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It shouldn’t come as a surprise to anybody that images of unrealistic body standards constantly surround us. Social media wouldn’t be what it is today if it weren’t for fitness influencers, thirst traps, and so-called “fitspo” constantly popping up on your timeline. If Instagram and TikTok are to be believed, you’d think it were the norm for men to have six-pack abs, square pecs, and massive biceps.

All too often, exercise is reduced to being seen as a means to lose weight. As a result, many of us have an unhealthy relationship with losing weight and how we respect our bodies. But exercise is still valuable. Here are six reasons you should be exercising that have nothing to do with losing weight.

I have a love-hate relationship with clothing. On the one hand, I love fashion and all the ways that you can express yourself with what you wear. On the other, I hate shopping. Take my gay card if you must, but it's true. I'm a tall boy who lives in central Kentucky. A trip to the mall means wasted hours of trying on ill-fitting, generic-looking clothes. As a result of my relationship with shopping, I've largely opted to just wear the clothes I've had since college.

StitchFix for Men sends out several handpicked outfits for you to try on in the comfort of your home. But how does the StitchFix experience compare with buying clothes in stores? Is it worth it?

If you want to horrify yourself just a bit, consider keeping a tally of all the times you reach for your phone throughout the day when you don't have an explicit purpose for doing so. Chances are, you'll be a bit surprised by how often you do. We all like to think of ourselves as the main character, so we tend to underestimate the amount of times we engage in fruitless or unproductive behaviors in our day-to-day life. As a result, we fail to realize how much time we're actually spending on our phones doing essentially nothing. Often, in my own life, it's not until I get the screentime report on my iPhone each Sunday that I realize exactly how much time I've been on my phone throughout the week. It's fairly common that the time I've spent on my phone could equate to a second full-time job, and I have to kick myself and wonder what else I could have accomplished that week if I hadn't spent so much time on my phone. Any time I write about tech use, I want to clarify: tech is not bad, but the way we use it often is.

If you use your phone too much throughout the day, there's a good chance you feel like it's holding you back and preventing you from achieving your goals. By implementing the three strategies discussed in this article, you can change your habits and better build the life you want.

In mid-2020, I picked up a book for the first time in a while and sat down to read it. At this point, I can't recall exactly which book it was, but I remember that I enjoyed it– I think it was Alexander Chee's How to Write An Autobiographical Novel. Despite the beautiful prose and engaging content, I struggled to stay focused. As I read, I would periodically set the book down and check my phone, or I would let my thoughts wander so that my eyes glanced over the content on the page, but none of it registered with my brain.

If you struggle to focus throughout the day, it's likely that you've developed distraction-prone habits without realizing it. This is what it looks like and what you can do about it.

By the end of 2017, I knew that being a full-time freelancer wasn't right for me. I was living out of my savings account, which grew smaller and smaller by the day. I knew that I didn't want to go back into higher education or food service (I've paid my dues), but I needed to do something. You can only eat boiled vegetables and canned black beans for all of your meals for so long before you start wanting to earn I-can-eat-at-restaurants money.

Working for a software company means I'm always online. While it has done wonders for my career growth, I've also noticed negative side effects of always being online.

With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, the number of folks working from their homes skyrocketed. For folks fortunate enough to be able to maintain their employment as communities went into a state of lockdown, telecommuting has a significant impact on how many employees think about their long-term career and working situation. In spite of the benefits we associate with working from home, it also has its drawbacks; in particular, it can be hard to focus and stay on task from within the familiar walls of your home.

Do you get distracted when you have to work from home? Do you worry about your productivity or career advancement opportunities while working remotely? Here's some advice from a veteran telecommuter.

Season 1, Episode 13 Transcript This transcript has been edited for clarity. Episode Intro Buckle your seat belts, everybody. And this week's episode, I'm going to be talking about how I fell in love with coaching and ultimately became a coach. But also how you can do some coaching on your own. And. What you can do. With something as simple as a $1 notebook and a good ink pen. It can change your life. It can be revolutionary.

In this episode of the Finding Fulfillment podcast, Blake shares his experiences in a collaborative co-coaching environment and how that process helped him decide to become a coach in the first place. Additionally, he dives into some of the self-coaching strategies you can implement to reap some of the benefits of coaching without the hefty price tag.

As my alarm blared from next to my bed, I reached over and slapped the snooze button. Nine minutes later, it rudely repeated its screaming. This time, I grabbed my phone, turned the alarm off completely, and went to check my email. After a few minutes of deleting marketing emails, I decided to take a glance at my other notifications.

