Golden Data

Personal intervention map · September 2026

Everything is downstream of sleep.

The original chart plots how many strangers rated a thing against how often they called it life-changing. That’s a popularity map. This one is mine: friction to actually do it against expected payoff for a 40-something single dad of four who runs ultras, sits in dashboards all day, and is trying to hold 11pm → 6am through a divorce. The top-left corner is where the leverage lives. Nothing in the supplement aisle beats the four things sitting up there.

Sep 7, 2026Updated Sep 13, 2026

Friction against payoff

Interactive

Every intervention I have looked at seriously, scored on how hard it is to actually do and how much I expect it to move energy, mood, and focus. Hover a point for the reasoning. Click a category to hide it.

High leverage — cheap and it workslife-changingmajorsolidmarginalnoisefree / todaya real habitgatekept or costlya projectfriction →expected payoff for me →Lights out at 10:30Sleep target 11→6Strength training 2×/wkMorning light, 10 minEndurance runningCaffeine cutoff at noonSleep apnea screeningMeditationFull bloodwork panelAlcohol to near-zeroSunday planning hourSSRI / bupropionPhone out of the bedroomStimulant medicationCaffeineZone 2 volumeWeekly outdoor resetFreewriting Mon/Wed/FriModafinilProtein floor ~150gCreatine 5gMagnesium glycinate PMSauna 3–4×/wkVitamin D3L-theanine with coffeeMelatonin 0.3mgOmega-3Cold showerBacopaNicotine pouchesIntermittent fastingAshwagandhaKeto / carnivoreMultivitaminRhodiolaRacetams / noopeptLion’s ManeAlpha-GPC / cholineGinsengCBD
X · friction: cost, time, gatekeeping, willpowerY · payoff: expected effect on energy, mood, focusClick a chip to filter

Scores are my read of the evidence weighted for my situation — a prioritization, not measured effect sizes. The shaded corner is the cheap-and-it-works quadrant.

The next five

In this order

Do these in this order — each one earns the next.

  1. Move lights-out to 10:30pm

    Highest payoffHardest

    You’re running a 7-hour target through a divorce, four kids, and a 300-person sales org. Seven is a floor, not a target. The half hour you’re missing is the same half hour that would fix the afternoon crash you’re considering modafinil for.

    First moveSet a 10:00pm alarm labelled “wind down”. Not a bedtime — a start-stopping time. Four weeks.

  2. Bright light in the eyes by 6:15am

    FreeCompounds with #1

    The 10:30 bedtime won’t hold unless the clock it’s attached to is anchored. Ten minutes outside — porch, driveway, the first block of a run — does more for sleep onset than any pill in the bottom half of this chart.

    First moveAttach it to something you already do. Coffee happens outside now.

  3. Last caffeine at noon

    FreeToday

    Six-hour half-life. The 3pm cup is still a quarter-dose in your blood at 11pm, thinning exactly the deep sleep the first two rows are trying to buy.

    First moveNothing to buy, nothing to build. Just a hard line on the clock.

  4. Two strength sessions a week

    90 min/wkUnlocks the creatine

    You’re an aerobically fit man with no resistance training, which is the classic ultrarunner gap — and it’s the piece that protects your running from the injury that would take the whole base away.

    First moveTwo 45-minute sessions on Dad nights after the kids are down. Squat, hinge, push, pull, carry. No program-shopping.

  5. Book a physical with full bloodwork

    DoctorOne morning

    Ferritin, B12, thyroid, testosterone, A1c — plus an honest conversation about sleep and snoring. One appointment either finds something specific or clears the whole doctor-gated column off this chart.

    First moveBook it this week. It’s a fifteen-minute phone call you’ve been postponing, and it’s the only item here you can finish today.

Already in the stack

Don’t touch it
Endurance runningMeditationSleep target 11→6Sunday planning hourCreatine 5gCaffeineFreewriting Mon/Wed/FriVitamin D3Omega-3

This is a good base. The running and the meditation are the two heaviest-hitting things on the whole chart and I already have both. Creatine, D3, and fish oil are cheap insurance. Resist the urge to optimize this half — it’s working.

Where I’d waste six months

The overbuild trap

The bottom-right of the chart is a research project disguised as self-improvement: racetams, adaptogens, exotic diets, stacking protocols. High friction, near-zero evidence, endless reading. It is exactly the kind of thing that feels like progress. The whole grey cloud down there is worth less, combined, than moving lights-out thirty minutes earlier.

One honest experiment at a time: pick one row from the list, run it four weeks, note energy and mood on a 1–5 in the Sunday review. That’s the whole protocol. Don’t build a tracker for it.