7 First Things I'd Do If I Had to Start My Health Journey Over

Most people fail at health not because they lack willpower — they start in the wrong order. In this episode, Dr. Josh Axe walks through the exact 7-step sequence he would follow if he had to rebuild his health from zero: the things that make the biggest difference fastest, layered so each one makes the next easier. **In this episode:** - Why 88% of Americans are metabolically unhealthy — and the one blood marker most doctors skip that predicts disease a decade early - The sleep fix that beats duration: why a consistent wake time (not more hours) cuts risk of death by up to 48% - The ancient after-meal walk that matched a full 45-minute workout for 24-hour blood sugar control - Why resistance training twice a week is the highest-return investment if you're over 40 — and why body weight and bands count - The "crowd out, don't cut out" food strategy that helped Josh's patients reverse autoimmune disease and hypothyroidism without giving up the meals they loved - Why guarding your peace isn't soft advice — church attendance alone was linked to a 33% lower risk of death over 16 years, and the physiology behind it is real Uncover what’s really going on in your body with advanced biomarker testing for hormones, thyroid, and metabolism— plus a 1-hour consultation with a Senior Health Advisor! → http://mybloodwork.com *Disclaimer: The bloodwork our team runs at mybloodwork.com covers a handful of the biomarkers listed in the guide above — including critical thyroid and metabolic markers — plus a 1-hour consultation with a Senior Health Advisor, but does NOT cover all 25. You will want to consult your primary or functional doctor for the entire list. Thank you to our sponsors! Sunlighten Sauna: https://get.sunlighten.com/axepodcast Manukora Manuka Honey: https://manukora.com/axe Watch The Dr. Josh Axe Show every Monday & Thursday on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@drjoshaxe?sub_confirmation=1 🎧 Early Access! Our listeners enjoy every episode before anyone else! Tune in below and join our exclusive group of listeners → Spotify: https://bit.ly/DrJoshAxeSpotify Apple Podcast: https://apple.co/3JDvWcS Pre-order my NEW BOOK, Heal Your Cells → healyourcellsbook.com Watch my free training on how to naturally balance your blood sugar and reverse your symptoms → http://DrAxeDiabetesClass.com Discover practical steps you can take today to start healing your thyroid naturally → http://DrAxeThyroidClass.com If you’re ready to start feeling like yourself again and balance your hormones, take my free class → http://DrAxeHormoneClass.com CONNECT WITH DR. JOSH AXE Instagram → https://www.instagram.com/drjoshaxe/ Facebook → https://www.facebook.com/DrJoshAxe/ TikTok → https://www.tiktok.com/@thedrjoshaxeshow/ X → https://x.com/drjoshaxe/ LinkedIn → https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshaxe Website → http://thehealthinstitute.com Sign up for my newsletter → https://bit.ly/4oE9Jf3 Ask Dr. Axe → http://speakpipe.com/drjoshaxe 0:00 Introduction — why health is a sequencing problem 4:28 The 88% statistic — what metabolically healthy actually means 5:30 The 5 ordinary habits linked to 12–14 extra years of life 9:04 Step 1 — Know your numbers (the blood markers that matter most) 11:30 Step 2 — Anchor your wake-up time first 13:20 Step 3 — Walk after your meals 16:00 Step 4 — Lift twice a week (especially if you're over 40) 21:07 Step 5 — Crowd out, don't cut out 24:30 Step 6 — Fix your gut with fermented foods and fiber 28:00 Step 7 — Guard your peace and build joy 30:25 Weekly action plan + closing encouragement 30:48 Free resource: Top 25 Blood Markers PDF DISCLAIMER This content is strictly the opinion of Dr. Josh Axe and is for informational and educational purposes only. It is not intended to provide medical advice or to take the place of medical advice or treatment from a personal physician. All viewers of this content are advised to consult their doctors or qualified health professionals regarding specific

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

• 0:00Josh Axe?

