Dynamic Dialogue with Danny Matranga - 251: 15 Habits to Make 2023 Your Happiest and Healthiest year ever

Episode Date: January 2, 2023

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This episode is brought to you in special part thanks to our awesome partners over at Ice Barrel. If you're like me, you want to get the absolute most you can out of your fitness and out of what it is that you're doing in life. I like to make sure that I'm recovering well and prepped for hard workouts. I like to make sure that my cognition is sharp and I like to make sure that I'm doing what I can to maintain my long-term health. And cold water immersion is a phenomenal tool I use and have

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free sample pack containing all of Elements' amazing flavors like mango chili, citrus, raspberry, orange, and more. To get access to this free gift with purchase, scroll down to the show notes and check out using the special link for Dynamic Dialogue listeners. Welcome in everybody to another episode of the Dynamic Dialogue podcast. As always, I'm your host, Danny Matranga. And in this episode, we're going to be discussing 15 habits and behaviors you can implement in 2023 to live a happier, healthier life with better performance in the gym, in work, and in everything that you do. These are habits and behaviors I've either implemented myself with success, implemented with clients with success, or am eyeballing myself in 2023 on my own journey to improve my quality of life. And I figured, hey, I ought to share these because

I always find it very helpful when I listen to a podcast from somebody whose advice I respect, when they outline things that they're doing in their life to improve. Because when somebody is making a conscious effort and trying to improve, and they're doing the trial and error and trial and tribulation, you know, you get that sense of, hey, I'm going to tag along for the journey or I'm going to give this a go too. There's an almost communal effect when you hear that other people are working on bettering themselves. And it's something that so many people stay quiet about or they're obnoxious about. And so my goal today is for you to listen to this, hear this, hear my reasoning. This should not come across as obnoxious. It should come across as like, hear this, hear my reasoning. This should not come

across as obnoxious. It should come across as like, hey, there's a list. There are three to five of these items on this list, habits on this list that I can implement, that I can inject into my life that will make it better. I really don't think any of these are super asinine and just unreasonable for you to implement and incorporate into your life. In fact, I'm really confident that many of these will prove to be on the easier side of things. And they come from a variety of different areas, which I think will be quite nice. It's not all fitness, but it is a lot of fitness and health with some additional focus on performance, on quality of life, on sleep, peace of mind,

things that I think will make your life better. Okay. So the first habit and behavior that, and this is one that I am looking to implement, I've implemented it with success, but I've been hardly able to maintain it for any respectable amount of time. And that is a screen time limit on social media applications. Almost any smartphone on the market these days has a setting you can use to not only set a general screen time limit, but to also set a individualized or even batch screen time limit. For example, on an iPhone, you can simply open up your settings, access screen time, and choose to reduce screen time on applications that are in the music category, in the video category, in the social media category. So what I will be doing in 2023 is attempting to, and this is an attempt,

this will be quite difficult because of the amount I engage with social media as a professional. Okay. I'm going to set a two hour daily screen time limit. I've actually already started doing this and I'm doing okay. What's interesting to me is the days where I like lay down in bed and at eight o'clock I get the alert, Hey, uh, you've reached your screen time limit versus the day where the days where I hit it at like 10 AM or am I having a lot of human to human interaction on those days? I find a lot of dead time is filled with social media and I don't want to do that in the year 2023. I think social media is a drug. I know that I create

content on social media. So I'm very aware that if I follow that rabbit hole deeply enough, I will find some hypocrisy there and probably even a misaligned or asymmetrical value structure. Like I like what social media does for me. I like what social media gives me access to, but I'm also aware that social media can be dangerous. I'm so aware of it. In fact, that I'm setting a screen time to only allow myself to access it for two hours a day, because I think that if I spend more time on that, there's a huge diminishing marginal return. And this includes the work I would be doing on social media as a professional, not just my own intake. On the days that I have done this successfully, I'd say I have the 50% success rate so far. I can probably get most of

the comments I'm going to engage with, most of the content I'm going to post, posted inside of about an hour and a half, which leaves me a half an hour for personal use. And like I said, the busier I am on those days, the longer that half an hour can go. But there are days where I can literally write one tweet storm, post one Instagram post, communicate with a few comments, interface with a few comments, and have personal use. And I completely run out of steam. And I'm at the two-hour mark at 11 a.m. And it's challenging, but I do think there is a huge, huge benefit to reducing the amount you engage with social media. And the reason I say this goes back to the fact that I think of

