In Rhythm: Listening for Balance in a World of Health Tech

There’s something comforting about watching your steps count up after a long day. Even when the to-do list explodes and your energy wobbles, you walked. You moved. You reminded yourself that you’re still living in a body that deserves care. There’s also a kind of relief in seeing your blood sugar stay steady after a meal—or in realizing that your 2 p.m. crash might not be a character flaw but a metabolic clue. Health tech can bring clarity where confusion used to live.

And for many of us—especially those navigating chronic illness, TBI, or hormonal chaos—it has. Tools like Function Health (a platform I personally use and recommend) gives you access to over 100+ biomarkers through a simple lab panel you order yourself. You get to track trends, not just treat symptoms, and this helps get to the root cause of pain, illness, and suffering. For those interested, here’s my personal referral link if you want to join.

Even with helpful insights, I’ve learned the more we track, the more we have to choose how we relate to the data. The data alone isn’t what shapes our health. The meaning we give it—the rules, the guilt, the gold stars or red flags—that’s what really shifts the story.

The Wisdom Beneath the Numbers

Let me be clear: I’m not anti-tracker. I still wear mine, but I’ve had to reframe how I use them. Like many, I once shaped my whole day around a “recovery score” from a wearable. I’d wake up feeling rested, ready, alive—and the app would tell me to rest. Other days I was exhausted but the score said “go.” And I went. Eventually, I stopped asking the one expert who knew best: my body.

Here’s what works better for me now:

• I still track food sometimes, but I use a platform called MacroFactor, which adjusts to your intake rather than punishing you for fluctuations. It’s one of the few apps I’ve found that supports health and real life (like birthdays and cravings).

• I monitor sleep, but I don’t look at it every morning when I look up. I first check in with how I feel. Then I can use the data from my tracker to improve my habits and look at what’s happening during sleep cycles—which feels more attuned to recovery trends and less focused on judgment. But even that I take with a grain of salt: some days, the deepest rest is simply not being measured.

Nature Doesn’t Optimize—She Aligns

Nature isn’t on a 30-day shred plan. The forest doesn’t strive to “crush macros” or beat its VO2 max. It moves in cycles. It listens to its own rhythm. And it doesn’t question its worth if the moon is full or the fruit hasn’t ripened yet. Our bodies? They are not exceptions to this. They are ecosystems—dynamic, relational, seasonal. Sometimes we bloom. Sometimes we lay fallow. Sometimes we wake up excited to workout. Sometimes we need to stretch in the kitchen with tea. And nothing about that is failure.

A New Kind of Knowing

Yes, use your tools. Yes, collect the data. Yes, learn what supports you. But also remember: You are allowed to pause the tracking and just be.

Eat a beautiful meal and don’t log it. Walk outside with no step count. Lie in bed and just breathe. Because the real goal of health isn’t perfect stats—it’s presence.

The capacity to respond to life with integrity. The ability to tune in and say: “Today, I need stillness.” Or: “Today, I’m strong. Let’s move.” You can use your data as a compass—just don’t let it become a cage.

Reflective Prompt: Listening Inward

Take a moment. No app. No dashboard. No measurement. Just you and your breath.

Ask:

• What am I feeling today—not in numbers, but in sensations?

• Where in my body feels awake, open, or tender?

• If I honored my body as a wise, seasonal landscape… what would I do next?
  

Let the answer come softly. Trust it. This is your rhythm. And it already knows the way.