After I shared earlier this week about hidden goals, a lot of news came out about more people getting infected with the coronavirus. This includes people who deliberately went against sensible health guidelines, especially regarding mask wearing

From a cause-and-effect perspective, we could say that the virus eventually caught up with them, and of course their risky behaviors significantly increased their chances of getting infected.

But from a hidden goals perspective, we can also say that when people express such behaviors, they’re also expressing the hidden goal of getting infected. In other words, not wearing a mask isn’t just an expression of denial or bravado. Not wearing a mask expresses an elevated intention to invite infection. The hidden goal is to get sick.

Why would someone – or some part of a person’s psyche – want to get infected?

There could be lots of reasons. What are the benefits of getting infected? These are numerous.

First, you get immediate access to lots of downtime in a socially acceptable way. You’re expected to go into isolation and rest more.

Suppose that I announced that I had the virus. Wouldn’t that immediately change what you expected of me in the coming weeks? If I put myself into such a stressful or obligatory situation that getting sick could provide a much needed break, that could increase my chances of engaging in risky behaviors, such as not exercising or not eating well.

How often have you gotten sick when you were stressed, but you could also look back and see that you didn’t take very good care of yourself during those times either? Did you eat more iffy foods or slack off on good self-care practices? If so, you could say that you were courting illness as a way of giving yourself a break.

If you’re a very busy person and say you just want two weeks off for the sake of taking two weeks off, how will your social circle respond to that? Will anyone give you flak for it? How would they respond if you needed a few weeks off due to a serious or life-threatening illness?

If you get sick, the time is yours, and people are normally glad to let you off the hook regarding any expectations. They just expect you to focus on recovery.

Trump’s situation could also align well with hidden goals. He’s heading for an election that he’s likely to lose. He had a terrible debate performance this past week and has two more debates coming up (with the expectation of tighter rules), so there’s little or no upside and lots of downside if he does them. His long-term financial lies have been exposed publicly by the New York Times. He’s facing huge debt payments coming due, and he’s dealing with a major audit from this IRS that could cost him $100 million or so. More ex-insiders are turning against him. He and his family members may be looking at some real jail time too. Suffice it to say that his world is collapsing, and he doesn’t have many good options going forward.

His previous approach included trying to disrupt the election, setting the stage for disputing the results and throwing the process into chaos. That creates a big mess, but it probably wouldn’t work well enough to actually solve his problems, and this is generating an even bigger backlash against him.

By some measures it may seem like this would be the worst time for him to get sick – with just a month to go until the election. At a bare minimum, he has to self-isolate for at least 10 days, which is 1/3 of the time he has left. And that’s if things go well and he recovers quickly, which seems iffy since he just spent last night in the hospital.

But from the perspective of hidden goals, this is actually a very good time for him to get sick. As odd as it may seem, getting sick provides more options during this time.

He’s losing anyway. The next two debates aren’t going to go well for him, especially if they turn off his mic while Biden is speaking. He’s unlikely to turn things around in the next 30 days. There isn’t much hope for him to be found in those 30 days if he stays healthy. Even if he does his absolute best, it won’t likely make enough of a difference.

But getting sick – at a minimum – gives him access to extra outs and reframes. I’m not sure which of those would appeal to him, and some depend on how sick he gets, but here are a few to consider.

One aspect is that he gets to blame the virus if he loses – and anyone and anything he can associate with it. Moreover, people’s expectations of his performance are greatly lowered. So he can lose the election without losing so much of his social support. His supporters get to blame the virus too, and he surely knows this.

Another angle is that if he recovers quickly, he can say that the virus isn’t such a big deal and that people are blowing it out of proportion. Or he could claim that he’s strong enough to beat it quickly. And then if he loses the election, he can still blame the virus (and all of its associations) for its bad timing during the final month before the election. But given his hospitalization, I think this angle regarding a speedy recovery is becoming less accessible.

Another angle is that if he gets really sick, he can try to make a case for postponing the election. It fits with his attempts to sabotage the election and gives him even more options along those lines.

There’s also the angle of the virus being potentially fatal. That too is a potential hidden goal – the ultimate escape from all of life’s problems and challenges. Just let everything go and be done with it.

These are just conjectures since we can’t really know what another person’s hidden goals may be. I share this for the purpose of encouraging you to look at your own hidden goals – the goals that can be gleaned from your actual behaviors. So don’t see hidden goals as some absolute truth you’re trying to discover about yourself (or about other people). Rather see this as a tool that you can use to better understand your behavior and where you may be heading, so you can make more conscious choices.

