The #1 Habit That’s Aging You Faster — Transcript

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1. 0:00So, maybe you've never smoked a
2. 0:01cigarette a day in your life. Not a
3. 0:03single one.
4. 0:04But, your body is aging like you've got
5. 0:07a pack-a-day habit anyway. It's not the
6. 0:09beers on the weekend. It's not the
7. 0:11burger you had on Tuesday. It's
8. 0:13something you're doing every single day,
9. 0:15probably today actually. Something we're
10. 0:17all doing.
11. 0:18And it's quietly taking close to a
12. 0:20decade off your life.
13. 0:22I spent years training, defusing bombs
14. 0:26in war zones.
15. 0:27Iraq specifically. Real ones. Real
16. 0:29stakes. Couple hundred actually.
17. 0:32After that, I became a federal agent.
18. 0:33Protection details, running security all
19. 0:35over the world. Never really knowing
20. 0:37what the next day was going to bring.
21. 0:39And then four more years of medical
22. 0:41school, then residency, then I became an
23. 0:44ER doctor.
24. 0:45The kind of job where somebody's worst
25. 0:48day just happens to be your Tuesday.
26. 0:52Somewhere in the middle of all that, I
27. 0:53also had four kids.
28. 0:55And you might look at that list and
29. 0:56think
30. 0:57that guy's tough. He's built different.
31. 1:00And for a long time
32. 1:02so did I.
33. 1:03But, there was something happening to my
34. 1:05body that whole time. Something I didn't
35. 1:07understand until years later
36. 1:09when I was staring at the research with
37. 1:11my own name basically written all over
38. 1:14it.
39. 1:15It wasn't the deployments. It wasn't the
40. 1:16trauma days. It wasn't even the four
41. 1:18kids as much as they'd like to take
42. 1:20credit for it. It was something
43. 1:23quieter, running in the background every
44. 1:25day, whether I was overseas or sitting
45. 1:27in traffic. And it was aging me.
46. 1:30Fast.
47. 1:31Just like it is you.
48. 1:33If we haven't met, I'm Seth. I'm an ER
49. 1:34doctor from a special ops guy and dad of
50. 1:36four.
51. 1:37And now I focus on simplifying health to
52. 1:39keep people out of the ER.
53. 1:41Today, I'll tell you exactly what that
54. 1:43habit is and something you can actually
55. 1:46do about it.
56. 1:47And that habit
57. 1:49is chronic stress. Not a bad day. Not a
58. 1:51rough week. The kind that never really
59. 1:53turns off. Background noise you stop
60. 1:56noticing because you lived with it for
61. 1:58so long, you think it's just what life
62. 2:00feels like.
63. 2:01I know a lot of you are just going to
64. 2:02roll your eyes and say, "Ah, stress,
65. 2:04stress, whatever, this new trend of
66. 2:06stress or whatever."
67. 2:08But, it is so important that you
68. 2:10understand the ravages of what it does
69. 2:13to your body. When I say that, I
70. 2:15literally mean taking up to 10 years off
71. 2:17your life. So, just hear me out. Here's
72. 2:20the mechanism that happens inside your
73. 2:22body.
74. 2:23Every cell in your body has these little
75. 2:26caps on the end of your chromosomes. So,
76. 2:28I think of your DNA creating your
77. 2:29chromosomes, and there's little caps on
78. 2:31the end. They're called telomeres.
79. 2:34Think of them as like the plastic tips
80. 2:36on the end of a shoelace.
81. 2:38Every time a cell divides, which it does
82. 2:41through your life, that cap gets shorter
83. 2:43and shorter and shorter. Eventually,
84. 2:45it's too short, and the cell can't
85. 2:47divide anymore. That is called cellular
86. 2:50aging. That is your biological clock.
87. 2:53When your cells can no longer divide,
88. 2:56well, that's when things start dying
89. 2:57off.
