Spring Integrative Health/Josh Overcash

About four or five years ago I met Josh Overcash and his awesome family. They were some of the first people I met in Bozeman when I moved here.

Josh told me about Body Talk over dinner one night, and said that he could teach it to me; or better yet, I could see him as a therapist, after those good body thrashings I'm into.

I logged the information in the back of my mind and moved on. Then a year later, after a number of good body thrashings, I bumped into Josh on the street.

I laughed and complained about the woe's of being human-powered; hoping to get a rise out of him. It didn't work. I like Josh, so I boasted and tried to impress him with tales of vertical heights, and dangerous mountains.

Nothing. It was awesome. He wasn't impressed at all. Or at least I couldn't tell if he was.

That settled it. I booked an appointment to see Josh. I wanted to know more. I was also a walking pinball machine, and ached all over.

I had chronic knee pain from two climbing accidents, and twenty years of ski bumming down the Rockies, Canada, and Alaska. My feet, fingers, and shoulders bothered me; and I was starting to show signs of aging.

But it was also the kaleidoscope view of life I needed help with. Let's face it. We are living in a different world today. Our understanding of life is changing almost as fast as our technologies. (Which came first?)

That first appointment three years ago, Josh used a combination of Craniosacral Fascial and Body Talk therapies to clean up old scare tissue in my knee.  The therapy was so effective and profound, it changed my life.

For less than a hundred dollars, I was pain free for the first time in ten years. I couldn't believe it. I almost kissed him.

Starts to work on my knee by moving my head around. 

Still moving my head around.

As an athlete, I don't claim to understand how Craniosacral Fascial, or Body Talk therapies work. I've listened to Josh explain how he's manipulating cerebral spinal fluid in the brain, 'to help the brain breath,' and how that circulates cerebral spinal fluid to the connective tissues throughout the body.

This, with his help, is directed towards my knee. Then Josh changes one of his multiple hats, and goes from being all soft and gentle, to getting kung-fu.

After a couple minutes of discomfort, (which is fun if your into mountaineering) he let's go of the grip on my knee. Woe dude? What was that? The first time it happened, when my knee was scared, it swelled up like a ballon.

"That's the cerebral spinal fluid clearing out the scare tissue."

Directing cerebral spinal fluid to my knee. 

The kung-fu grip on my knee. 

This is one cool dude, I thought. I started recommending my friends see Josh. Then I met other people who agreed Josh is the real deal.  As the word spread, I met therapists, doctors, and health care professionals that all had the same consensus. Josh Overcash has the healing touch.

Amazing Grass Challenge

In good company with The Green Darner and The Bicycling Electrician.
They have real names too, but I like their super-hero aliases. 

This month Amazing Grass is holding a 5 day V-Tox Challenge; with recipes and articles on eating a plant-based diet, ambassador spotlights (I'm on day #2, check out my spotlight here), and a daily challenge; with exercises and activities to keep you excited and stoked on getting healthy, fit, and ready for life.

(Click on the link and sign up with your own email account.)

Recipe #2. Red lentil and butternut squash soup. 

I have been working with Amazing Grass now for a few years and I love their products. I know how easy it is to struggle with eating the "right" foods and staying on track with my "diet."

In fact some of that stuff about eating right and being on a diet, bugs me. Why can't I eat what I want? Right?

Maybe it's not that simple. Maybe food has changed. And with all the people who now have food intolerance's (mine are potato, corn, and processed sugar), eating is even changing.

As an athlete, my health is very important to me. I got into eating a more plant-based diet when I was still a teenager, but I also lived a hard life for many years; drinking and doing drugs. My health suffered because of it. When it came time to restart my life, and focus on the what I loved to do; ski and climb mountains, I had a slew of health problems to deal with that all came directly from my poor diet.

So it's not simple. Not for anyone. And I don't pretend it is easy either. Good luck.

Amazing Grass is the wheat grass company, and they make the best tasting wheat grass powders available. I love these little flavour packets on the trail, at home, and they make a great hit at parties. (Yeah, that's how I party. Hunter S. Thompson did grapefruit. I shoot wheat grass.)

Happy Trails

"The happiest people are not the ones with the most, but the ones that make the best with what they've got."

I read this quote somewhere, and thought about all the things 

I am not bringing on my next adventure. 

a cell phone, laptop, or itinerary

Those new cold weather cycling boots I was eyeing with clipless peddles. Nope, didn't buy those. Sorry Mercedes; this trip is more Mitsubishi. 

Still don't have decent bike lights, or a decent headlamp; been looking at that purchase for about ten and a half years.

(Umm, did he say he doesn't have decent bike lights? )

Yeah, this trip I'll still be enjoying some darkness.

And maybe someday my bike will come with lights. 

Be like selling a car without lights. That would be odd. 

Some day my bike will be run with a computer, power-inverter, lights, and a bad ass sound system. But first I'm going to pull off this expedition, and get all human-powered and shit. 

Then I'll get back to imagining about things and stuff, and what I really need in my life.

Like a $20,000 bicycle, with a bad ass sound system.

I know that might sound funny, but I want to be the first to own a real autocycle.

Sign me up 2015, here I am. (Did I just coin that shit?)

The beginning of the dream. Imagining the $20,000 autocycle. 

Caravan Factory Tour

This February I am going to the Beartooth Mountains on my first human-powered expedition in winter. Cycling hundreds of miles on frozen highways to attempt skiing on mountains that must be climbed.

(Stupid I know,  please leave comments at the bottom.)

I don't really have a plan beyond that. Bike a long ways, go skiing for a month in the Beartooth Mountains, and come home. Simple as that. Trailheads and laundromats will appear, no doubt.

And yeah, I end up wondering about wandering a lot. Who do I think I am out there by myself, hundreds of miles from home, with a bicycle and pair of skis?

What am I trying to prove? Or save? Do I have a purpose? Does my mother know what I do?

Well, I go to the mountains because mountains are honest, and show emotion with stark benevolence. And I need that for some reason. I'm drawn to it.

Getting stoked at the Caravan Skis Factory.

This year Caravan Skis made the Daily Drivers their best selling ski. An all mountain ski that likes to go fast and can hold down the throttle. I demoed a pair of Daily Drivers early in the season, and now I'm testing a prototype for next year.

Zeph, the man at Caravan, has lightened the ski with carbon-fiber, trimmed the tip and tail to make the ski more slashy, and I get to test them.

The selected wood core gives the ski a liveliness I haven't felt before. The hand made feel also gives the ski a sense of being something new and different. Both things I like.