Justin Bieber, Muhammad Ali, Miley

Cyrus. And then there's murderers,

rapists, arsonists. I probably have seen

more brains than anybody in the world.

And now, your brain. So, this is going

to be really hard for you. You have

ADHD. Really? Dr. Daniel Amen, the

world's leading expert

on the brain.

Dr. Amen's mission is to end mental

illness

by creating a revolution in brain

health. Buckle up, Dr. Amen. Let me know

what you see. Your brain is involved in

everything you do. And after today, you

will always care about your brain. What

things make the brain worse? Drugs,

alcohol, not getting good sleep, sugar,

fruit juice, hitting a soccer ball with

your head, caffeine. Caffeine? It

shrinks it. What's bad about sugar?

You're more likely to get an obesity.

And as your weight goes up, the actual

physical size and function of your brain

goes down. That should scare the fat off

anyone. And then there's social media.

If you're on 3 and 1/2 hours a day, you

begin to wear out those pleasure centers

that bring you happiness and they bring

you pleasure and they bring you drive.

You thrill them to death. But, you're

not stuck with the brain you have. You

can make it better. I can prove it. So,

it starts with

Let's look at my brain. Let's do this.

We have evidence of And that's normal in

our society. The problem is two or three

of those can impact the rest of your

life and nobody knows about it.

Quick one. This is really, really

fascinating to me. On the back end of

our YouTube channel, it says that 69.9%

of you that watch this channel

frequently over the lifetime of this

channel haven't yet hit the subscribe

button. I just wanted to ask you a

favor. It helps this channel so much if

you choose to just subscribe. Helps us

scale the guests, helps us scale the

production, and it makes the show

bigger. So, if I could ask you for one

favor, if you've watched this show

before and you've enjoyed it and you

like this episode that you're currently

watching, could you please hit the

subscribe button? Thank you so much and

I will repay that gesture by making sure

that everything we do here gets better

and better and better and better. That

is a promise I'm willing to make you. Do

we have a deal?

Dr. Amen,

if someone's just clicked on this

podcast

and they're considering sticking around

or maybe doing something else with their

time.

Can you explain to me

based on what you know that we're going

to be discussing and the subject matter

we're going to be discussing and how

important it is,

the benefit to their life if they stick

around?

10 extra years of cognitive performance

in their life,

better love, better money,

better health, because your brain, we're

going to talk about, is involved in

everything you do. How you think, how

you feel, how you act, how you get along

with other people. And my goal is to

end, this is going to sound huge and it

is,

and it's going to sound impossible, but

it's not. My goal is to end mental

illness

by

creating

a revolution in brain health. I hate the

term mental illness. It shames people.

It's stigmatizing and it's wrong. These

things aren't mental disorders, they're

brain disorders. If you get your brain

healthy, well, your mind tends to

follow. So, you're depressed, an

antidepressant is not doing one thing

for getting your brain healthy. Nobody's

talking to you about your diet, your

level of exercise, your sleep, not

living in a mold-filled home, not really

allowing your kids hit soccer balls with

their head, right? Cuz that's not brain

healthy.

And if we can create this revolution in

brain health,

the incidence of mental health disorders

will go down

by half.

And I guess that's part of the reveal

here is you've actually scanned

my brain. And you're going to tell me

today the results that

you have on your laptop over there in

the corner of the room. So, I came to

your clinic in Los Angeles, and they

made me do a test on a computer. Like it

was almost like a speed test of sorts.

And then they made me lie down in a big

machine

for about How long was that? About 30

minutes? 15 minutes.

15 minutes?

While this big machine rotated around my

head and looked at my brain. That was my

experience of what happened. And then I

filled out some questionnaires about

myself and my brain and my life

generally.

And from that,

all that data feeds into the thing

you're about to show me now.

Yes. So, I never will make a diagnosis

from a scan. Okay. I make a diagnosis

from all the information, which is why

we had you fill out all that information

and I gave you a test called the Conners

Continuous Performance Test, which is a

15-minute test of attention. And every

time you see a a letter, you hit the

spacebar,

except when you see the the letter X.

When you see the letter X, you don't do

anything. So, it measures impulse

control and inhibition, response time.

And you actually did fine

on the test.

And but there's other

evidence that you might in fact have ADD

or ADHD from

getting bored easily to poor

handwriting, being disorganized,

and so on. Uh Uh and obviously you're

very bright but

struggled a bit in school. So,

with all that information,

um first thing to do is look at a

healthy scan so we know what a healthy

scan

looks like.

And we're going to show it in two

different ways. We're going to look at

the outside surface

of your brain. So, a healthy one is the

image

on the left and all we should see is

full, even, symmetrical activity. So,

the image on the top left is looking

underneath the brain. So, the top is the

front part of the brain, the bottom is

the back, the top is an area called the

prefrontal cortex, hugely important in

humans, largest in humans than any other

animal by far. It's 30% of the human

brain, 11% of the chimpanzee brain. And

then the back is the cerebellum, back

bottom part of the brain.

Um again, very important, involved in

processing speed.

The bottom right of the images on the

left is looking down from the top. Uh

the other two looking at the brain from

the side. Color doesn't matter, it's the

shape. It should be

full, even, and symmetrical.

The images on the right, the color

matters. So, it's what we call our

active images. Blue is average activity,

red is the top 15%,

white is the top 8%. And you see all the

white. So, the white is where things are

really happening. It's really hot. Okay.

And that's healthy. That's normal. And

that's going to become very important

for you. So, if we look at your brain,

it's a little bumpy, and so I'll ask you

about toxins. Are there anything toxic

in your life? What What are all toxins?

So, think alcohol, marijuana,

mold, uh

heavy metals in your body, infections,

and so if it's not

alcohol or drugs, then I begin to go,

"Have you ever lived in a mold-filled

environment? Maybe we should test you

for that. Do you have more mercury in

your body or lead in your body than you

should?" So, for example, I had very

high mercury levels. My brain sort of

looked like that when I first scanned

it. It was toxic. And I had very high

mercury levels. Like, I never drank.

I just don't like it. Never smoked.

Never did drugs. But, my brain looked

toxic. And so, you then have to go hunt

down, "Well, why?"

And for me, it was mercury.

Um decreased activity in your left

prefrontal cortex. So, when I think of

maybe ADD-like symptoms in your life,

probably coming from there.

And decreased activity in your left

temporal lobe.

And you right-handed? Yeah. Yeah. So,

that can go with the irritability. What

I've seen is that can go with sort of

short fuse. Mhm. And your prefrontal

cortex is sort of the brain's

supervisor. It watches you.

