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Fat Loss Scientist: It’s Easy To Lose Weight, But Here’s Why You WON’T Do It! | Dr Andy Galpin

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Fat Loss Scientist: It’s Easy To Lose Weight, But Here’s Why You WON’T Do It! | Dr Andy Galpin

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4189 segments

0:00

Everything you see in this table has a

0:01

strong scientific evidence that it will

0:03

help with sleep.

0:04

>> So, we're going to dig into all of those

0:05

in great detail.

0:06

>> So, the first one is a really good one.

0:07

Kiwis.

0:08

>> Kiwis.

0:09

>> Yeah. So, there's been good studies on

0:10

them. So, if you have two to three kiwis

0:12

before bed, you'll see people sleeping

0:13

better. Next on our list is sleep

0:16

divorce. People generally don't sleep as

0:18

well when you're in the same bed as

0:19

others. Next, we want this.

0:21

>> This is more evidence than the rest of

0:22

these things combined, and it is

0:23

effective. Another one to think about is

0:25

sound. And

0:25

>> it really matters sound when you sleep.

0:27

>> Yeah. as much if not more of any other

0:28

factor. There's also screen usage,

0:31

light, your pillow and wearables. But

0:33

the other thing is we're spending more

0:34

on sleep and sleep is getting worse. And

0:36

for this last 20 years, I've been doing

0:38

science coaching and education that

0:40

enhances human performance. And I've

0:42

been fortunate to work with the world's

0:43

most elite athletes, entrepreneurs,

0:45

leaders, and even 50% of athletes have a

0:48

clinical sleep disorder. It gets worse.

0:50

70 to 80% of people who have clinical

0:52

sleep apnea will go undiagnosed. And for

0:55

women, it's somewhere in the

0:56

neighborhood of 90 to 95% and it is

0:58

delletterious to your health because

1:00

it's highly associated with long-term

1:02

death risk, cognitive function, mood

1:04

regulation, performance, recovery,

1:06

metabolic health, and it happens for a

1:08

bunch of different reasons and we can go

1:09

through them, but we look at the 8

1:11

billion person population. We need more

1:13

people to pay attention to their health.

1:14

And so I just want to get the best

1:15

possible out of people. So this could be

1:17

energy, could be metabolic, it could be

1:19

cognitive function, could be muscle

1:21

growth or fat loss. And so I want to

1:22

give every person listening to this the

1:24

opportunity to reach their goals and

1:25

dreams.

1:26

>> I'd love to go through all of those. And

1:27

you have a 5 4321 method. What is that?

1:30

>> Yeah, it's just a little thing I came up

1:31

with that says, "All right, can we help

1:32

people with fat loss?" So the first

1:34

thing to think about is

1:41

this is super interesting to me. My team

1:43

given me this report to show me how many

1:44

of you that watch this show subscribe.

1:46

And some of you have told us according

1:47

to this that you are unsubscribed from

1:49

the channel randomly. So, favor to ask

1:51

all of you. Please could you check right

1:53

now if you've hit the subscribe button

1:54

if you are a regular viewer of this show

1:56

and you like what we do here. We're

1:57

approaching quite a significant landmark

1:59

on this show in terms of a subscriber

2:00

number. So, if there was one simple free

2:03

thing that you could do to help us, my

2:05

team, everyone here to keep this show

2:07

free, to keep it improving year over

2:09

year and week over week, it is just to

2:10

hit that subscribe button and to double

2:12

check if you've hit it. Only thing I'll

2:13

ever ask of you, do we have a deal? If

2:15

you do it, I'll tell you what I'll do.

2:17

I'll make sure every single week, every

2:19

single month, we fight harder and harder

2:21

and harder and harder to bring you the

2:22

guests and conversations that you want

2:23

to hear. I've stayed true to that

2:25

promise since the very beginning of the

2:26

Dio and I will not let you down. Please

2:29

help us. Really appreciate it. Let's get

2:31

on with the show.

2:36

Dr. Andy Gin, before we started

2:38

recording, you said you want to do

2:40

scientific research, coaching for your

2:42

clients, and you said education.

2:45

You also kind of alluded to the fact

2:47

that you were less interested in money

2:48

and these kinds of things. So the

2:50

question is why why do you do what you

2:52

do and what is it you're doing and who

2:53

are you doing it for?

2:54

>> The most concise way I can say it is I

2:57

want to give every person listening to

2:58

this the opportunity to reach their

3:00

goals and dreams. You want to look this

3:02

way or not look this way and you want to

3:04

perform this way. How can we get you

3:07

there? I want to remove those barriers.

3:09

And if you get there or don't get there,

3:11

it was because of you. It was not

3:13

because something was holding you back

3:14

that was in your way.

3:15

>> Mhm.

3:16

>> And so that's why I get equally excited

3:18

to work with the best linebacker in the

3:21

NFL and some person who just wants to

3:24

wake up and not be in back pain

3:25

tomorrow.

3:26

>> So tell me who you've worked with then.

3:27

Who has been a client of yours?

3:29

>> Yeah, I've been fortunate to work with

3:31

the world's most elite athletes for 20

3:33

years at this point. So this is your

3:35

number one draft picks in every major

3:37

sport. Hall of Famers, Sai young

3:39

winners, MVPs, Olympic gold medalists in

3:41

many sports, world champion fighters.

3:44

We've worked with hemoplegics and

3:46

paraplegic individuals. We've worked

3:49

with, you know, the cliche executives,

3:52

the mom and pops, the person dealing and

3:55

struggling with parmenopause. Like,

3:56

we've really done most of it.

3:58

>> And what kinds of symptoms or goals do

4:00

they come to you with?

4:02

>> So, I'll go broad categories and

4:03

specifics below that. broad categories

4:05

we tend to say is either rebuild or

4:07

upgrade.

4:08

>> Mhm.

4:08

>> Rebuild is there's something wrong,

4:11

hurt, broken, damaged. I'm overweight. I

4:14

can't fix it. I'm dying from sleep

4:16

restriction. I have a clinical sleep

4:18

disorder. I have some injury. I have

4:21

some huge clear limitation that needs to

4:23

be resolved. The second half is what we

4:26

call upgrade. I don't have any of that.

4:28

Feel pretty good, feel okay. Now, I just

4:30

want to get the best possible out of my

4:32

life. So, this could be energy. It could

4:34

be metabolic. It could be cognitive

4:36

function. Why I can accomplish that and

4:39

our our folks I work with can is because

4:41

I'm after the physiology.

4:43

>> What's what does you mean by that

4:44

physiology?

4:45

>> It's your biomolelecular signature. Do

4:47

you have a muscle imbalance that's

4:49

creating neck pain that's making it hard

4:51

to sleep and that's giving you a hard

4:53

time regulating your emotions. It could

4:55

be classic things like inflammation.

4:58

everything that is inside of your body

5:00

and both the way that it is running and

5:02

expressing itself.

5:04

>> And what are your credentials?

5:06

>> So my PhD is in what's called human

5:08

bioenergetics. I started my lab in 2011.

5:11

>> Your lab?

5:12

>> Mhm. So I'm an active scientist. I'm a

5:13

professor. That's my real job for the

5:15

most part. And so we conduct and

5:17

disseminate research there that enhances

5:19

human performance. And then I've started

5:21

a number of companies and privately

5:23

coach people. That's what I've been

5:25

doing for over 20 years. We talked about

5:27

the different personas and the types of

5:29

problems they come to you with. If you

5:31

had to, and this might be quite

5:32

difficult, order them in terms of the

5:35

frequency in which people come to you

5:37

with these issues. What would that sort

5:39

of top five be?

5:40

>> I'll break them from our professional

5:43

athletes and I'll probably spend more

5:44

time on non-professional athletes.

5:45

Assuming u most of your audience is

5:47

probably not a professional.

5:48

>> I won't take that.

5:48

>> Pretty close.

5:49

>> I won't take that, guys.

5:50

>> 50/50. We'll assume 5050. Yeah. Yeah.

5:53

Great. The athletes typically come to us

5:55

under two circumstances. Um, frequent

5:58

injuries I'm getting or tanked energy,

6:00

bad sleep. They they deal with the same

6:02

human problems we deal with, right? The

6:04

other one is what we'll just say is the

6:06

upgrade, the optimizer. Feel great, feel

6:08

young. I just want to get ahead of

6:09

things and I want to catch things before

6:10

they start. The general public is a

6:13

similar breakdown because you have a lot

6:15

of people who are like, I do feel pretty

6:16

good. I'm great, but I don't want to

6:19

play the game backwards. I don't want

6:21

problems to come up and then I got to go

6:23

scrambling and figure it out. So, let's

6:24

collect baseline data now. Let's get

6:26

ahead of things. Let's predict problems

6:28

before they arise, but I've only got a

6:31

few minutes a day,

6:32

>> right? I'm not trying to like take over

6:34

my whole life with all this stuff. Like,

6:36

probably the most common ones are things

6:37

like sleep and energy, performance

6:39

goals, can't seem to get stronger, can't

6:42

seem to lose that little bit of weight,

6:44

maybe touch of brain fog, I don't feel

6:46

as sharp. Well, I'd love to go through

6:48

all of those. Sleep, energy,

6:50

performance, strength, struggles,

6:51

weight, but also I've got my blood test

6:54

results here, which um Andy has taken a

6:58

look at for me. It's not all good. Okay,

7:00

so that's a pre-warning. It's not all

7:01

good, but he's going to run me through

7:03

my blood test results in this episode,

7:05

tell me how I improve things. And there

7:06

was a couple of deficiencies that I had

7:07

that I had no idea that I had cuz I

7:10

thought I was doing everything right,

7:11

which have completely changed my

7:12

supplement, um but also my behavior

7:15

generally. And also you've got this here

7:18

which is a gentleman I believe whose

7:21

blood test results you did similar age

7:23

to me and you took him from not so good

7:27

to great and we'll talk about that as

7:29

well. So hold on for a second while we

7:31

we touch first on the subject of um

7:33

sleep and energy which is one of the

7:35

first thing you talked about. A lot of

7:36

people listening struggle with sleep and

7:38

they also in their waking life feel

7:41

variances in their energy. Um, if we

7:44

start then with sleep, what are the like

7:47

most people problems of sleep?

7:49

>> This is a great question. We'll start

7:51

off and in fact I think this is a nice

7:52

framing of everything we're going to

7:53

talk about. We want to be weary of what

7:56

we call health anxiety.

7:57

>> Mhm.

7:58

>> This is overfixation, over concern,

8:01

worrying too much about little things

8:03

with your blood work, with your sleep,

8:06

everything. You're in a really great

8:07

spot. So, we can look for some upgrade,

8:09

but we want to be careful of pushing

8:10

that line. Why that also matters is if

8:13

we look at the 8 billion or so person

8:16

population, we probably need more people

8:18

to pay attention to their health than to

8:20

not pay attention to their health,

8:22

right? We're not in an abundance of

8:23

people caring too much. But if you're

8:25

listening to this show, you are probably

8:27

not representative of the general

8:29

population. And so I want to be really

8:30

careful of everything I'm about to say

8:31

for the next couple of hours.

8:34

I don't want to create health anxiety. I

8:35

don't want you to be so terrified to

8:37

touch a receipt that it sends you in a

8:39

three-day tail spin.

8:41

Anytime we're talking about a health or

8:42

performance, we want to run the spectrum

8:44

of disease to optimization. We should

8:48

not be playing around with optimization

8:49

performance if we're in the presence of

8:50

a medical disease. And why I say that is

8:53

sleep is probably the biggest place of

8:56

clinical disease that exists that no one

8:59

knows about.

9:01

Somewhere in the neighborhood of 70 to

9:03

80% of people who have clinical sleep

9:05

apnea will go undiagnosed.

9:09

>> Wow. If that existed for a broken bone,

9:13

>> right? If that existed for diabetes,

9:15

you'd be like insane. It gets worse. 50%

9:19

depending on which study you look at of

9:22

athletes have a clinical sleep disorder.

9:24

For women, it's somewhere in the

9:26

neighborhood of 90 to 95% of women that

9:29

have clinical sleep apnea will go

9:32

undiagnosed.

9:33

>> Why?

9:34

>> If you were to look at me and you would

9:36

say, if I said, "Stephen, you think I

9:38

have apnea?" He said, "No." Right? If I

9:41

were to bring in a whole table of 10

9:42

people and I said, "Pick the person in

9:44

here least likely to have sleep apnnea."

9:47

You'd find the smallest girl.

9:49

>> True.

9:49

>> You don't think about apnea as something

9:51

that can happen unless you're big and

9:53

fat.

9:55

Women also are less likely than men to

9:59

complain.

10:02

They're less likely to think about it as

10:04

an anatomical issue. They're going to

10:07

charge it to hormones. to their

10:09

menstrual cycle, to their cognitive

10:11

load, to what it's the demands that it

10:13

is to be mom. All these are true. By the

10:14

way, it is also in the same point true.

10:17

You could have apnea that has nothing to

10:19

do with body composition.

10:21

>> And let's define apnea for a second.

10:23

>> You stop breathing at night

10:24

>> and that wakes you up.

10:26

>> Sometimes it doesn't. No,

10:27

>> that's the that's the problem is it

10:29

won't necessarily wake you up, but it is

10:31

delterious to your health. It's highly

10:32

associated with consequences from

10:35

long-term death risk to short-term

10:38

cognitive function, emotion, mood

10:40

regulation, performance, recovery,

10:42

metabolic health. It's really really

10:44

nasty. In fact, one of the larger things

10:46

uh that can go wrong in your health is

10:48

is not breathing at night.

10:49

>> This might be a silly question, but does

10:51

sleep apnnea disrupt your sleep?

10:54

>> It it can.

10:54

>> So, it doesn't always.

10:55

>> Doesn't always. Okay.

10:56

>> And this is why do you think it's so

10:58

poorly diagnosed? So the classic

11:01

giveaways, if you were that person who

11:03

wakes up four counties because you snore

11:05

so loud, snoring doesn't necessarily

11:07

mean you have sleep apnnea, but it's a

11:08

really strong indicator. That's one form

11:10

of it. So apnea happens for a bunch of

11:13

different reasons. More evidence

11:15

recently has suggested like neck size

11:17

was this kind of original thing that we

11:19

say like a big neck is just a problem.

11:22

Doesn't look like that's as true, but

11:24

certainly it is true. As you increase

11:28

obesity rates, you'll see an increase in

11:31

apnea as well. So, what's happening here

11:33

is now you're talking about I'll call it

11:35

anatomical or physical like something

11:37

physically is landing on your neck and

11:39

your tongue and your throat, your larynx

11:41

and esophagus and it's stopping your

11:43

breathing. And why this matters is when

11:45

you're standing here or sitting here in

11:46

this chair, you're in this vertical

11:48

position and as you go and lay down,

11:51

anatomy shifts. You also have a lot of

11:54

research showing that the larger the

11:56

human being, the more fluid they have,

11:58

which is pretty normal, right? So, a

12:00

person who's twice your size will have

12:02

twice the amount of water in their body

12:03

that you do. Imagine if you had I mean,

12:05

we'll take this beverage right here. Why

12:07

do you have red wine? Well, anyways,

12:09

we'll come back in case you get thirsty.

12:12

>> So, you see the water is sitting

12:13

vertically, right?

12:14

>> If I were to shift this cup

12:16

horizontally, the water would shift and

12:17

it would it would balance horizontally

12:19

to where the gap in the air would be on

12:21

the top, right? That happens in your

12:23

body. So imagine this top piece start up

12:25

here. That's your neck. Now when you lay

12:29

down, your neck is over here. And I

12:30

would tip this over, but it would spill

12:32

everywhere. That fluid then shifts up

12:34

into your neck. So it's not even

12:36

necessarily a physical size thing, but

12:37

it's the fluid associated with being a

12:39

larger human being that the fluid shift

12:41

can happen.

12:41

>> Mhm.

12:43

>> What we're now finding is a whole series

12:45

of other types of apnea. Now there are

12:47

neural causes to it. There are

12:50

environmental causes. um there are

12:52

positional causes. And so as a classic

12:54

example to round the story out,

12:57

traditionally if you're told you have

12:59

apnea, you're going to be given one of

13:00

about three choices. Medication,

13:04

what's called a CPAP device,

13:07

>> right? So that's the big like Vader

13:09

breathing machine

13:11

or potentially what's called an oral

13:12

appliance. It's a mouthpiece that kind

13:15

of repositions your jaw and neck. I'm

13:17

for all of those treatments. Why they

13:20

all have such low success rates is

13:22

because they're given out generically.

13:24

You come in, you have apnea, you get the

13:26

same stuff. Now, what the field is

13:28

moving towards is precision and saying

13:31

you have this specific type of apnea. An

13:33

oral appliance won't help here. You

13:35

actually need this

13:37

surgical intervention.

13:38

>> I was looking at some of the data here

13:39

and it says that sleep apnea is very

13:42

common globally, much more common than I

13:44

expected. It says men who are

13:46

middle-aged

13:47

have a 24 to 34%

13:51

prevalence of apnea.

13:53

Women 9 to 17%.

13:57

Uh seniors

13:59

>> 30 to 60%.

14:01

>> That's right.

14:01

>> Post-menopausal women 25%. So yeah,

14:04

rough numbers. That means that listening

14:06

now, if you're a middle-aged man

14:08

listening, if there's three of you

14:09

listening right now, one of you

14:11

statistically might have apnea. Now,

14:14

that's clinical sleep apnnea. That

14:17

doesn't even count subclinical.

14:19

>> And if you're a senior listening now,

14:20

which is 65 years older, there's a 30 to

14:24

60% chance. Wow.

14:26

>> Depending on some numbers you see,

14:27

Stephen, you'll see a billion people

14:29

across the globe.

14:30

>> Yeah, that's what it says. It says a

14:31

billion people. Yeah.

14:33

>> Now, that's only apnea. That's not

14:35

insomnia. That's not all the other sleep

14:37

disorders. That's simply the one variant

14:40

of it.

14:40

>> Why is this happening? Because again

14:43

from an evolutionary perspective, sleep

14:44

apnnea couldn't have been a great for

14:46

survival.

14:47

>> Yeah. Three primary reasons why this is

14:50

happening. The first is the fact that

14:52

our our environment is physically

14:54

changing.

14:56

Our ancestors never had to deal with

14:57

this.

14:59

Two, our current solutions for testing

15:02

are either insanely outdated or

15:05

incredibly difficult to get to.

15:08

The third major one

15:10

is our solutions that we provide people

15:12

in public communication are wildly

15:14

generic. Thus not helpful. In fact, if

15:17

you were to pull everyone listening

15:18

right now, sleep comes up and you go,

15:20

"Oh, great." They're going to tell me to

15:22

sleep in a quiet room that's cold and

15:24

dark and they're like, "I've heard it

15:26

all." And you have. Where we need to get

15:28

to next is how do we help people find

15:29

these precision solutions based on their

15:32

type of sleep issues. But that's that's

15:34

the three-part reason uh why this stuff

15:36

is happening. I'd like to go into all

15:38

three of them. I also would like to just

15:39

pause on the diagnosis part because

15:40

there'll be people listening here that

15:41

might have a suspicion that they need

15:44

help. But again, they're going off their

15:45

feelings.

15:46

>> Yeah.

15:46

>> How can they know for sure what help

15:49

they need and what their problem is?

15:50

>> Yeah. I always start with subjective.

15:53

How do you feel? If you feel good, let's

15:56

now like immediately take a breath.

15:59

>> You have good energy. You wake up. You

16:01

feel good. Like everyone's going to be a

16:02

little bit tired.

16:03

We also don't we've actually had a I've

16:05

been working with for several years a

16:07

very close friend of you and I. We

16:08

constantly have to battle because he'll

16:10

just get like really honestly terrified

16:12

because he gets sleepy at the end of the

16:13

day. And I'm like bro that's the point.

16:18

People that are hard chargers, high

16:19

performers are actually afraid of being

16:21

tired. We have to recognize and realize

16:24

that is natural and needed. You need to

16:28

feel a little bit sleepy in the early

16:29

afternoon and you should feel tired,

16:31

unmotivated, lack of focus at the end of

16:33

the day.

16:34

>> What if I didn't used to? Because that's

16:36

what people they compare it to old

16:38

version of themselves.

