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The Mitochondria Doctor: This Reverses Gray Hair, Makes You Feel Young Again & Fixes Disease! — Transcript

by The Diary Of A CEO · 30,824 words · 5,048 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

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0:00This is incontrovertible evidence that
0:02graying of hair is reversible and
0:03[music] it can be pre-fast.
0:05>> Wow.
0:05>> And there's more. So, we all walk around
0:07with our biological [music] history
0:09encoded in your hair. Like, for example,
0:11if you have marijuana 6 months ago, it's
0:12going to be in your hair.
0:14>> He's got a haircut.
0:17>> [laughter]
0:17>> So, my [music] research lab had the idea
0:19that if we could find what was happening
0:21in this person's life when this [music]
0:23young hair become old, then we could
0:24understand the mechanism of the aging
0:26process.
0:27>> So, what is the secret to anti-aging?
0:29>> It's the proper allocation [music] of
0:30energy.
0:32>> Can you can you How What's the simplest
0:34way you can explain that to me?
0:35>> So, first, [music] energy is real and
0:37it's the difference between feeling like
0:39you can change the world or feeling
0:40completely drained.
0:41>> [music]
0:42>> And a lot of people live on that end of
0:43the spectrum. And it's because there's a
0:45finite energy budget with a hierarchy of
0:47energy needs in the body. For example,
0:49we did an experiment because we wanted
0:51to know how much energy does it cost to
0:53[music] worry about the future, to
0:54ruminate about yesterday. And we found
0:56that the stress hormone increased energy
0:58expenditure [music] by 16%. Right? So,
1:00it needs to steal energy from some of
1:02the things that keep you young.
1:03>> So, it's not the stress [music] that
1:05burns us down. It's the response to
1:07stress. And the third piece is this,
1:09energy is in your mitochondria. And
1:11there's [music] about 5,000 trillion
1:13mitochondria in your body. And so, they
1:14made our bodies possible and they can
1:16change how you feel.
1:17>> Well, I read that studies on brains of
1:20dead people have found that those with
1:21greatest sense of purpose have more
1:24efficient mitochondria.
1:25>> Yes. We are really in service of the
1:27mitochondria. They allow us to be alive.
1:30>> And yeah, I've got so many questions for
1:31you based on what people wanted to know.
1:32Like, how patients with ME, chronic
1:34fatigue, or long COVID safely
1:36rehabilitate their mitochondria. What I
1:39consume, how does that impact the
1:40efficiency of the energy? Does red light
1:43therapy impact mitochondria? [music]
1:45And is there anything I can do to have
1:47more energy available? But before that,
1:49I've heard you say that most diseases or
1:50disorders can be explained by
1:52understanding energy resistance.
1:54>> Yeah. We think there's increased [music]
1:55energy resistance in cancer, and then
1:57Alzheimer's. Like fundamentally,
1:58diabetes is a disease of energy
2:00resistance.
2:01>> So, is there anything I can do?
2:03>> There is. So, you can start by
2:08>> This is super interesting to me. My team
2:09gave me this report to show me how many
2:11of you that watch this show subscribe,
2:12and some of you have told us, according
2:14to this, that you are unsubscribed from
2:16the channel randomly. So, favor to ask
2:18all of you, please could you check right
2:19now if you've hit the subscribe button
2:21if you are a regular viewer of this show
2:22and you like what we do here. We're
2:23approaching quite a significant landmark
2:25on this show in terms of a subscriber
2:27number. So, if there was one simple,
2:29free thing that you could do to help us,
2:31my team, everyone here, to keep this
2:33show free, to keep it improving year
2:35over year and week over week, it is just
2:37to hit that subscribe button and to
2:38double-check if you've hit it. Only
2:39thing I'll ever ask of you.
2:41Do we have a deal?
2:42If you do it, I'll tell you what I'll
2:43do. I'll make sure
2:45every single week, every single month,
2:46we fight harder and harder and harder
2:47and harder to bring you the guests and
2:49conversations that you want to hear.
2:50I've stayed true to that promise since
2:51the very beginning of The Diary of a
2:52CEO, and I will not let you down. Please
2:56help us. Really appreciate it. Let's get
2:57on with the show.
3:00>> [music]
3:02>> Dr. Martin Picard,
3:04what is it that you believe, know, or
3:07understand
3:08that most people out there don't
3:11believe, know, or understand?
3:15>> We are energy.
3:17We literally are the energy that's
3:19flowing through the body.
3:21>> Mhm.
3:22>> And
3:23and that sounds a little woo.
3:25>> You don't have context. And And that's I
3:27think something that we're just starting
3:29to have the right scientific framework
3:31to to understand, to understand
3:32ourselves from first principles as
3:34energetic processes.
3:36>> In a nutshell, what is it that people
3:38are looking for
3:40when they
3:42listen to this subject of energy?
3:44>> Yeah.
3:45I think that people want to understand
3:47what is energy, and how can I have more
3:50energy?
3:51>> I can relate to that because sometimes,
3:53you know, if I look through my life,
3:54sometimes I wake up and I feel amazing.
3:57I really have, in my view, done the same
3:59thing. But then sometimes I wake up and
4:01I don't feel amazing. And it feels kind
4:03of like ruler, like this sort of sort of
4:05opaque mystery of how do I wake up on
4:09with more days in a row and feel
4:11amazing, like I can take on the world.
4:13And then there's also some friends that
4:14I have who are suffering with different
4:16things, whether it's chronic illness or
4:17long COVID or whatever, who repeatedly
4:20wake up and feel low energy for years,
4:23you know, at a time.
4:24>> Yeah.
4:25>> That's a really tough
4:27place to be when you wake up repeatedly
4:29and and you don't feel like you have the
4:31capacity, the energy to be in the world.
4:34It's it's a really tough place to be.
4:35>> And and who are you and why
4:39did you commit your life to this
4:40subject?
4:41>> I'm a regular guy who with, you know,
4:43lived experiences who who's gone through
4:45some tough things that have taught me
4:47lessons and have gone through wonderful
4:49things that have made me feel like life
4:51is really special and precious. And then
4:53I became a a scientist and as I learned
4:56the tools of science, I started to see
4:58and I discovered mitochondria.
5:00I thought, this is an approach to start
5:02to bridge
5:04what's true about the human experience
5:05that we know from first experience
5:07empirically and we know to be real not
5:10because, you know, some white coat
5:11wearing doctor or scientist, you know,
5:13said, "Yes, energy is real and it's in
5:15your mitochondria."
5:16We know it to be real from first
5:17experience.
5:19Right? Because we we feel it. And then
5:21what science is telling us about how
5:23things work in our bodies, right? And
5:25about health and and disease and where
5:27diseases come from. So I had these
5:28questions. So I became a scientist
5:31to bridge those
5:32domains of of existence.
5:35The the science and the experience. Um
5:37so I've led a research group at Columbia
5:40University for 10 years
5:42and founded an institute to
5:45really build the systems and
5:47technologies to to help people grow,
5:49heal, and and and transform.
5:51>> You have a PhD in mitochondria.
5:54>> Yep. My PhD was in mitochondrial biology
5:56of aging.
5:57>> I mean, there's a an image here in front
5:59of me. Some people will just be
6:00listening, so we'll try and explain it
6:02for them, but there's an image here of a
6:03video. I'll play the video on screen
6:05now, and it kind of looks like a looks a
6:07little bit like an alien. But I I I read
6:10that this video
6:12was quite formative for you. What is
6:14that video, and why was that a formative
6:16moment in your career?
6:18>> I took this video in England in
6:20Newcastle upon Tyne in the north of
6:22England with my Geordie friends.
6:26The medical school there, I was a
6:27graduate student and went there for kind
6:29of an exchange, and this is the first
6:31time I saw mitochondria moving.
6:34I saw like the inner life of our cells.
6:36And when I saw this,
6:38something struck me as like, "Oh my god,
6:42I'm able to see this, right? And to see
6:44living mitochondria
6:46because of the mitochondria inside of
6:48me."
6:49>> Mhm.
6:50>> It's the energy that's flowing through
6:51my mitochondria in my eye, right? That's
6:53allowing me to perceive to see this.
6:55Mitochondria made multicellular life
6:57possible. They made our bodies possible,
6:59and and we might just be a vehicle for
7:01mitochondria to kind of propagate and
7:03keep on living. So, when I saw this,
7:05it's like, "This is mitochondria looking
7:06at mitochondria."
7:07>> Mhm.
7:07>> And then I was starting to understand
7:09that mitochondria do more than just
7:12transforming energy. What they're known
7:13for is they take the food you eat, and
7:16then they take the oxygen that you
7:17breathe in, and then those two things,
7:20the food, the oxygen, converge inside
7:21the mitochondria. And then something
7:23really special happens. The electrons
7:25that are stuck on food that were stuck
7:27together in a green leaf somewhere,
7:29right? Photosynthesis. What your
7:31mitochondria do is they they kind of
7:33unpack this, and they rip off the
7:34electrons one by one, and then they flow
7:36them like an electrical circuit. And
7:38that happens in the like the 5,000
7:40trillion mitochondria that are in your
7:42body.
7:43And then when the electrons flow, they
7:44need to flow towards something. Just
7:46like an electrical circuit, electrons
7:48flow from one pole of the battery to the
7:50negative to to the other pole of the
7:51battery.
7:52Uh and that circuit is closed in the
7:55mitochondria.
7:56So that the electrons from the food you
7:58eat flow towards oxygen that you
8:00breathe, and then it becomes water. And
8:02and it's that
8:04vital flow of energy, electrons flowing
8:06towards oxygen, that allows us to be
8:09alive. And uh mitochondria do this, and
8:12then as they do this, they transform
8:13energy from food biochemistry into
8:16electricity and into signals and into
8:19heat. And the reason the body is warm is
8:21because the mitochondria, as they
8:22transform and flow electrons like a
8:24little energetic circuit, they release
8:26heat. So the the source of heat, right,
8:29that makes us warm, you shake someone's
8:30hand, you feel their warmth, you're
8:32feeling the warmth from their
8:32mitochondria.
8:33>> So is there a mitochondrion every single
8:35cell in my body?
8:37>> There's
8:38on average 1,000 mitochondria per cell.
8:41>> Per cell, there's a thousand
8:42mitochondria. So how many is there in my
8:43body?
8:44>> About 5,000 trillion.
8:46>> Who should care about the mitochondria
8:49and why should they care about it?
8:51>> Anyone who cares about their energy.
8:54Right? About having enough energy to do
8:56what they really care about.
8:58Uh
8:58>> [clears throat]
8:58>> we all care about different things.
8:59We're we're all gifted and talented for
9:02different things. Uh everyone has this,
9:05you know, unique authentic self that
9:07wants to come out.
9:08The only way for this to come out, and
9:11the only way for a person to flourish,
9:13is through energy.
9:15>> [clears throat]
9:15>> If there's no energy flowing through
9:16your body, you're dead. Right? And if
9:18the energy doesn't flow efficiently,
9:21right, and smoothly through you as an
9:23organism, then
9:25life feels hard. Like you you're not at
9:27your best. You feel tired. Uh and and
9:29you feel like
9:31you know, maybe it's not worth it. You
9:32know, when you're sick and your immune
9:33system is like draining all all your
9:35energy, it's really hard to be
9:37optimistic and it's hard to be a good
9:38person and it's hard to be a good dad.
9:42And it's hard to want to do good for the
9:43world if you're struggling with energy.
9:46>> Do you know what it is? So many of us
9:47think that
9:49that just is what it is and that we can
9:50do nothing about that.
9:52You know, we we breathe in, we eat food
9:55and then how we feel is kind of
9:57roulette.
9:57>> Yeah.
9:58>> There's this certain, I think, feeling a
10:00lot of us have that we can't really
10:01control that much.
10:02>> Mhm.
10:03>> Where do we need to start to understand?
10:05Cuz the outcome I want from this
10:06conversation is I want to live my life
10:09with more energy to do the things that I
10:12want to do. And I imagine the people
10:13that are listening also feel the same
10:14way. So, where does one have to start?
10:16I'd like to understand the basics and
10:18then move to the actionable stuff, like
10:19things I can do so that I live my life
10:22full of energy.
10:22>> Yeah. So, there there are three things
10:24that are really foundational to how
10:26energy works in the human body. One is
10:29that you are the energy that's flowing
10:31through this body.
10:32>> I am the energy that's flowing through
10:34my body.
10:34>> Yes.
10:35>> So, I'm not my body.
10:35>> You're not your body.
10:36>> Okay, I'm the energy flowing through it.
10:38>> You, Stephen,
10:39>> Yeah.
10:40>> this expression now that I'm getting to
10:42experience, thank you.
10:44>> [laughter]
10:45>> This expression is an expression of the
10:47flow of energy.
10:49If there was no energy flowing through
10:50your body, through your heart, through
10:52your brain, like you wouldn't be, right?
10:55You'd be a cadaver and we'd say that
10:56Stephen is gone, you know.
10:58>> body.
10:58>> Yeah, you'd be a dead body. The
10:59difference between a dead body, a
11:01cadaver, and a living, thinking,
11:03feeling, conscious person, who cares, is
11:06the flow of energy.
11:07>> Okay.
11:07>> You you get so indoctrinated in this
11:10worldview that the only thing that's
11:11real is the physical stuff.
11:14And you know, the nucle- the the genes
11:17that you that you got from your parents
11:18and the body the physical body and
11:20that's the real stuff. What you can't
11:21see with your eyes, not real.
11:23>> Mhm.
11:23>> Right? I think that's a reframe that's
11:26kind of a a bigger picture mindset shift
11:29that we need to and and scientists
11:31struggle with. So, number one is you are
11:33the energy that flows and transforms uh
11:36through this body. Number two is
11:39there's a fixed energy budget.
11:41Right? All of us have a fairly fixed
11:44energy budget to deal with. And and for
11:47example, if you want to have more energy
11:49to do more podcasts, to write more
11:51articles, to uh you know, be more
11:53creative, the solution is not eating
11:55more.
11:57Because there's this fixed energy
11:58budget. And if you overload the system,
12:00you feed it too much food, especially
12:01too much sugar, it's really hard on the
12:03system. And then the system, like an
12:05electrical system, you jack up the
12:07voltage, right? And then the system
12:08starts to overheat.
12:10Uh so, inflammation is this this
12:12overheating. There's too much energy in
12:13the system. And
12:15uh or the cells are are burning too much
12:16energy, and they need to kind of tell
12:18other cells that's
12:20and those signals we call inflammation
12:22cytokines.
12:23>> Mhm.
12:23>> So, there's a fixed energy budget that
12:25you have to deal with. And over time,
12:27the organism does a lot of of uh
12:30finessing and adapting to kind of try to
12:33preserve this energy budget.
12:34>> And that's somewhat linked to stress, I
12:36guess, which is from I read your work
12:37and it talked about how stress was
12:39basically just like an overconsumption
12:40of energy. It's It's requiring loads and
12:42loads and loads of energy.
12:43>> Yeah.
12:44>> Okay, we'll talk about that, too, then,
12:45cuz I think stress is a really important
12:46one. What's the third?
12:47>> The third one is
12:49life is resistance.
12:52In order to be alive, in order to to
12:54grow, to learn,
12:56uh to transform, right? Change your
12:58views.
12:59You need resistance to go through some
13:02resistance.
13:02>> Mhm.
13:03>> [clears throat]
13:03>> You need energy to go through some
13:05resistance. Right? If energy just flows
13:08and there's no zero resistance, then
13:11there's no possible transformation.
13:14So, if life was always easy
13:16>> Mhm.
13:16>> and you never faced any challenge, any
13:18stress in your life, then you would just
13:21remain as is, right? And and it would be
13:22very boring. And from first principles
13:25physics, like we know this to be true,
13:27you know, at a number of levels. But,
13:29for example, the sun, this beautiful
13:31nuclear reactor in the sky,
13:33shoots energy, right? As photons. So,
13:35light is a form of energy. And as long
13:38as light, you know,
13:41just goes and and photons travels in
13:43outer space, photon will remain photon.
13:46Light energy will remain light energy
13:48until [clears throat] that light energy
13:50hits a green leaf,
13:52right? And the green leaf basically
13:54breaks or stops the photon in its path.
13:56So, it's it offers a constraint, right?
13:58It offers resistance.
14:00So, when light energy faces resistance,
14:03now it can be converted. And that's the
14:05basis of making food. That's how nature
14:08makes food.
14:09It crystallizes energy from sunlight
14:12into molecules. Life, you know, plants
14:15crystallize light energy into
14:18carbohydrates.
14:19And then those are transformed into the
14:21different kinds of food that we eat. We
14:22need resistance for energy to trans-
14:25form into something meaningful.
14:26>> has the mitochondria got to do with all
14:28of this?
14:28>> Mitochondria are basically little
14:30resistors, right? And and they are what
14:32allows the flow of energy through the
14:35system.
14:35>> Have you got a picture of Okay, here we
14:37go.
14:37>> Yeah.
14:38>> Okay, so this is a an image of a
14:40mitochondria. A mitochondrion o n is a
14:43singular. Okay.
14:45>> is plural. Yeah. So, this is a
14:46mitochondrion and there's about a
14:48thousand of these in each of your cells.
14:50>> Okay.
14:51>> And there's about 5 trillion cells in
14:54your body uh that have a nucleus and
14:56that have these beautiful mitochondria.
14:58And what you see here, these little
15:00wings, these are called cristae.
15:02And the cristae is where the food you
15:04eat end up and where the oxygen you
15:06breathe end up as well. So, this is
15:08where the electrons are flowing. There's
15:10like little electrical circuits here.
15:12And as the electrons are flowing, the
15:14mitochondria become charged like little
15:16batteries. So, effectively a
15:17mitochondrion like this has all of these
15:20sites of oxygen consumption and and food
15:23consumption and then that gets
15:24transformed
15:26into a little charge battery. And once
15:28the battery is charged,
15:30the mitochondria can use that charge to
15:32make ATP, adenosine triphosphate, which
15:34is kind of the the cellular energy
15:36currency. If a cell wants to contract,
15:38right, a muscle cell wants to contract
15:40in the gym, it needs ATP. So, it calls
15:42upon the mitochondria, it says, "I need
15:44ATP." And then the mitochondria gets to
15:46work and then flows electrons, consumes
15:50some food, burns some oxygen, that's why
15:52you get out of breath. All right, so
15:53when you get out of breath it's because
15:54the mitochondria are using the oxygen
15:57and calling for more oxygen. What we've
15:59been discovering is that mitochondria do
16:00a lot more than just making ATP.
16:03>> Okay.
16:03>> They use their their energized state to
16:06produce signals,
16:08to receive information and then to
16:09produce signals.
16:10>> Oh, so they're talking to each other.
16:11>> They're talking to each other.
16:12>> And what are they saying?
16:13>> They're they're it's a whole collective
16:15and and they're talking to each other,
16:17kind of monitoring what's happening not
16:19only inside the cell but outside the
16:20cell. So, on the surface of
16:22mitochondria, all along there are little
16:24receptors for all sorts of signals that
16:27tells this mitochondrion, is there
16:29enough energy? Is there are we running
16:30out of energy? Is there a stress hormone
16:33here? Should we be getting ready for,
16:35you know, something dangerous?
16:36So, mitochondria are like like a little
16:38distributed brain.
16:40Right? So, they're like the
16:41intracellular brain.
16:43>> Am I right in thinking that they used to
16:44be bacteria?
16:45>> They are. Yeah, they did Yeah.
16:47>> What what is that story?
16:48>> [laughter]
16:49>> Cuz I think someone said that to me
16:50before on the show that our mitochondria
16:51are actually bacteria that from
16:54prehistoric times or something.
16:55>> So, the story is about 1.5 billion years
16:58ago
16:59that there was two different types of
17:01bacteria.
17:02One type was able to use oxygen
17:05to transform energy, right? So, it could
17:07fuel along oxygen and and other food
17:09substrates. The other type could not. It
17:11was anaerobic.
17:13And the anaerobic bacterium was probably
17:15a little bigger and it had like a a few
17:16more genes,
17:18um and it could only ferment its food
17:20and kind of fermenting the food,
17:22spitting out, you know, like lactate or
17:24like yeast does. And what happened is
17:27the big one either engulfed the small
17:29one,
17:30right? Or maybe the small one kind of
17:32infiltrated, colonized the big one. And
17:35the story goes uh that this basically
17:38gave a whole bunch more energy to the
17:40big cell.
17:41That's one perspective. And then with
17:43more energy, what can you do? You can
17:45evolve more complexity.
17:46The version I I favor, based on the
17:48evidence we have, is that when
17:50mitochondria came in and then they they
17:53there was this new structure, this
17:55symbiotic relationship, mitochondria
17:57basically gave the ability of the cell
18:00to perceive the environment in a
18:01different way and to compute information
18:03in a different way. So,
18:05maybe the the the coming of of
18:07mitochondria into this big cell
18:09made the big cell social. Because before
18:12this event, most of the evidence says
18:14that cells were asocial. They were
18:16little bacteria foraging for for for
18:19themselves and you know, kind of
18:21operating from a very selfish
18:23uh perspective. Just trying to
18:24replicate, you know, just trying to
18:26survive. When mitochondria came in, it
18:28like gave those cells a different view
18:29on life. And they're like, "Ooh, we
18:31could work together. How about you
18:32become a cell that gets energy, right?
18:35And I become a cell that uh moves,
18:38right? So then you're the gut and I'm
18:40going to be the muscle."
18:41And and then then together those two
18:43cells can do a lot more, right?
18:45>> And fast forward a couple billion years
18:47and here we are.
18:47>> Here we are, yeah. And and that led to,
18:50you know, bodies with organs, you know,
18:52the liver feeds the rest of the body,
18:54the heart keeps things flowing, the
18:56brain kind of computes and and plans. Uh
18:59so that's division of labor. It's uh and
19:01it started with the mitochondria.
19:03>> You you talked about energy resistance.
19:05I've heard you say that most diseases or
19:07disorders can be explained by
19:08understanding energy resistance.
19:11Give me a a disease that's linked to
19:13energy resistance.
19:14>> The clearest is
19:16what we call insulin resistance or
19:17diabetes.
19:18Right? Diabetes affects millions in the
19:20world. Fundamentally, diabetes is a
19:23disease of energy resistance. Uh so, if
19:25your resistance is too high
19:27>> Because
19:28>> Because you have
19:31um
19:32too much energy pushed onto the system.
19:34>> Sugar, too much sugar, glucose.
19:36>> Yeah, exactly. Or if the mitochondria
19:38are impaired, right? They can't flow
19:41energy, then the the the the energy is
19:43kind of stuck. It faces
19:46greater constraints. Like it wants to go
19:48in that direction, but then there's a
19:49barrier and then another barrier,
19:50another barrier. It's like water
19:52flowing, right? Nice and and and and and
19:55smooth, and then there's like a dam.
19:58Right? And if the dam has zero
20:01um openings, right? Then the the the
20:04water accumulates and then there's high
20:05pressure. And then at some point, the
20:07the water accumulates and ends up
20:08flooding the the landscape and then
20:10damaging things. So, it's a bit of like
20:12the same thing. If now you open
20:14floodgates on the dam, right? Then then
20:16you can use that energy to make
20:18electricity, for example. You use the
20:20the movement of the water to transform
20:21this into electricity. That's basically
20:23what the mitochondria do.
20:25Uh and if you move and you're physically
20:26active, now the flow of energy through
20:28the mitochondria can transform into
20:30work, right? Into speed, into
20:33uh movement, right? Into lifting.
