Overall: Busy week and physically was down. Will probably need to do some sort of recovery modality, massage/float/sauna. Tried adding cortisol manager and slept very poorly all week long which is atypical. Uncertain if it’s just overtraining from modifying the current training program and it will just take a couple of weeks to adapt or if it’s just too much. Had some interesting conversations and hopefully we’re implementing some tools to improve clinical care. It’s a challe

In The Psychology of Money , Morgan Housel does an excellent job articulating a simple idea: Happiness ≈ Expectations – Reality The gap between what we expect and what actually happens determines a large portion of how satisfied we feel with our lives. The same concept applies to health and the healthcare system. Over the next few articles, I want to explore how expectations vs reality shapes how people perceive their health, their fitness, and ultimately their well-being. T

Overall: Still in a rut over the past couple weeks. Sleep is all jacked up. Felt good to be able to get in a do some admin work this past weekend and getting started on ACLM board review. Finished Spirit Gym which took about 10 months to complete. Had promotions at supersystem this past weekend and it’s always wonderful to see long term friends move up the ranks. It’s a journey. It’s also fun to get to see people I haven’t seen in a while and roll with people I haven’t in a

Walking With People Through Loss There are very few constants in our existence: birth, change, taxes, and death. Everything else is variable. Death is the one appointment none of us can cancel. The finish line looks different for each person, but it is certain for all of us. In that way, death may be the most honest teacher we have. It reminds us that our time is limited. And because it is limited, it matters. Yet in modern society, death is largely removed from daily life or

Overall: Uncertain if it’s the time change or just the grind of life, but recovery was poor all week long. Was hitting minimums all week in the gym and have really emphasized increasing sleep. Assume the busy period will continue for the next month or so. Wrapping up the Spirit Gym course and I’m very impressed with the content Paul has put out over the years. He is one of the drivers of holistic health - mind/body/spirit, and this course seemed to be a culmination of his li

On the Clock: The Limited Window of Time With Our Kids While reading The Art of Spending Money by Morgan Housel, I kept thinking about something he implies but doesn’t explicitly say: the most meaningful investments in life often involve limited windows of time. One of the most finite resources we have is time with our children. We are on the clock. On average, you get about 18 years with your kids under your roof. After that, they begin building their own lives. Studies sug

Overall: This week is typically challenging. Had travel this weekend and the Arnold classic brings a fair amount of external pressures. Was feeling a little run down. Have had a fair amount of patients struggling with this winter, and I think I felt the same. From Thanksgiving - Tax day seems to be the winter at this point with increased stress. Need to think about strategies to help break this up. A long term goal is to snow bird, but that’s not realistic at this point or in

Parenting is one of the strangest callings in life. It is exhausting, frustrating, ego-crushing…and at the same time, it is one of the greatest privileges you will ever experience. Both things are true. People are a lot like dogs. We are wired differently. Some kids are calm and compliant. Some are intense and explosive. Some are natural pleasers. Others are relentless negotiators. Some require very little guidance. Others require enormous energy, structure, and patience. The

Overall: It’s been a stretch over the past several weeks. The winter months are still here and I’m seeing the impact on patients and personally. There’s been glimpses of the winter breaking and it’s nice to get back outside again. There’s a price you pay when you go away, but I still find it very necessary to get a break from the monotony and connect with those closest to us. Training has been very flat over the past couple weeks and I know the root cause is insufficient sl

In my time in practice, I’ve had some genuinely goofy conversations with patients. For better or worse, open-mindedness has never been my problem. One conversation in particular, spoke about the bond—almost a cord—that exists between parents and children. At the core of that bond is a simple but powerful desire: every child wants to be seen by their parents. Not for what they could become, not for what the parent wishes they were—but for who they actually are. That is uncondi

I think a lot about the concept of a RINO — Republican In Name Only . It describes someone who claims a label but doesn’t live by the principles behind it. The same thing exists everywhere in life. I call it LITO : Leader In Title Only. There are few things more frustrating than a LITO — someone who carries authority without carrying responsibility. A title is not an identity. A title is a job . If you carry one, you have to earn it every day. Parent Is a Profession The titl

Role Models, Rituals, and the Humbling Education of Parenthood Having children has been fascinating, humbling, and at times brutally exhausting. There’s truth to the cliché: the days are long, but the years are fast. But beyond the fatigue and unpredictability, the greatest gift of parenting has been the education I’ve received from my kids. Children are expressive, opinionated, curious, selfish, imaginative, joyful, and wildly observant. They are not subtle. They want to kn

The Long Drive: Health, Pace, and Preventive Maintenance One of the core principles of this practice is little and often, over the long haul . Real progress almost always happens in small, stepwise advances. A wise patient once told me, “God gives you only the challenges you’re prepared to handle,” and over time I’ve found that to be remarkably true. Life rarely moves in dramatic leaps—it moves in steady miles. I often think of the human body like a car on a long road trip. O

Overall: Well that weather was interesting. Big wrench in the week and was probably the most bizarre training week I've had in a long time. All the closures impacted life and was the perfect ending to is seeming one of the more challenging months of the year for me personally. What I seem to notice throughout the past several Januarys is you're coming off the stress of the holidays and then you enter into the Ohio darkness in a cold. Currently I'm working through the Dan Joh

Life Is Better When You Don’t Walk Alone Life is easier when you don’t walk alone. When you fall, someone helps you back up. The problem is that many people feel like they don’t have anyone to walk with—and to be fair, people will let you down. That reality is unavoidable. This is why I’m a strong advocate for what I call distant mentors . There are countless people whose work has shaped the way I think, live, and practice—many of whom I’ll never meet. One advantage of learn

When Goals Stop Working: Recognizing a New Chapter of Life For the past 10 to 15 years, once or twice a year, I’ve sat down and mapped out goals for the coming calendar year. For most of that time, I was remarkably consistent at hitting the majority of them. 2025 was different. It was the year I missed more goals than I completed — and I’ve spent a lot of time reflecting on why. The answer, I think, is simple but uncomfortable: I transitioned into a new chapter of life withou

Overall: Kind of a crummy week. In reflecting back, January has been hard the past couple of years. I’m uncertain if it’s the exhaustion coming out of the holidays mixed with our lovely Ohio weather or what, but it seems like my baseline level of grouch has been amplified. This was a testing week and things were hoo-hum. Reps were hit and that’s about it. I’ve always struggled with top end strength and I’ll be entering the intensification phase over the next 4-8 weeks. Run to

Perspective, Normal, and the Illusion of “Compared to What?” One of the most common—and quietly corrosive—questions people wrestle with is: Compared to what? Compared to who? Compared to where I “should” be by now? Broadening perspective is one of the most powerful—and humbling—things we can do in life. Many of us walk around with the quiet belief that we don’t have enough, aren’t good enough, or should be further along. And the uncomfortable truth is this: all of that might

Overall: Past week was chaotic. With the holidays ending there were a lot of things to clean up coming off a busy holiday season. Work hours were longer with a weekend trip. Sleep was really poor this week and was more or less exhausted by Saturday. Got to train at Lexington Athletic Club this weekend, which is one of my favorite gyms around the world. Has every piece of equipment you could imagine. Was interesting running on the woodway vs my Farmer Boy Fitness curved tread

Stress Management, the Mirror, and the Two Selves When we talk about stress management, the concept only really works if we accept one simple truth: we are always two people —our present self and our future self . These two versions of us are often competing. What brings pleasure to the present self can compromise the future. What brings long-term joy to the future self often feels uncomfortable—or inconvenient—right now. Stress often arises from this tension. The Mirror The