Discipline

My goals for March were the same as January and February. And they will be the same for the rest of the year. That’s because I’ve committed to tripling down on my existing foundational health habits this year, and to not start anything new.

I want to see a huge green wave on my six habits – alcohol, sleep, protein, caffeine, water and steps. I want absolutely no doubt that I can keep these green EVERY month. I’m close to that, but there are some weak spots across some of those that I need to fix.

My other goal is to get my whole foods habit to 80% consistency. I hope this can be done in 2024, but it’s early days. I know this will be my toughest challenge to date, so, we’ll see.

One of the things I’ve realised about building foundational health habits, is you have to be patient. In fact, it’s one of the five rules I outline here – 5 rules to build rock solid habits (not what you would expect!).

Things will take as long as they will take. Setting a fixed goal for when you want something in place isn’t going to force the matter – as much as you would like it to. It’s much better to simply be clear about your focus, and then settle into the process. Put in the work every day, week, and month and keep building. If you stay focused and work hard, you’ll get to where you want, as fast as you can.

With all of that said, let’s see how I did in March.

(Click here to see the full history, going back to Jan 2022)

What a month! I hit 80% consistency for the six health habits I am trying to keep green. That’s the second time I’ve ever done this. You can’t ask for more than that.

I should also note that I had a few challenges to overcome in March. A work offsite, Easter (yeah chocolate eggs are my kryptonite) as well as it being the start of half term for schools.

Luckily, I made such a strong start to the month, that some slips towards the end of the month didn’t make much of a difference overall.

Let’s take things one by one.

Alcohol was 100%. Always will be.

Sleep was a super impressive 90% consistency. I had only three misses for the entire month. All of these were because of an unusual late night or early start that was hard to work around. I’m noticing that I’m really settling into a consistent sleep and wake time now, which is making all of the difference.

Protein was at 94%. This is super easy for me now. If I ever miss this, it’s usually because I am traveling or out for the day, and it’s hard to hit the number. Because my average is usually upwards of 180 grams anyway, I don’t stress about missing it now and again.

In fact, now that 150 grams is easy, I’m going to raise the target to 175 grams. This is my gold standard, because it equates to a gram of protein, per lb of bodyweight. Yes, it will make things a little bit tighter. But I don’t see any issue with being able to hit 175 grams and keep consistency above 80%. Let’s see how things pan out in April.

Caffeine was 84%. Not much to say here. I find it super easy to keep above 80%. Every miss was a strategic loosening of the rule, to either help with a bit of energy pre workout, or to fit in with some traveling.

Water was also at 84%. Again, not a gigantic amount to say. I always feel comfortable being able to hit over 80%. The main point to note here, is that I’m still working on being able to do this more smoothly. I talk about that here – Habit Hack: An easy way to start or improve a habit.

Steps hitting 87% was definitely my proudest achievement in March. This is the first time I’ve been in the green with this habit for six months. Comfortably above 80% too. I feel I’ve turned a bit of a corner with steps recently. I’ve made some changes to my routine, and I feel more confident in being able to hit over 80% every month from now on. This now falls into the same category as sleep – I need to work on achieving it more smoothly. It’s often a rush towards the end of the day to make it over the line.

And lastly, whole foods, the new habit I am working on. I managed a small increase from 45% to 48%. But hey, it’s so small, we’ll call it flat.

If I’m honest, I haven’t really done the work of trying to figure out some strategies of making the leap to 60 and 70% consistency yet. I’m kinda happy for it to tread baseline, whilst I focus on smoothing out my water and steps habits. Plus, March and April have a lot of irregular stuff in them (the bulk of the two week half term, some overnight travel etc.), which will make it really hard to improve upon this habit at the moment anyway.

That leads me nicely to my focus for April.

Same again. I want to see those six habits (alcohol, sleep, protein, caffeine, water and steps) all above 80% and in the green again. That would be a fantastic step in the right direction given my goals for 2024. It would also be a decent achievement given the irregularity of April.

I’ll let whole foods settle where it wants to in April (which by the way might even be worse than February and March), and start to turn my attention to getting that up to 60 and 70% thereafter.

Alright. I’ll see you guys in about a month’s time when I look back on April to see how I did.

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Have you noticed that often the best and right thing to do, is sometimes not what you would expect at all?

Only from trying something time, and time again with poor results – do you out of desperation do something that is counter intuitive. And only then, do things finally click. In fact sometimes, the counter intuitive thing you do, isn’t even a conscious decision. It came about, only after throwing your hands in the air, and finally giving up on something. Only then, did trying something completely different jump out at you.

I’ll share an example of something in my own life.

I used to be a very detailed goal setter. I’m talking, Tony Robbins on steroids.

I had five year goals for every area of my life. Each goal was broken down into 1 year, 9 months, 6 months, 3 months and 30 day goals. I had a very long and elaborate routine to plan my week, so that I could achieve these. I was utterly convinced this was the right and only way to be successful and happy.

The bottom line – yes, it helped me be successful at things. But, it was a very miserable way to live life. There was no room for deviation. I found myself constantly re-planning my goals when something changed – which it always did. In fact, I was spending more time re-planning my goals, than working towards them.

After reaching peak meltdown for about the thousandth time, I gave up on goal setting. I had my own ‘throw my hands in the air’ moment. I then went through a no goals period of my life, which of course was a very counter intuitive thing to do at the time. But, I was at my wits end with it all.

That didn’t work out particularly well either. It turns out that you kinda need to have a sense of where you want to be going, if you’re going to organise yourself well on a day to day basis.

Nowadays, I’ve settled somewhere in the middle. I’m the most productive and happiest I’ve ever been in my life. But it did take counterintuitive action to end the vicious cycle of frustration and poor results.

It’s funny how we will try to do something over and over again, even though it repeatedly isn’t working.

OK, let’s bring it back to health, fitness and habits.

How many times have you tried to commit to a new training program, diet, or even healthy behaviour – but only managed to stick to it for a week? Perhaps you lasted a month. Maybe you’re even one of the lucky ones, and you managed a few months. But, like every other time, you weren’t able to stick it out much longer than that.

I used to be exactly the same. I tried every training program and diet under the sun. I could tell you the ins and outs of them all.

But, I couldn’t seem to make any of them a consistent behaviour. I couldn’t get anything to stick. And as a result, well, I didn’t get many results.

And now I know why. I was going about it the wrong way around.

Here’s the big problem. I wasn’t the type of person who was capable of sticking to training programs, diets or advanced habits. It was inevitable that I would only last so long, despite having the best of intentions.

Instead of jumping into a new training or diet program, or fancy new habit, I needed to buckle down and build a set of foundational health habits. I needed to build a base level of capability.

Someone who slept well.
Someone who didn’t consume alcohol.
Someone who moderated their caffeine intake.
Someone who ate enough protein.
Someone who was well hydrated.
Someone who ate mostly whole foods.
Someone who walked a lot.

I was going to become someone who was highly disciplined. Someone who was confident. Someone who looked good and felt good about themselves. Importantly, someone who was capable of doing the things I desperately wanted to do. And, I was going to be super patient, and take my time with it.

Let’s fast forward to today. I now find it easy to train for two hours a day. Throughout the week, I do a mix of weight training, interval training, zone 2 cardio, walking and mobility work.

I now find it easy to be in control of my nutrition. I track my calories, my macronutrients (i.e protein, carbohydrates and fats). I eat mostly whole foods. And, I can influence with a fair amount of precision what I want my body composition to be.

I can only do that now, because I went through a process of rebuilding myself.

It’s the base of the pyramid metaphor that I like to use. The foundational health habits ARE the base of the pyramid. It’s essentially a base layer of capability. When you build that base layer of capability, you end up building a person that’s capable of doing so much more than a person who doesn’t have those foundational health habits down.

And now whatever I decide to turn my attention to (i.e the layers above the base of the pyramid), I have a hell of an easier time sticking to them. I’m now coming at it from a highly capable place.

And that’s why you probably have things the wrong way around.

Forget jumping into new training programs, new diets, or trying to give up or start something new and big in your life.

Instead, slowly rebuild yourself. Become the type of person who is capable of making big changes in your life. Build that base layer of the pyramid and build foundational health habits into your life.

