I'm excited to announce a project I've been working on that's officially published!

The Self-Improvement Companion Journal was made to assist you with setting goals, tracking habits, reflecting, and planning as you progress through a year's time. The core of the journal is it's weekly goal and habit-tracker worksheet and writing prompt (seen below) but  there are also 4 quarterly assessments to assist with setting long-term goals and lined sheets in the back of the journal for open-journaling.

After much working, testing, and refining, it is now available on Amazon in paperback and hardcover! Click the link below to view it on Amazon and order your copy today!

Kelly Starrett is an athlete, physical therapist, and (above everything else) strength and conditioning coach who focuses on movement. He has worked with several national and international teams including the Buffalo Bills, New York Giants, Golden State Warriors, New Zealand All Blacks, Toronto Blue Jays, and a variety of sports organizations like the NBA, MLB, NFL, NHL, and international Rugby as well as multiple (if not all) branches of the military. Kelly also coaches top-performing athletes one-on-one at his gym, San Francisco CrossFit, where he focuses less on volume and power and more on form and function being the keys to performance.
 
Kelly states that there are three categories or ways to train:

1. General Physical Preparedness, or GPP, is working on foundational strength or fitness by practicing basic skills like push-ups and pull-ups.
2. Sports Preparation is mastering coordination and skill, like jumping and landing with your feet straight, to work on being able to pick up new sports and skills quickly.
3. Sports Specific Training is training skills for a specific sport so that you can be “good at your job” and/or be prepared. This means you are possibly sacrificing work in the other two categories.

 
The reason for having these categories are to know when you should be working on which area and to be aware of all the areas of strength training so that you can be a better athlete all-around.1
 
He gives the general public advice on strength training and ways to improve outside the gym through mobility exercises which he provides in his New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestselling book, Becoming a Supple Leopard, and his online coaching program, The Ready State. Kelly is popularly known for teaching people to use tools like foam rollers and lacrosse balls to increase mobility in joints and to downregulate and he suggests doing this for about 10 minutes each day outside the gym.
 
Kelly has many other accomplishments worth mentioning, including:

• Being a two-time Whitewater Kayak and Canoeing champion.
• Being co-founder of StandUp Kids with his wife, Juliet. StandUp Kids is a non-profit organization with the mission to give all public school kids standing desks in a matter of 10 years and so far have been very successful, implementing standing desks in school all over the United States.
• Running The Ready State Podcast with Juliet, interviewing friends and people with heavy influence on topics like longevity, nutrition, pain, CrossFit, and children’s sports practices. Guests include folks like Laird Hamilton, Matt Hasselback, Geoge St. Pierre, and Alex Hutchinson.
• He has also written other books than Becoming a Supple Leopard, including: Ready to Run, Waterman 2.0, and Deskbound, focusing on more specific topics.

1. Alpha Brew Podcast - "Ep. 2 - Kelly Starrett"
2. Ever Forward Radio - "Ep. 242: How to Best Recover From Injuries and Training for the Infinite Game with Kelly Starrett"
3. Becoming a Supple Leopard, p. 59
4. Becoming a Supple Leopard, p. 96
5. Becoming a Supple Leopard, p. 126-`128
6. Becoming a Supple Leopard, p. 132
7. Below the Line Podcast - "Ep. 22: Kelly Starrett - Foundational Thinking"

​Dr. Cate is a board-certified physician who worked as a family physician all over the United States for over 20 years. She also worked with the Los Angeles Lakers to create a nutrition plan that helped players be less susceptible to injuries and allowed them to recover faster. Currently, she works as a consultant for a company in Florida (ABC Fine Wines & Spirits), helping to improve the health of their 1500 employees through one-on-one consultations.
 
Dr. Cate has written multiple books but her most well-known is Deep Nutrition. She covers many different topics in this book but the most prominent are:

1. Why vegetable oils are “Public Enemy #1.”
2. What she calls the four Pillars of World Cuisine: meat on the bone, organ meats, fermented and sprouted foods, and fresh foods.

