Tag Archives: healthy living

A Slippery Slope

I’m at a conference downtown, but staying at a hotel a 10 minute walk from the conference center. On this rainy morning I checked out and made arrangements to leave my car in the parking lot until the conference was over. Then, listening to Peter Attia’s audio book ‘Outlive’, I headed to the conference center, umbrella in one hand and protein bar in the other.

Not 50 feet from the entrance of my hotel there is a field with a diagonal, muddy path.

Listening to the chapter on Stability, literally at the point where Peter is discussing how important stability is, and how falls can be the pivotal point in a senior’s health, I started down the grass rather than muddy trail… and I wiped out.

I muddied my pants and my hand that was holding my umbrella. Back to the hotel I went to change my pants and wash up. Thankfully they let me back into my room I had just checked out of.

I don’t think I hurt myself further but now I do feel a bit achy in my hips. It’s not serious but something that will need to be monitored, and I will need to think more about my stretching routine over the next few days.

Oh, the irony of listening to this chapter and specific content around falls exactly as I made the decision to take this muddy shortcut and fall myself!

But what a great wake up call this was. Two things come to mind. First, did I really need to take this muddy route and save myself 20-30 seconds? I should make better, safer choices. Secondly, I’ve just started doing some stability work, specifically implementing balancing on one foot with my eyes closed as part of my workout regimen… I need to do more stability work. It might not have helped with the choice I made to take this path, but it could help with my ability to fall a bit better.

In the end I got a life lesson with a small slice of humble pie, or actually mud pie. 😜

As I get older a careless slip or a poor choice to push my capabilities, or climbing a ladder, or paying attention to my phone instead of uneven pavement, can lead to an injury and a slippery slope towards a less mobile and less healthy future. My focus on fitness needs to include strengthening my muscles that support my balance and ‘training’ for everyday living, as described in Outlive by Peter Attia.

VO2 Max

When it comes to health and fitness, the two people I follow and learn from the most are Dr. Rhonda Patrick and Dr. Peter Attia. Recently I’ve been hearing them both talk about how important your Maximum VO2 is to improving you health. VO2 max is the maximum amount of oxygen your body can absorb and use during exercise. It is a great measure of both your aerobic fitness level and your overall health.

Here, Dr. Patrick shares information about a VO2 study as well as the Norwegian Protocol, to help improve VO2 Max:

I usually do 20 minutes of cardio, but yesterday I tried this protocol, and did 31 minutes on the treadmill: 3 minutes warmup, followed by: 4 minutes high intensity and 3 minutes cool down, repeated 4 times. It’s challenging, but totally doable. I’m going to commit to doing this at least once a week.

I was not going to get a heart monitoring watch until I retired, but I think I’ve changed my mind. I’d like to get one because my tracking has not been great and I’d really like to ensure that when I’m trying to get my heart rate up past 80%, I’m actually getting it there and not just guessing. I also want to get my maximum VO2 measured so that I can have a baseline for where I am.

Today I’m not pushing like that again, my hips feel tight and I might just walk on the treadmill and increase the incline as I loosen up. One and maybe sometimes two Norwegian protocols a week will be enough. They aren’t fun. But if I’m going to commit to daily exercise anyway, at least once a week I should make sure I’m doing something to really push myself and maximize outcomes.

Watch the video above, and think about how you can exercise your way into being healthier… and quite literally younger at heart.

A Simple Shift in Perspective

I woke up just after 4am this morning and thought to myself, ‘Nice, almost an hour more to sleep.’ Then I had this little inkling to check my alarm…

What? It’s not on?

Thinking for some reason it was a Tuesday rather than a Saturday, I turned on my 5am alarm and made sure the volume was low before snoozing until it buzzed in about 55 minutes. When it went off I hit the stop button quickly, but my wife still woke up, “Why are you getting up so early on a Saturday?” She asked curiously.

‘It’s Saturday?’

