Welcome to 1-3-1 Fridays, my weekly newsletter where I reveal evidence-based strategies to get lean, strong, and create optimal health.

What's in store for today:

• The fruit I eat each day for optimal brain health while protecting my memory.
• Never diet again using this method (hint: it doesn't involve tracking calories).
• My 2-part evening routine that's helped me 10x my goal achievement progress even as a busy father.

The new year is in full swing.

As I write this, we're almost 15 days into this year.

What has this year taught you about yourself?

What have you noticed about your habits?

How consistent have you been the past 2 weeks?

If you've been slacking, what's been getting in the way?

If you've been rocking things, what's supporting your growth?

Progress can be made in many different ways.

But if you've been struggling or not making momentum, pausing midway through the 1st month can help you regain progress.

Doing more is not the solution.

Even though this was my approach (working hard/trying more) in the past, I've learned over the past few years that slowing down and reflecting can yield more insights than just 'doing more.' 

If you're stuck, there's a reason why.

There are two categories I've been teaching our clients to break down their bottlenecks.

'Is this a systems or mindset problem?' I'll ask.

The first is related to your schedule, environment, time, or anything related to your health systems.

The second is related to your inner world - thoughts, emotions, sensations, beliefs, etc.

Both are valid concerns.

But you don't want to confuse one problem with the other.

For example, I recently changed my workout time from 5 pm EST to 10 am EST.

The reason was that I wasn't working out as hard as I wanted, nor was I completing each workout.

I also noticed that I had less drive to work out by the end of the day.

It's strange to see me writing this since I spent a large bulk of my life working out in the evenings.

I also didn't have a child to care for, run a business, have a wife, or travel internationally during those periods.

Life is short, and what you do matters.

My workouts are the foundation for my fitness and strength.

They fuel my energy for the rest of the day.

So, identify whether you have a systems or mindset problem.

Then, take action on the right solution.

For me, it was moving my workout time block on my calendar to earlier in the day.

Solutions don't need to be difficult or complex.

Oftentimes, they're more straightforward than you think.

It's 2025.

Let's keep the main thing, the main thing.

Which is your health, well-being, and life.

Lesson: Problems are just questions waiting to be answered.

Here's Your 1-3-1 Friday:

1.) Eat this fruit for brain health

One of the most powerful brain foods you can eat is wild blueberries.

Wild blueberries have a range of benefits for us.

One of the world's leading experts on berries, Mary Ann Lila, Ph.D. and Director of the ​NC State Plants for Human Health​, shares:

“The wild blueberry has a phytochemical profile tailored by the harsh environments of Maine and the surrounding areas where they grow.​

The wild blueberry’s adaptation to this environment has resulted in a diverse phytochemical profile that gives the wild blueberry an incredible potency for human health,” she shares and then adds:​

“Phytochemicals are compounds in plants that develop to defend the plant from environmental stress, fungi, bacteria, and viruses.

Once consumed by humans, they transfer these health benefits to us."

In other words, if you eat wild blueberries consistently, you receive all the resilience and fortitude each berry brings.

Another fun fact about wild blueberries?

When faced with harsh winters or terrible fires, not only do these berries survive... but they thrive.

When you freeze or eat frozen wild blueberries, their resilience and benefits are amplified even more.

Wild blueberries also contain a ​large amount of antioxidants​, which have been proven to slow down the aging process by combating free radicals in our bodies.

Paired with the positive cognitive health effects and brain-boosting benefits, wild blueberries have been my diet's mainstay for years.

I buy my frozen pack of Wegman's wild blueberries each week (usually 2-3 bags weekly), from which my wife makes a delicious morning smoothie.

Wild blueberries aren't a 'superfood' (which was a coin termed to encourage buying more foods that don't have any actual health benefit for us).

They're more than that.

They're foods designed for us to maximize our health and a gift from this planet to us.

As for brain health, wild blueberries are a brain powerhouse.

One of the little-known benefits of eating them is improving the speed of processing thoughts.

In a 6-month double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled trial, participants experiencing cognitive issues as determined by scores on the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) were randomized to consume either wild blueberry (n = 44) or placebo (n = 42) powder daily for 6 months.

The results?

The group that ate blueberries improved their speed of processing thoughts.

If you want to get smarter while eating one of the most powerful foods on the planet, add wild blueberries to your diet.

6 months from now, you'll be surprised at your health results.

Photo by University of Maine

2.) Never diet again using this method

I learn fast but sometimes slow.

If there’s ONE lesson I’ve had to learn repeatedly - it’s my environment.

According to Beradi’s Law, you eat the food around you.

Yet there’s also a parallel to this law: if there’s healthy food around, you’ll also eat it.

When it comes to health and nutrition, getting stuck on calories, macros, and dieting is easy.

Yet, most of us forget about our environment, which can change our health permanently.

Remove the foods that don’t serve you from your environment while adding healthier options.

It’s important that you don’t just remove all your junk food.

Add in your favorite fruits, vegetables, and whole foods, which will fill the gap that is missing from some of the foods you love.

