Tag: Mens Health

Helmets Don’t Matter

We’ve always been told that wearing a helmet is important for our brains.

After @davemirra being diagnosed with CTE, I’ve become even more obsessed with 🧠 health and sharing with the BMX community and all of you.

Although I’m an advocate for helmets 100%, they don’t do much in terms of concussions and preventing CTE. They do protect the skull from fractures, tho, which is amazing!

🤓But, when we talk about the brain in regards to concussions, we have to understand the brains development, how the brain actually sits in the skull, and how a concussion occurs.

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🤦🏼‍♂️Helmets Don’t Matter🙈 . We’ve always been told that wearing a helmet is important for our brains. After @davemirra being diagnosed with CTE, I’ve become even more obsessed with 🧠 health and sharing with the BMX community and all of you. Although I’m an advocate for helmets 100%, they don’t do much in terms of concussions and preventing CTE. They do protect the skull from fractures, tho, which is amazing! . 🤓But, when we talk about the brain in regards to concussions, we have to understand the brains development, how the brain actually sits in the skull, and how a concussion occurs. I’ve seen many of my friends out cold while wearing a helmet. . 🧠@scottycranmer was wearing a helmet when his life altering TBI occurred. . 🧠I’ve seen @vincebyron out cold several times with a full face helmet on, the last gnarly one resulted in blood seeping out of his nose and ears. . 🧠 @davemirra crushed his face through his full face helmet one year at a contest. . 🧠I myself have had a few concussions where I had a seizure and my heart stopped, all while wearing a helmet. . 🙏🏼 That said, this isn’t a post advocating for not wearing a helmet. Very much the opposite and helmets serve an amazing tool for protecting our skull and mitigating issues if a head injury were to occur. . 🙏🏼 This post is to understand the implications of hitting our heads. It takes time or it can be immediately. . 🙌🏼 Part 2 from my trip to @doc_amen with @ryanplowery to get SPECT scans of our brains comes out Friday at 330pm EST! Dr. Ali will be explaining this topic much more along with our scan results with exogenous @justpruvit ketones and without, what the scans mean, why we are the way we are, and how we can change our brains with and without exogenous ketones. . 🤔Comment any questions or concerns and I’ll do a LIVE to answer those questions.🤗 . Josh P. 💚🧠✌️ . ‪#BeTheChange‬ ‪#BeTheChange🌎‬ ‪.‬ ‪#ProtectThisBrain‬ ‪.‬ ‪#braintumor #ketoathlete #lowcarbdiet #ketofam #brainhealth #bmx #ketogenicdiet #purposedriven #ketolife‬ #brainhealthmatters

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I’ve seen many of my friends out cold while wearing a helmet.

🧠@scottycranmer was wearing a helmet when his life altering TBI occurred.

🧠I’ve seen @vincebyron out cold several times with a full face helmet on, the last gnarly one resulted in blood seeping out of his nose and ears.

🧠 @davemirra crushed his face through his full face helmet one year at a contest.

🧠I myself have had a few concussions where I had a seizure and my heart stopped, all while wearing a helmet.

🙏🏼 That said, this isn’t a post advocating for not wearing a helmet. Very much the opposite and helmets serve an amazing tool for protecting our skull and mitigating issues if a head injury were to occur.

🙏🏼 This post is to understand the implications of hitting our heads. It takes time or it can be immediately.

🙌🏼 Part 2 from my trip to @doc_amen with @ryanplowery to get SPECT scans of our brains comes out Friday at 330pm EST!

Dr. Ali will be explaining this topic much more along with our scan results with exogenous @justpruvit ketones and without, what the scans mean, why we are the way we are, and how we can change our brains with and without exogenous ketones.

🤔Comment any questions or concerns and I’ll do a LIVE to answer those questions.🤗

Josh P. 💚🧠✌️

We NEED Adversity

I would complain about things in my life, let alone what was outside of my immediate and selfish perspective that I would then complain about.

I lived my life fueled by anger, spite, and on a mission to prove abusive people in my life wrong.

After many wake up calls (3 brain tumor diagnosis, my main bike sponsor dropping me out of the blue mid ACL recovery, multiple TBI’s, debt, etc.) I decided to stop making excuses for why I couldn’t do or have something I desired.

I then took accountability for my life and started making small shifts that led to massive changes.

I sacrificed what I had left after my sponsor giving me the boot and set myself on a path fueled by gratitude and love with a very clear reason as to WHY I was doing what I was doing.

That why was PURPOSE.

A purpose to help others reach their full potential with health, happiness, and success, without the suffering we choose upon ourselves.

The reality is, we all face some sort of shit in our lives.

Perspective is essential, tho!

It could always be worse.

Anyone reading this, especially from a smart phone, is winning.

The belief we choose about our life and limitations dictates our reality and we become a slave to external sources when we’re all incredibly capable of manifesting a life we belief we deserve.

What do YOU believe is the life YOU deserve and what are you willing to do for it?

