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LenDentonThrive Letter #12
The Too-Busy Guy’s Health & Fitness Guide
Happy Saturday! I’m Len Denton, and I’m glad you’re here!
Are you over 50, overweight, and too busy to get into shape? If so, this week’s newsletter is just for you!
But first, here’s a quick overview of this week’s edition of the LenDentonThrive Letter:
The Big Idea - This week, I’ll show you my 5-30 Plan - 5 simple principles to lose weight and get into shape no matter how busy you are.
Tip of the Week - This week, I’ll share some ideas to help you find time in your schedule to become more fit and healthy.
What I’m Eating - a quick look at a typical ThriveAge-compatible meal or snack. (Warning - non-professional food photos below!)
What I’m reading - I’ll share two useful news items that you can benefit from!
I’m glad that you’re here! We have a lot to cover in ten minutes or less, so let’s get started!
1. The Big Idea - The Too-Busy Guy’s Health & Fitness Guide
Are you over-50 and overweight, but you just don’t have the time to dedicate hours at the gym every week? Too busy with work and family priorities?
I get it!
Ten years ago, I was that Too-Busy Guy. At age 55, I was 70 pounds overweight, had cholesterol readings off the chart, and had a family history of heart disease. My doctor called me “a poster child for a heart attack or stroke.”
Those were busy times for me. I prioritized work and family over my health. I had no time in my schedule to do what needed to be done to take care of myself.
Fortunately, my doctor helped me come to my senses. I made a few simple changes in my daily routine that had a dramatic impact on my health and fitness. Those changes allowed me to lose 70 pounds and become healthier than I’d been in 20 years.
And now, ten years later, I weigh less and have maintained my health by doing those same things!
The 5-30 Plan
In this edition, I’ll introduce you to my 5-30 Plan, aka The Too-Busy Guy’s Health and Fitness Guide. I’ll share five daily habits that I’ve used to lose weight and stay fit over the last ten years. Best of all, these habits can be done in 30 minutes a day. Following the 5-30 Plan isn’t going to transform you into the next Arnold Schwarzenegger. However, you will see rapid results and it will put you onto a path to a longer, healthier life - your ThriveLife.
So, set your timer, and let’s begin!
Habit #1 - Get a Check-up - Habit #1 isn’t actually a daily activity, but it’s so important to a healthy lifestyle that I’m including it here.
My primary mission is to help guys to lose weight, get fit, and live long, healthy lives. One of the best tools to help you achieve a long, healthy life is an annual check-up.
Here’s why:
First, it’s always a good idea to get checked out by your doctor before starting any fitness program.
Second, the risk of death for any reason (called All-Cause Mortality) rises exponentially as we age. The primary killers of over-50 men in America are chronic diseases like heart disease, cardiovascular disease, and cancer. The best defense against dying from one of these chronic diseases is early detection and treatment.
If you haven’t seen your doctor in a year or more, make the call and get a checkup.
Time required: 30 minutes one time per year, then 0 minutes per day.
Habit #2- Eat Smarter - Food choices are the secret to losing weight. A smart guy once said: We lose weight in the kitchen and build strength in the gym. Said another way: “It’s impossible to outwork a bad diet.”
As American men, most of us have been consuming the Standard American Diet (aka SAD) for our entire lives. The SAD is filled with hidden sugars and excessive calories. Coupled with the large portion sizes that are so common today, it’s no surprise that the rates of obesity and diabetes have exploded among American men. The SAD is slowly killing us.
But, the antidote to the SAD is NOT to simply eat less. The secret is to eat smarter. Eating smarter will enable you to avoid the most damaging aspects of the SAD. I’ve developed an entire system to help guys eat smarter, called FoodIQ. I wrote about it here. But for now, here’s a quick two-step process to immediately begin eating smarter in 5 minutes or less per day.
Step 1 - Daily Food Planning - Here is an important fact to keep in mind. It’s easier to avoid consuming calories than it is to burn them off through exercise. With a little planning, you can avoid hundreds of calories every day. Five minutes of planning can save you an hour and a half of cardio!
