The Experiment Continues

I did not plan to write this blog, but my previous blog got a pretty big response. I received many questions about the specific things I did and what worked.

I still think the general framework, which translates reasonably well to other disciplines, is the most important thing. I will try to answer some of the questions about specifics while keeping an orientation toward that bigger, general framework. My hope is that my comments will be useful for people dealing with their own health-related issues, but that the overall approach may generalize to other things you wish to do well.

Probably the most important point is that intent matters. If you want to do something, you must truly set an intent to do the thing. This doesn't mean "having a passion for it" or really wanting it--it means that doing the thing becomes one of the top priorities in your life. I'm convinced this is the simple key to success in many fields. No, it won't overcome all obstacles. I, for instance, will never play professional sports. And it's also possible you will achieve some impressive things without centering your life around them, but the best plan, if you want to do something, is to set a clear, focused intent to do it. (An entire book could be written on this subject alone.)

Attention and focus follow real intent. In fact, it's one way to see if you really want the thing. You want to become a famous painter? You bought the brushes and paint. Are you painting every day? Are you doing the thing? Are you thinking about it almost every moment? Are you dreaming about it? If not, you didn't really want to do the thing and you're probably not going to do it, especially if it is something difficult.

At some point, this stopped being something I was going to do and became something I was doing. That doesn't seem like much of a difference, but it turned out to matter a lot. I think people fail in bettering themselves health-wise when it is something they want to do or something that would be nice. People succeed when they must. You probably know someone who had a medical scare like a heart attack and then completely transformed themselves and their lifestyle. This applies to everything we do: if you want to succeed, with excellence, you have to want it so badly it becomes an obsession.

There are quite a few ways to get here. For me, it was the data. I had over 40 tubes of blood drawn for blood tests--so many the lab wouldn't do them all on the same day! I then monitored my body's reaction to various foods and scenarios, and figured out how to hack some of my wearables so I have access to datastreams covering heart rate, HRV, sleep, etc. etc.

I started by monitoring too many things--everything I could get my hands on, and then moved toward figuring out what really mattered. AI was helpful here, but also occasionally misleading. (I had some fascinating experiences watching various AIs glitch in ways that became predictable, probably revealing aspects of their tuning. Claude Opus, for instance, was so set on harm-avoidance "he" insisted on dredging up data on my hydration level from four years ago.)

And here's a lesson that ties directly into trading: we have to understand the variability of the data. Many aspects of biology are highly variable. Some, of course, are not--a few salts get a little out of whack in your blood and things get weird, your temperature moves a few degrees and you know it, but your response to food or exercise--even doing the exact same things on different days--can vary dramatically. Make sure you're looking at data with a lens that appreciates the natural variation so you don't mistake a jiggle in the data for a real signal.

This is a hard post to write, because I'm clearly not an expert on the subject and I'm very much a work in progress. Over the past few weeks, some aspects of my program have regressed a bit as I've tried to figure out how the pieces fit together. (Since you're wondering, I'm doing more resistance training at a caloric deficit so figuring out adaptation under that stress sometimes leads to overeating a bit. But my system catches this quickly...)

I have read actual research pretty carefully. This has been a great use of AI: ask for an answer to a question (e.g., "how many reps should I do each week for a muscle group given___") and then ask for the specific research that backs it up. I'm aware not everyone has the inclination or frankly the math skills to parse actual research. (But, rest assured, you can get those skills if you want them. Remember, I had one math class in college which was basically "math for poets", in which we talked about how cool math was without ever working an equation. I graduated college not knowing what linear regression was.) When you get into this stuff, you'll see evidence of p hacking and shocking methodological misses in published research. Still, someone did the work and got the result so you will have an understanding that goes beyond the casual.