20:35>> Is this linked to cancer at all? Because
20:39it sounds I mean, I don't know much
20:40about cancer, but
20:42cells dividing out of um control
20:46seemingly randomly
20:48>> Yeah. I think that there's a very good
20:49chance, if you look at the biology of
20:51cancer and what scientists call the
20:53hallmarks of cancer there's like a
20:56a 10-item flywheel of these are the core
21:00features of of cancer. Uh all of those
21:02features have some relationship, some
21:04very direct, with increased energy
21:06resistance. Right? So, if energy can't
21:08flow smoothly and a cell
21:11uh is, you know, burning too much energy
21:12and it and it doesn't flow energy
21:14through the mitochondria, which is what
21:15cancer cells do. Cancer cells ditch
21:16their mitochondria and they revert back
21:18to this ancestral, you know, cell that
21:21didn't have mitochondria. It was
21:21anaerobic. It was spitting out lactate.
21:25And we don't really know why cells do
21:26this. It's called the Warburg effect.
21:28And the Warburg effect is when a cell,
21:31in the presence of oxygen, right? If it
21:33wanted, it could use oxygen, flow
21:35electrons through mitochondria, and
21:37transform energy, and and live a nice
21:40social life, uh like every cell in in
21:42this
21:43social collective does in the body.
21:46Uh what cancer cells do is they say,
21:47"I'm not going to use my mitochondria,
21:49even if there's oxygen, even if my
21:51mitochondria can respire." And by doing
21:53this,
21:54it seems like cancer cells revert back
21:56to this ancestral
21:58cell, right? That that just
22:00cares about itself.
22:01>> So, an antisocial cell.
22:02>> Yeah. Then the the the organism will in
22:04the tumor will try to make more blood
22:06vessels around it. Right, it's called
22:07angiogenesis. So, it's like the the
22:09cancer cell trying to decrease energy
22:11resistance. It says, "Bring me more
22:12oxygen."
22:13>> So, it's kind of like there's this sort
22:14of alien all of a sudden that decides it
22:16no longer wants to work with the rest of
22:17the organism, and that it's going to be
22:18selfish, and demand more and more
22:21resources for itself.
22:22>> Mhm.
22:23>> And it multiplies itself Yeah. With
22:26equally selfish little aliens?
22:29>> Yeah.
22:29>> And then the body responds by
22:32listening to it and giving it more
22:33resources? Is that what you're saying?
22:35>> Why do the blood vessels surround the
22:36cancer?
22:37>> Yeah, it's like it's the cancer calling
22:39for, you know, more energy.
22:41>> Okay.
22:41>> Yeah.
22:42So, energy resistance is the product of
22:44two things. Is how much energy is being
22:47demanded, right? Like how much power is
22:49being deployed in in the in the tumor,
22:52for example, or in the working muscle.
22:54Uh and then how much energy is can flow
22:57through the system. It's like the
22:58equivalent of current in an electrical
23:00system. So, if there's a lot of demand,
23:03right, a lot of power is being generated
23:05or a lot of activity is happening like
23:08in a cancer cell, but there's not enough
23:10flow to to to to support that activity,
23:14then that increases resistance.
23:18>> So, is there any understanding as to how
23:20those kind of cancers are caused? Like,
23:23what what causes that moment where, you
23:24know, you talked about the Warburg
23:26effect? What causes that?
23:27>> The cancer community used to think that
23:29dominant driver for cancer was genetic
23:32mutations, but there's an emerging
23:34perspective that changes in metabolism,
23:37changes in the way electrons flow
23:38through through this energetic
23:40circuitry, through the mitochondria, can
23:42actually drive the
23:45instance of a of a new cancer cell. And
23:47then when it a cell becomes cancerous,
23:49ditches its its mitochondria, it goes
23:51back to this selfish state, and then it
23:53makes more of itself.
23:54>> And it tries not to die. Explain that
23:56part to me cuz I was reading about how
23:58cancer cells try to evade death.
24:00>> Yeah, the best way to think about this,
24:02I think, is as a a social collective,
24:04right? Every cell in this organism
24:07cares about the same thing, which is
24:09pres- preserving the the life and and
24:11the health of the whole being, right?
24:13So, [clears throat] every cell in in
24:14this body is in a social contract with
24:17every other cell.
24:18Right?
24:19A cancer cell basically
24:22gets out of this agreement and says,
24:24"No, no, I'm going to fare for myself.
24:26I'm going to take all the energy I can
24:28and I'm going to make more of myself and
24:30it it goes into, you know, bacterial
24:32mode." That happens
24:35sometimes because of mutations and it
24:38seems like there there other causes of
24:40this. Like, for example, hyperglycemia.
24:42>> What's that?
24:42>> High blood glucose.
24:44>> Mhm.
24:44>> Right?
24:45Diabetes
24:47is a major risk factor for developing
24:49cancer.
24:50Why is that?
24:52I don't think there there are good
24:53explanations out there based on like the
24:55molecular framework of of disease and
24:58you know the the genetic
25:00mutation perspective.
25:02If you look at cancer from an an
25:04energetic perspective and
25:06it's I think likely that the increase in
25:09blood glucose increases the pressure,
25:11right? There's more electrons that are
25:12being pushed onto those cells or to
25:15those mitochondria. And when you push
25:17too much energy on a system that doesn't
25:18need energy, it's like you're trying to
25:20shove, you know, a lot of of water
25:22through a very small pipe.
25:23>> Something goes wrong.
25:24>> Yeah, something goes wrong. Something
25:26something can break.
25:27So the the resistance is
25:29if you push a lot of energy into a very
25:32small, you know, container or into a a
25:34channel that can support that, then the
25:36the what happens kind of physically is
25:40an increase in in the resistance to the
25:41flow.
25:42And then that can lead to the cell
25:44trying to protect itself.
25:46That's what insulin resistance is in
25:47diabetes, right? Insulin resistance is a
25:50protection mechanism. There's too much
25:53glucose being pushed onto the cell,
25:55right? And so that causes this excess,
25:58you know, energy coming in. The cell
25:59says, "Whoa, you know, too much." And it
26:02damages the mitochondria, this excess
26:03resistance, because there's too much
26:05heat produced, reactive oxygen species,
26:08oxidative stress.
26:09>> I was thinking about smoking and how
26:11smoking also is carcinogenic. It's
26:13cancer causing. And through the lens of
26:15the mitochondria, how could something
26:17like smoking be
26:19cancer causing?
26:20>> Yeah.
26:21It's clear that in
26:23cigarette smoke, there are carcinogens.
26:25They're molecules that can damage the
26:27genome and cause mutations.
26:30It there's a strong link between lung
26:32cancer and smoking, but for all of the
26:34other cancers, there's much less of a a
26:37clear connection between exposure and
26:39cancer.
26:40Right, the cancers that that affect and
26:41and kill most people,
26:44we don't really know
26:46why they come, when they come.
26:48And it's clear that there's kind of a
26:49long history. And
26:51uh
26:51the the science behind, you know,
26:53connecting metabolism and cancer shows
26:55that obesity and
26:58uh high blood glucose and diabetes
27:01especially, which causes very high, you
27:04know, excursion I I have very high
27:06spikes in in blood glucose, those things
27:08are damaging to ourselves. And what the
27:10energy resistance principle says is that
27:13biology processes energy in terms of
27:16resistance.
27:17And it makes that kind of computation.
27:19How much energy is flowing now? And then
27:21how much how much energy demand and how
27:23much energy pressure am I exposed to?
27:26And if there's an imbalance, then that
27:29uh causes damage.
27:31>> Rather than being innocent bystanders,
27:33mitochondria are hijacked by cancer. The
27:35tumor re-programs them to stop acting
27:37like the body's protective energy
27:39factories and starts using them as a
27:41manufacturing plant to build more cancer
27:43cells. Because of this, targeting
27:45mitochondrial metabolism has become a
27:47major promising frontier in developing
27:49new cancer therapies.
27:50>> Mhm.
27:52>> It hijacks the the mitochondria and uses
27:55them to produce more cancer cells.
27:57Mhm.
27:57>> So, a normal cell
28:00uh
28:00is driven, its behavior it's driven by
28:04the mitochondria. It's like mitochondria
28:05are in the driver's seat. Right?
28:07Mitochondria can basically call the
28:08shots. If is the cell to live and
28:11divide, right? Or is the cell to
28:13contract and remain this kind of cell?
28:16Or if it's a stem cell, is it to divide
28:18or remain a stem cell? Uh or is it to
28:21die? Right? And cells have to make these
28:23decisions all the time. And cell suicide
28:25for the greater good is something that
28:27happens all the time in our bodies. And
28:28that's why and how we get rid of of most
28:31cancer cells, right? As far as we
28:32understand, you have a cell that kind of
28:35defects from the social collective, and
28:37then the organism has the wisdom to say,
28:39"Okay, this is no longer ours. Let's get
28:41rid of it." Right? Because it could
28:43become cancer. And most of the time that
28:45works well. Uh but what cancer cells can
28:47do is say, "Okay, I'm They They ditch
28:49their mitochondria and then they start
28:50to use them for their own growth." Uh
28:53and by ditching their mitochondria, they
28:54basically immunize themselves against
28:57the death that mitochondria could could
28:59trigger. So, mitochondria have a veto on
29:01cell life or death, and cancer somehow
29:03is able to kind of get away from that.
29:06>> And it's it's it's weird to think about
29:07because yeah, the things that are cause
29:09cancer or that have a correlation to
29:10cancer are things like, you know,
29:13as you said, like having too much of
29:14this stuff here. Too much sugar.
29:16>> stuff, yes.
29:17>> High blood glucose levels, etc., are
29:19linked to cancer. And one would wonder
29:21why
29:22eating sugar in excess is going to
29:24increase my probability of cancer, but
29:27obviously it points to the fact that it
29:29must be doing something to my energy
29:30systems which are causing some kind of
29:32malfunction somewhere.
29:33>> Yeah.
29:33And what the energy resistance principle
29:36allows us to understand is why that is
29:39and what's really happening. If you
29:40overload your body with
29:43excess energy,
29:45your body has to deal with this. And in
29:46a simple electrical system circuit, if
29:49you jacked up, you know, the voltage and
29:52the system is is too weak to take this,
29:54then resistance goes through the roof,
29:56the transistors start to melt, and then
29:58the system, you know, it gets gets
30:00damaged.
30:00>> Mhm.
30:01>> The The same thing happens, you know, in
30:03the body. If you overload the system
30:04with too much energy, too many
30:05electrons, right? Very direct parallel
30:08with the electrical circuit. There
30:10electrons stuck here on these little
30:12glucose molecules. If you ingest this,
30:14now increases the voltage in the body.
30:17And then if the mitochondria can't keep
30:19up and because they're they're not
30:22flowing energy because you're sedentary,
30:24you're you're not moving, um then that
30:27increases the resistance. All right? And
30:28then
30:29>> And it might die or malfunction.
30:31>> Correct. Or things get damaged, right?
30:33The The clear connection here is too
30:35much energy, increased energy
30:37resistance. So, then the electrons that
30:38normally flow smoothly in your
30:40metabolism, right? From the food to your
30:42mitochondria,
30:44then that whole circuit becomes more
30:45resistive. And then if you're an
30:46electron and you're trying to go through
30:49the the metabolic pathways looking for
30:51oxygen in a mitochondrion, but then
30:54at every [clears throat]
30:55at every point in this cascade you face
30:57resistance, there's more chance that
30:59that electron kind of jets out and and
31:02then becomes oxidative stress.
31:04>> Well, then what's what's going on with
31:05aging? I've got two women in front of me
31:08and they have two different colors of
31:11hair. Now, let's just pretend for
31:14argument's sake and for the sake of this
31:16explanation that this is someone's hair
31:18that's gone gray because of stress.
31:22Um and this is what she used to look
31:24like or he used to look like in terms of
31:26the color of the hair.
31:27What I found really interesting cuz it
31:29kind of speaks to
31:30lots of things that are going on going
31:32on in the body is you're saying you can
31:34actually reverse
31:36gray hair
31:39without dyeing it. And if so, what does
31:41that tell us about what gray hair is,
31:43but more broadly about stress, energy,
31:46mitochondria, and everything in between?
31:47>> Yeah.
31:48Uh what we discovered is that hair
31:50graying is reversible. And and that was
31:54surprising because what I've learned and
31:56what most people learn is that when you
31:58age it's kind of this linear progressive
32:00decline and and there's kind of nothing
32:02you can do about it. Uh but it turns out
32:04that if you look on most people's head,
32:08um
32:09you can see things like this. This is
32:11obviously, you know, this was dyed and
32:13all of the hairs were were white and
32:15then all the hairs are are are dark. And
32:18if you take a hair like this, uh the tip
32:20here, right, was inside the body long
32:23time ago. This is almost like if you
32:24look at tree rings, right? You take a
32:26tree and you cut it in cross-section,
32:28you see like the rings, and then you can
32:30say, "Ooh, this ring was
32:32uh 30 years ago, right?" And this ring
32:34is today. Uh so, you can use that to
32:36kind of map the history of what happened
32:37in the environment of of the tree.
32:40You can do the same thing. We all walk
32:42around with biological history
32:44crystallized in in this hair. And that's
32:46why if you want to know if someone had a
32:48a drug, for example, like a month ago or
32:506 months ago or like 2 years ago,
32:52depending how long the hair is, you can
32:54actually use the hair and all along
32:56would be, you know, the chemical
32:57signature of what you took. So you can
33:00find marijuana in in the hair, you know,
33:02here but not here. So if you if you have
33:04marijuana
33:066 months ago, it's going to be in your
33:07hair and you're going to walk around uh,
33:10with that trace, that physical trace in
33:12in your body.
33:12>> He's got hiccups.
33:13>> [laughter]
33:15>> And the idea was if we could find hairs
33:18on someone's head
33:19that the tip was
33:22uh, dark, right? And then when you look
33:25closer to the body, it becomes white.
33:27Right? And you would say the hair was
33:28young, it was young, it was young, it
33:29was young, and then boom, it became old,
33:31right? It It lost color. Hair graying is
33:34a a a classic hallmark of aging. Um,
33:37then we thought then you would know
33:38something that something was happening
33:40in this hair follicle in this person's
33:42body, right? That made this young hair
33:44become old. And then maybe we could
33:46understand the mechanisms of the aging
33:48process. So this became a kind of an
33:50interesting scenario. And through doing
33:53this, we found people started to send us
33:55hair samples in Ziploc bags, you know,
33:57over the mail. Uh, and we were looking
33:59for two-colored hairs, a single hair
34:02that has two colors, kind of like this.
34:04Uh, and we found the hairs that
34:06uh, you know, head hair, beard hair,
34:08pubic hairs that showed the signature.
34:11The hair was dark and then it became
34:13white or the hair was white and it
34:15became dark again.
34:16>> Mhm.
34:17>> So we had physical evidence from like
34:19multiple people that showed white hairs
34:21can go back to being dark. And this
34:23contradicted this idea that, you know,
34:26aging is this linear progressive process
34:28that we're kind of doomed to experience
34:30without any flexibility. I was one of
34:33the participants in that study. I ended
34:34up finding five hairs that had this
34:36pattern. And when we looked at when the
34:38reversal happened, we found that the
34:40reversal happened when I went on
34:42vacation.
34:43And I would go back in those days on
34:46annual
34:47uh cycling uh training camps. So, I
34:49would go for a week where all you do is
34:52you bike, you eat, you sleep. Uh energy
34:55started to move very differently in my
34:56body during that that time.
34:59Um and then when we looked at the hair
35:02and we analyzed the the composition, the
35:04molecular composition, that's what
35:05scientists do. You can take a hair like
35:07this, snip the pieces, the white
35:09segment, the dark segment, it's all the
35:11same genome, right? Every hair has the
35:12same genome, the same genetic material,
35:15same food, uh same physical activity,
35:17same everything. Why some hairs grow
35:19like this or like that uh
35:21was an opportunity to understand the
35:22dynamics, the plasticity, like how life
35:25can go from being young to old or old
35:27back to young. Uh and what we found was
35:29a the main signal was a mitochondrial
35:31signal.
35:32And in the white hair, I thought there's
35:34going to be less color, right?
35:36Obviously, but also probably less
35:38mitochondria, less, you know, some other
35:40things. We found that the white hairs
35:42have more mitochondria.
35:44And there was an upregulation of the
35:46body that the hair follicle where the
35:49hair was becoming old wasn't kind of
35:51letting go of things. It was doing more.
35:53>> So, that means during that period of
35:56time, you were more stressed and using
36:00more energy?
36:00>> When cells become old, instead of just
36:03dying, right? They struggle.
36:05And when a cell has damage in the DNA or
36:08the mitochondria not working properly or
36:11for some reason they accumulate damage
36:13and become old, the cell struggles to
36:15make more mitochondria. And it it tries
36:18to kind of compensate.
36:20And then ends up wasting a lot of energy
36:22in the process.
36:23>> So, when that hair what you looked at
36:24that was gray, let's call it, um it had
36:27more mitochondria because it was
36:30struggling.
36:31And why was it struggling?
36:33>> It looks like the stress hormones can,
36:35you know, make a cell struggle, for
36:37example.
36:37>> Cortisol?
36:38>> Cortisol, yes. If you're a cell, right,
36:40and your perspective on the world is
36:42pretty simple.
36:44You don't have, you know, the senses
36:45that, you know, we we enjoy, but you do,
36:48nevertheless, you know, sense the
36:49environment. If cortisol comes and you
36:51get the signal,
36:52it means there's something out there in
36:54the environment that's dangerous. Right,
36:56you should be preparing for having to
36:57fight or to flight or
36:59there's something out there that's
37:00dangerous. Our cells evolved to
37:01interpret cortisol in that way.
37:03So, we did an experiment in the dish. We
37:06wanted to know how much energy does it
37:08cost to worry about the future?
37:10Right? Or how much energy does it cost
37:12to ruminate about yesterday?
37:14>> Mhm.
37:14>> The thing you didn't do or the mistake
37:16you made at work or
37:17>> [laughter]
37:17>> that conversation that went sideways,
37:20you know, with your partner.
37:21How much energy does that cost to be
37:23thinking about this, to be, you know,
37:24engaging your stress system, to be
37:26releasing cortisol?
37:28So, two students in a lab, Gabriel and
37:30Natalia, did that experiment. You put
37:32You put cells in a dish. You give them
37:34the equivalent of cortisol. How much
37:36energy is going to cost for these cells
37:38to prepare? There's nothing damaging
37:42to the cortisol itself, but the cortisol
37:43is a signal that there might be
37:44something dangerous outside. Right,
37:46that's like when you're sitting down,
37:47you get an email, you're like,
37:49"I might lose my job, right?" Or "I
37:51might not get this contract." And then
37:53you you have this whole stress response.
37:55Your heart starts to beat
37:56faster. How much energy does that cost?
37:58So, in cells in a dish, we can isolate
38:01that question really well. We found that
38:04the stress hormone increased energy
38:06expenditure, at the cost of life, by
38:0860%.
38:10>> So, when I'm stressed, I'm using 60%
38:13more energy, theoretically.
38:14>> I don't know about you, but cells in a
38:16dish.
38:17>> [laughter]
38:17>> Okay.
38:17>> So, there the beauty about like
38:20bodies and, you know, with the mind and,
38:22you know, just complex organism. They're
38:24buffering systems, right? So, you might
38:25Yeah, I don't think your energy
38:26expenditure increased by 60% if you're
38:28stressed out, but it increases somewhat.
38:31>> What is that graph there?
38:32>> So, there two graphs here.
38:35The top one is the color of the hair of
38:38a single hair from a young Asian woman
38:41who was part of the study. And what we
38:43see here, this is called a hair
38:44pigmentation pattern, the HPP that we we
38:47developed in the lab to understand
38:49quantitatively bring science to the to
38:52hair graying and and reversal. And so,
38:54what you see here is this hair was dark
38:56and then it became white
38:58for 2 cm and then boom, completely
39:02regained color. Actually, it regained It
39:04was darker here than it than it used to
39:05be, right? And then stayed dark
39:07afterwards. So, this is a hair that we
39:09received in the mail as we were starting
39:12to to collect
39:14two-colored hairs.
39:15And then when we when we saw this, we
39:18had found from a few different people
39:20white hairs that had regained color.
39:22We'd never seen a hair like this. That's
39:24dark, white, and then dark, right? So, I
39:27remember holding this hair. I was like,
39:29"Oh my god."
39:30This is in the same hair. This is
39:32incontrovertible evidence that graying
39:35of hair is reversible and it can be
39:37pretty pretty fast. Like this transition
39:40here is just a few weeks. This is about
39:411 week. Right? So, this white hair,
39:44completely white, regained color in just
39:45about a week. So, then we developed an
39:48instrument which was a simple sheet. On
39:51the Y axis, the vertical is most
39:54stressful thing that ever happened to
39:55you, no stress at all. 10 and zero. And
39:59then the X axis, the horizontal, was
40:02time. Yes.
40:03On the far right is now, right? This is
40:06now, this is a year ago. And then we
40:08labeled all the months.
40:10And then we asked people and we asked
40:12this lady put a dot on the graph that
40:15was the most stressful time in the past
40:17year. Like anyone can do the exercise,
40:19past year, most stressful time.
40:22Okay, maybe last March. And then you put
40:24a dot right in March, number 10. And
40:27then least stressful part, uh zero. And
40:29then put other like meaningful things
40:31that happened that were challenging. So
40:32people put dots, you know, along the
40:34this last year, then connect the dots,
40:36right?
40:38The red graph is her dots connected.
40:42>> And it correlates perfectly to her hair
40:44going gray.
40:45>> Correct.
40:46And what happened to her life, she said
40:48she finished her PhD thesis and she was
40:51jobless, but she was fine. She was happy
40:54to be done with her studies and then
40:56broke up with her boyfriend.
40:58>> Oh, damn, and her hair went gray.
41:00>> Yeah. Broke up with her boyfriend. She
41:02didn't know what was happening with her
41:03life. She had to travel to Europe. There
41:05was some family drama.
41:07Uh she said these were the last the most
41:08stressful 2 months of my life.
41:10>> There's a killer question here, which is
41:13if that remains chronic, does that hair
41:16follicle go gray forever?
41:18>> Yeah.
41:19>> I if I go through a a stressful period
41:22for 2 to 3 weeks and my hair goes a bit
41:25gray, as long as I get out of that
41:27stressful period as quick as possible,
41:29does that hair then return to to black
41:31or dark?
41:32>> Yeah.
41:32>> Do you see what I'm saying?
41:33>> Yes. It seems like and we ran some like
41:35fancy mathematical model to understand
41:36why this would be possible,
41:38why it could happen like now for this
41:41hair and then be reversible, but we know
41:43it, you know, very well. If you have a
41:45full head of gray hair and you're 70
41:46years old, you're not going to regain
41:47your color.
41:48>> Yeah.
41:48>> So there seems to what the model the
41:50mathematical model suggested is that
41:52there's a window of opportunity,
41:54right? Where a hair slowly accumulates
41:56damage, becomes more and more probably
41:59energetically inefficient, right? So
42:00there's more and more energy resistance,
42:02and then there's a barrier. And then
42:03when the the hair hits that threshold,
42:06now it loses color.
42:07>> It's done.
42:08>> Yeah. But then if something changes in
42:10the body, right? You go on a vacation or
42:13you start to do intermittent fasting and
42:16then there's more energy available for
42:17your dark hair, now it can be reversed,
42:19right? Because you can go back up
42:21against that threshold. But then
42:23eventually this hair is going to go gray
42:24again. And then if you're way way down,
42:26like this hair turned gray 10 years ago
42:28and you go back up, you're too far away
42:30from threshold to regain color.
42:32>> Okay.
42:33>> So it suggests to some threshold model
42:35that there's a window of opportunity for
42:38some something as binary as hair color.
42:40It's a black or it's white, right? So
42:42there's kind of a window of opportunity
42:43there where
42:44>> where you can reverse gray hair.
