If you’re just joining the Bare Minimum Mondays posts, here’s the premise…

Action always gets more results than ideas. (Related to this: the thing you do is better than the thing you don’t do, progress is better than perfection, consistency, even with something small, is more effective than occasional bursts of excellence).

Every Monday, we send out things to try in four areas: movement (exercise), nutrition, sleep, and stress management. These are, without question, the four most powerful tools available for tackling a massive number of maladies. The goal isn’t for you to do all of them forever. It’s not even for you to do all of them this week. The goal is to give you enough things to try that you can find a couple that stick, and then for you to have some intentionality in each of those areas that you can stick with for the rest of your life.

Take what you need, discard the rest.

Let’s get into it.

Move
Perform one minute of jumping jacks or high-knee marching before you take a shower. Brief bouts of vigorous movement improve energy expenditure and cardiovascular fitness. Plus if you do it before your shower anyway, no need to worry about breaking a sweat.

Eat
Swap one dessert this week for fruit with yogurt. Replacing added sugars with protein- and fiber-rich foods enhances satiety and reduces caloric intake. Is it the same as ice cream? No. But it’s a sweet snack that does more jobs for your body than ice cream does. And it makes a difference.

Sleep
Keep your wake-up time consistent after daylight-saving changes. Consistent circadian cues mitigate sleep disruption during time transitions.

Manage
Write down the top three priorities for tomorrow before bed. Bedtime planning reduces anxiety and improves next-day performance.