Hello Reader,
I hope you’ve had a great week!
Here is your weekly dose of Sunday circadian sunshine. And a bunch of actionable tips, tools and information to help you become your own health boss.
TODAY AT A GLANCE...
⭐ Secret to living longer
⭐ Bears, hibernation and bear wisdom
⭐ 5 Bear-y good winter biohacks
⭐ The know and do chasm
⭐ What are we really chasing?
⭐ Stop waiting for Friday
Thank you so much for being here. 🙏 I hope you have a wonderful week and as always, from my heart to yours, much love.
Sandy xxx
P.S – Loving these emails? Keep me caffeinated to say thanks ❤️
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We all say we want to live longer — but what if we’ve been chasing the wrong kind of life? This week, we’re turning to bears, biology, and a little soulful wisdom to explore what it really means to live long, well, and wildly alive.
1 Thing I’m Doing
Discovering the Secret to Living Longer (And No, It’s Not Supplements)
If you’ve been with me for a little while — and part of this amazing Unstoppables family — you’ll know what fuels my fire. It’s the question that sits at the heart of everything I do:
How can we live happier, healthier, more vibrant lives by reconnecting with nature and ancestral wisdom?
So when I saw a recent Wall Street Journal article exploring the habits of the world’s healthiest 80 and 90 year olds - the so called Super Agers - of course my little ears pricked up. And so I clicked.
What I found though? Not surprising at all.
Turns out, it’s not expensive biohacks, or green powders, gadgets, wearables or supplements that are the secret to longevity.
Instead, the real “secret” to longevity looked a lot like… real life.. are you ready?
The Longevity Doctor With All The Answers
Dr Eric Topol has studied the healthiest people in their 80s, 90s for decades. He has published over 1,200 peer-reviewed articles, with more than 370,000 citations, elected to the National Academy of Medicine, and is one of the top 10 most cited researchers in medicine. He knows all about aging vibrantly, right? Well, here are his findings and the five simple things people should do:
💥 Move your body
💥 Eat real food
💥 Stay connected
💥 Keep learning
💥 Have a reason to get up in the morning
Shocking, I know!! 🤦
These revelations aren’t flashy. They’re not new.
And they’re probably not trending on TikTok.
I'd also happily sit down with Dr. Topol and let him know they're not the only things needed, but I'll give him credit where it's due.
His list is true. And they work.
👉 Daily movement (walking the dog, dancing in the kitchen)
👉 Mental challenges (music, languages, puzzles — not doomscrolling)
👉 Real connection (not just comments, likes and emojis)
👉 A reason to wake up that isn’t just coffee
👉 Food that looks like it came from the earth, not a chemical plant
Because it’s not about being born with the perfect genes.
It’s about the daily choices we make — the ones that quietly stack up over decades.
So that high blood pressure reading? It likely started 10 years ago.
That diabetes diagnosis? 15 years back.
Cardiovascular disease and heart attacks? Often rooted 20 years ago.
Health issues don’t appear overnight — they accumulate.
So here’s my question and invitation for this week:
🌀 What kind of future, and future you, are your daily choices creating?
2 Things I’ve Learnt
Why Don’t Bears Get Blood Clots During Hibernation?
I came across another fascinating article this week that stopped me in my tracks. (Also, I have a bit of a thing for bears… though maybe not the kind with big sharp claws, chase you through forests.)
It started with winter, stillness and hibernating bears.
And led straight into blood clots, biology and what it really means to rest well.
Let me explain...
What the DVT?
When it comes to cardiovascular disease, blood clots are one of the biggest silent killers.
In fact, “only heart attacks and strokes kill more people than clots.”
That’s why, if you’re ever stuck in a hospital bed, chances are you’ll be given daily injections of heparin to prevent one — usually without a second thought.
But here’s the thing…
Bears lie still for months each year — and never get clots.
No Nurse with blood thinners. No movement. Just stillness. And yet, they emerge healthy and strong when spring arrives.
So what’s going on?
Meet HSP47. (No, it’s not a new hot sauce...)
HSP47 stands for Heat Shock Protein 47 — a collagen-specific protein that acts like a microscopic quality-control manager.
It helps fold collagen properly, especially during times of stress, repair, or environmental shifts.
And in bears, it plays a powerful, seasonal role.
Where Things Get Wild (and Wonderfully Rhythmic)
In summer, HSP47 levels in bears are high, prepping their vascular system for movement and action.
In winter, it drops dramatically, reducing clot risk, inflammation, and keeping blood flowing smoothly despite months of stillness (aka hibernation).
And they pull all this off naturally...
Sandy's Hypothesis...
Could the seasonal expression of HSP47 be tied to light and temperature cycles? And could seasonal light cycles regulate HSP47 in us too?