social media as a drug. In effect, it's going to operate on a lot of the same systems and the same neural circuitry that drugs do. I think it's very addictive. I think certain apps like TikTok, take the addictive capability of social media to new levels. I did not think of any content coming along, especially after Vine died, that would be short form video and somehow this captivating, especially with the utilization of hooks and song parts and trending audio versus trending verbiage or even things trending thematically. They've paired many different things together to create what I believe to be the most addictive form of content in, in human history, outside of perhaps like pornographic material of certain types with certain people. I don't even know. And so I think to myself, that cannot

set me up for success in the new year to spend a shit ton of time on these platforms. I should spend enough to contribute what I think is mostly good and mostly helpful. And then I should probably chill on it. And I should probably use it less. And like all of the homie group chats that I have on there, I can transfer those to my phone. Like, you know, I can still keep up with the boys and none of my friends really post on social anyway. So that's not really what I see when I'm on social media. It's mostly politics and it's mostly sports. And so like that stuff that I think, you know, that's not, it directly affects my life, but the way in which I give it time unyielding, got to work on that. So tip number one to live better in the year 2023 is to set

screen time limits. An actionable limit for most people, I think would be two to three hours a day reserved for total time. Meaning like on the smartphone in general, if you have a social media business or a component of your business that requires you be on social media, at least set a social media cap screen time cap. Okay. Number two, uh, would be to try a dry or dopamine reset. And so I should say to try a dry period or a dopamine reset or detox. And these are from, they're not from Dr. Anna Lemke's work, but they are inspired by Dr. Anna Lemke's work and the book she wrote, A Dopamine Nation, and just the general ideology that abstinence or abstaining from a particular substance is likely the best tool for resetting your neural circuitry around

addictive or compulsive use and putting you in a position where you can better interface with substances and not have a risk of being addicted or having compulsive use development. And this is really fitting to come in at number two, since number one was all about screen time and how easily you can get hooked to that. So what a dry period is, or what a dopamine detox is, we'll start with the dry period. A dry period refers specifically to alcohol, which I believe to be probably the most pervasively used drug that has a negative impact on people's health and performance. Now, I don't want to get puritanical. I am heavily biased. I have an opinion about alcohol that probably puts me in the

minority slash more extreme camp and that I really try not to drink. And quite frankly, I don't drink at all. I've probably had less than 30 full serving alcoholic beverages in my entire adult life. That's like less than one to two a year. When people ask me if I drink, I usually just say, no, I don't. Um, and it's not that I am so against it or that I am in a, uh, uh, practice of sobriety that I, I literally like ideologically will not allow it or it's against a religion. In fact, I've actually had people assume that I literally ideologically will not allow it or it's against a religion. In fact, I've actually had people assume that I am extremely religious because I don't drink, which sometimes I think just highlights where we're at as a society. So please do not take

this as condescending. If you are somebody who enjoys alcohol, I totally understand there are things that I indulge and enjoy myself. And that's part of why we're recording this episode. But a dry period would be a time in which you committed to not drinking. And I think a month is a really good dry period. This is something that I've implemented with tremendous success for clients who are looking to either sleep better or lose body fat who also consume alcohol. Because there's two things that happen when you remove alcohol. One is that you tend to get better REM sleep. The second thing is that you tend to eat less because you have better control around food. Not necessarily because alcohol itself lowers your inhibitions. That's obviously the most direct way, but it actually goes back to that REM sleep thing.

Alcohol is so disruptive for REM sleep that you don't get that kind of willpower recharge effect that sleep has on the brain. So if you're in a situation where you're drinking most nights and you're not getting adequate, deep recuperative sleep, it makes it harder to perform at work. It makes it harder to stick to your diet. It makes it harder to lose body fat. And so I've just seen over the years, wow, not drinking has all these unique improvements. And so that would be a reason to consider implementing a dry month, even if you're somebody who plans to continue drinking alcohol in the future. Now, if you really don't like your relationship with alcohol or you have a dependence thing, then that's something that you should see a psychologist about. Again, I am not a doctor, so you shouldn't take any of my advice seriously, or you should at least

consult a medical professional before you implement any of this advice. But if you are drinking to a degree that it's not making you feel good, or you wake up hungover the next day, you'll really, really benefit big time, I'm telling you, from a dry month. I think you could try it. I think it would be at the very least somewhere between slightly challenging to super rewarding, but I don't think it will ever be extremely uncomfortable. I'm not asking you to be sober. I'm saying try a dry month. And this is one that I won't be implementing because I can do that pretty easily, but it's one I might recommend for you. And the second component of this is a dopamine detox, which can be for a day.

