you can exercise all you want eat all

the right Foods sleep eight hours a

night if you are not breathing right you

will always be sick

James Nester International bestseller on

breathing as a species we've largely

lost the ability to breathe correctly

James travels the whole world trying to

figure out what went wrong and how to

fix it 99 of people are breathing

dysfunctionally they don't realize the

damage they're doing to their bodies and

brains by being this way look at the way

we sit all day long the way we sleep the

way we eat the modern world is

conspiring to make us sick diabetes

asthma metabolic and autoimmune issues

anxiety even ADHD experts said it is 100

related to your breathing at night

especially really bad breathing habits

are a recipe for disaster which is what

has happened for so many kids today so

if you're a parent and if you can hear

them breathing when they're sleeping

this is a big red flag but I believe

that everybody can become a good breeder

and these steps are free you can do this

while we're seated here so the first

thing is to

carbon dioxide is seen as this poison

why levels over 800 into a thousand can

have serious issues with cognitive and

physical functions I've been recording

our CO2 during this interview it's going

up and if we were to continue working in

here for the next few hours you will

Jesus

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[Music]

James

[Music]

of all the things you could have

committed your life to you could have

committed a decade of work and effort to

you decided to commit it to the subject

matter of breath and breathing

why it was a number of things that

happened and personally professionally

over a number of years I never set out

to write a book about breathing I mean

what a boring subject right until I

started having breathing problems I came

back year after year I was i surf a lot

in San Francisco so I was getting

bronchitis I was getting pneumonia mild

pneumonia it was nothing to worry about

I'd go to my doctor I'd be given a pack

of pills and sent on my way this kept

happening year after year until a doctor

friend of mine

was looking at me we were out having a

drink and she's like I think there's

something going on with your breathing

so breathing you know this is just

something we do automatically it's

nothing I considered she's like oh you

might want to go to a breath work class

and I went to a breath work class and it

completely blew me away on on a number

of levels I was able to get over the

respiratory problems I had I don't write

about this in the book because I didn't

want to make my experience be indicative

of everyone else's experience but all

the issues I had completely went away

100 percent

and so I started looking into this more

just personally what else I could learn

about breathing and how it could benefit

me for athletic performance for sleep

and more and noticed that my health was

changing in all the right ways over and

over again when I was adopting different

habits so that was more than 10 years

ago actually that was probably 12 years

ago and then I started writing about

freedivers started freediving myself and

learning the limits of breathing and how

you can do things that are supposed to

be scientifically Impossible by

harnessing the power of your breath and

that's what really got me interested as

a science journalist so your symptoms

the symptoms you had of what were those

symptoms at the time

I was mouth breathing a lot when I was

working out I was always mouth breathing

when I was jogging I was mild to

breathing doing karate mouth about

breathing surfing and I noticed at night

I could not remember a time when I did

not go to sleep with a huge glass of

water by my bedside I would wake up

numerous times throughout the night my

mouth was very dry

very pasty in the morning I thought this

was completely normal I also noticed

that when I was working out at really

high levels I would start to wheeze a

bit like I could hear myself breathing

and I thought this was normal whenever I

talked to people about it they said oh

welcome to old age this is what happens

when you get older and I didn't think

that that was a good reason to be

breathing so dysfunctionally but it

really took someone else to point it out

for me to understand that maybe there

was a problem there maybe I should fix

it and your friend who was a doctor then

suggested this breath work class you go

to this breathwork class and is it the

one session itself that helped you or

was it the practices you took away from

that session that helped you that one

session completely blew my mind so it

had all of the Hallmarks of flakiness

and new aginess you know all the people

flowing flowing clothes uh there were

some headbands I said good God what am I

doing here there's a lot of this stuff

in San Francisco so I'm kind of used to

it dream catchers all that

and it wasn't until I sat down and

started actually got rid of all of that

all those problems in my brain that were

making me resist really giving myself to

this practice

got rid of that started breathing and I

I read about this at the beginning of

the book but I completely sweated

through my t-shirt was not a warm room

it's quite cold in there sweat through

my t-shirt there's sweat marks on my

jeans my hair was sobbing wet and this

was from sitting in a corner of a cold

room just breathing at this certain

pattern so it obviously released

something in me and when I mentioned

this to doctors I went back they said oh

you had a fever or oh you know the room

was too hot oh you were covered in

blankets all of that was false there was

something else deeper happening and they

didn't understand it from their medical

training so I tried to get answers

elsewhere and that's what I spent years

doing

you spent years doing I mean your your

book on the subject matter comes out

almost a decade later

um

so in hindsight now you have those

answers on why you sweated through your

clothes and why you had that

physiological reaction what is the

answer

I do not have opinions as a science

journalist and I am a filter so uh my

job is to talk to absolutely everybody

and especially when people doctors tell

me oh don't talk to those people they

don't know what they're talking about

those are the first people I'm going to

talk to so I talk to everybody and try

to synthesize what I've learned the

truth according to all of these

different cultures all of these

different ways of learning and put that

in a book that the general public can

understand so I have my own personal

views on it but I try to keep my

personal views out of what I write

and then the sort of next significant I

guess Catalyst event that was an

Inspiration Point for your work was in

2011 as you say you went and covered the

freediving championship in Greece what

did that experience add to the

inspiration Cloud that would then form

the book what did you learn about the

nature of breath from that yeah it's so

funny uh you know as you go through life

there are some experiences that you have

that you have no idea that you are

opening a completely different door and

you're just gonna be walking through

that door for the next decade so that's

what happened in Greece didn't really

know anything about it go out there and

just have my mind blown I mean you have

these people who are at the surface of

the water take a single breath of air

one breath

and dive down 120 meters on a single

breath of air

and come back up five minutes later

and go

and then get out of the way for the next

competitor so you watch them the water

is very clear there right it goes down

visibility is 150 meters you watch them

just

disappear into nothing the size of an

ant and then completely disappear into

the ocean and come back and I said my

God

there's so much we don't know about

breathing and also about the limits of

the human body

I want to learn more about this I want

to experience this as well not diving

down that deep but I want to access more

of what I've been given because I think

we've been sold pretty short on what our

limits are and what we should be doing

and shouldn't be doing but I think our

bodies are much more potential than that

when I was when I was reading through

your book you describe breath as a

pillar of Health

which is a pretty big statement to make

is when we think of pillars of Health we

might think of you know exercise or

um diet but breath hasn't been

considered a pillar of Health I think to

be honest for the first 27 for the first

29 years of my 30 year old life I purely

viewed breath as this thing that just

happens unconsciously that is

inconsequential and it's only in recent

times because your work has influenced

some people very close to me that I

started to second guess that

