F) Health

It’s hard to talk about health in isolation. Physical health affects mental health and relationship with self which affect relationships with others which influence emotions which affect sleep which affects habits and decision making which affect physical health. It’s all related and they all lean on each other. The better job we can do in each of these pillars the more helpful of a human we are to ourselves and the people around us… which in turn help us.

• 15 Gee Wizz
• Nutrition
• Exercise
• Stress
• Sleep
• Misc
  • Cultivate a Peaceful Inner Enviro
  • More Gee Wizz
  • Songs
• Some Inspo
• Books

>> Goals and Habits

Oftentimes it seems like our problem isn’t that we don’t know what to do, but rather that we don’t build the habits to sustain. When I’m first building habits I challenge myself to do ‘it’ for 30 days. I don’t actually have to workout I just have to get to the gym. Often times getting there I’m more likely to workout. 30 days and then I can stop…. this initial inertia is usually enough to trick the brain.

15 Gee Wizz Facts

1. Saunas – “Men who use saunas one, two, or three times/week had a 24% decrease in all cause mortality. Men who used it 4-7x per week had a 40% decrease in all cause mortality. These were men aged 50-65 followed over 20 years”. Also decrease muscle atrophy and stress. (I used when I broke my wrist) Sauna Use: Found My Fitness #14 (45 mins) with Dr. Rhonda Patrick. Her .gov pxaper Abstract here (3 mins).
   
2. Physiological Sigh for stress.
   Exhale activates parasympathetic: Calms body
   Inhale activates sympathetic: Fight or flight

Exhale longer than inhale to force body to calm.
‘Ideal’ breath is 5.5 sec in and 5.5 sec out
Westerners have a tendency to ‘over-breath’
Source: Breath by James Nestor (5 mins)

3. Colon Cancer is completely preventable. Solution: Get a Colonoscopy every 5 years after age 35 – cancer completely preventable. As much as we don’t want fingers up our butt, (well…) colon cancer is essentially completely preventable. Source: Dr. Peter Attia x Tim Ferriss 2.25 hrs
   
4. Nasal Breathing – Mouth breathing reduces oxygen, worsens sleep, erodes jaw structure.

5. Vitamin D – 70% of the US deficient in Vitamin D. It “activates the enzyme tryptophan hydroxylase 2 (TPH2), which is responsible for synthesizing serotonin from tryptophan” Serotonin affects mood
   
   Idk. I don’t want soft bones so I like Vitamin D.
   “A systematic review and meta-analysis of 14 observational studies that included a total of 31,424 adults (mean age ranging from 27.5 to 77 years) found an association between deficient or low levels of 25(OH)D and depression. Clinical trials, however, do not support these findings [133].” NIH.gov
   to make tryptophan – amino acid for emotional regulation

Exercise

“The body should be treated rigorously, that it may not be disobedient to the mind”

Seneca

“Athletics not aesthetics”

My buddy Jimmy hit me with this one. It’s easy to focus on the aesthetics rather than what the machine can actually do. Climbing has helped me with this as you have to physically carry the engine. But focusing on performance also makes training more fun (and an excuse for more hobbies)

Weekly Rec

Bad Knees

• Knees Over Toes YouTube Channel – Very good exercises, have been recommended him by multiple people. Started doing some of the exercises to help my long runs and feels like it’s working

Nutrition

“Take your food as medicine or eventually you’ll have to take your medicine as food”

Unknown

Our health industry is fueled off recurring injuries. Prescriptions, surgeries, and pills. The part that is beyond frustrating to me is that so much of our pains and bullshit is preventable. I’m not yoga guru but I’m sure that would prevent sooooo much pain in older years. I had a great aunt in her 70s that was still limber, and moving fine – i was told her trick was yoga.

1. ~150g protein/kg up to ~150g protein/lb
   
2. Weight Loss: Instead of reducing bad things, add good things: Instead of drinking less soda, drink 8 glasses of water
   
3. Cutting Sugar: I consolidated my sugar intake to Sundays and it totally helped me cut down
   
4. Dark leafy greens – help me poop
   
5. Mushrooms: “A meta-analysis of 17 studies found that people that ate 18g of mushrooms had a 45% reduced risk compared to people that did not eat any mushrooms” (1 min vid, Dr. Rhonda Patrick)
   
