All protocols

Use an older separate phone or device loaded with music or audio but without texting or outside communication to avoid distraction during exercise.

Use familiar, motivating, often faster or more upbeat music intermittently during exercise rather than continuously throughout. Examples include listening during rest periods between resistance-training sets, periodically during running or cycling, or alternating silence and music during workouts.

Use faster music to shift mood toward happiness. Happy music tends to be about 140 to 150 beats per minute or faster, often in a major key, and listening for 9 minutes or more appears to be the threshold for significantly improving mood.

When feeling sad, match or amplify the sadness with sad music to help process those feelings. Sad music tends to average 50 to 60 beats per minute or less, and listening for 13 minutes or more was described as effective for processing somber feelings and moving past sadness.

Use this specific song as a rapid anxiety-reduction intervention. As little as 3 minutes was associated with up to a 65% reduction in anxiety in one study. Keep it queued on your phone or device so you can use it when you anticipate anxiety.

Learning an instrument at any age appears to enhance neuroplasticity and acquisition of new skills beyond music itself; learning multiple instruments is described as even better, especially in children younger than eight, for enhancing brain connectivity and plasticity.

Listen to music you do not typically listen to in order to expand brain connectivity and support neuroplasticity. Use 30 to 60 minutes per session, and it does not need to be daily; even 3 days per week was described as beneficial. Actively attend to the music rather than letting it play in the background.

Singing, including as an adult, is associated with enhanced learning and neuroplasticity; singing with others in a group is especially emphasized as beneficial.

Recommendation to continue learning new things throughout life to support healthier aging and longevity.

Recommendation to focus first on improving your own mental health so you can recognize health or lack of health in others and protect against bad relationships.

Recommendation to notice avoidance patterns when you want to do something but cannot bring yourself to do it, and to investigate the avoidance rather than simply accepting it.

Recommendation to examine whether discomfort comes from trauma, social disparagement, bad experiences, or internalized beliefs.

Recommendation to identify attachment insecurity, honor it without shame, and avoid letting it drive unhealthy overcontrol.

Recommendation that with understanding, empowerment, and support, people do not have to stay in abusive situations.

Recommendation to use community support systems and opportunities for interconnection, including social venues and religiously affiliated venues, to help in difficult situations and foster health more broadly.

When anxiety is affecting a relationship, first identify that you are anxious, use introspection to determine if it is too high for comfort, start by looking at yourself, ask why, and consider biological, psychological, environmental, and other-person contributors.

For people with lifelong, chronically high anxiety, the speaker suggests that a small amount of medication to reduce baseline anxiety may be helpful long term; no specific compound or dosage is named.

Recommendation to notice if low motivation or demoralization is being soothed by overusing something.

Recommendation to discern feeling states and intention states in self and others as a route to truth and healthier relationships. This includes learning about the other by putting yourself in their shoes, being aware of your own state first so your understanding has fidelity, using mentalization even when things are going well, and asking during conflict: is it me, is it you, is it us?

Recommendation to watch for rationalization, projection, and other defenses that distort your reading of another person.

Recommendation to postpone difficult conversations when you are too activated to think clearly and revisit them later when both people are calm, cool, and collected.

Avoid foods with very high sodium content, especially highly processed foods.

Be aware that sugar is added to savory products such as spaghetti sauces and salad dressings.

Avoid consistently eating very sweet or very savory hyperpalatable foods, because over time they can rewire food preference and appetite so that healthy foods taste less appealing.

Favor a slightly lower-calorie, nutrient-enriched diet built around healthy proteins plus fruits and vegetables.

Suggested as part of school precautions during infectious disease periods.

Recommended in the context of school infectious disease precautions.

Recommended in the context of school infectious disease precautions.

Make environmental changes around food availability and quality because food environment affects health.

Physical activity was named as a key health behavior affecting overall health.