[This DrP article was first published on Next Evolution Performance]
When people talk about longevity, they often fixate on lifespan—how many years you’ll exist. But healthspan? That’s the real game-changer. It’s about how many years you’ll truly live, not just survive. I know this intimately. My childhood was a revolving door of hospital corridors, watching my grandparents gradually lose their vitality. What most don’t know is that I was born with stunningly poor immunity. As a baby, my fevers weren’t measured in days, but weeks—lasting 3-4 excruciating weeks at a time. In England, norovirus outbreaks became my winter companions. I always thought I was simply “too lazy” to push through, to keep up. Even during cardio, I’d experience visible pain and assume it was my lack of discipline. It took years to understand this wasn’t laziness, but my body speaking a language I hadn’t yet learned to understand.
The last four years have been my personal renaissance of health. Ironically, vanity— the dubious life goal of rocking a cropped top all year after post-COVID weight became my #NeverAgain re yoyo-ing—became my initial motivator. But life had other plans, introducing me to even more performance trainers and Olympians as clients, and a deeper understanding of human potential. In 2024, my metrics tell a different story: 1200+ kilometers biked, lifting free weights at nearly half my body weight, and significantly reduced sick days. When I talk about health, I’m not offering wellness platitudes. I’m sharing a meticulously engineered personal transformation. Across medical research and ancient wisdom traditions, longevity isn’t just about adding years—it’s about adding life to those years. And that’s a mission I take dead seriously.
Scientific Foundations of Healthspan
Let’s talk leg strength—and why it’s not just about looking hot in shorts.
Your leg muscles are your body’s longevity crystal ball. Muscle mass, particularly in lower extremities, correlates directly with metabolic health and reduced mortality risk. For every 10% increase in leg muscle strength, you’re looking at a potential 14% reduction in all-cause mortality (Journal of Gerontology). This isn’t gym rhetoric; it’s biological mathematics. My own journey here wasn’t academic—it was survival. Coming from a background of chronic illness, building leg strength wasn’t about aesthetics. It was about proving to myself that my body could be resilient. When I started weight training, I wasn’t just building muscle. I was reconstructing my relationship with my own physicality. Even if I daren’t dream of better health, so I told myself it was all for looks.
Leg strength is intimately connected with brain health. Movement creates neural pathways, stimulates neurogenesis, and helps maintain cognitive flexibility– extra brain fertilisers (BDNF) are sent to enlarged blood vessels. Peter Attia’s work in “Outlive” brilliantly articulates how physical strength isn’t just muscular—it’s neurological insurance.
Dental health emerged as another unexpected longevity marker most people criminally overlook. My childhood dental trauma wasn’t just a personal horror story—it was a microcosm of systemic health interconnectedness. Emerging research reveals oral health’s profound implications. Periodontal disease directly correlates with cardiovascular inflammation, increasing heart disease risk by 40%. The oral microbiome isn’t about fresh breath—it’s a critical inflammatory response indicator. When I finally confronted my dental phobia in 2021– after feeling vindicated that I’d been a victim of dental fraud– I wasn’t protecting teeth. I was investing in my entire physiological infrastructure. Today I floss everyday, and am I glad I walked into the clinic and said “I am terrified of the dentist, don’t take this personally, and I want you to help me keep my teeth for as long as I live.”
Traditional Chinese medicine has long understood what modern science is catching up to: the mouth is a window into bodily health. Oral bacteria can trigger inflammatory cascades affecting everything from cardiac function to neurological performance. Our bodies are not discrete systems but intricate, interconnected ecosystems. Each choice—from movement to oral maintenance—creates systemic ripple effects. The scientific literature is unequivocal: Healthspan is about strategic, holistic mastery. It’s not about avoiding death, but optimising life’s quality. And optimisation requires profound, nuanced understanding.
Environmental Health Mastery
Health isn’t just what happens inside your body—it’s the ecosystem you create around yourself. And I’ve become ruthlessly selective about this ecosystem. I have come too far, and am too old, to simply play nice or the good Catholic girl I was socialised to be.
What's most important is understanding that if no one taught me how to design my environment, then of course I needed to figure it out on my own. That shed a ton of emotional weight for me.
Take relationships. Scientific literature is crystal clear: ambivalent relationships—those frenemies, the subtly competitive colleagues, the energy vampires—have measurable cardiovascular consequences. A landmark study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences revealed that interpersonal uncertainty increases cortisol by 25%, directly impacting heart health and accelerating cellular aging. My approach? A comprehensive relationship audit. I’m too old for performative social interactions that drain my energy. If a relationship doesn’t inspire, challenge, or genuinely support my growth, it gets strategically phased out. This isn’t about being cold—it’s about creating psychological safety and maintaining metabolic efficiency.
Boundaries are my user manual– we teach people how to treat us, and if they can’t, then they are out. Some topics are simply not up for discussion. When someone attempts to drag me into unnecessary drama or competitive narratives, I redirect with surgical precision. My mental bandwidth is a limited, precious resource—and I allocate it like the strategic asset it is. I curate my social circle like a professional art curator. Each relationship is intentional. Each interaction is an opportunity for mutual growth, inspiration, or strategic exchange. The result? A support system that doesn’t just exist, but actively contributes to my evolutionary trajectory.