where do we stand as a society at the

moment when we're talking about the

majority of people in terms of our view

of what breathing is and the role it

plays and then I also want to understand

um why that's wrong because as I said I

thought of breathing as just this thing

that happens and it was it was quite um

unnerving to understand that that view

has potentially been impacted me in

profound ways without me knowing it like

you said I've been pointing at the wrong

thing I've been thinking I need some

pills or I just can't sleep or I've got

in I'm you know

someone might think they're an insomniac

or whatever

but you make the case quite profoundly

that breathing is much more than an

unconscious act that we just

do without thinking about well breathing

is something that just happens and how

wonderful that is that we've evolved to

not have to think about every breath we

take right that would be a real problem

but that doesn't mean we can't take

conscious control of our breathing and

then elicit different effects from our

body so we have adopted habits according

to our breathing from our environment

from the way we sleep from our mouth

structure and more that are not the best

habits to have for breath so the reason

why people spend so much time doing

breath work and rehearsing slower

breathing lower breathing breathing

through the nose is to reset a natural

habit so that you don't have to think

about it I mean I don't want to have to

constantly be checking in on my breath

throughout the day I want that to be

automatic but that takes a lot of time

to get back to that healthy state to

make it unconscious where do we get

these bad habits from and because I

think you know surely my body I'm the

product of you know several I don't know

thousands gazillion years of evolution

surely my body is doing it correctly by

default what is what has changed that is

causing me to do it incorrectly your

body is not doing this correctly by

default what has changed is this modern

environment is conspiring to make us

sick and I don't think that that is an

exaggeration at all if you look at the

way we sit all day long if you look at

the way we work if you look at the way

we eat if you look at the way we sleep

of all the pollution noise pollution air

pollution we're surrounded by this is

why we are so sick it is the environment

the human body is so well equipped to

live a healthy life which is why

indigenous cultures the few left they

don't need to go to a Cardiologist or a

pulmonologist or a dentist they have

straight teeth they breathe perfectly

they don't have all of these problems

that we have today so these are diseases

of civilization the vast majority of

problems we contend with we have created

in the last few 100 years and one of the

problems with breathing is that our

facial structure does not allow us to

breathe in a healthy way anymore and it

did hundreds of years ago and we know

that from the skeletal record

what are some of the um the most common

Modern Problems then that the

environment we live in

um have caused and here I'm talking

about diseases what are the everyday

diseases that you've discovered are

byproducts of

misunderstanding and our bad breathing

habits

show me a list of the top diseases and

they're all related to it even diabetes

who would have thought that the onset of

diabetes could be triggered by poor

breathing habits at night but that is

exactly what researchers have found

because if you are choking on yourself

all night as so many people do

oh

you aren't resting you aren't entering

stages of Deep Sleep which means your

body never restores and your body is

going to break down so researchers have

have known this for 50 years their

scientific studies

showing this over and over again so

that's just with with diabetes and

metabolic issues autoimmune issues for

the same reason you're constantly

breathing like this stooped over

you're causing undue inflammation to

your body you're causing nervous system

dysfunction you're in that sympathetic

state which after a while will trigger a

bunch of autoimmune issues so so many of

these things not exclusively are related

to breath they are exclusively related

to diet exercise sleep and breath you

can eat all the right foods you can

sleep eight hours a night you can

exercise all you want if you are not

breathing right you will always be sick

and I've heard that six years ago by a

researcher and believe it more now than

I ever have

at the very start of your book you

you test these things on yourself

you did an experiment

which I found really really interesting

I think that experiment has actually

stayed with me for a long time and then

it's impacted me in the gym a lot every

time I'm on that tread bloody treadmill

I'm thinking about what I read but um

why did you want to do that experiment

on yourself and what was the experiment

I didn't want to do this experiment on

myself I really did not want to do it no

one else was going to do it really there

had never been a human trial of nasal

breathing versus versus mouth breathing

for this amount of time and I was

talking to jayak or Nayak who's the

chief of rhinology research at Stanford

the top top of his field and I said we

know what happens to animals when they

breed this way we know all the

deleterious effects of mouth breathing

on kids on adults on old people on sleep

on athletic performance why can't you

test this let's get a big group of

people and test this he said it'll never

happen we're not going to find funding

and he thought ethically there would be

problems doing it because he knew what

damage could be caused by becoming a

mouth breather and so after all this I

just kind of gave up and then I had an

idea I said well what if I did it and

what if I got one other person we will

sign up we'll sign whatever waivers and

we did it doesn't you know it's just two

people but that was the maximum we were

allotted and he said okay but he had no

money for it so we had to pay for this

experiment at Stanford which was not the

cheapest thing I've ever paid for in my

life

um but I wanted to know I I'm writing

about mouth breathing writing about all

the problems I'm writing about my

subjective experience of how it

transformed my life becoming a nasal

breather I wanted to see that experience

dictated and documented in data by

machines and that's why we did it

and how did it go terribly it was awful

um so just to let let people know uh

this was an experiment in which for 10

days we had our noses plugged up right

and then for another 10 days we had all

of that stuff released from our noses

and we were almost exclusively nasal

breathing everything else in those

10-day periods was exactly the same we

ate the same Foods we walked the same

number of steps we exercised the same so

exactly the same and we did scientific

studies and took a bunch of data before

during and after we were collecting data

three times a day as well looking at

what was happening to our bodies Our

sleep our inflammation and more and we

knew this wasn't going to be pleasant

but I didn't know it was going to be

this bad like it was really not trying

to be over dramatic but it was awful

awful and uh I'm so happy I never have

to do that again at the same time I feel

so sorry for people who do not realize

that their noses are stuffed up who have

been living this way for years and don't

understand that this is their main

source of their issues with migraines

sleep problems and more I can I could I

could see it in you and you described it

as being awful that you're almost

teleporting yourself back to that to

that chapter I could see it in your face

a little little PTSD from that still uh

it was bad

um when you say bad what you mean

specifically is in it was the the first

few days so I did this with uh breathing

researcher and breathing therapist

Anders Olson from Sweden he was the only

person that would do this and he flew

from Sweden on his own dime to try to

understand this he had been talking

about nasal breathing for 10 years right

and so he said okay I want to put this

to the test I want to see if I'm right

or wrong so the first few days were kind

of laughing it was like how bad did you

sleep you know we're comparing we went

from zero snoring to full-on snoring and

sleep apnea within a couple of days and

so we were comparing kind of showing off

how sick we were

but then after about a week we saw three

days ago like I wasn't able to sleep at

night and I was dreading every single

night going to sleep because you're my

mouth was so dry and my sleep was so bad

I was so tired after sleeping nine ten

hours a night I was so tired and and the

data proved that as well so it got

really bad by the 10th day we were in

really bad shape and and again I want to

mention like