16:39

>> Sure. Again, we can say natural. When

16:42

you are sub 25,

16:45

like you're you're just a powerhouse,

16:47

right? When you're past 25, we shouldn't

16:50

just accept frailty. We shouldn't accept

16:53

a permanent decline. But we do have to

16:54

start to realize we're not going to have

16:57

the energy of a 20-year-old. Like it's

16:59

just it's just not typically super

17:00

realistic. And if you do, you're

17:03

probably getting there exogenously,

17:05

right? Stimulants and other things which

17:08

have a place, but we just want to be a

17:09

little bit careful of those things.

17:11

>> We'll talk about stimulants, melatonin,

17:12

and all these things. But going back to

17:14

this point of diagnosis, yeah.

17:15

>> So Jenny who doesn't have much money.

17:17

>> Y

17:18

>> how does she get

17:18

>> Okay, great. So one thing we can do and

17:20

we can put these in your show notes for

17:21

you for free. There are a ton of

17:23

completely free short questionnaires

17:25

that are scientifically validated.

17:27

>> Okay?

17:27

>> You can do these for RLS, you can do

17:29

them for insomnia, you can do them for

17:31

apnea, you can do them for circadian

17:33

disruptions and disorders, you can do

17:35

them for chronoype. Are you a a morning

17:38

person or tons and I'll put as many of

17:40

these for free. So my answer there would

17:42

be start with one of those.

17:43

>> Okay.

17:44

>> If you flag that and you want to move up

17:45

to the next step, then you kind of have

17:47

a couple of different ways. And your two

17:49

options are what we'll call wearables at

17:52

home tech. These are typically we'll

17:53

call the $100 to $600 range.

17:56

>> Mhm.

17:56

>> And then past that, you have a true

17:58

medical option, which is a sleep

18:00

hospital. This is when you would go

18:02

into, you know, the hospital, you go

18:04

into that weird room, and you sit there,

18:06

you get all the wires, someone looks at

18:07

you through a window, you sleep in for

18:09

one night. You can see from the look on

18:11

your face sort of, you're just like,

18:12

"All right, who wants to do that?"

18:14

>> Mhm. If you have a true disease at this

18:17

point, for the most part, the sleep

18:19

hospital, depending on the disease, it

18:21

is where you need to get to. Now, what

18:24

our group is working on and others is

18:28

can we bring the sleep possible into the

18:29

home. It's not super affordable at this

18:32

point. We're working to get it there,

18:33

but that is the clear future. If you

18:35

have insurance, take that validated

18:38

questionnaire I just said. Go to your

18:39

doctor and say, "Here's what I scored

18:41

this thing. Will you order me that sleep

18:43

study?" Mhm.

18:44

>> is a giant pain. I know it, but it is it

18:46

is probably worth it. If you want to use

18:48

the wearable, you can do that. The

18:50

problem with the wearables is numerous.

18:52

They are awesome at things like

18:55

awareness, at accountability, right?

18:58

They're pretty good for things like

19:00

total sleep time. They're really, really

19:02

bad. And a major pitfall for wearables

19:05

is predicting things like deep sleep and

19:08

REM sleep. Do you know what I you know I

19:10

was I was thinking about I was thinking

19:12

about certain times where um I've done

19:14

certain things behaviorally and then I

19:18

got in bed woke up feeling terrible and

19:20

my wearable said to me

19:23

>> you had a bad really bad night's sleep

19:24

and I could kind of put two and two

19:26

together and kind of establish cause and

19:28

effect and I could almost I guess test

19:30

that then going forward and say okay

19:32

don't do that or maybe get in bed

19:33

earlier or the heat was was way too high

19:35

whatever it might be and I could sort of

19:37

AB test my way to a better outcome.

19:39

Yeah. So they can give you things like

19:41

total sleep time. As I said, what you

19:43

want to be careful of are the

19:46

aggregate sleep effectiveness score,

19:48

sleep quality score. That's the stuff

19:50

that directionally won't be there. But

19:52

you actually said something interesting

19:53

a second ago, which is you felt worse.

19:56

>> Mhm.

19:56

>> That's the only directional thing we

19:58

need to have to pay attention to. If you

20:00

go, "Wow, I felt worse today."

20:03

>> And then you can go backwards and go,

20:04

"Yeah, that's because I did A, B, and C

20:06

yesterday or I felt better today."

20:08

That's not the only metric. And to be

20:10

really clear, I'm not advocating to

20:11

ditch all the wearables. We use them

20:13

extensively.

20:14

It's just really being careful about

20:17

what data from those we pay attention

20:18

to.

20:19

>> Mhm.

20:19

>> And what we don't. So stuff that we do

20:21

now is find big themes

20:24

that they're often times missing. Here's

20:27

a good example. We had 1,200 days of

20:29

data from I think it was an aura ring.

20:32

And we are actually able to find that in

20:34

in one of our clients for every one drop

20:38

in resting heart rate. So his resting

20:40

heart rate say went from 65 beats per

20:42

minute to 64.

20:43

He got six more minutes of sleep.

20:47

And so we were like, "Okay, great. You

20:48

want to add an hour to your sleep. Let's

20:50

continue to work on your cardiovascular

20:52

fitness." Every time he got more fit,

20:55

his resting heart rate dropped. He slept

20:56

more. Additionally, every time you put

20:58

and you invest in down regulation,

21:01

you'll lower your resting heart rate

21:03

going into bed. You will sleep longer.

21:05

So, he was a classic case of like, I try

21:07

to go to bed, I do all the things, but I

21:09

just can't stay in bed. So, the key

21:10

there to get him the more sleep is to

21:12

put his physiology in a position that

21:13

would allow him to have more sleep. And

21:15

for him, like that was the canary in the

21:16

coal mine. So, that's the type of stuff

21:18

where wearables can be like you can't

21:20

replace that. Not only from a data, but

21:24

from a coaching perspective. It was so

21:26

easy for me to communicate to him,

21:28

here's your data.

21:30

This is our target. And he's an

21:32

extraordinarily busy person. He's like,

21:34

great, I got one thing to pay attention

21:36

to. Do whatever it takes to keep that

21:37

heart rate low going into bed. Copy

21:39

that.

21:40

>> What in his case was making his heart

21:42

rate high.

21:42

>> When it comes to something like sleep,

21:44

anything that is in your physical

21:46

environment, that's in your lifestyle,

21:48

that's in your physiology can impact it.

21:50

I mentioned earlier one of the reasons

21:51

why sleep is getting worse is because

21:53

these physical changes in our

21:54

environment. annual spend on sleep is

21:56

like 600 billion right now, but yet we

21:59

have seen a 60inute drop in total sleep

22:02

time over the last 60 years. So you're

22:05

seeing an inverse. We're spending more

22:06

on sleep and sleep is getting worse. I

22:09

think your team printed out some cards

22:10

here and we can go through them. The

22:12

first one is a really good one. The

22:14

world is physically brighter. In fact,

22:15

there's data from NASA satellite data

22:18

that can look and say the world is

22:19

physically brighter now. you're expected

22:21

to be communicating with Singapore and

22:23

Australia and the US, which means you're

22:26

going to be up later. Your business is

22:27

going to be on. Your lights are going to

22:29

be on. There's also a phenomenon called

22:31

skylow, where the light from Earth is

22:33

going up, hitting the clouds, and being

22:34

shot back down. And so, it's keeping our

22:37

world brighter. So, when you hear people

22:39

talk about things like you got to have

22:41

these blackout curtains and masks, and

22:43

you're thinking like, I never did that

22:45

when I was a kid. Like, what's the big

22:47

deal? It's because of this. I mean

22:49

there's some graphs that I found here.

22:52

>> Yeah. Yeah.

22:52

>> Which kind of demonstrate this which

22:53

I'll put up on the screen.

22:54

>> Yeah. More people are moving into urban

22:56

environments. And if you look at some of

22:57

the studies, not to be dramatic, but

22:59

some of the studies have found things as

23:00

high as like anxiety and depression are

23:02

up 20 plus% when you move into the city.

23:05

And that's largely attributed to things

23:07

like light and sound. It's extremely

23:10

bright and extremely loud in cities. It

23:12

doesn't mean they're bad or you can't

23:13

live in them. It just simply means

23:16

that's why you have to take extra steps.

23:18

I think a lot of people listening to

23:19

this will think, "Well, Andy, my my

23:21

bedroom's very dark."

23:22

>> Great.

23:22

>> But that's actually not what you're

23:23

saying, is it? Because the way I was

23:25

thinking about it is we are here in New

23:27

York City now, and if I walked to the

23:30

shop last night at 10:00 p.m.

23:31

>> Yeah.

23:32

>> and walked back, I was exposed to so so

23:35

much light outside at a critical time

23:38

when my body should be not exposed to

23:40

light that it's going to impact me even

23:42

when I get into that dark room.

23:43

>> It goes even better than that. There's

23:45

evidence now that the light exposure you

23:46

have both in the morning and throughout

23:48

the day dramatically counteracts what

23:51

you just mentioned. So yes, you went for

23:54

that walk, you went for that thing when

23:56

light was still out and you had a

23:57

brighter light exposure in we'll just

23:59

call it the 3 or 4 hours before bed than

24:01

you would have had ever in the past.

24:02

>> Mhm.

24:03

>> But you can mitigate that damage by

24:06

seeing light appropriately during the

24:08

day and in the morning.

24:10

>> Oh, okay.

24:11

>> And and this is actually something my

24:13

friend

24:14

Andrew Huberman has talked about for

24:16

years now and I'm like I've always joked

24:17

and laughed at him but then I'm like

24:19

damn he nailed this. Like he was way

24:20

ahead in this one. Light exposure in the

24:22

morning will impact your sleep at night

24:25

the next day. He always explains it as

24:27

setting your circadian rhythm but it's

24:29

more than that actually. It's like

24:31

that's the part where I was like yeah

24:32

whatever. Like I'm in the same time

24:33

zone. Why do I care? But now I'm like,

24:35

"Oh." Because then if you were exposed

24:37

to high amounts of light later in the

24:39

day, that exposure to light earlier will

24:42

help reduce that damage.

24:44

>> There's this whole cascade of things

24:46

that influence when it is time to be

24:48

awake and when it is time to go to

24:49

sleep. And this is both hormonal based

24:52

as well as neurally based. So your brain

24:56

will shut down or activate in response

24:58

to light, in response to exercise, in

25:01

response to arousal, in response to

25:02

food, in response to stimulants and a

25:04

whole host of other things. That light

25:06

earlier in the day sets that rhythm.

25:08

>> Okay? So it's like starting the

25:10

>> it starts the clock. It starts the sleep

25:12

pressure. This is uh oh this is the

25:14

graph of rural versus urban plot. And so

25:17

yeah, I mean you can see that pretty

25:18

clearly. The red line here is the noise

25:21

in in a rural environment. And this is

25:22

the noise here. The typical number you

25:25

want to see um for sound at night is

25:27

like 35 dB, right? So if you see the

25:30

rural environment, you're cruising at

25:32

about that. And you see the urban

25:33

environment, you're looking in the 60 to

25:35

7 as a baseline.

25:36

>> And it really matters sound when you

25:37

sleep.

25:38

>> Tons.

25:38

>> Really?

25:38

>> Yeah. As much if not more of any other

25:40

factor that the big thing with sound is

25:42

inconsistency. A lot of people will do

25:44

things like uh put a sound machine in

25:45

the room.

25:46

>> Most people put them too loud because of

25:49

that thing. So you put them pretty

25:51

common default is like 40 to 50 dB for a

25:54

sound machine. More the data suggests

25:56

sub 40 especially for kids if you're

25:58

using a sound machine for your children.

26:00

Most people put them too close and too

26:02

loud.

26:02

>> What's a sound machine?

26:03

>> Uh just a little device that makes a

26:05

white noise. And what that does is it

26:07

cancels out a bunch of low-level

26:09

inconsistent sounds. Oh,

26:11

>> okay.

26:11

>> So the dog getting up, the window

26:13

creaking, the you know the car driving

26:16

by and so it can kind of cancel that

26:17

noise level out. How come I can have

26:19

like a great night's sleep listening to

26:21

a podcast falling asleep whereas my

26:24

partner can't? She needs silence and I I

26:26

I almost feel like I need to listen to

26:28

something to fall asleep.

26:29

>> Most likely you would do better if you

26:30

didn't do that.

26:31

>> Really?

26:31

>> Yeah.

26:32

>> You turn them off before you go to

26:33

sleep, right?

26:33

>> No.

26:34

>> Yeah. Okay.

26:35

>> That will never lead to your best sleep.

26:37

>> Okay.

26:38

>> What happens is you get to bed and

26:41

something is happening cognitively

26:42

>> and you're like, I need something to

26:44

switch me off

26:44

>> to distract me. Yeah.

26:47

>> Great. If we took that away from you,

26:50

you might sleep worse because you're

26:52

going to sit there and struggle through

26:53

that moment.

26:55

>> If you wanted to go from upgrade, we

26:56

would say, "Okay, let's figure out what

26:58

is actually a way for you to

26:59

downregulate cognitively,

27:02

give you that same thing that won't then

27:04

disrupt your sleep throughout the

27:05

night."

27:05

>> Have you dealt with people in that

27:06

situation before?

27:07

>> Super common. Podcasts are an incredibly

27:09

common one with that. Uh TV, books. My

27:12

philosophy is let's step back and solve

27:15

causes. Let's solve constraints rather

27:18

than mask them. Uh you've got a host of

27:20

different supplements over here.

27:22

Everything you see in this table has

27:25

moderate to strong scientific evidence

27:27

that it will help with sleep.

27:28

>> What are those things?

27:29

>> So lovely, delicious looking tart cherry

27:32

juice and I'll go through why that is.

27:34

There you've got some chamomile tea. You

27:35

would see this in a supplement form of

27:38

apogenine. It's a really common way of

27:39

that as kind of like distilled

27:40

chamomile. Um look at these lovely

27:43

kiwis. What's funny here is this is

27:45

actually what happens in in research.

27:47

They will give people two to three

27:48

kiwis. They will eat them right before

27:50

bed and you will very routinely see

27:52

people sleeping better after ingestion

27:54

of kiwis.

27:56

Um other things that are high on the

27:59

evidence-based list are of course

28:00

magnesium and various forms. More of the

28:03

research now on magnesium for sleep is

28:06

turning to a particular form called

28:08

magnesium bislycinate

28:10

um rather than 38. That's up there as

28:13

well. Uh, you will also see things like

28:16

omega-3. This is your common fish oil.

28:17

Oh, this is actually interesting because

28:19

this popped up on your labs as something

28:22

we have to work on.

28:23

>> Oh, my test.

28:24

>> Yeah, we'll come back to that in a

28:25

second.

28:25

>> Okay.

28:26

>> And then of course you've got melatonin,

28:29

right? The issue with all these is the

28:31

same that you have with your podcast.

28:35

These are doing the exact same thing.

28:37

So, one thing we could do is say ditch

28:39

the podcast and let's go with one or

28:41

multiple of these options because

28:42

they're doing the same thing. They're

28:43

cognitive turnoff. Apen or chamomile

28:46

specifically will play that role. It is

28:48

a reasonable switch that says frontal

28:51

cortex turn off. And so, you're getting

28:53

there through the podcast where you

28:55

could get through theirs through food or

28:56

supplements if you'd like as well.

28:59

>> Kiwis, Kiwis have scientific evidence

29:02

that they improve sleep for some people.

29:05

It's really common. If there's like

29:06

levels to this, you'd probably like

29:08

level one, two, and three. Level one

29:09

being things like actually surprising

29:11

enough magnesium, chamomile, melatonin,

29:14

of course, lots of randomized control

29:16

trials.

29:17

>> Level one being the best,

29:19

>> the best of the best,

29:20

>> the best, highest quality.

29:21

>> And you'd say what? Magnesium, kiwis.

29:23

>> Yeah, kiwis would probably be like a

29:25

level two or level three.

29:26

>> Okay.

29:26

>> So, there's been good studies on them

29:28

enough to put them on this table. Enough

29:30

to say there's data there. So, you're

29:32

getting some product below it. In this

29:34

case, epigenine, in this case, other

29:36

phyitochemicals

29:38

that either reduce a little bit of

29:40

cognitive function, they reduce arousal,

29:42

they put you in some sort of checkout

29:44

state.

29:45

>> And then there's this one over here,

29:46

melatonin. Yeah.

29:47

>> That a lot of people are aware of.

29:48

>> Yeah.

29:49

>> Strong. What level is melatonin?

29:52

>> So melatonin probably has more evidence

29:54

than the rest of these things combined

29:55

because it's a medicine. It's a drug.

29:57

There's a ton of research on it from

29:59

children to aging to bone health and

30:02

tons of other stuff, right? It's a

30:04

hormone. You're going to be able to to

30:05

move some units with this one. Um,

30:08

nobody is going to be super concerned

30:10

about risk factor profiles with eating

30:12

two kiwis,

30:13

>> but you start getting to the level of

30:15

something like a melatonin and now you

30:17

have to have real conversations about

30:18

risk versus benefits. We typically don't

30:21

use melatonin

30:23

at the dosage that's normal. So a common

30:25

dosage for melatonin is like 5

30:26

milligrams, sometimes even up to 10.

30:28

>> Wow.

30:29

>> We will typically use like.3

30:31

maybe 0.5. So about a tenth that dose. A

30:33

lot of times we're trying to find like

30:34

one milligrams, cut them in half, kind

30:36

of things like that. The only real

30:39

reason we use melatonin outside of some

30:41

fringe cases is when we actually

30:43

legitimately need to reset circadian

30:45

rhythm, travel, jet lag,

30:49

things like that. Uh and it is effective

30:51

and it is useful there. It is safe in

30:52

small doses. Where people mistake

30:56

melatonin is I use it every night to go

30:58

to sleep and or I wake up in the middle

31:00

of the night, can't go back to sleep, I

31:02

go grab a melatonin.

31:03

>> Why is that bad?

31:04

>> It doesn't work.

31:05

>> It doesn't work.

31:06

>> No, because the thing that melatonin is

31:08

supposed to do is realign circadian

31:10

rhythm. If you're in the middle of the

31:11

night, you're already in that rhythm.

31:13

It's not going to do anything. You would

31:15

in fact, not to not want people to do

31:16

this, but you would actually be better

31:18

reaching for something like a chamomile

31:20

perhaps because if you're having a hard

31:21

time getting back to sleep cognitively,

31:24

this is not going to do it. The other

31:25

issue is we've done a lot of morning

31:28

urine testing. There's enough studies

31:32

that look at the dosage that's actually

31:33

in the pill versus on the label and they

31:35

can be up to 100x higher.

31:38

>> 100x.

31:40

>> And we see this in morning urine. We

31:42

have seen people who are consistently

31:44

tired.

31:45

Their sleep doesn't look horrible.

31:47

They're doing all the right things. It's

31:48

cold. It's dark. They're meditating.

31:50

They're doing all this stuff. They're

31:52

popping in even a moderate dose of

31:53

melatonin. And the amount of melatonin

31:56

the next day in their urine is 100x the

31:59

upper end of the reference range, which

32:01

means they're spending the rest of their

32:04

next day in a hyperdosed melatonin

32:07

state. So they have to live then on

32:09

stimulants to get better.

32:10

>> How would they feel and horrible?

32:12

>> They would feel sluggish and

32:13

>> you wake up the next day and you're

32:15

like, man, it's what we call sleep

32:16

inertia.

32:17

>> You're wildly groggy. You can't get out

32:19

of bed or you're just getting throughout

32:21

the day. This is a like don't talk to me

32:23

until I've had my coffee kind of

32:25

response, right? This is not a normal

32:27

waking physiology that you should be

32:29

going through.

32:30

>> Presumably, that's just melatonin from

32:34

sort of cheap sources that haven't been

32:36

tested. That's going to knock off a huge

32:38

part of your problem, right? Only this

32:40

is why we'll always say you don't, no

32:41

one needs supplements. Like no essential

32:44

person needs to have any supplement to

32:45

live a great happy healthy life. If you

32:48

choose to use supplements though,

32:50

just buy them from third-party tested

32:53

transparent

32:54

companies that place their testing on

32:57

their websites that give you open access

32:58

to it for for these exact reasons.