I had no idea. I was going to do my typical weekday morning routine, and head off to work. I wasn’t upset about this, it was just another normal school day in my head. I got up anyway, did my morning meditation and went back to sleep on the couch for a bit before heading to meet my buddy first our Saturday morning walk.

My buddy, also named Dave, inspired this Daily-Ink. He told me he struggled to be motivated to do our walk this morning, and I responded that I was excited to come, having realized that it was Saturday and not Tuesday. I’m not great at rehashing conversations, but this was Dave’s message in a nutshell:

‘Isn’t it interesting how that shifts your perspective. Think of how much better every day would be if you framed it the same way. What if next Tuesday you thought about what a great day it is, and ask yourself, who can I show gratitude to? Or, how can I make someone’s day great today?’

Pick any day in the last week, week day or weekend, and imagine redoing that day, but with a shift in perspective of how rich, engaging, and rewarding that day was going to be… What’s to stop us from doing this daily?

The push

I’ve been in a workout slump recently. I haven’t stopped working out, it’s just my effort has waned. I’m finding it hard to push myself and get the most out of my workouts. I know it’s just a phase and I’ll get through it, but it’s lasting a bit longer than I hoped.

I mention it because it builds a little fear in me. The lack of drive, of push, scares me a bit. It whispers in my ear, ‘you are getting old’, it says to me, ‘you aren’t an athlete anymore’.

It hits me when I’m doing a short sprint on the treadmill and there is 30 seconds left and I want to shorten the sprint time… Not push through, not muscle it, just end it early. It hits me when I’m on my 3rd set with weights, and I start the set thinking I can get 8 reps, then at 4 reps I’ve already decided I can only do 6… and then I do 5. Or when I know I have more gas in my tank and still I leave a few reps undone, because while I wasn’t at full fatigue, my mind said ‘that’s good enough’, and I can’t push myself anymore.

Part of it might be that I’ve been working out on my own too much and I need some external motivation. It might also just be a slump. But it eats away at my confidence. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy that makes the next push experience harder.

I’m confident that I’ll find my focus again, and I know that the fact that I’m still showing up and not letting this discourage my commitment is a real positive. But I have to say that this slump has been mentally challenging for me. I want to feel I’ve left nothing in reserves after I finish a set or a sprint. I want to really feel ‘the push’ again.

Easier and hard

It’s easier to eat unhealthy. It’s hard to avoid unhealthy snacks.

It’s easier to watch TV. It’s hard to push yourself hard in the gym.

It’s easier to scroll on your phone. It’s hard to get to bed early and get enough sleep.

It’s easier to skip a day. It’s harder to start a new streak.

It’s easier to make excuses. It’s harder to stick to a disciplined schedule.

It’s easier to make excuses. It’s hard to avoid excuses and do what needs to be done.

It’s easier to make excuses. It’s hard to convince yourself that your excuses aren’t good.

In the end, doing harder things is more rewarding. Easy things just aren’t as memorable, and aren’t as rewarding, and the satisfaction they provide are fleeting. Harder things bring results that you can see, and feel… and done often enough, the hard journey itself gets easier, even if the individual tasks remain hard. That’s the end goal, to make the hard things that are good for you easier to do, than the easy things that aren’t good for you.

And remember, you are always a work in progress… as long as you are moving in the right direction, don’t be too hard on yourself.

Biography and Biology

I’ve found conflicting information about who said this first, but I love the quote, “Your biography becomes your biology.” It also works the other way, “Your biology becomes your biography.”

Our habits and routines, whether good or bad, affect our biology. Our overall energy levels and health affect what we do with our lives. We tend to place blame on one or the other of these, but it’s a symbiotic relationship between our physical makeup and the physical environment that we consistently expose our bodies to.

Eat foods that are not nutritious or create imbalances in our sugar or energy levels, and we end up exercising less, and being more lethargic. Work out regularly and start noticing positive results, and we start thinking more about how to fuel or bodies well.