so many people especially during allergy

season are plugged up for months at a

time and they don't realize the damage

they're doing to their bodies and brains

by being this way

how many people

are breathing incorrectly

in your view how many people if they if

they went and did

a practice or they had the understanding

that's in your book and that you speak

about do you believe would have better

overall health and well-being

if they made a change to their breathing

by taking simple steps

I believe that everybody can become a

better what is considered a good

breather and these steps are free and

they're available for everybody if you

look at the percentage of the population

who is breathing dysfunctionally I've

heard different percentages from

different people respiratory therapists

who do this all day long to Elite

trainers of Olympians they say 95 to 99

of the people that they see are

breathing dysfunctionally

so it's basically everybody some people

obviously there's a curve to that

there's an asthmatic with panic attacks

that is breathing very dysfunctionally

and then there's an athlete who can push

through the pain and win that

competition but is still breathing

dysfunctionally

so there's a there's an arc to that

we will sit somewhere on that spectrum

and we all do yeah and I'm not a perfect

breather you're not a perfect breather

like it's hard to find a perfect perfect

breather just like it's hard to find

someone that eats perfectly every single

meal that's probably not the person you

ever want to hang out with anyway

you referred to tribes there and um

people that are not living in our

environment and also you know you talk a

lot about breathing as a lost art I'm so

fascinated by I think I spent the last

couple of years really fascinated by how

our ancestors lived their lives and how

they did things you know I was talking

to Dr Daniel Lieberman about running and

feet and muscle strength and all those

things and spoken to so many other

people about processed food and you know

all of these modern sort of misalignment

diseases where we're not living in

alignment with ourselves have have

become a really important part of my

understanding of how I should be living

now breathing has a lost start

what did you learn when you looked back

through history about how people breathe

and

um what did that tell you about how

we're doing it wrong I learned that we

didn't need breath work classes hundreds

of years ago we already had

bodies that were able to breathe in

properly we were living in an

environment that supported healthy

breathing I love lieberman's work by the

way I've learned so much from them

including a lot of this stuff on skells

and and breathing

so I learned a lot a lot from him so you

know people say well how do you know

that we can't go back in time what you

can do is look at indigenous cultures

which is what Lieberman and so many

other people have done and they found

they don't have problems with their feet

they don't have problems with their

backs they don't have heart disease they

don't have asthma why is it that

Mennonites this is these are these

groups in the U.S that live this very

traditional lifestyle right so some

people say that asthma is is genetic so

Mennonites and Quakers who aren't around

any technology right

they have 0.5 percent of their

population has asthma meanwhile in the

U.S 10 of the population has asthma so

obviously the environment has so much to

do with our health and it absolutely

affects our breathing for all the things

I mentioned earlier how are you sitting

how are your stress levels how are you

sleeping how are you working out all of

these things will weigh upon how healthy

you are able to breathe and so the in

the context of the modern world so if we

didn't need breath work you know a

couple hundred years ago the

introduction of things like pollution I

understand but all their everyday things

like the chair I'm sat in right now and

the way that I work every day that have

impacted breathing and then the

modalities like asthma and these other

things absolutely yeah and we could go

through a few of these things so

when you're sitting as I said eight

hours a day I try to stand at the

standing desk as well you are inhibiting

your ability to breathe properly so I'm

sitting forward in this chair right now

even if I wanted to take a deep breath

it's really hard I have to struggle to

do that

because my diaphragm which is right

underneath the lungs is unable to

descend properly to allow for that

proper inhale give me an example of what

the diaphragm is sure the diaphragm is

this umbrella shaped muscle that sits

underneath the lungs the lungs are just

like two balloons they don't inflate

themselves they need the diaphragm to

come down it creates a vacuum and air

comes into the lungs when we exhale that

diaphragm pushes up and pushes the air

out of the lungs so that's how we

breathe it's not the lungs doing the

work the lungs are just these fleshy

bags right it's that diaphragm

descending creating a vacuum air comes

in and that diaphragm ascending lifting

back up and pushing that air out so you

need proper diaphragmatic movement in

order to breathe properly when our

bodies aren't allowing us to do that

when you're sitting on a bus or sitting

on a plane for 12 hours at a time and

you're seated like this

you aren't able to breathe properly that

means you're only breathing into your

chest you weren't accessing all of this

other area if you're just breathing into

your chest you have to breathe way more

breaths the reason is so much of that

area you're bringing that air into does

not participate in gas exchange it does

not soak up that oxygen that's in the

air so most of us spend most of our days

like this

slumped over in the chair like yeah

and breathing like that we can live this

way doesn't mean we're healthy we can

live on three pieces of pizza every day

right we have enough calories to do that

doesn't mean we're healthy so that's

that's the number one thing you can sit

in a chair properly

to breathe right but it takes some

effort if you look at indigenous

cultures again look at how they're

sitting look at their spines like it's a

beautiful thing they're sitting in a way

that is conducive to proper breathing

any statue any ancient statue look at

the posture the posture is for people

that can't see this right the poster is

straight up or it is it is it is it is

straight up but relaxed at the same time

it is having a straight spine I now once

you learn this it just it makes you

neurotic after a while but that's the

first thing is to really notice how

you're sitting when we get stressed out

when we're answering emails we're over a

laptop I spend so much of my life doing

this then we also have a stress response

which further reduces our ability to

breathe properly we start to breathe too

much we start holding our breath and we

breathe too much our posture is like

this so everything is conspiring to make

us really poor breathers and this isn't

some far-flung hypothesis I have it's

it's basic biomechanics of how the body

works

the diaphragm part's really interesting

to me because the

you refer to and many people refer to

the diaphragm as the second heart

because it kind of it's a muscle that is

uh autonomous to some degree like the

heart I don't control my heart I can

control my diaphragm but when I don't

think about it it kind of controls

itself is that accurate yeah absolutely

it's it's an autonomic function but by

taking conscious control of that

diaphragm you can't control your heart

you can control your blood flow and that

the diaphragm also does an incredible

amount of work pumping blood into the

heart and pumping lymph fluid throughout

the body so when you see people only

using five ten percent of their

diaphragmatic movement which is

considered normal now just moving the

diaphragm this much they their hearts

have to work so much harder to just pump

blood and their bodies have to work so

much harder to pump lymph fluid which

you need to get rid of all that waste

right the body likes movement the fluids

need to be moving so just by taking a

slightly deeper breath and exhaling a

little more you were able to help your

heart rate out and which is why your

heart rate will start to go down after a

while you're able to help your blood

pressure in some cases you're able to

pump lymph fluid in more just by taking

a slower deeper breath and you know just

look to the Animal Kingdom for your

guidance on this we don't need any fancy

animation to show us what proper

breathing is look at a healthy dog

sleeping look at a healthy infant

sleeping and breathing look at

indigenous cultures how they sleep how

they breathe you can't tell they're

breathing

and that's what healthy breathing is it

should not be perceptible so when a lot