42:46>> Yes.
42:46>> I do want to come back to this hair
42:48thing, but it did make me think cuz you
42:50you added a layer of nuance there, which
42:51is about the mind.
42:52>> Mhm.
42:53>> Like if I go through my life um with a
42:56more resilient mind and you get that bad
42:59email and you go
43:00and I get the bad email and I go
43:02it, who cares?
43:02>> Yeah.
43:03>> Am I therefore going to be a way more
43:04productive person throughout those 24
43:06hours because my mitochondria are using
43:08less energy because there's less
43:09cortisol?
43:10>> Yeah. Based on what we know, I think
43:11that's likely correct.
43:13So it's not the stress that burns us
43:16down, it's the response to stress. And
43:19nothing is free in biology. And for your
43:20heart to beat a little faster, if you
43:22mount a response to that email, right?
43:25You're burning energy in your heart. And
43:27then
43:27>> [clears throat]
43:27>> you're tensing your you know, your your
43:29shoulder, that's burning energy. Now
43:31your brain is going into like rumination
43:32mode and then this thing and then then
43:35it makes you think about your childhood
43:36and this and like and then the anx- the
43:38anxiety and then you start to sweat.
43:40Like everything costs energy.
43:42>> So the chain of events is I get the
43:45email. It's a very bad email. Says
43:47you're fired, Steven, from the BBC. We
43:49found a different host.
43:50>> Yeah.
43:50>> Um I look at the email.
43:52That goes into my psychology, my mind.
43:55I then have a story I tell myself about
43:58what that email means for me, my future,
43:59my children, whatever.
44:01Which then causes a physiological
44:03response of like chemicals like
44:05cortisol.
44:06>> Yeah.
44:07>> Um which goes into my cells, my
44:09mitochondria, which then have to work a
44:11little bit harder or use more energy.
44:12>> Mhm.
44:13>> Which is ultimately then going to mean
44:15that I'm
44:16more tired because I have a finite
44:19amount of energy per day.
44:21>> Mhm.
44:22>> Is that Is that sequence of events I I
44:24ask about that sequence because it
44:25offers me an opportunity to intervene at
44:27some point.
44:27>> Yes. Yes.
44:29>> That's it. Right, when you think about
44:30it.
44:31>> [laughter]
44:32>> Or I
44:33get a little bit better with bad news.
44:35>> Yeah, or you know, learn to be less
44:37reactive, right? Or learn to to feel and
44:40and
44:41um, you know, sit with be aware of that
44:43reaction cuz the key solution to kind of
44:47to cutting that
44:48sequence of event that ends up draining
44:50you is to become aware of it.
44:52>> Yeah, become aware of it. Yeah.
44:54>> All right? Uh, so you can kind of
44:55interrupt this and people who study
44:58contemplative practices and and
45:00meditation and you know, mindfulness
45:02approaches,
45:03I think many of them think this is kind
45:05of the key, right? The the the
45:06awareness, the somatic awareness or
45:08interoception. So if you feel into your
45:12your bodily responses, you become free
45:14of do I mount a response? Is that needed
45:16now or not?
45:17>> There's different types of stress,
45:18right? There's like the acute stress,
45:20which is just you get the email, you
45:22feel a little bit of a spike, but 5
45:23minutes later you're fine.
45:24>> Yep.
45:25>> And then there's the more chronic type
45:27of stress where
45:28you're waking up every day with the same
45:30feeling of stress deep inside you for
45:33many many days in a row, many weeks in a
45:34row.
45:35>> Yeah.
45:35>> Um, I hear that acute stress isn't all
45:37that bad and it's very normal and
45:39useful, but it's this chronic stress
45:41that can cause a lot of damage.
45:42>> Yeah, and I think that brings us back to
45:44the concept of how is energy flowing
45:46through the body? And if it flows with
45:48not enough resistance, you can't
45:50survive, but if there's too much
45:51resistance, then you you get drained.
45:53>> How do I think about this resistance
45:55thing cuz I'm really struggling with
45:56like understanding it?
45:58>> Maybe one good example to to frame this
46:00is exercise.
46:01>> Yeah.
46:02>> All right? When you start to exercise,
46:04there's increased resistance in your
46:06muscle, right? Your muscles are
46:08contracting, so there's a physical
46:09resistance there, but there's also
46:11energy resistance. So, the the energy is
46:13trying to flow through the muscle, and
46:14then there's you have mitochondria. If
46:16you have just a few mitochondria and the
46:18muscles are contracting really hard,
46:20like you're running, you're sprinting,
46:21right? You're doing interval training.
46:23Um now, the mitochondria don't have the
46:25capacity to flow as much energy as the
46:27muscle is asking.
46:29Right? So, that's an imbalance of demand
46:32to flow capacity. Now, the the product
46:34of this, the demand divided by flow
46:37capacity, is resistance.
46:38>> Okay.
46:39>> So, if you demand a lot of your muscle
46:41because of your your your sprint, uh but
46:43you you don't have a lot of
46:44mitochondria, right? It's going to feel
46:46terrible. Uh and then because the
46:48resistance creeps up, and then your
46:49muscle, you know, becomes really hot,
46:51and then eventually there's
46:52inflammation,
46:53uh and then it burns, and then then it's
46:55uncomfortable.
46:56Uh but then
46:58So, that's like an acute bout of of
47:00energy resistance. What happens with
47:02exercise is once you recover, right? The
47:05benefits of exercise don't happen during
47:07the exercise, they happen after, during
47:09the recovery. So, if you recover, now
47:11you're you're the muscles are relaxing,
47:13and you're resting, eventually you go,
47:16you know, for you go to sleep. Uh it's
47:18the in during the decrease in the
47:20resistance, now the cell says, "Next
47:22time this happens, I better be ready.
47:24Like this was really uncomfortable. It
47:25was too much energy shoved into a system
47:28that couldn't take it. Right? So, I need
47:30I'm going to make more mitochondria."
47:31So, that That's what happens if you go
47:33from being a sedentary couch potato,
47:35right? To training for a marathon. You
47:38can double the amount of mitochondria
47:40you have in your muscles.
47:42And that's the system feeling the the
47:44rise in resistance, like I don't have
47:45the capacity to flow that much energy,
47:47and then
47:49adapting for this for the next time. It
47:51said, "Next time I'm going to be ready.
47:52Let's make more mitochondria." So,
47:54that's probably what where the benefits
47:56of exercise come from. This the spiking
47:59and and why stress is is not a bad thing
48:02intrinsically, right? If you have a
48:04spike of stress, it stimulates the
48:06process the the the it stimulates the
48:08body to put in place things that in the
48:11long run makes you more efficient,
48:13decreases your resistance. Then you can
48:14go through life with with less
48:17resistance.
48:18>> Coming back to this gray hair thing. So,
48:20if if we consider gray hair, my hair
48:23going gray,
48:24to be the last domino that fell.
48:26So, like the symptom.
48:27>> Yeah.
48:28>> Then what is what are the what what is
48:29the first domino?
48:30>> Mhm.
48:31>> And can you walk me through the sequence
48:32of events? Because one would assume that
48:35if I understand that sequence of events,
48:37I can also understand how to then
48:38reverse it.
48:39>> Yeah.
48:39>> How to kind of take I've got a couple of
48:40gray hairs now. And I actually
48:42anecdotally do think, weirdly now you've
48:44said this,
48:45that I have like gray hair flare-ups
48:48where I'll go I'll, you know, go through
48:49a couple of weeks or months of doing
48:50something and I'll look in the mirror
48:52and be like, "What? I have 12 now?"
48:54I'm being generous there. There's more
48:55like 25. [laughter]
48:56I have I have 25 now. In terms of those
48:58dominoes, the symptom is gray hair. What
49:00is the first domino that that falls? And
49:02what is the sequence of events that
49:04leads to the gray hair in the follicle?
49:06>> So, there's a finite energy budget.
49:08>> Mhm.
49:08>> And then what the organism does is it
49:10allocates energy in different places,
49:11like a business, right? You have this
49:13budget, do I put more energy here? If do
49:15I put, you know, more resources here? If
49:17so, I need to take resources away from
49:19here, right? So, as stress happens in
49:21your life, it pulls energy away from
49:24some of the things that keep you young.
49:25Right? So, there's
49:27there's a kind of a hierarchy of energy
49:29needs in the body. Not everything can be
49:30prioritized the same way. You know
49:32Maslow's hierarchy of human needs?
49:34>> Yeah.
49:34>> Yeah? So, Maslow's insight was uh
49:37>> Oh my god, I just freaked out. My hand
49:39reached down and I just felt someone's
49:40head.
49:41It was just
49:42I just
49:44>> Acute stress response.
49:45>> Yeah, I just [laughter] got Yeah, caught
49:47off guard. Sorry. Maslow's hierarchy of
49:48needs.
49:49>> Yeah.
49:50So, there's there's a hierarchy of
49:52energy needs in the body that's works
49:54similarly to Maslow's hierarchy of
49:56needs. Maslow said, "Uh for a human
49:58being to be fully realized, first, you
50:01need to have safety and food and shelter
50:03secured, right?" Once you have this and
50:05you feel this is kind of covered in your
50:07life, then you can start to think about
50:08building relationships with other
50:10people, right? Loving relationships.
50:12Once you have this settled, now you can
50:14start to think about building your
50:15skills, right? Like becoming really good
50:17at something. Uh and then once you have
50:19this covered, now you can devote energy
50:22to the more frivolous things like
50:23spirituality, what do you call
50:25self-actualization, and kind of becoming
50:27your best self, flourishing. Uh so, he
50:29saw this very much as a this is this
50:32needs to be covered uh and when things
50:35get really hard and there are
50:36constraints on your life, the first
50:38thing to go is the top of the pyramid,
50:39right? Your meditation practice or the
50:41long-term type like I'm going to be a
50:43better person. No, like I need to make
50:45sure we can put food on the table next
50:48week, right? Um so, this hierarchy of of
50:51human needs, I think, aligns with
50:53hierarchy of
50:55uh of energy needs in the body. And as
50:57far as the importance of hair color
51:00goes, it's pretty low on the hierarchy.
51:03So, as the body gets older and you have
51:06more and more cells in the body that
51:08start to
51:10uh be less efficient, right? Their
51:11mitochondria are working a little, you
51:13know, less efficiently and
51:16uh and then there there's more
51:17inflammation in the body that's costing
51:18energy, and uh
51:21there's
51:22more worries about, you know,
51:24professional obligations and all these
51:25things kind of stack up and steal energy
51:27away from the things that are there. We
51:29call them growth, maintenance, and
51:31repair. These are like the anti-aging
51:34processes in in the body. And those need
51:36energy, but they're not as important as
51:39you know, facing the stressor that you
51:41think is life-threatening now.
51:42>> So, if there's a lion chasing me, my
51:44body's going to commit all the the
51:46energy I have to getting away from this
51:48lion and it might say, "Listen, Stephen,
51:51we're not going to repair the skin next
51:53to your eyes. You're going to get a
51:55couple more wrinkles and we're not going
51:56to make your We're not going to commit
51:58energy to making sure your follicles in
52:00your hair produce black pigment or
52:02whatever."
52:03>> Exactly.
52:03>> So, I would then look aged. I would look
52:05old older.
52:07>> But, that's because all of my energy's
52:08been going to something else which my
52:09body considers to be a higher priority.
52:11>> Correct.
52:11>> Which also brings me to, I guess,
52:14the famous
52:15what we always talk about with
52:16presidents because presidents go into
52:18office often with dark hair.
52:19>> Yeah.
52:20>> And they come out with gray hair. And
52:22usually one does not age that quickly in
52:248 years. We see the same in the Premier
52:25League with football managers.
52:26>> Mhm.
52:27>> They walk in on that first day, they
52:28look very sprightly and energetic. And
52:30uh 2 years later, they have have gray
52:32hair, bags under their eyes, wrinkles,
52:34and they look like they've aged 10
52:35years.
52:36>> Yeah.
52:36>> So, you're telling me actually that the
52:38the real secret to anti-aging, if there
52:40was one,
52:41is this.
52:42>> Is the proper allocation of energy.
52:48So, if you don't waste energy stressing
52:51out about the future and the past,
52:53and you can spend more time in the
52:55moment not being overly reactive to
52:58things,
52:59which uh is kind of a a lifelong effort,
53:02then more of that precious energy can go
53:04towards anti-aging.
53:05>> Can I also pull more energy in the top?
53:07Like, can I just if I get more energy,
53:10does that mean that there's less
53:12likelihood that we're going to run out
53:13of energy when it comes to my hair
53:15follicles being black or gray?
53:17>> Yeah. The thing is it doesn't look like
53:19we have that flexibility. Like, if you
53:20want to have more energy and you want to
53:21age more slowly, uh eating more does is
53:25not going to give you more energy.
53:26>> So, is there anything I can do to have
53:28more energy available?
53:30>> Uh you you can become more efficient.
53:32>> I can become more efficient, but I can't
53:33put more in.
53:34>> No.
53:35>> Hm.
53:36And how does one become more efficient
53:37then? You know, you said about stress.
53:39Okay, I'm going to live a less stressed
53:41life.
53:41>> Yeah.
53:42It seems like
53:43there's a few things that we know makes
53:45organism more efficient. One is
53:46exercising.
53:48>> Okay.
53:48>> Right? Because when you exercise again,
53:50you're increasing energy resistance,
53:51uncomfortable, potentially you're
53:53damaging things, right? Because you're
53:55you're uh
53:56increasing what we call dissipated
53:58losses, right?
54:00Oxidative stress and all sorts of things
54:01happen during the
54:05during the exercise, but then when you
54:06recover, now the body's like, "Next time
54:09this happens, I'm going to be ready."
54:10And
54:12the process of getting ready to to go
54:16through a high resistance, you know, gym
54:18session is that you make more
54:20mitochondria, right? Your muscles get
54:22bigger and stronger, and your heart
54:24becomes more efficient, and your
54:26arteries, you know, become more become
54:28softer, and you develop, you know, the
54:31the confidence that you can do this
54:33well. Um and then it becomes rewarding.
54:36You you know, it becomes enjoyable. So,
54:37all of these things, now that you're off
54:40the gym session,
54:41>> Mhm. [clears throat]
54:41>> right? You spent an hour in the gym
54:43telling the body, "This is what we're
54:45going to do in the future." And then the
54:46body's like, "Okay, I'm going to get
54:47ready."
54:48If there's a fixed energy budget, the
54:50only way really to to get ready for this
54:52is to become more efficient. So, by
54:54having more mitochondria, by having a
54:56more fluid um and kind of flexible
54:59cardiovascular system, and uh by putting
55:02in place all of these changes,
55:03decreasing inflammation, right? All of
55:06these things make energy more energy
55:07available. It decreases the energetic
55:09cost of doing the activity,
55:11and then there's more energy available
55:13for anti-aging, growth, maintenance, and
55:15repair, vitality. So, I suspect that's
55:18why you burn more energy when you
55:19exercise, but you feel like you have
55:21more. And you don't actually have more.
55:23The feeling that you have more energy is
55:25simply energy's flowing more smoothly
55:28through this thing.
55:29>> It's more efficient. I've got more
55:30mitochondria.
55:31>> Yeah.
55:31>> Okay.
55:32What what else?
55:33What about food? You know, I've I've
55:35uh I've got coffee here. I've got some
55:39alcohol here. I've got the sugar.
55:45What I consume, how does that impact the
55:47efficiency of the energy flowing through
55:50my body?
55:50>> Yeah, great question. Uh alcohol, what
55:53we know about alcohol is that
55:56as we talked about earlier, nothing is
55:58free in biology, right? So, if you put
56:00something in the body that shouldn't be
56:01there, effectively a toxin like ethanol,
56:04which is what's in there, uh it's going
56:06to cost energy to get rid of it.
56:08So, there are detoxification systems in
56:10your liver, primarily, that takes
56:13alcohol, breaks down the molecule, and
56:15then you can pee it out, right? Or
56:16metabolize it for energy even. Uh so,
56:19there's a bunch of of energy in ethanol,
56:22but when you take alcohol, it doesn't
56:24give you more energy. If anything, the
56:26next day you feel like because what
56:28happens is you you waste energy
56:31degrading the alcohol, right? And even
56:33though it's a net plus, you're putting
56:35calories in the machine in the body, uh
56:38but uh
56:39what ends up happening is you burn
56:41energy getting rid of it. So, there's a
56:43cool study where they brought people in,
56:45they gave them a bunch of alcohol, they
56:47they're, you know, effectively
56:49effectively drunk, and then they
56:50measured how much energy are they
56:51burning. And you can do those kind of
56:53studies, we've we've done those studies
56:55in the lab. In a small room, you put a
56:57human being, and then you just measure
56:58how much energy does it cost for them to
57:00stay alive, right? And you ask them to
57:02not do too much in the smaller room,
57:04they're just sitting down reading a
57:05book. Um and then then you can ask them,
57:08"Okay, now drink this alcohol." And then
57:10you measure, you look you're minute by
57:11minute, they drink the alcohol, and then
57:13you start to see, "Woo, it climbs up."
57:15So, the alcohol, even though you feel
57:16relaxed, inside, under the hood, the
57:19body's like burning energy to get rid of
57:21the alcohol. And other toxins probably
57:23work the same way, you know, pesticides
57:25or kind of the things we eat that we
57:27shouldn't be eating. The reason why
57:29those things might be bad for our health
57:30maybe because they they steal energy
57:33away from, you know, a growing body, for
57:35example.
57:36Uh there's good data in uh South
57:38America. Children who are exposed to
57:40more pathogens, right? There's no
57:42sanitation, they walk barefoot, they
57:44they eat stuff, you know, that's not
57:45clean, then um they have more pathogens
57:48uh in their gut, right? There's there's
57:50more
57:51uh viruses, bacteria, and parasites. Uh
57:54it costs energy to fight those things
57:56off.
57:58That's why you feel like when
57:59you're burning when when you're fighting
58:01a flu, for example. Right? Your immune
58:03system your immune cells are like,
58:05"Whoa, you know, virus, like COVID or,
58:07you know, any, you know, seasonal flu
58:09virus." The immune system goes into
58:11overdrive to kill this virus and get rid
58:14of it. And then that the immune system
58:16steals energy away from the brain, from
58:19from your mind, and then you feel like,
58:21"Oh, everything is so difficult. You
58:22just want to be in bed, over covers, you
58:24feel cold," which is strategy to
58:26basically save energy. So, all of the
58:29what's called sickness behavior, right?
58:31All of those features of your behavior,
58:32you become antisocial, right? Your skin
58:35is more sensitive, so you avoid moving.
58:37Uh
58:38it's like all of those features can be
58:39understood as energy conservation
58:42strategies.
58:43>> Stressors,
58:44alcohol, parasites,
58:47all kind of have this increased the the
58:49cost of living. Uh and then because
58:52there's a cap on your energy budget, uh
58:54then that energy needs to be coming from
58:57somewhere else.
58:58>> And if you're in those states for long
58:59periods of time, you're in a chronic
59:01state of um I guess like energetic
59:03distraction is the way I think about it.
59:05>> That's that's a cool way to think about
59:06it.
59:06>> I was thinking about it. I was thinking
59:07about it like if you you
59:09my body has an army of 10 soldiers.
59:12And usually those 10 soldiers are like
59:14at work doing the things that I need to
59:16do to survive and grow and flourish. And
59:18then when I have one of these, I don't
59:20know, some sort of toxic substance comes
59:22into my body,
59:24you're basically saying that four of
59:25those soldiers have to be reassigned to
59:28go deal with this invader.
59:30And so now I only have six that are
59:32focused on
59:33everything I need to flourish, which is
59:35why I I probably feel
59:36>> Mhm. Sometimes.
59:37>> Yeah, exactly.
59:37>> Um And what if if there's only six
59:39working on
59:41my you know, fundamental requirements to
59:44flourish,
59:45then
59:46some of those things are going to have
59:47to give way, and I might end up with
59:49gray hair, and I might end up with
59:51wrinkles, or
59:52maybe my brain won't function the same.
59:54Maybe
59:55>> Yeah.
59:55>> disease
59:56>> Yeah.
59:56>> You know, my immune system won't be
59:57taken care of in the same way.
59:58>> Yeah. Immune system won't be there
1:00:00clearing the cancerous cells, for
1:00:01example. Um and the repair processes
1:00:04that happen all the time in the brain,
1:00:06right? Clearing out proteins that you
1:00:08don't need, uh repairing
1:00:10damage DNA that's get gotten damaged, or
1:00:13making new mitochondria. All of these
1:00:16processes happen like every day. Every
1:00:18day you go through a little phase of
1:00:20getting rid of the things that don't
1:00:21work too well to make
1:00:23more of the things that work well, like
1:00:24mitochondria. Quality control it's
1:00:26called. Right? So, there's this quality
1:00:27control cycle. Old mitochondria that
1:00:29don't work too too well anymore, they
1:00:31get degraded. It's called mitophagy.
1:00:34Autophagy is self-eating. Mitophagy is
1:00:37self-eating of the mitochondria.
1:00:39So, when a cell, for example, is is
1:00:41hungry, if you pull energy away from the
1:00:44cell, the cell goes into a mode like,
1:00:46"Oh I might run out of energy. I
1:00:48need to be really efficient here. So,
1:00:50let's get rid of those mitochondria that
1:00:52aren't really contributing their share,
1:00:54uh and then I'll have just the best
1:00:56functioning mitochondria." And then when
1:00:58food comes back on board, the cell makes
1:00:59more of the better ones.
1:01:01>> It made me think of Alzheimer's and
1:01:02dementia, weirdly, because
1:01:05I don't really know a huge amount about
1:01:07Alzheimer's and dementia, but I know
1:01:08that something clearly goes wrong in the
1:01:10body that produces these plaques.
1:01:11>> Mhm.
1:01:12>> And you know, you often hear that
1:01:14there's lots of things we consume or do
1:01:15that increase our probability of getting
1:01:17Alzheimer's and dementia.
1:01:18>> Yeah.
1:01:18>> So, is that at all linked to the same
1:01:20sort of like energy distraction?
1:01:21>> Yes. It's been long believed that the
1:01:22plaque, right, that you've heard about,
1:01:25amyloid plaques and tau tangles, and
1:01:28there's kind of this idea that the brain
1:01:30accumulates proteins, and it's those
1:01:31proteins that cause Alzheimer's.
1:01:34I think that's what most people have
1:01:35heard and what most people believe
1:01:37because it came from, you know, white
1:01:38coat-wearing scientists and
1:01:40university professors.
1:01:42Um that is not the truth.
1:01:44And what is more true is and and and
1:01:48let me just say why it's not the truth.
1:01:50You can have people in their 60s and
1:01:52their 70s and their 80s, zero protein
1:01:55deposit in the brain.
1:01:57We can image this now pretty well with
1:01:58neuroimaging. You can have people zero
1:02:00protein deposit in the brain, and they
1:02:02have full-blown Alzheimer's and
1:02:04dementia.
1:02:05And you have the other extreme,
1:02:07people with loads of
1:02:10amyloid plaques and tau tangles,
1:02:13completely normal cognition.
1:02:16So, those extremes really tell us this
1:02:19hypothesis, this amyloid, you know,
1:02:21protein aggregates in the brain as a
1:02:23driver of dementia and
1:02:25neurodegeneration, is not correct.
1:02:28Uh what we know happens energetically in
1:02:30the brain is that initially, in the
1:02:32early stages of Alzheimer's, there's
1:02:34kind of an increase in energy demand.
1:02:36And there there are specific brain
1:02:38regions that tend to be more affected in
1:02:40some people, not all not all people tend
1:02:42to have those protein deposits. Those
1:02:44regions start start to burn more energy.