Josh P. 💚🧠✌️

But, Fat Makes Us Fat

Not. Fat does NOT make us fat. If we’re talking the right context.

Here is an easy filling dinner consisting of a bunch of non-starchy & fibrous veggies, quality protein, and lots of delicious fats.

If you want to burn body fat, you gotta eat healthy fats while getting rid of the crap foods.

I was conditioned by mainstream media and education to think fat was bad for our heart health and would make us fat.

What I had to dig deep to learn on my own was far from what I was being told and sold.

In the pretense of whole foods, lowering carbohydrate and sugar consumption, and eliminating toxins and stress as much as we can, fat is an integral part of brain and overall health.

Fat is critical for brain health in general.

Where fat gets a bad wrap is when people confuse dietary fat with the following:

1. unhealthy body fat as a result from poor lifestyle choices.

2. the combination of excessive fat consumption along with excessive carbohydrate and sugar consumption.

3. fat combined with processed food and sugar intake, which the latter is toxic no matter what its combined with or not.

4. tom foolery marketing backed by sugar companies claiming that fat is bad.

5. false propaganda for different dietary theories claiming that fat and cholesterol destroy our health and they we need “heart healthy” whole grains.

Can you name any more reasons why people believe fat to be evil?

Josh P. 💚🧠✌️

Financial Stories

This trip meant the world to me to have documented.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bwwnbdmho93/?igshid=4kisibv1ee62

In the past, I would make decisions by the short term gain vs loss.

I used to be crippled to the lack of money I had and my choices would be dictated by the fear of “not having enough”. That meant I missed out on seeing a lot of my family and friends a lot of the time because although I was laser focused on my BMX career, and successful, I wasn’t making much more money than my basic needs.

I’ve learned that was a simple perspective piece based on past subconscious programming that manifested this past relationship with money.

Today, I’ve thrown out the mentality of being limited by what’s in my bank account, not being to manifest more than “average”, and have swapped it out for the belief we live based on the limits we believe in for ourselves.

I’ve taken massive risks over the years, gone all in on what I believe in today, and made choices based on what’s best for my long game and my soul.

Taking the money I have after basic living needs is usually saved up to reinvest back in my business.

This time, I wanted to use that money for the people I love, now that my belief system is one of love, health, happiness, success, and abundance.

It’s always been a dream of mine to fly in with no notice to surprise my family and best friend (Brandon) and take Brandon and my dad to a Celtics game.

I was able to do that a few weeks ago and it was a byproduct of my belief and hard work for the life I envision.

Nothing more.

Josh P. 💚🧠✌️

It’s All Perspective

Perspective is essential to life. “Life is 10% of what happened to us and 90% of how we respond.” “Life doesn’t happen to us, life happens for us.” Both quotes come from different people but underline the same choice & that’s a choice in perspective that we have every single day, no matter what. We all face this choice with every part of our lives.

This choice can not be taken from us unless we decided to give it up.

We can choose how we decide to see the world, see our lives & we see the events that place one way over another, good or bad, with the simple act of thought.

Glass half full over glass half empty. “Failure” over an opportunity to learn and grow.

It’s all perspective.

Now, I could have given up on more than 2 handful of occasions but good would that have done for me & my vision for my life?

It wouldn’t have done any good & would have actually put me further back from reaching my goals & potential to help others.

I also can’t stress enough how gratitude fuels the shift in perspective & leads to abundance.

When I was faced with a death sentence at the pinnacle of my dream BMX career & just turned 21, I first went to fear, worry, & what I call “victimville” but my family, the BMX community, learning of @lancearmstrong, & my own desire to live my life on my own terms wouldn’t allow that choice in fear.

My perspective quickly shifted to that of gratitude to still be alive, have the love & support of many around the world, & most importantly, a chance to fight to make my tomorrow better & continue living my life.

I often hear friends, family, & strangers complaining of how “hard” life is, how much life “sucks”, or “it must be nice” when in reality, every single person that is conscious & breathing has something to be grateful for.

I challenge you all to focus on just ONE thing you’re grateful for each day & really feel it deep down. That emotional state you find yourself in can change you life as it’s changed mine.

Josh P. 💚🧠✌️

Keto Friendly Beverage

16 months ago I was diagnosed with 2 new brain tumors, totally 4 in my skull.

That’s when I took the “ketogenic diet” serious and started studying and applying it 100% in my life.

Not just the foods but the lifestyle around the keto benefits, which includes; proper training (no chronic high heart rate training), mindfulness practices (meditation, stress management, doing what I love every day), optimizing my sleep by getting 6-8 hours a night, eating specific foods at specific times, not having specific stimulating lights from screens (TV, iPhones, etc.) in my life at specific times before bed, and learning new things to keep my brain adapting and promoting neuroneogenisus (growth of new neurons and networks).

That said, @kevitadrinks makes an amazing low-calorie and low-carbohydrate beverage full of probiotics and flavor. It’s what helped me kick my sugar/soda habit that I had years ago and keeps cravings at bay. A great choice for those looking for a tasty beverage while watching their carb intake for utilizing keto or living in the keto-adapted lifestyle.