33:00

Vitamin D's has a similar profile of

33:03

inaccuracy. The other issue with that

33:05

then simply let's say you're buying it

33:06

from a high quality source. You're

33:07

dosing it too much and you're taking it

33:09

too late. So take it earlier than you

33:12

think before bed so that your body has a

33:14

chance to break it down before the next

33:16

morning.

33:16

>> What kind of time and how quickly acting

33:18

is it?

33:19

>> It's person to person dependent, but a

33:21

lot of times you'll see things like an

33:22

hour before. Uh some people will feel a

33:24

response in 10 to 15 minutes. Some

33:27

people will feel it closer to an hour.

33:28

But that's a pretty good window.

33:29

>> Hang on. If it's 2 a.m. in the morning

33:31

and you're and you're getting in bed,

33:32

don't take it. Don't take it at all.

33:34

>> Okay,

33:34

>> we're going to use this in very specific

33:36

situations and then we're coming off of

33:38

it. This is this should not be a part of

33:40

your nightly routine most of the time.

33:41

>> What exactly is going on in my brain

33:43

when I take melatonin? Cuz a lot of

33:44

people take it and we know that it makes

33:45

us feel tired but but understanding the

33:47

mechanism I think will help us under

33:49

understand the application.

33:50

>> So it actually doesn't really make you

33:51

feel tired. That's part of the issue.

33:53

>> Oh

33:53

>> the mechanism is a circadian shift. So

33:55

it's telling your indogenous system that

33:57

this is nighttime. So it doesn't hit you

33:59

with like a oh my eyes are there. This

34:02

hits you with a shift in cortisol. This

34:04

hits you with a shift in a whole cascade

34:07

of epinephrine, norepinephrine,

34:09

serotonin that are moving around and

34:11

saying this is the millu that you need

34:12

to be in that is consistent with a sleep

34:15

pattern.

34:15

>> Okay. So, I take it and then it

34:17

regulates my other hormones which would

34:19

be getting in the way of me feeling

34:21

tired theoretically.

34:22

>> That's probably more appropriate to what

34:23

it does.

34:24

>> Okay. Because yeah, I've taken it a

34:25

couple of times again always for jet lag

34:28

issues and within about 30 45 minutes I

34:30

feel a bit drowsy and then I find my

34:32

eyes going shutting and I'm off.

34:34

>> Great. And then you get out of those

34:36

that 2 or 3 day window,

34:38

>> put it back away and you're off and

34:40

going. That's a good use case for it.

34:42

The mistake is when this is like I can't

34:44

go to bed without

34:45

>> I'm generally scared of all these things

34:46

because um

34:47

>> honestly anything that's effective I'm

34:49

more scared of

34:50

>> and so sure

34:51

>> it's really effective which makes me

34:53

hesitant to use it frequently.

34:55

>> Yeah,

34:55

>> it's a good default position to be in by

34:56

the way.

34:57

>> It's a good strategy.

34:58

>> Yeah, cuz I one of the things you learn

34:59

from doing a podcast like this is you

35:01

just learn that everything has a

35:02

trade-off

35:02

>> always.

35:03

>> And I and again this might not be

35:04

logically sound but I assume that the

35:06

bigger the upside the bigger the tra

35:08

like the trade I'm making on the other

35:09

side as a general rule. So, do you know

35:11

the only thing that I've still not been

35:12

able to, I guess, understand the full

35:14

trade-off of is coffee

35:16

>> because the upside is so significant. No

35:19

one can articulate to me the downside

35:21

other than they say if you have it after

35:23

midday, it's going to

35:24

>> impact your sleep. But I'm like, come

35:26

on, there's got to be.

35:27

>> The phrase that I'll say in my class all

35:29

the time is there's no free passes in

35:30

physiology.

35:31

>> Mhm.

35:32

>> With coffee specifically, there actually

35:33

we have a meta analysis led by my

35:36

colleague Dr. Ben House puts this

35:39

together. But if you look at the

35:40

research on caffeine and sleep, it's

35:41

very interesting because if you go

35:45

through sleep deprivation, your physical

35:47

and cognitive performance goes down. No

35:50

surprise there. Coffee can offset that.

35:52

Caffeine specifically is is the thing.

35:55

But what it doesn't do, at least the

35:57

data and the meta analysis suggests, is

36:00

it doesn't actually put you back into

36:02

the augmented spot. Meaning if you did

36:04

you sleep great last night?

36:06

>> I think so. Yeah.

36:06

>> Full night. Okay. Let's just say you're

36:08

there. If we took you out and we had you

36:10

throw that medicine ball and we did a

36:13

grip strength tester and we did what

36:15

some sprints up and down or whatever you

36:16

wanted to do, you would perform well.

36:19

And then if we gave you caffeine, you'd

36:21

perform better. It's why we call it

36:22

erggoenicate. It's a performance

36:23

enhancer. Caffeine is really effective

36:24

primarily at endurance based events, but

36:27

it is a stimulatory thing that people

36:29

will use. So let's just say you have

36:31

normal baseline performance, then

36:33

caffeine augments that performance. If

36:35

you go into sleep debt, the sleep itself

36:38

will reduce your performance. And the

36:40

coffee can bring you back to normal, but

36:43

it won't bring you back to that

36:44

augmented state that you had when you

36:45

were rested and caffeinated. This is

36:48

important because a lot of people will

36:50

be like, "Ah, I'll throw away the sleep

36:52

or I won't worry about it as much

36:53

because I'll just take more stimulants

36:55

tomorrow and I feel great." You will

36:58

feel as good, but you will not perform

36:59

as well. So, what you need to perform at

37:01

your best if you're a caffeine user is

37:04

to be both well-rested and then

37:06

caffeinated. Another thing you want to

37:08

pay attention to in your sleep

37:09

environment, um, labeled ergonomics here

37:11

is your pillow, your bed, your mattress.

37:15

This is mostly

37:17

based on feel.

37:18

>> Is there any no- go in this regard?

37:19

>> Not really.

37:20

>> Not really.

37:21

>> No. Unless, let's say you have a

37:23

sleeping partner and you're sleeping in

37:24

a bed that is too small and that results

37:26

in you hitting each other or touching

37:27

each other and you don't like that. So

37:29

other than those uh the framework

37:31

themselves there there's really no

37:33

nothing to be concerned with.

37:34

>> What about these like eight beds?

37:36

>> Asleep is fantastic. So asleep is not a

37:38

bed it's a cover

37:40

>> which regulates temperature. If you are

37:42

in a bedding situation where you're

37:43

getting hot then that's a problem. So if

37:47

then an eight will help you regulate

37:49

that temperature it's a great solution.

37:51

If you're not in that situation then

37:53

you're going to be just fine. So

37:55

temperature regulation is a really big

37:56

deal

37:57

>> and you'll quite often see people that

37:59

do that. Whether that's getting a

38:01

product like that or it's getting a

38:03

sheet that's cooler or a mattress that

38:05

is better with ventilation, then you'll

38:07

often times see them sleep a little bit

38:08

better. Next on our list is screen

38:12

usage. Everyone has been told and you

38:14

know perhaps nothing's more destructive

38:15

when you're sleeping screen. What's more

38:17

interesting here is the stuff that

38:19

people generally don't talk about. It's

38:20

not the fact that necessarily screen

38:23

usage is shooting your face with a bunch

38:25

of blue light. What's more dangerous

38:27

about your screen is the arousal

38:30

associated with the search for novelty.

38:33

>> The search for novelty. What does that

38:35

mean?

38:36

>> You're engaging in a podcast,

38:40

social media, a game is puzzle driven.

38:43

It is solution. It is interest. It is

38:46

engagement. It is search for the next.

38:48

That's the stuff that more likely than

38:51

not cause sleep disturbance

38:52

disturbances.

38:54

In the studies that have looked at

38:56

things like TV time versus tablet versus

38:59

phone versus reading, those all can be

39:02

equally dangerous to sleep. Here is the

39:05

example. I am a TV before bed guy. A

39:09

giant TV with a blast of blue light. I

39:12

sleep great with that. My wife is really

39:16

struggles with light before bed. she

39:18

will read and yet she chooses to read

39:21

things that I don't think she should be

39:22

reading for a night and then she'll wake

39:23

up because of the topics that she's

39:25

reading where I'm watching things on TV

39:27

that are you know documentaries on

39:29

Ulysius Grant or something and you're

39:31

just like that is the least engaging

39:32

thing ever. So it's not the fact that

39:34

the light is there. Um I use that stuff

39:37

much like you use your podcasts which is

39:39

my entire day is so driven by somebody

39:41

wanting my attention and time. I have to

39:44

have something that gives me a cognitive

39:45

switch that says you get to turn off.

39:47

>> I wanted to add something to this which

39:49

I've been thinking about this week. So

39:51

in Meta, Meta own Instagram and Facebook

39:54

and WhatsApp etc. In Meta's earnings

39:57

call this week, Mark Zuckerberg talked

39:59

about how they had changed the

40:00

recommendation algorithm on social media

40:02

apps using AI. And this was something

40:04

that we've always forecasted would

40:05

happen and we've been thinking about the

40:06

creator economy and how it would impact

40:08

it. But specifically for people

40:09

listening, what essentially he said is

40:11

every time you post something on

40:12

Instagram, whether it's a real or or a

40:15

normal post, they now feed it to a large

40:17

language model, an AI, and the AI

40:20

effectively, and again, I'm summarizing

40:21

here, watches it, and it can now

40:24

understand the full context of what it's

40:25

watching. So, if it's watching a clip of

40:27

you and me right now, it'll understand

40:28

that that is Andy Galpin. He's holding a

40:31

card, he's wearing a black t-shirt, he's

40:33

it'll look at the transcript, it'll know

40:35

what you said. And this is all pertinent

40:37

because it then can without in the past

40:41

needing to look at the caption and the

40:43

hashtags, it can then decide with way

40:46

more context than ever before who

40:48

exactly would want to see that. And the

40:51

net impact of that for for the user of

40:53

Instagram or these other social media

40:55

apps or Tik Tok or whatever it is, is

40:57

you're going to be more retained now

40:58

than ever before. And as you were

40:59

talking about that, I thought, I wonder

41:00

if they think about timing of day. Like,

41:03

I wonder if they think at 11 p.m.

41:06

there's a certain thing that's going to

41:09

keep Andy scrolling versus something at

41:11

9:00 a.m. when you're off to work. And

41:13

of course they do because that and you

41:16

know they were talking about on the

41:17

earnings call Mark was saying how it's

41:19

increased retention by I think 15 basis

41:22

points. And there's this quote where he

41:24

said there are already two large sets of

41:26

content to draw from. first from your

41:29

friends and people you follow and second

41:31

from creators that you don't follow. But

41:32

now there's going to be a whole new and

41:35

nearly infinite universe of personalized

41:39

content which from that I infer what

41:40

they're saying is with their new large

41:43

language model called Muse is we're

41:45

actually going to make new content to

41:47

show Andy Galpin

41:48

>> that no one made no humans made. We're

41:50

going to make stuff that we know Andy

41:53

will like. And so I say all this to say

41:55

that in this sleep conversation, we've

41:56

been talking about as creators. We've

41:57

been saying basically it's going to get

41:58

really difficult if you're a creator

42:00

because now if you have a million

42:01

followers, it doesn't matter. No, if

42:02

Jenny has zero followers, but she makes

42:04

something that is contextually more

42:05

interesting than the million follower

42:06

guy, Jenny's thing is going to see be

42:08

seen to everyone. But actually now

42:09

you're going to be competing with an AI

42:11

that's going to be churning out super

42:13

personalized Andy Galpin content.

42:15

>> Like that just Andy would just love at

42:18

11 p.m.

42:19

>> I said to my team this week, I was like,

42:20

just take care of yourself. Do you know

42:22

what I mean? Just be aware, you know,

42:25

when you open your phone that the AI is

42:27

doing everything it can to retain you.

42:29

>> Yeah. I mean, just don't be on your

42:32

phone. We've been making this argument

42:34

for years, but gez, um, you got every

42:36

disadvantage possible coming in your

42:38

way. And and look, we're all human. I I

42:42

think I remember

42:44

last time I was here, you were talking

42:46

about how like you wake up and your

42:47

phone's right there, but your your

42:49

fiance like doesn't touch your phone for

42:50

the first hour of the day or something.

42:51

and it's just like on the charger until

42:53

noon or something. You're just like,

42:54

"What? I'm more like you." Right? I'm

42:56

like, "My phone is in my room. It's not

42:58

three rooms. Like, I'm just not doing

42:59

any of that stuff." Right? And we

43:01

started this entire piece by saying the

43:02

environment you're in is just different

43:03

than it's ever been before. And it's not

43:05

getting any better. And at some point,

43:08

you have to make that decision of

43:11

do you care about your own health? Do

43:15

you care about the thing the next day

43:18

that you didn't do well? And you care

43:21

more about that than you cared about

43:22

that next reel.

43:23

>> What is it that's causing us to

43:25

understand everything you just said, but

43:27

to ignore it and to pick up our phone

43:29

anyway?

43:30

>> You are hard driven through the entire

43:32

biology of our species to search for

43:34

novelty.

43:36

In fact, I I look at this from the lens

43:38

of sports. Why do you care about high

43:42

achievement? Why do I care about

43:44

performance? There has direct

43:46

translation. When someone breaks a

43:48

barrier,

43:50

we all benefit from that. And I could

43:52

give you direct examples of this. But we

43:55

have every story. You want to go to

43:58

Joseph Campbell heroes journey, right?

44:00

You want to go back to Hercules, the

44:02

story of the marathon. Like you pull any

44:04

story from history out and what are you

44:06

actually looking at? You're looking at

44:08

somebody did something that no one has

44:09

ever done before. You care more about

44:11

records

44:13

than you do regular wins and losses.

44:15

Why? because they're novel.

44:19

Why are you more interested in watching

44:23

Messi break that record

44:25

than you are the other team winning in

44:28

the exact same shot?

44:30

It's because you saw something. You got

44:32

to be there when someone did something

44:34

for the first time in human history.

44:36

>> I get more of a dopamine hit from the

44:37

novelty, from the new thing.

44:38

>> It's more than the dopamine hit, though.

44:40

It's a sense of purpose. Your life

44:42

mattered

44:44

because you got to be involved in

44:45

something no one else has ever seen. And

44:48

even as that bystander on TV 30,000

44:51

kilometers away, you got to be a part of

44:54

that. And that all comes down to we are

44:58

so wired

44:59

to reward novelty.

45:02

So then now that comes back to your life

45:04

and you have to be thinking how do you

45:06

walk away from that core drive? thinking

45:09

about a study I read about in psychology

45:11

class in school with pigeons getting

45:14

variable rewards.

45:15

>> I'm going to butcher this, but bear with

45:16

me. They took a pigeon and they got a

45:18

little lever for it to press and every

45:20

time it would press the lever and

45:22

sometimes it would get a reward. And

45:24

they found from the study that if they

45:26

made the rewards variable, i.e. it

45:28

couldn't predict when it was coming, the

45:30

pigeon was more likely to keep pressing

45:32

the lever, i.e. it was more addicted to

45:33

the behavior if it didn't know when the

45:35

dopamine hit was coming or the the treat

45:37

in that case. Scrolling on social media

45:39

is kind of like the slot machine of

45:40

variable rewards. I just don't know what

45:42

I'm going to get. But every fourth, you

45:44

know, scroll, I get something that

45:46

>> or every 40th.

45:47

>> Yeah. Orth better, right? Because the

45:50

more unpredictable it is,

45:52

>> the more likely you are to be like, "One

45:53

more, one more, one more, one more."

45:55

Right? Like, if it actually comes too

45:56

quickly, you care less.

45:58

>> So, you're going to scroll through all

45:59

the boring stuff, boring stuff, boring

46:00

stuff, boring stuff, boring stuff for

46:02

the one out of every 40 that gets you.

46:04

That's what you're actually there for. I

46:06

mean, if I gave most people and I said

46:08

like you can have $10,000

46:11

or you can have $10,000 in equity in a

46:13

startup.

46:15

I look at your face. Like I know what

46:16

you're doing, right?

46:18

You want to like people are it depends

46:20

on where you're at, right? But it's just

46:21

like okay. And if I said right now the

46:24

most likely scenario is that $10,000 is

46:26

go zero.

46:27

>> Yeah.

46:27

>> Which is what happens, right? You're

46:30

like kind of hedge. Can I go five and

46:32

five? like you're you're going to go you

46:33

don't you unless you need the 10 grand

46:35

which a lot of people do but you get the

46:37

point because you're like man walking

46:40

away from belief walking away from hope

46:43

walking away from what if is in insanely

46:45

hard to do.

46:46

>> I deleted one of these social media apps

46:47

just completely from my phone and

46:49

honestly you always think that you're

46:50

going to have like FOMO. You're not

46:52

going to know what's going on or there's

46:53

going to be some huge loss to your life

46:54

if you don't have an app on your phone.

46:56

And it's just remarkable when you delete

46:57

these some of these social media apps

46:59

how positive of a net impact it has on

47:01

your life.

47:03

>> I have a a friend of mine named Shaun

47:05

Ali, a famous UFC fighter. He was

47:08

sitting at his pool and he had his

47:10

daughter was like one or two years old

47:11

and he was like scrolling Twitter and

47:14

was like, "What am I doing?" Like my

47:16

daughter's over here in front of me.

47:18

He's 2 years old and like I'm on

47:19

scrolling like not doing work or not

47:21

making a post. Not like I'm just

47:23

scrolling.

47:24

dumped it was just like team you guys

47:26

handle it not on any social media more

47:29

>> so that screens

47:30

>> that's screens my friend another one to

47:32

think about which we've sort of touched

47:33

on is called the presence of other

47:35

beings this is our classic sleep divorce

47:40

I assume you uh as I do share your

47:44

sleeping environment with your partner

47:45

>> yes

47:45

>> tough to make the argument of like get a

47:48

sick divorce right

47:49

>> yeah I'm not telling her

47:50

>> you can tell that

47:51

>> it's funny if it was up to my if we

47:54

would have a sleep divorce.

47:55

>> You're joking.

47:56

>> No,

47:56

>> she's like, "Get away from me. Don't

47:58

touch me." She wants to like if we could

48:00

have separate beds in separate rooms,

48:02

she I don't snore earning, but she just

48:03

like

48:04

>> My fiance is the opposite.

48:05

>> It's not super realistic, but it is

48:07

true. There are data behind it. People

48:09

generally don't sleep as well when

48:11

you're in the same bed as others. The

48:14

realistic solution, try to get sheets or

48:17

a sleeping situation in which when one

48:19

partner moves, it doesn't roll the other

48:20

person.

48:21

>> Oh, like separate sheets. separate

48:23

sheets or simply the type of sheets.

48:25

>> Um my wife loves to be really

48:28

constricted so she likes the sheets

48:30

tucked in tight. She likes to bed and I

48:31

hate it. Like

48:33

>> I feel like I'm in Shaw Shank. I'm like

48:34

break me out like rip it all out of

48:35

there. So there's little things like

48:37

that that don't require you to buy

48:38

anything where you just change kind of

48:42

the the setup and the scenario to where

48:45

their movement doesn't impact you as

48:46

much. Um noise would be the same one. if

48:48

you are sleeping with somebody who makes

48:49

a lot of noise, tosses and turns a

48:51

bunch, um you could put a pillow in

48:53

between, so when they roll over and

48:55

move, they don't hit you, earplugs,

48:57

things like that. So, that one's a

48:59

pretty straightforward one, but that

49:00

said, it's pretty impactful. It can

49:02

really make a big difference. And if

49:03

you're really struggling,

49:05

maybe do a partial sleep divorce.

49:07

>> Okay.

49:08

>> Next, sleeping in new environment. Uh

49:10

this would oftentimes be called first

49:12

night effect. So your first night,

49:14

whether it's back home, whether it's in

49:16

a hotel or somewhere else, you don't

49:19

feel as comfortable and as safe. And

49:21

your circadian rhythms, the things that

49:22

set your timing, aren't there. This is

49:25

sound. This is light. This is feel. This

49:27

is temperature. This is smell. What you

49:29

can do if you travel a lot, our athletes

49:32

travel every 3 to 5 days, right? This is

49:34

what they do. You can try to mimic your

49:36

sleep environment at home on the road.