And your prefrontal cortex is flat. Mhm.

And I don't like that. And then when I

heard you played soccer or when I read

you played soccer, it's very common in

my soccer players. Now, how long did you

play soccer for? Uh, pretty much all of

my childhood.

And any concussions playing soccer? I

think I had a couple of big head bangs

that

were significant, but not many. Not

nothing that took me to hospital, but I

had a couple of moments where I was

pulled off the pitch because like there

was a clash of heads.

So.

Your brain is soft, about the

consistency of soft butter.

Your skull is really hard and has sharp

bony ridges.

Um.

Two or three of those can impact the

rest of your life and nobody knows about

it.

Because nobody looks. Right? If you went

in saw a thousand psychiatrists, say, "I

want to focus better and

have better temper."

You saw a thousand psychiatrists, two of

them would look at your brain, which I

think is

insane.

So, the colors here that I'm looking at,

the What does the the red and the green

So, the color really Doesn't matter

here. doesn't matter. It's the shape.

So, when I see this hole, you don't have

holes in your brain. What the hole means

is less blood flow than is optimal. In

fact, I'm going to show you

if you do what I ask you to do

and we scan you

6 months from now, that'll be better. I

have a program that tells me

if you do what I ask you to do, this is

what's generally going to happen. And if

you don't do what I ask you to do, well,

this is what it's going to look like 5

years from now, 10 years from now. And

you're young. If you

get serious about loving and repairing

your brain,

your 60s, 70s, 80s are going to be

amazing because you're going to have a

healthy brain. If you go, "Oh, Amen's a

quack and I don't believe any of this

crap."

it's going to be really hard for you

because you're not going to have full

access to your brain.

And that's scary. So, I know that's sort

of a big deal, but I think this is

from

traumatic brain injury at some point

and a bit of a toxin, which may be mold.

Mhm.

And then when I say mold, our house was

very, very dirty growing up.

So,

that's what I assume you're speaking to

that. And we did have like mold around

the window sill sometimes and we had

mice and

rats at some point and

it was like living in a house that a

hoarder

had uh

lived in because some of the rooms were

just stacked to the ceiling with crap.

So,

I think maybe if you're talking about

mold or a toxic brain, I I I'm guessing

that's where it's come from.

If that makes

it gets in your body, unless you do

something active to get it out, it

stays. I really and can continue to

cause problems. And then if we go to the

active scan,

it's very different than I want it to

be.

And I know I can make it better. But if

we go back to

what's healthy,

lots of activity in the cerebellum,

your cerebellum

is sleepy

despite you probably being very

coordinated. I need to activate that

thing. It's really important to get

better activity

there. And you have this diamond

pattern. So, you have ADD and we'll talk

more about it. It's a subtype I call

overfocused ADD where you can be

obsessive when you're really interested

in something, but if it doesn't interest

you,

it's hard for you to focus.

So,

if you look at this, it looks like a

diamond. And when I see that diamond,

I think of past emotional trauma.

And uh I published a big study

looking at this 20,000 people, can I

separate emotional trauma from physical

trauma? And I can with actually high

levels of accuracy, and it looks to me

like there's sort of bit of both

for you. Do you play racket sports?

No, I don't.

So, that'll be one of my prescriptions

for you. And actually, study from

England, people play racket sports live

longer than everybody else by far.

Soccer was on the bottom, like soccer

and football were on the bottom, but

tennis, table tennis, racket ball, now

pickle ball,

uh badminton are on the top.

But let's talk about this diamond for a

bit. When I say emotional trauma, Mhm.

what comes up for you? So, a few things.

The first thing is my parents were

always at war. Growing up as a kid in a

household where there was so much

screaming and negative energy, but then

growing up with shame because we was I

was so different from everyone else

around me.

Never inviting friends back to my house

in those 16 years that I lived there

before I left, so nobody really knew

where I lived either. I think of all

that stuff when I think about like

emotional trauma.

Well, that's a lot. Okay. Yeah.

I mean, if you grow up in a stressful

environment, boo,

and um a hostile environment where your

parents are at war,

it trains your brain,

your emotional brain to become

hyperactive, Mhm. because you always

have to watch

for danger.

And

that gets programmed early.

And even later,

when there's not the danger, your body

still can look for Mhm. You're waiting

for that

next bad thing

to happen.

And Do you think I have ADHD? I do.

Now, the question would be,

who has it in your family? Cuz it

doesn't just show up. But often,

children who have ADHD have one or both

parents who have it. And you can see

those similar traits.

And

it sounds like one or both of your

parents could have been a little bit

conflict seeking.

My My mother.

And if I was to hazard a guess at which

one of my parents had ADHD, and this is

just me guessing, not trying to diagnose

my parents, I would say it's would have

been my mother.

Why?

She's the She's the most irritable.

Handwriting isn't great. She

is

a little bit more sort of like

scat scattered, I should say.

She's a lot more messy. My dad's like

very organized with everything. My mom's

very very very messy. Like me. Um

The The other thing I would ask is,

what did teachers say about you?

I went back to speak at my school

to the GCSE and A-level students. I've

done it twice. And I remember one of the

teachers came up to me. Bearing in mind

at this age, I'm 24, 25 years old. And

she said, "You are a useless student,

but you are nice. You're a nice person."

I was never swearing or throwing chairs,

but I was useless. And I spent most of

the time in the exclusion unit, which is

where you go if you don't do your

homework or you don't attend. I just

couldn't sit in classrooms. I couldn't

sit in classrooms and stay focused on

what they were telling me, es-

especially when I wasn't interested.

That's been like a defining quality of

my life. I'm exceptionally good

at not doing things I'm not interested

in. And I'm ex- And I'm good at when I'm

interested, but when I'm not interested,

I could see my peers almost like will

themselves to engage in things they're

not interested in.

I'm I will I could never do that. And

I've always said I'm a remarkable

quitter. So, you think about stop going

to school, then went to university for 1

day and was like, "Nope."

Never went back after that first day.

So,

So, it's it's a very important piece of

advice for people who have ADD.

Is pick something you love, not a job

that you think you'll just make more

money in. And that's another sort of

piece of the puzzle that completely fits

with having

ADD. And as as we know,

there are problems with it,

but there are also huge benefits of it.

Your prefrontal cortex,

when it works too hard, so I imagine if

I scanned your dad, that it would be

busy, cuz he's very organized and like

collecting.

Um

but there's less creativity

that goes with the busy frontal lobes.