The ketogenic diet is not just a fad or get quick results one and done type of plan. It’s a lifestyle shift that takes time to adapt to properly and takes commitment but should never entail suffering of any kind and isn’t always a long-term plan, more like a tool to utilize when necessary. It doesn’t happen over night and can take 21-days to 6-weeks for people to adapt properly depending on their past history and genetics. The goal is not to be in ketosis. The goal is to become fat & keto-adapted and use ketosis as an annual clean up and day to day tool that can be easily implemented.

This ensures that your body and brain knows what to do with all the ketones it’s producing, burns stored body fat, no longer depends on a constant supply of carbohydrates/glucose, and helps fight disease, slow the aging process down, supports the brain, improves sleep quality, reduces inflammation, and so much more.

It really comes down to hormone control from the choices we have every day, which is what we choose to put in our mouths. 💚✌️

-Josh P.

Adversity Cultivates Success

I was 21 when I was told I would never ride my bike again.

That’s the day I was also told I would die unless my head was cut open to remove a massive tumor taking up half my brain. Even then, I still had a chance I may not make it out alive.

This was one of the many challenges I have faced in life and not the first circumstance that put the fragility of my life into perspective.

I later learned, life is full of gifts in the form of adversity and it’s all a matter of perspective. I have overcome injuries, financial instability, abuse, cancer, heartbreak, living in my car, on couches, or in hallway closets, and even depression.

What most of us don’t seem to see, is that we all have choices. We have a choice to believe the things we’re told or to dismiss them as noise. We have a choice to see all of the abundance and success within our lives, or we can choose to see the failures, set-backs, and the things we lack in our lives.

We have a choice to give up or fight back to beat the odds. Prove people wrong and prove our support right. Some choices are hard to make. But those are the ones that mold who we are today. It’s these choices that make us stronger…and wiser…and allow us to grow. I believe it’s not the cards we are dealt, rather it’s how we CHOOSE to play those cards that determine the outcome of our lives.

Sometimes we fall down in life. It’s these falls that are some of the most important learning opportunities for us. Not failures; learning lessons on the path to success.

But, it’s how we choice get back up that defines us and determines our future. Not our past times when we fell down or failed. We’re defined by how we CHOOSE to move forward in life.

Adversity cultivates success and life is all about choices.

So choose wisely. 💚✌️

Be Proactive, Not ReActive

Starting the week off strong with a PR in hang power cleans (70kilo) and some @go_exxentric squats and 3 second decent bench press.

Be proactive rather than reactive! Take care of your body and mind as they work in a uniform reactive relationship to one another. Be pro-active when it comes to your health and goals with your life.

Don’ settle for the status quo and then react to negatives. Do what you can to prevent a negative from occurring in the first place. It’s never too early to take action towards your goals and your health.

I learned this the hard way. I blew out my knee in 2013 and decided to have it fixed in 2015. 2015 was the year I started to take this fitness bing serious in an effort to strengthen and protect my legs. The more I practiced, the more I experienced benefits in the mind and body. 💚✌️

Brainy BMX – Providing Support & Inspiration

I believe in providing everyone with support in times of need. Even the strongest walks of life can’t do everything on their own.

From brain tumor patients to brain injury and disorder patients, I am raising funds for direct patient funding/care. Not research or awareness, although I believe those have their place. But funding for the people that need the help now and can’t wait for a scientific intervention and are already plenty aware of what’s going on. They need help with home expenses, treatment options and funding, healthy food, lifestyle choices that they can implement, and just someone to resonate with and not feel alone.

Being in the shoes of brain tumor and brian injury patients, I know this all too well. I’m grateful to be alive and thriving even with 4 brain tumors. I’ve combined my passion for bmx, nutrition, fitness, mindset practices, and supporting those to live as healthy and happy as possible into a touring live event around the world with the mission to inspire change and raise support for those in their biggest time of need.

Click this Link to learn more and see how you can help my mission along with The Athlete Recovery Fund. 💚✌️

-Josh P.

Add Fat & Eliminate Sugars

“The benefits of introducing higher levels of fat into your diet are going to be erased and even made worse, if you don’t at the same time cut sugars and carbs. The higher fiber carbs not withstanding.” Dr David Perlmutter, Neurologist

That being said, fat is so crucial for brain health. The beneficial fat, not damaged, refined, hydrogenated, fried, industrial, high/pro-inflammatory vegetable oils. Things like avocados, avocado oil, coconut oil, grassfed butter, nuts, olives and olive oil, full-fat coconut products with no sugar, raw 100% cacao, and grass-fed ghee.

Here is a salad with pasture raised chicken, avocado, olives, mixed veggies, some spices, and @primalkitchenfoods avocado oil based dressing all on a bed of red and green leaf lettuce. All organic and no added sugars.

Great meal to feel light but full before or after an exercise or sport. Healthy brain fats, clean quality protein, and minimal carbohydrates with plenty of nutrient dense, fiber-rich veggies. 💚✌️