All protocols

If errors are not hazardous, continue practicing at a high repetition rate rather than stopping when mistakes occur; learning is often possible in that period.

Avoid increasing dopamine levels before motor skill learning using pharmacology because it reduces signal-to-noise and likely hinders plasticity.

Even when working with a coach, include a period in each session where the athlete simply attends to their own errors without external cueing.

After receiving a correction from a coach, generate many repetitions from that corrected position or pattern rather than constantly switching cues.

After skill practice or training, do nothing for a brief period so the brain can replay and consolidate the motor sequence. Ideally sit or lie quietly with eyes closed for about 5–10 minutes, though even 1 minute can help; avoid new sensory input, social media, email, conversation, or shifting to other learning tasks.

In early sessions, let errors guide attention instead of deliberately cueing specific movement features. This approach may be used for one session or several sessions.

Once somewhat familiar with the movement and occasionally performing it well, deliberately cue attention to one specific aspect of the movement and keep attention on that one thing consistently throughout the session; as skill deepens, focusing purely on the motor execution itself can be beneficial.

Once making fewer errors and the core motor pattern is learned, attention can shift across features such as motor sequence, stance, grip, speed, or outcome from trial to trial; doing this too early is suboptimal.

Use ultra-slow or slow-motion practice only after some proficiency has been gained. It is suggested to become beneficial once success reaches about 25–30%, rather than when success is only 5–10%.

For swimmers, use a device placed in the swim cap that cues when to perform another stroke.

Determine your current repetition rate, then set a metronome slightly faster to force more repetitions and adaptive errors. Especially useful for speed work such as sprinting, swimming, or running to increase strokes, steps, or efficiency and train central pattern generators at higher speed.

To increase flexibility or range of motion, measure your current range of motion, then keep your head and body still while moving your eyes to the far periphery—left, right, up, and down—and retest. This can increase range of motion by about 5–15 degrees and can be used as a warm-up before exercise or skill learning when range of motion matters.

Before training, some people may benefit from 1–2 cups of coffee along with hydration to improve focus and motivation; avoid coffee if it makes you jittery or causes attention to jump around.

For physical learning, if using caffeine, take it before training so its effects extend into the session, rather than trying to spike arousal after training.

Do not interrupt practice with texting or other distractions; prioritize density of repetitions within the session.

Seek professional help rather than trying to manage serious anxiety or psychiatric symptoms entirely alone. The guest notes that leaving a serious anxiety issue untreated for a year or more can convert to depression.

Pay attention to your own patterns, family observations, and potentially device-based metrics to detect when you may be veering toward depression so you can seek treatment earlier. One classic early sign is early morning awakening: waking progressively earlier and being unable to fall back asleep, sometimes shifting from 5 a.m. to 4 or 3 a.m.

Used during writing or thinking to reduce distraction by removing the border so only the document remains visible.

Get above 1,000 mg of EPA per day to support metabolism and fat loss; this can be obtained from food sources such as fatty fish, grass-raised meats, or plant sources of essential fatty acids.

Change up exercise patterns and engage in novel types of movement, especially exercise involving lots of different body parts and movements, to potentially access stubborn fat stores and encourage maintenance or growth of neural innervation of fat throughout the body.

Keep insulin levels relatively low if the goal is body fat reduction and fat oxidation.

Reuse mate leaves repeatedly over about a day to extract more of the compounds that increase GLP-1.

Pay close attention while tasting food and repeatedly practice tasting to improve sensitivity and discrimination of flavors and develop a more nuanced palate over time. Includes really tasting food, focusing on component parts of foods, and taking an active role in tasting and smelling food.

Do not sniff real ammonia directly; it can damage the olfactory epithelium, olfactory pathway, and possibly vision/eye surfaces.

If using smelling salts, work with someone or know exactly what you're getting and how you're using them; misuse can severely damage the olfactory pathway and vision.

Do not ingest foods or beverages that are too hot, because burning the tongue damages taste receptors and can reduce taste for about a week.

Can be purchased online and changes taste receptor configuration so sour tastes sweet; effects last several hours. Presented as a fun experiment to invert sweet and sour perception, with a note to check package warnings and safety concerns.

When combining strength and endurance training, get at least 4 hours between workouts, ideally 6 hours, and even better 24 hours.

During high-intensity work, exhale during the highest-effort/concentric phase of the movement and inhale during the less intense portion, usually the eccentric phase.

Before endurance work or in the first few minutes, warm up the intercostals, diaphragm, and breathing system to breathe more deeply and deliver more oxygen. This can be done sitting, standing, walking, or while starting to pedal. Emphasize both chest/intercostal expansion and diaphragmatic belly expansion; if feeling unmotivated, do about 30 deep breaths or roughly a minute of this practice.