Living-Deliberately.com

Sometimes the days run together and taste like white bread…a bit bland, a bit beige, and a bit forgettable. And then sometimes a day holds a surprise. A hearty, whole grain, hot loaf full of depth that can’t always be repeated and intrigues one with it’s constant nuance and impact. When that happens, things change. A wholesome, nurturing connection impacts the hours and opens the mind and a kindredness is found.

Richard Morris was that kind of surprise for me. A friend sent me a link to his website a few weeks ago, thinking I might find him interesting. “Interesting” is perhaps too beige of a word for what I thought! It’s too overused, too common. Here is a person, a fresh and vibrant and healthy personality who’s story exudes, nay oozes, an aura of freedom and vitality. I didn’t get three of his articles in when I knew intensely that I had to know him, I had to talk to him. His website doesn’t have the words, “living deliberately” upon it but the spirit is everywhere, from each inspirational article to every beautiful photo. I knew this was someone I had in my hall of fame; he’d quickly become one of my deliberate heroes.

I was thrilled when he emailed me back, granting me an email interview. I was beyond words with encouraged glee when I discovered a new friend and kindred spirit. One interview doesn’t seem enough….he should have a running feature! And then, looking through my notes, I realized I could write a book! But he already has, one with a fantastic title called A Life Unburdened. And he’s working on a second. So check it out, and here’s my interview with Richard Morris, and in places, his wife Mary’s story. The interview will be posted in parts, due to length.

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I just spent quite a lot of time over on your site, breadandmoney.com! You are an amazingly fresh breath of air and talented writer. Can you tell me a little about your story?In 2003, I weighed over 400 pounds and suffered from sleep apnea, asthma, hypertension, adrenal fatigue and a handful of other interesting miseries. I had a wake-up call one day in New York when my knee gave out without warning as I was taking the elevator up to my office. I could see a tombstone in my future and I don’t mean pizza. We each arrive at a crossroads at some point in our lives. That was mine. I had a choice. Follow the well-worn path set by so many others, down a road of dieting and despair or take the other road—in the words of Robert Frost—“the one less traveled by.” Like Frost, I discovered that “that has made all the difference.” That pivotal decision led to my rediscovery of the redemptive power of real food. Among many other wonderful things, I lost over 160 pounds in 18 months.

Wow!! So, that’s like, a whole person, weight-wise that you lost in a year and a half!! And was this just by going back to simple, homegrown kind of foods? Did you experiment with different fad diets like South Beach or Adkins or anything like that? When did you come across books like Nourishing Traditions?

Like most people with a serious weight problem, I was either on a diet or planning to go on a diet almost every day. I tried vegetarianism, a diet drug prescribed by my doctor and engaged in countless other episodes of low-fat masochism. I had some success low-carbing, but didn’t really do enough research to understand how it really works. I eventually concluded that diets simply don’t work. I learned of Nourishing Traditions in the spring of 2004, which was almost a year after I decided to return to eating nothing but whole foods. NT accelerated the learning curve for me. It’s a great book. Richard is originally from Detroit and now lives in Virginia but considers Arizona “home”, which is where he grew up and met his beautiful wife Mary. They have two daughters, Stephanie and Raven, ages 16 and 11. When I started the conversation I didn’t know they were a fellow homeschooling family but I wasn’t surprised when that came up! You might say I’m a born-again independent thinker. Like all children, I came into the world with an innate ability to think for myself, but that independence, viewed as a congenital defect by our educational system, was vigorously discouraged from kindergarten through college. In my case, I’ve spent the last 3 years trying to undo the damage of 16 years of formal education. Thus at the age of 46, I’m struggling to regain the native intelligence I had when I was 5. Having two children to whom I can look to for leadership in this regard, has been a great help.

I love this! Children humbly teach us so much and I think we do well as adult to learn. BTW…it was when you said this that I began to suspect you were a fellow home schooler! Have you always home schooled your girls?

Stephanie was home schooled from about the middle of fourth grade at age 9. When we moved to Virginia, we thought we’d give the local school a try and enrolled her in sixth grade. In less than six months, she asked if she could go back to being home schooled. Raven was home schooled from the very beginning.

