Tag Archives: Wellness

IMPERMANENCE / CHANGE — WHAT’S UP FOR YOU THRU GARRY RODGERS IN 2025

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Impermanence means change. The arrow of time. Progression and alteration are fundamental operating principles that govern the evolution of the universe as well as oversee the mutating human condition. There are a lot of synonyms for impermanence and change—variation, transformation, improvement, revolution, fluctuation, renewal, transience, volatility, growth, succession, advance, and movement come to mind. But probably the best words for impermanence or change are compounding and entropy. Ying and yang. Construction and destruction. Additive and substractive. Effort and passive. Go and let go.

2024 was a year of massive change in my life. No, my family, friends, and finances are intact. Probably in better condition than ever. The impermanence was internal, in myself, both physically and mentally. 2025 promises more refinement which I hope parlays into offering you positive benefits gained from my experience. Let’s look at what happened to me this past year and what’s up for you thru Garry Rodgers in 2025.

My physical health was the shits back in January. I suffered from chronic inflammation. One area was my neck where the sternocleidomastoid muscles (SCM) had seized following an accident where I cracked a couple of cervical vertebrae. I was so stiff that I could not shoulder check, never mind look around and enjoy life.

The other ill area was my gut. For years, I’d suffered from an upper GI ulcer. By January, it’d inflamed to the point where I was barely able to eat. If I could swallow, it wouldn’t stay down, and my only medicine was bananas.

Between my shoulders and my stomach, I was a physical mess. Rita, my wife of 41 years, and I took up serious hiking hoping it’d help. Walking was a good fit, we thought, as it’d get us out and active. Me trying to loosen with less pukin and Rita expanding her Noom wellness program that has worked wonders for her. By the way, I turned 68 this fall and she’s 66.

On June 1st we hiked the Qualicum Falls trail on Vancouver Island and were introduced to the fungi Tramete Versicolore. This mushroom is commonly called Turkey Tail, and it has anti-inflammatory properties. Amazing properties, as within one day of ingesting this miracle supplement my ulcer pain eased and within the week my muscles released. Read the post I wrote about Turkey Tail which explains it from a medical science point.

I’m now completely discomfort-free, fully rotational, can eat like a Medeterainian goat, and my body is back to its 30-year-old state. I’m not exaggerating. Through a committed exercise routine practiced over the past six months, I now exceed the physical fitness standard required when I was an Emergency Response Team (SWAT) police officer back in my twenties and thirties.

Rita and I turned our hiking game into rucking. Rucking is trekking with poles and a weighted rucksack. We aim for 8,000 steps per trip but did one day of 16,653. Rita has a step counter as part of her Noom commitment.

In the fall, I took up roping. That’s ascending and descending a steep hill face using a rope. That’s being upped now to rappelling and rock climbing. For Christmas, I got a complete set of climbing gear which I tried out today. It’s an amazing full body workout, but I am sore. No pain, no gain they say.

In the mental department, during 2024 I became a serious student of Stoicism—Stoicism being a philosophy, not a religion. To help understand this ancient wisdom and guidance in life, I wrote a blog post on it. I’ve also filled five notebooks with quotes and personal observations about this Hellenistic practice. A high point in November was hearing Ryan Holiday live in Vancouver. He’s the host of The Daily Stoic site and has over a million followers.

I didn’t publish any books in 2024. My focus was on producing content and appearing on-camera in the film industry. I teamed with Global/Hulu on Crime Beat which will continue in 2025. It’s fun, but the film highlight of the year was framing (writing outlines) for 26 episodes of City Of Danger which is a Netflix option. We’re waiting until a new delivery technology is ready that takes text and turns it into audio and visual. Here’s my web page for City Of Danger.

Moving on to 2025, I’m expanding my curiosity in critical thinking and how it applies to understanding human nature. I’m influenced by Shane Parrish and his Farnam Street site and Knowledge Project podcast. In November, Shane released his four-volume set called The Great Mental Models which are based on insightful works by the late and great Charlie Munger. If you don’t recognize the name, Munger was Warren Buffet’s partner at Berkshire Hathaway and is considered one of the great critical thinkers of modern times.

Once I get a grip (absorbing and understanding) the content in these books, I’ll do a condensed form on a Dyingwords post. I find writing about a subject is my best way to retain the knowledge. Which leads me to this. The critical thinking concept is something I’ve taken more and more interest in this past year.