1:02:46This is early phase, right? And then at
1:02:48this point, probably this is the brain
1:02:50trying to cope.
1:02:52Right? It's like something's not working
1:02:54great, but it's working harder.
1:02:56>> Like like with the gray hair.
1:02:57>> Yeah, exactly. And then
1:03:00over time, the those brain regions
1:03:02become hypometabolic, and then that's
1:03:04when you start to have symptoms.
1:03:05>> What does that mean?
1:03:06>> That's that's when people start to have
1:03:08memory issues and
1:03:09>> You said hypometabolic.
1:03:10>> Hypometabolic, yes. This is
1:03:12hypermetabolic
1:03:14is kind of this energy distraction you
1:03:16were talking about. Like, there's more
1:03:17energy being burned here. Normal
1:03:20metabolic is, you know, you use 100
1:03:22units of energy for the brain and this
1:03:24Let's say this brain region, 100 units
1:03:26of energy is what this brain region
1:03:27needs to just sustain normal healthy
1:03:30functions. Uh if there's a problem with
1:03:33the mitochondria or there's a problem
1:03:35with, you know, the cell communicating
1:03:37with the synapses, right? Cells talk to
1:03:39each other through these things called
1:03:40synapses. Uh if there's a problem, now
1:03:42the the that part of the brain is going
1:03:44to need to do more work
1:03:46to compensate. Uh and then we know
1:03:49something happens with neurodegeneration
1:03:51and Alzheimer's is inflammation,
1:03:53neuroinflammation. That basically means
1:03:56there's some cells in the brain that are
1:03:58trying to heal the brain.
1:04:00And part of that healing process is kind
1:04:02of a stress response locally. And then
1:04:05that stress response leads to the
1:04:06secretion of little proteins we call
1:04:08cytokines. And then it's basically those
1:04:10cells saying, "Something's wrong.
1:04:12We need to fix this." So, that costs
1:04:14energy. So, you have those cells that
1:04:16get activated, they they secrete those
1:04:18proteins to say, "Please help, you know,
1:04:20there we need to reestablish
1:04:22homeostasis. We need to reestablish
1:04:24normal healthy balance." But that
1:04:26process of reestablishing, of healing,
1:04:28costs energy. Just like when you're post
1:04:30exercise, your muscle invest energy to
1:04:32to become stronger. So, in that kind of
1:04:35early phase, hypermetabolism
1:04:38is when you spend more energy, hyper
1:04:41function, some people have called it.
1:04:43And then eventually it seems like those
1:04:46brain regions get tired out and then
1:04:48they they become hypometabolic, so they
1:04:50burn less energy. So, if you look at the
1:04:52brain of someone with Alzheimer's,
1:04:54there are these regions that are that
1:04:56burn less energy. And energy is so
1:04:58central to everything, including
1:05:00cognition, right? In order to have an
1:05:02idea and to be conscious of that idea,
1:05:04you need to burn energy.
1:05:06So, the the brain kind of
1:05:08burning less energy in later stages kind
1:05:10of reflects this lack of function. You
1:05:13know, the the it's difficult to
1:05:15remember, you know, old memories. It's
1:05:17it's remember it's difficult to to make
1:05:19associations. It becomes difficult to
1:05:21plan in the future
1:05:23and to regulate your emotions and you
1:05:25know, a lot of people with dementia end
1:05:27up having kind of mood issues. They
1:05:29become really depressed and it
1:05:31>> Is this is this what they call it type
1:05:32three diabetes? Cuz I've just heard that
1:05:34phrase quite a lot recently.
1:05:35>> Yeah. And
1:05:37So, my hunch is that Alzheimer's and
1:05:41dementia more generally is a disorder of
1:05:44energy.
1:05:45And
1:05:46specifically, it's a disorder of you
1:05:48know, increased energy resistance.
1:05:51So, there's type three diabetes comes
1:05:53from the fact that when the brain gets
1:05:57sick, right? And symptoms of dementia
1:05:59start to appear like loss of memory and
1:06:02mood and depression and that
1:06:03constellation of symptoms when you look
1:06:05in the brain, it's burning less energy.
1:06:07But, it's also harder for glucose to get
1:06:09inside the brain.
1:06:11>> It's less efficient.
1:06:12>> It's so there's yes, a loss of
1:06:14efficiency but an increased resistance,
1:06:17right? Or a decrease in conductance for
1:06:19energy for glucose for example, to get
1:06:21inside the brain to be processed and and
1:06:23be used.
1:06:24>> And why might that be?
1:06:25>> Because you're pushing too much glucose
1:06:27on the system.
1:06:28>> Oh, okay.
1:06:28>> If you load up the system all the time
1:06:31with with glucose, with sugar in the
1:06:34blood and glycemia is high, you have
1:06:35diabetes perhaps, this is all the time
1:06:38like pressure pushing energy onto this
1:06:40the system that's like really delicate
1:06:42and it's not like a jacking the the
1:06:44voltage on your lamp that eventually,
1:06:46you know, is going to catch fire.
1:06:48We are a slow burning fire. Right? Like
1:06:50the inside of our cells, you have the
1:06:52electrons flowing and when there's
1:06:54sparks flying, it damages the
1:06:56mitochondria. It damages this, damages
1:06:57that. And that increases that's what
1:06:59aging is. Aging the the most basic
1:07:02mechanism of aging
1:07:04including brain aging that leads to
1:07:05Alzheimer's is the accumulation of
1:07:07little damage, little mutations, little
1:07:09defects, little imperfections. And as
1:07:13the imperfections accumulate, the system
1:07:15becomes less efficient. Insulin
1:07:16resistance basically and diabetes refers
1:07:18to the fact that muscles, but also the
1:07:20brain can
1:07:22has the capacity to say, I I can't
1:07:24anymore. Like glucose, too much for me,
1:07:27too much resistance, too much you know,
1:07:29damage that I that I'm exposed to. So,
1:07:31if you're a muscle cell and you want to
1:07:33protect yourself against this excess
1:07:35energy pressure, right? From the
1:07:37glucose, from the from the electrons,
1:07:39you can become
1:07:40insensitive or resistant to insulin. So,
1:07:43then you you take the the receptors that
1:07:45are sitting on top of the surface of the
1:07:47cell,
1:07:48you pull those out, right? So, then the
1:07:50cell no longer is sensitive to insulin.
1:07:53So, then the body's like, "Whoa, like
1:07:54glucose is way high. What do you A
1:07:56normal healthy body releases insulin,
1:07:59floods the blood, insulin goes to the
1:08:01surface of of your muscles and then
1:08:04says, 'Take in the glucose because
1:08:06there's too much glucose in the blood.
1:08:07It's we're going to damage the brain,
1:08:08we're going to damage the eyes, we're
1:08:09going to damage the nerves. So, muscle,
1:08:11please take in the glucose.' But when
1:08:13the muscle is overwhelmed and the
1:08:15mitochondria are starting to be
1:08:17at capacity in terms of how much energy
1:08:20they can
1:08:21resist and and and flow, then they shut
1:08:24down the valves, right? So, the muscle
1:08:25cells become insulin resistant and then
1:08:27glucose intolerant. And that protects
1:08:29the mitochondria in the muscle cells,
1:08:32but then gluco blood glucose starts to
1:08:34increase. So, the next step in this
1:08:36cascade is well, if there's too much
1:08:39energy in circulation, too much sugar,
1:08:40too much fat, what what can we do with
1:08:42this? And that's where fat stores, you
1:08:45know, adiposity
1:08:47comes in. So, obesity
1:08:49is
1:08:50a protection mechanism against
1:08:52[clears throat] excess energy
1:08:53resistance.
1:08:54>> One way to think about this hypothesis
1:08:56that
1:08:58dementia, Alzheimer's, is linked to an
1:09:01overflow of glucose, let's say, is to
1:09:05look at other civilizations or um I
1:09:08don't know, tribes, the Hadza tribe in
1:09:10Africa, who don't have a lot of glucose.
1:09:12Do they still get Alzheimer's and
1:09:13dementia?
1:09:14>> I don't know the the literature on this,
1:09:16uh but it's clear that people who if you
1:09:18if we look at what
1:09:20makes you more likely to have
1:09:21Alzheimer's, uh what makes you less
1:09:23likely to have Alzheimer's, all the
1:09:25things that make you more likely to have
1:09:26Alzheimer's
1:09:27contribute to increasing
1:09:29this energy resistance, right? Too much
1:09:32sugar in the blood. Diabetes,
1:09:34physical inactivity,
1:09:36right? If you don't move, energy doesn't
1:09:38flow through your mitochondria. So, it
1:09:39just stacks up, accumulates, and and the
1:09:41things that protects the brain, protects
1:09:44you against Alzheimer's and dementia,
1:09:46are things that let energy flow.
1:09:47Physical activity, uh not eating too
1:09:50much, especially not eating too much
1:09:51sugar,
1:09:52uh and and then ketones, there's new,
1:09:55you know, data now showing that ketones
1:09:57can uh you know, enter the brain and be
1:09:59metabolized more easily, and can even
1:10:03kind of improve cognition. And the
1:10:04ketogenic diet, which I know you've
1:10:06tried, uh many people report more energy
1:10:09on the ketogenic diet. It's not because
1:10:11you eat more calories, it's because
1:10:13those uh electrons that are stuck on
1:10:15ketones, instead of being stuck on
1:10:17glucose, can flow more more easily. And
1:10:20the those ketones are made by
1:10:22mitochondria in your liver. This is a
1:10:23really beautiful story of this the
1:10:25sociality of mitochondria in the
1:10:27organism. The liver mitochondria is
1:10:29where ketones are made. If you eat eat
1:10:31fat, right? Avocados and oil and and
1:10:34meat and uh butter and uh those fat
1:10:37molecules and go in the liver, and then
1:10:39the mitochondria in the liver take those
1:10:41fat, transform them into ketones, and
1:10:42then put the ketones into the blood. The
1:10:44kidneys also do a little bit of this.
1:10:45And then the ketones go to the brain,
1:10:47and then they feed the mitochondria in
1:10:49the brain. So, you have mitochondria in
1:10:50the liver talking and feeding
1:10:52mitochondria in the brain. And the path
1:10:55for a ketone to go from blood to
1:10:57mitochondria is much shorter in terms of
1:10:59number of enzymes, number of resistors,
1:11:02if you want to think about it
1:11:03energetically,
1:11:04than for glucose. That path is very
1:11:06long. The ketone path is much shorter.
1:11:09>> I just want to make sure on that point
1:11:10that I don't misunderstand because, you
1:11:12know, it sound it could have sounded
1:11:13like you're saying that too much energy
1:11:15might cause Alzheimer's, but actually
1:11:17you're saying you're not saying cuz I
1:11:18think of ketones as energy and I I'm I'm
1:11:20shutting, you know, ketones all the
1:11:22time. I don't want to flood my brain
1:11:24with energy so that, you know, it
1:11:25malfunctions, gets Alzheimer's.
1:11:28>> It's it For some reason, it's really
1:11:30hard to overwhelm the brain
1:11:32>> with ketones.
1:11:32>> And with with ketones or overwhelm the
1:11:34body if you eat fat. Like it's it's very
1:11:37easy to feel like I'm full.
1:11:39I've had, you know, a good enough meal.
1:11:41If you bring sugar into the picture and
1:11:43you mix sugar and fat, now things like
1:11:45taste so good and there's like an extra
1:11:47reward and a lot of people eat for
1:11:48different reasons, not just because
1:11:49they're hungry.
1:11:50>> [laughter]
1:11:51>> That's because it's so rewarding to eat
1:11:53something fatty and sugary.
1:11:54Uh especially the the sugar part, then
1:11:56you you lose regulation and that's why I
1:11:59think the GLP-1 drugs are are so
1:12:00powerful because they they address the
1:12:02problem where it starts. Like how much
1:12:05food are you putting into the system?
1:12:07>> Yeah.
1:12:08I did look at the stats there on the
1:12:10tribes in Africa and it says when
1:12:11researchers study indigenous groups such
1:12:13as the Hadza hunter-gatherer tribe in
1:12:16Tanzania or rural
1:12:19agrarian populations like the Yoruba,
1:12:22they find that Alzheimer's and vascular
1:12:23dementia are exceptionally rare.
1:12:26>> Mhm.
1:12:27>> Which again means that it points to
1:12:30Western diets.
1:12:31>> Mhm.
1:12:31>> Western diet, Western
1:12:33>> lifestyles.
1:12:33>> Yeah,
1:12:34behavior. Yeah, these people move all
1:12:36the time
1:12:37um and they don't eat too much.
1:12:40Um most of them don't need to kind of
1:12:42rely on their fat capacitor.
1:12:45They don't have excess energy to just
1:12:47store away. And for for some people,
1:12:49there's congenital leanness, right? Like
1:12:51you're you're born lean and you're going
1:12:53to like you can't put on fat. If you eat
1:12:55too much, the the high sugar or high fat
1:12:58just accumulates in the blood and then
1:12:59it it gets lodged in ectopic ways. So,
1:13:02in the
1:13:03it gets lodged in the muscle or in the
1:13:04liver or in the brain
1:13:06um and and then that causes damage
1:13:09because of you know this like excess
1:13:11energy pressure and then the system
1:13:12overheats.
1:13:13>> It's skinny fat.
1:13:14>> Skinny fat, yeah.
1:13:15>> No, it stores it in your around your
1:13:17livers and stuff. What's What's that
1:13:18called? That fat inside you?
1:13:19>> Visceral.
1:13:19>> Visceral fat.
1:13:20>> Yeah. And the visceral fat is linked to
1:13:22increased inflammation and it's linked
1:13:24to a bunch of diseases, but this is just
1:13:26a symptom. Like the increased fat and I
1:13:28think the reason why obesity in general
1:13:30we say obesity is bad is because obesity
1:13:33reflects a deeper state, a more
1:13:36important state.
1:13:37With the which is this increased energy
1:13:39resistance.
1:13:40Like there's too much energy in the
1:13:41system and the system can't flow it.
1:13:44Like the mitochondria can't keep up. So,
1:13:46to protect themselves,
1:13:47they store that and store that away and
1:13:50and then
1:13:51then then you become obese.
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1:15:55So, on this point of food then, fasting,
1:15:57autophagy, all these words that I've
1:15:59heard. If you were giving me advice on
1:16:00everything you know about how to create
1:16:02a body that is very, very efficient in
1:16:05how I deal with the energy that I have,
1:16:07what advice would you give me as it
1:16:09relates to eating?
1:16:10>> Develop that awareness of what your body
1:16:12needs. So, when I think about how I eat,
1:16:14I don't think about, you know, my
1:16:16weight, or my body. I think about how am
1:16:18I feeling, and do I need more food,
1:16:21right? Am I like depleted, or uh am I
1:16:24tired and exhausted because there's too
1:16:26much food on board, and my organism is
1:16:28like struggling to keep up with this
1:16:30excess like friction, or excess, you
1:16:32know, energy pressure and on my brain,
1:16:34on my on my mitochondria. So, I think
1:16:36about it from the perspective of my
1:16:38mitochondria. Uh what do my mitochondria
1:16:40need?
1:16:42And in general,
1:16:44it's much harder to
1:16:46you know deplete the mitochondria, like
1:16:48not eating too much.
1:16:49So, if you're thinking about that, okay,
1:16:51there's this food there. Do I snack? Do
1:16:53I not snack?
1:16:56Generally, eating too much there there
1:16:58clear consequences to this. Like it
1:16:59increases the resistance or the friction
1:17:01in in your mitochondria. Not eating
1:17:03enough is typically innocuous for most
1:17:05people.
1:17:06>> Because we we have stores, don't we? Of
1:17:08glycogen and we have stores of glucose
1:17:10in our body, in our muscles, so if we
1:17:11were running low, then our our body can
1:17:13go get some fat, metabolize it.
1:17:15>> Exactly. Make ketones.
1:17:16>> Make ketones.
1:17:17>> Yeah. Yeah, the
1:17:19most people have enough energy on board,
1:17:21right? In the form of fat, some glycogen
1:17:23in your muscles and in your liver
1:17:25to live at least a month.
1:17:27>> I mean, I'm I'm a big big fan of
1:17:29survival documentaries. And one of the
1:17:31most remarkable things you see in
1:17:32survival documentaries, I'm even
1:17:33thinking about some that I've watched,
1:17:34is people can survive for seemingly
1:17:37months without eating anything.
1:17:39>> Yeah.
1:17:40>> And they can't survive very long without
1:17:41water, yeah, but they can survive for
1:17:43months without eating anything.
1:17:45Um because their body will start to kind
1:17:47of go into its reserves and break down
1:17:49muscle and all these other things.
1:17:50>> Yeah.
1:17:51Yeah, the record is
1:17:53world record for not eating is over 300
1:17:55days.
1:17:56>> Wow.
1:17:56>> Irish man.
1:17:58Um
1:17:59and he lost I forget the exact numbers.
1:18:02250 lbs, 300 lbs.
1:18:04>> What does this say about hunger?
1:18:06And also, what does it say about this
1:18:08society we live in where we have so many
1:18:10We have like five meals a Some people
1:18:11basically just eat from morning till
1:18:12night, you know?
1:18:13>> Yeah. I
1:18:14I think a lot of us
1:18:16eat not because we're hungry. I think a
1:18:19lot of us have learned to eat
1:18:22to to subserve some other need. And
1:18:25eating is quite rewarding. It taps into
1:18:27the same systems, you know, as gambling
1:18:28and um kind of connecting with other
1:18:31human beings. So,
1:18:33we know some people eat emotionally,
1:18:34right? When when stressed out, they they
1:18:36they eat more, and
1:18:38so I [clears throat] think hunger is is
1:18:40something to be skeptical of because
1:18:43there are many pathways that I think
1:18:45kind of converge on hunger. Like if you
1:18:47feel sad, you feel like bored,
1:18:50hunger will kind of get you out of
1:18:51boredom because of the salt, because of
1:18:53the especially if you had salty, sugary
1:18:55things around.
1:18:57It's a rewarding thing that will get you
1:18:58out of uncomfortable other uncomfortable
1:19:00sensations. I think most of us overeat.
1:19:03That's
1:19:04um
1:19:05a good general assumption to make.
1:19:06You're probably overeating.
1:19:08>> I think I probably am.
1:19:09>> Um it's harder to overeat if you
1:19:11restrict your eating window, right? And
1:19:13is that works really well for some
1:19:15people.
1:19:16Um like eating, for example, a very
1:19:19severe kind of window would be 2:00 p.m.
1:19:21to 6:00 p.m. Right, so you eat for 4
1:19:23hours, and you kind of put this around
1:19:25dinner time so you can be social with
1:19:26your partner or something like that. Uh
1:19:28that tends to work well for a lot of
1:19:30people who have been in the habit of
1:19:32overeating. Um and my dad, you know,
1:19:35still thinks to to this day he's 69 now,
1:19:38um that breakfast is the most important
1:19:40meal of the day. That's what he learned
1:19:41when he was a kid, and he wants to
1:19:44believe that this is true.
1:19:45I don't think it's true for most people,
1:19:47and especially if you're in your 60s,
1:19:4970s, right? Like the metabolism changes,
1:19:52and if you're always eating, you the
1:19:55body never goes into the state of I must
1:19:57be efficient, right? And then if you go
1:19:59into that state of I must be efficient,
1:20:01you accumulate poorly functioning
1:20:02mitochondria, and then there's more
1:20:04friction, you know, in in your whole
1:20:06body, there's more inflammation, which
1:20:08is a signal of that energy friction or
1:20:09resistance.
1:20:10And then you don't feel as good, right?
1:20:12You don't feel you have as much energy.
1:20:14So many people who go from eating three
1:20:16meals a day plus or minus snacks to like
1:20:19intermittent fasting, they just say,
1:20:21"I'm going to eat whatever I want,
1:20:22however much I want, but just in those 4
1:20:25hours or 6 hours." Most of those people
1:20:27have a lot more energy. They experience,
1:20:30right, that they have more energy. It's
1:20:31not because there's more energy in their
1:20:32body. If anything, they're putting fewer
1:20:34calories in the body, but the way energy
1:20:37flows now, it flows more efficiently.
1:20:39And we don't perceive the amount of
1:20:41energy, we perceive the flow energy or
1:20:43the transformation of energy.
1:20:45>> I was just reading the other day that it
1:20:46says that this idea that breakfast is
1:20:48the most important meal of the day came
1:20:51from an advertising campaign
1:20:53that was designed to sell cereal and
1:20:55bacon.
1:20:58Um before the industrial revolution,
1:21:00breakfast wasn't a heavily scrutinized
1:21:02meal.
1:21:03People often just ate whatever was left
1:21:06over from the night before or they ate a
1:21:07quick heavy meal before going out to do
1:21:09physical farm labor. But as people moved
1:21:11into cities and took sedentary office
1:21:13jobs, those heavy greasy breakfasts
1:21:15started causing widespread indigestion.
1:21:20Indigestion? Enter
1:21:22Harvey Kellogg's.
1:21:24Yes, that Kellogg's. He ran a famous
1:21:27health sanitarium and believed that a
1:21:29clean, light, grain-based diet would
1:21:32cure indigestion and improve overall
1:21:34health. He co-invented cornflakes and he
1:21:37and other cereal pioneers pushed the
1:21:39narrative that a healthy, cold cereal
1:21:42breakfast was essential for a productive
1:21:45day and your dad bought it hook, line
1:21:47and sinker.
1:21:47>> Yep. I mean, I lied to you, but then
1:21:49>> Everybody did.
1:21:49>> And and I did until recently, until I
1:21:52started to like feel into this. I would
1:21:54have this big cereal bowl of cereals,
1:21:56that's how I grew up as well. And then I
1:21:58would feel like this low, like this
1:22:00um you know, low energy. And I think now
1:22:03I understand why because I was
1:22:04overloading my system with way too much
1:22:07kind of rapidly available sugary energy
1:22:09that I didn't need. Uh and then the body
1:22:11needs to find a way to handle this.
1:22:13Either you get fat, which I can't do, so
1:22:16then it goes kind of to my brain and
1:22:17then makes me feel lousy.
1:22:18>> So, on this point then, just to close
1:22:20off on this diet question, if I want
1:22:22[clears throat] to feel really, really
1:22:23optimal on a given day, I probably do
1:22:26want a smaller eating window and I
1:22:28probably want to eat just what I need,
1:22:30and I want to not overeat. I don't want
1:22:32to under eat, but I don't want to over
1:22:33eat.
1:22:33>> If you under eat, you're going to pick
1:22:35it up tomorrow.
1:22:36>> I'll pick it up tomorrow anyway, so I'll
1:22:37be fine tomorrow. But, the worst thing
1:22:39is overeating today, which is going to
1:22:40impact my performance today.
1:22:41>> Correct. And food is one
1:22:44thing that influences
1:22:46where energy goes in the body, how it
1:22:48flows. Um
1:22:50and just maybe to close the loop on that
1:22:52example, like when you're sick and
1:22:54you're fighting an infection
1:22:55>> Yeah.
1:22:55>> I had a a beautiful opportunity to
1:22:58understand not just under understand to
1:23:00experience this one day. It was New
1:23:02Year's Eve
1:23:03uh 31st in the evening, and I started to
1:23:06feel like a little scratchy throat. I'm
1:23:07like, oh,
1:23:08I think I'm getting sick.
1:23:10So, I I go to, you know, the evening
1:23:13dinner. I didn't cough or anything. I
1:23:15didn't I don't think I was contagious,
1:23:16but I just could feel, right? Like
1:23:17something was was coming up.
1:23:20I felt terrible. I was I had a starting
1:23:22to have like full-blown flu symptoms.
1:23:24Went home early at like 10 9:00 p.m.
