2 Bears, 1 Cave with Tom Segura & Bert Kreischer - Body Hacks w/ Andrew Huberman | 2 Bears, 1 Cave Ep. 168

Episode Date: January 16, 2023

It’s another episode of 2 Bears, 1 Cave with Tom Segura and guest bear, Professor Andrew Huberman! They talk about Huberman’s rough and tough upbringing, psychedelics, and cannabis. Huberman gives some insight on brain function, tobacco use, supplements, and performance enhancement drugs. They discuss clean training, teaching while podcasting, explaining the need for sun light and good sleeping habits. They discuss importance of appearance, getting obsessed with stuff like Joe Rogan, and cold plunges. They encourage surrounding yourself with a diverse crowd, the creative process and Tom almost gives Andrew a heart attack. Tom asks Andrew about testosterone for women and to analyze Bert Kreischer's drinking.   https://tomsegura.com/tour https://www.bertbertbert.com/tour https://store.ymhstudios.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Have you explored psychedelics? I just did. Which one? For the very first time. And by the way, these are all illegal unless in a clinical trial. So don't possess or sell these things. You will go to jail. But which ones did you do?

So 100% excuse. On average, it takes about 30 days for a person to break their New Year's resolutions. It took me two. So if saving your money was on your 2024 list, your odds aren't looking that great. Luckily, I have a 100% guaranteed way to save you money this year. Just switch to Mint Mobile. Right now, Mint Mobile has wireless plans starting at $15 a month. $15 a month? Are you kidding me? That takes your monthly nut and skinnies it up. And then think about what you can do with all that extra money. All plans come with unlimited talk and text plus high-speed

data delivered on the nation's largest 5G network. You don't really appreciate 5G until you get out of this country. To get your new wireless plan for just 15 bucks a month and get the plan shipped to your door for free, go to mintmobile.com slash bears. That's mintmobile.com slash bears. Cut your wireless bill to 15 bucks a month at mintmobile.com slash bears. Additional taxes and fees and restrictions apply. See Mint Mobile for details. Well, today is a very special day. First of all, it has been confirmed that Bert was kidnapped and we're thrilled that

he's being held for ransom. In his place, we have an absolute special treat. We've never had a smart person on this show, let alone somebody qualified to teach us something. And so today we got both of those. We knocked them both out. I don't know. I always wear this. I'm surprised that you're wearing this. But it is another blue-eyed, handsome man with a beard and a black shirt.

It's Professor Andrew Huberman. Thanks for coming, man. Thanks for coming. Thanks for having me here. There's a lot of reasons I'd love to be here and finally got here. But look, I'm no replacement for Bert Kreischer. There's no, there's no, I hope people aren't expecting, I hope people aren't expecting me to be nearly as funny as Bert.

That's okay. Spontaneous as Bert. Well, you know, I think we're going to have a great, actually this is already one of my favorite podcasts that I've ever done. We're thrilled to find out. You know, people have told you that we look alike. They've told me that we look alike. We did 23andMe.

Turns out your father's third cousin slept with my mother in 1964. Twice. And so somos primos. Somos primos. We have Latin roots. And what are you going to do? We're related. Sorry, guys so somos primos. Somos primos. We have Latin roots. And what are you going to do? We're related. Sorry, guys.

That's it. Put it on the internet. Yeah, we're trying to figure out whether or not there's time for this holiday is whether or not we can get the families together. We'll get them together. We'll make it happen. We'll make it happen. Before we get into, like, I have so many questions I want to ask you that are more academic and in your field. I want to know a little bit, if you would share, about Huberman roots, you know?

Sure, yeah. So you were, I'm surprised, I didn't realize you actually grew up in the same community that you basically live in now. Yeah, I was born at Stanford Hospital. Wow. I did some, not all of my training at stanford school of medicine and now i work at stanford school jesus so the only joke i have to tell today is that someday i expect to die at stanford school of medicine that's really cool hopefully a long time from now i like that morbid joke yeah yeah um thanks the um yeah my my father's from

buenos aires vamos argentina um that's the most spanish i'm going to speak the ah Yeah, my father's from Buenos Aires. Vamos, Argentina. That's the most Spanish I'm going to speak. Yeah, che, boludo. I think they're doing well in the World Cup, right? They are. This will air afterwards. Let's just go for it. Congratulations to Argentina on winning the World Cup.

Hey, dale, dale. Yeah, my cousin's there. It's crazy. You know, you go to dinner with them. And, you know, before there were smartphones. They're just living on the radio. They're out of their fucking minds. They're out of their minds. Out of their minds.

I think my dad's the odd man out there. Growing up, he wasn't really into football, soccer. It is other level. It is other level. I mean, one of my favorite videos of all time is of a guy, El Tano Pasman. Have you seen that guy? No.

So he's a, there's a, there's obviously, I mean, Argentina is all behind their national team as a country, right? Which is kind of the nice thing about the world cup is it kind of, you know,

sports are a great equalizer unifies the whole country, but club wise, you know, there's, there's Independiente, Boca, River, River,

and San Lorenzo. There's all these clubs, right? So the most famous fan of River is named Tano Passman. And his family recorded him absolutely losing his goddamn mind to the point where they sent him to the doctor after this went, this went viral. Oh yeah.

I mean, he ends up, he ends up kicking over furniture and like really, really losing his shit. I mean, it's, it is, it's one of my favorite things I've ever seen.

And we'll, we'll take, we'll check it out in a bit, but people will change marriages. They'll change schools. They'll change children. They'll change schools. They'll change children. But they don't change their commitment to their club team. There was a, I want to say, it was probably a year, maybe two years ago, there was club finals.

So it was like intercity finals. And when one of the buses would come into the stadium, fans of the opposing team broke all the wind, like through rocks at the window, shattered the windows. And then the teams had to play their final. So like the championship went out of the country. So they flew the teams out of the country to play the final game. And they're like,

we want to play it here, but we can't. It's too violent. It's crazy. Yeah. My cousin who's grown with kids now every weekend, I, it's too violent. It's crazy. Yeah, my cousin who's grown with kids now, every weekend, I think it's on Saturday, he goes to play football, soccer with his friends

that he grew up playing with. And there must be, no joke, 50 fields. Like trying to find their field is impossible unless you know where to look. And little kids, adults, like everybody's out there. It's incredible. Their love of the game is unsurpassed. Yeah, absolutely.

Now here are the Brazilians and the Italians are like going crazy as they say, unsurpassed. But maybe that's why Argentina won the World Cup. Yeah, man, that was amazing. That last game. So yeah, so my dad moved to the States on a naval scholarship. He says he was a physicist, is a physicist.

Went to school in Philadelphia, met my mom in New York and they fell in love and moved to California and had my sister and me and grew up at a time when Palo Alto wasn't this super wealthy community. We weren't poor, but it wasn't what it is now. Right. It wasn't crazy VC kind of money.

There were kids at my school that, you know, we lived in a single story home. It was a nice home. It was, you know, relatively, you know, typical American home. And, you know, a lot of the kids were associated with Silicon Valley, which at the time were a lot of the children of engineers. Sure. And yeah, so I grew up in a home where science was discussed a lot and where graduate students would come over and those sorts of things. So that played a, definitely a big part in your development though, right? Yeah. I remember asking my dad when I was about, you know, six or seven, you know, what do you do for work? And he said, he tried to explain what he did and physics is complicated and

he's a theoretical physicist. So it was especially abstract, especially to a six-year-old. Oh my God. Yeah. Theoretical physicist. I know, right? Yeah, he was one of the early founders of chaos theory. So if you've read the book chaos, or if you haven't, you know, there's some description of the work there. And so he was explaining some of that to me, but then he just said, look, the reason I do it is because do you remember, you know, that feeling the night before your birthday?

I was like, oh yeah, definitely. He's like, it's like that almost every day. That's a pretty cool description. And then what he should have told me was, but every once in a while you open the present and there's nothing in there oh yeah, definitely. He's like, it's like that almost every day. That's a pretty cool description. And then what he should have told me was, but every once in a while you open the present and there's nothing in there. Yeah, yeah. Because that's science.

There's a lot of failed attempts. But yeah, basically the long story made short is that I was on a standard track of every kid played soccer, did swim team in Palo Alto. A lot of kids down at the end of my street, I was on a standard track of every kid played soccer, did swim team in Palo Alto. A lot of kids down at the end of my street, grew up skateboarding and building ramps and forts. You got into that too. Got into all that.

I got really into skateboarding. What happened was when I was about 13, 14, no sob story here, but my parents split up like super high conflict divorce. I'm on good terms with both my parents, but they basically took a- You are on? I'm on very good terms with both my parents, but they read basically the rule book of what not to do in a divorce and

basically just like systematically broke every one of those. Yeah. So I went a little bit feral or a lot feral from about 14 until 19, um, fell straight into the skateboarding community at that time in the early nineties, the so-called Embarcadero EMB crowd was really spinning up some amazing skateboarding. Rob Dyrdek came out to the EMB and would hang out, but there was a ton of amazing skateboarding, a lot of fights, a lot of drugs, a lot of alcohol, a lot of pregnant girlfriends, a lot of chaos.

You were involved in all that? Not every single one of those things. I won't, my checklist. I was like, that's a fucking summer, bro. Lot of, you know, a lot of people dead in jail. It was crazy. Okay. But the skateboarding was amazing.

Yeah. It made amazing friends. And so from a pretty early age, I found that being in a big pack of guys, because at that time skateboarding was mostly just guys, was my family. And so I started traveling for skateboarding, admittedly, and I have to be careful here because the skateboarders will like pick me apart. I wasn't very good. I was okay. Got a little sponsor. I think they put me on for sympathy, but I was really part of that community that. Which translates to I'm way better than your average skateboarder, but I'm not as good as the very best. Yeah. I kept getting broken. I kept, you know, as a skateboard kid say getting broke off, you know, I broke my left foot five

times. I just didn't, my body hadn't fully developed. I had puberty, but somehow like I had a long arc of puberty. I think I'm still going through it. Yeah, that's good. That's good. I see your hair's coming in. Yeah, little by little. Yeah.

And, you know, I grew up quick as a consequence of those years. You know, I learned, hey, look, a lot of kids just don't go to school. Like they just don't go. So I stopped going to school, doing a lot of skateboarding. And the whole thing of being truant got me in some trouble. I got put away for a little while. You did. I did.

I didn't harm anybody. I didn't harm myself, but the school understood, you know, this, if you go to Palo Alto schools or like, you know, as opposed to inner city, San Francisco school, they're going to find you and basically get you at least attempt to put you under discipline. You have to be some teacher from that era's favorite story of like bad kid who flipped it around. Yeah, I think so. I mean, I got out of that place. That place was really unpleasant. Kids, let me just tell you, the moment the door locks, it sinks in. Like if you think life sucks wherever you are in freedom,

think about how much it sucks when you have no, zero control over your schedule, your food, your life, your interactions. But I learned a lot in there and I learned that maybe I wasn't responsible for everything. I was still a minor, you know, that was happening to me. But I got out and unfortunately, instead of shaping up, what I did is I was just a lot more cryptic

about my activities. Sure. Which is normal. Yep. Natural for a kid. Got a girlfriend. She became my main focus. I wasn't skateboarding quite as much after that

because I got hurt. Got really into Thai boxing, lifting weights and running. I got really into fitness starting early. Yeah. We had a football coach at our school, Bob Peters. And he was the one who wrote the script that eventually became the John Hughes We had a football coach at our school, Bob Peters.

And he was the one who wrote the script that eventually became the John Hughes film, Mr. Mom. And it was called Wait Till Your Mother Gets Home. And he was this great big strong guy and like all the girls liked him. And I was like, okay, well, you know that. And this new girlfriend, and I saw a picture of her ex-boyfriend and he's like this big strong guy.

And I was like this, you know, this like ferret, you know, like skinny ferret of a skateboard kid. And so I started lifting weights and doing all that. And Bob Peters taught me how to take good care of my body, but also really focused on me also doing running and things of that sort. Anyway, in those years, I'd love to say that I got right back into school,

but I really didn't. I didn't perform well in school. I was getting into fights a lot. I was troubled. I was, you know, I've never been a drug alcohol guy, but I dabb well in school. I was getting into fights a lot. I was troubled. I was, you know, I've never been a drug alcohol guy, but I dabbled in some substance abuse back then. And got, you know, my girlfriend pregnant, like there was a bunch of things that I look back on. I was like, I was really wayward. So I followed her. She went off to college and I felt pretty

alone. So I was, I traveled down to where she went to school, UC Santa Barbara, and I lived in the parking lot outside her dorm. You lived in the parking lot? Yes, I keep an eye on her. So I keep an eye on her. No, I'm kidding. No, because we wanted to be together. We wanted to be together.

Are you fucking lunatic? We'd party on the weekends. We'd party on the weekends. And then if anyone went near her, I'd beat them up. Who's that guy? Who's that guy that went inside? Yeah, I was kind of, you know, I was really afraid to lose her, you know, pretty soon. pretty soon did you really beat up guys that came close to me i might

have i might have i might have and you know what you know what this is and i don't recommend this i don't recommend this but you know what it it quote unquote worked in the sense that oh it works she was just like you're you know you're my protector you're the person that's really there for me so we got a pet ferret we had you know the whole the whole picture this time you know this is like she you're this is like uh, you're, this is like a college. I should have been, she was a year older than me. So I should have been in high school. But you've now been lifting and,

and throwing bombs for like a few years, right? It's really bad guys. Don't pay. Don't do what I did. Just don't do it. Unless you really want to impress a girl. No, no. Cause it will be. I was it will i was determined i was determined to keep her and then um so we'll get back to we'll get back to how this can all go badly wrong so what happened was i had to figure out a way to get into college yeah because she was there and um and i didn't think i'd go to college but i thought okay what am i good at

basically nothing um but i can lift weights and I can run. I like hanging out with friends and working in big teams of guys. I'd done a little bit of that, skateboard shops and factories. And I thought I'll become a firefighter, right? Everyone loves firefighters. I wanted a dog. So I started taking fire science classes

at Mission College in the South Bay. Loved the work. Just felt like it was just the greatest. It's like cook with your friends and like fight fires. Everyone loves firefighters. Not everyone loves cops. And you know who else loves firefighters? Chicks.

There was, I feel like all of your decisions are chick fucking driven. There's a, or in neuroscience, we say that they were hypothalamic driven. Yeah. There's the area of the brain. Here's your first,

here's your first take. The area of the brain sits roughly over the roof of your mouth. That's associated with all your primitive drives. You know, the drive for sex and reproduction and temperature control, aversion of vomit, the approach to something that smells delicious. This is all the-

Housed in one little tiny brain area about the size of a gumball called the hypothalamus. Amazing, amazing structure. Stimulate one small set of neurons in this structure. You or anyone else will go into a rage. Stimulate the nearby neurons. I mean, less than millimeters away. And you will try and mate with the nearest person of your particular proclivity.

Let's get that going. Where is it now? So, and so there are, um, there are, yeah, I guess Elon spinning up neural link, you know, they got to figure out where to put the stimulating chip, but, um, hypothalamus probably not high on the list because it it's pretty sensitive and can get unwieldy in any event. I, I decided I was gonna become a firefighter, but then someone out at mission college said, listen, you stand a much better chance of going up the ranks in the fire department if you have a bachelor's degree.

And so I took the SAT. I have no idea how it happened, but I somehow managed to break a thousand, not by much. I thought you were about to say 1600. I was like, you son of a bitch. My girlfriend was like in the high 1500s. I went to a school where literally they'd publish that as a double page spread of who was going to what school. Harvard early admission and blah, blah. Now listen, there's a dark side

and a light side to everything I'm telling you because Gunn High School, G-U-N-N is the school that I went to, which is now infamous because the academic demands on kids became so severe that in the late nineties and two thousands, it was the school, the high school with the most suicides in the entire nation. Really? There's a train tracks that run through Palo Alto between the middle school and the high school and kids were killing themselves on the train tracks. It's like a rash of suicides.

Yeah, you can look this up. Very tragic. Hopefully they've, you know, they've solved that problem. But, you know, kids at gun high school are forbidden from meeting earlier than 7 a.m. at the nearby Starbucks to start studying for the SAT. People move from China.

We're moving from China to buy homes near there just so their kids could go to that school, public school. So this academic rigor thing can go a little too far. That's obviously not what happened to me at that stage. But I took the SAT. I applied to UC Santa Barbara and somehow I got in. I wrote an honest essay. It just said, listen, I was not a good student. I applied to UC Santa Barbara and somehow I got in. I wrote an honest essay. It just said, listen, I was not a good student.

I had some challenges early on, but I take responsibility for them. My girlfriend goes to UCSB. I want to be a firefighter. I want a Dalmatian. I live in the parking lot. I live in the parking lot. And it obviously touched a chord.

And so the lesson there is kids, tell the truth on your entrance exams. I made up a fucking story about did it work i was like there's a kid eric who inspired me he was gonna die i made it up wait he was gonna he was about to die i was like they were that is messed up yeah it's fucked up that's like the basketball diaries yeah yeah i think i was like uh the basketball um fiction i was so i was a terrible high school student. Okay.

And I was actually curious to know if you were just always like this great, great student as being somebody in academia now. But I was a terrible student. And when I was applying to college, I wasn't getting in anywhere. I don't think I got in anywhere. I think, well, I guess I went to the school I went to. But they were like, you have to write an essay and I remember I had this friend um that uh whatever he was just a regular kid I just decided I put a disease I think I said oh he had cancer and like he inspired me and uh oh my goodness this podcast could be entitled

what not to do by the way he's fine okay he's you cured him i think i cured him with my love yeah my affection i got into no i got into the only school that first of all i never heard of it and then my i remember sitting with the like a high school i went to a prep school where did you grow up well i moved around a lot but I ended up going to a prep school in Florida, in the Vero Beach area. And all the kids, they did this thing where they post like, and it was just like Stanford, Harvard, Yale, Princeton, all the big schools, all the like impressive schools. And then there would be like a little drop to the next tier of schools where you see kids. Then there was a couple of fuck offs that were doing like, you know, community college. The same kids in the yearbook it said was like not available.

Not available. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And mine, people would go like, what is that? Because the name was Lenore Rhine. They were like, what is that? Like a special trade school? I was like, no, it's an actual school, a college, a university now.

But anyway, I think, I mean, I got, I couldn't believe it. I did so poorly as a student. I took the SATs. The first time I took it, I got 1030, which they were like, that's not that bad. And I was like, I should take it again. I took it again.

