Try This: 🧠4 Big Shares for Your Week

Today, I have a fun share plus some practical, everyday tips! 

We’re talking about the easy hack I’ve been using every morning to get more fiber, a critical and overlooked way to help prevent dementia, a major tip for anyone concerned about hearing loss, and how much you actually need to exercise to experience benefits. 

Let’s get into it!

Number 1: 🍳 What I’ve Been Eating for Breakfast

Try This community, if you’ve been following along, you might have noticed that I’ve been talking about fiber a lot lately. 

One way that I’ve been making sure to get a good amount of fiber in the morning, even when I don’t have a ton of time, is with these crackers: 

They’re called Kraut Krackers (I have no affiliation with this company; I just genuinely love these). Each bag has 24 grams of fiber and no sugars, seed oils, gluten, or junk. It’s literally cabbage, beets, Himalayan salt, and flax. I usually add a little bit of Primal Kitchen mayo and some sauerkraut and kimchi in addition to whatever else I’m eating—eggs, sausage, etc. Easy and delicious. 

Just a reminder, you don't need to buy any fancy products to get a good amount of fiber in your diet. If you wanted to shoot for 30–35 grams of fiber in a day, it can be as simple as the following:

• 1 avocado (10 g)

• 2 kiwis (4 g) 

• 1 pear (6 g)

• 2 cups of cooked broccoli (10 g)

• 1 cup of carrots (3.5 g)

• 1 tablespoon of psyllium husk (5 g) (optional)

Side note: I was a raw foodist for almost six years (it was wild—trust me, I know!), and I ate a ton of fiber. But then I drastically lowered my fiber intake for a while because I thought it was contributing to some digestive woes. Now, after a lot of trial and error, I know that fiber is absolutely key for maintaining a healthy gut microbiome and heart, and I have thankfully hopped back on the fiber train over the last few years. 

But timing is everything for me, so here’s what I learned through my own personal experimentation:

1. I feel best when I eat a good amount of fiber in the morning.

2. I sleep poorly when I eat too much fiber at night (my digestion is working overtime while I’m trying to sleep).

One thing every gut expert has talked about on my podcast is how important it is to:

1. Ramp up your fiber slowly, especially if you haven't been eating a lot recently, and

2. Personalize the fiber that actually works for you. 

Hopefully, sharing my personal experimentation has inspired you to experiment with your own diet.

Number 2: 🧠 An Overlooked Way to Prevent Dementia

Last week, I shared some of the healthy habits we’ve been implementing in my parents’ lives as they get older. One of the most important things for them has been continuing to have a strong purpose in life, even after retirement—time with grandkids, volunteering, hosting friends, walking groups, and more.

A brand-new study dug into the data around purpose in life (PiL) using 13,700 adults tracked for around eight years. And it turns out, purpose protects your brain.

Here’s what they saw: 13 percent of participants developed cognitive decline during follow-up. Those with greater life purpose were significantly less likely to develop cognitive decline (about a 28 percent lower risk), and the onset of impairment came later in people with stronger purpose, too.

In other words, purpose didn’t just lower odds; it seemed to push back the clock on when decline might begin. And, even those with a higher genetic risk for developing dementia experienced benefits from PiL! 

And here’s the deal: purpose in life doesn’t just mean career aspirations. It could mean artistic endeavors, a passion for cooking, reading, spending time with family and friends, knitting, yoga, biking, hosting events, and the list goes on. Find what you love, and do it. 

These joyful practices may have ripple effects on your mental resilience years down the line.

Number 3: 🎧 Do You Use Headphones? Listen up!

Here’s a fact: extended exposure to loud sound is a major cause of hearing loss, and hearing loss can also increase your risk of dementia.

And it turns out, many younger people are damaging their ears without even realizing it, especially by blasting music through headphones.

In this clip from Andrew Huberman’s podcast, Dr. Konstantina Stankovic, the Otolaryngology Chair at the Stanford University School of Medicine, shares a critical tip for anyone who listens to music using headphones: if the people around you can hear your music, podcast, etc., through your headphones, it’s too loud.

So what’s “safe”? This article from American Hearing & Balance breaks it down: 

• For adults, listen for no more than 40 hours per week and keep the volume under 80 dB.

• For teens or younger people, stick to 75 dB or lower.

To put that in perspective, 80 dB is roughly the sound of a running dishwasher or garbage disposal. Past that point, prolonged listening starts to risk damage.

Here’s the tricky part: most devices don’t display volume in decibels. That’s where noise‑monitoring apps become your friend. Free apps can read out dB levels in real time so you can dial them in. The Apple Watch and iPhone can both notify you if you’re in a very loud environment or if your volume is too high.

Here’s an article on how to set up your iPhone to protect you from noise that could contribute to hearing loss.

Does anyone in your life listen to things way too loud? Send this to them!

Number 4: 🏋️‍♂️ The Power of 15 Minutes of Exercise

What if I told you that moving just a little bit each day (maybe much less than you’ve been told) can make a big difference? That’s exactly what this landmark study from The Lancet found.

Researchers followed over 400,000 people for about eight years, comparing mortality rates across different levels of physical activity. Strikingly, those who did 15 minutes of moderate exercise a day (around 92 minutes per week) had a 14 percent lower risk of death (!) than those who didn’t move at all. In the words of Brandon Luu, MD (he wrote about this study here), “To put that in perspective: This is better than any other longevity medication or supplement, with minimal side effects and no prescription needed.”

Also, it seemed the first 15 minutes offered the most benefits. Every extra 15 minutes beyond that initial dose lowered the risk by another 4 percent, but nothing was as steep as the 14 percent lower risk within that first quarter hour.

So, what does that tell you? “Exercise” doesn’t have to be hours at the gym every day. Even 20–30 minutes of activity a day, 5–6 days a week, could have a massive impact on your health. 

That’s it for now. 

See you next week, 

Dhru Purohit