6. Mushrooms: “~150g of a variety of cooked mushrooms weekly performed better on neuropsychological tests and had a 50% reduced risk of cognitive decline. Compounds in some mushrooms may promote the synthesis of nerve growth factors in the brain” (1 min vid, Dr. Rhonda Patrick)

maybe excessive, but dehydration is a huge factor of brain function

Tips

• Easiest healthy meals I make
  • Rice, beans, peppers, chicken – Kinders seasoning
  • Pasta, onion, zuccini, squash, chicken
  • Green peppers, potatoes, steak

>> Good Books on Food

Sleep

Tips

1. Mouth tape – I spent years researching how to improve my sleep. I used to wake up in a haze and dead inside daily. I tried blue light, changing times, vitamins, exercise, everything. 1 line in an 8 hour audiobook (Breath by James Nestor) completely changed my life. (I still use it)
2. Sunlight in morning and evening (helps combat blue light)
3. Warm light auto on PC and phone, (I have mine auto 1 hour before bed and have noticed feeling more drowsy than blue light counterpart)
4. 68* F Matthew Walker – Optimal room temperature to fall asleep
5. Hot showers or sauna before bed – Has helped my sleep (Internal core temperature struggles to maintain homeostasis, so it fights to cool itself off, once back to room temp, core temp drops which is exactly what’s needed for sleep)
6. Fiction before bed – distract mind. Recently I’ve been working through the Lord of The Rings series (I know, decades behind the curve, suck it)

The day after losing an hour for daylight savings ~ “there was a 24% increase in heart attacks on the Monday following the switch to daylight saving time”

The day after gaining an hour for daylight savings ~ “heart attack visits drop 21% as many people enjoy a little extra pillow time”

7. Wake up same time everyday
8. Melatonin helps you fall asleep but not stay asleep – It’s a band-aid to deeper issue
9. Mg, L-theanine, apigenin
10. Nasal pathways open
11. Stop eating >30 mins
12. Stop thinking > 30 mins
13. Sauna/hot shower – so good, actually cools internal temp (which is what u need)

15 Mins

My Stress Tolerance

• 35 min run-I dislike running but few things clear my mind more efficiently
• 10 min breathwork by Wim Hof (dude hiked Everest in shorts) and it genuinely helps. Did this today at the time of writing
• 7.5 hours sleep – I’ve noticed the days I’m most stressed, lonely, emotional are the days I’ve slept like shit or little sleep
• 35 mins meditation – when my mind continuously makes shit up I need some way to reel it in. This has been wildly effective
• 25 mins in a sauna – love this
• Multiple hour hikes in nature

More Gee Wizz

Some Inspo (in no particular order)

1) Ethan Suplee – Lost 286 lb

Gained and lost hundreds of pounds until finally keeping it off. Used to be ~550 and has gotten down to 250.

3) (3 hours) Courtney Dauwalter

Female ultrarunner, age 39 won 3x 100 mile races: Western 100, Hardrock 100, UTMB. Insaneeeee.

Trail runner, won Moab 240 10 hours ahead of her competitors at 32 years old

4) (1 min) David Goggins

Abusive childhood, gained 120 lbs and worked as exterminator. Inspired to become Navy SEAL after watching a documentary

These are all individuals with wildly different stories. What that all are undoubtably, is overwhelmingly inspirational. From Ethan Suplee and John McAvoy completely changing their lives to Louis Zamperini going through hell and back and continuing to skateboard at 79 and carry Olympic torches at 81 it’s possible.
People like this convince me time and time again what the hell the human body and mind are truly capable of. They put my struggles in to perspective. It’s hard to think you and I are no different… but in the words of David Goggins ‘Don’t call me superhuman, don’t put me on a pedestal, that devoids you of all responsibility’

It pisses me off when people say “I’m too old for this” when Bill Ramsey is 59 years old and climbing 5.14s. For non-climbers…that’s hard shit. Point is, there are people much older still getting after it. Training doesn’t have to be crazy. But to allow our bodies to atrophy and chalk it up to ‘too old for this’ is just laziness.

There are plenty of examples of older people still active in their older age, you just have to look for them. Hopefully these few will help.

Songs

1. Fast Car by Tracy Chapman
   
   Neglecting to take care of ourselves is neglecting to take care of our friends, family, and kids as well.

“See, my old man’s got a problem
He live with the bottle, that’s the way it is

He says his body’s too old for working
His body’s too young to look like his

Mama went off and left him
She wanted more from life than he could give
I said, “Somebody’s got to take care of him”
So, I quit school and that’s what I did”

Books

1) (8 hrs) Breath: The New Science of the Lost Art by James Nestor