Time Smart – by Dr. Ashley Whillans
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First, what this is not: it’s not a productivity book.
What is rather: a book of better wellbeing.
There is a little overlap, insofar as getting “time smart” in the ways that Dr. Whillans recommends will give you more ability to also be more productive—if that’s what you want.
She talks us through time traps and the “time poverty epidemic”, as well as steps to finding time and funding time. Perhaps most critical idea-wise is the chapter on building a “time-affluence habit”, making decisions that prioritize your time-freedom where you can—which in turn will allow you to build yet more. Kind of like compound interest really, but for time.
The writing style is a conversational tone, but peppered with bullet-point lists and charts and the like from time to time, and often with citations to back up claims. It makes for a very readable book, and yet one that’s also inspiring of the confidence that it’s more than just one person’s opinion.
Bottom line: if you sometimes feel like you could do everything you want to if you could just find the time, this book can help you get there.
Click here to check out Time Smart, and live your most satisfying life!
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Food Fix – by Dr. Mark Hyman
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On a simplistic level, “eat more plants, but ideally not monocrops, and definitely fewer animals” is respectable, ecologically-aware advice that is also consistent with good health. But it is a simplification, and perhaps an oversimplification.
Is there space on a healthy, ecologically sound plate for animal products? Yes, argues Dr. Mark Hyman. It’s a small space, but it’s there.
For example, some kinds of fish are both healthier and more sustainable as a food source than others, same goes for some kinds of dairy products. Poultry, too, can be farmed sustainably in a way that promotes a small self-contained ecosystem—and in terms of health, consumption of poultry appears to be health-neutral at worst.
As this book explores:
- Oftentimes, food choices look like: healthy/sustainable/cheap (choose one).
- Dr. Hyman shows how in fact, we can have it more like: healthy/sustainable/cheap (choose two).
- He argues that if more people “vote with their fork”, production will continue to adjust accordingly, and we’ll get: healthy/sustainable/cheap (all three).
To this end, while some parts of the book can feel like they are purely academic (pertaining less to what we can do as individuals, and more on what governments, farming companies, etc can do), it’s good to know what issues we might also take to the ballot box, if we’re able.
The big picture aside, the book remains very strong even just from an individual health perspective, though.
Bottom line: if you have an interest in preserving your own health, and possibly humanity itself, this is an excellent book.
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Eat Move Sleep – by Tom Rath
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The subtitle of this book, “how small choices lead to big changes“, is very much the idea that a lot of what we do here at 10almonds is about.
And the title itself, “Eat Move Sleep”? Well, that’s 3/5 of The Usual Five Things™ that we promote here (the other two being: reduce or eliminate alcohol, and don’t smoke). So, naturally this book got our attention.
One of the key ideas that Rath presents is that every action we take leads to a net gain or loss in health. The question then is: what are the biggest point-swingers? In other words, what are the places in our life where the smallest changes can make the biggest difference?
Rath looks at what parts of diet make the biggest difference to our health, and the findings there alone probably make reading the book worthwhile.
When it comes to movement, he actually flips this! For Rath, it’s less about how much exercise you get, and more about minimizing how long we spend not moving… And especially, minimizing how long we spend sitting. So, lots of little tweaks for that.
In the category of sleep: a key idea is that quality is as important as quantity, and there’s an aspect of bringing together as a synergistic routine. To finish off a productive day with good rest, and power up ready for the next morning.
In short: tying these items together—and focusing on the smallest choices that lead to the biggest changes—makes for quite a manifesto that we could describe as “Atomic Habits, for health specifically”.
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Top 8 Habits Of The Top 1% Healthiest Over-50s
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Will Harlow, over-50s specialist physio, compiled some stats from over a thousand over-50s clients:
Checklist
The findings:
- Consistency: the healthiest individuals practised some kind(s) of health habit daily. Consistency was emphasized as more important than perfection.
- Resistance training: 75% of the sample engaged in resistance training for better mobility, strength, and mental health. Not all used gyms; some used household objects like bags of books or resistance bands.
- Walking: everyone walked at least 6,000 steps per day, often briskly. Walking speed, not just step count, made a significant difference
- Purpose: most participants (bearing in mind that 80% of the total sample were retired) engaged in purposeful activities like volunteering, joining groups, or writing. Having a sense of purpose correlated with longer and healthier lives.
