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With all the noise out there, it’s tough to get sound nutrition advice.

At Memorial Hill, we’re extremely fortunate to have some very smart scientists (looking at you, Sabrena) on the team to help us navigate the waters. But, just as important as sound science, is a sound behavior philosophy. After all, this is where the rubber meets the road. Below are our non-negotiables for nutrition:

1. There is no end date – health is a lifestyle change
2. Food should not be approached as a “Challenge” – this leads to disordered relationships with food.
3. Tasty – you should enjoy the foods you eat.
4. Food should fuel your goals.
5. Change should be incremental and adjustable (based on goals).
6. Any changes you make should improve your relationship with food.

Interested in digging deeper with NutritionNOW?

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I’ve never been one for burpee penalties, but this may be the one instance wherein I institute a “drop and give me 10”.

Let’s get them all out of the way…

Here are the top “I’m the _____est one in the room” s I’ve heard in the last 90 days:

• Oldest
• Youngest
• Fattest
• Most out of shape
• Strongest
• Weakest
• Busiest
• Poorest
• Least Competitive
• Only Competitor
• Thinnest
• Slowest

We’re all the ____est. What now?

I didn’t sit down intending this post to be the “tough love” post. What I do intend is to provide a little perspective. As the filter for all things good and bad in the gym, I have the luxury of a bird’s eye view.

For every 55 year old established professional complaining about being the oldest in the class there’s a 22 year old rockstar athlete up to their eyeballs in student loan debt – underemployed – looking up to the 55 year old’s career success.

So, while you’re looking around comparing yourself to others, they’re seeing your best attributes. Here’s the tough love part – get out of your head. We’ve all been the ____est. Dwelling on that is narcissistic. Know that for every quality you look up to in another athlete, there is someone looking up to your best qualities. Celebrate that.

To perform a more efficient kettlebell swing, pay attention to your starting and finishing positions.

Let’s get real honest – no one knows what the hell they’re doing. I don’t trust anyone who says they have it all figured out. For a long time I let my own self-confidence be bridled by the perception that others knew what they were doing to a much greater degree than I; that I had no business attempting anything meaningful.

Acting as if…

I love radio call in shows. It’s a total guilty pleasure. Guy calls in with a problem, host delivers a single piece of advice, and hangs up. It all seems so simple. It helps me imagine that the caller took that 1 sentence from the host and turned a complete 180 – it’s total B.S. though.

Until I heard this one piece of advice – act as if. Guy called in after a nasty high school break-up. The host simply said: “Act as if you’re fine. Go on walks. Listen to music you like. Do cool stuff. You’ll wake up one day and actually be just fine.” 

We are creatures of habit. We really enjoy the perception of complete free will, but we will always fall into habits. The great thing about habit is we can create new ones. Make them fake habits at first – I don’t really care. But ask yourself: “What would be best version of me do in this situation.”

One day you’ll wake up and be that much closer to that version of yourself.

A comfortable and sturdy front rack is essential for a successful front squat and clean. Here is a stretch you can do with a band and a pvc pipe to improve your position easily.

“A short memory.” I first heard this phrase to describe a good baseball player.  Sit on this for a moment – the best batting average in all of baseball history is held by Ty Cobb at .366. To translate that stat, 64 out of 100 attempts were unfavorable. 

How’s your fitness memory?

Chances are, you’re just coming off Thanksgiving holiday. If your’s was anything like mine you overindulged and over-imbibed a bit with family. You’re probably struggling with feelings of un-doing all the indulgences in the gym. Or maybe you’re feeling a bit of guilt over all the pie.

You have a much higher batting average.

Here’s the thing – you’ve already won the holiday battle. You’ve been building habits and anchor points around health, wellness, and momentum. You’ve already put in the hard work over the last several months. You have all these great habits and people in your life to push you toward your goals. And here’s the awesome thing – you’re probably batting .800. 8/10 decisions are a win. 

So, don’t beat yourself up; keep up the hard work. And – most importantly – have a short memory. After all, momentum is more powerful than gravity.

Muscle ups are a highly technical gymnastics movement that require hours and hours of practice for most athletes. First you must be very comfortable with pull ups and dips, then you must practice kipping, then you have to get comfortable with gymnastics rings, then you can begin to put it all together in a full muscle up. Jumping muscle ups are one tool you can use to begin your muscle up journey.

You’re probably beginning to see a theme.

If you follow our Podcast, Coach’s Corner, or this Blog you’ll notice that we’ve been talking an awful lot about habit and behavior modification. This shift in focus happened at about the 10,000 training hour mark at The Hill; when we started to track archetypes of success.

Any discussion of behavior modification wouldn’t be complete without addressing Decision Fatigue, or “the deteriorating quality of decisions made by an individual, after a long session of decision making.”

A long session of decision making

I think we can all relate with this. Let’s think about the decisions I make before I leave the house in the morning:

• Hit snooze or jump out of bed
• Brush my teeth before or after coffee
• Cold enough for sweatpants?
• Should I eat breakfast at home or at work?
• How many ounces of oatmeal is that?
• Honey, do we have plans this weekend?
• When’s my first call?
• Where are my shoes?

What can I put on auto-pilot?

When I do coaching with other business owners, we talk a lot about systems. Systems and protocol put low-value activities and decisions on auto-pilot so the entrepreneur can begin to move on to higher-level decisions. Not only to make those decisions, but make sound decisions.

Look at your day. I know…we’re all busy. But really take a look. What are the areas you can put on auto-pilot? Food and nutrition decisions are huge areas we can all automate. So are dress and fashion. I’m not saying you need to wear a black turtle neck everyday – but you can easily systemize tops/bottoms into corresponding sections in your closet.

You don’t need to go full Steve Jobs today. But, let’s just look at your morning routine. Where can you automate to save up some sound decision-making for high-value items such as career, health, and relationships?