49:38

Some people will take their pillows.

49:40

Other things that are on the similar

49:42

list are smells like lavender.

49:45

Lavender is moderately associated with

49:47

helping people fall asleep. None of

49:49

those is going to like knock you out.

49:52

>> Mhm.

49:52

>> What you're looking to do is stack

49:53

winds.

49:55

Next is temperature. You want to be

49:57

cool. Generally, you're looking at 64 to

50:00

68 degrees. This is personally

50:02

dependent. Um, some people actually like

50:05

to be a little bit colder so that they

50:08

can have a heavier blanket because they

50:09

like that feeling. When this idea got

50:11

popular a bunch a few years ago, people

50:13

just started raking the ACs, right?

50:15

You're just like, get the room as cold

50:16

as you possibly can. That can become a

50:18

problem because we're seeing this

50:20

somewhat consistency where when people's

50:21

air conditioners kick on, it actually

50:24

wakes them up. And as we talked about

50:26

earlier with noise, it's not necessarily

50:28

always about the volume, but it's the

50:30

change,

50:31

>> okay,

50:32

>> in sound. And so you have something

50:33

kicking on, kicking off, kicking on,

50:34

kicking off. The other thing we see is

50:36

because of air quality situations, uh,

50:39

we've seen quite often when we have

50:40

environmental sensors and stuff that if

50:42

your air conditioner is not clean and

50:44

the fan is out in there, you can

50:45

actually kick a bunch of dander and

50:47

particulates and other things into the

50:49

air and then you start breathing those

50:51

things in it overnight and your nose

50:53

starts to get a little bit stuffed up.

50:54

You can't breathe through your nose and

50:55

then boom, you have this hypopnic or

50:58

apnneic event. The last component that

51:01

comes up, you know, pretty often at

51:03

absolute rest is fans. This can make

51:06

your mouth dry. So, if you're waking up

51:09

with that and you're like, "Ah, I got to

51:10

get a drink of water or something." Um,

51:12

then maybe consider not having the fan

51:14

blow directly out your face.

51:15

>> An interesting thing I was thinking

51:16

about there, which is there was the uh

51:18

viral experiment done in 2009 by Mind

51:22

Lab sleep study where they conducted um

51:24

the sleep experiment at the University

51:25

of Sussex. Researchers hooked men and

51:27

women up to an ECG machine to measure

51:29

their brain waves and played a variety

51:31

of ambient sounds while they slept to

51:34

see which noises triggered an immediate

51:36

wake response. And the top wake

51:39

responses from men and women was

51:40

completely different. Men's top trigger

51:42

was a car alarm. Women's top trigger was

51:44

a baby crying. Men's top trigger was

51:47

wind howling outside. Uh women's second

51:50

top trigger, I should say, is a dripping

51:52

tap. Yeah.

51:54

>> Men's third top is buzzing or flying of

51:56

a mosquito. Uh women's was um shouting

52:00

outside. And both of their fourth top

52:02

trigger was snoring. But it was

52:04

interesting that the thing that woke

52:07

most men, their top trigger in that

52:08

study was an alarm outside, but women's

52:10

was a baby's crying. Yeah. Every mother

52:13

out there is gone. Yep. It's in in fact

52:15

one of the largest causes of sleep

52:17

disorders in women is having children.

52:20

what happens after child birth and and

52:22

it's a whole interesting field to hear

52:23

of uh postpartum care is really poor in

52:26

women like we just sort of like start

52:28

paying attention to baby stop paying

52:30

attention to mom as soon as baby comes

52:31

out well I'm saying that because it is

52:34

obvious and clear that the last

52:36

trimester can present a lot of sleep

52:38

challenges for women and then especially

52:39

as soon as a baby's there like you're

52:41

just going to have some known period of

52:42

sleep deprivation whether it's delivery

52:44

or having a newborn all that stuff and

52:47

that can actually cause patterns this

52:49

can cause insomnia. This can cause

52:51

irregular sleep schedules, circadian

52:53

disorders, natural things. Totally fine.

52:55

In some percentage of women, those

52:58

patterns will persist. And so, you'll

52:59

see women who have sleep disorders, even

53:01

with adult children that started because

53:04

of the child birth. We were advocating

53:07

at all times like, yeah, get through it.

53:09

I got two kids, you know, I've been

53:10

there. But then just make sure you're

53:13

you're providing care and going back to

53:14

try to fix those things. And why that is

53:16

difficult is because the study you just

53:18

mentioned

53:19

>> it's worth saying there is an

53:20

evolutionary theory behind this that

53:22

says you know men and women are attuned

53:24

to different things. But there's also a

53:25

counterargument that says the difference

53:27

in who actually wakes up and who gets

53:29

out of bed is often heavily driven by

53:30

social roles. Parenting expectations and

53:32

individual sleep depth rather than a

53:34

biological inability for men to hear the

53:35

baby. So how how do we close off on the

53:38

subject of sleep? Is there anything that

53:40

we haven't touched on that we should

53:41

have touched on as it pertains to how to

53:43

have incredible sleep? One thing that I

53:45

think will help everyone whether you're

53:47

at any of those stages free a little bit

53:49

of money or you got to go the full end

53:52

of the spectrum and use a hospital or a

53:54

service like ours

53:56

is everyone has the ability to run

53:58

self-experiments. We we have a a free

54:01

guide that anyone can go use and it's

54:03

just a a quick tutorial about how to run

54:05

your own self-experiment for sleep

54:07

specifically.

54:08

>> Oh, there you go. Yeah. Um so this is up

54:11

and available for free on our website.

54:13

Anyone can check it out. There's a lot

54:14

of stuff in here we've covered. You can

54:16

get more into it. But the short answer

54:17

of it is we don't want to make people

54:20

think sleep has to be the center of

54:23

their life. I often times when sleep

54:25

comes up, people start thinking, I'd

54:27

love to sleep more, but I'm too busy.

54:30

Hey, I'm the same boat. Like, I can't

54:33

afford to have a 12-h hour sleep

54:34

routine. What we should be paying

54:36

attention to is sleep resilience. Steve,

54:38

I want you to be as resilient to bad

54:42

sleep as possible.

54:44

I don't want you optimizing your sleep

54:46

because optimization turns into that

54:50

giant routine before bed. I got to take

54:52

12 different supplements and four

54:55

different cocktails and I got if I have

54:57

to do that along the way, great. The

55:00

endgame though should be resilient.

55:02

Meaning, you had a bad night of sleep,

55:05

cool, and you still performed.

55:07

We had this challenge. Flight got

55:09

delayed. Great. We still executed. I

55:12

want you to know how to get a good night

55:14

of sleep so you can feel as refreshed as

55:16

possible, execute the next day, and then

55:18

get right back onto it.

55:20

>> The way you get there is, and that's the

55:23

way our company works, like we're just

55:24

going to run a series of experiments.

55:26

And everyone can do that. Start by

55:29

changing one thing. Your trackers,

55:32

your data are going to tell you how

55:35

you're sleeping, but they're not telling

55:37

you why you're sleeping that way. So,

55:38

that's your quest. Go figure out why

55:40

you're sleeping that way. Is it your

55:42

bedroom temperature? Is it your partner?

55:45

Is it the fact that you're sensitive to

55:47

light? Is it the fact you're exercising

55:48

too late? Are you eating too late? Like,

55:50

all these things are possible.

55:53

One at a time. Just like Jon Jones,

55:56

where marginal improvements in your

55:58

cognitive performance can have a massive

55:59

impact. Sometimes I podcast for 10 hours

56:01

a day. Over the last couple of weeks,

56:02

I've been in filming for a TV show and I

56:05

have like one or two days off to get all

56:06

of my work done, which means there's

56:08

lots of cognitive load. And so I turned

56:10

to ketones because I find myself more

56:12

articulate, able to think more clearly,

56:14

able to work out better when I'm fueled

56:16

by ketones. And so the reason I became a

56:19

coowner of this company and the reason

56:20

why they now are a sponsor of this

56:21

podcast is because I remember one of my

56:23

team members called Cristiana, she tried

56:24

it once and came up to my desk and she

56:26

goes, "This is the best product ever

56:28

made." And I think in part that's

56:29

because she really cares about those

56:31

cognitive benefits as I do, as Jon Jones

56:33

does, and as I think most of my

56:34

listeners probably will. So if you

56:36

haven't tried these yet, all you have to

56:38

do is go to ketone.com/stephven,

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and you'll also get 30% off your first

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benefits that might just change your

56:50

life. If you're thinking about starting

56:52

a business, one of the first decisions

56:54

you'll have to make is actually one of

56:56

the most important, which is where do

56:57

you build that business? Our product

56:59

team who manages everything we do from

57:00

our conversation cards to our diaries

57:02

has always used our sponsor Shopify.

57:06

There are a few reasons for this, but

57:07

one of the big ones is that when you're

57:09

running a business, you really need your

57:11

own store and your own customer data.

57:13

And Shopify gives you exactly that. You

57:15

aren't renting space from someone else's

57:17

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57:18

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57:21

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because it's already built into Shopify.

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Those early days are messy enough

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your free trial at shopify.com/bartlet.

57:52

I guess one could argue that the

57:53

antithesis of sleep is being awake. And

57:56

when we're awake, the thing we care

57:57

about is energy. Now, I had a really

58:00

great conversation on this podcast with

58:02

um several people that talk about

58:04

mitochondria and energy and those kinds

58:06

of things. And some some of those

58:08

conversations have really really changed

58:09

me. If you hadn't haven't listened to

58:10

the more recent conversation we had on

58:12

um mitochondria on the channel, please

58:14

do go listen to it.

58:15

>> Martin Peard.

58:16

>> Martin Peard. It was a really honestly

58:18

it's one of my favorite conversations

58:19

I've had this year just because I've I

58:21

knew about the mitochondria like I I

58:22

conceptually knew what it was but I

58:24

hadn't thought about it as being so

58:29

central to everything in my life because

58:32

energy is essential to everything in my

58:34

life like my relationships, my ability

58:36

to do this, my my joy, my everything. If

58:39

someone is trying to improve their

58:41

energy levels and that's what they come

58:42

to you with in terms of a symptom that

58:44

they self-describe, where do you aim?

58:46

Okay, we talked about sleep, but where

58:48

else do you aim?

58:50

>> Energy is

58:52

probably the number one thing on our

58:53

list of reasons people come to us.

58:55

>> What do they say?

58:56

>> I'm tired all day, can't figure it out,

58:58

or I don't have the energy I used to

59:01

have, or I can't sustain output like I

59:04

used to. Whether this is physical, uh,

59:06

my recovery is longer than it used to

59:08

be, or I just can't hang working as many

59:10

hours as I used to do, I get fatigued at

59:13

the end of the day cognitively, I'm not

59:15

of the camp that this is entirely

59:17

mitochondria. But I certainly will agree

59:19

that energy would be the number one. In

59:20

fact, probably the most common question

59:22

I've ever got in my career is what

59:23

separates these world performers from

59:25

the rest of us? And people want me to

59:28

say things like they work harder. They

59:31

they don't. They are categorically

59:34

though better at energy management.

59:36

That is the one thing that seems to be

59:38

most consistent again with the world's

59:40

highest performers, athletes,

59:42

entrepreneurs, leaders, executives, you

59:45

name it, however you're defining

59:47

success. When you get better at managing

59:49

energy,

59:51

you're more effective. This is

59:53

everything from cellular energy to

59:56

understanding things like your own

59:58

interpersonal communication.

60:00

What type of relationships give you

60:01

energy? What type of relationships take

60:04

energy from you? What type of activities

60:06

give you energy? What types give you

60:07

back? When can you be more efficient?

60:09

When are you running for the sake of

60:11

running and not actually running in a

60:12

direction? And I mean this figuratively,

60:14

not literally.

60:16

This is all energy management. And what

60:18

you'll see is these people are

60:19

world-class performers. get incredibly

60:21

good at going 80% of my energy suck

60:24

comes out of here for 20% ROI. I'm going

60:26

to switch that out. They're better at

60:28

choosing what matters and what doesn't

60:29

matter.

60:30

>> Okay?

60:30

>> And this is everything from what

60:31

supplement is working to what type of

60:34

person that they work with. Where people

60:36

struggle is in the like what if I could

60:38

also be doing this? What if I could also

60:40

be doing this? What if I add this on

60:41

top? What if I add this on top?

60:42

>> Okay. So, I thought you were talking

60:43

about um I guess if I try and put this

60:46

into some sort of analogy or metaphor,

60:48

>> the high performers wake up with 100

60:51

energy chips, let's say, and they're

60:53

really really good at allocating them

60:55

against the most important thing.

60:56

>> Yes.

60:57

>> Whereas maybe Jenny and Dave listening

60:59

kind of let it seep out. They put 20 on

61:01

Instagram, 20 over here on this

61:03

>> and they spin their wheels.

61:04

>> They spin their wheels.

61:05

>> They go, "Okay, great. I'm going to I

61:08

listen to this podcast and I got super

61:10

excited about zone 2. I'm going to go

61:12

hop into a bunch of zone too. And then I

61:13

listen to this other podcast and I get

61:14

super excited about journaling. Let me

61:17

go add journaling to my mix.

61:19

>> And then what ends up happening is you

61:20

see their daily routine and you're like,

61:23

"Okay, your daily routine is 20 hours."

61:25

And then at some point like you didn't

61:27

actually do anything that mattered. What

61:29

is the one thing that can get you to

61:31

that goal in the most effective way

61:34

possible? And then everything else has

61:36

to actively be stripped away. So the

61:39

traditional thing we like to do is we

61:41

give one to two what we call active

61:44

movements per week which is this is

61:47

something Stephen you have to actively

61:48

remember to do. You don't actively

61:51

remember to brush your teeth. You don't

61:52

have to actively remember to shower blah

61:54

blah blah. You might at this point not

61:55

have to actively think about your

61:57

gratitude practice or your meditation

61:59

time. Like you probably have these

62:00

things you've been doing for years,

62:01

right? I don't actually call those

62:03

additive because you you do those.

62:04

You're going to get those in. But I

62:06

might ask you to do one thing different.

62:08

I don't know what that would be, but I I

62:09

would look at this and say, "Here's your

62:11

constraint. I'm not going to ask you to

62:13

do five things new. It's too difficult.

62:16

Maybe this is a change in what time you

62:18

eat."

62:18

>> Okay?

62:19

>> Your training style. Find what's

62:22

constraining you from your energy.

62:24

>> What things could it be?

62:25

>> It could be sleep. It could be

62:26

mismanagement of relationships. It could

62:28

be you're working too much. It could be

62:30

you're under fueling. You're not eating

62:32

enough. It could be that you're

62:34

overusing stimulants. sleeping poor and

62:36

you're in that cycle, right? It could be

62:38

you're not seeing sunlight. So, what you

62:40

need to do is run a a quick analysis and

62:43

think what is the single biggest thing

62:44

in your way. Is it the fact that you're

62:47

in pain?

62:49

Great. Maybe the only one thing I want

62:50

you to go after then is

62:53

let's go figure out why that knee hurts.

62:55

>> Okay. So, for me, you've seen my blood

62:56

results.

62:57

>> Yeah.

62:57

>> So, what things might improve my energy

62:59

from the blood results that you saw?

63:01

>> What are you mid-30s? Early 30s. and 33.

63:05

>> 33. All right. You're lean, you're

63:07

active. The first thing that jumps out

63:10

on your report.

63:11

>> Yeah. Can we skip that?

63:12

>> I think uh skip the page. You're going

63:16

to see quickly the difference between

63:17

medicine and performance.

63:18

>> Okay. Um this is medical. So, we're

63:21

looking at cholesterol and cholesterol

63:23

related markers. You've got I don't know

63:25

a dozen of them or so there. Not one's

63:27

good.

63:29

>> This is incredibly actionable.

63:31

>> Can I ask a question about this? what

63:33

what does it mean? And then I was going

63:35

to ask a secondary question which is I

63:37

was going to try and self diagnose why I

63:38

think this is the case but

63:39

>> I would love that second question

63:40

that'll actually tell us where to go. So

63:42

when you look at things like blood work

63:43

these are secondary measures of

63:45

physiology. They're trying to predict

63:47

what I what we'll call an outcome.

63:49

Meaning in this case we are looking at

63:50

your heart health.

63:52

>> Okay.

63:53

>> There is an association and I choose

63:55

that word carefully between cholesterol

63:57

and cardiovascular disease.

63:59

>> Okay. High cholesterol, low cholesterol,

64:01

good cholesterol. All the above. Very

64:05

traditionally, excessively high

64:07

cholesterol is going to be associated

64:09

with earlier heart disease, heart

64:11

attack, could even manifest itself into

64:13

strokes and things like that, right? So,

64:16

if we were to just like zoom all the way

64:18

out and we say, "All right, your

64:19

cholesterol is extremely high. I'm

64:21

concerned about your heart health."

64:23

>> There's way more to the story, but at

64:26

the top of it, that's where we're at.

64:28

So, the second question I was going to

64:30

ask is at the time that I did these

64:32

blood test results, I was frequently in

64:34

a ketogenic diet.

64:35

>> I know there's a lot to unpack here and

64:37

a lot of people are going to get mad

64:39

online. Cholesterol has lifestyle,

64:42

dietary, and familial causes. Often

64:46

times, you might have high cholesterol

64:48

and all these various markers simply

64:50

because that's a familial genetic

64:51

inheritance and there's not a lot of

64:53

action behind it. When you see these

64:55

things independent of obesity, now we

64:57

have a different connotation. If I were

64:58

to look at all this stuff and go, "Oh,

64:59

yeah, sure. You're 35% body fat. I know

65:02

you drink alcohol." Then I'm like,

65:04

"Okay, this is true, but let's tackle

65:06

those things first because those have so

65:09

many robust implications on your

65:10

health." That's the starting place. You

65:13

don't drink alcohol excessively. I don't

65:15

even know if you drink alcohol at all

65:17

and haven't in years, I assume, right?

65:19

You don't smoke. You don't like I know.

65:21

So, all those things are checked off the

65:23

list. This means this is actionable.

65:24

>> I should give you some context here. My

65:26

uncle died of a heart attack and my dad

65:27

had a heart operation last week.

65:29

>> Ooh.

65:30

>> So,

65:30

>> do you remember what kind of heart

65:31

operation?

65:32

>> He had a pacemaker put in. Um,

65:35

>> but he's been on statins, I think, for

65:38

>> to lower his cholesterol.

65:39

>> A long time. I think he's been on

65:40

statins for about 15 years if I was to

65:42

guess. About 15 20 years.

65:44

>> Yeah. So, when I look at this

65:46

independent of your obesity with your

65:48

familial history, do you remember what

65:49

advice you got when you got these

65:51

results of what to do? Do

65:52

>> you know I did two two um tests. I did

65:55

this one with Function Health, who I

65:57

believe are a sponsor, so I should say

65:58

that. Um, and I did the second one with

66:00

Nico Health,

66:01

>> where I'm a big investor in the company.

66:03

They both said to me like, "Steve, stop

66:05

eating steak all the time. Um, bacon,

66:07

stop eating bacon all the time." The way

66:09

that I heard it was, damn, this

66:11

ketogenic diet you've been on, Steve,

66:12

you need to just take it easy.

66:14

>> And have you done blood work since then?

66:16

>> No.

66:17

>> All right. First thing that would pop up

66:19

and this is the order I would do this

66:20

in. When you get something like blood

66:22

work,

66:23

the value is not in the data. The value

66:27

is in the interpretation. What they're

66:29

talking about why you heard that as

66:31

steak, butter, bacon is because those

66:34

are food items high in saturated fat.

66:37

Saturated fat is not evil. There are no

66:40

evil foods. It's only evil context.