  If you've tried to get healthy before, maybe more than once, and it didn't stick, today I want to walk you through exactly what I would do if I were starting over. And so imagine you lost it all, every habit, every result, everything that's been in your path, and you were starting over with your health and rebuilding a new foundation. Today, I'm going to walk you through the things that matter the most when it comes to resetting your health and transforming. And if you're a person saying to yourself, I don't want to just see small improvements. I want to see a complete transformation in my body physically. I want to look younger. I want to feel younger. I want to do the things health-wise that make the biggest difference and where I will see results the fastest.

• 0:43Josh Axe?

  Well, today on the show, I'm going to walk you through how to do just that. Welcome to the Dr. Axe Show.

• 1:01Josh Axe?

  So in this episode, I'm going to walk you through these seven things that I would do if I had to start my health journey all over. These are the things that make the biggest difference the fastest. That's the whole episode. The seven things I do first if I had to rebuild my health from zero and in the exact order I do them. So let me start with an idea that sort of reframes everything. And here's what I've discovered. For many people, health is not simply a motivation problem. It's a sequencing problem. Most people fail because they start with the hardest, flashiest thing, right? The extreme diet, the 5:00 AM boot camp, the intermittent fasting, or the hardcore cleanse, and then it collapses and they blame themselves.

• 1:45Josh Axe?

  When you do the right things in the right order, each one makes the next one even easier. And that's the entire episode in one sentence. So let's start here. Listen to this fact. 12% of American adults are metabolically healthy. And this is most closely tied to insulin resistance. I mean, when you look at the statistics, and I want you to think about that. 88% of people in America today are not metabolically healthy. That means their metabolism is off, their hormones are off, especially insulin, including cortisol, they're aging more quickly, they don't feel well. All of those things are happening to nearly 90% of Americans today. And there was a study done on this.

• 2:28Josh Axe?

  Researchers checked nearly 9,000 Americans on five basic metabolic markers, okay, blood markers. Only about 1 in 8 cleared healthy marks on all of them. So if your health has drifted, you're not the exception. You're the rule. And the rule can be broken in this case. Okay, so here is the math of ordinary habits. Five ordinary habits were linked to 12 to 14 extra years of life and a 74% lower risk of dying during the study. And so the five things were this that mattered most. Eating real food. Now, notice I didn't say you had to be paleo or keto or carnivore, vegan, no. So again, so here's the five.

• 3:12Josh Axe?

  First one is the people ate real food, not packaged food, real food, like apples and steaks. They moved regularly. Again, there wasn't any specific type of exercise. It wasn't CrossFitter, marathon running. It was just they moved. They had a healthy weight. They didn't smoke cigarettes. And if they drank alcohol, it was in moderation. So there was no biohacking, there was no supplements or anything like that. Okay, so here's what the basics are worth. And let's look at this list one more time. Again, there is nothing that required a gym membership or a prescription or taking the newest FAD supplement. It was all about building a healthy foundation.

• 3:55Josh Axe?

  Now, before I dive into the seven here, do me a big favor, subscribe to the episode. If you're getting value already, hit subscribe. It's free. It takes two seconds. It is the single biggest thing that helps this show reach the people who need it. And then you don't miss a thing. Okay, so now let's dive into number one. So number one, know your numbers first. Now, here's why it's first. You cannot fix what you don't measure and you will not stay motivated by how you feel. Feelings drift. Numbers move. Watching your labs improve is the most underrated motivation tool in all of health. And I can tell you from taking care of tens of thousands of patients, the thing that

• 4:36Josh Axe?

  seems to move people the most is when you see the actual number, right? If you see that your magnesium levels are half of what they should be, and it's connected to the symptoms of why you're getting migraine headaches or fatigue, well, you know, okay, that number has to get better. I need to take action. There's a level of proof there. And this is why, one of the things I've found over the last five years is I have almost all of my patients get some sort of blood work today. Now, listen, you don't have to get blood work. You could just look at your symptoms and then maybe put a ranking next to them. You could, you know, you could get Chinese medicine tongue diagnosis, or you could have your body fat measured, right? And that doesn't necessarily take blood work.

