software developer can help you upgrade your health and fat loss program. * How to eliminate on-the-spot decisions by Deciding in Advance. * Why a Purpose Driven Workout -- having reasons beyond weight loss to work out -- may be the missing link to staying consistent with your exercise regimen. * How a book about writer's block can help quiet the heckler in your head. * The Power of Less. How small changes have a HUGE impact on BIG change. I could interview this guy every week!! Like I told him during the show, he's like my brother from another mother! Click the PLAY button below to listen to the entire show. You'll dig it.

The FREE Webinar About Information Overload, Breaking Bad Habits, and a REAL Nutrition Course

UW Sean — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 14:54:36 +0000

by Sean Croxton I wish I had a time machine. If I did, one of the first years I would venture back in time to is the year 1999. My destination? Front row of my university Nutrition 101 class. After reading many hundreds of diet and nutrition books since college, as well as interviewing the best of the best health experts on the planet, I imagine I would either have a really hard time sitting through an entire hour of dietary misinformation, or I’d be “that guy” constantly raising my hand to question every word coming out of the professor's mouth. It would go something like this... Uh, professor, how does an old school food like beef cause a brand new disease? Did you really just say that soy is a health food? What do you mean genetically engineered foods are perfectly safe? Low-fat milk. Really? Wait, so you're telling me to take the yolks OUT of my eggs? I’d probably land myself in the Dean’s office pretty swiftly. How dare I openly question a tenured professor! Maybe this time machine thing isn’t such a great idea after all.

The Podcast About Balancing the Brain NATURALLY and Stuff…

UW Sean — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 17:48:08 +0000

by Sean Croxton Dr. Kalish is the man. If there is anyone who can appreciate the beauty of balancing the brain naturally, it's me. About 6 years ago, my own chronic anxiety and depression issues finally led me to the doctor’s office, where I literally begged for a prescription fix. I had done some reading up on Paxil (an SSRI) and just knew that it would help me snap out of a funk. Instead, the doc wrote me prescription for Prozac, a drug that, at the time, I had associated with “crazy folk” who were one step away from jumping off a bridge. (I know better now, of course.) I didn’t want to be a member of Prozac Nation. I wanted my damn Paxil! It was cooler than Prozac -- even the great NFL running back Ricky Williams took Paxil, and he led the league in rushing that year! The following day, I took the leap and dropped my first Prozac down the hatch. I will NEVER forget that day. I popped my first pill in the morning before heading to my personal training job. I didn’t really notice anything different, figuring that the effects would take a few days to kick in. Then, during my final session of the day -- fortunately my client Beth was a psychologist -- I started feeling a little...weird. The colors in the room became brighter. My balance was suddenly off. And I started hyperventilating. I couldn't get enough air, it seemed.

The Podcast About What to Do When a Vegan Diet Stops Working…

UW Sean — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 17:54:33 +0000

by Sean Croxton There's nothing wrong with changing your mind. My gosh, if it weren’t okay to flip-flop in the event of new information, I would still be pushing the Food Guide Pyramid and watching my personal training clients get fatter! In his book How to Win Friends and Influence People, Dale Carnegie writes, “...ninety-nine times out of a hundred, people don’t criticize themselves for anything, no matter how wrong it may be.” In other words, human beings LOVE being right -- the overwhelming majority of us will stick to our guns regardless of how conclusive the evidence to the contrary may be. But not Susan Schenck. Susan had fallen madly in love with her raw food vegan diet. So much so that she wrote a 700-page book about it! Going vegan made Susan feel amazing. Her book, The Live Food Factor, even became a bestseller, making her a hero amongst the vegan community. She was on top of the world. That is, until... Her diet stopped working for her. Ouch!

The Blog about Losing Fat by Making Shi(f)t Happen and Stuff…

UW Sean — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 18:32:08 +0000

by Sean Croxton Dean Dwyer is a Professional Human Being. And then some. Anyone who can take books like Rework (about streamlining success and increasing productivity for entrepreneurs and small businesses), Good to Great (about how companies achieve enduring greatness), and Against All Odds (the autobiography of James Dyson, the inventor of the Dyson vacuum) and apply them to fat loss and personal transformation is my kind of guy. Diet books will only take you so far, my friends. So last night, I skipped the Lakers game and read Dean’s new book entitled Make Shi(f)t Happen: Change How You Look by Changing How You Think. Actually, I didn't just read it. I inhaled all 268 pages of it cover-to-cover. Was it good? Heck yeah it was good! Rarely do I ever read a book straight through. But when Dean shared the epiphany he had after 25 years of eating “healthy” while still carrying around an extra 50 pounds of body fat, I was hooked. In Dean’s words... “There was no reason to believe that this time around would be different, and yet I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was onto something this time because my epiphany focused not on how to lose weight, but rather on how to think about weight-loss. Twenty-five years of doing “stuff” hadn’t worked. This time I needed to be different, and in order for me to be different, I needed to think different.” Word up, Mr. Dean.

The Podcast about How the Paleo Diet Reversed Multiple Sclerosis and Stuff…

UW Sean — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 02:21:05 +0000

by Sean Croxton I used to love Richard Pryor. Still do, in fact. I imagine it was my father who turned me on to him. At the time, I didn’t really understand his stand-up comedy routine -- jokes about sex, women, and cocaine kinda go over a 6-year-old's head, ya know. I just remember my Mom covering my miniature-sized ears while he cursed up a storm on stage. But that just made him cooler, Mom. Off-stage and on the silver screen there was a lighter side to the potty-mouthed comic. The Toy -- co-starring the great Jackie Gleason -- is still one of my favorite movies. And who can forget his roles in Brewster’s Millions with John Candy, Superman III with Christopher Reeve, and the hilarious Hear No Evil, See No Evil with sidekick Gene Wilder. I may have been 9-years-old when I first heard the bad news of Pryor’s diagnosis with multiple sclerosis (MS), a condition he battled for 17 years. Like his comedy act, I was then too young to fully understand the outlook and implications of an MS diagnosis. It was not until I watched the movie Harlem Nights that it finally clicked. Right away I knew that something wasn’t right with Richard. His speech was slightly slurred. His coordination seemed a bit off. His facial expressions weren’t the same ones I was used to. He was deteriorating. Over the next decade I would watch his condition progress further as he struggled through television interviews. Eventually, his wife did most of the talking for him. The man who once strutted back and forth on stage had been confined to a wheelchair. The man who made a living with his BIG mouth was rendered nearly speechless. In 2005, he was gone. The laughter had ended. MS is no joke.

The Webinar about Healing Your Gut and Stuff…

UW Sean — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 15:21:29 +0000

by Sean Croxton Everyone needs to watch this. Why? Because at least 60% of the American adult population has some form of digestive dysfunction -- whether it be gas, bloating, acid reflux, constipation, loose stools, diarrhea, fungal overgrowth, leaky gut, food sensitivities, on and on. What a lot of us choose to do when dealing with these pesky matters of pooh is head over to the supermarket and grab a bottle of Tums, Pepto, or Ex-Lax. But those are just quick fixes, not really root cause solutions. The digestive system is a very complex and critical system. As one really smart man once said, “Life begins and ends in the gut.” That's no exagerration! When the gut is functioning optimally, you’re able to digest, absorb, and assimilate the nutrients coming in from your diet. These nutrients are what nourish the 75 trillion-or-so cells that make up your body. Pretty important stuff. But when the digestive system goes offline -- and there a ton of ways that this can happen -- you may up with starving cells, a leaky gut, foggy brain, toxic liver, poor skin, and weird-looking stuff coming out of you when you're on the throne (or nothing at all).