66:42

Right? So in your particular case, if we

66:44

saw those and we don't have this, but if

66:47

we had your baseline

66:49

before that test and then we had this

66:52

and we went, okay, when you change your

66:54

diet and increased your saturated fat

66:55

intake and then we saw these numbers

66:57

increase,

66:58

most ethical people in this space would

67:00

look at that and say that's not a

67:01

positive thing. That does not mean

67:03

ketogenic diets are bad or unsafe. Not

67:07

at all. It only means if we had those

67:09

theoretical data for you, it's probably

67:12

not healthy. You stack that on top of

67:14

the fact that you have your uncle and

67:15

your dad in there. Then I would triple

67:17

down and go talk to your doctor. I'm not

67:20

your medical doctor, but I'd be really

67:22

concerned about that. Then what I would

67:25

do would be go to the next step. Let's

67:26

run the experiment and see. This is an

67:29

indirect marker. And remember, what is

67:31

it trying to predict? Your heart health.

67:34

Have you had your heart scanned?

67:36

>> Yes, I have. And

67:37

>> they said that I had like I had a thick

67:40

wall.

67:40

>> Okay. Exercise induced cardiac

67:43

remodeling

67:45

if especially if it's left ventricular.

67:47

>> It's a good thing. Right. So your heart

67:48

has four chambers. Two on top, two on

67:50

bottom. The two on the top are called

67:51

atria.

67:52

>> Uhhuh.

67:53

>> Ventricles on the bottom. Oh, you got a

67:54

great image there as well. Yeah. So you

67:56

can look at this as a maze. Okay. So

67:59

we'll use double modeling here. Can you

68:01

see how the left ventricle

68:05

is much larger than the right ventricle?

68:07

>> Mhm.

68:07

>> There's a reason. The right ventricle

68:09

only has to kick blood to your lungs.

68:12

>> Yeah.

68:12

>> Which are, you know, physically

68:14

>> quite close

68:15

>> a few inches away. The left ventricle

68:18

has to kick it up out through your

68:21

entire body down to the tip of your toes

68:23

all the way back up against gravity and

68:25

then back up into your heart. Mhm.

68:28

>> And so what you're seeing here is

68:30

strength training. This is resistance

68:32

exercise. Your left ventricle is lifting

68:33

weights. It has to be bigger. It has to

68:36

be stronger so that it can contract

68:37

really hard and shoot all that blood up

68:40

and down and up and out. If you said you

68:43

had a thicker wall either naturally or

68:46

exercise induced, just like when you

68:48

lift with your biceps more, it's larger.

68:51

The same thing is happening your left

68:52

ventricle. Incredibly common and healthy

68:55

adaptation. Okay.

68:57

>> What we would be concerned about is if

68:59

there was any type of blockage

69:02

or any type of plaque buildup.

69:05

>> One of the things that I remember them

69:07

saying is they, again, I'm going to

69:09

butcher this, but they told me there's

69:10

kind of like two types of plaque build

69:11

up in my veins or my arteries, whatever.

69:13

And they said, "The bad type you haven't

69:16

got."

69:17

>> And they said, "But the other type you

69:21

have got." And they I think they were

69:22

referring to like the bad type as being

69:23

like more sticky.

69:24

>> Yeah. and it like doesn't go,

69:26

>> it'll dislodge.

69:27

>> Oh, okay. And that can cause a risk.

69:29

>> Yeah.

69:29

>> They said I didn't have the bad type,

69:31

but I had this other type that can is

69:32

like temporary, but could turn into the

69:34

bad type or something.

69:35

>> Yeah. One thing you want to be really

69:36

careful of, and this happened to a dear

69:38

friend of mine, Joel Jameson, young,

69:40

super fit, all the things. No stress,

69:43

doesn't smoke, doesn't drink, much like

69:44

you, all this stuff. Family history.

69:46

>> Mhm.

69:47

>> Didn't think about it. Blood work came

69:49

back totally fine. still asked to get a

69:52

CT angiogram scan of his heart. His

69:55

cardiologist said, "No, you don't need

69:57

it. You're young. You're all the thing."

69:58

Got it anyways. And he had a I think he

70:00

had a 50% blockage of his what's called

70:02

a widowmaker.

70:04

You're flipping the dice whether you're

70:05

going to die here, right? So, this is a

70:06

classic case to me where he's doing all

70:08

the right things, but imaging saved his

70:10

life. Let's not live in fear. Let's go

70:12

look. He went had a looked. I'll just

70:14

trust your physicians. Great. then I'm

70:17

less worried about this because this

70:19

could be a direct response to your

70:21

ketogenic diet, which it almost

70:22

certainly was. And if it's presenting no

70:25

risk to the place we actually care

70:26

about, then I'm less concerned about

70:28

your cholesterol.

70:29

>> But is if it carries on like this, could

70:31

it create a risk?

70:32

>> Absolutely could.

70:32

>> Okay. Cuz they all did tell me to fix

70:34

this.

70:35

>> Yeah. Just keep getting it scanned every

70:36

few years and if you see any aggress any

70:38

any buildup at all, then I would manage

70:39

it.

70:40

>> Okay.

70:40

>> Now, in what you're seeing over here is

70:42

that client of ours. And so as an

70:45

example, I'll give you a specific

70:46

number. His total cholesterol was 347.

70:50

We got him down to 223.

70:51

>> What did you do?

70:52

>> Fiber.

70:53

>> Why fiber?

70:54

>> Stress reduction. Fiber, depending on

70:57

the type of cholesterol, will actually

70:59

bind to the cholesterol and clear it

71:00

from the system.

71:01

>> You will physically reduce it.

71:02

>> That's why they one of the supplements I

71:04

was told to take is a fiber supplement.

71:06

>> It's not always going to solve

71:08

something. And I want to be really

71:09

clear.

71:11

If you have numbers like you had, you

71:13

need to work with a doctor. and you need

71:14

to get screened. Don't just be like, I

71:16

took Fiber. I'm fine. This guy said on a

71:18

podcast. That's not what I'm saying. But

71:19

it is, it can be effective. The other

71:21

thing we did was massive stress

71:22

reduction. Guy was a a very hard

71:24

charging CEO for a large company.

71:26

>> How is stress reduction going to impact

71:27

my cholesterol?

71:28

>> Things like cholesterol can be what are

71:30

called acute phase reactants, some parts

71:32

of them, not all of them. Meaning it

71:34

responds to acute stress and stimuli.

71:36

When you look at things like blood work,

71:38

they aren't static. They are responding

71:40

to the entire system. And so if you were

71:42

to be stressed, and we not to blame

71:44

anything on cortisol, but cortisol is

71:46

elevated. You are in a uh heightened

71:48

alert state. This causes short-term

71:51

inflammation. In fact, if you look at I

71:53

think your inflammation was a little bit

71:55

um nuts over there. Oh, this guy as

71:56

well. Probably like your most classic

71:59

inflammation marker is called CRP. His

72:03

was at two, which is really high. We got

72:05

him from two to 2. So 10x reduction that

72:08

then allowed cholesterol to normalize.

72:10

Um the the easiest most technical way to

72:13

get to say it is it's an acute phase

72:14

reactant. Meaning it will change in

72:16

response acutely to inflammation. Some

72:19

markers will go up and some will go down

72:21

in response to that like like D like

72:22

vitamin D goes down

72:24

>> if what if you

72:25

>> in a a stressed environment. Some go up,

72:28

some go down. Blood glucose goes up.

72:30

>> So you got stressed down, you got his

72:31

fiber up.

72:32

>> And that took him from 347 to 223, which

72:35

is still high. Went from 223 to 163. Now

72:38

that took a statin.

72:40

>> Oh. Obviously you did give him a statin.

72:41

>> We didn't but his medical team did.

72:43

>> Okay.

72:44

>> And so this I why I want to draw this

72:46

point out is we were able to go a long

72:48

ways with lifestyle.

72:52

But he wanted to go more. He wanted to

72:53

be green green green.

72:56

So that's when medicine came in. And I

72:59

to me this represents a a great marriage

73:01

of the two. Some people are very anti-

73:04

medicine. Some people are that's not my

73:06

decision. That's up to you and your

73:07

medical provider. But I think it's it's

73:09

it's unfair to tell people things like

73:12

all of it can be done with lifestyle and

73:15

there's no need for medicines ever or

73:17

the opposite of just like oh just take

73:18

the drug don't worry about it. He needed

73:21

all of it. He needed stress reduction.

73:23

He needed some changes in his diet and

73:25

that made a huge change in his

73:27

biological health. So if you were to be

73:29

like look this is so complicated this

73:31

guy like how can I make actional advice

73:33

of all this stuff this guy's saying I

73:34

don't have a private doctor and cool

73:36

just run the experiment. Try more fiber.

73:38

try to regulate your stress. If you want

73:40

to go the opposite route and jump right

73:42

into the the medical side, that's fine,

73:43

too. Um, but it doesn't need to be super

73:46

scary or super daunting because these

73:48

are not like especially if your heart

73:50

has been scanned. I'm not concerned

73:51

about an acute emergency.

73:53

>> The two things on here that I thought

73:54

were were shocking to me are my my

73:58

vitamin D levels and my omega levels,

74:00

which I was told were deficient.

74:02

>> Yep.

74:03

>> I thought I was smashing it with those

74:04

two cuz I think I was living in LA at

74:06

the time and

74:07

>> Yeah. So your vitamin D was borderline

74:09

low. Fairly traditionally people of

74:13

African heritage are going to be lower

74:14

in that marker.

74:15

>> Okay.

74:16

>> You're at 37.

74:18

Kind of lower end of that number is 40.

74:21

That might actually be fine.

74:22

>> I think I heard you say something about

74:24

vitamin D. Again, I don't want to

74:25

butcher your words if this wasn't what

74:26

you said, but you kind of make the

74:28

assumption that most people are

74:29

deficient.

74:30

>> Yeah, it is true.

74:30

>> Why does it matter?

74:31

>> So vitamin D is a nice microcosm of

74:35

overall health. So what I mean by that

74:36

is you will tend to see people low in

74:38

vitamin D who are also tending to make

74:40

poor health choices. So it's a little

74:41

bit like grip strength and all that

74:43

where it's kind of a one snap shot at

74:46

saying are you generally healthy or not?

74:49

Why is it needed specifically? It is

74:52

involved in every reaction from your

74:55

brain to your gut to your hormones, your

74:57

immune system, metabolism and everything

75:00

in between. It's critical to maintaining

75:02

bone health. that's critical to being

75:03

able to grow skeletal muscle. It's also

75:07

clinically low in a high percentage of

75:09

the population and even subcl clinically

75:11

low in a vast majority of the

75:13

population.

75:14

>> So, should we be supplementing if we are

75:15

low?

75:16

>> The real world will always win. Whole

75:18

foods, sunlight, positive social

75:20

environments. That's always the place to

75:22

start. So, do you want to supplement

75:24

with it? That's up to you. I would much

75:26

rather you get sunlight if possible.

75:28

Now, enter everyone in the chat going,

75:29

"I live in the UK. There's no sun. sort

75:32

of up here. Fine. If you want to choose

75:35

a supplement um because you live in

75:37

those situations, then that's absolutely

75:39

fine.

75:39

>> Or I work in an office for 12 hours a

75:41

day. It's it's interesting because there

75:42

is a bit of a paradox here in we're all

75:44

in search of very natural solutions in a

75:47

very unnatural way of living. I had this

75:50

conversation with my fiance a couple of

75:51

couple of weeks back about a few things

75:52

where in one area of our life we're

75:54

trying to be really really natural.

75:56

>> Y

75:57

>> um

75:58

>> but I'm like babe like look at the rest

76:00

of our lives. so unnatural. We get on

76:02

planes and have these smartphones and

76:03

and so almost forcing this one part to

76:05

be natural is

76:07

>> arguably going to cause a bit of a

76:08

problem.

76:08

>> I mean, it happens to me, right? Like

76:10

I'll

76:11

put in the entire hours of the day and

76:13

not even realize I didn't step outside.

76:15

>> Yeah,

76:15

>> it absolutely happens.

76:17

>> So, what I think you have to do is

76:19

number one, give yourself grace, right?

76:21

Like you're not going to be perfect. I'm

76:22

especially thinking about like single

76:24

parents. It's just like you're not going

76:26

to go out and spend 30 minutes in the

76:27

sun.

76:27

>> Night shift workers.

76:28

>> Totally. Boy, that's a really hard

76:30

thing. Um, we've dealt with a lot of

76:31

nurses and surgeons and things like that

76:33

where you're on call, you're out. And

76:35

that's when we can lean towards modern

76:37

medicine, modern supplementation. It

76:39

that's why those things are not trash.

76:40

They're not garbage. They're not fake.

76:42

Our strategy typically is that's can we

76:44

find one actionable thing, one thing

76:46

that you're doing as a focus that is

76:48

something you got to go out of your way

76:49

and do. And that might be you have to go

76:52

outside today. You have that might be

76:54

your one thing to pay attention to. When

76:56

you start asking for more than one to

76:57

two active things per week, you start

77:00

end up failing.

77:01

>> Okay, fine.

77:01

>> So, with your omegas, so your omega

77:04

score at five is low.

77:07

>> Mhm.

77:07

>> You want that to be eight. But you

77:08

probably didn't notice your mercury was

77:10

right on the line of high as well. Those

77:12

things will typically track. The more

77:15

omega-3s you consume, the more mercury

77:17

goes up.

77:18

>> Oh, really?

77:19

>> Because most omega-3 sources

77:22

are going to be filled with mercury. But

77:24

I was low omega and high mercury.

77:26

>> So what that tells us is if you were to

77:29

jack your omega-3s up, your mercury is

77:32

going to get into the line that we don't

77:34

want it to be in. So solution,

77:38

you need to alter the source of your

77:40

omega-3s. Get it from a higher quality

77:42

place. So I'm not sure where you were

77:43

getting them from there.

77:44

>> All over the place.

77:45

>> Yeah. But you would want to to either

77:47

choose your supplement more carefully or

77:50

choose better quality foods. What

77:52

actually moves the needle on this

77:53

subject of energy, which is what we're

77:54

talking about here. Is there anything

77:56

that is more consequential as it relates

77:59

to these people that are trying to get

78:01

more energy in their life? They feel

78:02

lethargic. We talked about sleep as

78:03

being a real foundation here.

78:05

>> If you're looking for more energy, I

78:06

would divide everything into two

78:07

buckets. Hidden stressors and visible

78:10

stressors. Visible stressors are things

78:12

like you're not exercising. We know from

78:16

excellent databases, physical exercise

78:20

enhances energy. Why? And how?

78:22

>> Mitochondrial health is one of the many

78:24

aspects of it.

78:25

>> You'll have more mitochondria if you

78:28

exercise more.

78:29

>> Generally, not only will you have more,

78:31

they'll be larger and they'll be

78:32

healthier.

78:32

>> And mitochondria basically process your

78:34

energy. So, you get more efficient

78:36

energy production.

78:36

>> They're one of the ways you can make it.

78:38

You can make energy a lot of different

78:39

ways. It is the end path of all aerobic

78:42

exercise. So, in other words, anytime

78:44

you're using oxygen as a byproduct to

78:46

make fuel, mitochondria have to be

78:48

there. So, it is central and core to

78:50

that. Um, but it is more than

78:51

mitochondria. You'll have more total

78:53

blood

78:54

>> if you exercise.

78:55

>> Yes.

78:56

>> It's one of the primary adaptations to

78:57

endurance is you'll physically have more

78:59

blood in your body

79:00

>> and that will mean

79:01

>> you carry more oxygen.

79:02

>> Oh, okay.

79:03

>> You have more red blood cells.

79:05

>> So, you're able to carry more oxygen to

79:07

fuel those mitochondria.

79:09

>> Is that a certain type of exercise that

79:11

gives you more?

79:12

>> Generally, anything that demands blood

79:13

flow will increase blood supply.

79:17

>> Cardiovascular exercise

79:18

>> can be can be anything.

79:19

>> Okay. Stress equals adaptation. Meaning,

79:22

if you put a demand on your heart to

79:23

pump more blood, it'll get better at

79:25

pumping more blood. If you put a demand

79:26

on bone to resist tension, it'll get

79:29

better at resisting tension. You run the

79:32

whole cascade of connective tissue to

79:35

cellular health. It is simply what's

79:38

called the said principle. S A I D,

79:40

specific adaptation to imposed demand.

79:43

And also is it fair to say then if we

79:45

take the word exercise out of the

79:47

traditional definition which is like in

79:49

a gym doing a thing and we broaden it to

79:51

work or just you know cognitive

79:55

performance. Remember exercise is a

79:57

novel madeup term. This is a new thing

80:00

to us. Historically humans have carried,

80:03

have sprinted, have jumped, have

80:04

climbed, have grappled, have done all

80:06

those things. putting that into a

80:08

structured non-aily activity is a last

80:12

75 year phenomenon, right? It wasn't

80:14

actually until we started to realize

80:16

that stress reduction to the end of the

80:19

limit is a bad thing and then we had to

80:21

recreate stress into our lives. One form

80:23

of that was we call that exercise. So

80:25

yes, if you think about exercise as

80:28

either running, cycling, swimming or

80:30

lifting weights, you have left a bunch

80:33

on the table. I don't care how you're

80:35

challenging yourself. Even if that

80:37

structured exercise in your example is

80:39

more vocationally based,

80:41

>> it's the stress being provided to the

80:43

system. And so when you start to look at

80:45

things like what's the best exercise

80:46

protocol for AB and C, one of the things

80:48

you start to realize is all of them can

80:50

have equal responses given a few

80:54

constraints and if they hit that

80:55

constraint, they work. So if you have a

80:58

movement practice, you skateboard, you

81:00

play pickle, you walk, you garden, fine.

81:03

All those can have equal clinical

81:05

outcomes.

81:06

mortality, joint pain, body composition

81:09

because they're getting to the same

81:11

spot.

81:12

>> Does this make sense then? So, if I'm

81:14

say I'm a podcaster and I want to have

81:16

more energy to podcast,

81:17

>> Yeah.

81:17

>> I should podcast more.

81:19

>> Yeah. You'll be more resilient, right?

81:20

>> Okay. So, you could apply that to sort

81:22

of any vocation or activity. If I want

81:24

to have more energy to

81:26

uh lift my kids up and run with them in

81:29

the garden, then I should lift things

81:31

and run with them.

81:33

>> Stress inoculation. And then in the

81:34

future my body will adapt and it will

81:36

give me more energy for that particular

81:37

activity.

81:37

>> Yep.

81:38

>> So sometimes when people say they don't

81:39

have energy for a thing, it's because

81:41

they haven't challenged themselves in

81:43

that particular activity enough to

81:46

expand and adapt.

81:47

>> It's it's really difficult, right? So if

81:49

if walking up the stairs is a V2 max

81:52

test for you, how likely are you to walk

81:55

upstairs? Oh,

81:56

>> okay. So it's like a downward spiral.

81:57

It's

81:58

>> too difficult, right? So then what

81:59

happens?

81:59

>> You don't do it

82:00

>> and you get

82:01

>> Yeah. less good at it.

82:02

>> Able to do it, right? Yeah.

82:03

>> So when we start thinking about energy

82:05

and I started talking about like hidden

82:06

visible stressors, right? I'm looking

82:08

for constraints. Do you have an

82:11

undiagnosed pathogen in your body? We

82:13

have a major league baseball player.

82:16

Felt horrific. I'm talking like can't

82:18

make it through a baseball game. Legs

82:20

are shot. No energy whatsoever. In his

82:24

particular case, we were able to confirm

82:26

in his blood, in his physical bedroom,

82:30

and with a bunch of other tests for

82:32

actually you test his eyes and you test

82:34

a bunch of other stuff. He had a very

82:36

gnarly exposure to mold.

82:38

>> Oh yeah.

82:39

>> All we had to do in large part was get

82:42

that cleared and his energy came back.

82:44

That's an example of a hidden stressor.

82:46

But one of the things we're always

82:47

looking for is are you an energy

82:48

toxicity? Meaning, are you eating too

82:50

many calories, which is not the same as

82:52

being obese, or are you in low energy

82:55

availability? You're sleeping fine, but

82:57

you're of low energy.

83:00

Are you eating enough calories? Oh,

83:01

you're not. Like, we have to go no

83:03

further on this train. You are

83:04

underfueled for what you're asking. So,

83:07

there's things that are hidden stressors

83:08

like that. There are visible stressors,

83:11

which we just talked about. Like, you're

83:12

not actually doing the thing. Another

83:13

easy way to explain this is cognitively.

