19 Essential Health Hacks and Tips to Enhance Focus and Performance in 2024

Trying to live forever? Maybe something just doesn’t feel right. Whether you’re taking on a journey of biohacking for longevity, or just trying to feel and perform your best, you need to make sure you’re handling the basics right.

Before you reach for that bottle of the latest craze, here are the best tips to make sure you’re not working harder than you need to.

Whatever your goals or mission may be, maintaining optimal health is a key component of staying on track to achieve your goals.  Whether you’re trying to maintain high levels of energy or focus, or looking to just feel better during the day, here is my list of top health hack tips to keep your body in optimal condition.

When it comes to changes you can implement to improve your life, there is a basic hierarchy to follow for the best effect.  Behavior, nutrition, supplements, and medication. If at all possible you want to try to make your changes to behavior first, and take medication only when necessary.

19 Health Hacks for Focus and Performance

This list of 19 simple daily changes you can make to dramatically improve your ability to perform whatever activity you’re attempting.  Making these simple changes has had the greatest impact on my ability to perform regardless of the task.

Feel free to combine to save time and effort or build a plan personalized to you that you’re going to be able to stick to for long-term benefits.

I generally recommend introducing new life hacks slowly instead of all at once to really see how each individually affects your performance.

Ultimately, there is just no replacement for consistency and discipline.  So before you start jumping into the hottest productivity or biohacking trend, first make sure you are hitting the basics.  And on that note here are some easy basics to not just set you up for success, but at the very least make sure you’re not doing unnecessary harm or getting in your own way.

1. Natural Sunlight Early in the Morning.

This is one of the best ways to start your day and get all the right natural bodily processes going to set your whole day up for success, including improving your ability to fall asleep at the appropriate time later!  Getting early sunlight triggers the release of chemicals in the brain to set your circadian rhythm for the day and not fight lethargic states throughout the day.

If you can’t get natural sunlight first thing in the morning, I find that a natural sunlight alarm clock works wonders.  I often need to wake before the sun comes up and nothing has made that easier than a sunrise alarm clock, and it seems like these things just keep getting better and better.

As is the case with most things though it’s better to get the natural light, but if you have to get up for work before the sun rises, A sunrise alarm clock gives me the best wake-up experience with the least amount of grogginess.  

I first got the idea for a sunrise alarm clock when I suddenly found myself unable to sleep through sunrise.  It’s the same reason I became the biggest fan of blackout curtains.  The sunrise alarm clock really shines when you have to wake up before sunrise.  (no pun intended…ok pun intended) 

At the end of the day though there is no substitute for natural light so do what you can to get some of that early morning sun even if you can’t do it first thing. 

Setting and maintaining a regular circadian rhythm is key to optimal health and you’ll probably hear this from me multiple times…wink wink.  

Sticking with our hierarchy of changes, this behavior is also a great way to start getting your vitamin D.  While there are lots of people who are likely deficient in vitamin D and will benefit from supplements, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try to get as much as you can safely from natural sunlight and diet first.  

2. Cold Water Exposure. 

I know some of you are already thinking “Noooooope, nope, nope nope, all of my nopes.”  But hear me out on this one.  Not only has this become a popular trend recently, but there is a lot of good science to show the health benefits of cold water exposure. 

If you’re trying to start your day off right, getting some cold water exposure early on can set your dopamine levels on the right track to help keep you motivated and focused.

Even if you’re not keen on jumping in an ice bath first thing in the morning, I find if I’m still groggy after waking up, jumping in a cold shower not only comes with various cold exposure benefits but guarantees I’m wide awake afterward.  Try to be mad getting out of a cold shower.  Go ahead, try it.

To get the best out of cold exposure, most recommendations are for simply 1-2 minutes at a time so if the water coming out of your shower is sufficiently cold, there’s a good chance you can get some benefit out of this method without footing the bill for a cold plunge. However, there are some inexpensive options out there.

