Recovery, Explained: How Your Body Rebuilds After Stress

Stress shapes you. Recovery strengthens you.

Your body is constantly balancing breakdown and rebuild — and with the right inputs, you can turn stress into adaptation rather than exhaustion.

When it comes to stress, recovery, and adaptations the body treats mental and physical stressors in the same fashion with a very similar process. Knowing how this process works not only will help you as you look to make progress, but also pinpoint one of the biggest culprits in leading to plateaus. These stressors can be planned workouts, busy days at work, illness, relationships, or all of them combined and it becomes crucial to account for this when looking at how much you're trying to accomplish and what results are reasonable to expect.

The first step in this process is an immediate response to this stressor that includes things like an increase in heart rate, cortisol and adrenaline rise, mental focus increase, and an increase in blood sugar to provide more energy to meet the increased need. After the stressor has passed the body then shifts into repair mode shifting those resources to stabilize which will include things like a normalization of hormone levels, and repair of any tissue damage. Finally we get into the adaptation phase where muscle strength increases, muscular endurance improves, cognitive resilience increases, and there's a mood improvement all with the goal to better handle the next stressor that comes.

The challenge for many is balancing out the stressors such that this entire process can run from start to finish in an efficient manner. Too strong or too quick of a stressor and the body never finishes the repair mode and as such can't adapt or grow stronger. The repair process can also be delayed by other factors too, such as poor sleep, underfueling, or even relationship stress. Some indicators that you may be stuck in this cycle are consistent muscle soreness or perpetual fatigue. The flip side can also cause problems as too weak of a stressor, or ones spaced too far apart and the body never triggers an adaptation as it doesn't need to.

Unfortunately, there is no one single test that can identify either of these as the exact problem you may be facing in hitting your goals. However, if you find yourself stuck at a plateau or feel like you're just going through the motions, the first place to start would be that honest assessment of your stressors and what actions you're currently taking. If you feel like you're perhaps putting your body under too much stress, look for ways to either reduce some of that or change up your workouts by reducing the duration or intensity. Most workout programs have a built-in de-load period to help the body adjust, but depending on where you're starting from it may take longer than that. If you feel like you're on the other side of the fence, I wouldn't suggest increasing your stress (don't go out purposely to get poor sleep) but look to change up or increase your workout frequency/intensity. With either of these paths, I wouldn't look to change too many things or make a drastic change but start small and evaluate progress.

Stress is unavoidable — but recovery is intentional.

When you understand how your body repairs, resets, and rebuilds, you can train harder, handle stress better, and perform at a higher level.

Support the process. Build resilience. Keep forging forward.

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Breakfast: The Why and The What

Whether you’re an executive juggling meetings or an athlete in training, your morning fuel sets the tone for the entire day.

Breakfast isn’t just a meal — it’s a performance tool.

Used well, it gives you steady energy, better focus, and stronger training sessions.

For many of my clients, breakfast can be one of the most challenging habits to change and then it can also be one of those most impactful changes they can make. There are lots of explanations I've heard (and used myself) for not eating breakfast but the advantages of breakfast far outweigh any of the other options by a large margin. What I try to walk through with my clients are the benefits of breakfast, and what can we do to gradually work towards a better solution. For those with looking to perform either physically or mentally, or those looking to better manage their weight in a sustainable way, some sort of breakfast is one of the best starting points.

Let's start with the benefits:

• Eating breakfast works to stabilize your blood sugar after a natural period of fasting (overnight sleep) which is one of the leading causes not only of fatigue during the day but also cravings.

• An early meal helps regulate and promote the normal hormone cycles of cortisol such that it can start to decrease during the day as well as helping to regulate the appetite hormones.

• From a practical standpoint, eating an early meal helps with getting not only the proper macro nutrients (primarily protein) but also getting in enough other nutrients from things like fruits and vegetables.

So what should a breakfast look like? Just like every other meal, there should be a good mix of protein, complex carbs, healthy fats, and some color typically coming from fruits or vegetables. Three options that can not only knock out those requirements but are either quick to throw together or can be batch made ahead of time:

1. A combination of eggs, meat (or tofu), potatoes (or toast), and veggies. This can be done as a scramble, omelette, casserole, or a burrito and each of those present other options for additional flavors and prep times.