It can be for a week. Again, inspired by Dr. Anna Lemke's book, Dopamine Nation. But this is a opportunity to expand your social connections, get some friends involved and say, hey guys, I'll use my, my male friends as an example. Hey guys, we're going to do no sports betting and we're going to do less than two hours of screen time a day. And we're going to do no alcohol in January. So we'll be setting a screen time limit. We'll be doing, um, no sports gambling. We'll be doing no drinking. And that builds the opportunity for us to quote unquote detox or reduce the amount of reward chemical we are bombarding our brain with

because of the dopaminergic effect of those activities. So you're saying, hey, let's get together. You can do this independently too. And let's cut multiple things out. Some people do like a dopamine detox where they go like a whole month with no, or a whole day with no phone, a whole day with no stim, all that stuff, all of the screens. And they do it with friends and they just sit in a room and you know, I'm sure people would feel very uncomfortable with that. But that's something you could do for a day with a group of people. That's something you could do with, you know, you could do that solo. But these are things that I'm considering.

This is something that I might look at doing in 2023 is trying a dopamine detox with a few friends where maybe we spend the whole day without the phone and just seeing what happens. Okay. Number three is to add one hard thing per week that you do not enjoy, but it has good return. This is going to do two things for you. It's going to cultivate resilience and mental toughness, and it's going to help you sneak in some more stuff that's good for you. So for example, if you do not like walking at all, you hate it, you always complain about walking, you want to park as close to the store as possible, go on one big walk a week. Okay. And during that big walk

includes something that you do like, right? So that can be an audio book you like, or an album that you like to listen to. I'll share with you what I will be doing, because this is one tip I will be implementing in the year 2023. And that's that I'm going to be doing an ice bath for at least one minute. I know that doesn't sound like long, but I'm quite sensitive to the cold for at least one minute in my ice barrel. So we're going to do one minute's worth of cold water immersion three times a week. Okay. That's no small amount, um, with the goal of building my mental toughness, building my ability to kind of reset my focus and pull myself back to center, uh, to use it as an opportunity to recharge. And I'll tell you what guys I've been using the ice barrel for a while now, and I still struggle to get more than a minute. And I still struggle to jump in there without like having trepidation and fear. Like just,

I feel it kind of welling up inside me beforehand. Like I can tell myself, you're going to get in, you're not going to flinch. You're going to climb up the ladder. You're going to jump in. And I, I do it every time. There's no hesitation, but for every second leading up to it, I'm just like, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. I hate this. I don't want to do it. And I feel phenomenal after, phenomenal after. And what's interesting is my girlfriend doesn't really have the same trepidation. When she does it with me, she's like, oh, I know it's going to be cold, but it's not like eating away at her in her head. we walk out there. She's less afraid of it than me, I think, at this point, despite less uses. And she can almost always match my time.

So she also has a little bit more of the resilience and toughness specifically around the cold. So I'm going to be making a habit of doing this at least, like I said, guys, three times a week for one minute. That's three minutes a week of me being uncomfortable, but it will make a big difference. It's already made a huge difference in my ability to handle hard things. Just having used the ice barrel now to do my cold water immersion for a couple of months, but I do want to ramp it up, keep it far enough away from my workouts that it doesn't affect my gains. But again, that's something you could do. You could try going on a walk. You could try, um, going on a hike, even something scaled up a little more. I would recommend doing it physical. It can be intellectual.