I came into this with a pretty conventional understanding of nutrition and medicine. I thought my doctor could be relied upon to tell me what was best. But the deeper I went, the harder it was to ignore the evidence stacking up. Some of what I think now sounds a bit like a conspiracy theory: I think "Big Food" and the government have created a cycle that leads to food addiction. I think sugar is the cause of many health issues, and highly processed foods may almost be poisoning our bodies. I think the medical community is ill-equipped to deal with this because your doctor is probably not educated on these subjects and they have to toe the party line if they want to continue to be a doctor. Far better for them to follow advice which is probably harmful (e.g., the USRDA for protein for adults) than to risk getting sued by telling someone the truth. (Another trader parallel: if you're a money manager, far better to lose your clients' money in a market crash than to be underinvested in a rally. That's how you get fired.)

I don't think there's actual malicious intent here, but it's all about incentives. Companies need to stay in business (and, indeed they do, because otherwise how are you going to feed a dense population?). Companies need to make profits. In every walk of life, you get what you incentivize. When you start looking at the world through that lens, the glasses are very much not rose-colored! This project has really made me think about incentives and consequences in a different way.

I had some advantages here that I realize not everyone has. I want to acknowledge that up front, because it keeps me from being an evangelist. All of this took a lot of time, and some of it was expensive. Insurance covered exactly zero dollars of this work. I also had the data analysis and programming skills to really wrap my hands around the data. I've probably made some mistakes, but I've worked hard to find them.

As I write this, I realize there could be a whole book lurking here, but I don't want to write that book! A major subject is what we eat, to return to my rant a few paragraphs up. Cooking at home, with a focus on whole foods, was key. Fortunately, I found a few cuisines that worked very well in this scheme. In particular, Mexican and Levantine foods are ideally suited for this. And let me tell you, I'm not suffering food-wise. If you saw my menus, you would not think this was any kind of diet.

Lunch is often tacos, with handmade tortillas hot off the comal. Or maybe it's kebabs, or hummus with a hot pepper sauce and a boiled egg with a flatbread I also made. I do have the skills to make these dishes and to do them relatively efficiently. Still, it's several hours of work in the kitchen each week, and quite an extensive research project tweaking recipes and gathering ideas at the beginning of the project. AI proved to be a powerful partner in this work. As a former professional cook, I was consistently amazed by AI's accuracy and prowess in refining recipes. Using AI well has made me a substantially better cook--a true force multiplier.

I did and continue to do meditation and contemplative work extensively. I found this to be useful, essential even, but that probably veers into another topic area. I would also suggest you explore fasting. This is something that is often misunderstood and underestimated in our culture. You probably know that the "Mediterranean diet" doesn't really show the results in American culture that were hoped for, and usually does not give the health benefits expected. There are probably several reasons, but one to consider is fasting is a huge part of life and culture in the islands researchers used as the template for this diet.

Why was fasting omitted from the diet? Again, there's not one, simple, clear answer, but I have to wonder if they realized virtually no American was going to go on an eating plan that says "don't eat anything at all on some days." But I'd strongly suggest you do exactly that: I found some pretty amazing cognitive and health benefits from 24-48 hour fasts. Drink water and take electrolytes for longer fasts. People with certain health conditions probably should not fast (especially anyone with a history of disordered eating), and having a discussion with your doctor is probably a good idea. Fasting is much easier than you probably expect, and you'll likely be surprised at what it reveals about how you think about food and why you eat like you do.

All of this probably seems complicated, but it really boils down to measure things properly, pay attention to what changes, and refine as you go along. Watch what happens, and be prepared to adjust. Any changes you make will have to be lifestyle changes, and, again, we are each systems that effectively maintain the status quo by resisting change. If you want change, you have to set a clear intent and then feed your quest with ongoing energy and attention.

I don't think I've found the perfect exercise or diet program, and I'm increasingly sure that no such thing exists. What I've found is a way to apply a way of thinking to a problem in another domain, and I think I should keep getting better, as long as I pay attention.

That much, at least, I learned from trading.

I am a writer. The ideas, structure, writing, and mistakes in this post are my own. I use AI as I would use a capable human editor--mainly for line editing and fact checking. I remain deeply committed to human creative work and am equally committed to using the tools that support this work well. Images accompanying these posts may be generated by AI.