You may or may not have heard of “eating the frog.” It’s one of those things that triggers the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon once you learn about it: Suddenly, everyone seems to be saying it, which is jarring, since it’s a little graphic and evocative. Luckily, it doesn’t mean you have to eat any frogs for real; it’s just a way to refer to the productivity philosophy that says you should tackle your biggest, toughest task first thing in the morning.

What it means to “eat the frog”

“Eat the frog” means “do the day’s worst task as soon as you wake up.” It comes from a quote attributed to Mark Twain, though there are a few different versions floating around. (Lifehacker Editor-in-Chief Jordan Calhoun, for example, calls it “swallowing the frog,” which sounds more awful for reasons I can’t quite pinpoint.) Basically, what Twain is alleged to have said (though there isn’t much proof he really did) is that if you have to eat a frog, you should do it straight away in the morning so the worst part of your day is immediately behind you.

Regardless of the dubious origin of this colorful suggestion, it’s led to the creation of a popular self-help series by Brian Tracy and has evolved into shorthand for getting the hard stuff out of the way so you can focus on your other tasks.

What’s in it for you?

As Tracy explains on his blog, your “frog” is whatever your biggest, most important task is at any given moment: “It is the one you are most likely to procrastinate on if you don’t do something about it.”

You don’t even have to eat the frog as soon as you wake up; you can simply make a conscious effort to get your hardest responsibilities handled before moving on to lesser ones. But you should try to get them out of the way early in the day. When I have to have an uncomfortable phone call, I schedule it for the earliest possible time in the day. When I have a project due, I try to wake up early to take care of it instead of staying up late. I can attest to the fact that I feel great throughout the day knowing that the worst thing I had to do is already done. This always makes it seem like whatever other tasks I need to handle are a breeze. They pale in comparison to the behemoth I knocked out in the early hours.

If no particular task is filling you with dread, you can replace something unpleasant with something important or resource-heavy. To determine which of your to-dos is most pressing—and, thus, is the frog you should eat—you can use a prioritization system like the Eisenhower matrix or the 1-3-5 method. In fact, the 1-3-5 technique helps you structure your day around the completion of one major task, three medium ones, and five little ones, making it ideal for frog-eating.

If you struggle with procrastination—whether cleaning your house or doing work for school or your job—or you find that you get all the little stuff done but don’t make sufficient progress on the big stuff, try eating the frog. Schedule the most despised tasks for the morning. Try going to the gym before work instead of after, blocking out your first half hour of work to respond to neglected emails, or scrubbing down the kitchen before making your morning coffee. Study for the test in your most difficult class before studying for your easier ones. Call your parents before calling your friends. You get the idea.

It’s similar to the two-minute rule, which says you should jump on any and every task that takes fewer than two minutes the moment it occurs to you. Your frogs may take longer than two minutes, but the idea that you should simply tackle them instantly without deliberating or procrastinating is crucial. Get into the habit of just doing things.

Ideally, make your ranked to-do list the night before so you have nothing to think about when you wake up and you can get right to business. As you build this habit and mindset, at some point, moving on to the smaller activities—even if they’re important—will feel like a reward.

While logic might suggest that getting more done means operating in a constant state of productivity, the opposite can actually be true: When you hit that afternoon slump and can’t seem to push through the simplest of tasks, it’s probably because you needed a break earlier in the day—certainly science backs up that idea. Put simply, your brain needs regular periods of downtime to maintain peak operation.

After periods of intense work, taking a brief break doesn’t just improve your mood—it can actually boost your concentration and performance. So if you want to be truly productive, you should schedule those rest periods into your busy day.

The case for scheduling your “brain breaks”

It’s one thing to know you need downtime, but another to actually find time for it in your day. Through the course of a busy schedule—working, cleaning, studying, taking care of kids, driving, and doing all the other things on your to-do list—you might have the best of intentions when it comes to taking breaks, but not actually do it in the moment. That’s why you should schedule them.

In one episode of HBO’s Succession, the character Shiv Roy actually set aside a block of time on her calendar for crying. You might not need to cry, but Shiv’s got the right idea: Open the calendar on your phone and add in blocks of personal time throughout your day, however you might spend it. Maybe you like to scroll TikTok, look at recipes, work on your creative projects, close your eyes for a moment, or call a friend. Whatever you’d like to do, prioritize it seriously by building the space for it into your schedule. If you use a shared calendar at work or home, block it out so everyone can see. You don’t need to publicly state what it’s for; you’ll know. And you won’t be letting your colleagues or family down since you’ll be even more productive when it’s over.

