The Minimalist Minute

Welcome to the weekly dose of brain juice that helps you build better habits, get fit and live longer. If you were sent this email, come and join us here.

In today’s instalment:

• A professional approach to tracking goals

• How to protect your brain from disease

#habits

Last week I mentioned using psychometric testing to help understand why you make the decisions you do. This week in line with the same train of thought I want to introduce you to “time span”.

Time span was originally used by Elliott Jacques in a methodology called Requisite Organisation to discover how long people can stay on task to assign them appropriate roles within a company. Essentially, the longer the time span the higher in the organisation they should go.

It works with habits too.

People with long time spans tend to have better health and fitness outcomes as they think past the horizon of the day or week to stack successful weeks, months or years and compound the outcome. Kind of like a compounding interest strategy for longevity.

How to apply it?

Measure your streaks or consistency in weeks (at a minimum) aim to achieve an 80% success rate over months and watch the magic happen

#longevity

You become more vulnerable to brain-related diseases as you get older, as well as breakdowns in memory and cognition. Yay!

But, the time you spend in the gym or getting after your fitness goals could do much more than support muscle gain and fat loss. 

A recent study found that exercise might significantly reduce the likelihood of getting Alzheimer’s disease. 

The meta-analysis reviewed 29 studies and included more than 2 million participants. While scientists are still researching how to prevent Alzheimer’s, they’ve been uncovering more clues on strategies anyone can take to reduce the likelihood of the disease. 

They found that moderate-intensity exercise reduced the risk of Alzheimer’s by 15 percent, and high-intensity exercise led to a 44 percent reduction in risk.

“High-intensity” activities included lifting weights and running. 

More research is needed to determine exactly why exercise can reduce the risk of Alzheimer’s disease, but current theories suggest it has to do with increasing the blood flow to the brain, which offers various health benefits. Exercise is also associated with improvements in learning and memory, which might also help protect your brain. 

#quote

I hope you enjoyed this week’s instalment of the Minimalist Minute.

Got anything you want to know? Hit reply to this email and will include it in the next edition!

Stay frosty,

Brett