Like you could find time to, to read a something that you know would benefit you, but it's a perhaps dry genre that you don't like reading from, uh, find something, set aside time for it, make sure that it is challenging so that you can cultivate resilience and prove to yourself, hey, I'm capable of doing hard things. That's a habit I'll be implementing in 2023. A fourth habit, this is a more meta health habit, but I do think that you could find lines that would connect this to improved performance, specifically cognitive performance with things like creativity specifically, maybe cognition, but mostly creativity. And it's definitely something that's going to be very good, helpful, and effective for your mental health. And that's designating time to get out into nature. Now you can stack this and combine this with the third tip. Like I

mentioned, a hike. That would occur in nature. If you don't like hiking, that would be a difficult thing to do, so you could combine these two habits. But getting into nature is, and I don't want to get too woo-woo or metaphysical, but it is uniquely capable of changing the organism, the human organism, at an emotional, cognitive, and physical level. Like, crazy things happen to our bodies and our minds when we spend more time in nature. Good things, right? So, nature has a unique effect on human beings as it probably does for all animals. Think about how your dog behaves differently in nature, like take them out to a big field and what that does to its state. Look at the clear, you know,

just elation, jubilation, the zoomies, the massive amount of uncontained energy sprinting wildly. Like there's a visceral response to an animal being in nature and human beings are animals. And I do think great things happen for your mind, even when you do simple stuff like walking around the neighborhood and getting a little sun. So something that I will be looking to implement in 2023 more regularly, it does help to have friends or partners who like to be in nature. And it does help to have animals that you are at least mostly responsible for exercising and taking care of. Maybe you share that responsibility or have a dog walker. But I know many of you who have dogs make a point of walking your dogs. And if you can schedule one

walk a week or one hike a week out into nature and just improve the amount of time and the number of opportunities you give to be in nature from like somebody like me who can spend a lot of time in the city, who can spend a lot of time in the house. You know, it's tough. Like, I think that there have been probably months where I've gone or there's been years in which I've gone months in a row without getting any exposure to the natural world. I'm just kind of living in the city limits and, you know, I might enjoy a sunset or some rain and that's about as close as it gets. I do think that you get a recuperative recharging effect when you go into nature and it's great for your creativity. And it feels like such a reset when you don't do it very often. So that's totally something

that I would recommend. Hey guys, taking a break from the show to tell you about our amazing sports nutrition partner, Legion. Legion makes the best evidence-based formulas for sports performance, sports nutrition, recovery, and fat loss. I don't recommend many supplements. In fact, I think you can get the majority of the nutrition you need from a whole foods diet. But let's be honest, many of us are either on the go and need assistance, or quite frankly, we're not going to settle for average and we want to get the absolute most we can out of our training. So Legion is the company I go to for all of my supplement staples, whether it's creatine, which I get from their product Recharge, my

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get two times points towards future orders, which you can use the same as cash. Pretty cool, guys. So head over to legionathletics.com and check out using the promo code Danny to save on all your sports supplement needs. Back to the show. What's going on, guys? Coach Danny here, taking a break from the episode to tell you about my coaching company, Core Coaching Method, and more specifically, our one-on-one, fully tailored online coaching program. My online coaching program has kind of been the flagship for core coaching method for a while. Of course, we do have PDF programming and we have app-based programming. But if you want a truly tailored one-on-one experience with

a coach like myself or a member of my coaching team, someone who is certified, somebody who has multiple years of experience working with clients in person online, somebody who is licensed to provide a macro nutrition plan, somebody who is actually good at communicating with clients because they've done it for years, whether that be via phone call, email, text, right? This one-on-one coaching program is really designed to give you all the support you need with custom training designed for you, whether you're training from home, the gym, around your limitations and your goals, nothing cookie cutter here, as well as easy to follow macronutrition programs that are non-restrictive. You'll get customized support directly from your coach's

email, or they'll text you, or they'll WhatsApp you. We'll find the communication medium that best supports your goals, as well as provides you with the accountability and the expertise you need to succeed, as well as biofeedback monitoring, baked-in accountability support, and all of the stuff that you need from your coach when you check in. We keep our rosters relatively small so that we can make sure you get the best support possible. But you can apply today by going over to corecoachingmethod.com, selecting the online coaching option. And if we have spots available, we'll definitely reach out to you to see if you're a good candidate. And if we don't put you on a waiting list, but we'll be sure to give you the best shot at the best coaching in the industry. So head over to corecoachingmethod.com and apply for one-on-one coaching with me and my team today. Hey, everybody, I have a favor to ask you. If you're a regular listener or somebody who gets value out of this podcast, somebody who's learning from me on your health and fitness journey, whether you're a trainer, a high level

