Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• The misleading “evening light” study

• An unexpected way to improve sleep quality

• The missing piece of GLP-1 muscle loss

• Why your program isn’t working for you

Beyond The Headline 
The Scary Headline About Your Vision Has Nothing To Do With Screen Time

A headline warning that nighttime light could damage your eyes might make you look suspiciously at the phone in your hand.

But the researchers never measured screen time. They measured brightness levels that might be higher than you have at home. 

In the study, more than 82,000 adults wore wrist monitors equipped with light sensors for one week. The researchers then tracked their medical records for nearly eight years, looking for diagnoses of cataracts, age-related macular degeneration, and glaucoma.

The association appeared only among people exposed to unusually bright light between 8:00 and 11:30 at night. But here’s the little detail that caught our attention: their wrist monitors recorded an average of more than 1,000 lux, placing them in the brightest 10 percent of participants.

For perspective, typical residential lighting ranges from 100 to 500 lux. One thousand lux is closer to the illumination you might encounter in a brightly lit workplace or in other settings designed for highly detailed tasks.

Compared with people in the dimmest half of the study, those exposed to the brightest evening light had a 31 percent higher relative risk of macular degeneration and an 18 percent higher risk of cataracts. They also had a higher risk of primary open-angle glaucoma, although the association disappeared when researchers considered all forms of glaucoma together.

Those percentages sound alarming, but they are nowhere near as bad as they seem. For every 100 people in this study, about 1.2 suffered from eye disease over those eight years. The 31% increased risk means it affects 1.6 people out of 100. 

So, in practical terms, even at those high levels, you're looking at not even one additional person at higher risk.

This was an observational study. The researchers found that extreme evening brightness and certain eye diseases appeared together, but they could not establish that one produced the other. Light exposure was also measured during a single week and treated as a reflection of people’s habits over the next eight years.

Reverse causation is another possibility. Cataracts accounted for roughly 9 out of every 10 eye disease cases recorded in the study, and they develop gradually over years before diagnosis. 

Someone whose vision is already becoming cloudy might use brighter lighting to read or move around comfortably. In that case, the brighter room could be a response to declining vision rather than its cause.

And to the original point, which some headlines claimed: none of this tells us whether phones, televisions, or computers damage your eyes. The wrist monitor recorded total ambient brightness. It did not track screen use, identify the source of the light, measure specific wavelengths, or determine how much light reached the eyes.

The study raises a fair question about prolonged exposure to extremely bright environments at night. It does not show that ordinary screen use is destroying your vision.

Even if it’s not a threat to your eyes, there is a good reason to dim the lights at night: Bright light close to bedtime can interfere with the biological signals that help your body prepare for sleep. Turning down overhead lights or using a dimmer lamp can make winding down easier.

Together With Momentous
The Nutrition Addition That Helps You Sleep Better

You can do everything right before bed and still overlook something that happened hours earlier: what you ate.

New research suggests the fiber on your plate could subtly influence what happens while you sleep.

Scientists analyzed sleep data from more than 3,500 adults. On days when people ate more fiber relative to their total calories, they spent slightly more time in deep and REM sleep and had a lower heart rate while sleeping.

We’re not talking about hours of deeper sleep. It’s minutes, but this is another signal that matches other research suggesting that people who eat more fiber also do more of the things that support better health and sleep. 

People who eat more fiber tend to also exercise more, drink less alcohol, or have other habits that support better sleep. That means, fiber is worthy of some of the credit, but not all of it. 

Interestingly, the percentage of calories coming from protein, carbohydrates, or fat wasn’t strongly associated with sleep. That suggests food quality might matter more than obsessing over the perfect macro split.

If you need help eating more fiber, focus on beans, lentils, berries, oats, whole grains, vegetables, nuts, and seeds. 

Two extra minutes of deep sleep isn’t a reason to buy a fiber supplement. But consistently falling short on fiber might be.

That’s why we created Fiber+ with Momentous. It provides three different sources of fiber, providing six grams you can stir into your beverage of choice. It’s also NSF Certified for Sport, which means what’s on the label is what’s in the product, and there are no dangerous levels of heavy metals.

Fiber+ is a practical way to consistently get enough fiber without rebuilding your entire diet.

As an APC reader, you get up to 35% off with code PUMPCLUB at checkout.

No grand ritual. No promise that you’ll feel something immediately. Just six more grams of something your body needs, without any thinking or prep.

On Our Radar
The Missing Piece Of GLP-1 Muscle Loss

You might have heard that GLP-1 drugs melt away muscle faster than ordinary weight loss. But the body composition data tell a different story.

When researchers analyzed 22 randomized trials, people taking GLP-1 medications did lose some lean mass. But the amount was similar to what typically occurs when people lose a significant amount of weight.

And lean mass isn’t synonymous with muscle. It also includes water, organs, bones, and other non-fat tissue.

In other words, GLP-1s don’t appear to target your muscles. But losing a lot of weight can still cost you muscle if you don’t give your body a reason to keep it.

That reason is resistance training and adequate protein.

In a one-year randomized trial, people who exercised while taking a GLP-1 gained lean mass and lost more body fat than those who took the medication without exercising.

If you use a GLP-1 or are considering it, new research suggests that your weight loss might trick you into giving your body less activity than you need. 

Scientists examined fitness-tracker data from 753 adults before and after they started a GLP-1. Despite losing weight, their average daily steps dropped by 560, while moderate-to-vigorous activity dropped as well.

The medication can make eating less easier. It does not make exercise optional.

If you’re taking a GLP-1, lifting weights, eating enough protein, and staying active can help ensure that more of the weight you lose comes from fat, not muscle.

Better Questions, Better Solutions
Have You Been Looking For The Wrong Type Of Program?

Someone you trust swears by a program. Maybe it’s the person at the gym who finally got lean. Or the coach with a sales page full of transformations.

So you start Monday feeling motivated, inspired, and ready to succeed. Then, 11 days later, a work trip collides with a sick kid, the whole routine falls apart, and you reach the conclusion that feels most obvious: What’s wrong with me?

The old question: What’s the best diet, workout, or routine?
The better question: What’s the best version for my body, my schedule, goals, and history?

The old question assumes there’s one perfect answer waiting to be found, and your job is to follow it without slipping. So you choose the program with the strongest testimonials or the fastest promised results.

But then the program designed for someone with two free hours, predictable weekends, and no travel runs into your actual Tuesday.

And when it breaks, you blame your willpower instead of questioning the fit.

A great program you can’t maintain will always lose to a good program you can.

This is where “it depends” stops sounding like a cop-out and starts looking like the truth.

In one study, researchers put participants through the same supervised 20-week endurance program. On average, aerobic fitness improved, but the average hid an enormous range.

Some people barely got better, while others saw an increase of more than 40 percent. Researchers estimated that genetics explained about half of the differences in how people responded, with similar results appearing within families.

It’s easy to see what happened but worth repeating: Same workouts. Same supervision. Same timeline. Very different results.

And biology is only part of the equation. Your sleep matters. Your job matters. Your relationship with food matters. So does the week you’re actually walking into.

Before committing to a new plan, make sure you choose one that allows you to stay consistent. That’s the first step. 

Then, identify the two hardest days in your upcoming week. Design those days first, so you have a plan, even if the plan is that you won’t be going to the gym on those days.

If the plan can survive your worst days, it will handle the easy ones. Because when you build around the life you have, success no longer depends on everything going right.

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to edit and review our interpretations of the research, ensuring scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• Why high blood pressure sneaks up on you

• Eliminate your financial blind spots

• The flaw of “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger”

• Do this during the day, sleep better at night

• How to fix menopausal bloating

Health
Don’t Let Your Blood Pressure Sneak Up On You

Ask the average person how they'd know if their blood pressure was fine, and a lot of them say the same thing: I feel calm. I'm not stressed. I'd be able to tell. 

Surveys find that belief is one of the most common and most costly misreads in health.

High blood pressure is a health issue that gives you almost no signs that something is wrong, and that’s why the CDC calls it the “silent killer.” 

However, it doesn’t have to be that way. 

High blood pressure strains your heart, arteries, and kidneys for years, even as you feel completely normal. By the time a symptom appears, the damage is often already done.

Nearly half of American adults have high blood pressure right now, and a large share of them have no idea. Not because they're careless, but because there was never anything to notice.

While you might “feel relaxed,” it tells you nothing about the number on the cuff. 

Your body simply has no sensor for blood pressure the way it does for a stubbed toe or a hot stove. 

We didn't get better at this condition by teaching people to feel it more accurately. We got better at it by measuring and monitoring, and we can do it cheaply and easily.

An upper-arm monitor at home can even provide a more accurate reading than a single reading at the doctor's office, where nerves can spike the number. Just sit still, feet flat, arm at heart level, and take the average of two readings on a couple of different days. 

There’s no need to let a health problem sneak up on you, especially when it’s painless.

If you get a monitor, here’s how to make sense of the numbers: Under 120/80 is normal, and anything above 130/80 is worth a conversation with your doctor.

And if the number is high, don’t panic. Blood pressure is one of the most changeable numbers in your whole health picture. Diet, movement, weight, and reduced sodium intake can significantly affect it, and research suggests behavioral adjustments can help in some cases as much as a single blood-pressure medication.

Together With Coveron
The Worst Way to Tell If Something's Wrong

Did you read the blood pressure item above? We hope you learned the importance of testing to make sure you’re not blinded. 

But there’s a bigger lesson: the most dangerous problems are often the ones you can't feel. 

You don’t beat high blood pressure by teaching people to sense it better. You beat it with measurement. The ability to have a tool that watches what matters so you don’t depend on your gut or a sixth sense. 

We often ask where else this shows up in life. Stressors and risks can hide everywhere, and rather than create anxiety, we find tools and systems that help protect you from the things you can feel. 

Your financial life has its own version of this. Americans reported losing a record $15.9 billion to fraud in 2025, up from $12.5 billion the year before, according to the FTC. 

The single most common type of financial fraud isn’t some exotic hack. It’s someone pretending to be somebody you trust. Your bank. The IRS. A family member. Often, it starts with a plain-text message that looks completely ordinary.

We’ve had it happen to our grandparents and friends. And here’s the part most fraud warnings leave out: The median loss was around $700. For most people, this isn't a life-ruining event, and we're not here to scare you. But the reason the total keeps climbing is a small, growing group losing tens of thousands or more than $100,000. And those hits fall hardest on people over 60. 

And by the time you feel it, the money is usually already gone.

It’s hard to beat a threat you can't see. Being careful is good, but having a way to monitor and protect you is a safer route. 

That's why we use Coveron. Yeah, they’re a partner of Arnold’s Pump Club, but one that has already saved us because they do for your money what a blood pressure cuff does for your heart. It watches the numbers so you don't have to trust a feeling. 

Coveron exposes hidden threats and monitors your financial accounts and personal data around the clock, alerting you the moment something looks off or your information shows up in a breach. And if a scammer does slip through, Coveron's insurance benefits cover eligible losses up to $2 million for identity theft recovery and up to $10,000 for online fraud.

Pump Club readers can get started for up to 71% off with the code “pumpclub” at checkout. 

The threats that get you are rarely the ones you see coming. So build the alarm, and remove a stressor you don’t need. 

Mindset
What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Stronger (If You Do This)

We've all heard the line, "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger."

But research suggests the saying is only a half-truth. A bad situation does not guarantee a good outcome. In fact, the bad situation itself is just bad.

But post-traumatic growth — turning the tough into something transformational — isn't something that happens to you. Research suggests it's something you create.

Scientists have studied growth after hard times for decades, focusing on five areas: appreciation for life, closer relationships, personal strength, new possibilities, and a shift in beliefs.

About half of people who go through a major crisis report positive growth. But when researchers dig in, they increasingly argue it's not the hardship itself that leads to the upside.

What seems to lead to growth is how you make sense of the struggles and what you do about them.

The people who come out stronger are not the ones who got hit the hardest. They're the ones who took the hit, found a positive, and then went to work on themselves.

In one study that followed 636 people through a hard season, those who came to see growth in what happened to them were, six months later, doing better on almost everything the researchers measured — more meaning, more purpose, steadier relationships, better sleep, more hope. 

However, two things didn't move: raw happiness and loneliness. So this isn't about feeling good. It's about the story you end up telling yourself about the hard thing, and that story seems to shift how you view your life. 

It's not proof that the growth was "real." It's a sign that how you make sense of the wreckage is the on-ramp, not the destination.

So if you're struggling right now, you don't have to look for the gift in it. There isn't one. The loss isn't the gift. What you build after it can be.

No one is going to rewrite the cliché. But if we could give the old line an edit, it would say: What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, if you learn from the hardship and make the changes.

Be Better
How To Time Your Caffeine For Better, Deeper Sleep

The goal: Limiting caffeine intake later in the day.
Be better: Shut off caffeine by 2 pm.

We love coffee, and more studies than we can count point to its benefits. But there's a difference between coffee at any time and coffee at the right time.

Caffeine has a half-life of roughly 5 to 6 hours. So half of your 2 pm cup is still working at 8 pm, and about a quarter is still in your blood at midnight. 

You drink more than you need because you might stop feeling the buzz hours before your brain stops feeling the caffeine. 

Hours later, caffeine is still blocking adenosine, the molecule that builds "sleep pressure" all day. 

So, the later you drink caffeine, the longer it takes to fall asleep and the less deep sleep you get, even on the nights you don't feel wired.

In one controlled trial, two to three cups of coffee (~400 mg) six hours before bed cut total sleep time by over an hour.

Two o'clock is a solid rule of thumb. But if you want a personalized caffeine schedule, take your bedtime, subtract 8 to 10 hours, and that's when you have your last sip.

Reader Q&A
Is There a Fix for Menopausal Bloating?

Q: My wife is 57 and doing everything right — daily Pilates plus strength training three times a week — but she's battling constant menopause bloating, and we're stumped on the nutrition side. Is menopause bloating actually real? What causes it, and is there anything that helps?

Menopause bloating is real, it's common, and has very little to do with your exercise routine.

Bloating during and after menopause is driven by hormones. The active routine will help with many other symptoms of menopause, but unfortunately it doesn’t necessarily improve bloating. 

If anything, exercise works in your favor because muscle and regular movement help the body keep both fluid and food moving.

"Menopause bloating" is usually one of two things (sometimes both), and telling them apart makes it easier to address:

Fluid retention: the tight, puffy, heavy feeling, sometimes with puffiness in the hands, face, or ankles. As estrogen and progesterone levels shift (and the balance between them changes), they influence how the body handles sodium and water, which can cause it to retain more fluid. This tends to come and go through the day.

Digestive bloating: the gassy, distended-after-meals feeling that shifts through the day. Lower hormone levels can slow how quickly food moves through the gut, be linked to changes in gut bacteria, and affect how comfortably food is digested. Many women also notice that foods they used to tolerate suddenly don't sit as well.

Here are a few easy wins that might help:

Take a 10- to 15-minute walk after meals: For the gassy, digestive kind of bloating, this is one of the simplest things to try. Studies suggest a short post-meal walk helps clear gas and keep things moving.

Reprogram mealtime habits: Eating a little slower, keeping meals from getting too large, going lighter on carbonated drinks, and staying well-hydrated (water actually helps with fluid retention; it doesn't make it worse) all take pressure off a slower-moving gut.

Watch hidden sodium: If the puffy, fluid-retention type is common, cutting back processed foods, deli meats, sauces, and restaurant meals can help

Add fiber thoughtfully (but not all at once): Fiber helps, but ramping up too fast — especially on beans and raw cruciferous veg — can backfire. Go gradual and lean on soluble sources.

Pay attention to trigger foods: Keep a two-week food-and-symptom diary before cutting anything. Common culprits (onion, garlic, wheat, some dairy) affect people differently, and most women react to only one or two. 

Consider fermented foods or probiotics. Kefir, live yogurt, or a Lactobacillus/Bifidobacterium supplement help some women. It's not a guarantee, but it's low-lift and could ease some discomfort.

Most of the nutrition evidence here is highly individual, so treat this as a "keep what works, drop what doesn't" experiment, not a fixed protocol.

And it might be a good idea to check with her doctor. We don’t believe in fear, but some bloating can be a sign of something else that's easy to write off as "just menopause," so it's worth checking before it gets dismissed. 

There's no fixed clock on when the bloating ends, which is why talking with a doctor, experimenting, and finding a handful of habits that make a difference can be a helpful path forward. 

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to review our interpretations of the research and ensure scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• Arnold’s Corner: Monday motivation

• The drink that supports better aging

• Why it’s hard to shake critical feedback

• Workout of the week (And a special opportunity to train live with Coach Jen)

Arnold’s Corner
Monday Motivation: The Bricklayer’s Mindset

I was a bricklayer.

It was how I paid the bills when I first moved to America. Even the biggest title in bodybuilding, Mr. Olympia, only paid a thousand dollars back then. 

It makes me proud that in March, the winner of our Arnold Classic and our Arnold Classic UK took home more than a million dollars. He can focus on bodybuilding.

But in our day, that wasn’t an option. Some guys were teachers. Some sold insurance. Franco and I laid bricks.

We put an ad in the paper and sold ourselves as European craftsmen. We figured if people heard the accents, they would picture old-world masonry instead of two bodybuilders with a wheelbarrow. 

It worked. 

The phone rang. And then we had to go out and actually do the job, which was the part nobody could fake. Luckily, Franco knew what he was doing.

The work was simple. Mix the mortar. Set the brick. Tap it level. Scrape the edge. Then do it again. And again. Nobody claps for you. There is no crowd, no music, no trophy. There is just the next brick sitting there waiting for you.

You can still find some of the walls we built in Venice.

That’s where my lesson today comes from.

One brick doesn’t look like anything. Ten bricks don’t look like anything. A hundred bricks, you’re starting to see something, but it doesn’t impress anyone.

You just keep laying bricks until the job is done.

And you know what happens after four or five hours on a wall? You are so damn tired, and you feel so great that you stop measuring.

You are not standing back every ten minutes asking how far from finished it is. You are covered in mortar, your hands are raw, you’re schvitzing, and you are happy. The work took the question away from you.

That is the part nobody tells you about hard work: It doesn’t just build the wall. It terminates the voice that keeps asking when the wall will be done.

Instagram and TikTok and all the rest spend all day showing you finished jobs.

The one who transformed and lost a hundred pounds to get a six-pack.

The one who got out of debt and built a business worth millions.

The one who met the love of their life after years of being alone.

They’re showing you the whole house while you are staring at an empty plot of land with one brick in your hand wondering how you’ll ever get there.

That’s the problem with social media. Most of it isn’t about the work. It’s about the result.

Whether it’s meant to be bragging or meant to be inspirational, it ends the same way for you.

It makes you feel like you’re too far away to even start. Fitness, finances, work, love. All of it.

It’s time to stop comparing and start laying your own bricks.

I want you to develop a bricklayer’s mindset.

Every day, lay one brick.

One workout.
One meal where you have protein and fiber.
One bill paid.
One job application submitted.
One chapter of a book read.

Each decision you make is a brick you can build on.

When you stop comparing and start laying bricks, no matter what goal you are building towards, you will feel a sense of accomplishment. 

Or, at the very least, you will be so worn out at the end of the day that you stop worrying about the finished job and start focusing on the job itself.

You just keep working. One brick at a time.

The only way you won’t build something is if you walk away when the job isn’t finished, and we know most people do exactly that.

So here is the second half of it, and this is the part I don’t want you to skip.

Do the work every day. Then once a week, count your bricks.

Pick a night. Sunday works. Take five minutes and write down what you actually did. Four workouts. Twelve meals with protein and fiber. One bill paid. Sixty pages read. Not how you felt about it. Not whether it was enough. Not what you meant to do and didn’t.

Just what you did.

Because the voice in your head is a liar. It knows only one way to measure you: against the finished house.

It will never volunteer that you laid eighteen bricks this week. You have to tell yourself, and you have to see it written down in your own handwriting, or that voice wins by default.

