Stop Calling Yourself Old: #110

Episode 111 A red-light panel that never worked left Alan with a question: how different is it from an infrared sauna? In this episode of Busy Pro Fast Wellness, Alan puts that question to Phillip Wilson, who represents Relax Saunas. Phillip shows a portable sauna that Alan initially mistakes for a covered armchair, describes why some users compare the experience to being wrapped in a warm cocoon, and explains what he looks for when comparing infrared devices. Alan asks what we can realistically expect and how some of the bigger claims, including “detox”, are measured. Find Phillip and Relax Sauna Website · Portable sauna details YouTube · Instagram · Facebook · X Research and further reading Taiwanese infrared lamp comparison — The 2004 conference paper Phillip refers to. The human portion measured local skin blood flow in four volunteers. Finnish sauna use and cardiovascular outcomes — A long-term observational study of traditional sauna use. Traditional sauna, far-infrared sauna and hot-water immersion compared — A small study of short-term responses to three types of heat exposure. Infrared sauna and exercise recovery — A small study of post-workout soreness and performance in 16 basketball players. Connect with Alan J Welch For coaching, speaking enquiries and more Busy Pro Fast Wellness episodes: alanjwelch.com

Does “I’m getting old” describe a reality - or become a reason to stop trying? In this episode of Busy Pro Fast Wellness, Alan J Welch speaks with optometrist and author Dr. James Beckwith about ageing, everyday habits and the choices that help people keep moving forward. Drawing on decades of patient conversations and his book, Positively Not Old: Mindset and Longevity Habits for Aging Well, James explores how small actions can create an “upward spiral”: action improves outlook, which encourages further action. The conversation covers: How to adapt activities with age while remaining open to new experiences. Why health deserves space in the calendar alongside work commitments. How preparing the night before makes a morning routine easier. How familiar routines can reduce everyday decisions and free mental space. Why taking a small step matters more than waiting for the perfect moment. How to modify an activity when energy or motivation is low. James also shares a patient’s turning point, his first experience of pickleball at 64, and the advice his mother gave him when eight years of study seemed daunting: “The time is going to pass anyway. You might as well do something worthwhile with your life.” A practical conversation about staying curious, building momentum and continuing to find purpose as the years pass. Connect with Dr. James Beckwith Website: drjbeckwith.com Book — Positively Not Old: Book details and purchasing link LinkedIn: Dr. James Beckwith Contact and speaking enquiries: Contact James Connect with Alan J Welch For coaching, speaking enquiries and more Busy Pro Fast Wellness episodes: alanjwelch.com

What keeps healthy intentions going when motivation fades and life gets busy? In this episode of Busy Pro Fast Wellness, Alan J Welch talks with Mike Capuzzi, author of Resilience Rituals and host of Unstoppable After 50, about making everyday health practices a meaningful part of life. Both having turned sixty this year, Alan and Mike explore what it means to stay strong and capable as they age. Mike explains his distinction between habits and rituals, including how his daily walking shifted from chasing a step count to caring for his long-term health. He shares the three practices he values most: daily walking, attention to exercise intensity and consistent strength training. The conversation also covers preparing for travel, adapting expectations and keeping going without demanding perfection. Listeners will hear: How Mike connects healthy actions with identity and purpose. • Why he prioritises walking, exercise intensity and strength training. • How he prepares to maintain his routines away from home. • What “unstoppable after 50” means in everyday life. • Where gratitude and continued learning fit into his approach. Mike’s book, Resilience Rituals, brings together 50 practices he has used in his own life, presented in short, accessible entries. Alan found the approach valuable enough to buy several copies for friends and family. A practical takeaway: choose one useful action, connect it with something you want to remain capable of doing, and plan how it could fit into your everyday life. Explore Mike’s podcast and find links to his books: https://unstoppableafter50.com Discover more from Alan J Welch: https://alanjwelch.com