athlete, or you're just getting started, other people need this kind of advice. And the best way for you to help me grow the podcast is to take a little bit of time, literally one to two minutes max, to leave a rating and review on the app that you listen to your podcasts on. The majority of you probably listen on an iPhone and you probably listen on Apple podcasts, but many of you listen on Spotify. Both platforms allow you to leave a quick, easy review. And if you could leave me a five-star review plus a short one to two sentence blurb about what you like, not only will it help more people reach the podcast, it will help me to continue to refine what it is I bring you each and every week.

Thanks so much for doing this. It means the world to me. It helps me achieve my dream of helping more people live a healthier life. Enjoy the episode. This fifth tip, and this one I think will resonate with a lot of you, whether you're into fitness, health, or not. And it's from Robert Green's book, Mastery. And specifically, it's about finding a mentor. And these can be people who either, maybe they don't know that they are a mentor to you, or maybe it's somebody that is hired and a formal mentor to you. Uh, but the point is you should find somebody or something that you are extremely, extremely interested by or about, and you should learn as much as you can from that person or about that thing.

And so a good example of a mentor, and they might not be a fitness mentor, they might not be a health mentor. You might be somebody who is into architecture. You might be somebody who's into golf. But find something that you are passionate about and find a mentor of some type in that space. It can be the premier podcaster on that topic. It can, like, if you're, if you're somebody who's recently been like, I'm super into politics and I would really like to be more plugged in and more tapped into politics. And you're going to listen to every single episode of politicology and you're going to read every single tweet from a certain politico or set of politicos for a year and identify somebody and consume all their work, that could be beneficial for you.

Find the things you're passionate about. Sniff out a mentor or an expert in the field and consume everything that you can from that person. I'm doing this with Sam Harris this year for probably the second or third time using his waking up app, pursuing, you know, mindfulness, stoicism, continuing to try to work on meditation. That would certainly be a number three tip for me going all the way back to number three, doing something uncomfortable. Gosh, meditating, not something that I'm good at. I do consider the cold water immersion semi meditative because I focus my breath and focus on my physical signals so much more than what's happening in my mind. That's

really helped. But I am using Sam Harris as a mentor for my mindfulness. I'm using Tom Nichols as a mentor for my politics. I am using the Stronger by Science podcast as a mentor for my evidence-based coaching. I'm using people like Jay Shetty and people like also Sam Harris and Chris Willicks. I can't remember what his actual last name is for growing in my relationships. I've identified a number of very intelligent, who I believe to be integrous people putting out great content. And I'm pursuing as much of that shit and consuming as much of that shit as I can from these people out there in the world, who I look at as mentors. The internet has given us access to the greatest minds ever.

And we have access in many cases for free or at low cost to interface with these people and take in their amazing knowledge. People used to travel for days to speak to wise men and to oracles in the ancient world. And now we have access to some of the most brilliant minds. And yes, there's a lot of misinformation out there and there are a lot of charlatans. So you always have to be careful, but I do find it quite fascinating that we are living through a period of unfettered access to brilliance. We are living through a world, in a world, with unfettered access to brilliance. And we choose whether or not each day we want to interface with that. I want you to sit with that. Think about all the incredible minds you have access to thanks to the internet, the people you could learn from.

So many of us complain, I didn't have a good teacher growing up or my parents weren't smarter. I struggled in school. And maybe there's reasons for that. And I'm sure all that's true. But right now you have access to a plethora of incredible minds who make great content you can learn from. So find mentors for different areas of your life. Look to learn as much as you can in the new year. I think you're going to absolutely thrive if you do this. This is totally one that I will be implementing in 2023. Okay. Tip number six. And this one is, I've heard this said a few different ways, but the one that sticks with me, I think it was from Scott Adams. I'm not exactly sure who said it, but it was, I've also heard it from Alex Ramosi. And I, I think I heard it originally from Naval Ravikant, but it was the idea that,