Here’s a quick test to tell if it’s cold enough.  Is your brain yelling at you to get out? Are you shivering?  It’s probably cold enough.  If you feel like it’s not a big deal and you could hang out there for a while.  Not cold enough. 

Now if you’re going numb and you can’t feel anything it’s too cold.  You’re not trying to hurt yourself.  You’re just trying to improve resilience and mood.

Most professionals will tell you that the science says you’re looking for 1-2 minutes at a time, no more than 11-15 minutes a week max to get all the benefits, so maybe even just hang out in the fresh produce section at Costco for a couple minutes if you’re nervous about starting. 

No jackets though…cheater. 

I’ve seen Joe Rogan discuss his preference for hitting these first two recommendations at the same time by taking a cold plunge outside while getting some natural sunlight first thing in the morning.  If only we could all just drop a plunge bath in a scenic location overlooking the sunrise.  Sounds amazing right?

According to Dr. Andrew Huberman of the Huberman Lab Podcast, you just need to make yourself a little uncomfortable to get a good dopamine response that will last you hours.  The amount of cold has to do more with your tolerance level.  I just take a cold shower in the morning and I find that gets my mind right without the daily plunge.

3. Get moving early.

This one could easily be swapped with number two but I wanted to hit you with the cold upfront.  

Whether it’s getting a workout or just going for a walk first thing, getting your body moving first thing in the morning is a great way to set the entire day for success.  Getting an early workout has been shown to improve your circulation as well as improve mood and focus.  

This is a great activity to combine with some early sun exposure to get the greatest benefit.  Play around with this and cold exposure to develop something that works for you.

Maybe you want to get a good workout in first and then cold exposure.  There’s no rule here so whatever your preference or schedule that you can still too is going to be best.

4. Delay your daily caffeine habit. 

Dan Pink is the first author who introduced me to the importance of the timing of caffeine intake in the morning when researching his book When.  So try to avoid drinking caffeine first thing in the morning. 

Based on Dan Pink’s findings, at least 1 and a half hours after waking is best for caffeine consumption to get the optimal effects. For me, I’m usually not sipping on my morning beverage until I’m in the car on my way to work.  

You want to delay your caffeine intake because of how it works on the brain.  Caffeine works by blocking adenosine receptors, and adenosine takes some time to clear after waking.  Take your caffeine too early before adenosine has had some time to clear and it will flood your receptors as soon as the caffeine wears off.  Then you crash… 

If your looking for the best way to clear adenosine from your system early in the morning?  Check number 3.  Get a workout in!

For those looking to reduce caffeine intake or want additional health benefits, mushroom coffees or mushroom-based morning beverages are also garnering more attention recently.  There are mushroom-based beverages as well as mushroom coffee mixes. They have similar effects on mood and focus sometimes without any caffeine.

My favorite is Ryze coffee which is a mushroom coffee blend, meaning it contains both. I actually add it to a regular cup of coffee because, well, I love coffee and I’m just looking to get the added health benefits of the mushroom blend.

MUDWTR is a popular blend of mushrooms without coffee if you’re looking to eliminate the coffee part or reduce the caffeine content of your morning beverage.

Tea can be another great option.  Matcha or green tea has less caffeine than coffee but can still deliver a noticeable effect.  Yerba mate tea is a compelling alternative as well.  The only recommendation I’ve ever heard for this one came from Dr. Andrew Huberman from the Huberman Lab podcast.  

Now I’m sure you’ve seen the yellow beverage cans in supermarkets and health food stores..  While it is certainly made with yerba mate tea, It’s more of an energy drink than a tea. It also tastes like Lipton sweet tea and contains a good amount of sugar.  

What Dr. Huberman is talking about is the loose-leaf version and I’ve only heard him mention a brand once.  I haven’t personally tested it but I did look it up and good news…you can get it easily on Amazon so if you are interested here’s an easy link for Anna Park Yerba Mate.  

5. Replace your electrolytes.

I really could have written hydrate here but how boring would that be?  There’s already enough dry material in this article, so I had to spice it up a little.  Plus, it emphasizes a key component of hydration that is often missed, and “replace your electrolytes” just sounds more sophisticated right?