90. 2:58Researchers at UC San Francisco directly
91. 3:01measured this. Women under chronic,
92. 3:04sustained stress,
93. 3:05like caregivers, people with real no
94. 3:08real recovery window, year after year,
95. 3:10the most stressed had telomeres shorter
96. 3:13by the equivalent of at least a decade
97. 3:15of extra cellular aging. That's
98. 3:18measured, not a guess.
99. 3:20Now, smoking, the thing we all agree is
100. 3:22terrible for your health, cost the
101. 3:24average smoker somewhere around a decade
102. 3:27of life expectancy.
103. 3:29Different measurement, different
104. 3:31mechanism. I'm not going to tell you
105. 3:33they're the same thing, but look at
106. 3:35those two numbers sitting next to each
107. 3:36other.
108. 3:37A decade from stress, a decade from
109. 3:39cigarettes. I didn't make that up to
110. 3:41scare you. That's just where the
111. 3:43research landed. You're not doing the
112. 3:45thing that kills you fast, like smoking
113. 3:47or, I don't know, skydiving. You're
114. 3:49doing the thing that ages you very
115. 3:51slowly, and slow is exactly why nobody
116. 3:54catches it,
117. 3:55including me, for about 15 years.
118. 3:58So, what do you actually do about it?
119. 4:01You can't remove stress from your life
120. 4:02completely. Anybody who tells you that
121. 4:04the goal is is trying to sell you
122. 4:06something. You've got a job, you've got
123. 4:08kids, you've got bills, and traffic, and
124. 4:11all the is not going anywhere.
125. 4:13The real goal is building in windows
126. 4:16where your nervous system actually gets
127. 4:18to come back down from that sympathetic
128. 4:20state. Your body's got two settings,
129. 4:23fight and flight, and rest and digest,
130. 4:25or rest and repair. Most people are
131. 4:27stuck in the first one basically all
132. 4:29day, every day, and never give the
133. 4:31second one a chance to switch on. That
134. 4:34switch runs through what's called your
135. 4:36vagus nerve. It's one of the longest
136. 4:37nerves in your body, runs from your head
137. 4:39all the way down through your gut.
138. 4:41And it doesn't flip on by accident.
139. 4:44You have to create conditions that allow
140. 4:47it to turn on.
141. 4:48So, I can only tell you what it works
142. 4:50for me, because I'm not you. I don't
143. 4:52know what works for you. I can tell you
144. 4:53what works for me, though.
145. 4:55Something I do every day, I schedule
146. 4:57into my day, is 10 minutes outside in
147. 5:00silence. No phone. This isn't like a,
148. 5:03you know, mindfulness trend that you see
149. 5:05on TikTok.
150. 5:07When you sit outside in nature, and you
151. 5:09remove noise and stimulation, your vagus
152. 5:11nerve actually gets a chance to fire.
153. 5:14Your cortisol, which is your stress
154. 5:15hormone, starts dropping within minutes
155. 5:17of real quiet. 10 minutes doesn't sound
156. 5:20like much, but it's enough.
157. 5:22It's the same thing that I have the
158. 5:24people who run through my Primal 60
159. 5:26Challenge do every day,
160. 5:28and it is the one thing
161. 5:30that oddly enough people struggle with
162. 5:32the most out of the diet and the
163. 5:34exercise and everything. People say that
164. 5:36they struggle the most with sitting
165. 5:38outside in silence for 10 minutes,
166. 5:42and allowing their brain to just calm
167. 5:44down.
168. 5:45The first few times you try it, you're
169. 5:47going to feel very antsy. You're going
170. 5:49to feel your mind racing. What do I do?
171. 5:52Uh what do I do with my hands? Where do
172. 5:53I put them now? But like your brain's
173. 5:55going to keep running and you're going
174. 5:56to wonder how you do this for 10
175. 5:58minutes. It's going to feel like an
176. 5:59eternity.
177. 6:01After you start doing it for a couple of
178. 6:03weeks,
179. 6:04you will start to adapt and you will
180. 6:06start to crave it because you'll realize
181. 6:07that after 10 minutes of sitting and
182. 6:09just watching the leaves and the trees
183. 6:12and the wind blow and the birds chirp
184. 6:14and whatever it is for you where you're
185. 6:16at,
186. 6:17everything calms down inside. You start
187. 6:21to feel like yourself again. You start
188. 6:22to feel your mind clear like you can
189. 6:24think again.