• 5:18Josh Axe?

  But, but starting off with markers and knowing exactly where you are and where you're deficient is so incredibly helpful. Most disease is silent for years before it has symptoms. That's another problem. And so if you're just waiting until you have symptoms, oftentimes there's an issue. I can tell you, I've had so many people, including loved ones and other people I knew who just waited and waited and waited. They never tested, they never, in fact, sometimes they just said, I'm never going to go to a doctor, which I don't think is the right thing either. Did you know that nearly 50% of people have heart attacks? That, that is their first symptom and many of them will die from that. So you never want to wait until you have symptoms before you know where you're at. Now, here are some of the most important markers, according to the studies.

• 6:02Josh Axe?

  Fasting glucose and fasting insulin. So it's in hemoglobin A1C. So it's looking at blood sugar, incredibly important. Triglycerides and HDL cholesterol or ApoB, right? Looking at those numbers. Looking at high sensitivity C-reactive protein. This is looking at how much inflammation are in your cells and body. Vitamin D, very high up there also, but also magnesium and zinc and iron, critically important. Vitamin B12. And have them take your blood pressure and look at your body fat. If you have just those markers alone, you can tell so much about where you're at in terms of your health. And fasting insulin is the one that most doctors skip and the one I would fight for.

• 6:46Josh Axe?

  It often rises 10 years before your other blood sugar markers do. And so if your blood sugar is off, we know insulin's high, your body is aging more quickly, and numerous diseases are linked to imbalanced blood sugar. Cancer, diabetes, of course, heart disease, autoimmune disease, almost every condition you can think of. Okay, here's the second thing I would fix. So number one, get a baseline of where you're at with your health. The biggest myth about inflammation and chronic symptoms is that they're all separate issues. In reality, your symptoms behave more like a chain of falling dominos. When one goes down, it triggers several more. And before you know it, everything feels off.

• 7:27Josh Axe?

  This new test completely changes things and I know exactly what to look for. I'm currently offering a simple at-home blood test that actually tests for the right things. Targeted biomarkers that reveal the very first dominoes impacting your hormones, inflammation, your thyroid, and your metabolism. Plus a full hour with one of my senior health advisors to review your results and show you exactly how the Health Institute can help you stop the chain reaction and finally balance your hormones and heal. If you want to check it out and grab one before they're gone, just go to mybloodwork.com now. Number two, fix your wake-up time first, right?

• 8:08Josh Axe?

  Go to bed, wake up, prioritize sleep, but fix your wake-up time first. That's the first thing. I would anchor my sleep, okay? Backwards from how everyone else tries. Forget forcing an early bedtime, okay? Pick one wake-up time and hit it seven days a week, okay? Then get outside light within the first 30 minutes of waking, okay? Morning light sets your body clock and your body clock sets your melatonin. And about 15 hours later, sleep starts coming to you. You have to, you, you stop chasing it. It comes to you naturally. And so pick a time and then get outside to balance those circadian rhythms. By the way, there is evidence of this, according to medical journals, that consistency, going

• 8:51Josh Axe?

  to bed consistently at the same time, actually works better than you trying to just get more sleep. The most regular sleepers had a 20 to 48% lower risk of death and regularity beat duration as a predictor in terms of getting quality sleep. Now, I'm not saying you should try and stay up later. You shouldn't. You should go, you should wake up at the same time every morning. And as soon as you're tired at night, you should start going to bed. And at the same time, making sure you're getting at least eight hours of sleep. Now, here's, here's a study that was published pretty recently. It was done on 60,000 people that wore trackers like Oura Ring and Whoop and these sort of bands that track your sleep. And it had tens of millions of hours of data. The steadiest sleepers won even against long sleepers.