you know, you might be like a, a fantastic air hockey player, and you might also be a really good videographer and you might also be a decent video editor, but you are the best air hawking video creating editing machine. I know that that is kind of like a stretch, but it's weaving your passions together. So a lot of you are in a space where you want to create, whether that be content, whether that be products, whether that be experiences, we're moving into a creator economy. People want to weave their passions together with their skills. And maybe they don't want to work a full-time job, or maybe they want to work a full-time job and add something to it. And so what I would recommend you do in the year 2023 is weave your skills together. Find a way to connect your passions to your hard skills

and go from there. Don't overcomplicate it, but find the way to weave your passions together with your hard skills. If you want to invest in real estate and you are super passionate about it, and you also happen to be a voracious reader, and you also happen to be somebody who has a super fast internet connection, you should be watching a lot of real estate videos and reading a lot about real estate. Find the things you're good at. Find the things you're passionate about. Weave them together in your free time. I think a lot of people have begun to identify themselves as the job that they do. Oh, what do you do? We ask people like, oh, what do you do? Okay. And I

tell people all the time what people say. Danny, what do you do? I say, I own a fitness company. I own a gym. I'm the founder of Core Coaching Method. I'm a podcaster, right? I have all these things that I could say, but really I am Danny and I have interests and you do too. And so I think it's important that you weave those hard skills and your interests together and find time to create.

Even if you create with no intention of sharing. And this is something that I learned from, I believe it was Scott Galloway or no, no, no. You know who it was? This is from a podcast that Sam Harris did with Cal Newport. And Cal Newport said, it's okay to create art and for people not to like it. Essentially that you can put something out there. It could be content, it could be art, it could be written work, whatever, but find something, find your passions, weave them together and make something in the year of 2023. Tip number seven, find one book that you will read for each month of the year. I think that if you create time for reading by limiting your screen time, you could pair number one and number seven together. And I think that

that would work really, really well. And this is carve out some time each day to read. I think reading can be very challenging for a lot of us. Many of us prefer to listen to audio books because we can't slow down long enough to actually read a real book. This is true. I've gotten better at reading in the last couple of years, but there was a time where it was basically audio books are bust. So an audio book is better than nothing, but find one book a month to consume. I think that these all really blend well together. These can be things that improve your health, that improve your fitness, that improve your performance at work, that connect your passions. Spend less time letting an algorithm curate your life for you and spend some time actually

curating the life you want to live. Because I can tell you right now, the stuff that's getting thrown at you on your leisure time scroll through Netflix or TikTok is designed to keep you consuming. It's not designed to really inspire a ton of creation. So there are a lot of good books. Some of my favorite books of the year were Anxiety Rx by Russell Kennedy. The Obstacle is the Way by Ryan Holiday. Discipline is Destiny by Ryan Holiday. Think Again by Adam Grant. Stephen King's Fairy Tale, if you're somebody who is into fiction. 12 Months to 10 Million by Ryan Daniel Moran, which is a book about marketing and branding. Ready, Fire, Aim by Michael Masterson. Do Hard Things by Steve Magnus.

The Psychology of Money by Morgan Housel. The Molecule of More by Daniel Z. Lieberman. This is a book about dopamine. Stillness is the Key by Ryan Holiday, Courage is Calling by Ryan Holiday, The War of Art by Steven Pressfield. These are all books that I've read this year that I found to be enjoyable, many of which I revisited this year, books that I'd read before. I think that you probably have the ability to pick a book for the next 12 months. You could pick all 12 now, have them, set them aside, or you could pick at least one book a month to consume in audio form or by reading that you think will improve your life. I think a lot of people spend too much time reading self-help books and not enough time learning about people, learning about, you know, there's so many, like one of the best

forms of self-help you could ever read is an autobiography on somebody who accomplished what you want to accomplish. If there's something you want to do, read the autobiography of the best person who ever did it. Learn from them. Find the inspiration. Model yourself. This would also be the fifth tip. Find a mentor.

