Yes!! I resonate with this. I am a tracker and did WHOOP for awhile and eventually broke up with it. I also used to do whatever to get 10K per day but even though I still wear my Garmin and see it, I was able to let that go! I am learning that I can still track but to be less myopic. Instead, I look back on my week and think: did I move my body and spend time outdoors, do I feel rested, did I spend time with friends and my husband and doing things how I wanted to do and having fun experiences, did I honor my body. How you spend your days is how you spend your life and I have come to a point, I don't want to spend my life with my head down in details trying to live longer. I want to take care of myself and live my life! Then, no matter what age I die, I can hopefully look back and think "well done".
Yes for sure....it really helps me to remember to pull back my view and focus on how I want to spend my life and it becomes very very clear it's not being caught up in too much tracking and measuring on physical health measures and tracking on emotional, spiritual and mental health measures! We can hold space for each other on this journey!
As someone also in eating disorder recovery, I can relate to the alcohol mention! I never had an issue with it but if I tell myself I can’t have it at all, it feels like a form of restriction. I don’t even drink weekly at this point, maybe a couple of times per month, but if I’m going out to eat or hanging out with friends and family and want a drink, I’ll have one!
I’ve always been curious about the wearables like Whoop and Oura but I know myself well enough to know it would become obsessive for me. I already have issues poring over the sleep and RHR data from my watch, so having more data would not be a healthy thing for me!
Glad someone can relate around alcohol! And yeah, I think the key is really knowing yourself when it comes to data. I wish I could not let it affect me, but just accepting I’m not that person!
I could have written this exact thing regarding alcohol and tracking and my ED! Even Strava is a slippery slope... but I try to have fun with that one :)
What you are describing sounds like surrender - surrender to the fine art of living! When did everything we have done naturally for a millennia become so hard? Why can’t we sleep without monitoring every aspect of it? Why does it take so much science to just live our lives? Everything is Huberman optimized these days. What about - just living? We only have this one life - why are we making it so difficult? (Spoken by someone who has realized the my Huberman optimization obsessions - measure everything - optimize and time everything - is not leading me towards my true goals).
Hard agree on no heart rate tracking! Mine is perhaps slightly higher than "normal" for someone who runs as much as I do, but it's such a range, and wrist watches aren't designed to be perfect anyway. I joke to people, "HAVE YOU MET ME I AM NOT A LOW ENERGY PERSON MY HEART RATE IS JUST HIGH CAUSE I'M EXCITED OK??" But if I listened to conventional running wisdom, all my runs would be "too high" in HR and I'd have to walk nearly everything. I'm not doing that. I go by feel, I can tell this is an easy pace for me based on the weather, the terrain, the previous day etc. I don't need a little HR indicator to tell me what to do ; )
Once again, you’ve touched on something many of us see and feel.
I’m fascinated by quantified self and, at times, will wear 3 trackers - a Suunto Race S, an Apple Watch and a whoop. They all do different things and do them to different degrees. This is partly professional interest for me and partly fitness, optimizing, longevity behavior.
But, increasingly, I find myself wearing an old fashioned watch that just tells time and looks good. I like those days.
Am I addicted to the data? I don’t think so, but am I totally ready to pull the plug on the tracking? No. And, do I wonder why or why not? All the time. I have seemingly found my peace with it, but I also won’t look at any readiness or recovery scores before a race or a big workout, important meeting, etc. I trust how I feel.
seems like you’ve found a really good balance - I’ve always wanted to be the person who could find data interesting, but then not attach meaning to it. Maybe one day!
This is great! I know it's particularly well-written, but it also hit me at a time when I've done exactly the same things: dumped all the tracking devices and took it all in as "training". Now I know that X results in Y and A creates B. Sleeping early is great but so is diversion. And oh, shut down the podcasts and the newsletters once in a while. That pesky sun is still due to come up tomorrow. Get the stress down, stop counting, and live! Moderate but say yes and enjoy. You really nailed it. Bravo!
Your grandma sounds like she lived authentically and that she was a wonderful person in your life. Thank you for sharing her memory. I agree 100% with all of the above too. Trust mama nature and your body to let you know how your body is doing, and get on with living : )
Re alcohol— I am on a similar wavelength as you. I do not drink at home and we do not keep alcohol at home. And I don’t miss it there. But I do let myself have a beer or even two when out to dinner on special occasions. (Beer, not wine or hard alcohol, because those mess with my brain and sleep too much.) I enjoy the sociability and eating out more with a pint, and enjoying that occasional beer is my way of moderation.
