Episode 560: Low Effort Healthy Habits You Can Do With A Busy Schedule

The habits that actually optimize your health are not the hard ones. They are the small, low-effort ones you can do without rearranging your whole life. We get sold protocols and programs and things that can feel too complicated or demand time you do not have, so the simple hacks get passed over because it feels too obvious to matter. But the simplest and obvious healthy habits are obvious because they work. When you stack a few of them together, they compound into something that changes your life in the long run. In this episode of Habits and Hustle, I walk through the easy, low-effort habits I do every day that have optimized my life tenfold, even on the busiest days, from how I start my morning to how I trick myself into staying hydrated. Let's dive in! What's Discussed: (1:56) Why start every morning with 32 ounces of lemon water and how that can set up your whole day. (3:33) Why three short walks beat one long walk for your body. (5:19) Why working out first thing makes me sharper and more productive all day. (5:48) The impact of hot and cold therapy and how to do it without a sauna or cold plunge. (7:06) Why weight training is non-negotiable, especially after 40. (8:04) Why having healthy food on hand saves you from your own worst decisions. (8:42) The healthy habit nobody calls a habit: laughing every day. (9:51) The elastic band trick that forces you to actually drink enough water. Thank You to Our Sponsors! AirDoctor: Head to AirDoctorPro.com http://airdoctorpro.com/ and use promo code HUSTLE to get up to $300 OFF today! AirDoctor comes with a 30-day money back guarantee, plus a 3-year warranty (an $84 value) FREE! Kion: Visit getkion.com/habits http://getkion.com/habits for 20% OFF Momentous: Ready to try supplements that actually do what they claim? Head to livemomentous.com http://livemomentous.com/ and use code JEN for 35% OFF your first subscription. Therasage: Visit Therasage.com http://therasage.com/ and use code JEN to get 15% OFF your order. Your skin deserves this level of care. Magic Mind: Head over to magicmind.com/jen http://www.magicmind.com/jen and use code JEN at checkout. Prolon: Prolon is offering listeners 30% OFF sitewide plus a $40 bonus gift when you subscribe to their 5-Day Program! Just visit prolonlife.com/JENNIFERCOHEN https://prolonlife.com/JENNIFERCOHEN and use the code JENNIFERCOHEN to claim your discount and your bonus gift. Rho Nutrition: Go to RhoNutrition.com http://rhonutrition.com/ and try Rho's Liposomal Glutathione. Use code JEN20 for 20% OFF sitewide. Manna Vitality: Try it now by using the code Jennifer20 at http://mannavitality.com/mannavitality.com http://mannavitality.com Find more from Jen: Website: jennifercohen.com https://jennifercohen.com Instagram: @therealjencohen http://instagram.com/therealjencohen Books: jennifercohen.com/books https://jennifercohen.com/books Speaking: jennifercohen.com/speaking-engagements https://jennifercohen.com/speaking-engagements

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:01Speaker 00

  Hi guys, it's Tony Robbins. You're listening to Habits and Hustle. Crush it.

• 0:06Jen Cohen?

  Hello, everybody. Welcome to another solo episode of Habits and Hustle. Next up, I want to talk about healthy habits. I think that there are some habits that we can adopt that really don't take that much effort at all and doesn't really require really that much that can really optimize your life like tenfold. And I want to go over them super quickly because they're easy and they're important. So let's do it, okay?

• 0:36Speaker 02

  Amazing.

• 0:37Jen Cohen?

  Okay, this is super simple, super, super quick. The first thing that I do every morning is I drink basically a 32 ounce glass of room temperature water and I squeeze a lemon in it. Number one, I feel like it totally detoxes my body and it starts my day off right because I'm hydrating. I'm, I'm not someone who loves water. I actually hate water. So I have to be a little bit more premeditated of drinking it during the day so I actually drink enough. And so that way I'm then getting in a huge amount, like two or three glasses at a time, right in the morning. So I'm starting off my day right with that lemon and that's how I take my supplements.

• 1:20Jen Cohen?

  So I take all of my supplements with that big glass of water that is, like I said, 32 ounces, I think. I'm going to show you this. I'm going to show you the size.

• 1:28Speaker 02

  Oh, nice.

• 1:29Jen Cohen?

  This is it. This is the size of the glass. And so this is probably, like I said, was this, was this 32 ounces? No.

• 1:36Speaker 02

  Oh, it could be.

• 1:38Jen Cohen?

  I don't know.

• 1:38Speaker 02

  Yeah, because eight ounces is probably like where your lower thumb is right now. Definitely more than 16.

