Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 847: Max Lugavere of The Genius Life Podcast

Starting point is 00:00:00 If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, with your hosts. Salda Stefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. Max Lugavir. Love this guy. He's one of my favorite people. I just fucking love him. You say that a lot.

Starting point is 00:00:20 No, no. Well, I have a few favorite people. Yeah, no, you say that too much. No, no, no, no, no. I, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no stay in contact on almost the daily for sure weekly basis. That's what I said. That's one of them. He's one of the guys that we're that close with. And just because off air, we've connected on home. I mean, no matter what, the guy professionally is incredible,

Starting point is 00:00:54 is books incredible, he's on TV now. He's got a great podcast. Got a great podcast. But just for sure are people outside of even the podcast. I wish that he lived close by because I think that him and Mike, both guys that live far away from us that I think that we would probably hang out with on a regular basis if they were new.

Starting point is 00:01:13 He's just a super cool guy. He's got great guests on his podcast. His book has done exceptionally well. Dude's brilliant. Yeah, he's a very, very intelligent guy. It's funny that he said that he had trouble in school growing up. Yeah That's interesting. Well, I think that says more about school than it does about you know about him

Starting point is 00:01:30 But I mean again, we love Max. I was on his podcast a while ago had a great time. He's been on our podcast before that before his book You know genius foods came out and now that it's been out It's been selling very, very well. He started his podcast afterwards. He mentions the documentary that I guess he's been working on his phone. We have a great conversation in this episode. We talked to him about his personal life,

Starting point is 00:01:55 which is kind of funny. I think about his dating life and what that's all I have. Right, how the gates. Well, he's a good looking bachelor, you know what I mean? It's a successful, good looking dude. So of course we're gonna ask him about that. We're just trying to dig a little. Yeah, we also, I brought up the blue blockers with him

Starting point is 00:02:09 and he's a huge advocate of that, which I was excited to introduce him to Felix Gray, which is one of our new sponsors. Yes. And one of my favorite new sponsors that we have. Yeah, if you go to Felix Gray Glasses, that's F-E-L-I-X-G-R-A-Y, glasses.com-for-sl-I-X-G-R-A-Y glasses.com-foreslash-mind pump. You could check out all their stuff. We did talk about meat quality.

Starting point is 00:02:33 Here's something that's interesting. He did talk in this episode. We did a YouTube video afterwards where he clarified even deeper. Grass-fed meat, the profile of grass-fed meat, is of the fatty acid profile of the human brain. When it's corn-fed or grain-fed, it's much higher in omega-6s and not quite as healthy for you. And that's a big problem is that balance of fatty acids. And we did mention our other sponsor butcher box because all their food is grass-fed. And grass-fed. Everything. Yeah, all the way through. Which was the other part of it that's sneaky.

Starting point is 00:03:07 You get some of the grass fed, but then I aren't grass fed. That's where a lot of these grocery stores, that's the hustle that people don't know, is they people are starting to get savvy with organic, they're starting to get savvy with grass fed meat, and then now the hustle is grass fed, but then what they do is the final two weeks,

Starting point is 00:03:23 they fatten them up with the grains, and they can still legally say Grass fed on the label So you're what's neat about butcher boxes. You know that it's getting grass fed and grass finished So there are other sponsors if you go to butcherbox.com forward slash mine pump You'll get free bacon Two ribbys your sold already ten dollars off and free shipping on your first order. So max, you can find max, his podcast is the Genius Life podcast.

Starting point is 00:03:49 I highly recommend you go over and subscribe to it. He's got great guests on their great conversations. His book of course is Genius Foods. You could buy that at any bookstore, you could buy it online. You got to check out too, his documentary that he's working on too. You can go look at the teaser at breadthemovie. it's bread head head oh bread head not bread that bread head movie dot com and that's it man without any further ado here we are talking to our good friend Max Lugavier Max Lugavier so we're we're on the podcast and we're we're talking about the

Starting point is 00:04:22 the different names that gay people call each other for, stereo type. Like, that's a good thing. Gays, stereo type. Yeah, gay, gay, gay stereotypes that other gays call each other. And we're talking about what would each of us be. And so instead of us speculating,

Starting point is 00:04:37 because we know nothing about this, let's reach out to our audience. I'm sure somebody has some sort of, knows these terms. And so they sent over the list, which by the way, it's way longer. Oh man. Yeah, it's like, there's like no idea. There's like 30 names. It's a bunch of dudes, right? Guys name that's what we do. We name things things so. He's a twunk. He's a twunk. It's like a mix between a hunk and a twink. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, because he has a he has a girly face but then the

Starting point is 00:04:58 muscle because I have muscles like I can see that. Yeah, right? Yeah, he's got a profile. And then he's, Sal was a silver fox and a daddy. He was a combination, so a fox and a daddy. And then Justin is a muscle cub. A muscle cub. A muscle cub. A cub is like a bear, right? So like, like big, burly, hairy, but he's younger, so he's a cub.