• 9:36Josh Axe?

  So again, going to bed at the same time, waking up at the same time, that was the most important thing in terms of people getting deep, restful sleep that restored and healed their mitochondria. Number three, here is something I would do. If I were starting over from scratch and said, okay, what are the biggest things that can change your health? Walk after your meals. The great thing about this is it costs you nothing. And you know what? Your great-grandmother did it without being told to, you know, a short walk after eating. There's an old Chinese proverb, 100 steps after meals and you'll live to 99. Okay, so 100 steps after meals, you'll live to 99. Ancient Chinese proverb.

• 10:17Josh Axe?

  Chinese medicine has prescribed the after-dinner walk for centuries. And the old wisdom had the mechanism right. Working muscles pull sugar out of your bloodstream like a sponge, so it lowers your blood sugar. We talked about that marker, probably the most important marker earlier, the fasting glucose, the fasting blood sugar. If you fix that, bring insulin back into balance, now every other hormone in your body comes back into balance with it typically. So again, walk after your meals. Walk for 10 minutes after breakfast, you know, when you're at work or you're at home after you eat lunch, go for a 20 minute walk. Go for a 15, 20 minute walk in the evening. Try and walk 20 minutes, three times a day, one hour a day. You will not

• 11:02Josh Axe?

  believe what that will do to your health, or even at least just one time a day. Now here's the evidence according to a medical study. Three 15 minute walks after meals matched one 45 minute walk for a 24 hour blood sugar control. So again, it could be, you know, 15 minutes and 45 minutes a day after each, okay? And by the way, the walk that helped the most for blood sugar was the after dinner walk. Now this is something my family and I like to do sometimes after dinner. Now we don't do it all of the time, but we oftentimes do this. We'll sort of get out and, and with Chelsea and I, we always walk. Actually, on occasion, maybe once a week, we'll go out and depending on the time of year, we'll go out and ride our bikes. But the girls will sometimes walk, sometimes they'll

• 11:46Josh Axe?

  be on scooters, sometimes they'll be on bikes, but we love the after dinner walk. And again, studies prove this, there it is, the great grandmother habit that matched the workout, right? So here's the thing, a lot of times we think to ourselves, I gotta go to the gym and I gotta pump iron, I've gotta go and do hours of cardio. And what studies show, listen, and by the way, that's great, by the way, and I will talk about weight training because that is incredibly important. But if you're just getting started and you want to know what is foundational for health, walking 45 minutes a day will make a massive difference in your health. All right, the number four component that will make a major difference in your health and help you build a steady

• 12:27Josh Axe?

  foundation is lifting weights or doing any type of resistance training. Strength training twice a week, and if you're over 40, nothing on this list pays you back more per minute, okay? Of all the things I talked about, if you're over 40, this one makes the biggest difference in your health. And here's the reality, after 30 years of age, you lose muscle every year, you don't fight for it. And muscle is your metabolic engine, your blood sugar sponge, and your independence at 80. You don't need an hour a day. You need two sessions a week where the last few reps generally feel hard, okay? Body weight counts, bands count, uh, you know, a backpack full of books or, you know,

• 13:12Josh Axe?

  doing a, you know, rucking counts, but, but weights, okay? And ideally, and you can do machines, you can do dumbbells, but move something to support the growth of muscle at least two days a week. So if you're saying, hey, where do I get started? If you can walk 45 minutes a day, and if you can lift two days a week, it will make a major difference. You could pair that like push or pull days, it could be let a lower body day and upper body day, but do some form of resistance training. And listen to this study around it. 30 to 60 weekly minutes of strength training were linked to a 10 to 20% lower risk of death. So again, incorporate weight training. Okay, next, number five, crowd out, don't cut out. You know, when I opened up my clinic in

• 13:57Josh Axe?

