Based on the realisation that you can‰’t just give someone a nutrition plan, and expect instant results, Matty & Stacey from The Chief Life have spent a lot of time uncovering the many other factors that help to create health and wellness in your life, in both the short and long term.

After all, it‰’s about creating realistic goals that actually fit into your busy life. In this episode, we have a huge amount of short and sweet facts, advice, and studies, all derived from Matty & Stacey‰’s very own Seven Pillars for optimal health. There‰’s something for everyone in our first ever four-way podcast and we guarantee you‰’re going to walk away much wiser after tuning in!

The Seven Pillars of Health for Lasting Success

  1. Nutrition

  • The rule of 3: it‰’s all about when you‰’re eating, how much you‰’re eating and what you‰’re eating.
  • Eat every three to four hours.
  • Make sure you‰’re getting three macros- proteins, carbs, and fats. The optimal amount is 1/3 of each macro in each intake, or 40% carbs, 30% protein, 30% fat, depending on your specific goals or situation. This is a great baseline to get your hormones back to a high functioning and balanced level.
  • Include plenty of good fats including nuts, seeds, olives, avocado and heart-healthy oils like olive and coconut oil. Consuming good fats mean our bodies actually adjust to burning fat as a fuel source.
  • Work on reducing inflammation in the body to avoid acute or chronic fatigue and unrest, and any general discomfort in the body.
  • Detoxing and removing food groups for 30 days such as gluten, dairy, sugar, alcohol, and caffeine. Reintroducing these foods one by one, to see how your body responds.
  • Differences in wheat today than back in our parents or grandparent‰’s days, including GMO, sprays & pesticides and how that affects our overall health.
  • We discuss the differences in the average person removing gluten from their diet, including increased energy and gut health.
  • We all have normal functioning level in terms of what we turn to for food, how we exercise and other overall habits, so we don‰’t know any different until we make a change and realise we can be living life at a much deeper level, where we spring out of bed in the morning ready to take the day on.

  1. Sleep

  • We all know that when you sleep, your body fully repairs and recovers. But did you know that if you go to the gym, your work doesn‰’t end at the gym? It actually ends once you‰’ve gone home and slept as that‰’s where the recovery takes place.
  • Solidifying neural pathways through sleep ie. Anything that you learn during the day, when you go to sleep you‰’ll remember it better the next day, once you‰’ve processed and put your memories where they need to go.
  • Sleep cycles are broken into five stages and last around 90 minutes each. If you aim for eight hours of sleep per night, it‰’s actually a myth because you‰’ll be waking in the middle of your sleep cycle. Instead aim for 6, 7.5 or 9 hours. When you do wake, get up and use that extra half hour, that you might otherwise roll around in bed for. You‰’ll feel much more alert for it!
  • If you find that you fall asleep the moment you hit the pillow, you know that you‰’re not rested enough overall, and need to place greater focus on your sleep and overall lifestyle patterns throughout the week.
  • Each individual has their own chronotype, there‰’s generally four across the board. Once you know what you are, you can actually work it in your favour, as there are different times during the day when you‰’re going to be optimal at different things. You can truly cater your life for what times of the day you should be eating, fasting, working out, sleeping, drinking or moving. These descriptions below come out of an interview with Dr. Michael Breus, sleep doctor on Matty & Stacey‰’s podcast show (see references for the link):
  1. You have your night owl which is usually a wolf by nature.
  2. The dolphin which is an insomniac.
  3. The bear which is someone who loves naps and sleep, and is good at waking between 6am onwards.
  4. The lion who wakes up before the alarm and must get up and always hungry the moment they wake. But they‰’re not great at napping, as if they try to lie down, they think about all the things they need to do.
  • Setting your sleep up for success including reducing blue light from your phones or laptops, which tricks your brain into thinking you want to stay awake, where your body wants to rest. Purchasing black-out curtains, blue-blockers, sleeping masks and keeping your room at a cold temperature.
  • Sleep is so important for fat loss, muscle gain and just about every one of your health goals because if you‰’re not adequately rested then your cortisol (stress) levels remain high.

  1. Training/movement

  • Figure out what your movement level is, and keep a mental record of how much of your day is made up of sedentary activity.
  • Find out what your thing is in terms of exercise. There‰’s no point in engaging in cross-fit or yoga if you dread going to every class.
  • There‰’s no need to punish yourself if you‰’ve chosen to eat less-than-healthy foods. This only triggers a negative release of hormones, which ends up backfiring on you! You‰’re much better off owning your less favourable food choices.
  • Look above and beyond the cliche 10,000 steps a day, especially if you want better results than your average person. In other words, don‰’t just stop at 10,000, push your boundaries! Add an extra challenge to any basic weight training, such as filling a backpack with water bottles while doing push ups or triceps dips.
  • If you‰’re looking at weight loss, don‰’t focus solely on cardio, always add in weight or resistance training, as this helps to increase your basal metabolic rate (BMR) and burn more fat at rest and assist with bone density.
  • Yin vs yang type exercises: Yin is very feminine, gentle and calmer workouts such as swimming and yoga, whereas Yang is very masculine and aggressive such as cross-fit or weights. It‰’s important to have a balance of each type.