Working from home, studying, and relaxing all often require us to be online. As convenient as modern tech can be, the fast-paced, connected world of the internet can make it hard for us to focus, find quiet time, and disconnect.

Season 1, Episode 13 Transcript This transcript has been edited for clarity Hello everybody. It is me, Blake Reichenbach, the host of this podcast and the owner and managing editor of SelfHimprovement.com. I am back again with another podcast episode. We are finally at the point in this season where episodes are coming out really soon after I record them.

Distraction and doom scrolling abound, especially in our current political climate. Here are some of the ways you can recenter and refocus as needed.

Transcript: Season 1, Episode 11 A Year in Review, and a Year Ahead Hey, everybody, Blake here for today's podcast. If you're watching this on YouTube, you will notice that unlike the previous episodes, you actually have a video of me talking and not just a static image with the name of the individual episode on it. I wanted to start putting podcast episodes up on YouTube, just for the opportunity to connect with a broader audience who may not have found us on Spotify, where most of our listeners tune in, or on our website, which is how most new people find us in general.

In this episode of the Finding Fulfillment podcast, host Blake Reichenbach takes a look at the personal development site Self-Himprovement, and what 2020 has brought to it, as well as what it looks like will be coming in 2021.

Almost a full year ago, I wrote about my experiences with Athletic Greens and what I observed after my first month taking the nutritional supplement. At that time, I had been drinking Athletic Greens every morning for a month. After those first thirty days, I noticed that I was drinking more water, being more active throughout the day, and had more (TMI warning) regular bowel movements. But now that I've been taking Athletic Greens for an entire year, what has changed? Do I still think Athletic Greens is worth it?

Is Athletic Greens still worth it? How does it hold up when you take it for a long time? What are the benefits of Athletic Greens over the course of a year. Buckle up. Here's the info you're looking for.

I really hope all of y'all out there listening have had a great week, and I really hope that it has been less eventful than my week. These last seven days, for me, have been wild. And it has definitely taken a toll on my mental health and on my ability to practice what I preach about finding fulfillment and contentment and self-improvement.

In 2020, we've all probably used the term new normal more than we'd like. But, if we get more comfortable with adaptability and developing our ability to adapt, we can make the most of it.

This morning, I want to talk a little bit about hope and hopefulness. This may be a somewhat somber episode. I'm sitting here in my office, recording this on the morning of November the fourth. We are currently waiting to get some official election results. Donald Trump has already tried to call the election for himself, but that is to steal his own words, fake news, because we just don't know yet. Votes are still being counted. Early votes are still being processed. Mail-in votes are still being processed.

An election. A pandemic. Natural disasters. 2020 has made it hard to be hopeful, but not impossible. Here's how you can find a bit more to be optimistic about.

Season 1, Episode 8 Transcript This transcript has been edited for clarity So recently I've had some really cool opportunities to talk about prioritization specifically within the context of SEO-- search engine optimization. For my day job at HubSpot, I am a search optimization product expert, which is a really long title for basically saying if our customers have a question about our search optimization tools that our customer service team can't fix or can't answer for them, then it comes to me and I answered those questions, fix the problems, or send it to engineers as a bug so that they can fix it.

Prioritization is the process of choosing what efforts deserve the most immediate attention. Even though it's critically important, most of us struggle at it.

Season 1, Episode 7 Transcript This transcript has been edited for clarity Hey, everybody, Blake here. As per usual, I apologize in advance for the sounds of a sleeping puppy in the background while I am recording my dog is very meaty. He lives under my feet essentially, and he is currently snoring, very loudly in the background because he's part bulldog and that's just what they do.

Tons of people claim to be experts, but they may not be all they claim to be. Here's why it's better to be curious than it is to be right.

Season 1, Episode 6 Transcript This transcript has been edited for clarity Hey everybody, Blake here I am. Once again, home alone with my dogs and a microphone. So I wanted to hop on and record another episode of the Finding Fulfillment podcast. As per usual, a thought struck me while I was at the gym, and I couldn't help but play around with it.

Some people seem to skate by on natural talent. Others have to put in a lot of hard work. How do we negotiate that in our own journies?

Season 1, Episode 4 Transcript This transcript has been edited for clarity So today has been an interesting day. Let's go with that. Interesting is a good adjective to describe today. It honestly had some pretty significant low points. In particular, there's a project I've been working on for a few weeks now. I have put my heart and soul into this. It's one of those things where I've worked on it so hard that it became embedded in my psyche.

Rejection can be really painful. At some point, we all face it, but we can all also overcome it. Shame and Rejection have a lot in common, so we can use shame resilience techniques to overcome and move past both.

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