When there's a little bit sleepy,

you entertain all sorts of thoughts, and

you're a little less rule bound than

people whose prefrontal cortex more

active. They like rules, and they like

sameness, and they like predictability.

And

probably like some of that because I

think you inherited some of your dad.

That's the top of the diamond.

But

you're obviously very creative.

Mhm.

I do um I do think of myself as being um

a a

creative entrepreneur. I I know other

entrepreneurs that are like really good

at finance and operations and processes,

whereas my skill in entrepreneurship has

always been

the creativity. That's why I'm a

marketeer. That's where I built my my

fortunes, per se, was in marketing and

creativity. So

and I've always found other people to do

the

finance or the process or operation

stuff for me because that's not where I

I'm engaged or or where I think I'm

particularly good.

So

Well, and since a lot of CEOs listen to

this podcast, a lot of CEOs have ADD of

one form or another.

And they thrive

when they hire people

who are organized.

So it's very important cuz we tend to

like to hire people like ourselves.

And it's very important to hire people

who help us where we're more vulnerable.

It's almost like hiring people with

different brains. Yes. Literally.

Yes.

We we we talked about something a second

ago. You said, "When you saw your brain

for the first time, it changed your

life." I do feel like that now. I do

feel like when

I almost didn't realize my brain was

there. And I think a lot of people we go

through our lives just kind of cuz we

never see the thing.

We don't appreciate the thing. So step

one is that awareness and then step two

is the realization that we can do

something about it. Because I grew up

thinking that your brain and your body

generally is just it just is what it is.

Like I can't do anything about, you

know, I tend to think I can't do

anything about, I don't know, my

fingernail. I probably I mean you can,

but you just see these things as static

objects that are what they are.

This idea that I can do something about

it is the most important idea. It's the

it's the empowering idea.

And that is what you're telling me

is possible. I can change my brain.

It's the most exciting lesson that I've

learned. You're not stuck.

I'm not stuck

with the brain I had. You're not stuck

with the brain you have. You can make it

better. I can prove it. In fact, every

day, what I've come to believe, you're

making your brain better

or you're making it worse. Let's start

there.

you're doing. What things make the brain

worse? What are the common things that

most of us do without thinking that make

the brain worse?

When my daughter, Chloe, was in second

grade, I went to her classroom and I

wrote 20 things on the board.

And I went separate them for me. Good

for your brain, bad for your brain.

7-year-olds.

They got 19 out of 20 right. So, most

people know.

The only thing they got wrong was orange

juice.

They put it in the healthy category.

When, in fact, when is it rational to

unwrap fruit sugar from its fiber

source? Because it turns toxic in your

body. So, I'm not a fan of fruit juice.

I'm a fan of fruit, not fruit juice. But

so, the bad category. Hitting a soccer

ball with your head. No, don't do that.

Um

What's bad about sugar

for the brain?

Which What does that mean?

It makes you diabetic. But I mean as it

relates to the brain, why is like orange

juice or the ice cream bad for my brain?

Because it's ultimately going to give

you high blood sugar levels, Mhm. which

erode your blood vessels,

and you're going to have lower blood

flow to your brain.

That's bad. It's a bad thing. I mean,

there's so many things about it. So,

it's addictive, it's pro-inflammatory,

it makes it more likely you're going to

have diabetes and obesity. So, 72% of

Americans are overweight, 42% are obese.

I've published three studies on 35,000

people.

As your weight goes up, the actual

physical size and function of your brain

goes down.

That should scare the fat off anyone. I

used to be chubby, but when I figured

out that connection, I'm like, "Oh, no.

I am

It was that that gave me the motivation

to drop about 25 lb. And

so, sugar

is the gateway drug to diabetes and

obesity.

And so,

not to mention

inflammation,

which is the cause of depression and

dementia. So, I've got sugar, I've got a

head injury.

I'm going to avoid both of these things.

What else should I avoid? And then you

have low blood flow in those two very

important areas.

And so,

how can we increase blood flow? So, you

want to avoid things that cause low

blood flow, caffeine, nicotine.

Caffeine? Caffeine constricts blood flow

to the brain. What does that do to my

brain?

It Well, constricts blood flow. So,

you're going to get less blood flow. And

remember, I showed you that progression

with age?

No, you don't want that. You want to do

things that increase blood flow to your

brain. So, exercise. Um

ginkgo is just one of the supplements

I'm going to give you. Eat foods like um

beets, oregano,

rosemary, cinnamon, they increase blood

flow.

And do you think there's a correlation

or link between

caffeine

consumption and a shrinking brain?

Yes.

And a shrinking brain, is that

associated with things like dementia?

Aging brain.

I You know, I don't think there's a

connection. I haven't read any research

that says there's a connection between

caffeine

and dementia.

There's a connection with sleep

problems, and there's connection with

sleep problems and dementia. Mhm. I

think if you have like 100 mg a day of

caffeine, it's probably fine.

But, one venti

Starbucks coffee has got 330 mg of

caffeine.

Jesus.

And people just aren't thinking about

the level of caffeine they're having in

our society. What are the other very

obvious things that are not good for my

brain? Cuz I really want to make sure

that I avoid those things. So, I've got

sugar,

So, and erectile dysfunction. I mean,

while we're at So, B is for blood flow,

right? While we're on blood flow,

40% of 40-year-olds

have erectile dysfunction.

70% of 70-year-olds have erectile

dysfunction. What that means, if you

have blood flow problems anywhere, it

means they're everywhere.

And so

like no.

And

it means either you're too sedentary,

you're overweight, you're

smoking,

or having too much caffeine,

or using marijuana cuz marijuana lowers

blood flow to the brain.

And so just in that one of the 11,

it's exercise,

ginkgo.

For you, not for everybody, but for you

hyperbaric oxygen, those three things

will make a big difference in blood

flow. Ginkgo? Ginkgo. What is that? It's

a supplement. What does it do? Uh

increases blood flow. To the brain? The

prettiest brains I've ever seen take

ginkgo. There's actually SPECT study.

Uh they gave

people 100

20 mg of ginkgo twice a day, significant

improvement in blood flow to the brain.

And so in one of the supplements I'm

going to give you,

we have ginkgo.

I I've taken it every day for the last

20 years,

at least. And then this is where the US

government got an F for the pandemic,

loneliness accelerates dementia

and brain problems.

And so when they isolated us, the whole

significant increase in brain problems.

So get connected to other people.

The I in bright minds is inflammation.

So what increases inflammation? Low

omega-3 fatty acid levels. And we are

deficient.

93% of the population is deficient in

omega-3 fatty acids. 93%.