If you play fast and loose with intelligent health precautions these days, consider the potential hidden goal that you may be trying to get sick. Then ask why you might want to do that. Do you see any potential benefits to a period of illness?

Illness can provide many benefits. It’s a period of rest. People’s expectations are immediately lowered, so it can make life easier, especially socially. You may be treated with more caring and compassion. Many of your problems will be put on pause – and some may even be improved or solved by your illness, such as interpersonal problems. An illness can remind you to appreciate good health and how precious it is, so you feel extra good when you recover.

Have you ever gotten sick in the past and found afterwards that it wasn’t such a bad thing? The experience may not be so great, but when you look at the full package, it’s not necessarily all bad.

The lesson of hidden goals with respect to illness is this: Watch out for when getting sick might actually give you some nice benefits or more options – especially when you see your behavior sliding in the direction of courting illness, like Trump’s behavior has been for months. That’s a good time to acknowledge the hidden goal and give it some conscious expression instead. You don’t have to court illness to get those benefits. You can create those benefits in other ways.

If you suspect that based on your behaviors, you may be courting illness, consider that you’re actually dealing with a social problem. If you lived alone on an island, you wouldn’t need to get sick just to earn a break from people’s expectations. So the warning signs of courting illness can point towards the need to invest in better management of social boundaries and expectations and win-win relationships.

You can also see this as a lifestyle problem. If illness starts to look better than wellness, at least to give you access to a short period of rest, that signals that your lifestyle is out of balance and that it would be wise to incorporate more rest. You can claim a lifestyle that includes sufficient time for rest and play. Maintain a lifestyle that provides an accessible pathway to the benefits of illness without actually having to get sick.

For the month of August, I’ve been doing a new dietary experiment. I’m eating grain-free, legume-free, and sugar-free. I’m doing this mainly out of curiosity to see what effect it has. I think I’m far enough along (about four weeks) that this would be a good time to share what I’ve learned.

The biggest adjustment was switching some common food sources, especially carbs. Instead of brown rice or rice noodles, I’ve been eating more potatoes, sweet potatoes, and starchy squash. Instead of beans or tofu, I’m eating more fruit, nuts, and veggies.

While I’ve removed refined sugar sources like coconut sugar and maple syrup, I’m still having some sweet fruit, including bananas, berries, and peaches. I’m allowing but limiting dried fruits, so I normally won’t eat more than 2-3 dates in a day.

This was a fairly modest adjustment. I still like all the foods I get to eat, so it doesn’t feel like a sacrifice. I just focus on a different subset of the wide range of foods I like. One favorite meal I’ve been eating more often is a big plate of roasted potatoes, red peppers, and sweet onions.

I’ve also been eating a lot of salads. One of my favorites includes romaine or mixed greens, shredded cabbage, cherry tomatoes, cucumber, avocado, 10g olive oil, 24g balsamic vinegar, and a sprinkling of seasoning (nori, kelp, sesame seeds). I often eat this with some olives on the side.

I haven’t noticed too much difference in terms of mental and physical differences, but there is some.

The main difference is that I feel less hungry for much of the day, especially between meals. I’m eating slightly less because of that, but most days I’m still coming in between 2000 and 2200 calories. At first I felt some cravings for certain foods, like a rice bowl, but those went away after the first week.

Exercise-wise I haven’t noticed any meaningful difference. I like to begin most days with a 5-mile run, and my runs have felt about the same this month. If there’s a difference one way or another from this dietary change, it’s too minor to detect. Or it’s possible it may take longer for there to be enough of a difference to notice.

The main effect I do notice on my runs is that if I don’t eat enough on the previous day, I feel more tired and sluggish during my run the next morning. So if I only eat 1800 or 1850 calories instead of 2000+, I feel less energetic the next day when I go running. Running feels a bit harder, especially when going uphill. That’s true even if I have a big dinner the previous day; the day’s total calories matters more than the size of the previous meal. So even if I don’t feel hungry enough to need those extra calories, I find it best to eat at least 2000 calories per day. I also experienced this same effect before doing this dietary experiment, but with this different way of eating, it’s easier for me to feel satisfied on fewer calories, so I’ve “run” into this issue more often this month.

