Atomic Habits – by James Clear
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James Clear’s Atomic Habits has become “the” go-to book about the power of habit-forming. And, there’s no shortage of competition out there, so that’s quite a statement. What makes this book stand out?
A lot of books start by assuming you want to build habits. That can seem a fair assumption; after all, we picked up the book! But an introductory chapter really hammers home the idea in a way that makes it a lot more motivational:
- Habits are the compound interest of productivity
- This means that progress is not linear, but exponential
- Habits can also be stacked, and thus become synergistic
- The more positive habits you add incrementally, the easier they become because each thing is making your life easier/better
For example:
- It’s easier to save money if you’re in good health
- It’s easier to sleep better if you do not have financial worries
- It’s easier to build your relationship with your loved ones if you’re not tired
…and so on.
For many people this presents a Catch-22 problem! Clear instead presents it as an opportunity… Start wherever you like, but just start small, with some two-minute thing, and build from there.
A lot of the book is given over to:
- how to form effective habits (using his “Four Laws”)
- how to build them into your life
- how to handle mishaps
- how to make sure your habits are working for you
- how to see habits as part of your identity, and not just a goal to be checked off
The last one is perhaps key—goals cease to be motivating once accomplished. Habits, on the other hand, keep spiralling upwards (if you guide them appropriately).
There’s lots more we could say, but it’s a one-minute book review, so we’ll just close by saying:
This book can help you to become the kind of person who genuinely gets a little better each day, and reaps the benefits over time.
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Practical Programming for Strength Training – by Mark Rippetoe & Andy Baker
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Strength training is an important part of overall health maintenance, but it can be hard to find a good guide to progressive strength improvement that isn’t a bodybuilding book.
This one gives a ground-upwards approach, explaining small details to even quite basic things, before taking the reader through to more advanced progressions, and how to get the most strength-building out of each exercise over time.
As such, this is a good book for anyone of any level from beginner to quite experienced, and you can hop in at any point since there are always catch-up summaries and/or reiterations of the previous concepts that we’re now building on from.
The authors do also talk nutrition, hormones, and so forth, but most of it is about the exercises and the progressions thereof.
There is a slightly patronizing chapter towards the end, about “special populations”, for example offering “novice and intermediate training for women”, but it doesn’t take away from the majority of the book, as the exercises don’t care about your gender. Muscles are muscles, and we all start from wherever we are. Yes, testosterone boosts muscle mass, but let’s face it, there are a lot of women in the world who are stronger than a lot of men.
One thing to bear in mind is that a lot of this is barbell training, so you will need a barbell (or access to one at a gym). If purely bodyweight training is your preference, or perhaps some other form of weightlifting (e.g. kettlebells or such) then this isn’t the book for that.
Bottom line: if strength training is your focus and you like barbells, then this is a great book to take you quite a way along that road.
Click here to check out Practical Programming For Strength Training, and get stronger!
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Fatty Acids For The Eyes & Brain: The Good And The Bad
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Good For The Eyes; Good For The Brain
We’ve written before about omega-3 fatty acids, covering the basics and some lesser-known things:
What Omega-3 Fatty Acids Really Do For Us
…and while we discussed its well-established benefits against cognitive decline (which is to be expected, because omega-3 is good against inflammation, and a large part of age-related neurodegeneration is heavily related to neuroinflammation), there’s a part of the brain we didn’t talk about in that article: the eyes.
We did, however, talk in another article about supplements that benefit the eyes and [the rest of the] brain, and the important links between the two, to the point that an examination of the levels of lutein in the retina can inform clinicians about the levels of lutein in the brain as a whole, and strongly predict Alzheimer’s disease (because Alzheimer’s patients have significantly less lutein), here:
Now, let’s tie these two ideas together
In a recent (June 2024) meta-analysis of high-quality observational studies from the US and around the world, involving nearly a quarter of a million people over 40 (n=241,151), researchers found that a higher intake of omega-3 is significantly linked to a lower risk of macular degeneration.
To put it in numbers, the highest intake of omega-3s was associated with an 18% reduced risk of early stage macular degeneration.
They also looked at a breakdown of what kinds of omega-3, and found that taking a blend DHA and EPA worked best of all, although of people who only took one kind, DHA was the best “single type” option.
