8 Habits That Will Change Your Life：The Expert Advice You Need This Year
Here are the top 10 key takeaways from Mel Robbins' podcast featuring world-renowned experts that can transform your health, mindset, and relationships this year.
1. Stress causes belly fat and impairs brain function
Dr. Tara Swart explains the biological mechanism behind how stress leads to abdominal fat. When cortisol (the stress hormone) levels remain chronically elevated, your brain interprets this as a survival threat. To protect you from potential starvation, cortisol specifically deposits fat in your abdominal area as an emergency energy reserve.
This belly fat is particularly stubborn and difficult to lose even with diet and exercise if stress levels remain high. Additionally, stress reduces blood flow to the higher functioning areas of your brain, creating what Dr. Swart calls "low power mode." This impairs creative thinking, emotional regulation, and complex problem-solving abilities, similar to how your phone functions when battery is low.
2. Stress is contagious, especially from authority figures
Research on silverback gorillas shows that stress from higher-status individuals affects the group more profoundly than stress from peers. This pattern applies directly to human relationships as well, where a stressed boss or parent can significantly impact everyone around them.
This happens because the stress of someone who controls resources important to your survival (like a paycheck) represents a direct threat to your own wellbeing. To protect yourself from catching others' stress, practice mindfulness techniques like meditation, spending time in nature, gratitude practices, or using the "let them" approach - acknowledging their stress while maintaining your own boundaries.
3. Stop, Breathe, Be is an effective three-second reset technique
Dr. Aditi Nerurkar shares a simple yet powerful three-second technique to manage stress that she developed as a medical resident and now prescribes to her patients. The method involves stopping what you're doing, taking a deliberate breath, and being present in the moment by grounding yourself physically.
This technique works because anxiety is fundamentally future-focused, centered on "what if" thinking. The Stop, Breathe, Be method redirects your attention from "what if" to "what is," creating a micro-moment of peace that can reset your stress response. It can be practiced during mundane daily activities like turning a doorknob, between meetings, while brushing teeth, or whenever you feel stress building.
4. Mindless scrolling increases stress instead of providing relaxation
Many people turn to scrolling through their phones when taking breaks, but Dr. Nerurkar warns this actually increases stress levels. Rather than helping you relax, scrolling actively primes your brain and body for more stress.
More effective break activities involve connecting your breath to movement or engaging your mind-body connection. Options include heart-centered breathing, taking a short walk outside, stretching, or practicing the Stop, Breathe, Be method. These activities help shift your autonomic nervous system from the sympathetic (fight-flight-freeze) state to the parasympathetic (rest and recovery) state.
5. The ketogenic diet may help improve mental health
Dr. Chris Palmer explains how mental health issues can result from problems with brain energy and metabolism. He recommends trying a ketogenic diet for three months to potentially address mild to moderate mental health disorders. This approach has been scientifically validated for treating epilepsy and may work by improving mitochondrial function and brain metabolism.
A well-formulated ketogenic diet is low in carbohydrates, moderate in protein, and high in fat. The initial week or two can be challenging (the "keto flu") as your body adjusts from primarily burning carbohydrates to using both carbohydrates and fats as fuel sources. People often experience an antidepressant effect first, feeling lighter with more energy and better sleep. For mental health purposes, this isn't necessarily a lifelong diet - many people find benefits after following it for 1-5 years.
6. Diet, exercise, sleep, and substance elimination create a brain health protocol
Dr. Palmer outlines a comprehensive approach to supporting mental health. Beyond considering a ketogenic diet, he recommends increasing exercise even slightly from your current level. Just one weekly session of resistance training to muscle failure can make a difference, or simply taking a 10-minute walk after dinner.
Prioritizing 7-8 hours of quality sleep is essential - you should be able to wake up without it feeling like torture. He also advises eliminating harmful substances like alcohol, marijuana, CBD, smoking, and vaping for at least three months to give your brain metabolism a chance to heal and recover. This temporary elimination period can significantly improve brain function and mental health.
7. Menopause requires specific nutritional and exercise approaches
Dr. Mary Claire Haver emphasizes that women going through menopause need to focus on three key nutritional elements. First, adequate fiber intake (from legumes, berries, nuts, and seeds) which feeds the gut microbiome. Second, sufficient magnesium from sources like pumpkin seeds and leafy greens. Third, omega-3 fatty acids found in fatty fish, flax, hemp, and chia seeds.
For exercise, Dr. Haver stresses the importance of strength training rather than excessive cardio. The focus should be on building muscle and bone strength, which become increasingly important with age. She also notes that hormone therapy can be beneficial for sleep issues during menopause, and that alcohol tolerance typically decreases during this life stage, often disrupting sleep.
8. Emotional connection can create new memories even in dementia patients
Dr. Wendy Suzuki shares a moving story about telling her father with dementia that she loved him for the first time. Despite his memory impairment, her father remembered this emotional exchange a week later, demonstrating how emotional resonance can help form new memories even when the hippocampus (the brain structure responsible for memory) is compromised.
This story illustrates the power of emotional connection and shows that it's never too late to change family dynamics. The brain's remarkable ability to form memories around emotionally significant experiences means that even people with dementia can create new connections when the experience carries strong emotional meaning. This understanding offers hope for maintaining meaningful relationships with loved ones facing memory challenges.
9. Self-forgiveness is essential for healing
Sarah Jakes Roberts explains the crucial difference between sitting with yourself to punish yourself versus sitting with yourself to heal. She emphasizes that you cannot heal while continuing to punish yourself, as these are contradictory processes. Repeatedly replaying negative thoughts about yourself doesn't lead to growth - it only reinforces the pain.
Roberts advocates embracing your full identity, including both mistakes and achievements. Instead of being defined by a single moment or mistake, she suggests using the phrase "but also" to acknowledge all facets of who you are. This complete self-acceptance allows you to move forward with compassion rather than shame. The goal isn't to disconnect from who you were, but to bring your entire self - past mistakes included - into the fullness of your present and future.
10. End-of-life regrets center on relationships and authenticity
Research from Harvard's 86-year study on happiness reveals that the most common end-of-life regrets are spending too much time working instead of with loved ones, and worrying too much about others' opinions. Dr. Robert Waldinger notes that when reflecting on their lives, people rarely mention achievements - instead, they focus on relationships and how they treated others.
Dr. Zach Bush adds that many people regret spending their lives performing rather than authentically being themselves. From his experience as a hospice physician, he observes that people often realize at life's end that they were whole and complete all along. This insight reminds us to prioritize genuine connections over external validation and to recognize our inherent wholeness rather than constantly striving to become "complete." These perspectives encourage living more authentically in the present rather than waiting for some future moment to fully embrace life.