For example, when I decided that eating a Haagen Daz vegan chocolate truffle every weekend no longer served me, I realized it wasn’t the ice cream I was craving.

It was the glucose, the sugar, that my body craved from fruits.

So, I immediately reinvested my energy and money into buying fresh and frozen fruits.

Your BODY knows precisely what nutrients we need.

It’s our MIND that gets confused and thinks we need to have every vegan junk food on the planet.

Our bodies know exactly what we need to eat (fruits, vegetables, whole foods) as we heal our bodies and focus on our health.

Our mind regains clarity, and we can see what we are missing.

So here are three key steps to apply Beradi’s Law to your health:

#1 Shape the path in your environment.

#2 Choose healthy foods like fruits, vegetables, and whole foods that you enjoy.

#3 Remove 1-2 junk foods weekly and test out how you feel about your healthier choices.

Absorb what’s useful. Discard what’s not.

Then, add what’s uniquely your own.

As a side note, if you're like me and like vegan pizza or Thai food, this doesn't mean you can't ever eat this again.

I certainly don't plan on doing this.

However, as I've worked toward certain health or fitness goals (whether it's been healing from a chronic autoimmune disease or getting down to 5% body fat), I've used food for its main purpose:

To be thy medicine.

Food is a drug.

When you use it solely for pleasure, you'll get in trouble after a few years.

When you use it for fuel and medicine, you'll find that junk food won't tempt you as much.

You can still enjoy your favorite foods.

Just remember what the real purpose of food is.

Dieting eventually fails for 95% of people.

For the rare 5% who win with dieting, it's not sustainable either.

You can't live in a permanent caloric deficit.

But you can learn to create an environment that supports your health without relying on willpower.

This will defeat any dieting method out there.

Test this out for yourself.

Let me know how it goes.

3.) My 2 part evening routine

For the past 10 years, I've tested out dozens of routines.

Most of them have come and gone.

I've found that the simpler I keep my habits, the more sustainable they are.

Part of habit creation is creating a trigger to start the habit.

Most of us do this unconsciously with habits that don't help us.

For example, when you sit on the couch, you automatically grab the remote control and turn on the TV in the evening.

The trigger: seeing the remote.

The action: grabbing the remote and turning on the TV.

The result: you spend your evening watching TV and go to bed late.

There's no right or wrong here.

There are just habits that support your growth and those that destroy it.

If you feel bad about your habits, that's an internal sign for you to examine why you feel bad about it.

Habits in themselves just are.

We are the ones that project 'good and bad' onto them.

So, after years of testing and developing different evening routines, I've currently landed on my current routine.

It's simple... but highly effective if you want to see transformation in your life.

Here's my two-part evening routine:

#1 Spend a few minutes reading my life vision

What you focus on - expands.

When you focus on something emotionally, this expands even further.

Your mind is a beautiful thing and has the ability to shape your reality.

We are literally reality-creating beings.

Don't believe me.

Test this out for yourself.

Read your goals and vision every night for the next 90 days.

Allow yourself to see yourself already achieving your goals and living your best life.

The best athletes and CEOs do this every day.

Why wouldn't it work for you?

#2 Spend a few minutes in silence, coming back to my center

Time in silence is precious.

Silence is golden.

Observing your unconscious realm without creating time for silence and stillness is hard.

Or, as Jung would say:

'Until you make the unconscious conscious, you'll call it fate and leave it at that.'

Our life is ours.

No one else will take ownership of your life, body, or mind.

No one else can do this for you.

According to developmental psychology, only 2% of humans ever fully develop into mature adults.

Our society is not built or designed to create healthy, mature humans who are connected to their center.

It's the sad, unfortunate truth about this realm we live in.

It's not your fault, but it is your responsibility.

When you sit in silence, you can 'see through' what's beneath.

The waves of thoughts, feelings, and sensations are for us to explore.

When you do this consistently, you start to become a mental astronaut.

It can be scary.

I remember the first time I sat down in silent meditation.

It was the hardest exercise I had done in my life.

But it gets easier with practice.

This one practice has changed my life more than anything else.

Maybe it can do the same for you.

It's interesting what you can find when you dive into the ocean of the unconscious.

Take this two-part evening routine and test it out for yourself.

Track your results and observe what happens to your life when you do this for 90 days or more.

The results can be eye-opening.

1 Action Step

Create time for yourself this week. This could be a walk, a journaling session, or just sitting down.

What you do for yourself, you do for the whole universe.

One Quote To Finish Your Week Strong

We got an inch of snow last weekend.

Apparently, the South isn't made for snow.

Everyone got a bit crazy.

The snow was gone the next day.

Just another day in Greenville.

Whenever you're ready, there's 3 ways I can help you:

1. Connect with me on ​Facebook ​and ​Instagram ​and let's be friends.
2.  ​Join our free Facebook Group​. Get free trainings on how to get lean and strong with plants.
3. Want to drop body fat and build lean muscle in a fraction of the time with ease? ​Apply for Accelerator 1:1 coaching.​ 

References:

• https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36066009/