Marmanold.com

Strength Training Snack Routine

Since August of 2024 I’ve been on quite the health journey. I started walking on my desk treadmill that month and, starting January 2025, committed to hitting 50,000 steps per week.

Since January, I’ve consistently exceeded my 50k steps and have had quite the physical transformation. I’ve lost at least 15 pounds and have seen my waist go down by a few inches. I have more energy, my joints hurt less, and — even with an incredibly difficult work situation — my depression and mood are under control. I’m still amazed that something as simple as slowly walking while I’m in meetings has had such a positive effect.

Daily Supplements

For several months, I was taking this mixture of supplements daily. My goal in this mixture was to target imflamation, depression, and increase my energy and metabolism. I saw great results.

Health Plan Success

The last fifteen years have been a wild health ride for me.

I entered my mid-20s at nearly 200lbs. Which, when you’re only 5'5" is a rather unhealthy place to be.

Thankfuly, my early 20s found me fully immersed in anarcho-capitalism, LewRockwell.com, and — of course — Ron Paul. Radical libertarianism aside, LewRockwell.com in the late aughts was rife with posts and essays on the benefits of the various paleo diets. As one does in their 20s, I went all in.

Analogue Mornings

While 2024 was a year of great things in ministry¹ and my personal health², it was also a year of a lot of stress and change in all areas of my life.

Because of this — and, naturally, my deep sinful nature — many of my good morning habits fell to the way side. Though I had banished social media from my phone, set it to B&W, disabled recommended videos & shorts on YouTube, and quite a few other things, by the end of 2024 my mornings were rubish.

My Dream Minimalist Setup

As is pretty apparent, I’ve been thinking a lot about digitmal minimalism here lately.¹ This morning on my walk, I pondered a little what my perfect device setup would be, and I think I’ve got it. Here’s what I want.

1. An iPad mini with the Daylight DC1’s screen.
2. An iPhone mini with the same screen, no app store (only Safari, iMessage, Apply Pay, Wallet, Mail, Calendar), and a single small camera.

The more I think on it, this would totally solve my many problems.²

The Fallen Apple

Over the last two years, I’ve completely rethought my use of technology and done a lot of work to simplify my life and avoid distractions and unnecessary stress. A major component of this change has been rethinking how my iPhone is configured.

As it stands today, I’ve deleted all social media apps¹, disabled all notifications, switched the phone permanently to silent, disabled the web browser, removed badges from app icons, and uninstalled Slack. Further, until 8a each day, my phone is set to black & white. As configured right now, I’ve pared my phone down to be an engine for sending texts, referencing e-mails, checking the family calendar, reading RSS articles, and taking photos.