• 1:45Jen Cohen?

  Okay.

• 1:45Speaker 02

  It'd be 20.

• 1:46Jen Cohen?

  It's about 20, whatever. It's a big, it's a big.

• 1:48Speaker 02

  It's a big, it's a big glass.

• 1:49Jen Cohen?

  It's a big glass of water, okay? And I take my supplements. I take omega threes. I've been taking that forever. I take Tru Niagen, which is the NAD precursor. You take it and it basically helps your body produce NAD. I've been taking Tru Niagen for, again, like six years also. I take an antioxidant called NAC. That's really good. And what else do I take? And then I kind of, I sometimes take a probiotic.

• 2:14Speaker 02

  Do you do magnesium?

• 2:15Jen Cohen?

  Uh, sometimes at night, but that's not one of my go-tos. I don't like to take so many supplements. I just take, you know, I have, I take a certain amount with the water. And then I make sure that I walk multiple times a day versus just taking one long walk. I think it's really important for you to move your body multiple times a day versus, you know, let's say, moving for one big chunk of time and then being sedentary the rest of the time. It's good to kind of move around and like get your blood circulating multiple times. So I'd rather do three 10-minute walks than like one 30-minute walk.

• 2:50Speaker 02

  Can I say a game changer for me has been my Fitbit? I usually don't like to keep these on because I'm so bad at keeping watches on my hand. I always end up taking them off and then never put them on. But I've been pretty diligent about it the last few weeks. And it is, it's been great because you gamify your steps and I love doing that. And I do like doing that where I'll split everything up. So I'll just make sure I'm walking and it reminds me, it's like, stop being lazy and get up. It's been an hour.

• 3:13Jen Cohen?

  A hundred percent. I use where I like my Apple Watch. And I think that the one good thing, but a lot of these trackers, a lot of these trackers can be kind of like, they overcompensate or overestimate what you're doing.

• 3:23Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 3:24Jen Cohen?

  But what it does is it keeps you, it keeps you alert to the fact like, oh yeah, I should be getting up. Right? I am walking. I think of all the trackers, the one thing that is pretty good on all of them is the, the steps.

• 3:37Speaker 02

  The steps. Yeah. I never listen to the, the calories are, they overestimate calories so much on there. There's no way you're burning that, but I do love the step counter. Steps counting has been around for a long time. So I trust those.

• 3:48Jen Cohen?

  I use it for the step counter.

• 3:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 3:50Jen Cohen?

  And so steps are really important. I try to get, I, I like everybody and note that the number, by the way, 10,000 steps is very arbitrary. If you can get 8,000, that's great too. But I like to go for 10. If I can, if I see myself getting to 12 or whatever else, I'm like so excited.

• 4:05Speaker 02

  I got 17 the other day.

• 4:06Jen Cohen?

  That's amazing. That is amazing. I want to work, I like to work out first thing after, like, so I drink my water. I tend to make my kids their breakfasts and my, and their lunch. And then I want to work out right after that. And the reason why is I want to start my day off on the right foot. I want to be able to sweat. I think the sweat. What activates my brain to work better for the rest for the rest of the day. It gives me way more productivity and my cognitively, I'm way more on top of it. So that's another big one. The other thing I wanted to say, a couple of other ones. I do love the sauna. I love the sauna. If you don't have a sauna, you can get a sauna blanket. You can get all sorts of different ways you can, you can, well, you can, you can go use a sauna.

• 4:51Jen Cohen?

  There's tons of places now where you can use a sauna. What I love about it is, again, I love the, the whole idea of like sweating out your toxins. I think it's really good. I like doing the hot cold, you know? So I do have a cold plunge now, which I'm very happy about. For those of you who don't have a cold plunge, you can take a three minute cold shower. It's just, it's, it's very effective and it gives you that same type of thing, right? The cold and hot therapy is super, super good for recovery, inflammation, circulation. The cold is great for all, so I think it's called like adip, uh, the brown fat that you have in your body. It's great. Some other ones, easy ones that you can do is I fall asleep to meditation music.

• 5:35Jen Cohen?

  I think I'm not a meditator, as most of you probably know, because I talk about that. But something that kind of calms me and soothes, soothes me is meditation music. And falling asleep in that way is really a big one.

• 5:47Speaker 02

  Meditation music, do you ever fall asleep to like spa music? Is that the same thing?

• 5:50Jen Cohen?

  Uh, similar.

• 5:51Speaker 02

  Similar?

• 5:52Jen Cohen?

  Yeah, similar for sure.

