In this episode 42 protocols
▶ 9:35 Zone 2 Cardio Behaviors “I've talked before on the podcast about the fact that the scientific literature and the health literature really points to the incredibly positive effects of getting 150 minutes to 180 minutes per week minimum of what's called zone two cardio. Zone two cardio is basically any cardiovascular exercise that gets you moving and your heart pumping and breathing, but not so hard that you can't hold a conversation.” ▷ 12:44 Walk After Dinner Behaviors “There's actually a really nice literature showing that walks after a meal can speed glucose clearance from the bloodstream, can be beneficial for not just weight loss, but cardiovascular health, et cetera. So a walk after dinner seems pretty straightforward, right?” ▷ 16:45 Resistance Training Behaviors “And I'm in the habit of doing resistance training three or four times per week, typically also for about 45 to 60 minutes per session. Now, I enjoy those.” ▷ 16:53 Exercise Early in the Day Behaviors “And for reasons that I'll get into a little bit later, I place those activities typically early in the day because of the neurochemistry and the various types of hormones, et cetera, that are associated with performing those activities.” ▷ 26:12 Procedural Memory Visualization Behaviors “It can simply be, if you are deciding to, you know, adopt a new habit, to just think about the very specific sequence of steps that's required to execute that habit.” ▷ 39:11 Use Phase-Based Habit Scheduling Behaviors “It involves dividing the 24 hour days into what I call three phases. The first is phase one, which is zero to eight hours after waking up, approximately. The second phase is the nine to 14, maybe 15 hours after you wake up. And the third phase is 16 to 24 hours after waking up.” ▷ 41:26 Morning Light Exposure Behaviors “They involve, for instance, viewing sunlight or bright artificial light if you can't access sunlight within the first 30 minutes of waking.” ▷ 41:49 Deliberate Cold Exposure Behaviors “Cold exposure in the form of cold showers or ice baths or outside with minimal clothing, appropriate yet minimal clothing.” ▷ 41:56 Caffeine Diet “Caffeine ingestion, fasting, for instance, not ingesting calories also will lend itself to increased norepinephrine, dopamine, et cetera.” ▷ 41:56 Fasting Behaviors “Caffeine ingestion, fasting, for instance, not ingesting calories also will lend itself to increased norepinephrine, dopamine, et cetera.” ▷ 42:09 Protein Intake in the Morning Diet “If you are going to consume food, for example, you're going to consume a lot of protein, foods that are rich in things like tyrosine, which is a precursor for dopamine.” ▷ 42:17 Alpha-GPC Supplements “And for those of you that are interested in supplementation and like to use those routes, things like alpha-GPC or phenylethylamine or L-tyrosine, if that's in keeping with what you're able to do. Of course, consult your doctor if you're going to rely on supplementation.” ▷ 42:17 Phenylethylamine Supplements “And for those of you that are interested in supplementation and like to use those routes, things like alpha-GPC or phenylethylamine or L-tyrosine, if that's in keeping with what you're able to do. Of course, consult your doctor if you're going to rely on supplementation.” ▷ 42:17 Ashwagandha Supplements “For those of you that are interested in supplementation and like to use those routes, things like alpha-GPC or phenylethylamine or L-tyrosine, if that's in keeping with what you're able to do.” ▷ 42:17 L-Tyrosine Supplements “And for those of you that are interested in supplementation and like to use those routes, things like alpha-GPC or phenylethylamine or L-tyrosine, if that's in keeping with what you're able to do. Of course, consult your doctor if you're going to rely on supplementation.” ▷ 43:49 Place High-Friction Habits in Phase 1 Behaviors “Take the habits for which you know there's the highest degree of limbic friction. They are the hardest for you to engage in. They require the most activation energy and put those in this zero to eight hours after waking.” ▷ 44:52 Avoid Rigid Exact-Time Scheduling for Habits Behaviors “The literature indicates that people who do that, who are very rigid about when they do things, tend, because of context dependence, to not necessarily stick to those habits over time. Some people do, but many, many people don't.” ▷ 48:11 Reduce Bright Artificial Light Later in the Day Behaviors “First of all, as the day goes on, you should try if you can to start tapering the amount of light that you're viewing.” ▷ 48:34 Afternoon or Evening Sunlight Exposure Behaviors “Viewing the sun as it's what we call low solar angle. So as it's headed toward the horizon, you don't necessarily have to watch the sunset, although that can be nice, but getting some sunlight in your eyes in the second half of the day can also be beneficial.” ▷ 49:22 NSDR Behaviors “Things like NSDR, non-sleep deep rest. Another thing that I've talked about on this podcast... non-sleep deep rest is an umbrella term for things like meditation, for yoga nidra, a very powerful science supported tool for teaching you how to relax.” ▷ 49:37 Self-Hypnosis Behaviors “Things like self-hypnosis, which might sound a little kooky to some of you, but actually is a clinically based tool for which there's