Starting point is 00:05:19 And then muscle cub. Not even hairy, so you know, like, it's flawed. I mean, that's a misconception. I like the terms. I feel like we should lay claim to them ourselves. That's where, every picture I say going forward on Instagram, I'm hashtagging muscle teller. I mean, it's in my handle now.

Starting point is 00:05:33 I mean, the muscle teller. I mean, what I'd be. You? Yeah. That's a tough one. Do we have the list? You remember? Yeah, actually, this go over that.

Starting point is 00:05:41 It could be a silver fox, but you're too young, but you don't have any silver yet. No, they seem to be. Yeah, a little bit of silver silver yet. No, they said, in fact, they said, Yeah, a little bit of silver. A little bit, a little bit. Or are you younger than Sal, right? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so you couldn't,

Starting point is 00:05:51 because Sal was too young to even technically be a silver fox is what this guy said. Oh, it's like, there's like an age. Yeah, you wouldn't be a gibster, because that's, No, he's not a gibster. He's not too hipster. I'm gonna find the list here,

Starting point is 00:06:01 but that was one of them. And not necessarily a twink, you know. No, no, it's not gonna fly. You guys give each other hand jobs where I find this list here. But that was one of them. And not necessarily a twink, you know. No, no, I was not gonna lie. You guys give each other hand jobs where I find this real quick. I'm just, I'm rolling through them all. I'm rolling through them all. Bro, every time I get a joke, kind of a mix.

Starting point is 00:06:15 Every time I see you, I gotta say, I have to make a comment on this, Max. Every time I see you, in person or in the story or Instagram, you're always with an attractive young lady. Oh man. A bunch of different. Are you just rolled you into the bus? He's kind of like the Hugh Hefner of Health.

Starting point is 00:06:30 You're like the wellness, like, uh, most brain foods paying off. Yeah, most eligible bachelor of the wellness world. Are you dating someone? Are you single? No, I'm not. I'm not. I'm not.

Starting point is 00:06:41 I'm not putting on this spot. I don't know. I'm definitely not. No, I'm single. I'm not, I'm not formally in spot. I don't know. I'm definitely not. No, I'm single. I'm not formally in a relationship with anybody, but I do have close ties with, you know, with a few females, but I'm.

Starting point is 00:06:56 Is this your politically correct way of trying it? Are you like, are you in the, the on it thing like where you like, it's the open, the open obry mark, yes, I do, do you subscribe to the sex at dawn? I do struggle with the philosophy of monogamy, but it's never, I mean, you know, just from speaking from personal, like actual experience, I've never,

Starting point is 00:07:19 you know, when I was in monogamous, when I've been in monogamous relationships, I've never cheated, and I've never really felt the need to make it an open relationship, because I've always personally felt that when I've ever felt strongly enough about a girl to be in an exclusive relationship with them, I wouldn't really wanna watch them get it.

Starting point is 00:07:40 So this is why all the girls like them. So, well, you know, what you, sounds like you're the type of guy that, which I always tell guys to be like this, which I think some dude struggle with this, and I think you get the bad rap when they become the shady guy who's lying to all the girls, just to hook up with all of them.

Starting point is 00:07:56 It sounds like you're very blunt in up front. So, like if a girl meets you and you guys are hanging out and whatever happens, you probably laid that foundation or you're someone like that, you communicate that pretty well. This is kind of way to do foundation. Communication honesty, I think they're integral parts of any solid relationship.

Starting point is 00:08:13 I just don't believe that it's possible to maintain, a sexually appreciative relationship with somebody for the entirety of your life. So, I'm not marriage, the concept of marriage, I struggle with, long term monogamy, I struggle with, but when I'm with somebody, and I'm honestly committed to that person, then I don't think it's, I've never felt it appropriate to sleep with.