• 5:53Speaker 02

  I love spa music.

• 5:54Jen Cohen?

  I do too. I weight train at least four times a week. Super important, especially as you get older. The, the best way to increase muscle mass on your body, ladies, please listen to this, is to resistant train, very, very, very important. And you are not going to get bulky, trust me.

• 6:15Speaker 02

  I've been trying for five years.

• 6:18Jen Cohen?

  It's, it's exactly.

• 6:19Speaker 02

  I'm nowhere near bulk. It's so annoying.

• 6:22Jen Cohen?

  It's very, very difficult. And also it's a great way to increase your testosterone in your body, right? The most natural, effective way to do it is, is to weight train. So especially. After the age of forty, I cannot tell people how how important this is to be weight training. A minimum of three times a week for twenty minutes at a time. You don't have to be doing hardcore, hard, hard weights, but get into the practice of resistant training. There is no other fitness modality that will give you the same bang for your buck. I promise you. A couple of other ones that are really important that kind of keep me on point is prepping and having healthy food options available to you.

• 7:04Jen Cohen?

  Or else that will be one of your biggest demise is because when you're hungry and you're starving and there's nothing around, you'll you'll tend to grab whatever is available, chips, chocolate, whatever. So having having some healthy options with you or around you is a game changer. Some of these are pretty obvious, but sometimes sometimes the most obvious things need to be repeated. I'm trying to, oh, another thing I love is, and I call this a healthy habit, is listening to comedy. Like watching some stand up. I love that because laughing is so important for your health.

• 7:41Speaker 02

  That's great.

• 7:41Jen Cohen?

  And for your happiness. And it like it like it increases my serotonin, it like gets my endorphin, I love it. It like really makes me happy. That's a great dopamine hit that doesn't require you being on, you know, uh, social media. I mean, you can, I guess, look at it on social media, but the whole concept is like laughing. It like it automatically, who doesn't like to laugh? It's so good for your overall health. So I try to listen to comedy daily.

• 8:09Speaker 02

  If the comedy is good enough too, it'll be an ab workout if you're laughing that hard.

• 8:12Jen Cohen?

  That's right, exactly, exactly. And and these are things that are like simple to, a lot of these things are very simple ways to kind of just be overall more healthy and have actually adopt some self-care into that, right? Like just things like that. So walking multiple times a day, drinking a glass of water first thing in the morning. And if you're not someone who is a water drinker, hydration is so important. So then plan it out, you know, like another trick I used to do until I had these these other ways I would drink my water was I'd put A bunch of elastic bands around my my cup or my bottle. And at at the end of the day, all those elastic bands had to be taken off. And if they weren't, that would tell me, like, it it would trigger my brain. Okay.

• 8:57Jen Cohen?

  I take off the elastic band, I gotta drink another glass of water. And so I wasn't allowed to go to sleep until all the elastic, all ten elastic bands were off because hydration is so important. People mistake hunger when they're actually thirsty and they end up eating more because of that. It's great for, also great for your skin, for your bones. It's great for everything. So that's another thing.

• 9:19Speaker 02

  Would you put the elastic bands on in different spots so you'd have to drink to that level? Or they were just all on there and it would just remind you, like you had to just keep taking like a big few sips?

• 9:27Jen Cohen?

  It would, it would, it would remind me that, not just a few tips, because I do, I don't do it that way. I did it for like, okay. Once I take off a band, I had to drink eight ounces of water.

• 9:36Speaker 02

  Oh, got it.

• 9:36Jen Cohen?

  Because that way, that's how I'm gonna get my daily, my, my amount, my quantity in, plus, plus more.

• 9:43Speaker 02

  That's pretty good.

• 9:44Jen Cohen?

  Each band represented an eight ounce glass of water that I would just like drink up.

• 9:49Speaker 02

  That's very smart. I like that.

• 9:51Jen Cohen?

  And I just actually stopped doing that maybe a couple of years ago because I've put things in place. Like, of course, I drink my water in the morning and then when I work out, I drink a one point five liter bottle. So I know I'm getting that in. And then afterwards, like, so I, I, I have all of these benchmarks and places in my life where then it, it eliminates my. It it eliminates the ability for me to kind of fail.

• 10:16Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 10:17Jen Cohen?

  Really. And so basically, that was basically the weight training, the lemon in the water, the elastic bands. If you're not hydrating enough, that's a great one. Falling asleep to meditation music, listening to comedy for ten minutes a day to make you laugh. Walking multiple times a day, the weight training, super important, especially if you're over forty. Um, is there anything else that you wanna add? Oh, the sauna, sweating first thing in the morning to be really more productive during the day. Doing the hot cold therapy. So you can go into a sauna and then use a cold shower. Or you can go to a gym and use their sauna, or you can get a sauna blanket. That also really is effective. But I love the hot and cool therapies. Really good.

