Implementing Your New Year’s Plan

Meaning

Jan 29

Written By Kevin H

Something to Live By

I will govern my life, and my thought, as if the whole world were to see the one, and to read the other.

Seneca

I met up with a dear friend, Connie, in San Fran, and she gave me a gift, an old book she had found at the library, which was selling all of their books. She loved it so much that she thought I would love it as well, since she knew I loved old, undiscovered books that felt like lost treasures and filled the soul. They had a second copy for sale!

“Something to Live By” was published in 1945, and my edition is its 18th printing, from October 1963. As I opened up to read the intro and then the ending, it lit up my heart. Dorothy Kopplin had compiled the writings that touched her heart throughout her life, and it appears she had not much longer to live when she wrote this book for her son.

I told my friend it was like discovering Tolstoy’s last book, “A Calendar of Wisdom” also known as “The Path of Life”, which he deemed as his greatest contribution to humanity. He had summited the literary world with War and Peace, yet found no contentment even after he had accomplished his lifelong dreams. He spent the last ten years of his life compiling the wisdom of other wise people throughout history and adding his personal thoughts for each day of the year. Priceless.

As I read “Something to Live By”, it was a book I instantly recognized as Priceless. I read the first chapter, “What is Happiness,” and thought I must write about each chapter in my newsletter. It felt like Emily Dickinson’s sister discovering her collection of poetry after she died, or Mendelssohn reviving Bach 70 years after his death. I’ve used a few quotes from this chapter in this newsletter.

What does ‘something to live by‘ mean for you? And, what is happiness for you? What are the prevailing thoughts, principles, and frameworks in which you view life and your place in it?

I have asked myself these questions for decades and know some things for certain. The pivotal moments, experiences, and decisions that shaped who I am today.

Have you deeply pondered and asked yourself these essential questions, as the busyness of life buzzes all about you?

Your Health:

I’ve just started a Youtube channel to educate others about the first principles of health and our most common diseases.

How I Reversed My Plaque in 3 Months
Stop Eating These 3 Foods (Heart Attack Warning)

Subscribe, like and share with your friends and family. I believe that through this, we can save many lives and prevent a lot of suffering through health education.

Implementing Your New Year’s Plan

We live in deeds, not years; in thoughts, not breaths; in feelings, not in figures on the dial; we should count time by heart throbs. He most lives who THINKS most, FEELS the noblest, ACTS the best.

Phillip James Bailey, A Country Town

What 3 Values Do you Live by and Aspire to?

Mine are:

1. Love 2. Honour 3. Glorify.

I truly try to practice and live these three values. I often fall short. If I had to add a 4th, it would be Humility. A 5th would be Gratitude. This would be akin to Benjamin Franklin’s 13 Virtues and how he practiced them.

But as I distilled the practicalities of life, I have focused on 3 Main Pillars:

Health
Wealth
Meaning

And its 4 dimensions of: Physical, Intellectual, Emotional and Spiritual

Some of you wanted to see my New Year’s plan. I hesitate not because I don’t have one, but because the moment I show you my plan, I take on more accountability. It reveals my deep inner heart, although still on the surface. They show what I aspire to, want, fear, what I am fighting for and what I’ve decided is “This is going to me!”

But let me first explain why your plan really matters and why most plans fail.

Why Most Plans Fail

Ideals are like stars; you will not succeed in touching them with your hands, but like the seafaring man on the ocean desert of waters, you choose them as your guides, and following them, you reach your destiny.

Carl Schurz

Your brain’s first priority is to keep you safe, to make you survive today and tomorrow and as long as possible. It isn’t engineered to make you noble. It’s designed to first make you efficient.

Survival instincts to feed hunger, thirst, sleep, arousal, mood, deep in the centre of our brains lies the command centre, the hypothalamus, relentlessly keeping you alive and seeking comfort.

This instinct for efficiency is what sabotages New Year’s resolutions.

A new year, a new start: your higher self, your prefrontal cortex, wants meaning, love, and growth in your soul and spirit, sacrificing any hardships and short-term gratification for long-term, meaningful outcomes. This higher self is not rational. It is profoundly emotional and spiritual.

