What is that thing you’ve been thinking about doing but have yet to take action on?

The history of success stories is littered with examples of people who just got started and figured things out along the way. We can paralyze ourselves by wanting to make sure that the initial decision to do something is the right decision when in practice, taking the first step and being adaptable along the way is the most important part of the process.

You’ll never have all of the information. It’s impossible to guarantee success. Just take the leap and figure things out along the way. Be like the explorer, who anticipates storms along the journey, rather than try to avoid them.

Thanks to our friends over at RunDot for sponsoring today’s Superset. Click the link below to learn more about their project:

Brain - Who Cares, Who Cares

I have been thinking a lot about what separates normal people from the ones who go on to achieve incredible feats, and I continue to come back to one key principle - the lack of needing to be validated by those around them.

In our current times, everything we do (and don’t do) is often very public. Social media is the highlight reel, and with that comes an inherent desire to impress the circle of people who “follow” us.

In honest reflection, I bet each one of us can think of something we didn’t do because of fear of what other people would think. I bet most of us can pinpoint something from just this week!

• Do you think Steve Jobs invested much mental energy into what other people thought about his decision to drop out of college and start a computing company out of his garage?

• Do you think Andrew Huberman spent much time listening to the moans and critiques of his peers as he took some his science profession public with his podcast in the pandemic?

• What if the AirBnB founders had listened to all of the people who said no one would ever want a stranger to stay in their house?

• How about those people who said Lululemon would never be able to expand out of the female yoga apparel?

• Nick Bare has 1.2 Million followers on Instagram and a multi-million dollar brand now - I bet he is glad he didn’t listen to his inner dialogue, wondering what others would think when posting videos of his workouts a decade ago

These are primarily business stories - but the concept is the same. In our everyday lives, we need to ask ourselves these questions:

• Did you think about how you would look to others the last time you tried on a piece of clothing at the store?

• Is there a hobby you are interested in but haven’t started yet in fear of the critique that comes with being a beginner?

• What’s that career path you would love to explore if you didn’t care what others thought

At some point in time, all success stories started with an inner conviction that was so powerful it drowned out the weight of criticism from other people. You can make that same decision for yourself, today, no matter how small or large the idea or aspiration may be.

To put it even more simply - life is way too short to be worried about not doing something because of what other people think. So start posting the videos on your Instagram about that hobby - wear the shoes you like but think others might not - play the video game if you want to play video games - sign up for a course to learn about that thing that’s piqued your interest. Be more like the explorer -

Body - The Green Face Diet?

I saw this diet in a post from DanGo, and thought it was a nice rubric for anyone looking to get ahold of their nutrition and simplify their options.

The concept is pretty straight-forward - if it’s green, you can eat it, and if it comes from something that has a face, you can eat that too. This is what that looks like:

• Green:

  • Arugula, Asparagus, Broccoli, Brussels Sprouts, Celery, Cucumber, Green Beans, Green Peas, Green Peppers, Kale, Lettuce, Okra, Snap Peas, Spinach, Zucchini, and any other green veggie

• Faces:

  • Pork, Chicken Breast, Chicken Thigh, Chicken Leg, Eggs, Ground Beef, Lamb, Salmon, Scallop, Shrimp, Steak, Tuna, Turkey, etc.

Dan includes notes as well on portion sizes, including making the protein serving the size of your fist, unlimited vegetables, and one serving of fruit, twice a day.

The whole purpose of a diet like this is to quick start your body to prepare for a more sustainable, long-term option. By selecting whole foods from this list and consuming only them for 2 - 3 weeks, you will allow your gut health to reset, you will reignite your metabolism, and you will curb the cravings that come from indulging in excess carbs, salts, and sugars.

My personal recommendation would be this:

• Follow this diet for 2 weeks only, consuming a breakfast based around eggs, and lunches and dinners based around a large protein serving and a bunch of vegetables

• At the end of the 2 weeks, I would slowly introduce carb sources into the mix for 3 days at a time. For example, take your protein and veggie only lunch, and add in a cup of jasmine rice. The reason to be so specific and slow to reintroduce carb sources is that it will give you quick feedback on how your body and gut respond to that particular food. You have been 2 weeks without rice - if you consume it and don’t feel as good, it might be an indication that rice (or whatever carb) is something to try and avoid

• Over an additional two weeks, continue to stay focused on primarily consuming only whole foods, but carbs included. After 1 month of a relatively strict diet, I would attempt to continue the same structure, only for 80% of your meals. Give yourself the 20% to play with

What you will likely find is that (discussed further below in the book of this week) is that your normal diet that includes processed food is a major contributor to things like drowsiness, unsettled gut, mental clarity, and more. Use this 2-week rubric whenever you fall off track in your nutrition to kickstart things back up again.

Book - Good Energy by Casey Means MD

What if there was a singular common denominator between diseases and ailments like depression/anxiety, chronic fatigue, infertility, autoimmune diseases, hearing loss, chronic pain, cancer, sinus infections, acne, and more?

Author Dr. Casey Means is a former med student who came to this hypothesis during her surgical residency. She was the top of her class at Stanford, Chief Resident at Oregon Health & Science University, and well on her way to a successful career in medicine, wherever she chose to settle down. In her fifth year of residency, she couldn’t help but shake the feeling that while she was succeeding in the OR with relieving her patients of their symptoms, the modern medicine system she was a part of wasn’t asking and addressing the right question to begin - WHY do my patients have these symptoms to begin with? And why do they all come back with another ailment down the road?

She took a bold leap and left the traditional medicine route to open up her own practice in Portland, Oregon that sought to offer deeper, more foundational approaches to treating the root causes of disease, rather than treating the symptoms with medicines and procedures.

I am about halfway through her new book, Good Energy, and already know it will be a mandatory recommendation of mine for anyone looking to learn more about diet, fitness, longevity, or just health in general.

Her view in layman’s terms is this - everything starts at the cellular level. Our cells produce energy, which can be “good” or “bad” based on the inputs it receives (primarily from external factors). These cells have developed their responses through hundreds and thousands of years of adaptation throughout human history, but the last few decades have thrown a myriad of environmental changes that Dr. Means believes to be the root cause of 80% of diseases.

I will share much more in-depth on social and in a future newsletter, but here are a few crazy statistics to intrigue your brain to pick this one up:

• The average American over 65 sees 28 doctors in their lifetime. Fourteen prescriptions are written per American per year

• Among teens, 18 percent have fatty liver disease, 30 percent are prediabetic, and more than 40% are overweight / obese

• 6/10 adults are living with a chronic disease. About 50% of Americans will deal with some mental illness in their life. 74% of adults are overweight or have obesity

• Compared to 100 years ago, we are consuming 3000% more sugar, working in more sedentary jobs, and sleeping 25% less. We are also exposed to over 80,000 synthetic chemicals in our food, water, and air. As a result, our cells have stopped being able to make the energy they should.

“This sounds radical until you realize that virtually no animals in the wild suffer from widespread chronic disease. There isn’t rampant obesity, heart disease, or type 2 diabetes among lions or giraffes. But preventable lifestyle conditions are responsible for 80% of modern human deaths”