Finding Your True Form: Lessons That Actually Changed Me (2025 Review)

A solo reflection on a year of conversations about health, stress, resilience, dating and purpose

TL;DR

• You hold most of the knowledge you need to get better. Know yourself and your goals first, then find a good coach who asks the right questions.
• Stress is the health risk you can't feel. Awareness and tracking tools like HRV help you see what you can't sense.
• Resilience isn't being a brick wall. It's being able to adapt.
• Be authentic and vulnerable, stop waiting for the right time to start, and try not to be everything all at once.

Introduction

There was an episode every week in 2025. That's 52 conversations, and I'm grateful for every guest who sat down with me. But I've noticed something about podcasts, including my own. We listen, we nod along, and then we forget about it.

So to kick off 2026, I sat down with my journal and asked a simple question: what actually stuck? Not what sounded good in the moment, but the lessons I've carried into how I train, work, date, manage stress and show up as a person.

This isn't a recap of every episode. These are the ideas that changed me, roughly in the order they popped up when I started writing, except for the first one. If you only take one thing from this post into the new year, make it that one.

Lesson 1: You hold most of the answer

Insight: In episode 276, podiatrist Thien Trinh said something I haven't stopped thinking about. Thien knows feet inside out. His brother and sister are podiatrists too. Yet he said that when you walk into his clinic, you hold about 60% of the knowledge that's going to help you get better.

Honestly, I think it's closer to 80%. If you walk in and say "my feet hurt, fix them", even the best practitioner in the world will struggle. Dr Avi Charlton made a similar point in episode 250, our most downloaded episode of the year. After 20 years as a GP, her answer to "what is health?" was simple: be curious. No one should care about your health more than you do.

Action: Before your next appointment, session or goal-setting chat, write down what you want, why you want it and what you've noticed about your body. Then make sure the person you're seeing is good at asking questions.

Outcome: You get better answers because you're asking better questions, and you stop outsourcing your health to someone else.

Lesson 2: Your past shapes you, and that's okay

Insight: Episode 259 with Sammie Lee was one of the most powerful conversations of the year. Sammie shared stories most people would never share publicly, including childhood sexual abuse and an eating disorder she nearly didn't survive. It didn't get the reach it deserved, but if anything in it resonates with you, please go back and listen.

The note I wrote in my journal was this: your past shapes your habits, your personality and your future, and that's okay. When we push trauma down and ignore it, it quietly runs the show. It triggers reactions and holds us back. When we take the time to understand it, with proper support, it can become a source of strength. Sammie is living proof.

Action: If something from your past keeps showing up in how you react, consider speaking with a psychologist or psychotherapist about it. You don't have to work it out alone.

Outcome: The things that once controlled you become things you understand, and eventually things you can use.

Lesson 3: Stress is the health risk you can't feel

Insight: Stress came up again and again this year, especially with the doctors I had on. In episode 273, Dr Nupur Nag and I both shared stories of exercising, sleeping well and eating healthily, and still having stress knock us over. For me, that meant waking up in a restaurant with paramedics ready to zap me back to life. We also talked about the eight pillars of health, which go well beyond sleep, food and exercise to include connection, relationships and mental health.

That pairs perfectly with episode 231 with Dr Torkil Færø. His point was that we have senses for touch, taste, smell and sight, but no sense for stress. That's where heart rate variability (HRV) comes in. His rule of thumb stuck with me: a good stress is one you can recover from. But you won't know which is which unless you're tracking it.

Action: If you wear a tracker that measures HRV, start paying attention to the trend rather than the daily number. If you don't, try a short daily check-in on sleep, energy and stress.

Outcome: You start catching stress before it catches you.

Lesson 4: Start with what you're already doing

Insight: In episode 246, Cam Harris from Truth Fitness and I spoke for about half an hour before we even mentioned exercise. Cam has worked with thousands of people, and his focus is the simple things we already do every day: eating, sleeping and drinking. A classic example is drinking your calories. Soft drinks, coffees, milkshakes and juices add up, and trimming a couple of hundred calories there can change your trajectory more than a brand-new routine.

Then there's intensity. At the Melbourne fitness expo, I asked people what fitness actually is, and in episode 234 Tom Rock from the Australian Fitness Academy and I got into the thing nobody talks about: intensity is hard to learn from an online program. Too much and you get injured. Too little and you're just fluffing around. I'd rather see you do an average program at the right intensity than a perfect program at the wrong one.