83:16

If you want to write a book and you

83:19

don't currently write and you sit down

83:21

to write, it's going to be exhausting.

83:23

>> Mhm.

83:24

>> And then you talk to a writer and

83:25

there's like, oh yeah, like I I need 45

83:27

minutes so I can crank out a thousand

83:28

words.

83:29

>> Mhm.

83:29

>> It's like not exhausting at all. Right.

83:31

Stress inoculation. This is exactly what

83:32

you said before. You can build up

83:34

endurance in those things by them.

83:37

>> This is one of the things I've learned

83:38

from this podcast and meeting all these

83:40

exceptional people is um this like use

83:42

it or lose it principle.

83:43

>> Oh yeah. you know, because I'm getting

83:45

older and you start to feel the odd

83:46

pain,

83:47

>> you know, and so you start to like not

83:49

use that part, you know, your back for

83:51

example.

83:52

>> Yeah.

83:52

>> Or bending down and so you find ways to

83:55

not bend down properly so you can avoid

83:57

the pain.

83:58

>> And what's happening there is because

83:59

something is difficult, you do it less,

84:01

which then means it becomes more

84:03

difficult. So you do it less and there's

84:04

this downward feedback loop to decline.

84:07

>> Atrophy leads to atrophy.

84:09

>> Yeah. And like, you know, I think the

84:10

critical idea that got in my head a

84:12

couple of years ago from someone I was

84:13

interviewing on the podcast was that

84:16

aging isn't always the excuse. And I

84:18

think we assume it's just aging so we

84:21

accept it and we don't fight back.

84:23

>> When I sat here with one of the

84:25

exceptional PhDs that I interviewed, she

84:27

showed me I think it was a DEXA scan of

84:29

a 70-year-old.

84:30

>> It was like a pentathlete and then a

84:33

DEXA scan of someone that was like 30

84:34

years old. And this 70-year-old was just

84:38

phenomenal. Yeah. Their their sort of

84:40

bone, their muscle, etc. And she

84:41

basically proved to me. I'll put up the

84:43

scan on the screen. It really is a

84:44

mind-blowing scan. I've actually sent it

84:45

to my best friends because it really did

84:47

I couldn't I couldn't get this idea out

84:48

of my head that actually don't accept

84:50

everything as an aging problem because

84:51

the minute you do, you go on this

84:53

downward cycle. And it blew my mind. And

84:55

that was such an important idea to get

84:56

in my head at my age at 30 years old. So

84:58

when I feel like a pain in my back, my

85:00

my solution isn't, oh, okay, Stephen,

85:02

you're getting older. stop bending down

85:04

and protect the pain. It is go to the

85:06

gym and start squatting and bending etc.

85:09

There are some things that will go down

85:10

with age. Sleep is actually one of them.

85:13

We typically just see you will sleep a

85:15

little bit less as you age. Fine. There

85:17

are some aspects of that but I think you

85:19

can resist and fight as much of that as

85:20

possible. This is actually you're seeing

85:23

a turning of a tide right now that just

85:25

starting to emerge with longevity.

85:28

longevity is currently being positioned

85:30

as this anti-aging

85:32

phenomenon and people are already bored.

85:36

Like, is your goal to just not age or is

85:39

your goal to dunk a basketball at 70? Do

85:42

you want to have the 4x4 truck that has

85:45

the best off-road package ever and it

85:48

stays in your garage? Probably not,

85:51

right? like you want to be able to be

85:52

like no you you want to live

85:56

because you want to experience life and

85:59

so then you want to be able to take

86:00

advantage of those capacities and

86:02

functionality.

86:03

>> Yeah. Someone said to me you want to

86:04

extend your health span not necessarily

86:05

your lifespan.

86:06

>> It's not health span though.

86:07

>> Oh really?

86:08

>> No that's what I'm that's what I'm

86:09

pushing back on. Hell span cool. I mean

86:11

lifespan fine great. We're all past

86:13

that. Health span though is still like I

86:15

don't want to be in pain. I don't want

86:16

to be I'm saying performance span. I'm

86:20

saying I want you to be focused on

86:22

having the most skill. I want you to

86:25

just be crushing cognitively. I want you

86:28

to be able to do anything you want

86:29

physically for as long as we possibly

86:31

can. And not just being like, well,

86:33

that's going to go away. Let's just stay

86:35

alive and be out of pain. I want you to

86:37

be thinking about, no, like, I'm going

86:39

to be doing awesome stuff in whatever

86:41

venue you like to do it in for as long

86:44

as you possibly can.

86:44

>> I think people want both.

86:46

>> Yeah, of course.

86:47

>> Yeah. But let's not for let's just not

86:49

leave that end of the table off and

86:50

assume the performance has to go away.

86:54

>> So on this point of energy then I think

86:55

we've we've covered a lot of it and

86:57

given me some sort of like really

86:58

actionable principles there for how to

87:00

have more energy. I do notice I have to

87:03

say cuz I travel quite a lot and so on

87:05

on occasion my gym routine will be

87:08

impacted

87:09

>> and there's quite a clear correlation

87:10

for me between the amount of times I've

87:12

gone to the gym in previous weeks

87:14

>> Yeah. and how I feel in terms of energy

87:16

today. I was thinking about this this

87:18

morning. We're in New York here and over

87:20

the last couple of weeks, I've probably

87:21

been going to the gym like three or four

87:23

like three times a week if I'm being

87:24

honest. Whereas usually I'd go almost

87:27

every day and I have felt a difference

87:29

in my energy. And I wasn't sure if that

87:30

was just like psychological or if that

87:32

was supported by science.

87:33

>> Both. If you go and do a a moderate to

87:36

to light lower intensity exercise

87:39

session, those are generally going to

87:40

provide energy. Mhm.

87:41

>> If you're like, "No, I did a like to the

87:43

death training. I I pegged it. I went

87:45

all the way." Whatever that is, whether

87:46

you're lifting weights, intensity,

87:47

whether you're getting your heart rate

87:49

all the way up, then you might walk out

87:50

of those and be like, "Woo, I'm

87:52

exhausted." But on aggregate, those will

87:55

provide more daily energy. If you're

87:57

traveling, sick, super busy, do the

88:01

former. Like, just get in some motion.

88:03

You'll feel better. You'll get a sweat

88:04

in. You there. If you're healthy and

88:06

looking for long-term adaptation, then

88:08

that's when you can start to push the

88:10

pace on the training.

88:12

>> I want to speak to the business owners

88:13

listening and watching right now. I know

88:15

what it's like to be personally

88:16

responsible for every decision. I

88:18

founded my first company at 21 years

88:19

old, and honestly, the pressure can be

88:22

immense. It's the kind of mental load

88:24

that takes its toll below the surface. I

88:26

recently did some tests through our

88:27

sponsor, Function, which got me thinking

88:29

about that invisible impact. I found

88:31

that I had low levels of omega-3s. I had

88:35

deficient levels of vitamin D, probably

88:37

because I sit inside this dark room all

88:39

day. And that has totally changed how I

88:42

construct my day going forward. I get up

88:43

in the morning and the first thing I now

88:45

do is I go for a walk outside in the

88:46

sunshine. In part to help my vitamin D

88:48

levels increase, but also because it

88:50

helps to reset my circadian rhythm. With

88:52

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watches our show, but you haven't yet

89:28

hit that button. Thank you so much.

89:30

>> Speaking of training, you know what this

89:32

is, don't you?

89:32

>> Sure.

89:33

>> This is a a grip strength machine.

89:36

>> Yeah.

89:36

>> A lot of people told me that um grip

89:39

strength is the single biggest predictor

89:41

of I think they said like longevity and

89:43

stuff like that.

89:44

>> I wouldn't call it the number one

89:45

predictor of mortality. It is a really

89:47

nice scientific test. late 1980s,

89:51

Stephen Blair and his team started

89:52

looking at giant databases and started

89:55

to realize that cardiovascular fitness,

89:58

V2 max, V2 peak, things like this were

90:01

predicting how long people were going to

90:02

live.

90:04

And in fact, they started to realize it

90:05

was out predicting what we call

90:07

traditional clinical markers, blood

90:09

pressure, your cholesterol levels,

90:10

things like that. And this launched an

90:13

entire 45 year field that we're in now,

90:16

which is like, wait a minute, these

90:18

performance-based markers are actually

90:21

predicting health more than these

90:23

indirect markers.

90:25

The unfortunate problem is that got like

90:27

too taken too far. And so when you hear

90:30

things like people and my colleagues who

90:32

have been on your show and said things

90:33

like, "Oh, grip strength is an important

90:35

predictor of mortality." It's good. It's

90:36

great. It's an important message. But we

90:38

have to be careful in being lost in what

90:40

that means. Getting a grip strength

90:42

device like that, which is probably

90:44

under $40 is amazing. And what you will

90:48

see consistently is those people that

90:49

are really, really, really weak,

90:51

are in worse health on average. Where we

90:54

come become false is saying, okay,

90:56

therefore, you need to alter your

90:58

lifestyle to maximize grip strength.

91:00

>> I did do my grip strength results

91:02

actually.

91:03

>> Do you remember how they were?

91:04

>> It was they was it was good. It was uh

91:06

it was high. You know what that tells me

91:08

about your health? Well,

91:09

>> nothing.

91:09

>> Okay.

91:10

>> Why wouldn't it be high? You're young.

91:11

You're fit. I have all those other

91:12

markers. It's not going to tell us

91:13

anything. You know, these things are

91:15

really powerful. Somebody who doesn't

91:16

have blood work or doesn't have a body

91:19

composition test or doesn't have

91:20

anything else. It can give us a crude

91:22

strength or a crude metric. Let's say

91:25

this person's probably at a health risk.

91:28

So, I've always been quite confused by

91:30

this because is grip strength a proxy

91:32

for my overall strength of my entire

91:35

body and therefore it's just indicating

91:37

that my overall strength is low or is it

91:40

actually like my arm?

91:41

>> It's both.

91:42

>> Oh, okay.

91:42

>> It's both. Here's why. You know what

91:44

you're really testing right there?

91:45

>> What's that?

91:46

>> Ner nervous system.

91:48

>> Oh, really?

91:48

>> You're testing your brain.

91:50

>> So, you're not testing your strength as

91:51

much.

91:51

>> You are,

91:52

>> but it's both.

91:53

>> There's an overlap. Mhm.

91:54

>> That's why your grip strength does it

91:56

indicate general poor health? Yes.

91:58

>> That's the value. Does it tell you

92:01

anything directly about your It can. And

92:04

so this is when you see two camps here.

92:06

So camp one is like great, I'm going to

92:08

open up a gym down the street and it's

92:10

going to test your grip strength and

92:11

then we're going to focus all of your

92:12

training on grip strength training. That

92:14

is we've exaggerated the point. The

92:16

other camp is it doesn't matter. It's

92:18

all indirect. That's not true either. is

92:20

an actionable, useful thing where you

92:22

don't need to worry about us optimizing

92:24

maxing it. Like I if you're in the 80th

92:26

percentile, going to the 90th percentile

92:28

probably doesn't make you live a day

92:29

longer. Over the last probably 3 years,

92:32

I would imagine there's over 20 to 25

92:35

studies that have been published on a

92:36

very specific type of grip strength, and

92:38

that's grip strength asymmetry.

92:40

Do you know why that matters?

92:42

>> I don't, but I know that I'm I'm

92:44

stronger on my left side than my right.

92:45

>> It's not uncommon. Um, typically your

92:48

force dependent limb is not your neural

92:50

control limb. So you write right-handed

92:52

because you have to have fine motor

92:54

control.

92:54

>> Okay.

92:55

>> Gross strength can be in the opposite

92:56

side.

92:57

>> Go like this. You know, keep it in here.

92:59

Don't touch your arm to the table at

93:00

all. Keep it 90° like that. Yep. And

93:03

then you're just going to squeeze, you

93:05

know, one good effort as hard as you

93:06

can.

93:08

>> All right. Don't blow out now.

93:11

>> All right. Let's see.

93:12

>> Oh gosh, my head nearly exploded.

93:16

130. So you're you're above average. So

93:19

>> can I try this side as well?

93:20

>> Yeah.

93:21

>> This is my So this is my weaker.

93:22

>> All right. Here we go.

93:23

>> My weaker hand.

93:24

>> All right. You got to beat it though.

93:25

Now

93:27

>> gosh, it's a bit slippery.

93:31

>> I think you did.

93:31

>> Did I beat it?

93:32

>> Oh my god. Wow. 160.

93:35

>> No, you're joking.

93:36

>> 160. Not the

93:39

lot crunching there.

93:42

>> 130.

93:43

>> Okay. Okay. On that side

93:44

>> and your left side.

93:45

>> Let's see.

93:51

>> 110.

93:52

>> Crossing, man. That's really good.

93:54

>> But it what it taught me is that it's

93:55

not it doesn't correlate to overall

93:56

strength because Jeff is definitely

93:57

stronger than me.

93:58

>> For sure. For sure. Yeah. I mean, it's a

93:59

very specific type of strength, right?

94:01

So, the asymmetry actually matters

94:03

because most of the work in that area is

94:05

in groups with neurological disease. So,

94:08

you're trying to look at early

94:09

predictions of Alzheimer's, Parkinson's,

94:10

and things like that. which ties into my

94:13

earlier point is it is not simply an

94:15

overall proxy of your health. It can

94:17

tell us direct things like nerve

94:19

denervation

94:20

and overall neurological health. So it

94:23

to me is a it's a great tool but what we

94:26

don't want to do then is optimize

94:30

for that.

94:30

>> What is a better marker of my overall

94:31

health?

94:32

>> There's not a single marker that will

94:34

tell you everything.

94:35

>> What about muscle power?

94:36

>> Muscle power is great as well.

94:38

>> What is that?

94:38

>> Power is defined as force multiplied by

94:40

velocity. So if I

94:42

>> Yeah.

94:43

>> If I throw this

94:44

>> Yeah.

94:45

>> Do you want to throw it?

94:46

>> Go ahead.

94:46

>> Okay. Put your hand on there.

94:48

>> Yeah. Yeah.

94:49

>> Yeah. Great.

94:50

>> Is that Is that muscle power?

94:52

>> That wasn't much power because you did

94:54

it slow.

94:54

>> Okay.

94:55

>> So, think about it this way. This is uh

94:58

12 kilos, right? 12 kilos. I don't know.

95:01

Pounds. Kilos. That is mass. Kilos.

95:05

Pounds is a unit of mass. Force. That's

95:08

what you think when you think of

95:09

strength. That's force.

95:11

Force is defined as F= ma. It's mass

95:13

times acceleration is force. Okay? So

95:15

it's the mass multiplied by how you can

95:18

how well you can accelerate it. Power

95:21

is your force multiplied by your

95:22

velocity. So here's the difference. If I

95:25

were to take this 12 pounds of mass or

95:27

12 kilos and hand it to you slowly.

95:29

>> Mhm.

95:30

>> Okay. That is an expression of 12 pounds

95:33

of force is how we'll think about it.

95:34

Now if you hand it back to me the exact

95:36

same speed that is the same amount of

95:38

newtons of force. How I create power is

95:40

now I do that same thing with speed.

95:42

Ready?

95:44

>> So there are two ways you can get more

95:46

powerful. More force, more velocity.

95:50

>> You would use an implement like that

95:51

because you're trying to say give me a

95:52

little bit of mass but you can obviously

95:54

lift more than 12 kilos. But now I'm

95:57

going to emphasize the velocity into the

95:59

spectrum. Where people make the mistake

96:01

in training for power is if you go slow,

96:04

the mass is too light to do anything. So

96:06

you don't get stronger and you don't get

96:09

faster. Why this matters in the current

96:11

conversation is you see power and what

96:15

some people will call call things like

96:17

powerpenia.

96:19

So the the term that we've been using

96:21

for a long time is sarcopenia and this

96:23

is the the accelerated loss of muscle

96:25

and probably muscle strength with aging.

96:28

You're going to drop some but sarcopenia

96:30

is are you dropping faster than you

96:32

should? And now there's a turn of

96:34

scientific attention to powerpenia,

96:36

which is are you losing the power faster

96:39

than you should be losing power. That

96:41

matters because it is everything from

96:43

prevention of fall,

96:45

>> catching yourself when you slip to be

96:47

able to move and accelerate quickly. And

96:49

so you see that thing that stuff highly

96:51

associated with breaking of bones uh

96:55

fractures, dislocations

96:58

which are incredibly impactful to health

97:00

especially post age 60 or 65.

97:04

>> I think a lot of people listening and me

97:06

too. So I guess one of the questions we

97:09

have as it relates to the gym and

97:11

working out is we often think that in

97:13

order to get better results in the gym

97:15

and you can define that however you want

97:17

to. fat loss, muscle gain, whatever,

97:19

strength,

97:20

>> we need to go more often.

97:22

And I was curious, someone who spends so

97:25

long with athletes,

97:27

is that a bit of a myth? Because even my

97:29

even me, I'm thinking, well, if I want

97:30

better results in the gym, I probably

97:32

just need to I'm currently going three

97:34

or four days a week. I need to go back

97:35

to going six or seven days a week to get

97:36

better results.

97:37

>> You could go either way. It is generally

97:39

true that if you train more, you give

97:42

yourself more opportunity to create

97:44

stress, which is more opportunity to

97:46

create adaptation.

97:48

But that said, depending on the marker,

97:50

the answer here could range from yes to

97:52

no. Let's use muscle growth as an

97:54

example. As long as you hit the same

97:58

volume throughout the week, the amount

98:01

of times you go to the gym doesn't

98:03

matter that much in theory.

98:05

>> Volume. How much load did you lift? How

98:09

many times

98:10

>> does time period matter? I.e. if I

98:12

lifted four weights in 1 hour versus

98:15

lifting four weights in 20 minutes.

98:17

>> No, because now all you've changed is

98:19

really the rest in between.

98:20

>> Yeah. Does that matter? It does in the

98:22

sense that if you take a short rest

98:25

interval and that leads to excessive

98:28

fatigue accumulation and then that

98:30

compromises how heavy you can lift or

98:32

how many reps you can do or how many

98:33

sets you can do. That will have

98:35

compromised your volume.

98:36

>> Wait, so cuz everyone talks about taking

98:39

shorter rests in the gym to build more

98:42

muscles.

98:42

>> Not consistent with the evidence.

98:44

>> Really?

98:44

>> Yep. But this is this is the game you're

98:47

playing at all times, right?

98:49

Who has the time to wait two and a half

98:51

minutes between every set? You're going

98:52

to be in the gym for an hour and a half.

98:54

>> A lot of people are on their phones.

98:56

>> Totally. And then because of that,

98:58

they're like, I got to get out of here.

98:59

So they do half the amount of stuff,

99:00

they leave cuz they're out of time. So

99:03

the battle is in an isolated world,

99:08

if you were to probably spend 60 to 90

99:11

seconds or maybe up to two minutes

99:12

resting in between each set, generally

99:14

you recover enough to have a higher

99:16

quality set the next one. So, is that

99:18

the most important thing to be

99:19

optimizing for is the high making sure

99:21

the next rep you do is high quality?

99:23

>> In my world, quality is always number

99:25

one.

99:26

>> So, you're saying take a bigger break as

99:28

long as you can recover and are more

99:31

strong for the next rep.

99:33

>> As long as it doesn't put you in a

99:35

position where you're in the gym so long

99:37

that you won't do all the stuff you

99:38

needed to do.

99:39

>> But in a world where you had unlimited

99:41

time

99:42

>> really

99:42

>> generally

99:43

>> depends on what adaptation we're working

99:44

for. If we're working on endurance, then

99:47

we don't necessarily have to do that.

99:48

>> Okay?

99:48

>> But if we're working on speed or skill

99:51

or flexibility or balance or muscle

99:53

growth or fat loss, now we have options.

99:55

So depending on the outcome you're

99:57

looking for, you have tools. I I think

99:58

the biggest point we want to make here

100:00

is

100:01

where the field struggles right now is

100:05

making a little bit of information get

100:07

in the way of motivation.

100:11

If you're going to the gym three days a

100:12

week, I'm clapping.

100:15

done. Like, we're winning. I don't want

100:18

you to hear messages and go, "Oh, I'm

100:20

doing it all wrong. I'm not going to get

100:22

any results. I'm tanking my metabolism.