For example, let’s say you have a business lunch on your schedule. Check the restaurant’s menu online to choose a healthy meal before you arrive. This way you can know what to order before you get there. No good choices on the menu? Then, I’d change the restaurant. Using the same planning approach, you can also ensure that you’ll have access to quality foods throughout your day.
Planning helps you to avoid calories. It’s a perfect strategy if you’re a Too-Busy Guy.
Time required: 3-5 minutes a day
Step 2 - Avoid Red Zone Foods (Glucose-spiking foods) - The single most important action that we can take to eat smarter is to eliminate sugars and foods that spike our blood glucose levels. This spiking of glucose leads to all kinds of bad things like excess fat storage, insulin resistance, obesity, and disease (including diabetes and cancer). I refer to these as Red Zone foods in my FoodIQ system. Hint: we need to stay out of the Red Zone!
To begin eating smarter, eliminate these six glucose-spiking foods from your diet:
Sugar
High Fructose Corn Syrup
White Flour
White Rice
White Potatoes
Corn
Time required: 0 minutes a day
These two simple and effective steps will help you to start eating smarter and will help you lose weight.
Habit #3 - Daily Weigh-In Ritual - If you don’t measure it, you can’t manage it.
If something is important to us, we track it. We track our bank balances, golf scores, and fantasy football stats. Tracking your weight is even more important!
Weighing daily and writing it down creates a feedback loop in your brain. It also tells your brain that THIS is important. Once that happens, you’ll subconsciously begin to make decisions and take actions that reinforce the importance you’ve placed on your weight loss.
It’s not magic. It’s neuroscience.
Create your own daily weigh-in ritual where you do it the same way, at the same time every day. I weigh first thing every morning before I get dressed or consume any food or fluids. Being consistent is important. That’s why I call it my weigh-in ritual.
Time required: 1 minute a day
Habit #4 - Get Your Daily Steps - There is power in motion (exercise). Exercise is an important component of any healthy lifestyle. First, exercise helps to strengthen your bones, muscles, and heart. Second, it can help you develop a calorie deficit, which is essential to weight loss.
In the beginning, prioritize cardio over strength training. Cardio burns calories faster, which helps with calorie deficit and weight loss. You can add strength training later on. Walking is a great way to start.
How much cardio is enough? In this beginning stage, I suggest that you walk 20-25 minutes a day. Over time, I suggest that you set a goal of 7,000 total steps every day. This includes your planned exercise sessions, as well as routine steps you take as part of your daily routine. (Any fitness tracker can help you keep track of your total steps.)
Why 7,000 steps? Recent research from the UK shows that when people walked or ran a minimum of 7,000 steps daily (including moderate walking), their overall risk of death declined by 50-70%! That is like a Do-It-Yourself life extension program. Sign me up!
This is such an important benefit (with so little effort required) that I recommend that every guy should get “7K Every Day.”
But, what if you aren’t able to walk or run 7,000 steps a day? No problem. Start wherever you are, and make 7k your goal. Whatever your current capability, start moving! Read more about 7K Every Day here.
Time required: 20-25 minutes a day
Habit #5 - Get Better Sleep - Most of us aren’t getting enough quality sleep. Over-50 Guys need 7-9 hours per night.
We’ve learned a lot about the importance of sleep over the last decade. Sleep determines how well we process incoming information; our memory performance; how well our bodies recover from stress and illness; and even our brain health.
Sleep experts recommend two key steps to get better sleep:
Step 1 - Good Sleep Planning - Good sleep planning involves making sure that your bedroom is conducive to sleep. Things like comfortable bedding, proper levels of darkness, a cool temperature, and quietness are fundamental to getting a good night’s sleep.
Step 2 - Create a Night-time Ritual - Create your own night-time ritual to help you gradually slow down from a busy and hectic day to allow your mind and body to prepare for sleep. I have found this ritual idea to be extremely useful in my effort to improve my sleep.
I’ve written extensively about the benefits of sleep and how to improve your sleep here.
Time required: 0 minutes a day
Summary
Being too busy to get healthy is a real problem for many men. But, the alternative to spending the time to improve our health may be the early onset of disease and premature death.