1:23:27Um and then I went to bed. It was a
1:23:29horrible night. I felt even I was in
1:23:33pain, and then my I had like massive
1:23:35fever. I took a bath, a warm bath to
1:23:37help my fever kind of, you know, go up
1:23:39so that I could fight the high fever
1:23:42stimulates your immune cells and weakens
1:23:44the virus. So, it's a it's it's usually
1:23:46a good thing. Um and then it is next day
1:23:51I was out, and I was so depressed, and I
1:23:53was like, I should write about this. I'm
1:23:55writing a book on on energy
1:23:57>> [laughter]
1:23:57>> and energy constraints and like the the
1:23:59division partitioning of energy in in
1:24:00the body. I was like, I should write
1:24:02about this. This is so interesting. My
1:24:04immune system is in full-blown defense
1:24:06mode,
1:24:07and it's not like I I was like I could
1:24:11feel my heart. I'm wearing this aura. My
1:24:13heart rate was like 110 [snorts]
1:24:14at at rest instead of being like 60, you
1:24:17know, normally. So, there's all of this
1:24:19energy flowing through. I was like, wow,
1:24:21like my metabolic rate objectively is
1:24:23higher." We know this is true from from,
1:24:25you know, good studies on that when
1:24:26you're fighting something you burn more
1:24:27energy. Uh yet I'm feeling completely
1:24:30drained. Right? So, it's not like the
1:24:32amount of energy that's flowing through
1:24:33that I should feel more energetic. The
1:24:35my immune system in that moment uh was
1:24:38draining all my energy. Draining is
1:24:40sucking away my energy from,
1:24:43you know, from my from my mind, from my
1:24:45brain, perhaps. Um and I remember
1:24:48thinking it wouldn't be a whole lot of
1:24:49energy if I just pulled my laptop, like
1:24:51prop myself on the bed, and then start
1:24:53to write what I'm experiencing in the
1:24:55moment, right? Like the
1:24:56uh
1:24:57and but I couldn't muster the strength.
1:24:59It's like, what what the Like, why
1:25:00would I care?
1:25:01>> [laughter]
1:25:02>> I couldn't care, right? And this is what
1:25:04the stuff I care about on a daily basis,
1:25:06but in that state of my energy being
1:25:08disrupted, I couldn't care about this.
1:25:11And then I start to think about the work
1:25:12and about, you know, the the lab and
1:25:14about uh you know, family things. It's
1:25:16like, "Woah, it's my whole life feels so
1:25:19different."
1:25:20>> I don't care about anything.
1:25:21>> Yeah, I don't care about anything. I
1:25:22just I'm just trying to survive.
1:25:24>> That's so interesting cuz I can relate
1:25:26so much.
1:25:26>> Yeah, I mean, everyone has been through
1:25:28like a difficult like you when you're
1:25:30really sick.
1:25:31>> Or when you're really stressed.
1:25:32>> Yeah.
1:25:33>> Or just anything that's all consuming
1:25:35like that.
1:25:35>> Exactly. That's like Maslow's pyramid,
1:25:37right? The the top is squished and
1:25:38you're like, "Survival."
1:25:40>> And you're like, "Where where did I go?"
1:25:42>> Where is Where is
1:25:43>> [laughter]
1:25:43>> Yeah, I heard about that.
1:25:44>> I was still me, right? I was still
1:25:46Martin, but
1:25:47I I felt completely different. The
1:25:49quality of my of my mind, the quality of
1:25:52of my intention was like completely
1:25:54different. I was just trying to survive.
1:25:56I didn't care about anything else.
1:25:58So, that episode went on for like 2 days
1:26:00or so. Through Day number three, I was
1:26:02able to take my computer and like
1:26:04start to feel again
1:26:06the purpose.
1:26:07But it was so interesting that
1:26:09just the what what it felt like when I
1:26:11was able to write about it.
1:26:13>> [laughter]
1:26:13>> And really feel into it. It felt like I
1:26:15was diffuse energy.
1:26:17Like the light, for example, right?
1:26:19There's a form of energy. You can have a
1:26:20laser. And the difference between a
1:26:22laser and a
1:26:24an incandescent light bulb, like an
1:26:26old-style filament light bulb, is not
1:26:29the amount of energy. It's the the way
1:26:32the energy is patterned.
1:26:34And in a laser, you have every photon
1:26:36that are kind of in phase with one
1:26:37another. And then there's a coherence to
1:26:40it, right? And it's the coherence that
1:26:42gives a laser its power.
1:26:44Uh it's not the total amount of energy.
1:26:45The same amount of energy, if you put in
1:26:47an incandescent light bulb, now it's the
1:26:49same energy, but it's diffuse, right?
1:26:51Every photon is doing its own thing.
1:26:52They're all going in all over the place.
1:26:54And then if you want to look at how far
1:26:56can these photons go?
1:26:58Right? How far can my mind go?
1:27:01Caring about things. The diffuse energy
1:27:03doesn't go very far.
1:27:04Uh but the the laser can go super far.
1:27:07So, my mind had become like a diffuse
1:27:10incandescent light bulb.
1:27:12>> Uh I the two things came to mind when
1:27:14you said that.
1:27:15The first is
1:27:16in my previous company, because we were
1:27:18a startup, fast growing, we had cash
1:27:20flow issues.
1:27:22Cash, making sure we had enough money
1:27:24coming in from our clients, whatever, to
1:27:26pay our staff was always a problem. For
1:27:28anyone that doesn't know,
1:27:30um when a business is growing quickly,
1:27:31it's usually spending more today than
1:27:33it's receiving in. So, even if you're
1:27:35you're growing from like 1 million to 6
1:27:37million to 12 million to 25 million,
1:27:38whatever, as we did, you're you still
1:27:40have a cash flow problem. And there'd be
1:27:42times when we're nearing the end of the
1:27:44month, and months in months in a row,
1:27:46and
1:27:47I had the same cash flow stress. I
1:27:48couldn't pay the team. They They always
1:27:50got paid. They never knew. We always
1:27:51figured it out.
1:27:53But what I'd notice is in those moments
1:27:55of really, really high stress,
1:27:57sometimes, not always, but there were
1:27:58periods where
1:28:00I lost motivation.
1:28:02And what I meant by that is I literally,
1:28:04as a 23, 24-year-old like CEO of all
1:28:07these hundreds of people, some of them
1:28:08older, double my age,
1:28:10I'd basically hide at home.
1:28:12And what I mean by hide at home is like
1:28:13I didn't have the I lost purpose for
1:28:15this business. Like I I'd wake
1:28:17up for it might last a week or two weeks
1:28:19and I just didn't have the purpose, the
1:28:22quote motivation as they call it to like
1:28:25go out and be a leader. And now as you
1:28:27say I could always because I was
1:28:28stressed and it would last for when the
1:28:30cash flow issue would resolve, my
1:28:32motivation, my purpose, the reason why
1:28:35we're doing this zoomed back into focus.
1:28:38And I think that's really important cuz
1:28:39I you know, that we do have a lot of
1:28:40entrepreneurs watching this show and
1:28:41they'll beat themselves up sometimes
1:28:43because they lose motivation. And as a
1:28:45founder and as a CEO, it's you feel so
1:28:46guilty that you
1:28:49the the source of motivation and
1:28:50inspiration and leadership for this
1:28:51group of people, you could lose it. But
1:28:53now I understand what it was. Now I
1:28:55understand that I was at like an a
1:28:57chronic well,
1:28:58uh yeah, a bit of a chronic energy
1:28:59deficit in that moment.
1:29:01The other thing I actually made me think
1:29:03about as well when you you said about
1:29:05this diffusion of energy, it actually
1:29:07made me think about businesses and OKRs
1:29:08and goals.
1:29:10It made me think about
1:29:11>> [laughter]
1:29:11>> if you take 10 10 people in a startup
1:29:13and they're all really really focused on
1:29:15the same goal, they're way more
1:29:17successful. But sometimes you don't have
1:29:19a clear goal and you're all pointing in
1:29:20different directions.
1:29:22>> So there's incoherence.
1:29:23>> There's incoherence. It's kind of like a
1:29:24disco light ball.
1:29:25Yeah, but you need to be a laser. And
1:29:26this is why OKRs are so important cuz
1:29:28you can point all the energy at the
1:29:29problem. This is traction
1:29:32towards a particular goal.
1:29:33>> This is what purpose does.
1:29:36Purpose focuses energy.
1:29:38And I think the reason
1:29:40purpose is so powerful, right? And why
1:29:43you need to have that, right? To to feel
1:29:45it. I I want to say like you have
1:29:47purpose. It kind of becomes this must
1:29:50find my purpose, you know, must like I'm
1:29:51on a a spiritual journey to find my
1:29:53purpose.
1:29:54>> out and then you're in panic.
1:29:54>> Yeah, exactly.
1:29:56Uh but when you
1:29:58uh
1:29:58somehow
1:29:59find your yourself in a place where you
1:30:02feel like
1:30:04those things, you know, that are in your
1:30:06life are meaningful, right? And that the
1:30:08path you're on is purposeful. I think
1:30:10what this does is it brings all of your
1:30:13energy that might be diffuse like a a
1:30:14light bulb and boom, it [clears throat]
1:30:16brings it like a laser. And then you can
1:30:18go that distance, right? You can go
1:30:21through that half day without eating.
1:30:23You can go through that month, right?
1:30:25Where it's like you have all all of
1:30:26these meetings and it doesn't feel as
1:30:28difficult as it would if you were going
1:30:31kind of all over the place.
1:30:33Focus, I think, brings our energy into a
1:30:36coherent state and then it feels like
1:30:39coherent, right? It feels like I know
1:30:41what I'm doing this. It's then it
1:30:42becomes very easy to say no to this and
1:30:44to say yes to just the right thing cuz
1:30:46there's this coherence, not just
1:30:48energetic coherence that allows you to
1:30:51do more with less energy,
1:30:52but also this coherence of mind, right?
1:30:55And then maybe of spirit if you want to
1:30:56go there.
1:30:57>> I'm I'm going to ask the team to play
1:30:58clip. It's a clip of Kevin O'Leary
1:30:59talking about this idea of signal and
1:31:01noise. And he's referencing his
1:31:03experiences with
1:31:05Steve Jobs who he used to work with and
1:31:06also Elon Musk.
1:31:08>> Look how wildly successful he was.
1:31:12But here's why.
1:31:14There's a concept that he understood
1:31:16that very few people focused on back
1:31:18then in the early 90s of signal to noise
1:31:21ratio.
1:31:23What was so brilliant about Jobs
1:31:27that I tell every CEO now and I don't
1:31:29care if you're an S&P 500 CEO or you're
1:31:31just starting a business.
1:31:33His vision of signal was the top three
1:31:36to five things you have to get done in
1:31:38the next 18 hours. Not your vision for
1:31:40the business next week or next month or
1:31:42next year. Just the next 18 hours you're
1:31:46awake.
1:31:47You're going to get those three things
1:31:49or as five things done that you have
1:31:51deemed critical for your mission.
1:31:53They must get done today.
1:31:55Anything that stops you from doing that
1:31:57is the noise.
1:31:59So the signal to noise ratio to be
1:32:01successful for Steve Jobs
1:32:04was 80/20. 80 signal 20 noise.
1:32:08And I knew that to be true with him
1:32:10because he would email me at 2:30 in the
1:32:11morning expect me to get back to him
1:32:13because back then we didn't have texts.
1:32:14It was all email.
1:32:17He was right. He was right.
1:32:20And the only other person that I've seen
1:32:22that has a higher ratio than that
1:32:25is Elon Musk. He has no noise.
1:32:27He does not deal with noise. He is 100%
1:32:29signal 24 seconds of you know every
1:32:32cycle. I mean the guy is just 60 seconds
1:32:35of every minute 60 minutes of every hour
1:32:38the 18 hours he's awake it's all signal.
1:32:41And look what he's achieved.
1:32:42>> And so I can really sort of summarize
1:32:44this for my audience. Signal is the most
1:32:47urgent thing you should be focused on
1:32:48right now and noise is basically
1:32:50everything else.
1:32:50>> No, the goals you set for that the way
1:32:53that you are awake. If you're going to
1:32:54be awake 18 hours
1:32:55>> Yeah.
1:32:56>> and you have determined that there's
1:32:57three things you have to get done
1:32:59you're going to get those done. No
1:33:00matter what it takes you're going to get
1:33:02those done and you're not going to let
1:33:03anything distract you from the three to
1:33:05five things.
1:33:06If you're a CEO and you achieve that and
1:33:09you can get those done with 80% of your
1:33:11time based on that
1:33:13you're extraordinarily successful.
1:33:15>> In that clip
1:33:17he's basically saying that the most
1:33:19successful entrepreneurs in the world
1:33:21are remarkably good at focusing on the
1:33:23signal. He said that from his time
1:33:24working with Steve Jobs Steve Jobs would
1:33:26be 80% signal. I he wakes up in the
1:33:28morning and he knows exactly what we
1:33:31need to work on. And I watched these
1:33:32interviews with Johnny Ive. I'll
1:33:33actually also play the Johnny Ive's
1:33:35interview because I send this around to
1:33:36everybody. So I'm going to play it where
1:33:37Johnny Ive talks about how remarkably
1:33:39focused Steve Jobs was.
1:33:41>> This sounds
1:33:42really simplistic but it still shocks me
1:33:45how few people actually practice this.
1:33:48Um and it's a struggle to practice but
1:33:51is is this issue of focus.
1:33:53Um Steve was the most remarkably focused
1:33:58person I've ever met in my life.
1:34:00And um
1:34:02And the thing with focus is it's not
1:34:05sort of like this thing you aspire to or
1:34:07you you decide on Monday, you know what
1:34:10I'm going to be focused.
1:34:12It is a every minute a why we talking
1:34:16about this? This is what we're working
1:34:18on. You can achieve so much when you
1:34:20truly focus. And one of the things that
1:34:23Steve would say
1:34:25um because I think he was concerned that
1:34:27I wasn't.
1:34:29Um
1:34:29he would say um how many things have you
1:34:32said no to?
1:34:34And I would Honestly, I I would have
1:34:36these sacrificial things cuz I I mean
1:34:39I wanted to be very honest about it and
1:34:41so I'd say, "Oh, I've I said no to this
1:34:44and no to that."
1:34:45And um
1:34:47he but he he knew that I wasn't vaguely
1:34:50interested in doing those things anyway.
1:34:52Um so there was no real sacrifice. What
1:34:55what focus means is saying no to
1:34:57something that you with every bone in
1:35:00your body you think is a phenomenal idea
1:35:04and you wake up thinking about it but
1:35:07you say no to it because you're focusing
1:35:09on something else.
1:35:10>> There's something in giving your entire
1:35:13being of focus to something. Maybe it's
1:35:15the context switching or whatever it is
1:35:17that means
1:35:18your probability of being successful at
1:35:21that particular thing drastically
1:35:23drastically increases.
1:35:24>> Mhm.
1:35:24>> Solving hard problems is hard.
1:35:26>> Yeah.
1:35:27>> Yeah. But these great great founders,
1:35:29they they solve them because they're so
1:35:31they're focusing every available unit of
1:35:33energy on the thing.
1:35:34>> Mhm.
1:35:35>> Yes.
1:35:36>> I think the reason this is is because of
1:35:38a physical principle about energy, which
1:35:41is called a resonance, right? If you
1:35:43walk through life with such clarity of
1:35:46mind right? Like this is
1:35:49what the truth is. This is where we're
1:35:50going, right? And and live and you
1:35:52breathe that. You become like a
1:35:54resonator. You hold this energy pattern
1:35:56and it comes out not just in in your
1:35:59actions and your emails. It comes out in
1:36:00the way you speak and then comes out in
1:36:02the the things you turn attention to,
1:36:04right? It turns out in your tone of
1:36:05voice, in the care that you, you know,
1:36:07look at people with. It comes out in
1:36:09every facet of you, right? So, you
1:36:10become the emblematic leader, I guess,
1:36:13for for that thing that you're 100%
1:36:16into. What this does is that it's picked
1:36:19up by other people. Right? Maybe this
1:36:21gets like vibes.
1:36:23You have that vibe. You have like the
1:36:24founder's vibe, right? Or like the
1:36:26entrepreneur's vibe. I think this is
1:36:28real and this is the energy that's
1:36:29flowing through mitochondria somehow
1:36:31becoming coherent and, you know, aligned
1:36:33and it feels meaningful. It feels
1:36:35purposeful and then you live
1:36:38like that and then other people around
1:36:40you that resonate with it, right? Like
1:36:43people are drawn to
1:36:45a pure signal. Like if you have that
1:36:48specific signal, it's like a a music,
1:36:50like a symphony, right? Like when it
1:36:52sounds when it's on tune, then people
1:36:55that want to come on board like they
1:36:57feel this and then it gets amplified.
1:36:59>> It's so funny cuz we were talking there
1:37:00about Steve Jobs being often cited as a
1:37:03prime example of someone who was really
1:37:04intensely focused with his with his with
1:37:06his energy.
1:37:07And what you've just described sounds
1:37:09almost perfectly
1:37:10like what people said about him when
1:37:12they described him as having a reality
1:37:13distortion field.
1:37:14>> Mhm.
1:37:15>> Probably heard this term. Um the reality
1:37:17distortion field, they called it his RDF
1:37:19was a term coined by Apple software
1:37:21engineer Bud Tribble in 1981 to describe
1:37:24Steve Jobs' uncanny, almost hypnotic
1:37:28ability to convince everyone around him
1:37:31to believe practically anything. And
1:37:33people who worked closely with Jobs
1:37:34described the RDF, the reality
1:37:36distortion field, as a confounding mix
1:37:39of intense charisma, unyielding
1:37:41willpower, and sheer persistence in a
1:37:43certain direction which pulled you with
1:37:45him.
1:37:46>> Mhm.
1:37:46>> That's an energetic quality.
1:37:48And in physics, if you have something
1:37:50that's you has a really strong energy,
1:37:52then it can entrain other things. If the
1:37:55the source resonator is strong enough,
1:37:57people will come in resonance. And then
1:37:59it looks spooky. It looks like, "Whoa,
1:38:01this thing, you know, synchronicity or
1:38:02this you know, this thing happened and
1:38:04somehow, you know, that he was able to
1:38:06mobilize this this donor and you know,
1:38:08fundraising is like easier than it
1:38:09should be." And so, they're like all of
1:38:11these things snowball because you hold
1:38:13that you know, that that vibe. You hold
1:38:16that energy and amplify it.
1:38:18>> I mean, exactly that. So, I was just
1:38:19reading this quote from someone that
1:38:20used to work with Steve Jobs. Um, and he
1:38:22said that it would cause two things. It
1:38:24would be like he was casting spells on
1:38:25you, but he was also bending time and
1:38:27physics.
1:38:28>> [laughter]
1:38:28>> They said, "Apple engineer Andy
1:38:30Hertzfeld recalled that if you told
1:38:32Steve Jobs a task would take 6 months,
1:38:34he would look you in the eye and say,
1:38:37'You can do it in 2 weeks.' Because of
1:38:39the sheer force of his conviction,
1:38:40engineers would often actually end up
1:38:42doing it in 2 weeks, completely
1:38:44rewriting their own understanding of
1:38:45what was possible." And even Bill Gates
1:38:47famously remarked on Jobs' charisma,
1:38:50saying, "I was like a minor wizard
1:38:53because he was casting spells and I
1:38:56would see people mesmerized, so much so
1:38:59that I was so jealous."
1:39:01Gates noted that even when Jobs was
1:39:03lying or wrong,
1:39:05he had everybody completely hooked.
1:39:07>> Mhm. What's clear to make some like
1:39:08something like this happen is you need
1:39:11to
1:39:12um
1:39:12feel that there's something compelling.
1:39:14Like you need to feel something is
1:39:16important. And again, that's not a
1:39:17rational thing. Like you need to feel it
1:39:19in yourself. Um, and then you need to
1:39:22kind of bring that energy into focus and
1:39:25bring attention to it, right? And then
1:39:26then that's where ideas start to come.
1:39:28You build a structure around it to to
1:39:30sustain that flow.
1:39:31>> You said um at the start that we are the
1:39:34energy flowing through ourselves. And if
1:39:35I think about the fact that every
1:39:38barrier or obstacle we have in the world
1:39:40is actually other people. Like that is
1:39:41true. Like for me to become the
1:39:42president, prime minister, best sales
1:39:44person, or best philanthropist, what I
1:39:45need to do if I am energy is convince
1:39:48other energy
1:39:50to change its shape.
1:39:51>> I think that's what amazing people do.
1:39:53Uh they're able to, you know, see
1:39:55something, hold that vision so strongly,
1:39:58and then mobilize others, right? And
1:40:00then new things become uh possible. I
1:40:02think that's what great leaders do. And
1:40:04I I now approach, you know, other human
1:40:06beings and you know, my my son, like my
1:40:086-year-old son Noah,
1:40:10I see him as yes, a little boy, and yes,
1:40:13a lot of energy, and yes, you know, some
1:40:15some challenges
1:40:16>> [laughter]
1:40:17>> that come with this, but he's this
1:40:19beautiful little energy pattern,
1:40:21right? He's just energy flowing through
1:40:22this little child's body. But my role as
1:40:25a parent is to provide just around the
1:40:29right amount of resistance, right? The
1:40:30right amount of constraints. If I don't
1:40:32provide any constraint as a do whatever
1:40:34you want, have whatever you want,
1:40:36uh you know, anytime, then like that's
1:40:38not good for development. Kids need to
1:40:40feel, you know, some boundaries. And so,
1:40:43those are like resistance, right? Little
1:40:44constraints. But if every minute, like
1:40:47me putting constraint, no, you can't do
1:40:48this, no, you can't do that, then it
1:40:50damages the system. It traumatizes the
1:40:52system.
1:40:52>> be able to grow.
1:40:53>> Yeah, exactly. So, the the art really of
1:40:56parenting, and I think the art of
1:40:58leadership is providing the right
1:41:01structure, right? So, that the energy
1:41:03has some constraints. You like there's a
1:41:05challenge. There needs to be a challenge
1:41:06for the team to meet, right? Challenge
1:41:08is like a barrier. It's like a little
1:41:09resistor. Of course, there's challenges,
1:41:11you're like it's difficult to get there.
1:41:13And if it's not difficult, then every
1:41:14everyone's bored. If it's like, yeah,
1:41:16we're going to do the same thing as we
1:41:17did last year.
1:41:18And then next year we should do the same
1:41:20thing. That's not the same kind of
1:41:21energy as we need to double this year.
1:41:23And then we need to double the you know,
1:41:24the year after. This kind of goal or
1:41:27challenge is a form of constraint,
1:41:29something you have to work through. I
1:41:31think that's why the human mind is
1:41:32naturally drawn to challenges. Like,
1:41:35what's the next challenge? Why go down
1:41:37deep in the ocean to discover new
1:41:38creatures? Why go in the Amazon trying
1:41:40to discover new species of little bugs?
1:41:42Why go into space? Like this is all
1:41:44curiosity driven. It's like the mind
1:41:46wanting to have something to hit
1:41:47against. Cuz if there's nothing to hit
1:41:49against, if there's no resistance, then
1:41:51it's there's no purpose.
1:41:53>> I was thinking about worthwhile goals as
1:41:55actually being magnets for energy. You
1:41:57think about going to the moon, the moon
1:41:59pulled energy towards it, so we found
1:42:01ourselves to the moon. And actually, if
1:42:02you bring that down into your own life
1:42:04as like a leader of a company, you go
1:42:06Okay, if I set a worthwhile goal, I'm
1:42:08going to pull people, energy,
1:42:11towards it. And if I have an unworth-
1:42:13worthwhile goal, energy won't be
1:42:14attracted. So, maybe a worthwhile goal
1:42:16is actually philosophically a magnet for
1:42:18energy.