2. An oat mixture is a great bulk option, I use a version of overnight oats that tastes like a chocolate chip cookie and is not only one of my breakfast staples, but my pre-race meal as well.

3. A shake is another great quick and portable option that allows for the combination of a lot of things, with the taste of the veggies masked by the other items.

4. If you're starting from not eating anything, maybe think about adding something into your tea or coffee increase calories. Things like protein powder, collagen protein, creatine, and MCT oil are all good options that dissolve well and can either be flavorless or give a nice twist to your beverage of choice.

Each of these options has its advantages and which one is best will vary by the individual, circumstances, and you may even want to rotate through to provide a level of variety. As I've said numerous times, start with understanding of where you currently are and look to make small shifts to make consistent progress.

If you want better energy, stronger workouts, and fewer cravings — don’t skip the foundation.

Build a breakfast that supports your goals and sets the tone for your entire day.

Start strong. Fuel early. Perform better.

🔗 Subscribe to The Wellness Forge for more practical strategies to fuel your body and optimize performance.

How to Measure Progress (Even When the Scale or Stopwatch Won’t Budge)

Iron sharpens through challenge — not repetition.

Plateaus aren’t roadblocks. They’re invitations to refine your approach, dial in your habits, and train with intention.

Let’s break down how to progress with purpose.

Progress is one of the key metrics we all pay attention to as we train, and we primarily focus on two types of progress - quantitative and qualitative. However, I will admit, for myself and many of my clients, the fixation on the quantitative (numbers/metrics) can be overpowering and dominate the thought process. That's not to say focusing on numbers is a bad thing, for the most part they can be a great metric as they're usually very cut and dry. You either hit that metric/goal or you don't. However, these only tell part of the story and shouldn't be used as the sole metric for gauging progress. You'll want to pair those metrics with some qualitative guides to help you understand HOW you're hitting those numbers. For example, if one of the metrics you're tracking is how much weight you're squatting, it is very easy to keep track of how much weight you load onto the bar (or hold in your hands, or how many body weight squats you're doing). But you'll also want to keep track of qualitative things like how easy/hard those reps feel, how you recover from that workout, how is your range of motions (think squat depth) is improving, and the list goes on from there. Pairing the numbers with the feel gives you a more complete understanding of how you're progressing with your squats, in this example, and a better grasp of when you might actually be hitting a plateau. Many consider plateaus when just the numbers stall, but if you're able to do the same weight but it feels easier, that's not a hard plateau, you're most likely very close to being able to increase the weight.

There are many reasons why you might be hitting an actual plateau where not only are the numbers not moving, but the workouts don't feel any different and they mainly will fall into 3 types:

1. Too much training or not enough fueling - these essentially get to the same problem, too much training load that the body can't properly recover from and as such never adapts.

2. Too little training which doesn't challenge the body enough such that it needs to adapt.

3. The wrong kind of training, an extreme example of this would be doing lots of speed work during your marathon training

So what does it look like to pull out of a plateau, it first starts with understanding IF you're actually in one and then figuring out which of the above three buckets your training falls into. Some of the solutions are simpler to figure out, for example an over training imbalance can be helped with either adding in a de-load week or an increase of calories. Starting with that honest assessment of where you currently are not only with training, but fueling and your other stressors will help narrow down the challenges to work to adjust. My recommendation would be to pick one aspect and make a small change to see if you notice things moving in the right direction, then lean in further. As an example, if you feel your fueling may be off, look to add a small snack, or slightly larger meals, to add around 100-300 calories a day for a week, and see how that impacts not only your training but how you recover and feel. Another option if you're feeling truly stuck, and assuming you don't have a calendar restriction (like a race in 3 weeks), would be to pivot to something completely different for a few weeks. This will provide a radically different stimulus and force your body to respond and adapt.

Sometimes it can be hard to be objective about progress, and it helps to have someone else to observe and discuss your current training. While this is the exact purpose of having a coach or trainer, you can also look to other training partners, friends, relatives, etc to get some feedback on not only the training but how they view your recovery and mentality. This outside viewpoint may be the missing piece in helping crack the plateau challenge.

Plateaus aren’t a dead end — they’re a sign to adjust.

