Quotes worth reading

True recovery requires probing the depths of what shaped you, how you adapted to it, and how those adaptations are now serving you (or not, as in my case).

OUTLIVE— Peter Attia with Bill GiffordNon-Fiction

In the 1920s, a German physiologist named Otto Warburg discovered that cancer cells had a strangely gluttonous appetite for glucose, devouring it at up to forty times the rate of healthy tissues.

OUTLIVE— Peter Attia with Bill GiffordNon-Fiction

Absorb what is useful, discard what is useless, and add what is specifically your own.

OUTLIVE— Peter Attia with Bill GiffordNon-Fiction

People are often tired of being hammered with their own name. The slick salesman trying to drive them to ‘Yes’ will hit them with it over and over. Instead, take a different tack and use your own name.

NEVER SPLIT THE DIFFERENCE— Chris Voss with Tahl RazSelf-Help / Business

The modern food industry relies on stretching our Paleolithic instincts beyond their evolutionary purpose.

ATOMIC HABITS— James ClearSelf-Help / Business

No matter how you measure your improvement, habit tracking offers a simple way to make your habits more satisfying. Each measurement provides a little bit of evidence that you’re moving in the right direction and a brief moment of immediate pleasure for a job well done.

ATOMIC HABITS— James ClearSelf-Help / Business

One fundamental rule—if you’re asked how you feel, you cheerfully answer fine, even if you can barely stand on your feet.

A CITY ON MARS— Kelly Weinersmith and Zach WeinersmithNon-Fiction

Getting to Mars may require beautiful science and elegant engineering, but paying the rent? Only reality TV can do that.

A CITY ON MARS— Kelly Weinersmith and Zach WeinersmithNon-Fiction

Once I got a little older, knowing how to fall safely, and knowing I knew how to fall safely, opened up a lot of possibilities—for falling for fun!

100 RULES FOR LIVING TO 100— Dick Van Dyke with Tal McTheniaNon-Fiction

Almost always, though, poor metabolic health goes along with being undermuscled, which speaks to the interplay between nutrition and exercise.

OUTLIVE— Peter Attia with Bill GiffordNon-Fiction

If you can grip strongly, you can open a jar with ease. If you can pull, you can carry groceries and lift heavy objects. If you can do a hip-hinge correctly, you can get up out of a chair with no problem. You’re setting yourself up to age well.

OUTLIVE— Peter Attia with Bill GiffordNon-Fiction

We pick up habits from the people around us. We copy the way our parents handle arguments, the way our peers flirt with one another, the way our coworkers get results.

ATOMIC HABITS— James ClearSelf-Help / Business

For example, doctors have traditionally relied on two tests to gauge their patients’ metabolic health: a fasting glucose test, typically given once a year; or the HbA1c test we mentioned earlier, which gives us an estimate of their average blood glucose over the last 90 days. But those tests are of limited use because they are static and backward-looking.

OUTLIVE— Peter Attia with Bill GiffordNon-Fiction

As a general rule, the closer we are to someone, the more likely we are to imitate some of their habits.

ATOMIC HABITS— James ClearSelf-Help / Business

The human body has about eleven million sensory receptors. Approximately ten million of those are dedicated to sight. Some experts estimate that half of the brain’s resources are used on vision.

ATOMIC HABITS— James ClearSelf-Help / Business

This is extraordinary—far better than the short-term, five-year time horizon at which we typically declare victory in conventional cancer treatment.

OUTLIVE— Peter Attia with Bill GiffordNon-Fiction

A more significant issue with DR is that everyone’s metabolism is different. Some people will lose tremendous amounts of weight and improve their metabolic markers on a low-carbohydrate or ketogenic diet, while others will actually gain weight and see their lipid markers go haywire—on the exact same diet.

OUTLIVE— Peter Attia with Bill GiffordNon-Fiction

When implementation happens by committee, the support of that committee is key. You always have to identify and unearth their motivations, even if you haven’t yet identified each individual on that committee.

NEVER SPLIT THE DIFFERENCE— Chris Voss with Tahl RazSelf-Help / Business

Almost everything we do in fitness, and in our daily lives, goes through our hands. If our feet are our contact with the ground, absorbing force, our hands are how we transmit force.

OUTLIVE— Peter Attia with Bill GiffordNon-Fiction

This is the one emotional health “risk factor” that does seem to grow worse with increasing age.

OUTLIVE— Peter Attia with Bill GiffordNon-Fiction

If we do plan to leave this place, better to do so as an adult. Let’s spend the awkward years learning and then strike out for new vistas.

A CITY ON MARS— Kelly Weinersmith and Zach WeinersmithNon-Fiction

Cancer had been on my mind since before I had even applied to medical school.

OUTLIVE— Peter Attia with Bill GiffordNon-Fiction

Toothpaste had a similar trajectory. Manufacturers enjoyed great success when they added flavors like spearmint, peppermint, and cinnamon to their products.

ATOMIC HABITS— James ClearSelf-Help / Business

If you can manage to stick with this strategy, each context will become associated with a particular habit and mode of thought. Habits thrive under predictable circumstances like these.

ATOMIC HABITS— James ClearSelf-Help / Business