6 Habits of highly effective programmers
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The world is a big place and everyone has their own ideas. We are constantly bombarded with information left, right and center. One video will have one idea and as you scroll, the next video will have a totally conflicting idea.
In our quest to improve our lives, we still want to get the best information. Information that will be life changing.
We start to notice a certain pattern to certain information. Some information that we listen to and we practice in our lives bring about change. We incorporate that into our habits until it becomes part of us.
Most of the things I will talk about here are things that I have incorporated into my life. I have been the Lab rat so that humanity can advance. Just kidding. Most of this information is from my mentors, research and also from my own personal experience.
And so, we start.
Move one foot in-front of the other
I always talk about how I lost weight by fasting and eating healthy foods but what activity did I do that went along with it? Walking.
I had not started weight lifting at that time. I would sometimes go for basketball once in like a blue moon. Other times I would test my body with some 10 push ups. But the large majority of what I did was simply walking.
So, there was research that was done that says, by the year 2030, one out of two people are going to be obese and one out of every four people are going to be severely obese. I would do my best scared cat impression at this moment because “WHAT!”
Another study was done where the took a bunch of people and told them to walk.
People that walked 5,800 steps per day, were 40% less likely to die than people that walked 3,500 steps per day.
People that walked 7,800 steps per day, were 45% less likely to die.
People that walked close to 11,000 steps per day, were 54% less risk in all cause mortality compared to the 3,500 step group.
Another thing is that walking is moving some of the largest muscles in our body. All the big muscles: the glutes, the quads, the hamstrings.
By the way, there is another study that demonstrated that if you just increased your step count, 1,000 steps from where you are right now per day, you have a 12 percent less risk of all cause mortality. That means your chances of your dying goes down down.
Also, the fact that you are walking, you are burning fat. The longer you walk at a low intensity, the more fat you are utilizing and less carbohydrates and other fuel that you are utilizing.
This means that if you have the time to walk, and just casually walk, you are going to burn a lot of fat and only fat, and not break up nearly as much muscle.
Put more proteins in
As a programmer, I didn’t realize that eating has anything to do with my health.
I used to eat a lot. I remember back in campus, I would take pre-breakfast, breakfast, pre-lunch, lunch, pre-supper, supper and the post-supper.
All these did was just reduce my chances of losing fat.
If you put more carbs in before you burn through the previous ones, you can never get to lose that fat. You can’t get to fat burning and the other thing is, if your insulin is high which again is a result of those carbohydrates in the presence of high insulin, you can’t burn fat because your body is busy making fat.
In the presence of high insulin, your body is making fat and it is way too smart to make fat and burn fat at the same time.
I was always tired. You know, this lack of energy throughout the day, this chronic tiredness was something that you would expect to happen to you if you were like 60 years old, 70, 80 years old.
But it was happening to me at my 20s. A young person who is supposed to have this youthful exuberance to them, but they find themselves operating in life with a sluggishness and dread.
Years passed and, I had to figure out why I was always tired.
Through all my research and self experimentation, I have found out that the most important things are the kind of the things that you hear all the time. Diet, sleep, and exercise.
I started doing fasting and researched on the best foods to eat.
I experimented with leafy greens like spinach and kale. They are very high in nutrients, in minerals, in vitamins, in fiber and they are very low in carbohydrates and starch and sugar.
I also ate a lot of meat. Animal proteins especially the fat kinds provide enough nutrients that we could live on it for years. So that included beef, pork and chicken.
Other times it was fish but I avoided it since fish from our country people most times comes fried. They use seed oils which is considered normal by WHO but it is a story for another day. Don’t use seed oils.
I added eggs and avocados which I don’t regret to this day.
In short, my energy levels went high and in the process I lost some good amount of weight.
Go without food
A lot of people, when they hear fasting they think they are going to die.
They have never missed any breakfast in their lives. They might have skipped lunch some time, but that day they felt like dying. The minute they got home, they ran to the fridge to get anything that is eatable.
I’m here to tell you though that you will not die when you fast. It is said that an overly obese person can go for a whole year without eating. Just drinking water.
You can’t lose fat without fasting. You need to skip the breakfast in order to go for a longer time of fast.
In fasting, we want to go from sugar burning to fat burning. A big misconception is that your body is not eating when you are not eating. In reality, your body eats when you don’t eat. It eats its own fat.
You have to get healthy to lose weight. Not lose weight to get healthy. Weight lose will come when you get healthy.
You have to get to a position where, the food is no longer controlling you. You are controlling the food.
I like going for 18 hour fasts everyday. Other times, on a weekly basis, I go for 48 hours fasts and on a monthly basis go for 72 hours. But that is all progressive like in the gym where you lift weight.
You want to start with your fast level. You can skip breakfast and make your first meal to be at 3 PM.