Most importantly, stick to it. Even 15 minutes per day can be beneficial, but not if you don’t adhere to your plan. Being serious about taking time for yourself will help you build the habit and give you something to look forward to when working gets hard, so treat it like an important step in your workday.

How to time your breaks for maximum productivity

There are a few approaches you can take to ensure your downtime proves to be effective. First, you should be time blocking and time boxing. These similar but distinct techniques involve not only determining exactly how much time you’ll need for a given task, but using a calendar or planner to mark it all down. Using something like Google Calendar or even a physical planner, you’ll account for every second of your day, so the entire column is filled up with back-to-back entries—but not all of those entries will be for work. Here is your chance to slot in something enjoyable, like a 2 p.m. matcha run or an episode of SVU at 8 p.m. You’ll feel better about scheduling downtime if you’re doing it alongside the designation of work tasks, and if you can see it all concretely represented in one place.

Second, use the Pomodoro method. This famous productivity hack calls on you to work for 25 minutes, take a five-minute break, work another 25, break again, and repeat the cycle four times before taking a longer break. Building in smaller breaks this way might make the exercise more palatable if you are struggling to justify off-time. Plus, Pomodoro is more flexible than it seems at first, and a lot of variations exist. Take animedoro, for instance: you work for 40 to 60 minutes with a 20-minute break, about the length of an episode of anime. You don’t need to watch anime, of course, nor be so rigid with your timing: The important part is being conscientious about interspersing your work sessions with small breaks.

(Washington, D.C., October 22, 2025) – Today, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke L. Rollins, Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum, Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and Small Business Administrator Kelly Loeffler announced a suite of actions to strengthen the American beef industry, reinforcing and prioritizing the American rancher’s critical role in the national security of the United States. Since 2017, the United States has lost over 17% of family farms, more than 100,000 operations over the last decade.

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When you updated your iPhone to iOS 26, you were probably expecting to try out a bunch of new features. Maybe you were excited to see the new Liquid Glass design, or interested to see how the new spam prevention tech works. But if you opened Messages to send a text after updating, you might have run into a frustrating problem: All of a sudden, you aren’t able to activate iMessage with your phone number.

It’s not clear how widespread the problem is at this time, but it seems to be a big enough issue for Apple to formally address it. As spotted by MacRumors, Apple now has official troubleshooting steps for anyone experiencing iMessage activation issues specifically after updating to iOS 26.

Though we don’t know the scope of the users affected, we do know who might be affected. According to Apple, the issue might occur when updating to iOS 26 if you have an inactive SIM with the same phone number as your active SIM. If this is your issue, you may run into the following problems:

• When you try to send an iMessage, you get a “Not Delivered” notification.

• You can only send SMS or RCS messages—or, in other words, green bubble texts only.

• Your sent messages go through your email address instead of your phone number when you don’t have it set up that way.

• You see the same phone number twice under Settings > Apps > Messages > Send & Receive.

Reactivating iMessage after installing iOS 26

If this is the case, the fix is pretty simple: All you need to do is remove or delete the inactive SIM. Here’s what to do: First, head to Settings > Cellular. If you see two SIMs here with the same number, choose the one that isn’t active. If the inactive SIM is a physical SIM card, remove it from your iPhone. If it’s an eSIM, choose “Delete eSIM” to delete it.

Once you get rid of the inactive SIM, head to Settings > Apps > Messages, then choose “Send & Receive.” Here, choose your phone number, which should trigger iMessage to reactivate.

If you’re still having trouble with iMessage after following these steps, your issue might not have to do with this bug. Apple has a series of general troubleshooting steps for getting iMessage back up and running, which includes things like turning iMessage and FaceTime off and on again, activating your account online, and using your email address to sign into your account instead.

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Besides measuring heart rate and other metrics like steps, pretty much every fitness tracker and smartwatch measures heart rate variability, abbreviated as HRV. This measurement is the basis for recovery scores and stress readings, and you can usually find it as a standalone measurement in the “vitals” section of your chosen app. So let’s break down what this number actually measures, and how to interpret yours. 

HRV is heart rate variability

HRV stands for heart rate variability, but that doesn’t mean what you might think. HRV is not related to your heart rate changing throughout the day or during exercise. (Your heart beats faster when you’re exercising hard, which is what heart rate zones measure. Totally different purpose.) 