Progress comes from intention, not intensity.

Change the stimulus, fuel well, recover well, and track your trends — and your progress will keep moving forward.

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More Than Sleep: How to Recover Physically and Mentally

Sleep is the foundation of recovery — but it's not the whole story.

True recovery happens through the habits, movement, and mindset strategies you use throughout your day.

Here’s how to build a recovery system that supports greater performance, resilience, and consistency.

One of the best recovery tools you can master is sleep, however that doesn't cover all aspects of recovery. Recovery isn't just a single item and it needs to be adjusted based on the specific stressors on the body and how it is handling them. A tricky part for this is that the two aren't always correlated, for example after a hard workout you may feel like you need a mental break more than a physical one. Many think of recovery as the down time between workouts, but it is a complex set of processes the body is consistently engaged in as it deals with the stressors of life. Things like eating, hydrating, watching Netflix are just some of the things that can be leveraged as recovery aids. Recovery is where all the magic happens as not only does the body heal from any damage that has been done, but it also is where the adaptations to those stressors occur. And that's the most important part, we want the body to have the time AND resources needed to make the adaptations we're training for. We don't build muscle during out strength workouts, our body builds in as it recovers and adapts such that it can be more efficient in handling those workouts in the future.

First let's talk about physical recovery, as this is what most think about when recovery comes up. This can essentially be broken into two buckets - movement and fueling. While many might think that a lack of movement (laying on the couch) is the best recovery, usually the best option is light, low impact movement to get the blood flowing to help bring nutrients to the areas of need, and pull all the bad stuff away. Think things like stretching, mobility work, walking, yoga, swimming, all are great options to consider when used appropriately and at a low intensity. That's not to say, there are times when taking time to fully "do nothing" might be the best option, but for me at least, those are usually paired with needing to mentally restore as well. Load management is also a key part in all of this, some times swapping out a strength workout for a mobility day, or changing your speed day for a Zone 2 run will also prove more beneficial in the long term. The other aspect to think of physically is refueling your body not only of the nutrients (carbs, protein, vitamins, etc.) but also hydration. While you may think that since you're taking it easier, you don't need as much fuel - remember that while you're recovering, you're also building, and to build your body needs the fuel to accomplish that task. I'm not suggesting you fuel your recovery days like your monster workout days, but you should most likely fuel more on your recovery days then you think you need to. This is also the bucket where all those fun tools/toys come into play, but that's a whole different post for another day.

Physical recovery is usually the one most people think of first, but we can't underestimate the impact of mental and emotional recovery. Those are much harder to track and monitor as we don't have great ways to quantify those aspects of our lives (yet). And yes, there is some overlap between physical and mental recovery, I myself often find exercise as a great way to let my mind wander and disconnect from the other stressors in my life - but physical exercise still is a stressor on the body. Mindfulness is one of the top ways to foster this kind of recovery and it can take lots of forms (journaling, meditation, quiet time, etc) such that you open up to the idea of acknowledging where you currently are and what paths forward are available to you. This doesn't have to be large block of time, even 5 minutes can be enough to not only provide the mental clarity but an opportunity for your brain and body to rest and reset. Another great option is to take time outside (weather permitting) maybe even combining this with some mindfulness for additive benefits. Finally, a great way to mentally recharge is to be around other people either in person or through voice, text, video chatting. The simple act of reaching out to someone else not only removes you from your stressors but opens up the possibility of connection and helping someone else through their challenges.

Recovery isn't a one size fits all process, it varies from person to person, and from day to day, so the way to improve it is through awareness and experimentation. Consciously understanding where you currently are, trying some things, and then evaluating how you feel during and afterwards. You can do this using some form of journaling, combined with a wearable, or with the help of a coach to see what works for you in various kinds of circumstances. As important as numbers and metrics are, don't discount how you feel either - ideally they will correlate, but sometimes they don't which requires further investigation. This process also applies to the holidays, you'll need to be aware of what's changing in your life, your stressors and your ability to handle them, and adapt your training and recovery appropriately to match those.

Recovery is a skill — and you can build it like any other.

You don’t need an hour, a spa day, or a perfect routine. Just a few intentional habits that help your body and mind reset.

Start small. Stay consistent. Protect your recovery.