A wall being built doesn’t have the flash of a TikTok post. It gets built by the guy who showed up on a Tuesday when nobody was watching and laid forty bricks and went home.

That was Franco and me. That can be you.

You can change your life.

One brick at a time.

Now tell me: what is the one brick you’re laying today? Reply and let me know. Then go lay it.

Together With Pique
Do Tea Drinkers Age Slower?

Most of how you age is decided by the big stuff. Some of it is genetics, which you don't get a vote on. The rest is mostly within your control and influenced by how much you move, how you sleep, what you eat, and other lifestyle choices like whether you smoke or how much alcohol you drink.

That's the foundation, but if you're hunting for a small edge on top, there might be one steeping in your mug.

Regular tea drinkers appeared "younger" than their age predicted on a panel of routine blood markers.

Researchers tracked more than 13,000 participants, comparing tea drinkers with non-drinkers. The scientists kept a close eye on how people changed, particularly with those who started and stopped drinking tea. 

When people went from not drinking to drinking, the "younger" effect showed up in one model but not in the other. 

However, people who were consistent drinkers for a long period showed blood work suggesting better aging. And the magic number appears to be about 3 cups per day (the scientists didn’t see any additional benefits beyond that). 

The scientists believe that polyphenols, catechins, and theaflavins in the leaves, which have antioxidant and anti-inflammatory benefits, could explain the improved blood work, but they don’t know for certain. 

This doesn’t mean that 3 cups of tea per day will make you live longer. Instead, it shows a link between the behavior and a potential mechanism. And "biological age" isn't your lifespan, or some disease you'll dodge. It's a prediction based on your bloodwork. 

If you already drink tea, that's a mark in your favor, and you don't need to change a thing. If you don’t, it might be a small healthy behavior that could make a difference. One small brick that will support the other big bricks you lay. 

If you're sipping the same thing every day for decades, make sure it’s loaded with the stuff that makes a difference.

If you steep a tea for too short a time, you might only get a fraction of the nutrient benefits. Steep it too long, and it turns bitter, so you don’t drink it all. And that’s just part of the science of tea.

That's why we recommend Pique. They cold-extract the tea and turn it into crystals, so each serving gives you a consistent amount of those plant compounds instead of whatever a random steep happens to deliver. 

Pique tea dissolves in hot or cold water in about ten seconds. And since you're ideally drinking it every day, it's triple-toxin-screened by third-party labs for heavy metals, pesticides, and mold, so you get the good stuff and nothing you didn't sign up for.

Pump Club readers get 20% off for life plus a free starter kit on subscriptions over $100. No code. The discount applies automatically when you check out. 

Start Your Week Right
Why the One Bad Comment Sticks (And How To Change It For The Better)

One offhand criticism can live rent-free in your brain for longer than you want. And yet, for many people, five compliments seem to barely have the same impact. 

If this feels like your experience, you’re not alone. Bad leaves a deeper mark than good, a concept that psychologists call negativity bias. 

But understanding why it happens and who it affects most is the key to reprogramming how you receive information, so you can embrace the good and shake off the bad. 

There appear to be two scenarios where the bad seems to stick. The first is about your attention and what your mind snaps to in the moment. The second is about your memory, and what stays with you long after. You might recognize yourself in one, or both.

Research suggests that how anxious you tend to run is closely tied to how much a piece of criticism yanks at your emotions and pulls your focus off course.

Scientists pooled 172 studies and tracked where attention jumped when something threatening flashed on a screen. In the anxious group, attention snapped toward the threat fast and consistently, even when the image appeared too quickly to consciously notice. In everyone else, that automatic pull didn't show up at all.

Researchers think an anxious mind runs in a higher-alert mode and scans for what might go wrong, so a threat grabs the spotlight before you've had a chance to think. And they suspect it feeds on itself: the more your attention darts to the bad, the more on edge you feel, which keeps you scanning. 

Maybe your attention doesn't focus on the bad in real time. However, the negativity bias can still find you. Scientists reviewed decades of research on feedback, relationships, money, and ordinary daily events and found that one harsh comment outweighs a handful of kind ones. 

A bad first impression takes far more good behavior to undo than a good impression takes to wreck. This has nothing to do with anxiety; it's a basic feature of how most people record experience. The good tends to fade; the bad gets filed in bold.

If you run anxious, the bad grabs your attention in the moment and settles more heavily into memory later. If you're even-keeled, your focus may hold steady, but the bad still leaves the deeper footprint in what you remember.

The good news: you can change this for the better.

You can't delete negativity bias, and you wouldn't want to because bad feedback can be very useful. 

The goal isn't to silence it. It's to help the good register with the weight it deserves. 

If bad news tends to swallow your focus, start with a short mindful pause. In one experiment, people given a brief mindfulness exercise (just a few minutes) went on to weigh good and bad more evenly and reported feeling more optimistic than a control group. 

And if you're the type who's hardest on yourself, talk to yourself the way you'd talk to a friend having a rough day. 

Across dozens of trials, that habit lowered self-criticism and eased anxiety, and the effect held months later.

Fitness
Workout Of The Week: Follow Along With Coach Jen

A note from Ketch: This week, we’re giving you a special inside look at The Pump Club app workouts, and something we’ve never offered before. 

Arnold’s birthday sale ended, but we’ve made some big changes.

First, “Earn it Back” is forever. 

As Arnold said, the $50 OFF birthday discount was temporary. Anyone can join now for $150/year and still earn back $100/year. You’ll get the first $50 back when you complete your first 12-week workout program. And then you’ll earn back another $50 when you complete your fourth workout program.

And, we’re adding a $50 referral bonus when a friend joins and finishes the Foundation program. That means, with “Earn It Back”and the referral, you can earn back all of your money.

Second, we launched a new program today. It’s Adam’s baby. The Hybrid Full Body Foundation. It’s a blend of full-body weight training three days a week with cardio mixed in for a complete fitness program.

Finally, Jen is going to livestream her way through the Intermediate Dumbbell Foundation for anyone who loves follow-along workouts. 

If you’ve been curious about our programs and want to watch a pro do it, Jen goes live at 9:15 am Pacific today. You don’t even need to be a member to join Jen. You can find her live workout here:

• Jen’s Instagram

• The PUMP CLUB Instagram

• Arnold's Pump Club Facebook

• The PUMP CLUB YouTube

If you want a better idea of what she’ll be doing, here’s the workout she’ll be completing today.

The Dumbbell Foundation (Workout #1)

1. Dumbbell deadlift: 3 sets x 6 reps

2. Dumbbell incline press: 3 sets x 6 reps

3. Chest-supported dumbbell row: 2 sets x 10 reps

4. Dumbbell biceps curl: 2 sets x 10 reps

5. Dumbbell step-up: 2 sets x 8 reps

6. Lying bent leg raise: 2 sets x 10 reps

Give it a try, and start your week strong!

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to review our interpretations of the research and ensure scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

At midnight tonight, the sale is finished.

For my 79th birthday, we went crazy. Here’s what we told everyone: you can have the Pump Club app for free if you do the work. 

How? Complete four entire programs in your first year and we give you every dollar back. All of it. Automatically deposited back to your card.

More people joined this week than at any point in our history. That is not the part I care about most. The part I care about is that thousands and thousands of them are training right now, today, this morning.

A smart consultant would tell you we have a problem. If everybody finishes, nobody pays, and we are stuck holding the cost of running the whole thing. (Here’s a small sample of what it takes: our amazing tech team, our state-of-the-art Arnold Intelligence that’s available 24/7, world-class coaches who do weekly video calls with members — all of these bills land on my desk.)

Good.

Because that would mean I got tens of thousands of people training for a full year. No spreadsheet in the world beats that.

This is why we have no consultants and no investors.

One thing you need to know before you join: You have to sign up through the link in this email.

If you buy through the Apple App Store or Google Play, we cannot pay you back for finishing your programs. Those stores will not let us automate the refunds, so the money back only works if you join here. I am telling you this now so nobody finds out the hard way.

But through midnight Pacific Time, when you start your 7-day free trial directly through us, you can get your whole first year for nothing. 

What Comes After My Birthday Sale? 

After tonight, the offer changes. 

But the principle never changes. The philosophy behind it is here to stay, and we will continue to reward members for training. We call it “Earn It Back.” 

Starting at 12:01 AM Pacific Time, you will pay $150 to start, and you will still earn $50 back when you finish your first program, and another $50 back when you finish your fourth. One hundred dollars back, every year, for as long as you keep doing the work.

When the rest of the fitness industry gets people to train for a month, and I get them to train for a year, why would I ever stop?

But here’s the deal: I wanted people to have a way to get the app for free even when we aren’t doing a sale. And remember, what’s my main goal? Getting more people training.

So, for everyone who joins our Earn It Back program at $150 a year, I am also planning to add another $50 back when you bring somebody in.

But this time, there’s a catch. You don’t just get the refund if they sign up.

You will get the refund when they complete their first program. You have to push them. You have to be their accountability buddy. You’re their Franco.

After the sale, if you get someone new to finish a program, and you do four programs a year, my app is still free. 

You can do that every year and never pay. And you will have earned it.

So yes, I’m crazy… if you work in a boardroom with spreadsheets analyzed by AI. But if you know anything about my real goals — I’m totally sane.

What the Hell Were We Thinking?

Here is why we built it this way. In our January test, paying people back to finish a program more than doubled both our start rates and our completion rates. 

Those members became the most active people in our community, and they are the ones welcoming everyone who joined this week. That’s the opposite of what most of the data says about people who sign up for a new fitness membership in January.

The reason is simple: Fitness has always put the reward in the wrong place. The industry rewards you for starting instead of for staying. That is all a January discount is, and it is why most of the January crowd is gone by February.

We found the structure that pays you for consistency. We are keeping it.

But the $50 birthday discount you get upfront, and the opportunity to earn your full $100 back when you complete four programs… that ends tonight.

Join our movement to change the fitness industry and put the incentives where they belong.

Help us make our CFO angry and start your free trial. This time, you have everything to gain.

P.S. If you are already in, do me a favor today. Find somebody in the community who just joined this week and tell them what got you through your first program. That is how this works. Lifting each other up, one person at a time.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Editor’s Note: Every week, we receive hundreds of emails from all of you. Sometimes, you ask us to go a little deeper to help you understand topics. We save these longer emails on one topic for the weekend.

Arnold’s first rule is that you have to have a vision. Without a vision, he says, you’re like a pilot taking off without a flight plan. He attributes his success in life to his vision.

If you stopped reading here, though — and let’s be honest, in the era of social media and AI, people seem to stop reading as fast as possible — you might not’ve gotten to his third rule: 

Work your ass off, or as he reminds us over and over, Reps, reps, reps. 

(His second rule? Never, ever think small.) 

And action might be the most important part. 

Think about it: All the influencers and authors tell you to picture who you want to be. Their tactics can come across as cheesy: Say it in the mirror, believe it hard enough, and then the rest follows.

If you’ve tried that and felt like a liar by the second sentence, you weren’t doing it wrong. You just needed to get to the second step: putting in the work. 

Research has found that you don't think your way into a new identity. You do the thing, and your self-image catches up.

It is simple, not easy. And it’s where most people get stuck.

It’s why we changed the Pump Club’s pricing to reward people for taking action, rather than for starting.

We have heard about every hurdle imaginable that makes it hard for people to accomplish their fitness goals and make them last. And if you’re also someone who’s struggled in the fitness arena, then maybe one of these three themes will sound familiar:

1) You want to change, but you don’t identify as someone who is fit. 

2) You’ve tried to change before, had some success, but then found yourself back where you started or far short of the goals you set.

3) You used to be fit, but time, life, age, jobs, injuries, illness, a global pandemic — something — caused a change, and you can’t recapture your previous glory. 

We’ve helped tens of thousands of people in The Pump Club app of all ages, sizes, and situations achieve dramatic transformations by deconstructing these barriers. The situations are different, but we’ve found the solution almost always follows the same path. 

Once you understand what that path is, you can follow it, too — and see the kinds of transformations our members can’t believe they’ve achieved, like Ben losing 212 pounds or April deadlifting 330 pounds in her 60s or Bobby finally being able to keep up with his son. 

Whatever The Goal, Change Starts Here

Whatever your hurdle, the fix begins in the same spot: you stop trying to feel like a different person and start collecting proof that you already are one.

“What’s proof?”

Reps.

Action.

Back in the 1970s, psychologist Daryl Bem shared his thoughts on self-perception theory, which is quite simple and explains how you perceive yourself. 

When your feelings about yourself are faint or uncertain, you figure out who you are the way a stranger would: by watching what you actually do and drawing conclusions. 

You don't consult some fixed inner sense of self. You look at the evidence of your own behavior and reason backward.

We assume that self-belief comes first and the action follows. But Bem's work suggests the action comes first, and the belief forms to explain it. That is good news if you've been waiting to feel like a fit and healthy person before you act like one. 

Researchers have since put the fitness version to the test, and it holds up.

In one study, inactive women followed a supervised exercise program for 16 weeks. Over that stretch, their "exercise identity" — how much they saw themselves as the kind of person who trains — changed dramatically. 

But that’s not the part that we focused on. 

The shift in self-perception wasn't tied to how hard or how long they worked out. The women doing short, moderate sessions built the same sense of this is who I am as the ones grinding through long, vigorous ones. 

Showing up led to change. And the women whose identity changed the most tended to still be exercising six months later.

And that study isn’t a fluke. A broader review found that across dozens of studies, how strongly people identify as exercisers and how much they move tend to rise and fall together. 

The more you create consistency with exercise (or any behavior), the more it becomes who you are.

It works because, as the kids say, action creates “receipts.” You can talk yourself out of a slogan, a mantra, an affirmation. You can't talk yourself out of a thing you already did. 

So if you keep showing up, on the hard days, on the bad days, and when you’re still figuring things out, and the changes are happening fast enough, eventually your brain has to explain the pattern, and the easiest explanation it reaches for is a new identity: I am someone who trains. 

You built that conclusion out of evidence you generated yourself, which is exactly why it sticks.

How To Overcome The Negativity That Holds You Back

If you've never felt like a fit person or that your time has passed, or that you’ve tried and failed too often, you’ve created a psychological trap. 

You've been treating the feeling as the reason you aren’t acting, when the action is what can change the feeling.

You’ve told yourself that you have to believe you can succeed before you're allowed to begin. That’s why so many people create barriers or do research and read to try and find the thing that will change their mind, when what they’ve been looking for all along is permission to start and keep going, even when success doesn’t happen immediately. 

The feeling you desire is the prize, not the ticket. 

Nobody in that study walked in as "an exerciser." They became one by stacking up sessions, and the identity showed up afterward to explain the pile of evidence. 

If the self-talk in the mirror never felt like a fit, here’s some good news: You get to skip the fake confidence in the mirror. Instead, spend that time generating proof.

Depending on your situation, here are two ways to overcome what stands in your way.

If you've done this before and slid back: Most people tend to run on motivation and willpower. You white-knuckled a brutal program, and when the enthusiasm ran out, there was nothing underneath to catch you. 

Evidence that leads to identity fills the gap between "I'm trying to work out more" and "this is just what I do" — and only the second one survives a bad week, a busy month, or a broken streak. 

Remember, intensity was never the thing building that identity. If you burned out grinding last time, the sustainable, repeatable version would have built the same self-image and been far easier to keep. Missing a session doesn't wipe the board, either. You don't lose the receipts you already earned. You just add the next one.

If you used to be fit and lost it: This one has a specific trap. You're carrying an old identity — the version of you who trained, who was strong — and measuring every current day against that highlight reel. 

Comparing to your former self feels like falling short, so you don't start. But your brain doesn't run on your highlight reel. It reads current evidence. 

The old identity isn't gone; it's just not being fed. The moment you put sessions back on the board, you're not building from scratch; you're resupplying an identity that already knows the shape of your life with training. You've been this person before, and the proof reminds you fast.

The First Domino (To Life Transformation)

There's a long-standing idea in psychology that some habits punch above their weight. That a single change can knock over others you weren't even aiming at. 

Research suggests exercise is the first domino that can knock over all the other dominos in your life. 

And it matters most for the people who face the hurdles we mentioned above. Because for those individuals, when fitness slid, other things likely slid with it.

In one study, sedentary volunteers started a two-month exercise program. The researchers weren't only tracking fitness. They tracked a grab-bag of unrelated everyday behaviors: how much people smoked, drank, and ate junk; whether they procrastinated, lost their temper, overspent, or left the dishes in the sink. 

Across the board, every aspect of life — productivity, diet, and personality — improved once the exercise started. People smoked less, drank less, ate better, spent more carefully, snapped at people less, and put things off less. None of it was the goal. It came along for the ride.

In the same study, there was a comparison group waiting to start the same program, and while they waited — motivated, signed up, but not yet exercising — nothing changed for them. 

The wanting, motivation, and excitement of change wasn't enough to result in real, observable change. The doing moved the needle. 

We’ve seen this every day in the Pump Club app. “I came here to exercise, but everything changed.”

Now, this isn’t a promise that working out will help you fix your budget and get out of debt. But it is a reason to believe building the discipline to exercise and take care of yourself has transferable takeaways that can show up in other aspects of your life.  

Don’t Think About It. Do It. Do It Now.

None of this works as a thought experiment. It works like an equation, and this is the order of operations.

Step 1: Take an action that forces you to commit. Text a friend and ask them to hold you accountable. Hire a trainer.

 Or — and we’re biased about this — join the Pump Club app. We even pay you back when you complete your programs (more on this below, but through tomorrow, you can earn back $100 for doing four workout programs in a year and get the app for free).

Whatever it is, the first step is the hardest. Most of the time, you’ll wait to find the perfect answer. You’ll want to do more research. That just kicks the can down the road. Today is the day you take the first action, and that’s making a commitment. 

Step 2: Declare what you’re going to do as specifically as possible, and make the next session near-certain. You don’t need to PR. You don’t need to know how to do everything in the gym or feel comfortable. You need to show up. A 30-minute session you complete beats a 60-minute session you dread and skip. Remember, you're chasing evidence.

Step 3: Put it on the calendar as an appointment, not an aspiration. "I'll train this week" is a wish. "Monday, 6 am, 30 minutes" is a plan your future self can keep. Decide the when and where now, so the moment doesn't hinge on how you feel when it arrives

Step 4: Finish, and count it. The win isn't the perfect session. It's the completed one. Every finished workout is a fact your brain now has to account for. Don't wave it off because it was short or easy — short and done is the whole strategy. See it as a win, and you’ll feel motivated to keep going.

Step 5: Protect the streak, not the perfection. Missing one session doesn't erase who you're becoming, but stringing enough of them together is what tips your self-image over. If you miss, you don't start from zero. You add the next receipt. This is why our app streak calculator doesn’t ask you to hit all your workouts. You keep it going by doing at least one workout a week, not by being perfect.

When you complete your first 12-week program in The Pump Club app, we even pay you back $50. It doesn’t require perfection. If you skip days, we know it happens. The reward is in finishing. Because we know if you keep going, your body not only changes, but you change who you think you are. 

Step 5: Name it once it's earned. After a few weeks of showing up, the label starts to fit. Let yourself use it: I'm someone who trains. Not because you're faking it, but because you've finally got the evidence to back it.

So stop waiting to feel ready. Ready isn't a feeling you find. It's a conclusion you earn, one finished session at a time. 

Whichever hurdle brought you here, the way over it is the same: put the next session on the calendar and go do it. Those are the receipts that matter, and they tend to pay off in more places than you'd expect.

Need Help? We Have Your Back

If you need help starting and finishing, we want to help you get there so much that we’re willing to bet on your success.

If you join the Pump Club app in the next 24 hours, you will not only take the first step towards change, but you could also accomplish your goals for free. 

Tomorrow is the final day to take advantage of Arnold’s birthday sale. 