If you do things that way around, I guarantee your life is going to be, and will feel very different.

I’ll give you one last example, in case you’re not convinced.

Do you know someone who all of a sudden committed to a big physical challenge?

Maybe a half marathon, or climbing a mountain – something like that. I say all of a sudden, because for that person, it usually comes as a bit out of character. They’re not usually the type of person that you would associate with that type of thing.

Now of course, it’s very impressive to see them commit to the type of training needed to achieve their physical challenge. And most of the time, they are fairly consistent with the training. They go on to achieve the big physical challenge. They’re very pleased to have done so – as they should be.

But, now notice. How many of those people go on to consistently continue their training?

If your experience is the same as mine, very few.

So, why is that?

It’s because, for the most part, the sheer accountability that comes from committing to it publicly, as well as getting monetarily sponsored by close friends and family – helps them put in the work. It pulls them over the finish line.

As soon as that goes away, what they’re left with is just themselves. And now the option to continue that type of training – or not. And for the most part, it usually dies off.

It goes back to what I’ve been talking about in this episode. They are not fundamentally the type or person who is capable of sustaining that type of training and effort over the long-term. The accountability factor catapulted them into it, and was propping things up all along. It was only ever going to last for a fixed period of time.

Now, I want to be clear. I’m not trying to dismiss people taking on big challenges, and putting in the work to get them done. It’s super impressive. In fact, it’s maybe even more impressive because they attacked it from a place of not being prepared, or being capable to do that type of thing.

But what you don’t want is hacks. You want to become the type of person that can put in the work day in day out. Week in week out. Month in month out. To sustain it over many years. In fact, sustain is over a lifetime.

And if you want to do that, you have to build a base layer of capability, discipline and confidence. You need to build the type of person that can do the types of things you want to do.

And that’s where the foundational health habits come in.

If you want any help or advice on how to get started, you know where I am. Just reach out.

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If you’ve ever tried to start or improve a habit, you’ll know it can be hard. Fortunately, I can share a technique that will make it much, much easier.

It’s called habit stacking. You find something that you’re already able to do consistently, and then you stack the new thing you want to do alongside it.

I’ll jump into a real life example that’s worked brilliantly for me recently.

One of my foundational health habits is to drink three litres of water per day. I hit that goal most days. But, the big problem is that I often leave it towards the end of the day.

Now, you might ask, as long as I’m able to hit my goal – what does it matter when I drink my water?

When I leave a lot of my water consumption towards the end of the day, it makes me feel uncomfortable and bloated. But, more importantly, it means I’m up several times in the night having to take a pee. This really gets in the way of a good night’s sleep (my most important foundational health habit).

To do a better job of drinking my three litres of water earlier in the day, I’ve been trying to drink one litre of water within 30 minutes of waking up. That’s because I know that when I do that, it gives me early momentum. I usually then find it quite easy to hit my three litres by the late afternoon.

But, like with anything, it’s one thing to have a good intention. It’s another thing to actually do it consistently.

That’s exactly what I struggled with. I found it hard to consistently drink that first litre of water within 30 minutes of waking up – even though I knew it was good for me. I’d either forget, or I would be tempted to put it off. There’s just enough discomfort that I would find ways to avoid it. I was successful about 50% of the time.

I had a brainwave one morning. It happened whilst I was making my coffee. There’s one thing that I definitely don’t find uncomfortable, or try to avoid – in fact I look forward to each morning. And that’s having my coffee.

In that moment, I thought, why don’t I have a rule for myself? I’m not allowed to have a coffee, until I’ve drunk one litre of water? In fact, that’s a new rule for me – starting NOW.

I knew I had about five minutes until my coffee was ready. The only way I was going to be able to drink it, was if I first drank a litre of water. And that’s exactly what I did. I filled my water bottle, and gulped down a litre, just in time for my coffee to come to the boil. And as it would happen, I finished my 3 litres of water by 5PM that day.

That’s the new rule I have for myself now. I’m not allowed a coffee until I’ve first had my litre of water.

In fact, sometimes I now wake up and think ‘I know I should drink a litre of water and just get it out of the way – but I really don’t feel like it.’ To force myself, I just go and put some coffee on. That starts the clock. I now have a finite amount of time before my coffee is ready. It literally forces me to grab the water bottle and get it done. Because I know if I don’t, I’ll have a cup of freshly made coffee that I’m not able to drink! And for the last ten days or so, I’ve not skipped drinking one litre of water within 30 minutes of waking once.

OK, let’s back up for a minute.

I said, habit stacking works when you find something that you’re already able to do consistently, and then you stack the new thing you want to do alongside it.

In this example, making and drinking my coffee first thing in the morning was the thing that I was already able to do consitently. It was a very reliable routine for me.

The new thing I wanted to do was drink one litre of water within the first 30 minutes of waking up.

By stacking them together, I managed to crack it. I’ve gone from struggling to drink a litre of water in the first 30 minutes of the day, to now consistently being able to do it.

You’ll notice that the habit I stacked on top of (drinking coffee) was something I looked forward to. In fact, I think this is when it works best – when you take a habit that you find both EASY and PLEASURABLE. And then you put something that’s new and very manageable before it.

You don’t want to put something that’s unpleasurable and long winded before something that already works. If you do that, you might even put the existing habit in jeopardy. Also, by having the existing habit be something you look forward to, it acts as an incentive and a reward to do the new thing.

So, in summary:

1. Identify the easiest version of the new habit or behaviour you want to do. Remember, you can always dial it up later, once you’ve won the battle of establishing it as a habit
2. Identify a habit or behaviour that you already find easy, and are already consistent with. Preferably make it something you find pleasurable (that way it can act as an incentive and reward)
3. Put the new habit in front of the existing habit.

I can guarantee, if you do this, you’ll find improving your habits, or creating new ones, much, much easier.

Give it a try and see how it works for you!

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I’ve gone from eight to seven habits over the last couple of months. I’ve dropped two habits, and introduced a brand new one. If you want to know a bit more about that change, check out Three BIG changes to my habits!

The two habits that I’m particularly struggling with right now are sleep and steps – so these were big focuses for me in February.

And then the other thing that’s worth mentioning is, I was using February to set a baseline for my new habit – which is Whole Foods.

Whenever I start a new habit, I always start with no expectations. I use the first month to simply track it, and see where my baseline naturally sits. From there, I then set a realistic first target, and I start to think about where I can make improvements to hit that target.

So, without further adieu, let’s see how I did in February.

(Click here to see the full history, going back to Jan 2022)

Overall I’m super pleased with how February went.

I hit green on five of my habits, so that was awesome. I slipped just below green with one of them. And then of course one of them looked terrible – but – we’ve just talked about that one. February was the first month establishing a baseline for my new habit, whole foods. So that was to be expected.

Let’s take the habits one by one.

I hit 100% consistency for no alcohol. I would never expect anything different here. Even so, I will continue to track it and call it out every month, because it’s such a key foundational health habit.

Sleep came in at 83% consistency. I’m super pleased with this one. It’s now the second consecutive month of being in the green, and this is hopefully the start of a new trend.

What was particularly great to see is my average sleep for the month coming in at 7 hours, 25 mins. That’s the highest I’ve ever seen it.

That’s because I’ve been making a big effort to be mindful of when I go to bed, and when I wake up – to ensure I give enough of a window to safely hit my six and a half hours sleep target.

I can’t emphasize enough how important getting at least six and a half hours of sleep is for me. For example, the night before last, I hit six hours and 15 mins. Not only that, it was low quality sleep – a lot of light sleep and not much restorative sleep.

And I REALLY felt it yesterday. I struggled with energy. I was also anxious for most of the day and I just couldn’t seem to click into an optimistic gear. This actually lasted for most of the day, and it’s even drifted a bit into today (despite me catching up nicely last night with a whopping 9 hours sleep).

This is a huge reminder of why sleep is one of my most important foundational health habits – and why I was super happy to see me come in at 83% for February.

Protein also came in as green at 83% consistency.

There’s not much to say here, other than my five misses for the month came in a block of two and another block of three. And that’s because of a couple of trips I had in February, where I found it hard to hit 150 grams of protein on consecutive days.

Now this is something I have to be careful about because it’s a risky place to be. A single miss is usually pretty easy to recover from. I know I can afford six of them in a 30 day period and still achieve 80% consistency.