I guess I’ve come to a life point where, as stoic as I try to be, some things outside my control seriously alarm me. One is how scrolling for a dopamine hit is replacing how to read, think, and write. I wrote a post on this and republished an article written by Paul Graham titled Write and Write-Nots.

Mr. Graham raises a concerning point—how so many people, especially professional people, are relying on artificial intelligence to aid in their writing which replaces their thinking. Here’s a quote from his piece:

The reason so many people have trouble writing is that it’s fundamentally difficult. To write well you have to think clearly, and thinking clearly is hard.

AI has blown open this world. Almost all pressure to write has dissipated. You can have AI do it for you, both in school and at work.

The result will be a world divided into writes and write-nots. There will still be some people who can write. Some of us like it. But the middle ground between those who are good at writing and those who can’t write at all will disappear. Instead of good writers, ok writers, and people who can’t write, there will just be good writers and people who can’t write.

Yes, it’s bad. The reason is something I mentioned earlier: writing is thinking. In fact, there’s a kind of thinking that can only be done by writing. If you’re thinking without writing, you only think you’re thinking.

So, a world divided into writes and write-nots is more dangerous than it sounds. It will be a world of thinks and think-nots. I know which half I want to be in, and I bet you do too.

This situation is not unprecedented. In preindustrial times most people’s jobs made them strong. Now if you want to be strong, you work out. So, there are still strong people, but only those who choose to be.

It will be the same with writing. There will still be smart people, but only those who choose to be.

AI replacing critical thinking and original writing concerns me. Deeply. It shouldn’t, as it’s completely beyond my control and one of the core tenets of Stoicism is the dichotomy of control—focus on what you can control and detach from what you cannot control.

Having quoted this excerpt from Paul Graham, I readily admit to using ChatGPT4 daily. It’s a phenomenal research tool and idea-bouncer. But it (currently) sucks at creativity and critical thinking. That’s quickly changing as it gets more intuitive and informed. We truly are in the age of the rise of the machines and rapidly moving toward the Singularity.

Lightening up, something I’ve become aware of while ruck ‘n roping out in nature is the immune system power-boost of phytoncides—the organic compounds gassed-off by trees and other plants. The Japanese have a name for experiencing the incredible immune system benefits from phytoncides. It’s called Shinrin-yoku which translates to “forest bathing”. I recently wrote a post about this, too.

My life progression (impermanence/change) in 2024 leads me to an awakening, a realization, in how awareness of positive physical and mental health contributes to a significant extension in longevity—an increased healthspan (the number of years of healthy living) and an increased lifespan (the number of years staying alive).

Which brings me to some 2025 news. I’ve volunteered for a longevity study program with the Buck Institute in California. Yes, a human guinea pig or lab rat. This cutting-edge research project tracks the participants quarterly by monitoring their key parts of life that build a holistic base to health and longevity; diet, exercise, sleep, mind, and purpose.

I’ll daily track these keys and every three months my progress will be entered into a data bank that follows and analyzes my aging pattern. I’ll also submit a blood sample that measures 64 biomarkers that form the hallmarks of aging. I’m truly looking forward to this journey.

Finally, something I’m also looking forward to in 2025 is building OldGoats.Health. This is the first time I’ve publicly mentioned this web-based wellness resource that’s been percolating in my mind since I made the personal wellness commitment on turkey tail day. OldGoats.Health (OGH) is senior-focused as a trustworthy and useful curator/aggregator of credible information on the longevity industry and personalized medicine which is becoming hugely popular among us old goats.

The OGH project is a website homebase with what-you-need-to-know about the disease of aging, the longevity industry, and how you can slow, stop, and potentially reverse your aging process thereby increasing your longevity stay in the old goat pasture. It’ll have continually updated information paddocks—Diet, Exercise, Sleep. Mind & Purpose as well as a free weekly newsletter and a fluid, premium-content Substack subscription presence with a community sharing forum. As far as I know, there’s nothing like this and it should be live by July.

So, that’s what’s happened in 2024 to motivate me in 2025. My commitment to you is sharing what I’m learning about living a long and healthy life (fighting entropy through compounding) so hopefully you benefit, too. Also, you can continue to expect Dyingwords posts on life, death, and writing every second Saturday morning at 8:00 am Pacific. Yes, I’m going to do more true crime analysis.

Thanks for your support and may you have a safe, healthy, happy, and prosperous 2025 new year!