I did, I got a lower score. And they were like, turns out the random bubble fill approach. They were like, stick to that. I think you get 150 points for filling out your name. And I thought it was other information. Yeah. I think you get more.

Like every once in a while, I look back on that. And I just think, you know, a macaque monkey learned more in my high school than I did. Yeah. And, um, but a big part of it is that you were not yet applying yourself. That's right. I was very serious about fitness. I was very serious about the girlfriend. I mean, I'd wake up on Sunday morning,

run to her house, run six miles, wash her Ford Bronco while she was at church just to show her like I'm a devoted, hardworking guy. Because her dad hated me. Her dad hated me. He recorded our phone conversations. And oh yeah, and discovered all sorts of stuff. He had every right to hate me, right?

I was a punk. I mean, that's true. And when I say punk, I mean, for me, I was also really tight in the punk rock community. Like to me, a punk, that's like a term of endearment, but I was a punk kid. I was getting in fights. So, you know, he had a daughter and he had every right and I think was reasonable in wanting to have her be

with somebody who was really solid. She hadn't yet gone off to college. I think he was worried that she was going to hang back. And, you know, he was somebody who had less than a high school education, really made something of himself by essentially being a janitor and doing maintenance in all these apartments.

So, you know, now I have the adult perspective as saying he was doing exactly what he should have. Right. Protecting. You're a really devoted boyfriend. I was a very devoted boyfriend until I wasn't. Because basically what happened was I got into UC Santa Barbara, went down there and it was crazy.

I mean, at that time it was, you know, party central, but I had already done a lot of that in the skateboarding world. Right. So I didn't show up wanting to party. I was like, this is just easy pickings. Right. I just, and so I was getting into a lot of fights. She and I were getting into a lot of, you know arguments and then no one wanted to go near us because you know we were both we were a little

Sid and Nancy like yeah right um there were no drugs I I feel very lucky that I went to college in the early 90s when there were there weren't if there were hard drugs I never saw it's really interesting that you describing what you were like and the absence of drugs because it sounds like all the stories you would hear somebody going like, and then I shot up. No, no, no. For me it was Thai boxing and yeah, I loved her and I was really passionate. Did you still practice Thai? I mean, do you still box?

No, no, I didn't. I fought a couple of fights. I boxed actually when I was assistant professor in San Diego. I started sparring on Wednesday nights and started boxing, but you know, I started getting a little stutter from getting hit. So I boxed for a little, like just, you know, going to get lessons and like first I did class and it's the most amazing thing. And then I sparred and I was like, I think I should probably not spar because I feel like I need this brain to do

the, the bullshit that I do requires my brain to not be rocked. And listen, you, you, but you call it bullshit, but it's important. And I think the real estate in here, it can't be replaced easily. My lab works on neural regeneration. And, you know, looking back- Yeah, you especially should know. Yeah, I learned a lot. I mean, I think, you know, I've always had that drive.

And so I, looking back, I probably should have done jujitsu or something that, you know, Joe and Jocko tell me, or Lex tells me, you know, you can go really hard in jujitsu without having to worry about. Your brain. About getting, you know. Yeah.

Concussed. So, you know, those years were pretty wild. But so at the end of my first year, the girlfriend and I had broken up. No one wanted to go near us. Right. I had basically failed out of my classes. Really? I was really dismayed.

And what happened that summer was July 4th, 1994, bunch of friends threw a barbecue. Some guys were stealing some stuff from the house. A big fight broke out. Police showed up. It was like knives, bottles, the whole thing. And I stayed up. I stayed on my feet.

It was good. I didn't get arrested that day. Actually, one of the cops congratulated me. And I remember feeling just kind of the pit in my stomach. So I went back to where I was staying alone. I was squatting in a house in Alavista that summer with my ferret. You know, I got the ferret in the divorce.

That's right, in the breakup. Yeah, in the divorce. And I remember thinking like, I basically am like, I'm officially a loser. I'm not very good at skateboarding. Haven't done that in years. You know, okay, I've got some drive to do fitness. I work at the Bagel Cafe.

It's a job, but it's minimum wage job. Girlfriend's gone, getting in fights. Someone's going to get killed or go to jail, either me or them. And it was really that day that I decided that's it. So I took a leave of absence. I didn't drop out. I took a leave of absence, went home to Palo Alto

and went to Foothill College, community college. And this is a plug for the community college. You know, community colleges get kind of a bad rap, especially when you're, you know, you're hanging out with Stanford professors and, you know, I'm probably, there might be one other Stanford professor. If there's more than one, let me know that went to community college. They're all went pedigree schools. You know, someone to UC Santa Barbara, which is a good school, but I think you can get a really great education at community college or any school. If you just apply yourself and focus, it's about your, you're trying to do well, a hundred percent. And there are good teachers at all these places that are bad

teachers at all these places, the bigger, more famous places. Sometimes the researchers are too busy to put a lot of effort into their teaching. And sometimes they're spectacular. Like Robert Sapolsky, you know, it varies. Now at this point though, I'm jumping in here, but at this point, are you still thinking I'm going to be a firefighter? I'm just going to get this degree. I didn't know what I was going to do.

Honestly, I realized that I was basically, I got an A plus degree in being a loser, right? Because in my book, everything I would describe, you know, it sounds like kind of a wild ride, but you know, I had a number of friends at that point that were dead or in jail that really just flamed out and also was watching some of the better skateboarders that I grew up around, uh, like Danny way, start DC shoes, you know, doing amazing things. Some people are soaring, but I always knew I didn't have the athleticism that they had.

So I had a hard talk with myself and I basically thought, listen, okay, I think I'm frustrated and angry about stuff that happened in childhood and the kind of like break of my family, but boo-hoo, like no one's gonna care, I'm 19, right? The moment you transition to that, it's like, no, the sad story is like, you're just a loser. So, or I was a loser. So what I decided to do at that point was I asked myself,

what am I good at? What do I like? And I've always loved biology and animals. I've always had a ton of curiosity for learning. Even in those crazy years, I would go to Tower Books. Kids, it's a bookstore. It doesn't exist anymore. And I'd read about fitness or I'd read about animals

or I'd read about sex. I was like, you know, in the book stacks, like trying to learn as much as I could and or psychology. And so I thought, well, I can learn and memorize things, especially if I write them down. I'm just going to go all out at learning in school. So I took classes in psychology and biology and really became a straight A student

through a lot of hard work. Because you were interested too though. And I was scared. Okay. Honestly, I was scared. Scared to be a loser? Scared to be a loser. And also, you know, the girlfriend thing did have a lot to do with it. Cause I thought, you know, if I were to just

start a family now, how would I support anybody? I became very practical very fast because, you know, there wasn't anything to fall back on at that point. And, you know, I'm sure had I gone, you know, hat in hand to my parents and said, help me out. It's all your fault or something, you know, that they would have done something. They're good people, but that actually would have been the worst thing for me. And I know a lot of kids that were living at home, they had gone to high school with that were kind of of the not so ambitious crowd that were on the dole that way, you know, 1500 bucks a month. Or my friend who was a professional skateboarder was making $2,000 a month, which at the time we were like, Whoa, you're killing it. And then all

I did was play video games. He dislocated his shoulder and he kind of, you know, became like a, you know, he's a good guy, but, um but you know, just kind of got into drinking and pills and got a girlfriend and he works a job, you know, so he did fine. But, you know, I saw the escape route and I took it. And so after two quarters, I asked my dad, I said, listen, I want to go to the school up in Washington, which is a journalism school. And he goes, no, the university of California system is a public school system. And you're going to go get a real degree, like a science degree or something. And, and I was still pretty angry with him, but there was something true in that message. I felt like, okay, rigor is good. Rigor is good. I was feeling kind of Henry Rollins about life, like, you know, lift weight study. So I went back, I lived in a studio apartment by myself and it was listen to rancid bob dylan classical music on repeat drink coffee

workout study and that was it and once a month admittedly i'd go out and just tie one on yeah i would just let loose with friends but over time i started noticing you know the days after that i'd really struggle to study and do anything. You recover pretty well in your early 20s, but. That's a big fucking change from these days. Cause I can have like one drink and feel it. And then if I have two more, I feel like my recovery is like 72 hours. It's lousy. And if you're tracking your sleep, you'll see it's really lousy. Yeah. There's actually a trick to the hangover, but I don't know if I want to give it to people because I don't know if I want people to drink more. I didn't, we did an episode on alcohol for the podcast.

Go ahead. Oh no, the Huberman Lab podcast actually turned out to be our most popular episode of 2022 is about the, you know, the health effects of alcohol. Look, I am not against drinking for, you know, most adults who aren't alcoholics, who aren't pregnant. But really when you look at the data, it's a toxin to the brain and body.

There are some health benefits in, in certain studies, but the idea that you're going to get resveratrol from, from wine, I mean, you'd have to drink so much wine to get that enough resveratrol. Basically you can have two drinks a week and still be okay. Most people are drinking far more than that. And here's what I say, if you're going to drink more than that, then you should do a bunch of other things to support your health, right? Try and get good sleep, get exercise, you know, cardiovascular and weight training exercise,

try and eat mostly non-processed, minimally processed food, get sun in the morning, all the sort of Huberman Lab podcast staples of health and wellbeing. We can talk more about these if you want. But in any case, back then, you know, I'd go out once a month, tie one on, have fun with friends. Everyone wanted me to continue to get in fights and you kind of get egged on to be your former self. But yeah, so

there was no smoking weed. There was no wildness. It was just study. And I wanted to be the A plus student at the end of the curve. I want to be that data point out there. So I got really competitive and across those next three years, you know, I just, aside from one class and it still pisses me off where I got a B plus, it was just straight A's the whole way. What was the B plus class? It was in developmental neurobiology and guess what I became? A developmental neurobiologist. That's probably why. Yeah. It just still got me that the teacher was super tough and I love the topic, which is why I eventually pursued that. But you know, I finished. You're a big fights guy though. You got in so many fights.

I back then. And you look another point that's important. I never was the aggressor. In any of the fights? No. Well, okay. I suppose if, if so, I suppose if somebody was like, you know, there was this whole thing. I was very protective of my girlfriend.

Dude, this fucking girlfriend. Okay. But, but I'll tell you, I'll tell you, I don't want to say to say her name my friends know her name but the other thing is she was also a fighter so you know there was was she known as what is i mean i don't know if this is academic term a mouthy broad oh no she was actually pretty quiet really but you wouldn't want to piss her off i remember because so i we had broken up and i got kind of a wandering eye at that point i started seeing other people you know this kind of thing. And she, yeah, she, I mean,

she would walk up to girls then and shove them and at parties and stuff. So pretty soon no one wanted to go near us. So we had only one option, which was to get, get back together. This is like fucking Jerry Springer. It's crazy. It's crazy. Right. We were, we were two kids who had really hard home lives. No, it's not a sob story, but we had hard home lives and we became each other's family. And it's confusing at that age because you're each other's family, but you also are feeling

the pull of, you know, you should date other people. You're trying to explore in the, in the world. So, I mean, eventually what happened was she graduated ahead of me. It took a little longer because of the time away, moved home. And I stayed there, graduated. And then I went to graduate school first at UC Berkeley and then, and then later UC Davis, and then it was at Stanford and San Diego. And then now I have my lab at Stanford. So, you know, in those years, I did what I could with the resources I had, which was not a lot, even as a graduate student and postdoc. I mean, I'll tell you,

they don't make enough money these days, especially, but I did my best to try and, you know, do therapy, which I'm a big proponent of. I know a lot of people think that's just sitting back and blaming everybody else for your problems. Oh, like talk therapy, like psychoanalysis? Yeah, like talk therapy. I actually started working with the same,

continued working with the same therapist that I did when I got out of the lockup. And I'm not embarrassed to say this because I think he's spectacular and I really needed someone to advocate for me as, you know, because my parents weren't in a great place to do that at that time. But we've continued to work together for 34 years.

That's fantastic. Yeah, and I've used insurance when I could and he'd cut me a rate when he could. And I worked extra, just to be clear, when I was a postdoc, I worked at Thrasher magazine, skateboard magazine. So I had money to pay for therapy. So I took it seriously, just as seriously as the gym. But I will say if people don't have access to that, you know, journaling is powerful. I still have stacks of journals that I'm afraid people are going to find and read. Not because there's anything damning in there. It's just embarrassing.

It's embarrassing thoughts, you know. Journaling is really powerful. What the data say is also just talking to a trusted friend, even if they don't respond. I mean, they probably shouldn't be texting while you're doing it, but even if they don't respond, leads people to better insights

than if they just try and process things purely in their head. It's the baseline, like what to do to basically rid one's self of shame is that the shame like thrives in secret. So when people feel shame, they tell you like the first thing to do is at least find a trusted source to even if they don't say anything. Yeah. So then you go like, oh, it's out. Like I didn't, it's not inside and and a secret

i've i've done therapy now for i i think i'm just coming up on i think this will be like 11 years coming up i love it same therapist same well i started no i started with one but this one now is the majority of the time so it's probably like seven years with this person great but i i love them i think it's fantastic well a few years ago i would have been afraid to ask this question but now i can ask it because I've had several guests on the podcast who are colleagues of mine who work in this area. Have you explored psychedelics?

I just did. Which one? For the very first time. And by the way, these are all illegal unless in a clinical trial. So don't possess or sell these things. You will go to jail. But which ones did you do?

So first of all, it was a awesome experience. Um, I didn't know what I was going to get. And I told the, uh, told the people that were organizing this. I asked for a private cause they do like groups. I asked for a private session. Um, and I got like this really beautiful place to go to. Cause I, they were like, do you want us to do at your house? I'm like, get out of your fucking mind. You're like, have you seen my house? I'm like this really beautiful place to go to. Cause I, they were like, do you want us to do at your house? I'm like,

get out of your fucking mind. You're like, have you seen my house? I'm like, no. Uh, and I have kids and I'll be like walking around the house. I was like,

what's up boys. So I, imagine what your kids would be doing. Oh yeah. They'll be like, dad's being fucking weird. So I, uh,

I got this beautiful place and then I still have there. And then the, you know, they say, and I, and I agree with this, that to go into it with intention. Right. Right. Like that, still, and then they say, and I agree with this, that to go into it with intention. Right.

Right? That's kind of like, if you're not going to do anything, at least do that. Don't just go like, I want to feel some shit. Have an intention. So I shared that, which I won't share, but I shared what the intentions were. And then I asked I asked him like,

what am I going to get? And they go, we found that it's best to tell you afterwards. Really? Yes. Wow. So I've never heard of that. Well,

this is like, I'm not saying it's wrong. This is like the week in advance. I see. Right. Then like the day of they go, we're going to give you this first. And it's an African plant called Kana.

Okay. A K-A-N-A, I believe. So you have neuromodulators, dopamine, serotonin, acetylcholine, et cetera. They do a bunch of different things all over the brain and body. But Kana increases serotonin. I think it's a serotonin dump.

Right, which is a lot like what psilocybin does. It is. So, but the thing about uh this particular um is it it says it looks like dopamine also so mdma stimulates dopamine and serotonin well they call this one the love one yeah that sounds so it sounds like an empathogen um which mdma is and um yeah khan is a very interesting compound. Well, I wasn't just done after that, buddy. Oh,

that was just the, that was the base coat. Yeah. Then I got. Comedians go hard into the paint. Yeah. Then I got a, I got a second dose of Kana.

And then they were like, they were gauging me. Cause I, I got a place where I could separate from them, but they were just kind of like supervising. Well, I actually went into a room that had a set up light show on the ceiling and a speaker that was playing a playlist of chants and music. And I went into a really good place with this. And then they were asking me, they were like, do you want to like, how do you feel?

Do you want to just like go down or do you want to like, do you feel like you want to take this further? And I was like, let's go. So then I got the psilocybin and that was prepared in a chocolate that also had ayahuasca. Oh yeah. Wow. Okay.

So I did that. Wow. And then I was just like. You were out there. Yeah, it was pretty great. Yeah, as I mentioned a few minutes ago, a few years ago, I would have never brought this up because this stuff was considered super at the edge, right?

Academics losing jobs and that kind of thing. I mean, the counterculture movement of the sixties and seventies, obviously focused on psychedelics, Lucy in the sky with diamonds, yada, yada, but meditation and psychedelics were synonymous back then. What happened in the nineties and two thousands is a lot of laboratories took meditation seriously as an exploration, a lot of good science

to support meditative practices as ways to improve focus mainly. A lot of people think it's a relaxation exercise. It actually improves focus. We can talk about this. Psychedelics were still kind of earmarked as drugs that were illicit. Then what's happened in the last really five to seven years

is thanks to the incredible work of Matthew Johnson at Johns Hopkins University and a guy named Robin Carhart who used to be over in London, but who's now at UC San Francisco, clinical trials started on psilocybin and then the MAPS group out in California. So this is all done legally, clinical trials with federal taxpayer money

done at universities, major universities, looking at the antidepressant, long-term antidepressant effects of things like psilocybin, MDMA, MDMA in particular for trauma. And the data are astounding, right? 66% of people who do these two MDMA sessions spaced appropriately in conjunction with a clinician, you got someone there to support them,

show long-term depression relief, this kind of thing. We did an episode with a guy named Dr. Nolan Williams, who's one of these incredible doctors at Stanford. He's a triple board certified neurologist psychiatrist who's doing work on Ibogaine. There's another psychedelic psilocybin, all the various psychedelics. And he really emphasized, you know, that obviously kids who are developing should stay away from this stuff.

I would say, you know, before you're 25, you might want to think seriously or really, you know, reconsider because the brain is still plastic. But what's very clear is that these compounds, before you're 25, you might want to think seriously or really, you know, reconsider because the brain is still plastic. But what's very clear is that these compounds, they provide a dump of these neuromodulators like dopamine or serotonin in particular ways. And in those very unusual states of sometimes hallucinations, but different modes of thinking, the brain learns new associations. And on MDMA, people can see something that is very traumatic that's been looping in their head or that they've been

hiding from themselves and see it from a new perspective. And this is really important. People think that everything that happens, it happens during the psychedelic session, but that's just the opening of neuroplasticity. Neuroplasticity is just a process. The question is, where is it directed? And so here's the double-edged sword. If someone takes psychedelics and just pays attention to the music that they're listening to, there might be a few insights there, but it is sort of waste of plasticity, if you ask me, because there's a real opportunity to ratchet

through some of the more challenging things. You can use an intention. Other times people will just kind of let what comes up come up through the subconscious, like the Freudian psychoanalysts would have done. I'm very direct about this. You know, I did psilocybin and some LSD when I was in high school and college,

completely regret it. Did not have good experiences. Some weren't bad, but had some bad experiences. Just do not recommend it at all. Why? I just wasn't intentioned about it. I wasn't in a place to really make sense of what was going on.