of people hear about healthy breathing

they want to overdo it right they want

oh yeah I feel great

if you look at a monk or someone who's a

master breather you cannot tell their

breathing it's so soft and so subtle

that it just comes in and comes out that

is someone who is balanced their nervous

system is balanced their breathing is

balanced

are these habits we can learn you talk

there about posture and about the

diaphragmatic

um movement and at what percentage of

the diaphragm we're we're kind of using

and how much that's filling our lungs

are these habits we can learn absolutely

because even posture feels like it's

like it's quite hard to sit like that if

you start paying attention to your

breathing your posture is going to get

better it is hard to be leaning over

like this and take take a huge breath

look what happens to your posture so

form dictates your breathing your

breathing dictates your form that was

written in the Dow like 1200 years ago

so once you learn how this proper slow

deep breathing Works your posture by

virtue of that will get better would you

recommend because a lot of people do

work in offices I'm one of them I spend

a lot of my days sat down 10 hours

looking down at a screen what would you

recommend for for us well I think the

science is pretty clear on standing

desks uh convertible standing desks are

really helpful to sit for part of that

time to stand for part of that time

whenever I'm on the phone which is often

I'm standing so I just press a little

button and I go back to standing when

you're standing you're opening up your

chest these intercostals you're opening

up to allow yourself to naturally

breathe deeper breaths so you can do

that sitting but you just look kind of

corny like sitting like this all the

time so I think that that's a good hack

I think that the science is very clear

that every couple hours I'm not very

good at this I'm trying to get better go

for a walk for 10 minutes take your call

while you're walking around to reset

things but that's just one of many

different components looking at the

posture and its relationship to healthy

breathing

the um when I was reading through your

work and I was thinking about having

this conversation with you this is

really

I guess slightly obvious but I also can

understand how it's a stupid question

um which is if nose breathing is so

beneficial for our health and well-being

then why do we have the capability of

breathing through our mouths

do you see what I'm saying great

question how wonderful that we have a

backup system in case anything happens

to our noses that we don't suddenly die

right so you can drink through your nose

right it's really hard to do that but

you can and it goes down to your stomach

but that doesn't mean it's the right

thing to do just like with breathing

again look at the Animal Kingdom look at

a cheetah running at 100 kilometers per

hour how is it breathing

and then out through its nose the only

time that a horse starts breathing

through its mouth is when it's sick so

that is a sign that it's sick a horse

running at a Sprint is breathing through

its nose this is what we this is the

organ we are designed to breathe through

and no one who has studied rhinology

would argue otherwise there are 30

different functions that the nose does

for breathing so not only does it help

filter air out and heat air but it helps

capture moisture about 40 percent more

moisture so you don't have to constantly

be drinking water when I see people

jogging and they're breathing through

their mouth and they're carrying like

four different water bottles they

wouldn't need those water bottles if

they just learned to breathe through

their noses because the body is designed

to capture that moisture that's what the

nose does and all those hairs do and

then there's nitric oxide which is this

miraculous molecule that plays in a

central role in vasodilation circulation

and more and it kills viruses and

bacteria this all happens in the nose

this does not happen in the mouth

nitrous oxide is is only happens in the

nose nitric oxide yeah we get six six

times more nitric oxide just breathing

through the nose six times more wow and

if you because of all of these different

tissues they they release nitric oxide

and there is some science showing that

this boost of nitric oxide can

significantly help us defend more from

viruses and bacteria including colds so

breathing in and out through the nose

there's a lot of work in nitric oxide

and covid Rehabilitation who knew we can

produce so much of it in our noses and

if you hum you can increase that to 15

fold

so humming you're gonna annoy everyone

if you do this increases that nitric

oxide 15 fold and there was one study

that showed this guy completely got rid

of his rhinitis just by humming for

about 10 minutes four times a day

so these are simple tricks you can do

they're free available for everyone the

humming also helps to calm the body down

because we have the vagal nerve right

vagus nerve Bagel tone is right along

here so when you hum

you're sending signals to the vagus

nerve and you're calming your body down

what what is humming doing humming is

stimulating more nitric oxide and

allowing it to break free from all of

those tissues so you hum in your nose

yeah and you can feel the vibration

there so somebody sent me this device

like three months ago that they now have

a device for people who don't want to

hum that goes on your nose and hums for

you if that's going to help you hum you

can do that but I've found it's just

kind of easier to pick a song you like

and hum that when you talk about the

common colds and you know flu and

infection did you see a clear

correlation between people that had good

breathing habits and the common cold and

bad breathing habits and there have

never been like a huge study done done

on that on humming and nasal breathing

and the common and there never will be

right no one's No One's Gonna fund that

I can say anecdotally absolutely and if

you look at the biochemistry if you look

at the physiology if you look at all the

functions of the nose you can deduce

it seems very clear to me that you will

be susceptible less to certain viruses

certain bacteria by breathing in and out

of of your nose

you mentioned covid there your book came

out right as covid hit which is

unbelievable timing yeah yeah

some people thought I'd plan that

somehow it was interesting um the first

week the book came out somebody

criticized it for taking advantage of

this pandemic without bothering to

notice the book was printed and in

warehouses six months before anyone had

ever heard the word covid you know and I

worked on this book for years and years

and years so yeah lockdown in the U.S

was in March this book came out in June

right on the heels of it which was

absolutely

bizarre to me and all of the research

looking into breathing patterns looking

into nasal breathing how that can help

rehabilitate people with long covid and

with acute cases of covid is very solid

and I still don't see anybody talking

about this

one of the most important things that

we're not talking about as it relates to

things like covid from from your

research and your book I think the most

important well it depends on on Whose

stock people in breath work communities

have been talking yogis have been

talking about Buddhists have been

talking about it so I think in Western

medicine

you come in and your doctor assesses

your health listens to your heart maybe

looks at your cholesterol they're not

looking at your breathing and this is

especially important for kids I cannot

tell you how many hundred thousands by

now of parents have written me their

kids are on all these different pills

none of them are doing anything they

have ADHD they're flunking out of school

and I am astounded that more

pediatricians and more doctors aren't

looking into this because so many

millions of kids are suffering because

of their breathing is is so terrible

it's been so terrible for so long that

their their bodies are now rebelling

against them and why are kids breathing

in such a way because you think you

think of a kid you think they I think we

form these bad habits when we're adults

or later on in life but to thought the

thought that a kid

has developed such a bad habit somewhere

it's quite hard to take see all roads go

back to those skulls right and that

anthropology and those ancient cultures

right so these kids are not able to

breathe well because their facial

development is is so retro nathic which

means it has grown so far backwards that

their airways aren't able to open up

enough so whenever they put their heads

on a pillow

that's what it sounds like so it is a

problem with facial development that we

did not have hundreds of years ago and