When you join the Pump Club app, you instantly receive $50 OFF.  And if you complete four workout programs in your first year, you pay nothing.

The Pump Club app is a one-stop shop for everything you need to get healthier: customized workouts, personalized nutrition, a habit-builder, a supportive community, and world-class coaches who hold you accountable every week and support your goals. There are weekly coaching calls, form checks, guidance, and everything you need to put your past behind you and reshape your future. 

All programs are adjusted to your needs, goals, equipment, and preferences. 

Here’s how it works:

Sign up for the app. You get a 7-day free trial so you can make sure it’s for you. But please USE THIS LINK to get $50 off immediately as part of Arnold’s birthday sale. The sale is not available through in app-subscription.

Then, once you complete your first 12-week program, you’ll get another $50 back. 

Finally, when you complete your fourth program, we’ll pay you back (yet again) another $50. 

That’s it. 

We are the only app that gives you discounts based on the actions you take to change your identity.

You are one decision away from changing who you are. Whether or not you join the app, make the choice that will benefit your health and change your mind. 

The answers you're looking for will be found with action. Take one today. 

FAQs: Questions You Might Have About The Birthday Sale

Is the app really free?

If you do the workouts, yes. The app costs $150 per year for an annual subscription. Until August 9th, you automatically receive $50 OFF as a gift from Arnold in honor of his 79th birthday. After you complete your first program (which takes 12 weeks), you’ll receive another $50. And if you complete 4 programs within 12 months, you’ll receive another $50 back, meaning you’ll pay nothing for the year. 

Can I sign up for a free trial if I’ve already done one in the past?
Yes! Everyone can start a new free trial, but only through our birthday sale page on our website.

What if I already have a Pump Club subscription and want to switch?
No problem. If you are subscribed directly with us, log in to your customer portal, select “Update Subscription,” select “Earn It Back (Annual),” click “Add promotion code,” enter the code EARNITBACK, and click “Apply.” You'll then only be charged for the $100 Earn It Back subscription minus whatever is left on your current term. Your membership will renew at $150/year, but with our Earn It Back system, you still get up to $100 a year for finishing programs — forever. If you are subscribed through Apple or Google, you won’t find yourself in our customer portal, and you’ll need to serve out your current subscription.

But don’t worry: Earn It Back is our new pricing. The only temporary thing here is the birthday sale. We believe in rewarding you for action.

What if I’m already on a trial and want to switch?
If you subscribed through Apple or Google, you’ll need to cancel your trial in your phone’s subscription management center, wait for it to expire, and start a new trial here. If you started a trial directly on our website, you can log in to your customer portal, cancel your trial, wait for it to expire, and then start a new trial with the birthday sale. (Our system prevents you from having duplicate active subscriptions.)

Is this available through Apple or Google?
No, unfortunately we can’t automate refunds there. You have to use this link.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• Number you won’t forget

• Small goals, big outcomes

• An easy deficiency to fix

• Weekly wisdom

Longevity
Number You Won’t Forget: 1.41 

The Number Your Fitness Level Shares With Smoking

How does your fitness stack up for your age? While there are many calculators and quizzes, most of you have probably never checked.

Doctors at Cleveland Clinic did just that by putting more than 122,000 adults through a treadmill test, then tracking who was still alive about 8 years later. One number stood out: 1.41.

Those with below-average fitness for their age had a real gap in survival: Line up two similar people — same age, same weight, same health conditions — and the less-fit one was about 41% more likely to die during those years. 

That's what 1.41 means. It represents a 41% higher risk of death. And here's the context that matters: In that same study, smoking also had a score of 1.41 too.

We know smoking is bad for you. But based on this study, being out of shape for your age carries about the same health risk.

The cool part of the study was that it appears the fitter you become, the more you reduce your risk of death. Even the leap from fit to extremely fit paid off. 

Here's what below-average fitness looks like in real life: feeling winded after two flights of stairs, out of breath within a minute of a brisk pace, or struggling to finish a 30-minute resistance training program with short rest. 

Even if you’re unhappy with your current state, there’s no need to stress. Fitness isn't fixed like your age or your genes. It responds to how much you move, and you can make improvements into your 90s. So no matter where you are now, start moving today and improving. 

Health
The Habits That Serve Your Goals Are Almost Always the Small Ones

Most people picture healthy aging as a big project. But the research suggests a simpler approach works better.

The things that actually shape how you age are small, often boring, and repeated a few thousand times. And most of us badly underestimate them.

About 15 years ago, researchers ran one of the first real studies of how habits form in daily life. People each picked one new daily behavior. A glass of water at breakfast. A piece of fruit at lunch. A short walk. Then they tracked every day for twelve weeks to determine how automatic it felt.

For the people whose habits actually took hold, the median was 66 days to feel automatic, though the range ranged from 18 days to a projected 254 days. The simplest behaviors locked in fastest: a glass of water became second nature in under three weeks. The most complex ones were still being worked on when the study ended, and the model projected it could take the better part of a year.

But there were two other findings from that study that got ignored, and both matter.

Missing one day didn't set people back. A single skip barely moved the needle, and people recovered fast. And the biggest gains came early; the largest jumps in automaticity showed up in the first repetitions, then tapered as the behavior settled in. 

So when it comes to habits, consistency beats intensity, and forgiveness beats perfectionism.

There's a second reason we get this wrong, and it's built into how our brains handle math. Behavioral economists have a name for it: exponential-growth bias. 

When something compounds, we reliably lowball where it ends up. It's the same mental glitch that makes people underestimate compound interest. We feel the size of one day and can't feel the size of a thousand.

No single habit is magic. A capsule won't overrule a bad diet, and one salad won't undo a decade of bad eating. But the small, repeatable thing you actually keep doing matters, and can lead to other good behaviors. It's just what the data on real behavior keeps showing.

Which is the whole case for picking habits small enough to survive a bad week.

So no matter the goal, start with something you can do even when you're not at your best.

It might be a walk for exercise, a salad for nutrition, a text you send to a friend when you're feeling lonely.

Find the thing you're deficient in, focus on a small behavior, and make it happen.

Together With Magtein 
One Easy Deficiency To Start With

If you want a small habit that helps you achieve many common health goals, here's one worth a look.

About half of US adults don't get enough magnesium, and it’s connected to many of the things people want to fix: sleep, mood, attention, and focus. It's also one of the easiest gaps to close. 

The catch is the form. Most magnesium supplements struggle to reach the brain or are rough on the stomach. And that’s part of what makes Magtein® different. Magtein® is a form of magnesium (L-threonate) developed by a former MIT neuroscientist to cross that barrier. 

In a randomized, placebo-controlled trial, adults who took it improved both their objective and subjective sleep scores in as little as three weeks. A separate trial published in 2026 found sharper reaction time and less daytime impairment from poor sleep when taking Magtein®. 

It's also gentle on the stomach, which matters more than it sounds. 

Our preferred option is Momentous Magnesium L-Threonate, built on real Magtein®, taken in the evening. 

Magnesium is a small habit. But it’s also the kind you’ll stick with in any situation, which is why it works. 

Mindset 
Weekly Wisdom

Someone tells you you've changed. And instead of taking it, you challenge it.

It’s a common paradox. You spend weeks putting in effort and earn that compliment, and the second it lands, you start arguing with it.

You want to be the person who changed. And yet, some older part of you would rather be right about who you've always been than wrong about what you can become. 

Wallace's quote speaks to the struggle of change. Setting down an old version of yourself doesn’t happen easily, even when that version was not good for you. 

Wanting a change and believing it about yourself are two different jobs. You can do the first for months and still fail the second. 

Psychologists have examined this phenomenon. In one study, researchers asked two questions: 1) How much have you changed in the last ten years? And 2) How much will you change in the next ten? 

At every age, people gave the same answer: I've changed a lot already. And, I'm basically finished now. They called it the “end of history” illusion. We can all see how different we used to be. We just can't believe we're still moving and there’s still so much change to come. 

That's what the old story costs you. Say "this is just who I am" and you're treating today's version of you as the final one. The finished portrait. 

But you're a draft, same as you've always been. And that’s a good thing. The person you were ten years ago would argue with half of what you believe now. You changed anyway. You'll change again. 

Turn Wisdom Into Action

This week, pay attention to the subtle ways this shows up in your life. When someone credits you with a change, how do you react? If your instinct is to wave it off, don’t. Agree with it out loud. "Yeah. I've been working on it." 

That's the whole exercise. It'll feel like bragging, but it’s not.

You're letting the new version stand in the room without apologizing for it, which hands your new identity the evidence it needs. Do that repeatedly, and your self-perception will change, and more motivation, momentum, and positive habits will follow.

And that’s it for this week. Thanks for being a part of the positive corner of the internet. And remember: don’t wait to make a change. Take action on any goal, don’t quit in the hard moments, and the results will come. Have a fantastic weekend!
-Arnold, Adam, and Daniel

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to review our interpretations of the research and ensure scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• Coffee has many benefits, but this isn’t one

• How your pillow steals deep sleep

• Under the microscope: Apple cider vinegar

• Adam’s Corner: What do you do when you’re lost?

On Our Radar 
We Love Coffee. This Study Isn't Why.

Drinking coffee has many potential health benefits. And the more you drink (up to 3-5 cups), the more it appears to help. 

However, that doesn’t mean coffee is immune to the same type of misleading claims we see all throughout wellness. 

A recent study suggests that coffee switches on an anti-aging receptor. It sounds great on paper, and we were excited to give you another reason to caffeinate. However, the study found the opposite of what the headlines say.

Researchers showed that brewed coffee and compounds such as caffeic and chlorogenic acids bind to a receptor (called NR4A1), which helps cells handle stress and damage. In the cells the researchers tested, coffee's compounds turned that receptor down, not up.

When you take a deeper look, the study wasn’t done on humans. This was lab work in dishes. Nothing about aging or measured in a living body.

But that wasn't the biggest issue with the study. The more we read the research, the more we realized the study had been badly misinterpreted. Not by the researchers, but by the people who make studies go viral.

The researchers themselves were careful. They flagged the biggest issue: the amounts of these compounds that did anything in the dish were far higher than a cup of coffee will ever put into your blood. 

They also talked about aging, but only as background, the reason they got curious. Their experiments never actually tested it, and the scientists knew it.

The study appeared to go through a game of telephone. The university's press release moved aging up into the headline. And by the time smaller sites rewrote it, the cautions were gone: no mention that the doses were unreachable, no mention that no one had tested aging at all. Just a promise about coffee that wasn’t true.

If you drink coffee, many studies suggest it might help improve longevity, but not for the reasons the study claims.

Together With BEDGEAR
How The Humidity On Your Sheets And Pillows Affect Your Sleep

Earlier this week, we shared research about all the reasons you have trouble falling and staying asleep. It clearly struck a nerve. We received hundreds of emails with people explaining their struggles, asking one simple question:

If temperature affects sleep, can’t you just lower the thermostat?

Yes and no. 

There’s a reason why dropping the thermostat in your bedroom doesn’t necessarily lead to a better night of sleep. Or why flipping your pillow to the “cooler side” feels amazing in the moment, but doesn’t translate to a great night of rest. 

Your body also responds to the thin layer of air pressed against your skin — the bed and pillow — and that depends on two variables: temperature and the moisture your body gives off all night.

The moisture is the half people miss. 

When sleep labs compared warm-dry nights to warm-humid ones, the humid nights were measurably worse. 

At the same temperature, higher humidity meant more time awake and less deep and REM sleep. 

So lowering the thermostat definitely helps, but if moisture can't escape the pocket around your skin, evaporation stalls, and your body loses its main tool for shedding heat, even when the room air is cold.

This hits some people harder than others. If you train hard, run warm in the night, or sweat heavily in your sleep, then you're shedding more heat and moisture than average, which means a pillow that traps it costs you more deep sleep than it would someone else. The harder you're training, the more this matters.  

Unfortunately, most pillows do not handle moisture in a way that benefits sleep.

Your head and neck sit pressed against one small surface for hours, so any heat and moisture that builds up there has nowhere to escape. 

Traditional memory foam makes it worse: it's dense and molds tightly to you, choking off the airflow that would otherwise carry heat away, which is exactly why it sleeps hot. A tightly woven cover slows things further, holding moisture against your skin instead of letting it wick off. 

Across a night, you can shed nearly half a liter to a liter of water through breath and skin combined.

Which is why the pillow you select deserves extra consideration. It's the one surface trapping both the heat and the water you're trying to shed. 

The fix is a pillow built to keep both moving all night, not for the first cool-to-the-touch minute.

We tried six different cooling pillows. We gave them to 5 different testers, including four people who have no working relationship with Arnold’s Pump Club. 

The winner for the best pillow that keeps you cool and improves sleep was the Night Ice pillow by BEDGEAR, and the science supports the testers' findings.

Start with the moisture, since that's the half most gear ignores. Dri-Tec^® fabric wicks sweat off the surface before it pools against your skin. Ver-Tex™ advanced cooling yarns pull heat off as you make contact. Underneath, React™ open-cell foam allows air to travel through the core rather than sealing it in, as dense memory foam does. And an Air-X^® mesh gusset vents warm air out at the edges instead of letting it sit under your head. That's the BEDGEAR Performance^® Pillow.

The pillow is where most people lose the most sleep to trapped heat, but it's not the only place it happens. 

Your sheets and mattress protector sit against your body all night too, and BEDGEAR applies the same airflow principle across those layers, so heat and moisture that make it past the pillow don't just get trapped one layer down instead.  

One catch: if you don't want a BEDGEAR pillow and go for a different option to keep your head cool: airflow does nothing if the pillow doesn't fit. A collapsed or wrong-profile pillow pins your head into the exact spot where heat and moisture collect, no matter how well the materials breathe. 

If nothing else, we recommend BEDGEAR's PillowID quiz (it’s free) because it matches you to the right profile for how you actually sleep. Then you can choose what’s right for you. 

If you want to take advantage of our favorite pillow for better, science-based rest, as an APC reader, you get 20% off BEDGEAR pillows and bedding when you use the code “PUMPCLUB20.”

Nutrition
Use It Or Lose It: Apple Cider Vinegar For Fat Loss

The claim: A shot of apple cider vinegar a day melts fat, and there's a real clinical trial to prove it.

Let's break it down: For a couple of years, this kept on popping up thanks to a published study. Whereas most health claims lack any published research and rely on anecdotes and good vibes, a 2024 trial suggested that daily apple cider vinegar (“ACV”) use led to weight loss and lower blood sugar. 

Much later, the journal retracted the study and the claims because editors cited implausible statistics, questions about the raw data, and the fact that the trial wasn't properly registered. 

Once that study was gone, there wasn’t much left to back up ACV as a fat-loss solution. Other reviews of vinegar research suggest it can slightly improve blood sugar, especially around meals, because acetic acid slows digestion. But there’s no solid evidence it's a fat-loss shortcut. 

And it comes with a real downside: ACV is rough on tooth enamel and can irritate your throat and gut. And vinegar can interact with certain medications and conditions. So, if you have blood-sugar or digestive issues, check with your doctor before making it a daily habit.

The Verdict: Apple cider vinegar is not a fat loss solution. The primary study that "proved" it works no longer exists.

Adam’s Corner
When You’re Lost, Do You Ask To Be Found?

“Rach, Ash is missing.”

Those were the words I said into the phone, and I’ve gone back and forth on whether to tell you what happened.

Because this wasn’t the type of memory that’s fun to share. 

We were on the East Coast for the summer, staying in a new town. I took a walk, pushing my daughter in a stroller, while my 8-year-old son rode his bike a little ahead, the way he likes to. We’d gone on this route before. He’d pedal to the corner, wait for us to catch up, then push off again.

It’s a small loop. Not the kind of place you think twice about. At some point, though, I didn’t see Asher. All the places he normally stops, he didn’t. It had maybe been 5 minutes.

Five minutes is nothing. Five minutes is also, when it’s your kid and the street is empty, a very long time. 

But I’d been in this situation earlier in the summer. He’d ridden ahead and gone home on his own before, so I told myself that’s what he did and finished the route back to the house.

Until I got home and found out he wasn’t there. 

I asked my other son. He hadn’t seen him. So I went back out with my daughter and checked the blocks we’d just walked. Nothing. I brought my daughter home, left her with her brother, and started running. Up one street and down the next, past the same mailboxes, calling his name. Nothing again. 

I got in my car and called my wife.

“Rach, Ash is missing.”

Facing Fear (With The Volume Turned All The Way Up)

I hadn’t called my wife earlier because she was in meetings. But now that she was out, it was time to admit I lost our son.

I told her what happened, and I was driving around searching for him. She didn’t wait for me to finish the sentence. She was already on her bike.

Five minutes became 15. And then 15 became 30.

We went to every place he knew. Nothing.

Around that thirty-minute mark, something moves into your chest that doesn’t have a good name. It isn’t dread. It’s fear with the volume turned all the way up, and underneath it a list of things you refuse to picture. You talk yourself down. You keep your eyes on the road, because steering is the only useful thing your body can do.

I called my wife. I told her if we went five more minutes, we were calling the police.

Almost on cue, an officer pulled up next to her.

“Are you Asher’s mom?”

She could barely get the words out. “Is he okay?”

“He’s safe. He’s with two of our officers right now.”

He was 2.2 miles from home. One wrong turn had folded into another, and then a few more, the way they do, until the streets stopped looking like anything he’d seen before. Scared, a long way out, an eight-year-old on a bike with no idea which direction pointed home.

The reason I’m writing this isn’t what I did. I ran, and I drove, and I made the calls any parent would make, and none of that is the point.

It’s how he got found.

It wasn’t the police, at least not at first. 

My son, lost and frightened and further from home than he’d ever been alone, stopped a stranger and asked for help. Everything after that — the officers, the phone call, the version of this story where he ends up safe — started with that one decision.

He felt lost, and he treated lost like a problem to solve instead of something to hide.

Honesty (When You Need It Most)

Once the dust settled and Asher was safe, I kept coming back to my son's bravery, skillful assessment, and his ability to be honest with himself when he needed it most.

You might not be on a bike, but many of us have faced the moment when we lost our way in life, felt scared, and knew things were not right.

We take a wrong turn, and it feels fine, so we keep going. Something is clearly off, and we keep going anyway, sure the next block will straighten things out.

You’ll start the diet next week. You’ll pick the workouts back up once things settle down. That ache you keep meaning to get looked at? It can wait a little longer. 

You tell yourself the road bends back on its own. It usually doesn’t.

You look up one day, and you’re miles from where you meant to be, and the distance itself becomes the reason you don’t stop.

The feelings and emotions negotiate a false reality. Too far gone to fix it now. Too embarrassing to admit how you got here.

So you keep pedaling, because pedaling at least feels like motion.

But that’s when you need honesty to drive a type of clarity that sometimes can only be found when you’re lost.

My son is eight. He hasn’t learned yet that grown-ups treat asking for help like a confession. He just felt lost and decided lost was a thing you get out of. He hit the brakes. He found a stranger. 

He did the hard part by recognizing the farther he’d gone, the worse his odds were getting. He understood that better than a lot of adults I know.

I tried not to think about the version where he keeps riding. But my brain still went there.

What I know is this: the turn he took didn’t decide how the day ended. What decided it was that he was willing to stop, look at someone he’d never met, and admit he couldn’t get home on his own.

Sometimes, Your Reflexes Can’t Be Trusted

Admitting you’ve made a mistake or are struggling is a challenge.

Most of us are wired to keep it to ourselves. Head down, figure it out alone, because asking means saying the sentence we hate most: I got this wrong.

You don’t know my son, but it’s a big struggle for him too. He already carries more pride and stubbornness than a kid his size should be able to hold. He hates being wrong. He will argue a losing case straight into the ground, staring down every piece of evidence that says he slipped up, refusing to blink.

And still, scared and alone and a long way from anything he recognized, he did the one thing that fought against every strand of stubbornness and pride in his DNA. He asked for help.