And I think that the brain is so plastic until about age 25 anyway, that there's a lot of good work that can be done through just insight, hard work, et cetera. As an adult, I've done three in conjunction with an MD, three different MDMA sessions, each of which was very different and each of which really helped me move through a lot,

a lot of forgiveness, a lot of being able to feel. I used to be able to feel things like in my head, I could have emotions and waist down, I could feel, but it sort of, my body didn't feel like a coherent hole when I'd have an emotion and I could like, I was really good at packing down emotions. Yeah. And then, you know, and they erupt one way or another.

Yeah. So that all largely got resolved. You know, I'm not, obviously not from, I'm far from perfect. I always say I have 3000 pet peeves and about 3000 flaws to match those pet peeves. So they go to hand in hand. And then the second session was just, I finished it out. It was very mellow and it was just all about acceptance. And then the third session really was a deep dive into some complicated stuff that I've been trying to navigate more recently. And I would say in every one of these cases, it matches exactly what the clinical literature shows, which is that people gain new insight in positive ways that allow them to be more empathic towards others, but more importantly, more empathic towards themselves. And so again, you know, this isn't, I don't want to send people off to get these things. Obviously, I would enroll in a clinical trial. As an academic, I have the responsibility of saying, if you want to do this legally,

I would enroll in a clinical trial or go to a place where it's legal and work with a physician. And don't look at these things as magic bullets, but rather opportunities to do better work. They're a little bit like, frankly, a little bit like performance enhancing drugs in the sense that,

do I recommend people take anabolic steroids? No, but if you're really into fitness and you've already reproduced, successfully reproduced, and you're in your mid to late forties and you're thinking about taking low dose testosterone, like, yeah, you can do a lot more exercise. If you just take it thinking it's going to replace the exercise you would have done,

forget it. And again, that has to be done safely too in conjunction with an MD, but they really amplify the plasticity process and the clinical data are astounding. I mean, there's a group. There's a real shift now. Academics. Academics at the level of government funding. And the last thing I'll say about this, you know, is that I think is important is that within the veterans community, there's a group called

Veterans Solutions. Again, I don't know, I don't get paid to say this or anything, but I've paid attention to what they're doing. These are former special operators of kind of what they call tier one operators and other operators who, you know, basically their careers put them in the face of a lot of stuff and they're tough as nails, but they come back and a lot of them are challenged with some of those things and who wouldn't be right. And so I went to an event that veteran solutions put on on veterans day last year and Coronado Island, which of course is the home to BUDS and SEAL Team training. So you got a lot of tier one operators there.

You also had, I won't name names, but you had far right politicians and far left politicians on the same stage talking about the benefits of responsible use of psychedelics as therapeutics to offset the enormous wave in suicide that's been happening in veterans. And so you look at that and you go, okay, that's one very important community, but there are other communities like this. And this is the one place where I see, you know, partisan politics actually meeting in the middle. It was, I couldn't believe it.

Governor Rick Perry was there talking about heart medicine. I was like, what? You know, and you had other folks like Rick Doblin from MAPS who was like a conscientious objector. And he, you know, he had the guts to say that in a room full of tier one operators. I was like, wow. And, and listen, I was scared for his life, but you know, everyone really centered around the fact that people grow up, have different experiences. And at some point, I really do think that the only opportunity to really meet in the middle for social issues and political issues, economic issues, and everything in between

is going to be through plasticity. I think after age 25, people are pretty locked into their modes of thinking, even if they don't like those modes of thinking. They still are, yeah. Totally locked in. There's very little change. Being set in your ways is a real thing.

This, I mean, that experience, for me, by the way, I'm already very much looking forward to the next one because I really enjoyed it so much yeah and i've i've recognized insights i'm not asking for them no no i know i know but you felt you had insights insights uh i love by the way so one of my because i had zero experience with this the only thing that i could even relate this to was basically cannabis in some form right and and and more so-

Are you a pot smoker? I should know this. No, I don't. I haven't smoked in a- You don't sound like, you know, the pot smoker. No, no. They actually messes up their time perception of hearing. So they have that like drawl.

Yeah. Oh, really? Yeah. The pot voice is a real thing. That's a real thing? Yeah, and it also adjusts some of the neural innervation of the throat that controls speech. I mean, pot smokers, not all of them, right?

Some are highly articulate. Yeah. Highly highly articulate but some of them just sound dumb the chronic smokers especially listen and i mean like people that it nukes the memory system yeah like high thc and of course the thc community is crazy we did an episode on cannabis and people like you got it wrong you didn't talk about the terpenes and that. Look, I don't have anything. I don't have any problem with, I'm basically like live and let live. It does as long as you don't harm anyone. But kids vaping or smoking high THC containing cannabis.

I mean, there's a huge predisposition towards psychosis in those kids later, especially young males. A lot of what you see in terms of homelessness on the street, a lot of that psychosis is high THC cannabis induced and nobody likes this. There's amazing research out of Canada on this. And then here's what I'm not trying to do. I'm not trying to take away anybody's cannabis. I know the cannabis culture worked hard to get it legalized in a number of places or decriminalized. So I'm not trying to take away from that, but young kids in particular, young males smoking very high potency, meaning high THC concentrated cannabis,

you know, indica, indica-couch kind of, you know, weed might mellow people out or sativas might make them more ramped up. This is kind of broad, broad sweep stuff, but cannabis is not an innocuous drug. Well, I, my only experience, I mean, I had obviously some smoking. I smoked a lot in college, you know,

and just out of college. Were you funnier on, on college on on yeah i don't know do you write on on sometimes but it has to be here's the thing it can't be uh really really strong because then you're just like you're too high you know so it's space time it's got to be like the right kind of chill dose to i feel like to shoot the shit to write to right to be in a creative space it's not hey does is this gonna melt my fucking face well i have a question about this and comedy in particular because you know i've been watching more and more comedy thanks to you guys and joe and you know shules and all the crew um whitney so timing seems like such a key thing and the one thing we know

about cannabis is that it throws off time perception and the reason it was synonymous with the jazz culture is that it was about a breakdown of kind of standard timing and and structure in music which done well is amazing amazing jazz done poorly is just like noise yeah as far as we know so it seems like comedy is at least to me is like 50 timing i mean i think it's a pretty accurate i mean timing is huge, it's like when you say the thing now, it's funny. Right. Or hilarious. If you go 10 seconds later, it's like, what was that? It's all about, everything's about the moment in which you say it.

Right. But I find that one of the things that blows my mind are, is like the comedians that perform high is it's always wild to me because I think the hardest I, well, one of the hardest I've ever bombed was, was with Rogan. And we're right outside. And he was like,

smoke this or like hit this. Yeah. But he's super human with that stuff. Well, you know, not only that. And I was like, no, he's like, come like come on don't be a i'll edit out the word i was like okay i'm like all right and i you know i think i took a hit maybe two

dude immediately first of all my tolerance for when this happened was low probably lower than it is now now i don't know how low it's low now i don't have a high tolerance for this i haven't smoked marijuana so in so long that like you know so anyway i go into this club and i'm like i am fucking fried right and i forget while joe's ready to like kick box oh he's totally he's like totally on point he's good he's like he's like it's that italian blood of his i don't know what he has he's got crazy monkey italian blood but he fucking he's fine he's like he's like excited to perform and i'm in the opposite headspace i'm like i want to go away right now i want to leave but i gotta i gotta go up and i go up i forget if i open to go away right now not the thing you want to be telling yourself no man and i go out there and i can here's

the thing so and i and i took and I took part of that. Part of this is connected to this psychedelic conversation for me is that that was from smoking. And also when you eat, I've had more edibles than I have. So, and, and it's all about finding that dosage because you can, you can eat an edible where it's like a buzz and then you can eat edible where you're like, and you're like ready to cry. And like, it's, it's a, I find that to be a horrific experience. I look, I go up on that show with that Joe show and I get off stage and I, I mean, I see the owner of the, it's like the worst thing you could,

it was a club and I walk out of backstage and I see the only club and he was like, like, I was like, I was like, yeah, I was kind of a, he was like, he didn't even, he didn't even say what, he was just like. Yeah, because it's also the spontaneity of it, right? I mean, I don't do comedy, but we did some live events this last year and then we finished up in New York

and I honestly can't ever remember what I said when I'm up there. I mean, I know the general structure, it's science and we talk, but I do some storytelling and things around science, of course. And you sort of go into a altered state, right? But that altered state is highly tuned into the interaction, right?

You're not trying to feed wishes. You're trying to, you know, there's a whole dynamic there. And I just don't see how one could do that under any kind of substance. Well, I mean, you know, so I always perform sober. Like I'm to this day like if somebody goes do you want to have a drink I'll be like after the show I don't like to have anything messing with my head so I was like

you want to have a drink yeah can you wait till the moment I get off stage like you know I just I like to be clear because the other thing is like you even, I can have a sip and you're like, that's not going to do anything to you. But like, if it has me doubt timing or structure or a word, and like, then I'm like, why the fuck did I have that drink? So I just rather be completely sober. And when I, all this is to say that when I got into, I signed up for the psychedelic experience, my big thing that I was nervous about, I was like, Hey, yes,

I go, am I going to be paranoid? Am I going to have anxiety? Or, you know, there is a common fear of I'm going to lose my ability to do what I do for a living. Oh,

I didn't, I wasn't as worried about that as I was that like, I've had edibles where, you know, I learned later, like it was 50 or a hundred, like, you know, something where you're just like, ah, like it was 50 or a hundred, like, you know, something where you're just like, ah, like I think.

The variability isn't good there. And I was like, is that what this is like? And I remember them, the people who ran this go like, you're not gonna have any paranoia. And I was like, I thought that meant mild. And that's because you had the con of the empathogen first. So it creates this serotonin and dopamine. Normally they can be present in the brain at high levels,

but usually not at the same time. And dopamine, when it's elevated in our system, we tend to pay attention to things outside and beyond the confines of our skin. And we like to make plans. So think about the extremes, and I'm definitely not recommending this. People on cocaine or amphetamine,

everything's a plan, right? We're going to do this. We're going to do this. We're going to do this. We're going to do this, right? Someone who's- That really resonated in the booth., everything's a plan, right? We're going to do this, we're going to do this, we're going to do this, we're going to do this, right? Someone who's- That really resonated in the booth. Yeah, manic bipolar, right?

Delusions are growing, I'm going to run for president, I'm going to do this, I'm going to do that, I'm going to like plant. Oh, the fucking Jews. Well, so what's interesting is, well, you know, I did an episode on bipolar and we've had several expert guests. When I observed those interactions,

I didn't see delusional plan-making. Oh, right. No, but who knows what he's clamping that with in terms of medication? I don't know. I don't want to get drawn into that conversation. It's just a, you know, I think that bipolar depression,

as it's sometimes called, or just bipolar illness is so serious. You know, it's one of the highest suicide rates. Number one death rate for any psychiatric illness, anorexia nervosa. Huge percentage die from starvation, related illnesses. That's number two, bipolar. Suicide risk goes up 20 to 30 times for people with bipolar.

So now that the bipolar conversation is kind of around right now, people need to be very, very serious. When somebody is in a manic episode and then they come down from that, they're at 20 to 30 times the risk of suicide. So that's a real one. But they're making tons of plans in their manic thing.

Why? Elevated levels of dopamine. Now, serotonin tends to make us feel- It does, these things, dopamine, serotonin do a lot of different things in the brain and body, but serotonin is more about satiety. It tends to make us feel comfortable with where we're at and focus mainly on things within the confines of our skin,

perception to things inside us, how we feel in terms of how full or hungry we are. Do we feel good in our body or agitated? That's called interoception. Perception of the outside world is exteroception, internal interoception. So if you think about it, paying attention to the outside world

and paying attention to your inside world, highly not incompatible States, but MDMA and KANA and things like those seem to do both at the same time. And so as one is experiencing new ideas, new thoughts, new considerations about things, past, present, and future, you could under those conditions, people have a kind of an empathy for themselves and a kind of recognition like, Hey, this is different and weird, but maybe there's a learning to be had here that it isn't scary.

Now, cannabis is different. It hits a bunch of transmitter systems, these two different receptors, CB one, CB two, mainly present on the hippocampus, which is associated with memory,

which is why people have shit memory. They have, they have terrible memories when they're smoking a lot of THC containing cannabis. Now, I will say in favor of cannabis, there are pure CBD forms of cannabis. There's one called Charlotte's Web that's only available in Colorado that the parents of kids with serious epilepsy move to Colorado just so that they can get because pure CBD cannabis actually can, I'm not going to say cure, but can alleviate the otherwise completely debilitating epileptic seizures.

So it's in a fascinating plant with incredible compound properties. And do you do the, in your cannabis episode or in general, do you do a huge distinction between smoking and consuming it? You know, because that does release a completely different. Yes, absolutely. And, you know, I think the big, the big question nowadays is, is vaping as bad as smoking, right? There's a lot, there are a lot of data now showing that the lungs take some serious abuse from cannabis use. Vaping is bad. I'm sorry, folks.

I'm not, I'm not, this is whenever I say cannabis has some bad features and some good features, but it's better for you than alcohol. It's like, all right, we're getting hit by bicycle real hard is, you know, is not as bad as getting hit by a bus, but you know, and that's not a fair analogy, admittedly. What's the verdict on cigarettes? Are they bad for real? Okay. Nicotine, but here's what's crazy.

Nicotine is neuroprotective. Nicotine is great for us. Not that everyone should take it, but it increases acetylcholine and dopamine and epinephrine, leads to heightened focus, improved memory, and can offset neurodegeneration in Parkinson's and Alzheimer's. Yes.

Can we basically have this blurb that says Professor Huberman says smoking cigarettes is good for you? No, because smoking cigarettes, smoking cigarettes is bad because it's carcinogenic. There are about a thousand carcinogens in cigarettes. Vaping is bad because of the chemicals that you're inhaling with it. Dipping and snuffing, the snuffing is just just weird does anyone really shove tobacco up their nose i mean that's

nose yeah that's snuffing no tobacco yeah yeah yeah and rapé which is if you look at rapé r-a-p-e like people put the tobacco up their nose what oh yeah that's it up there fucking nose mucus membranes right mucus membranes um as far as i know no one does uh you know uh you know tobacco suppositories but you know mucous membranes oh yeah you know any mucous membrane that stuff can get across look at this fucking guy um it's r-a-p-e it's not recommending this but here's what's interesting um i have a p-e jesus christ this guy fucking failed middle shamanic stuff snuff okay there's i think michael Pollan wrote about this in his book. Yeah, they actually put it up the nose.

What? And then dipping or snuffing, right? Yeah. Did you ever get house cancer? No, no, no. I moved to Florida and that was one of the first things I did. A kid in high school, Nick Mitchell,

oh, sorry, Nick, this is bad. Nick Mitchell came out of the, he chewed some tobacco, he came out of the bathroom and he was Kermit the Frog green. Yeah. And just vomiting the whole night. That was enough for me to see. But there's a Nobel Prize winning neuroscientist

at Columbia University, who's kind of infamous in our field for chewing five to 10 pieces of Nicorette a day. And you ask him, why are you doing this? And he said, well, I do it for the focus and the concentration and offsets Parkinson's and Alzheimer's. Now I'm not recommending people do this, right?

But nicotine is a powerful nootropic. It makes us better able to focus. Well, then how is Andrew Huberman getting his nicotine? Sounds like you would not. I'm a supplement guy. I take alpha GPC, which is a different acetylcholine agonist, 300 milligrams. Are you a big supplement guy?

I am. Since I was in my teens, I discovered there are compounds in supplements that are just terrific for me. You have to get good sources, but there are a lot of good sources out there. Have you done the thing where you ever got away from any of your supplements and noticed the actual,

you feel different, you do? Yeah, I take a number of different things, but I don't recommend using supplements every time you study, but a double espresso or a nice black coffee or yerba mate for the South Americans. The non-smoked ones. Smoked yerba mate is carcinogenic,

but you can get the non-smoked versions and just the pour over tea. You don't have to buy it in the bottle. They're not a podcast sponsor. So I'm just saying that what- He's just telling you the truth. But alpha'm just, you know, just saying that. You just take it to reality. But alpha GPC, 300 milligrams or 600 milligrams taken every once in a while before a workout

or before studying. And you are like a laser. I need the full, you got to send me up before you leave. I'll send you the package. I sent Bert some stuff. I don't know if you ever took it, but I sent Bert some. It wasn't for focus. It was for some other things.

Was it in a bottle of tequila? No, no. Like supplements like L-carnitine, oral or injectable L-carnitine, incredible for sperm health, egg health, and overall kind of mitochondrial health. And then you say, oh, well, how could that be a supplement? Well, listen, in Europe,

it's a prescription drug for that specific purpose. So you can find that there are supplements that are really powerful. Like a lot of people don't want to go straight to, you know, full-blown TRT or hormone augmentation and shouldn't, right? Because it does shut down your own testosterone production, et cetera.

But- Testicular atrophy. Testicular atrophy. People will take HCG, human chorionic gonadotrobin to offset that. But in any case, supplements like Tongat Ali, you know, at 600 milligrams a day or 400 milligrams a day and Fadogea Agrestis,

those work. Now, are they going to give you TRT-like results? Are you going to become the liver king? No. But if you want to be liver king, you have to follow the nine ancestral tenets of living though, right? Listen, getting some morning sunlight

I'm a big proponent of that I think so I don't know them cold exposure etc etc it's a real shame what happened there mostly because it could have been avoided it could have been avoided here's the thing I mean this has been addressed already and people knew

I had been tipped off long ago but I wasn't't gonna make accusations you know what i knew when i fucking looked at him the first time like it's it's very obvious if you've uh if you've been in gyms and you've been around um like people in fitness that you you it's it's very clear when somebody is like juice to the gills yeah what is an interesting thing to bring up and i'll i'll leave i, I feel like he's been dragged. I'm not trying to drag him. I know it's-

No, no, he's been out there apologizing. Yeah, and people now have the opportunity to form an opinion. Here's the thing that's kind of interesting though about PDs and having crazy physiques is that his story has brought something to the light that is actually, I think, is worth addressing. And that is, you know, this was done for women.