So all of us should be either eating

more fish or

taking an omega-3 supplement like fish

oil.

Gum disease. Like who knew?

Like I wasn't really that good at taking

care of my gums until I started reading

the studies. You have gum disease, you

have inflammation, you're more likely

get depressed and have dementia. I'm

like, "Oh my goodness." So, I'm a

flossing

fool.

Um

ages, head trauma, we talked about that.

I did the big NFL study when the NFL was

struggling with the truth on traumatic

brain injury in football.

80% of our players got better.

T is toxins.

Um

drugs, alcohol.

Um but other things like

mercury and

What are the unobvious toxins? Because

Anesthesia. Anesthesia. I I was looking

at my bathroom

items. And I have like mouthwash and

toothpaste and deodorants and

aftershaves. And I was wondering to

myself whether those were toxic to some

degree.

So, there's an app. There's a couple of

them, but the one I like is called Think

Dirty. Mhm. Where you can scan those

products and it'll tell you on a scale

of 0 to 10

how bad they are for you. So, 0 is you

live a long time and 10 is you die

early.

And so, when I figured this out, I was

scanning everything.

Um I mean, it cost me hundreds of

dollars to replace things.

And my wife

more than that with all the makeup and

stuff. But I shaved for 50 years with

Barbasol.

And it's a nine.

Which is die early.

And now I shave with something called

Kiss My Face. And it's a two.

It's like, you know, we teach people

read the labels on food stuff, should

read the labels on anything that goes on

your body or on your child's body. And

we have this epidemic, and we'll get to

it, of low testosterone in males because

of the toxins we put on their bodies

when they're young.

What is the M in bright?

So, the M is mental health. It's

the quality of your thoughts,

the level of your stress,

and

the level of trauma you carry

in your body.

And whether or not you have any of the

psychiatric

stuff. Like depression, for example,

doubles the risk of Alzheimer's disease

in women and quadruples it in men.

And so, the M is what's going on

in your mind.

And so, I teach people to kill the ants,

the automatic negative thoughts that

steal their happiness.

Um

understand

and process their traumas,

and treat

whatever

psychiatric issues may be present. Like

in your case,

the ADD.

And I think cuz start with the

supplement, um

or even consider medication.

Talk about the natural ways to do it,

the medicine ways to do it. And for me,

I'm not opposed to medicine. I'm

actually really good at it.

But it's never the first and the only

thing I think about. I've really never

taken medication in my life. Even like

if I get a headache, I don't take

medication. I'm not the type of person.

I probably haven't taken a pill in like

really in years. The only time I've

taken medication is if I have a severe

infection of sorts. So like there was

this one time where like my foot was

going green and I'd stood on some glass,

whatever, and it was really getting out

of control. I'm talking like a 2-in

purple thing growing on my foot. I

thought, "Okay, instead of getting my

leg cut off, I'll take this medication

the doctor's given me. Otherwise, I just

do not take it."

So I would rather go through severe pain

than take medication because I believe

that my body can fix things. Um

So when I think about taking ADD

medication or ADHD medication, I don't

really know the difference,

I go, "Well,

if my

if I'm messy or if I'm my handwriting's

bad or whatever it might be,

then that's just who I am.

And that's okay. I can get better at it.

I can be less I can be more organized.

But why why do I want to take

medication?

Well, I'm not going to I'm not going to

be the one to sell you on medication,

but what I would say

is

So a lot of times people ask me the side

effects of medication. Mhm.

And for stimulants for ADD, it could be

it decreases your appetite or can

negatively affect your sleep.

But you always have to ask the second

question.

Which is what are the side effects of

not taking

the medicine?

What's the impact

on your life, on your business, on your

money, on your relationships, on your

health? Because living with untreated

ADD for many people, and maybe not you,

but for many people goes with chronic

stress

because of

the

negative things that tend to go along

with it. Dysfunction.

And for you, you're

clearly not broken.

But are you optimized?

Do you have full access

to your own brain?

And I would argue no.

And we can do and we can do better.

But we can do it in steps.

And ultimately, I see my job

is giving people options.

And then telling them the pros and cons

of each option, and then letting them

choose. Right? I mean, that's what good

doctors should do. It's called informed

consent.

Um

and you know, I can just tell you

my experience. I told you the story with

my daughter.

And

I've seen that play out thousands of

times.

That

people

just become more optimized. In what way?

not necessarily the medicine. But that

medicine, when it's for the right brain,

right? The wrong brain, it makes people

worse. And if you read my book, Healing

ADD, I talk about the Ring of Fire ADD.

So, ADD and ADHD

are different terms for the same thing.

1980, the American Psychiatric

Association's DSM

Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of

Mental Disorders, I hate that, but

it's what we have, was Attention Deficit

Disorder, ADD, with or without

hyperactivity.

1987, God knows for what reason, they

changed the name to ADHD. Attention

Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder,

basically throwing out half the people

who had it. Cuz half the people who have

ADD or ADHD are never hyperactive. And

they don't get diagnosed because they

don't bring enough negative attention to

themselves for parents to go,

"You have a problem.

And you're giving me a problem."

Um

so, anyways, different

names for the same thing.

And if you can

manage it

by having extra help for the things

you're not good at,

with exercise,

with all of the good habits you have,

well,

that's awesome.

If you want to be be 10%

more focused, like I treat this writer,

um

and she only takes medicine when she has

to get stuff done. But she never takes

it when she writes because she has 16

plot lines going on at once in her

books. And she goes, "No, I think it

decreases my creativity a little bit."

Interesting.

Because the

the fact that we're medicating

the a brain like mine,

I

I go, "Is that for professional

optimization?" Cuz if you just go back

like, I don't know, a couple hundred

years. You go back even further to a a

time when we couldn't like read or

write, there wasn't computers, and all

of these things, you would have had no

idea that You know, if you go if you go

back far, you wouldn't have been able to

tell a

really a an ADHD Well, what I'm trying

to say

But you'd be able to tell their life. I

mean, I have a patient from Ethiopia.

And

I'm like, "So, tell me the impact in

your culture."

And he said, "The people with severe

ADHD get excluded because they can't be

relied on.

And the isolation causes great shame and

pain.

Um and

they have no idea it's a brain thing.

Where does it come from ADHD?

Or ADD?

Well, it's genetic. Okay.

It's clearly genetic. I mean, I if I

don't see it in someone's family, I

think head trauma.

And with you, I think that's possible

because of soccer. Um except you see it

in your family.

Um

Is it a defect or is it a difference?

It's a difference.