100:25

I'm breaking my hormones." That's the

100:27

that drives us nuts. You're

100:29

motivated. It's hard enough to get to

100:31

the gym and when you get there to try

100:33

really hard. We've gotten over the hill.

100:36

Now, if you're past that point, we could

100:37

start tinkering with some things. But I

100:38

hate it when people leave conversations

100:40

like this and go, "Oh, did you know that

100:42

if you don't rest more than 60 seconds

100:45

that you're not getting anything?"

100:47

That's not true. So, we can get like

100:50

upgrades, but in general, I think most

100:53

people quality should be the biggest

100:56

thing you pay attention to because this

100:57

is going to reduce your likelihood of

100:58

injury. And there's even evidence that

101:01

whether you're trying to get stronger or

101:04

grow muscle,

101:05

the quality of the repetition as defined

101:07

by your technique, as defined by your

101:11

range of motion, as defined by your

101:13

intent, as defined by what we call your

101:15

mind muscle connection. So like are if

101:18

you're trying to contract your shoulder,

101:20

are you really contracting your should

101:21

like all these things start to matter.

101:23

And so what you'll see happen is you can

101:25

get more results

101:28

with less work and shorter time because

101:31

each individual repetition is of a

101:33

higher quality and a more focused

101:35

intent.

101:36

>> I mean this might be a good time to just

101:38

quickly take a I mean everyone's talking

101:41

about creatine at the bloody moment. Do

101:42

you have your athletes taking it?

101:43

>> Yeah, of course

101:44

>> you do.

101:44

>> Yeah, everybody.

101:46

>> Do you take it?

101:46

>> Yeah.

101:47

>> What do you take? What's in your

101:48

supplement stack? my personal supplement

101:50

stack.

101:52

Same with all of our clients and

101:53

athletes. There's two things. Correct

101:55

physiology, performance enhancement.

101:58

Totally separate categories. Correct

102:00

physiological

102:02

deficiencies are, in your case, your

102:04

vitamin D. What is low, what is high,

102:06

what is off track based on blood work,

102:08

right? We try to solve this through

102:10

food. But what this often time looks

102:12

like is a high quality multivitamin,

102:15

oftentimes fish oil. Now you have

102:17

performance accelerators on the other

102:19

side of that equation. This is when

102:20

creatine can come in. If I'm traveling,

102:23

I'm going to take things like fiber,

102:26

right? Because it's harder to get

102:28

vegetables when you travel. You probably

102:30

know this, but airplanes, airports,

102:32

restaurants, like vegetables are nowhere

102:34

to be found. And so I know those are

102:36

going to be a struggle. I'm going to

102:37

take fiber there. I'm generally not

102:39

taking it as much when I'm home because

102:40

I can control my diet. Performance

102:43

enhancers are things like creatine, are

102:45

things like beta alanine, sodium

102:47

bicarbonate. So depending on what

102:49

fitness training goal I have at the

102:50

moment, I'm going to alter those based

102:52

on if I'm looking for muscle growth or

102:53

endurance or

102:55

>> What are you taking right now?

102:56

>> Zero.

102:57

>> Zero vitamin D like this week.

102:59

>> No. No. Summertime.

103:01

>> Okay.

103:02

>> I live in I live in the forest.

103:03

>> Omega-3.

103:04

>> Nope.

103:06

>> Why?

103:06

>> I got full control of my diet and we got

103:08

a lot of fish right now. So we are good

103:10

there. I also have I'm fortunate I get

103:14

to harvest my own meat and one of the

103:16

things you'll see pretty consistently is

103:18

even in red meat sources they're higher

103:21

in a lot of nutrients wild caught versus

103:23

unw wild. So we're in a pretty good plus

103:27

I have my blood work I know where my

103:29

omega-3 numbers are. So I'm going to get

103:30

there if I don't have to take those

103:32

things I don't.

103:32

>> A lot of people I imagine come to you

103:34

for with weight loss goals whether

103:35

they're trying to cut weight for a a

103:37

fight or if it's just mom and pop

103:39

looking to lose a few pounds. What are

103:40

the big misconceptions about weight

103:43

loss?

103:44

>> Yeah, it's the magic of it, right? It's

103:46

the there's one specific element you

103:49

can't eat or one way you have to train

103:51

or can't train. That is the the biggest

103:54

misconception around fat loss. The

103:56

specificity. It is

104:00

categorically quite simple to lose fat.

104:03

It's practically hard. It's difficult

104:06

human endeavor, but categorically it's

104:08

incredibly simple. We only have a few

104:09

things we have to do and now you have a

104:12

billion choices of how to get there. So

104:14

if you are the type of person who

104:17

struggles with moderation,

104:20

then I'm not going to give you

104:21

moderation.

104:22

>> Moderation of calories

104:23

>> could be or exercise or environment. Do

104:28

you know the difference between baking

104:30

and cooking?

104:31

>> Uh yeah, I guess so. Conceptually,

104:33

>> baking is chemistry.

104:35

>> Okay.

104:35

>> You mix something together and put in

104:36

the oven. You can't just fake the

104:38

amounts

104:39

>> because it won't rise, it won't set, it

104:41

won't do the things, right? If you're

104:43

cooking on a stove and you could just be

104:46

like, "Okay, what's in the

104:48

>> fridge? Put it in there."

104:49

>> You can't do that in baking, right?

104:51

Depending on what you're baking. We will

104:53

address this fat loss problem with

104:54

trying to identify, are you a cook or

104:57

are you a baker personality type? Here's

105:00

what I mean. If you came to me and we

105:01

were going to help you lose some fat,

105:02

you're already pretty lean, but let's

105:03

say you wanted to just get super lean.

105:05

All right, great. I would I first

105:07

question I would ask you is how do you

105:08

want this to operate? You get one of two

105:10

ways.

105:12

One way is I tell you exactly what to

105:15

eat. You weigh and measure every single

105:17

thing. You do not deviate. You check

105:20

your weight every single day and you

105:22

follow exactly

105:24

what I tell you. The other option is I

105:26

give you concepts. We have one to three

105:28

rules. You're going to check weight

105:31

maybe daily, maybe once a week. And I

105:34

want you to stay airtight to those

105:35

concepts.

105:36

>> I prefer the concepts.

105:37

>> Concepts. Great. Concepts or cooking.

105:40

>> Okay.

105:42

>> Baking,

105:43

weigh and measure everything. Right.

105:45

Here's why this matters. You're a

105:47

concept kind of guy. Why? You do not

105:49

want to be thinking about all that

105:51

little stuff cuz you got other stuff

105:52

you'd rather be thinking about, right?

105:54

>> It's great because it's freeing.

105:57

You know, the downside is

105:59

if you don't know exactly what's in your

106:01

food and you don't have a really good

106:03

eye in calibration, someone like you

106:05

might have a hard time losing fat

106:06

because you're already at the end. We

106:09

need to be weighing that olive oil. We

106:11

need to be measuring that rice cup. We

106:12

can't just be like, a little bit of rice

106:14

over there, right? If you're trying to

106:15

lose a 100 pounds,

106:17

we can probably eyeball a lot of things

106:19

and get really, really far.

106:20

>> Yeah.

106:21

>> But personality type is what I'm really

106:22

getting at here. Okay.

106:25

If I gave that concept to some people

106:28

listening, some people would be going

106:32

like like how many meals am I eating? Um

106:34

like what's what's the fiber? Like they

106:36

want the detail, right?

106:37

>> What's the what's the concept?

106:39

>> The concept could be something like

106:40

>> give me an example of a

106:41

>> I want you eating fresh vegetables at

106:44

every meal and I want you to have a

106:46

dedicated protein source every time you

106:48

eat.

106:49

>> Okay,

106:49

>> that might be the only rule I give you.

106:52

Well,

106:52

>> could it be an eating window? Could be.

106:54

Sure. I could say, "Eat whatever you

106:56

want, but you're only going to eat

106:57

between these hours."

106:58

>> Okay?

106:58

>> I could do whatever kind of one to three

107:00

rules I want. I could say none of those

107:03

things and I'll just say, "All right,

107:05

just cut out all your junk food."

107:06

>> Okay?

107:07

>> I'm not going to tell you what to eat.

107:08

I'm just going to give you a list of

107:09

things not to eat. I could only give you

107:11

I prefer to do the opposite. Defer to

107:13

give you things rather than take things

107:14

away because you're going to take those

107:16

things away, right? So, I could play

107:17

with your meal timing. I could play with

107:20

your meal frequency. I could play with

107:21

your meal composition. So, what types of

107:23

food you're eating, the combinations of

107:25

them, I could do anything there. And why

107:28

all those work because those are simply

107:30

different strategies to likely reduce

107:33

food intake.

107:36

That's all that's all we're really

107:37

doing. But some people hate that because

107:39

it's not enough detail.

107:41

>> There's no specificity. There's no

107:43

precision. They get anxiety from

107:44

guessing. I've had plenty of athletes

107:46

before just be like, "Okay, but like 6

107:48

ounces of chicken or seven?" And I'm

107:49

like, "6.3." Like, "Okay." Like who

107:52

cares? Like it doesn't matter. But

107:53

they're just like they want they don't

107:54

want to make any decisions.

107:56

>> Mhm.

107:57

>> You have to make decisions about what

107:58

you're going to eat because you got only

107:59

have concepts. The nice part about the

108:02

way you measure is you have no choices.

108:03

>> I think the the average people listening

108:05

would rather have the concepts. Like

108:06

it's much easier for me to they they

108:09

busy lives. They don't want to be

108:10

weighing 6.3 g of so

108:12

>> so you'd be stunned.

108:14

Most people want that.

108:16

>> Most people want the

108:17

>> they want the detail because they don't

108:18

have to think. They don't have to guess.

108:20

They don't have to worry. They don't

108:21

have to go, "God, like maybe I ate too

108:22

much today. Maybe I didn't or whatever."

108:24

>> But that's like hard to measure.

108:26

>> Super hard. So, here's the

108:27

recommendation.

108:29

Do the baking approach first for two

108:31

weeks.

108:32

>> And by that, you mean measure

108:33

everything. Understand what's in it.

108:35

>> 100%. Then you can back off and start to

108:39

go, "Okay, I have a better sense of what

108:41

a tablespoon of peanut butter looks

108:43

like. I have a better sense of what a

108:44

cup of rice is.

108:46

>> I'm getting a better sense of what

108:49

>> 3 ounces of this is, whatever. now I can

108:51

start toning things back.

108:52

>> I think this is really great advice

108:53

because I think the big shifts that I've

108:55

seen in my own diet have have um been in

108:58

that exact order where for one

109:00

particular week I did it might be

109:02

calorie counting or it might have been

109:03

some of these apps where you can scan

109:05

the food by using the barcode

109:07

>> and it tells you what's inside there.

109:09

And through that it only took me a week

109:11

or two to discover that the things I ate

109:13

frequently weren't what I thought.

109:15

>> Yeah.

109:16

>> Both in quantity but also in like

109:17

nutritional profile. I think it's just

109:19

super important for as many people as

109:22

possible to spend at least a week doing

109:24

that.

109:25

>> And then I could make informed decisions

109:26

about what I wanted to keep and what I

109:29

actually didn't really like that much.

109:30

Anyway,

109:30

>> you know, I used to run this experiment

109:32

in class every year. These are graduate

109:34

students getting master's degrees in

109:37

this particular field and we would have

109:39

them do a seven-day diet recall. Just

109:41

measure weigh everything you eat for

109:43

seven days. Consistent themes that

109:45

popped up.

109:47

Almost everyone ate way more fat than

109:50

they think.

109:51

>> Is that a bad thing?

109:52

>> If you're eating more calories than you

109:54

need.

109:54

>> Oh, fat. So, it's the calories is the

109:56

problem versus the

109:56

>> That's not bad for you. And there's no

109:58

evil foods.

110:00

People ate way more carbohydrates than

110:02

they realized. Same answer. People ate

110:05

way less protein than I think.

110:06

>> What about sugar?

110:08

>> Everyone knows they're eating sugar.

110:09

where they're always stunned is they're

110:11

like, "Whoa, I thought I was eating a

110:15

small percentage, you know, 20% of my

110:17

calories from fat." They didn't realize

110:18

they're at 40%.

110:19

>> This is why the keto diet actually did

110:20

help me because it forced me to check

110:23

everything for a while.

110:24

>> So, this is great.

110:25

>> It was really learning. It was learning

110:27

what was in all these things that I

110:28

loved. And keto forced me. You know, the

110:31

the principle of a concept that I had

110:32

when I was on keto was that I could have

110:33

about 50 grams of carbs a day roughly

110:36

>> and stay in ketogenic keto ketosis

110:38

rather. Yeah. So I would think about it

110:39

like a budget. I'd be like, "Oh, hm, I'd

110:41

spend 23 carb, you know, grams of carbs

110:44

on this particular thing." But but to do

110:45

that, I had to look at everything,

110:47

research everything.

110:48

>> Yeah.

110:48

>> Um and now I have an intuitive idea.

110:50

>> Exactly. The point is simply your

110:52

awareness and consciousness of what is

110:53

actually

110:54

>> in the elements that you want. And then

110:55

if you want to change and tweak, you can

110:57

do that cuz you know, but if you don't

110:59

have the knowledge, you can't even play

111:01

the game.

111:01

>> What are the big misconceptions about

111:03

exercise's role in weight loss?

111:05

>> It is valuable. forever we've been

111:06

telling people burn more calories than

111:09

you ingest, right? And then then it's

111:11

still true. And then we had a bunch of

111:13

research pop out that was sort of like,

111:15

hey, exercise is not playing the role we

111:17

think it is in fat loss. And those data

111:19

still hold true in the sense that you

111:21

don't burn as many calories in your

111:22

workouts as you think. Most of the time,

111:24

if you hop on a piece of exercise

111:26

equipment and it tells you you burned x

111:27

amount of calories, you burned most

111:29

likely significantly less than that.

111:32

It's also true that there's there is

111:34

places where you can get to with

111:37

adaptive thermogenesis. Meaning if you

111:40

burn say 500 calories with exercise,

111:44

if you are lean enough or non-lean

111:47

enough or fit enough or not fit enough,

111:49

your body will change how many calories

111:51

it burns throughout the day in response

111:54

to that 500 calories from exercise.

111:55

Meaning, you could be in a situation

111:58

theoretically where you burned 500

112:00

calories in your workout, but then your

112:03

body downregulated your energy

112:05

expenditure by three or four or even up

112:09

to 500 calories

112:10

>> to make up for it. So, it was

112:12

>> you're neutral.

112:13

>> Okay.

112:13

>> When you're lean like that, that can

112:16

happen quite often, right? And so then

112:17

what do you do? You pull more calories.

112:20

You train harder. You get a more of a

112:22

response. This is a like oh okay calorie

112:25

counting doesn't matter like it

112:26

absolutely matters may not be the

112:28

strategy you want but it matters there.

112:31

So then there was a big push of like

112:33

exercise is playing no role in fat loss

112:36

which was fundamentally also not true

112:38

because now we have meta analyses in the

112:41

recent years as well as more studies

112:42

showing probably the fairest way to say

112:44

it is exercise is a fantastic way to

112:48

burn some calories. It is not the only

112:51

thing that you can do though to lose

112:55

weight. You can handle weight loss

112:56

entirely through nutrition if you want.

112:58

That said, people who exercise during

113:00

their weight loss journey consistently

113:02

are better at keeping that fat off over

113:06

the weeks to years at the end of the

113:08

diet.

113:08

>> You have a 54321 method. Oh,

113:12

>> sure. 54321 was is just a little thing I

113:14

came up with that says, "All right, can

113:15

we help people with fat loss rules? Five

113:18

days a week be active.

113:20

Now this can be exercise. It can be

113:23

walking. It can be your vocation. I

113:25

don't really care. But what was cons has

113:27

to happen with fat loss is you have to

113:30

be able to produce caloric expenditure

113:34

and you got to do a lot of it. This is

113:36

my way of saying be active. And also I'm

113:39

saying it's cool to take a rest day too.

113:41

Like it's totally fine to just veg. You

113:43

can do that. But be as active as you

113:45

possibly can. Then from there, I want

113:48

four days a week of structured exercise.

113:52

One of these days can be a super hard

113:54

day. It can be light. One of those days

113:56

could be a yoga day. Like not all four

114:00

days have to be head to the gym, volume

114:02

11, like train as hard as you can. But

114:05

four days a week where I want you doing

114:07

structured exercise, at least three days

114:09

a week, I want you training hard enough

114:11

to sweat. If you're doing all that,

114:14

you're active five days a week, you're

114:16

doing structured exercise four days a

114:18

week, three of those sessions, you're

114:19

doing it hard enough where you're

114:20

getting a really good solid sweat,

114:22

you're probably doing enough to burn

114:25

enough calories to give yourself a

114:27

chance from the exercise perspective

114:29

um to losing weight. If you've done

114:32

those first three, we could even we

114:33

could even just call it the 543. Like,

114:35

you're in a pretty good spot. If you

114:37

mean more granular, I would love a

114:38

couple of days a week of strength

114:40

training and I would love at least one

114:42

day where your heart rate's getting

114:43

really, really, really high.

114:45

>> So, a lot of people, including myself,

114:47

often think, you know, I'm going to the

114:48

gym 3 4 days a week, but nothing's

114:50

changing. I feel like I've stagnated.

114:52

>> Yeah.

114:53

>> What is going on there? Typically,

114:55

>> typical solutions for this are lack of

114:57

focus. And I don't mean in your

114:59

training. I mean in your programming.

115:01

So, if you are looking at your program

115:02

saying, I'm going to the gym 3 or 4 days

115:04

a week. First question would be, okay,

115:06

what type of training program are you

115:08

on?

115:08

>> I'm kind of just winging it.

115:09

>> That's why.

115:10

>> Okay.

115:11

>> If I said the same thing to you and gave

115:12

you any business analogy here, you would

115:14

look at me in the face and smile. I'd be

115:15

like, you have a plan. Why would you

115:18

expect without a plan to get to any

115:21

particular direction?

115:21

>> It's a good point.

115:22

>> 80% of the time, that's the answer. Now,

115:24

here's the thing, and we have literature

115:26

on this. There's good evidence. The plan

115:29

itself isn't the biggest factor. It's

115:33

actually just having a plan.

115:35

>> Interesting.

115:36

>> Because you have the ability to

115:37

progressively overload.

115:39

>> What does that mean?

115:39

>> Meaning you were able to increase your

115:42

number of repetitions than you did last

115:43

week. You can do a few more sets than

115:45

you did. You can increase the load. You

115:48

can increase the range of motion.

115:49

There's all kinds of ways that we can

115:51

overload the system progressively. You

115:55

can't do all that.

115:55

>> This is, you know, I think this is

115:56

really the heart of it, which is most of

115:58

us go to the gym and we do the same

115:59

thing.

116:00

>> Totally.

116:00

>> We do the same thing we did last week.

116:01

We put the the stair master machine on

116:04

level eight and we do 10 minutes. And we

116:06

did that for the last 7 months.

116:08

>> Yeah.

116:08

>> Whereas we should really just put it up

116:10

one. But in order to do that, we kind of

116:11

need a plan as you say

116:12

>> because you can't just go up one every

116:14

time.

116:14

>> Yeah.

116:15

>> Like how many how many weeks in a row

116:16

can you add 5 lbs?

116:19

>> Three, four. Like it's not going to be

116:20

very long. This is the entire reason

116:22

exercise is a scientific field, right?

116:24

We have that. So my strong

116:26

recommendation would be if you're a

116:28

absolute beginner and you're not going

116:30

to the gym at all, you're not doing

116:31

anything, you can probably use AI tools

116:35

and give you some basic starting

116:36

program. In fact, I people send these

116:38

things all the time to me be like, "Hey,

116:40

I prompted my thing with like all of

116:42

your content and I have a complete

116:45

personalized training program from Andy

116:47

Galpin." I'm like, "Great." And I look

116:49

at them, I'm like, "Pretty good." Like,

116:51

"All right, that's pretty reasonable."

116:53

And it's they're good enough to get you

116:54

started. They're going to get you the

116:55

basics. They're going to get you going

116:56

and then you have something to follow

116:58

for six, eight, 10 weeks, whatever.