 
“Meat on the bone” means that when we consume meat, we should be including everything that comes along with it. Most of the meat you find in the grocery store is stripped of the skin, fat, cartilage, and bones even though all of those things give us nutrients that our bodies need. Dr. Cate warns that the more you cook meat, the less nutrients remain, especially when it comes to steak - she advises trying to work your way down to eating steak medium-rare or even rare.1 She also states that the bones can be used to create something she calls “a missing food group,” bone stock.2
 
The other groups are more self-explanatory. She suggests eating organ meats 1-3 times per week,3 eating probiotic-rich foods like kimchi and sauerkraut once a day,4 and having a salad with four cups of fresh vegetables of four different colors, four days a week.5
 
Dr. Cate’s other books include Food Rules and The Fatburn Fix and she also shares articles on her website, DrCate.com. Through her job, her books and website, and the work she does to spread the word through interviews and health documentaries, she is doing all she can to help as many people as possible with improving their overall health.

1. Deep Nutrition, p. 244
2. Deep Nutrition, p. 303
3. Deep Nutrition, p. 405
4. Ben Greenfield Fitness Podcast: "4 Ways To Eat Yourself Beautiful: Meat On The Bone, Fermented & Sprouted Foods, Organ Meats, Deep Nutrition & More With Dr. Cate Shanahan"
5. Ben Greenfield Fitness Podcast: "4 Ways To Eat Yourself Beautiful: Meat On The Bone, Fermented & Sprouted Foods, Organ Meats, Deep Nutrition & More With Dr. Cate Shanahan"
6. The Fatburn Fix, p. 333
7. Deep Nutrition, p. 21
8. Deep Nutrition, p. 118
9. Deep Nutrition, p. 298
​10. The Fatburn Fix, p. 216

​Mike Matthews is a virtual fitness coach and bestselling author of several books. His flagship books and programs are Bigger Leaner Stronger (or ’BLS’) for men and Thinner Leaner Stronger (or ‘TLS’) for women. To explain the purpose of these books and his mission as a coach, he states, “I’m Mike and I believe that every person can achieve the body of their dreams. My mission is to give everyone that opportunity by providing time-proven, evidence-based advice on how to build muscle, lose fat, and get and stay healthy.”1 He also has a popular podcast, Muscle for Life, and is the founder and CEO of his supplement company, Legion Athletics.
 
Mike works to give the coaching advice that he wished he had when he started working towards his health and fitness goals. He also backs up all of his advice with scientific reasoning. For instance, in BLS and TLS, he cites over 500 different resources that are mainly scientific articles.
 
For Mike’s advice on weightlifting, he mainly focuses on progressive overload. This term is used to express that you are loading your muscles enough when you work out that you consistently see progress in reps and weight you’re adding to the bar. He also focuses on “The Big Three” lifts: the barbell squat, barbell deadlift, and barbell bench press and working in the 4-6 rep range (with 1-2 left in the tank) for those lifts and in the 8-12 rep range for most other exercises.
 
For his advice on nutrition, his main focus is on your caloric intake: making sure you are in a caloric surplus when you are trying to bulk up and in a caloric deficit when you are trying to cut weight. He also states that you cannot ignore the quality of food you eat and suggests eating 1-2 servings of fruit and 2-3 servings (cups) of fibrous vegetables each day.2
 
Mike does a great job at breaking everything down so that anyone could get started on one of his programs. His programs vary between 3-5 workout sessions each week to accommodate those who cannot find time to go to the gym every day. He also has workbooks that go along with the BLS and TLS programs, more advanced books to follow, and even a cookbook, The Shredded Chef. Last but definitely not least, The Little Black Book of Workout Motivation is a book that he wrote to give advice on motivation and success to assist you further in making goals for yourself and crushing them. As you can see, Mike has been creating great content for a while and he continues to do so.