SHINRIN-YOKU AND PHYTONCIDES — BREATHING NATURE’S PREVENTATIVE AND HEALING COMPOUNDS

Fresh air and forests have a profound effect on us. There’s something therapeutic found in nature walks—especially through pristine and vibrant woods filled with inspiring sights, smells, sounds, tastes, and touches. The Japanese have a name for this. “Shinrin-yoku” which translates to “Breathing and taking in the wellness of a healthy forest atmosphere”. Millions simply call the practice “forest bathing”. Shinrin for forest, yoku for bath.

Phytoncides (Fye-Ton-Sides) are volatile organic compounds that healthy trees emit, or gas off. It’s the forest’s self-protection system at work, dealing with dangers like insects, fungi, and bacteria. When we forest bathe, we breathe in phytoncides which empirical evidence proves help our mood, better our sleep, lower our blood pressure, and boost our immune system. There’s even proof that phytoncides inhaled while forest bathing help to prevent, and possibly cure, cancer.

Preventing and curing cancer are bold statements. How can forest air possibly combat the demon of all illnesses that is cancer? We’ll get into that—how phytoncides from trees activate Natural Killer (NK) cells in our bodies—but first let’s look at the history of Shinrin-yoku and the chemical makeup of phytoncides.

Despite its enormous population of 126 million, this Japanese island complex of 146,000 square miles is still two-thirds covered with pristine forests. That’s 59,750,400 acres of treed greenspace, 27 times larger than Yellowstone Park. I’m not going to try to compute the volume of phytoncide off-gassing from Japan.

For centuries and generations, the Japanese have recognized the therapeutic properties of their forests. Although the phrase shinrin-yoku is relatively new, the benefits of walking through forests is ancient knowledge. Shinrin -yoku is based on three traditional concepts:

  • Yugen is about being so keenly aware of the beauty of the world around you that the deep emotions you feel can’t be expressed with words.
  • Komorebi literally translates to “sunlight leaking thought the trees.” It describes the relationship or interplay between the sun and the leaves.
  • Wabi sabi celebrates the beauty of imperfection and impermanence.

In 1982, concerned by the rapidly growing population and an expansion into greenspace, the Japanese Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries took a novel approach to protection. Dr. Tomohide Akiyama had been studying the health effects on humans who were repeatedly exposed to phytoncides from trees and was convinced of the significant benefits to the Japanese people if forest exposure were promoted.

Top: Japanese symbols for Shinrin-yoku. Lower: Japanese symbols for Phytoncides.

Dr. Akiyama saw promoting forest walks and nature sensing was a win-win for people’s health and tree protection. He, through the Ministry, began a campaign where Shinrin-yoku was a recognized health practice, and the term “forest bathing” was born. Today, Shinrin-yoku is a worldwide phenomenon helping millions of people improve their health. It’s especially popular in the Pacific Northwest of North America where I live in a temperate rainforest covered with phytoncide-producing conifers like cedar, spruce, fir, pine, hemlock, and balsam.

That’s not to say that deciduous trees like maple, alder, birch, oak, and a weird local thing called an arbutus don’t gas off. Same with grasses, shrubs, and plants of all types. That unmistakable scent from freshly cut grass? Phytoncides.

Phytoncides aren’t one single entity. They’re a variety of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that include terpenes, aldehydes, and alcohols. The word originates from the Greek phyton meaning plant and cide meaning kill. In other words, natural antimicrobials designed by nature as medicine for the plants. Forest medicine, you could say.

Claims that practicing Shinrin-yoku and inhaling phytoncides have proven human health benefits are backed up by science. There have been many peer-reviewed papers presented on forest bathing and all come to the same conclusion. There is overwhelming evidence the claims are valid—claims of stress reduction, lowered hypertension, sleep improvement, mood alteration (for the better), immune protection, and the one assertion that leaves some folks skeptical. Shinrin-yoku and phytoncides reduce the risk of cancer and possibly even stop and reverse cancerous cells in the human body.

Here are a few studies supporting the claims.

1982 — Dr. Akiyama’s proposal to the Japanese government.

2009 — Effect of forest bathing trips on human immune function.

2019 — Comparative study of the physical and psychological effects of Shinrin-yoku.

2022 — Effects of Shinrin-yoku on health promotion and disease prevention.

The 2022 study headed by Dr. Qing Li has a fascinating and highly informative, 10-page downloadable pdf. If you’re at all interested in the science behind forest bathing, this paper is a must-read and it goes into the key function that phytoncides have on the immune system. That’s to build up Natural Killer (NK) cells that are the front-line warriors in the cancer battle.

