I’ve been watching a lot of the Science Channel lately – we have it in HD now and it’s my new, favorite thing! I’m an artist by trade, but I have always loved math and science. It was tough deciding what to do with my life as a result. lol… So now I do the design thing for a living, and satisfy my ’science tooth’ with TV and reading, which works out well.
So, yesterday, I watched a program on Supermassive Black Holes [which happens to be my favorite Muse song... hee hee], and was fascinated by the fact that every galaxy has one in the center, and in all likelihood, rather than being only a super destructive force, they’re also responsible for creating all physical matter and life as we know it. Go figure. Watching it all unfold, it had the same effect on me that sitting on the beach in front of a choppy sea does. It made me feel small, and my problems smaller. Not that I have much to complain about these days. I really don’t. Everyone has ups and downs, crazy relatives and daily struggles as part of being a member of human society, but overall, things are really good. And I find myself wanting to know one thing: What came first, the supermassive black hole, or the gaseous cloud? lol…
I remember being very little and thinking along the lines of…”our planet is in the solar system, which is in the Milky Way galaxy, which is in the Universe…” But when I’d try to think of what was beyond the Universe itself, every single time my brain would literally go “TILT” and I’d get a headache. lol… and as I got older I decided it was okay to leave some things a mystery. I don’t need to know everything to enjoy my life. But if someone else figures out the answers – I still want to know. =)
So… you’re probably wondering ‘how do these black holes relate to diet and exercise?’ Well… I guess it’s just a matter of perspective for me. Not all ominous things [or crappy situations or circumstances] are bad. Sure, a black hole could swallow everything in our galaxy up, us included. But without it, we wouldn’t be here in the first place. Kind of like the saying those crazy movie moms used to say from time to time, “I brought you into this world… I can take you out!” lol…
For me, I relate this to… if I hadn’t had all the [crappy] experiences I’ve had up until now, or the genetics that make it more difficult for me to lose weight – or if I didn’t have a weight problem – I probably wouldn’t be so interested in diet and exercise and I may not have lived as long, or as healthy a life as I plan on doing now. I do believe everything happens for a reason. In the end, there’s very little I take for granted. I’ve been through a lot, I’ve worked through a lot, I’ve learned a lot [like many of us. I'm not special]. I’ve had to work hard for everything in my life, so why should getting healthy be any different? In the end, when you have to work hard for something, you appreciate it that much more than the next guy [or gal], right? And besides, the very phrase ‘weight problem’ infers there there is, in fact a ’solution’! As long as the learning part never stops, things will always look up, no matter how bad they may seem at the moment.
The other analogy to draw from is, when looking at a supermassive black hole, it sucks matter in on one end, and spits it out on the other. You could say it’s destroying what it’s sucking in, but in doing so, causing all the friction and heat within the gases that surround it, it’s initiating the reactions that all life came from. Like any problem, you can either focus on just the negative, or you can look at it as a whole [no pun intended], and choose to focus on the good that will come of it. What I want to know is – where does all that stuff go – does it come out the other end and start life there too? Does that mean there are Universes on top of Universes and these supermassive black holes are the doorways? [TILT]… ouch… ;)
Image: An artist’s impression of the accretion disc around the supermassive black hole that powers an active galaxy. (Image credit: NASA / Dana Berry, SkyWorks Digital) via University of Leicester, Department of Physics and Astronomy
This probably won’t mean much to anyone else reading this, but this was a huge deal for me. I practice a little yoga almost every day as part of my warm up and cool down for workouts, as well as before bed to stretch and relax. The other day I decided to try to do ‘wheel’ again. I haven’t been able to do it in years. Not strong enough, too heavy… just plain out of shape, I guess. I used to be able to stand up, lean back and fall into it as a teenager. Now I have to start it from a lying down position, which is fine. Ultimately, I would like to be able to not only get into it from a standing position, but also be able to be in ‘wheel’ and come standing again. To me, that’s a better goal than any number on a scale. Along with wanting to be a race car driver when I was a kid, I also wanted to be a contortionist. lol… I don’t think that’ll ever happen, but that doesn’t mean I can try. ;)
Another physical goal is to be able to do ’scorpion pose’ someday. I think it’s so beautiful to look at when someone else is doing it… I have a long way to go, but incremental progress also feels good on the road to achieving it. In the meantime, I’ll keep doing what I’m doing and keep working on the postures that prepare one for scorpion pose until the day I’m successful. I’m the meantime, I’ll keep getting inspiration from seeing pictures of it and visualizing myself doing it. =) 