But, if I do have a miss, it’s so important to put things right the following day. Because, where one miss is a blip, two consecutive misses can easily become the start of a new pattern. It just becomes a really slippery slope, and it’s a big risk to falling off the wagon entirely.

And that’s why even though my 83% for protein is a win, I have to be careful about those two and three consecutive miss patterns. That’s one to watch for next month.

I won’t spend much time on caffeine. That’s because I hit 90% consistency and I find caffeine very easy to stay on track with generally – which as a reminder is a maximum of 2 cups per day, and always before midday .

My three misses were all single misses, and each one was a conscious decision to break from the rule – either because I was on a trip or because I decided to have a coffee before an afternoon training session.

Next up is water. I came in at 83%, which in the grand scheme of things, is all fine.

I rarely dip below 80% consistency for the month when it comes to water. What I’m more concerned about at the moment is how I get there. I tend to leave things too late in the day, and then I find it a rush towards the end of the day to get my three litres in.

And when I do miss my goal of 3 litres, it’s usually because of exactly that – I’ve left things too late in the day. I choose not to drink water in the evening, to avoid waking several times in the night to take a pee – which is me basically prioritising sleep over water at that point.

So, my focus remains the same with my water goal. Get it in earlier in the day, and make sure that I get to my 3 litre target by the early evening.

Steps is where I slipped into the orange. I came in at 76% consistency because of seven misses for the month.

Whilst not disastrous, I need to start doing better here. It’s the fourth consecutive month that I’ve come in at under 80%. I really have to figure this one out.

Like water, it’s just a case of being more intentional with when I will get my steps in each day. I preferably need to break the back of the 10,000 steps as early in the day as I can.

Watch this space for hopefully a big improvement in March as I try to do that.

I’ve saved the new habit for last – whole foods.

My goal here is to have 80% of my calories be from whole foods. I had no expectations for my consistency in February – I simply wanted to track things and see where my baseline settled at.

I came in at 45% consistency – so, pretty low. But, it’s just the starting point, and I see a lot of opportunities for improvements.

One of the most useful things I got from tracking whole foods in February is an increased level of self awareness (which by the way is one of the biggest benefits of tracking daily habits in general).

Simply having to track this daily has helped me see how thin the margin is when it comes to eating 80% whole foods. I usually eat about 2,400 calories a day, so that means I can only afford 480 calories of non whole foods – anything above that and I’ll miss my target of 80%. If you have a good grasp of the calorie content of foods, you’ll know, 480 calories is not much of a margin at all.

I have a good idea of where I can tighten things up with whole foods for March. I’m going to set my goal at 50% consistency, with a stretch goal of closer to 60% consistency for the month. That would be a nice step forward to the eventual final destination of 80% consistency.

All in all, February was a pretty solid month. I’m really happy with it. Five habits in the green. One just slipping into orange. And, whilst one was in the red, that was totally expected.

The goal for March is preferably six habits in the green, and whole foods moved into the orange and much closer to 60% consistency.

And on that note, I will see you next month!

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I’ve made three BIG changes to my foundational health habits. I’ve dropped two of my habits, and I’m bringing in a brand new one.

I don’t make changes to my habits lightly. Whether it’s changing my target with a particular habit, dropping one entirely, or bringing on a new one – there’s often months of reflecting before making changes like this.

I’m really excited about these recent changes. It takes everything up a couple of levels. This is now a much stronger set of habits for me.

I’ll start with the habits I’ve dropped. The first one is supplements.

Supplements

When I first introduced this as a habit, I took quite a large number of supplements every day – eight different ones, and over 20 pills and capsules a day. I believed it was important to hold myself accountable for taking these on a daily basis.

However, over time my stance on supplements has shifted quite a bit. Nowadays, I actually take very few supplements. I’ve stripped it right back to just a few that I think are good for me.

As it stands, these are the four I take:

• Protein powder
• Creatine Monohydrate
• Magnesium
• Athletic greens

The reason I choose to take these four supplements is because they each serve a specific and important need of mine at the moment.

I use a protein powder when I’m struggling to get to my daily 150 grams of protein. It’s a sort of ‘break glass’ strategy. I use it when I need it.

Creatine is probably one of the most researched and proven supplements to support gaining strength and muscle. It’s super relevant to my goals right now.

Magnesium I take to help improve my sleep.

Athletic Greens, it’s essentially a high quality multi-vitamin. I see it as an insurance policy. I try to eat mostly whole foods and to get in as much variation as possible. But, knowing that I also get plenty of vitamins and minerals through supplementation – it just makes me more confident I’m covering all bases.

I absolutely believe these four supplements are worthwhile. But, worthwhile isn’t the same as foundational.

The world isn’t going to stop if I miss taking them for a day or two – probably even a week or two won’t make much of a difference. If I had to lose them all tomorrow, I could still push on and keep becoming a healthier person without them.

Therefore, taking supplements doesn’t feel foundational. I can’t put it on the same shelf as the likes of sleep, alcohol, protein etc.

I’ll still aim to take my supplements daily. But, I’m not going to track it every day, and I’m not going to stress if I don’t manage it. And this means I’m going to remove supplements as a foundational health habit.

Now, onto the second habit I’m removing – intermittent fasting

Intermittent fasting

Intermittent fasting has been a hard habit to remove, because it’s served me so well up until this point. It’s served me so well, for a couple of reasons.

Firstly, it’s helped me develop a healthier relationship with food. I’m now very self aware and intentional with my eating – compared to a few years ago where I would unintentionally graze throughout the day. It’s helped me take back control of my relationship with food.

Secondly, it’s helped me better control my calorie intake. I’ve always been very indulgent when it comes to food. Once I start, I find it hard to stop. Pushing out the first bite of food until the afternoon and making the eating window smaller, has really helped me with this. It’s often been the difference between effortlessly being able to hit 2500 calories – to easily blowing upwards of 3000 calories.

So, you might ask, why the hell am I removing intermittent fasting as a foundational health habit then?

Well, recently I’ve been fasting less anyway. Since I’ve become more focused on building muscle, I choose to eat breakfast on weight training days. This helps to get some food in me before a training session. That means I’ve only been aiming for 80% consistency for the eighteen or so days left in the month outside of that.

For the days I’m not fasting, I find I don’t have the problems I used to have. I can still have a good relationship and discipline with food, and I’m pretty consistent with hitting my calorie goals on these days too.

And you know what? I’ve started to really like having a whole food, high protein breakfast to kick off the day. So much so, that I’ve found myself wanting to do that more than 20% of the time on those 18 days I’m supposed to be fasting.

So, I had to ask myself – why keep sticking to this as a foundational health habit, if it’s not actually solving a problem for me? If it’s not critical to improving my long-term health?

Now, I want to make it clear, by removing intermittent fasting as a health habit, that doesn’t mean I won’t ever intermittently fast again.

Sometimes it’s nice to just get going for the day, and not have to worry about food. And now and again, it’s a nice flex to remind my body that I’m in control. It’s also a great tool if you know you’re eating out at a restaurant, or you have a high calorie dinner ahead of you. It’s a damage control strategy.

I’ll still intermittently fast from time to time, I’m just happy to be a bit more flexible with it nowadays. I actually expect I’ll end up fasting two, maybe three times a week going forward.

If I find myself going backwards on my relationship with food, or in being able to stick to my calorie target for the day, I always have the option to bring it back in as a foundational health habit again. But, I think I’m going to be just fine.

At this stage, I just can’t justify it as a foundational health habit. It’s more something that was very important for me at a point in time – and will continue to be useful as a tool when I need to use it.

OK, that’s it for the habit’s that are out – supplements and intermittent fasting.

So, what’s the new habit?

Whole Foods

Whole foods is a habit I’ve been thinking about for a while now. I brought it in as a new habit for February. There’s just no question that ultra-processed foods are horrible for your health.

In fact, the British Medical Journal did an umbrella review of 45 studies [1] that looked at the relationship between ultra-processed foods and adverse health outcomes.

They found convincing evidence that supported direct associations between ultra-processed foods and higher risks of cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, as well as anxiety and common mental disorders.