You can read the paper in full, here:
Association between fatty acid intake and age-related macular degeneration: a meta-analysis
A word about trans-fatty acids (TFAs)
It was another feature of the same study that, while looking at fatty acids in general, they also found that higher consumption of trans-fatty acids was associated with a higher risk of advanced age-related macular degeneration.
Specifically, the highest intake of TFAs was associated with a more than 2x increased risk.
There are two main dietary sources of trans-fatty acids:
- Processed foods that were made with TFAs; these have now been banned in a lot of places, but only quite recently, and the ban is on the processing, not the sale, so if you buy processed foods that contain ingredients that were processed before 2021 (not uncommon, given the long life of many processed foods), the chances of them having TFAs is higher.
- Most animal products. Most notably from mammals and their milk, so beef, pork, lamb, milk, cheese, and yes even yogurt. Poultry and fish technically do also contain TFAs in most cases, but the levels are much lower.
Back to the omega-3 fatty acids…
If you’re wondering where to get good quality omega-3, well, we listed some of the best dietary sources in our main omega-3 article (linked at the top of today’s).
However, if you want to supplement, here’s an example product on Amazon that’s high in DHA and EPA, following the science of what we shared today 😎
Take care!
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Surgery is the default treatment for ACL injuries in Australia. But it’s not the only way
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The anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) is an important ligament in the knee. It runs from the thigh bone (femur) to the shin bone (tibia) and helps stabilise the knee joint.
Injuries to the ACL, often called a “tear” or a “rupture”, are common in sport. While a ruptured ACL has just sidelined another Matildas star, people who play sport recreationally are also at risk of this injury.
For decades, surgical repair of an ACL injury, called a reconstruction, has been the primary treatment in Australia. In fact, Australia has among the highest rates of ACL surgery in the world. Reports indicate 90% of people who rupture their ACL go under the knife.
Although surgery is common – around one million are performed worldwide each year – and seems to be the default treatment for ACL injuries in Australia, it may not be required for everyone.
PeopleImages.com – Yuri A/Shutterstock What does the research say?
We know ACL ruptures can be treated using reconstructive surgery, but research continues to suggest they can also be treated with rehabilitation alone for many people.
Almost 15 years ago a randomised clinical trial published in the New England Journal of Medicine compared early surgery to rehabilitation with the option of delayed surgery in young active adults with an ACL injury. Over half of people in the rehabilitation group did not end up having surgery. After five years, knee function did not differ between treatment groups.
The findings of this initial trial have been supported by more research since. A review of three trials published in 2022 found delaying surgery and trialling rehabilitation leads to similar outcomes to early surgery.
A 2023 study followed up patients who received rehabilitation without surgery. It showed one in three had evidence of ACL healing on an MRI after two years. There was also evidence of improved knee-related quality of life in those with signs of ACL healing compared to those whose ACL did not show signs of healing.
Experts used to think an ACL tear couldn’t heal without surgery – now there’s evidence it can. SKYKIDKID/Shutterstock Regardless of treatment choice the rehabilitation process following ACL rupture is lengthy. It usually involves a minimum of nine months of progressive rehabilitation performed a few days per week. The length of time for rehabilitation may be slightly shorter in those not undergoing surgery, but more research is needed in this area.
Rehabilitation starts with a physiotherapist overseeing simple exercises right through to resistance exercises and dynamic movements such as jumping, hopping and agility drills.
A person can start rehabilitation with the option of having surgery later if the knee remains unstable. A common sign of instability is the knee giving way when changing direction while running or playing sports.
To rehab and wait, or to go straight under the knife?
There are a number of reasons patients and clinicians may opt for early surgical reconstruction.
For elite athletes, a key consideration is returning to sport as soon as possible. As surgery is a well established method, athletes (such as Matilda Sam Kerr) often opt for early surgical reconstruction as this gives them a more predictable timeline for recovery.
At the same time, there are risks to consider when rushing back to sport after ACL reconstruction. Re-injury of the ACL is very common. For every month return to sport is delayed until nine months after ACL reconstruction, the rate of knee re-injury is reduced by 51%.