Heart rate variability refers to how rhythmically your heart beats. If the time from one beat to the next is always the same (at a given heart rate), you have low HRV. But if some heartbeats come more closely together, and some are more spaced out, you have high HRV. 

This may be surprising, but you actually want your heart rate to show some variation. High HRV is considered to be better than low HRV. Your fitness app will say you’re well recovered if your HRV was higher than usual last night, and it will say you’re stressed or not recovering well if your HRV was low. 

That said, it’s of course possible to have a heart rate that is too variable. In a sense, that’s what an arrhythmia is. When I’m talking about HRV here—and when fitness apps report your HRV—they’re considering the teeny tiny differences from beat to beat in an otherwise normal(ish) healthy(ish) person. 

These differences are measured in milliseconds, and you wouldn’t notice them if you didn’t have a watch sampling data while you sleep. If you ever notice anything wildly strange about the rhythm of your heart, ask your doctor (or seek emergency medical help, if appropriate). 

What does a high HRV mean? 

High heart rate variability (that is, high for you) tends to mean that you’re relatively relaxed and not too stressed. Fitness apps will bump up your readiness and recovery scores when your HRV measured during sleep is high. 

The variation in beats is thought to come from the push and pull of two different body systems, the sympathetic (“fight or flight”) and parasympathetic (“rest and digest”) nervous systems. It’s normal for your brain and body to be balancing these needs, so this is considered a good, normal functioning. 

What does a low HRV mean? 

Low HRV tends to occur when your body is working on something—recovering from hard exercise, fighting off a cold, experiencing lots of stress. If your HRV measured during sleep is low, you’ll get lower readiness or recovery scores. I find my HRV tanks when I’m sick or when I’ve been through a rough time either physically or mentally. (The day after a race or a weightlifting competition is always a low HRV day for me.) 

What is a “good” HRV number? 

I’ll give you some numbers in a minute, but the most important thing to know is that HRV is most useful when you compare readings to what is normal for you. Your HRV can be higher than mine, but still low for you, or vice versa. 

So please don’t go around asking whether an HRV of 50 is “good.” Is it higher than usual for you? Then it’s good. Is it lower than usual for you? Then maybe it’s indicating that your body is under stress. If your typical HRV readings range from 35 to 50 (for example), then 50 is high for you. 

It doesn’t matter whether the average person your age has a HRV of 20 or of 100; those numbers are just fun facts about the population in general. They don’t apply to you. Studies tend to show that fitter people have higher HRV, but also that HRV declines as we age. The average man’s HRV is slightly higher than the average woman’s, but the full range of what’s “normal” for each gender almost fully overlaps.

There’s one more important caveat: when you look up HRV data, you’ll find that different studies and different devices each measure HRV differently. For example, this meta-analysis found the average HRV was 42, with a range of 19 to 75, when measured as rMSSD (root mean square of successive differences). 

So—and remember this is just for fun, here are some graphs from two wearable companies that publish their data and they both use rMSSD:

• Whoop’s breakdown of HRV data from their users finds men have an average of 40 and women 37. They have graphs breaking down how this changes with age, and showing the variation for each group. 

• Oura’s breakdown of HRV from their users finds an average of 41 across all users, and they also graph it by age and gender. 

As I’ve found when comparing multiple devices on HRV, devices don’t always report the same HRV numbers, but usually you can follow similar trends on all of them. If you’re sick, they’ll all report low HRV. If you have a good day, they’ll all report high HRV. So pay more attention to the trend than the specifics.

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Two of the biggest names in fitness tracking are beefing: Fitness app Strava has filed a lawsuit against Garmin, demanding that the device manufacturer cease selling effectively all of its fitness watches and cycling computers. The suit claims patent infringement on two core features—segments and heatmaps—and alleges that Garmin violated a decade-old cooperation agreement between the two companies.

But according to Strava’s Chief Product Officer Matt Salazar, the lawsuit is a response to a much more immediate threat: Garmin’s plan to cut off API access unless Strava plasters the Garmin logo across virtually every part of its platform.

What is Strava’s lawsuit about?

At first glance, Strava’s lawsuit centers on two main patent claims. The first involves heatmaps and popularity routing, covered by patents filed in December 2014 and issued in 2016. These patents describe technology for generating maps that show where users work out based on aggregated GPS data from multiple users. This first claim is pretty clear-cut, but before diving into that, know that the second patent focuses on a different signature feature: segments. This patent, filed in March 2011 and granted in August 2015, covers the concept of user-defined route segments where athletes can compete for best times using GPS data.