1. Bigger Leaner Stronger, p. 31
​2. Bigger Leaner Stronger, p. 206
​3. Bigger Leaner Stronger, p. 38
​4. Bigger Leaner Stronger, p. 102
5. Bigger Leaner Stronger, p. 163
6. Bigger Leaner Stronger, p. 70
7. Bigger Leaner Stronger, p. 216
8. Muscle For Life - "Ru Anderson on How to Master Your Habits"

​Ben has so many titles, both current and former, that if I tried to list them out, I know I would miss a few. Today, mainly he is a coach to high-performing CEOs and athletes, CEO of his own supplement company, Kion, a top-rated blogger and podcaster through Ben Greenfield Fitness, and a world-renowned speaker on health, fitness, and productivity. To explain some of his past work, he has written over a dozen books on all different subjects from his experiences of being a personal trainer, bodybuilder, and top-performing triathlete.
 
During a live conference he spoke at for Mindvalley Talks, Ben stated that his main goal through his work is to, “empower people to live a more adventurous, joyful, and fulfilling life.”1  He strives to give people quality advice on performing their best, whether it is in the gym or in the office, while maintaining a full and happy life. Many know Ben as a “biohacker” because he talks of improvements you can get by means of things like saunas, cold thermogenesis, and stem cells.
 
Ben has also been a strong advocate of being on a high-fat diet, or at least saving the most of your carbohydrates for the end of the day. Outside of an increase in performance and just anecdotally feeling better, Ben states that a high-fat diets also improve metabolic efficiency and flexibility2 as well as recovery3 and reduced risk of diseases like type 2 diabetes and even cancer.4
 
Some of Ben’s highest-praised and most recent books include Beyond Training and Boundless. His past books speak more to specific topics like bodybuilding or triathlete training while these books speak more to a general audience who wants to improve their lives and increase longevity.

1. Mindvalley Talks: "Can You Hack Your Biological Age? - Ben Greenfield" 
2. Beyond Training: p. 318-319
3. BenGreenfieldFitness.com Article: "Rewriting the Fat Burning Textbook - Part 1: Why You've Been Lied to About Carbs And How To Turn Yourself Into A Fat Burning Machine"
4. BenGreenfieldFitness.com Article: "10 Ways To Do A Low Carbohydrate Diet The Right Way"
5. Beyond Training: p. 207
6. The Mindbodygreen Podcast : "Ben Greenfield, Professional Biohacker, On Daily Hacks Everyone Can Try"
7. Beyond Training: p. 115
8. Beyond Training: p. 127

Dr. Steven Gundry has an incredible story of how he made the switch from being a talented heart surgeon to becoming a best-selling author and one of today’s well-known nutrition experts. Gundry graduated cum laude at Yale University in the early 1970s and has been heavily involved in medicine (mainly in the fields of cardiology and immunology) ever since.  As a cardiac surgeon, he patented multiple tools still used in heart surgery and was known for keeping hearts beating for extensive periods outside the body.
 
In the early 2000s, Dr. Gundry had a patient who he calls “Big Ed” that threw a curveball in his career path. Big Ed was a special case who had seen multiple doctors about his clogged arteries and had been continuously told that nothing can be done to help him. After Dr. Gundry had said the same thing, Big Ed explained that he lost forty-five pounds in the past six months and had been taking a number of supplements. Gundry congratulated him on the weight loss and said something along the lines of, “Good for you, but that isn’t going to help your heart.” Big Ed insisted that a new video be taken of his heart and Dr. Gundry was astounded to find that half of Ed’s artery troubles had been wiped away!
 
Thanks to this moment, Dr. Gundry started helping people that he would perform surgeries on to then adjust their diets and start taking supplements so they never had to have the same operation again. He also stated that he had performed multiple surgeries on the same patient several times. In one instance, he operated on someone NINE times. About a year after meeting Big Ed and when Dr. Gundry realized his methods were working, he decided he should be helping people before they ever need surgery so he started his own restorative medicine practice at the International Heart and Lung Institute in Palm Springs, California.1
 
From there, Gundry started to study his own patients more enough to write multiple books. His first book, Dr. Gundry’s Diet Evolution, was published in 2009. It focuses on weight loss and shows his root principles. His following book is what really sparked his popularity – The Plant Paradox. In both of these books, Dr. Gundry shows his interest in longevity by helping us achieve “dying young at a ripe old age” through adopting a healthy, sustainable diet that eliminates processed foods and strengthens our guts.
 