And here’s the crazy part: When I finally got to him, he wasn’t relieved. He was bracing because his reflex was to prepare for an even worse outcome than being lost. He was certain my wife and I would punish him, and all he could see was the trouble he thought he was in.

We weren’t angry. We were terrified, and then we weren’t, because he was standing right in front of us. He just didn’t know that yet. In his head, the consequence was already on its way.

He asked for help anyway.

He was sure the worst was waiting on the other side of admitting he was lost. The worst never came. What was waiting was two parents who only wanted him back.

That’s the thing about reflexes and pride: they can steer us right, but then can also do us wrong. 

We assume admitting we’re off track will cost us something. That people will think less of us, or that owning the mistake is worse than just living with it. So we say nothing and keep going. That’s the mistake.

The move you’re most afraid to make, the one with all the resistance stacked against it, is usually the exact thing that ends the whole ordeal. The one your pride has been talking you out of since the first wrong turn.

You’ve taken a wrong turn somewhere. So have I. That part isn’t the question.

The question is the one my son answered without knowing anyone was asking it.

When you’re lost, do you ask to be found? -AB

-Adam Bornstein is the co-founder and co-editor-in-chief of Arnold’s Pump Club

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to review our interpretations of the research and ensure scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• Is higher protein making you age faster?

• How to power through sleep-deprived days

• Watermelon is healthier than you think

• Better questions, better solutions

Beyond The Headline 
What The Newest “Protein Makes You Age Slower” Fails To Mention

The headline is everywhere from social media to mainstream news outlets: if you eat less protein, you’ll age slower.

But here’s the problem: The study does not prove protein is bad for your lifespan. And the headlines are misinterpreting the details that matter.

Researchers pulled together more than 350 studies on protein restriction and aging and mapped how eating less seems to shift metabolism, dial down the body's growth signals, and slow cellular aging.

The research primarily focused on animal models. In flies and mice, lower protein levels appear to extend lifespan.

But in humans, it’s a different story. Nobody has shown a human living longer on less protein. And no human aged faster on more. The headline makes it appear that animal lifespan data is interchangeable with human data, and it makes claims it can’t support.

Here's the trap: "you don't need extra protein" is not the same as "eat less protein." Those are different sentences, and the headline blurs the distinction between them.

Protein protects your muscle. And muscle is one of the clearest markers of how well you age. In one study of about 3,600 older adults, those with the most muscle were roughly 20% less likely to die over the next decade-plus than those with the least. Cut your protein too low, and you lose muscle faster, which is the exact thing you're trying to avoid.

So the real takeaway is a lot less scary than the headline, and more useful. If you're sedentary, you don't need to chase higher amounts of protein or protein-max. If you’re more active, you’ll benefit from more protein, but you don’t need to extreme amounts. Either way, everyone still needs enough protein.

If you're mostly sedentary, aim for about 0.5 to 0.7 grams of protein per pound of body weight (roughly 1.2 to 1.6 g/kg). If you train regularly, aim for 0.7 to 1 gram per pound (about 1.6 to 2.2 g/kg), leaning toward the top of that range when you're losing weight and trying to keep muscle. 

For a 175-pound person, that's somewhere around 90 to 120 grams a day if you're sedentary, 120 to 175 if you're active. Spread it across your meals, lean on real food first, and you’ll be giving your body what it needs.

Together With Momentous
Can Creatine Rescue a Sleep-Deprived Brain? (The Research is Getting Stronger)

When a terrible night of sleep hits, you know what’s coming. Thinking slows down. Short-term memory springs leaks. And no matter how many cups you pour, the coffee doesn’t seem strong enough. 

If you’re looking for a backup, evidence is growing that one exists and it doesn’t require any stimulants. 

One big dose of creatine can restore your thinking and memory when you have a terrible night of rest. 

At first, it seemed like a hypothetical. In one study, healthy adults stayed up all night while researchers scanned their brains and ran cognitive tests. One night, they got a single, large dose of creatine. The other night, a placebo. 

Despite having no sleep at all, taking creatine monohydrate kept the brain’s energy stores full, and there were real improvements in processing speed and short-term memory.

It surprised many because it didn’t appear that your brain would absorb creatine that quickly. Remember, this was a big dose for a single night. 

But a brain that's exhausted and running low on fuel seems to grab creatine right away and put it to use. 

And now another study appears to show it’s not a fluke. 

A 2026 follow-up ran the same overnight test at a lower dose. While processing speed wasn’t as good, there were still improvements to cognition, reaction time, and logic. 

The catch? This wasn't a 5- or 10-gram serving. The creatine was measured by weight, but the dose wasn’t what you typically see recommended. For example, based on the different studies, a 175-pound person would need anywhere from 16 to 28 grams daily. 

The good news is there’s research suggesting those big doses don't pose health risks. The bad news is that some people might have GI discomfort taking that much in a single dose. Studies do suggest that two separate doses can alleviate that problem. 

If you know you didn’t sleep well, and you need to stay sharp, loading up on creatine might help. The evidence continues to show that creatine is connected to cognition, especially when you’re sleep-deprived, stressed, or as you age beyond your 50s.  

Whether you're loading up on creatine to stay sharp or taking a small dose for workout performance, the biggest risk with creatine isn’t how much you take but the source of your creatine. Creatine has thousands of studies supporting its safety and use, but a big issue is quality control and purity. 

We trust Momentous Signature Spec because it is made in a pharmaceutical facility, water-washed rather than chemical-rinsed, and verified by NSF for Sport and by SuppCo TESTED. APC readers get 35% off a subscription or 14% one-time with code PUMPCLUB.

If you choose to supplement with creatine, don’t settle for any type of creatine. Get the highest quality, so you experience the results backed by science, without any worry or concern. 

Nutrition
Foods Are Super: Watermelon 

It Won't Give You a Pump. And It's Still Worth A Spot In Your Cart

Every summer the same clip resurfaces: someone eats a few slices of watermelon before a lift and swears the pump was unreal. It's a fun story to tell at the gym. But researchers have actually put it to the test, and the story doesn't hold up. 

However, there are many other reasons why watermelon deserves a spot in your diet, and could be a sneaky way to improve your health. 

In one trial, resistance-trained men took a watermelon concentrate before a bench press session, while researchers measured their blood vessels before and after the session. Despite the hype of being the “pump fruit,” it didn't widen their vessels or improve their lifts any more than a placebo did. 

Most other watermelon-and-exercise studies also found little to no effect on performance. So before you build a pre-workout ritual around it, know the pump story is a gym legend the research doesn't back up.

However, the same amino acid behind the myth of the pump — L-citrulline —  is the same reason why it’s a good idea to enjoy watermelon. 

Your body converts L-citrulline into arginine, which helps blood vessels relax. A 2023 meta-analysis found watermelon lowered systolic blood pressure. There's even early evidence that watermelon juice takes the edge off next-day muscle soreness.

Beyond the fact that we think it’s delicious, it’s also a hydrating, low-calorie fruit. A cup of watermelon is about 92% water and just 46 calories, so it fills you up for almost nothing. 

Watermelon is also the most concentrated fresh source of lycopene, with more per cup than raw tomatoes, plus a solid hit of vitamin C.

And, if you’re worried about sugar content, a normal serving has a low glycemic load, so the idea that "watermelon is just a lot of sugar" is not how your body processes the fruit. 

Better Questions, Better Solutions
How Are You Judging Your Workouts?

How do you know when you’ve had a good workout?

For many people, after you finish a hard session, you take some sort of inventory. Maybe the stairs feel like a challenge, or reaching for something creates a soreness that signals you did something right. And yet, when a workout leaves you feeling fresh and not a little beat up, you might wonder if you wasted a session. 

Old question: How sore or exhausted should I feel after a good session?
Better question: Am I training to grow, or training to feel destroyed?

The old question treats pain and soreness as the meter. You’ve been taught to believe that the dull aches or maybe a little pain is a sign of more results. It's an easy belief to hold, because suffering feels like proof, and proof is comforting when you can't watch your muscles change in the mirror day to day. 

But soreness is not necessarily a sign of progress or results. It tells you a muscle met a stimulus it wasn't ready for. It could be a new exercise, a new program, or an increase in volume. That's a novelty signal.

Years ago, researchers followed lifters through ten weeks of training and watched what their bodies did after each session. In the first few weeks, the workouts left the most muscle damage, and the body worked hardest right after. But all that work went into patching up what the session tore. The muscle wasn't getting bigger. It was just getting repaired. 

The actual growth showed up later, once the soreness stopped being the main event. In other words, the weeks that beat them up the most weren't the weeks they grew the most.

So the wrecked feeling after a brutal session is mostly repair work. Your body is fixing what the workout tore up, and that fixing costs energy and recovery time. Piling on extra sets to earn more of that feeling, what coaches call junk volume, buys you more soreness and a longer road back without buying more muscle. 

What really builds size is progressive overload. A little more weight, or one more rep, session over session. That kind of progress can happen without feeling like you need an extra day off.

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to review our interpretations of the research and ensure scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• Does this popular supplement cause heart failure?

• What keeps you up at night

• The truth about eating the same foods and your gut health

• Why workout recovery might feel slow

Beyond The Headline 
Melatonin Doesn't Cause Heart Failure. But Your Use Still Might Be An Issue

If you’ve ever taken melatonin, you might have felt a bit of panic based on research suggesting you’re at a “90% higher risk of heart failure.” And if you ask AI to calm your fears, it probably didn’t help:

Before you react to that overview, like many of the headlines you see, all is not as it appears. That’s why we read the studies, take a deeper look at the data, and help you make sense of it all, so you can make an informed decision about what’s right for your goals and health.

First, let’s tackle your primary fear: Research does not suggest melatonin causes heart failure. 

The better question might be: if you've needed melatonin to fall asleep every night for a year, the finding that matters isn't that the supplement is dangerous. It's that it isn't working. But more on that in a moment.

The scary claim came from a conference presentation where researchers pulled 5 years of health records on adults with insomnia. They compared people with melatonin use for a year or more against people with no melatonin on record. 

Heart failure turned up in 4.6% of the melatonin group and 2.7% of the others. That’s the basis for the 90% figure, which is itself misleading.

But when we looked at all the data made available, we found something that didn't make the headlines: melatonin users were also about 3.5 times as likely to be hospitalized for heart failure and roughly twice as likely to die of any cause.

Those last two numbers are the sign that the association data is misleading because nothing on a drugstore shelf doubles your chance of dying in five years. 

When the association is that big across unrelated outcomes, the more likely explanation is who's taking the pill, not the pill itself. 

And when we read the commentary, the lead author even admitted worse insomnia, depression, or anxiety could be driving both the melatonin habit and the heart risk. 

Just because melatonin doesn’t deserve a red flag doesn’t mean it should be relied upon either. If melatonin is used at all, it’s most likely to help jet lag or a schedule flip. Outside of that, it doesn’t help sleep in the way you’ve been told.

A 2022 review of 24 randomized trials found it didn't meaningfully improve how quickly people fell asleep, how long they slept, or how well they slept. 

Not to mention, neither the American Academy of Sleep Medicine nor the American College of Physicians recommends it. 

If you've been leaning on it every single night for a year to fall asleep, the move isn't to panic about your heart. It's to treat that as a sign that something needs fixing, and to address the problems and causes, and search for better solutions that work. 

Together With Eight Sleep 
What's Really Keeping You Up At Night?

You might have read the last item and wondered, “If melatonin isn't the solution to my sleep problems, what is?” 

When researchers and sleep physicians line up the real causes of bad sleep, the list is boringly consistent: not enough time set aside to sleep, bedtimes that drift night to night, too little morning light, caffeine or alcohol that’s consumed too late, undiagnosed breathing problems, pain, stress, and the environment you sleep in. 

Fix or address any or all of those, and that’s the real “magic pill” to a better night of rest. 

It might seem like a lot, but there’s good news you shouldn’t ignore: most of the “science of better sleep” list is free. 

Lock in a consistent wake time every day of the week (including weekends). Get light in your eyes early in your day, and your melatonin production can naturally reset. Move your last coffee to before noon, and the caffeine will be out of your system. Get some exercise, and you’ll be more likely to feel tired at the end of the day and feel less stress. All of these tips will do more than any supplement. Start there before you spend a dollar.

Once you do that, there’s another variable that won’t bend to habits and will influence how quickly you fall asleep and how well you stay asleep: your sleep environment. 

To drop into deep sleep and stay there, your core temperature has to fall about a degree. A room that runs warm, or a bed that traps your heat, blocks that fall. That's why you drift off fine and then snap awake in the middle of the night. Or, you wake up feeling like you didn’t get enough deep sleep. 

Studies show the right mattress can help, and published research suggests the Pod by Eight Sleep is the best option. 

It's a cover that fits over the bed you already own, and it addresses your body temperature. It actively cools or heats each side from 55°F to 110°F and keeps adjusting on its own throughout the night as your body changes. Two people, two temperatures, no thermostat wars. And it reads your sleep straight from the cover, so there's nothing to wear.

The result is that studies have found that Pod users get up to 34% more deep sleep. If temperature is keeping you awake or disturbing you at night, this fix pinpoints exactly where the trouble is. 

As a Pump Club reader, you get up to $350 OFF the Eight Sleep Pod. And you get 30 days to try it at home and return it if you don't love it. If you have an HSA or FSA, the Pod may qualify as a medical expense through Truemed, and qualified customers save an average of about 30%. Check your eligibility here.

If sleep is a struggle, there are answers. Many of them are free. And if your mattress is holding you back, there’s a fix for that too. 

Whatever you do, stop wasting your time thinking melatonin is a cure, and start focusing on things that will make a difference you will see and feel. 

Instant Health Boost 
How Eating The Same Foods Influences Gut Health

You've got your meals. The same breakfast most mornings, the lunch you don't think twice about, a dinner rotation of maybe five things. But you might worry that all that repetition is shortchanging your gut health.

A new study says the fear is misdirected.

Researchers tracked adults who logged every meal in real time, and the ones who ate good food consistently, day after day, tended to have a more diverse gut, not less. The steady eaters had richer microbiomes than the inconsistent ones.

Scientists had 1,000 healthy adults log meals through an app for up to 4 weeks, then collected a single stool sample to analyze the mix of bacteria in their gut. 

The researchers found two common behaviors linked to a more diverse gut: Diet quality — such as more vegetables, fruit, nuts, fiber — was a leading indicator. That’s probably what you would expect. But the second one might be more surprising. People who ate the same healthy foods day after day had more gut diversity than those who were inconsistent.

The researchers think of the gut like an ecosystem. A reliable food supply lets more bacteria settle in and coexist. Still, diet explained only about a fifth of the differences between people, so it's one factor among many.

Variety isn't a bad thing, but the study suggests that steadiness and consistency — just like with exercise — matter more for your gut than you'd think. 

So if you've got a few genuinely good staples, keeping them in steady rotation is a feature, not a flaw.

Be Better
Why Your Workout Recovery Might Feel Slow

Your day-after soreness from a hard workout or a new training plan feels like something to fight. But it usually isn't, unless you have an injury and you can’t tolerate the pain. 

The mild inflammation after a hard workout is part of the signal that tells your muscles to repair and come back stronger. 

So when you reach for ibuprofen or another NSAID to numb routine soreness, you may be quieting the very process you trained to trigger.

Research suggests that higher doses of anti-inflammatory medications can blunt the strength and muscle gains you're working for.

You don’t need a pill to bounce back better. Instead, prioritize sleep, hit your protein target, move gently on rest days to keep blood flowing to sore muscles, and give yourself time to adjust and adapt to your workout. 

Save the anti-inflammatories for real injuries or when your doctor recommends them, not for everyday post-workout ache.

Soreness isn't the goal of a great workout, and it isn’t the enemy either. It's usually proof you showed up and did something new.

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to review our interpretations of the research and ensure scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• Arnold’s Corner: Monday motivation

• Most people get electrolytes wrong

• The fix for Sunday scaries

• Workout of the week

Arnold’s Corner 
Monday Motivation

Since we’re letting you earn back every dollar you spend on the Pump Club app until the end of this week, I wanted to let you in on one of our best traditions: the weekend schmooze.

Every Saturday and Sunday, I bring everyone together in the app to celebrate the wins from the week. Not just the big ones. Mostly the small ones nobody outside of the app would think to clap for.

We think it’s a big part of why this works. When people learn to see their own progress, they quit quitting.

Here’s what I shared with our newest members this weekend:

Welcome to our new members. There are a lot of you. The most since the first day we opened to the public.

This is the weekend schmooze, and it’s probably going to feel pretty weird to you at first.

I ask everybody to show up here every Saturday and Sunday and share a win from the last week.

It can be big. If you hit a milestone, go for it.

Most of the time it will be small. Showing up even though you didn’t want to. Doing all of your workouts. Getting your protein or vegetable servings all week.

It’s the small stuff that no one outside of here celebrates.

And that’s a major mistake. You’ve heard we do things differently. It’s because of the old quote: insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

The same thing isn’t working. You all know that.

So take a leap of faith and celebrate the little tiny wins you’d normally brush off.

Let me explain.

People are used to the huge transformation. It’s all they see on social media.

They don’t see that the huge transformation is built on a million bricks of tiny steps forward.

And then people quit. Because the big win seems so far away they’ll never get to it. All of us who run this app can tell you how many times someone has said “I only lost a pound a week.”

They never zoom out and think, if I did that for a year, I’d lose more than 50 pounds, and would I say someone “only” lost 50 pounds?

If you learn to see your progress, I believe you’re less likely to quit.

And it has a second benefit. I’m a wildly positive person in a world that’s getting more and more negative. If I can train more of you to find the positive like I do, that’s a win.

So just join us in celebrating something you did this week to move forward.

The first workout. The first day tracking your food. Joining a coaching call.

Learn to celebrate yourself so that you have the fuel to keep going when it gets really hard.

The last thing I want to leave you with is this: don’t expect perfection.

Throw it out the window right now. It was never real, anyway.

You will hear this from all of us, over and over.

You will miss workouts. You will eat delicious treats that aren’t on your plan.

Some of you think that the people who succeed don’t do any of that.

Bullshit!

They just come back every single time.

I eat treats. It’s my birthday week! I miss workouts. I’ve had to miss weeks and months after operations. I’ve had days where it just didn’t work in my schedule.

There is no secret.

There is no perfection.

The only thing that works is being relentless. Like a Terminator.

You just keep coming back.

Fall, get up. Miss, show up.

Too many people choose the mirage of perfection over the reality of progress. And 5 years later, they are still standing in exactly the same place, still researching the next move.

Just move. Relentlessly.

If you just joined here, promise me this.

Today, you quit quitting.

—

Remember, if you want to join the app, for this week only, you can get a yearly membership for free — if you do the work.

You’ll get $50 off to celebrate my birthday, $50 back when you complete your first program, and another $50 back when you finish your fourth program. Add it up, and the app is free. And you get in better shape and improve your health. 

You can check out the app, start seeing the small wins, and get a free 7-day trial by clicking here. 

Together With LMNT 
Do You Need That Electrolyte Packet?

Ten years ago, you would only see electrolyte packets in a marathoner's gym bag. Now they're on the desk, poured into the bottle before a 40-minute lift, sold as the thing that will help you have a more energized afternoon. 

But the electrolytes story has lost the plot and ignored the science. There is a real time and place for electrolytes, but most people use them incorrectly or take them unnecessarily. 

Most people believe that electrolytes prevent cramping, but that’s one use where the benefit isn’t as significant. Cramps can affect people with completely normal sodium levels. When researchers tracked runners across races, those who cramped and those who didn't had the same blood sodium and hydration levels. If low salt were the trigger, that wouldn't happen. That’s not to say it has no impact — dehydration can influence it — but it’s not a primary cause.

The real issue is fatigue. Cramps show up in the muscles working hardest when you're going harder than you trained for. The muscle tires, the signals telling it to fire and relax fall out of balance, and it locks. That's why the common fix for a cramp is a stretch, not a sip. That’s because stretching can help reset the signal. And it's why prevention is about building your motor and endurance. You can't salt your way out of a conditioning gap.