If I if I chose to take a drug, was it

like equal to Ritalin that you called it

one of the So, Ritalin would be one of

the options. Whatever drug it was, what

exactly would it do under brain scanning

to my brain? So, if I scan my brain and

took the drug, what would you see in my

brain?

Well, I can tell you. It would activate

your cerebellum. Okay, the bit that was

a bit sleepy. It was a bit sleepy and it

would activate your prefrontal cortex.

And

um

it would give your brain better energy.

So, my first SPECT scan, 1991, a woman

she tried to kill herself the night

before. I went to the lecture on brain

SPECT imaging and then I walked out of

the lecture and she was my new patient.

Her name was Sandy. She tried to kill

herself the night before and as I'm

getting to know her, I'm thinking she

has ADD. She has an 8-year-old son who

has ADD, talked about the genetic

connection. She had an IQ of 144

but never finished college. And I'm

like, "How did you study?" She said,

"Well, I never really did except maybe

the night before a test, I'd put on a

pot of coffee,

stay up all night cramming and then I'd

take the test. That's classic ADD way of

doing things.

And I'm like, "You know, I think maybe

you have adult ADD. And she goes, "Oh,

adults don't have ADD."

And I'm thinking, I'm the doctor,

I'm like, "How about if we look at your

brain?"

And And I knew from other work I'd done

that I should do it twice, at rest and

concentration.

And

when she tried to concentrate, her brain

completely deactivated.

Turned off. Like, for you, we only did

it once, but if I had done it twice,

probably your brain would be busier at

rest, and then when you try to do it, it

would drop.

And I put the pictures on

a couple of days later, I put the

picture on the table in front of her.

And as I explained it to her,

she started to cry.

And she said, "You mean it's not my

fault."

And I said, "Having ADD is sort of like

people who need glasses." And I wore

glasses to drive, and took my glasses

out, put them on.

And I said, "People who wear glasses

aren't dumb, crazy, or stupid. Their

eyeballs are shaped funny, and we wear

glasses to focus."

I said, "People with ADD aren't dumb,

crazy, or stupid. Some are among the

brightest people I know,

but their frontal lobes deactivate.

Taking the medicine is like glasses for

your frontal lobes, help you focus."

And she did it. She was conflict-driven.

She was always poking her husband. They

got into a huge fight, which is why she

tried to kill herself. She stopped that.

She's a better mom. She went back and

finished college. I mean, her life's

It's like your brain with glasses. Wow.

My friends that take medication for ADD

say that to me. They say it's like their

life is before and after that moment.

So, I've, you know, I've

I completely believe what you're saying.

Um

A second ago, you said this phrase when

we were talking about the M, which is

your mental health, and the impact that

has on the

development of a brain that's either

healthy or unhealthy. And you said this

thing about you got to make sure you

kill the ants,

which is killing those negative

thoughts. Um that's much easier said

than done.

How does How does someone go about

killing their negative thoughts? Is

there a process they can go through to

do that? Yeah, it's a habit.

Right? And it's not hard.

But like any habit, you have to do it

repeatedly, like over and over and over

and over and over and over. Um

Whenever you have a thought,

your brain releases chemicals.

Whenever you have a bad thought, a sad

thought, a mad thought, your brain

releases a certain set of chemicals that

make you feel bad.

Immediately.

Your hands get cold. They start to

sweat. Your muscles get tense. You start

to breathe erratically.

And it all happens

instantaneously.

Whenever you have a positive thought, a

happy thought, a hopeful thought,

a loving thought, like I'm back cuz I

loved the first time I was on the

podcast with you.

Um

a completely different set of chemicals

come out. And your hands get warmer,

drier. Your breathing slows down. Your

heart beats in a healthier It happens

like immediately.

People have ADD, since we're talking

about that, they tend to go more toward

negative thoughts cuz negative thoughts

are more stimulating.

And

uh

here's the exercise.

Whenever you feel sad, or mad, or

nervous, or out of control, write down

what you're thinking.

And then ask yourself, is it true?

Is it absolutely true? This is a process

I learned from my friend Byron Katie.

How do I feel when I have this thought?

How do I act when I have this thought?

And what's the outcome

of the thought? So, is it true?

Is it absolutely true?

How do I feel, act, and the outcome of

the thought?

How would I feel

if I didn't have the thought?

How would I act if I didn't have the

thought? What's the outcome of not

having that thought? Then my favorite

part of it is take the original thought,

"Tana never listens to me." Tana is my

wife. I've had that thought.

Um

and then turn it to the opposite. Tana

does listen to me.

And then just ask yourself whether or

not that's true.

And by directing my thoughts, by

managing, so rather than being a victim,

so many of my patients are victims of

their thoughts until they do the work,

right? This is one of the things where

do what the F I say.

Write down 100 of your worst thoughts.

Take them through that process.

And by the time you get to 30, they'll

stop bothering you.

So, if I'm a repetitive negative thinker

or a repetitive positive thinker, does

that alone change the shape of my brain?

Yes.

And in

my new book, Change Your Brain Every

Day, there's actually pictures of Noelle

Nelson. She was writing a book called

The Power of Appreciation.

And I had her

she wanted me to scan her while she was

appreciating her brain, and it looked

beautiful.

And I'm like, as I'm showing it to her,

I'm like, "You need to come back

tomorrow, and I want you to hate

yourself."

And she goes, "Oh, I don't want to do

that." I'm like, "Come on, you have to

suffer for science." I said, "We want to

We have positive scan, and then we have

negative scan."

And the negativity

dropped

her left temporal lobe, her left frontal

lobe, and her cerebellum.

So interesting. I mean, similar to what

your scan looks like, but hers was way

worse. I mean, this is healthy brain and

then a deactivated brain. And that

explained to me

athletic slumps.

It's like, why do people get in athletic

slumps? Cuz negativity turns off their

cerebellum. And they become just a

little less coordinated.

Interesting.

And I'm not a fan of positive thinking.

I'm a fan of accurate

thinking with a positive spin. So,

positive thinking is I can have this

third piece of cheesecake and it's not

going to negatively impact my body or my

brain.

Like, no.

The don't worry, be happy people die the

earliest

of accidents and preventable illnesses.

So,

a lot of people come to me for anxiety.

And I'm like, so, on a scale of 0 to

100, how much is it?

And they're like, 50.

I said, okay, our goal is not zero.

Our goal is 15.

I want you to have enough anxiety you do

the right things.

Somewhat linked to that is a word you

used as well, which is stress.

When we're talking about the M in bright

minds, how to have healthy brains,

what role does stress play on our

brains?