🔗 Subscribe to The Wellness Forge for more science-backed strategies to perform better, stress less, and live stronger.

Why You’re Tired, Craving Sugar, and Plateauing: Underfueling Explained

If you’re tired, unfocused, craving sugar by mid-afternoon, or feeling flat during workouts, there’s a good chance your problem isn’t discipline — it’s underfueling.

High performers burn more energy than they think. And most of them aren’t eating nearly enough to support the pace they’re trying to maintain.

One of the sneakiest ways I see many of my clients run into roadblocks with their progress boils down to a matter of underfueling, which can eating too little, fueling incorrectly, or not balancing fuel for the demands put on the body - or for a combination of all three. In many cases these aren't conscious decisions being made, or they're decisions that seem correct but lack context, and as such correcting them can be challenging. It takes a little more digging to not only identify the issue but also recognize how simple the solution might be.

Underfueling is one of those concepts that sounds simple and yet in practice is complicated enough that it goes unnoticed. The main idea is that you're not providing enough quality fuel for you body to perform the tasks that you're asking it to. The body is also very good at adapting and compensating for these deficiencies, but can only do so for a period of time before it becomes overwhelmed. A couple of the main culprits are caffeine and fiber as while they are beneficial in many ways, they also will dull or mask hunger queues such that skipping meals entirely or not fueling enough becomes not only easy but can become consistent. The first part of the challenge is underestimating the caloric needs of the body, some like basic daily needs (Basal Metabolic Rate or BMR) and training load are relatively straightforward to get a good estimate as there are calculators and wearables to help. However, these can also be wildly inaccurate, especially when estimating caloric needs based on exercise. In addition, other factors such as poor sleep, mental stress load, travel, and injuries will all skew your fueling needs and not always in magnitudes or directions as you might expect. Based on all these factors, it can be hard to get a handle on the caloric needs and even being off a couple hundred calories a day can create a sizeable enough gap to cause challenges.

So what does underfueling look like, or what are some of the symptoms you might notice? First off, physically you may notice:

• Low energy or consistent fatigue

• Inability to concentrate or brain fog

• Frequent illness

• Poor sleep

The symptoms don't stop there, you will also notice struggles mentally as well:

• Irritability or mood swings

• Decreased libido

• CRAVINGS

• night time snacking

And then to further compound all of this, you'll notice some performance and metrics dip as well:

• Workouts feeling harder than normal

• Heart rate variability (HRV) dips

• Higher than normal resting heart rate

With all of this, it may seem daunting to overcome this challenge - however, the first step is quite simple, remember simple doesn't always mean easy. I've mentioned this before, and will continue to suggest it - but awareness is your greatest asset for this kind of situation. And that comes down to:

1. Understanding your body's needs including not just calories but the allocation of those calories between carbohydrates, protein, and fat.

2. A good handle on your intake and timing of your fueling including the macro breakdown.

3. A honest self assessment of how you feel on a daily basis such that you can better understand where you may be lacking.

Another option you could consider, if you feel like you're experiencing a number of the symptoms, would be to increase your caloric intake by 200 to 500 calories, paying attention to how you feel. This could come from the addition of a snack, or if there's a particular meal (like breakfast) you typically skip, add that back in. Do this for a week or so, and see if you notice any differences. This is also a time when using a scale can be helpful to notice if you're gaining any weight, but with the increases I'm suggesting it would probably take a couple of weeks before you noticed anything significant considering the normal day to day weight fluctuations. Continue to balance how you feel with the numbers you're seeing on the scale and look to continue to increase the calories without seeing a consistent weight increase. I typically recommend increasing for a couple of weeks, then taking a week to hold steady to help accurately assess the dynamics.

Travel, busy seasons, and packed schedules make underfueling even more common. But they don’t have to derail your performance.

Learn how to fuel consistently no matter where life takes you — and build the foundation that drives your energy all year long.

🔗 Subscribe to The Wellness Forge for more tools to support strength, energy, and recovery.

Building Better Sleep Habits — and Keeping Them Through the Holidays

The holidays bring joy, connection… and disruption.

Travel, late nights, and changing routines can throw your sleep completely off track.

But with a few intentional habits and environmental tweaks, you can stay rested and ready through the busiest season of the year.

