About Big 10 Health

Big 10 Health is a free resource to help you take a more informed, data-driven role in your own health by fusing practical, evidence-backed information with simple biohacking techniques.

I want to cut through the noise and help you identify the highest impact actions for living well now and also for reducing the risk of poor health later on in life.

In a nutshell, I want to help you to:

Reclaim your food from industrialised nutrition

Reclaim your body from a sedentary lifestyle

Reclaim your mind and connections from social media

Reclaim your sleep from the distractions of modern life

1. Find Your Motivation

If you want to make powerful changes to your health that stick, you need an incentive that motivates you. You need something to aim at that lifts you up as you challenge your mind and body to carry you forward into a healthy and happy future.

Before we even talk about what you could change to improve your health now and to increase your future healthspan, we need to talk about why you are doing it.

For myself, I have a simple vision:

“In the distant future of my 90th birthday, I want to regularly be in charge of collecting my great grandchildren from school. All through my life I want to feel great in my body, happy in my mind, and perform to the very best of my ability in sport”

I guess at face value that doesn’t seem like a particularly big vision, does it? But if we think for a moment about what being ninety years old means for many people right now, then perhaps it might not seem quite so simple. Advances in science and medicine have extended our lifespans but without improving the quality of life very much in that later stage. We expect to live longer, but we can also probably expect (even if we don’t want to think about it) that the last decade(s) will be troubled with ill-health and perhaps isolation and loneliness. In fact, for those of us in the middle of our lives (or, sadly, even younger) our poor contemporary lifestyle, nutrition, and use of social media are seeing those problems arrive ever earlier in life. On average, we are unhealthier, more isolated, and more anxious than ever before.

I profoundly believe that it doesn’t have to be like that. I think that in the last 50 years in the industrialised nations we’ve taken a wrong turn. We each must take a personal stand, seize control of our health, and make practical, evidence-backed, data-driven changes to get back on track.

To achieve that seemingly simple vision of picking up my great grandkids from school (assuming we even have cars and schools in forty years 😉), not only do I need to live to ninety, but I’ll need to be in good enough physical and neurological health to take on that responsibility. That vision of me at the school gate implies a happy, healthy and connected life in my latter years. It means that I’ll have achieved a long healthspan and not just a long lifespan. Most importantly, the lifestyle needed to achieve that goal needs to be put in place and maintained from now. It’s not a fix I can magically apply when things go wrong. It also means that through all my middle years I’ll have had good health and been physically active and connected with the people I love. By protecting the ‘future me’ the ’now me’ gets to benefit too.

I'd like you to think about what would motivate you to take control of your health. Maybe you have a condition you are living with? Maybe you want to achieve more from your training or sport? Maybe you want to feel happier and healthier in your skin? Maybe like me you want to plan for a healthier future?

So, what are you up against that might stop you from getting there?

2. Be Aware of The Biggest Threats

Of all the diseases and conditions that affect humanity, there are four dominant threats that stalk us in these modern times, and the odds are high that it will be one (or often several of them) that will get us. However, I believe that our armour against them is knowledge and our weapons against them are the simple, proven, practical actions that I lay out in high level below and in more detail throughout this programme. Let’s name those four chronic disease threats:

Cardiovascular disease (such as heart attacks and strokes)

Neurodegenerative disease (such as Alzheimer's and vascular dementia

Cancer (various malignant tumours)

Metabolic disease (such as type 2 diabetes and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease)

We have, to some extent, been conditioned to believe that these are just a consequence of living longer and are inevitable. I profoundly disagree with that. Those conditions are made more likely by a diet high in ultra-processed foods and refined sugars combined with a sedentary lifestyle, poor sleep, and an addiction to anxiety inducing, concentration destroying social media. I think it is perfectly reasonable to at least try for a long life, maintaining good health all the way through leading to a relatively peaceful end.

3. Understand the Solution

Rather than waiting for symptoms to appear and then seeking help, I believe a wiser approach would be to take early proactive interventions long before these conditions develop and long before symptoms start to appear. We need to reverse the dietary changes pushed on us by big business, strengthen our bodies, sleep properly, and have deep connections with friends and family. Moreover, we need to do it now whilst we have a window to protect our own future.

If being healthier now and living longer in good health isn’t sufficient motivation, it is also worth considering that, whatever the vast social upheaval that AI (Artificial Intelligence) brings to our work and social structures, it is also likely to unlock significant further improvements in our understanding of human health and associated treatments and preventative measures. How sad would it be for you to ’not make it’ to that point for lack of applying some obvious and well-understood tools right now and thus buying yourself some time.

There is so much information on health, nutrition, and wellbeing out there, and maybe the whole concept of biohacking seems complex, weird, and off-putting? What I have worked to identify and then apply to my own life is the Big 10 interventions that you too can make which will give you the most return on your effort. I’d like to think also that using the information I have gathered will light a fire within you, and you’ll go on to do your own reading and thinking. Even better, perhaps you will come back with some suggestions, challenges, and questions for me and we can discuss them together and learn as a community. I want you to take an active involvement in understanding your health and join me on this journey into a healthy future.

Don’t worry, you don’t need to start all the Big 10 at once, and in fact I would strongly encourage you to start gently one topic at a time and, of course, with the involvement and support of your doctor.

You should never embark on a change to your diet, exercise or lifestyle without first talking to your doctor and that's especially true if you are living with a health condition. I am not a doctor or a scientist, and nothing in this site should be taken as anything other than information for you to consider and to discuss with your health professionals. I'm not here to tell you what to do, and I'm certainly not qualified to tell you how to treat your health issues.

I am here to encourage you to get actively involved in your own health and to think about the ‘future you’ you’d like to arrive at years down the line. That person is going to thank the current you for getting involved. There are no fads, trends, gimmicks, or weird products anywhere in the Big 10. Everything I talk about is well-known, well-established, backed by science and is really just common sense. However, we really need to get motivated and apply that common sense!

4. Use the Big 10 Toolbox

Below you can find a high-level introduction to the Big 10 to give you a sense of where this journey is going. From each of those summaries you can then jump to a detailed article which will give you approachable, high-level information and some practical actions and suggestions. Each article also contains suggestions for books, video or podcasts you might find useful to start growing your own knowledge. Finally, each article concludes with literature references to help you with fact checking.

In my own research and in the direct, practical application of what I have found to my own body and mind I have learnt so much. It’s my pleasure to share that information with you. I hope also that I have presented it in a way that makes it easier for you to find a way in and get started. I believe that by finding the right motivation and by investing time and effort you too can become better informed. I believe you too can take a more active role in your health and in building yourself a long healthspan. If you have any questions or suggestions, I’d love to hear from you so just drop me an email.

I’ve not arranged the Big 10 in order of importance, but I would suggest that you look at the first three to begin with as they are key pillars of health. Also, there is increasing evidence that insulin is a contributing factor to all the four threats we looked at earlier, which would make number one important to consider early on in your journey through the Big 10.

All the Big 10 have the potential to improve your health right now and will help to combat at least one (if not several) of the four threats we identified earlier. The following icons are used to help you tell which they help to fight:

Cardiovascular disease
Neurodegenerative disease
Cancer
Metabolic disease

Finally, remember, spend some time thinking about why you want to make changes to your lifestyle. Give yourself a strong motivation to hold to when the change feels tough!