Most recently, he released a new book, The Longevity Paradox. Other than reading his books, you can also visit his website at gundrymd.com, watch videos from him on his YouTube channel, or listen to him on The Doctor Gundry Podcast or on one of his dozens of podcast interviews.

Here are some of the tips and quotes from Dr. Gundry that I’ve found most valuable:
​

• “I love cardiac surgery. But giving people the tools to heal themselves transcends just about anything I can do with a knife, needle, and thread.”2

 

• “Calories merely tell us how much energy is contained in a food, not how much energy your body can derive from it.”3  Dr. Gundry explains that for longevity purposes, it is more about the quality of the food you eat than the quantity.

 

• “Research has shown that it takes at least six weeks of continuous practice to instill a new habit.”4

 

• “My research has shown that if you can work your way up to consuming the equivalent of one bag of dark green leaves (lettuce, spinach, or other greens) daily, your life will change dramatically for the better.”5

  ​

• More than 80% of Dr. Gundry’s patients are deficient in Vitamin D3 and “anyone in my practice with leaky gut or an autoimmune disease has low levels.” Dr. Gundry states that this essential vitamin prevents leaky gut as well as bone degeneration. He also relates a lack of Vitamin D to prostate cancer and obesity.6 Take at least 5,000 IUs per day and if you have an autoimmune disease, take 10,000 IUs per day.7

1. Muscle Intelligence Podcast: Dr. Steven Gundry, Rethinking Everything You Knew About a "Healthy Diet."
2. Dr. Gundry's Diet Evolution - p. 131
3. Dr. Gundry's Diet Evolution - p. 24
​4. Dr. Gundry's Diet Evolution - p. 47
​5. Dr. Gundry's Diet Evolution - p. 132
6. The Plant Paradox - p. 113-114
7. The Plant Paradox - p. 275

Shawn Stevenson is a general fitness and nutrition expert who has influenced hundreds of thousands over the past 10+ years through his book, Sleep Smarter, his fitness program, The Fat Loss Code, as well as his insanely popular podcast, The Model Health Show.

​It all started when Shawn was in high school. Shawn was on-track to be a star athlete but this came to a quick halt when he broke his hip while simply running a 200m time trial in practice. He dealt with constant pain and four years later was diagnosed with a degenerative bone disease and degenerative disc disease. When he got this diagnosis, he recalls asking his doctor, “Does this have anything to do with what I am eating.” His doctor looked at him like he was crazy and replied, “This has nothing to do with what you’re eating. Just carry on as you are because this is something that just happens. I’m sorry that this happened to you but it’s just something you’re going to have to deal with; this is incurable.” 
 
For the following two years, he followed the doctor’s orders of remaining inactive and using medications for his pain. This, along with what he called his “TUF” (Typical University Food) diet, he gained over 40 pounds and wasn’t seeing his situation getting any better. Eventually, Shawn said, “Enough is enough,” and decided to take matters into his own hands. He started small: working out on the exercise bike, changing his eating habits, and sleeping better. After six weeks, he lost 20 pounds and within nine months, he reversed the damage done to his bones, healed his ruptured discs, and amazed his doctors that weren’t able to make progress by consultations, medications, and surgeries.1
 
After taking these steps to get his health on track, Shawn kept on improving what he calls, “the three pillars of health that changed everything for me: right nutrition, right exercise, and right sleep.”2 He changed his college courses to learn as much on health as he could, got certified as a strength and conditioning coach, and started assisting students and professors at his university.3

Soon enough, Shawn started to realize his passion for helping others through podcasting, writing, and speaking at events. He also realized after years working with clients one-on-one, how many people needed help with their sleep more than anything so he put his best efforts into his book, Sleep Smarter​, which was published in 2016.

Nowadays, the heart of Shawn's content is found at www.TheModelHealthShow.com, where you will find blog posts, upcoming speaking events, podcast episode information, as well as information on Sleep Smarter, The Fat Loss Code, and his upcoming book, Eat Smarter scheduled for release at the very end of 2020. Shawn's content has a strong focus on how our hormones are influenced by our fitness, nutrition, and sleep habits and how they effect our overall health.

