Easy Diets

MIKELeave a comment

In November 2025, Rich Roll release a podcast about fasting. This compilation episode included an overview of why fasting works, how to fast, an additional details. But, what stood out was the importance of design.

Dr. Valter Longo spoke about the effectiveness of a 12/12 fast. That includes a twelve hour eating window and a twelve hour non-eating window.

Roll pushed back, asking is that enough non-eating time?

Yes, Longo explained, there are positive health effects but more importantly it’s easier to do.
Dr. Michael Greger said the same thing – only in reverse. Greger’s early advice was about a daily dozen set of foods people should eat. A dozen foods a day?

Inconceivable! Vizzini shouts.

That led to a lot of explaining by Greger. It’s aspirational. It’s a suggestion. It’s something to work towards.

Actions are based on frictions. How easy is something: to understand, to follow, to fit with my current worldview?

Better fits may not be perfect fits, but they’ll happen more.

Olsen’s Little Things

MIKELeave a comment

Greg Olsen is a former NFL player and current NFL broadcaster. He also coaches a middle school football team. What’s nice about Olsen’s perspective is that he’s played at the highest levels (“The U”, The NFL) and still says it’s the little things that matter. (Apple Podcast) ““The shit that Luke and I are yelling at the kids when we’re trying to coach seventh and eighth grade defense is the exact same coaching points the good coaches are trying to give pro bowlers. It’s all the same.”

What are those things? It’s not the highlights, flash, plays, or scheme. It’s “little technique, fundamental habits. How do we do pat and go in football? Like no one spends any time on that. And I think if people realized how much that would move the needle, they’d be shocked.”

Okay. So it’s the little things that matter. How do you coach them? Specific solutions

“But what I’ve learned is like you can be loud and you can be boisterous, but you have to give them solutions. You have to give them, it can’t just be, we got to tackle better.

“You missed that tackle, tackle them. Like, you know, go get them, go get them. Yeah, what?

“I don’t know, coach, I’m trying, but like, I don’t know what that means. So to your point, what I’ve learned is like, when you are yelling instruction, it’s got to be very specific. Alex, Alex, you’re tackling the wrong hip.”

The wrong hip. That’s specific. That’s fundamental. That’s helpful. It’s the little things.

Texts from School

MIKELeave a comment

My daughter’s high school (where I teach) has a new software program this year called Parent Square. It’s an app/service that allows school messages to be delivered more consistently, more immediately, and (unfortunately) more often.

During our training meeting where the administration sung the app’s praises I couldn’t help but think like an economist: oh this is too easy.

We all want to be informed parents. Or do we? Do parents want to know everything going on their children’s lives?

Regardless of if we want it (I don’t think we should) – we can’t!

Around the same time as my frustration with so many notifications, Kris Abdelmessih was asked about how to be a trader. He gives helpful advice. He’s a great writer, a good dad, super smart, and kind online. But part of kindness is honesty, he wrote:

“It’s gonna sound maybe harsh, but I tend to think that if you’re gonna figure it out, you just kind of are. You’re gonna find what to read; you’re gonna find the right things. And it’s like, if you’re unable to do that meta work, you’re just not cut out for it.”

Don’t bring information to a design fight. Want to change behaviors? Make it easier to people to take actions. Want to not change behaviors? Give people (more) information about the world. The ones who want it will get it.

The Freedom to Buy Anything includes Shackles

MIKELeave a comment

From Jakob Lund Fisher, author of my favorite personal finance / philosophy book:

The freedom to buy anything you want is actually really limited because it’s proscribed by things that are for sale.

It’s a well kept secret that there is actually a lot more to life than what one can buy. 

For example, $10M gives you the freedom to buy seasonal tickets to any seat (including boxes) in the stadium. It might even buy a handshake from the players or a backstage pass. However, it does not buy the freedom to actually play a useful role in a game or as part of the coaching, even at amateur level. It does not buy the feeling of playing—deking an opposing player or dunking a basketball after jumping 2ft in the air—or the game knowledge to appreciate all the nuances of the game. Or even having an interesting conversation with a professional player. These are not bought with money but with (sometimes lots of) time and practice.