They also found highly suggestive evidence that linked ultra-processed foods to higher risks of incident all-cause mortality (that’s fancy science speak for dying of pretty much anything), type 2 diabetes, depressive outcomes – together with higher risks of adverse sleep related outcomes, wheezing and obesity.

The huge and undeniable health benefits you get from eating a mostly whole food diet – is in itself, a cast-iron reason for bringing it in as a foundational health habit. But, I also know how I feel when I eat mostly whole foods – it’s very tangible for me to see.

I feel lighter, leaner, less bloated, less achy (which probably means there’s less inflammation going on) and less tired. I’m generally sharper in my mind too – I have less anxiety and just feel in a better mood. And on the flip side, I know when I get stuck in a rut of eating ultra-processed foods for a few days, I quickly begin to feel lousy.

And I don’t want to feel lousy. I want to feel good.

So, this is why whole foods is making its way in as one of my foundational health habits.

The goal I’m setting myself when it comes to whole foods is to have 80% of my calories be whole foods – allowing myself 20% leniency.

The whole foods definition can be a bit fuzzy and is admittedly open to interpretation. I’ll cover my own definition of whole foods in a future episode, but for now I’ll summarise it, as for the most part, foods that tend to have one ingredient, and haven’t been heavily processed. So, that’s meat and fish, vegetables, fruit, nuts, milk, eggs, potatoes, oats etc.

That means avoiding the obvious ultra processed foods, such as ready meals, cakes, biscuits, ice creams and chocolate bars – yup, all the tasty stuff! But, even things that might not quite be so obvious – fruit flavored yogurts, instant soups, fizzy drinks, mass produced white bread, breakfast cereals and bars etc.

As with all of my habits, my ultimate goal is to be able to achieve this 80% of the time over the month.

And boy, do I have some work to do here. I only achieved 45% consistency in my first month of tracking it. This is easily going to be my biggest challenge with my habits in 2024. Watch this space as I look to get this up to 80% consistency.

So, there you have it. Supplements and intermittent fasting are out. Whole foods is in.

I’ll continue to keep reflecting on all of my foundational health habits, and I reserve the right to change and improve things in the future. And if I do so – you’ll be the first to hear of it!

Notes:

Ultra-processed food exposure and adverse health outcomes: umbrella review of epidemiological meta-analyses

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As I was ticking off some of my habits earlier today, I noticed that we’re just over half way into February. It felt like a good idea to take stock of where I am so far in the month.

This isn’t a process that’s set in stone for me to do. It’s just a check in with myself, that I tend to naturally do as I get about half way, or at the latest – about two thirds of the way into a month.

It’s super quick to do – it usually only takes five minutes or so.

But, for something that’s so quick – it’s a very powerful thing to do. I wanted to explain why, and give you a bit of a peek as to how I am actually doing in February. This will help give some context for why the mid month check in is so useful.

So, let’s start with why I find it useful.

Firstly, it’s an opportunity for me to zoom out a bit and look at the bigger picture.

It’s so easy to think about how you’re doing with a habit on any given day – that you can end up losing sight of what’s happening across all of the habits, and over a longer period. When you look at the bigger picture in that way, you get a different type of awareness. You then tend to notice things happening and see trends that you wouldn’t have otherwise noticed.

For example, if I’ve had a perfect run on a particular habit, that’s interesting to notice. I then ask myself, what’s been happening, or what have I been doing that’s caused that? I should do more of that.

Or, perhaps I’ve been struggling with a particular habit. I might have already lost the chance to reach 80% consistency for the month – or be very close to it. Then I ask myself, is there anything I can spot that’s causing me to struggle with that habit? And if so, how might I learn from that, so I can improve?

It’s this balance of being honed in on the day, but also taking a step back now and again, that helps to keep pushing me forward and improving myself.

The second thing is a bit more tactical. When I do this check in around the middle of the month, I get the chance to make adjustments in real time.

And it really does make a difference. I always get clearer on where I need to tighten up or focus on for the rest of the month. That always leads to a stronger final position for the month, than had I not have done it.

So, the mid month check in is really about being able to see the bigger picture, and to make improvements at a point in the month where it can actually make a difference.

With all that said, let’s jump into where I am in February so far, as it will help make all this a bit more tangible.

February Mid-Month Check-In

The first habit that I look at is no alcohol. I won’t spend any time on this habit, because as you would expect from someone who doesn’t drink – it’s a clean sweep of ticks.

The next habit is sleep. So far in February, I’ve missed my sleep goal of six and a half hours, three times. That’s about where I would expect to be for about two thirds of the way into the month – so it’s not that big of a deal. However, sleep is one of the habits I find the most difficult. I can only afford a couple of misses from here, if I’m to stay within 80% consistency for the month.

So, ideally I need to make an extra effort to push for another week without a miss. This will pretty much guarantee that I hit 80% consistency for the month. As I think about that, my mind starts to go to what’s happening for the next week or so. This helps me try and get ahead of where I might risk missing my target.

The next habit to look at is protein. Here, I’ve only missed twice so far, so I’m well on track to hit 80% consistency for the month. I find hitting my protein goal very easy, so this doesn’t need much more thinking about.

The same goes for the next couple of habits. I’ll skim over fasting and caffeine because I’ve only missed once on both of those, and each of those misses was an intentional choice. I’m in a great place with both fasting and caffeine at the moment.

Next up is water, and this is where there’s a bit of thinking to be done. I’ve missed my goal of drinking three liters of water, three times so far this month. I usually wouldn’t be too concerned about that, given we’re two thirds of the way into the month. However, water is a habit that I tend to leave until too late in the day, and one of my goals at the moment is to smooth that out a bit.

It’s a great reminder that I have to prioritise getting more of my water in, earlier in the day. I’ve talked about my 1/3, 1/3, 1/3 strategy before. That’s where I drink a litre in the first 30 mins of waking, a litre before midday and finish with my last litre around 6PM. When I stick to that way of doing things, it’s a much nicer and safer way to hit my target of 3 litres of water for the day. If I can stick to this, I’ll finish February in a strong place.

Then I go on to look at my habit of 10K steps. This one is in a dangerous place. I’ve missed four times so far this month, so I can only afford one more miss if I’m to hit my goal of 80% consistency for the month. I’ve identified steps as one of my health habits that is still a bit of work in progress – so given that, it’s probably about where I would expect it to be for the month. But, I would also really like to be in the green with this habit in February – so I need to push a little bit harder on this one.

I then spend a little bit of time looking at what’s happening for the rest of the month. Again, this means I can get ahead of where it might be more difficult to get my 10k steps in. I remind myself that I will have the best chance of being successful with this habit, if I can get as many steps in as I can, earlier in the day.

OK, last health habit – whole foods. Whole foods is a new habit for me, so it’s very early days. My daily target with this habit is to have whole foods be 80% of my calories.

However, because it’s the first month that I’m tracking it, I’m not holding myself accountable to a hard result with it yet (i.e 80% consistency for the month, like my other habits). What I’m interested in, is to see where my baseline is. And from there, I can start to set a first realistic goal with it, and a strategy that can help me get there.

To give you an idea of how that baseline is forming so far in February – I’ve missed whole foods being 80% of my calories for the day, eleven times. That’s under 50% consistency already for the month. Again, for now, this is just interesting to observe. But, it’s an early sign – as I already knew – that this habit is going to take quite a long time to master. For the time being, I’m just happy to see where I get to at the end of the month, and we’ll go from there.

And, that’s my mid month check in.

As you can see, plenty of habits are fine and they don’t need any attention at all. And it’s actually quite nice to observe that – it’s a good feeling.

But there are also a few habits that definitely need a bit of extra attention over the next week or so – especially if I’m going to stay on the right side of things for the month. I know what I have to do there.

I hope it was useful to give you a bit of a peek into my own mid monthly check in.

If you’re already tracking foundational health habits, why not give the mid month check in a try for yourself? It will help you keep a balance between the day to day, but also the big picture.

If you’re not already tracking foundational health habits – well, of course – I’d highly encourage you to start as soon as you can!

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When a new year starts, it’s always a good time to reflect and take stock of where you are, and to also think about where you want to focus your efforts for the year ahead.

I used the time towards the end of last year to think about where I was with the eight foundational health habits I’ve been building for the last couple of years – and where I want to focus my efforts in 2024.