you can see this I spent years looking

at ancient skeletons and they did not

have these problems so right out of the

gate were messed up right arts or facial

function is messed up and it's making it

harder for us to breathe add on top of

that pollution

bad sitting habits bad breathing habits

and you have a recipe for disaster which

is what has happened for so many kids

today so I have to ask why that facial

um issue started and how that is being

passed on because in my mind Evolution

or de-evolution or whatever the word

would be in this case stopped I thought

we stopped changing and evolving because

we are no longer being selected out of

the gene pool

there is no stopping Evolution Evolution

means change throughout time

it does not mean progress

so when people use the word Evolution to

mean we're evolving uh better and we

have these better capabilities that's

not what the word actually means is

change throughout time and we can change

For Better or For Worse

and for the past few hundred years we

have been changing for the worst this is

not my opinion this is a scientific fact

so it comes back to that question why

why would an animal change for the worse

and it goes back to my answer the

environment we can trace the exact point

that our facial structure started

growing in this deform way to make us

less susceptible to healthy breathing to

that changed in such a way to make us

such poor breathers and that point is

right when industrialized food came into

different cultures so that happened at

different times came in first to England

and France then it spread to Germany

then is spread to you know Scandinavia

then it spread through the rest of the

world you can see in a single generation

of eating industrialized Foods things

that were canned things that were

bottled things that were baked things

with sugar in it single generation 50 of

the population will have crooked teeth

that didn't have it before crooked teeth

are indicative of having a mouth that's

too small for your face your mouth grows

too small teeth have no or to grow in so

they grow in crooked what else is a

problem with having a mouth that's too

small for your face you have an airway

that's too small you aren't able to

breathe properly so we can see that

exact point and researchers have done

this for decades and decades and I've

seen these skulls before after

industrialization and the same story

plays out no matter where you are on the

planet so that is what is what has

ruined our faces and that's why we look

so different than we did 300 years ago

two thousand years ago 20 000 years ago

why did our mouths get smaller at that

point because of industrialized food

elicits very little chewing you don't

need to chew very much when you're

eating soft foods so every if you think

about it our ancestors chewed for like

three four hours a day

chewy raw meat bones or Roots uh yeah

think about the foods you ate today well

maybe not you because you're probably

eating

healthy food but the food that most

people are eating everything's soft

takes a few bites is gone there's no

rigorous chewing and if you don't get

that early on in life your skellicature

does not develop properly and your

musculature does not develop properly

and you grow a different kind of face

that makes you much more susceptible to

poor breathing habits does that then

mean that one way we can avoid these

breathing Related Disorders later in

life would be to have our children

eating more difficult Foods when they're

younger

absolutely and if you look at the

reasons why our ancestors all had these

pronathic really strong faces these huge

Airways it's because they were breastfed

for a minimum of two years and after

that they weren't weaned onto applesauce

or baby food they ate Adult food right

there was no such thing as Gerbers back

then a few hundred years ago they went

from being breastfed to eating Adult

food which requires a lot of chewing

that's the main driver behind how our

faces have developed and devolved in the

past

300 years

the point there about being breastfed

for two years why is that consequential

this is where I get into a lot of

trouble here so I want to be very don't

worry I'm gonna do I get in trouble as

well you might trust me

so I want to be extremely clear here I

am a journalist and I go out and talk to

experts in the field these are not my

opinions what I'm telling you what I

have been told by dozens and dozens of

experts and I'm not shaming anyone for

feeding their children any way they want

that's none of my business okay what I

have learned from several experts is the

stress and chewing required for

breastfeeding will help pull the face

out and develop a larger Airway

again I want to be very clear I'm not

shaming modern mothers you're under an

incredible amount of stress

bottle feeding perfectly fine you want

to do that I think it's great but

that stress and and you think about it

like for two years if you're constantly

pulling that face out the face is going

to develop differently right so that

makes sense to me but even if a kid is

is bottle fed which is great if you want

to bottle feed a kid

as long as they're eating healthy food

that they actually chew after that I

believe my personal opinion is you can

develop all of that proper facial

structure and you can also use some

different orthodontic devices to help

push that along and you will be

perfectly fine what is the difference

between the bottle and the nipple like

in terms of what it does to my yeah see

when I when I mentioned we're both going

to get in trouble here uh this is what I

was talking about I will not visually

demonstrate

look it up on YouTube anybody but there

is it's much easier to feed from a

bottle it requires less less stress to

feed from a bottle when you are

breastfeeding it is much more activating

for the infant to have to glom onto the

breast and the nipple goes actually deep

into their mouth almost down their

throat and it requires more chewing

stress we know this okay which is why a

lot of kids when they're given the

choice between the two they want the

bottle because the bottle is easier they

want more food more quickly and and

again I want to be clear just because

you were bottle fed or whatever early on

does not mean you're doomed it's some of

this sounds depressing but I considered

it inspiring and empowering to know the

science behind this so you can fix what

the core issue is and I'm convinced that

kids who are bottle fat can be wonderful

perfect breathers by adopting other

habits beyond that

you mentioned hyperactivity as being

correlatory to breathing

so if you're a parent and you have kids

who are having health issues even if

they don't have health issues look at

how they're breathing at night this is

so important look at how they're

breathing in the day if they're

breathing the vast majority of their

breasts through their mouth you have to

fix that number one they will be much

more susceptible to asthma allergies and

other issues later on in life especially

at night if they are breathing through

an open mouth and if you can hear them

breathing when they're sleeping

this is a big red flag that you better

look into immediately because there will

be so many Downstream issues caused by

that breathing pattern like this is

increased risk of diabetes increased

risk of autoimmune issues increased risk

of asthma ADHD and more so some

researchers this is not my words this is

what they told me they said there is no

such thing as ADHD what that is is sleep

disordered breathing

period really they said it is 100

related to your breathing at night

especially so again that is not my view

this is what they have said

I think that's a bit of an exaggeration

but I don't think it's too far to say

the vast majority of those issues if

your kid has sleep apnea or is snoring

are caused by that they are not sleeping

well if you are not sleeping well what

do you do all day long your body is

trying to stay awake so they're giving

Ritalin to stay awake they're given

sleeping pills to go to sleep those

sleeping pills will make their breathing

worse because they loosen all of the

muscles in here

and they cause more resistance when

they're breathing

so even if kids even if you hear a

slight resistance to it that is cause

for alarm as well I know this seems

overblown like some some crazy warning

but you can there are 500 scientific

references available for free on my

website look at the work by Christian

gimino who is at Stanford for 40 years

he was sounding the alarm in the 70s and

nobody listened to him and people still

aren't listening to this and it is a

serious problem so what's true for kids

is also true for adults but I'll just

cap that off right there

I mean please do not cap it off ever I