- Flexible dieting: participants paid attention to their eating without strictly following specific diets. Portion size discipline and consistency (eating well 90% of the time) were key.
- Mobility: they worked on joint stiffness with regular mobility and stretching routines. And, importantly, they do not accept stiffness as inevitable.
- Social engagement: they maintained at-least-weekly social contact (e.g. clubs, family meetups, outings). Social isolation, in contrast, was linked to severe health risks like dementia and early death.
- Positivity: participants maintained a positive attitude despite hardships, focussing on the things they could control. Broader scientific consensus supports the premise that a positive outlook improves health and longevity.
10almonds note: we’re curious as to how causality was established in some of these, since (for example) it could easily be that someone who is in better health will more readily walk more quickly, meaning that a higher walking speed was not necessarily such a causative factor in good health, but rather a result thereof. Of course, there may also be a degree of two-way causality, but still, we like good science and there seem to be some leaps of logic here that have otherwise gone unacknowledged.
This does not take away from the fact that those eight things are most certainly good things to be doing for one’s health, all the same.
For more on each of these, enjoy:
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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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Build Strong Feet: Exercises To Strengthen Your Foot & Ankle
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A lot depends on the health of our feet, especially when it comes to their strength and stability. But they often get quite neglected, when it comes to maintenance. Here’s how to help your feet keep the rest of your body in good condition:
On a good footing
The foot-specific exercises recommended here include:
- Active toe flexion/extension: curl and extend your toes
- Active toe adduction/abduction: use a towel for feedback this time as you spread your toes
- “Short foot” exercise: create an arch by bringing the base of your big toe towards your heel
- Resisted big toe flexion: use resistance bands; flex your big toe while controlling the others.
- Standing big toe flexion (isometric): press your big toe against an inclined surface as forcefully as you can
- Foot bridge exercise: hold your position with the front part of your feet on an elevated surface, to strengthen the arch.
- Heel raises: which can be progressed from basic to more advanced variations, increasing difficulty
- Ankle movements: dorsiflexion, inversion, etc, to increase mobility
It’s important to also look after your general lower body strength and stability, including (for example) single-leg deadlifts, step-downs, and lunges
Balance and proprioceptive exercises are good too, such as a static or dynamic one-leg balances, progressing to doing them with your eyes closed and/or on unstable surfaces (be careful, of course, and progress to this only when confident).
For more on all of these, an explanation of the anatomy, some other exercises too, and visual demonstrations, enjoy:
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Want to learn more?
You might also like to read:
Steps For Keeping Your Feet A Healthy Foundation
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Scheduling Tips for Overrunning Tasks
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Your Questions, Our Answers!
Q: Often I schedule time for things, but the task takes longer than I think, or multiplies while I’m doing it, and then my schedule gets thrown out. Any ideas?
A: A relatable struggle! Happily, there are remedies:
- Does the task really absolutely need to be finished today? If not, just continue it in scheduled timeslots until it’s completed.
- Some tasks do indeed need to be finished today (hi, writer of a daily newsletter here!), so it can be useful to have an idea of how long things really take, in advance. While new tasks can catch us unawares, recurring or similar-to-previous tasks can be estimated based on how long they took previously. For this reason, we recommend doing a time audit every now and again, to see how you really use your time.
- A great resource that you should include in your schedule is a “spare” timeslot, ideally at least one per day. Call it a “buffer” or a “backup” or whatever (in my schedule it’s labelled “discretionary”), but the basic idea is that it’s a scheduled timeslot with nothing scheduled in it, and it works as an “overflow” catch-all.
Additionally:
- You can usually cut down the time it takes you to do tasks by setting “Deep Work” rules for yourself. For example: cut out distractions, single-task, work in for example 25-minute bursts with 5-minute breaks, etc
- You can also usually cut down the time it takes you to do tasks by making sure you’re prepared for them. Not just task-specific preparation, either! A clear head on, plenty of energy, the resources you’ll need (including refreshments!) to hand, etc can make a huge difference to efficiency.
See Also: Time Optimism and the Planning Fallacy
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