They started to go, hey, these body types that you are seeing on magazine covers, do you know that these are all photoshopped and airbrushed? And like, you know, even when there's like the outliers, meaning like this genetic freak, a gorgeous woman, a tenant you know just like an oh my god they're like even she has this done on the cover of the magazine right yeah well there's also now the cheekbone elevation but they're doing implants yeah but for men i'm saying one of the things that is is not and it's funny the way that it's being dealt with is that our biggest movie stars right now are in their 40s, 50s, and 60s. It's wild. Those are the top box office draws are 40 to 60 and over.

Leo DiCaprio looks natural. That's a natural bot for sure. But the other ones are not. And they all have a thing of like, don't bring it up or I'm just going to be like, no, I work out. And they all have a thing of like, don't bring it up. Or I'm just going to be like, no, I work out. And it's like, why aren't you just telling the masses and the people who go like, man, how do I do? Because there's a lot of people like you have a fitness background or there's people who like are exposed, who know about nutrition, weightlifting, recover. Like they know the world.

A lot of people don't know anything. Like they have no idea. They think that like, they're like, oh, that's from like like they know the world. A lot of people don't know anything. Like they have no idea. They think that like, they're like, oh, that's from like just going to the gym, right? They just, they don't know. And you have guys who are starring in movies with these impossible physiques and they should be just saying, yeah, I was on a fucking, I'm on all the shit. Yeah, the pharmacy. But they go, don't say that.

Yeah. So I, you know, I paid attention to this space for a long time, not because I've been interested in bodybuilding, but starting in high school, got into weight training, got into supplementation. I've tried, look, there's a supplement out there.

Chances are I've tried it. Yeah. And I know which ones work and I know which ones don't work for me. We talk about a lot of them on podcasts. Anyway, if people are interested in them, we cover these and we have newsletters and toolkits and stuff,

and they're all free. So you can download them from our website. But there's some telltale signs, okay? And you know, when people have a huge physique and they're hypervascular, sure there's some possibility of a genetic freak there, but actually I know one, right?

A white guy? No, Nasima, who's Mark Bell's kind of co-host. I know, exactly. Yeah, Nasima Mark Bell's kind of co-host. I know, exactly. Yeah, Nesima, I believe, I believe is natural. Nesima, yeah. I've seen his, and I've seen his blood work and I've trained with him and you look at him and he has high fiber density, long muscle bellies.

He's lean, he trains hard. Yeah. And he's like, look, look, Nesima. Mark is not, Mark is not natural. Mark's not, Nesima's also bodybuilding. His name starts with an N. Nesima was bodybuilding at a young age. He obviously has some genetic gifts.

And works super hard. Has taken care of himself. And he's- He's done the Fidojia Tongat thing and actually talked about his results with it. He had, I believe it was an increase in luteinizing hormone, which is the precursor to testosterone and estrogen increases.

So, you know, there's some effects there that people, after I started talking about it on Rogan and some other places, I got a lot of pushback. And then now Tongkat Ali is being marketed like crazy. It increases in libido. Again, these aren't huge increases, but they're substantial enough in men and women. Fidojia for increases in luteinizing hormone, et cetera.

But the basic, the real tell is if you see a white guy who's in shape, you know he's on gear. Here's the deal. Here's the deal. If there are some telltale signs and obviously Brian Johnson, liver King had them, but others have them too. So I'm not picking on Brian at all. And, you know, I hope that he sorts out his health because his real risk is his health. When I looked at what he's taking there, the MDs I know who are in that space were just like, yikes, you know, they see a patient and a potential health hazard. So I hope he gets it sorted out. One thing that you'll notice is when people go on TRT,

these creases get deeper from some of the edema, the tissue retention that comes from the increase in estrogen associated. So if you look at- Like a gaunt kind of look? No, you look at the creases between the nose and the cheeks, how deep those creases are. So almost like the cheeks are trying to crawl up

on the nose. Wait, so what's happening there? Even though somebody's lean. It's edema, which is swelling, excuse me, fluid retention, because some of the testosterone converts to estrogen. So people then will start taking estrogen blockers or what are called aromatase blockers. And then, you know, a lot of people don't realize this,

but if your estrogen is pushed too low as a male or female, your libido crashes. So a lot of the bodybuilders that look like they were wrapped in Saran wrap, ask them how they're feeling. Okay. It's not, you know, often not great. They're flat lining their libido. So you don't want to crush your estrogen either. You don't want it too high, but you don't want it too low.

And they have like these, this shoulder muscle that there's usually a tell for people. So there's a lot of androgen receptor in the deltoids and traps. So some people will say the traps, the real telltale is this creasing here. And even from TRT, people are taking, and TRT, of course, being testosterone replacement therapy, but there's no line between TRT and full-blown steroid use, right? Like where do you draw the line?

And in some professional sports, I've been told directly by the players in some leagues, what you'll find is that if you had an injury, you can take to 200 milligrams of testosterone a week a week a week which is usually what's distributed over a two-week period for a kind of standard trt yes so don't tell me that they're not also on it and i won't say what league it is but basketball anyway so the the like the players all talk about it right they all talk about it it's absolutely clear i didn't say which basketball league no that's right in any case so so those abs are kind of wild right on this guy and you see some lean guys we had a gymnast They all talk about it. It's absolutely clear. I didn't say which basketball league. No, that's right. In any case. So there's- Also those abs are kind of wild, right? On this guy?

Yeah, and you see some lean guys. We had a gymnast that went to our high school and another guy that went to the Olympics for lugeing of all things. And that kid was lean and he was natural, right? But the bulk on top of that? Well, so it's the creasing here and then there's the left side vein

or it's a major artery. When somebody's talking and they're not having just finished some physical exercise and they've's the left side vein or it's a major artery when somebody's talking and they're not having just finished some physical exercise and they got this left side vein kind of bulging out of the side that's the elevation in blood pressure and you see that in almost everybody that's on high levels of trt or full-blown kind of steroid use not always and of course if a normal person who's not on if a typical person who's not on these things is doing a set of squats in the gym, you'll see that. But you can see that just in conversation. And so, you know, there's these telltale signs

and there's the ruddiness of the skin. People get a little bit red because of the increased blood flow. And listen, a lot of these folks are also taking things like vasodilators, like Cialis and Viagra to kind of get more pump into the muscles before they shoot their things. It's a whole- They're taking Cialis and Viagra to kind of get more pump into the muscles before they shoot their things. It's a whole- Are they taking Cialis and Viagra before their photo shoots?

Well, to get more blood into their muscles. I mean, it's a whole world of pharmacology. Really? I didn't know this. Yeah. It's a whole thing. Now, keep in mind that Cialis, actually low-dose Cialis was actually originally prescribed as a prostate drug because it increases blood flow of the prostate, can offset prostate cancer in midnight, middle of the night trips to the bathroom, but that's low dose, not for erectile dysfunction. It's in a lot of football players now in the NFL are taking Viagra prior to

games to lower their blood pressure and increase blood flow. There's there drugs and sports drugs are rampant in sports. I know this. And I have friends in, I have friends in like three, actually four major leagues. Major leagues of like the big sports in the United States. And I've heard different drug stories

from each of them about like what, you know, so I knew that I did not know about the Viagra Cialis thing. Even in biathlon. Really? Ski and shoot. What would you like to happen when you go from skiing to shooting? You'd like your heart rate to slow so you can hold the gun steady, focus.

Propranolol, you take a beta blocker. So there's a ton of this stuff. And a lot of it's banned. Some of it's not banned. How are they not all hard when they're taking Viagra? Well, so the interesting thing about those drugs, about Viagra and Cialis, is they increase peripheral blood flow

through disruption of this enzyme pathway. Again, low-dose Cialis to dolophil, like, you know, in the five milligram per day range is a common treatment for prostate health that, you know, I think actually more men should know about because prostate health is extremely important. And it kind of gets lumped into, the drug kind of gets lumped

into the sexual performance arena without, and doing so overlooking its potential roles for a prostate health yeah because increasing blood flow through the prostate can help with a number of things prostitis to be one but other things as well but the way those drugs work is that the neural pathways associated with um with sexual arousal have to be triggered before the erection response happens. So when they're playing football, and you know, they're- But if your hand's in the dirt and you're looking up at a guy

that you really want to fuck and you just took a Viagra, you could get a result. I'm guessing that the protective gear kind of shields the viewers from that. But- That's too bad. Yeah.

So, you know, drugs and sports are rampant. I actually really want to get Jeff Novitsky, I think his name is, they call him the golden snitch. He now works for the UFC. He was the guy that did the whole Balco scandal. Oh, that'd be a cool. Look, there are new drugs being developed all the time.

I love this as kind of a hobby topic, not on TRT. Oh, that's Jeff Novitsky. Yeah. So he's definitely not on TRT. He's the guy that busts people for it. UFC is actually one of the more heavily drug tested sports. And I've seen their banned substances list. A lot of UFC fighters contact me about different things.

I just say, listen, refer back to the list. But you know, there's a lot also happening. You mentioned Hollywood. So this is all the men, people are thinking muscles, but on the female side, peptide use is rampant. Peptide use is huge. Okay, so it's sermorelin, sermorelin, depending on how you want to pronounce it, which is a IGF-1 and growth hormone secretagogue. Sounds like synagogue, but secretagogue. Stimulates

growth hormone release, not as potent as full-blown growth hormone, but makes people leaner, kills their appetite, tissue repair. I take BPC-157. That's for tissue repair. That's a gastric peptide. I don't take it now, but I was taking thymus and beta-4. Yeah. So unclear to me exactly what thymus and beta-4 is. I stopped.

I stopped really just because, I don't know. Well, you look like you're in good shape. You were flexing out there in the lobby. My whole life I've been trying to gain weight and I can't. But I just have one of those bodies, man. You look really fit I was going to say I walked in like we've never met in person I know thank you man

we're related so this is an important control experiment once I knew you were coming on I was like I know Huberman's jacked I gotta fucking get ready I've been training since I was 15, 16 you're an anomaly of a professor when people think of professors it's like

old guy, tweed coat, pipe. We have some fit ones. There's a guy at UCSF, Lou Reichardt. He and his brother climbed Everest. Yeah. He's like freakishly strong. He's tall and thin. You see a lot of endurance athletes in academia.

That adds up. There's sort of a size threshold beyond which if you're too big, people think you're dumb. Sure. I'm not saying that's what I think, but so I've never wanted to be- Look at this big, dumb fuck. Once you this big dumb fuck once you waddle once you waddle right there's sort of a and i don't know why that stereotype came to be because um there's certainly

some very smart very muscular people sure um with degrees and it's always surprising honestly it is it's like somebody like really muscular says something remotely intelligent you're like get the fuck out of here with this guy. There you go. Perpetuating the stereotype. Well, it's true, but you know, it's fucking true. Well, also, you know, that there's a history to this that I don't want to take us down a rabbit hole, but you know, the running movement of the, you know, the seventies, the whole

Nike movement, Steve Prefontaine and all that endurance sports have always been synonymous with most of the sports played on a college campus, you know, tennis, badminton, or badminton. I don't know if anyone plays badminton, tennis and cross country and all these things. They, you know, for people to feel fit and look like an athlete, but when they say athlete, they mean the kind of more svelte, you know, shapes, right? And it's only recently that people have started doing resistance training. I mean, the data clearly say, clearly say that at a minimum, everyone should be getting 180 to 200 minutes of so-called zone two cardio, which is the cardio that you can do,

but just barely hold a conversation per week minimum. And then on top of that, you need to do somewhere between six and 10 sets per muscle group in order to just maintain the musculature, which is very important for everybody for metabolism, health, posture, ability to be resistant to falls. And of course, if you do those sets really hard, you know, to failure, progressive overload, then you're going to also gain muscle, gain muscle. But you know, I think that now the world is a little less afraid of

getting bulky, but still, yeah, there aren't many professors who are in the gym training three, four days a week. I've always done three or four days of weight training a week and three or four days of running per week. One day per week minimum, I do sauna, cold, sauna, cold, sauna, cold. And you've stuck to this. You still do it. I do. I mean, there are days when I miss. My run this morning was as long as my normal Sunday run.

But I try and be consistent over time. How long do you typically run when you do a long run? My long Sunday run is anywhere. Maybe I'd like to get in a one hour slow jog on Sundays or throw on a weight vest and go for a long hike. That's cool. Sometimes, you know,

with, with the girl, you know, so, um, is this a girl that you're sleeping in the parking lot too? No, no,

no, no. Luckily I don't have to do that anymore, but, but we like to hike and talk. And so you can do this socially. And then I, what was that guy fucking looking at.

I'll go break his goddamn neck. That part of me was put to rest a long time ago. You know, that's so funny. If I didn't know you and I'm on a hike, I'm like, it's Andrew. I'm looking. You're like, what are you looking at? I was never like that. I was never like that.

Oh, goodness. Goodness gracious. You know, I come from my mom's side is from Jersey. I was never like that. Oh goodness, goodness gracious. You know, I come from, my mom's side is from Jersey. My grandfather was like, he went to college on the GI Bill. He like boxed in the army and he had this, he was one of these never lifted weights, just pushups, pullups, dips, sit ups, and box jumps and things and boxed, ring boxing,

and had this like incredible physique. He was super strong. He had farm work, you know, grow up blue collar worker until he was- Those guys are other level. Those guys, yeah. And GI and the whole thing. And so, you know, growing up there was this like

fighting spirit in half of my family. So, and there was probably looking back a little bit too much encouragement to be like protective man of the house, but you know, when I was a kid, I felt like 14, I was a man of the house. So I also sort of part of that back then was me just trying to feel safe. That makes sense.

And make people feel safe. But I was not an aggressor running around beating people up. Watch out, some stories will come out of UC Santa Barbara now. But, and I feel bad, you know, I feel a little bad about some of those guys that I beat down with.

Hey, listen, they should have just, you know, just paid attention to what was- They should have fucking looked the wrong way. So wait, one of the things I want to say though, about the stereotype of muscular dudes and that it's rooted in truth. If you've been around, I've been around a bunch of fucking meatheads my whole life. And a lot of them are dopey as shit.

Like the only thing they care about is like their chicken breasts and their creatine and their, but that's what i'm saying the the the as time has has passed and progressed and you find uh you know muscle like resistance training and lifting becoming more generally accepted you find and you find people that are like have crazy physiques or really and then are articulate and and well thought out. But I think it's rooted in the thing where like for a while, it was just like these dopey dudes. Well, it was assumed that people were that large

that they were spending two hours a day in the gym, which is not required actually to get that large. You had bodybuilders like the famous Dorian Yates, who was famous for very short, high intensity workouts, probably one of the greatest bodybuilders of all time. Actually, when I was in high school, I worked hard to save up $100 to get a phone consultation

with Dorian's kind of mentor of sorts named Mike Menser, who was a, unfortunately he's dead now, who was a proponent of very short, high intensity workouts. I remember Mike calling- How short are we talking? We're talking sometimes 30 to 40 minutes twice a week or something. It was really excessive. Mike was also known to be a bit of an amphetamine user. So, you know, and unfortunately he and his brother Ray died young, but I remember my mother saying, you know, why is this grown man calling the house?

And it was Mike Menser. And what was interesting is he gave me some training programs and my, I reacted very well to those training, very infrequent, very high intensity training. But at that age at 16, 18, 19, you know, do almost anything you're on so many circulating androgens. Mike was a very smart guy and actually read a lot of Ayn Rand and was, was really kind of an intellectual of sorts. And he was the one who said two really important things to me, well, three, he said, first of all, don't use anabolic steroids because you're not going to become a competitor

and it's just a waste of your health. Great advice and never did it. Later in life at 45, I can talk about this, that I did a foray into low dose TRT. I've been open about this, so, and why and what it did. And it was for an experiment and for a book and some things. And I found some really interesting results related to testosterone and brain health.

Okay, he said that. Then he said, learn to really enjoy training hard. So I've come to develop this thirst for training hard. I look forward to it. It doesn't feel like a pain to me. It feels like adventure and I love it. And then the third thing was he said, get good at something else.

And you seem to like information. I highly recommend. He said, I don't believe anything PhDs say. He said, he referred to him as PhD for piled high and deep. That's what he said. But he said, you seem to have a hunger for information. So I think you should focus on school.

And like, here I was, you know, 16, it took me a few years to really listen to that. But it was still embedded in my brain. And so occasionally you get a guy like Menser who's really smart, who's got 20 inch arms and this kind of thing. Or Arnold Schwarzenegger, obviously. There are some neurons firing in there.

So there are exceptions, but I think that by and large, the jock phenotype and the intellectual phenotype are not always synonymous. Sure. But I wanted to know, has it been at all on your radar a challenge and in any way that you know you're a professor obviously like i know you know that's the the the science and the work is what's most important and all this but you know you have

this podcast that has become a huge hit and that you're now a popular professor do you like sense you know that the jealousy or stuff from other that has to be you mean are they the source of the death threats well i mean there just has to be like some of them they're like wait you just get on your fucking microphone and you talk about shit and then well and oftentimes so okay so i'll try and keep this answer short first of all, Stanford has been immensely supportive. Really? Immensely supportive, in part because, you know, I think they value public education,

even though it's a private university. Yeah. Also, we featured a lot of excellent work, laboratories and professors and clinicians from Stanford. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, the podcast for me is an opportunity to showcase the amazing work of people like Nolan Williams. It was going to take years before people would discover

who he is. Yeah. He's doing amazing work on psychedelics and transcranial magnetic stimulation, curing depression in people that would otherwise suffer from depression forever for which talk therapy, drug therapies were not working. So people like him, you've never heard of him, right?

My goal is to make the world know who he is so that his work can flourish, this kind of thing. Anna Lemke, who wrote Dopamine Nation, she didn't need my help, but putting her on to talk about addiction. She's our head of dual diagnosis addiction clinic at Stanford. So Stanford supports me in part because I'm happy to put on my colleagues. We also put on colleagues from other universities, right? Everywhere from Cal State Fullerton to Harvard Medical School. But I can showcase great work.

Second of all, most of what I talk about is not my own laboratory's work. We work on stress. We work on neural regeneration. I will sometimes talk about that work and especially vision and visual repair. A lot of your podcasts are you learning something from your guests.

That's right. I'm going to school by calling people all week and developing these solo episodes where I just blab about a topic or I bring somebody on and I develop tools. I would say that about a third of my colleagues have been extremely and directly supportive. Like saying, hey, I'm really proud of you.

This is great. Thanks. Science needs this support in the world. And by the way, I'm getting my morning sunlight and I'm starting to take off the 45 pounds. I mean, a lot of academics are very unhealthy. A lot of physicians are very unhealthy. It's interesting, right?