prefer when you talk so

um the ADHD point is fascinating to me

because it's been a huge topic of

conversation in society because of the

apparent Rise

um in the disorder but the certain rise

in the diagnosis of the disorder

these researchers and scientists that

believe that ADHD is purely a

consequence of early breathing habits

what evidence have they got for that or

what studies have they done to show the

correlation between how we breathe when

we're at little and our chance of ADHD

when they fix the breathing the ADHD

goes away really for the majority of the

cases offer everybody for the majority

of the cases it disappears

you can look at the studies you know if

you I'm I'm happy to provide those for

you

to me it makes sense it's if you're

struggling to sleep

you are never going to be fully aware

during during the daytime right

and this is one of the reasons why so

many kids get their adenoids taken out

their tonsils taken out and more but

unless you fix the breathing habit you

can do those surgeries and they can be

very helpful unless you fix the

breathing habits all of those problems

tend to come back sometimes even more so

so you're not fixing the core issue in

the core issue is breathing and

breathing retraining breathing habits

ahead of this um conversation you know

we were doing some research and we found

that study that analyzed more than 11

000 children over six years beginning at

six months of age and that revealed that

children sufferings from sleep

disordered breathing had a higher

incidence of Behavioral and emotional

issues such as hyperactivity

aggressiveness depression and anxiety

they have 50 to 90 percent more likely

to develop ADHD like symptoms than were

normal breathers that blew my mind there

it is right there I'm glad that you you

mentioned that and I didn't yeah and

there's there's dozens of studies

showing the same thing over and over and

over

the question then becomes I guess is if

I have ADHD and I'm 30 years old uh yeah

I I think it depends on who you are I

don't think that there's a blanket

prescription or a blanket guarantee on

any of this stuff I think it depends on

what's the root cause of that ADHD we

know in kids it's treated as a

neurological problem right if that were

true then the drugs should work and they

don't right and I believe it's a

physiological problem it's a breathing

problem and that that study is just one

of many that that has espoused that if

you're talking about an adult with ADHD

what I know about adopting healthy

breathing habits you will only benefit

that benefit might be this big or might

completely transform your life right you

will only know once you do it so I don't

feel comfortable guaranteeing anyone of

anything there might be some respiratory

therapists or breathing coaches who will

say absolutely I can cure your ADHD with

these breathing practices that's fine

but I don't think it's the same

prescription for for everybody I know

it'll help though um going further back

at this train of thought then we're

talking about

um exercise and nose breathing at the

very start of this thread of thought and

I have sat here with a few people now I

think it was Peter attia who was talking

to him about VO2 max a subject matter I

don't still fully don't understand but

from what I understood it was the amount

of oxygen we're able to take from each

breath yeah yeah so that's that's a

general measurement of the amount of ox

how efficient you are at taking up

oxygen which is related to breathing but

it's also related to the respiratory

system and how you're able to extract

that oxygen from your lungs into your

bloodstream and it's a good gauge of

General athletic performance it's not

everything and there's been some

pushback against using that as a as a

measurement but but it's a general

General gauge a good tool for that is

there a correlation between our health

outcomes how long we'll live and our

lung capacity or VO2 max and all of that

stuff is there a correlation there so I

had the same question years ago and I

started looking into it and it turns out

that numerous Studies have found found

that the healthier and larger your lungs

are the longer you will live that is the

greatest indicator of lifespan was lung

size and lung Health the greatest

indicator the greatest indicator

according to these studies the

Framingham study looked at 5200 people

over the course of 70 years and they

found that the people who lived the

longest have the largest and healthiest

lung function they even did studies in

which they were looking at people who

had lung transplants so surgically

implanted lungs those who were given

larger lungs lived way longer than those

given normal size or smaller lungs so no

matter how you get these larger lungs

it's better and luckily we don't need to

get a transplant to do this we can

practice healthy breathing we can

practice stretches we can exercise and

this naturally can keep our lung size up

it's very sad when you start looking at

these charts of what happened after

you're 30 you're almost there so get

ready it's a real bummer but your lung

function starts dropping off

very quickly and especially for women

around 50 and 60 your lung function and

your lung size starts shrinking

shrinking shrinking up which means at

the time you need more oxygen more

easily it's much harder to get that and

that's where People's Health really

starts disintegrating and they start

having problems the good news is you can

Stave off this deterioration this

shrinking of your lungs by doing all the

stuff we're talking about by doing

breath work exercise by exercise what is

yoga but stretching

and breathing into this lung and

breathing into that lung so the Yogi's

newest thousands and thousands of years

ago

and he said it almost feels like that

downward spiral is kind of

self-reinforcing and self-fulfilling

because if my lung capacity deteriorates

my movement and my Exercise capacity

will deteriorate which means my lung

capacity will deteriorate which means

I'll move less which it's kind of this

downward spiral right absolutely and

it's

my belief after studying this stuff for

so long that that is the thing you want

to pay attention to more more than

anything else especially as you grow

older your lung function how much air

you can pack into your lungs how long

you can hold your breath all of this is

indicative of your general respiratory

function in your General Health so that

that little hint of using a breath hold

every morning to see where you are

physically and mentally I think it's

good they've used it for thousands and

thousands of years and now it's coming

back this is something that a lot of

these longevity experts aren't looking

into they're looking into nutrition and

exercise they're not looking into lung

capacity we get more energy from breath

than we do from food and drink right we

take 30 pounds of air in and out of our

lungs every single day and so I I find

it interesting they're focused on all

these micronutrients all that stuff's

important right I believe most of it

but from what I know a lot of them

aren't focused very much on their

breathing I want to make sure that I

have something to that I can take into

my own life there for the expansion of

my lung capacity because I'm sold on the

importance of it so

um exercise expands my lung capacity

yeah 15 20 just just by exercising by

virtue of actually if you're a good

exerciser your lung capacity will will

stay up cardiovascular exercise

cardiovascular exercise

and there's ways to access that a little

more if you're dysfunctionally breathing

when you're working out you're not doing

yourself too many favors so you have to

remember those simple basic things you

have to learn how to take a proper

breath then apply that to your workouts

you will see such an incredible

difference once you do this this is what

yoga is good for it's hard to do yoga

without breathing well right you can do

it but by virtue of all those different

poses they're meant to open up your

chest right to expand this area so yoga

cardiovascular exercise with proper

breathing through my nose breath work

practices the start of the day I think

biomechanics the first thing is

awareness to any of this stuff you can

take your hands we can do this while

we're seated here you can put it above

your sit bones here yeah and when you

breathe in breathe very very low and you

want your hands to move out laterally I

don't care what your stomach's doing

moving out laterally so as you breathe

in when you say low you mean in my belly

you want your hands to me moving

outwards okay I don't care what's

happening with your lung I with your uh

stomach I can hold my breath

and move my stomach in and out so when

people talk about a belly breath that's