Starting point is 00:08:37 Now, I compare monogamy to, because I've heard people make arguments about, what is it called, polyamory or open relationships. And they make the evolutionary, you know, arguments and all that stuff. And the way I talk about it, look, you know, we all have cravings for eating whatever the fuck we want. But we don't, like, why don't I go just eat a bunch of cake

Starting point is 00:08:57 and a bunch of candy and a bunch of whatever all the time? It's not good for me. And I think monogamy has proven itself to be, if you can do it and you can do it in a meaningful way, is proven to be a superior way of living. Doesn't come without its challenges. Of course. I think it's the ultimate expression of humanity in a sense and executive function, because one of the cognitive abilities that would fall into the umbrella of executive function

Starting point is 00:09:22 is being able to delay gratification and think altruistically. And so, you know, obviously when you initiate a relationship, I think it's always going to be in the compassionate stage, you know, where it's like very sexual, very physical, but then eventually those relationships transition to companion it love is something I learned in, you know, I majored in psychology and college and I think that that has benefits too, you know, especially as you age. I mean, it's something that is really helpful. I mean, there are benefits to that. Absolutely.

Starting point is 00:09:53 And then there's been, we've known this for a long time and since this is your field of study, maybe you can correct me if I'm wrong, but when we do observational studies on societies, monogamous ones versus ones where there's husband and many wives, monogamous societies are far more peaceful, much more violent in the societies where people own multiple wives. And they think it has to do with the fact that the wealthy men at the top hoard all the, whatever you want to call it, sexual resource or whatever,

Starting point is 00:10:24 and then men at the bottom or left without any Options and they become violent and whatever as humans aren't we designed to seek novelty as it is right and then do you think that Starts to decline as we get older so maybe that's it's it's probably a more natural thing to wait to set all the way down If for a long-term relationship, which your thoughts on totally. Yeah, I mean, I think people sex drives change But I agree with that that idea about monogamy as it being sort of something that actually favors men. It guarantees sort of one sexual partner for every guy, even if that guy doesn't happen to be, you know, at the top of the dating pool, so to speak. But yeah, you know, for somebody, I think, I think where monogamy really becomes difficult is for men with options. I mean, it sounds kind of crude to talk about it that way.

Starting point is 00:11:08 No, no, Chris Rock says it best, man. Your guys are only as faithful as their options. You always hear the guy who's bragging about, oh, just me and my wife's like, motherfucker, ain't no one trying to fuck you. Saying like, it's real easy to be fucking faithful when nobody wants to have sex with you. Try being the guy who's walked down the street

Starting point is 00:11:24 and pussy's getting thrown at him every five minutes. Total different story. I mean, yeah. For Tiger Woods, am I right? Yeah. Hence why Max is like, no, I'm cool, I'm not. Well, I, I mean, I'm curious, because you know, when you said that

Starting point is 00:11:36 and even the way that you articulate it, it really, it sounds similar, because I'm the same way too. I'm not like against one way or the other way or I feel like I stand on one side. But I do have my own personal views. I think that I think many people's perception of what love is, I think is distorted and confused with lust. And I think that a lot of my personal experience in life and growing up like, you know, I'm still learning to love myself fully. And I don't think

Starting point is 00:12:03 that you can love another partner fully until you've learned to love yourself And so you know I have different views on marriage and when to get married and things like that Where where do your views like that come from? Does it stem from childhood? Did you have a good or a bad example with your family or like where where does that come from? I had a good question. By the way, I love how sensitive you guys are like it's really cool because I love how sensitive you guys are. Like, it's really cool. Because I'm a certain, a few woosey players.

Starting point is 00:12:25 Well, okay, fair. But you're in a balance as well. But you're able to volley between, you know, like, you know, really sort of like, male, you know, locker room sort of conversation, but then also like you guys have like a soft center, which is which I appreciate. Okay, so my upbringing, my parents had a pretty bad marriage.

Starting point is 00:12:45 And so that's sort of the template that I'm trying to unwire and rewire and sort of fix. You know, my parents were together for 18 years. They had a business together. They were great parents, but their relationship was totally crappy and they were both very poor growing up and they reached a level of success together with the business that they created.

Starting point is 00:13:03 And the minute they became successful my dad You know became kind of a woman not a womanizer, but he Definitely loved like boats cars Hot women and he cheated on my mom all the time and you know that's Well, you know sort of well known in my family, but nonetheless were both kind of, my mom's a very codependent woman, and, you know, they stayed together for a long time, and then finally, when I turned 18, they broke up,

Starting point is 00:13:31 but they're both still, they never got remarried, and my dad's, you know, in Miami, he's kind of alone by himself and my mom, sort of has a significant other, but somebody who she's not in love with, and certainly not attracted to sexually and still I think kind of longs for my dad and it's just, you know, it kind of screwed me up

Starting point is 00:13:52 in many ways, I think. Yeah. Because, yeah, I mean, I just, you know, I don't have that template for what. Were you the youngest? I'm the oldest. Okay, so you turned 18 and then they? Yeah, when I turned 18, I went to college.

