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43Folders.com is Merlin Mann’s website about finding the time and attention to do your best creative work.

Dethroner on the 1.0 of incremental weight loss

Dear Grady, You Asshole at Dethroner

Joel, situated in day two of Dethroner's topical "weight loss" week, throws down on the need for what I like to call a 1.0; yeah, we all want to be perfect, but first we just have to suck less -- in Joel's case, that means the need to just intake less, even if it's pre-packaged, non-organic, non-artisanal cuisine.

The compulsion to be perfect, immediately and eternally, is one of the most profound causes of procrastination for the garden-variety human, and it most certainly gives each of us all the reason we'll ever need not to even try. Or, as Joel puts it, to commenter "Grady:"

Some of us have lives, jobs, stresses, and realities we face every day that make switching from our unhealthy lifestyles -- and we know they’re unhealthy; our bodies testify -- straight away into a wholly organic, hand-prepared, completely healthy lifestyle. The thought of purchasing and preparing every last bit of food that goes into our bodies is daunting and serves as a bulwark in which we can hunker down with our insecurities to inaction, stocked as it is with cheeseburgers, chocolate milk, and the echoing rejoinders of self-righteous, preening princes like you...

It’s awesome that you eat well -- seriously. And you know what? The more one starts monitoring one’s diet and calorie intake, the more quickly it becomes apparent how much more flavor and tangible feelings of health come from fresh, hand-prepared food. And then once we’ve taught ourselves how to eat healthily from experience, Grady, we can start accusing those who never claimed otherwise of imperfection.

About Merlin

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Merlin Mann is an independent writer, speaker, and broadcaster. He’s best known for being the guy who created the website you’re reading right now. He lives in San Francisco, does lots of public speaking, and helps make cool things like You Look Nice Today, Back to Work, and Kung Fu Grippe. Also? He’s writing this book, he lives with this face, he suffers from this hair, he answers these questions, and he’s had this life. So far.

Merlin’s favorite thing he’s written in the past few years is an essay entitled, “Cranking.”

 
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