Stress,

um, especially chronic unremitting

stress. So, if we think of the stress

you had growing up,

um, where there was a lot of fighting,

it raises a hormone called cortisol.

Cortisol begins to shrink

activity in the hippocampus, one of the

major memory and learning centers in the

brain. So, one

could at least argue or postulate your

struggle in school

was because your emotional brain was

busy cuz you were worried about things

at home.

Um it makes it more likely you get

infections. It makes it

more likely um

that you have learning problems.

And trauma. Trauma was the other word

you used which I I thought it was worth

diving into. Um the impact that trauma

has on our brains.

Um and does trauma show up when you scan

someone's brain? Can you see it?

Yeah, so trauma shows up as that diamond

pattern, uh which is why I asked asked

you about it. It's your emotional brain

anterior cingulate at the top. It's the

brain's gearshift, thalamus often

involved in mood, basal ganglia,

amygdala involved in anxiety. So, we

often see worry, anxiety, and sadness.

And it shows up as that diamond pattern.

But after people do EMDR, a specific

psychological treatment for trauma,

calms it down. And I say psychological

treatment, I'm like, "Yeah, but it has

biological effects." Uh

it's a very

interesting treatment. So, I get you to

like first thing,

write down 10 big traumas

in your life. And we'll go after the

worst one first.

Um and have you bring it up. And there's

a whole process to it. But have your

eyes go back and forth while you bring

it up. And it's so interesting the

connections your brain will make to it.

But as you process it, you find you're

actually less bothered

by it. And it's masterful for single

incident traumas like being robbed or

being in a car accident. For chronic

trauma, it takes longer.

Um

but it's so helpful. Um when I met my

wife

18 years ago, um

her ACE score, adverse childhood

experiences, on a scale of 0 to 10, how

many bad things happened to you, was an

eight.

And

I was so taken with this woman. And one

of my first gifts to her was 10 sessions

of EMDR. One, I wanted to see if she

would like wrestle with her traumas. But

she went for 2 years. And I'm absolutely

convinced that's one of the reasons she

and I rarely fuss

with each other.

Because we don't trigger each other.

And when you talk about trauma, it's not

these big T traumas that some people

sometimes talk of, which is

you know, when I was young, I was

fondled by my uncle, for example. It can

also be an isolated incident that

happened when you were an adult.

Absolutely.

It can be anything that attacks

your sense of safety, either physical

or emotional.

Getting fired is traumatic for a lot of

people. Um not performing in a high

in an important situation can be

traumatic.

And that changes the activity within

your brain.

On Well, it depends on how strong it is.

If it was really strong. If it was

really strong. Then the activity centers

of your brain would

Well, and there's one thing we haven't

talked about yet called brain reserve,

which is how healthy was the brain that

you brought into trauma.

Because you can take

two soldiers,

put them in the same tank, and expose

them to the same blast, the same angles,

everything is the same. One walks away

unharmed. The other one's permanently

disabled. Why?

It's the brain they brought into

the trauma.

And so,

if your mother used drugs while she was

pregnant with you, she decreased your

reserve. If your mom and dad fought a

lot or they separated when she was

pregnant with you, that decreased your

reserve. If she gave you bad food, if

she neglected you, if there was chronic

stress, that's decreasing

your reserve. So, all of us have a

certain level of reserve when we go into

that trauma. And some people get

post-traumatic growth that they're

actually better after the trauma. You

know, they

make the trauma and makes something

meaningful out of it. And other people

have post-traumatic stress where it

really

um causes them to suffer.

I love the idea of brain reserve cuz I'm

like always thinking of boosting mine.

Yeah, because then also when something

traumatic happens, I'm in a better

place, right? Right. Like if you kill

the ants, like if your ant population is

low, my automatic negative thoughts.

Right. Yeah. So, if you're masterful, if

you have an anteater running around in

your head cleaning up the negative

thoughts that all of us have,

when you go into that trauma,

well, you're just better able to deal

with it than

if you have an undisciplined

mind that's infested.

And there's nowhere in school

that people teach you to kill the ants.

We have a foundation called the Change

Your Brain Foundation.

And I love it so much.

Uh we're dedicated to research,

education, service.

But last year we produced this new

course called Brain Thrive by Five. So

it's for preschoolers, kindergarten,

grade one,

where we teach kids to love and care for

their brain. It's like 30 modules,

they're 6 to 7 minutes long, and six of

them are on learning to kill the ants.

Uh, little kids just love that. You

don't have to believe every stupid thing

you think. And I don't know if you know,

but Jerry Seinfeld once said, "The brain

is a sneaky organ." We all have weird,

crazy, stupid, sexual, violent thoughts

that nobody should ever hear. And just

because you have bad thought doesn't

even mean you believe the thought,

right? It's not the thoughts you have

that make you suffer, it's the thoughts

you attach to

that make you suffer. I get all sorts of

crazy thoughts and I'm like,

"My brain is so creative." But I don't

believe most of them.

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Tell me about the most unhealthy brain

you've ever seen.

For a 15-year-old was Kip Kinkel.

He's a 15-year-old boy in Springfield,

Oregon who brought weapons to school,

got arrested, his parents picked him up

from jail,

and sometime between 6:00 that night and

8:00 the next morning, he murdered his

mom and dad.

And then he went to Springfield Thurston

High School in Springfield, Oregon and

shot 25 people.

Based on my work, they scanned him for

his trial.

His brain was so awful. Like, I'd never

seen a 15-year-old

that had a brain so damaged.

And his life reflected it.

What did you see in his brain? It was

shriveled.

At 15? At 15.

And it's like, okay, why? Well, he

murdered his mom and dad, so I couldn't

get a good history. But he either had

anoxia

at birth, lack of oxygen, a severe

infection, or something was poisoning

his brain. It could have been lead. It

um

could have been an infection. I mean

we're talking about M, the I is immunity

and infections. It's a major cause of

psychiatric problems. Nobody knows about

it.

Have you scanned the brains of lots of

psychopaths? I have.

And what do you see when you look at a

psychopath's

So I published a study on murderers, and

young murderers have really low frontal

lobe function. Older murderers, it's

global low activity. Now, not all

murderers are the same. I have one

murderer's brain Her brain actually

looked pretty good. But she was in the

middle of being abused by her husband,

and she

murdered him. And

it wasn't that irrational, you know,

when you really know her story.

Um but most brains are

troubled.

Do you think you could look at a brain

and predict Now you should ask me,

should you scan presidential candidates?

Interesting.