The everyday "hydration upgrade" doesn’t hold up much better. On a normal day, your kidneys clear excess minerals you don't need, and plain water with regular meals gives your body what it needs. 

But electrolytes are valuable. And if you do need them, they are a priority. The key is knowing when you’re losing enough that electrolytes should become a priority. 

There are four ways to determine if you need to take electrolytes: workout intensity, workout duration, the climate (think hot days or humid gyms), and how much you sweat. 

When you’re pushing near your cardio or strength limit, go past 1.5 hours in your workout, train in real heat, or sweat heavily, electrolytes become not just a benefit but possibly a necessity. 

Sodium is what lets your body hold onto the water you drink instead of flushing it straight through. During a long, hot session as you sweat, your blood volume drops, and thinner blood means your heart works harder to push it to your muscles and your skin to cool you. 

Sodium helps you keep more fluid in circulation, so the whole system functions as you want when you’re training. 

Lose enough water through sweat, heat, and exertion — roughly 2% of your body weight in sweat — and endurance starts to slide, and you break down quickly, and that influences both performance and recovery.

And it pays off after, too: drink plain water alone, and your body senses the dilution and pees a good chunk of it back out. Add sodium, and you actually keep it, which is the difference between feeling wrung out an hour later and bouncing back.

So it's not always, and it's not never. For a normal 45-minute session, water and a meal with a little salt get the job done. When it's longer, hotter, saltier, or you want to bounce back fast, that's when the packet stops being a habit and starts being worth it.

There’s no shortage of electrolyte options, and we tried most of them. We recommend LMNT because it was designed to replace the vitamins and minerals you lose through sweat during exercise. 

It doesn’t try to be something for everybody. It solves the problem of when your body needs electrolytes. 

With the right balance of sodium, potassium, and magnesium, LMNT helps replace the electrolytes your muscles and brain need to keep going strong. 

As a member of the village, you’ll get a free sample pack (8 packets) of all LMNT flavors when you make any purchase. 

If you don’t love the product, LMNT offers a no-questions-asked refund policy, which means if you’re not satisfied, you get your money back. That’s the type of guarantee we can appreciate. 

Start Your Week Right
The Antidote To Sunday Scaries

Every weekend, we get emails from people telling us they want to be better, more optimistic, and inspired. And yet, each Sunday night, they already feel it: the dread of Monday. If last night you were answering emails in your head that nobody had sent yet, understanding what’s happening might help you break the pattern. 

Psychologists call it anticipatory anxiety, and it’s your brain reacting to a stressor before it arrives, not after, and there’s research suggesting you can rewire how you deal with these thoughts.

The anxiety is not a glitch unique to you or to Sunday nights, and it doesn't mean you're bad at your job or bad at unwinding. It means your brain is doing what brains do: rehearsing what's ahead so you're not caught off guard.

You can't out-think that dread, and you can't order yourself to stop feeling it. Unfortunately, worry doesn't take commands. But you can give it somewhere to go. Here are three moves researchers have actually put to the test.

Rename the feeling: That knot in your stomach and a jolt of excitement are almost the same thing in your body: high alertness, faster heartbeat. In studies of people facing exams and public speaking, those who treated the buzz as fuel (rather than fighting to feel calm) felt more capable and did better. You don't have to fake calm. You just have to let the feeling mean, “I’m ready” instead of “I’m doomed.”

Get it out of your head: You likely run the same loop on repeat. In a sleep-lab study, people who spent five minutes writing a specific to-do list before bed fell asleep about nine minutes faster than people who wrote about their day. And the more specific the list, the faster they dropped off. So when the loop spins hardest at night, that's your move: one short, specific list, then lights out.

Give worry an appointment: Your worry expands to fill whatever space you give it. In a review of randomized trials, people who worked to consolidate their worrying into a fixed 15-minute window each day spent less time worrying overall, and naming a specific "if this comes up, I'll deal with it then" plan further reduced it. When a worry shows up off-schedule, you're not ignoring it. You're just telling it “not now.”

Fitness
Workout Of The Week: The 10-Minute Deadlift

This one might seem easy, but it’s a great way to train strength and endurance, especially on days when you’re short on time or training at a busy gym. 

How to do it:

You’ll be doing deadlifts and only deadlifts. It can be traditional, Romanian, or whatever variation you prefer. Any type of equipment works, but we recommend a barbell (like the official Pump Club barbell) because you’ll be using heavier loads. 

1. Perform 2-3 work-up sets to help prime your body. Don’t go above 60% of your 1-rep max on the work-up sets. 

2. Select a weight that’s about 70% of your 1-rep max. So if you can deadlift 300 pounds, you would load 210 pounds. 

3. Set ten different 1-minute timers. Start the first 1-minute interval and perform 3 reps. Once you complete the second rep, rest for the remainder of the minute. So if the 3 reps take 10 seconds, then you would rest for 50 seconds. 

4. Then, perform another 3 reps. Once again, rest for the remainder of the minute. 

5. You’ll repeat this process for a total of 10 sets, for a total of 30 reps. And that’s it. 

The approach allows for heavier weights to build strength, enough volume for muscle, and short enough rest to jack up your heart rate. 

Give it a try, and start your week strong!

Is The Pump Club App For Me?

We hear a lot from people who wonder, ‘Is the Pump Club app for me?’ So we pulled feedback from the different types of people who experience success.

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to review our interpretations of the research and ensure scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• Number you won’t forget

• Weekly wisdom

• Do grill marks increase your risk of cancer?

Fitness 
Number You Won’t Forget: 2-3 Reps

Most people log dozens or hundreds of workouts and never even notice a common error that's robbing them of results. 

If you just count reps without ever noting how many are difficult, you might be missing out on the reps that signal your body to transform.

Our understanding of muscle growth has grown extensively over the last decade. Things that we used to assume as fact — such as growth being determined by microtears in the muscle that recover and grow bigger — have been disproven and replaced with a much clearer and more direct understanding of how you need to train. 

Scientific reviews have eliminated other competing explanations, too — the pump, metabolite accumulation, the burn — suggesting they don't drive muscle growth. Tension is the key.

Mechanical tension (the force placed on your muscle fibers) is the primary driver of hypertrophy. And the muscular force doesn’t count all reps equally. 

As your muscles fatigue, your nervous system recruits more motor units to keep the work going, and that recruitment peaks in the final reps before failure. That's when individual fibers experience the tension that actually signals growth. 

The big lesson and breakthrough that will change your training: Research suggests that the final 2 to 3 reps before muscular failure are where the growth signal peaks. 

That means if the last 2-3 reps when you finish a set are not extremely challenging to the point where rep speed is unintentionally slowing down, then you’re likely not yet creating enough tension and not doing the reps that trigger growth. (Pump Club app members know this as “first set mindset.”)

If you're using an appropriate weight, the earlier reps in a set are building toward that threshold. The last few reps are where you cross it to maximize tension. 

When the final 2 to 3 reps in a set don't feel like a genuine struggle, the load is too light, or you stopped too early.

But that does not mean every set (or any set) needs to be taken to failure. Or that every set needs to be heavy. You can do this with lighter weights, as long as you take it near failure.

Scientists found that stopping 1 to 3 reps short of failure produces the same muscle growth as pushing to the limit, while allowing faster recovery and more productive sessions each week.

After every set, ask yourself one question: how many more reps could I have done? If the answer is more than three or four reps than what you completed, then you know you need to bring more intensity to the next set. 

If you need help with your training, accountability and support, diet, and habit coaching, that’s what we offer in The Pump Club app. 

Right now, to celebrate Arnold’s birthday, you can earn the app for free. 

Sign up for the app, and you’ll instantly get $50 off and receive a 7-day free trial. After your trial ends and once you complete your first program, we’ll give you another $50 back. And then, after you complete four programs, you get $50 more. That’s a total of $150 in savings, which means you got the app for free. 

The offer is only good for a week. 

Join us. Show up, earn it back, and get in the best shape of your life for free.

Mindset 
Weekly Wisdom

Replaying a bad day feels like accountability. Responsible people look hard at their mistakes, so you go back and look at yours. This is not the problem. It’s what happens next. 

You go through it once. But then again, and again. You overanalyze everything, trying to prevent the outcome you want to avoid.

Eventually, you stop searching with the goal of moving forward and just dwell. Ten passes later, it feels like proof of something about who you are.

All along, you consider this a form of self-awareness or processing. It sounds good and feels right, so you believe it helps. 

But at some point, all it does is rehearse the mistake.

Susan Nolen-Hoeksema spent most of her career on this exact loop. In one experiment, she put people in a low mood, then had one group sit and analyze their feelings while another group turned their attention to something ordinary. 

The analyzers stayed low longer. Their thinking also narrowed and darkened, which left them worse at solving the problem they’d been thinking about. 

Decades of follow-up found that this is a typical pattern. Going over a bad moment on repeat keeps the mood running and strips you of the clear head you'd need to fix anything.

Arnold comes back to a version of this: You can't get where you're going if your eyes stay glued to the rearview mirror. A glance back tells you where you've been. Spend the whole drive looking there, and you'll drift out of your lane long before the past does you any good.

Emerson wrote his line to his daughter in 1854, while she was away at school. "You have done what you could" takes the day at face value, absurdities included, and calls it closed. The mistakes stay in the day they happened.

Turn Wisdom Into Action

Give the tough days an ending. Write down the one moment you keep going back to. But be brief. Maybe 1-2 sentences. It’s about the lesson. Then, give yourself closure. It could just be writing: I did what I could, I learned the lesson, it’s done.

It might sound silly, but there’s something to capturing what you were looking for and then closing the book on it. 

That doesn’t guarantee your mind won’t go back. But when it does, you already have spelled out the answer: you’re done with it. 

Reader Question
Are Grill Marks Increasing Your Risk Of Cancer?

Reader Question: "I've heard that using the grill will give me cancer. Is there any truth to it?"

This one hits home. Because far too many times we’ve been at a BBQ, the steaks barely hit the grill, and then someone announces that char causes cancer. Next thing you know, everyone's looking at their plate with a little more guilt and fear.

To be fair, some of the chemistry is accurate. But the concern is overstated.

You don't have to give up grilling. But you might want to be mindful of how much black crust from the grill you consume. It’s a mix of science and cooking style. 

If you cook meat hot enough, the amino acids and other nutrients inside turn into compounds called HCAs. At the same time, fat dripping onto the flames throws up smoke, and that smoke carries PAHs that settle back down onto the surface of your food.

Both are compounds that can damage DNA in the lab, and DNA damage is one of the ways cancer can start. 

But please don’t confuse grill lines or a brown crust with char. The potential for these chemical changes comes from the black, brittle, burnt spots, especially the crust that forms when flames flare up directly on the meat. 

The simplest rule there is: brown is fine, black is the part to trim.

What nobody can tell you is how much you can consume before it’s an issue. You can't run a twenty-year trial that assigns people to eat charred steak and waits to see who gets sick, so all we have is observational research, and those studies don't agree.

A 2017 review of 39 studies suggests a link to colorectal cancer, but it wasn’t dramatic. One of the compounds increased while the other didn’t. So this becomes as much about risk tolerance as it does cause-and-effect threat. 

If you love using the grill, there's an easy three-step process that can reduce compounds and ease your mind: pay closer attention, cook at lower heat, and marinate.

Scientists found that marinating chicken before grilling knocked PhIP, the most common of these compounds, down by 92 to 99 percent. 

Just make sure your marinade isn’t loaded with sugar (think more than 10 grams per serving). If your marinade is sugary and you leave the meat on the grill a long time — around 30 to 40 minutes — the sugar backfires. A different compound increases more than ten times higher. 

And no, there's no magic temperature to stay under. Any grill hot enough to cook is hot enough to make these compounds. The easiest approach is to flip it often so no one spot burns.

And that’s it for this week. Thanks for being a part of the positive corner of the internet. And remember: don’t wait to make a change. Take action on any goal, don’t quit in the hard moments, and the results will come. Have a fantastic weekend!
-Arnold, Adam, and Daniel

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to review our interpretations of the research and ensure scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• Artificial sweeteners and your brain

• Creatine risks

• A new fix for knee pain?

• Why you really keep grabbing your phone

Health
Does Diet Soda Damage Your Brain?

Yesterday's breakdown about TV and brain aging brought in a flurry of new questions from all of you.

The most common request was a review of the recent coverage suggesting that artificial sweeteners harm your brain. A deeper look at the root of the conversation helps explain why there's no reason to panic.

We'll start with what you care about: There's no human research showing sweeteners damage brain cells.

The new commentary is based on studies examining erythritol. There's one study in particular that took cells lining the tiny blood vessels in the brain, cultured them in a dish, and bathed them in erythritol — about the amount in one sweet drink (roughly 30 grams) — for three hours. Then they looked at how the cells behaved.

The treated cells made less of the molecule that keeps blood vessels relaxed and open, more of the one that tightens them, and were slower to release the body's built-in clot-buster when challenged. On paper, that's the kind of change you'd rather not see in a blood vessel.

But this was cells in a dish, not a person. Nobody drank anything. There was no mouth, no gut, no bloodstream, no body doing what a body does with what you eat.

The cells were exposed to a single dose at once and submerged in it for three hours. That's arguably the most important detail because it's roughly 150 times the amount the heaviest sweetener users in real-world studies consume in a full day.

So not only was it based on non-real-world scenarios, the conclusions were hypothetical. It's hard to say a sweetener increases stroke risk when nobody had a stroke because there was nobody to test. The study measured cell chemistry, not a single real outcome in a single real human.

And when you do look at real people, the fear shrinks fast because the data doesn't back up the extreme warnings.

There's one study about a "threefold dementia risk" that came from an analysis of fewer than 100 cases of stroke and dementia. But once researchers accounted for diabetes and blood pressure, the association no longer held up. 

If you're worried about your brain, The Lancet Commission identifies 14 factors that actually affect dementia risk, including blood pressure, blood sugar, cholesterol, hearing, movement, and smoking. Diet soda isn't on the list because there's no evidence showing a close relationship.

Together With Momentous
What Are The Real Risks Of Creatine?

Reader question: "I see so much about creatine, but what's the biggest risk of using it? What are the downsides?"

The answer is a bit of a letdown, but in the best way possible: for a healthy adult, creatine is about as low-risk as supplements get, while offering legitimate research-based benefits.

The scariest-sounding risks are linked to what’s in the tub, and the reality of not being able to trust what’s on the label. 

Creatine is one of the most researched supplements. It has decades of studies, long-term trials, and tests where they mega-dose as much 30 grams a day for five years. And time after time, creatine holds up as one of the cleanest safety records on the shelf. So the truthful answer isn't a scary headline. It's a short list of small, mostly avoidable things, plus one group that should check with a doctor.

Risk 1: What's in the tub. Supplements get regulated after they hit the shelf, not before, so what's in the container can drift from what's on the label. When researchers test sports supplements, an uncomfortable number of products come back dirty. 

One review found that up to 50% of products tested positive for banned substances, and a larger review of 50 studies covering more than 3,000 supplements found over 28% contained undeclared drugs, including anabolic steroids. 

And many creatine products don’t even have any creatine and instead are stuffed with other, sometimes illegal, performance-enhancing ingredients. 

Or, they use forms of creatine — like Creatine HCL — that aren’t backed by decades of published research. 

Creatine monohydrate is a single, affordable ingredient, which puts it near the safe end of the shelf. 

You erase most of the risk with one habit: buy a third-party-tested tub.

Risk 2: Your stomach, if you mega-dose. The side effect that shows up is stomach trouble, but it depends on how much you take, not creatine itself.

At 3-5 grams, most people have no issues. But in a trial of 59 people, a single 10-gram serving increased the risk of GI issues. Split that same 10 grams into two 5-gram doses, and it was no different from placebo. 

Risk 3: The one group that should pause. If you have an existing kidney disease, talk with your doctor.

Not because creatine has been shown to damage kidneys — a thorough review of the literature found no compelling evidence of that in healthy or clinical populations. 

It's because creatine can affect creatinine levels, which are the blood marker doctors use to monitor kidney function. That rise is a normal byproduct of taking creatine, not a sign of damage. But if your kidneys are already compromised, you don't want to blur the gauge you're steering by. That's a conversation for your doctor if you have a health condition, not a warning for everyone else.

So the whole risk really comes down to one question: can you trust the tub? 

Momentous built the Signature Spec Creatine around that exact trust problem. Every batch runs through six verification stages and gets checked by outside labs before it ships. Then it's certified by NSF for Sport and by SuppCo's TESTED program, which buys the product off a real shelf and checks it against the label the way you would at home.

If you’re going to take a product that actually works, don’t leave yourself vulnerable to the only risk.

APC readers get 35% off a subscription or 14% off a one-time order when you use the code PUMPCLUB at checkout. 

If you’re looking for workout benefits, the research suggests 3-5 grams of creatine monohydrate per day. If you’re more interested in cognitive benefits, then you might need 10 grams per day, and the benefits appear to be stronger the older you are. 

On Our Radar 
A Surprising New Target for Knee Pain: Your Gut

For cranky, arthritic knees, exercise is the best-tested thing you can do. But a new trial looked somewhere else and came back with something worth keeping an eye on.  

A fermentable fiber appeared to take the edge off arthritic knee pain, an early hint that the gut may be another way to help cranky joints.

Researchers enrolled adults with diagnosed knee osteoarthritis and divided them into four groups: one group stirred a daily 20-gram scoop of inulin (a fiber) into their food. One followed a digital physical-therapy program. One did both. The last got a placebo.

Other than the placebo group, everyone got better, but not equally. Exercise beat fiber for pain relief, and doing both together led to the biggest drop of all.

The approaches also helped in different ways. 

Exercise made people more functional: they could rise from a chair more times in 30 seconds and moved more steadily on their feet. 

The fiber helped some with soreness and reduced the sensitivity to pressure. The researchers aren’t sure why the fiber made a difference, so that’s a reason not to overstate the claims. 

And, as we’ve told you many times before, approximately 95% of people don’t get enough fiber in their diet. And a sufficient amount of fiber is linked to everything from weight loss and better cardiovascular health, to a lower risk of diseases like diabetes. 

So if eating more fiber also might help reduce knee pain, instead of viewing that as a primary purpose of taking fiber, it’s just one more benefit from a habit you want to build regardless. 

If you want to follow what they did in the study, participants mixed 20 grams of inulin into their daily diet. 

Better Questions, Better Solutions
Are You Distracted, Or Creating An Escape?

You sit down to lock in. This is the block where you finally make progress, and nothing is going to stop you.

Ten minutes in, your hand drifts toward your phone. No buzz. No notification. No trigger at all. It's easy to blame the phone — it's built to keep you hooked. But the phone isn't the whole story.

Old question: How do I block out distractions?
Better question: What am I trying to escape the second I interrupt myself?

Here's why the second question can help you improve focus and concentration without any added text or guilt: When researchers watched people work, they found that close to half of our interruptions — around 44% — don't come from the outside at all. No coworker, no ping, no alert. They come from us. 

So even in a silent room with your phone in a drawer, roughly half the pull is still there, and it's coming from the inside.

In a separate experiment, people were more likely to interrupt themselves the moment the work stopped feeling like it was going anywhere. When they got stuck, or the task started to drag, or they couldn't feel any progress. And those self-interruptions came at a price: their accuracy dropped. 

In the moment, it might seem like the pull of your phone is random. But the studies suggest it’s probably not. It's a tiny escape hatch from a moment that just got uncomfortable.

That same workplace research found the more people got interrupted from the outside, the more they went on to interrupt themselves afterward. 

This is the part that has likely infiltrated all of our lives. We are now connected to phones, email, and many forms of technology that keep us in touch. And all of those notifications, reminders, and messages train the habit. 

You're being trained to give yourself something to react to, even once things finally go quiet.