For people who opt to try rehabilitation, the option of having surgery later is still there. PeopleImages.com – Yuri A/Shutterstock Historically, another reason for having early surgical reconstruction was to reduce the risk of future knee osteoarthritis, which increases following an ACL injury. But a review showed ACL reconstruction doesn’t reduce the risk of knee osteoarthritis in the long term compared with non-surgical treatment.
That said, there’s a need for more high-quality, long-term studies to give us a better understanding of how knee osteoarthritis risk is influenced by different treatments.
Rehab may not be the only non-surgical option
Last year, a study looking at 80 people fitted with a specialised knee brace for 12 weeks found 90% had evidence of ACL healing on their follow-up MRI.
People with more ACL healing on the three-month MRI reported better outcomes at 12 months, including higher rates of returning to their pre-injury level of sport and better knee function. Although promising, we now need comparative research to evaluate whether this method can achieve similar results to surgery.
What to do if you rupture your ACL
First, it’s important to seek a comprehensive medical assessment from either a sports physiotherapist, sports physician or orthopaedic surgeon. ACL injuries can also have associated injuries to surrounding ligaments and cartilage which may influence treatment decisions.
In terms of treatment, discuss with your clinician the pros and cons of management options and whether surgery is necessary. Often, patients don’t know not having surgery is an option.
Surgery appears to be necessary for some people to achieve a stable knee. But it may not be necessary in every case, so many patients may wish to try rehabilitation in the first instance where appropriate.
As always, prevention is key. Research has shown more than half of ACL injuries can be prevented by incorporating prevention strategies. This involves performing specific exercises to strengthen muscles in the legs, and improve movement control and landing technique.
Anthony Nasser, Senior Lecturer in Physiotherapy, University of Technology Sydney; Joshua Pate, Senior Lecturer in Physiotherapy, University of Technology Sydney, and Peter Stubbs, Senior Lecturer in Physiotherapy, University of Technology Sydney
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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Test For Whether You Will Be Able To Achieve The Splits
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Some people stretch for years without being able to do the splits; others do it easily after a short while. Are there people for whom it is impossible, and is there a way to know in advance whether our efforts will be fruitful? Liv (of “LivInLeggings” fame) has the answer:
One side of the story
There are several factors that affect whether we can do the splits, including:
- arrangement of the joint itself
- length of tendons and muscles
- “stretchiness” of tendons and muscles
The latter two things, we can readily train to improve. Yes, even the basic length can be changed over time, because the body adapts.
The former thing, however (arrangement of the joint itself) is near-impossible, because skeletal changes happen more slowly than any other changes in the body. In a battle of muscle vs bone, muscle will always win eventually, and even the bone itself can be rebuilt (as the body fixes itself, or in the case of some diseases, messes itself up). However, changing the arrangement of your joint itself is far beyond the auspices of “do some stretches each day”. So, for practical purposes, without making it the single most important thing in your life, it’s impossible.
How do we know if the arrangement of our hip joint will accommodate the splits? We can test it, one side at a time. Liv uses the middle splits, also called the side splits or box splits, as an example, but the same science and the same method goes for the front splits.
Stand next to a stable elevated-to-hip-height surface. You want to be able to raise your near-side leg laterally, and rest it on the surface, such that your raised leg is now perfectly perpendicular to your body.
There’s a catch: not only do you need to still be stood straight while your leg is elevated 90° to the side, but also, your hips still need to remain parallel to the floor—not tilted up to one side.
If you can do this (on both sides, even if not both simultaneously right now), then your hip joint itself definitely has the range of motion to allow you to do the side splits; you just need to work up to it. Technically, you could do it right now: if you can do this on both sides, then since there’s no tendon or similar running between your two legs to make it impossible to do both at once, you could do that. But, without training, your nerves will stop you; it’s an in-built self-defense mechanism that’s just firing unnecessarily in this case, and needs training to get past.
If you can’t do this, then there are two main possibilities:
- Your joint is not arranged in a way that facilitates this range of motion, and you will not achieve this without devoting your life to it and still taking a very long time.
- Your tendons and muscles are simply too tight at the moment to allow you even the half-split, so you are getting a false negative.
This means that, despite the slightly clickbaity title on YouTube, this test cannot actually confirm that you can never do the middle splits; it can only confirm that you can. In other words, this test gives two possible results:
- “Yes, you can do it!”