Here are just some of the tips and quotes from Shawn Stevenson that I've found most valuable:
​

• ​Many people say that eight hours is the perfect amount. Shawn does not agree with this for multiple reasons. Mainly, everyone is a bit different: some people may be fine with eight but others might need up to ten hours each night. You also have many lifestyle factors that affect your sleep and certain times are also more valuable than others. According to Shawn, “It’s been shown that human beings get the most beneficial hormonal secretions and recovery by sleeping during the hours of 10:00 p.m. to 2:00 a.m. This is what I call money time.”4

​

• “Sleep cycles typically last for 90 minutes each and repeat four to six times per night. So, six normal 90-minute sleep cycles would equal 9 total hours of sleep… To make your mornings better and more energetic, start setting your alarm so that it goes off in accordance with these sleep cycles instead of the standard “8 hours of sleep.” For example, if you go to sleep at 10:00 p.m., set your alarm for 5:30 a.m. (for a total of 7 ½ hours of sleep), and you’ll likely find that you feel more refreshed when you wake up than if you set the alarm for 6:00 a.m. and interrupted another sleep cycle.”5 A couple suggestions Shawn has to optimize your sleep are that we should schedule our sleep around our ideal number of hours and to aim for a minimum of bare minimum of four sleep cycles (or about six hours) each night.6,7 

​

• ​Two things that can seriously impair your sleep are caffeine and alcohol. According to Shawn, you should set a caffeine curfew of around 2:00 p.m. the latest and avoid alcohol three hours before bedtime.8,9 Caffeine is harmful to your sleep because it causes your body to create adrenaline and cortisol and the half-life is between five and eight hours. To show how detrimental this is, he states that consuming caffeine six hours before bed causes one hour of lost sleep.10 When it comes to alcohol, Shawn explains how it is harmful because of how it and disrupts your REM sleep so your body and brain cannot recover properly and your memory also suffers.11

​

• Shawn explains that daily exercise is not an option. “If you’re really serious about being the healthiest person you can be, you’ll set your personal exercise appointment and sleep time first, then schedule everything else around them.”12 Many people believe running is the best way to burn fat but Shawn states that running is not the best because it can burn away your muscle if you run too much. Rather, on an interview with The Ultimate Health Podcast, he states that his suggested exercise plan is to lift heavy 2-3 times per week and to walk for 20-30 minutes each day, minimum.13

 

• “Strive to eat organic, locally grown, unprocessed foods for the bulk of your diet.”14 According to Shawn, this is the best way to get the nutrients your body needs. He always suggests natural forms of vitamins and minerals over supplements.

 

• “If you were to ask me… your relationships are the biggest governing force over all of it because that is the most influential thing on the decisions you make with your sleep, the decisions you make with the food that you eat, the decisions you make on whether or not you’re exercising or when or how you do it.”15

Over the next couple months, I will be providing short summaries of each of the experts to be featured in my upcoming book, Twelve Paths to Health & Fitness (Part 1)​ (this is a working title). To see a breakdown of the research I have done on each expert, go to my About Twelve Paths Page. Some of these experts focus on strength and conditioning, some focus nutrition, and others focus on physical therapy and these biographies show how they built their platform along with all of the tips and tricks that I've learned from them.

Whether you are a beginner on your own self-improvement journey, an intermediate lifter who wants to make tweaks to their nutrition or fitness program, or a coach who wants to learn what other coaches with enormous platforms have learned form their experiences, I guarantee you will be amazed by all of the helpful information in this book.

Each biography in the book is about 20-30 pages long, whereas the profiles in this series will be quick summaries with some of my favorite quotes and tips so you can get a taste of what the book will be like.