not what we're doing when your hands are

moving out laterally that means your

diaphragm is descending that's how we

can see if you're taking a proper deep

breath so as you breathe in

you want your hands to be moving outward

and if you take a cloth measuring tape

you can actually measure your progress

this way the next thing you want to do

is take your hands okay take your four

fingers place them on your collarbone

and put this one's very weird place your

middle finger right there so it's only

your middle finger that's touching okay

and we're going to breathe deep then

we're going to move that breath up into

our chest okay

don't move your shoulders

you want to see those fingers naturally

separated okay so this is not a flexing

thing your shoulders stay down like this

just like this fingers on the collarbone

we're going to take a big breath into

our lower abdomen area

move it up

and you want your chest to be expanding

outward the last thing we want to do

take your hands and put them especially

you you need to do this take your hands

put them around your neck yeah I want

you to do that same breath you should

feel zero tension in your neck there's

none of this going on okay it should

feel soft and supple so let's take that

belly to the chest breath

if there's any tension do it again until

there's no tension

okay now try that again keeping your

shoulders down okay do not move your

shoulders up there's none of this going

on you're very soft very relaxed take

your hands above the hip bones when

you're breathing in very deep those

hands should be out like this

like wings yeah okay and you're going to

breathe in deep and those hands should

be moving out laterally

you will start to feel those organs

getting compressed that's good you want

that then you can move it up one more

time so we're going to start low we're

going to move that breath up to the

chest

keep your shoulders down

try it again keep the shoulders down

there you go and those fingers should be

separating so this is something that you

can check in if those hands are moving

out laterally

if those hands are separating on your

chest you're taking a proper

biomechanical breath

and that's what you need to focus on and

you'll notice once you start learning

how to access these different areas you

start applying this to working out and

your performance will tend to go up

you'll be less exhausted at the end

you'll just feel better all around

so we should expect our chest to come

kind of move outwards as we breathe in

you you want to see your chest moving

outwards because most of your lungs the

expansion is in your back but some of

that is going to be happening this is

not a pose that you want to do like this

right you should be very loose very

limber

and when you breathe in you want that

air to fill all the way up there but you

want to start low first that means the

diaphragm is descending most of the air

that is soaked up from the lungs in that

gas exchange happens at the bottom of

the lungs so you want to be able to

access the bottom of those lungs is

there a certain way that I because when

you say you want to start by breathing

at the bottom is how do I know so this

the symptom of me breathing at the

bottom is

it coming out my my sort of what do they

call this my abdomen coming outwards on

the sides that's right

because everyone calls this a belly

breath so people do this with their

belly but you can move your belly

independently of your breathing yeah

this is a way that you can't cheat so a

tape measure is good and if you get an

inch inch and a half that's pretty good

but you can work that up and if you see

really good breathers people have

practiced a lot of yoga and done it the

right way they can have this massive

expansion and this is what ties into

free divers free divers are the experts

at accessing every square inch of their

lung capacity to fill it with air that's

what they do which is why if you ever

see free divers go to one of these

competitions they're short people tall

people fat people whatever they all have

these enormous chests because they've

been able to develop this incredible

lung capacity one of the things that um

I think causes shallow breath is this

kind of constant state of fight or

flight stress anxiety screens social

media and it's funny because whenever

people would have been listening to this

podcast and started how do you talk

about breath and they would realize that

they were probably at that exact moment

doing really shallow

breaths

you talk about these free divers who are

able to extract you know 18

use 80 90 of their diaphragm or more we

you said we used 10 roughly 10 this is

about 10 and oftentimes less than that

the average person what is the

correlation between like stress and

breathing and also I'm talking now about

like the everyday angst of life

so we've talked about the skeleton we've

talked about anthropology we've talked

about biomechanics and posture but

something else that ties into this

you're 100 right is is psychology is

your brain so how you breathe affects

how your brain works affects your

anxiety but your anxiety also affects

how you're breathing so again it's

another one of those circles what

happens so often is when we're at work

we're so sensitized to threats and to

fear that we overreact when something

happens even though it's not threatening

our life we get a nasty email from a

friend or a email from the boss that's

disappointed at the last project you did

and we get stressed out right and so

what what is the physiological response

to stress is

we clench up

we hold our breath

and then we breathe like this

and we hold our breath again and we

breathe like this

you think about

thousands of years ago when we were out

in the Wilds what would we do if there

was a threat approaching you'd hold your

breath to be silent and then you breathe

too much you get respiratory system

ready to either fight it off or to run

away

so we're having the same response in our

day-to-day lives now because we're so

over sensitized to it

so researchers have different names for

this they call it email apnea or

continuous awareness I mean there's an

academic name for it partial attention

syndrome I prefer email apnea easier to

remember no matter what you call it it's

the idea that when you're in the office

place you're breathing dysfunctionally

because of this constant stress Loop and

they've found there were some NIH

studies on this they found that

breathing this way can have long-term

damage to your health high blood

pressure issues all the things we had

talked about metabolic dysfunctions and

more which makes sense because you're

just constantly in this Loop of fear and

threat and stress so the quickest most

effective way way more than drugs to

take control of this stress is to take

control of your breathing and this has

been documented time and time again so

when you notice you're breathing this

way you stop

what I like to do is breathe two breaths

in and then an exhale looks like this

laughs

that resets your respiratory system that

resets your breathing pattern then you

can do a few rounds of that and go back

to very simple five second and five

second out so let's just pretend yeah

you're in line at the airport someone's

cut you off you ordered something at

Starbucks it gave you the wrong you know

all the things that are just drive us

crazy nowadays at that moment

want you to breathe in

pause

breathe in again

let it out

relax yourself a little bit when you're

doing these breaths okay breathe in

breathe in again

and let it out

do that one more time breathe in

a little more subtle let in it again

and let it out

so you did this in very exaggerated way

which is fine but you can do this so no

one can tell you're doing it you can do

it very subtle you probably feel a

little different now than you did before

yeah so much different you can return to

then a slow low rhythmic breathing

pattern from there or whatever makes you

comfortable I like five seconds in five

seconds out also what's beneficial for

people if it's comfortable for them is

four seconds in six out will really

mellow you out and we could try that

right now breathe in

okay first of all slow I should not be

seeing you okay

so we're going to breathe in just very

very lightly we're going to relax here

what does it matter if you see it

because you're trying too hard okay this

is not there is a time and place for the

this is not it okay

okay right so breathe in

two

three four out two three four five six

breathe in two three four out two three

four five six doesn't have to be that

exact pattern but this will trigger all

of that

parasympathetic response in your body

you can see this if you're looking at

your heart rate variability it's amazing

to see the the difference that this

