THE LIFESTYLE ENTREPRENEUR

Read time - 4 minutes

The simple health prescription

In my first issue I laid out my main content pillars:

1. Health/Wellness

2. Mindset & habits

3. Building businesses

4. Community/relationships

5. Play & self expression

Which are the areas of focus in life to create a life of joy and meaning.

Balanced habits, effort, and focus on all creates alignment and magic. Allowing one or multiple areas to slide for periods of time, and we start losing balance, and likely enjoyment.

Health and wellness seems like an obvious area of focus for most high achievers.

But it’s completely neglected by the majority of the population:

1. 46% of Americans don’t exercise at all

2. 69% of Americans don’t strength train

3. 33% of Americans get less than 7 hours a sleep a night

4. 30% of Americans report binge drinking each week

And as a result, Americans are fat, sick, anxious, and depressed. And it’s getting worse.

And the majority of people I know have trouble figuring out how to establish physical and mental fitness routines that have lasting effect over years.

Most are constantly in a cycle of starting new programs, having some results for a while, falling off the wagon, getting down on themselves, and repeating.

This happens because of a few key things:

1. People don’t prioritize their health

2. People rely on too much willpower and not enough habit formation

3. People spend their time on the wrong things

Each of these areas are meaty enough for a newsletter or a book chapter, so for today I’m going to dive into #3 and lay out my simple framework for an effective wellness program (note - mindfulness and mental health fits within this category, but today I’ll only speak about the physical health side).

Where did my philosophy come from?

Like all my areas of interest, my point of view comes from a combination of practical application, formal study, and personal tweaking over my 43 year lifetime. My wellness journey highlights are:

1. High school and college athlete - basketball and lacrosse

2. Marine Corps Infantry Officer - led Marines in the invasion of Iraq and in Afghanistan

3. Regular corporate guy trying to get in shape during my MBA and 3.5 year corporate stint while starting a business and having kids

4. Started first CrossFit gym in St Paul and Minneapolis, and launched Alchemy 365 in 2015. I coached an average of 2 classes per day for 7 years - that’s at least 5,000 hours of classes taught.

5. Started brazilian jiu jitsu as a practitioner in 2017

Despite being consistently involved in athletics and wellness my whole life, I didn’t get really consistently healthy until I was about 38 - when I figured out my own version of prioritizing, creating habits, and doing the right things on a daily basis.

Because of that, and the fact that I’ve never been a naturally athletic person, I have great empathy for the majority of people who have trouble with long-term compliance of programs.

I also have decades of personal tweaking along with training others to shape my viewpoint.

Ok here’s my recipe for a healthy body:

1. Strength train 3x a week :

2. Max out your heart rate 3-5x a week

3. Active lifestyle - move your body every day for 30-60 minutes in zone 2 cardio area (movement that you can still hold a conversation with, like hiking, yoga, dancing)

4. Mobility - train your joints and muscles through programming that increases range of motion over time

5. Sleep 7-9 hours a night

6. Limit alcohol to 2 drinks a day, 3 or less days a week

7. Active sex life

8. Eat real, unprocessed foods all the time. Minimize sugar and processed foods and oil. Focus on food quality.

Again - each of these areas could be a chapter or newsletter alone, but the point is they are simple prescriptions, that when added up and followed daily, create a balanced and healthy human.

So simple that for most people, an 80% adherence to these principles each week, will yield put them in the highest percentile of health among their age group.

Simple doesn’t mean easy, so how do you start with so many areas if you’re just getting going?

Start with your workout program - all of the above are important, but a consistent workout program has a waterfall effect that makes complying with the others much easier:

• The fitter you are the easier it is to sleep

• The fitter you are more you’ll want to have sex

• The fitter you are the more you’ll want to fuel yourself with quality ingredients

• Working out on the weekends will make you want to avoid a hangover

When in doubt - work it out. That’s an easy mantra for most people.

And when you’re balancing the crushing limitations of time when you’re building businesses, raising kids, and doing all the things - finding a few minutes for a workout is usually the right thing to do if you can only focus on one thing.

Being healthy is essential for optimal performance. And I believe deeply you can’t live your best life without taking care of yourself physically.

Hopefully this motivates you to have an active, healthy, and fun-filled weekend, I know I’m going to.

Talk to you next week,

Mike