What keeps healthy intentions going when motivation fades and life gets busy? In this episode of Busy Pro Fast Wellness, Alan J Welch talks with Mike Capuzzi, author of Resilience Rituals and host of Unstoppable After 50, about making everyday health practices a meaningful part of life. Both having turned sixty this year, Alan and Mike explore what it means to stay strong and capable as they age. Mike explains his distinction between habits and rituals, including how his daily walking shifted from chasing a step count to caring for his long-term health. He shares the three practices he values most: daily walking, attention to exercise intensity and consistent strength training. The conversation also covers preparing for travel, adapting expectations and keeping going without demanding perfection. Listeners will hear: • How Mike connects healthy actions with identity and purpose. • Why he prioritises walking, exercise intensity and strength training. • How he prepares to maintain his routines away from home. • What “unstoppable after 50” means in everyday life. • Where gratitude and continued learning fit into his approach. Mike’s book, Resilience Rituals, brings together 50 practices he has used in his own life, presented in short, accessible entries. Alan found the approach valuable enough to buy several copies for friends and family. A practical takeaway: choose one useful action, connect it with something you want to remain capable of doing, and plan how it could fit into your everyday life. Explore Mike’s podcast and find links to his books: https://unstoppableafter50.com Discover more from Alan J Welch: https://alanjwelch.com

When life gets overwhelming, our first instinct is often to add something: a new routine, another app, an ambitious workout plan. But what if adding more is making it harder to look after yourself? In this short solo episode of Busy Pro Fast Wellness, Alan explores why we so often reach for more, and how removing a little friction can help us build healthy habits that survive a messy, unpredictable working week. He also shares a simple change that helped him stop skipping his afternoon breaks. It didn’t involve more discipline. It involved making it easier to get out of the door. In this episode: Why “addition bias” can turn wellness into another demand on your time. How hidden steps and decisions get between you and healthy choices. Three practical ways to simplify: subtract choice, subtract distance, and subtract digital drag. Why a small action you can repeat beats an elaborate routine you struggle to maintain. Your Busy Pro Challenge Choose one habit you’ve been struggling to keep up with. Identify one point of friction standing between you and that action—and remove it today. Put the shoes by the door. Leave a filled glass on your desk. Make the first step smaller. Shrink the effort. Remove the barrier. Keep the momentum alive. If this episode resonates, subscribe to the show, leave a rating or review, and share it with someone who’s trying to squeeze one more thing into an already overflowing day. Restart. Simplify. Sustain. — Connect with Alan J. Welch Executive Performance Coach and host of Busy Pro Fast Wellness. Helping busy professionals find clearer direction, a calmer presence, and better strategic communication. Explore coaching, speaking, and more episodes: www.alanjwelch.com

Why You Keep Saying Yes When You’re Already Overloaded | Dr. Alena Čandová Knowing you need better boundaries doesn’t always make it easier to set them. Why does a late-night message feel impossible to ignore? And why do good intentions disappear when the working week gets hectic? In this episode of Busy Pro Fast Wellness, Alan speaks with Dr. Alena Čandová, a Doctor of Chiropractic, neuro-coach and author of Grace Over Grit: The Neuroscience of Claiming Your Inner Authority. Alena shares her perspective on how learned protective patterns can influence everyday decisions, from replying immediately to emails to accepting work you haven’t got time for. The conversation explores how curiosity and self-compassion can help create space for a different response. She also recounts a revealing experience at a silent retreat in Bali, where extending compassion towards herself proved unexpectedly difficult, and explains why a powerful realisation doesn’t automatically become lasting change. Listeners will hear about: Recognising the urgency behind an automatic “yes”. Using “Let me check my calendar and get back to you” to create breathing room. Noticing physical tension before reacting. Preparing for a difficult meeting without needing to feel completely calm. Recognising small signs of progress and responding constructively to setbacks. One question to take into the week: “If I say yes to this, what am I saying no to?” Explore Alena’s work and her book, Grace Over Grit: https://www.sattvaintegralhealth.com/ Find out more about Alan J. Welch, his coaching and speaking: https://alanjwelch.com/