Before I dive in too deep, let's first set the ground rules for what I tend to consider when thinking about "Sleep Hygiene:"

1. The Environment - light, temperature, noise, other people, pets, etc.

2. Your Behaviors - phone usage, caffeine, stress, etc.

3. Your Routine - what you do leading up to attempting to fall asleep

There's more you can look at when defining Sleep Hygiene, but these are the biggest impacts you can make.  The good news is that making a few tweaks now for the Holidays, allows you to roll them into the New Year and build on that foundation for continued benefits.

For each of these three areas, there's a range of changes that can be made not only in how much of an impact they'll have for your sleep quality, but also how large of a change you'll need to make. Both of which will vary wildly from person to person and as such I typically recommend making only one or two changes at a time, prioritizing your ease of implementation and sleep impact. So let's look at each of these areas, and toss out a couple of ideas for each as well as some idea on the commitment needed to make the change:

1. Environment

1. Try to create as dark of a room as possible, with the simplest option being to use a sleep mask.

2. A little more of a financial commitment, but might be better if masks are not comfortable, would be blackout window coverings of some sort.

3. Temperature is also a massive factor in sleep quality and covers not only the temperature of the room, but that of the bed as well. There are lots of options here ranging in price from adding fans to help cool down, setting the room temperature cooler, or even looking at the various options out there to cool (and heat) your bed itself.

2. Behaviors

1. Stress is one of the more impactful factors I've listed, but it is also complex and not always obvious. A workout (productive stress) done late in the day could have a calming impact on some, or it could produce too many endorphins such that it becomes harder to fall asleep. Couple stressful days with some items in the routine area I'll get to such that you moderate those days and mitigate the detrimental effects of an excess of stress.

2. Caffeine varies significantly not only in the magnitude of the impact but also the duration such that everyone needs to understand for themselves what does and does not work for them.

3. Screen usage has been consistently shown to be damaging to sleep quality, with the simple answer being to put everything away a set period before bed. However, that's practically very challenging for many people, so an alternative would be to wear blue light blocking glasses to reduce (or negate) that impact.

3. Routine

1. A routine starts with timing, ideally one that allows for consistent bed time as well as a consistent waking time. Best practices are to keep both of these times as consistent as possible, during the week and weekends. A way to think of this is the popular shift many do over the weekends essentially is subjecting your body to jet lag every week. Now, does this require a rigid structure such that there's never any fun? Of course not, but recognize the impact a night out will have and look for other ways (like a nap) to more fully restore the body and mind.

2. Outside of that, look for things you can stack in the evening to help enter a calm state and prepare the body for sleep. Again, these could be all sorts of things and don't need to be overly complex - start simple and work backwards from whatever time you want to go to bed. Some options to consider:

1. reading, journaling, stretching, meditation, turning down the lights, and way too many more to list out.

There are two separate paths you can take to work on your sleep hygiene as the holidays approach:

• Pick one or two items from the list above, work to implement them, and keep track of the impact they have on your sleep duration, quality, and how you feel the next day. Look to be as consistent as possible, but allow yourself the grace to enjoy the Holidays. The goal is progress and awareness, not creating the perfect solution.

• If your schedule seems overwhelming and too chaotic to control, roll with that and keep a journal of the various things that change, how they impact your sleep, and how you feel the next day. This information you gather will then better inform you for the New Year such that you can have targeted changes that you KNOW will impact YOUR sleep in a positive way. Mentally, making changes in a way you've already proven to work are significantly easier to implement and sustain such that you'll get a massive boost to start the New Year!

A final idea to consider if you're traveling for the holidays, what parts of your sleep hygiene can you bring to carry that continuity and familiarity with you?

And as always, look for the small changes you can make that are sustainable and build momentum.

The holidays don’t have to derail your rest — they can be a chance to refine it.

Build a sleep routine that supports recovery, clarity, and energy, no matter where you are.

Start small. Be consistent. Protect your foundation.

💤 Subscribe to The Wellness Forge for more actionable wellness strategies that keep you performing at your best.

Strength Training Anywhere: Build on What You Already Have

Strength doesn’t live in the gym — it lives in your habits.

Whether you’re training from home, a hotel, or halfway across the country visiting family, you can still build on the foundation you’ve created.