Yeah, I mean, a dentist with bad teeth would never be in business, but science, you can do a lot of science while slowly killing yourself. One of my neighbors as a kid, when I was a kid, cardiologist, was like fucking 100 pounds overweight. Yeah, there's some terribly unhealthy physicians. Yeah, that's a whole landscape. I don't know. You should get Peter Atiyah on the

podcast. He's an excellent physician. Who's in great shape. He's also a big fan of yours. And he's great. He's amazing. And he, he knows he can explain that landscape in medicine in science. Yeah. You've got some geeky scientists who don't take good care of themselves. And you have some that are starting to take good care of themselves. The tide is kind of shifting. So I'll tell you about a third are directly supportive. Like congratulations, keep going. Okay, now the next third, I don't hear from them. These are people that I used to think were my close colleagues and friends, crickets.

Like I haven't heard a peep from them. So either they're angry about it. Haters. Or they're kind of waiting. How come I haven't been invited on the podcast? That's a big one. A big one is that. And we only bring people on the podcast that are top 1% in their field and that can communicate

well to the general public. Yeah. Because I'm not going to bring somebody on to give a lecture that they would only give to their like two closest colleagues because that's a waste of everybody's time. And then there are about a third. And you hear from them mostly on Twitter who are kind of like sour grapes nitpicking about this and that. But I always say this, look, we started, I, you know, I started doing this thing in 2020, I started going on podcasts and it was the pandemic and people were stressed. They weren't sleeping well.

And I would kept waiting for the national institutes of mental health or somebody else to come out there and talk about something other than vaccines and say, Hey, here's how you deal with keeping your sleep regular social connection. Here's what's going on and nothing. So I stepped up and I did it. That was the year that kind of everything kind of took off. And then 2021, we just started podcasting and I figured, look, I'm teaching. I don't get everything right, but I try and get, I try and get everything right. And I listened to feedback. And, and also I feel like, Hey, listen, if they have a problem with it, listen, it's a microphone, a couple cameras, and you put up an RSS feed. It's a little more than that.

I have an amazing team. You have a team. But here's the thing. As a listener, what I think people get out of your podcast, A, the listener feels like I'm learning. I'm learning something. And not only that, if you want to even step back, broad overview of this, there is something about going, I have time right now to do something. And if I can do something, I could look at Instagram photos. I could listen to music.

I could do all different things. But when your podcast, if you choose to consume that as a listener or a viewer, what you end up feeling like is I did something positive because it's a learning experience. So not only did I learn something, it's that I can look at how was the time spent and the time was spent in a positive way. So you feel like you did something constructive, which is a feeling you can't orchestrate this feeling. It either is something it is a feeling you can't, you can't orchestrate this feeling. It either is something it is, or it isn't like you can consume something that is a distraction, something that is amusing. You know, you can, it could be something that's funny or whatever, but if you feel like you, you gave yourself to something like a professor and like

the topic is, you know, something in the brain, you actually feel like I did something positive for myself. And that's a big thing I think that your show provides is that it's not just the specific information, it's that I did something constructive with my time. Thanks, that's very gratifying. Look, it's a labor of love. I'll tell you, when I was six or seven years old, I used to go to these carnivals

where you could throw the ping pong ball into the little thing and win the goldfish. I was really into aquaria, but I noticed they weren't sending anyone home with de-chlor, and I was all worried about these fish. So my mom used to take me around to these carnivals and I'd give you de-chlor to de-chlorinate your fishing, but you had to listen to me lecture about chlorination.

And so, you know, and then I'd study on the weekends and I'd come into class, I was like, tell everybody about medieval weapons or about the coral reefs or something. So I've been doing this for a long time. That's really who you are. It's really kind of who I am. It's that little geeky kid. I'll go out and say it for everybody.

That's adorable that you did that. Well, the goal is always to try and provide information that's, you know, interesting, actionable and clear. And, you know, I just, it's a labor of love. The other day I thought about how much money would I take in order to stop podcasting? Yeah. There is no number. If you offered, no joke,

if you offered me a hundred billion dollars. You still keep doing it. I wouldn't take the money. Because you want to keep teaching. No, but I wouldn't. If you said, take this to stop podcasting. And then there, I realized I could do a lot for the world with that money.

But it's a bit of a compulsion. And it just, the word that comes to mind, I, it's a, it's a bit of a compulsion. And it just, the word that comes to mind, I know it's a, it's a word that people might have kind of funny connotations of, but I love searching out and researching and finding things. And when I find them, I just want to tell the world about them. And there's a sense of kind of delight. It must be the same feeling that when you come up with a joke that captures something so true on both sides of an argument or a joke with like makes people realize just how ridiculous people are. Yeah. It's like, how can you not tell that joke?

There's a feeling you get where you, you just go like, when you just know it's a good, like it's a simplified way of saying, but when you're like, this is a good one where you are just like, you're just rocking. Right. And it lives in you. Yes. where you are just, like, you're just rocking. Right, and it lives in you. Yes. And so my feeling is if the information just lives in me and I'm walking around kind of basking in that feeling,

it's not really doing good in the world. And so most of what we talk about on the podcast is, you know, mechanism, but also a lot of behavioral tools. Yeah. So sure, we talk about nutrition, supplementation and stuff, but most of them are zero cost tools.

And I heavily weigh my time toward speaking about tools that work the first time and every time because they're not hacks. They are based on the way that we are wired up. One thing I appreciate that you do, and I really mean this, is that there are some staples of Huberman that like that you bring back up over and over. And the reason I value that is that most people, a lot of people don't realize, like a lot of people go like, oh, I have this bit of information to share, right? Like 10 minutes of sunlight. They go, I said it. And then they move on. And then, you know, somebody goes, hey, what about that thing? You're like, yeah, I said that. And I posted about it once. It's like, yeah, dude, not everybody that even follows you captured that time. If you're actually into teaching, you need to repeat things, like over and over and over, even to get it to the full audience. Like if you post something on Instagram or, you know, you have a two million followers, like whatever.

A small fraction. A fraction of them are going to see that post. You have to repeat things. You have to say them over and over. For people like, let's say listening right now, what, what, and why, why should people get sunlight in the morning? 10 minutes of natural. Yeah. Getting sunlight in your eyes early in the day, even if it's through cloud cover, we talk about how to do that. I would put right up there in the top batch of mental health,

physical health, and performance enhancing behavioral tools. And it's completely zero cost. It takes a little bit of time, but here's the idea. And this means actually natural sunlight. That's right. Yeah. And you should stare at the fucking sun, right? Blink if it hurts. When the sun is low in the sky,

you can look at it directly much more easily without pain. But if it's painful, it's okay to blink. Don't damage your eyes on account of trying to get the sunlight. Here's the idea. A little bit of background just to kind of nest this in something. Every cell in your body has a little 24 hour clock viewing the sun in particular morning sunlight on a consistent basis. I would say 80% or more of the days of your life is what you should strive for. So it could be a hundred percent could be 80, but try and do this daily. What it does is it aligns all of those clocks

in a very precise way. And it does this by activating specific neurons in your eye called the intrinsically photosensitive melanopsin ganglion cells, but forget it. That's all geek speak, connects to your brain and informs all the cells of your body, what's going on in the outside world and aligns them. So imagine going into a clock store with every clock

as an alarm clock and they're on different schedules. That's what happens if you don't view morning sunlight. When you do view morning sunlight for about, I would say five minutes to 10 minutes on a clear day, try and face in the direction of the sun. Don't do it through a window. Don't do it with sunglasses on. Fine to wear eyeglasses or contacts,

even with as UVB protection. Don't wear a brimmed hat. You know, just look in the general direction of the sun, even if you have to be on your phone, but just kind of get some sunlight in your eyes and blink if you need to, if it's painful, look away from it a little bit, if it's really bright, that morning sunlight coordinates all the cellular or an organ systems of your body and does a couple of things. First of all, it boosts a number of chemicals that need to be released early in the day, such as cortisol, which is healthy if it's released early in the day,

and the so-called catecholamines, which are dopamine, norepinephrine, and serotonin. What is that? Excuse me, dopamine, norepinephrine, and epinephrine. What does that do? It gives you increased focus, energy, and alertness through the morning, increased immune system function throughout the day,

focus throughout the day. And it sets a timer on some other clocks in the body, including the one that releases melatonin about 16 hours later to make you sleepy and fall asleep easily. This is my biggest struggle, by the way. If you don't get that morning sunlight for one day, no big deal.

But if you don't do it for two days or three days in a row, what happens is that morning increase in cortisol still happens, but it starts getting pushed out towards the afternoon. And that is strongly associated with depressive symptoms, anxiety, and sleeplessness at night, which then just makes it harder to function during the next day.

So getting five to 10 minutes of morning sunlight when it's clear out in your eyes, when it's clear out on an overcast day, people say there's no sun here. Okay, look, unless you live in a cave, there is sun. I don't care if you live in Seattle in winter or Tromsø, Norway in winter, there is sun. You got to go outside and see it.

And the goal is to really flip on as many artificial bright lights throughout the day. Most people make the mistake of not getting morning sunlight in their eyes or driving to work with sunglasses or looking at the sun through a windshield. Then they get to work and it's kind of dimly lit because they have windows that are tinted.

And so you're never getting enough light in your eyes early in the day. Then they go home at night. And here's the diabolical thing from 10 PM to 4 AM. You really want to keep the lights dim. If you want to put in red light bulbs, that's even better. That's kind of geeky. You can just sorry, red light vendors, but you can literally just go buy red party lights just as well. In most cases, these aren't the ones to bask in front of naked. I suppose you can do that too. But the point is that you want to avoid getting bright light in your eyes from 10 PM to 4 AM. Why that plummets dopamine and

melatonin disrupts sleep and can lead to issues in next day cortisol and even learning issues. This was beautifully shown by Samer Hattar at national institutes of mental health. It's a good friend of mine, but also a fabulous circadian biologist. So morning sunlight on a cloudy day, maybe 10 to 20 minutes, really overcast day. If it's really overcast, you wake up,

oh, it's ugly out. Your goal should be to get outside, be under an overhang, try and get some light in your eyes with no sunglasses. Then during the day, you really want to crank the lights. On a clear day, get outside. And then people say, well, I've got kids. You don't have kids. Have you ever tried to do that? First of all, you don't know my home situation. Second

of all, you go outside with the kids. They need it too. People say, does this work in animals? Of course it works. It was discovered in animals and then shown in humans, right? Every mammal needs to do this and dogs and other animals even will orient towards the sun. Ideally, you're seeing some sun in the morning, again in the afternoon before it sets, and then limiting your nocturnal light exposure. You can dim your screens. Tell me this. What is limiting my nocturnal light?

Because this is my, if you were to ask me, what is your biggest health care? Sleep issues, right? Sleep. Do you have trouble falling asleep or staying asleep? Well, no, well, first of all, I'm in different time zones. You know, I'm winding down a tour for a moment. Then I kind of ramp back up. I've got protocols for jet lag. I'm always like, we did an episode, but I'll send you the protocols for jet lag. I'll get you straightened out there.

It is that I, I think, I mean, look, I, when I was single and without children, I was a lunatic. I was always staying up till like three in the morning and, you know, waking up at like 11, 8. Sure, we did that. I did that in graduate school. Yeah, so like that was like, so most of the time now though, I'm going to bed, you know, well, it depends if I'm on tour or not. You know, I'm home right now. So I'm home. I'm probably going to bed like around midnight.

Yeah. And I'm probably. Yeah. Yeah, none, I'm home right now. So I'm home. I'm probably going to bed like around midnight. Yeah. And I'm probably- Yeah. Yeah. None of this like 9 p.m. No. Yeah. That's just never, that's never going to happen with me ever.

Great. Midnight. Listen, going to bed somewhere between, you know, 10 p.m. and midnight is normal for most people. Yeah. I try to make it happen. Waking up somewhere between, you know, 5.30 and 7.30. That's-

I mean, unless you're Jocko. Yeah. Right. Getting a bit- I mean, he's training at 4.30. He's out of his fucking mind. Yeah, well, he's, yeah. By the way, talking about natural, not natural,

I just want to point out, natural. Yes. But also he has wrists like this. He's like my bulldog Costello. Like it's just born with giant wrists. Not a normal guy. Just big and solid, you know? And look, and see, none of the creasing,

like he doesn't, not in the ruddiness. And surprisingly white guy. I'm surprised that you imagine Jocko on TRT would be a scary thing. I don't think he should do it. Please don't do it. Yeah, great guy, by the way. Also a very kind person.

There's a great, I love the comments on YouTube. Cause that to me is like, you know, and there's forget where it is maybe it's a gq or something where someone says that um when jocko came out the the doctor said it's a man it's a man that's good that's good yeah that's a real man yeah exactly so okay yeah sleep issues so getting yeah it's basically that uh you know i'll'll have a couple of days at home that are a little more tolerable. Then it's like, you know, I get on a plane. I go to Eastern time.

You know, we have two shows. How long are these forays overseas or wherever? You know, two days, four days? So a road, a road, a domestic road week could be four or five days. And it might be, in some cases, like three different time zones. Flying or bus tour? It'll be mostly flying and some bus.

OK. The bus sleeping is, by the way, I have. So when this tour started, I was doing the overnights. So show ends at midnight. We do something. We're on the bus at 1 AM. And we're driving. We're getting to that location at 7 a.m.

I was like, nah. Because what would happen is we did it. And I just, I didn't sleep. Yeah. I'd finally fall asleep at 4.30. It starts pulling you apart. It was killing me. So I've got to, do you supplement for sleep?

I've started taking magnesium. Yeah, mag three and eight. Yeah. So we have, here's what I recommend. And so for jet lag and shift work, we have a there here's a here's what i recommend and so for jet lag and shift work we have an episode on that for most people just go cuberoonlab.com jet lag shift work just scroll down or search for everything's keyword search um organized there um there's a lot that uh you know to do for shift workers and for jet lag i'll put together a protocol for you based on whether or not you're traveling one way or the other way.

But here's, it all relates to where your brain thinks you are two days before. So it would be too in-depth to go into now, but let's say you're going from, you know, Austin to New York and then to California and then back again, we have to think about where your body and brain thinks it is and then adjust the timing of light.

And it's very easy to do. And you can even use a little light box or you can just get outside at the appropriate times. where your body and brain thinks it is, and then adjust the timing of light. And it's very easy to do. And you can even use a little light box or you can just get outside at the appropriate times. And you'll want to throw on sunglasses every once in a while during the daytime to avoid getting shifted in the wrong direction. Okay. So I can teach you how to do that.

Very easy. But I think most people, I would say about 75% or more people have sleep issues finding getting this morning sunlight in their eyes. Again, not through a window or windshield. People are like, can I do it through a window? Can I just look at the sun on an Instagram post? It's like, no, you actually have to go outside, okay?

It's like a free resource, but just do it. It's pleasant. Bring your kids with you or whatever. Getting that sunlight in your eyes, then try and catch the sun before it sets in the evening or even just get outside for a few seconds, even for a conversation at work, step out in front of the building. And then in the evening, or even just get outside for a few seconds, even for a conversation at work,

step out in front of the building. And then in the evening, dim those screen lights. If you're out on stage and you got the blaring lights in your eyes and you're dealing with that, afterwards, there are some things that can help. And then for most people, make sure you're not going to bed right after chugging a big glass of water.

One of the most common problems with sleep is people wake up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom. Totally normal. I just saw this, by the way. You said sipping is different than- Yeah, so when a lot of people don't realize this, that of course the total amount of fluid that you ingest

dictates whether or not you'll need to go to the bathroom. But when you slug down more than four ounces of liquid in one shot, there's a signal that's sent from the gut and the bladder to the brain that you need to excrete fluid. And so what's going to happen is you're going to be waking up to use the bathroom a few hours later, try and sip your last drink of the, of the night. That is fascinating. I had no idea. It helps in about, I would say about 70, again, about 75% of people are like, oh,

I'm sleeping more through night or I'm only getting up once for men who have, you know, who are older for prostitis. You might want to talk to your doctor about taking low dose to Dalafil. This is not, you know, I mean, it will increase blood flow to the penis and all over, but it's also, at that low dose, it's really about prostate health. It's really about incur, which is vital. But dim the screens.

And then there are some supplements that are excellent and very safe for sleep for most people. So 900 milligrams, myo-inositol, great for sleep, especially if you wake up in the middle of the night, you need to fall. Should I try this? Yeah. I'll send you all this and you can give it a try. You can tell me if you like it. Magnesium threonate, theanine, apigenin. If you go to hubermanlab.com, you can go to the menu, go to newsletter and just scroll down to the toolkit. It's free. You don't even have to

sign up. So all this is zero cost. And I would say behavioral tools first. Yeah. Then if needed, do supplementation. I'm not a fan of melatonin. Why? Well, because as, first of all, a lot of the melatonin supplements have far too much melatonin in them.

Oh. And it's not a very well-regulated hormone supplement. And so sometimes you think you're taking three milligrams, you're taking 10. Sometimes you think they've tested. And that is bad. Why though? You know, then when I was in graduate school,

for my masters, I looked at the effects of melatonin on the reproductive system. If you take a ham, so we were working in hamsters, but there's some evidence in humans too. You know, long days and short nights are synonymous with breeding in most seasonally breeding animals. And in humans to some extent.

Okay, now there's a lot of breeding right around Christmas. A lot of births in September, in the early fall. Some people think it has to do with the alcohol consumption over Christmas, that's one theory. But melatonin can be suppressive to testosterone and estrogen output. We used to take these hamsters that would have testicles about the size of a large grape in the summer.

Now think about what melatonin is. The longer the night, the longer the melatonin signal. So more melatonin. And in these animals, their testicles, in volute, they become like the size of a grain of rice. Yes, to offset, to suppress breeding during the winter months. Now humans aren't seasonally restricted breeders,

but taking a lot of melatonin can suppress testicular function indirectly and can suppress over-airing function indirectly. It is an antioxidant. So people are like, oh, it's an antioxidant. There are some benefits to melatonin, but if you can avoid supplementing with melatonin, that'd be great, especially in kids.