What if the secret to lasting wellbeing isn't doing more, but making it easier to keep going? In this special edition of Busy Pro Fast Wellness, host Alan J. Welch revisits three memorable conversations that helped shape one of the podcast's central philosophies: sustainable progress doesn't have to be complicated. Featuring insights from Dr. Andrew Fix, Scott Lynch and Joe Rodonis, this episode brings together practical perspectives on restarting after setbacks, reducing unnecessary complexity and building routines that survive the demands of everyday life. Dr. Andrew Fix explores why consistency doesn't mean perfection. When a healthy routine slips, the most important skill may be knowing how to restart without turning a temporary setback into a permanent stop. Scott Lynch challenges the tendency to wait for ideal conditions before taking action. From accepting imperfect effort to recognising the importance of recovery, he makes a compelling case for simplifying our approach to performance and wellbeing. Joe Rodonis brings the conversation back to sustainable habits. By choosing movement we genuinely enjoy and building it into familiar daily routines, we make consistency less dependent on motivation and willpower. Together, these three voices reinforce a powerful message: the best system isn't necessarily the most sophisticated. It's the one you can return to, repeat and sustain. In This Episode Why restarting matters more than maintaining a perfect streak How short walks and small actions can rebuild momentum Why waiting for ideal conditions often prevents progress The value of doing something at 70% rather than nothing at all How simplicity improves execution and reduces mental friction Why recovery deserves a place in any sustainable performance strategy How enjoyable movement and everyday routines support lasting consistency Three Ideas to Take Away Restart. A missed day doesn't erase your progress. Make the next positive action small enough to begin immediately. Simplify. Reduce the number of decisions, expectations and unnecessary obstacles standing between you and action. Sustain. Build habits around activities you enjoy and routines that already fit your life. A Final Thought Busy professionals rarely need another elaborate system to manage. Often, they need permission to make things simpler. This episode is a reminder that progress isn't built through occasional bursts of perfection. It's built through the ordinary actions we're willing and able to repeat. Restart. Simplify. Sustain. Three voices. One philosophy. Busy Pro Fast Wellness explores practical ways to improve wellbeing, performance and everyday life without adding unnecessary complexity. Connect with the Guests Dr. Andrew Fix Physio Room: https://physioroomco.com The Code Podcast: https://physioroomco.com/podcast/ Scott Lynch Podcast archive: Listen to The Motivated Mind on Spotify Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/motivatedscott   Joe Rodonis Website: https://www.rodonistraining.com The Standard / Athlete's Pursuit: https://www.rodonistraining.com/thestandard Connect with Alan J. Welch Website: https://alanjwelch.com  

Most people already know that sleep, movement, nutrition and recovery matter. Why, then, do healthy intentions so often disappear when life becomes difficult? In this episode of Busy Pro Fast Wellness, Alan speaks with Oscar Trelles, author of the forthcoming book The Human OS Manual: Why Self-Improvement Fails When You Ignore the System Underneath. After spending years diagnosing problems within businesses and technological systems, Oscar began recognising similar patterns in his own life. Despite considerable professional success, his health and relationships were suffering. He realised that he had been treating sleep, exercise, nutrition, stress and recovery as separate concerns when they were all influencing one another. Oscar explains why lasting change requires more than information or discipline. Our working environment, daily pressures, energy levels and relationships all shape which behaviours feel possible. Instead of expecting perfect consistency, he advocates creating smaller, adaptable versions of healthy habits that can survive travel, exhaustion and demanding weeks. Alan and Oscar also explore personal responsibility, recovery as essential infrastructure, the effect a leader’s stress can have on an entire team, and the value of stepping into “observer mode” before reacting. Oscar also shares the personal experience that prompted him to stop smoking and begin rebuilding his health, along with some refreshingly straightforward wellbeing practices involving walking, breathing and working with his natural energy patterns. Topics discussed include: Why knowledge alone rarely produces lasting behaviour change Looking beneath a habit to understand the conditions producing it Why recovery should not be treated as a reward for productivity Creating a minimum viable version of a healthy routine How personal stress changes other people’s working environment Using self-awareness to create space between stimulus and response Why healthy routines must be able to bend without disappearing Find Oscar Trelles The Human OS Manual: thehumanosmanual.com/book Oscar’s website: oscartrelles.com Breathing Flame: breathingflame.com Instagram: @oscartrelles LinkedIn: Oscar Trelles The Human OS Manual is scheduled for publication on 15 October 2026 and is currently available to preorder.