This initially started with me thinking, I’m in a pretty good place with these eight health habits. I’ve built to a decent level of consistency with them, whilst also increasing the targets incrementally over time too. So, I started to get excited thinking about what new things can I focus on this year.

As I was thinking about these new habits, something didn’t feel quite right in the back of my mind. That’s because, if I’m super honest with myself, there is some unfinished work with these existing eight foundational health habits. Whilst that’s true, I shouldn’t be thinking about anything else until all eight of these are completely nailed and default behavior. I want them all to be easy – SUPER EASY.

And the reality is, I’m not quite there yet. So, why am I not quite there yet?

Well, for a start, there are two habits in particular that I slip just below 80% consistency on fairly regularly. And then there’s another couple of habits, that whilst I am pretty much there with them – there are some weak spots. I often end up hitting low 80% consistency on these – and behind the scenes, it’s touch and go even getting to that low 80%. And then the other 4 habits – yeah, they are feeling pretty easy now. They’re definitely in the bank.

So, I have four habits that need some work and four that are completely nailed. And it just so happens that the four that need some work, they are the most foundational – sleep, steps, water, and fasting.

If I take a step back, that doesn’t exactly feel like a place that I should be trying to build on top of. In fact, it feels more like a place that needs some extra attention and work to finish properly laying the foundations.

Therefore, 2024 isn’t about anything new for me when it comes to foundational health habits. Instead, it’s about tripling down on the eight foundational habits I already have – and completely nailing them .

The reason I’m hell bent on this, is that I often talk about these eight habits as the base of the pyramid for me. This feels the easiest and most elegant way to describe them. With them in place, I’ve found it actually quite easy to operate at a very high level with my training and nutrition. I can reach a level that I never thought would be possible for me – a level that I thought was reserved for athletes. Before these habits were in place, I struggled to piece together any type of consistency with my training and nutrition – or in fact, most other areas of my life. I was simply trying to do things on a very shaky foundation.

Let me give you a couple of examples:

If I go back a couple of years, I had no real rhythm or consistency to my training.. Some weeks, I would do four workouts. Other weeks, I would only manage a couple, or perhaps even go a whole week without getting round to any – despite starting the week with really good intentions. I remember vividly, I would plan my weeks with what I wanted to do, and it almost felt random whether it would get done or not. I did this over, and over, and over for many years. I just couldn’t seem to get into the flow of things, and stick to it. It’s not surprising that I didn’t see many results at all – my physique and strength stayed about the same.

Fast forward to today and I’m consistently training five times per week (mix of weights and cardio) and I have a really solid rhythm going on now. I hit 10,000 steps per day as an average. As a result, I’m now making decent progress on my strength and fitness. It all feels pretty easy to keep up now.

Here’s another example. Even just a year ago, there was lots of yo yo’ing going on with my nutrition. I went through periods of being super on, and then super off. I’d be all in on paleo one minute (and not really enjoying it), and then bingeing on bad foods the next minute (enjoying it at first and then feeling disgusted with myself afterwards). As a result, I didn’t feel good about myself at all. I had low energy, felt uncomfortable, was overweight, and I wasn’t setting myself up to be successful with my training.

Fast forward to today, and I count and stick to calories. I eat 180 grams of protein per day. I stick to a set of macros, and eat lots of whole foods. As a result, I feel SO much better, I’ve dropped 20 lbs and completely changed my body shape and physique.

The big difference between these before and after’s with my training and nutrition – is that before, I didn’t have these foundational habits down, and now I mostly do. Because I have built that base of the pyramid, it means I now have the right foundations in place – the right capability, the right energy, and the right discipline. And this means, I can now tackle and be successful with the types of training programs and nutrition strategies I hopelessly failed at before.

It’s so clear that building these eight foundational health habits has been transformative for me – physically and mentally. I therefore don’t want to short cut things and move onto new habits whilst there’s still a final bit of work to do in building the last couple of blocks of the base of the pyramid. And like I said, the four habits I’m a bit stuck on, they are actually the most foundational – so I know there is likely a further transformation round the corner from nailing them.

On that note, I’ll give you a peek into how I’m thinking about working on the four habits that I’m struggling with.

I’ll take them in order of difficulty, starting with the most difficult.

Sleep

Sleep is not only the most difficult for me, it’s also the most important.

I only realized this after giving up alcohol. One of the things that led to me giving up alcohol was the dreaded hangover. As I got into my forties, my hangovers were getting worse, and longer – and that was despite me cutting down my drinking.

About a month into giving up drinking, I remember waking one morning and feeling super crappy and hungover. I went to have a really bad day. I was tired and anxious. I didn’t feel like training, I didn’t stick to my diet etc.

I had to literally double check myself – did I have a drink yesterday? And then it clicked. A really poor night’s sleep made me feel like I was hungover. And actually, it might have been less the alcohol, and simply a poor nights sleep caused by the alcohol that was making me feel terrible.

So, sleep is super important for me. It is also the habit that needs the most work. Six of the last seven months have been under 80% consistency.

My goal is six and a half hours sleep per night. With all my habits, I’m aiming for 80% consistency over the month – meaning I can afford six misses per month.

This means total time asleep, not just time in bed. Most of us usually lose an hour each night either getting to sleep, or with various night time interruptions. So, to hit six and a half hours of sleep, I usually need to be in bed for seven and a half hours.

I track my sleep with my whoop band, so I’m confident I have an accurate measurement to track against.

In terms of improving my sleep, there’s no fancy gimmicks needed. The big thing is to be intentional about when I’m going to bed and when I’m waking up. Yes, I know that sounds really simple and obvious. But, most of the time I miss my goal of six and a half hours, is when I know I need to rise early, and then I end up getting to bed late. I just don’t give myself enough time to get six and a half hours in – which as I said, usually requires seven and a half hours in bed.

So, the big thing for me is that as the evening gets under way, I need to think ahead about what tomorrow looks like, and hit the sack accordingly. If I can be disciplined with that, I should be able to get to 80% consistency for sleep going forward.

I’m really pleased to say that I’ve started 2024 with a bang. I got 84% consistency!

Steps

Steps is in a pretty similar place to sleep – six out of the last seven months have been under 80% consistency. So, again, quite a bit of work to do!

My target is 10,000 steps a day.

The first thing to say is, I don’t count the steps I do as part of my running workouts, or any other type of training. It has to be purely ‘walking’ steps.

That makes 10,000 steps actually pretty tough going because it’s about 90 mins of walking.

Now, there’s nothing terribly complicated about going for a walk. And there’s also nothing terribly complicated about fitting in 90 mins of walking each day.

What that means, is the way to improve my steps is very similar to my sleep – I need to be more intentional. I need to think and plan ahead for when I want to get them done.

For example, if I just jump into the day and leave it to think about later – it’s really easy to reach mid afternoon without getting many steps in at all. By then, it’s over. It’s really hard to recover from. I’ll almost always fail to reach 10,000 steps.

The other thing for me to think about, is to make sure I get a decent lump of them as early as I can. If I can get 3000 – 4000 done early in the day, I tend to find that between another walking session, a dog walk and general day to day life, I get to the 10,000 mark fairly easily.

So, with steps – it’s about being intentional. Think and plan ahead. And when I’m able to – get them in early.

Alright. That’s the first two hardest habits covered . Things should get a bit easier from here

My goal with fasting used to be the same as all my other habits – 80% consistency for the month.

Fasting

However, since I’ve become more focused on building muscle, I now don’t fast on weight training days. This is because I usually train around lunch time, and I like to get some food in before a weight training session.

I weight train three days a week. So, my goal is to be 80% consistent for the eighteen or so days left in the month outside of that.

I’m in a much stronger place compared to sleep and steps. I’ve hit well over 80% consistency for fasting in the last three months. But, I had a rocky period adjusting to the mix of fasting and not fasting throughout the week. That caused me to dip below 80% for three consecutive months.

So, even though I’ve done well in the last three months – I don’t quite feel out of the woods yet.

I don’t really have a specific focus to improve my fasting – other than to just keep an eye on it. I can only afford three misses when it comes to the total days being eighteen-ish. That’s a slightly thinner margin that I just need to stay on top of.

