Harvey Milk, was a visionary civil and human rights leader who became one of the first openly gay elected officials in the United States when he won a seat on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1977. Milk’s unprecedented loud and unapologetic proclamation of his authenticity as an openly gay candidate for public office, and his subsequent election gave never before experienced hope to Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgendered (LGBT) people everywhere at a time when the community was encountering widespread hostility and discrimination. His remarkable career was tragically cut short when he was assassinated nearly a year after taking office.
I, Coach Leslie, am choosing to honor Harvey Milk in tomorrows class because I absolutely believe that human rights are non-negotiable. The struggle for equality and justice for the LGBTQ community has impacted my life in a way that many people might find surprising. As most of you know, I was in the US Marine Corps from 1989-1995. This was before "Don't Ask, Don't Tell." Back then it was illegal and a crime to be gay in the military. You could not serve if you were gay, and you could be legally prosecuted and discharged if you were found to be gay. While I was deployed to Saudi Arabia during the Persian Gulf War (also known as Desert Storm) I was stalked and eventually sexually assaulted by one of my fellow Marines. Lucky for me, my flight or fight response is highly developed for fighting and I successfully fought off my attacker with a knife. However, at the end of the assault he threatened to kill me if I told anyone about the incident. As most women (and I suppose some men) do, I told no one about the attack. It wasn't until I was with a bunch of other female Marines that I felt brave enough to tell them about the "crazy thing" Cpl. White did to me. After I shared my story, about 5 other women said, "Me, too." This was in 1991, a full 27 years before our current #metoo movement. We all decided to report Cpl. White's abuse to our Sergeant Major. Lucky for us, this crusty old Vietnam veteran took swift and decisive action and Cpl. White found himself on a plane bound for the US where he would remain in custody while awaiting trial. After all of us returned home the Court Martial began. Cpl. White's defense argument was that all 5 of us women were a band of "man-hating lesbians with an axe to grind." Because he accused us of being gay the Court Martial shifted. All 5 of us now were legally obligated to prove that we were not lesbians. Remember, he stalked most of us for 3 months, assaulted all of us, and threatened to kill the rest of us. However, at this point in the Court Martial none of that mattered. The entire focus of the Court Martial was on us women to prove that we were not lesbians. How where we obligated to do this? We had to provide personal testimony from a man with whom we had sex. Yep. It's true, I had to bring a male witness to legally testify that he had indeed had sex with me. It was one of the most humiliating experiences of my life. I was 19 years old. Eventually, all of us were able to convince the court that we were heterosexuals and the Court Martial could continue. Cpl. White was found guilty of conduct unbecoming with regard to the women who were equal to our above his rank and sexual harassment with me because I was lower rank. You see, back then, the Code of Military Justice did not recognize sexual harassment from a person of lower rank to a person of higher rank. Since then, because of the brave souls of lesbians and gays in the military, the laws have changed. Don't ask, don't tell was repealed (believe me, this was stupid law) and gays and lesbians can serve openly. Since then, because of these brave souls, transgender people can serve openly. Since then, because of these brave souls, military sexual harassment laws have changed to no longer be specific to rank. Since then, because of these brave souls, women and men who are stalked, assaulted and abused do not have to have their sexuality on trial. All of these human rights are only possible because of the courage of early leaders like Harvey Milk. He stood tall and proud in the face of unbelievable hate. In one of his eloquent speeches, Milk spoke of the American ideal of equality, proclaiming, “Gay people, we will not win our rights by staying quietly in our closets. … We are coming out to fight the lies, the myths, the distortions. We are coming out to tell the truths about gays, for I am tired of the conspiracy of silence, so I’m going to talk about it. And I want you to talk about it. You must come out.” Harvey knew, as did Martin Luther King, that equality and justice will elevate our entire society. Dr. King said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” Harvey Milk knew this. His fight for equality and justice for LGBTQ community ripples across all of humanity. Please join me tomorrow as we honor Harvey Milk.