Starting point is 00:14:04 My parents got a divorce and, yeah I turned 18, I went to college. My parents got a divorce and yeah, just never, never great. My mom was like, you know, she had this like weird relationship with her mother. Her mother was always around, probably drives my dad nuts too. I mean, it wasn't all of my dad. So yeah. So when I was, you know, I didn't start to put this together. I loved psychology and college.

Starting point is 00:14:24 And I didn't go all the way through college and finish But I that was my first Experience in taking a psychology class and a lot of the books that I've read as I got older isn't that field And that's really when I started to learn all this like I started to unpack and go Oh, this is where this comes from because a lot of people would say to me or especially girls that I'd be dating that Because I wouldn't commit I wouldn't settle down I wouldn't give you like I'd get these girls that were great and we'd have this great chemistry and I'd be dating, because I wouldn't commit, I wouldn't settle down, I wouldn't give you, like I'd get these girls that were great and we'd have this great chemistry

Starting point is 00:14:47 and they'd be like, you know, they wanna lock it up and I'd be like, no, and I'd be very honest, I'd be say, hey, you know, I really like you and joy spending time with you and we can hang out, but I just, I know where I'm at in my life right now and I'm just not ready to give. We sure, honest. Yeah, and I was, and it got me,

Starting point is 00:15:01 it actually, I did really well for myself as far as like relationships, like I don't have a lot of women out there that hate me or anything like that because I was truthful now It might have hurt their feelings when I first said it But they always respected me later on for that Do you do you remember what that was like for you like going through college? Like was that when you started to like kind of unfold all this or did you have similar situations in relationships? well, I mean I when I when I went to I went I went to school at University of Miami in Florida, and I, as an undergraduate, I think my junior year of college, I met then who was the most beautiful girl who I'd ever

Starting point is 00:15:39 seen in my life, and I began dating her. We broke up after four months because she was a bit younger and she was sort of like immersed in the craziness that is South Beach and being young and hormone fueled and being attractive in one of the most superficial cities on earth. And so that, the relationship back then was kind of a nightmare, but we ended up getting back together a couple years later. And you know, dating and it kind of continued to be on and off for a couple years after that.

Starting point is 00:16:08 And it's kind of a pattern that I kind of think maybe is a little bit illustrative of like the pattern that I saw my parents growing up. But I've dated many girls, but always sort of, I guess burdened with the grass's greener on the other side. Sure. You know, mentality and, you know, my fear is that all,

Starting point is 00:16:30 you know, one day, 20 years from now, I'll look back and I'll be like, look, the grass was greener because it was fucking fake. You know? Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh You split your time between East and West Coast. Quite a bit, right? Is there a big difference in the people and dating between those two coasts? It's hard, man. I don't really put a lot of energy into dating. I'm just not good at it.

Starting point is 00:16:54 Like I don't, I'm not on any of these dating apps. Every time I try to go on it because I've heard, anecdotally, some friends are really successful at it. I always find it to be a major waste of time. I'm just not good at it. And yeah, I have, I don't know, anecdotally, some friends are really successful at it. I always find it to be a major waste of time. I'm just not good at it. And yeah, I have like, I don't know, commitment issues. I can't even commit to a city. Like, I'm, you know, I don't even honestly know

Starting point is 00:17:13 how to describe where I live. And, but on the other hand, it's allowed me to filter kind of that angst, I guess, about it into my career and into my work and into my, you know. So let's talk about that for a second because the last time You had we had you on the show great interview by the way love talking to you Yeah, you were had just or would just about to release your book genius foods. Mm-hmm since then blown up. We've seen the everyone Yeah, we're gonna watch you on Dr. Roses

Starting point is 00:17:40 I think we're in the hotel room. I was like, oh my god. Look, it's Max That was awesome because we just flown into LA. We were there for something else, right? Yeah, and Justin and I had a room, and we, as soon as we turned the TV on, it was like literally Max was on the TV on us. Oh, it's so crazy. So now you're like, you're like one of the guys,

Starting point is 00:17:58 or one of the people in this wellness world, which is riddled with a lot of false information. There's some great information there. There's a lot of snake oil. And there's a lot of what seems to be contrary information. What's that been like for you? Now that you've blown up, how have things changed for you? Are people coming after you?