Water

My goal is to drink three litres of water a day. No surprises here, I’m aiming at 80% consistency again (I’ll cover why I aim at 80% consistency in a future post or podcast).

If you look at my track record, you would question why I’m worried about this habit. I’ve had nearly two straight years of achieving over 80% consistency.

However, if you go below the surface, there’s another story.

Even though I pretty much always make three liters a day – it’s often a rush in the second half of the day. Consuming the bulk of your water towards the end of the day is always a bad idea – because it involves a lot of pee-ing at night. That doesn’t help with the sleep goal!

Even though I’m doing great with my consistency, I want to make it a little smoother how I get there.

And the strategy I plan to use is simple, and I know it works.

I call it the 1/3, 1/3, 1/3 strategy. Yes, I know it’s a rubbish name for a strategy – I’ll think on that!

I need to drink a third of my total water intake in the first thirty minutes of waking. It’s not the most comfortable thing to do. I mean who really likes drinking cold water upon waking? But, getting that early win in the bank sets it into my awareness straight away. It also gets me an early win and momentum.

I then need to drink a third of my total water intake throughout the morning – before midday. That’s usually pretty easy given I’ve just done that in thirty minutes. It’s a super low bar.

That leaves me the rest of the afternoon to get through the last third – again, usually pretty easy given I have momentum and can now see the finish line.

That’s my focus for my water habit. Follow that strategy, and try to reach the goal a little more smoothly .

There you have it. 2024 is about really dialing in the four habits that need a bit of extra work – sleep, steps, fasting and water.

I’ll cover my progress with these four habits in future posts and episodes, and I will also share strategies and tips that can help you build foundational health habits for yourself.

But, for the time being, I wish you a healthy 2024!

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It’s about time that I properly laid out the eight foundational health habits.

Think about this as more of an introduction, than an in depth guide. I’ll keep things pretty high level for now, and then I’ll cover each habit in a lot more detail in future posts / podcasts.

For now, I want to introduce each of the habits, explain why they are foundational, and also what I’m striving for with each one.

So let’s get started.

#1 Sleep

Sleep, hands down, is my most foundational health habit.

I often say that my foundational health habits are the base of the pyramid for me. Without that base in place, I really struggle to operate at a high level with anything in my life. But, when I’m consistent with these habits, the foundations are strong, and I’m incredibly high functioning – whether that is with fitness, work, my mental health, or just any part of my life.

One thing that I haven’t ever shared is that I often question whether sleep itself might actually be THE base of the pyramid – and then the other seven habits are actually all equally a second level of the pyramid. Sleep is literally that important – in itself – but also in how it influences how consistent I’m able to be with the other habits.

When I don’t sleep well for a few nights, everything else starts to fall apart. My discipline just starts to crumble. I end up skipping workouts. I snack on processed foods. Bad choices just start to muscle out the good choices in my life.

Maybe this is something you’ve noticed in your own life? Think about it. When you’re tired, do you find it harder to stick to good habits? I suspect the answer is, yes.

But, don’t just take my word for it. If you want to delve deeper into the relationship between sleep and will power, I’d encourage you to check out Dr Andrew Huberman’s podcast on How to Increase Your Willpower and Tenacity. [1] Huberman spends a whole section covering how sleep affects the autonomic nervous system, and how important a well balanced autonomic function is to be able to consistently generate will power.

Simply put, he says

‘When we’re not getting enough sleep, our capacity to call on tenacity and will power will be diminished’.

In fact, he goes so far to say, unless your autonomic function is working well, most other tools or protocols to try and improve willpower won’t make that much difference. Again, very similar to my base of the pyramid metaphor.

Of course, aside from how a lack of sleep wreaks havoc with discipline, there are many benefits to being a well slept, well rested person. I’ll get into these in the future. For now, just know, if you’re not getting enough sleep, you’re going to have a hard time keeping everything together – possibly even anything together. And your health is going to suffer big time.

And that’s why I have sleep as a foundational health habit, and why I hold it in the highest regard out of all of my habits.

So, what is my goal when it comes to sleep? Personally, I shoot for six and a half hours. For me, that’s just a very clear line. Anything less than that, I feel it the next day. When I consecutively fall under six and a half hours for a few days? God, help me. It’s going to start getting messy.

I definitely want to progress that to seven hours at some point. I think that would be the sweet spot for me. But hey, one step at a time. I have quite a bit of work to do before I’m able to be consistent with six and a half hours.

#2 Alcohol

Alcohol is a huge deal. I have two main things to say on it.

The first, is that alcohol consumption is undeniably bad for your long-term health. There’s no shortage of studies that link alcohol consumption with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease and cancer.

There’s a really interesting study from Kiran Biddinger. [2] This study sets out to assess the link, not only between alcohol intake and cardiovascular disease risk – but also how different amounts of alcohol consumption affected that risk. And In short, the study found that consuming alcohol at all levels was associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease. So, yeah. very bad.

I know I’ve started off a bit gloomy when it comes to alcohol. But, there is actually a bit of good news with this study, which I’ll come back to in a minute. So, hang in there.

The second thing I want to say about alcohol, and this is particularly important when it comes to habits, is that it affects the quality of your sleep (you know, the habit I just talked about and consider the most important) – and not in a good way. Alcohol will fragment your sleep, and it also blocks you from getting into restorative phases of sleep. [3]

So, in short., If you’re going to prioritise sleep (and you should), alcohol is going to put one and a half hands behind your back.

I want to back that up with a real life example. Before I was sober, every time I would have a few drinks, my health metrics on my whoop band would be in the gutter the next morning . My resting heart rate would be sky high. My heart rate variability would be low. And my respiratory rate increased. I would always wake up with a low, red recovery score on my whoop app, telling me that my body wasn;t properly rested. The link between having a few drinks, and how my body was feeling the next day was just so clear to see.

And actually, here is an actionable thing you can do, to see it for yourself. If you don’t have a health wearable, try wearing one for a couple of weeks. You can grab a cheap fit bit, or like me, something more advanced, like a Whoop band. You will start to see a very obvious correlation between drinking the night before, and a set of horrible health metrics the next day.

And again, one of the biggest reasons for this, is that alcohol destroys the quality of your sleep.

So, in the same way that a lack of sleep will wreak havoc in my life, alcohol is arguably just as disastrous. And that’s why I have it as a foundational health habit.

As for my own goals with alcohol, that one is simple – I abstain from it entirely. I’ll definitely cover why I made that decision in a future post / podcast episode, watch this space.

Let’s get back to that piece of good news from the Kiran Biddinger study. One of the conclusions they drew was that whilst people who consume alcohol at low levels do have an elevated cardiovascular disease risk relative to those who abstain, this increase in risk is actually fairly small, and may even be mitigated or offset by other factors.

It’s not necessarily about completely abstaining – although to be clear, I do think that this is ultimately the best decision you can make for your long term health and to be able to stick to a set of foundational health habits. But, it’s at least about being mindful to have a low level of alcohol consumption – and you must set clear limits you can track your consistency against.

#3 Caffeine

Caffeine is a funny one because it has a range of positive and negative side effects. And actually, in the grand scheme of things, it seems as if most experts tend to err on the side of it being a net positive.

For example, it can help boost our brain function, our mood and our metabolism. It may even protect against heart disease, diabetes and a number of other diseases. However, it is also associated with anxiety, headaches, high blood pressure, irregular heartbeat, and trouble sleeping. [4]

It’s the trouble sleeping part that’s the reason I made it a foundational health habit for me. I want to do whatever I can to protect my sleep for the reasons we’ve already talked about.

Caffeine has a quarter life of 10-12 hours. What that means, is that if you have a coffee at midday, you can still expect about a quarter of it to be in your system at midnight. And we know for sure that caffeine is a sleep disruptor – like alcohol, it fragments your sleep and stops you getting into restorative phases of sleep.

For example, leading sleep expert, Professor Matthew Walker, points out:

Drinking just one dose of caffeine in the evening can decrease the amount of deep sleep by 20%. [5]

To put that in context, that type of reduction in deep sleep would usually happen as you age 15 years – that’s a big deal.

Now, it appears that we all have different levels of tolerance to caffeine. But on the whole, it’s sensible to limit both the amount of caffeine you consume, as well as when you consume it.