One of the many things that happen to you while you’re sleeping is the depletion of helpful electrolytes. Think Sodium, Magnesium, and potassium.  It’s important to replace these the following day or after exercise.  It’s equally important to maintain them in the appropriate ratios.

There’s a good chance your diet doesn’t necessarily account for this loss so you may want to take action.  Plus if you’re also observing some type of fasting protocol it can make your fasting window significantly more pleasant.  

You don’t necessarily want to eat first thing in the morning so if you can rehydrate with some of these without stuffing a bunch of food in your face before you’ve accomplished anything is going to be a good idea.  Why?

To some degree, eating is going to trigger your parasympathetic nervous system or rest and digest and slow you down.  Why would you do that to yourself first thing while you’re trying to get going?  

The easiest way to get some back into your system is to drop some sea salt into your water.  

There are several electrolyte water brands that you could use or even specific electrolyte supplements that don’t contain sugar, you know, like Gatorade.  Although I do take advantage of the specific electrolyte blend benefits of Gatorade in the morning following a challenging workout.  Otherwise, you probably don’t want to be using Gatorade first thing in the morning on an empty stomach to replenish electrolytes.  Unless of course, you’re trying to spike your insulin for no reason.  Your call.

So, eat more salt.  Oh no! Controversy! Look if you have trouble with your blood pressure it’s best to consult your doctor instead of just adding a bunch of salty food to your diet. Here’s some information that might help the conversation you could have with your doctor or things to consider if you’re not sure you’re getting enough salt in your diet.

Really what I’m saying is eat (or drink) more electrolytes.  Salt or sodium is an important electrolyte.  Your body needs it.  The FDA and the Amererican Heart Accosiation maximum daily recommendation for sodium is 2300mg. I can tell you from first-hand experience that if you’re eating food you mostly make yourself and limiting processed foods, you’re likely coming short of this number.  

As mentioned earlier, it’s arguably more important to maintain an electrolyte balance of Sodium to potassium of 1 to 1. While the standard American diet is sufficiently high in sodium. It falls very short on potassium.

Additionally, studies are emerging that are beginning to indicate that this number is likely lower than the actual requirement and that health problems associated with excess sodium are more likely from processed foods in general, or an imbalance between sodium, potassium, and magnesium. 

On top of that, this fixed upper limit recommendation doesn’t take into account differences in individual requirements, activity levels, hydration levels, or how much you sweat.  

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/08/180809202057.htm

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0033062018300835

From my reading, It would seem the safe upper limit is likely closer to 6g per day when balanced appropriately with potassium through fruits, vegetables, potatoes nuts, and beans.

What the FDA and AMA are really saying is to reduce processed food intake.  Salt isn’t bad for you.  Processed food is.  Make sure you’re getting adequate amounts of all essential electrolytes in balanced ratios to keep your body happy.  

6. Balance your Gut.

Now I’ll be one of the first to admit that this is a broad statement, but there are some pretty simple ways to do this if you’re not sure if you have a gut problem and you don’t know where to start.

We are just starting to learn more scientifically about the gut and its impact on every aspect of our heath. 

In addition to the recommendations you’ll find below, it’s important to start slowly when introducing new foods.  If it’s something that you’re not used to eating like say vegetables.  Don’t go eating a ton all at once.  Your gut might not be ready for that.  

The idea is you want to build as diverse a system of microbes as possible, but we’re assuming you don’t have one now.  You can’t just dump every vegetable in your bowels and hope for the best.  This is absolutely a recipe for disaster and bloating, probably some diarrhea.

Now you’re thinking “This whole veggie thing is bullshit.  Back to carnivore!  When the real problem was you can’t just do it all at once, you need to build it incrementally.  The END goal is to be able to eat every veggie all at once and for your gut microbes to handle it flawlessly.  

