The Bobby Rock Newsletter #80 (10-15-22) - Fall Seven, Rise Eight!
The Bobby Rock Newsletter #80 (10-15-22) - Fall Seven, Rise Eight!
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Hello Gang -
Checking in from a brisk, Illinois town this evening, about to pull the trigger on Newsletter #80. Thanks so much for joining me here. I appreciate your time and energy here every week. Now let’s jam!
In This Issue:
- Check-in From the Road Once Again, before a Fall break in the action. Here’s the latest…
- Fall Seven, Rise Eight…: How “getting back on the wagon,” quickly, is imperative for a solid health and fitness program.
- On This Special Day: What’s so special about October 15? It’s my “little sister’s” b-day. But man, you gotta hear the story of how our birthday call tradition began...
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Check-in From the Road
The Lita Ford train has "pulled into the station" near Chicago this weekend… into the Normal, IL region for a gig that (pardon the pun) will be anything but normal tonight. Why? Because it’s supposed to dip down into the 40s here, and this is an outdoor show. (Probably no biggie to many of you, but remember, we're from California!) This show was a reschedule from August, and the venue has remained intact, hence the outdoor location. We will survive it, I’m sure. But the last time we played such a cold show was… you got it: Alaska in 2017!
Here’s a quick peek from our backstage accommodations today at soundcheck. Pretty cool… a huge window overlooks the ball field (although, oddly, the gig is elsewhere on the grounds...)
Looking forward to hitting. And then, we actually have some downtime coming up, with our next shows being in Houston, then somewhere in Oklahoma, late-Nov. I’ll miss playing every week, but will relish the extra time to get caught up on other things back home, as well as tend to beautiful personal matters… the likes of which, I promise, I will be sharing soon.
Onward...
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Falling Off the Wagon… but Then Jumping Back On!
The state of your overall health and wellness is determined by what you get up and do every day, the majority of the time. You do not have to be perfect, but if you want to enjoy superior health, you do have to be consistent and persistent about engaging solid health practices more often than not. This means, by my rough estimations, that 85% of the time, you’re doing the right stuff. Again, this is a general estimate, but it’s also an educated one. If, for example, you look at the people of the infamous Blue Zones—those five key places around the world where folks tend to live the longest, healthiest lives, with the highest number of people thriving into their nineties and beyond—you’ll see that 85 to maybe 90% of their diet is pretty damn clean… mainly simple, unprocessed, and largely plant-based foods... with very little of the type of shit we’re used to consuming every day with our SAD (Standard American Diet) way of eating.
Study up on this, and see how our fellow humans
who tend to live (and thrive) the longest do what they do...
The people of the Blue Zones also engage in physical activity regularly (yes, even into their 90s with light but steady movements and activities) and pay attention to their mind/body practices… which could involve proper rest, relaxation, meditation, and the like. And here we have what I’ve been referring to for years as The Three Bs: Body, Blood, and Brain, which translates to Exercise (for a strong, supple body), Nutrition (for healthy blood), and the Mind/Body Connection (for a sound brain).
To build a lifestyle around all three of these things can be daunting, I know. But again, you don’t have to be perfect. And, in fact, when you experience the synergy of all three Bs firing together in radiant health, I suggest that maintaining high-performance in two of the areas can help get you through a tougher spell with the third… at least until you can get back on that wagon.
This has been my approach through the years with my #1 nemesis in Mind/Body Land: Getting enough sleep. Every year, it seems that more scientific evidence presents itself as to just how important sleep is for us. And I do okay with it for the most part, I think. But consistency has been an issue. In fact, if I’m being transparent here, this past week was a disaster. So... just so you guys don’t have the impression that I’m infallible in my program, here are my iPhone sleep stats from this past week. Read ‘em and weep!
Pretty fucking bad, I know. Fortunately, I believe that my clean, nutrient-dense style of eating and consistent training are helping me get by this week. But then again, let me take it all the way back to BR Newsletter issue #15 where I paraphrased sleep expert Matthew Walker’s wisdom:
If you are sleep deprived on any level, you are actually evaluating your state of being with a compromised mental acuity. So how would you really know if not getting enough sleep is working for you?
