Walking the Walk for Better Heart Health

I love coffee -- I drink about 11 espressos every day. I′m so in love with real coffee that I called my global??all-hands meeting Kaffeeklatsch -- a traditional German term for an informal gathering to talk and share information over a cup of coffee or tea. Coffee is my thing, and my body has been fully caffeinated for decades.?

But it can impact another part of my life: If I think about 120 over 80, I′m not talking about a recent Golden State Warriors game score. It’s my target blood pressure. In December, I realized my blood pressure had quietly crept into the 140/80 range. As a man over 50, diabetic for more than 30 years who lost both my father and grandfather to heart attacks, it was a startling wake-up call. When I talked to my doctor about what I could do to lower my blood pressure and address mild hypertension, you can imagine how I actually felt my heart sink when I realized some changes would be harder than others -- and my coffee consumption would be part of that change.?

The good thing that I learned over the last year: I′m not alone. When Cisco’s CFO Scott Herren reached out about the American Heart Association and encouraged me to chair the?2022?Bay Area Heart Walk, there was no denying it was a sign to get with a new program. It is more than just an issue for me

While the ongoing pandemic has changed some aspects of the life we used to live, it’s also encouraged us to focus on mental wellness and?reducing stress.?Clearly, this is something we must address at every level, individually, as a family, as work colleagues and as communities.?We all know that navigating health and work the past couple years has been a challenging transformation to established routines. As we spend more time sitting, certain issues like higher blood pressure become more prevalent, especially as we age.

This morning as I prepared to post this message, my blood pressure was 129/79. It’s been a dramatic change within a month that’s been achievable by making small, consistent changes. I’ve stopped eating late in the evening, I’ve cut out the sweets and I’ve started walking and exercising more. And most important, I found a solution for the biggest challenge: I’ve invested in a second coffee bean grinder, which is dedicated solely to decaffeinated coffee, which now accounts for nine of my less than 11 cups. Progress!

In sharing this personal side of my life, I hope you will feel empowered to make change too. What will drive your success? For each person it will be different, but a big key is to simply move more. Go for a walk! It’s?exciting for me to think about the possibilities of the actual in-person physical heart walk with thousands of people together! I can barely imagine the energy of a large group striving together for a great cause.?

As the 2022?Chairman of the Bay Area Heart Walk, I’m honored and excited to share my progress and be part of this wonderful event. It’s especially important to me to get as many of my colleagues and friends involved as I can. So big thanks to Scott! I plan to keep you up to date on my journey by sharing the successes as well as the obstacles. Most of the obstacles will likely involve coffee.

What’s Next?

I hope you will sign up to get involved with this year’s?Bay Area Heart Walk?and I will be sharing more about that more in the coming months.??

Be sure to follow me on?LinkedIn and share your stories too. I’d love to hear about your tips and heart health progress.