And here's why. In kids, melatonin is already what we call tonically high. It's high, instead of oscillating across the 24-hour cycle, it's really high all the time. And guess what? One of its major roles is to suppress the onset of puberty. Really? So now adults popping melatonin like M&Ms,

this is a problem. And this last year, there were a lot of studies published showing that melatonin supplementation, especially excessive melatonin supplementation, can be really deleterious for the whole hormone system. And maybe even for brain function. So I am not a big fan of melatonin, maybe every once in a while for jet lag

or something like that. But magnesium-3-8-theanine and apigenin, myoinositol, far more mild, far more cost-effective, and not dependency-forming so you know i mean i think those are the places to start once you've got your light viewing behavior down for a few days see how you're sleeping um the travel thing is tricky you live a highly unique lifestyle yeah but i've done some work with with military and with athletes who they live like this yeah and so you're gonna have to do i mean you're not gonna start going out on stage with red light, with red glasses.

That'd be a cool look. What's that? I said, that'd be a cool look. I think when Rick Rubin went on Joe Rogan's podcast, he had them on. He can get away with any look. Yeah, and I'm blessed to have him as a friend. And you know, once the sun is down, he's red lights.

He is? Or the glasses. That's kind of cool. And he, so he can sleep like a baby because he's the creativity guy, right? I'm going to get red lights at home. I'll do that. They're great.

The little party lights, the screw in lights. When I travel, I bring them with me. That's how geeky I am. You do? I do because oftentimes you're in some hotel room and it's like blast. So what do you bring? You bring like a little lamp or something?

No, I just have a couple of the bulbs, these red bulbs in the box. And you put them in? Yeah, I just put them in. You are, that's taking it to another level. Yeah, I mean, it's super inexpensive. That's true. You know, I'm not gonna travel with a red light unit.

There are some small red light units that companies like Cozy Light make, which are excellent. Again, not a podcast sponsored, but they're great. And Juve, I think is the other one. I could put one on the bus. That's a good idea. Oh yeah, but the issue, you know, and again, I'm not trying to undermine

any businesses out there, but a lot of the things like getting morning sunlight or people say, well, what if there isn't enough light or it's not bright enough at work or in my home environment? Should I buy a daylight simulator? It's like, sorry, daylight simulator companies. Those are like thousands of dollars. You can get a drawing pad,

930 Lux drawing pad from Amazon for about a hundred bucks. Put it on your desk. And now you're getting a lot of that during the day, which is what you want, but better to get outside periodically. So I think a lot of these behavioral tools or even the things that require an artificial light, you can get them at lower cost

and get most, if not all of the effect. Now there's certain things like an ice bath or a cold water plunge, which is far better than a cold shower, but a cold shower is still pretty good. Yeah. So. One thing I, this is changing the topic.

I'm going to go back, but i learned on i saw a clip of you talking that you're all tatted up and that you yeah although the picture they use were not my tattoos oh i didn't even see the picture okay that's good but i i uh yeah i uh i started getting tattooed really young how old i think the first one i did don't do this kids was india ink and a needle at when i was 13 okay so this is like the beginning of your off the fucking farm yeah when i was a kid there were these guys in my town called the yahtzee crew and a bunch of older skateboarder like guys that had motorcycles and one of them wrote for high times magazine and they lived up on top of the varsity theater in palatine they

were cool my sister thought one of the guys was really good looking and i was like oh i guess like and they were tough and they had like their full sleeves and shaved heads super nice guys yeah super nice guys right um and what was your music in this era so i grew up i know hardcore punk rock guy yeah i'm not like hardcore actually jocko's really into like agnostic front hardcore i like that music um i grew up the east bay punk scene for me so rancid, Operation Ivy, wasn't really a peace punk guy like Green Day. Like it wasn't really my thing, but Rancid,

you know, I'm a huge, huge Tim Armstrong fan. Huge Tim Armstrong fan, all the stuff he's written, all that Rancid albums. Operation Ivy, Stiff Little Fingers, Bouncing Souls from the East Coast. I love all that stuff so, so much. It's kind of hard to like state it in words, but I also love Bob Dylan.

I listened to a lot of Glenn Gould classical music. Glenn Gould playing Bach is like the absolute best music to listen to while you work. That's cool. But I was heavy into the punk rock scene, going to shows, still have a lot of friends in that world. And I love there's like a uh mexican punk rock band or partially spanish-speaking punk rock band called left alone from wilmington there's some amazing bands out

there so if andrew huberman is going out to a show are are the tats out like other yeah so i mean i i um i can hide pretty well in public in short sleeves so i'm basically tattooed from wrist to neck yeah uh one side ribs chest nothing on One side ribs, chest, nothing on my stomach, back's completely covered, nothing on my legs. So this is, here's what ties, what I brought this up is, I believe that the reason that you cover up on podcasts, and I'm assuming when you lecture at school. Oh, absolutely.

Is so that the information that you're sharing is the focus. Correct. None of this is distraction. This is the same principle. Not everybody adheres to this, but in comedy, there is this general thought from people who know what the fuck they're talking about. I should point out that if you want the focus to be on your comedy, you should cover those things up. If you're a male with an overly muscular physique, you should actually try to cover it up, like not flaunt it. If you're a

woman with like an incredible figure, same idea. Why? Because if you are, if you're showing the tats, the muscles, or this incredible female body, can you do it? Do whatever you want. If you want to do it, do it. Nobody knows who you are, but if you want to, you you know what do i know i'm only so but if you want people to focus on your comedy the idea is that don't don't like this this is how people can can actually not be distracted if you're tatted up and those are out guess what people in the audience are looking at your tattoos if you're jacked they're looking at your muscles and if you're jacked, they're looking at your muscles. And if you're super hot and like, they're just going to be like, look at her, like look at her body. If you cover those things up, if you do that, and all of a sudden it becomes about what you're saying, which is what you

want it to be. You nailed it. And so for once I can be succinct, you know, because you, because you nailed it. You know, even though early on we had our, our challenges, my dad and I are in really great terms now. And I learned a lot from him when I was a kid. And one of the things, him being Argentine was, he always said, you know, at a wedding in Argentina, the men keep their jacket on all night. In the US, they seem to like start undressing the moment they get there.

Like he was a serious guy. And I once asked him, you know, like, what's the deal with this whole jacket thing? We had the conversation recently too, because as he pointed out, your friend, Lex Friedman, wears a jacket and tie, whereas you dress like kind of, you know, you should be like more like Lex.

You wear a button down. Well, he thought that Lex was very formal and I thought he appreciated that. Now, the one thing about formal dress is that people know that you take them seriously. That's true. It's not about being taken seriously. It states to your audience,

I take you seriously enough to take the focus off me and make this really about you. That's one part. And I also think as you stated better than I could, it forces attention to the information, whether or not it's comedy or it's the information that's being put forth. Now I'm not trying to hide who I am.

I believe in authenticity. I also don't believe in oversharing. The tattoos are also, I like them. I have nightmares that I'll wake up and they're all gone and I'll have to have them all done again. Right, exactly. I have pictures of my dog. I have nightmares that I'll wake up and they're all gone. I don't have to have them all done again. Right, exactly. I got pictures of my dog. I had some things, some, you know,

stuff related to people died, birds, skulls, you know, stuff related to relationships, you know, like good and bad, you know, all this kind of stuff. That guy whose fucking neck you broke on a hike somewhere. No, no, no. A fucking obituary from Santa Cruz. Exactly. You know, I mean, tattoos are largely an expression of how we feel on the inside.

Yeah. Right. And, you know, I've never been a piercing guy or wanted to put anything on my neck or face or anything like that. So for me, it's really an attempt to just teach and be the most effective teacher that I can. I think it makes a lot of sense. I'm certainly not trying to hide it. However, when I was coming up in science, I would go to meetings, especially on the East coast,

where it's humid in the summer and like, you know, 90 degrees out and everyone's like playing Frisbee or whatever they do at those meetings or having a cocktail or something. I'm like sweating buckets of people like, why are you wearing long sleeves? I think it's changing now, but still to this day, you know, if you're a surgeon or you're a physician,

you know, you have to cover those things up. Even cafeteria workers, when I was younger, when we were young, how old are you? I'm 43. Oh, I have to go back to the 23 me. That's right, so 43, 47 for me. Fuck, I'm younger than you? I look like eight years older than you.

No, you don't. Jesus Christ. No, you don't. I think, yeah, we're going to have to, the lineage thing is going to be so much fun. God damn it. I got to start sleeping more. Go ahead. You know, someone at Starbucks had to,

who had, say, an eyebrow ring, used to have to cover it up with a Band-Aid and stuff. And I think it's highly generational. And listen, I always tell the students and postdocs in my lab, be you, right? But understand that people are forming an impression. And, you know, I'll never forget once going to a practice job talk of somebody in my postdoc lab.

And she was wearing a half shirt and a belly button ring. And I remember at that time, it was fair game for the person in charge of the lab to say, I really think you should cover up, you know, I can't, he said to her, I can't, you know, I can't pay attention to anything that you're, you're saying. And then it became this big debate, like, is that okay? Is it not okay? Look, do as you do as you wish, but know what you're doing. And I think then you can make the decision. And the idea that everyone should accept you the same just because you accept you the same,

that's simply naive. If your goal is professional development, if your goal is to make a statement about who you are and to live, quote unquote, true to yourself, that's fine. But wanting to be excellent at your craft is also being true to yourself. So I think that, you know, as a trade-off wearing long sleeves is like a minimal trade-off for me.

I like the, I wear one type of black shirt. I own a bunch of them. And I did that because I think it was like Mickey Rourke in nine and a half weeks, she goes into his closet. She's kind of snooping around his closet during the day as you know, sometimes people do when they're in a new relationship and he has like 26 of the same suit or black shirt i thought man that's cool yes cool so i just i started i was like someday you know so well you did it i mean and i'll have to say i side with your father on this lex is very professional he dresses extremely

professional it is i do say this any this goes for any guy if you want to see the way people respond to you differently you put on a suit and tie, it's a completely different experience. It's like, I mean, you walk into a store like that, a bank and everyone is just like, oh, you're a serious person. Oh yeah. Yeah. Have you ever tried to, you know, again, I'm, I'm tattooed from, from wrist to neck. You know, if I, if I trying to get boosted up to first class and travel, you go up to the counter, it's a completely different experience. And again, people are now more accepting of it growing up with only, you know, few subcultures had tattoos. Now it's more common. Again, I like them. I mean, I also see a lot of bad tattoos out there. It's

also what you've got. And also you have to be careful about the statement you're making. Sure. Right. I mean, I'm not going to reveal what my tattoos are. Oh man, this is such a cool mystery. Will you show me one day? Sure. I think if we teach a class together, it should be, would that be a fun thing? Oh my goodness. The students would go wild. They would have so much fun. They would like it again. That's another place where Stanford has been really helpful. We have a human biology major at Stanford. And for some of the human biology courses this year, they have me come in and do podcast related content. So a lot of the podcasts

are a lot like a lecture I'd give at Stanford. That'll be a lifelong goal of mine. Comedians don't do tours at your level, right tours they do tours but not they don't do college campus tours we don't do i mean i did a few colleges on this on this tour in other words um one of the things i like to request when i do colleges is that they leave the shows uh at least partially open to the public so that it's not all dumb fucking so some people are sober. Well, no, just because like academia is this really weird world to perform to as a comedian because like I'm not saying your school, but a lot of the schools are like these weird insulated bubbles where it's like everything's like, oh, it's protected. That wasn't, you know, that wasn't an inclusive enough statement.

It's like, yeah, dude dude i live in the real world so like my comedy is not i'm not performing uh in whatever they told you that like it like you're that this is off limits and that like that's what academia feels like to people that are outside of it a lot of times i think it's not just academia every big institution right now is confronted with a major challenge, which is how to comfort and not trigger the people that work there, but also acknowledge what's going on in the world. Right. And this is a challenge. I mean, what's happening now with Twitter is really fascinating. You know, the unleashing of all these Twitter files or whatever it is.

What are we learning from the unleashing? I need to follow this. I actually, the other day I had the joy of a conversation with barry weiss you know who's yes yes let go fired i don't know something at the new york times but now she's independent and doing i'm a big fan of hers and the work she's done there's some real dirt being oh yeah i mean i think you know i'm not super informed about all this but i'm informed enough to know that first of all twitter and instagram these are private companies yes some of them are publicly held, but you know, you can't go to a mall with no shirt on and say, I just want, you know, be here with my shirt off because I'm, you know, it's a mall. Everyone can come here. It's privately owned so they can have rules.

Yeah. So a lot of people don't realize that, but I think a lot of these public spaces have been kind of leaning towards it's the algorithm when in fact there were some conscious choices to suppress certain kinds of information and amplify other kinds of information. That said, you know, on Instagram, if you can't put hashtag sex, you try and put that in, you won't find it. Or if you do that in your post, it's going to get down regularly. Right, right.

Certainly. And you can kind of understand why, right? I mean, otherwise the entire thing would be filled with all sorts of pornography and super pornography. And, you know, so there's an etiquette of each of these places. I think what's surprising and what people are kind of like, you know, going eyes wide about is the etiquette oftentimes leans in one direction or another in a way that has never

been explicitly stated. Which is, is this more to like left leaning? Yeah, more left or more right. You know, it typically more, it seems like with the Twitter thing, it's more left, although I haven't gone deep into this. Or in looking back at the last few years, what's getting, you know, and so I think like anything,

I think full disclosure is the best idea. I mean, you talk about the liver king thing earlier, and again, it's gotten all already too much press and attention, but it really speaks to, you know, when people are upfront, people can usually handle it, right? When people actively lie and use that as part of their marketing, you know, then people get upset. Some people get upset when, you know, a social media platform says, doesn't reveal what its rules are. And then people are dropping into the lava of quote unquote cancellation,

deplatform, being deplatformed, et cetera. And you don't know what the rules actively are. I think that in my mind, that actually promotes people's desire to kind of probe the system. For sure. Because how else will we find out? So I think if the rules are stated,

then people can decide if they're going to follow the rules or not follow, or start a new company. But then they'll also apply the rules like not across the board the same way. It seems to be like this kind of, well, this is a rule, but you're like, well, why did you can like, you can show them clear cut cases, but you haven't applied that rule here. And it's like, and then there's no one to really has to answer for that. Cause like you said, like some of that falls back. We don't have to answer questions from anybody.

It's all cloaked. Yeah, it's all very strange. Well, comedy has undergone this massive transition. It seems like you guys all release your own shows in your own podcast. And it's, I mean, frankly,

it's awesome. Well, it's awesome because yeah, we used to just have to get on our knees to the tastemakers who was just like some fucking guy who doesn't like, doesn't write or perform. Like he just all, you know, this is the person in charge. And you're like, may I, may I perform,

may I put this out? And that whole thing is gone. Like everybody just puts out what they want to put out and the response is what it is. So it's a, it's a much more, I mean, fair system for people that are trying to do comedy for sure. And it, it seems like it's most, if not all comedians, is that right? Or is it just the ones that I follow? What's that? That are doing their, that are gone independent essentially.

I mean, it's so appealing. I mean, yeah, a lot, a lot have, I mean, you know, I still, I have a deal with Netflix, so I have specials there, but I consider myself very fortunate to have those. But what I'm, I mean, for the, for the actual, the world, the, the, the, you know, comedy as a whole, it's fantastic that the, that you have these options that you don't have to rely on just one place. And, you know, people have done their specials there. Obviously it's, it's a huge platform, HBO max, people do that on Showtime, on Amazon. And they're all fantastic. Look, they're huge platforms.

But there's something really cool about a comedian going, I have my special and I'm just uploading it. I mean, it is kind of the most punk rock version of it. And they just go like, check it out. It's here. You know, you don't have to sign up for anything. You don't have to pay. You can just-

Listen, the skateboarding punk rock thing lives large in in me that is the diy that's great you know our photographer for the podcast guy named mike blayback we got him from he was working for dc our video team we took from dc shoes and um the spirit of it you know has always been about that we're going to do our own thing filming in our our, my closet at that time. Now we have a proper studio, but I think it's, I think it's great. I think the creative spirit like of doing things on your own. And that was the reason I defaulted to skateboarding, by the way, because you parents didn't have to go. When I went to soccer, parents didn't go with my parents didn't go. I felt like kind of like a loser, you know? So it was skateboarding is, you know, and the sports drink was like a slurpee. You didn't need a uniform.

You could usually buy gear from other people if you needed to get the shoes or whatever, hand me downs. Do you still ride a skateboard? No, but now because I've been out there talking a little bit about the fact that skateboarding, I know the skateboarding community, I have friends in that community,

I'm getting some pressure to put up some footage. So I might put up some footage. So I might put up some footage. Oh shit. Yeah, adult footage. I can still hit a front side grind on vert, like not a lot of vert. Do you surf? No, no, that's the one thing in Santa Barbara I didn't.

And you know, actually my girlfriend at that time lived in the summer house of what the person who's now Jack Johnson's wife, who went to school with Jack and he was a professional surfer, you know, the Jack Johnson guitar player. And I remember he played in a band called Soil in college. It was like nothing band.

I mean, they were kind of fun party band. And then he became this huge musician and everyone was learning how to surf from Jack. From Jack Johnson? Yeah, like in our kind of crew of friends in college. But somehow I just never took to it. It felt like, you know, the whole thing with surfing is weird.

I lived with some surfers for a while. First of all, it must be amazing because these were the laziest human beings on the planet. The laziest human beings on the planet. I'm not sure a single dish was cleaned the entire year, but they would wake up at four in the morning to drive to Ventura to catch waves. Yeah.

So it must be incredible. I mean, they would give up relationships for surfing. Sure. They didn't, you know. So Jack is still actually with Kim. They're still married and he's very devoted to her. Great surfer. But most surfers that I knew were just like addicted to the water. That's all they can do. And I was trying to get myself, you know, aligned around school and other things. So it's a little bit about how like Joe has talked about golf or things like that. Like if you'd start something,

you're going to go down that rabbit hole. So he stays away from rabbit holes. I'm pretty busy already. So I've stayed away from surfing. I wish he would get addicted to golf because it would just be hilarious. It would be hilarious. He did the ball so far. He'd hit it, but he'd also be like, can't go, bro. I got to hit the fucking links today. He would be so. I think Jamie plays. I've seen on his Instagram. He does. But Joe does have, of all the people that I know, I've known him a while. He does have this very obsessive gene where he, when he gets into something,

if he discovers that he likes something, he has to find out whether he can master that or come as close to mastering it. And he gets, and he usually gets incredibly proficient at the thing. Well, and disciplined. We've been exchanging a few texts around ice bath. You know, ice bath is great for resilience. as close to mass and he gets and he usually gets incredibly proficient at the well and discipline we've been exchanging a few texts around ice bath you know ice bath is great for resilience it does really increase dopamine and epinephrine for hours yes do you have a cold plunge i do okay i was

gonna say doing it before podcasting or things like that i found though it might have been your podcast or somebody else somebody mentioned this, which was actually a real, another thing where I was like, oh, that's good to know this now, is that not to do it in the four hours or so after strength, because I would do, you know, like squats. Yeah. And, you know, there's a different, if you lift weights, there's something about like leg day sweat and grind that you're like, holy shit. That's why Monday for me is always leg day. And it's like, it just rocks your system in a different way, I feel like. Well, they're big muscle groups. They're like, holy shit. That's why Monday for me is always leg day. And it's like, it just rocks your system in a different way, I feel like. Well, they're big muscle groups.