1:42:19>> Yeah, I think so. And people are
1:42:21energetic processes. So, my my
1:42:236-year-old son is this beautiful
1:42:24movement of energy. My goal is to
1:42:26nurture it, right? And not just with
1:42:29food and
1:42:30physically, but to nurture his curiosity
1:42:32uh and his transformation.
1:42:34>> Let me get to this. I read that studies
1:42:37on brains of dead people have found that
1:42:39those with a greater sense of purpose
1:42:42have more efficient mic- mitochondria?
1:42:45>> This is this beautiful study in it was
1:42:47run in Chicago. Every year, people would
1:42:49come to the hospital and then fill out
1:42:51questionnaires and meet with a a
1:42:53therapist and neuropsychologist and they
1:42:54would ask them questions and test their
1:42:56memory and their cognition. And then
1:42:58every year, they would report how much
1:43:01purpose they felt like they had, how
1:43:03much sense of connection with other
1:43:05human beings or with something greater
1:43:06than themselves, how optimistic they
1:43:08were about the future, right? And some
1:43:09people are like more optimistic, happy,
1:43:12and and and purposeful than than others,
1:43:14but there's always kind of fluctuations,
1:43:16right? Like we go through fluctuations.
1:43:17We go through life, no matter how lucky
1:43:19you are, life always ends up being
1:43:21challenging in in some ways. So, we
1:43:23asked
1:43:25how people felt, how much purpose people
1:43:27experienced before they died. Is that
1:43:29related to the mitochondria in their
1:43:30brain? And the only way you can ask this
1:43:32question is to look at the brain after
1:43:34the person died.
1:43:36Right? So, then you have how the person
1:43:37felt, right? Before they How much
1:43:39purpose they experience. And then you
1:43:41look at the mitochondria after they die.
1:43:43>> Where?
1:43:44>> In in the the dorsolateral prefrontal
1:43:46cortex. So, that little part of the
1:43:47brain that's involved in, you know,
1:43:49active reasoning and executive function.
1:43:51And the mitochondria in the people who
1:43:53felt more purpose had a greater energy
1:43:57transformation capacity.
1:43:59>> What does that mean in simple terms?
1:44:00>> The resistance was lower. This could
1:44:02mean that if you feel more life purpose,
1:44:06the mitochondria in your brain can flow
1:44:07energy more easily.
1:44:09>> Or it could mean the inverse of that.
1:44:10>> Well, it could mean that having
1:44:12mitochondria in your brain that can flow
1:44:13energy more easily just changes how you
1:44:15see life.
1:44:16>> Makes you feel more purposeful.
1:44:17>> Yeah, exactly.
1:44:18>> Or it could mean that purpose itself is
1:44:20creating more efficient mitochondria.
1:44:21>> Exactly. People have done studies in
1:44:23animals, and we've done some of those
1:44:24studies, where you can basically change
1:44:27the state of mind of a mouse by like
1:44:29stressing it out chronically. And then
1:44:31you make it feel defeated and like a
1:44:33really stressful life. And you ask,
1:44:35"Does this change the mitochondria in
1:44:36the brain?" Right? Can the experience of
1:44:38stress change the mitochondria in the
1:44:40brain? 100%. That happens. Now you can
1:44:43say, "Okay, now let's change the
1:44:44mitochondria in the brain. You can like
1:44:46open up the brain, inject a little
1:44:47something that either boost the
1:44:49mitochondria or inhibit and activate the
1:44:51mitochondria, increase or decrease
1:44:53resistance." And then you ask, "Does
1:44:55this change how the animal appears to
1:44:56feel? How do animals behave in terms of
1:44:58anxiety or social interactions with
1:45:00other animals, sociality or dominance?"
1:45:03100%. So,
1:45:05the best science shows it goes both
1:45:06ways. So, how you feel can change the
1:45:08mitochondria, the mitochondria can
1:45:09change probably how you feel.
1:45:11>> And so, if And we're going to we're
1:45:12theorizing here. If I don't have purpose
1:45:14in my life, it's going to change the
1:45:16mitochondria. And then if it If my
1:45:18mitochondria becomes more inefficient,
1:45:20>> Mhm.
1:45:21>> then what?
1:45:22What will I notice as the next symptom?
1:45:24>> Yeah, probably fatigue is the first
1:45:26thing that kind of starts to pop up. You
1:45:28feel drained, you don't feel you have,
1:45:29you know, enough energy. Burnout?
1:45:32Probably feels like burnout, and you
1:45:34start to lose enthusiasm for, you know,
1:45:37for the future.
1:45:38You become more pessimistic. So, there's
1:45:40kind of a constellation of things we
1:45:41call depression or, you know, burnout,
1:45:44or we put labels on these things, but
1:45:45really every person starts to experience
1:45:47life as less enjoyable, less purposeful,
1:45:50less meaningful,
1:45:52um regardless of the the diagnostic
1:45:54title we put on it.
1:45:55>> Which is interesting, cuz I've I've
1:45:56interviewed a few people that are
1:45:58experts on the subject of depression,
1:46:00and also addiction, frankly. And one of
1:46:01the things that I remember Johann Hari
1:46:03saying to me, who wrote a book called
1:46:05Lost Connections, is that in some
1:46:06cultures, the cure that they apply for
1:46:09depressive symptoms is giving someone
1:46:12purpose in their life.
1:46:13>> Mhm. Yeah, it's so powerful.
1:46:16My hunch is that
1:46:18most of what we call depression is a
1:46:20loss of coherence. And when we're
1:46:22isolated,
1:46:23we did a study recently to look at the
1:46:25energetics of mental stress.
1:46:27When you feel like you're being pulled
1:46:29aside and judged, and right? What does
1:46:31that do energetically to the body?
1:46:33And and there's this protein marker in
1:46:35the blood that reflects energy friction,
1:46:38energy resistance, right? If the
1:46:40mitochondria can't flow energy smoothly,
1:46:43this protein gets made. And then it's in
1:46:46the kind of a blood biomarker. It's
1:46:48elevated in cancer,
1:46:50where we think there's increased energy
1:46:52resistance. It's elevated in
1:46:53Alzheimer's, where we think there's
1:46:54increased energy resistance in the
1:46:55brain. It's elevated in diabetes, where
1:46:57there's increased energy resistance with
1:46:59the insulin resistance. It's elevated in
1:47:02all sorts of pathologies, hypertension
1:47:04and the heart disease, and it's a marker
1:47:06that the organism energetically is not
1:47:08doing well. There's it's not efficient,
1:47:11right? That's almost a marker of
1:47:12inefficiency. We did this study where
1:47:14you bring people in, we put an
1:47:16intravenous line, so we can measure the
1:47:18blood markers,
1:47:19and then we tell them, "Okay, just
1:47:20relax, everything's fine, you're doing
1:47:22great." And then they they sit down,
1:47:23they relax for 30 minutes, cortisol goes
1:47:25down, the heart rate goes down, blood
1:47:27pressure goes down.
1:47:28And then our lovely study coordinator,
1:47:30Catherine, walked into the room and then
1:47:33looked at the participants and said,
1:47:34"Now you're going to be judged.
1:47:35You're going to have to deliver a speech
1:47:37and here's a situation. You were in a
1:47:39shopping mall. You were you know, you
1:47:41grabbed this this car if you put it on
1:47:43just to try, but then the security guard
1:47:45caught you and then they're accusing you
1:47:46of shoplifting. So now you're in court,
1:47:48you need to defend yourselves in front
1:47:50of the
1:47:51the judge and you need to tell the judge
1:47:54what should happen to the security
1:47:55guard. Should he lose his job or and
1:47:57then then we tell them, "You have 2
1:47:58minutes to prepare your 3-minute defense
1:48:01in front of the judge."
1:48:03Most people
1:48:05start to feel the the anxiety and then
1:48:07we we monitor heart rate at the same
1:48:08time and blood pressure and and then we
1:48:10draw blood and so you can see everyone's
1:48:12physiology. Wasting energy, right? The
1:48:14energetic cost of stress.
1:48:16You see this on the monitor on the other
1:48:18side, you know, in the control room. And
1:48:20then we put a camera in front of them
1:48:21that mocks, you know, video records
1:48:23them. And then we have a white
1:48:25coat-wearing old white man who stands 6
1:48:28feet in front of them, looks at them
1:48:30straight in the eye and says, "Start
1:48:31talking."
1:48:32And then they have to
1:48:33look into into the camera and they do
1:48:35their their defense and they know
1:48:36someone's looking at them. And what we
1:48:38saw was that this energy stress marker
1:48:41goes up.
1:48:42Just with mental stress. You're not
1:48:44doing exercise, you're not doing
1:48:45anything strenuous. You're just going
1:48:47through this phase of
1:48:50what's going to happen to me, to my ego,
1:48:51to to my sense of self.
1:48:53>> So what's the downstream consequence of
1:48:54this thing, this stress chemical being
1:48:56in your body?
1:48:57>> Yeah, so that protein is called GDF15.
1:49:00>> Yeah.
1:49:00>> Growth differentiation factor 15. The
1:49:02name doesn't matter, but that energetic
1:49:04stress marker, you're asking the right
1:49:06question. What does it do? And what does
1:49:08it matter? And it turns out this protein
1:49:09goes to the brain
1:49:10>> Yeah.
1:49:11>> and that protein can be made by any
1:49:12organ in the body except one.
1:49:16The brain.
1:49:18What is it doing? It's very useful to
1:49:19know where Where is the receptor? Right?
1:49:22Cuz you need to have for signaling and
1:49:23biology to happen, you need a signal and
1:49:26you need a a receptor, a sensor, right?
1:49:28Uh where's the receptor for this
1:49:30protein, do you think?
1:49:31Only in one organ in the body.
1:49:36>> Is it in here?
1:49:37>> It's right in here.
1:49:38>> [laughter]
1:49:39>> Yeah, so in the brainstem. The The
1:49:41brainstem is where kind of the the
1:49:44basic survival systems of the body are
1:49:47and there's a region in the brainstem
1:49:48called the area postrema. Doesn't
1:49:50matter. It's It's known as the vomiting
1:49:52and nausea center for the brain.
1:49:54>> Wait, so if something happens, I'm
1:49:55extremely stressed, the world is judging
1:49:57me, this protein goes into my blood and
1:49:59then it goes up into my brainstem and it
1:50:01docks in there, correct? And then what
1:50:03happens?
1:50:03>> And then it turns out the brain
1:50:04interpret this as
1:50:06there's something running out of energy.
1:50:08>> There's something running out of energy,
1:50:09okay.
1:50:10>> Something in the body is not right.
1:50:12There's something running out of energy
1:50:14and then the brain makes two decisions,
1:50:15very similar to when you're sick. That
1:50:18protein GDF15 is called a cytokine. It's
1:50:21the same thing that immune cells produce
1:50:23when they're activated during an
1:50:25infection.
1:50:25>> Okay, so your body thinks you're sick.
1:50:27>> Yes.
1:50:27>> And then what?
1:50:28>> And then does two things.
1:50:30Save energy, conserve energy.
1:50:32>> So you lose motivation.
1:50:33>> Yes. Lose motivation.
1:50:35>> Feel depressed.
1:50:36>> Feel depressed.
1:50:37>> Can't go to the gym.
1:50:38>> Yes.
1:50:39Doesn't feel worth it. We know that this
1:50:41specifically from animal studies, if you
1:50:43inject animals with GDF15, they hunch in
1:50:45a ball and they don't do anything,
1:50:47right? They go into this sickness
1:50:48behavior. That's number one. Number two,
1:50:51the brain says, "Something's running out
1:50:53of energy. First, let's conserve energy,
1:50:54number one, but two, let's mobilize
1:50:57energy, right? Let's put glucose into
1:50:59the blood. Let's put fat into the blood
1:51:01because there might be cells out there
1:51:03that are, you know, running out of
1:51:04energy and we need to rescue them."
1:51:06>> Are you going to get
1:51:07belly fat?
1:51:08>> Visceral fat, yeah.
1:51:09>> Yeah, you're going to get belly fat from
1:51:10this.
1:51:10>> Yeah, when stress hormones are up,
1:51:12right? And you're increasing blood
1:51:13glucose, increasing
1:51:15blood lipids, if the rest of the body
1:51:17doesn't need it, which is what kind of
1:51:18happens in during a stress response like
1:51:20this, that fat gets lodged where it
1:51:23shouldn't. Called ectopic fat, and
1:51:25that's what belly fat is.
1:51:27>> Okay, so let's go a bit further. This is
1:51:29happening. Um if this is chronic,
1:51:32I guess it's going to lead at some point
1:51:34to disease.
1:51:34>> Mhm.
1:51:35What the best studies show on this is
1:51:37when you have high level of this
1:51:39energetic stress marker, this protein,
1:51:41you're more likely if you follow people
1:51:43then studies were done where you take
1:51:45the blood, you measure this protein.
1:51:46Some people have very high levels, some
1:51:47people have very low levels. Uh and then
1:51:50you
1:51:51wait 14 years. This is actually a study
1:51:53from the UK. It's called the UK Biobank.
1:51:55So if you measure the protein energetic
1:51:58stress cytokine and you ask, "What
1:51:59happens to people with high GDF15 versus
1:52:01people with low GDF15?" Turns out people
1:52:04with high GDF15 are more likely to
1:52:06develop mental illness.
1:52:07>> Mhm.
1:52:08>> Bipolar disease, depression,
1:52:10schizophrenia.
1:52:11People with high GDF15 are more likely
1:52:13to develop cardiovascular disease,
1:52:15hypertension.
1:52:17People with high GDF15 are more likely
1:52:18to be dead.
1:52:20At this point we don't know if it makes
1:52:22a difference if it's from mental stress,
1:52:24if it's from physical stress, if it's
1:52:25from an organ struggling, right? That's
1:52:28sick and trying to to heal itself. High
1:52:31energy stress, high energy resistance in
1:52:33the body
1:52:34based on this marker
1:52:35is
1:52:36called a prognostic indicator. It's an
1:52:38indicator that
1:52:40something bad might happen. And uh and
1:52:42and people with high GDF15 also, they
1:52:44don't like to take the stairs. They
1:52:46don't like to walk for pleasure. They
1:52:47don't like to go out to the gym. They
1:52:49don't like to go out with friends.
1:52:51>> They don't like to exercise, or what?
1:52:52>> Correct. Yeah, cuz it it if you're
1:52:54getting the signal like when you're
1:52:56sick, right? If the GDF15 is made
1:52:58somewhere in your body, it goes to your
1:52:59brain, you're getting the signal, you're
1:53:01running out of energy.
1:53:02>> So I guess the the question everyone's
1:53:04asking that is listening to this now is
1:53:07how do I prevent GDF15 or whatever it's
1:53:10called, this stress cytokine thing that
1:53:12goes and docks in my brain? How do I
1:53:14prevent it from floating around in my
1:53:16blood so often?
1:53:17>> Good question. Taking the time to feel.
1:53:19>> [laughter]
1:53:19>> Meditation.
1:53:20>> Meditation. My bloody fiance was right.
1:53:24>> Uh what we know is there's some initial
1:53:27evidence that GDF15 increases throughout
1:53:29the day, right? Uh so the purpose of
1:53:32sleep then might be to reduce energy
1:53:35resistance.
1:53:36All right, like what we were talking
1:53:37about earlier, it's not about having
1:53:39like finding this one optimal level of
1:53:41resistance and sticking there. It's
1:53:43about this movement of increasing
1:53:45resistance and then decreasing
1:53:47resistance and increasing resistance and
1:53:48decreasing resistance. It's kind of this
1:53:50movement of life.
1:53:51>> And I guess all the other things we
1:53:52talked about earlier as it relates to
1:53:53lifestyle factors like keeping away from
1:53:55these sort of extreme stresses, eating
1:53:57way too much, starving oneself,
1:54:00oxidative stress. None of the solutions
1:54:02here are rocket science, are they?
1:54:04>> Mhm.
1:54:04>> Do you know what I mean?
1:54:05>> Mhm.
1:54:05>> If we just look back in time of how we
1:54:07used to live a you know, a little bit
1:54:08more human out in nature with people,
1:54:10with friends, off screens.
1:54:11>> Yeah.
1:54:12>> Eating stuff that grows in the ground or
1:54:13has legs and runs.
1:54:15A lot of that is pretty like a pretty
1:54:16simple playbook for like how to live a
1:54:17good life.
1:54:18>> Yeah.
1:54:19>> And to not be so bloody stressed out all
1:54:20the time.
1:54:21>> I think part of it is yes, living a life
1:54:24that is more aligned with the way we
1:54:26evolved.
1:54:27Right? Which is
1:54:29connecting to other human beings and not
1:54:31eating too much and
1:54:32um I think that's one piece and but
1:54:35that's like everyone knows this.
1:54:37>> Yeah.
1:54:37>> Why aren't we doing it?
1:54:39And I think part of the reason is
1:54:42because we we have this kind of
1:54:43misconception of ourselves as a
1:54:45molecular machine, right? And it's like
1:54:48need to maintain your car. If I'm like a
1:54:50machine, if I'm like a car, then I'm
1:54:51just going to put more fuel in and I
1:54:53should feel better. And then you do it
1:54:54and then you you eat more and then you
1:54:56don't feel better. And that's I think
1:54:58extremely disempowering.
1:55:00People want to be empowered and people
1:55:02want to have knowledge, but they want to
1:55:04know what to do so they can be their
1:55:06best version of themselves, so they can
1:55:08flourish.
1:55:09>> So, you know what's interesting? Before
1:55:10you arrived, I I did something I've
1:55:11never done before. I went through
1:55:13all of the interviews you've done, and I
1:55:14looked at all the comments because I
1:55:16wanted to understand the people that
1:55:18have listened to you frequently. What
1:55:19what what What is it they feel like they
1:55:20would love to ask you, or what they
1:55:21haven't gotten from other interviews?
1:55:23One of the most popular comments, which
1:55:25was seen roughly 10% of time, was the
1:55:28audience asking about supplements. And
1:55:30the question that they had is that they
1:55:32know you personally lean on lifestyle
1:55:33interventions, but the biohacking
1:55:35community is very interested in
1:55:37compounds like methylene blue, urolithin
1:55:40A, and N NAD+ boosters.
1:55:44In your opinion, what does the sort of
1:55:45clinical data or clinical consensus
1:55:47actually say about these supplements?
1:55:48Are they a shortcut? Are they a
1:55:50band-aid? Are they useful?
1:55:51>> I think there are shortcuts to
1:55:54to some
1:55:56states. I lean away from them because I
1:55:58think once we start to think that
1:56:00there's a magic pill to solve a complex
1:56:03issue, to solve the way that you're
1:56:05feeling, becomes like the oh, there's a
1:56:07magic pill for this. And then you don't
1:56:08need to bring awareness to what you are.
1:56:12>> But, can I do both?
1:56:15>> [laughter]
1:56:15>> I think so. In in some cases, I don't
1:56:17really know how methylene blue does
1:56:20everything it's supposed to be doing.
1:56:21What
1:56:23biologically methylene blue seems to be
1:56:25able to give electrons to the
1:56:27mitochondria. So, maybe there's
1:56:28something there that methylene blue can
1:56:29help relieve energy resistance in the
1:56:31mitochondria. NAD+ is probably the best
1:56:35supported intervention to reduce
1:56:38inflammation. Also, it's an electron
1:56:40carrier. So, it take electrons from food
1:56:43and then gives them to the electron
1:56:44transport chain, so the mitochondria can
1:56:46flow those electrons with low
1:56:47resistance. So, if you're depleted of
1:56:50NAD,
1:56:51there's that's going to cause increased
1:56:53resistance for electrons to flow through
1:56:55the the metabolic circuit.
1:56:57>> So, NAD+ seems to calm things down a
1:56:59little bit in terms of energy processing
1:57:01and if
1:57:01>> Yeah, and most people are not deficient
1:57:04of NAD+, so giving more to the system
1:57:07might not help, but for for reasons I
1:57:10don't really understand, it seems like
1:57:12it helps some people and it makes people
1:57:14uh feel more energetic.
1:57:15>> Is that in pill form? Like, how do
1:57:17people take NAD+? Cuz I know there was
1:57:18some like drips one time that some guy
1:57:20gave me.
1:57:21>> Yes, I think there there's
1:57:22uh oral supplements that are uh
1:57:24precursors to NAD. If you eat NAD
1:57:26directly, it doesn't the
1:57:28bioavailability, it's called, it doesn't
1:57:30get into, you know, your cells very
1:57:32well. You can inject, infuse IV,
1:57:34intravenously, uh NAD+ directly, and
1:57:37then that gets to your cells better. Um
1:57:40that's not a uh an approved or kind of
1:57:43recommended medical intervention, but
1:57:45I've seen people with mitochondrial
1:57:47disease, you know, saying that it helps
1:57:49them and uh
1:57:50normal healthy people as well who feel
1:57:52more energy.
1:57:53>> What about this urolithin A?
1:57:55>> Urolithin A is a a new compound that
1:57:58seems to stimulate the degradation of
1:58:00bad mitochondria.
1:58:02So, we talked about autophagy, mitophagy
1:58:05earlier. So, a cell that has a thousand
1:58:07mitochondria, there always some that are
1:58:09getting a little old and then they
1:58:10eventually they're degraded, especially
1:58:12if you fast, right? If the cell is a
1:58:14little starved, it's going to degrade
1:58:16the ones that are least functional. And
1:58:19there's a kind of a whole selection
1:58:20process that happens inside the cell to
1:58:22know which mitochondria are bad, which
1:58:23ones are good, but the bad mitochondria
1:58:25get targeted and then they get degraded
1:58:27if you're fasting or if you're pushing
1:58:29the system like during exercise.
1:58:31What your urolithin A seems to do is to
1:58:34kind of accelerate this process. Right?
1:58:36So, it accelerates the degradation of
1:58:39the bad mitochondria, the mitophagy, so
1:58:41that the cell has to make more of the
1:58:43good ones.
1:58:43>> I'm looking at some of the studies here
1:58:44and it says the clinical evidence for
1:58:46urolithin A has rapidly expanded over
1:58:48the last few years, transitioning from a
1:58:50compelling animal data study to highly
1:58:54rigorous placebo-controlled human
1:58:55clinical trials and overwhelmingly the
1:58:57human research confirms that urolithin A
1:58:59targets mitochondrial dysfunction and
1:59:01systemic inflammation with one study in
1:59:042022 in the JAMA Network Open study
1:59:07journal
1:59:08where they took adults aged 65 to 90 and
1:59:11gave one of them placebo one of the
1:59:12groups placebo and the other urolithin A
1:59:15for 4 months and at the end of that they
1:59:17found
1:59:18that the group that were given urolithin
1:59:20A showed statistically significant
1:59:22improvements in muscle endurance and a
1:59:24reduction in biomarkers of mitochondrial
1:59:26inefficiency.
1:59:27>> Mhm.
1:59:28>> I should be on urolithin A then.
1:59:30>> Everyone should. Do you take any of
1:59:31that?
1:59:32>> I don't.
1:59:32>> You don't take any supplements?
1:59:33>> I don't. I'm skeptical of this. You
1:59:34know, there's always kind of a new
1:59:36supplement that does amazing things
1:59:38especially if it cures mitochondrial
1:59:40dysfunction. Mitochondria have dozens of
1:59:41functions.
1:59:42>> Yeah.
