When Life Gets Stormy, Go Simple
Finding calm in the chaos through tiny daily habits ☔️
The last few months have felt like one long wave hitting after another. Job upheaval. A chaotic US market. The pressure of figuring out next steps while trying to keep income steady. Blending a family and building a new home rhythm. Coparenting three boys with different needs. And the financial stress that sits under all of it when work feels uncertain.
It’s the kind of stretch that makes you feel like you’re standing in the ocean while the tide keeps rising. You’re trying to hold your footing, but the water keeps knocking you sideways.
And I’ll be honest — I slipped into some old patterns at first. Distraction. Protecting myself. Trying to solve everything in one big swing. It never works. It just adds more noise.
What actually works is going simple.
That was the heart of Simple Fun Health when I launched the blog in 2020. When life gets unstable, you go back to tiny habits that keep your head above water. You don’t add more complexity. You strip it away.
Here’s how I’m handling the storm right now.
1. Keep the habits small on purpose
Storms drain energy. You won’t have the bandwidth for big routines or perfect discipline. So you keep things tiny.
A five-minute walk.
A slow breath.
A glass of water.
One decent meal instead of none.
Ten minutes off your phone.
Thirty seconds of cold at the end of the shower.
Small habits feel almost too simple, but they’re exactly what give you stability. They’re anchors when everything else moves.
2. Use resets instead of escapes
Escapes feel good in the moment but leave you worse off. Resets help your body settle so you can think clearly again.
There’s good science behind this. Short controlled breathing or brief cold exposure moves your body out of a stress response by lowering sympathetic activity and raising vagal tone. Andrew Huberman cites research from Stanford and USC showing that even one slow exhale calms the amygdala and reduces immediate stress.
For me, the most reliable reset has been contrast therapy. Heat, cold, heat. It cuts through the noise. But resets don’t need gear or time.
Step outside.
Sit down.
Close your eyes for a minute.
Stretch your back.
Drink water slowly.
You’re giving your body a clear cue that it’s safe.
3. Don’t try to “solve” the storm
Storms come and go. You don’t control the timing. Your job is to stay steady until it passes.
This means:
don’t chase big solutions
don’t overhaul your life
don’t judge yourself
don’t expect clean thinking when you’re overloaded
Your nervous system is doing its job. When stress spikes, your brain shifts into fast pathways — cortisol, adrenaline, threat-scanning. Lisa Feldman Barrett’s work shows this is normal physiology, not a character flaw.
Small habits help your prefrontal cortex come back online so you can regulate instead of react.
4. Focus on the one or two habits you can do every day
Simple Fun Health has always been about the basics. When life feels big, you shrink the plan.
For me, the non-negotiables have been:
move a little
breathe on purpose
eat something real
pause before reacting
There’s evidence for all of this. Short bursts of movement increase dopamine and improve mood. Slow breathing reduces heart-rate variability swings tied to stress. Real food keeps blood sugar steady, which keeps your behavior steady. These aren’t hacks. They’re just physiology doing what it’s built to do.
When I stick to these, even on rough days, I stay more grounded. Not perfect. Just steady enough.
5. Remember you’re not broken — you’re just overloaded
Your body is responding to a lot of input at once. That’s all. You don’t have to fix the whole picture right now. You just have to stay with yourself long enough to ride the wave.
The bigger picture
Simple Fun Health has always been about the basics: small steps, daily choices, no overwhelm.
And now everything is coming together under one direction.
Athletic and Aware is the next version of this blog and the bigger vision behind it. Same simplicity. Same honest approach. More alignment with how I live, coach, parent, and navigate life.
New things coming.
New tools.
New stories.
A clearer path for anyone trying to stay steady in their own storm.
Simple. Fun. Healthy.
And now, a little more aware.