Don’t set yourself up for failure and accidentally cause a ton of bloating and convince yourself that eating a wide variety of veggies isn’t for you because they “cause bloating”  That’s the wrong lesson.  Go slowly, build slowly. Your body with thank you for it long term.

Now, I’m not a doctor or a nutritionist, but what I have found with my own personal experimentation was that I was able to solve several of my own personal health problems including eczema exclusively with my diet. 

That said balancing your gut is a highly individualized part of your biology that is going to involve experimenting with what works best for you.  I can’t tell you what to eat for your own genetics but here are some broad recommendations to get you started.

As stated above, Nutrition comes before supplements and as much as possible you want to be able to balance your gut with nutrition over supplementation.  The best way to do that is…

Eat a broad diversity of foods.  Focus on getting as wide an array of colors into your diet as possible. You may have heard “Eat 5 colors a day.” You can pretty much peg the color of your food to the beneficial vitamins and nutrients that you are going to get out of it.  The most important ones are Dark Green, red, yellow/orange, white/tan, and blue/purple. 

Here is a great cheat sheet for foods to get the desired color pallet for your daily dose.  

I’ll add a couple of my preferred caveats.

Your best sources of green are going to be your dark leafy green veggies like spinach and kale.  The darker the better.  You can pretty much apply this to all the color groups.

This is why the dark, in dark leafy greens, is so important.  You can interpret the darkness or the boldness of the color with a higher concentration of beneficial components.

I do want to give a special shout-out to mushrooms and fermented foods.

Now this might not be the best for everyone, but I am a huge believer in the beneficial health potential of mushrooms.  Nutrition provided by mushrooms can yield a wide array of benefits depending on the mushroom.  If I’m adding mushrooms to my diet it’s because I’m looking for the benefits to gut health, immunity, cognitive function, and anti-cancer properties.

If we’re talking about gut health I think it’s important to have a quick discussion on FODMAPs or Fermentable Oligosaccharides, Disaccharides, Monosaccharides, and Polyols.  If you have any unexplainable health issues and your doctors are convinced your only solution is medication, I encourage you to look into FODMAP diet protocols. 

I can’t promise they will solve your problem but research is only just now starting to reveal the connection of our microbiome and gut health to all sorts of seemingly dissociated illnesses.   If you are familiar with FODMAP diets and you know or think you may be susceptible to dietary issues when consuming FODMAPs, Many mushrooms can be high in FODMAPS at higher concentrations. 

Fermented foods.  I’ll be shocked if you find a nutritionist who thinks adding a serving of fermented foods to your diet is a bad idea.  Loaded with probiotics, fermented foods are associated with improved gut health, bone health, lower cholesterol levels, lower blood sugar, lower blood pressure, lower inflammation, reduced IBS, reduced risk of cancers, particularly colorectal, breast, and prostate cancer, and reduced risk of neurodegenerative disease, and man that’s a long list.

A high-quality greens powder or superfood blend can also be a good option but, as a supplement, this should take a back seat to whole-food nutrition.

Remember, take it slow. Introduce new things in small amounts and build a diverse microbiome deliberately.

If you want to put some added data behind your gut health here are a couple of companies that offer at-home microbiome testing:

7. Balance your hormones

Ok, this one could be several articles on their own and if you really want to balance your hormones properly, you’re likely going to spend a good amount of time researching your hormones.  This is easily the most challenging aspect but could make a huge difference for many people especially if you’re doing everything else on this list and something still just doesn’t feel right.

The biggest reason and likely barrier preventing most people from getting this done is going to be cost.  Unless you can demonstrate a medical need for this you’re likely going to pay a high price for the tests to understand your levels and then another high price for the insights on what you should do about it.

Best case scenario you have a doctor you’re working with to help explain your numbers and what specific actions will help bring your levels into the appropriate range for your health.  Past that there are more an more companies coming along that will provide this as a service, but again, with a price tag. 

So what are the rest of us to do? Instead of focusing on balancing your hormones, the better option for a lot of people is rather, quit messing with your hormones.  There’s a good chance that if your hormones are a little out of wack it might be because of something you’re doing.