This season is about consistency, not perfection. Here’s how to make it happen.

In my earlier post on strength training I provided some ideas for getting started, as well as some ways to progress what you're currently doing.  Another key aspect of consistent strength training is pivoting when your situations change, and the holiday season is right around the corner.  So what kinds of options should we look at to continue our training during a busy travel and gathering time period?

The first conversation to have with yourself is the duration of the travel or holiday window you're working with.  Missing one workout over a long weekend really won't have much of an impact, but a week or two starts to slide into the period where it might matter physically and definitely has a mental impact.  Also consider your current stress levels and how the holidays and/or travel will impact that, taking some time off or scaling back might be the best long term answer.  And then of course, think about your goals and how those align with your timing.  Personally for me, I typically travel between Christmas and New Year's, and then have the Houston Half-marathon in early January, such that training is important for me.  But I also know that trip is very restorative for me and I can handle the training load.

So what does it look like to strength train through this period?  I would look at 3 main options that are not only scalable for anyone of any level but very portable:

1. Body weight exercises, think squats, step ups, core work, and pushups all provide value and can be progressed reasonably well.

2. Resistance bands easily fit into a suitcase and can scale to pretty much any difficulty level and provide a full body workout.

3. A Suspension Trainer is another very portable option that does require a mount point (tree, bar, outward opening door) but allows another option for a full body workout and most likely a different stimulus.

I would then think about shortening your workout time and pivot towards more workouts.  For example, instead of two hour long workouts, think of four thirty minute workouts. You can look at either mimicking your current exercises with these tools, or maybe take advantage of the novelty and try some new movements. All of the above tools allow for lots of variations of angles and pivot points which can significantly change the stimulus that exercise provides. This unfamiliarity will not only help with your training, but also mentally it will allow you to focus on the experience and not get caught up in trying to compare numbers.

The holidays don’t have to be a setback — they’re an opportunity to stay grounded and keep your momentum.

You don’t need a perfect plan, just a flexible one.

Build on what you already have, adapt when life gets messy, and keep forging forward.

💪 Subscribe to The Wellness Forge for practical, adaptable training strategies you can take anywhere.

How to Structure Your Eating for Better Energy & Performance

Many people know what to eat…

But fewer know when to eat.

Some people experiment with intermittent fasting to simplify their routines — and it can work for the right person.

But for many, structure beats restriction.

Over the years there have been lots of ideas and fads surrounding the topic of when is the best time to eat.  And like most everything in the Wellness space, the optimal timing will vary wildly from person to person.  The key to figuring out what works best, like I've mentioned before, is the awareness of what you're currently doing and paying attention to the signals your body and mind are already sending you.  If you think that meal timing might be a challenge for you, the key things to pay attention are your hunger cues, energy levels, and mental acuity.  Based on that information, you can start to piece together where sliding a meal might help, or adding in an additional meal or snack would curb the cravings and eliminate energy crashes.  The goal of meal timing is to stabilize and even out not only your hunger but also keep your energy levels consistent such that you don't have any of those dreaded nose dives.

What does this look like in application?  Typically for most people this ends up as 3 spaced meals with some sort of an afternoon snack mixed in there, or possibly a fourth meal.  Of course, this will all vary based on training loads and work schedules but that is the general pattern that seems to benefit most people.    Having a loose structure like this during that day not only stabilizes hunger and energy, but it also keeps insulin levels more consistent and helps limit over-eating.  This also allows for more consistently hitting macro targets, especially protein, as you're not struggling to catch up late in the day. You'll also want to adjust this based not only your logistical schedule but any sort of training needs and can vary on a daily basis.

One concept that comes up frequently with meal timing is centered around not eating too late in the evening, or too close to going to sleep. For most people, this is a pretty decent guideline to follow - but like everything, there are possible exceptions. The main idea is that digesting food while trying to sleep doesn't lead to as productive sleep, however there is some variance here. So, if your schedule lines up or seems to work out that you're eating late - pay attention to how you sleep and feel, and try running your own test to see what differences you notice when you do or don't eat late. Personally, eating late does not bother me, but I know others that it can absolutely tank their sleep.