117:01

>> Let me ask AI for Andy Galpins.

117:05

>> Put in your constraints. Tell it how

117:06

many days a week.

117:07

>> Okay, let's do it like so everyone can

117:08

hear.

117:10

Hi. Um, I want to go to the gym 4 days a

117:13

week and I want Andy Galpin's formula

117:16

for me to gain muscle, but what are the

117:20

principles that I need to apply based on

117:23

Andy Galpin's work over the next 4

117:25

months in order to gain this muscle?

117:27

>> To gain muscle in strength over the next

117:29

4 months, you'll want to focus on a few

117:31

key principles from Dr. Galpin's work.

117:34

First, prioritize progressive overload

117:36

by gradually increasing the weight,

117:38

reps, or sets over time. Second, use a

117:41

variety of repetition ranges,

117:43

incorporating both heavy low rep work

117:45

for strength and moderate to high rep

117:47

work for muscle growth. Finally, ensure

117:49

you're taking adequate rest between

117:51

sets, usually two to 5 minutes for heavy

117:54

compound movements to allow for full

117:55

recovery and maintain high quality

117:57

effort.

117:59

Pretty good. That's not There's a little

118:00

bit of hallucination in there, which is

118:02

AI, but that's pretty close.

118:04

>> A lot of people aren't doing this now,

118:06

aren't they? using AI is like the

118:08

>> we saw a huge pendulum in the last 5

118:09

years. 2020 almost ended health and

118:13

fitness.

118:15

Gyms went out of business. Everyone went

118:17

home. Everyone bought their exercise

118:18

equipment. And as soon as AI came

118:20

online, online coaching tanked and

118:22

online companies got crippled cuz

118:25

everyone was like, "Why am I going to

118:26

pay you a hundred bucks a month, 200

118:27

bucks a month, 300 bucks a month for

118:29

that?"

118:30

>> And they were right. It's going the

118:32

exact opposite now. It's already swung

118:34

back. In-person training is way more in

118:37

demand.

118:37

>> I'm not surprised

118:38

>> because

118:39

>> everyone's tired of that.

118:40

>> It's also personal trainers don't just

118:42

tell you what to do. No,

118:43

>> they make sure you do it, you know? So,

118:45

>> how do I do it? It's the emotion. It's

118:47

the connection.

118:48

>> It's the emotion. It's the connection.

118:49

It's the like holding me accountable.

118:51

>> So, what you're seeing is people going,

118:54

"It was never about the information."

118:55

>> Yeah. We always had the information.

118:57

>> We always had it. Nothing in that

118:59

>> I made up.

119:00

>> Yeah. That stuff's been around for like

119:03

it's funny. Every time I talk about like

119:04

exercise prescription, somebody will hit

119:06

the comments and be like, "Why don't you

119:07

give credit to blah blah blah? They're

119:08

the one that invented that." And I'm

119:09

like, "None of us invented this stuff."

119:12

>> Mhm.

119:13

>> Dumbbells, barbells, like rep rang. This

119:14

is

119:16

It's not the information. It's never

119:17

been it.

119:18

>> So, what is it then? Like, why why do

119:20

people keep listening to these

119:22

conversations when they kind of a lot of

119:24

them kind of know the stuff? I don't

119:25

know what's happening on your platform,

119:27

but a lot of people are not listening to

119:30

podcasts anymore because you're going to

119:32

see this probably in the comments

119:33

section. Hey, Grock, tell me the 10

119:35

actionable things from this three-hour

119:36

conversation.

119:37

>> Cuz they just try and extract the data,

119:39

right?

119:39

>> Mhm.

119:40

>> And then they don't do anything. You

119:42

know who's going to take action from

119:43

this? The people who listened.

119:47

>> True. Yeah. Yeah. Because it's not it's

119:49

the it's not the information.

119:50

>> Yeah. In part in part it is the story.

119:52

And I say the story in particular

119:54

because one of the most compelling

119:55

things that we see on these podcasts is

119:57

when you tell me real case studies of

119:59

real people. You talk about what Jenny

120:01

did and you were training Jenny and she

120:02

had this thing and she was permenopause

120:04

and she did this thing with this thing

120:05

and da

120:06

>> and people go ah okay those stay with

120:08

me.

120:08

>> You know what I'm willing to pay for you

120:10

know what the world is willing to pay

120:11

for. Have you done it before?

120:14

>> Oh yeah. Yeah. True. Human experience

120:15

like lived experience. So when you see a

120:17

story, you're able to go, "Okay, I

120:20

believe that person's done it

120:22

>> and now I trust that opinion because I

120:23

could just go grab the program, right?"

120:25

The other thing is it's saving me time.

120:27

Like you could sit there and go, "Okay,

120:29

here's all the prompts and whatever,

120:30

throw it in there and get your own

120:32

training program." Or you could be like,

120:34

"Yo, I'm just going to go pay Andy. I

120:36

know he's done it before. I trust him

120:38

and now I'm going to go spend my time on

120:40

this other thing that I care about

120:41

learning about and spending my time on."

120:43

Are there any commonalities in the

120:45

catalyst moment that causes behavior

120:48

change in people who are otherwise

120:50

stubborn? So I think everyone that I I

120:52

sit with and just even myself there's a

120:54

there was a moment in my life where I

120:55

heard something or something happened

120:57

where I go Yeah.

120:58

>> And that was the day it was like a

121:00

before and after moment I call them that

121:01

was the day that I decided to take this

121:03

seriously.

121:04

>> Yeah.

121:04

>> And do you see any commonalities in what

121:06

that is for different people?

121:07

>> It's such a fabulous question and I

121:08

don't have a good answer for you

121:10

>> because it's always so different.

121:11

>> It's so hard. I would love to say

121:14

it was the rock bottom moment. I mean,

121:16

it can be true. It's not always true.

121:19

>> Can I suggest another

121:20

>> please?

121:20

>> Maybe like big life changes like kids,

121:24

>> death, friend, family, life becomes

121:26

real.

121:27

>> I've heard that a few times on this show

121:28

actually.

121:29

>> You'll see that. Um,

121:30

>> my dad had a heart attack and that's

121:31

crazy. The threat of death doesn't

121:33

motivate anybody,

121:35

>> right?

121:35

>> If it would have, we wouldn't have a 40%

121:37

obesity rate.

121:38

>> Yeah. Who doesn't know obesity tanks?

121:42

Everybody knows. It's not a information

121:44

issue. You know the risks associated

121:46

with alcohol, smoking, social media.

121:49

That does not change behavior. You get

121:51

closer though when it it's at home,

121:54

right? Somebody died in the car

121:56

accident.

121:57

I'll I'm going to stop looking at

121:59

my phone while I drive cuz my neighbor

122:02

just died. My ex Like that's the thing

122:04

that makes you go

122:06

>> too close to home.

122:07

>> That's so true. I was saying to my

122:08

fiance when I was um driving the other

122:10

day in the car cuz I'm notorious for

122:11

asking everybody to put their seat belts

122:13

on. If we get in a car, I'm the guy in a

122:15

black cab or I'm like, "Everyone, could

122:16

you put your seat belts on, please?" My

122:17

team know this as well. Like if we going

122:19

anywhere, I look around at every single

122:20

person to make sure they have their seat

122:22

belts on. Yeah.

122:22

>> When did this begin? When I was 10 years

122:25

old.

122:25

>> Yeah.

122:26

>> And they came to my school. I remember

122:27

being sat in the front row. I almost

122:28

remember my seat number. It was that

122:30

vivid for me. Two things I remember from

122:32

10 years old.

122:33

>> They brought a mother who had lost her

122:35

child in a car accident. And then they

122:37

brought out a police person and he

122:38

described going to the scene of the

122:40

accident, looking down at the person who

122:42

had just been in a car accident's phone,

122:44

realizing that they were deceased, and

122:46

then looking down and seeing their phone

122:47

ringing and it said, "Mom."

122:50

>> And I just I've never forgotten it. It

122:53

was somewhat traumatic, but it's meant

122:55

that for the rest of my life, I've

122:56

policed seat belts.

122:58

>> Yeah.

122:58

>> And that's what I mean by these catalyst

123:00

moments where an idea gets in your head

123:01

and it just completely changes.

123:03

>> Yeah. And so I'm wondering what those

123:04

ideas are for people as it relates to

123:06

like weight loss and health. And so we

123:08

we ticked off some of them. Someone gets

123:10

a line in your family. Maybe a diagnosis

123:12

in the performance perspective. This is

123:14

when we would argue for data

123:16

because we've had this happen earlier in

123:19

my career with a professional athlete

123:20

who was not fast enough and was

123:22

convinced he was fast. And then we put

123:25

him on a force plate and we started

123:27

collecting objective data. And at the

123:29

same time, I had some of my students

123:30

around and I had them do it kind of like

123:32

what you did with your grip strength

123:35

with Jeff and was like, "You see how

123:37

they're as fast as you are?" And he was

123:39

like, "Oh,

123:42

everything changed." Like he was totally

123:43

bought in, made every training change

123:46

that we asked. He had to see it in front

123:48

of his face. Like he had to see his

123:49

data. So my other answer to that to you

123:51

would be now that we've democratized

123:54

health in this sense, the ability to see

123:55

your own data, I would be willing to bet

123:59

had I pulled up a blood panel that had

124:02

the cholesterol levels that you saw and

124:04

I said, "Oh, this is a client of mine."

124:06

You would be like, "Oh, okay, great.

124:08

Uh-huh. Uh-huh." But then when I pull up

124:10

yours and say, "This is," you're like,

124:12

"Sit

124:14

over." Like, "We're done with that."

124:16

Right? Like there's no question. I was

124:18

looking for some research and there's

124:19

some um evidence here backed by some

124:21

research that goes to answer the

124:23

question and I think we actually

124:24

answered we hit most of them which is an

124:26

acute health shock or diagnosis which is

124:27

the primary catalyst

124:29

>> um various health events which become

124:31

wakeup calls which you talked about as

124:32

well which is

124:33

>> someone else a peer or friend or

124:35

sibling. Number three you touched on as

124:36

well which is this quantitive biometric

124:38

feedback so data.

124:40

>> Yep.

124:40

>> Um yep

124:41

>> it says major life this one we didn't

124:43

touch on major life transitions i.e.

124:46

>> Yeah. um such as becoming a parent,

124:48

turning a landmark age like 30, 40, or

124:51

50.

124:51

>> Yeah.

124:52

>> Or reaching retirement. You see that a

124:53

lot?

124:54

>> Yeah. You know what? Actually, that made

124:56

me think. Here's one we've seen the

124:57

most. Sold my company.

125:00

>> Oh,

125:02

>> that one changes everyone's life. It's

125:04

similar to post gold depression.

125:06

>> Oh, you've lost purpose.

125:08

What do I do?

125:09

>> I need to do something.

125:10

>> Now I got Now I got money. Now I have

125:12

time.

125:12

>> Interesting.

125:13

>> I'm investing in my health now. like I

125:15

didn't I sacrificed my health the last

125:16

20 years. Ding ding ding ding ding. Now

125:19

I got to turn around and I'm like okay.

125:21

>> But is it also just like I need a new

125:23

purpose and my body then becomes the the

125:24

project.

125:25

>> That's exactly what it is where in the

125:26

past I had the excuse of sacrificing for

125:30

the company

125:31

>> and I I couldn't focus on myself. It was

125:34

selfish. It wasn't fiduciarily

125:35

responsible to do that. And now I have

125:38

no more excuse. Well, looking at this

125:40

list then, listen, we can't we're going

125:42

to pray no one in your family or no one

125:44

you know gets sick. So, let's stay away

125:45

from that one.

125:46

>> Um the the two of them there that can be

125:49

quite motivating and again, we don't

125:51

want to motivate you if you're

125:52

completely fine. But this actually

125:54

answers the question is to go and get

125:55

your health checked.

125:56

>> Yeah,

125:57

>> that's like a simple solution because

125:58

maybe you're fine and that's great.

126:00

maybe you're doing everything right, but

126:01

also um just saying, "Oh, I want to lose

126:03

a bit of weight or I want to do this

126:05

isn't as solid enough as going and

126:07

finding out how you're doing."

126:08

>> One thing also I think is important cuz

126:11

I will default to performance and

126:14

optimization and getting the best and

126:15

excellence. Like that's just the

126:16

language and stuff I do, but that's not

126:19

the opposite of what you just said. To

126:22

be really clear on that point,

126:24

not everyone gravitates the idea of

126:27

being the best possible ever.

126:29

>> Yeah. Totally fine. But that still

126:31

doesn't mean it's okay to just check out

126:34

on your health. You can have it both

126:36

ways. You can be like, "Look, I'm not an

126:37

optimizer. I'm not a maximizer. I'm not

126:39

that doesn't

126:41

li live with my ethos." And cool. We can

126:45

still though say you still want to live

126:47

that life for as long as possible,

126:49

right? All right. Let's just make sure

126:51

we're paying enough attention to where

126:52

nothing catches up and we're not waking

126:54

up one day and being like, "Oh my gosh,

126:57

now I've got to go invest all these time

126:59

and resource energy and all those things

127:01

and go backwards in that." So pay

127:02

attention enough.

127:03

>> How important is it to get clear on your

127:05

why?

127:06

>> You're not going to love the answer

127:09

because

127:10

traditionally when people approach me,

127:13

they already have that figured out.

127:15

They're getting to me. they figured out

127:17

why they're here or they're if they

127:19

haven't figured it out, they at least

127:20

have had the motivation to seek outside

127:22

counsel like that.

127:23

>> Mhm.

127:24

>> So now they're getting to the what and

127:26

how part.

127:27

>> What about bad goals? I I look back at

127:30

my life and I had some bad goals that

127:31

set me up for

127:32

>> that's more realistic to what we will

127:33

do.

127:34

>> Okay.

127:34

>> And this is a you're aiming at the wrong

127:37

target.

127:37

>> I was aiming at my goal when I was 20 I

127:39

think it was 27 was to go to the gym

127:41

every day and I failed.

127:42

>> Oh yeah. Yeah.

127:42

>> I failed six months later but then once

127:44

I failed it was catastrophic for me. How

127:45

are you not going to fail?

127:46

>> Yeah. Yeah. But yeah. And

127:48

>> like were you going to go every day the

127:49

rest of your life?

127:50

>> It was a terrible goal because the day

127:52

that I missed one day cuz some flight my

127:56

it was like my entire motivation was

127:57

over.

127:58

>> Yeah. Yeah. Sure.

127:59

>> And I was like, "How do I get back on

128:00

the horse now?"

128:01

>> Yeah. Here's an example. You want to

128:02

lose fat.

128:04

>> Your goal is fat loss. Cool. Why aren't

128:06

you leaner right now? And you

128:09

automatically think, "I have to exercise

128:10

more and diet." And I'm like, "Great.

128:12

That's the tactic.

128:14

I want to know why you're not there

128:15

right now.

128:17

>> Like what is the thing that's actually

128:18

getting in the way? Because like

128:20

calorie, fine. Like yeah. Yeah. Like you

128:21

know that though, but it's not working.

128:24

What is really in the way? Do we

128:27

actually have some hidden stressor? Um a

128:30

lot of times people will say things like

128:32

I I got to lose fat so I can get

128:34

healthy.

128:35

>> And we will generally say you need to

128:37

get healthy first

128:40

>> and then the fat loss will be a whole

128:41

lot easier. That's the bad goal. And and

128:44

so we'll ask this question like, "What

128:46

would success look like? What would

128:48

failure look like?" And when we hear

128:50

things like, "Oh, success is I'll lose

128:52

these 25 pounds." All right, great. Let

128:55

me ask you this.

128:57

If we lost 12 pounds and then your

129:00

shoulder pain went away, you have normal

129:03

bowel movements now for the first time

129:04

in 10 years. Your energy is way up.

129:09

Is that all a failure? No. That's

129:11

success. So then we didn't just find

129:12

success properly.

129:13

>> So it is a huge focus of of how we help

129:16

people actually make progress in those

129:18

areas that they've struggled with. Dr.

129:20

Andy Galpin, we have a closing tradition

129:22

where the last guest leaves a question

129:23

for the next, not knowing who they're

129:24

leaving it for. And the question left

129:25

for you is, if you were sure to fail,

129:31

what would still be worth doing?

129:35

What a great question.

129:36

>> Yeah,

129:37

>> fantastic question. I am

129:41

ultra competitive,

129:43

but I really don't mind losing. So, my

129:46

answer to that question was, it sounds

129:48

like a copout, but it's all of it cuz I

129:51

actually don't care about failing that

129:52

much. It just doesn't bother me. Like, I

129:54

just like the competing thing. I like

129:56

the doing thing. So, my initial reaction

129:58

to that was like, God, being around my

130:01

kids, right? There's you fail anything

130:03

you want there. And I'm like, winning,

130:04

right? And then I went to business

130:06

things and I'm like I don't even really

130:07

care about losing those like

130:10

>> cuz you get to do it. You get to be

130:11

active and whatever. So kind of a cop

130:12

out but my answer would be all of them

130:14

man. Like

130:16

>> the process is dope.

130:17

>> The podium is the process.

130:18

>> Yeah man.

130:20

>> Or the process over the podium.

130:22

>> Dr. Andy Galbin, thank you so much.

130:24

Thank you. You're held in such high

130:25

regard by everybody. I think there's two

130:26

reasons. I think it's so you're so

130:27

deeply obsessed with this subject matter

130:29

for reasons that we talked a lot about

130:30

last time, but also I think the essence

130:34

of your motivations is so unbelievably

130:36

pure. You before we started recording

130:38

you were saying to me how like you

130:40

you're really not that concerned with

130:41

the business side of things because what

130:43

you'd love to do is just be focusing on

130:44

the research, the education, and the

130:46

coaching. And I think that says a lot

130:47

about you and it comes through. People

130:48

understand that you're just deeply

130:49

obsessed about this stuff in a way which

130:51

allows us to benefit tremendously from

130:54

all the work that you have done. and

130:55

you're a wonderful synthesizer of very

130:58

very complex things. So please carry on

131:00

doing what you're doing. If people want

131:01

to go and listen to your show or if they

131:03

want to go consume more of your stuff,

131:04

if they want to continue this journey

131:05

with you, where do they go? Where's the

131:07

best place to send them?

131:08

>> Well, first of all, thank you for those

131:09

kind words and to be invited back. It's

131:11

it's a huge opportunity. I will never be

131:14

ungrateful for it. Uh my podcast is

131:16

called Perform with Dr. Andy Galpin.

131:19

Available everywhere. and then

131:21

andygalpin.com and social media,

131:23

Instagram and all that stuff is probably

131:24

the easiest way to follow along.

131:26

>> I highly recommend you go and subscribe

131:27

to Andy's channel and we're going to

131:29

link it down below now. But it's um it's

131:31

what you're incredibly rigorous with all

131:33

the work that you do. Having spoken to

131:35

Andrew Andrew Huberman, who's a good

131:37

friend of both of ours. He he's also

131:40

told me just how utterly obsessed you

131:41

are with truth and also your mission of

131:44

helping people become who they could be.

131:47

Um and that shines through in all of

131:48

your work. So, please go and subscribe

131:49

to Andy's podcast as well, perform, and

131:52

um I shall link all of his other

131:54

resources below, including some of them

131:56

that we've mentioned today, including

131:57

the tests and questionnaires that we

131:59

talked about. Andy, thank you. YouTube

132:02

have this new crazy algorithm where they

132:03

know exactly what video you would like

132:06

to watch next based on AI and all of

132:08

your viewing behavior. And the algorithm

132:10

says that this video is the perfect

132:13

video for you. It's different for

132:14

everybody looking right now. Check this

132:16

video out and I bet you you might love

132:18

it.

Interactive Summary

Dr. Andy Galpin, a professor and researcher in human bioenergetics, discusses the science of sleep and energy optimization. He emphasizes that while many health trends exist, there is no 'free pass' in physiology, and individuals should focus on personalized strategies rather than anxiety-inducing optimization. Key topics include the high prevalence of undiagnosed sleep apnea, the importance of maintaining a consistent environment, the cautious use of supplements like melatonin, and the critical role of managing energy rather than just effort.

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