Updated October 2024

Consult your doctor on the best course of action for you. This checklist is primarily for my reference, but hopefully, sharing it can help you, too.

Nothing here is meant to be revolutionary. It is a checklist to browse and remind yourself to make better and healthier habits. I use this as a reference to ensure I regularly incorporate these items into a healthy life.

Eating Healthier

• Avoid processed foods — anything in a box or on the shelf, as well as processed meats — to reduce overall sodium intake and the fillers and other additives that come with them. Avoiding processed foods means you’ll generally eat more nutritious and less calorie-dense foods.
• Walk or do some simple exercise afterward to aid digestion and restore blood sugar levels.
• Limit alcohol or remove it altogether – it’s a toxin. Here is my favorite podcast episode on it: Huberman Podcast Episode 86: What Alcohol Does To Your Body, Brain & Health.
• Eat slower. Being in the present moment while eating can prevent overeating and help with better digestion.
• Drink more water. Usually, a good rule of thumb is at least 2L per day, but it could be more depending on your weight.
• Eat more fiber and vegetables.
• Berries are high in antioxidants.
• Prioritize protein and eat lean meat, fish, eggs, and nuts. Very few people get enough protein. Aim for 0.8g of protein per pound of body weight.
• The less sugar, the better.
• Include omega-3-rich foods (fish, nuts, seeds, etc) in your diet.

Exercise

• Aerobic capacity (V02 Max) is the strongest predictor of future health. Train VO2 max by maxing out your heart rate for four-minute periods through sprinting, rowing, HIT, or other intense, short-term cardio activities.
• It’s essential to strength training necessary to build and maintain muscle mass. Building muscle is much more difficult than keeping it, and your ability to create muscle declines significantly over age 40. Build muscle when you’re young!
• Aim for at least 10,000 steps per day. I was surprised to see how tight the data correlation is between daily step count and all-cause mortality:

It’s critical to prioritize daily walking!

• Mobility is essential, especially for people who work on a computer all day. Daily stretching or yoga is helpful for maintaining range of motion.
• Rebounding / Jumping on trampolines is great for your joint and ligament health.

Self Care

• Sleep 7-8 hours per night; it’s best to do this at the same time every night. Make sure your room is dark and a bit cool. Change your pillow at least every two years to avoid the build-up of dust mites, etc. Silk pillowcases prevent wrinkles. Finally, some studies suggest that Melatonin ~2 hours before bed helps you get higher-quality sleep (but I currently don’t do this).
• Brush your teeth daily and get your teeth professionally cleaned every six months. I was surprised that lousy mouth health is associated with an increased risk of heart disease.
• Breathe through your nose primarily, especially at night. Flonase can help keep your sinuses clear. I started using nasal strips, which seemed to help me breathe through my nose.
• Regular sauna use is linked to significantly lower rates of cardiovascular issues and related deaths.
• Take ice-cold showers and, even better yet, ice baths. Minimally, it has been shown to increase your mood and decrease inflammation.
• Interacting with animals has been shown to decrease levels of cortisol (a stress-related hormone) and lower blood pressure.
• Learn to breathe and meditate.
• Avoid toxic chemicals and single-use plastics.
• People with a sense of humor live longer. And people who are optimistic live longer. Be optimistic and laugh more!

  A meta-analysis from 6 prospective cohort studies (n=181,709) found that patients with a more optimistic mindset were at lower risk for all-cause mortality (HR 0.87, 95% CI 0.82–0.92). Less worrying, more living 😀✌️ (source)

Supplements

Unless you take care of the basics like sleep, exercise, managing stress, and diet, supplements will help very little. Most people should skip the supplements early on and use that money to hire a trainer and learn to lift weights.

Overall, I get as much nutrition as possible from food and have deprioritized supplements. However, I take a few supplements daily to get enough of the basics.