• 10:57Speaker 02

  I do as well. I would say my one for water is buying a reusable water bottle. It's been a game changer for me because there's so many times when you're out and you're thirsty and all you want is some water. And that would have been a great opportunity for you to get some water in and hydrate yourself. But you're out and you just don't really want to go buy a bottle. Or maybe it's just inconvenient for you. So I love having a water bottle always on hand. And I think a reusable one is just better. Once you get a reusable water bottle, you start tasting the plastic of plastic water bottles. And you're just like, ugh, disgusting. And it starts hitting you in a way that, I mean, I really don't like drinking out of plastic water bottles anymore. I can really feel it. So yeah, I'd buy a reusable one. Always have it on you.

• 11:35Jen Cohen?

  Oh, the one I just forgot also, by the way, was having healthy options around you. So you're not grabbing like junk around you. So, you know, take a few minutes and either meal prep a little bit. So you have like healthy proteins around you or you're taking them with you as a snack. It could be, I'm not a big, to be honest with you, I'm very conscientious of what kind of nuts I eat. Because people tend to overeat nuts.

• 11:58Speaker 02

  Almonds will make you break out, you know.

• 11:59Jen Cohen?

  Only to some people, not most, like you may have a problem with almonds.

• 12:02Speaker 02

  No, almonds in general are really a big acne causer. It's just not discussed very much, but they can.

• 12:07Jen Cohen?

  Okay, I'm talking more, but maybe you're probably right. I don't, I don't know about that. But I would say that what I think what happens is people don't know what a real portion is of nuts. And they take a handful and a handful, people say that take a handful of nuts when you're hungry, is usually four or five portions, which is in your whole daily intake of your fats and your calories. So what a real portion of nuts are is usually like six nuts, which is not at all filling. I mean, who eats six nuts unless you're like so disciplined, which I mean, that's really hard to do. So I love eating an apple a day. That's what I do. I'm a big apple person. Because apples are super fiber filled and satiating. I'll eat like two apples a day just because it's so, it gives you so much fiber.

• 12:52Jen Cohen?

  And there's a lot of water, the water content's really high. So I try to eat a lot of foods that have a high water content for the same reason.

• 13:00Speaker 02

  Two apples, you must never go to the doctor.

• 13:04Speaker 02

  Do you like carrots? I love carrots are one of my favorite go to snacks. I'll just chop them up at the beginning of the week. I don't like baby carrots. I think they have too much water in them.

• 13:13Jen Cohen?

  I don't like baby carrots either.

• 13:14Speaker 02

  Regular carrots and I will peel and slice them and have them in like a container for the whole week. I can finish like a bunch of carrots in one sitting. I love carrots.

• 13:22Jen Cohen?

  I love carrots too. I love jicama. Jicama is my favorite snack too.

• 13:26Speaker 02

  Jicama is a really good one too.

• 13:27Jen Cohen?

  Jicama is amazing. I also love cucumbers, but jicama is like my favorite.

• 13:30Speaker 02

  Do you, kohlrabi? You'd like kohlrabi. Kohlrabi is delicious.

• 13:33Jen Cohen?

  I've never had that.

• 13:34Speaker 02

  You slice it really thin. You put like a little olive oil and salt and pepper. It's like such a good snack.

• 13:38Jen Cohen?

  I never knew that one. I also love fennel.

• 13:40Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah, I have a thing with fennel. I'm not crazy about it.

• 13:44Jen Cohen?

  I also like radishes.

• 13:45Speaker 02

  But my family loves fennel.

• 13:45Jen Cohen?

  Really?

• 13:46Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 13:46Jen Cohen?

  I also love radishes. But this is what I'm saying. These are ways you can, you can save yourself a ton of calories and a ton of like heartache, right? Because you may not want to, you may be like, you may like just kind of like screw up your entire nutrition or your health by just like taking, basically snacking on the wrong food, not even intentionally, just because there was nothing else around, right? So be prepared, be prepared. Yeah, that's it.

• 14:13Speaker 02

  That was great. Thanks. Join the Facebook group. Follow Jen everywhere.

• 14:18Jen Cohen?

  Let me know, guys, also, if there is a hack, like a healthy hack, healthy habit, that's really helped, you know, be a game changer for you and helped you optimize your overall health. Let me know. Thanks.