Behaviors
3,731 protocols, ranked by how often the world’s top health podcasts mention them.
- Avoid Very Short Feeding Windows
Avoid 4-6 hour feeding windows for most people, as they tend to promote overeating and may not improve weight outcomes. In practice, do not go much below 8 hours if training hard, under high life stress, or trying to maintain ovulation/fertility, due to hormone and stress considerations.
▶ 1 - Maintain the New Feeding Schedule for at Least 30 Days
Once a comfortable feeding window is established, maintain it for at least 30 days; ideally indefinitely.
▶ 1 - HIIT in the Afternoon or Evening for Glucose Lowering
High-intensity interval training later in the day can lower blood glucose and help accelerate the transition into a fasted state before sleep, provided you do not eat afterward and do not use caffeine or anything else that disrupts sleep.
▶ 1 - Sauna 3-4 Times Per Week Before Sleep
Use the sauna three or four times per week, about 1-2 hours before sleep.
▶ 1 - Use Specific Habitual Routines to Segment the Day
Place specific habitual routines at particular intervals throughout the day to leverage dopamine and divide the day into functional units. Have one specific dopamine-evoking habit after waking, insert another regular habit around breakfast or later in the morning, and keep the sequencing regular without being obsessively precise about exact timing. Example given: habit markers around 8 a.m. and 10 a.m. to define distinct epochs within the morning.
▶ 1 - Equalize Ear Pressure During Altitude Changes
To relieve ear pressure during altitude changes, open the passageway behind the eardrum by plugging the nose and blowing out, plugging the nose and sucking in, or moving the jaw; the key is opening the passageway so the pressure differential can resolve.
▶ 1 - Cyclic Hyperventilation Before Gratitude Practice
One optional way to increase autonomic arousal before gratitude work is cyclic hyperventilation: very deep inhale-exhale breathing for 25 to 30 breaths, followed by meditation or writing gratitude notes.
▶ 1 - Take Gratitude Bullet-Point Notes
After choosing your gratitude story, write 3 or 4 short bullet points on a small sheet of paper or in your phone to cue the practice later. Include the struggle or pre-gratitude state, the help or gratitude event, the post-gratitude state, and any emotionally salient elements or how it impacts you emotionally. Read these bullet points as a cue to your nervous system before feeling into the experience.
▶ 1 - Calming Breathing Before Gratitude Practice
Calming breathing can be done before a gratitude practice, but it is optional and not required. Examples include exhale-emphasized breathing or physiological sighs to help slow the heart rate and calm down beforehand.
▶ 1 - Time Supplements and Meals to Support Muscle Building
Time eating and supplements strategically so muscle can be built at certain times without constant growth signaling.
▶ 1 - Avoid Constant Supplement Use
Do not take certain supplements continuously; instead use every-other-day dosing or periodic breaks to give the body rest.
▶ 1 - Measure Biological Age
Measure biological age to assess whether interventions are working.
▶ 1 - Avoid Airport Body Scanners
Opt out of airport scanners that use radiation and choose alternative screening such as the metal detector.
▶ 1 - Limit Dental X-Rays
Try to minimize dental X-rays because radiation exposure is cumulative.
▶ 1 - Avoid Withdrawal as Contraception
Do not rely on the withdrawal method to avoid unwanted pregnancy; it was described as a poor contraceptive choice.
▶ 1 - Lateral Eye Movements
Move the eyes from side to side with eyes open; described as reducing activation of the amygdala/threat reflex circuitry and lowering sympathetic arousal.
▶ 1 - Regular Social Connection
Maintain regular, trusting social connection while working through fear or trauma, such as conversing, sharing a meal, or appropriate physical touch. This can be beneficial whether in therapy or working alone and may reduce tachykinin-related amplification of fear and trauma.
▶ 1 - Interoceptive-Exteroceptive Self-Assessment
Assess whether internal sensations are reasonable given external circumstances; he presents this as a biological component people can assess for themselves when considering fear/trauma.
▶ 1 - Five Minutes Per Day of Deliberate Self-Directed Stress
Very brief daily deliberate stress exposure, potentially for 2 weeks, is presented as a promising protocol for recalibrating stress/fear systems. He emphasizes self-directed entry into the stressed state and cautions that longer bouts like 15 minutes/day may worsen trauma/fear. Methods can include deliberate cold exposure such as a cold shower, ice bath, or cold water immersion.
▶ 1 - Adopt an Empowering Mindset About Healthy Food
View healthy foods as potent for energy, immune function, and endocrine function, and approach eating them with a mindset of indulgence, satisfaction, and enjoyment rather than chronic restraint or deprivation.
▶ 1 - Adopt an Empowering Mindset About Exercise
View exercise as remarkably potent and effective for health, and cultivate a sense of enoughness rather than constantly feeling you never get enough exercise.
▶ 1 - Use Subjective Sleep Assessment if Tracker Scores Bias You Negatively
If numerical sleep or recovery scores cause negative expectancy effects, avoid looking at device readouts and instead decide subjectively on waking whether you slept well or not.
▶ 1 - Delay Bathroom Break for Alertness
After drinking water during an all-nighter, avoid going to the bathroom for at least 90 minutes to leverage bladder-driven alertness; example given was 32 ounces of water.
▶ 1 - Restricted Visual Window for Focus
Keep the work target directly in front of you and not too far beyond the sides of your head; use an invisible-blinders style visual window. Avoid working on a screen so large that it extends far beyond your head/ear width if you want to maintain focus.
▶ 1 - Use Active Workstations for Non-Verbal Tasks
Use treadmill or cycling workstations for tasks requiring focus/cognitive control, but not for tasks requiring precise verbal memory recall.
▶ 1 - Move Work Location Within the Day
Change work locations across the day, such as house to cafe, office to home, or room to room, to maintain alertness and engagement. If attention drifts in long sessions, move to a different seat or visual angle periodically, including after each session.
▶ 1 - Observe Natural Breathing in a Quiet Room
Lie down in a quiet room, relax, breathe normally without controlling the breath, and pay attention to your breathing for a few minutes to notice that a deep breath or physiological sigh tends to occur naturally every couple of minutes to about every five minutes.
▶ 1 - Use brief multitasking before focused work
A bit of multitasking before focused goal-directed work can help generate adrenaline and get you into action, but should not be maintained throughout the work bout.
▶ 1 - Use broad visual focus to relax goal-directed activation
When not trying to activate focused pursuit, broaden the visual aperture instead of focusing narrowly. This is associated with a more relaxed state.
▶ 1 - Reduce visual clutter
Keep the visual environment sparse to help orient attention and behavior toward what is in front of you. If you must pursue multiple overlapping goals, create systems that isolate them rigidly and align toward each sequentially rather than all at once.
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