Especially now. Uh

What do you think Donald Trump's brain

looks like?

Well, I think if we scanned

President Biden or former President

Trump, neither one of them would be

healthy.

I mean, one, we talked about the older

you got,

the less healthy they are, and

um

if someone is going to have nuclear

codes,

shouldn't we know what their brain looks

like?

And I wrote an op-ed piece in 2008 when

Barack Obama was running against John

McCain arguing for don't you think we

should scan presidential candidates?

And

yeah, I don't think either one of their

brains would be healthy and that

concerns me.

Because I mean, what do we need for our

top politicians?

Judgment,

forethought,

impulse control. Okay, so playing

devil's advocate to that. If we started

to do that at the very highest office in

the land, then that philosophy might

creep down to lower offices in the land

and when you go and try and get a job at

I don't know, a restaurant or a

marketing agency, it might become the

norm that there's a almost brain

discrimination or brain prejudice in

play where someone like me, they have

their brain scanned, they go, "Listen,

this guy's

he's not going to be very good at I

don't know, focusing on things like

that."

interesting question.

I have to tell you if you date one of my

children

for more than 4 months,

I'm going to get you scanned. Really?

I'm going to figure out how to do that.

It's the rule in my family.

Um and if you have a bad brain, it

doesn't mean you can't come back.

But are you smart enough to fix it?

That would be the question. Have you

done that?

Well, my son-in-law,

Jesse, who I love, his mother has

paranoid schizophrenia.

And I'm like,

"I want to scan your brain." And I have.

He actually wrote a book called Change

Your Brain Before 25 and

he opens the book with the story of his

scan and him sitting with me. He's 6'4,

I'm 5'6, and he said he'd never felt so

small.

And

Yeah, no, that's the rule in my family.

I like I said when I met my wife, I

really liked her. And the first naked

part of her I wanted to see was her

brain.

And so 3 weeks into our relationship,

I'm like, "Hey, you haven't seen the

clinic. Don't you want to see the

clinic?" She came, I scanned her, and

it passed.

Do you use her brain

against her?

I bet you do.

I bet you do. No.

We spoke to Tana, she said you do.

You're telling me there's not been one

time where you've brought up her brain

in a moment of conflict or arguments.

Not once, cuz I will call Tana.

I I don't. Yeah. No, okay.

Because you know what I do? And this is

this is on par with killing the ants.

I do an exercise with my patients called

the one-page miracle.

On one piece of paper, write down what

you want.

Relate and in a very specific way.

What do you want in your relationships?

Your work, your money, your physical,

emotional, and spiritual health. What do

you want?

And with her, cuz she's on the top of my

list, I want a kind, caring, loving,

supportive, passionate relationship. I

always want that.

I don't always feel like that. Rude

thoughts come into my head.

And if I've slept and I've eaten,

I never say them.

Why? Cuz it doesn't get me what I want.

Mhm. Right? And that's not selfish.

People go, "Oh, but you know,

what you want What what I want is not

selfish.

It's good.

Cuz hedonism is the enemy of happiness.

But happiness is a moral obligation

because of how you impact other people.

Your brain's so smart, but you have to

tell it what you

want. And every major business,

including mine, we have a one-page

strategic plan. We know what we want,

and we know what we're going to do this

quarter and this year.

But people don't do that in their lives.

And you think they should have like a

life plan? Every

person should. What do you want?

Is your behavior getting you

what you want? Do you think the brain

almost conspires to make

to fit what you want? I either brain,

once you're clear on what you want, I

guess your actions will change a little

bit, and then your brain will change

shape to fit what you've said you

wanted. Yes. And the brain is lazy.

The brain

does what you allow it to do.

And it's habitual. I was talking to one

of my patients about this yesterday.

Um

cuz we were working on his one-page

miracle.

And he's like, "You know, I could be

more positive."

And I go, "It's a habit

to be negative or to be positive. Which

highways are you building in your brain?

Positive highways or negative highways?

Accurate highways or distorted highways?

You build that."

And if you watch the news, they'll

become more distorted.

Cuz it's Yeah. In my book, The End of

Mental Illness, I I did something It was

very fun for me to do. I imagined if I

was an evil ruler

and I wanted to create mental illness,

what would I do?

And watching the news, I think it was

there's 62 evil ruler strategies and I

think that's like 12. Um, because

the news is no longer the news.

The news is about eyeballs and selling

things.

And

negativity sells. If I can scare you,

that will sell.

And so, um

you have to be very careful with what

you allow in your brain. And yes, you

should be informed.

But not over and over and over and over

again. People who start the day with the

news

are 27%

less happy in the afternoon.

Well, I listen to lots of true crime and

serial killer things.

Like every day.

Are you telling me

funny. I have this show on Instagram

called Scan My Brain. I take influential

people and scan them and I did Meghan

Trainor, uh, the

uh, musician. I love her music. And she

goes, "I can't sleep." And every night

before bed, she's listening to true

crime. And I'm like, "Stop that." Do you

think it matters? Cuz I listen to true

crime before bed.

I have this exercise that I recommend

all my patients. I've done it for

10 years.

What went well when I go to bed.

I start at the beginning of the day

and

just go hour by hour looking for what

went right about my day. I think that's

set your dreams up to be more positive.

I think it's

I do both and then I just see which one

works better for you. Every day win or

learn.

What is the I in Bright Minds? Immunity

and infections. So, do you know your

vitamin D level? No, but I do take the

only supplement that I

take frequently, I'd say there's two, is

vitamin D and omega-3.

But I've because I'm black as well, I

was You need more vitamin D. Yeah.

So,

uh people have darker skin need and

going from Africa, where there's a lot

of sun, to the UK, where there's no sun,

dramatically increase the risk of mental

health problems. Yeah.

Because of vitamin D deficiencies. Do

you know what? I think there's a certain

member of my family, who I won't name,

who went from Africa, they're

they've got two Nigerian parents, went

from Africa to the UK,

and I saw their mental health

deteriorate quite significantly to the

point that we believe this person might

have bipolar now.

And I I I

part of me suspects, once I learned

about vitamin D deficiency in people

that have darker skin,

this person has very, very, very, very

black skin, um that it might be

associated with that change.

Being in a new country that has no

sunlight for 30 years when you're,

you know, black black. You bet. Yeah.

And it's part of So, if you see

mental health is brain health, then that

becomes a critical intervention. If

you're not paying attention to brain

health, then you're like, well, what

antipsychotic or what mood stabilizer

can

I give them. And I'm fair well, may use

an antipsychotic or a mood stabilizer,

but if I get your brain healthy,

you might not need it, or you'll need

half the dose.