On your website, Mary shares her story as well. And while she didn’t have as much weight to lose as you did, she had her own “crossroads” moment to come to, with an ongoing struggle with depression. She now glows with radiant health!

Mary is my treasure. We’ve known each other for 25 years and have been married for 20 of those years. She lost 50 pounds and was finally able to let go of the depression medication that had left her perpetually frozen in place for so long.

I love that phrase “perpetually frozen in place”. I think it describes ongoing depression well. Did Mary’s epiphanal moment happen around the same time yours did?

Yes, that’s what was so amazing about our nutritional revelation; we came to the same conclusion at the same time. I go into much more detail in the book, but when I called Mary from New York to tell her of my plans, she responded with a story of her own. We just felt like we had to do this—to go back to cooking and eating the way our parents and grandparents once did. (Mary speaking): I was depressed for a good portion of my life. I would get really sad and cry for no apparent reason. I was taking Wellbutrin for about three years. I did not want to tell my doctor about my depression initially, but, my it was getting worse and I was concern about its negative effect on my family. I prayed and asked God to heal me. I did not want to be on medication for the rest of my life. When I started taking Wellbutrin, it did seem to help for a time. I read “once a student is ready, the teacher will appear”. Well, it happened when I decided I wanted health for my body, mind and spirit and for my family. I listened to my heart and discovered through my reading and research that my body was not getting the nutrients needed to function properly. I had a severe hormonal imbalance. I started eating good fats, such as, butter, coconut oil, cod liver oil, real eggs, etc. I began to think clear and all of sudden I had a purpose for living. I saw my family health improve also. It felt like a burden was lifted. It is a miracle! I have not taken depression medication for over three years now. I’m healed and I thank God.

What was your life like as heavy people?

Normal. What I mean is that morbid obesity, sickness and disease has regrettable become a normal occurrence for American families in the 21st century. We were just like a lot of families, spending a large share of our income on health care, which is really the sickest of euphemisms, since if we were healthy, we wouldn’t have needed all the medications and doctor’s visits. We bought cars, TVs, toys and other useless trinkets like the consumer zombies we were trained to be. We were an astonishingly unhappy family and we were not alone in our discontent.

It takes a lot of courage to utter words like that. Dave Ramsey says, “Why be normal? Normal is broke!” I guess the same could be said of being overweight. Sadly, it’s quite normal. How has your professional life changed?

I am a graphic designer by education and profession. I worked in the software industry in the financial sector, as a user interface designer, for most of the last ten years. The software industry is an industry rife with disappointment, denial and desperation—the perfect breeding ground for unmanageable stress. Today I feel like I’ve been asleep for most of my life and have only recently awakened. I wrote a book, “A Life Unburdened” that talks about my transformation and I remade myself as a public speaker. I’m rediscovering the simple joys of living openly and with purpose.

What did your children think about the changes as you made them? Were they full participants?

Yes they were solidly with us on this, but they were a bit confused too, because as we learned more about food and nutrition, we would adjust our diets likewise. For a while, it felt like we were changing something every week. Children like stability in their lives… well, I guess we all do don’t we? We explained to them that we were all learning together, so change was inevitable, but what kept them on-board with us, I believe, is that they saw the benefits themselves. Stephanie lost weight and her asthma completely disappeared. Raven used to have seasonal skin problems that completely disappeared after we added healthy fat to our diet. Perhaps most important, Mary and I were happier, which as any child will attest, makes for more agreeable living when you don’t have your parents hassling you all the time.

Go Team Morris!! What’s a typical menu at your house look for a day?

We always have eggs, wonderful pastured eggs, for breakfast. Additive-free bacon, raw cheese, fermented kimchi, tea or seasonal grapefruit usually round out breakfast. In late fall, lunch might include leftover chicken, a piece of cheese, home made pizza, kimchi or sauerkraut. Dinner could be wild salmon with green beans and sweet potatoes. When the blackberries are in season, I’ll pick a handful and cover them in raw cream—no sugar needed. Delicious.

Okay, what the heck is kimchi? And if you make it, can you pass on a recipe?