Put those together, and one thing becomes clear: blocking notifications only solves half the problem. You can leave your phone in another room and still walk away from the task the second it gets hard or uncomfortable.

That's why white-knuckling your way to focus so often fails. You're trying to power through a moment of friction without knowing what you’re fighting, so the friction wins.

Here’s a three-step process that will give you a better chance of improving focus and undercutting the distractions.

1. Catch the drift: The next time your hand reaches for no reason, don't wrestle it. Just ask one question: what just got uncomfortable?

2. Name it out loud or on paper, and be specific: "I don't know how to start this section." "I'm dreading this email." "I have no idea what the next step is." Naming turns a vague urge into a small, solvable problem.

3. Shrink it, then do five minutes. Cut the task down until it's almost too easy, and do only that for five minutes. Not the daunting email, just the first couple of sentences or bullets of what you want to say. You’ll finish it, but the goal right now is to resist the urge and start on the task your mind is trying to get you to avoid. 

None of this is about defeating distraction. It's about removing the reason you were going to leave in the first place.

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to review our interpretations of the research and ensure scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• Can too much TV watching shrink your brain?

• It’s time to check your water filter

• A true instant mood boost

• Foods are super

Beyond The Headline 
The "TV Shrinks Your Brain" Study Never Watched Anyone's Brain Shrink

The headlines were blunt: "Heavy TV watching systematically shrinks your brain. One common daily habit could be raising your dementia risk."

On the surface, the data seems compelling. The study was more than 20 years in the making. On the misleading side, like so many other headlines, it draws a big conclusion from something the study didn't measure.

Back in 1987, participants answered two questions: how often they watched TV in their free time, and how much of the workday they spent sitting. The scale ran from "never/seldom" to "very often." Then, some 24 years later, those original participants received MRIs.

The people who'd said "very often" on their TV time had smaller frontal, occipital, and Alzheimer's-signature volumes, plus more white matter damage. And even after accounting for how much participants exercised — along with weight, smoking, and blood pressure — the association held up. So it's something, but not exactly a before-and-after.

And, maybe more importantly, there are so many other variables that could explain the connection.

In other words, the researchers had participants answer questions in their 50s, and then, when they were in their 70s, did a scan. Heavy TV watchers had smaller volumes than light watchers.

That's a difference between people, not a change with clear causation, and certainly not a before-and-after.

Most importantly, the scientists did not measure shrinking, didn't measure dementia, and found essentially nothing in women. As wild as it sounds, heavy TV viewing was not associated with any changes to a single brain region among female participants. The whole finding is really a story about men.

When the study received coverage, several outlets made a connection to dementia. But being dementia-free was a requirement to get scanned in the first place. The risk figures circulating online come from a different, larger analysis of the same study population, not this brain-imaging paper.

And then there was the part most people overlooked: sitting at work was associated with less white matter damage and larger volumes in several regions.

While sitting and inactivity are usually associated with worse brain outcomes, the researchers suspect that longer hours at work keep you mentally engaged, which improves brain health. But we can't be sure because the data wasn't detailed enough to prove it.

Our take? It's less "TV is eating your brain" and more about what you're doing while you sit. And none of this makes TV the villain; it's just that heavy TV time tends to be associated with many other habits linked to worse health, which makes it reasonable to keep in check. If you're going to sit, it's not a stretch to trade some passive screen time for something that makes you think.

If you want to protect your brain, a randomized trial of more than 9,000 older adults found that blood pressure control lowered the risk of mild cognitive impairment by about 19% and slowed the buildup of white-matter damage. 

Exercise helps too: one landmark trial found that a year of regular aerobic activity increased brain volume (it didn’t just slow it; the hippocampus increased in volume). 

If you’re going to sit, do it with the mentally demanding kind. Reading, learning something new, or even a conversation can be fuel for a younger, healthier brain. 

Together With Rorra
Your Water Filter Might Only Be Doing Half Its Job

You probably buy a filter and assume the water is handled. It tastes better, it runs clear, the pitcher says "removes 99% of contaminants" right on the front. So you stop thinking about it.

Here's the part most people don’t know: Many filters are built to fix how your water tastes, not what's actually in it. Those are two different jobs, and the label almost never makes the difference obvious.

The easiest way to tell them apart is to see if the filter tests for NSF/ANSI 53.

A filter tested to NSF/ANSI 42 handles issues with looks and taste, such as chlorine, odor, and the stuff you'd catch with your own mouth. The NSF/ANSI 53 is the health tier. That's the standard used to test water treatment products for removing or reducing concentrations of contaminants that have the potential to cause health problems.

A pitcher can honestly print "removes 99%" and still only mean the chlorine.

That's why Rorra built the Countertop System differently. Its Enfinity™ nanofiber filtration is independently lab-tested to target PFAS, lead, microplastics, and 50+ other contaminants. These are the health-tier features most pitchers leave behind. It filters faster than the gravity systems it replaces, it's built from medical-grade stainless steel, and it actually looks good sitting on the counter.

And it's backed by a money-back guarantee, so you can taste and see the difference with zero risk.

Pump Club readers get 15% off the Rorra system.

And if you’re not ready to buy? Start where everyone should. You can test and see what’s in your water to determine whether you need a filter. No purchase required. 

Clean water isn't about fear. It's about knowing if your filter is doing the job you pay for. 

Instant Health Boost 
Feeling Low? This 30-Second Reset Lifted Mood

You pass a hundred small, amazing things a day, and you probably don’t recall many details about any of them.

Scientists tested what happens when you stop for just a few of them, and it’s better than you might think. 

Stopping to look at something, pay attention to it, and appreciate what you’re viewing a few times a day measurably lowered stress and lifted mood.

Researchers examined participants struggling with depressive symptoms. They taught them a three-step process called AWE: put your full attention on something you appreciate, wait a beat and slow down, then exhale and let the feeling stretch. 

They practiced it at least three times a day, in bursts under 30 seconds. This wasn’t about going or doing something extraordinary; it was about finding ways to see the ordinary as something amazing

Over about four weeks, the group that practiced it dropped 17% in depression symptoms and 12% in stress, while their well-being climbed 16%. 

Researchers think awe works by quieting the loud, self-focused voice that runs your worry loop.

Other studies have suggested the method works, but it doesn’t always result in such a big change. So it’s possible that it won’t be as impactful for you, but given that it’s free and doesn’t take much time, it’s a great investment with very little possible downside. 

If you want to try for yourself, pick one thing you'd normally blow past, slow down, and try to process and find something to appreciate about it. 

Nutrition
Foods Are Super: Sardines

They come in a flat little tin, cost about a dollar, and most people walk right past them. 

And yet, sardines might be the most underrated food in the store.

A single can of sardines delivers protein, omega-3s, and a hit of calcium.

Sardines are among the richest sources of omega-3 fats, which are linked to heart and brain health. And a review in Frontiers in Nutrition argued that they're more than just an omega-3 pill: 100 grams provides roughly 380 mg of calcium (from the edible bones of sardines), along with magnesium and potassium. It’s a combination the researchers think supports both heart and bone health. 

Sardines are also one of the few whole foods that naturally supply vitamin D, while being naturally low in mercury.

Eating oily fish about twice a week is a standard heart-health recommendation, but for many people, it can be cost-prohibitive, or cooking can be a barrier. But if you like the taste, a couple of tins do the job. 

If you’ve never had sardines, you can eat them straight from the can, or add to toast with a squeeze of lemon and pepper. Other favorites from Pump Club app members include having them mashed up on crackers like tuna salad, tossed on a green salad, or added to pasta. And if the flavor feels strong, start with ones packed in olive oil or tomato sauce, which helps make it a little more palatable.

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to review our interpretations of the research and ensure scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• Arnold’s Corner: Monday Motivation

• Is typing stealing your brain power?

• How to feel more optimistic about Mondays

• Workout of the week

Arnold’s Corner 
Monday Motivation: Open The Door

How many doors have you walked right past in your life?

I am not talking about real doors. I’m talking about opportunities.

One of our members I’ve trained with, Peggy, made me think about this. I’ll share what she wrote in just a second. But first, I want to get you thinking.

All of us walk past a lot of opportunities in life, and sometimes, we don’t see them. Sometimes, the unknown behind them scares us. Sometimes, we are so stuck in our ways it just doesn’t feel like who we are.

When Joe Weider invited me to America, that was a door opening to a new part of my life. But that’s big and obvious. I think all of us see those doors.

They can be much smaller.

Anything that is new to you might be a chance you don’t realize.

It can be going to a farmer’s market for vegetables. It can be training for the first time. It can be going to a class or a club or church.

All it has to be is something that the old you wouldn’t do — because that’s how you walk through the door that brings you to the new you.

It can also be something that you’ve been meaning to do, but you’ve been putting off over and over. You know you want what’s on the other side, but something keeps holding you back.

We have shared a lot of research here about how once you have a vision, you have to act on it. You can’t just think about it. Your brain needs proof that the vision you see is really who you want to be, and the only proof it believes is action.

A lot of you tell me you can’t find your vision. If you’re stuck, the best thing you can do is stop thinking and start doing.

That’s when you walk through every door you see.

When my friends invited me to train with the Graz Weightlifting Club, that was a door that changed my life.

When I was wandering through town and saw the magazine with Reg Park as Hercules in a window, I walked through a door and found my blueprint.

Neither of those things ever happened if I sat at home.

I especially want young people to hear this, because we see data on how much time they spend on their phones, playing video games, and gambling.

If the only door in your life is the one you’ve locked yourself behind, you’re not going to find what you’re looking for. I guarantee you.

It’s not just the young people. I know people of every age who have retreated into their devices and stopped looking for more in their life.

They’ve stopped finding the joy of being surprised, choosing the comfort of what they know.

I want all of you to open a door this week. Just do something that you’ve been putting off, or that takes you slightly outside of your status quo.

Let yourself be surprised.

Now, I am letting Peggy take over, because she wants to challenge women in her age group — and everyone — to join her on the other side of the door she opened.

—

Meet Peggy

My name is Peggy O’Brien. I’m 53 years old, and fell completely and unexpectedly in love with barbells and competing at 52. 

I took a trip that was a reach for me in 2025 to Venice Beach for my first Pump Club meetup, ruck, and visit to Gold’s Gym. 

At the time, I had been running the beginner bodyweight foundation in the Pump Club app for about a year. At Gold’s, the team set up a trap bar for us to try deadlifting.  I had never seen anything like this before. We were all invited to lift. 

Jen Widerstrom had just finished demonstrating how to secure a barbell across our backs for a squat.  A barbell can go across your back?  This person is strong enough to hold a barbell across her back like it’s a broomstick?!  I had never seen a physique like Jen’s either, and on that day I told her so.  I had no idea who this gorgeous living superhero creation was.  

People started lining up to lift, and I found myself swept up — kicking off my shoes and joining the line with everyone. I touched the trap bar. I lifted 180lbs that day. Adam Bornstein told me I was strong. Daniel Ketchell gave me a hug. I sat down on the floor and for the rest of the morning watched incredible feats of strength. 

I had never seen such effort and exertion — gym faces reddening with maximum effort.  Muscles and veins exploding. The fervor of cheers for the lifters. The slam of the weights on the ground. The thump that reverberated through our bodies as we sat watching. The clang and smash of the loading of the plates as the weights went up. And chalk. What was chalk? All I knew was that I was HOOKED. 

And so my journey began.

The Tuesday when I arrived home, I signed up at my local gym, and a portal was opened for me that day to observe and potentially join a powerlifting team. I leapt through. Unreal. But that’s how it happened. By the next Monday, I was lifting with the team that would become my family, and I never stopped.  

Today, I write a love letter to you, imploring you to compete if you are holding back.  

I competed this weekend and had a glorious time. But during the award ceremony, I went to accept my first-place medal. To walk and stand upon the podium. There were spaces for three champions to pose and hug — roast, play, and celebrate. 

I was the lone woman in my age and weight class. I pulled up the 8-year-old daughter of a younger teammate, and thankfully she ascended the podium with me. We stood on the highest block, flexing together. Smiling, laughing. Pure joy. 

It is my dream that one day that podium will be filled by all of you. I know it will be filled by that incredible 8-year-old one day, but in the meantime, let’s ascend that podium together. 

On the platform, there is no safer place to fail, and no finer place to be extraordinary.  

It’s only you against that bar, testing the strength that you have developed. Surrounded by fellow “men in the arena.” These are your people. High fives flying, fist bumps, shoulder smacks, chalk slaps. We celebrate together, we cheer together, we console one another,  and lick our wounds together. We succeed, we eat dirt, we soar, we fall, and together we get up and try over again and again to lift the impossible. 

Every single lifter cheering and physically willing that weight up for one another, because we are all connected by the same grind, the same dedication, the same fight against the force of gravity — our only opponent. The human spirit, for one day, celebrates taking things from a dead stop to setting them in motion. The weight flies, the chalk dust spirals up, defies gravity, and reaches for the heavens.  

When we lift together, we not only lift the weight, we lift ourselves. We lift one another; we lift the world.

I have had so many impossible dreams come true here. I have taken so many leaps because of all of you. A dream that I have is to inspire one or many of you to take the leap.  

To get uncomfortable. To find that your fears were unfounded. That you find your people. That you discover more support and camaraderie than you imagined possible by getting together with a group of perfect strangers of every age and from every origin. 

People who bind together for the day, by picking up heavy things and putting them down.  We’ve been doing this since the beginning of time, and there’s a reason we continue to do so. It would be my dream to see all of you who are considering competing to take your dream from a dead stop and to set it in motion. The whole Village is beside you. 

I’m slapping chalk over your back; the pattern I create upon your shoulders looks like wings.

LET’S GO! -Peggy

Together With Wispr Flow
Typing Isn’t Stealing Your Brainpower. But It Is Slowing You Down

You might have heard that writing pulls from the same mental fuel you need for thinking. The premise is half right, but not for the reason you've been told.

Your working memory is a fixed tank, and forming letters, spelling, and hunting for keys all draw from it. 

In kids, who haven't automated any of that, the drain is big enough that they remember and produce less when writing than when speaking. 

But in adults, it’s not the same. When researchers tested whether making typing harder actually damaged the quality of adults' writing, it largely didn't. 

The good news: your fingers aren't secretly bleeding your best ideas. But they are slowing you down in other ways.

Talking out your ideas usually feels easier because speaking is much faster than typing, so ideas leave your head before they slip away. And there's evidence that ideas held too long at the "output" stage can simply get lost. 

Not to mention, there’s the practical aspect of how thoughts work. When you don’t need to pause mid-thought to fix a typo or rescue a sentence, your thoughts flow seamlessly. 

That's why voice-to-text is a technological advancement with real upside. It’s not that it gives you a smarter brain, but it offers fewer speed bumps in your processing. 

The science suggests using it as a capture tool can not only save time but also improve your thoughts. Try it as a capture tool. You can talk out the messy first pass, let it clean up the mechanics, then edit with your eyes. You're not upgrading your thinking. You're getting out of its way.

We went looking for a voice tool that does that one job well: getting out of the way.

Most voice-to-text tech is so inconsistent that we ran back to the keyboard inside a week. But one didn't get uninstalled. 

We loved Wispr Flow, so we asked them to sponsor APC because they earned our attention the right way: we kept using it even after the novelty wore off.

You hold one key, talk, and let go. The text lands right where you're already working, nothing to open, nothing to upload. It strips the ums and you-knows on its own, so you're not re-editing the mechanics. And it works the same everywhere you type.

It's about three times faster than typing, which mostly means the thought reaches the page before it slips away.

Pump Club readers get 60 days of Wispr Flow Pro for free. They’re covering the first two months so you can see why we find it so useful. Set it up on your computer to unlock them, and the app works on your phone too.

Start Your Week Right
Do Mondays Feel Worse? Let’s Change That

Your alarm goes off, and your stomach drops before your feet even hit the floor. Some narrator in your head says the thing you know but don’t want to be reminded: Get up, it's Monday.

There’s something about Mondays that doesn’t make sense. A new week should bring new hope, but for many it’s more of an ominous feeling. 

So we wondered: Does Monday actually feel worse, or have you just been told it does since you were a kid with a backpack?

When researchers looked at mood data from 340,000 Americans, they found almost no evidence that Monday itself sours your mood. 

The real effect is that Fridays and weekends feel better, not that Mondays feel worse.

The study analyzed six mood measures on each day of the week. Over and over, weekends and Fridays had higher ratings and good vibes. But Monday wasn't dragging behind Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday. It was just a regular weekday, no better or no worse, despite the bad reputation. 

The dread likely comes from the contrast of what just ended. 

Friday works because something shifts and it lasts for about 48 hours. And then Monday feels bad because whatever made Friday good has usually vanished by the start of your day. 

This might seem obvious, but it’s good news. 

It means the fix isn't "trick yourself into loving Mondays." It means finding one ingredient that happens on weekends that can realistically happen on Monday, and smuggling it into the day. 

There’s no comparing the weekend to a regular Monday. However, you can find elements that anchor something you look forward to and place it at the start of the week. 

You might not think it matters much, but the start of anything tends to set the frame for what follows. 

In one workplace study, the mood people walked in with spilled into how they saw the whole day, something the researchers called "affective prime." And when people brace for a bad day, the day's stress tends to hit harder. None of this proves optimism fixes Mondays. 

But it does suggest that the one good thing you anchor to Monday morning isn't wishful thinking — it's a small lever on how the rest of the day reads. 

So don't try to love Mondays. Just give yourself one thing that makes you a little more optimistic about the day and week ahead. 

Fitness
Workout Of The Week: The 4-3-2-1

Last week, you had your first take of us blending energy systems together. 

For that workout, you started with the highest intensity (a one-minute sprint), and then each set slightly reduced intensity and increased duration. 

This week, you’ll do the opposite: start with the longest duration, then build up to the highest intensity. 

Once again, it's a fun and challenging way to touch every gear you've trained. But this week, you learn to push yourself once you’ve already been fatigued. You can perform this 2-3 times per week.

The Workout

Warm up: 10 minutes to get your blood flowing and prepare for the workout. The warm-up should not be exhausting.

The Work (equal recovery after each interval)

Select the type of exercise you want to perform (see “tool” below), and then complete the 4 sets and rest periods.

Set 1: 4 minutes moderate intensity + 4 minutes rest
Set 2: 3 minutes hard + 3 minutes easy 
Set 3: 2 minutes very hard + 2 minutes rest
Set 4: 1 minute all-out sprint 
Cool down: 4-5 minutes

Pick your tool

• Rower

• Ski Erg

• Rogue echo bike

• Kettlebell swings

• Sled push and pull

• Hill running or sprints

Give it a try, and start your week strong!

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to review our interpretations of the research and ensure scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• Number you won’t forget

• Weekly wisdom

• Let’s talk about dirty lettuce

Nutrition
Number You Won’t Forget: 6%

Beans get a lot of credit for being a great source of fiber (because they are). And they have a reputation as heart-healthy food (which is also accurate). 

But research suggests there might be an even bigger reason to sneak in the affordable food into your diet. 

Scientists found that people who ate the most legumes had about a 6% lower risk of dying from any cause than people who ate the least. And all you need to do is eat about a quarter cup per day to see the protection. 

We’ll be honest: a 6% reduction in risk of death might not seem like much. And it’s not. But there’s more to the behavior, and reason to pay attention.

Researchers reviewed 32 long-term studies, which included more than 1 million people, and examined how legume consumption corresponded to lifespan. People who ate a lot of legumes appeared to live longer. 

Specifically, every 50 grams of cooked legumes a day (a little more than a quarter-cup) was associated with a lower risk of death. 

This is observational, so it can't prove beans add years. And, based on other data, people who eat more of them usually eat more vegetables, move more, and smoke less — all of which are healthier behaviors linked with better mortality. 

You might be doing enough healthy behaviors and figure this doesn’t matter, but that would miss the point. Legumes are filled with fiber, plant protein, and resistant starch, which steady blood sugar and feed gut bacteria. 