Starting point is 00:18:17 Are people starting to try to debate you and discuss your ideas and say, well, that's not what this literature says or what, what's that been like? It's a really good question. I mean, I think one of the coolest things is just the fact that the book that I wrote genius foods has gotten out there It's really, you know, I get I get dozens if not, you know, a hundred messages every single day across different platforms about how You know, some way in which the book is helped improve the life of another person, you know people Health care practitioners their patients are, you are, some of them dealing with cognitive problems, they literally recommend my book to their patients,

Starting point is 00:18:49 which is incredible. So awesome. I mean, I have a background in journalism, but I obviously did the homework, but it's just amazing that my book is actually having such an impact on people's health. So that to me is great. I get, you know, in certain areas,

Starting point is 00:19:01 I'll get like recognized, people coming up to me on the street, like telling me that they love the book. That's insane. That's weird, right? In terms of debating me, yeah, I mean, I get, I'm in it for the truth. So for people that don't know of here, if you're listening, I wrote genius foods,

Starting point is 00:19:17 which I consider to be the definitive care manual to the human brain. And I wrote it without any preconception, without any bias. The reason why I wrote it is because my mom has dementia, and she has a sort of rare form of it. And it's fucking horrible. Like I, you know, I was just in New York for the past two weeks, spending as much time as I could with my mom. And it is unbearable to see the person

Starting point is 00:19:39 that you love most in the world descend into, you send into this condition that is whatever the stereotype you have of a person succumbing to the ravages of dementia. That's what my mom has right now. And it's horrible. There's no way out. There's no light at the end of the tunnel. There's nothing good to come of it. So I really am dedicated to putting this truthful message of science and nutrition and how lifestyle

Starting point is 00:20:08 can affect brain function out there in a way that's like accurate and free of bias and without marketing attached to it and any of that stuff. And as you mentioned, there's a lot of crap advice on the internet, especially like, you know, I've had a decent amount of success on Instagram, lately on Instagram, I mean, you name it, like it's like the worst, you know. There's obviously a lot of people putting out, or I would say, handful of good, you know, people out there putting out good advice,

Starting point is 00:20:34 but generally speaking, I mean, there's tons of misinformation. Whenever I post anything about meat, for example, I get, you know, hordes of, you know, plant-based vegan, you know, and I love vegans. I have nothing against, you know, nothing against making that carefully considered moral decision. You're about to go speak to probably a bunch of them in this week. Yeah, possibly.

Starting point is 00:20:52 Yeah, that is a good chance. But yeah, they always come out. They're so militant. You know, and it's just like... It's their religion, that's why. Yeah, I get kind of tired, like batting them off. And people just posting blatant pseudoscience on my profile.

Starting point is 00:21:09 And at first I was like trying to like debate everybody but I mean at this point I really can't. And but yeah, I mean it's, I think it's really cool. We live in an amazing time. We have a lot of answers. There's still a lot of unknowns. So I don't ever purport to have all the answers I don't.

Starting point is 00:21:26 But there's like cool people, citizen scientists out there doing their own research, providing insights, adding to this sort of tapestry of knowledge that I think it's amazing. We live in a time that we all have access to, because I sit in Drs. Offices with my mom on the regular and mainstream medicine man, like you don't wanna get to the point.

Starting point is 00:21:46 Like we are so poorly equipped in this society to... For chronic disease, for chronic disease. It's, I mean, I know, I don't wanna just talk, you know, badly about the medical profession because I have a ton of respect for medicine. Actually, deep down, I love medicine. I love the practice. I was pre-med for the first two years of college.

Starting point is 00:22:04 And I know some doctors that are phenomenal, but the vast majority of experiences that I've had with my mom in the traditional medical system has been disgusting, like just horrible. Doctors operating according to script, keeping my mom on drugs that are indicated for her, but not, they're probably making her worse, or likely contributing to her symptoms, as opposed to actually alleviating any of them, because of course none of them have a disease modifying effect. So it's basically just, it's a nightmare. And also, when it comes to my mom,

Starting point is 00:22:43 I feel like in many ways she was victimized by not just the medical system, but medical or I should say health misinformation that's been out there. My mom was from a generation where they didn't have the internet. Whatever she knows about health, she got from media, the media of her time, not social media, not clickbait, websites and things like that,

Starting point is 00:23:04 but like, like, maxi-dye-gest websites and things like that, but like... Maxi's largest. Yeah. Yeah. So, that's why I have a real vendetta against anybody putting out nutritional misinformation because it's actually doing harm. More harm than anybody with a social media account can possibly realize. Well, I think that's the same thing that we felt about fitness advice.