As I create each Expert Profile, I will provide the link to the profile below:

• Expert Profile #1 - Shawn Stevenson

As you may know, I recently announced my upcoming book which should be complete by the start of next year. The purpose of this post is to give you an idea of what exactly the book is about and how it will be formatted. This book is a series of biographies that includes all of the experts that I've researched as well as all of the tips and tricks that I discovered while doing my research. The list of experts involved, a quick description of their backgrounds, and the amount of research done on each of them can be seen in my About Twelve Paths Page. All are involved in health and fitness in some fashion, whether they are nutritionists, physical therapists, or strength and conditioning coaches. Each biography is between 10-15 pages long, describing the following:
​

• Their background and how they built their platform.
• Summaries of their content including books, podcast discussions, blog articles, programs, etc.
• Their general advice when it comes health and fitness.
• Shared ideas with the other experts included in the book.
• Contradicting ideas with other experts included in the book.

The purpose of the book is to take everything I've learned from these individuals over the past couple years of deep research and spell it all out to help you learn how you can improve your health and fitness and possibly find experts that you would like to follow as well.

​Below, I will share with you the current version of the "From the Author" introduction of the book...

If you have any comments or questions, please comment below. I'd really appreciate any input you might have. I have all of the biographies written and am currently working on the final editing, formatting, etc.

If you have not already, please help me in deciding a title of my book by clicking this link.

If you know others who would be interested in this book or blog, share the post on. You can also subscribe to my blog by going to my Contact Page and entering your email address. I do not spam subscribers but simply let them know when new posts are up or if there is big news related to the blog.

Thank you for reading! ​

Last March, after hearing multiple podcasts and finding numerous experts that I enjoyed listening to, I decided to do deep research into these experts to learn what they have to say and where their research comes from. Whether they are dietitians, personal trainers/muscle building coaches, or physical therapists, my goal is to get research from all sides and find which experts I trust and appreciate the most. For at least a month each, I focus hard on one expert: only listening to podcasts including that expert, reading their books that interest me most, and reading their blog posts/articles.

​Here are the 5 experts I have researched so far...

Shawn is a dietitian who has given me a great foundation from hormones to heart health to exercise to relationships to success. His book, Sleep Smarter is a great book highlighting how sleep is just as important as nutrition and exercise when it comes to overall health. He also has a podcast, The Model Health Show, where he interviews other experts as well as shares masterclasses where he gives tips like what benefits come from walking in the morning and drinking plenty of water.

Dr. Gundry is a physician/dietitian who focuses on helping those with immuno-deficiencies. He believes a plant-based diet is the best for anyone and gives warning to what lectins and large amounts of animal protein can do to your body. Other experts speak negatively about Gundry but he has a lot of knowledge shared in his books, The Plant Paradox and Dr. Gundry's Diet Evolution.

Ben has an insane resume from bodybuilder to personal trainer to CEO and consultant to fellow CEOs/athlete. Over the past 5-10 years, his books and work stems from his experience between triathlons, bio-hacking, and research in longevity. His book, Beyond Training is a guide on how to be a top-performing athlete while making time for other things in your life as well by using things like High Intensity Interval Training and technology. He also has a health and fitness podcast similar to Shawn's, Ben Greenfield Fitness.

Mike is a muscle-building coach and CEO of his supplement company, Legion Athletics. Most of his fans come from his flagship books, Bigger Leaner Stronger (his fitness book for men) and Thinner Leaner Stronger (for women) where he gives his advice on diet and exercise and gives a plan on how to build muscle while staying lean. He also has a podcast, Muscle For Life.

Dr. Cate is a dietitian who led the Pro-Nutrition program for the LA Lakers and who also has been featured on The Model Health Show, Ben Greenfield Fitness, Muscle For Life, and several other podcasts - mainly to discuss her popular diet book, Deep Nutrition. This book delves deep into the science of nutrition, telling us why we must avoid vegetable oils and sugar at all costs while enjoying all fresh foods, from veggies to broths to organ meats.

All posts (other than personal journal posts) on this blog come from information I've learned from these experts. Here are a couple experts I plan to research in the near future...

• Rhonda Patrick (physician, owner of Found My Fitness, featured on Joe Rogan's podcast)
• Kelly Starrett (physical therapist, owner of Mobility WOD/The Ready State)

Do you know of any experts that you trust and that I should be including in my research?