Weekday Schedule

• 6:30 AM wakeup
• 6:30 AM – 7:15 AM Coffee, Food, Meditate
• 7:15 AM – 7:45 AM take care of kids get them moving
• 7:45 AM leave house or workout
• 9:45 PM – Stop using computers, watching TV, and read or otherwise spin down
• 10:30PM Sleep

Physical

• Work out four days a week – Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday
• Tuesday, Saturday, Sunday run on the treadmill – hour weekdays, hour plus weekend
• Thursday do the elliptical trainer
• Monday, Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday PT and weight training
• Workout as early as possible in the day
• Walk to lunch – avoid the car whenever possible
• Take the stairs but give yourself a break after you run
• Check my blood pressure once a week and track it on a weekly basis

Diet

• 50% vegan, 45% vegetarian, 5% carnivore
• Maintain weight around 180 lbs. Check weight weekly.  If its over 185 more than two weeks its time to start managing down.
• Limit snacks between meals to fruits and other “whole” foods.
• Manage towards a lower salt intake
• Drink alcohol in moderation and responsibly – like most things in life the people that get it right tend to strive for a good balance.
• Hard liquor doesn’t agree with your system anymore because you are, face it, middle age.
• Pull the heavy beers entirely and be exceptionally limited with even light beers.  Drink good beer when you drink it – just don’t drink it much.
• Drink wine instead, you know you like it.
• If you drink (i) too much or (ii) too late it keeps you from sleeping.  If you are going to drink something do it earlier or you will be awake for an hour at 2AM wanting to go back to sleep and feeling tired the entire next day.  Different drinks, different impacts, but you can’t go wrong with lighter drinks.

Caffeine

• A solid double espresso in the morning and then no coffee for the rest of the day seems the right balance. That’s a nice kick in the ass to get moving without making you jittery in the latter half of the day.
• Ahh – Diet Coke – drink less of this even though you aren’t very good at cutting it out.   When possible replace this with ice tea which is awesome – just takes a little effort to make

Personal

• Have a monthly check-in with my wife about the overall family and how we are doing
• Go on a date with my wife at least once a month – use Tuesday night to plan it
• Take a trip at least once a quarter with the family.
• Use the money you have to free up time to spend with the kids. When I am working, work hard. When I am not working focus on quality and depth of relationships with my kids.
• Strive towards a life that centers around family – broadly defined – and quality relationships.
• Work to get a fifteen minute mindfulness meditation session into the daily structure of things.
• Get the work you have to do on weekends done early in the weekend and then have a relaxed recovery time.   Pushing it out to EoD Sunday just makes it hang over your head the other days.

On The Road

As part of my job I travel a fair amount for work.   I find that if you aren’t thoughtful about your strategy for living on the road you eat and sleep poorly, run your body down and generally create an unstable situation.   So I started to think through – what are some good rules of thumb for keeping healthy as one travels.

• Yes, life on the road is hard but at thirty-eight you can no longer give yourself a free pass when traveling – the same rules for diet still apply
• Give yourself permission to work out every day ideally in the morning before you head into whatever you are doing.   Double bonus if you can run around the city for the workout.
• Whenever possible fly in late the night before – ideally leaving after the kids are asleep.   This is an easy way to avoid a painful early morning flight, give you the ability to work out early and be in an optimal state for a meeting.
• For multiple nights, cycle through business, friends and nothing in three day increments.   Business get the priority throughout as it is your fiduciary obligation.   If you get a second night free connect with a friend in the city.   If you get a third night free block it out and take an admin night to relax, catch up and go to bed early.
• Make time to FaceTime.
• Order a sparkling water at the same time you order wine or a beer.   That’s an easy way to stay hydrated and keep your pace slow.
• Account aggressively – more thank you think you should – for jet lag and sleeping in a weird bed.   It will mess up your sleep and you should go to bed earlier and plan to wind-down longer to account for it.
• People like to drink with the boss when he comes into town but there are more of them than you (and they are way better at going out then you are.)   You aren’t remotely capable of keeping pace, you’re old, don’t even try and be comfortable turning in early.