a lot of scientific literature. You can do these short 15 minute self-hypnosis scripts, as they're called, that can teach you how to relax yourself.” ▷ 49:44 Reveri App Tools “If you're interested in that, there's a great free resource called Reveri, R-E-V-E-R-I.com. There's a app for both Apple and Android. This is an app that was developed by colleagues of mine and researchers at Stanford School of Medicine.” ▷ 50:13 Sauna Tools “Things like heat and sauna, hot baths, hot showers. Those are terrific things to do in the second half of the day.” ▷ 50:13 Hot Bath Behaviors “Things like heat and sauna, hot baths, hot showers. Those are terrific things to do in the second half of the day.” ▷ 50:13 Hot Shower Behaviors “Things like heat and sauna, hot baths, hot showers. Those are terrific things to do in the second half of the day.” ▷ 55:47 Keep the Sleep Environment Very Dark or Very Dim Behaviors “Those things are very low to no light, meaning keeping your environment very dark or very, very dim.” ▷ 56:01 Keep the Sleep Environment Cool Behaviors “For most people keeping the room dark and keeping the room temperature low is very beneficial for getting and staying in deep sleep. The body has to drop by about one to three degrees in order to get into sleep and to stay asleep.” ▷ 56:29 Avoid Going to Bed Hungry Behaviors “One thing that can be useful is to make sure that you're at least well fed enough when you head into this third phase of every 24 hour day, that you're not awake because you're hungry.” ▷ 56:41 Experiment With Final Meal Timing Before Bed Behaviors “A lot of people recommend putting a gap between your final bite of food and when you go to sleep at night, some people will say that gap should be four hours, other people say two hours... You have to experiment for yourself.” ▷ 56:59 Theanine Supplements “I've talked about supplements that can support sleep in previous episodes of the podcast, things like magnesium threonate or magnesium bisglycinate, things like theanine, apigenin.” ▷ 56:59 Apigenin Supplements “I've talked about supplements that can support sleep in previous episodes of the podcast, things like magnesium threonate or magnesium bisglycinate, things like theanine, apigenin.” ▷ 56:59 Magnesium Bisglycinate Supplements “I've talked about supplements that can support sleep in previous episodes of the podcast, things like magnesium threonate or magnesium bisglycinate, things like theanine, apigenin.” ▷ 56:59 Magnesium Threonate Supplements “I've talked about supplements that can support sleep in previous episodes of the podcast, things like magnesium threonate or magnesium bisglycinate, things like theanine, apigenin.” ▷ 57:48 Avoid Caffeine Late in the Day Behaviors “Obviously not drinking caffeine in the middle of the night or too close to bed. That's going to be critical.” ▷ 58:25 Use Minimal Light if You Wake at Night Behaviors “Very important if you get up in the middle of the night to use a minimum of light in order to navigate your surroundings just as much as you need in order to safely do so because light inhibits the hormone melatonin, can make it very hard to fall back asleep.” ▷ 1:01:53 Move Established Habits Around to Build Context Independence Behaviors “Moving that particular habit around, somewhat randomly, can actually be beneficial to you because actually moving it from one time of day to the other is that context independence that we really are seeking.” ▷ 1:18:56 21-Day Habit Program Behaviors “So this is at least for sake of this example, a 21 day system. I picked 21 days because that seems to be the average or most typical system for engaging neuroplasticity as it relates to the formation of new habits.” ▷ 1:23:52 Use the Next 21 Days to Test Habit Automaticity Behaviors “After 21 days, you stop engaging in this 21 day deliberate four to five things per day type schedule. And you simply go into autopilot. You ask yourself how many of those particular habits that I was deliberately trying to learn in the previous 21 days, are automatically incorporated into my schedule?” ▷ 1:29:16 Quality Nutrition Diet “So things like stress reduction, things like getting good sleep, things like quality nutrition, things like having positive routines arranged throughout your day, all of those, of course, will support you in trying to break particular habits.” ▷ 1:29:16 Get Good Sleep Behaviors “So things like stress reduction, things like getting good sleep, things like quality nutrition, things like having positive routines arranged throughout your day, all of those, of course, will support you in trying to break particular habits.” ▷ 1:29:16 Stress Reduction Behaviors “So things like stress reduction, things like getting good sleep, things like quality nutrition, things like having positive routines arranged throughout your day, all of those, of course, will support you in trying to break particular habits.” ▷ 1:38:35 Replacement Behavior After a Bad Habit Behaviors “The period immediately after the bad habit execution is a unique opportunity to insert a different type of what we would call adaptive behavior, but that could be any behavior that's not in line with the bad behavior. You literally exit whatever you are doing and perform that other new positive habit in the immediate period right after that, even for a short period of time.”