We don’t have definitive answers, yet. But the clues are stacking up:
* Heat Shock Proteins are responsive to stress, especially UV light, heat and cold (that's why saunas are meant to be so good for you)
* Circadian genes regulate HSPs, and sunlight is the master circadian cue
* Seasonal light affects the pineal gland, melatonin — and likely HSP47 too
* In humans, heat, sunlight, movement, and infra-red light all influence HSP expression
So what if…
More light + more movement in summer = more HSP47 - preparing your body for action, repair, and growth.
Less light + more rest in winter = lower HSP47 - a natural shift that reduces clot risk and supports deep restoration.
Just like bears. And just like nature intended.
❌ Where It All Goes Wrong
Unlike bears, we’re stuck in permanent summer. Artificial light 24/7, climate-controlled everything (home, car, office), nonstop stimulation, stress, screen time and go-go-GO!
Your body never gets the seasonal memo. So it can’t downshift and heal.
And it certainly can’t hibernate.
So, as the seasons roll past, nature doesn’t guess. She codes. But the big question is, are you listening?
5 Bear-y Good Winter Biohacks
If you want to tap into nature's language, here are 5 of the best biohacks to help you embrace the winter rhythm and perhaps uncover another secret to longevity:
1. Align with the light: Get bright, natural light in the morning. Dim the lights in the evening. Let light teach your body when to rise and when to rest - just like it does for the bears.
2. Feel the cold: Don’t hide from the season - step into it. Let your skin feel the winter crispness. Crack open a window. Turn down the thermostat. Your biology understands cold better than you think.
3. Slow with the season: More rest. Longer sleep. Slower mornings. Winter isn’t the time to push. It’s the time to gather, reflect, and restore.
4. Move like your life depends on it (because it does): Bears have adaptations we don’t, and most of us are sitting way too much. Get up. Stretch. Walk. Move often.
5. Build your summer reserve: Think of summer as your savings account. Your body draws on those reserves of sunlight, activity and movement in winter.
So if you’re feeling the pull to slow down this season, don’t fight it.
You’re not lazy.
You’re in sync.
And there’s nothing inconvenient about that.
There’s something magical in every season — and nature knows exactly what she’s doing.
Let’s stop resisting her.
3 Things To Explore
When You Know Better, You Do Better… Or Do You?
The tools for living well seem simple enough, don’t they?
A little sunlight.
Daily movement.
A good night’s sleep.
And yet… the gap between knowing and doing seems soooo wide?
And more like a canyon some days (hello, scary chasm down there).
So why is that?
If the secret to longevity is so clear and simple why are so many people still struggling?
Here are just a few of the invisible forces we’re up against:
- Modern Life is Biologically Mismatched: We’ve created a world that’s out of sync with how our bodies evolved.
- Health Has Been Outsourced: We have been conditioned to believe that health is something you "get" from experts, pills, or procedures — not something you build.
- Our Culture Rewards Convenience, Not Wisdom: Speed, ease, productivity — these are the values of the modern world.
- Dopamine Drives Win: We’re constantly nudged toward dopamine hits — caffeine, sugar, social media, late-night scrolling — these hijack our natural rhythms.
- People Are Overwhelmed, Not Undereducated: Knowing isn’t the problem — it’s the overwhelm, the lack of time, the pressure to do everything “perfectly,”
So if you’re not exactly leaping out of bed every morning (OK… most mornings), here’s the question:
✨ What’s sabotaging my healthy rhythm?
✨ Is there a small shift I could make today — not perfectly, but intentionally?
Because when we honour the seasons, the stillness, the light, and our biology…
The doing gets easier.
And sometimes, we don’t need more information.
We just need to remember what we already knew.
What Are We Really Chasing?
We've talked a lot about longevity today, because we say we want to live longer — but for what?
This week, a longevity doctor who helps billionaires, celebs and those with the budget, quite honestly said he wants to die.
Not now. Not tragically.
But eventually — and awesomely.
Not in a hospital bed, wired to spreadsheets and protocols.
Not as a supplement-obsessed, data-tracked ghost of a life.
But with music, mischief, memories and meaning.
The goal isn’t to just extend our years…but rather it's to fill them — with love, joy, creativity, conversations, adventures, mess and moments that make you laugh so hard your belly hurts.
I’ve seen it myself, and you probably have too.
There are people who “look well” but feel lost. And yet there are others who are technically unwell… yet wildly, deeply alive. Unafraid. Fully themselves.
So what are we really optimising?
Maybe longevity isn’t the win.
Maybe legacy is.
It’s not the number of years we’re chasing.
It’s the kind of life we’re living within them — a life so full, you’d be okay to go...
but only after one more barefoot beach walk, one more deep conversation with your love, and one more listen to your favourite CD.
Let this be your reminder:
Don’t just add years to your life. Add soul to your years.
Stop Waiting For Friday
"Stop waiting for Friday, for Summer, for someone to fall in love with you, for life. Happiness is achieved when you stop waiting for it and make the most of the moment you are in now." – Unknown
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