Part of the overwhelm with all this is that it's a big, dark nebulous cloud of 'so much to do' that you can't think straight, you're always in a rush, you don't know where to start, there's even more inertia because you have to try to wade through all of it and decide what to do in this very moment, every time.

We're going to dump all the 'files' that are inside our mind out in front of us, then organize, prioritize and even eliminate some of them via Brain Dumping.

That might sound scary to do. But a monster you can see and understand is much less scary than an unknown monster of unknown shape, size and strength.

A massive benefit to exercise that rarely gets talked about is the 'cognitive reset' effect.

After a few hours of a mentally demanding task, you might feel exhausted. But, you could go exercise and perform totally fine. Why is that?

Your brain was tired. Not your body.

Now, you might not be able to go do your workout immediately after this 'brain-draining' activity depending on your schedule - but just doing it at any time of day period is going to help.

After work, chores, errands and other pressing responsibilities, the last thing we want to do is sit down and think about 'big' stuff. Important stuff. All those 'you know I should really do/plan X' thoughts that pass through you during the day. It requires real brainpower, and oftentimes we don't have much of that brainpower left when the time comes.

The purpose of this guide as a whole is twofold:

1. Increase our mental brainpower/willpower capacity so that we have some gas in the tank when the time comes to put it to use

2. Decrease the amount of brainpower/willpower needed in tackling these things to begin with

We're hitting it from both ends. It's just like improving your pull up performance while losing weight - train to get stronger so that your muscles can generate more force, and get leaner so that they don't have to generate as much force to begin with, making each rep easier to complete (or getting that much closer to your first pull up).

These kinds of activities have us moving in all kinds of unpredictable yet natural ways. Twisting, turning, jumping, changing direction, moving laterally, rotation through the torso, hips and shoulders, and in a very free manner. Quite the opposite of structured exercise.

It's not necessarily the type of activity that makes something considered play or not - it's the intent and purpose behind it.

The primary goal of play is to have fun doing the thing. Not to burn calories, improve your fitness or to get better at the thing. (Those just happen to be bonuses that we'll gladly take.)

Me being a nerd, I knew that if I gave it a cool name, I'd be more likely to do it.

Thus Primal Flows were born.

These aren't just random words thrown together though - it is to convey the real purpose behind doing these mobility routines.

It is to restore natural human movement - to help us move in the ways we are meant to be able to move.

The Primal Flows do a good job of covering many of these types of movements not often covered in strength training:

• Lateral (side to side) movement and stretching

• Rotation of: spine, shoulders, hips, lower leg

• Focused Breathing

• Core Isometrics

• Foot and Ankle

If you're lifting weights, but your breathing and/or heart rate are the limiting factor, rather than your muscles exhausting and becoming unable to produce enough force to lift the weight, then you're really doing cardio, not strength or hypertrophy training.

You're doing a mishmash of both at the exact same time, and getting a subpar benefit.

Don't mishmash.

Separate the two.

Can you guess what is the single most impactful way to change your beliefs of what you think you can accomplish?

Action.

Actually doing something, so that you have concrete evidence that you are becoming a different person.

THIS is why I'm passionate about time-effective fitness. If it doesn't take as much time, then it'll be easier to fit into your day and week, which means it'll be easier to stick to, which means you actually rack up some wins and give yourself a chance to believe in yourself.

This sort of 'fun for fun's sake' is important in its own right — but this isn't what keeps many of us playing the same game for dozens, hundreds and even thousands of hours. Meta Progression is what keeps us coming back. Every individual action we take, every small to medium sized goal accomplished or milestone achieved, is working toward a greater purpose beyond itself.

Think about any video game you've ever played. Think about some of your favorite challenging moments you've had to overcome. I guarantee you were in the flow state during that moment — that's why it stands out to you. It would not have been an epic or memorable moment if it was very easy for you.

A boss launches a special attack at you. Unsure of how to evade or block this attack, you take moderate damage.

Here it comes again. It hits you again, but you notice that it's a low, sweeping attack and he performs a unique animation just before the attack begins.

Here it comes for the third time. The attack animation begins, warning you to prepare. As soon as you see him begin to swing his blade, you jump — successfully avoiding the attack.

That is pattern recognition.

It feels pretty good when you have a gaming moment like that, doesn't it?

Progress drives everything we do. That might sound obvious — but that's because it's so hard-wired in our DNA, for the purpose of survival of our species and to further improve our offspring's chance of survival. This is why we crave it.

Also just as obvious: nobody would choose stagnation or regression over progress in an area they want to improve, or something that will benefit their life.

Imagine a video game without progression. No 'completing a stage and moving on to the next, slightly more challenging one'. No levelling up. No upgrades to your skills, no progression through a story. Probably wouldn't be that fun, would it? Not for very long, anyway.