Don't Quit. Shrink It. What happens to your healthy habits when life gets messy? Staying consistent is relatively easy when you've slept well, work is under control and everything goes according to plan. The real test comes during the bad week: when you're tired, travelling, overloaded or simply short of time. In this solo episode of Busy Pro Fast Wellness, Alan explores a simple alternative to the all-or-nothing approach: Don't quit. Shrink it. If you can't manage the full workout, do a shorter one. If your six-minute morning routine won't fit, do one minute. If the ideal option isn't available, find the smallest useful version that is. The aim isn't perfection. It's maintaining your relationship with the habit so that it can bend without disappearing. Alan also introduces an idea from Oscar Trelles' forthcoming book, The Human OS Manual, which explores how health, behaviour, recovery and wellbeing operate as parts of one interconnected system. Oscar joins Alan on next week's episode for a deeper conversation about why knowing what's good for us often isn't enough to make healthy changes stick. This week's Busy Pro challenge: Choose one thing you regularly do for your wellbeing and decide what its smallest useful version looks like. Because when life gets busy, you don't always need to start again. Don't quit. Shrink it. 🎙️ Busy Pro Fast Wellness Fast, practical wellness for busy professionals who want more energy, presence and clarity in less time. alanjwelch.com

What happens when the circumstances someone is born into seem determined to limit their future? Dr. Seyed Nourashrafeddin grew up in northern Iran as one of nine siblings, surrounded by poverty, war and family hardship. His father struggled with addiction, Seyed began working as a child to help support his family, and he was far from being a natural academic success. Yet a small gift from his school, the encouragement of his grandfather and a growing belief that his future could be different helped set him on another path. In this deeply personal conversation, Seyed shares how persistence and education eventually took him from struggling at school to becoming a scientist in molecular medicine. He recounts some extraordinary moments along the way: working as a child, the sacrifices his family made for his education, overcoming setbacks, losing around 30 kilograms after setting himself a very visible goal, and eventually building a new life in Pittsburgh. Seyed's story isn't simply about overcoming adversity. It's about refusing to allow circumstances to determine what comes next. In this episode The conversation explores childhood adversity and the people who shaped Seyed's outlook; why persistence mattered more to him than natural ability; education as a route towards a different future; the power of setting a clear goal and continuing when progress is difficult; starting again in the United States and the significance of becoming a father; and why Seyed now believes that achievement means very little unless it is also used to help others. About Seyed Dr. Seyed Nourashrafeddin is a scientist in molecular medicine and the author of In Search of Rain, From Motel Qu to Pittsburgh: A Memoir for Everyone. His memoir traces his journey from childhood hardship in Iran through education and scientific research to a new life in the United States. Find Seyed & the book Seyed's official website About the book / official book page Seyed Nourashrafeddin on LinkedIn Publisher's book page — Archway Publishing Apple Books edition Google Play Books edition Book: In Search of Rain, From Motel Qu to Pittsburgh: A Memoir for Everyone The book is available in paperback and ebook formats through major online booksellers, including Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Apple Books and Google Play Books. LinkedIn: Seyed Nourashrafeddin A Busy Pro takeaway Being the smartest person in the room isn't always what matters, and perfect circumstances aren't a prerequisite for progress. Persistence, a clear sense of direction and a willingness to keep learning can sometimes be enough to completely change the trajectory of a life.