190. 6:26You start to feel the anxiety and the
191. 6:28weight lift off your shoulders.
192. 6:30Just give it a try and let me know what
193. 6:32you think. But from the thousands of
194. 6:34people that I've put through it,
195. 6:36they all end up loving it.
196. 6:38Next, a daily walk. No headphones, same
197. 6:41mechanism, kind of different delivery.
198. 6:43Movement plus quiet is a bigger lever
199. 6:46than either alone.
200. 6:48In fact, this was one of the things that
201. 6:50I used when I was really struggling with
202. 6:52PTSD and anxiety after my military and
203. 6:55State Department years. I would do a
204. 6:57morning walk. It's pretty early in the
205. 6:59morning, usually around 5:00 or 5:30 so
206. 7:01that the streets were empty. I would
207. 7:02walk and I would just be in silence. It
208. 7:05would take me about 30 minutes and it
209. 7:07was like the start of every day, but it
210. 7:08was the start of one of the most healing
211. 7:11and changing parts of my life. So,
212. 7:13something you can try.
213. 7:15Next,
214. 7:162 minutes of slow breathing before you
215. 7:18go into something that's uh really
216. 7:20strenuous or after you come out of
217. 7:22something really strenuous.
218. 7:25This one is like not as passive as the
219. 7:27other two, but slow deep breathing
220. 7:29directly signals to your vagus nerve
221. 7:30that you're safe.
222. 7:32It's one of the only ways that you can
223. 7:34consciously
224. 7:35uh reach in and like flip that switch in
225. 7:37real time. You want to breathe through
226. 7:40your belly. You want to do like, you
227. 7:42know, 4 to 5 seconds in, you hold it,
228. 7:45and then you do 4 to 8 seconds out, hold
229. 7:47it, and then you just repeat that for
230. 7:49about 2 to 4 minutes.
231. 7:51And then there's the stuff that sounds
232. 7:53really soft, um
233. 7:56but I don't think it is. It's It's
234. 7:57really uh life-changing if you actually
235. 7:59implement it.
236. 8:01The first one is what you tell yourself
237. 8:02on repeat. So,
238. 8:05what you tell yourself repeatedly
239. 8:07actually shapes or reshapes the neural
240. 8:10pathways in your brain and the pathways
241. 8:13that your brain defaults to.
242. 8:15If you think of your brain as a forest,
243. 8:19and you're cutting pathways through it
244. 8:20for roads,
245. 8:22whatever you do, whatever you tell
246. 8:24yourself, what does other people tell
247. 8:26yourself, what you see, and what you
248. 8:27watch, and what you do create roads
249. 8:30through your brain.
250. 8:31And that is the way that your neurons
251. 8:33fire is through these roads.
252. 8:35The more you tell yourself something,
253. 8:37the wider that road gets, and the faster
254. 8:40the traffic can travel down that road.
255. 8:42Now, if you're telling yourself negative
256. 8:44thoughts or if negative things are being
257. 8:46said to you over and over, that pathway
258. 8:48gets wider, and your brain starts to
259. 8:50think in negative thought patterns. Now
260. 8:52becomes who you are.
261. 8:56You can change that.
262. 8:58If you begin telling yourself good
263. 9:00things, if you begin feeding your brain
264. 9:02good thoughts, positive thoughts, you
265. 9:04tell yourself, you know, I'm the person
266. 9:06who does what they says they're going to
267. 9:08do. I'm the person who's always on time.
268. 9:10I'm the person who
269. 9:12uh chooses to eat the healthy thing, or
270. 9:14I'm the person who work out work works
271. 9:17out daily.
272. 9:18That path becomes wider in your brain,
273. 9:20and it becomes who you are. And the
274. 9:22other
275. 9:24negative or unhelpful paths that have
276. 9:25been wide, telling yourself you're fat,
277. 9:28or lazy, or slow, or whatever it is,
278. 9:30become narrower and narrower until they
279. 9:32disappear. Okay? That is called
280. 9:34neuroplasticity.