I also notice a difference in mental performance if I eat too little. Some days I’ve felt a little mentally sluggish and then observed that I haven’t been eating enough relative to the time of day. So I’ll eat some more food, maybe 200 calories if I just want a snack, and this helps my mind feel sharper. It’s been interesting to observe this connection between food intake and mental performance. Multiple times I’ve made the mistake of eating too little, but I didn’t notice that I wasn’t eating enough till I tried to do some mental work and felt unmotivated to do it. Fixing the problem is as easy as eating some fruit or nuts.

Emotionally I haven’t noticed any discernible difference. I normally feel emotionally stable and positive, and I don’t sense any changes in that area this month. When I eat 100% raw, I notice a significant improvement in mood within the first few days, but that hasn’t happened with this diet.

After about four weeks of this dietary experiment, I feel the benefits are relatively modest, given the trade-off of narrowing my food choices. I do like that this different way of eating has encouraged me to explore different meal options, like the peach bowl I shared yesterday (which I had again this morning). I’ll at least finish off the full month, but I’m not seeing enough benefits to warrant a long-term change here.

I am curious, however, if the reduction in hunger between meals is due to removing grains, legumes, sugar, or some combo of those. So I may try reintroducing some foods slowly next month to see if I can gain more awareness there. You may have your guesses, as do I, but I gain the best insights from seeing how my body and mind actually respond, which often doesn’t match people’s predictions.

In terms of results, tweaking which plant foods I eat doesn’t seem like nearly as big of a deal as getting all animal products out of my diet. That was the most important step, especially given the long-term mental and emotional gains, many of which were very noticeable in the first week or two. The biggest deal beyond that was to eat 100% raw for a while.

I’ve continued to lose weight this month (I lost another 5.8 pounds during the 4 weeks of this experiment), so this diet hasn’t interfered with that. I have been losing weight a bit faster this month than before, but it’s hard to say if that’s significant. I think it’s too little time to know for sure.

I’m still keeping a food log of everything I eat, and that simple habit alone has made it really easy to lose weight. I’ve been doing daily food logging for 15 weeks now, and I’ve lost 18.8 pounds in that time, which is an average of 1.25 pounds per week. This has felt practically effortless. Just taking a few minutes per day to write down what I eat has raised my awareness of exactly how much I’m eating each day.

Food logging has been such a nice tool for raising awareness that it’s creating results without my having to deliberately do anything more. It’s very different doing it for 15 weeks in a row versus doing it for only a few days or a week. I intend to maintain this tracking habit at least through the rest of the year because I’m still learning from it, and it really is super easy to keep doing it after 105 days of consistency. Another 100+ days seems like a breeze.

I often get asked what I eat as a vegan, so I’ll share one of my favorite breakfasts that I’ve been enjoying lately. I’ve eaten this simple meal for most days of the month.

Previously I would typically have steel cut oatmeal for breakfast, but this month I’m doing a 30-trial of eating grain-free, legume-free, and sugar-free. So I needed to figure out a breakfast that would satisfy those criteria.

This breakfast is also:

• Quick to make (a few minutes tops)
• Quick to eat
• Satisfying
• Delicious

Here we go…

2 sliced peaches (110 calories):

60g grain-free granola (340 calories):

170g unsweetened almond milk yogurt (140 calories):

After mixing:

So good! I just love the combo of the juicy softness of the peaches, the creaminess of the yogurt, and the mild crunch of the granola.

Total calories = 110 (peaches) + 340 (granola) + 140 (yogurt) = 590

Here are the granola ingredients:

The peaches are from Trader Joe’s (this time, but I usually get them from Costco), the granola from Costco, and the yogurt from Whole Foods. Getting groceries from 3+ different stores is pretty normal for a vegan, and fortunately all of these stores are close to us.

Here are some variations I often make:

• Use white peaches instead of yellow peaches. Personally I like the yellow ones best.
• Swap peaches for blueberries, sliced strawberries, nectarines, sliced banana, or other favorite fruits.
• Use more fruit (and a larger bowl), like twice as many peaches or a combo of multiple fruits. I especially like peaches with blueberries.
• Swap almond yogurt for cashew yogurt (I use Forager brand) or coconut milk.
• Use 30g granola instead of 60g for a lighter meal (shaves off 170 calories, so 420 calories total).

If you like coffee, this goes really well with coffee too. I recommend trying it with a cup of Stumptown Founder’s Blend (organic) mixed with 50 ml of coconut milk (no sugar).

I especially like how this meal makes me feel. It digests easily, gives me good energy, and leaves me feeling light and happy. This is a really satisfying breakfast to have after a morning run.

Enjoy!