Alcoholic Design

MIKELeave a comment

“Catherine (a former alcoholic) put the kettle on and, while waiting, scrubbed at a stain on the kitchen counter. There was always something. Not long ago, she’d imagined herself out of Slough House for good, and the life she’s led during those few months had been serviceable enough: evenings had followed afternoons had followed mornings, and during none of them had she drunk. But they weighed heavy. There are worse things an alcoholic can have on her hands than time, but not many.”

From London Rules by Mick Herron.

This is my favorite current series (even more than Reacher). The Apple TV show is great.

Even though London is foreign and there are many references I don’t get, Herron’s created wonderful characters including Catherine. If you’ve found a recent favorite, let me know!

Shiny Prizes

MIKE2 Comments

The girl, the guy. The spot on the varsity team. The vacation. The elite college, program, or club. The job (and of course the salary). The membership. The friend group. The invitation. 

My daughters are in their sophomore and senior years. There are a lot of shiny prizes on their radar. I want them to chase the prizes – it reflects on me. My ego demands it.

But why?

Years ago a friend offered us tickets to a University of Florida football game. They were playing a good team. It would have been fun. But we didn’t really want to go.

The tickets were valuable to someone, just not us.

I think about this often when I get stuck on shiny prizes. One person’s prize is another persons meh. What one person wants so badly another person asks so what. And these prizes lose their appeal.

Step 1: Want a thing.

Step 2: Get a thing.

Step 3: Ask why we wanted the thing so badly in the first place.

All parents want for their kids. But do we want the right thing? The shiny prizes or valuable ones?

Related: How will you measure your life?

The Art of Frugal Hedonism (Book Review)

MIKE1 Comment

This is a fun book. Besides the charming Australian narrator, this book about personal finance was full of whimsy and fun. The chapters are short. The tips are good. The point is the same.

When I taught personal finance in school this year it was heavy on Morgan Housel’s ideas: there’s internal finance and external. The internal stuff is about how you view money. The external stuff is about what to do with money.

There are simple and straightforward answers to both these areas. The Art of Frugal Hedonism provides many ideas for both.

The book reminded me a lot of the joys of college. A thirty dollar paycheck was enough for a full weekend of fun: bars, pizza, games, being outside. It was all there. And the book wants us to get back to that point.

We can always shift our framing of the world and the authors of this book want us to think of that time. You don’t need money to have fun – we already know that – we lived that!

The Art of Frugal Hedonism is reminder of that. Find fun. Be around people. Embrace weirdness. Eat basic and delicious food.

Though a totally different financial scale, the suggestions in Frugal Hedonism align with the answer to: Should you buy a ski chalet?

Mental Accounting: Joy

MIKE2 Comments

When message board posters wondered about how much money Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak might have if he hadn’t sold his stock he told them.

But in his accounting:

“I gave all my Apple wealth away because wealth and power are not what I live for. I have a lot of fun and happiness. I funded a lot of important museums and arts groups in San Jose, the city of my birth, and they named a street after me for being good. I now speak publicly and have risen to the top. I have no idea how much I have but after speaking for 20 years it might be $10M plus a couple of homes. I never look for any type of tax dodge. I earn money from my labor and pay something like 55% combined tax on it. I am the happiest person ever. Life to me was never about accomplishment, but about Happiness, which is Smiles minus Frowns. I developed these philosophies when I was 18-20 years old and I never sold out.”

https://m.slashdot.org/story/445414

Health is a verb

MIKELeave a comment

“I don’t know why we made health a noun. Think about it. When it’s a noun, it’s an object to be obtained.

It’s something tangible. It’s a destination. Health should be a verb.

How many of us have been in the best shape of our life? If we stopped doing what got us there, we would fall backwards. So we, it’s an action.

Health needs to be an action you do every single day of your life. If you are, if we keep setting it up, like I’m going on a diet, I’m gonna lose 30 pounds. What happens once you lose the 30 pounds?

What’s your next move? This is the ozempic. What’s your next move”

From The Rich Roll Podcast: Dr. Mindy Pelz On Women’s Hormonal Health, Cyclical Fasting, Health As A Verb, Reclaiming Your Body’s Intelligence & Transforming Menopause Into Empowerment, Jul 31, 2025

Don’t hire a noun to do a verb’s job.