Another frequent comment I hear from people is that they struggle to eat breakfast or aren't hungry until later in the day. This is usually a more involved conversation but typically I do recommend people having something close to when they first wake up in the morning. A couple options if you really struggle eating in the mornings would be to include some protein powder with your morning coffee, or sliding your meals such that your snack comes during the typical breakfast time. I will do a complete post on this as I do feel strongly that breakfast is very helpful and also has more nuance then I can cover in a paragraph.

Intermittent Fasting (IF) is another common trend these days and many swear by it as a way to lose weight. IF centers around the idea of only eating during certain periods of the day, and if you think about it almost all of us naturally do this due to our sleep patterns. The main benefit of IF is that it is a simple way to reduce caloric intake, and that is the main driver with any sort of weight loss. However, as with all restrictive habits, it can lead to over eating as well as creating a more adversarial relationship with food, as opposed to eating to support and nourish your body. IF can be a useful tool, but should be used sparingly and with consistent awareness to best understand how your body is responding to the changes.

Meal timing doesn’t have to be complicated.

Build consistency. Fuel earlier. Match intake to your day.

IF can be a tool — but the real goal is finding a rhythm that supports how you live, train, and perform.

🔗 Subscribe to The Wellness Forge for more data-driven wellness guidance.

Data-Driven Wellness: When the Numbers Matter — And When They Don’t

High performers use data to make sharper decisions, focus effort, and avoid wasted time.

But over-reliance on numbers without real-world feedback leads to poor choices.

The best results come from blending data with experience, intuition, and honest reflection.

In the world we live in now, everyone has a definition of what "Data" is, so let's start with how I look at "Data" - any piece of information that can be used to make a decision. When we dive a little deeper data typically falls into 2 categories, quantitative and qualitative, and lately in the Health and Wellness space many are leaning entirely on the quantitative side. These are all useful pieces of information, things like Heart Rate Variability (HRV), sleep duration, resting heart rate, calories and macro distribution, body weight, and I could go on but you get the point. The boom of wearables and the continued prevalence of phones has made gathering this information easier than ever and it can be very comforting to look at a single number or metric and make a decision. However the key piece that is missing from all these numbers is CONTEXT which allows you to better understand if that value is in a positive space or towards a more negative direction. Context allows you to better evaluate how your body and mind are responding to the pieces of quantitative data and how they impact you specifically. For example, knowing that you were asleep for 8 hours last night is helpful, but without the feedback of how you felt this morning mentally and physically, it is hard to know if more sleep is needed or if maybe you're a member of the group that doesn't always need 8 hours, if you should push a hard workout or aim to recover.

Let's take a look at another common example of when numbers alone can foster incorrect next steps, tracking calories and macros. For many of my clients (I also do this from time to time) tracking can be a very powerful tool as it helps bring awareness to what exactly and how much food you're consuming. But, when you look to take only this information and make weight management decisions (either losing weight or building muscle) you'll most likely struggle as this problem is way more complex then just a couple of numbers. Our body continues to adapt and without paying attention to the qualitative pieces, consistent progress will be almost impossible to maintain. The great part is that when you become more attuned to the qualitative metrics you can loosen up on your strict adherence to the numbers, which again promotes a more sustainable path. In practice, this looks like keeping track of the following:

• how did you feel, including any stomach issues

• how was your energy

• how was your QUALITY of sleep

• how hungry did you feel

• what was your activity level

• you can add more if you want, but this will be a good start.

As you can imagine, the answers to these questions combined with the calorie and macro numbers allows for a better understanding of not only how well did you fuel your body, but how much fuel your body likely needs.

Now that you're on board with both numbers and context, where do you start? As I've mentioned in other posts the goal is to start small and build momentum. Track a couple metrics of each type for a period, and then look for trends. For example, let's say you want to work on feeling more rested in the morning and believe getting better quality sleep is the place to start. Pick whatever logging tool makes the most sense for you short term (if you like this process you can always change) and pick a couple of each kind of data to start with, something like this:

• (Quantitative) Hours of sleep (either from a wearable or an estimation based on when you went to bed and woke up)

• (Quantitative) heart rate shortly after you wake up, your resting heart rate is a good data proxy for overall stress levels

• (Qualitative) how you feel in the morning

• (Qualitative) level of stress (mentally and physically) from your previous day

Starting with these 4 pieces you'll have a great starting point to understand how much sleep you're getting and how much your body needs. Keep this log for a week or two and you'll start to be able to observe some trends and begin to plan better for those days when you're going to NEED more sleep. With a data set small like this, it becomes easier to not only keep track of things but run your own tests to better understand the connections. You can apply a similar methodology across the board to different challenges, but I suggest keeping the amount of things you're varying to a small number such that you can better understand which changes are correlated to which result.