Get your blood tested to determine what nutritional supplements you should take. Universal supplements challenging to get enough of in modern society include, but are not limited to:

• Creatine
• Psyllium husk / Fiber
• Collagen Peptides
• Vitamin D
• K2 MK7
• Zinc
• Omega 3 / Fish Oil
• Magnesium and Calcium

Here’s a video from a doctor on the supplements he takes:

Things I Do to Stay Healthy

Keeping Tabs on My Overall Health Data

• Measure weight with a smart scale at home regularly. If you track daily, you’ll likely see trends over time.
• HRV is a predictor of overall health. 0-50 is unhealthy, 50-100 is ok, and 100+ is healthy. You can see trends in your Apple Health app (I wear the latest Apple watch). If you want the most accurate HRV data, you’ll need to get a chest strap like the Polar H10 and use an app like Elite HRV.
• Professionally test body composition, VO2 Max, and RMR through DEXA or BodPod. I do this every 6-12 months.
• I do a blood panel through Inside Tracker every 12 months and take the recommendations to a doctor for review. I also do a blood panel through my doctor every 12 months. I’m looking into other services that also have a doctor review the panel, like Function Health or Life Force.
• Monitor blood pressure, aiming for 120/80 mmHg. I use the Qardio Arm to monitor my blood pressure, and I find it’s lowest right away upon waking up in the morning.

As mentioned, I’m looking for trends with this data over time. My weight can vary by 7 pounds depending on when I ate, how much water I drank, etc.

Blood tests are super accurate but can also change a lot. For instance, once, I had issues with my white blood cell count in one test, but it turns out I was just in the early stages of getting sick. To verify, I took another blood test three weeks later when I was over the sickness, which showed healthy results.

Exercise

This is going to sound like a lot, but I added each of these activities one by one until I reached a level of conditioning to handle this much. I started with simply walking and then progressed to adding one more activity at a time.

• Adult gymnastics class twice per week.
• Tennis once per week.
• Dance once per week.
• Running 2-4 times per week.
  • In 2023, I ran 350+ miles &mdash, a record for me since high school.
  • In 2024, I’m already at 500+ miles and set all my running records.
• Calisthenics: pull-ups, front lever, back lever, dips, leg lifts, handstands, handstand push-ups
• Plyometrics every other day. I follow this workout, but warning: it’s very intense.
• I walk over 10,000 steps per day (last year’s average was over 12,000). I use the Apple Watch to track this. My rule is to walk or run for 30 minutes per day.

Diet and Supplements

Drink 1L of water in the morning and drink 1-2L more daily (2-3L total).

I mix supplements into two cups of low-sugar Chobani or Oikos yogurt, add almonds and walnuts, and toss in some blueberries.

• Collagen Peptides + Hyaluronic Acid (skin and joint health)
• Psyllium husk / Fiber (more fiber, the better)
• Creatine 5g
• Multivitamin (I take Micro Vitamin)
• Fish oil

Eat more vegetables! Here’s a picture of grilling recently where the only unhealthy thing on the grill is the bacon around the asparagus

I do not any special diet. No Keto, intermittent fast, or anything. I prioritize protein and fiber… I do eat carbs but don’t focus on them.

Updates:

• I cut out 90% of my alcohol consumption and 100% of fried foods. I also try to avoid low-quality oils and refrain from eating out at fast-food restaurants. I could be better at avoiding processed foods.
• I used to fast but don’t fast anymore.

General Health

• Sauna 4-5 days per week (finishing with a cold plunge)
• Brush and floss daily
• Apply full-spectrum SPF in the AM

Organizing Thoughts

• Apple notes app on my phone and mac to take notes (trying to move more to Obsidian)
• Blinkist to go through non-fiction books and take notes to improve my life
• Sharing notes through Discord communities of like-minded people

Final Thoughts

I’m now almost two years into developing and following all of these items. I’ve collected feedback from people that I’ll try to consider and incorporate in the future.

What did I miss? Tweet at me @1marc.