Happy Monday friend - I hope the weekend has been good to you.
If you've been in this community for a while, you may know that in 2021 I lost my wife.
It was the first time really in my life that I had experienced grief to this degree.
I'd describe it as if the entire ground had just swallowed me up and I was just in freefall.
It's not a feeling I'd wish on my worst enemy.
And while many things helped to keep me together (my faith, family, and friends being a core part of that), I truly believe that the small daily health practices that I'd built in the years before this – whole foods, training, walks, cold showers, home cooking etc – helped play a huge supporting role in helping me keep my head above water.
I think that everyone has their own reasons to get into health.
For some people, it might be an aesthetic purpose and to look a certain way. For others, it's a way to manage stress. It can also be used as a tool to recover, rebuild and fine-tune health after illness.
All of the above reasons are absolutely valid.
But in my view, when you approach health from a place of aiming to build a sense of robustness, resilience and long-term health, it's different.
These habits ultimately turn out to be anchors that can keep you steady and give you something to hold onto when everything else feels like it's up in the air.
That season of life taught me 3 valuable lessons that I'll cling onto (probably for the rest of my life):
- Your habits can be a safety yet: it's fairly easy to lean into health habits when times are great – but actually they help keep you sane when the waters are at their choppiest
- Nutrition is bigger than macros and calories: although these are important (and I'm due to write a piece on calories soon), in times of grief nutrition is a refuge; a tool to help keep you grounded and clear-headed when things feel out of control
- Resilience should be a key factor in chasing health: dark times are coming for us all in some way or another – and being relatively healthy will help you deal with them a lot better
Never underestimate the power of these daily practices.
You might think that one gym session that you thought was mediocre hasn't helped you, but it's a deposit of resilience that adds up into something greater for the future.
You might not see it in that moment, but believe me – it counts for something bigger than you can believe.
Whether it's that long walk you went on, that choice to blend up a smoothie, or that show of discipline when walking down a high street littered with fast food outlets, these micro choices over time build a foundation of resilience that will stabilise you when life feels hard.
I can't stress enough how hard losing someone is.
Be it a parent, a friend, a sibling, a spouse – its inexplicable. For anyone who has gone through or is going through that season, I have a small semblance of how you may be feeling (or have felt).
(It's also not lost on me how grateful I am to be married again and have a beautiful daughter too).
And while I know there isn't a single way to approach grief – everyone will attend to their needs in their own specific way – what I do know is that for me, trying to continue to lean into the things that I know help me feel good was a cornerstone in staying afloat.
And it's something that I know I will lean on again when life calls for it.
Stay healthy,
Jeff
PS: if you got value from this newsletter (and previous ones), I want to encourage you to get two of your friends to sign up and spread the word of accessible, practical health and nutrition. Thank you for being part of this community!