So, and and then infections, I mean,

we're just coming out of a pandemic,

and COVID changes your brain in a bad

way. It causes, um

like a a

inflammatory bomb to go off in your

brain.

I was on the Kardashian show last year

because I scanned Kendall. Kendall came

to see me.

And obviously I was on the show, so it

was public knowledge. And it was

post-COVID, and her emotional brain just

was on fire.

Uh, and that's what we saw with COVID.

And long COVID, emotional brain is hot,

but then the cortex begins to

um

get low in activity. It's it's a bad

combination. Well, I mean, what does

that mean? It's like chronic damage. And

what does that mean if the in terms of

behavior?

What's the implications for behavior?

So, the hot

limbic brain tense anxiety

that she hadn't had. Um, if you start

damaging your cortex, then all of a

sudden you're sad, you're impulsive,

you're irritable, you

uh,

can get dark thoughts, sometimes even

suicidal thoughts.

And people got COVID, significantly

increased in dementia.

Someone who's listening to this right

now that is depressed,

clinically depressed, um

or just feels, you know, depressive

symptoms, where do you start? Let's go

to the extreme end. Someone that can't

get themselves out of bed. I sat here

with Jada Pinkett, and she told me that

she was clinically depressed, and she if

she just got to 4:00 p.m. every day, to

her that was a victory. There are lots

of people out there that are in that

situation right now.

Where do you start with those people?

What advice do you give them? Cuz I'm

sure you see a lot of them in your

practice.

It starts

with awareness. Yeah. That maybe this is

not me, maybe it's my brain. Mhm. And

then it starts with loving your brain,

and then investigating Mhm. your brain.

Cuz depression is like chest pain. So,

if you

if somebody's like had chest pain,

you're like, "Well, where would you

start?" Well, you start with an

evaluation. You wouldn't start with

drugs.

I mean, that would be like ludicrous.

You would like go, "Well, why do you

have chest pain? Why are you depressed?

You know, how's your thyroid? Right? The

person that can't get off the couch,

they

they could be hypothyroid.

Or one of my friends got depressed,

she had anemia. She had pernicious

anemia because it was a B12 deficiency.

I I wouldn't assume, "Oh, you're

depressed, take this medicine."

Depression is what it is, it's not why

it is.

And if you don't know why it is, how do

you effectively treat something? Like so

many people come to me and they go, "I

have an autoimmune disorder."

It's like, "Well, why do you have an

autoimmune disorder? Why is your body so

mad at you it's attacking itself?"

And so, Because my body's broken.

But why is your body broken?

Right? And I and I I hate the term

broken, right? The the series like the

broken brain. And it's like,

no.

It's not optimized. Let's optimize it. I

I never want my patients to think of

them as mental.

And I never want them to think of

themselves as broken. You're awesome.

So, how can I help you be maybe 10%

more awesome? People feel like their

brain is against them.

Is working against them when they're

feeling depression or those chronic

cycles of negative thinking. Why is my

brain attacking me? Why is it against

me?

So, part of it is it's not healthy and

part of it's undisciplined.

And I got to do a lecture last year for

the coaching staff of the Miami Heat.

It was so much fun for me. And I'm

really thinking a lot about elite

performance.

And I think it's just such a better

model. It's like let me help you be your

best rather than let me fix you.

And and I think someone like you, I

mean, it's like you're already awesome.

How can I make you more awesome? How can

I give you more access

to your

brain.

And it's just it's easier to sell that

than

you know, let me give you a diagnosis of

a mental illness and

then let me give you a medicine you have

to take for the rest of your life. This

is the wrong model that psychiatry is

currently operating with. Really good

for the pharmaceutical industry. Really

bad for our society. 25% of the American

population is on psychiatric drugs.

That's just horrifying.

Is Ritalin a psychiatric drug? It is.

And I'm not opposed to psychiatric

drugs. Let's be really clear. I'm

actually really good with them.

It's never the first and only thing

I think about.

What is the N in Bright Minds?

Neurohormone.

If your hormones that affect your brain,

which are all of them,

are not optimal, you're not optimal.

And the D and S?

Like if you're

um

cold when other people are not, we

should look at your thyroid. The D is

diabesity,

where you're overweight and/or have high

blood sugar. It's the most common of the

11. 72% of people are overweight. And as

your weight goes up,

you have seven of the 11 risk factors.

It lowers blood flow to the brain and

prematurely ages the brain, increases

inflammation, it stores toxins.

It's a bad thing. And then the S is

sleep.

I've got obsessed with my sleep

recently. I have my Whoop on pretty much

all the time and they're sponsor of this

podcast, I probably should say, but I'm

also like a equity shareholder in the

company. But it's become one of my

biggest obsessions in my life is waking

up in the morning and looking at how I

slept, how much deep sleep, restorative

sleep I've had, my heart rate

variability, all that stuff. I'm

obsessed with it. What does sleep do to

my brain? I guess you said earlier that

it kind of cleans it, cleans it and

refreshes it.

Well, we didn't even know that until

it's just 10 or 12 years ago where

researchers

saw that

the fluid system in your brain, it's

called the glymphatic system, doesn't

open up when you're awake, but when

you're asleep, it opens up and then sort

of cleans things, washes things. And so

for those people like me, who I thought

I was special because I could get by on

4 hours of sleep at night, I'm sort of

running around with a toxic brain or

dirty brain. And so What are these toxic

toxins? So what is it cleaning? Have you

heard of beta amyloid, which is

cluster of proteins that increases your

risk of Alzheimer's disease? So they

build up during the day,

system cleans it. But if you're not

getting good sleep, you have more of a

toxic buildup of those kinds of clumping

proteins

that are problematic for you.

Interesting.

Interesting.

Is there anything else people need to

know about sleep in the brain? Because I

think everybody knows sleep is

important. A lot of people struggle with

sleep. Sleep apnea triples the risk of

Alzheimer's disease. One of the big

lessons Imaging has taught me that I can

actually see the pattern for sleep apnea

on a scan and it looks like early

Alzheimer's disease.

Bilateral parietal top back part of your

brain decreases. What is sleep apnea?

Snore loudly, stop breathing at night,

chronically tired the next day. So, when

you sleep, your breathing um you have

many apneic episodes where you stop

breathing.

And so and if you're sleeping alone, you

actually might not know it because no

one's being woken up by your snoring.

Um

and even people who've been diagnosed

with it

don't treat it because they don't want

to wear the mask at night. And I'm like,