I am so with you on this, Amelia. I have a very Type A personality that lends itself to extremes and I lasted less than a year with my Oura ring. It started being an interesting and somewhat helpful tool, particularly for understanding my sleep. By the time I stopped wearing it, it was driving massive anxiety and over-thinking and had lulled me into believing I could no longer rely on my body's communication with me on my "readiness", recovery, or sleep quality. I think with so much of this data, we are trying our hardest to be "omniscient"... but we're not "omnipotent" and therefore can never fully control, understand, or address the non-optimal data we're seeing. That in turn drives anxiety and a frantic attempt to control the mysterious and often uncontrollable. The tool becomes the tyrant. Except, apparently, for those blessed souls like your ex who can easily shrug off the data. Cheers to giving the optimization a rest and pursuing peace as a limited human being instead.
I loved this post so much !! I’m 63 and I only want to know so much about my health stats , we all know the right things we need to be doing to honor and care for our body mind and soul! I’m working on how to reduce stress and anxiety and choices that help with that will always come first . I could go on and on about the obsession especially as people age with doctors and medicine and living longer - my goal …feel good in my body today and live fully until the end of my life if I can - I don’t want to focus on all the other markers that don’t really matter in the end anyway when diet and exercise can account for so much positive outcomes for health and wellness , and after spending the day in the ER with a friend yesterday there’s really only so much a dr can do for you medically (luckily her dizziness issue was crystals in her ear not a heart attack or stroke) anyway - thanks again for sharing your wisdom humor and light with the world xo
Yes!! I resonate with this. I am a tracker and did WHOOP for awhile and eventually broke up with it. I also used to do whatever to get 10K per day but even though I still wear my Garmin and see it, I was able to let that go! I am learning that I can still track but to be less myopic. Instead, I look back on my week and think: did I move my body and spend time outdoors, do I feel rested, did I spend time with friends and my husband and doing things how I wanted to do and having fun experiences, did I honor my body. How you spend your days is how you spend your life and I have come to a point, I don't want to spend my life with my head down in details trying to live longer. I want to take care of myself and live my life! Then, no matter what age I die, I can hopefully look back and think "well done".
I love this reframe! Appreciate you sharing - going to steal that
Yes for sure....it really helps me to remember to pull back my view and focus on how I want to spend my life and it becomes very very clear it's not being caught up in too much tracking and measuring on physical health measures and tracking on emotional, spiritual and mental health measures! We can hold space for each other on this journey!
As someone also in eating disorder recovery, I can relate to the alcohol mention! I never had an issue with it but if I tell myself I can’t have it at all, it feels like a form of restriction. I don’t even drink weekly at this point, maybe a couple of times per month, but if I’m going out to eat or hanging out with friends and family and want a drink, I’ll have one!
I’ve always been curious about the wearables like Whoop and Oura but I know myself well enough to know it would become obsessive for me. I already have issues poring over the sleep and RHR data from my watch, so having more data would not be a healthy thing for me!
Glad someone can relate around alcohol! And yeah, I think the key is really knowing yourself when it comes to data. I wish I could not let it affect me, but just accepting I’m not that person!
I could have written this exact thing regarding alcohol and tracking and my ED! Even Strava is a slippery slope... but I try to have fun with that one :)
What you are describing sounds like surrender - surrender to the fine art of living! When did everything we have done naturally for a millennia become so hard? Why can’t we sleep without monitoring every aspect of it? Why does it take so much science to just live our lives? Everything is Huberman optimized these days. What about - just living? We only have this one life - why are we making it so difficult? (Spoken by someone who has realized the my Huberman optimization obsessions - measure everything - optimize and time everything - is not leading me towards my true goals).