The rule of thumb is, DON’T EAT IF YOU ARE NOT HUNGRY.
The Cortisol hormone peaks around 8 AM. You may find that you are hungry in the morning due to a Cortisol spike. However, you are not really hungry. It is just a hormonal shift and a sensation that you get. If you get that hunger feeling, just ignore it. Ignore the hunger. 9/10 times, it will go away.
If you ignore it and it doesn’t go away, and you feel dizzy, tired, or weak, then you need to eat. However, you really need to tell the difference between hunger and time to eat. When you do this for long, you will realize you don’t have any hunger in the morning unless you consume carbohydrates(sugar).
Eat fatty foods at the end of the meal. When you begin fasting, you are not yet fat adapted. When you eat foods with fat, it will help you fast longer. Therefore eat fatty meat.
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Lift heavy things
I would argue that this is the best thing you can do in your life. Exercise had been proven to improve longevity, increase mental clarity, make you stronger and maintain your muscles.
A lot of people by the age of 30, from Science, begin to lose muscle due to lack of exercise. A simple yet sometimes difficult activity of waking your ass from your seat and deciding to go to the gym is all it takes to be in the top 1% of fitness.
I started weight lifting in March of 2023. This time, I was serious. I had learnt a lot from Facebook, YouTube and Instagram videos on how to lift effectively. Hearing from my mentors that gym is the number one thing you do to start improving your life, that is what I did.
8 months in and it is the best decision I have ever made. I am much stronger. When you see me greeting people, I feel like Hulk from the Avengers. I can just crush those little hands of yours. My confidence has improved, my posture too. I guess the posture just improves with doing bench press. I’m standing upright all the time. This has really improved the amount of respect I get from people.
Also, just by going to the gym and experiencing how hard it gets sometimes, I have incorporated it into other parts of my life. With progressive overloading that I try to do every week, the same habits I have transferred into other activities in my life like walking and even sleeping.
I was walking 10k steps but now with progressive overload, I have increased it to 20k. I will talk about this in the next part on walking.
Another thing is my sleeping habits have improved. Instead of watching a movie till 2 AM, coming from the gym tired helps my body automatically fall asleep since my eyes are just too heavy to watch a movie.
If you are still not convinced, just challenge yourself to go for only 30 days and then come and tell me.
Take a book
Reading is something that we have done since we were little kids. From the time you were in baby class, you were taught to read. “A B C D E F G H” was the song we used to read and sing along to when we were kids.
Now, with almost 20 years of schooling, our reading has improved. You might think that there is nothing else to read in this world since they taught us everything in school? Wrong.
The real learning starts out of the school system. The earlier you recognize this, the better for you. There are many books on self help that have been written that will really change your life and your perspectives.
From habits, to how to be a better man, to how to read body language, to how to deal with your health, and to how to get rich. All these are things that we all want in our lives. And it is hidden in books.
There is a saying that says, “If you want to hide something from an African, hide it in a book.” Sometimes we are all Africans just navigating life with questions in our heads with no answers.
We resort to being Scientists with our lives. Whatever solutions that your friend and your uncle got is what you implement into your life. But they don’t know better too. Therefore we dig ourselves into the deepest of pits.
A good example is not knowing about red flags in women. Red hair, tattooes, single mom, daddy issues and many of them. You uncle married such a woman. When you talk to him, he tells you life is great. “Marry the one you love.” Clearly, he doesn’t know that these are read flags.
But from listening to other stories, studies done, books read, you realize that these are red flags that your uncle assumed. Do you still go on to marry such a woman? No. You know better because of one thing. Reading.
I would therefore say that reading is the best thing one can do.
Old school pen and paper
We are all writers. Whether you believe it or not. You have been writing your whole life. Before you read this article, you wrote something, a text.
Writing is therefore a big part of our lives. From the beginning of time, we see writings everywhere. The early men would write and draw in their caves. The Bible is written. Great books from 18th century like Meditations from Marcus Aurelius are all writings. If you want to create a YouTube video, you have to write in order to present.
Therefore writing is the best thing that one can do.
Start by writing articles of things that you have learnt. Share them on social media. The next wave is going to be social media. Things are moving that way my friend. Learn to write and to share your ideas.
Another thing with writing is that you are able to express your ideas clearly. I started journaling also this year. I did it when I was younger, knew the benefits but since it was my primary school teacher pushing me, as a young kid, I only did it as an assignment.
But now, I do it everyday. I write of all the things I did that day. What good or bad happened to me. When I started, I just wrote a paragraph or two. But now, I write long, like really long journal stories.
Writing my journal has really improved my writing and my thought flow. I am able to just flow, like the water with ideas to write.
So, write.
That is all for now guys. See you soon!