Cognitive Preservation Strategies
Let’s talk brain maintenance—because your mind is not a passive recipient, but an active ecosystem you can strategically cultivate. You either rot your brain or you grow your brain. In the age of infinite scrolling and algorithmic rabbit holes, most people’s brains are slowly being eroded. Not mine. I’ve weaponised my ADHD brain’s love of novelty into a sophisticated learning machine. Take social media. Most see it as a mindless consumption platform. I see it as my personal learning laboratory. My algorithm isn’t an accident—it’s meticulously engineered. For every three phone touches, one goes to Duolingo, expanding my linguistic neural pathway, or to a book.. Another might dive into a scientific research thread, or improve my photography and writing skills. Neuroscience is clear: cognitive flexibility isn’t about consuming information, but creating meaningful neural connections. Shane Parrish’s work on adaptive learning emphasises that true intelligence isn’t about accumulation, but the capacity to critically think and strategically unlearn.
My travels are cognitive cross-training. Each new environment, each unfamiliar language interaction, creates what neuroscientists call “cognitive reserve”—essentially, building neurological backup systems that protect against cognitive decline. In 2023, I went to Paris for the first time in ten years, excited to test out my new French skills. Exhausted, I made a ton of mistakes, but after a baptism-of-fire having to converse with an art dealer in French the next day, my engine started revving. The point being, it’s about navigating what my younger self would have seen as failures, laughing at them, and growing resilient. The main failure is not being able to speak! In the same way, I took two trips in 2024 speaking 90% Spanish and Italian the whole time.
Art isn’t a luxury. For me, it’s a deliberate brain-growth strategy. Whether it’s analysing a painting’s composition or experimenting with photography, I’m creating new neural pathways, maintaining neuroplasticity. The goal isn’t just to prevent cognitive decline. It’s to create an environment where my brain doesn’t just survive, but thrives. Where learning becomes as natural as breathing, and curiosity is my primary operating system.
Physical Training
My approach to physical training isn’t about aesthetic perfection—it’s strategic human optimisation. Socially-flexible intermittent fasting, which I’ve practiced since 2018, isn’t just a dietary hack. For my ADHD brain, it’s a critical boundary-setting mechanism. “Time’s up for today,” becomes my internal reset button, managing an appetite that once felt uncontrollable. This way, I can fast from 13 to 95 hours.
My training philosophy? Injury prevention over intensity. This means carefully-calibrated weight training, Barry’s bootcamps, running, and biking—each activity chosen not for immediate gratification, but long-term physiological resilience. In 2024, I even completed a 5-day Camino rucking pilgrimage in Spain, something I’d wanted to do exactly half my life ago, but never imagined I’d have the strength to.
With ADHD, consistency has always been my challenge. So I’ve designed a system that works with my neurology, not against it. Structured variety prevents boredom. Precise tracking provides dopamine hits. Each workout becomes a small victory in neurological self-management.
And so, biking 1200+ kilometers in 2024 wasn't about proving anything. It was about proving something to myself—that my body, once a site of chronic limitation, could become a powerful instrument of performance.
The scientific literature is clear: diverse, consistent movement isn’t just physical exercise. It’s neural maintenance. Every rep, every mile is a conversation with my cellular potential.
Takeaway
I grew up watching my grandparents deteriorate, believing decline was inevitable. Then in 2024, I watched people from my parents’ generation lose their strength and health prematurely and irreversibly—not to age, but to neglect. I finally feel at peace that I wasn’t just being frivolous embarking on my own journey.
Healthspan isn’t about following another wellness protocol, where chasing metrics and checklists everyday exhausts you instead, when you’re buying yet another supplement because a content creator has to keep pushing out new ones. It’s about becoming the architect of your own potential. In an era obsessed with quick fixes and performative self-optimisation, let’s focus on strategic, sustainable transformation.
Your professional excellence and personal vitality aren’t separate domains—they’re interconnected ecosystems. When you optimise your physical resilience, your cognitive flexibility expands. When you curate relationships that inspire, your leadership becomes more authentic. When you understand that having a life isn’t a distraction from success but the very foundation of it, you unlock a form of performance most people can’t even imagine. Because in the age of AI and disruption, you have to master yourself, down to your energy.
Most leaders plateau because they’re chasing external metrics, not understanding their internal operating system. They accumulate protocols without integration. They sacrifice joy for productivity. They forget that true high performance isn’t about working harder, but working smarter—with your entire being. It’s about being both cyborg and human.
Instead of band aid solutions, why not comprehensively redesign your human potential. Whether you’re an Olympian, a CEO, or someone standing at a personal crossroads, your body is your most sophisticated technology. And like any advanced system, it requires nuanced, intelligent maintenance.
If you’re ready to stop managing your potential and start mastering it—if you want to create a life where peak performance and profound joy aren’t mutually exclusive– let’s talk. Your next chapter isn’t about another program. It’s about becoming the most integrated, powerful version of yourself. Book your complimentary Strategic Session here.