Sometimes we are dealt bad biology, and we have less to work with… allergies, a bad back, a chronic illness… sometimes we are dealt a bad biography, and it’s harder to change… a life altering accident, a tough or traumatic childhood, and it’s harder to change. But more often or not there are windows of opportunity to deal with these factors in some way, to better ourselves and the circumstances we face.

The greatest opportunity we have is to alter our biography. The past influences the future, but it doesn’t write it. We can be authors of our own biography… and ultimately change our biology too (to varying degrees). What’s essential is that we act, that we make intentional decisions about who we are and who we want to become.

Knowing/doing gap

It has become abundantly clear that the old adage that, “Knowing is half the battle,” is a pile of BS that should never have become a knowable quote. People know that smoking is bad for them; they know that second serving of desert is not a good idea; they know that they should work out. The only time knowing matters is after a life-threatening experience, a kick in gut that says ‘get your shit together or else.’

Prior to that, knowing is maybe 5% of the battle. Doing is the real threshold to get more than 1/2 way to the goal you are hoping for.

Doing something to change, no matter how small, is how you get to the goals you want to achieve… to accomplish positive change.

What you do could be less than 1% of what you hope to accomplish. It could be a small step in the right direction. It could even be an initial step in the wrong direction (but with the right intention). What matters is action.

Doing is more than half the battle.

Change doesn’t happen because you know it should, it happens because you took action.

Fit for life

I listen to a lot of podcasts about healthy living. It’s amazing how some key topics keep coming up again and again. it’s like there comes a point where collective knowledge just compounds and evidence piles up to support some key ideas. Here are a few things that I have been hearing repeatedly, which all suggest ways to live a long and healthy life. (Not in any order of priority.)

1. Eat more protein. We don’t tend to eat enough, and we tend to eat less as we grow older, but protein is important for both muscle and brain health.

2. Do cardiovascular exercise regularly. At least 5 days a week for the rest of your life. Don’t like to run? Then don’t run! Find something you like to do, spend a minimum of 20 minutes doing it. It doesn’t matter if you like intense cardio, or if you prefer low intensity, what matters is staying active and getting your heart rate up. It’s also important for burning calories, especially if you like food a bit too much.

3. At least once a week get your heart rate up to about 80% of your maximum. This can be done in bursts, like sprinting for 2-3 minutes then slowing down for 2-3 minutes and repeating a few times, or just pushing yourself with a consistently faster pace, or maybe walking on an incline on a treadmill. One thing that really matters for healthy longevity is your maximum VO2 (the max amount of oxygen your body can absorb during exercise). This is maintained and improved primarily by pushing your body past this 80% mark.

4. Do some sort of strength training 2-3 times a week. Constantly remind yourself body that it is not yet in a period of decline. Remind your body that it is a muscle builder. Do this by pushing at least one muscle group completely to fatigue.

5. Take creatine and vitamin D. I’m not a doctor, and you should seek medical advice for supplements, but these are two supplements I feel safe to recommend because they both have tremendous upside and are extensively researched with no downside unless you are an idiot and take extreme doses. Creatine really helps with muscle soreness and seems to have many other upsides too, including for menopausal women. This is not the ‘bodybuilding guy’s supplement’ people think it is, but one everyone can benefit from. Vitamin D is both a vitamin and a hormone used by your immune system. And unless you live in a tropical climate, 90+ percent of the population is low in vitamin D, or at the very most not at the highest levels recommended by health experts.

6. Reduce sugar intake. Our bodies crave sugar. An interesting thing that I heard recently is that this might be something ingrained in us from our monkey heritage. Fruit goes bad, and so when fruit ripens, it’s important to get a lot of it before the fruit rots. Therefore when our ancient ancestors had access to sugars, our bodies made sure to crave more while the supply lasted. Whether that’s true or not, we currently have convenient and continuous access to too much sugar and our cravings for it are unhealthy. I’ll leave you with a simple public service announcement: processed sugars are food for cancer.