But your basic self wants you not to suffer, to go through seemingly unnecessary risk and just be comfortable, make it easy, shortcut or hack your way to results and outcomes and to maintain your status quo. Why risk anything?

But to stay the same in an ever-changing world and an ever-changing you is riskier than venturing, growing, and fulfilling the deep-seated ideals of your heart.

So the goal of New Year’s plan is not motivation, but a rewiring from effortful intention to a sense of your true identity.

It is to strive for the process of becoming and not merely the result. This takes ‘work on yourself’ from the inside first. Mindset. Spiritset. And Physicalset.

The hardest is to go from 0 to 1. Whether it be in business, health, wealth, or meaning. Going from 1 to 2 is next. Then 2 to multiplying is much easier. Most of the world is used to this third stage, where systems are already built and determined. Very few as they get into their 30s, 40s and beyond, like going from 0 to 1. When you were younger, going from 0 to 1 was natural. But it got educated out of you as ‘risk’. You learned to walk. Run. Ride a bike, Learn languages. Study new topics. Read many books. Write. Create. How often do you learn a new thing? Set an impossible goal. We called that Daydreaming. How often do you daydream? How often do you try to make that daydream into reality? Compared to when you were much younger?

I am a perpetual daydreamer. But I am now 55 and realize I need to prioritize my dreams for the most meaning. My health and wealth are just ways to fulfill meaning.

Your Meaning: Your Destination

Your Health: Your Vehicle

Your Wealth/Gifts: Your Engine

How to Go from 0 to 1: The Lead Domino

The thought that leads to no action is not thought- it is dreaming.

Eliza Lamb Martyn

Have you ever seen hundreds of dominoes being knocked down, one after another, in spectacular fashion? Well, what if you lined up your New Year’s plan like a system of dominoes and figured out the first domino for you to knock down?

I plan the year in four quarters, just like a business does, but I plan Q1 (1st quarter) in the most detail, as it is where I establish my LEAD DOMINOS.

January is the first domino, the ignition, getting the engine started.

February is knocking that first domino down.

March is hopefully compounding or revising the plan/alignment of dominos, based on real-time feedback.

Once Q1 gains momentum, the rest of the quarters become more defined. It’s no longer a ‘start’ but a continuation of what your ‘new normal’ feels like.

This requires focus, self-discipline, courage, and faith.

You can endure the often painful process of growth and learning if you have a goal worth living for. Sometimes that is a person. Sometimes it’s a deep-seated want and desire from childhood or sometimes it isn’t even for you but for the world.

My Lead Domino

The thoughts which nestle within us, and issue from us in language and in act, determine our moral character. The most exquisite piece of sculpture which Michelangelo or Rodin ever carved, WAS ONCE only a THOUGHT.

Theodore Cuyler

I also think about what will prevent me or constrain me most—my biggest constraint. Right now, it’s my health. I have to take care of my body and my vehicle to get to my destination.

I used to think health was how I felt, even though I knew disease could grow silently, like rust inside a pipe. It can accumulate and present itself when it is almost too big to fail.

So I am not only focused on quality measures of health as to how I feel, but also a scorecard to keep track and process my body chemistry numbers.

My Jan 8, 2026 #s are:

LDL 79 mg/dl (2.0mM), HDL 58 mg/dl (1.5mM), TG 107
HbA1C: 5.3%
Weight 146 lbs

My goal in 3 months for further plaque reversal is

LDL 60, HDL 61, TG 60
HbA1c 5.0%
Weight 132 lbs (I was at this before with my rapid plaque reversal).

I’m currently at 138 lbs near end of Jan.

In 6 months,

LDL 50, HDL 65, TG, 50,
HbA1c 4.9%
Weight 132 lbs.

I had done this in my first three months after my high Calcium score from May to August. It’s when I knew I was rapidly reversing plaque.

Most experts say LDL<55, apoB<55 leads to plaque reversal.