Backing up a little, it’s worth noting here is how Strava and Garmin’s relationship has been close for over a decade. As trusted fitness tech blogger DC Rainmaker explains, Garmin introduced its own segments feature back in June 2014, before partnering with Strava to implement “Strava Live Segments” on Garmin devices in July 2015 through a Master Cooperation Agreement. Strava now claims that Garmin expanded beyond the scope of that agreement by continuing to develop and deploy its own Garmin-branded segments alongside Strava’s features. Notably, this alleged infringement has been ongoing for approximately 10 years.

For more context, the timing of this suit comes on the heels of recent friction between the companies. In 2024, Strava implemented controversial API changes that disrupted many third-party fitness apps. Around the same time, Garmin began requiring API partners to provide attribution for data sourced from Garmin Connect—a policy Strava reportedly resisted.

Additionally, Garmin launched its Trails+ feature in May 2025 as part of a paid Garmin Connect+ subscription, which Strava may view as encroachment on its subscription-based revenue model. According to DC Rainmaker’s sources, Strava formally notified Garmin of the patent concerns in late June 2025, with a follow-up in July. So, how did we get to today’s suit?

What sparked the lawsuit now?

In a Reddit post addressing the Strava community this afternoon, Salazar revealed that on July 1, Garmin announced new developer guidelines requiring its logo to appear “on every single activity post, screen, graph, image, sharing card etc.” for all API partners, including Strava. The deadline for compliance: November 1. The consequence for refusal: Garmin would cut off API access, preventing all Garmin activities from uploading to Strava.

“We consider this blatant advertising,” Salazar wrote. “These new guidelines actively degrade your user experience on Strava (and the other 150M+ athletes). We already provide attribution for every data partner, but Garmin wants to use Strava and every other partner as an advertising platform—they told us they care more about their marketing than your user experience.”

Salazar emphasized that Strava views this as fundamentally about user data ownership: “If you recorded an activity on your watch, we think that is your data. We believe you should be able to freely transfer or upload that data without requiring logos to be displayed alongside it or have that data be used as an advertisement to sell more watches.”

According to Salazar, Strava spent five months trying to negotiate with Garmin, proposing alternative attribution methods that would be less intrusive, but Garmin refused to compromise. Unable to justify complying with what they view as mandatory advertising requirements, Strava filed the lawsuit.

What this means for you

The good news for athletes: Your devices and data should be fine, at least for now. When asked about user impact, Strava stated that “our lawsuit is between two companies; we do not intend to take any actions that would disrupt the ability of Garmin users to sync their data with Strava.”

Plus, the legal process will likely take months or years to resolve. And Strava faces an uphill battle. Perhaps most damaging to Strava’s case is the timeline issue, particularly regarding heatmaps. According to DC Rainmaker’s research, Garmin actually introduced heatmaps in Garmin Connect in early 2013—more than a year and a half before Strava filed its patent application in December 2014. Multiple other platforms, including third-party developers using Strava’s own API data, had also created heatmap functionality during this period.

“The fact that they got a patent for it is a testament to how messy software patents have been over the years,” DC Rainmaker observes. He suggests that Garmin’s lawyers will “easily argue this patent shouldn’t have been granted and get it invalidated,” drawing parallels to a similar case where Wahoo sued Zwift and quickly dropped the suit after a judge questioned the validity of their patents.

The bottom line

A lot of athletes are feeling like children of divorce right now. Here’s how mom and dad see it:

Garmin’s position, as outlined in their July 2025 API Brand Guidelines, is that data attribution is standard practice across the industry—similar to what Google Maps and other platforms require. The guidelines give developers until the end of 2025 to comply, with Garmin noting flexibility on timelines. From Garmin’s perspective, they’re simply asking for the same attribution treatment that Strava demands from its own API partners.

Strava’s position, articulated by Salazar this afternoon, is that Garmin’s requirements go far beyond reasonable attribution and constitute forced advertising that degrades user experience. Strava points out that Garmin doesn’t provide attribution for third-party devices like heart rate monitors or power meters on its own Garmin Connect app, suggesting a double standard.

For now, users of both platforms can continue using their devices and syncing data as usual. But the lawsuit highlights growing tensions in the fitness tech ecosystem as companies increasingly compete not just for users, but for control over all the data and features that athletes have come to rely on.