When possible, finding changes that carry more weight can help you establish easily repeatable good habits that push you closer to your goals.

A finding like this isn't a message about death. It's about which habits are worth your time so you don’t major in the minor. 

The same things that make beans show up in a longevity study — more fiber, steadier blood sugar, better cholesterol, a well-fed gut — are things your body notices every week, not in fifty years. Longevity is just the receipt at the end for a lot of small, good decisions made along the way.

One food will not guarantee a longer life. But one good habit can lead to other good habits, and that’s how health works. And when something is this cheap, this easy, and this free of downside, the math works out well. 

Mindset 
Weekly Wisdom

You're not stalling. You're preparing.

That's how it feels, anyway. You listen to the episode about discipline. You take the assessment that tells you who you are. And you analyze morning routines, hunting for the one that’s best for you.

But how long have you been waiting and putting off the doing? How long have you been handing yourself reasons why you can’t do this or that? How quickly do you find excuses rather than accountability?

Waiting to feel ready is the most respectable form of procrastination there is. It looks like self-awareness. It uses the vocabulary of growth. And it can run indefinitely, because the thing you're waiting for doesn't show up in books or podcasts. 

What you’re missing is the thing you’re avoiding: action.

There's the person your actions have built so far, and there's the person your next actions will build. 

The problem was never that you haven't found your why. Yes, the why matters and can help.  The problem is that you're waiting for answers you can only get by doing.

Psychology long assumed that to change what you do, you first had to change how you think and feel.

Behavioral activation suggests that if you want to help people re-engage with activities that matter to them, then treat your mood as something that follows behavior rather than leads it.

We’ve worked with tens of thousands of people. And it’s rare for someone to think their way into wanting change and seeing change. 

Instead, we see people drag themselves through workouts they didn't want, and at some point, something shifts. The behavior stops feeling like a costume and starts feeling like part of who they are. 

The deception of "finding yourself” is that it puts the payoff before the work, when the work is the payoff mechanism.

Turn Wisdom Into Action

Pick one behavior that belongs to the person you want to be. Then, break it down into something that is doable even on your worst day. It can be 10 minutes of behavior, a walk, or an improvement in one meal.

These are the foundations of anchor habits. 

If you want to help it stick, make a list of the habits. And then check it off each time (we do this for you in the Pump Club app's habit builder). Or, just write the date, the habit, and the word, “Done.” Not how it went. Not how you felt about it. Just that you made it happen.

That's not motivation, and it’s not yet your personality. It's evidence, and that’s what you need to become the person you want. 

You don't have to become the person you want today. But you do have to do one thing that the person you're becoming would have done.

Fact or Fiction
Does Rinsing Protect Your Produce?

You've seen the lettuce headlines. And now, you're standing at the sink with a bag of greens, thinking maybe an extra rinse will keep you safe.

In most situations, the instinct is right. But using water to clean your lettuce is the wrong tool if you’re trying to remove cyclospora. 

Rinsing removes dirt, grit, and pesticide residue, and it lowers the general bacterial load that’s a cause of most foodborne illness. In general, water’s job is to dilute and remove. And for some foods, it is a great protective layer. For others, it doesn’t disinfect anything, and that distinction is why the contaminated lettuce is such a problem.

Researchers coated raspberries and blueberries with Cyclospora (the parasite behind this outbreak), along with two other parasites for comparison (Cryptosporidium and Giardia). They washed the fruit three ways: a one-minute rinse, a vinegar solution, and a swish followed by a salad spinner.

If you love blueberries, they come out clean. Every method took off more than 94% of the Cyclospora.

However, raspberries were a different story. A plain rinse pulled off about 35% of the Cyclospora, while stripping at least 80% of the other two parasites sitting on that same fruit. That's because raspberries are covered in tiny hairs and folds that a stream of water slides right past, and Cyclospora clings harder than the other two do.

The two swishing methods did far better on that same fruit: medians of 84% and 89%. The researchers couldn't say whether the vinegar or the hand agitation deserved the credit, and the two came out statistically even (which points to the swishing).

Texture decides how much comes off. Nobody has run this experiment on lettuce, so nobody can tell you what a rinse does to a leaf.

What we do know is that rinsing is a removal step, not a kill step. Nothing at the sink kills these parasites. In the lab, it took 15 minutes at 158°F to stop Cyclospora from ever becoming infectious.

If you’re worried, it’s helpful to put the threat into context: while none of us want a parasite, this is uncomfortable rather than dangerous for most people. The CDC has linked 1,644 illnesses across five states to shredded iceberg lettuce. Ninety-four people ended up in the hospital; nobody has died in this outbreak, and most healthy people recover without treatment. For the ones who need it, a standard antibiotic works.

If you're trying to avoid this bug, start with the outbreak itself: the CDC says skip shredded iceberg lettuce at Taco Bell in the five affected states. Everywhere else, swish your loose produce in a bowl instead of holding it under the tap. And when the meal allows it, or if you want to be certain, cook the greens at high heat to eliminate the risk.

And that’s it for this week. Thanks for being a part of the positive corner of the internet. And remember: don’t wait to make a change. Take action on any goal, don’t quit in the hard moments, and the results will come. Have a fantastic weekend!

-Arnold, Adam, and Daniel

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to review our interpretations of the research and ensure scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• The lower blood pressure Rx

• Fact or fiction: testosterone affects decision-making and aggression

• Adam’s Corner: Stand In The Doorway

Health
The Walking Sweet Spot For Lower Blood Pressure

If you’re trying to keep your blood pressure low, we recently discussed how wall sits are surprisingly effective. But that’s not the only exercise that works, and scientists now have a pretty good idea how much low-intensity movement you need to make a significant difference.

Research suggests that roughly 150 minutes of brisk walking a week could maximize the extent to which you can lower your blood pressure with lower-intensity exercise. 

Scientists analyzed 17 randomized trials of people with higher blood pressure to see how different amounts of movement affected their health. On average, brisk walking lowered systolic pressure (the top number) by nearly 7 points and diastolic pressure (the bottom number) by about 5 points. For context, researchers estimate a 5-point systolic drop is associated with roughly 13% lower risk of stroke.

When they modeled how much walking worked best, the benefit for systolic pressure peaked around 150 minutes a week. That’s not to say walking doesn’t have other benefits. But it just means more time doing less intense exercise doesn’t do more for your blood pressure

Walking seems to help by loosening stiff blood vessels and easing nervous system tension that keeps pressure elevated.

If you want a simple goal, aim for a brisk walk (a pace where you can talk) about four times a week, up to 40 minutes each. 

Fact or Fiction
Does Testosterone Lead To Reckless Thinking?

You've heard the theory, maybe used it as a punchline. Testosterone makes you more impulsive, floods your brain with confidence, and kills the ability to catch a bad decision before it happens. And that doesn’t even mention the most common belief about aggressiveness.

Scientists have tested the idea, and the answer is more interesting than the myth because testosterone does not influence mood or decision-making the way most people think. And it doesn’t create angry people.

The connection between testosterone and decision-making took off with one study about a decade ago. Men were given testosterone or a placebo, then took a short reasoning test built around trick questions. The testosterone group did worse, and the headlines exploded, turning one study into irrefutable fact. 

But it was refuted. Other labs ran the test three more times and came up empty. But the die was cast, and everyone remembered the first study.

Then something rare happened that we wish would happen more often in science: the scientists with opposing findings teamed up.

The original researcher and his critics designed one study together and tested 1,000 men. Every prediction was locked in before a single result was analyzed, which helped ensure that nobody could move the goalposts later.

Testosterone did not affect reasoning. It didn’t make men slower, faster, or worse. And a companion trial on the same men tested risk-taking, fairness, generosity, and competitiveness across nine separate measures. And once again, no difference.

When we looked at the studies, one finding jumped out. Both groups guessed they answered 5 of 7 questions correctly. In reality, on average, they only answered three of them. Testosterone or placebo, it wasn’t the hormones. Instead, it might be that men are overconfident. 

The study did have limits. Most notably, this isn't a study of anyone on TRT. It was a single dose in men between the ages of 18 and 45. However, longer trials suggest the same outcome. A 12-month study in older men and a 27-month study in more than 5,000 men both tested the impact of TRT on cognition and found no effect.

One more thing, because you're probably wondering: what about aggression? 

In a placebo-controlled trial, testosterone by itself did not make men more aggressive.

However, there was an exception: among men already high in dominance or low in self-control, researchers observed greater aggression. 

And a meta-analysis of 12 randomized steroid trials backed up that finding by observing a small bump in aggression men reported about themselves, but no bump in what observers actually watched them do.

So does testosterone make you aggressive? Not on its own, but maybe a little in men already wired that way. The hormone doesn't change your personality. At most, it turns up the volume on who you already are. 

Adam’s Corner
Stand In The Doorway

Two days ago, I heard my dad’s voice.

Not an easy feat because he’s been gone for three years.

There’s a set of audio files I recorded less than a month before he died. I made them because I knew that eventually I’d lose the sound of him. I was told that the face stays longer than the voice, so I hit record and asked him questions just to keep him talking.

After he first passed away, I listened to the recordings almost daily. I don’t play them as often now, but on July 21st, I find myself coming back to them. 

Normally when I think about my dad, it’s a mix of smiling about the moments we had, and being sad about everything he’s missing.

But this time of year, when I listen to the recordings, my brain goes somewhere different. For a moment, I stop focusing on how much I miss him, and start prosecuting the time I spent with him and the things I would do differently.

I couldn’t understand why the guilt showed up so intensely on this date and not the other 364.

But I think I finally figured it out.

The Memory Imbalance

On the anniversary of my dad’s death, I spend more time going back through the photos, videos, and those audio recordings. And when I do that, I think I subconsciously notice something about the archive that I finally realized this year.

It’s lopsided.

I have more of my father sick than I have of my father when he was healthy.

The three years he fought glioblastoma produced more pictures, more video, and more of his voice than the decades that came before them. I had more than 40 years with my father. At least 20 of them were when I had a mobile phone. Outside of a few saved voicemails, I have no intentional recordings of him from when he was healthy. The camera was in my pocket the entire time.

That’s the part that gets me. Not that I lost him, but that it took the impending reality of losing him to make me more present and capture more of his brilliance. 

Because once we knew he was sick, it was as if my brain changed, too. 

I can still see the day before his brain surgery. We spent hours at his home.

When it was finally time for me to go home, I stood in the doorway entrance of his home, looking back at him, and took it all in.

I knew after that day, nothing would be the same. My dad was sitting in his chair. I was standing in the doorway of his house. There was honestly nothing special about the moment. No big speech. But I was taking inventory of what he was wearing, how the light hit, the position of everyone else in the room, and every emotion I felt. My heart was heavy, but my dad just seemed light. The way he sat there like the surgery was a scheduling inconvenience. He never seemed to worry about his cancer until the very end. 

I wasn’t taking a picture. I was trying to store the room into my hardware.

It worked. Years later, I don’t have to close my eyes to get back there. I return to it on purpose. I’m standing in the doorway. My dad is at peace. And even in that moment of fear, it brings me so much joy.

And that’s what I’ve been thinking about all week: Why didn’t I do that more often? Why don’t any of us?

Presence costs nothing. It’s also the hardest thing for many of us to master. 

What’s Left Of Your Attention

A few months ago, I read something from Arthur Brooks. I remembered it the other day, and it helped me finally make sense of the emotions I feel around the anniversary of my dad’s final day. 

Brooks wrote that he’d always assumed he wasn’t a person who had many happy memories, and that it was just how he was built. Then he realized he had the science backward. 

Memory isn’t a personality trait. It’s what’s left over from your attention. The brain saves what you were fully there for, which is why time seems to stretch at a wedding, a birth, a car accident.

The reverse holds too. If you weren’t paying attention, your brain didn’t file it. The event happened, but you weren’t present, so it’s gone, almost as if it never happened.

That means most of life is not forgotten because something painful buried it. It’s gone because you weren’t truly in the moment.

And that made me think that before my dad got sick, maybe I was a guy with an attendance problem more than I’d like to admit.

And then, when the hourglass got flipped, I became the most attentive version of myself I have ever been. I saved everything. I’m grateful I did, but I’m mad at myself that it took a terminal illness to spark the change. 

I didn’t become present. I became scared, and presence was the side effect.

That’s what I want back. Not the archive. The instinct behind the archive, without the reason for it.

I am not you. And it’s possible you’re already doing this. I hope you are. But if not, it’s worth exploring where this lives in your own life.

These moments are everywhere. It’s the dinner where you were at the table but don’t remember anything that happened. The drive home when your kid told you something and you said “mm-hmm” without ever knowing what they were talking about. The days where you say “nothing happened,” which is not the same thing as a day when nothing was happening.

We tend to focus on the moments that clearly deserve to be remembered, for better or worse. And I’ve come to learn it’s better to take more time to create memories from moments that don’t “deserve it.”

Life and joy increase when we learn to appreciate and savor the ordinary moments. And not just say we enjoy them, but hunt for them. 

The home-cooked meal. The walk back from school. The ten minutes of chaos before your kid falls asleep. 

Treat it the way I treated that doorway, and take inventory.

I find myself doing this every night with my kids. Bedtimes with my 2 boys are still chaotic, and it’s one of my favorite times of the day. My daughter isn’t even two years old, and this is my third ride on the toddler train. But when it’s time for her to sleep, I’m fully in the moment, knowing damn well I want to be able to transport myself back to this moment when I’m 75 just as easily as when I’m 45. 

There are endless ways to do this. If your parents are still here, record their voice and lessons. Not just video of a birthday. Ask them something you already know the answer to and let them tell you the whole story anyway. Ask them things you’ve already wondered.

And don’t just limit it to your parents. Do it with friends and family, too. These intentional choices will matter more than anything else on your phone.

Listening back to the audio, I got to the question where I asked him what he wants me to remember most when he's gone. I'm glad I have his answer.

And I know it was heavily influenced by his cancer, and by then, his mind wasn't the same.

I wish I had asked him the same question when he was healthy.

I used to think I saved those last three years so I'd have something left of my dad after he was gone.

That's not quite it.

I have plenty from before he got sick. There are whole days I can still walk through. Those didn't survive by accident. They're with me because I was there, and that's the thing I need to remind myself every July when I put myself on trial. I wasn't absent for my father's life.

I just wasn't doing it often enough. And when I was, I didn't do enough to hold onto it.

It’s not just a matter of presence and absence. It’s also frequency and effort. Not much different than the gym. 

The last three years of my dad’s life weren't different because I showed up. They were different because I realized any moment was worth saving. 

Like standing in a doorway when nothing happens.

I don't think life asks you to become someone else. It asks for more of what you already do sometimes, in the moments you'd normally let pass. And there are far more of those left than you realize.

That's the trade we don’t discuss enough. You don't pay attention so you'll have the memory. You pay attention so you'll have the moment.

The memory is just the bonus. -AB

-Adam Bornstein is the co-founder and co-editor-in-chief of Arnold’s Pump Club

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to review our interpretations of the research and ensure scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• The salsa dancing study is hiding a better lesson

• Is wearable technology causing trouble for women?

• Better questions, better solutions: The best type of comparison

Instant Health Boost
Why "Salsa Boosts Mood" Is The Wrong Headline

There's a new study floating around suggesting that salsa dancing helps depression. That's not technically wrong. But the takeaway from the study is much better if you were born with two left feet.

The study did not prove that "salsa cures depression." Instead, it suggests that social activities, learning new skills, and having something scheduled are all different ways to lift low mood.

This might not feel groundbreaking, but it's a good reminder for how simple it can be to lift your mood.

Researchers conducted a randomized controlled trial in which they compared the mood of people who took eight weeks of salsa with that of those on a wait list. The dancers' depression scores dropped more than the waitlist group's. They also reported bigger reductions in social anxiety and an increase in daily happiness.

The interesting part is that after the classes ended, the gap between the dance group and the waitlist group was smaller. But when researchers followed up 4 weeks after the classes ended, the mood gap was even larger for people who took salsa. 

So whatever was working didn't stop when the music did, which suggests we can't credit the salsa alone.

This isn't a knock on the study, but an honest look at what might be causing the changes, so you can apply them in other ways outside of salsa.

Moving your body, listening to music, being around people, learning a new skill, having hobbies scheduled, and feeling accomplished are all tied to a better mood on their own. A salsa class just happens to bundle all of them together. And that’s the most likely reason it led to positive results.

On Our Radar
The Calorie Math That Doesn’t Add Up For Women

If you're a woman in your 40s or in perimenopause and feel like you're doing everything "right" but the progress has stalled, a new study hints that part of the problem might not be your effort. 

It might be your reliance on the wrong technology and misleading math.

Researchers at the University of North Carolina compared calorie-burn estimates from popular predictive equations — the same formulas used by most fitness apps and online calculators — against indirect calorimetry, the gold-standard lab method for measuring how many calories your body actually burns at rest. 

In midlife women, the equations tended to overpredict calorie burn.

And the reliance on today’s technology might explain part of the friction and frustration women experience.

Research suggests that your metabolism doesn’t slow down until after you hit 60, but you start seeing your body change dramatically in your 40s and 50s because of changes in your exercise habits, sleep, and diet. 

While hormones undeniably change, these changes affect your cravings, mood, and energy levels. So, it makes it harder to stay active and manage what you eat, but that does not mean your metabolism turns its back on you.

Menopause can affect your appetite and how you feel, making you eat more and exercise less. However, according to research and leading experts, changes in metabolism don’t happen because of menopause; they occur because peri-menopause and menopause cause shifts in behavior that result in less lean mass (muscle) and more fat. 

This is a normal but very frustrating shift. And it’s why many researchers and experts recommend strength training for women as they age to help offset the behavioral changes. 

But here’s where the research adds a new layer. 

If wearable tech tells you your body burns more at rest than it truly does, a "deficit" built on that number isn't much of a deficit at all. 

That gap between what the tech says and what really happens in your body could explain a frustrating plateau. The kind that too often gets blamed on hormones or a broken body when it's really a measurement mismatch.

This isn't a story about a broken metabolism. The researchers discussed that your muscle is a key piece of the puzzle. Muscle is metabolically active, and protecting and building it is one of the most reliable levers you have. 

It’s why thousands of women — people like April and Peggy, in their 50s and 60s — are now in the best shape of their lives, don’t stress trackers, and aren’t forced to overthink. They just use the Pump Club app, lean on the community of women, and focus on what works while ignoring the rest of the noise. 

So keep lifting, prioritize protein, and consider relying less on the calorie burn number on your tracker.

Better Questions, Better Solutions
Whose Starting Line Are You Using?

Your day was fine, and then you started scrolling. 

A few minutes later, you’re making comparisons that didn’t exist a few moments prior. Someone's lifting what you're still working toward, posting the body you've wanted, running the pace you'd kill for. 

For some people, that’s motivating. A spark. Something that pushes you. 

For others, it’s demoralizing and a reason to quit.

If you’re looking at your own progress and feeling worse about yourself, there’s no reason to be down, especially if you’ve been consistent, are putting in the effort, and trying to make the changes that matter to you. 

Old question: Why is everyone else so far ahead of me?
Better question: What would I think of my progress if I'd never seen anyone else's?

It’s easy to say, “don’t compare yourself to anyone.” But it still happens. And that’s when the better question helps you focus on what matters. 

It’s not you vs. anyone else. It’s you vs. you. And the only measurement that matters is effort, consistency, and progress of any type.  

When you put your energy into comparison, it can be distracting. It’s a measurement error. 

The moments you see from others hide so much you can’t know. The timeline, the years of work, the genetics. And even where they began. 

Everyone has their own story. But you set someone else’s moments against your own and call the distance a personal failure, then you're grading yourself against a starting line that was never yours.

In one study, people browsed their own social media and rated how each post affected them. 

Upward comparisons (the folks who seemed better off) vastly outnumbered the downward ones, and the effect was overwhelmingly negative: a small dip after each post that added up to measurable drops in self-esteem, mood, and life satisfaction. 