happens just after a few breaths look at

looking at your HRV looking at your

heart rate looking at your stress levels

what is it doing you mentioned

parasympathetic and resetting the

respiratory system but if I you know

what is the parasympathetic and the

respiratory system for dummies what is

that so how you breathe is going to

activate your nervous system function

your nervous system function is going to

activate everything in your body so we

can take conscious control of our

breathing we can't take conscious

control of our heart rate or liver

function or any of that we can take

control of our breathing when we take

control of our breathing we can hack

into our nervous system so you can be in

a sympathetic State just like we were

you take a couple of those double

inhales and exhales what's sympathetic

that is sympathetic state is the act the

fight or flight this is the action part

of your nervous system when you're in

this state you are ready for action and

what happened which is great we want to

be ready for action we want to be ready

to fight or run away from stuff we do

not want to be in this state all day

long anxiety anxiety stress because this

is where autoimmune issues and so many

other problems come from by constantly

staying stressed we want stress we want

to be able to access stress

for short amounts of time then we want

to flip back into this parasympathetic

this relaxing state if you look at once

again animals in the wild you even look

at like a gazelle that's been attacked

you know five minutes later it's just

sleeping so it has a nervous system

that's able to Pivot from one to the

other

unfortunately we live in an environment

where we're always activating always

pushing towards that sympathetic and is

making us sick really really sick so

your breathing is the quickest way of

taking control of acute stress so pills

work okay other modalities work but in

that moment is when you need the most

help and your breathing is the thing

that can get you there

so people that have chronic stress must

have awful breathing absolutely and

they've they've documented that they've

looked at their breathing they've looked

at their carbon dioxide levels and

carbon dioxide is indicative of how slow

you're breathing if your levels are very

low that means you breathe like this

so you're just off-gassing all of this

CO2 and they're always low especially

for anxiety and panic as well they're

always low extremely low you ask someone

with acute Panic or anxiety to hold

their breath this is usually what

happens

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I'm never doing that again I've seen

this hundreds and hundreds of times so

by breathing slowly you're making them

more comfortable with more CO2 you're

making them more comfortable with their

nervous system function with themselves

which is why this assessment of a breath

hold is very useful and so important

it's not only a diagnostic it's a

therapeutic because while you're holding

your breath you're also in the action of

training yourself to tolerate more CO2

which will calm your body down

and going back to this point about the

parasympathetic and the nervous system

and anxiety why

does having an extended exhale

help with anxiety so you said breathe in

for four breathe out for six why why

does extending that Exhale by two

seconds help with stress anxiety

so if you really pay attention and a lot

of people have problems doing this is

which is why it's helpful for them to

look at their whoop or or whatever you

can place your hand over your heart and

when you inhale

you can feel your heart rate increase

when you exhale

slows down this is how HRV works this is

how it's calculated is the difference in

time on that and the shortest distance

to the longest difference and this is

looking at your nervous system function

respiratory sinus arrhythmia so how you

breathe affects how how many times your

heart beats right so if you're exhaling

which slows the heart rate down more

what's going to happen to your heart

rate

it's going to start slowing down more

and that exhale that slowing down and

telling your body you're in a safe place

that it can relax is what triggers this

response by the nervous system

interesting so it's like tricking them

tricking the body into believing that's

such a simple hack

um and a lot of people they say oh this

can't be true but so many of us have

these wearables you can check it for

yourself and in real time to look at

your heart rate variability changing

your breathing pattern look at your

blood pressure too for many people they

can just switch to their breathing after

a couple of minutes you can see drops of

15 points not for everybody but for some

people 10 to 15 points just by switching

your breathing as you may know this

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recommend you try this out well we we

talked about the pandemic earlier on in

covid one of the big conversations you

must have seen playing out was that

masks are

um bad for us because it's like trapping

carbon dioxide in inside the mask which

is making us sick I even see people

having this conversation right now on

online in the wake of the pandemic

they're saying you know these masks that

we put on kids they've caused sickness

and illness in kids

um carbon dioxide is kind of seen as

this poison

what is your POV on all of this oh man

there's even more controversial than the

whole breastfeeding thing but let's go

there

Okay so

surgeons and Dennis have been wearing

masks for

100 years they're able to function just

fine they wear good quality masks and

they wear them when they need to be

wearing them there are several studies

that support if everyone wears a mask

and if everyone is wearing that mask

properly it does seem to stem some

transmission of covid and other viruses

that's that's the truth

now let's look at the other side has

been telling we've been telling people

that social distancing at least in the

US they after six months of social

distance distancing which absolutely

worked they said no now you can go out

as long as you're wearing a mask did

that do anything to stamp the spread of

covid from what I see no so there's

there's a number of problems most the

mass that people are wearing are

terrible quality they're filled with

chemicals that you are inhaling and

they're causing a lot of health issues

okay that's that's number one second one

is most of us are wearing them

improperly we're not wearing them in the

right way the third one is people feel

this sense of comfort that they're

actually protected wearing this mask

which is not the case in many situations

and this is because I've done my own

research looking at carbon dioxide

levels in indoor environments and have

found these places that we were told

that we could go to and we would be safe

as long as we're wearing masks

completely not the case some of these

places had such high CO2 that it meant

every seventh breath you were inhaling

was someone else's breath backwash was

someone else's exhale

so I don't care how many masks you're

wearing they are not going to stop the

spread of these diseases if you are in

an environment where so much of that air

has been recycled so that's really

interesting to me I've never heard this

before the the idea that the amount of

carbon dioxide in the room you're in

which I guess is determined by how well

ventilated it is has a

relationship with how much recycled air

I take in

how absolutely and this I learned all

this after the book came out I was

talking to a pulmonologist who said you

really need to look into indoor CO2 I

said well why he said that is a good way

of determining how much of that air has

been recycled so I bought one of these

which is a carbon dioxide meter and I've

been recording our CO2 during this

interview Jesus and uh so

um if you are outside it's about

418 depends where you are 418 19 parts

per million CO2 that's healthy right

even though CO2 is going up it's causing

climate change we all know that

but for breathing that is perfectly

healthy

once you get into 800 parts per million

some Studies have found that

sorry it's going when they are testing

people when they're testing students you

see a 20 decline in test results just

from 800 by the time you get to 1 000

you start suffering from things like eye

irritation sore throats other issues so

we're probably breathing in every one in

every 30 breaths that I'm breathing in

is your breath or the cameraman's breath

by the time you get to 2500 you're in

really bad shape one in every 17 breaths

is is a breath you're breathing from

somebody else so we have been told by

authorities that we should only worry

about levels that are up to 5 000 parts

per million that is completely false

there are over 18 studies that show