@questforhealth The only thing I miss about a low metabolism is not having to eat so damn much all the time. Life was simpler. I've just started feeling like a super fast well-oiled high energy machine. On a scale of 1 to 10, if my metabolism was at 1 or 2 before I started peating, it's at a 4 or 5 after a year and I already feel indescribably better. I'm wondering how much better it can really get. Can it reach Jacob Collier levels? Let's see!

@BeamsOfEnergy I don't think things can be looked at in isolation like that. I doubt a person with a failing energy metabolism, unable to converse with good energy, would be good at programming uniquely. Programming is after-all just talking to a computer in a language the computer understands. Might be reductionist but if you're good at a spoken language, you're likely good at programming too.

John Carmack is another example of a high-output programmer who has a high metabolism too fueled by 9 cokes a day.

Consumption vs creation seems to be the main distinction causing the low energy metabolism in my opinion. Excessive consumption leads to high serotonin I think which starts the cascade of hibernation vs creation being a dopaminergic activity. If computers are a bicycle for the mind, then they essentially act as a force multiplier for your habits.

In my health journey, I've gone from being unable to do mental work for 5 minutes without a stress reaction to being able to work 2 hours at a stretch before needing a snack. I think working on a computer (coding, making music, designing etc) is really energy intensive. Combined with poor nutrition it just completely obliterates a person's health.

@insufferable Mindset definitely has a big impact on perceived energy levels. Which E-Ink monitor do you use? Is it good enough to replace an LED one?

Not sure if I philosophically agree with the effect on blue light from screens causing such a big problem. I can think of examples of programmers who spend north of 10 hours a day in front of a screen and have pretty high dopaminergic metabolisms. Taking George Hotz as an example – he has really long live streams doing complex high energy requirement work with little to no perceptive difference in energy which I find amazing.

It's probably one of those things that affects everyone at a different level and may be worth a try for me too.

@questforhealth Thanks for sharing. How long have you been doing these?

Who here has truly gone from a sloth-like metabolism to a constantly-neuron-firing-dopaminergic-child metabolism? Is it realistic to expect to go from a Lex Fridmanesque taking 10 seconds to think of a word and speaking in a monotone boring low-energy way to a Jacob Collieresque creative infinity syndrome always looking like he just got struck by lightning type metabolic energy?

What’s your take on love handles — why are some more prone to them and what can one do to eliminate them?