Action: For three days, jot down everything you eat and drink. Circle one habit you could tweak. If you're starting a new training plan, have a coach check your intensity, not just your form.

Outcome: You get bigger results from small changes to things you're already doing.

Lesson 5: Resilience means adapting, not resisting

Insight: I've been trying to understand resilience for years, and it took episode 258 with psychotherapist Kosmas Smyrnios for it to click. Kos is a next-level human. He helped pioneer family therapy in Melbourne, and he answered my questions in ways I never saw coming.

Social media tells us resilience means being a brick wall: unbreakable, unmoving, repelling everything. Kos explained that the concept actually came from engineering, from materials that don't break because they can bend and stretch. For people, he sees resilience as a dynamic capability made up of many skills: bouncing back, adapting, being flexible, scanning your environment, and spotting opportunities and risks.

Action: Think of a challenge you're facing. Instead of asking how to push through it, ask how you could adapt to it.

Outcome: You build strength that bends instead of snapping.

Lesson 6: Quiet the noise and look within

Insight: The world has never been noisier. In episode 248, Flabia Orison and I talked about finding your purpose amid all of it, whether through journaling, meditation or prayer.

That led me to two conversations I'd suggest listening to back to back. In episode 266, I told Christopher August I kept going on dates with women who didn't want kids, when kids are something I want. His reply: "Jack, it's not them, it's you." What I was reflecting was what I was attracting. Then in episode 272, which turned into a bit of a dating therapy session for me with Tez, I took away the biggest lesson of my year: be authentic and vulnerable. When we put up a facade to make someone like us, they fall for someone who isn't us, and eventually the facade drops. Not everyone has to like you. That's okay.

Andrew Jobling gave me the tool to back myself in episode 262: find evidence. When I wonder whether I'm worthy of the guests I get on, I look back at 280-odd episodes and the messages from people whose lives have changed. And in episode 236, comedian Jordana Borensztajn taught me to ask "what's the worst that can happen?" five times in a row, until the fear gets so ridiculous it becomes funny.

Action: Next time you're anxious about a situation, write down the worst that could happen, then the worst after that, five times over. Then write down three pieces of evidence that you can handle it.

Outcome: You show up as yourself, with less fear and more evidence that you're capable.

Lesson 7: Just start, and be one thing at a time

Insight: I meet so many people with great ideas who are waiting for the right time. In episode 245, Mamuch Chuol started a not-for-profit before he even knew what a not-for-profit was. He just had a passion and figured it out as he went. It's like a bicep curl: you can picture the perfect rep all you like, but nothing happens until you start moving.

And people can change. In episode 226, my mate Ferdi shared how he went from 15 years in and out of jail to helping people as a personal trainer. When anyone tells me people can't change, I point to Ferdi.

Finally, Vahid Coskun in episode 263 gave me something I needed to hear: you can't be everything all at once. Social media shows us the 1% highlight reel, and we try to match it. Instead, be one thing at a time and give it 100%. At dinner with a friend, be a friend. In the gym, train.

Action: Pick the project you've been putting off and take one small step this week. Then choose one part of your day where you'll be fully present with your phone away.

Outcome: You build momentum on what matters and stop spreading yourself so thin.

Quick wins

• Write down your why before your next appointment or training block.
• Check one drink you have daily and swap it for a lower-calorie option.
• Track your stress for a week, even with a simple 1 to 10 score.
• Run the "what's the worst that can happen?" exercise on one thing you're avoiding.
• Put your phone away for one meal a day.

Closing insight

One more lesson from my own year: your foundation matters. I dealt with plantar fasciitis and then a stress fracture in my foot, and for a while I couldn't hike or surf. Those are the things that clear my head, so it hit my mental health more than I expected. Helen Halkias in episode 270 explains why your feet affect everything above them far better than I can.

That's really what this year taught me. Finding your true form isn't about one big breakthrough. It's about building a solid base, being curious, understanding yourself, adapting when life gets hard and being brave enough to show people who you really are. I'm still working on all of it.

In 2026, I'm doing more solo episodes like this one, taking what I learn from guests and showing you how to actually apply it. I'd love to know which lesson stuck with you most. Let me know in the YouTube comments or on Instagram.

Listen to the full episode

The full reflection is on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and YouTube, or you can press play at the top of this page.