  Nashville, Tennessee, this was back like late 2007, okay, almost 20 years now. You know that one of the biggest things that I learned in working with patients very, very early on was if I would tell them, you can't have this, and I didn't give them a replacement or a swap, it became very stressful and they failed more often. Versus if I went to my patients and I laid out for them and I said, eat this, not that. Hey, you're doing white flour? Let's switch over to oat flour and almond flour. Hey, let's switch from, you know, the canola oil over to the extra virgin olive oil. When I would give them the replacements and the swaps, it became so much either. I said,

• 14:40Josh Axe?

  you can still eat chicken Parmesan, you can still have chocolate cake, you know, let's just buy this brand, use these different ingredients, and it's going to taste a little different, but I promise you, after a few months of doing this, you will probably like it just as much as you did before. Sometimes it tastes better because you're using fresher, more real ingredients. But I also guarantee you this, you'll be incredibly healthier for it. And because of this, in my practice, I saw people reversing autoimmune disease, reversing hypothyroidism, you know, just healing in a dramatic way and being able to do it for their lifetime and not crashing and burning and fizzling out because, you know, they weren't coming into me and I wasn't saying, I need you to go on a keto diet

• 15:20Josh Axe?

  for the rest of your life. Instead, it was, hey, let's just make these simple swaps. So this is all about food. It is addition with no subtraction. No banned food lists, no Monday cleanse, one rule at every meal, okay? It would typically be this, I would say, I want you to increase protein and fiber, and I want you to try and eat a lot of meat, fruits and vegetables. That was it. And the results were incredible. So again, you want to focus on building a healthy plate, high protein, and then get those plants, right? Get the wild, you know, the Filet-O-Sam and the grass fed burger, the, the chicken breast, and then let's do some veggies, let's do some berries, let's do some sweet potato, let's do some avocado, and let's see what happens. You know what happened? People

• 16:05Josh Axe?

  lost weight, they reversed disease, they felt great, all of those things happened. And so, and it's going to be the same for you. Don't chase these fad diets. Instead, build a steady foundation with eating real food and making good swaps. The number six way that I encourage you to build a healthy foundation, if you're starting over and saying, okay, I just want to see big results, is focus on improving your gut and digestive health. Your gut health is tied to your brain health, your skin health, your heart health, the health of every organ, cell and tissue in your body. And one of the areas of your health that's of course critically important as well is your

• 16:44Josh Axe?

  immune system. And around 70 to 80% of your immune system lives in your gut. So if you're going to improve immunity, improve brain health, improve, you know, of course, inflammation, almost all of that starts in the gut. So focus on gut health because it positively impacts every other organ in your body. And so the way you improve gut health is what I talked about earlier, it's getting good things like protein, it's getting fiber. In addition, fermented foods, sauerkraut, kimchi, kefir, coconut yogurt or real yogurt, you know, these foods make a big difference. Getting more polyphenols, you're going to get those from things like berries and extra virgin olive oil and drinking green tea. Consider a probiotic supplement, even though first probiotics should

• 17:29Josh Axe?

  come from your food, but getting more fiber and probiotics will make such a big difference in your health across your entire body. You know, there's a medical study that found this, listen to this, a fermented food diet increased microbiome diversity and lowered 19 inflammatory proteins in 10 weeks. So there was a study and they said, okay, how does consuming fermented foods, probiotic rich foods compare to taking a anti-inflammatory supplement, a natural supplement, or even sometimes a drug? And you know what they found? A diet high in fiber and probiotics

• 18:08Josh Axe?

  outperformed supplements head to head by a large margin. Listen, I love turmeric and ginger, those are really foods in a way, they're, they're, they're spices. Um, those are great, include those in. But what makes an even bigger difference likely is eating sauerkraut or having some yogurt at home, a major, major difference. It's foundational for your health. And number seven, if I'm saying to myself, I'm starting from scratch, I want to do the things that make the biggest difference in my health, here it is. Guard your peace and build joy. This is the one I've never seen on another list before. When you're starting over, I'd guard peace like my life depended