They're huge muscles. Yeah, it's the biggest muscles. And nothing would feel like as good as like that lift being done and you jump in there. But it prevents hypertrophy and strength gains. But it's good to know. So it's pretty clear to do. And there's a lab at Stanford run by Craig Heller,

my colleague in biology who's really expert in this. So, you know, a hat tip to Craig, the athletes at Stanford go into the cold bath before they go out for their run, before they do their weight training. And Joe has written to me that he's now starting to get in for three minutes in the morning, first thing, I think he talked about this recently on his episode with Derek from More Plates, More Dates,

get into the ice bath or the cold plunge first thing in the morning or cold shower for that matter, for three minutes, and then start your workout in day. And that makes sense because you get this massive, long lasting increase in dopamine, epinephrine, and norepinephrine. And those are from human studies and the increases are huge and long lasting.

And so- And his is fucking so cold. Yeah, I think his is down in the 30s or something. Yeah, it's like 36 or i'm like crazy down here in texas what yeah the cold in the morning is great what's what do you have yours at mine's probably low 40s yeah 40s okay i do the sauna cold sauna cold thing but after that text conversation with joe i'm like you know i'm gonna start doing it so i was doing two minutes in the morning now i'm gonna i'm going to try and get in the cold plunge every

morning for a minute to three minutes do you do a special breathing because i've shared that like i didn't know when i first got it i got you know it's set up i get in and i'm like holy shit you know i'm just trying to like that's a normal response right that's adrenaline and yeah and your forebrain shut down you can't really think you're just trying to anchor your thoughts you know so i get through it. I forget. I do a few minutes. And then I have the temperature lowered a little bit, like to like 47. Because I got it.

I got it. It comes at 50, right? So I start lowering it. And then I just happen to stumble on this Wim Hof breathing video that is, it has like 50 million views or something, right? So I'm like, oh, this is like, obviously people like this thing. So I watch it and what happens is, it's voice guided and it has graphics.

So as he's talking, you see the graphic moving and you see the number. So it's like in and out. You're seeing like four, five, six. Well, your brain as you're doing this can't help but go like, these are seconds, right? And then there's a break and it's like hold your breath for this break and then it begins again so i'm doing this and i'm in the

and then after i i don't know a couple cycles of it i get out i did five and a half minutes right because his the the breathing thing isn't actually seconds these are breaths right so by watching his video and doing it i'm able to do a longer duration without even being conscious of it. Yeah. You bring up a number of really important points that, that reveal a lot about how the brain works, which is segmenting of time. Super interesting. It's one of my favorite topics. And just very briefly when dopamine and epinephrine are adrenaline and epinephrine, same thing. When dopamine and epinephrine are elevated in our system, we go into kind of, think fast frame rate.

Slow motion is taking more frames per second, right? So it seems as if time goes slower, but more happens. Imagine an amazing day, so much happens, right? You look back on it, it felt like it all went by really, really fast, but a lot happened. It's also true if you take certain drugs, it's like a lot happened, but went by.

Okay, think about waiting in the doctor's office for 45 minutes. It's like the slowest thing in the world. And that's because you're cutting your frames as maybe instead of like an iPhone, I think is 30 frames per second, it's over 60 maybe from typical video, 60. You're cutting it like 10 frames per second,

like, you know, okay. When you get into the ice bath, time is being micro-sliced. So you want to get the hell out. People always say, how cold should I make it? I say, you should be in cold that is uncomfortable, but safe. How safe? That you could stay in without dying, right?

Because if you get into 20 degree water from a warm bath, you could die of a heart attack, but 60, 50, 45, you know, probably going to be okay. So you're micro slicing time. Now, when you start paying attention to time units and you're watching it go tick, tick, tick, that's excruciating. So this breathing technique, what it does is breathing

actually changes how we're binning time. So like you said, and again, more succinctly than I ever could, because I'm an academic and you're a comedian, which is you're now using breaths as units instead of second hands as units. Now, so I highly recommend doing that. I don't recommend people hyperventilate before getting into water because you can pass out. So that's not good.

I don't want to do that. But there's another way to do this. My girlfriend, what she does is she picks a song. She has great taste in music, but the music she listens to when she gets into the cold bath is just horrible. I'm sorry. It's just, it's so bad.

It's so bad. So she blasts that. She blasts that and she stays in for the duration of one or two of those songs. Wait, does she hate it? I don't know. Is she doing it? Like, is she like, fuck this song or she loves it? I don't know. I don't know. We can list trash the song. What is it she hate it i don't know is she doing it like she's she like fuck this song or no i think she i i don't know i don't know we can let's trash the song what is

it i don't know it's just really rough it's okay it's i'm not gonna say it's a reggaeton it's um you know so the the so the don't tell me it's bad bunny no i don't even know this stuff is so bad i don't even know the names of it. Sorry, I had to do that. But listen, she's tough in the ice bath. She can- Really? Grinds it out? Oh yeah, she can grind it out. I take a different approach

and it's one that I think people could benefit from trying because there's a real learning crossover here to the real world. Okay. Which is, I think people should learn to pay attention to when adrenaline is in their system. A lot of people say, I feel stressed, I feel anxious, but they didn't catch when that hit. And so it kind of ramps up slowly and persists. I think people should learn to pay attention to when adrenaline is in their system. A lot of people say, I feel stressed, I feel anxious,

but they didn't catch when that hit. And so it kind of ramps up slowly and persists. One thing that you can do is, and this varies day to day, but what I'd like you to try, if you're willing, is to think about doing the ice bath for five, what I call walls. Imagine walls that you have to climb over. So you come over the ice bath, if you're pumped to get in it,

that doesn't count as a wall. But most of the time I'm like, oh, that's one wall. I'm going to go over one wall. I'm going to get in. Then I'm going to get to my neck. I'm going to get my hands under, and I'm going to call that the second wall. Then I'm going to wait until the impulse to get out hits.

That's the third wall. And then I'm going to ride through that. And what you find, you're like, oh, that's weird. I was able to kind of ride, get over that. Then it goes forth. And then after the fifth one, like, okay, I want to get out. I was able to kind of ride, get over that. Then it goes fourth. And then after the fifth one, like, okay, I want to get out. I really want to get out, try and cruise for another 10, 15 seconds. That's a lot more like the real world where the world hits you in adrenaline pulses. I like this a lot. It's I missed a joke. That was rough. Okay. I'm going to get

over that wall. Because when you start translating to just time or songs, sorry, now I'm feeling guilty about that dig. But anyway, it's pretty bad. Your shit fucking song that you listen to. Our neighbors are probably like, what? But anyway, it works. Imagine if some guy had told her what a shit song that was, you would have cracked his fucking ribs. Oh my.

Well, granted my music's pretty niche. Aside from the Glenn Gould and the Bob Dylan, music's pretty niche aside from the glenn gould and the bob dylan it's pretty niche and the the the yeah that's the also you have the classic uh was it who does bach you said oh yeah the bach the glenn gould all the block all the bach stuff that is amazing amazing rancid don't forget all rancid amazing all the albums i love them don't you like your songs i i don't think she's so much into the punk rock thing. I'm a huge Joe Strummer fan. I mean, full disclosure, the black shirt. Yeah.

Joe Strummer later in his career when he was with the Mescaleros. Sadly, he's dead 20 years ago, coming up soon. Wore a black shirt when he played Dripping in Sweat. This is when he was with the Mescaleros when he played. He would, there, like Joe was always in a black, black shirt and I'm a huge Joe Strummer fan.

Not some, I lose punk points for saying this. I'm not a huge Clash fan. Oh, Jesus. No, but I'm a huge Joe Strummer fan. Not a Clash fan. No, there's a whole story there. Like Joe was amazing. I mean, Joe would bring out hip hop artists as openers

and punks would like scream, like, what is this? He and people like Rick Rubin were really early to see that like these different genres of music that everyone thinks are so distinct are actually very similar, right? And that's how, you know, I mean, Rick is genius, right? How he does what he does is anybody's guess. But Strummer really was like bring people together from different genres, hip hop, all this kind of thing. And it had a real worldview. He hung out with comedians. He hung out with Jim Jarmusch. He was friends with scientists. He ran the New York marathon with a cigarette in his mouth.

I mean, there's a memorial for him in Alphabet City that I always go see. Like we need more people like him. I mean, I also think, you know, there's also like an early thank you for bringing me on here. I'm not trying to close out, but maybe you want me to anyway, but you know, comedians have been very kind to me in terms of bringing

on a scientist, right? Joe is, has friends from all these different walks of life, you know, and I've found this with comedians like you and Shoals and, and Joe and other people. It's like Whitney, like really interested in a lot of different dimensions of life and different kinds of people. And I actually think the best podcasters and maybe the best comedians, but certainly the best podcasters are people that have a lot of different kinds of friends because you're staying out of the hyper niche. So to straw view of the world, right. You know, I think the fitness community is great. The food community, they're crazy.

They're always like attacking one another, but it's so niche, you know, and at some point, if you really want to get a message out broadly, you want to educate, you want to make people laugh and educate them in the process, which I do think comedy does, then I think you need to be able to talk to lots of different kinds of people. And Lex does this exquisitely well.

If you listen to the way that he asks questions, I mean, he asks really sophisticated, but very simple questions. And, you know, as someone pointed out to me recently, he sounds a little bit like a 1970s construction worker, but he's asking real questions. I mean, he sat down with Ray Dalio and said, what is money? And you're like, do think the best comedians have the most interests, have a wide variety of interests. And I think it, I'm sure it lends itself obviously to good podcasting too,

to not just be like, I only talk to people like this. Right. Like that's- Well, skateboarding is a good example. Like there's a great podcast for skateboarding called The Nine Club. And what's cool about it is they just talk as people. But skateboarding is,

at least when I was coming up was very narrow. It was like jocks, we're not that. Now it's great. Cause you have all, also it's really, the demographic has totally changed. Some of the girls and women that are in it. Unbelievable, right?

Yeah. I mean, they are so good. When I was growing up, there weren't very many. And the ones that were there, like people would make fun of, they kill it now. I forgot the name.

Sky Brown. Yeah. She's growing up quick, but there are a bunch of them. And also the demographic, you have guys that are kind of from the hip hop genre. You have the kind of more jock phenotype, the kind of angry, like slayer phenotype, all of that.

And I love it because I think the more, the word diversity gets thrown around a lot for different reasons, but the more true diversity that you have, I think the more that a field evolves. I see it in comedy and I think it's awesome. I'd like to see more of that in science. I'd love to see another science podcaster. I'm sure there's got to be one itching to do it too. There are a few out there. Most of them are still trying to, they're still so concerned about protecting their academic careers

that they're not really out there throwing real punches. And when I say throwing real punches, what I mean is not at anybody, but really telling people what they can do to better their lives. You have to be willing to take a little bit of risk. Whereas in comedy, I feel like it's all about taking a risk. I mean, risk reward, you know, like if you want a big payoff, you have to take a risk. You have to say, I mean, you know, the best bits I've ever like that ever, that I ever developed on stage all started doing really poorly because it was high risk.

There's no such thing as it being really fun to say something if you don't feel a little bit of panic before you say it. A little afraid. Yeah, yeah. At least when you're starting it. I mean, you get it to a point where you know how to do it and then it works. I mean, you get it to a point where you know how to do it and then it works. But when you start, you got to feel like, like, if you feel that feeling, that's actually the thing that makes you go, go do it. Cause it might eat shit.

And sometimes it does. And then you, you have to assess whether there's something still there or you're like, no, no, no. Abandon this. You know, can I ask just cause I'm really curious and I'm, I'm preparing a episode on creativity for this Wednesday. just because I'm really curious and I'm preparing a episode on creativity for this Wednesday. What is your process in terms of, like Strummer, for instance, used to talk about always keeping a notepad and paper with him because he thought that ideas just kind of geyser to the surface.

And if you don't capture them at that moment, it can get away from you. That definitely is true. Now he's a singer songwriter. It's different but he's joe strummer um what is your process like do you have dedicated time where you sit down you tell the family like go away i'm gonna do this or do you take walks walking is a huge a huge time for creativity i think walking in showers are underrated because your mind just can kind of go yeah we know why this is but and i'll tell you why okay but end, but I'm really curious. So like a lot of times I've written a ton of things on walks before,

and I kind of feel like I've developed some just standing in the shower. So you need that time where it's just like, I don't know, it's almost like a form of meditation in a way. You forget where you are on the walk. That's a good sign. If you're like, where the fuck am I right now? That's a good way, you know, you just, you're, you forget where you are on the walk. That's a good sign. If you're like, where the fuck am I right now? That's a good sign. I think if you're trying to be creative, I totally agree with what he said about, there's this thing that's happened to me multiple times where you're like, oh, that's like an idea, something, you know, a joke, a premise, something. And you just go like i'll definitely remember that

like i don't know why you tell yourself i'll remember that and then don't jot it down don't do anything and then it's like later in the day you're like what was that thing exactly and we're coming out of a dream or something yeah yeah exactly i'm gonna remember this you know so i mean it's one of the big upsides i think to having smartphones over the years is that I jot down things. I'll put them in here. Voice dictation? Both. I've done voice dictation.

Oh, that's another thing I was going to tell you is another thing that I did instinctively, maybe from all my years of being a performer, is when I did my psychedelic trip, I turned on my voice notes. Oh, my. And I dictated to them. you oh you i just talk you didn't listen i know i i did stream of consciousness note like i was like okay i thought you mean you were listening to all your stuff from before i'm like no no no that's crazy i did i i i put it on my chest and just talked oh great and then i would stop and i and i wasn't like trying to i just and i wanted to be able to kind of relive. And I did.

And it was a very kind of cool experience to re-listen to myself, just whatever was going on in my mind at the time. But so anyways, I also have a board in my office. So I'll sometimes write notes on there. Yeah, the whiteboard is amazing. I do that. But there's nothing like, I mean, for me and the way I do it, it's like all those little things help, the notes.

And then I just have to take kernels of ideas on stage. I prefer to go to like smaller rooms where it's just, you know, it's not like a big show. You guys call it working out? Yeah, working out. I love that. I love that. I think I heard Joe say that.

It's like comedians or maybe it was Chris Robertson, like just working out. Just working out, yeah. Do you do Q&A with the audience to try and keep yourself spontaneous? No, I've done shows that are themed that way that are very fun. But I've done shows where I go like,

all right, I have like a few things written down and it just kind of becomes that. What happens is it's not like here, it's time for you to yell shit out, but I'll just start being like, what's up with you, man? And then you start a conversation, and then bits kind of, you know,

and the important thing is to record those sets. So there's a show called Stand Up on the Spot that I think Jeremiah Watkins started that in LA. That was really fun because it was a themed show and then somebody just goes like you know uh fucking you know like one night stands or whatever they like they yell at a theme that's good and then you go what happens is they say that and you go all right well when i was uh and you start telling that story and then it might lead you to just telling that story but it might lead you to saying something completely unrelated.

And those are, that's really how, what the best part about how comedy develops is that if I bring up a topic and you try to add to my topic, right? Like just, I said one night stand. So let's say I said that and you, you say something. Never had one. You say something related to it. Yeah. and you go like, okay, okay. But then what happens is you also in telling your story, you're like, well, I was in Phoenix and all of a sudden my brain goes Phoenix and then, and then it just, it just goes into a whole thing that has nothing to do with this topic. But all of a sudden I go like, well, you know, the thing that happened when to do with this topic but all of a sudden i go like well you know the thing that happened when i was in phoenix is that i got into this uh i got into a fight and all of a sudden

like my mind is actually going to this other place and that bit starts to develop all of a sudden you're like i thought we're talking about when i was like no no because this is a much better story do you ever pop back you know this whole idea like you're halfway through the show and then you remind them of something that they said earlier, that like it's twice as funny because it was like, he's still, you know, that's- Like a callback. Yeah, we know. So here's what, first of all, thank you.

Cause I'm obsessed with this. And actually Rick, Ruben has a book on creativity coming out fairly soon, I think in January, like the creative act. And I'm always hitting him for questions. He's like, read the book. So I've been reading the book. It's totally worn out already.

I love that thing. And I'm obsessed with this because nobody really understands the creative process at the level of science, but we have a few kernels of truth that are absolutely clear. There's been a beautiful study, brain imaging study, where they're scanning the brains of people while they watch basketball, favorite team playing.

And just like with the seconds and versus the breathing, et cetera, and the cold bath, the dopamine system kind of clicks on and gets ready. So dopamine is not about reward, it's about anticipation of reward. You get dopamine released when you think you're going to get the thing, when you think you're going to have sex,

when you think you're going to eat the ice cream. That's when you get dopamine. Dopamine, doo, doo, doo, doo. And then if you get the thing, there's a little bit further increase. And then it drops. And then it drops. But if you don going to have sex, when you think you're going to eat the ice cream. That's when you get dopamine. Dopamine, do, do, do, do. And then if you get the thing, there's a little bit further increase. And then it drops. And then it drops. But if you don't get the thing,

you got a big drop below baseline. If you are not expecting something or you're expecting something pretty good and something really good happens, boom, huge dopamine increase. Now, drugs that increase dopamine, like cocaine and amphetamine, completely mess with this system.

This is like naturally occurring dopamine. Right. Okay. There seems to be two kinds of humor. I'll get back to the basketball thing in a moment. But there seem to be two kinds of humor. At least when I watch comedy, I'm kind of watching for it. I'm trying not to play neuroscientist and just enjoy it.

But one is where there's this trail that's going along and all of a sudden something completely surprising hits you. It's either, it's rarely through pun, but it's through, it. But one is where there's this trail that's going along and all of a sudden something completely surprising hits you. It's rarely through pun, but it's through, it's like some collision where I never associated that with that, but like, ah, that's hilarious. And then the other is, I actually saw Joe do this at the Vulcan Club or what I think it's called a few months back, which is there's a story

that the comedian is laying out, like a trail of breadcrumbs. And you're like, no, they're not going there. Oh no, they're not going there. They won't go there. And the surprise is that they go exactly where you think they might go. So, and sometimes it's a confirmations.