Yup, you nailed it! Everything feels so overly complicated these days
Hard agree on no heart rate tracking! Mine is perhaps slightly higher than "normal" for someone who runs as much as I do, but it's such a range, and wrist watches aren't designed to be perfect anyway. I joke to people, "HAVE YOU MET ME I AM NOT A LOW ENERGY PERSON MY HEART RATE IS JUST HIGH CAUSE I'M EXCITED OK??" But if I listened to conventional running wisdom, all my runs would be "too high" in HR and I'd have to walk nearly everything. I'm not doing that. I go by feel, I can tell this is an easy pace for me based on the weather, the terrain, the previous day etc. I don't need a little HR indicator to tell me what to do ; )
🎯🎯🎯
Once again, you’ve touched on something many of us see and feel.
I’m fascinated by quantified self and, at times, will wear 3 trackers - a Suunto Race S, an Apple Watch and a whoop. They all do different things and do them to different degrees. This is partly professional interest for me and partly fitness, optimizing, longevity behavior.
But, increasingly, I find myself wearing an old fashioned watch that just tells time and looks good. I like those days.
Am I addicted to the data? I don’t think so, but am I totally ready to pull the plug on the tracking? No. And, do I wonder why or why not? All the time. I have seemingly found my peace with it, but I also won’t look at any readiness or recovery scores before a race or a big workout, important meeting, etc. I trust how I feel.
seems like you’ve found a really good balance - I’ve always wanted to be the person who could find data interesting, but then not attach meaning to it. Maybe one day!
This is great! I know it's particularly well-written, but it also hit me at a time when I've done exactly the same things: dumped all the tracking devices and took it all in as "training". Now I know that X results in Y and A creates B. Sleeping early is great but so is diversion. And oh, shut down the podcasts and the newsletters once in a while. That pesky sun is still due to come up tomorrow. Get the stress down, stop counting, and live! Moderate but say yes and enjoy. You really nailed it. Bravo!
Thank you!
There's one thing you don't do in moderation...over think.
Hang in there!
Hahahha…you got me 😬
Your grandma sounds like she lived authentically and that she was a wonderful person in your life. Thank you for sharing her memory. I agree 100% with all of the above too. Trust mama nature and your body to let you know how your body is doing, and get on with living : )
100%, love it.
Relate to my OCD turning a recovery tool into a new torture device <3
all too common...
Applause to this. Also, your grandma was my favorite character in Grumpier Old Men: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/N1z9lIf_5N8
hahahahahaha amazing. She’d be proud.
Re alcohol— I am on a similar wavelength as you. I do not drink at home and we do not keep alcohol at home. And I don’t miss it there. But I do let myself have a beer or even two when out to dinner on special occasions. (Beer, not wine or hard alcohol, because those mess with my brain and sleep too much.) I enjoy the sociability and eating out more with a pint, and enjoying that occasional beer is my way of moderation.
totally! It’s been fascinating to me to see the evolution of the ultrarunning community’s relationship with alcohol, and I imagine you see it as well!
💯
I am so with you on this, Amelia. I have a very Type A personality that lends itself to extremes and I lasted less than a year with my Oura ring. It started being an interesting and somewhat helpful tool, particularly for understanding my sleep. By the time I stopped wearing it, it was driving massive anxiety and over-thinking and had lulled me into believing I could no longer rely on my body's communication with me on my "readiness", recovery, or sleep quality. I think with so much of this data, we are trying our hardest to be "omniscient"... but we're not "omnipotent" and therefore can never fully control, understand, or address the non-optimal data we're seeing. That in turn drives anxiety and a frantic attempt to control the mysterious and often uncontrollable. The tool becomes the tyrant. Except, apparently, for those blessed souls like your ex who can easily shrug off the data. Cheers to giving the optimization a rest and pursuing peace as a limited human being instead.
absolutely - I love your distinction around not being able to control or understand or address the data. I think that’s key
I loved this post so much !! I’m 63 and I only want to know so much about my health stats , we all know the right things we need to be doing to honor and care for our body mind and soul! I’m working on how to reduce stress and anxiety and choices that help with that will always come first . I could go on and on about the obsession especially as people age with doctors and medicine and living longer - my goal …feel good in my body today and live fully until the end of my life if I can - I don’t want to focus on all the other markers that don’t really matter in the end anyway when diet and exercise can account for so much positive outcomes for health and wellness , and after spending the day in the ER with a friend yesterday there’s really only so much a dr can do for you medically (luckily her dizziness issue was crystals in her ear not a heart attack or stroke) anyway - thanks again for sharing your wisdom humor and light with the world xo
definitely a balance! Thank you for reading
Just be.
I liked this post very much.