• 18:52Josh Axe?

  on it. I'd wake up every morning, I'd spend 10 minutes in prayer, reading scripture before I ever picked up my phone. I would have a real Sabbath, one day of complete rest with family and God every weekend. And then I would build community of people I love that are encouragers, that brought me peace and joy. So focus on these spiritual practices. We know according to medical studies, that if you don't have peace and stress is high, cortisol goes up, your body gets in that sympathetic state, it drives disease. Cortisol goes up, well now insulin goes up, blood sugar, we talked about that being the probably the most important marker when it comes to inflammation and aging.

• 19:33Josh Axe?

  And here's a study to prove it. Women attending religious services like church more than weekly had a 33% lower risk of death over 16 years than never attenders. Okay. So, and there's, there are a lot of studies on this. And the biggest thing they found in the study were it was tied to a greater sense of community, having more hope and purpose in their life tied to faith-based attendance. So again, having that morning time to build peace, focusing on spiritual growth, having community groups, going to church, these have a profound impact on your overall health. Our new book, Heal Yourself, is now available for preorder. And if you've gotten value from

• 20:14Josh Axe?

  this podcast, we would be so grateful for you grabbing your copy directly through our own channels at healyourselfbook.com. When you preorder with us, you're also going to get the Cellular Peptide Guide, the Cellular Supplement Guide, the Heal Yourself Masterclass, and 40 Longevity Recipes, plus an at-home blood work kit for only $79, our lowest price ever, with a one hour consultation. Again, that's healyourselfbook.com and that offer won't last long. I want to encourage you to take advantage of the offer because we're only going to do that for the next few days. So remember these seven things. Know your numbers. Where are you at? Let me ask you this right now. Do you know what your vitamin D levels are? What about magnesium? What about

• 20:58Josh Axe?

  your blood sugar levels? What about your inflammation markers? Know where you're at and work to improve those numbers. Number two, anchor that waking time, right? Wake up at the same time every morning and get out and go for a walk. Number three, walk after meals, right? 45 minutes a day, 15, three times a day. And listen, if you can't do it three times a day, do it one time a day. Do your best. Number two, lift twice a week, right? Resistance training twice a week. Number five, protein and plants first. Number six, more fermented foods and fiber. Number seven, guard your peace. Here's what Lamentations 322 through 23 says in the Bible, "Because of the Lord's great

• 21:36Josh Axe?

  love, we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness." So again, it might even be just two minutes in the morning, reading something, meditating on for a minute can start to build peace. So here's my encouragement to you this week. Book the blood work and set one wake up time for all seven days. Walk after your biggest meal at least every day. Get two sessions of lifting in, plant and proteins every single meal, one fermented food daily, and 10 minutes of stillness and prayer or reading every morning before you pick up your phone. And if you forget everything else from today, remember this, you

• 22:15Josh Axe?

  don't need more willpower, more information, or a perfect plan. You need a starting line and a sequence. And now you have both. Start at the bottom of the stack, let each layer carry the next, and let this be the last time you ever have to start over. By the way, I created a guide for you. Okay, it's my top 25 blood markers PDF. It's worth $50. It's free if you go to the show notes and you can download it right now. And so that guide will walk you through exactly the markers you need to be looking for. And then next up, if you want to dive deeper into this advanced nutrition and health information and go to the next level, check out my book, Heal Yourself. It's in bookstores nationwide and on amazon.com. I want to say thanks for

• 23:00Josh Axe?

  listening here to the Dr. Axe Show, where every week I'm diving deep into the science and principles of how you can heal physically, mentally and spiritually. And if this helped you, do two things for me. Subscribe so the next episode finds you and send this to a friend who keeps saying they'll start Monday, or the one who just got lab results that scared them. It takes 10 seconds and it might just transform their life. Thanks so much for watching. I'll see you next week.