I limit my caffeine intake to a maximum of two cups per day, and never after midday. This tends to keep me on the right side of things for getting a good night’s sleep.

#4 Steps

The number of steps you walk per day is a really powerful habit, for a number of reasons.

When you commit to hitting a decent number of steps per day, you’re just an active person by default – regardless of what you do around it. And this is why it’s a foundational habit.

It’s so important, when I go on holiday, I pick only three health habits to stick to. Steps is one of those habits. Because at a baseline, it helps keep your head above water for being active.

It also happens to be the absolute easiest and most accessible form of exercise. I mean, virtually everyone is able to do it, and it’s free – I mean, you just have to go outside, and walk. It’s also very safe because it’s easy on the joints and therefore has a very low risk of injury – which makes it a perfect place to start if you want to have a more active lifestyle.

The other benefit to bringing in a habit of steps, is that it can be very effective for helping you lose weight. If you can commit to a decent number of steps per day, and even if you change nothing else, you are going to significantly increase the number of calories you burn every day. I’ve heard countless stories from people who have impressive weight loss stories, purely from only adding walking on a daily basis into their lifestyle. And not only that, it’s also a great addition to have, alongside a structured training program.

If all of that isn’t enough, check this out. There is a study on the lancet public health medical journal [6], that took a look at fifteen individual cohort studies. They found out that taking more steps per day was associated with a progressively lower risk of death. We’re not talking by a small margin either. Even getting your steps up to 5,800 steps per day, can help reduce one’s risk of death by 40%. And this increases as you increase your steps further. So, yeah – walking will make you live longer.

I shoot for 10,000 steps per day. That for me feels like the right amount of activity, when I consider the other forms of exercise I do.

#5 Protein

Most people don’t expect to see protein as a foundational habit – but let me explain why it has to be.

Building muscle should be an important goal of yours, no matter where you are in your fitness journey. Not only is it one of the keys to being a metabolically healthy and capable person now, it’s also a highly predictive metric of the quality of your life as you age, and how long you’re going to live.

I won’t get into the weeds for how protein builds muscle now – other than just say that when you consume protein, it is broken down into amino acids. Your body then uses these amino acids to create new muscle tissues.

So, to build muscle, you need to eat enough protein.

Building muscle aside, protein is also super useful for helping control the quantity and quality of the foods you eat – something which pretty much all of us find a challenge.

And that’s because firstly, protein is incredibly satiating. It can make you feel full and therefore helps you to eat fewer calories overall.

I’ll always remember listening to Greg Glassman, the founder of Crossfit talk about this in a nutritional seminar he gave.

It’s so true isn’t. Foods high in protein don’t make you feel like that. They just leave you satisfied.

The other thing about protein is that when you prioritise protein, it has this magical way of cleaning up your diet.

For example, let’s say you want some breakfast. If you think of protein first, you’re probably going to think of eggs. So, you drift towards making an omelet and chucking some other vegetables in it – or maybe some eggs with some sourdough, perhaps some avocado. When you don’t think of protein first, it’s all too easy to drift towards things like cereals, toast, or a pastry – all very low in nutritional value.

The same thing is true for lunch and dinner. When you prioritize protein, you tend to eat meats, potatoes, vegetables, and generally more whole foods. And when you don’t – it’s sandwiches, pastas, and stuff like that. Basically, more processed foods.

To summarise. Protein helps you build and maintain muscle mass. It also helps improve the quality of the foods you eat, and makes you less likely to overeat. And that’s why I have it as a foundational health habit.

The amount of protein we need is a bit of a controversial topic, and there is a wide range of opinions on it. I tend to listen more closely to experts who advocate for building lean muscle, people who look the part, and also tend to be very transparent about their health biomarkers. The advice from this crowd tends to be double the amount of grams for your body weight in KG.

For me, that equates to 150 grams of protein – so that’s the target I set for myself.

#6 Fasting

Like protein, on the surface, fasting feels an odd habit to have as a foundational health habit. But let me explain why it’s here.

Fasting really forces a healthier, and more intentional relationship with food. When you go through periods where you’re either allowed, or not allowed to eat – it’s now on your terms. You set the rules.

You start to realise, it’s OK to feel a little hungry and not react immediately. You’re in control – it now becomes an intentional and conscious process. This is actually very different to how the vast majority of people eat – where food is just always around us and up for grabs.

The other thing about fasting is that it generally helps you to better control your calorie intake – something which alot of us struggle with, and ends up leading to weight gain and other health issues. Fasting helps with this because you’re eating in a smaller time window. So, it just stands to reason – with less time available to eat, you tend to eat less.

I’ve found fasting incredibly powerful to regain control over my relationship with food and maintain a healthier body weight.

My target for fasting is 16 / 8, which is commonly referred to as intermittent fasting. It means a 16 hour fasting period, and an 8 hour eating period. I do this by skipping breakfast and usually eating between around 1PM though 9PM every day.

#7 Water

Being well hydrated is a fairly big deal – which is why I consider it a foundational health habit.

You’d be surprised how broad the benefits are to being well hydrated – and particularly how being dehydrated can negatively affect some of the other foundational health habits.

I like to think of the impact of being well hydrated in three main buckets. Two are specific, and one is related to the broader impact it has on my other foundational habits.

The first bucket is cognitive performance. Even slight levels of dehydration can make you feel fatigued and give you brain fog. But, when you’re well hydrated, you engage your sympathetic nervous system, which in turn helps increase your energy, focus and this helps to reduce brain fog. In short, you’re going to be sharper.

The second bucket is physical performance. It’s well proven that being well hydrated increases your performance when you’re exercising. And who doesn’t want the best bang for buck from your efforts in the gym? This can make a meaningful difference to your results over the mid to long-term.

The third bucket is the broader impact it has on my other foundational habits. There are alot of cellular processes in the body that rely on having the proper electrolyte balance – that’s enough sodium, magnesium and potassium. When these are off, it can really mess with your digestion, your cognitive performance and even your sleep. When you drink enough water and keep yourself hydrated, you’re much more likely to have a proper electrolyte balance.

So, how much water do I drink?

There’s no exact science in determining exactly how much water you should drink – and it can depend on a bunch of factors. Things like how active you are, whether you’re exposed to heat etc.

I ended up coming to my own number by listening to Dr Andy Galpin – who is a well respected authority in the health and fitness space. His recommendation is super straight forward.

Aim for half an ounce of fluid, per pound of bodyweight, per day. I weigh 175 lbs, so that equates to 88 fluid ounces. When you work that back into liters, you get to 2.5 liters. I then rounded that up to 3 liters to be safe.

#8 Whole Foods

Whole Foods is actually a new habit that I brought in only this month. That’s because, over the last few months I’ve been getting a growing feeling that I need something to bolster the nutrition side of things, and to hold me accountable for better food choices.

When I eat a diet mostly consisting of whole foods, it becomes much easier to be in good health, control my weight and build lean muscle. Quite frankly, I just feel amazing when I’m eating mostly whole foods.

On the flip side, when I’ve been in periods of eating a lot of ultra processed foods, the opposite is true. I get sick, I struggle with my weight – and I just feel lousy.

What do I mean by whole foods? Foods that tend to have one ingredient, and haven’t been heavily processed – so stuff like meat and fish, vegetables, fruit, nuts, milk, eggs, potatoes, oats etc.

That means avoiding foods outside of that definition, which I’ll call either processed or ultra processed foods. These are foods that tend to have over five ingredients in them. They usually come in packages and they usually have a long-shelf life. So, think of the obvious stuff like ready meals, cakes, biscuits, ice creams, chocolate bars – but even things not quite so obvious like fruit flavored yogurts, instant soups, fizzy drinks, mass produced white bread, breakfast cereals and bars etc.

Whilst I’ll cover the whole food topic in more detail in future episodes, for now I would recommend a really great documentary called the Magic Pill on Netflix [7]. They take a handful of different types of people struggling with health problems, and they put them on a paleo diet for 30 days – fruits, vegetables, lean meats, fish, eggs, nuts and seeds. Very close to the whole food definition.

In just 30 days, a lot of their health problems are reversed. It really highlights the power of making good food choices. It’s well worth a watch.