A good place to start is to quit doing the things that are deliberately wrecking your hormones and there’s a good chance that things will fall into balance on their own.  A lot of the behaviors highlighted in this article are a good start to this, but here is a short list of behaviors you can stop to quit messing with your hormones. 

Lack of quality sleep, Doom scrolling on social media or excessive screen time, eating highly palatable or processed foods, and consuming excessive amounts of alcohol are all behaviors you can quit that are all messing with your hormone levels.  And best of all, implementing these changes to your daily routine is free.

When you’re ready to take the next step, here are a couple of companies that will help you get started optimizing your biology with data!

8. Fasting.

I already mentioned not eating first thing in the morning but I’ll expand on this here.  I want to emphasize first and foremost, nothing says you need to eat first thing in the morning.

But…breakfast is the most important meal of the day, right? Sure, if you consider the first meal of the day that you break your fast as being the most important, but again nothing says this needs to be first thing in the morning.

There are several different fasting protocols that you can follow.  You’re not trying to starve yourself, you’re just generally restricting your eating to specific times or skipping meals.  As a general rule, you should be eating normally otherwise. 

Other than helping to maintain a healthy microbiome, it can help control caloric intake.  I have tried the skip one meal every day as well as the full-day fast methods.  The daily eating window method is probably the easiest to follow as it’s as simple as just skipping breakfast in the morning.  

You can also achieve this by not skipping breakfast and eating dinner early. This may also be better for people that have trouble getting to sleep .

Now I use a whole-day fast method and select my fasting day based on my workout rest cycle so that I’m fueling my workouts appropriately. 

So, give your gut some much needed rest, just don’t eat all day.

9. Get natural sunlight.

I know I already told you to get natural sun first thing in the morning to help set your circadian rhythm.  But that shouldn’t be the only time you see the sun during the day. 

A good option is to go for a walk during a lunch break for anywhere between 15-30 minutes depending on your time available.  For setting your circadian cycle and getting safe healthy levels of sun exposure for Vitamin D, a good general protocol is 3 walks a day.  One in the morning after waking with a low sun angle, one in the early afternoon ideally after a meal, and one in the evening again with a low sun angle.

One thing I’ve learned is that If your body establishes multiple pathways for something it’s because it’s important.  You can get Vitamin D from the sun and you can get it from food.  Now a lot of science will say that vitamin D supplementation is just as good if not better than Vitamin D produced by the skin at elevating Serum 25 HD D3. Levels.  While this is true it misses the bigger picture.  Getting natural sunlight, and moving around outside, will offer a wide range of benefits.  

So focus on getting some (not a lot, skin cancer risks are real) sun every day and eat real foods naturally high in Vitamin D.  IF you are still deficient after that, take a D3/K2.

If you aren’t able to get outside or if you work in a windowless building (I’ve been there…several times),  a D3/K2 supplement is a good second choice but there is just no substitute for the Vitamin D generated by the sun coming in contact with your skin.

10. Breathe through your nose.

A mouth breather isn’t just an insult anymore!  It’s now well-documented how damaging mouth breathing is for our overall health.  It’s even been shown to make us less attractive, lead to dental decay and issues as well as increase our likelihood of getting sick.  

It can also upset the healthy bacterial makeup of your mouth and is a major cause of halitosis. Bad breath. Breathing through your nose helps to maintain beneficial nasal bacteria while filtering out other harmful bacteria and viruses. It can also prevent overbreathing. Yes, overbreathing is a thing.

One of the amazing effects I found deliberately breathing out of my nose was that I was able to do so during longer and longer workouts.  This eye-opening moment was huge for me.  I’d spent most of my life thinking I needed to breathe through my mouth while working out to get more oxygen.  Not only is the opposite true.  The more I trained breathing through my nose the more obvious it became that I was getting MORE oxygen to keep my workouts going longer through nose breathing.  