Following the 5-30 Plan will put you on course to a healthy lifestyle in just 30 minutes a day:
Get a Check-up- 0 mins/day
Eat Smarter - 3-5 mins/day
Daily Weigh-In Ritual - 1 min/day
7K Every Day - 20-25 mins/day
Get Better Sleep - 0 mins/day
Now, where are you going to find those 30 minutes? Check out this week’s Tip-Of-The-Week (below) for ideas on how to find time to become healthier.
Want to Go Deeper?
Do you want to dive deeper into ThriveAge and what it can do in your life? If that sounds like a smart move for you, then consider subscribing to the LenDentonThrive Letter. It’s totally free!
As a bonus, new subscribers will receive a free .pdf version of Chapter 1 of my upcoming new book, The ThriveAge Way (The Over-50 Way To Lose Weight, Get Fit & Stay Fit For Life).
ThriveAge is the roadmap to your custom-built ThriveLife!
2. Tip of the Week: Finding Time to Get Healthy
Time is our only non-renewable resource. Finding time to focus on your health and fitness can be a real problem. Here are 4 ideas to help you find the 30 minutes per day that you need to build a healthy lifestyle using the 5-30 Plan:
Reduce time spent consuming media like TV, Netflix, social media, or surfing the Internet.
Get up earlier to create some workout time.
Take fitness breaks during the day, like during lunch.
Add bonus steps to your day by doing the following:
Park further away from the entrance to the office, restaurant, etc.
Walk during breaks
Hold walking meetings where possible
I hope you find these useful.
3. What I’m Eating
ThriveAge is a food-first approach to health and fitness. I call it '“fitness for food lovers!” So, each week I’ll be giving you a quick insight into one of my typical meals. No crazy diets, just real food.
This week’s entry is one of my typical, high-protein breakfasts.
Here’s the break-down:
Turkey-Taco Scramble: 4 egg whites with 2oz. of turkey taco meat (6 Greens)
1 cup of pinto beans (1 Green)
1 fruit cup with strawberries and red grapes (1 Green)
1 apple (1 Green)
This is a total of about 350 calories. But, more important to ThriveAgers, this is 9 Greens, 0 Yellows, and 0 Reds with a FoodIQ of 300. It’s another perfect ThriveAge meal.
Enjoy!
4. What I’m Reading
Here is some “news you can use” from this week’s reading stack. I hope you find these two items to be useful:
Amazing Benefits of Walking
Walking doesn’t get the credit it deserves. In this video, Dr. Eric Berg outlines the benefits of walking as a primary form of exercise. You’ll never think of walking in the same way after you watch this.
Watch time: 8 minutes.
Step-Tracking Using Just Your Phone
I’m a big fan of using fitness trackers. But, how do you track your 7K Every Day if you don’t have a Fitbit or Apple Watch? In this video, you’ll see how you can use a free Fitbit app download to track your steps (and a few other things) using just your smartphone.
Watch time: 2 minutes
I’m Writing A Book!
I’m a busy Over-50 Guy who has spent the past ten years building a practice of personal health and fitness that relies on real food and smart exercise instead of crazy diets and killer workouts. This process, called ThriveAge, helped me to lose 70 pounds and keep it off for going on ten years. Now, I want to share what I have learned with other Over-50 Guys. So, I wrote the book!
In The ThriveAge Way (The Over-50 Way To Lose Weight, Get Fit & Stay Fit For Life), I share everything I’ve learned about the principles and practices necessary to create and sustain a healthy lifestyle. I call it my ThriveLife.
New subscribers to the LenDentonThrive Letter will receive Chapter 1 of my new book for free. To get your free copy of Chapter 1, just subscribe to the LenDentonThrive Letter.
Upcoming Topics
Here’s a quick look at some of the topics I’m working on for upcoming editions of the newsletter.
Ten Years into the ThriveLife
ThriveLife - What It Is, And How To Get There
Develop a Longevity Mindset to Add Years to Your Life
Thanks for your time and attention. Have a great weekend. See you next Saturday!
Thrive & Prosper,
Len
Hey, Before You Go…
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See you next Saturday!
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