- “We don’t know whether you can do it”
For more on the anatomy of this plus a visual demonstration of the test, enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like to read:
Stretching Scientifically – by Thomas Kurz ← this is our review of the book she’s working from in this video; this book has this test!
Take care!
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Why You Should Diversify Your Nuts!
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Time to go nuts for nuts!
Nuts, in popular perception, range from “basically the healthiest food anyone can eat” to “basically high calorie salty snacks”. And, they can be either!
Some notes, then:
- Raw is generally better that not
- Dry roasted is generally better than the kind with added oils
- Added salt is neither necessary nor good
Quick tip: if “roasted salted” are the cheapest or most convenient to buy, you can at least mitigate that by soaking them in warm water for 5 minutes, before rinsing and (if you don’t want wet nuts) drying.
You may be wondering: who does want wet nuts? And the answer is, if for example you’re making a delicious cashew and chickpea balti, the fact you didn’t dry them before throwing them in won’t make a difference.
Now, let’s do a quick run-down; we don’t usually do “listicles” but it seemed a good format here, so we’ve picked a top 5 for nutritional potency:
Almonds
We may have a bias. We accept it. But almonds are also one of the healthiest nuts around, and generally considered by most popular metrics the healthiest.
Not only are they high in protein, healthy fat, fiber, vitamins, and minerals, but they’re even a natural prebiotic that increases the populations of healthy gut bacteria, while simultaneously keeping down the populations of gut pathogens—what more can we ask of a nut?
Read more: Prebiotic effects of almonds and almond skins on intestinal microbiota in healthy adult humans
Pistachios
Not only are these super tasty and fun to eat (and mindful eating is all but guaranteed, as shelling them by hand slows us down and makes us more likely to eat them one at a time rather than by the handful), but also they contain lots of nutrients and are lower in calories than most nuts, so they’re a great option for anyone who’d like to eat more nuts but is doing a calorie-controlled diet and doesn’t want to have half a day’s calories in a tiny dish of nuts.
Walnuts
Popularly associated with brain health (perhaps easy to remember because of their appearance), they really are good for the brain:
Check it out: Beneficial Effects of Walnuts on Cognition and Brain Health
Cashews
A personal favorite of this writer for their versatility in cooking, food prep, or just as a snack, they also do wonders for metabolic health:
Brazil nuts
The most exciting thing about these nuts is that they’re an incredibly potent source of selenium, which is important not just for hair/skin/nails as popularly marketed, but also for thyroid hormone production and DNA synthesis.
But don’t eat too many, because selenium is definitely one of those “you can have too much of a good thing” nutrients, and selenium poisoning can make your hair (however beautiful and shiny it got because of the selenium) fall out if you take too much.
Know the numbers: Brazil nuts and selenium—health benefits and risks
Bottom line on nuts:
- Nuts are a great and healthful part of almost anyone’s diet
- Obviously, if you have a nut allergy, then we’re sorry; this one won’t have helped you so much
- Almonds are one of the most healthful nuts out there
- Brazil nuts are incredibly potent, to the point where moderation is recommended
- A handful of mixed nuts per day is a very respectable option—when it comes to food and health, diversity is almost always good!
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Biohack Your Brain – by Dr. Kristen Willeumier
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The title of this book is a little misleading, as it’s not really about biohacking; it’s more like a care and maintenance manual for the brain.
This distinction is relevant, because to hack a thing is to use it in a way it’s not supposed to be used, and/or get it to do something it’s not supposed to do.
Intead, what neurobiologist Dr. Kristen Willeumier offers us is much more important: how to keep our brain in good condition.
She takes us through the various things that our brain needs, and what will happen if it doesn’t get them. Some are dietary, some are behavioral, some are even cognitive.
A strength of this book is not just explaining what things are good for the brain, but also: why. Understanding the “why” can be the motivational factor that makes a difference between us doing the thing or not!
For example, if we know that exercise is good for the brain, we think “sounds reasonable” and carry on with what we were doing. If, however, we also understand how increased bloodflow helps with the timely removal of beta-amyloids that are associated with Alzheimer’s, we’re more likely to make time for getting that movement going.
Bottom line: there are key things we can do to keep our brain healthy, and you probably wouldn’t want to miss any. This book is a great care manual for such!
Click here to check out Biohack Your Brain and keep your brain young and fit!
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