1:59:43>> And so the term mitochondrial
1:59:45dysfunction is I think a little
1:59:46misleading. Like there was a lot of hype
1:59:48about NAD, there was a lot of hype about
1:59:50coenzyme Q, CoQ10. There was a lot of
1:59:52hype about all sorts of things,
1:59:53anti-inflammatory, you know, berries and
1:59:55antioxidants was a big thing like 10 20
1:59:58years ago. Turned out not to be so
2:00:00useful. Actually impairs normal
2:00:03adaptation and signaling if you eat too
2:00:05many antioxidants.
2:00:07Um so urolithin A feels like the next
2:00:09fad. Maybe it's real. I think the
2:00:12science is fairly compelling but I'm
2:00:15I trust the wisdom of my body and my
2:00:17mitochondria more than I trust the the
2:00:19pharma company that's trying to sell
2:00:21this.
2:00:22>> And what does that mean in in practical
2:00:23terms trusting the wisdom of your body?
2:00:26Like what does that mean for you?
2:00:27>> Uh-huh.
2:00:28It means
2:00:29recognizing that I am the the energy
2:00:31that's flowing through this thing and
2:00:33this thing is nature. Like we are a
2:00:35piece of nature. Something that's true
2:00:37across the animal kingdom and the the
2:00:39living kingdom is things heal.
2:00:42And we don't think about this in
2:00:43biomedicine. We think about diseases, we
2:00:45study, you know, when things go wrong
2:00:47and we try to understand the molecular,
2:00:49you know, features of diseases. There's
2:00:51not really a science of the healing
2:00:53process. But the basis of health, it's
2:00:55clear, you need to heal continuously.
2:00:58Heal, you know, repair the DNA that's
2:01:00damaged. Repair the mitochondria that
2:01:01are getting old, you get rid of them,
2:01:03you make new ones. Like preserving the
2:01:05wholeness of the system. To heal means
2:01:07to become whole again.
2:01:08>> Is that contingent on me being in a
2:01:10natural environment for my nature to
2:01:13heal? Because if you think about me and
2:01:16you sat here now, we're sat in a like a
2:01:18dark bunker basically with no sunlight.
2:01:20[laughter]
2:01:21And listen, most of us live in such a
2:01:22dark bunker with very little sunlight.
2:01:23So, we then have to take vitamin D.
2:01:27So, because we live outside of our true
2:01:29nature, I'm wondering if actually we do
2:01:30need to take some supplements cuz we're
2:01:32not going to heal.
2:01:34>> We are going to heal.
2:01:35>> Even but if I sit here all day, I'm not
2:01:36going to get vitamin D and then that's
2:01:37going to cause problems.
2:01:38>> Yes. So, we're not in the optimal
2:01:39environment. When you're in that kind of
2:01:41environment, so I think there and and
2:01:42there's good research showing if you put
2:01:43a plant in a hospital
2:01:45patients recover faster. There's been
2:01:47studies
2:01:48looking at like windows with natural
2:01:50light then you see nature if you're in a
2:01:52hospital for example, people recover
2:01:54better. And there is good data on like
2:01:56nature exposure. Is it like
2:01:59the more better oxygen, you know, a
2:02:00little tiny bit more oxygen if you're in
2:02:02a forest, is it like the phytochemicals,
2:02:04the things that are produced by the by
2:02:06the plants? Like we don't really know
2:02:07what it is. Is it just seeing green,
2:02:09seeing something that hears that sounds
2:02:11and looks like what you evolved to be
2:02:14around? So, we don't really know, but we
2:02:15know exposure to nature kind of helps
2:02:18calm the body and somehow improve
2:02:20recovery.
2:02:26>> Whoa.
2:02:27>> Whoa, it's on your face.
2:02:27>> This is a my bun charge face mask. I've
2:02:29been wearing this for some time now.
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2:03:25One type of help people also wanted to
2:03:26know about from you, which was even more
2:03:29discussed, was about red light therapy.
2:03:32Red light therapy as a support for your
2:03:34mitochondria.
2:03:35>> Interestingly, the red light therapy is
2:03:37a pretty big thing now. There are
2:03:38hundreds of different devices, helmets,
2:03:42a hairbrush.
2:03:44A band.
2:03:44>> actually. I think this is This This is a
2:03:47red light
2:03:49>> therapy hairbrush.
2:03:50>> Therapy hairbrush.
2:03:51>> [laughter]
2:03:51>> Yeah.
2:03:52Uh so, someone was just telling me their
2:03:53dad is part of a study now. He puts a
2:03:56helmet with red light, you know, every
2:03:57day because he has a pre-dementia. By
2:04:01doing this, the idea is
2:04:03uh light is energy.
2:04:04>> Yeah.
2:04:05>> Right? Energy is not a thing, but it's
2:04:07the potential for change. It's the
2:04:08capacity to change something. Red light
2:04:11like this, especially the red, the
2:04:13infrared that you don't see with your
2:04:14eye, can penetrate tissue. It can go
2:04:16through your hair, through your skull,
2:04:18and then into your brain. And then
2:04:20there, it seems to do something and
2:04:21change metabolism. So, how is it doing
2:04:24this? The best hypothesis we have is
2:04:26that for light to do something in
2:04:28biology, there needs to be something in
2:04:30biology that resonates with it, right?
2:04:31That can
2:04:32offer the right amount of resistance,
2:04:34right? Do the photons of red light
2:04:36photons hit and then there's
2:04:37transformation of energy. That receptor,
2:04:41the antenna, the cellular antenna for
2:04:42red light seems to be mitochondria. So,
2:04:44there's something in the mitochondria
2:04:45where the electrons flow and then boom,
2:04:47they meet with oxygen to become
2:04:50metabolic water.
2:04:51Uh that is called cytochrome c oxidase.
2:04:54>> I'm going to try and say this in
2:04:55layman's terms. If I take red light and
2:04:57I put it on my skin, it doesn't even
2:05:00need to touch my skin. I can put it just
2:05:01close to my skin.
2:05:02>> Yeah.
2:05:03>> The red light is going into the
2:05:04mitochondria of my cell and it's helping
2:05:07the mitochondria to become more
2:05:09efficient.
2:05:10>> That's the idea.
2:05:11>> So, I should wake up every day and do
2:05:12bloody red light then?
2:05:13>> If you're deficient in that in that way,
2:05:15that might be good. Uh that might also
2:05:17offset, you know, the the natural order
2:05:20that your body has has created.
2:05:23>> Oh, what do you mean by that? You think
2:05:24it might be
2:05:25>> I think that in in general, that's why I
2:05:27kind of veer away from supplements
2:05:28because the organism is a beautiful
2:05:31dynamic equilibrium of like everything,
2:05:33you know, energetically dancing with
2:05:35each other where you have the
2:05:36mitochondria to transform energy and
2:05:37then, you know, genes are expressed and
2:05:39then this other cell is doing this, this
2:05:40cell is doing this and there's this
2:05:41beautiful balance. And uh when the
2:05:44system is out of balance, now there's
2:05:46signals, like inflammation, right?
2:05:47Signals of this imbalance
2:05:50uh at an energetic level and then that
2:05:51turns into molecular level and then the
2:05:53system tries to come back into balance,
2:05:56right? And
2:05:57>> Wow.
2:05:58I never realized this
2:06:00that too much red light can be bad for
2:06:01you.
2:06:02>> I don't know if there's studies that
2:06:03show too much red light is bad for you,
2:06:05but there's like phototoxicity is a
2:06:07thing and there you can buy a whole bed
2:06:11of like really intense light. And I
2:06:13think if you stay too long in those,
2:06:14that's probably not good. There's a a
2:06:16very compelling study that was published
2:06:18last year
2:06:19uh on
2:06:21blood glucose regulation.
2:06:23And I know you've talked about blood
2:06:24glucose on other episodes.
2:06:27How much glucose in the blood is really
2:06:29important because it causes this like
2:06:31energy resistance, energy friction in
2:06:33all of your cells, especially the brain
2:06:34perhaps. So, when you eat a bunch of
2:06:37sugar or you eat a meal with
2:06:39carbohydrates, blood glucose typically
2:06:41spikes. If you get stressed out, just
2:06:42psychological stress will increase blood
2:06:44glucose. So, those glucose spikes can
2:06:47increase energy resistance and then
2:06:48start to cause damage, accelerate aging,
2:06:50and so on. So, the what the body does in
2:06:53the normal healthy organism is able to
2:06:55regulate blood glucose. So, if you eat a
2:06:57big meal, there's amount of enough
2:06:58insulin that's released and then the
2:07:00glucose can come into cells into the
2:07:02muscles and into the fat and and then
2:07:04you preserve, you know, what's called
2:07:05normal glycemia, normal blood glucose.
2:07:08It turns out if you shine a red light on
2:07:10the back of people as they ingest a big
2:07:14bunch of glucose,
2:07:16the spike in glucose is not as high.
2:07:18And what they did in that study that was
2:07:19interesting is they measured
2:07:21mitochondrial metabolism through the
2:07:23mouth. You can measure oxygen coming in
2:07:26and CO2 coming out, which is coming from
2:07:28mitochondria. So, you can measure the
2:07:30the the energy metabolism, which is
2:07:32really the mitochondrial metabolism, as
2:07:34people are doing this. And what they
2:07:36found is that people who had red light
2:07:38on their back, their metabolism was
2:07:40actually
2:07:41uh a little higher. So, the electrons,
2:07:44the flow of energy was increased with
2:07:46the red light. And and they think that
2:07:48might be why the glucose didn't spike as
2:07:50much because the electrons that came
2:07:52into the blood were able to flow through
2:07:54the mitochondria.
2:07:55Um so, this points to some regulation of
2:07:59energy regulation in inside the
2:08:01mitochondria that I don't fully
2:08:03understand, but I think there there's
2:08:04something promising here. And it
2:08:06certainly supports,
2:08:08you know, the idea that energy
2:08:09modalities outside of ourselves, uh you
2:08:11know, light or electromagnetic fields,
2:08:14other human beings that are, you know,
2:08:16you energy energetic processes affecting
2:08:18my metabolism all the time.
2:08:20We respond to each other
2:08:22energetically, metabolically. Uh I think
2:08:24it it supports that idea. You're an
2:08:26energetic process and you're influenced
2:08:28by other forms of energy even if you
2:08:30don't see it.
2:08:31>> I'm really um stunned by this idea that
2:08:34there is such thing as getting too much
2:08:36red light and that that can have harm
2:08:37for yourselves because there is I'll be
2:08:39honest, you know, there's been a couple
2:08:40of times where I just put that thing on
2:08:41and maybe like read a book for a long
2:08:43time. Like an hour or two.
2:08:45>> Did you ever feel adverse effects from
2:08:47this?
2:08:48>> I never felt a adverse
2:08:50effects. However, looking at some of the
2:08:53studies, it seems to it suggests that
2:08:56red light therapy follows a bell curve
2:08:58model.
2:08:59>> Mhm.
2:09:00>> They found in this one particular study
2:09:01I was reading about in 2009 that low to
2:09:04moderate doses of light perfectly
2:09:05stimulate the mitochondria to produce
2:09:07ATP and a healthy small burst of ROS,
2:09:10reactive oxygen species to trigger
2:09:12cellular repair. However, this
2:09:15particular study also showed that when
2:09:16the dose is pushed too high, the light
2:09:18creates massive amounts of reactive
2:09:20oxidative species and this excess
2:09:23oxidative stress overwhelms the cells
2:09:25antioxidant defenses completely shutting
2:09:27down mitochondrial respiration and in
2:09:30inducing cellular apoptosis, cell death,
2:09:34instead of healing.
2:09:35>> Mhm. Yeah.
2:09:37That this bell-shaped relationship is
2:09:38something we see
2:09:40in many domains of biology and
2:09:43physiology. Same as like
2:09:44work out, exercising. Like
2:09:47most people know if you do a work out
2:09:49that's like half an hour, an hour, two
2:09:50hours, if you're an athlete and you're
2:09:52like really well conditioned, it's fine.
2:09:53And then you recover for you know, 23
2:09:55hours after your 1-hour work out and
2:09:57that's great. It actually makes you more
2:09:59efficient. It gives you the idea the
2:10:01impression you have more energy which is
2:10:02really energy flowing more efficiently.
2:10:05But if you work out for eight hours
2:10:07>> Yeah.
2:10:08>> that's not good, right? So the too much
2:10:10you you crash, not enough you're not at
2:10:12your optimal. So there's where is the
2:10:14optimal state and biology and the whole
2:10:18mind-body unit has kind of worked out
2:10:20through evolution and through your life
2:10:22and development to find this sweet spot.
2:10:24>> If you know how to listen to it.
2:10:25>> Yeah.
2:10:26>> And that's that's easier said than done.
2:10:27>> Yes. If you can live in alignment and
2:10:29that
2:10:30>> There's a lot of noise out there.
2:10:31>> There is. You know, for the same reason
2:10:33you close your eyes earlier when I asked
2:10:35you to kind of feel inside. This is a
2:10:37good analogy for I think
2:10:39what it means to kind of listen to our
2:10:41energy.
2:10:42And maybe we could do a little exercise
2:10:43if you're interested.
2:10:44>> Sure.
2:10:44>> Yeah.
2:10:45So, we'll do a a little exercise. Uh you
2:10:47can close your eyes if you want.
2:10:49>> Everyone at home also, close your eyes
2:10:50unless you are driving.
2:10:51>> Yeah. And we'll use the breath.
2:10:54So, you can start by
2:10:55just feeling your body. You can feel
2:10:57kind of gravity pulling your body down
2:10:59into the chair.
2:11:02And then we'll take a little breath in.
2:11:04And then breath out. And then all the
2:11:07way down.
2:11:08And then hold your breath.
2:11:10With empty lungs.
2:11:14And then hold there.
2:11:16For as long as you can.
2:11:20And just pay attention to the sensations
2:11:22that are emerging in your body.
2:11:25Whether it's in your belly, in your
2:11:27chest, in your neck, in your head.
2:11:33And the longer you wait, the more
2:11:34intense those sensations are.
2:11:42You can hold for as long as you want and
2:11:44when you can't, then just take a deep
2:11:46breath.
2:11:47Deep breath.
2:11:49What does that feel like?
2:11:50>> [sighs]
2:11:50>> I felt I felt lots of vibrations.
2:11:52>> Mhm.
2:11:53>> It's kind of like waves. I felt like
2:11:54kind of like waves
2:11:56going across my body, but I it was
2:11:58almost like I could feel the energy
2:11:59moving through my body.
2:12:00>> Mhm.
2:12:01>> It's kind of how it felt.
2:12:02I suddenly was very apparent clear of my
2:12:04heartbeat. I could feel everything.
2:12:06>> Mhm.
2:12:08>> In a way that I can't typically feel
2:12:09everything.
2:12:09>> Yeah. Any
2:12:11kind of negative feeling or any
2:12:13sensation that was uncomfortable?
2:12:15>> I mean, it near the end when I couldn't
2:12:17when I hadn't breathed in a while it was
2:12:18a bit uncomfortable.
2:12:19>> Yeah, what did that feel like?
2:12:21>> Like like I was starving for oxygen,
2:12:23like I was starving for air.
2:12:24>> Yeah. You know, running out of air and
2:12:27like drowning is one of the most
2:12:29horrible like aversive experience that I
2:12:31think we evolved to dislike. Right, so
2:12:35what what was happening there in our
2:12:36bodies as we were doing this is
2:12:39oxygen is being consumed by mitochondria
2:12:40continuously. Right? Every millisecond
2:12:43mitochondria consume oxygen and now
2:12:45you're not bringing oxygen through your
2:12:46breath. And then they produce CO2,
2:12:48carbon dioxide, right? So, mitochondria
2:12:51are burning the oxygen little bit by
2:12:52little bit and then they're producing
2:12:54carbon dioxide, CO2, and we evolved to
2:12:57feel those signals very very
2:13:00sensitively.
2:13:00>> That's the pressure that I felt.
2:13:02>> Yeah.
2:13:03>> Not good.
2:13:03>> think that yes. So, the subjective
2:13:05experience, right? What we described
2:13:07there is an experience of energy
2:13:10starting to stall cuz if there's no
2:13:12oxygen in your mitochondria, the
2:13:14electrons are like, "Where do I go?" And
2:13:15then there's like extreme level of
2:13:17resistance.
2:13:18Like [clears throat] the most extreme
2:13:19case of energy resistance I think that
2:13:22most people will be familiar with is
2:13:23like a heart attack.
2:13:24>> Mhm.
2:13:25>> [clears throat]
2:13:25>> My dad had a heart attack
2:13:27a few years ago and he woke up during
2:13:30the night with this terrible contraction
2:13:32like a pressure in in the chest and he
2:13:35said it was like 400 lb like pressure on
2:13:37his chest, terrible pain, worst pain
2:13:39he's ever had.
2:13:41What what's happening? Like where where
2:13:42what is that pain? The source of that
2:13:44pain really is blood flow can no longer
2:13:47bring oxygen to mitochondria in the
2:13:49heart.
2:13:49>> Oh, so the mitochondria are like
2:13:51panicking.
2:13:52>> Yeah. So, panicking is kind of a We're
2:13:55imposing now an experience onto a
2:13:57biological process, but you have the
2:13:59electrons that are flowing through
2:14:00mitochondria all the time. They're
2:14:01flowing on oxy onto oxygen, right? From
2:14:03food to oxygen and they're just nice
2:14:05freely floating. That feels great. It or
2:14:07it feels like you know, just normal
2:14:09life. And then all of a sudden there's
2:14:11no more oxygen. So the electron, I have
2:14:13nowhere to go. That feels terrible. The
2:14:15electrons can't flow so they start to
2:14:17back flow. That is what causes oxidative
2:14:19stress.
2:14:20That's why the heart gets damaged during
2:14:22a heart attack.
2:14:23Right? Cuz the electrons can't flow to
2:14:25oxygen because of this little clot.
2:14:27And for some reason that we don't really
2:14:29understand
2:14:31this feels extremely aversive. So what
2:14:32you experienced there by holding your
2:14:34breath, and anyone who's listening to
2:14:35this can try on their own, hold your
2:14:38breath for as long as possible. It feels
2:14:40horrible. And now imagine living your
2:14:42life with just like 5% 10%
2:14:45of this horrible feeling. Like you wake
2:14:47up in the morning and you have this like
2:14:50trace of like running out of energy,
2:14:53right? Running out of oxygen. Uh I think
2:14:56that's what some mental illnesses feel
2:14:58like.
2:14:59And there's very interesting data
2:15:01showing that if you inject people with a
2:15:03signal of energetic stress, lactate, you
2:15:06can trigger a panic attack.
2:15:09You're not messing with the brain there.
2:15:11You're not like, you know,
2:15:13kind of doing something to the to
2:15:15neurochemistry. What you're doing is
2:15:16you're injecting the human body with a
2:15:19signal that the mitochondria can't keep
2:15:21up with energy flow. You're tricking the
2:15:23body into thinking that energy
2:15:24resistance has just been jacked up to
2:15:27very high levels. This feels like
2:15:29anxiety. And people with traumatic
2:15:31memories, like post-traumatic stress
2:15:33disorder, PTSD,
2:15:35the simple injection of an energetic
2:15:37stress signal of lactate in the blood
2:15:38can reawaken traumatic memories. So
2:15:41there's this emerging notion in
2:15:43psychiatry called in metabolic
2:15:45psychiatry,
2:15:46where people understand mental illnesses
2:15:48as energetic disorders of the brain. And
2:15:50what I think is is happening in those
2:15:52kind of chronic state of of ill being,
2:15:55right? Where people don't feel
2:15:56themselves. They don't feel well. They,
2:15:57you know, the hypervigilance, the
2:15:59anxiety. It's quite likely at this point
2:16:02I think that part of that is driven by
2:16:03energy not flowing properly. And then
2:16:05the body just lives in high energy
2:16:07resistance all the time. And there's
2:16:08data directly measuring energy
2:16:10resistance in the brain from a group of
2:16:12McLean and and Harvard.
2:16:14And then lactate tends to be elevated in
2:16:17people with mental illness. And this
2:16:18marker GDF15 also is elevated in mental
2:16:21illness.
2:16:22>> And so the cure again or the the thing
2:16:24to ease that is all the lifestyle
2:16:25factors that we talked about. Purpose
2:16:27and
2:16:28so we've covered that ground.
2:16:29>> Yeah,
2:16:30life changes, you know, changing your
2:16:32life circumstances that's really hard to
2:16:34do. Uh exercising seems to help a lot of
2:16:36people but a lot of people don't feel
2:16:38they have the capacity to exercise.
2:16:40Uh and ketones seem to be
2:16:42uh life-saving for some people. Going on
2:16:45a ketogenic diet and I've met now dozens
2:16:47of individuals whose lives were crushed
2:16:51by you know, schizoaffective disorder,
2:16:53bipolar disorder, major depressive
2:16:55disorder. And they were treatment
2:16:57resistant, right? Meaning like the
2:16:59pharmacotherapy, the drugs that they
2:17:00were given were not helping, in some
2:17:02cases were making things worse.
2:17:04Uh with difficult side effects and then
2:17:06they change their diet.
2:17:08Cutting all sugars and they went on a
2:17:10ketogenic diet, medical ketogenic
2:17:13therapy.
2:17:14Uh and then they started to monitor
2:17:15ketones. And many people reported, you
2:17:19know, that this was life-changing. Like
2:17:22first the first thing they many people
2:17:23notice is they have more energy. The
2:17:25ketogenic diet does not work for
2:17:27everyone.
2:17:27>> Mhm.
2:17:28>> We [clears throat] don't know why.
2:17:30And
2:17:31the same way that we're all different,
2:17:33we all respond differently to even
2:17:34medications, right? They're supposed to
2:17:36work the same for everyone. We have a
2:17:38science of averages.
2:17:40Like the science that we use to get
2:17:42knowledge to inform our lives is
2:17:45almost entirely a science of averages.
2:17:47Meaning like all of the studies we do,
2:17:49like the the highest gold standard
2:17:51studies we consider to be RCTs,
2:17:53randomized controlled trials. These
2:17:56RCTs, if you run an RCT, what you do is
2:17:58you take let's say a thousand people,
2:18:00then you randomize half 500 into this
2:18:02group, normal diet, and then 500 into
2:18:04ketogenic diet. And then you say,
2:18:06"Great. Now, let's look at their
2:18:08depressive symptoms, right? Or or their
2:18:09anxiety symptoms." And then you have
2:18:11them on the diet for
2:18:132 months, and then after you assess, and
2:18:15then you compare the groups, right? You
2:18:17lump 500 human beings together, and you
2:18:19say, "What's the average depression or
2:18:21anxiety symptoms in this in these 500
2:18:23people?" Then you average these people
2:18:25together, and then you group them, and
2:18:27then you compare means.
2:18:28>> And I guess the other important point
2:18:30here is gender, which is so many of
2:18:32these studies were
2:18:33skewed towards men in many cases, and
2:18:36that doesn't apply to women a lot of the
2:18:38time.
2:18:38>> Yep.
2:18:39>> And this is part of the reason we've had
2:18:40so many conversations on this show about
2:18:41women's health is because we're just now
2:18:43discovering that, you know, once upon a
2:18:45time scientists would treat women like
2:18:47little men
2:18:48>> Yeah.
2:18:48>> and assume that everything used to apply
2:18:50when actually we're entirely different.
2:18:51And so
2:18:52>> Correct.
2:18:52>> this averages thing, you also need to
2:18:54think about the nuances of like who,
2:18:55gender, where they're from, their
2:18:56biology, their DNA. You just said that
2:18:58you you get the skinny fat thing or the
2:19:00visceral fat, whatever. I don't get
2:19:02that.
2:19:02>> Mhm.
2:19:03>> But if we were doing an average of like
2:19:04three people yeah, maybe we'd come to a
2:19:06conclusion based on me and hit me and
2:19:08the other person who's like me, but that
2:19:10wouldn't apply to you.