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Zach eliminated sugar from his diet. He won the Whole Life Challenge, dropped his body fat by 10%, got his first bar muscle-up and just got a new PR back squat at 275#. Coincidence? Today's Foodie Friday blog post continues our exploration into foods we eliminate or reduce on our Paleo eating plan. Remember, our version of Paleo is to eat meat, vegetables, nuts & seeds, some fruit, little starch and no sugar and to eliminate grains, dairy, dried legumes and of course sugar. We eliminate grains, dairy and sugar to control our insulin. Insulin is a hormone that controls carbohydrate and fat metabolism. Remember, Insulin is the hormone that regulates fat accumulation at the waist. We eliminate or reduce dried legumes because they can cause inflammation and GI distress. Today I look at why we eliminate sugar. The folks who created the Whole30 program have a series of manifestos that I have been using as inspiration for these Foodie Friday blogs. Their sugar manifesto is so good that I'm going to use it in its entirety. "When thinking of foods that provoke an unhealthy psychological response (including cravings), sugar comes to mind first. Because the sweetness of sugar is addictive, eating an excess amount is easy. The more we eat, the more we get acclimated to high levels, and the more we want. Artificial sweeteners are also commonly problematic, as they are hundreds of times sweeter than the sugar found in nature but lack any genuine nutritional qualities. The American Heart Association recommends women limit sugar consumption to 6 teaspoons (25 grams) per day and men limit to 9 teaspoons (36 grams) per day. I challenge you to keep a sugar log for just ONE day. Added sugar is in nearly EVERYTHING that is processed. Start reading your labels and you might be shocked and awed by how much sugar is sneaking into your diet. There are many names for sugar, and now that you're going to start reading labels you'll want to become familiar with all of sugar's pseudonyms. Here's a handy sheet from the Whole30 program on all of the names of sugar. A common trend I see with folks who "Go Paleo" is that they start to make Paleo this and Paleo that all the while still allowing their brain to be home to the Sugar Demon. The Sugar Demon is the intense and visceral craving we get for something sweet. Craving something sweet is totally emotionally based. Your cravings don't tell you that you have a nutritional deficiency. If that were true, everyone would be craving broccoli and spinach. No, your cravings are a deeply rooted in your emotions and HABIT. You crave something sweet after dinner or at 3pm? You're habituated to that craving, nothing more, nothing less. Slaying the sugar demon is one of the most important changes you can make to your diet and lifestyle. Simply swapping white or brown sugar for maple syrup, agave, or stevia is not doing you any favors. You're still appeasing the sugar demon. You're brain does not know the difference between each type of sugar. You're reinforcing the sugar demon habit. Do yourself a favor, slay the sugar dragon by eliminating ALL forms of added sugar for 30 days. Your body and mind will thank you for it. People can go down the rabbit hole of sugar elimination by lumping fruit into the high sugar food category. Please, let's use some basic nutrition science here. Naturally occurring sugar, like fructose in fruit, can be a great source of energy and it doesn't have the same affects on our bodies because it is bound with fiber to slow its absorption Naturally occurring sugar, like fructose in fruit, can be a great source of energy and it doesn't have the same affects on our bodies because it is bound with fiber to slow its absorption. But, ONLY when you EAT it. Drinking fruit juice is a serving of insulin spiking fructose because there is no fiber in juice. When all else fails, let's just return to our simple food rules. Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants. It's finally summer and I'm ready to fire up my new Kamado grill! One of the most yummiest things you can grill is fresh fruit. SERIOUSLY. Slice and grill peaches, pineapple, apples, etc. Sprinkle on a little cinnamon and life is very sweet indeed:-) Need an actual recipe to follow? I like this one from I Thee Cook. Click on the image for the recipe. Join us tonight at 6pm Wildrye Distillery!Marissa, Susan and Amanda rowed a 5K last Saturday. How far will we row today? The Invictus Mindset's 5th (and final) Pillar of Mental Toughness is Self Confidence. Self confidence is something you can train and develop. We all are faced with doubts and fears, and it is the self confident person who can face down those doubts and fears to start, perform and finish the task. The Invictus Mindset states that in order to develop self-confidence, you must first identify and eliminate symptoms of low self-confidence. This is a very encouraging practice because it puts the power of our confidence with us. Just because you have a self-limiting behavior doesn't mean you have to follow it down the rabbit hole of failure and defeat. According to The Invictus Mindest, the 4 most self-defeating low-self confidence behaviors are:
Please join us for True Spirits Night at Wildrye Distillery tomorrow (Friday) night at 6pm.Heather U. and Jim do burpees in Saturday's class. You'll notice at the top of your June Bingo Card is a square that asks you to keep a 3 day food log and show it to your coach. So far, not one has yet taken on this challenge. Keeping a food log, even one as short as 3 days, can give you great insight into your eating habits. Most people totally overestimate how well they eat and a food log can be a cold dish of reality. A food log can show you when your resolve to eat well is high and when your resolve starts to falter. For many people keeping a food log or meal journal can be all the motivation they need to make better food choices. However, we are asking you to show us your food journal, and I bet just the mere thought of that makes some of you nervous. It's meant to. Every Friday I discuss the importance of good nutrition. By now, I hope you know that you can't out exercise your diet. I hope you're getting the message that to be happier, healthier and to look better naked you have to do more than just CrossFit. You have to watch what you eat. Did you know you can use Beyond The Whiteboard to log your meals? Yep! It's true! You can even save photos of your meals to your BTWB App. How cool is that? Here's how you use your BTWB App as a simple food log. From the BTWB App home screen click on "Log" in the upper right hand corner. You'll see this screen next. Click on "Meal" in the lower third of your screen. Next you'll see this screen. The BTWB meal log gives you many options for qualifying your meal. If you're counting your Macros or following the Zone you can enter your grams of Protein, Carbs and Fat. You can select other attributes you want to track such as cheat meals (unhealthy) and whether you eat in or at a restaurant. You can assign custom attributes and you can add a photo. The BIGGEST limitation to the BTWB App is I have to find where your log is stored. For that, you need to log into your computer version of your BTWB account. Once in this account you can select "Log" from the upper left corner and "Meal" from the drop-down menu. You'll see a screen that looks like this. Now select the "Meals" option on the left side of your screen and you'll have access to your entire meal log. That screen looks like this. There you have it, a super easy meal log that is part of an App that you already use daily. Of course, if you want something more robust, I recommend Apps like MyFitnessPal or MyPlate. I look forward to seeing your 3-day food logs soon!
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