the most honest feedback loop i've looped / #17

i wore a continuous glucose monitor so you don't have to

It started with a tiny needle.

A continuous glucose monitor, ten days of unfiltered data, and the sudden realization that I was flying blind with the most complex system I’ll ever manage: my own body.

So I ran an experiment.

Here's what everyone gets wrong about glucose levels: they think it's about sugar and carbs.

It's not. It's about understanding how your system actually works.

I wasn't trying to fix anything. I just wanted data on what was happening under the hood — the persistent inconsistency — and the monitor turned every meal, every workout, every stress response into neat little graphs on my phone.

(And yes, dessert was involved. For science. 🙂‍↕️)

On day two, I had some mochi bread for breakfast. It’s one of those carbs that I can never get enough of.

My glucose traced a ski jump — crisp ascent, graceful descent, very Olympic.

Next day, same bread. But I drank some apple cider vinegar first.

Same input, slight tweak… completely different response.

This was the part I loved: real-time feedback, subtle experiments, tiny system adjustments that changed the outcome without fanfare. All part of watching a systems dashboard in real time.

And sometimes, the system responds well to cake.

(If “well” means launching it to the moon.)

Patterns emerged fast:

• 5 hours of sleep? Glucose stayed elevated all day, even with “clean” meals

• 9am workout? My body handled lunch like a champ

• Stressful workshop? Huge spike, no food involved, just pure cortisol

My blood sugar wasn’t just reacting to food.

It responded to everything: stress, sleep quality, workouts and timings, deadlines, even conversations.

Basically, it tracked life. And life showed up.

What really surprised me: my best days weren’t the ones where I ate “perfectly”.

They were the ones where the whole system was aligned — solid sleep, early movement, lower stress, decent meals.

Just rhythm, and not a Sisyphean effort for discipline and control.

The problem is: we’re all optimizing the interface — the tools, the routines, the visible parts of the stack.

Meanwhile, the operating system is glitching in the background.

It's like having the world's most sophisticated computer, but never updating the firmware.

Your productivity stack is only as strong as your physiological foundation.

Metabolic flexibility — your body’s ability to switch between fuel sources without drama — is like a hybrid engine: efficient, unbothered, adaptable. A design built not for rigidity, but optionality.

In systems design, resilience beats perfection.

The pattern holds:

• Financial: Buffer = flexibility to take risks

• Career: Transferable skills = flexibility to pivot

• Body: Metabolic health = flexibility to perform

Your stack is only as strong as your ability to adapt — to market shifts, mood swings, or surprise cinnamon rolls.

In the Full Stack, Strength sits at the base: physical, mental, and financial capacity.

But “strength” gets flattened into motivational noise: Push harder. Be tougher. Outdiscipline everyone.

This wasn’t that.

This was about seeing the system clearly enough to design with it — not against it.

true story, bro

Here's what the data actually showed — and why it changed how I think about optimization:

• When I ate mattered as much as what I ate

• Sleep was foundational — not just for energy, but for metabolic responsiveness

• Movement sped recovery and balance

• Stress is expensive — and the body keeps the receipts

• And yes: apple cider vinegar flattened spikes. Annoyingly effective, and lives up to the fitness influence hype.

But more than any of these tactical wins, the shift was architectural.

The body isn’t just one more variable in the system — it is the system.

Health is wealth, as they say, but the truth is: resilience doesn’t come from hacks, but from system-level stability.

The monitor’s gone now, but the lens stuck.

Is this the part where I'm supposed to wrap it all up? Where I tell you I've cracked the code of human biology and now live in perfect harmony with my glucose levels?

Yeah, no. Of course not.

I still eat ice cream. I still stay up too late. My cortisol probably spiked three times today.

But I know what’s happening now, and that makes all the difference.

Visibility isn’t control — it’s leverage.

We’re designing our lives, but if you can’t see the system, you’re not designing — you’re just guessing.

Other things

• Getting back into reading for the love of non-fiction reading, and not for personal growth or learning a new skill — I’ve just finished up Destiny Disrupted, a wonderful telling of “world history as the Islamic world saw it”, and it’s just fantastic to learn more

• In a fit of nostalgia, I’ve replayed Pokemon Red; as a kid it was a game I could play only on Sundays at my grandma’s. It’s still every bit as fun, and even more so when I could advance past Lt. Surge 😂

• I’ll think of Ahaha every time I ahaha, now. I sure hope she got her assets back

Until next time,
Jalyn