2:19:11>> Yeah. So and that's really problematic.
2:19:13Like all of the the health
2:19:14recommendations that we have and the the
2:19:17way drugs get approved uh and the way we
2:19:20determine whether a drug is useful or
2:19:22not for disease X or or Y is by
2:19:24comparing groups. And whenever you you
2:19:26peel the surface of a clinical study of
2:19:28an RCT you find some people like are
2:19:31amazing responders, and they're cured.
2:19:33They don't have symptoms. And then some
2:19:34people don't respond. These are called
2:19:35non-responders. And then some people get
2:19:37worse.
2:19:38>> The most
2:19:40commented thing across the videos you
2:19:41featured on
2:19:42um and the most passionate thing, uh the
2:19:45most urgent thing according to the the
2:19:46people that were watching your work
2:19:48that they wanted to ask you
2:19:50was about long COVID, ME/CFS, I'm not
2:19:53sure what that is, and fibromyalgia.
2:19:57Um for patients with ME, CFS, and you'll
2:19:59have to explain to me what that is, or
2:20:01long COVID, the standard advice given is
2:20:03to exercise for mitochondrial health.
2:20:06Um, but for them it often triggers
2:20:08severe crashes. What is happening at the
2:20:10cellular level when the energy budget is
2:20:12broken, and how can these individuals
2:20:15safely rehabilitate their mitochondria
2:20:18without causing further damage?
2:20:20>> Yeah.
2:20:21That's a really tough problem. And
2:20:24>> This was the most repeatedly the most
2:20:26liked, the most commented thing on your
2:20:28videos.
2:20:29Because these people are suffering and
2:20:30they're just not being given answers, I
2:20:32guess.
2:20:32>> Yeah. In the US, there is an estimated
2:20:35like 3 to 5 million people who have
2:20:37either myalgic encephalomyelitis,
2:20:41chronic fatigue syndrome ME/CFS, or, you
2:20:43know, long COVID version of this.
2:20:46Uh, in the UK, it's somewhere between
2:20:48like 2 and 3 million, I think. And then
2:20:50worldwide, there's 20 to 24 million
2:20:52people have these syndromes, right?
2:20:55>> What are the symptoms for someone that
2:20:57hasn't experienced it? What are the
2:20:58symptoms that they're experiencing?
2:21:00>> Chronic fatigue.
2:21:01>> Just always being sort of tired, no
2:21:03energy, feeling low energy.
2:21:04>> Yeah. Feeling low energy, um, is is an
2:21:07experience, right? So, it's you go to
2:21:10your doctor and you say, "I feel so
2:21:10tired." And then you look in the blood
2:21:12work and everything's fine. But so,
2:21:13there's a disconnect between what we
2:21:16know how to measure biochemically and
2:21:18then what the person is experiencing. We
2:21:20don't have a good understanding of the
2:21:21connection between the biology and the
2:21:24biochemistry in the blood and even
2:21:26process in the brain and how people
2:21:27feel.
2:21:28So, there's a disconnect here. And,
2:21:30ME/CFS, you know, chronic fatigue,
2:21:33long COVID, these people have been a
2:21:36little bit ostracized from the medical,
2:21:39you know, community because
2:21:41doctors are are really stuck. They have
2:21:43these patients which are really
2:21:44difficult, you know, patients to to deal
2:21:47with. First, they don't know what's
2:21:49wrong with them. And second, they don't
2:21:50have tools to help them get better.
2:21:52Uh and and then the classical thing is
2:21:55well, exercise, but then many of these
2:21:56people, when they exercise, they
2:21:58actually get worse. And and there's some
2:22:00studies that show increased
2:22:01inflammation. So, those signals of
2:22:03energy resistance
2:22:05increase energy friction in the body, uh
2:22:07go up after exercise in a normal person.
2:22:10In these people with chronic fatigue, it
2:22:12seems like they can skyrocket and then
2:22:14that leads to this uh post-exertional
2:22:17malaise. Right? We talked earlier about
2:22:19how
2:22:20the marker of energetic stress, GDF15,
2:22:22can go to the brain and make you feel
2:22:23sick, right? Or make you feel, you know,
2:22:25nauseous or, you know, tired. Other
2:22:27cytokines from the immune system, when
2:22:29you're sick uh when you're fighting an
2:22:31infection, do the same thing. The best
2:22:32study on on mitochondria and uh chronic
2:22:35fatigue syndrome was published last year
2:22:37or the year before, and it showed that
2:22:39there is
2:22:41a deficiency
2:22:42in energy transformation in the
2:22:44mitochondria of the muscle. They took
2:22:46muscle biopsies, little piece of muscle
2:22:47from the from the quad, from the the
2:22:49thigh, and then they looked at how well
2:22:51can the mitochondria in the muscle of
2:22:52people with chronic fatigue syndrome
2:22:54flow energy.
2:22:55And what they found is the capacity is
2:22:57much lower. If the mitochondria can't
2:22:58flux energy properly, you should feel
2:23:00like you don't have the capacity to
2:23:02push, right? To exercise.
2:23:05So, why is that? Why do those people
2:23:06have you lower mitochondrial energy
2:23:09transformation capacity? We don't know.
2:23:12There's so many stories, and I I've been
2:23:15curious and interested about this. Uh
2:23:17and I remember uh this uh family friend
2:23:20who came for dinner uh one night, and
2:23:23she uh she was asking me, "What do you
2:23:25work on? And what do you do?" And so, I
2:23:26tell her we work on mitochondria and
2:23:28psychobiology, mitochondrial
2:23:30psychobiology, how the mind and the body
2:23:32relate, you know, energetically. Uh and
2:23:34she said, "Well, I have an interesting
2:23:35story for you." I said, "Okay. What's
2:23:37the story?" She said, "I used to have
2:23:39chronic fatigue syndrome." So, I I
2:23:40perked up. I was like, "What happened?"
2:23:42>> [laughter]
2:23:42>> She was visibly an energetic person. She
2:23:44didn't It didn't look like she had, you
2:23:46know, a an issue with energy. Though she
2:23:49said she was in her 20s and she had like
2:23:52she was debilitated, she couldn't work
2:23:53and you know she lived in this place and
2:23:56you know her life was kind of you know
2:23:58completely upside down because she
2:24:00didn't have energy to do anything.
2:24:02Which is I think a common story and she
2:24:04was in bed like multiple hours you know
2:24:06every day and struggling to go get
2:24:08groceries and
2:24:10everything [clears throat] was a drag
2:24:11about life and then one summer
2:24:13this guy from Hawaii which was a friend
2:24:15of a friend came over
2:24:17for the for the summer just doing for a
2:24:19little trip and they had an affair. She
2:24:21had a boyfriend and this was long time
2:24:24that she that she had a you know a human
2:24:26connection like this.
2:24:27>> So you're saying
2:24:28>> I'm not saying
2:24:30>> [laughter]
2:24:31>> What what ended what ended up happening
2:24:33is she said my chronic fatigue kind of
2:24:35lifted and I didn't have to do anything
2:24:38and then after that summer she never had
2:24:40chronic fatigue again.
2:24:41And she kind of reintegrated the normal
2:24:44life. I don't know what the lesson is
2:24:46here. I don't know if there's a
2:24:47generalizable principle but there's a
2:24:49lot of those stories where people end up
2:24:52in a really dark place in their life and
2:24:54either they're diagnosed with a mental
2:24:55illness or with chronic fatigue syndrome
2:24:57or with kind of
2:24:59a somato you know psychosomatic you know
2:25:02label or
2:25:03whatever that is. There's always kind of
2:25:05precipitating conditions. Sometimes it's
2:25:08in response to a medical interventions
2:25:10like immunization, sometimes it's in
2:25:12response to you know an infection or
2:25:15like a parasite.
2:25:15>> Mold and stuff like that. There's people
2:25:17that have like mold poisoning or
2:25:19whatever and they get
2:25:20>> Yeah, very often there's like a trigger.
2:25:22There's like sometimes a lingering kind
2:25:24of
2:25:25condition and then sometimes there's an
2:25:27acute trigger and the body's never able
2:25:29to fully recover. So
2:25:31what do we take from that you know story
2:25:33of a of a summer fling?
2:25:35>> Well I take from it hope.
2:25:37>> Yeah.
2:25:38>> That you know even when the cards seem
2:25:40to be stacked against you and it feels
2:25:41like you might have to live with this
2:25:42thing for a long time. But in many
2:25:44cases, rem- miraculous things happen
2:25:46that defy the odds. And hope itself, I
2:25:48think, it can keep us in an optimistic
2:25:51mind- mindset.
2:25:52>> I've seen this in patients with
2:25:53mitochondrial diseases as well. You
2:25:55know, these people are diagnosed with a
2:25:56genetically defined mitochondrial
2:25:57disease. Their mitochondria can't flow
2:25:59energy properly. So, every day they live
2:26:02probably with this kind of discomfort
2:26:04of, you know, holding your breath for
2:26:06too long.
2:26:06>> Mhm.
2:26:07>> And everything's difficult about life.
2:26:08Many of them lose hope. And And when you
2:26:11you see them losing hope, they start to
2:26:12go downhill physically, and many of them
2:26:14die very early.
2:26:16The people who do the best, like, their
2:26:18mitochondria don't work the way they
2:26:20should,
2:26:21but they're they're able to find
2:26:23something that they love. They're able
2:26:24to, you know, find an expression for for
2:26:26themselves. And they're to have
2:26:28supportive family. Almost a universal
2:26:30theme for people who do well is they
2:26:31have
2:26:32a supportive, you know, environment. And
2:26:35cultivating this is is so precious. And
2:26:37it brings us back maybe to social
2:26:39connections. You know, you
2:26:41energetic process, me energetic process.
2:26:44When we interact,
2:26:45you know, through um through sounds and
2:26:48and, you know, physically shaking hands
2:26:50and
2:26:51and I feel your energy, I feel your
2:26:53excitement, you feel mine. And then, you
2:26:55know, we we might vibe and resonate. And
2:26:57And then maybe, you know, you find
2:26:58someone and you feel love for that
2:26:59person. I think love is the experience
2:27:01of resonance.
2:27:02Right? And And when you feel that with
2:27:04someone, it feels so special.
2:27:06>> Which goes back to the affair point.
2:27:08>> Yeah, maybe. [laughter]
2:27:09>> Maybe.
2:27:10On this point of exercise, which we
2:27:11talked about earlier, if someone wants
2:27:12to maximize mitochondrial biogenesis,
2:27:15what is the sweet spot for training? Is
2:27:17it strictly zone two cardio or high
2:27:19intensity interval training or
2:27:21resistance training or something else?
2:27:22Is there like an optimal type of
2:27:23training?
2:27:24>> Yeah. I think the key principle here is
2:27:26anything that will make you breathe
2:27:28harder
2:27:29>> Yeah.
2:27:29>> means that your mitochondria are working
2:27:31harder.
2:27:31>> Okay, but you don't want to do it too
2:27:32long.
2:27:33>> If you're not trained, right? Like,
2:27:35you're regular guy. I'm not trained now.
2:27:37I I I I run for like
2:27:4020 minutes every other day. That's my
2:27:42you know, routine. That's what I I have
2:27:44enough time to do and I feel like it
2:27:46moves energy through my body in the
2:27:47right way.
2:27:48>> [laughter]
2:27:48>> But if I go and I try to run a marathon,
2:27:50I'm going to injure myself. You know,
2:27:52I'm going to hurt myself. So that would
2:27:54be too much for me. And so
2:27:57I think that comes back to the point of
2:27:59like feeling into your energy. We call
2:28:01this mitoception, right? Feeling into
2:28:03your mitochondria and what's
2:28:04sustainable. So I think there's a an
2:28:06individualized you know, stance that we
2:28:08need to take towards this.
2:28:10>> And the last question from the audience
2:28:12was, "Right now mitochondrial health
2:28:14feels a bit invisible. Are there any
2:28:17accessible reliable tests like ATP blood
2:28:21tests or specific biomarkers that a
2:28:23normal person can use to accurately
2:28:25measure their mitochondrial function?"
2:28:27>> Working on it.
2:28:28>> You're working on it.
2:28:29>> So routine is working on it and so we're
2:28:31building
2:28:33a platform a technology platform that
2:28:36would allow people to tune into their
2:28:38mitochondria to mitocept, right? So do
2:28:40you feel your energy through your
2:28:41mitochondria and then you can make
2:28:43better decisions like ketogenic diet. Is
2:28:45this helping you? Is this not helping
2:28:46you? This new relationship, is this
2:28:48sucking away your energy or
2:28:50is this giving you energy? This new job,
2:28:53this new you know, direction in life.
2:28:56There's so much. I mean, all of the
2:28:58important decisions we make
2:29:00really you know, we make what how we
2:29:02feel. Like you wake up in the morning
2:29:04and either
2:29:06you feel great and you can change things
2:29:08or you wake up and and you don't want to
2:29:09be here. That's an experience and before
2:29:13you get there, you know, on the dark
2:29:14side there's all of these
2:29:16decision points that that we face and
2:29:18the power of discernment.
2:29:20Right? Then what we talked about like
2:29:22with Steve Jobs like this is the way and
2:29:25and then you know, you feel strong about
2:29:27this discerning what's right for you,
2:29:28what's not right for you, what's the
2:29:29right direction, is it the right time or
2:29:31not? Those are decisions we make, you
2:29:33know, with our guts. And there are many
2:29:35people who who swear that this is the
2:29:37only way they make decisions. And if
2:29:39they make decisions rationally, that
2:29:40ends up biting them in the butt. Because
2:29:43I think the this thing
2:29:45and this energetic system is the most
2:29:47sensitive instrument that we have
2:29:50to know whether
2:29:52the content of our lives is aligned with
2:29:54who we are as individuals.
2:29:56And that requires that we feel into
2:30:00this movement and into our sensations
2:30:02and into
2:30:03um
2:30:04the experiences we have. So, that's the
2:30:06the barometer that really guides us
2:30:07through life, like a GPS.
2:30:09An energetic GPS.
2:30:12>> Talk to Martin. We have a closing
2:30:14tradition on this podcast where the last
2:30:15guest leaves a question for the next
2:30:16guest not knowing who they're leaving it
2:30:17for. And the question that has been left
2:30:19for you is what is the most difficult
2:30:23thing you ever overcame and how did it
2:30:26make you the person you are today?
2:30:33>> [sighs]
2:30:36>> So, I just felt my energy change.
2:30:38>> Mhm. I saw it change.
2:30:40>> I felt like this sinking feeling.
2:30:45About a year ago, um um
2:30:47my fiance and I were expecting a baby.
2:30:51>> [sighs]
2:30:51>> And we were about 3 months into the
2:30:55pregnancy and
2:30:57it was great. We were excited. Um we
2:30:59were calling this
2:31:01new life, new life.
2:31:03>> [laughter]
2:31:03>> And we talked, you know, affectionately
2:31:05about it and
2:31:06we said like, you know, when new life
2:31:07comes this and we both have a a child
2:31:10and
2:31:12um and she was in Canada. She came back
2:31:14and then
2:31:15uh and that evening in in bed she had
2:31:18this like crazy pain that started and
2:31:22uh
2:31:23and we were both super scared. There was
2:31:25a bit of bleeding and then and then
2:31:27contractions started to come really
2:31:29fast. Not supposed to happen at 3
2:31:31months.
2:31:32Um and then I was like, "Oh, maybe this
2:31:34is just like a bump in the road, and and
2:31:37you know, things are going to be fine."
2:31:39Um so
2:31:41we ended up having a miscarriage, and
2:31:43Nerosha didn't want to go to the
2:31:45hospital, so we did this at home.
2:31:48And it was terrible. It was really
2:31:51really sad, really, you know,
2:31:53gut-wrenching.
2:31:55So we were were both devastated when,
2:31:57you know, new life left us, and and then
2:32:00I had this moment of like, "Why me?"
2:32:04Like, "Why the this has happened to
2:32:05me?" Like, "I'm
2:32:07I think I'm a good person. I'm doing my
2:32:09best to bring good in the world."
2:32:11I tried to be a good partner, a good
2:32:14um you know, leader. I tried to Yeah.
2:32:18Why is this happening to me?" So this
2:32:19was like this victim, you know,
2:32:20mentality mindset.
2:32:22And I've learned through
2:32:25my 40 or so years that I think a a
2:32:28useful stance to take in life is
2:32:30to assume that there's something to
2:32:32learn from everything you go through.
2:32:34>> Mhm.
2:32:35>> [clears throat]
2:32:35>> I don't know this for sure. It's not a a
2:32:37scientific fact. It's more of a uh
2:32:40>> [clears throat]
2:32:40>> of an experience turned into kind of a
2:32:42way of of living, more of a belief.
2:32:46So I was like, "But
2:32:47how could there be something to learn
2:32:48from something so terrible?"
2:32:50Um
2:32:52and I I had to sit with this, and
2:32:542 days later
2:32:56after the baby had gone, and Nerosha and
2:32:58I had sat in the shower and cried, and
2:33:01the smell was horrible, and just it was
2:33:04death. Like, death was around us, around
2:33:06me, and I felt angry, and I felt sad.
2:33:10Um and I just sat down and and wrote. I
2:33:13I just And that's my way now of letting
2:33:15things flow. Different people have
2:33:18different ways, and then and
2:33:20I was writing about my experience and
2:33:23why now and
2:33:24and I asked, "What is there to learn
2:33:26from this?"
2:33:27And a very clear answer
2:33:29came up.
2:33:31Slowing down.
2:33:38And that hit really hard because
2:33:40throughout my whole life, I've moved
2:33:42pretty quickly through life. I had a
2:33:43very
2:33:45short, you know, PhD then I became a
2:33:48professor very quickly and
2:33:50uh
2:33:51and grew a team and um and like moving
2:33:54fast is kind of something that's like a
2:33:55personality trait that I I do and
2:33:58uh and I think sometimes it's served me.
2:34:00It's allowed me to do some things that
2:34:02you would not have been possible
2:34:03otherwise, but
2:34:05at other times I think it's hurt me and
2:34:07it's like this drive, this inner drive
2:34:09like things must happen now, must move
2:34:11fast.
2:34:13I think it's hurt other people around
2:34:14and has impaired my ability to be an
2:34:16effective leader cuz I then
2:34:19maybe I lack sensitivity to other people
2:34:21who don't move at my pace.
2:34:23Uh
2:34:24to slowing down
2:34:26really kind of
2:34:27um hit home.
2:34:30The things were like clear. It was like
2:34:31looking at a canvas and
2:34:34there was more contrast.
2:34:36Like the things that really mattered
2:34:38were like sharper, right? And all of
2:34:40this other like these obligations
2:34:42and these
2:34:43things that I had said yes to or like,
2:34:46you know, the contrast was so much
2:34:48sharper. Um
2:34:50and this
2:34:51lesson, I think I I took this as a
2:34:53lesson, slowing down, I think has
2:34:56allowed me to be a better listener, to
2:34:58be a better, you know, more
2:35:00compassionate father and
2:35:02uh scientist.
2:35:03Uh I think it's changed me.
2:35:05And I don't know that I would have
2:35:08learned that lesson
2:35:11in another way. We are the this
2:35:14energetic process that's shaped by the
2:35:16sum of our experiences and the people we
2:35:19meet. Like, I'll never be the same after
2:35:21today from having sat with you at this
2:35:23table and you opening the door
2:35:26not just to scientific inquiry, but to
2:35:28human experience.
2:35:30Um
2:35:32yeah, the
2:35:33we we change all the time. We transform
2:35:35and [clears throat] what shapes us is
2:35:38those kind of
2:35:39energetic interactions and
2:35:41um
2:35:42>> [clears throat]
2:35:42>> yeah, everything we go through.
2:35:45>> Well, I'll never be the same either.
2:35:47For for I think all the best reasons.
2:35:49I'm I you know, I have to say that I'm
2:35:51I'm
2:35:52I'm hesitating my words here because of
2:35:55the gratitude that you've taken from the
2:35:57wisdom that it's given you, but I'm
2:36:00terribly sorry that that hap you had to
2:36:01go through that. I can only I just can't
2:36:03imagine. It's one of my Honestly, it's
2:36:05one of my like worst nightmares,
2:36:06especially at the season of life I'm in
2:36:07when me and my partner and my fiance are
2:36:09trying to have a kid. It's just like I
2:36:10think I think I'm thinking about
2:36:12those things now and how I would I'm
2:36:14like pre-empting how I would handle
2:36:16those kinds of things. So, to hear that
2:36:17it happened to you is just it's um
2:36:20it's really hard It's really difficult
2:36:21to hear.
2:36:22Um
2:36:22>> It happens to about 20 million people a
2:36:24year.
2:36:25>> Most people don't talk about it, either,
2:36:26do they?
2:36:27>> People don't talk about it.
2:36:28>> Yeah. Cuz it's shrouded in mixed
2:36:30emotions and
2:36:32yeah, I can understand that.
2:36:33>> Yeah.
2:36:36>> But I am better off for having this
2:36:37conversation with you and I think, you
2:36:39know, I speak on behalf of my audience
2:36:40for sure this time when I say that I
2:36:42think my audience are as well. I've
2:36:43learned so much. It's actually kind of
2:36:44like completely re-changed how I think
2:36:46about life itself, which is a weird
2:36:47thing. Mhm. And I hope I can just let
2:36:48sit in this moment a little bit and
2:36:50think about how I am energy and how how
2:36:53that's determining everything um around
2:36:55me and others and
2:36:58and it's um it's really really
2:37:00wonderful. I think what you know, what
2:37:01you're doing, people might think of you
2:37:02as like a my mitochondrial scientist,
2:37:04but actually it's much more deeper and
2:37:06much more philosophical than that. When
2:37:07we think about what energy is to us,
2:37:09it's it is everything. Mhm. And that's
2:37:11really the lens that you've given me
2:37:12today is you've completely changed my
2:37:13mind on like how I think about life,
2:37:15which is such a wonderful thing to get
2:37:16from a podcast. I don't say this like I
2:37:18don't kiss people people's asses like
2:37:19this. Like I genuinely my mind is like
2:37:21hell.
2:37:22It's also changed how I think about
2:37:23business, which is really weird and I
2:37:25>> [laughter]
2:37:26>> Um
2:37:27>> So business is is an extension of us, of
2:37:30you know, energetic.
2:37:31>> Like everything is.
2:37:32That's what I've learned today.
2:37:34>> [laughter]
2:37:35>> Quite literally.
2:37:36>> And it's also made me think a lot about
2:37:37how I preserve, conserve, aim my energy.
2:37:41Um
2:37:43So Dr. Martin Picard, thank you so much.
2:37:45Thank you so much for your generosity
2:37:46and your wisdom. It's not very often
2:37:47that I have conversations that actually
2:37:49like instantly cause this shift in me,
2:37:51but this is one of them today. If people
2:37:53want to learn more about you and the
2:37:55work you're doing, where do we
2:37:57channel that energy?
2:37:59Where do they go?
2:38:00>> The best place for people to go is
2:38:02website martinpicard.energy.
2:38:04>> Okay.
2:38:05>> And then from this website, you'll see
2:38:07information about the book, you'll see
2:38:08information about the research, core
2:38:10energetic principles that cover what
2:38:13we've covered today. There are little
2:38:14animations and there's information about
2:38:16the institute.
2:38:17>> Okay.
2:38:18Thank you so much.
2:38:19>> Thank you.
2:38:20>> YouTube have this new crazy algorithm
2:38:22where they know exactly what video you
2:38:24would like to watch next based on AI and
2:38:26all of your viewing behavior. And the
2:38:28algorithm says that this video is the
2:38:31perfect video for you. It's different
2:38:33for everybody looking right now. Check
2:38:35this video out. I bet you you might love
2:38:37it.

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