And then sometimes the surprise is that you pull from something earlier. And all of that is funny because it's all hitting the dopamine system. So- It's all anticipation related, it seems like. Yes, it's anticipation. And so it's like surprises hit dopamine system.

And so when they watch people or image the brains of people watching basketball, every time their team gets the ball and is heading down court, the time perception kind of switches over. Like, here we go. Here's the opportunity for another dopamine hit. Yeah.

People aren't thinking this, but that's what they're hoping. Now there could be, you know, like a defensive block or something like that, a little dopamine hit, but it's your team scoring is the big anticipation Now there could be, you know, like a defensive block or something like that, a little dopamine hit, but it's your team scoring is the big anticipation when there's a, when it's basically reverses the direction of play.

Yeah. In terms of creativity, what we know is that there are networks in the brain, many networks that are very, very precisely wired. The ability to move my hand in a very precise way develops, you know, a baby can't, in watching a baby eat when it's young, it's like food everywhere.

And over time they get better, most people anyway. The circuits are very one-to-one, no slop in the circuitry. Likewise, if you already know how to do something like write or say your name, the circuits are like, they're nailed down. But the brain always maintains some random wiring. And it appears that when we are doing things

like walking or showering, or when we're doing anything that doesn't require our conscious attention in order to perform it, that random firing occurs and it's setting up the opportunity for new rule sets for the frontal cortex, such as where all our rule sets exist, to come up with new ideas.

It's almost like, imagine a painter, they've got their paints on the palette and they're painting and then every once in a while, just by stopping and pausing, all of a sudden 20 new hues of red show up. And it's not that you would use all of them, but then you turn around and you go, oh. But you might take one and kind of elaborate

and create something new with it. What's really interesting is that if we don't allow ourselves any time for the brain to be in this kind of random thought generation pattern, sleep and dreaming or emerging from sleep and dreaming is one such time. Maybe low dose cannabis is another time, which is why, or some people have a drink or two,

which probably I'm not suggesting, but that is one way to kind of reduce our kind of constriction over what has to happen next. Or you're walking or showering. These random networks, they're tossing up ideas, some of which probably suck and are terrible, but every once in a while, if you're in a position to catch it,

it's like, oh, there it is. But if you're constantly on your phone or you're constantly trying to do linear type execution of things, or you're focusing on something, you know, it's like the difference between driving home when you know which way to go, you can think of things while you drive. Versus when you have to follow a map or you can think of things while you drive. Totally.

Versus when you have to follow a map or you're looking at Google Maps or you have to look at road signs and look for landmarks, completely different. Your brain is literally free to capture creative opportunities when you're in these kind of random thought states. So your creative process, your description of the creative process captures that to a T. That's interesting. Yeah. your description of the creative process captures that to a T. That's interesting. Yeah. And I, I do realize that it's happening when my brain isn't occupied, like, like walking that neighborhood is like a thoughtless activity. Right. And then you need the reps, like the, like the,

this is what I think a lot of people starting off in a field, they're like, Oh, you just be creative by not, you know, my taking a lot of showers, but I'm guessing that the actual writing process and figuring out the structure of a show and stuff getting on stage is actually the actual rep because writing is just a as a part of performing as a stand-up people do stand-up a lot of times i meet you know i meet people they go i have 45 minutes i've never i go how do you have 45 minutes so like i have these journals full of it i was like you don't have 45 minutes you don't even you don't have 10 minutes. You don't even, you don't have 10 minutes, but you've never been on stage.

Right. So like, time flies to get on stage and actually believe me, do 45 minutes is it's, if you're doing 40 minutes of standup, like it's, it's not something you're, it's a long,

yeah. Yeah. I mean like, you know, a headlining set is considered an hour. Right. So it's like 45 is like the introductory headlining set. Somebody's never been on stage saying they'd have that. You're like, okay. Do you channel anything before you

go on? Like, do you try and go, okay, like, am I pissed off today? Am I hot and very, am I tired? I've done a few live shows again, very different sort of thing, but I find that I have to check myself for any kind of, I call them energetic blocks. Like if I'm pissed or I'm sad or I'm tired or, or even if I'm super happy, I might not hit some of the darker themes. Right. All that is translates to stand up too. I think,

I mean, look, I've done thousands of shows. So I've gone on stage in every mood I've gone. And I've gone on stage where I realized I was really upset. I was really tired. I was anxious. Yeah. Nervous,

elated, excited. I've gone on every, and I find that like the best way to go on stage for me is neutral and kind of free, loose, silly. I think silly is a word that I don't know why I always am drawn towards, but I feel like I'm on the best version of myself when I'm in a silly, playful mood. If I'm like goofing around with you backstage and, you know, I'm not taking myself too seriously, not taking the environment too seriously, that mood going on to stage for me is the best. You know, there's some people that like to channel like a kind of an angry, ranty thing and stuff.

And like, I can go on stage like that. I've gone on stage like that. I don't think it's the best version of me as a comedian. So I like to get into a more playful headspace. Oh, I did. You know, I've been researching play for a while now and plays amazing because low stakes, I mean, going on stage for you is very high stakes, but low stakes activities done. The data show that if you play a game, like literally not, you can be competitive,

but in general, if it's just low stakes, like your job doesn't depend on it, your reputation doesn't depend on it. Your feelings of self-worth don't depend on it. Like the opposite of the Michael Jordan phenotype, you know, you play for one hour a week,

one hour, like just like play badminton with the kids, like, you know, play it opposite handed or just, just do something for fun, just pure fun. Thatinton with the kids, like, you know, play it opposite handed or just do something for fun, just pure fun. That kind of focused activity, we know starts to tap into these creative networks.

Really? Yeah, it doesn't happen during the play, but it seems to set a seed on some of these kind of what would otherwise be random thought generation patterns. And then people are able to just kind of capture. Later, there's this notion of capture, you know, that all of a sudden you just got, yeah. There's something about play.

I mean, I think it's hardwired into us. All animals play. As adults, we start to play less and less, or we tend to play hard or we tend to like, you know, we tend to, you know, you play tennis and you want to win. Like, so it's non-competitive, low stakes. It totally changes when it's- Totally changes.

Can you imagine, by the way, if we taught a class... We're going to have to cut that. We are going to have to cut that. I'm sorry. Sorry, we're going to have to cut that. We'll cut it, we'll cut it. We're going to cut that. We'll cut that, we'll cut...

Andrew Huberman is saying, please cut that. I didn't say it. I know, I'll cut it. I didn't laugh. Please cut it. Siguri, you're going to get me fired. Okay, I know, we'll cut it, we'll cut it, we'll cut it. But also put, Tom said a to get me fired. Okay, I know. We'll cut it. We'll cut it. We'll cut it. But also put Tom said a joke that was cut.

Okay. Okay, so I'm going to just say Tom just said a joke that I do not approve of. Okay. For many reasons. Okay. For at least two reasons. Okay. Okay.

Sorry. I'm going to cut it. It's cut. It's cut. It good it's good okay goodness gracious we were doing so well we were we were doing so well i had to tell you something we're related that was so much fun the whole thing well all of it was fun but especially that part just seeing me just seeing me get stressed yeah yeah folks let me tell you what happened your cortisol levels all right so my adrenaline level spike no i want you to think about what happened right before that okay so um i want to ask you uh two quick science things because we got to get out of here

okay number one because it's become something that people talk about now and i don't know anything about it testosterone for ladies is this something because it feels like it's more in the starting to catch a little bit i mean earlier i mentioned if estrogen levels get too low in men libido can suffer skin joint health cardiovascular health can suffer so there's estrogen and testosterone, both men and women. Many people, both men and women, are surprised to learn that women actually have more testosterone than they do estrogen.

That is a surprising thing. A healthy woman has more testosterone than estrogen. So when you look at, when you adjust the scales, these things are typically measured in nanograms per deciliter. If you just normalize the scales, what you find is that they have more testosterone than estrogen. That right there tells you that testosterone is also doing

something very important in women. There is a movement now toward prescribing very low dose testosterone, either through cream or through injectable, or there's some other forms too, for women for treatment of low libido, but also in order to encourage muscle protein synthesis, maybe even brain health and function. Certainly estrogen hormone therapy has been prominent for a long time. And the data on this really show that women who are concerned about menopause

and post-menopausal effects should talk to their doctor about the possibility of taking estrogen prior to menopause or as early as possible, because there are vastly different outcomes depending on whether or not women take estrogen during or after menopause or initiate it before menopause.

So yeah, testosterone, it's starting low dose testosterone. All the usual caveats apply, such as like if dosages are too high, they can start getting some you know some facial hair growth um mustache chin hair that kind of thing deepening the voice but that's going to occur at much higher dosages but it will relate to the sensitivity of their androgen receptors and there's some genetic variation there okay uh second i have to ask this you're sitting where the great and well-known party animal, Bert Kreischer.

Yeah, when I sat down, the seat was still warm. Oh, yeah. It actually never cools off. You've brought up that you've discussed this on your own podcast, and this is obviously a popular, which is alcohol consumption. Now, typically, because you talked about a couple days a week, someone having a couple drinks. In a typical week, there's about three days where he'll have six to eight drinks,

and then three days where we're talking about usually 12 to 18 drinks, right? Oh, my goodness. Yeah. Is there any side effects with that? Anything happening? There's a name for it. It's called alcohol use disorder. But a name alone doesn't tell the whole story. Bert, listen, we love you. I've never met you in person, but the world loves you. Like don't,

you don't need it. No, but I think so. Alcohol, you know, short list, you know, pro-cancer, neurodegenerative, it's a poison, right? It's a poison. It works to shift people's conscious states because it's a poison. Now it's true there's some genetic variation depending on how much alcohol dehydrogenase,

the enzyme that metabolizes alcohol, how much people make. Indeed, some people have a greater tolerance or can handle things. Certain cultures, they make so little of alcohol dehydrogenase, they have one drink or half a drink, it's like poison, they make so little of alcohol dehydrogenase. They have one drink or half a drink. It's like poison.

They turn bright red and they feel sick. Like they don't feel good. Other cultures, you know, based on genetic variation, they can drink far more. How early did Bert start drinking? How young? I don't know. I mean, I know he was having, you know, he was partying some in high school. In college, he was turned all the way up.

So I'll say to be safe, probably like 17, 18. Yeah. There are very good evidence that, there is very good evidence, excuse me, that if a kid starts drinking early, like 14, 15, the probability of them becoming a severe alcoholic is extremely high, independent of their genetics

and independent of anything else. So how early people start drinking a lot. I don't know if he was drinking at that age. I really don't know. Let's hope not. I mean, really two drinks per week would be the cutoff. I'd love to see Bert go sober, completely sober, and focus on other things.

Not because I need to see that for my own feelings of self-worth and wellbeing and happiness, but because I think, you know, obviously his neural circuits work incredibly well in the presence of alcohol. They probably work even better in the absence of alcohol. He does the thing that you, I don't even know if you knew this,

but you mentioned like if some, early in the podcast, you mentioned, oh, if somebody drinks like this, you know, you have to do certain things to offset. Exercise more. He exercises actually a lot more than people would even on tour even on tour when he's home even on tour trainer with him on the road i mean he's running he's lifting he's active he's a physically active guy and even the morning after the 10 drinks active yeah and people will throw

out things like oh you, my grandmother had like a gimlet of vodka or a half a pint of whiskey and she lived to be a hundred. Yeah. There are outliers but for most people who are drinking that much and carrying some extra weight, they, you know, you're going to, they're going to die young. Now how young, I don't know. I mean, if some people are more, have more vigor and they can go into their 70s and 80s yeah but it's generally not a pretty picture yeah as you get out into your you know 60s 70s 80s it's really not and um and so you know i'm not you know i didn't even attend the health classes in high school let alone am i going to try and stand here and be like i'm the

health provisor you know i actually didn't set out to tell people that alcohol is bad or or that cannabis it can be good or bad. That's how I feel about it, depending on the person in the context or that nicotine can be good or bad, depending on how it's brought into the body and the context and the age of the person. I'm just trying to give people the knowledge

so they can make decisions for themselves. I always say, you know, do what you want, but know what you're doing. And I think it would be great if he would cut back. Also, he did sober October. So it's obvious that- He can do it. Did he fall off? No. Okay. think it would be great if he would cut back. Also he did Sober October, so it's obvious that- He can do it. Did he fall off?

No. Okay, so it's clear that he could do it. I think that people who drink a lot and are high performers who then make an active decision for themselves to go sober do an incredible, their work just flourishes. Also, I will say this, I'm not in AA or NA, but the AA and NA community is amazing. The AA community, like I know some musicians

who are regular in AA and it's like a performance enhancing drug, the way they have this community, there's something about that filtering of experience through those steps that really does seem to work. And I know AA's got some issues too, right? You know, and they've been accused of a number of different things, but I think they've done far more good than bad.

And it's, yeah. So can you imagine Burt Kreischer, AA, first AA meeting? Right? Yeah. I would claim to be an alcoholic just so I could attend. Yeah, that'd be a lot of fun. Right? Also, they would have to be like,

hey, Burt, other people get to speak too in this meeting. It's not just your personal fucking meeting. Not four hour shares. Is he long-winded? I don't know. You're talking to somebody who's, yeah. Maybe he's an academic at heart. I'm not going to tell him to quit.

He's a grown man. He can make his own decisions, but he is loved by his family and friends. And it'd be great to keep him around a long time and maybe a drink every once in a while. Sure. No big deal. But it seems like that's a lot of alcohol.

That's a lot of alcohol. And this whole Mickey Mantle gene thing that people would joke about. Like, yeah, but- But Mickey Mantle died at 56 or something. I mean, I think what we should do is image your brain and Bert's brain. Okay.

And what you're going to see, but what you don't want to end up with is the Homer Simpson thing, right? With the little brain inside the big skull. And that's essentially what alcohol does over time. And then what happens is people end up on repeat of the same five or 10 stories in circuits. You ever been around somebody

who's been a long time drinker? Yeah. It just kind of become the old story over and over again. And your guys' game is all about what's new. I will say this, We're talking about tattoos. You know, I'll reveal one. I don't have a lot of script written on me. Some are like birthdates and like names of people that were important.

But I have one and it says new stories. And I got that one because I never want to stay stuck in old stories. There is a place for working through old things, good and bad. Yeah. But even like good old stories, like how boring is that to just talk to the person who's always talking about how great it was when or the thing that happened i'm all about new stories and trying to evolve he doesn't even know what he's doing right now so great stories not nude new stories yeah no and we do not make jokes about nudity here listen um i think that's i think that's good advice and i I think, I don't know.

I'm fascinated to see one of my dearest friends. Darum. What's that? Darum. Darum. Put 100K on the table or something. That's not enough money to him. Oh, yeah?

Yeah. He does too well. Well, he might feel about alcohol the way that I feel about podcasting, which is there's no amount of money that you could pay me to quit. And if he says that, there's actually kind of a test of this, right? Can I tell you this though? Yeah. He's already said there's no a kind of a test of this right can i tell you this though yeah he's he's already said there's no amount of money there's no amount of money really yeah because i will never quit drinking he loves alcohol yeah he here's the thing this sound for

people hearing this it might be thinking like are you talking about like just some fucking booze back no what he loves is like that the feeling of of like, let's go have a, hey, you just got to my house. Let's go, we're on a cocktail. That there's hope that this next, that this evening is going to be a good time. Okay. So among humans, about 8% have some genetic variant

that leads to increases in dopamine when they drink alcohol. It's got to be. I had an ex-girlfriend like this who, you know, could just drink and have the best time. And the next day is just fine. It's like the Don Draper phenomenon. Remember in that show, like you would just tie one on,

he's like staggering back in the office. The next thing you know, he's just all ching. You know, he's all dialed in. Now, of course that's a TV show. Sure. But the character was representing something that about 8% of people have, which is that they drink alcohol and they don't just sober up quickly. It's exciting to them. The anticipation is not just the circumstances. The alcohol really does

seem to trigger the dopamine circuit. Whereas for most people, it triggers other circuits, primarily mainly shutting down on the forebrain so that you're, you're kind of not as inhibited as would be the simplest way to put it. You're not adjusting your rule sets. This can be a problem, right? Context is important. Yeah. Listen, obviously he's been extremely successful, you know, and now I'm feeling a little uncomfortable, you know, here we are talking about Bert, like in what he needs to do. No, you're his friend.

I think that I'd never want to come across as like, I expect people to change their behavior, but I think of the new story in life is the interesting one. And I think it's the one that resets kind of, if there is a fountain of youth, I don't know exactly what it is, but I know that one thing that comes close to being a fountain of youth

is this idea of building a new story, having a new goal that you're committed to, even if it's really, really hard. I'm not trying to go David Goggins on us, right? But look, I mean, people have done harder things, but who knows, maybe for him, alcohol is the holy grail. Maybe, maybe. I don't know.

It's worth it. I'm glad we had the discussion. I think, first of all, the only thing that he likes more in alcohol is people talking about him. So this is very welcome in his eyes. Don't worry about that. Bert, I hope to meet you in person someday.

We won't have a drink. This is an absolute, no, a real treat that you came here. First of all, to sit with one of my cousins who I hadn't actually met in person. That was a thrill. Learning, I also learned during this thing. And we even edited out a joke. So it's a, it's, it's a full story. Yes, you did.

Well, I, I, uh, thank you. It's, it's been a total pleasure. I'm a fan. Thank you. I also in great admirer of your craft as you, as you probably, um, uh, could see, I have a lot of curiosity about comedy and what it means to us about neuroscience and life generally. And it's been a real pleasure to be here. I want to thank your staff because they are amazing. They're great.

Your team. Yes. And you, and even in his absence, Bert. Sure. Yeah, it's been a real pleasure. Yeah. I learned from you guys and I hope we can do it again sometime.

I'd love to do it again. And I'm going to hit you up now for like all your information. I mean, I'm talking about supplements. You're going to be on the supplement pharmacy okay and we can talk about what works and doesn't work for you and then um and who knows if you end up going down the other route of the you know the i mean the peds or something you know just remember tell people the truth i'm on the sauce. Let's go. Bert and Tom, Tom and Bert.

One goes to Topless while the other wears a shirt. Tom tells stories and Bert's the machine. There's not a chance in hell that they'll keep it clean. Here's what we call Two Bears, One Cave. No scripts, a bit of booze, amateur protology. Dirty jokes, raunchy humor, no apologies. Here's what we call Two Bears, One Cave.