Hello,

Let’s start with the positives from this week.

Week 5 of my health reset has gone to plan nutritionally. I’m still following the principles I set myself and, by this point, I genuinely feel like they have become a habit.

Apart from when I had to use a bit of willpower when I was slightly hungover the other day, sticking to my principles now feels almost automatic.

The habit, as a reminder, was simple: before I eat a food, I run it past my principles and decide whether to eat it or not.

According to habit psychology, this is what happens after enough repetitions. The behaviour becomes increasingly automatic and requires less conscious effort.

There has also been an identity shift. I now identify as someone who doesn’t eat ultra-processed foods and sticks to their nutritional principles. This is identity-based behaviour change, and I feel like I’ve actually made that shift, which is something I’ve struggled with for most of my life.

So, what hasn’t gone so well?

I’d stopped doing my simple end-of-day tracking, which included nutrition, exercise, steps and water. Almost without noticing, my steps, water and exercise started to slip.

Yesterday I put the tracker back up. Water went back up. Steps went back up.

Not exactly groundbreaking science, but it reminded me how much the tiny details matter.

Drinking enough water partly comes down to remembering to fill my 500ml bottle and put it next to my bag. Getting my steps in starts with actually putting my pedometer on my wrist in the morning.

It sounds ridiculously simple, but this is where behaviour change often succeeds or fails.

“Drink more water” is an intention. “Fill my bottle and put it next to my work bag each morning” is a behaviour.

The more specific I can make the cue, when, where and after what existing behaviour something happens, the less I have to rely on remembering or feeling motivated.

I think I need to get even better at this.

The bigger lesson this week has been about stress and workload

This has probably been my most demanding week in terms of mental load.

I’m off work for two weeks from next week, so I’ve been seeing more health and wellbeing coaching clients in the NHS, making more calls and trying to fill groups ready for when I return. I manage a fairly large caseload myself, and if I let things pile up before I go away, I know I’m simply creating more pressure for myself when I return.

So my work rate has gone right up.

The interesting thing is that I don’t actually feel stressed at work. I enjoy what I do.

But stress isn’t necessarily the same as feeling stressed. Increased workload, concentration, decision-making, emotional demands and exercise all place demands on us. Even when we enjoy them, they still require energy.

Exercise itself is also a form of stress on the body. It is a positive stress when we can recover and adapt from it, but it still adds to our overall load. I think part of what I have been doing this week is listening to that total load and recognising that adding more stress through exercise wasn’t always what I needed.

And this week I’ve noticed that increased workload has left me needing more recovery.

One of my old mentors, Paul Chek, describes this as the difference between “working out” and “working in”.

Working out expends energy and creates stress that, with enough recovery, we adapt to and become stronger from. Working in is his term for gentle practices intended to restore energy rather than further deplete it.

Interestingly, I’ve naturally found myself doing more of that this week.

When I’m working with more people, I notice that I need more time to myself. Instead of getting up and exercising in the morning, I’ve been doing some simple meditation and journalling. I’ve also been walking more during the day.

The question I’ve wrestled with is: am I listening to what I need, or am I just using work as an excuse not to exercise?

I think there needs to be room for both possibilities.

I don’t want “I’m busy” to become an excuse whenever life gets difficult. But equally, a sustainable health system can’t ignore workload, mental load and recovery and expect us to follow exactly the same plan regardless of what else is happening in our lives.

Perhaps the skill is learning to adjust rather than abandon.

Today my workload is lower, so I’m still planning to exercise today, tomorrow and Saturday. Then I’m off for two weeks, which will give me more time to train, recover and refine the system I’ve been developing.

I think this is becoming an important part of that system. A good health system shouldn’t only work when life is going perfectly. It needs to respond to real life.

Sometimes we can push a little harder. Sometimes we need to reduce the load. Sometimes the planned gym session might become a walk, some mobility, meditation or simply more recovery.

The important thing is making that adjustment consciously rather than just falling off completely.

And despite the imperfect week, there was another positive.

I checked my blood pressure and it’s the lowest I’ve ever recorded it. My weight is also in healthy ranges now.

So something is moving in the right direction.

My biggest lesson from Week 5 is that creating a sustainable healthy lifestyle isn’t just about building habits and following a plan. It’s also about listening to the demands being placed on you and learning how to adjust without abandoning the system altogether.

Next week I’m off work for two weeks, so I’ll have more space to put that into practice and continue refining diet, exercise, sleep, and what i was reminded of this week..happiness making.

I am really looking forward to a very healthy and restorative 2 weeks.

Then get the health check again, which I am arranging now.

Week 5 lesson: Don’t just build a system you can follow. Build one that can adapt to real life.

Catch up soon.

Dan