Cells are the basic building blocks of all living organisms—you, me, and the trees. They’re the smallest units capable of performing life functions making cells the fundamental components of both structure and function in the human body and the trees’ trunks. And cancer is nothing more than cells running amuck and multiplying out of control.

Phytoncides, emitted by trees and plants, enter our body through our respiratory system and bond with our NK cells which are a type of lymphocyte or white blood cell that plays a critical role in our immune system. NKs are first responders against infection, disease, and cancerous tumors. They kill viruses and tumor cells without prior sensitization. In other words, NK cells stop cancerous cells in their tracks before they take hold and are recognized by sensory awareness.

Apoptosis and autophagy are two important biological processes. Apoptosis is the natural death of a cell so new ones can replace them. Autophagy is the recycling of cellular material. Cancer tumors won’t allow apoptosis or autophagy to occur. Left unchecked, malignant cancer cells continue to multiply until they kill their host.

Natural Killers are always present and on duty in our bodies. It’s just that they can’t do it all without a little help. That’s where phytoncides step in. They bond with NKs and increase production of granzymes, perfoin, and granulysin proteins which attack a tumor cell as soon as it occurs. This causes the cancer cell to apoptosis and all is well. See the image/flowchart below.

Speaking of Dr. Qing Li, he wrote the definitive book on Shinrin-yoku. It’s titled Forest Bathing: How Trees Can Help You Find Health and Happiness. This work examines Shinrin-yoku from a holistic vantage where the value in forest bathing is not just the phytoncide intake but the entire experience you get from exercising your five senses in a nature setting.

Another great book that touches on forest bathing is The Hidden Life of Trees written by the forester and environmentalist Peter Wohlleben. Mr. Wohlleben posits that the entire forest is interconnected by a “wood-wide web” where all the plants communicate with each other including a regulation of mutually beneficial phytoncide release.

If you’re a regular Dyingwords follower, you might wonder why today I’ve veered away from my usual crime/blood & guts topics and how I came upon something as obscure as forest bathing. To tell you the truth, when I first heard the term about a month ago, I thought it was some sort of hippy-dippy thing stemming from a new-age commune. So did my wife, Rita, when I brought up “forest bathing” while we were out rucking.

“Rucking?”, you ask. “What’s rucking?” Well, there’s nothing new-age or tree-hugging about rucking. It’s simply forest hiking with a weighted backpack (rucksack) and using trekking poles (walking sticks).

Rita and I live on Vancouver Island in British Columbia at Canada’s west coast. We’re surrounded by a pristine rainforest that’s nicely overcrowded with healthy trees. You know, the ones that off-gas phytoncides. And we’re avid ruckers, regularly putting on 8 thousand steps per day through the trees.

That’s a lot of phytoncides to suck in.

Something else I’ve taken up is roping. It’s not technical climbing as in mountains and rocks. It’s more of a low-impact pull, up and down steep hillsides, on a rope, while wearing a weighted pack. It’s incredible exercise, requiring every muscle in your body to participate.

Which brings me to yoga, meditation, and mindfulness. Forest bathing is often called a combination of the three with additional health benefits. While I’m not into yoga (I don’t like pina coladas either, however walks in the rain are inevitable when you ruck on Vancouver Island.), I’m in tune with meditation and mindfulness.

Rucking and roping are full-immersion courses on meditation and mindfulness. While rucking through the trees, your mind is free to go still, as in meditation under motion or zoning out. But when on the ropes, on a 40 to 60-degree slope, your mind must be completely in the moment. Mindfulness of your grip, your foot placement, and your balance are paramount to preventing a fall with potentially serious consequences.

So how do you get into this Shinrin-yoku/forest bathing gig? It’s simple. You don’t need the gear and the grind. It’s just finding a wooded area and going for a slow stroll, absorbing the sight, sound, smell, taste, and feel of nature. It’s okay to see the trees (and the forest), listen to the birds, sniff the needles and leaves, taste the air, and run your hands up and down some bark—all the while breathing phytoncides, nature’s preventitive and healing compounds.

And if you want to get serious about forest bathing, there are online courses as well as extensive events to take part in. One online course is hosted by a Swiss-founded organization called Treeming.org. It’s reasonably priced in the $125 to $250 range, depending on the depth of information you’d like.

A much more involved education in the art of Shinrin-yoku is held in England by the Forest Bathing Institute. It’s pricey. To become a fully accredited Shinrin-yoku master it’ll cost you $4,113.81 USD.