Starting point is 00:23:24 I mean, we see the same thing that we felt about fitness advice. Like, I mean, we see the same thing in the fitness industry as, you know, these people, and a lot of people, I think, felt like, when we first came out, thought it was like, hate, and it's like, no, it's not, but it's the same vendetta that we have. If, you know, you guys don't realize that,

Starting point is 00:23:39 a lot of this information that you're giving these people, we're doing more harm than good. We're supposed to be these health and fitness professionals. When you're advising people, and you think you're giving these people out, we're doing more harm than good. We're supposed to be these health and fitness professionals. When you're advising people and you think you're motivating them with the, you know, beast mode, the all out, the no days off, and the, you know, this push shit, it's like, you know, the average person sees that and they just try and emulate what you're doing and what you don't realize is you end up setting that person back potentially, a long years potentially to get out of that hole.

Starting point is 00:24:03 And we saw the same thing. I do see a little bit of light at the end of the tunnel here with the, with person back potentially, a long years, potentially, to get out of that hole. And we saw the same thing. I do see a little bit of light at the end of the tunnel here with Western medicine in regards to nutrition. We're now seeing fields like nutritional psychiatry starting to come out, which 10, 15 years ago, if you went walked into a psychology class or you talked to a psychiatrist and you said,

Starting point is 00:24:25 hey, I think you could treat depression with diet, they would laugh you out of the room. Today, they're now studying the effects of how nutrition can affect the mind, and they're giving it a lot of credence with science and study, and it's difficult because science takes a while, I think, to catch up. But because of the internet,

Starting point is 00:24:43 one thing that I'm seeing now, Max is, so I have a god son who's got Crohn's disease, and when he first got diagnosed, something like seven or eight years ago, and there was very little in terms of, I mean, there was symptom control, and some of that was terrible, some of it was basically low dose chemotherapy

Starting point is 00:25:00 to kind of shut down as immune system, but there wasn't anything that, dietary that they really recommend. Basically they're like, well, I'll just stay away from things that bother you. So my aunt went online and in the past, you could never listen to anecdote because it was one person or two people telling you,

Starting point is 00:25:16 this is what worked for me. But when you go online and you have forums that are dedicated to Crohn's disease and you see thousands of anecdotes in people saying, hey, this diet called the carbohydrate-specific diet, I think is the name of it, is helping all these people with Crohn's. My aunt, who is a registered dietitian, who was way like pro-Western medicine, when this happened, she went online and she's like, let me try this and it worked. Totally put them in remission. What do you think about all that?

Starting point is 00:25:45 When you're looking at some of this information that's coming out with nutritional psychiatry. Yeah, well, I mean, the perfect example of that is an anecdote from people online, but I mean, specifically who comes to mind is Michaela Peterson. Oh, yeah. So what you guys have talked about.

Starting point is 00:25:59 We had it on the show. Oh, you did, oh, amazing. Yeah, I mean, I think like, you know, the carnivore diet is super interesting, right? Like on first glance, when I first heard about it, I was like, what is this bullshit? Like in light of everything that I know about, like, the microbiome and, you know, the value of fiber consumption,

Starting point is 00:26:14 polyphenols, like all that stuff, I couldn't believe that a diet so extreme could be doing anybody any good. But then I thought about it, and I actually have a pretty good, I think, working hypothesis as to what it may be doing anybody any good, but then I thought about it and I actually have a pretty good I think working hypothesis as to what it may be doing. I feel like for most people, you know, for most, if you, when we were tribal, right, and living as hunter-gatherers, you could almost assume that everybody in the tribe had a similar

Starting point is 00:26:41 if you made a past childhood without, you know, getting killed off by any number of pathogens, you probably had a fairly robust immune system, right? Very much so. Like you were born vaginally, you were breastfed, none of that formula crap, right? You were not over prescribed antibiotics. So you had a robust enough immune system and there was genetic heterogeneity. So like you were, or homogeneity, I should say, rather, you were all probably of the same gene pool in that tribe. And so you can get away everybody in that tribe, probably ate a similar diet, right?