7. Stretching and balance are important. It’s not enough to do the same exercise 5 days a week and not work on your overall flexibility and balance. Falls are more common as you get older, and stiff joints don’t help. Breaking a hip vastly shortens life expectancy. Keep nimble, and do things that challenge both flexibility and balance.

8. Self image is important. If you see yourself as someone who exercises regularly, you don’t have to work to get a workout in. To build a habit of good habits, create identity based habits. I am a person who works out regularly. I stretch as part of my routine. I make healthy eating choices. I enjoy doing things that keep me young.

9. Meditate. Find time for gratitude and awareness. Find time to focus on your breathing.

10. This one hasn’t been in on the health podcasts, but it’s a great place to end: Seek laughter. Find joy. Spend quality time with friends and family. Explore new ideas, and keep learning. If you are not finding ways to appreciate the life you have, you aren’t adding value to the life you are trying to extend.

Doctor’s visit

I recently went to the doctor to request bloodwork. It had been a few years since my last one. The results were not great. With high cholesterol being a hereditary issue on both sides of my family histories, my results show concerning levels of LDL (bad) cholesterol. Levels weren’t great last time, and they are worse now.

I’m going to change my diet, but I’ve also booked an appointment with my doctor and I’m probably going to go on statins… A decision for my doctor to make, not me. The reality is that bad cholesterol is a silent killer because you don’t feel buildup of plaque and fatty deposits in your blood and so a medical emergency can be the first hint of how bad things are. That’s why things like blood tests are so important. That’s one of many reasons why doctor visits are important.

I work hard to stay fit and healthy. Obviously my diet could be and should be a bigger part of that equation. But that’s not enough. Another factor is involving health professionals.

My dad wore a “I haven’t seen a doctor in decades” badge of pride. It was stupid. He was not quite 80 and his body was that of an unhealthy 95 year old. About 5 years ago we went to see my uncle, dad’s younger brother, perform in a band at a local pub. When my uncle introduced dad to a friend of his, the friend asked my uncle if my dad was his dad… I’m not exaggerating about the age comparison I just made.

I’m excited about the diagnosis tools of the future. There will be many ways for us to monitor our health and even be preemptively warned of pending issues. But for now, and increasingly as you age, visit your doctor regularly.

If I had the time

Here’s a great comic by @MrLovenstein:

On the same topic, I printed this and stuck it to my home gym wall by my exercise bike, after I read it in James Clear’s weekly email last March:

Author Julia Cameron on how to find time to write (or do anything, really):

“The “if I had time” lie is a convenient way to ignore the fact that novels require being written and that writing happens a sentence at a time. Sentences can happen in a moment. Enough stolen moments, enough stolen sentences, and a novel is born — without the luxury of time.”

Source: The Right to Write

Sometimes I’m brilliant at making the time for things. I’m up every day between 5 and 5:30am, I write these posts (if I didn’t the night before), I meditate, I do a workout, all before I get in the shower to start my work day. Recently I was challenged to do 2,000 pushups in February. I started on the 3rd, and as of yesterday I’d done 80 pushups for 10 straight days. I might take today off before doing another  800 in the next 10 days. Then a last break before 5 straight days and hitting 2K on the 29th. That’s the plan. If I forget and miss a day, guess what… I’ll make it up and still make sure I hit the target.

For other things I’m notoriously bad at finding the time. Tidying up my closet is a great example of that. I seem to know how to mess it up, but I never seem to have time to organize it. Some days I get home and my back is sore, but I’ll sit uncomfortably on the couch and think about getting in the hot tub until it’s too late and I just skip it. My blog drafts usually have a whole bunch of idea starters for when I get stuck, but now it’s filled with longer writes that I’ve started and don’t seem to have the time to follow up with. Drafts used to be drafts, now they are just good ideas that have died from a lack of taking the time to expand on them.

If only I had the time… would I use it? Would you? How convenient and comfortable is this lie? The reality is that if it’s important enough, there’s probably time for it, time we can find, time we can make, rather than making up excuses.