So there you have it. Okay. Tip number eight. This is a big time fitness one. Get your 10,000 steps a day. I used to think that that was just a lame marketing gimmick because people would say, well, I get 10,000 steps a day. Why am I not losing weight? And then it clicked for me one day. Wait, just because people have been told 10,000 steps a day is a magic number and it doesn't really get them where they want to get doesn't mean it's bad. In fact, going on more walks is fantastic. People should take more steps. People should get outside. People should move their body. Human beings were designed to locomote. So the eighth tip I have for you in 2023 or a tip habit that you can implement in 2023 that will assuredly make your life better

is to go on more walks. Tip number nine is to find some avenue for you to give back with your time, your energy, or your money. So time and energy, you can give back time and energy in the form of volunteering. You can give back energy in the form of taking work off somebody's plate. You can give back time in the form of spending time with somebody who's lonely. You can give back money in the form of giving to somebody in need or supporting somebody close to you through a challenging time. But I do think it's, you know, tithing is a religious practice. So this isn't a, uh, you know, an attempt to get you to engage in a particularly, uh, calculated form of tithing, but I think you should come up

with something, somebody, uh, some cause worthy of your time, energy, or money and give back. I know that that sounds like a very, very simple habit and something that you could do one time, but I think that altruism and making the world a better place and giving back to the world is really, really fulfilling. And so many of you guys do an incredible job of being mindful, practicing gratitude, journaling, getting your sleep, staying hydrated, exercising. You're all growth-minded, fitness-focused people, or you wouldn't be listening to this podcast. But giving some of yourself, whether that be in resources like time, energy, or resources like money, it seems like a take, but it's really a huge give to yourself as much as it is to the people receiving, it feels really good to be generous. So practice generosity in the new year. Number 10 is to find a new physical hobby. And so I know a lot of you

guys are super active. You're lifters, you're crossfitters, you're bodybuilders. You're looking to improve the way you look. Maybe you're a weekend warrior, a cycler. So many of you do different activities, but my appeal to you is to find a new one. And it's for a childish reason. It's that I literally think when we are children, we spend a lot of time playing games, learning new sports, picking up new skills. And I think we lose a piece of that. And I look at the huge surge in popularity in things like basketball for adults and recreational leagues and spike ball. And of course, pickleball is all the rage and CrossFit. And what I see is I see a lot of adults engaging in team or community or even single player sports where people are starting to have fun with their movement. It's disorganized in a sense. It's all

about fun and playing the game. And it really shows me that we don't outgrow that playful childish tendency. We like to find games. We like to lean into fun. And I think you should try to find something physical that maybe it doesn't necessarily enhance your big fitness goals. Like if you're a bodybuilder, you're like, fuck, I don't want to play pickleball. I might burn some calories. It's like, bro, it's probably going to be great for your hand-eye coordination. It's probably going to increase your intramuscular coordination. It's going to be good for you. It's probably going to increase your intramuscular coordination. It's going to be good for you. You're not going to lose any gains and it'll be fun as shit. You'll get out there, you'll be social and you'll tap into that inner child we all have that still

wants to play games and get out on the playground. Tip number 11 is to set time aside on a weekly, bi-weekly or monthly basis to spend quality time with your same-sex friend groups. I think that men really thrive when they maintain their male relationships throughout the lifespan. It's very challenging for men to do this as they start families. And I think a lot of the reason, and I'm no psychologist, so I'm only speculating here, but the, and this is a potential trigger. So if you're sensitive to suicide, skip ahead, but men commit suicide at a substantially higher rate than women. And a lot of this has to do with societal factors that we don't understand. And one of the things that I think contributes is the loss of meaningful male

relationships across the lifespan as men become fathers and providers inside of a lot of the traditional relational structure here, at least in the Western world. And, you know, it's really important to maintain those friendships. And I think when those erode, you know, and children grow up and marriages and partnerships are tumultuous, you know, You lose that male connection that we evolved over 200,000 years to have as a hunter-gatherer organism, especially you think back to the tribalistic hyper-patriarchal society where men, you literally go do this. Women, you literally go do that. That was baked into human structure, whether you like it

or not, until very recently. And so dudes evolved to spend some time with dudes. And I think when they lose that, it's really painful. And they do the quote unquote boys night, guys night stuff less than girls do girls night. And I've known so many women, especially as a personal trainer, who have that girls night and what it means for them to connect with their female friends and talk about uniquely female issues or issues that at least in that context are uniquely relatable. And I think, man, men should do more of that. And I just think there's so much value in these kinds of bonding opportunities that, you know, if you can be a leader in your community and your friend group and schedule that time, you'll be doing a lot of people a lot of favors. And I think that they will respond really, really well to that. So

the 11th tip I have for you in the year 2023, the habit I'd like you to get into is setting aside time for specific meetups and hangouts with your same-sex friends. The 12th tip, again, a little metaphysical, a little woo-woo, but it's to get an animal that you can take care of. And it doesn't have to be a dog. Dogs are great. There's a lot of dogs that need homes. Same thing with cats, same things with rabbits could be a fish, you know, it could be a bird, could be a reptile. But the point of this tip or habit would be, you know, you get outside of yourself and you know, the more sentient or that's the wrong word, but the more capable of communicating the animal is, the more meaningful and deep that relationship can be. And