He likens it to someone who’s had too much to drink and is incapable of evaluating whether they’re fit for driving. Of course, they think, “I’ll be okay to drive.” DUI folks always think that. But the point is, they are not in a position to even make such an evaluation. And believe me, based on some of my absent-mindedness this past week, it’s not such a stretch to make such a comparison. I need to jump back on the good sleep wagon, pronto!
And that’s my point here. When we fall off the wagon, we gotta simply get back on it… fast! No matter how many times we fall, we gotta get back up. It reminds me of the old Japanese proverb:
It doesn’t matter how many times we fail… so long as the number of times we get back up is one number higher than the number of times we fall.
PS. The Blue Zones are:
- Sardinia, Italy;
- Nicoya, Costa Rica;
- Ikaria, Greece;
- Loma Linda, California (where there is a strong concentration of Seventh-Day Adventists, who follow a vegetarian or vegan diet);
- And old-school 20th century Okinawa, Japan (before US military rolled in with all of their fast food chains and fucked everything up!).
Check out the main BZ site for some good overview material on these communities:
I don't agree with everything these communities do, but there are enough commonalities between them to learn a few things. Scope it...
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On This Special Day: October 15
On this day, October 15, 1988, I was going through a box of fan mail. It had been a minute since I had received any, since I was away on tour all that summer, so some of the letters had been mailed to me months prior. One piece of mail, in particular, caught my attention. It was from a female fan requesting an autographed picture for her upcoming birthday… which happened to be October 15. Obviously, she had mailed me the request a month or more prior, but I thought it was interesting that I should be opening her letter on her actual birthday… and also, that she included her phone number at the bottom of the request.
Man, at this point, I should just call this girl for her birthday, I thought. And so I did.
I dialed the number and, clearly, someone’s mother answered.
“Hello, this is Bobby Rock calling from Los Angeles. Is Sara there?” I began.
“No she isn’t,” the mom said, completely unaffected. "She’s at her friend’s house, Would you like the number there?”
“Sure.”
And so I called that number, and another mom answered:
“Hello, this is Bobby Rock calling from Los Angeles. Is Sara there?” I repeated.
“Yes she is, one moment please.” Again, completely unaffected.
I heard a muffled voice, then a gaggle of squeals, like a bunch of young girls were at a birthday party. A moment later, a timid voice cracked through the line.
“Hello?”
"Hi Sara. This is Bobby Rock calling from Los Angeles. I just now saw your letter. It’s your birthday, right?”
“Yes.” (Silence.)
"Happy Birthday!”
“Thanks.” (Silence.)
“Uhh, well, are you having a party over there at your friend’s?”
“Yes.”
"Cool! Are you having fun?”
“Yes."
And so it went, with these soft, one-syllable answers. I guess I had caught her off-guard a bit. But then, I had to know…
“So, how old are you today?”
(Drum roll, please…)
“13.”
Oh shit. Now I was the one caught off guard. But hey… the energy of the call was very sweet, and somehow, a big brother/little sister vibe was born between Sara and I that day.
And so, every single year since, on October 15, I have called Sara for her birthday. (Earlier today was birthday call #34, for those of you counting.) I’m not always able to catch her—depending on where I am in the world and what time I call—but we always get around to our annual birthday call, and we generally connect other times of the year, as well.
It’s been quite a special friendship. I have literally seen her grow up: get through high school, go to college, work various jobs, get married, and even have a kid of her own… who, by the way, is now 16: three years older than her mom was when we first started talking!
And, of course, we’ve had a chance to hang through the years as my travels have taken me through New England.
From Sara’s Facebook...
The pic on the upper left was when we first met: 1991 on the Nelson tour. Always so great to hang. She’s really been a good friend through the years, and her daughter is really something—as bright and cool as they come!
My life has certainly been enriched with Sara in it, and I hope the same has been true for her. So glad I made that initial call!
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Thanks again, everybody. Connect next week!
Until then, BR
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