Breathing through your mouth can be linked to crooked teeth, narrower nasal passages, sleep apnea, and more. It’s the classic use-it-or-lose-it conundrum. The less you use your nasal passages for breathing the more they will shrink and make it harder for you to…that’s right… breathe through your nose.

So do yourself a favor and make sure you’re deliberately breathing through your nose throughout the day. Exercise those nasal passages the way you would any part of your body you want to maintain for long-term health. Now, It can be relatively simple to make sure we deliberately nose-breathe during the day.  But, what about while we’re sleeping? More on that later.

11. Avoid sitting down.

It seems like the scientific community has gone back and forth on this one.  I’ve read several studies that state that sitting for more than 8 hours a day is shortening your life and also studies that say people who do this but also exercise for 30 minutes a day are exempt.  

Since the science is still out on this one I’ll just give you my quick take and experience. 

Simply sitting down triggers your brain to start shutting down for sleep.  Ever been recommended to stand up in class or at a meeting or conference if you’re feeling sleepy?  How about if you never sat down in the first place, ever notice how you don’t usually get sleepy (sleep not tired) while you’re standing up?  

Go ahead. Try to fall asleep while standing up.  If you are getting sleepy while standing up it’s likely that you’re not getting enough quality sleep in the first place and you want to focus your effort there first. 

Aside from helping you stay awake and alert, standing more often works wonders for your back.  Now I’m way too young to have back problems but I was a helicopter pilot earlier in my life.  I find myself constantly working through sciatic nerve pain.  I do all kinds of stretching, exercises, and weight training focused and dedicated on my back, but the thing that wipes out my back and leg pain quicker than anything?  Not sitting down for long periods.  

It’s also been shown that moving more often, say taking shorter walks say every 30 minutes might be better for you than 1 long walk once a day.

So take breaks, get up, move around.  Go for a walk.  If you spend most of your day in front of a computer, get a standing desk. My standing desk was one of the best investments I’ve ever made for my overall health.  

You can even try an under-desk treadmill if you can’t get away from your computer or office. In addition to not sitting for more than 30 minutes at a time without getting up, it’s a good idea to try to target about 3 walks a day.

12. Exercise Your Body

I’m not going to tell you how you should exercise because honestly the best advice I think you can give someone is to do the thing that you are most likely to stick to long term.  That said there is plenty of evidence that says you should be exercising regularly. 

To emphasize this point even more, I’ve heard countless experts describe how adherence is the number one cause of exercise program failure.  So again.  The best thing for you is the thing you’re most likely to stick to.

If you can squeeze this in early and combine it with step 3 that’s amazing, but I’m not going to weigh in on when the best time during the day to workout.  

I generally prefer to work out first thing in the morning simply because of how much better I feel throughout the day.  On the other hand, if I’m going to do some heavy weight lifting first thing in the morning is rough, and I’ve found that later in the day my body is more warmed up.

Your goals might answer this for you.  Based on my research I’ll provide this broad recommendation.

If your primary goal is to have more energy and focus throughout the day working out in the morning is better.

If your primary goal is strength and muscle gains, or if you have significant time constraints in the morning or need a lot more time to warm up to work out the stiffness, the afternoon is probably better.

13. Exercise Your Mind

Just like you exercise your body, if you aren’t pushing yourself into the realm of discomfort, you won’t stimulate sufficient stress and adaptive response for your muscles to grow, the same can be said for the brain and cognitive function,  

Tackle hard problems, exercise with puzzles, or read a book.  Stimulate your mind.

Do difficult things. Simply performing difficult tasks can help improve your mental health.  This can be anything from solving a problem or just tackling a task you’ve been avoiding for a while.  It actually doesn’t need to be difficult.  It can simply be doing something that you don’t want to do.  It can even be something else on this list.  I’m looking at you ice bath!

Believe it or not, deliberately NOT doing things you want, like picking up your phone to scroll through social media or eating that cookie exercises a portion of your brain as well.  These exercise the portion of your brain called the AMCC or anterior midcingulate cortex and is associated with willpower.  It also appears that this section of the brain may also be related to age-related neurodegenerative decline.