I would encourage you to adopt a dog if you're in a position to do it. I think dogs are a responsibility that should not be taken lightly, but if you give a lot of time, energy, and effort to the connection you have with your animal, you'll have a relationship that pays you back tenfold. So, you know, I would encourage you to spend more time with animals and to interface with animals. I think it's a uniquely positive thing that you can do to improve your health, your mindset, your wellbeing. And, you know, animals are interesting in how they affect our physiology. You know, they put fish tanks in the dentist's office for a reason. They do calm people. There's something tranquil about water and fish. There's something incredibly visceral when we see a puppy or a kitten and

they're cute and they're small and they just bring it out of us or the family dog, you know, there's, there's something beautiful. So interact with animals more in the year 2023. Tip number 13, this is for your brain. This is for your creativity, but find something artistic. And I think that music, drawing, painting, sculpting are all forms of art. I think that, you know, CrossFit and bodybuilding and sprinting are forms of almost like a physical art. There's such an artistic or deeply scientific side to exercise that you can really fall in love with analyzing the physiques, the posing, the biomechanics, but it's to lean into something artistic, creative, or scientific

that challenges you, but that you see growth in. I think that we really abandon those pursuits as adults, and I think that they could be really, really powerful. Okay. Number 14, this is a relationship tip for those of you who have a significant other, and that is to make sure that you schedule some date nights. My partner has told me on numerous occasions how much it means to her when we schedule date nights in advance. And I will say, advance. And I will say, I really, really notice a difference myself when we schedule these date nights in advance. I have something to look forward to. I always have a great time with her. I know what makes a big difference to her to know that I'm paying attention and setting aside that time. I'm so much less distracted. It really helps us connect and stay connected when we carve out that time. And I think life is really fast paced. And a lot of people want to get more out of their

relationship in the new year. I'm not numb to that. I'm not immune to that. I know that. I talk to a lot of my friends. I have a ton of clients. Everybody who's in a relationship probably has something in their relationship that they'd like to see improve. And a lot of people are really resistant to that advice. So don't take it with a grain of salt. But I think a date night a week or a date night every couple weeks that you say this is always going to be our day and we're going to plan these things out in advance and we're going to enjoy them. I think there's a lot of power in that. And I would recommend that you do that

with your significant other. I think you'll find that they really appreciate it too, especially if you initiate. And the last tip I have for you is to spend a day at the beginning of the year to get your finances in order. Financial literacy is challenging for a lot of people. And a lot of this depends on accessibility and socioeconomic status. So some of the advice I give might not be entirely applicable, but you can start with Ramit Sethi's book, I'll Teach You To Be Rich. You can get that for about 10 bucks. That should be reasonable for most folks. Most folks can afford about 10 bucks. If you want to go a little bit more than that, you could add in Morgan Housel's The Psychology of Money. And start with those two books and get a checklist. Go down and make sure

that you don't have subscriptions that you're overpaying for or not using. Go down and make calls to your insurance providers. See if they'll lower your rate because you've been driving well. Call your cell phone provider and say, hey, I'm looking for you to lower my rate. I've been a loyal customer. Find ways that you can make money on the side or get your salary raised at work. Pay off high interest debt on small accounts that's just revolving. Clean up your financial shit. Okay. So, you know, I think that's a relatively simple thing that could end up being a relatively complex task, but take some time in the new year to get your finances in order. All right, guys, that's 15 tips for 2023, 15 habits for 2023, 15 things you can do in 2023 to live a happy, healthier, and more fulfilled life. I hope you

enjoyed this episode. If you did, please do me a favor, share it with somebody, leave me a five star rating and review on iTunes. I would really appreciate it if you did that on Spotify too. Thanks so much for tuning in, and I'll catch you on the next one.