Starting point is 00:27:06 And probably felt fine. Today, the problem is we have widespread immune dysfunction. And everybody is struggling these days. I mean, rates of autoimmunity are on the rise. And that's what it's like. Yeah, so it's like exploding. People have dysfunctional immune systems to the point where their immune systems

Starting point is 00:27:24 are attacking their own enzymes and tissues and proteins and things like that, right? People have sensitivities and allergies and conditions defined by chronic inflammation and things like that. So, we all have these dysfunctional immune systems fed by the fact that the microbiome has become basically an afterthought, right? Like some of us are born via C-section, we're not breastfed, we're over prescribed antibiotics, we have an obsession with sterility and things like that. And so for people with a dysfunctional immune system, I feel like it's one of these

Starting point is 00:27:52 like context specific end of one like no one size fits all dietary approach cases where you know plant compounds that initiate what's called molecular mimicry in the body may basically further confuse an already confused immune system. So for anybody with autoimmunity, Crohn's disease, any of these like sorts of conditions, it actually makes a lot of sense to me that by cutting out all plants at least for a little while that you're going to see a reprieve from symptoms. Well the way the way and that's very similar to the way I kind of explained it because we had Dr. Sean Baker on who's the guy that's popularized the Carnivore diet.

Starting point is 00:28:26 And this is, we went a little back and forth with a little bit debate and I basically said the same thing. And what people need to understand is the immune system, when you say robust immune system, I think people think this super strong hyper vigilant immune system. That's not what a healthy immune system is. Healthy immune system is an intelligent immune system and knows when to react and when not to react. It knows not to overreact.

Starting point is 00:28:50 An immune system that's unhealthy tends to either be super, super depressed in which case you're probably going to die of the common cold or some other virus. Or what we're seeing a lot of is an immune system that doesn't know the difference between friend or foe and it starts to identify foods as foreign invaders and it mounts these immune system responses. And so what you have with some people is they're so hyper reactive, their immune systems are so hyper reactive to the foods that they're eating that they feel much, much better by eliminating almost everything except for the one food that probably has the lowest rate of, I would say, food intolerance, which also, I think, points to the fact that

Starting point is 00:29:32 that's probably the food that we relied on the most for lots of period of time, because you could just eat meat and survive. I don't think it's ideal, but you could just eat meat. It has everything that you need in it. You don't need much vitamin C when you're not processing carbohydrates and all that, but it's not an ideal diet But for someone like Michaela Peterson, or Sean Baker or all these other people, you know Let me tell you something the immune system is a fingerprint. Yeah, it's very very unique And I think that's the reason I would I would say that that's the number one reason why diets are a work so differently for so many different people

Starting point is 00:30:02 Yep, you know because I've had clients. I'll tell you what, when I first became a trainer max at, you know, I was pro omnivore, right? And when someone would come to me and say, I'm a vegan, I'd be like, oh, you can't get all the nutrients you can't. And scientifically speaking, I could make a pretty good case against veganism. And then I had this one client who,

Starting point is 00:30:20 he used to track everything, write everything down, he was super like, he would do everything I told him. And he always had kind of gut issues. Didn't really feel good. He was a doctor and did one of those doctors without borders, you know, trips or whatever. And the tribe that he was staying with was vegan and because of their belief system,

Starting point is 00:30:36 he came back and said, I feel amazing. Started eating vegan and he felt great. You know, I kind of had to swallow it a little bit and say, okay, well, everybody's a little bit different. And I think that may be why we get so much conflicting information with nutrition, you know what I mean? Speaking of conflicting information right now, what is this that's going out again with the coconut oil?

Starting point is 00:30:56 Yeah, there was some Harvard professor that said it was like pure poison. Yeah, it was the quote. Back in the news again. Oh my God, totally hyperbolic click baitie. I mean, that's not even a scientific phrase, like that kind of noise. Pure poison because it's just not.

Starting point is 00:31:15 I mean, there are communities that they're co-general as a staple in their diet. Look at anybody from Thailand or the Philippines. So yeah, it's not poison. It's just that this was, you know, unfortunately another example of like, you know, something that this German Harvard professor, which means less and less by the way these days, I feel like, you know, went viral on the internet and, yeah, I mean, you know what they say, the dose makes the poison. I don't think that coconut oil is, in any way, poisonous,

Starting point is 00:31:47 but I also don't think that it's like the miracle food that many health gurus on Instagram, you know, make it out to be. Like, people are putting coconut oil in their fruit smoothies and things like that. I don't use any coconut oil. I mean, sometimes I'll use MCT oil. I'm actually a fan of MCT oil,