It wasn’t just one post that did the damage. It was a bunch that added up. And that’s why it’s important to be aware of what happens.

That's the trap: never feeling too bothered by any one post. A single scroll won’t feel like damage. Until it adds up and starts affecting your actions, mindset, and behaviors.

Before you judge where you are, write down where you started. 

One number, one photo, one honest sentence about the version of you from whenever you started working towards your current goal. And then keep that as a reference for when you need it. 

This can help if you get distracted by others. And it can help if you realize you’re stuck and need to make a change. But in this situation, the inspiration doesn’t come from someone else. It comes from within, and that’s much more likely to lead to a change that sticks.  

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to review our interpretations of the research and ensure scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• Can smelling dark chocolate make you stronger?

• Check the cushion in your shoes

• This might change how you think about mindfulness

• Foods are super

Beyond The Headline
Can Smelling Chocolate Make You 18 Reps Stronger?

Within the past week, about 20 APC readers all sent us the same question

“Did you see the dark chocolate study? Is it true that if you sniff dark chocolate before a set, you’ll crank out 18 more reps?”

We’re already picturing “scratch and sniff preworkout stickers” with claims that match the research. 

So we looked into it, and the study isn’t as crazy as we first thought, though it’s taking a massive leap of faith in its claims. 

People who smelled dark chocolate really did add reps. But the study had many flaws, and the data suggest the researchers couldn't explain why performance changed. 

Here’s what we know, and why we’re not going to start stuffing chocolate into our gym bags (not yet, at least).

Scientists took men in their early 20s who lift weights. Each fasted for at least 10 hours, and then came into the lab on three different occasions for a workout. Before and between sets of leg extensions, a researcher held a liquid under their nose for 30 seconds with one of the following: 90% dark chocolate, milk chocolate, or plain water. 

Strange as it might sound, the dark chocolate added about 18 reps over water. Milk chocolate added about 9 reps. And when doing those extra reps, no one reported the workout feeling harder. In other words, the participants were able to do much more, but they said that the effort felt no more difficult than the plain water reps.

We’re skeptical because those 18 reps come with three big asterisks.

Start with the biggest one: The study named the mechanism in the title and then could not prove it with the results. That’s a bad sign. 

The researchers figured the smell worked by killing hunger, and sure enough, dark chocolate made the men less hungry, and the less-hungry sessions had more reps. But "happened at the same time" isn't "caused it." Ice cream sales and sunburns both spike in July, and the ice cream isn't burning anyone. 

When the team ran the real test to see whether the hunger drop drove the reps, it didn’t find a link between the two. So the explanation was just a hunch.

Then there's the control, which was plain water. Good studies “blind” the experimental conditions so the participants don’t know what they’re receiving. And that’s because we know the placebo effect is real and powerful (thinking something can work — even if it’s nothing — leads to changes). So, knowing the water was different from the other two conditions, it’s possible that much of the performance was driven by the expectation that it would work.

And it was a small study and only one exercise, so the applicability is limited. We’re looking at twenty-three young men, training on an empty stomach, testing one-leg machine across one session. It says nothing about other exercises, an entire workout, or whether this leads to more strength and muscle over time.

Here's what’s possible: when you train on an empty stomach, the sight or thought of food — or some source of energy — could boost performance. It's the same reason swishing a sports drink and spitting it out lets people grind out extra reps without swallowing a calorie. Your brain catches the cue, and it triggers a change in how hard you can push. 

It’s possible that something else is happening, but without additional research, it’s too soon to react to the latest study.

Together With NOBULL 
A Shoe Won't Add 50 Pounds to Your Squat. But The Wrong One Can Cost You Reps.

A new pair of shoes isn't a program, and it won't out-train bad sleep or a terrible diet. Train hard, eat well, get rest and recover, and you will see results. That’s how you stay focused, invest in consistency, and transform. 

If you master those habits and progress isn’t happening as you want, you’re not getting stronger, or you want to make sure you’re not overlooking anything, it’s worth looking at what silently eats away at performance. 

If you haven’t audited your footwear, research suggests the shoe you lift in can influence your strength or leave you vulnerable to injury.

Cushioned running heels are built to absorb impact. That’s great for a jog, but not the best when you’re adding load to an exercise. A sole that compresses lets your foot rock and sink mid-lift, and the power you send into the floor bleeds off before it moves the weight. 

The right training shoes solve this problem by keeping your foot flat, planted, and close to the ground. Stability results in more power, better balance, and stronger lifts. And not all shoes offer all three when you’re in the gym.

After two years of testing shoes that check the boxes without completely breaking the bank, the Outwork by NOBULL was our favorite. It’s been powering our workouts for the past year and remains a favorite among Pump Club app members. 

The NOBULL Outwork features a wide toe box, allowing your toes to spread and support balance, just as nature intended. And it has a flat, stable sole to ensure you don’t lose power, and a circular tread outsole that holds your footing through every lift and lateral move. 

It’s not better than a great program. But it ensures that if you put the effort into your workouts and recovery, your footwear isn’t working against you in the gym. It’s a shoe for people who show up and want to outwork yesterday.

New Outwork colors just dropped, and as a bonus for subscribers, APC readers get 35% off the entire site with code “APC35.” But the sale only lasts for this week.

Instant Health Boost
“Be More Mindful” Finally Has a Number

You've heard the advice a hundred times. Stressed out? Be more mindful. Mid-argument? Be more mindful. Slogging through a rough season of life? You guessed it…be more mindful.

It sounds nice. You'd even like to do it. But two things get in the way: nobody tells you what being mindful means, and nobody tells you what it's worth.

Let's fix both.

Being mindful just means paying attention to what's happening right now — your breath, your coffee, the person across the table — instead of running on autopilot while your head replays yesterday and rehearses tomorrow. That's it. Noticing your actual life as it happens, without immediately grading it good or bad.

Now the worth. Researchers reviewed 56 studies covering more than 24,000 adults and asked a straightforward question: do people who are naturally more mindful also feel less stressed? 

The answer was yes.

The scientists found that mindfulness and stress overlap by about a sixth. The other five-sixths of your stress comes from everywhere else, like your job, your sleep, your money, your relationships, and the 143 notifications hovering over you on your phone. 

It might not seem like much, but offsetting one-sixth of your stress can feel like a massive win.

Before you think this doesn’t apply to you, here’s the most interesting part: Nobody in these studies was taught to be mindful. Researchers just asked people two things on the same day: how mindful do you feel, and how stressed do you feel? So we can't say which one causes the other. Maybe being mindful shrinks your stress. Maybe having less stress makes it easier to be mindful. It's probably a bit of both.

If you want to see if mindfulness can make a meaningful difference for you, start with something small. You don't need an app, a subscription, or a 30-day challenge.

When you’re bored and want to use your phone, notice what you’re to avoid. Eat one meal without a screen and pay attention to the flavors. On a walk, name three things you can see and three you can hear.

Just notice what's in front of you, and don’t try to make sense of it all. That's mindfulness.

Will it lower your stress? No promises, but it costs nothing, and you might be surprised by what you discover.

Nutrition
Foods Are Super: The Beet

Beets look like they should be good for you. And if you dig into what’s in them, it’s hard to argue against them.

Beets have a surprising amount of research suggesting they support steadier blood pressure, better staying power during training, and faster recovery afterward.

The key is the nitrate in beets. Bacteria on your tongue convert the nitrate into a compound your body then turns into nitric oxide, which tells the muscle in your artery walls to relax. When that happens, you get easier blood flow and oxygen delivered where it's needed. 

When researchers pooled seven randomized trials in people with high blood pressure, beetroot dropped systolic blood pressure (the top number) by about 5 points on average. That’s enough to help reduce the likelihood of heart disease or stroke. 

Your muscles benefit too. A large review of 20 analyses found dietary nitrate gives endurance and muscular stamina a real lift, especially if you take it before your body needs it.  A beet shot before a hard session is one of the few legal, food-based edges that actually holds up in the data.

And a meta-analysis of beetroot juice and muscle damage found it helped strength and power bounce back faster in the days after hard, soreness-inducing training.

In fairness, most of the data uses concentrated beet juice. A whole roasted beet still delivers nitrate, but not as much as concentrated juice. However, it also brings fiber, folate, potassium, and the antioxidants that give it that deep red color. 

One important note that will influence how you prep your beets: nitrate dissolves in water, so roasting, steaming, or grating them raw keeps more than boiling does. If you do boil them, the nitrate ends up in the water, so use that liquid instead of pouring it down the drain.

For a quick, easy side, roast a few whole beets with olive oil and salt, then keep them in the fridge to throw on salads and grain bowls. If you want the exact amount measured in the studies, about 2 to 3 ounces of beetroot juice should do the trick. 

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to review our interpretations of the research and ensure scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell

Welcome to the positive corner of the internet. We’re here to make your life healthier, happier, and less stressful. At the bottom of each email, we explain our editorial process, stance on AI, and partnership standards.

If you were forwarded this message, you can get the free daily email here.

Today’s Health Upgrade

• Arnold’s Corner: Monday motivation

• Eat this, burn 100-400 more calories per day

• Does maximum strength determine brain age?

• Workout of the week

Arnold’s Corner
Monday Motivation: I’m Going To Be Blunt

It’s Monday. For a lot of people, this is the day it all gets complicated again.

I love research and statistics. Since we added a few questions when people sign up for this newsletter, we’ve gotten hundreds of replies every week. The most common one, by far, is this: 

“I’m confused about all the conflicting information about fitness, and I don’t know where to start.”

I’m going to be blunt with you. All of you already know enough to succeed.

Everyone already knows what healthy food is. The vegetables, the fruits, the lean proteins, the healthy fats. The real foods, not the treats. And let me be clear: we believe in treats. As a treat, not as the main menu.

Everyone knows they need resistance training. And everyone knows the basic movements. The squat. The pushup or the press. The row or the chin-up. The deadlift. We’ve got videos of them on our YouTube if you need a quick refresh.

Everyone knows it’s good to get outside, walk or ride a bike, and move a little.

Three simple things most people know.

And there isn’t one person who could try to do a little better at each of those things and not see results.

But still, people get stuck.

Instead of doing three sets of squats, they do ten sets of listening to podcasts about squats.

Instead of making a salad with some tuna or salmon, they read an influencer explaining the perfect human diet.

Instead of going for a walk and enjoying their life, they check every 10 steps to see if their watch says they are in Zone 2.

Here is where I get really blunt. It’s all bullshit.

I am a simplifier. My team can tell you. 

Whether I am working on a new business deal or planning an event, I know the danger of getting into the weeds. The weeds are where you get stuck.

When we start to trip into the weeds, my whole team knows I’m about to say, “It’s all bullshit.”

It’s the same in everything. 

Especially fitness. 

Train. Eat real food, with a couple of delicious goodies once or twice a week. Get outside and move.

People are stuck because they haven’t learned what I have in 60 years in this industry. 

It’s OK to be confused; it’s not OK to do nothing. You’re always going to be confused and feel like you don’t know anything if you always listen to the latest trends and experts. 

The trick isn’t getting smarter. It is just doing what you know works and ignoring the noise.

Look at me. I’ve done OK, right?

I never listened to any of it. I showed up and did my workouts, even on the days I didn’t want to. I stuck to the basic movements. I didn’t learn anything fancy. I pushed every set past the comfort barrier, because that is where you grow.

I ate mostly protein, vegetables, fruit, and pasta, potatoes, and rice. I added protein shakes to hit my protein goal. And you better believe I eat a croissant or a piece of pie a couple of times a week.

I used to run. Now I ride my bike every day. I have always believed that moving outside does something special for the mind, not just the body, and science backs me up now.

When they had six-minute abs, I ignored it.

When everybody started putting butter in their coffee, I ignored it.

When they talk about this peptide or that peptide, I ignore it.

So here is my simple solution for all of you.

Put the blinders on. The only thing you need to see is this: Train. Eat well. Move.

Once those three are a consistent part of your life, then we can talk about the next level. 

Some people want my arm routine from 1974 on their very first day. They want to start by studying what I did at the peak of my bodybuilding career. And still, I have bad news for you: that training would bore most of you with the basics.

In all of these years, I’ve learned that people would rather read about the peak of a mountain than start climbing it themselves.

It’s why the program we are proudest of in our app is called The Foundation. It is not because it is for beginners. There is an intermediate option and an advanced one. These programs change you no matter who you are.

But we call it “The Foundation” because most people build their fitness on a pile of bullshit, and we want them to feel what it is like to train the basic movements the way that has worked for decades. Pushing every set just short of failure. Progressing the same movements week after week.

(For those of you who love the science, this is another area where it agrees with me. You need hard reps to grow. You need a program, not random workouts. And you need progression.)

And here is the part that ends the confusion. You do not have to choose any of it. We chose the movements. We built the progression. Your only job is to show up and press start.

That was our whole goal when we built an app in the first place. How do we let people just click start and stop all the thinking?

I believe that thinking kills more transformations than trying and failing. So I wanted people to be able to turn off their brains and see results, and they have. A lot of them tell me they just do the Foundation over and over because they love seeing progress without having to think.

It’s the whole goal of the information we share here for free every day too. You have probably noticed that most of our summaries of the latest trends come down to “you can ignore this.” And we bring the science to back it up.

Do you want the brutal truth? I think everyone knows this already, deep down.

The overthinking, the researching, and the confusion are really about fear. People have failed before, and they are afraid to commit and feel that again. Hunting for the perfect plan is just a way to put off the failure.

But you do not have to fail. I want you to succeed.

I see this even with some of the people who join us in the app. They set everything up, and then they sit there staring at workout one, never pressing start. The tools are right in front of them. The fear is just louder.

So this is my push, whether you train with us or on your own.

You do not need a scientifically engineered twenty-point daily protocol. (No wonder you are confused.)

Just do something. Do the squats. Make the real meal. Take the walk.

Or if you want the choosing done for you, that is exactly what the Pump Club app is for. Open it and press start.

Whatever you do, this week, the goal is simple.

You are going to stop getting pulled into the weeds.

You know what to do.

This week, you start doing it.

Now hit reply and tell us the one thing you are going to start this week. Not next Monday. This one.

Together With Momentous 
The Nutrient That “Burns” More Calories

Our job is to bust myths and misconceptions. And we’ve been clear for 3 years that fat burners don’t work.

But research suggests there might be a real exception to the rule. Forget all the energy pills because this one comes from food.

Scientists discovered something that should make you like fiber a lot more: eat enough of it, and the bacteria in your gut will eat some of your calories for you.

In a tightly controlled study, researchers fed healthy adults two diets with identical calories and identical macros. The only real difference was the details of what people ate.

For example, both diets would have the same amount of carbohydrates, but one included high-fiber whole foods (think fiber, resistant starch, and minimally processed ingredients), and the other mimicked a typical Western diet.

Same calories in. But, once the data was reviewed, the scientists found that the change in food led to a different amount of calories absorbed.

On the whole-food, high-fiber diet, participants “burned” an extra 116 calories through their stool without feeling any hungrier. And that was the average. Some people passed close to 400 calories a day.

This wasn't just fiber passing through undigested. Feeding your gut microbes more fiber grew their population (think about good bacteria colonizing), and those bacteria consumed some of the meal's energy before it would stick to your body. 

Put simply, more fiber led to more good bacteria, and that good bacteria feasted on the calories you consumed, leaving less to be stored on your body. 

Unlike most diet advice, which is about removing food, this was about what you add. 

Most people eat only about half the fiber they should, so there's room to grow. Load up on vegetables, fruit, legumes, oats, and whole grains.

If you need help getting more fiber, that’s why we developed Fiber+ with Momentous. 

We invested two years developing a formula that makes a real difference in gut health: 3 sources of fiber, 6 grams per serving, a mix of soluble, insoluble, and resistant starch. Everything you need to feed your healthy bacteria without bloating or stomach discomfort. It’s the first product ever developed by the Pump Club, and has Arnold’s seal of approval. 

As an APC reader, get 35% off your first purchase subscription or 14% off a one-time order. Unlike many supplements, Fiber+ is backed by research, and you will notice a difference within the first week. And if you pick up a container at The Vitamin Shoppe, you’re entered into a chance to win a workout with Arnold. 

But remember, the benefits are in the dose. Aim for at least 25 grams per day and try to build up to about 40 grams daily. 

Longevity
Your Brain Doesn't Care About Your One-Rep Max

Somewhere along the way, fitness advice picked up a rule nobody voted on: if you're maxing out your weights, it doesn’t matter. 

So if you’re not frequently testing your 1-rep max, you could talk yourself into doing nothing at all. 

However, a new study found that resistance training is restorative for your brain and body. And as long as you push intensity — and there are many ways to do that without maxing out on weight — it’s good news for your body. 

When older adults lifted for two years, their brains looked younger on scans, and it barely mattered whether they trained with heavy or light weights.

Researchers randomly assigned older adults over the age of 60 to heavy resistance training, a moderate routine (one supervised session plus two at home each week), or no exercise. Brain scans came at the start, one year, and two years. A "brain-age clock," a model built on scans, estimated how old each brain looked.

Both lifting groups lowered their brain-age gap over two years. The non-exercisers didn’t see any positive changes. But that wasn’t all the researchers found. 

The heavy and moderate group saw brain age improve about 2 years. And when researchers asked whether the load used (heavier or lighter) explained the brain change, the link basically vanished. 

So the brain wasn't paying out in proportion to the weight on the bar. 

Pushing hard with the weight being used and staying consistent is what led to a younger-looking brain, not the load. 

Nobody's cognition was measured, so it’s just evidence that steady training may slow one sign of brain aging. If you want to make sure your workouts make a difference, the routine studied included at least three sessions per week.

Workout Of The Week
The 1-2-3-4 Ladder 

This is a session that ties everything together we’ve been sharing for the past month. 

After a warm-up, you start with the highest intensity you can maintain for one minute. After equal rest, slightly reduce the intensity and push to 2 minutes of work followed by 2 minutes of recovery. You keep adding time and rest for the next two sets.

It's a fun and challenging way to touch every gear you've trained, and the built-in progression keeps you honest. 

The Workout

Warm up: 10 min to get your blood flowing and prepare for a high-intensity set. But the warm-up should not be exhausting.

The Work (equal recovery after each interval):

Set 1: 1 minute all-out sprint + 1 minute rest

Set 2: 2 minutes very hard + 2 minutes rest

Set 3: 3 minutes hard + 3 minutes easy

Set 4: 4 minutes moderate intensity (your 4×4 pace)

Cool down: 4-5 minutes

Pick your tool

• Rower

• Ski Erg

• Rogue echo bike

• Kettlebell swings

• Sled push and pull

• Hill running or sprints

Give it a try, and start your week strong!

The Positive Corner of The Internet
About Arnold’s Pump Club Editorial Standards

We do things a bit differently here, starting with transparency.

1. The Content: All APC emails are researched, written, and fact-checked by the APC editors (see bottom of the email), with written contributions from Arnold (noted with “Arnold’s Corner”). Links take you to original studies (not second-hand sources).

2. Does AI play a role? Not for the primary content, but it is used in two ways. The main items are original content written by the APC team. The summaries at the end are AI-generated based on the human-written content above. We also use an AI tool to review our interpretations of the research and ensure scientific accuracy. We don’t assume AI is right, but we use technology to hold ourselves accountable.

3. Yes, we have partners (all clearly noted by “Together With”). Why? Because it allows us to keep the APC emails free. We first test products, and then reach out to potential partners who offer ways to help you improve every day. The bar is set high, and to date, we have turned down millions in ad deals. (Example: we will not partner with any non-certified supplements or those without evidence in human trials). If we won’t buy the product, we won’t recommend it to you. And if there’s no evidence it works, then there’s no place for it here.

—

Publisher: Arnold Schwarzenegger​

Editors-in-chief: Adam Bornstein and Daniel Ketchell