Journaling. Journaling is another great activity to exercise your mind.  Additionally, it comes with benefits like reduced stress, improved mood and memory, and increased creativity.  Combined with a slew of other mental health-promoting benefits, journaling can help you make sense of the day and be a great place to record your goals to help keep you on track.

14. Take naps/breaks.

Track your energy levels throughout the day.  People generally have a trough sometime in the middle of the day (generally 6-7 hours after waking) which is an ideal time to take a nap.  This is also probably the best time to hit yourself with a second dose of caffeine if necessary if you need to stay awake.  Or combine the two efforts with what is now popularly called a “napaccino.”

The best way to take a napaccino is the drink a cup of coffee immediately before taking a short nap.  The ideal time for your nap is going to be 25 minutes.  This is a great balance to help you feel energized by preventing you from falling into a deep sleep combined with the approximate time it will take for the caffeine to affect your system.

You probably have realistically 3 maybe 4 activity bursts of effort throughout the day before you are going to be faced with diminishing returns.  Some people can exceed this but those people are rare, genetic anomalies, mutants, enhanced, aliens, or otherwise insert comic book reference here. I’m assuming if you’re reading this you are not one of them.

If you can meet 4 that’s amazing, but if you’re trying to be more efficient with your day I’d start with 3.  Pick 3 1.5-hour periods throughout the day that you are going to work through difficult tasks.  Then take breaks between, get up, move around, and adjust your gaze.  

But think about it.  It’s only 4.5 hours of the day,  Think about how much you would be able to accomplish if you completed 3 difficult tasks every day!

15. Limit screen time.

 If you are trying to become more productive and focused, this is probably the simplest (simple not easy) to implement.  Not only are there well-documented negative effects associated with excessive screen time, it’s time that could better be spent on something else. The more productive I have attempted to be, the easier I found to find time simply by not picking up my phone.

At the end of the day, if you’re trying to be more effective, there are few if any benefits screen time can offer in the productivity department.

If you’re having trouble focusing and you’ve been staring at your computer screen for too long and you’re tempted to grab your phone and start scrolling, I’ve got a better idea for you…

16. Meditate/ focused breathing.

There is this amazing coincidence of different cultures that have all developed various meditative techniques that all just happen to converge on a breathing technique of approximately 5.5 breaths per minute.  As it turns out, this is the optimal breathing pattern for oxygen efficiency.

You may be surprised to learn that over-breathing is a real problem. 

There are however several breathing techniques that offer a variety of benefits for your next meditation.  All of these have been shown to enhance calm, reduce stress and anxiety, and even help you sleep better.

Here is a short list of breathing techniques you can experiment with to find what works best for you.

• Wim Hof
• 4-6. In for 4 seconds, out for 6 seconds
• 4-7-8, What is 4-7-8 breathing? The benefits of mindful breathing on health and wellness (webmd.com)
• Box Breathing, or 4-4-4-4…you get the idea at this point.

17. Limit alcohol consumption

Now I love a good drink as much as the next person, but according to the science, there is no health benefit to drinking.  Whatever trace amounts of beneficial compounds may be present are not sufficient to counter the negative effects of alcohol. 

Simply having alcohol in your system is going to prevent you from getting the kind of quality sleep you need to be getting to enhance your performance and focus.  Thus if you’re trying to get life-changing results, this one is non-negotiable in my mind because getting sleep is non-negotiable.

18. Get plenty of quality sleep.

The proverbial last but not least.  I chose to write this article in more of a chronological order for how you might experience these activities throughout the day, but if I were to list them in priority order or biggest impact, this would be hands down the number one.

I can say definitely that getting enough sleep is critical to performance. As a military pilot, I’ve been required to get 8 hours of “uninterrupted rest” for most of my career.  The 8-hour number has been around for quite a while and I’ve been getting about 8 hours for most of my life.  The importance of this became very obvious when my oldest son with autism began having sleep problems. 