Kimchi is a fermented dish made of cabbage, carrots, onions, garlic and a few other odds and ends. It originated in Korea and is most similar to saurkraut. Raw foods are the most healthy from a nutritional standpoint, but most people won’t eat those wonderful organ meats like raw liver, beef heart and kidney. Kimchi is a raw food that you can add as a side dish to your meals that can help integrate beneficial bacteria into your diet. These bacteria can enhance your intestinal flora and, among other things, improve your digestion. Antacid drugs are some of the biggest money-makers for the pharmaceutical industry. That’s because many people aren’t preparing their food properly, like soaking nuts and grains, and they may be lacking the right mix of digestive flora needed to properly digest their food. I found that my need for antacid drugs was reduced, then eliminated as I integrated more raw foods into my diet. I was in such a desperate state when we changed our diet that I could not afford to wean myself off the junk convenience foods I was eating. I had to go cold turkey. I expected severe withdrawal symptoms, but was surprised to discover that there were few. Lets face it, few things are more satisfying than a properly prepared home cooked meal. I used to think the packaged foods I ate tasted good. I now realize that they had no taste at all. What I was really tasting were the massive quantities of sodium and sugar that go into 90 percent of the convenience foods we eat.

I hear ya! Real food is so BEAUTIFUL! I feel downright wealthy when I have a plate of real, whole, foods. And isn’t it amazing how sickingly sweet a sip of soda is after you’ve not had any HFCS or white sugar in a long time? I like your point about going cold turkey too. I think that’s often a part of radical, deliberate choices. It’s a complete, repentance-style, turn around. No having one foot on each side of the fence. Would you agree?

Yes, one of the most common things I hear from people is that they’ve begun eating whole foods, and they love the food, but they admit that they’re not experience the level of change that they were expecting. Usually when I probe a bit deeper, I find out that they’re mixing whole foods with packaged convenience foods. I tell people that washing down a trans fat laden donut the size of a spare tire with raw milk won’t do much for their health in the long term. You’ve really got to give up some of the more egregious junk food. I really sympathize with them because I know what they’re going through. Most of the blame lies with conventional health advice doled out by the dietitians and diet gurus who say it’s OK to eat that garbage so long as you do so in moderation. Sometimes we eat “fancy food,” but most of the time it’s just good ol’ food. Food is important, but it shouldn’t consume your life. Eating should be as effortless and second nature as breathing. The fact that knowing what to eat is so complex today is proof of how much the industrial food industry has mucked up this most basic of necessities.

Eating can be, but cooking isn’t LOL! I honestly do prefer though, the connection with the food I feel, the almost-meditative quality one gets when they use things that actually grew somewhere, as opposed to coming from a factory or a lab.

You’re right. Cooking this way definitely takes more time and effort, but I enjoy cooking in the same way that I enjoy reading a good book or the intellectual challenge of solving a difficult puzzle. The combination of sensorial feedback and the sense of completion and closure one derives from the preparation of a meal can be therapeutic. This only works if you’re managing your time well, so if you’re rushed, it’s not any fun at all.

I totally agree. Time management is one more way to live on purpose. Dave would call it, “telling your money where to go.” and time is the same way. I love the title of your book, “A Life Unburdened.” . And your website name too. How did they come to be?

I was exercising one day with a 40 pound weight vest. When I took the off vest, I felt so light it felt as if I might float away. I suddenly realized that for years, I had been lugging around more than 160 pounds. That sense of being unburdened from the weight of the vest eventually became the title of the book. I originally wanted to call the web site bread and circuses, after the practice of Roman emperors who pacified the mob by providing them with free food and entertainment. While to-the-death gladiator fights are thankfully no longer part of civilized society, we have something similar in our mad desire for cheap junk food and our peculiar obsession with television, both modern day equivalents of bread and circuses. We cannot demand accountability from our leaders when we are stuffing our gullets with Oreos and our minds with “must see” TV, which is of course why television and junk food exist… to keep us pacified. Bread and money refers to the connection between what we eat and the price we pay for it. That price is not always monetary, it can also include the price we pay in health and ultimately our freedom.

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