  1. Breathwork

  • If you‰’re only breathing in the top section of your chest and breathing very shallow, you‰’re very constricted, causing higher levels of anxiety and problems with digestion, as you spend a lot of time in fight or flight mode.
  • By bringing the breath down into the diaphragm, and focusing on breathing through the nose rather than the mouth, we can get into the rest and digest state, which allows for more focus and clarity.
  • Studies can read what your IQ level is based on your breathing patterns, for example, if you‰’re a mouth breather your IQ is lower than a nose breather!
  • If you snore, you generally have sleep apnoea and studies show how much breathing affects stress levels. For example, you can find effective methods to breathe your way out of an anxiety attack.
  • Over the years that we‰’ve become more mouth breathers, it‰’s actually changed our jawline and facial structure. This is why we need a lot more braces than what we ever used to across history.
  • We need our heart rates to fall below 60 bpm, in order to get to sleep which is why breath control is so effective in falling asleep.

  1. Hydration

  • When you‰’re dehydrated, your overall energy production slows right down. Keeping hydrated means you‰’re going to be operating at a better level.
  • Drink naturally decaffeinated tea such as rooibos and chamomile, as they‰’re less likely to dehydrate you.
  • For every caffeinated drink you consume, you need to have another cup of water. Always ensure you‰’re not overdoing the caffeine, you can always try a 30-day detox to see the true effect it has on your body and the level of reliance you have on that big cup of morning coffee.
  • Wean yourself off coffee, rather than going cold-turkey.
  • If you have a mild headache, the first thing you should ask yourself is if you‰’ve had enough water during the day. Is your body also dehydrated? ie dry skin?
  • Allowing your body to function at its best, means it‰’s really good to sweat often, either through a sauna or exercise, helping the body to sweat out all the toxins. Float tanks, cold plunging and even Epsom salt/ magnesium baths can also be highly beneficial for your overall health.
  • Allocate some me time for each family member, at least once a week where you can simply unwind.

  1. Stress management/mindset

  • Stress isn‰’t something that we can take out of our lives for good. We should be focusing on tools that we can have in place to look after our health, while the stressors are going on around us.
  • Meditation is a vital coping tool. There‰’s no right or wrong way to do meditation because it‰’s personal to you. For you, it might be walking in nature and being alone with yourself.
  • Tapping certain parts of the body while repeating affirmations is an amazing tool for people that struggle with anxiety (see references for great Youtube video).
  • Based on how you respond to the aspects outside of your life, you‰’re never going to have full control of what everyone else does around you, it‰’s how you respond to that situation. Do you take life on with a fixed or limited mindset, becoming a victim, or function out of an open mindset finding ways to progress forward?
  • A growth mindset is so important! This is even being taught in schools across Australia now! Our kids are so lucky to experience all these mindset integrations that we never had in our schooling.
  • You can always integrate simple breathing techniques to calm a busy mind, even at the traffic lights when you‰’re waiting for the light to go green! It‰’s all about eliminating impatience or frustration and bringing yourself into a calm state through micro meditations. And it does work!
  • Morning routines are critical for setting your day up for success. You can integrate rituals in any way you like, to positively set yourself up. Studies suggest if you watch the morning news every day, you‰’re three times more likely to have a negative day!
  • Create a simple gratitude list that you run through upon waking. Go as simple or extreme as you like.
  • Journaling helps to organise all the busy thoughts that are in your head and place them into categories or levels of importance.
  • What negative assumptions are you saying to yourself that might be holding you back? For example, “I‰’m terrible at…” Perhaps other people have placed limitations on you and you‰’ve taken that personally.

  1. Vitamin D/Time spent outdoors

  • Get outside in the sunlight and recharge. Believe it or not, as a nation Australians, in general, are deficient in vitamin D, which can be linked to our heavy use of sunscreen. The government tells us to wear hats, sunscreen, long sleeves and be in the shade as much as possible but we‰’ve taken this advice to the extreme.
  • There are certain times of the day, for example, the early morning sunlight that won‰’t lead to sunburn.
  • Spend 10 to 20 minutes a day out in the sun without sunscreen. It can help to relieve feelings of tiredness or grogginess. Keeping your eyes closed and gazing up towards the sun will wake you up more than a coffee in the morning! The sun actually stops your body from producing melatonin which is your sleep hormone.
  • Your blood gets cleansed through your eyes, so if you‰’re always wearing sunglasses you miss out on that opportunity.
  • Watch the chemicals that are in sunscreen, as these could be doing more harm than good.

Resources

The Chief Life Podcast links