This isn’t a bikini body for pool season post, nor a directive to make any reset at all if you’re happy with how you’re feeling. But it is a good natured nudge of easy, mainly free swaps to improve your overall wellbeing this summer. ((Many of which you can start right this minute to enjoy the delicious fruits of your labor all summer long)):

sleep

You can do all of the remaining protocols on this list (and I hope that you do), but they mean very little without a strong foundation of restorative, restful, rejuvenating sleep. Start here with Dr. Huberman’s Toolkit for Sleep, it is absolutely brimming with best practices and actionable steps you can take tonight to wake energized tomorrow.

Anecdotally, a few practices that have worked wonders for me: lowering the thermostat half an hour before going to bed, making sure our room is blackout dark, and the 3-2-1 rule (finishing dinner 3 hours before sleep, not having any liquids at least 2 hours before bed, and no screens or artificial light 1 hour before). If we’re still not feeling completely at ease and ready at our usual time, Jon will play this and I am out like a light before it finishes, every time without fail.

swap

This is going to be a process, but please digest this bit before proceeding: it’s okay to go one by one here and take your time and resources to move forward as you can, when you can. When we’re talking about a reset, the first thing that comes to mind is looking at day to day consumption in all forms and seeking out what no longer serves you in an effort to make swaps that align with your best self. It could be changing out harsh cleaning products for natural ones. Perhaps you’ve been noticing you don’t feel comfortable after eating dairy and you decide to test a vegan yogurt instead of your usual choice. Maybe all of that desk work is catching up to you and you set a timer on your phone to get up and move on the hour to get in a quick exercise snack to get your blood pumping and a much needed brain and body boost. You might have read about all of the micro plastics circulating in our bodies and you toss your plastic water bottle for a glass one.

What I know for sure: habit stacking works wonders, but not when you try to employ them all at once. Make a list of your top 3 swaps that are meaningful to you, and find a way to prioritize those first. Set yourself up for success by eliminating any roadblocks. For me, it’s less processed snacking when I’m starving and under time constraint. Removing the roadblocks means not buying the snacks in the first place, and meal prepping something whole ahead of time to grab and go when I can’t trust myself to make good choices, because, hanger. PS – if you need a phenomenal book on habits, this is the gold standard (I’ve re-read it 3 times). “You do not rise to the level of your goals, you fall to the level of your habits”.

step

If you’re motivated by a goal, I challenge you to add 1,000 steps to your daily average this summer. It doesn’t have to be a strict target, but it gives us something to strive for. Ideally, we’re getting these steps in outside to get in our vitamin d, improve our immunity, facilitate the growth of the good bacteria in our gut microbiome, and vastly boost our mood. If you woke up this morning and are able to move without pain, there is no better way to celebrate it and give gratitude for mobility than to go for a walk and strengthen your vessel. What a gift to be able to move our bodies today!

strength

Are you a fan of The Drive podcast by Dr. Peter Attia? It’s been a longtime favorite of ours, and one of the topics I love most is his unique notion of the centenarian decathlon. There isn’t an actual centenarian decathlon (that I’ve hear of), but rather it’s his determination to build strength now in order to do more as a centenarian: choose 10 physical tasks you want to be able to do at 100 and then reverse engineer the necessary actions in the present to achieve that future. Do you want to live independently and be able to get up from a seated position on the floor? Open a jar of sauce? Fly kites with your grandchildren? Walk to the corner cafe? It can be anything you can dream up, but for most functions, we need muscle strength, which comes from lifting weights now. It’s never too late to start!

sanity

Lastly, I want to leave you with this. Every time you look at your life and analyze old systems that are no longer serving you, and upleveling to new pathways and protocols that do, you are winning. But please don’t shame yourself for staying with something (or someone) too long. In our family we live by when you know better you do better. So until you know better, you’re doing just fine. And when you do know better and have the courage to change it, you’ll be doing even better.

I learned a hard lesson last year: you can be working on all the ways to improve your physical health, but if you don’t pay equal attention to your mental fitness you’re no better off. When you’re making some of the swaps we listed above, also consider what swaps you can make for your sanity. Is it less time on social media? Maybe taking a break from the vicious news cycle. Or that catty friend who loves to gossip about others. Food for thought, and I’d love to hear more ideas in the comments below. I’m all for a summer reset! What a beautiful time of the year to strip it down and let the sunshine in!