The best decisions come from blending numbers with awareness.

Track what matters. Listen to your body.

Let data inform — not dictate.

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The Most Underrated Performance Tool: Sleep

Sleep is the highest ROI habit in health.

One extra hour can boost focus, regulate hormones, and even improve training outcomes.

Here’s how to start improving your sleep tonight — and what happens when you don’t.

Most people I work with have an understanding or a desire to improve either their sleep quality or the amount of sleep they get, but struggle to effectively make a change.  Like I mentioned in my previous post on Nutrition, awareness is the key first step.  Start a sleep log - paper, electronic, or via an app, doesn't matter at this stage, and start to look for trends to target.  But, something you can start tonight that will make a difference and build towards better sleep hygiene - before you try to go to sleep, take 5 minutes for the following:

• Put your phone/tablet/laptop down for the night

• Focus on your breathing, taking deep controlled breaths

• Reflect on your day, focus on the good things of the day to help calm the nervous system and relax

• Think about 1 thing you want to do tomorrow.  This isn't about creating your to-do list, or run through your calendar, but 1 tangible thing you want to do better tomorrow.  Maybe this is walking more during the day, taking the stairs, drinking more water, picking fruit for a snack and not the candy, or whatever small tangible step seems plausible to accomplish.  And then check in on your progress with that the next night.

What does this 5 minutes get you?  It starts you on the path to establishing a night time ritual that you can build on that doesn't have to be overly complex.  It simply needs to be a series of things you do (ideally around the same time each night) that helps you signal your body that it is time to sleep.  As you progress on the journey towards better sleep, there are lots of other things you can look to change, but for now, start small and build momentum. Another simple (not necessarily easy though) step to take that you can implement immediately, start reframing sleep from something you need to do to prevent the negative impacts, towards an attitude that embraces the restorative and supercharging benefits more productive sleep provides.

I know many live by the "I'll sleep when I'm dead" mantra, and I lived that way for a while too, but at some point that lack of sleep will come back around. Lack of sleep is one of the biggest stressors you can subject your body to, so it will dramatically limit your ability to perform as well as fight off any illnesses or injuries. The mental impact sometimes is hard to recognize as so often we've gotten used to the feelings and don't really appreciate it until we start getting CONSISTENT good sleep. Also it is hard to compare the impact on our body as there isn't a great way to quantitatively compare what it could be if we were getting better sleep. Some wearables can help address this and provide some insights, I personally have been using Whoop for almost 5 years now and have a pretty good feel how impactful sleep is on my mental and physical performance. However, there are numerous studies that look at exactly that - the dramatic impacts poor sleep has on your mental performance and capacity, as well as your physical performance. Physically it is even more damaging as the lack of sleep not only diminishes your performance but it will also prevent you from absorbing the same amount of your training such that you see reduced gains from your daily (or however frequently you work out) efforts. I could go on talking about the negative aspects, but honestly that list is VERY long!

Not only will you see the opposite of the above problems when you start getting consistently solid sleep, but you will also start to notice long term trends as well. The big health metrics - things like body fat percentage, blood pressure, and metabolism will all trend better as you work on your sleep quality. This is not only due to the short term impacts, but while we sleep the body has the opportunity to recover and repair itself. This recovery and repairing then compounds with your training load to create a very powerful healthy stress, recover, and adapt cycle that allows your brain and body to best leverage the hard work you're doing.

To summarize the last two paragraphs simply - progressing towards healthier sleep is the single best way to supercharge your tomorrow. It is one of the harder changes to make, but the benefits can be life changing.

Sleep is the foundation — not the reward — for your hard work.

You don’t earn it after performing; you build everything from it.

Small changes tonight can create measurable improvements in your energy, focus, and recovery tomorrow.

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