I realized as I inputted all my meals, that I was no longer eating <20g of fat per day. I was more like 50-70 g fat per day! I wasn’t measuring things precisely and drifted to how I was feeling.

Oat milk matcha : 8g fat (I sometimes had two a day). Before I was just consuming matcha in tablet form.

Edamame: 8g fat

Chia seeds: 2 tbsp is 8g fat. I started taking 4 tbsp

Flax seeds: 2 tbsp is 8g fat. I started taking 4 tbsp

Just eating these daily was 48g-60g of fat per day.
2.5-3x more fat than when I had first started.
Not to mention fat in beans and other foods I started to increase.
I’m removing oat milk matcha and just matcha tablets I used to eat, very sparingly edamame and no more chia seeds and just 2 tbsp of flax.
I’m aiming for Esselstyn’s < 20g fat/day
Intermittent fasting with 6 hour meal time windows with one day of the week one meal a day (OMAD) with enough calories, protein and as needed complex carbs.

Lentils have a 22:1 ratio of protein:fat (15g Protein:0.8g fat)

Black beans 17:1 (15g Protein:1.1g fat)

Chickpeas 4:1. (15g Protein:4g fat)

I am choosing Lentils and Black Beans as my protein source.

Now I am being much more ‘prescriptive’ so I can reverse my heart plaque. I realized the body is like a system, a machine and its cause and effect—input/output. I knew, but I didn’t truly understand it or implement it as concisely. I was ‘eyeballing’ measures and foods. Now I am treating it much more quantitatively, like math.

But my ultimate result is coronary plaque reversal, which typically takes 2.5-5 years.

Dr. Esselstyn noted that only his patients who had LDL<50 reversed their plaque. He’s proven it. I just need to follow it and enhance it for my own anatomy and physiology.

The blood flow in my artery with the biggest blockage (77% blockage) has increased from 75% in late August, which was considered the danger zone, to 80% blood flow, which is low-normal now. I do feel great, but I will repeat these exams in June.

My goal is to reduce my D1 obstruction from 77% to 60-70% by the end of 2026, to 40-50% by the end of 2027, and to 20-30% by the end of 2028. By then, the coronary arteries' remodelling plaque obstruction should be readily noticeable.

Carotid plaque is much easier to reverse, and I did that in 3 months.

I’m focused primarily on my PHYSICAL HEALTH in the health category.

For the rest of my HEALTH SCORECARD:

Intellectual health: Read one great book. I chose Paradise Lost and am reading it with my daughter.

Emotional Health: Solo bike rides 3x/week for relaxation, meditation and to get outdoors. Ride and run in nature.

Spiritual Health: memorize the book of Ephesians in the Bible. It has 6 chapters, so memorize a chapter every two months.

This is just my health section. If my wealth and meaning plans are of interest, please let me know, and I will consider writing about them as well if you think it will help you see into my mind and life.

Wealth is not just money, which is like fuel, but optionality to drive your vehicle and life where you want. But more importantly, there is your intellectual wealth, emotional wealth and spiritual wealth you must invest in.

Your Challenge (if you are willing)

There are only a few things that really matter in life. The rest is dressings.

Dr. Kevin Ham

Set a timer for 30 minutes.

Sit down with a blank page. Write one thing for each of the 12 dimensions below—one practice that, if it grew this year, would genuinely fill your body with energy, your mind with clarity, and your soul with peace.

Copy this:

HEALTH
Physical: ______________________________
Intellectual: ___________________________
Emotional: _____________________________
Spiritual: ______________________________

WEALTH
Physical: ______________________________
Intellectual: ___________________________
Emotional: _____________________________
Spiritual: ______________________________

MEANING / PURPOSE
Physical: ______________________________
Intellectual: ___________________________
Emotional: _____________________________
Spiritual: ______________________________

Then choose your training mode for January:

Draw the 12 boxes.
Write one practice in each.
Then answer one question:
What is my lead domino for the next 90 days?
Write it in ink.

The goal isn’t a perfect year. It's the year you became intentional. A year where the person you become by December feels like a quiet miracle. Built, not wished for.