For a several-month stretch of time I was averaging less than 6 hours of sleep, in many cases closer to 3-4 hours. My ability to function dropped noticeably.  I began to struggle to remember things. I couldn’t focus at work. I was getting less done, and I was getting agitated very easily. 

It couldn’t have been more obvious that the culprit for all of these was lack of sleep.  As soon as we were able to get my son’s sleep schedule back on track, it didn’t take long before my energy, focus, motivation, and clarity all returned to normal.  

The one caveat to this was that I had developed a disrupted sleep pattern that I needed to overcome.  There was a period of about a week or two that my sleep was disturbed in anticipation of waking with my son that continued despite him sleeping through the night.  Once my body learned I didn’t need to do this anymore everything quickly fell back into place.

It’s worth bookending this on a quick revisit of breathing through your nose.  Sure it can be relatively easy to make sure you put forth a deliberate effort to breathe through your nose during the day but what about while you’re sleeping?  

The two biggest factors that will help you improve the quality of your sleep are temperature and nose breathing.  Ideally, you can set the temperature of your room to something nice and cool to encourage good sleep but there are also various bedding products out there that will help you set the optimal sleeping temperature.

The harder one is breathing through your nose.  I’m sure most of you all have that embarrassing picture out there of falling asleep in an awkward position with your mouth hanging open and drool halfway down your face.  On a serious note.  You want to do everything you can to stop this from happening, not for the embarrassment, cause let’s be honest who doesn’t like giving their friends a good laugh, it’s actually extremely detrimental to your health.

The damage caused by mouth breathing while you sleep is enormous.  It can be the sole reason that despite getting what may seem to be the right quantity of sleep you never feel refreshed and you’re tired all the time.  

Enter mouth tape.  Look it’s awkward and it feels weird at first but I promise you after a week of deliberate nose breathing in your sleep with change your life.  

Now I have relatively thick facial hair so mouth tape has been a challenge.  I’ve tried just about every method I can to include some crazy-looking chin strap thing (these don’t work for me).  Right now my best method for sleeping is to tuck a pillow under my chin to hold my mouth closed, but it can fall apart on me if I move around. Unfortunately, unless I’m clean-shaven, most mouth tapes just don’t work that well.

I’m still on the hunt for a great mouth tape that won’t fall off easily with a little bit of facial hair.

19. Practice Gratitude.

Ok here’s a bonus for you.  If sleep is the most important, a daily gratitude practice is likely the most underrated.  

It seems every day there is more and more evidence supporting a daily gratitude practice and its benefits for mental health and well-being.  

So whether and the end of the day right before you go to sleep or first thing the next more, or both!  Be thankful for what you have and the privilege of being able to go to bed and wake up the next morning.  Not everyone will have that luxury.  

Combine this with a meditation or focused breathing exercise.  You could also add this do part of a daily journaling routine. 

Conclusion/Wrapping Up

So many of our daily routines have devolved into toxic behaviors that make maintaining focus, determination, and drive more difficult.  They degrade your performance, kill your energy levels, and make just getting through the day harder than it should be.

Learn how to make the efforts of each day their own reward, and be thankful for each opportunity to get a little better each day.

Start by making small incremental behavioral changes and eliminate bad ones. I hope that you will be able to use this information as a quick reference or cheat sheet to slowly build on your progress to improve your health and your life as a whole.

So if you’re trying to improve your health, enhance your performance, give you more energy, or increase your ability to focus, this comprehensive list should give you plenty of things to work on to get you where you want to be, one step at a time.

If you’re looking for more information on any of the topics listed above, here is a list of resources I’ve found enormously helpful in understanding various aspects of my health, fitness, focus, and motivation. 

The authors and podcasters listed below all have a fantastic ability to distill complex concepts down to actionable insights combined with exceptional storytelling to keep you entertained the entire time they are teaching you.

Breath by James Nestor

When by Dan Pink

Think Like a Monk by Jay Shetty

Dopamine Nation by Anna Lembke

Mindset by Carol Dweck

Huberman Lab Podcast, and Neural Network Newsletter.