My goal when it comes to whole foods is to have 80% of my calories be whole foods – allowing myself 20% leniency. Having this as a daily habit that I track is already highlighting how much work I have to do. I’m going to come in at less than 50% consistency for the month of February – so, watch this space for future improvements!

There you have it. My eight foundational health habits – Sleep, Alcohol, Caffeine, Step, Protein, Fasting, Water and Whole Foods.

When you figure out how to keep these things in check most of the time – you’re going to be a completely different human being. You’re going to build that solid base of the pyramid I talked about at the beginning of this episode.

Of course, it’s one thing knowing that, and it’s another thing being able to do it.

Luckily for you, that’s why I write about foundational habits, and why I started The Daniel Clough Podcast. I’m looking forward to sharing more about these habits with you over the coming months, especially some of the strategies that will help you build foundational health habits into your own life.

Notes:

[1] How to Increase Your Willpower & Tenacity | Huberman Lab Podcast (this link jumps right to the segment on Autonomic Function, Tenacity & Willpower, Sleep & Stress)

[2] Association of Habitual Alcohol Intake With Risk of Cardiovascular Disease

[3] Effects of Alcohol on the Body: Data Insights for HRV, Sleep & More

[4] What Is Caffeine, and Is It Good or Bad for Health?

[5] Sleep Expert REVEALS How Caffeine DESTROYS Your Sleep & Productivity! | Matthew Walker

[6] Daily steps and all-cause mortality: a meta-analysis of 15 international cohorts

[7] The Magic Pill | Netflix

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I want to start with a quote. Firstly, because it’s my favourite quote – but it also just so happens to really nicely sum up my journey with health habits.

Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backward. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

That quote is from Steve Jobs. It’s always resonated deeply with me.

There was no one moment where I sat down and said – right I need to transform my life.

And to transform my life, I’m now going to track foundational health habits because I know they are the base of the pyramid for me. I also happen to know exactly which habits to track – and once they are nailed, I will be a completely different person. Someone who is more confident, more capable, has better energy and is in better health. Oh, and I will also be able to completely change my physique.

Even though that would be the perfect story – it didn’t happen like that. I wasn’t able to connect the dots looking forward in that way – only looking backwards, after I’d been on that journey.

So, let’s start at the beginning. It actually started with me wrestling to get my relationship with alcohol under control. For a long time, alcohol was a very big handbrake on my life.

As I got into my forties, my hangovers were getting worse, and longer – despite cutting down my drinking. I was often tired, anxious and full of self doubt.

Here are a couple of examples of how this has affected my life.

I run two management meetings on a Monday morning. I used to dread them. I’d feel nervous, anxious and full of self doubt leading up to them. I just felt horrible about myself. I could literally feel my heart racing as I spoke – even just anticipating that I would need to speak. It was a really big hurdle I had to deal with every week.

Another area of my life that I found difficult was consistently sticking to a training program and to eat healthily. I felt like I had no control over whether I trained four times a week, or none at all. There was also a lot of bingeing going on with food – a lot of over eating, and eating ultra processed comfort foods. Overall, I found it very hard to be a disciplined person. This ate away at me. I desperately wanted to be a disciplined person – someone who could do what I said, and do what I wanted to do.

I’d tried to set all types of rules for myself with alcohol. No more than four drinks a week. No more than two drinks per day. Only on weekends. But, without fail, I always eventually failed. This happened hundreds of times.

One day, I finally had enough. I can remember it vividly. I had been out the night before with some friends and had four or five drinks. I had broken my rule of not having more than a couple of drinks per day AGAIN. As a result, I was feeling terrible the next morning. I decided at that moment that I needed to cut alcohol out of my life forever. It was the only way. I recalled someone’s advice on getting sober I had listened to recently – ‘the best drink not to have, is the first one’. That was the mentality I needed to adopt.

I printed out a thirty day calendar and stuck it on the fridge, where it was right in front of me every day. I went for a don’t break the chain strategy. Every day I didn’t drink, I put a tick against it. Eventually, seven days unbroken, turned into thirty days unbroken – and thirty days into sixty days. And the rest is history.

I was amazed at how much better I felt. The feelings of tiredness, anxiousness and self doubt didn’t completely go away. But, I had long periods where they weren’t there. I felt like a brand new person.

Importantly, my journey with giving up alcohol introduced me to a very important concept – the power of tracking a habit on a daily basis, and making sure it was in my awareness many times throughout the day.

So, that was sort of stage one of the journey with building foundational health habits – giving up alcohol.

The next stage was realising how important sleep is for me. When I had a few consecutive nights of poor sleep, I would get the same feelings of tiredness, self doubt and a lack of discipline that I felt with alcohol.

That’s when a light bulb went off. It wasn’t just the alcohol making me feel like this. It might have been more the alcohol which was causing poor sleep – and together they were a deadly combination. The more I looked into it, I learned that alcohol stops your body getting the quality and restorative sleep it needs [1]. This all started to make a lot of sense now.

So, I tackled sleep in the same way I did alcohol. I set a goal of six and a half hours sleep, and alongside my no alcohol tick, I also started to put a tick for achieving six and a half hours sleep.

I don’t have those tick sheets from back then, but I can remember finding it really hard to hit even only 30% consistency for the first month. My sleep was terrible. However, the next month this crept up to 40%. And then over the next few months, it edged into 50%. Again, all because of the daily tracking and the fact that it was in the front of my awareness every day. By being so aware of it, it was pushing me to figure out ways to get better and better over time, so I could hit my sleep goal more regularly.

And surprise, surprise. When I strung together a few nights of sleep over 6 and a half hours – I became less tired – less anxious – and I had less self doubt. I found it so much easier to stick to my training and to eat more healthily. I was becoming a different and more capable person.

And then I had a thought. This worked for alcohol and was starting to work for sleep. I’m starting to get more consistent with my training and nutrition. I’m really liking how much better I’m feeling, and how disciplined I’m becoming. I should do this for a few more habits that would be good for me – why not really push this as far as I can?

This led to me coming up with a bunch of other health habits that felt sensible to tackle. I bought a trusty moleskin lined notepad and made one page my own daily tick sheet for the month. This way, I could track a handful of habits each month – in the same way I did with alcohol and sleep.

(my first ever monthly health habit tick sheet!)

And the rest is history.

January 2024 is my 25th month of tracking a set of foundational health habits. Over time, they’ve changed quite a bit – both the habits and the targets I set myself. I’ve now settled on eight really strong foundational health habits – the ones which really move the needle for me.

I’ve also had to have several big mindset shifts over the last couple of years, and through trial and error, I’ve figured out strategies for being consistent with each of my habits. Again, all of this was very hard to predict. But, I can now look back and see how I was able to incrementally get to this point – eight foundational health habits that I can be consistent with.

The results have been awesome. I hardly ever feel tired and anxious nowadays. In fact, most of the time I feel great and have really good energy.

Most of the self doubt has gone and I’m a much more confident person – in all areas of my life. My work, my relationships, how comfortable I am with myself. It sounds silly, but I really like myself now.

My discipline with my training and nutrition is OFF THE CHARTS. In fact, I often tell people I live my life like an athlete – which sounds ridiculous on the face of it. Trust me, my performance is nowhere near the level of an athlete. But, my discipline and the way I live my life wouldn’t be out of place with the discipline you see amongst athletes.

As a result, I’ve transformed my physique by losing over 20 lbs, and reducing my body fat. I’ve gone from seeing no abs, to now 4 abs, and at my leanest, 6 abs. I’ve also improved a bunch of health markers along the way too.

So there you have it. This whole journey started with me just generally just feeling lousy about myself and my health.

I tackled alcohol first, which obviously had a big impact in my life. That led to me tackling another big one – sleep. From there, I used these learnings to start tackling other habits. And over time, these transformed into the eight foundational health habits I have today.

As I said at the start, I could never have predicted this journey. I can only now connect the dots looking backwards and just be forever grateful that I stumbled into this journey.

I know, hands down, I will track foundational health habits in my life forever. The change has just been too powerful and I never want to lose my grip on it. In fact, I just want to take things to the next level now.

I hope you find my journey inspiring and will consider starting your own journey of building foundational health habits into your life. It’ll be life changing, I promise.

Reach out if you need help, I’d love to help.

Notes:

[1] Effects of Alcohol on the Body: Data Insights for HRV, Sleep & More

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