281. 9:37If you tell yourself something enough
282. 9:38times, your brain gets very efficient at
283. 9:40believing it. The same mechanism runs
284. 9:43the other way.
285. 9:44If you smile on purpose,
286. 9:47even when you don't feel like it, if you
287. 9:49laugh,
288. 9:50even when you don't really feel like
289. 9:52laughing, your body can't distinguish
290. 9:54real from manufactured, and it responds
291. 9:56with the signal the the same way. It's
292. 9:59just the opposite way around. So, laugh
293. 10:01more, smile more. There's been studies
294. 10:04where they have shown that if you smile
295. 10:05on purpose, it actually makes you
296. 10:07happier. So, too many people rely on
297. 10:11external circumstances to make them
298. 10:12happy, and then they think the smile
299. 10:14results. But, you can actually
300. 10:17smile or laugh on purpose enough to make
301. 10:19yourself happy. And the more you do
302. 10:22that, the more happy
303. 10:23happy you bring yourself, the more
304. 10:25happier you are,
305. 10:26the more it trains your brain to be
306. 10:28happy, just like we talked about with
307. 10:29neuroplasticity. So, smile more, laugh
308. 10:32more, be around people who add to you
309. 10:35instead of drain you. Learn to say no to
310. 10:38the stuff that doesn't matter to you, so
311. 10:40there's room for the things that do.
312. 10:43Do what you love,
313. 10:46and then give less about the rest.
314. 10:49These are two things I wrote on my
315. 10:50whiteboard in my garage. Do what you
316. 10:52love, and give less
317. 10:55And it's not to be some vulgar term that
318. 10:57I just throw around.
319. 10:58It's to remind myself
320. 11:01to really orient my life around the
321. 11:03things that bring me joy, to do the
322. 11:05things that I love, whether it's certain
323. 11:07exercises in a workout routine, or
324. 11:10whether it's doing hobbies that I love,
325. 11:12or focusing my work around the things
326. 11:14that I actually love, and delegating or
327. 11:16getting rid of the things that I don't,
328. 11:19and then giving less cares about the
329. 11:20things that bring me a lot of stress or
330. 11:23anger or resentment in life. Getting rid
331. 11:25of those, and filling my life with the
332. 11:27things that I love.
333. 11:28All right?
334. 11:30None of this is complicated, because
335. 11:32it's not supposed to be. Complicated is
336. 11:34how you talk yourself out of doing the
337. 11:36things you should be doing. None of this
338. 11:37is about becoming a monk. It's about
339. 11:39noticing where your nervous system never
340. 11:41gets a break, and giving it one on
341. 11:43purpose.
342. 11:4415 years of running hot all the time
343. 11:47taught me that the hard way, and I'd
344. 11:50rather you learn it from this video
345. 11:52than from your own body forcing the
346. 11:54lessons on you later on.
347. 11:56Every month I run a couple of hundred
348. 11:58people through a uh something I call
349. 12:01Primal 60 Challenge. It's not a fad
350. 12:03diet, it's not just a workout plan. It's
351. 12:0560 days of training, nutrition, and
352. 12:07daily habits, all laid out for you
353. 12:09inside one simple app, accountability, a
354. 12:11community of people doing it alongside
355. 12:13you, and the thing people bring up to me
356. 12:16over and over months later is not the
357. 12:18workouts,
358. 12:20it's usually the daily habits, the
359. 12:21stress piece specifically, people
360. 12:23telling me that part alone changed their
361. 12:26entire life.
362. 12:27If you want in on the next one, the link
363. 12:30is below.
364. 12:31No pressure either way.
365. 12:33But, if you're not going to do it, or if
366. 12:34you are going to do it,
367. 12:35take care of yourself. Your health is
368. 12:37the most important thing in your life.
369. 12:39Put it first, prioritize it, everything
370. 12:42else will be much easier. Until next
371. 12:44time, y'all.
372. 12:45Keep moving.