Starting point is 00:32:01 but in terms of coconut oil and what I use that for, I mean, like, very seldom. I don't even cook of MCT oil, but in terms of coconut oil and what I use that for, I mean like very seldom, I don't even cook with it honestly because there are other, you know, oils that I prefer to cook with. But um, yeah, I mean the concern about coconut oil really stems from the fact that it's predominantly, it contains mostly saturated fat, but the latest meta-analysis that I, you know, that I've seen, a really robust study of studies published in BMJ Open, I believe is the the journal found no clear association between saturated fat consumption and heart disease risk. And there were some studies that showed

Starting point is 00:32:33 that people ate more saturated fat, were actually healthier in some cases. Yeah, there's a small study that adding saturated fat to the diet I've found can improve health. There's another, I mean, it's all nutrition research, you kind of have to like mix and match, but there was a cool crossover study that I looked at, actually I was looking at today where they gave, they put people on these like Mediterranean style diets and it was a crossover trial.

Starting point is 00:33:00 So they had, they had to, they meet these Mediterranean style diets and on the first iteration of the diet, they had to meet very low red meat, low amounts of red meat. Because of the dietary pattern as a whole, they were consuming more extra virgin olive oil, more plant material things like that. They had an improvement in their cardiometabolic risk factors and risk markers. In the crossover version of what basically the diet that they adopted, they told them to add more meat,

Starting point is 00:33:28 like double the recommended amount of meat. And what they found was that their numbers continue to improve. So it's really not about any one particular food. It's about the dietary pattern as a whole, you know. Let's talk a little bit about the myths surrounding saturated fat because for a long time, for most of my life in yours, we were told that it was the devil avoided at all costs. Actually, fats in general were the devil.

Starting point is 00:33:50 And let's talk a little bit about that. How did we develop that policy? Why did that even, why was that even a thing? Why did they become government policy to tell us all the void fat? It stems from one guy. I mean, that's sort of how I understand it. A pathologist named Ansel K at the University of Minnesota, who basically at a time when nutrition science was just being born in this country, and we really kind of were the flag bearers for the rest of the world in terms of nutritional research. There was an epidemic of heart disease in this country. And Ansel Keys was this pathologist who embarked on a number of epidemiological studies

Starting point is 00:34:28 looking at large populations, and presented a graph showing a perfect correlation between saturated fat consumption eventually. At first it was just total fat consumption, but he narrowed it down to saturated fat consumption and deaths from heart disease. But the problem is that he showed this perfect linear correlation.

Starting point is 00:34:47 The seven study, seven countries. Isn't this the same one that he teased out? The ones that like, or... He took two countries out of that, right? Yeah, two that countered his argument, right? What? France with the, with the, on what he was trying to do. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:34:57 Yeah. Yeah, I mean, it was, that study was heralded because he went around the world drawing blood labs and things like that. And so he did like a fair amount of work on it. He stationed himself in Crete where he got to look at the Mediterranean dietary pattern. But the problem is that he omitted data

Starting point is 00:35:15 that was available from other countries where there was no clear association between heart disease risk and saturated fat consumption. But nonetheless, he was apparently a very charismatic person. He landed on the cover of Time Magazine. And again, this was at a time where there was a immense pressure on these academics to come up with a solution to the nation's heart disease problem.

Starting point is 00:35:38 So when there's that kind of pressure and people were really looking for answers, and it was just a vacuum of nutritional information at the time that it was a neatly enough package story that he could sell it to both doctors and the public and that really became, I mean, it became, it became government policy. Yeah, it became government policy.

Starting point is 00:36:01 People don't know this actually, but he implanted that idea into the American Heart Association at the time, which was this little known professional organization, and then Procter and Gamble invested about a million dollars into it. Procter and Gamble they produced Crisco and unsaturated vegetable oils and fats and things like that. Weird. No conflict in the sense of it. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, always corn oil by the stove, my mom was always terrified of eating eggs, and she never ate red meat or anything like that, because we have this idea that saturated fat clogs our arteries.

Starting point is 00:36:52 Now, we now know that that's not true. Okay, so what happens in the body is a lot different than what happens when you pour grease down a cold drain. But still, that being said, saturated fat does have an interesting effect on the body. And in my book, which like, and work, I focus on brain health, preventing Alzheimer's disease, cognitive decline, things like that. There's really no evidence that eating lots and lots of saturated fat benefits health

Starting point is 00:37:19 on the other side of the coin. So in terms of just like hedging your bets and which I think is smart when it comes to your health, you know, I'm not one of those people that's like putting, as I mentioned, coconut oil on everything and butter on everything, like people have different genes, they have different ways in which they respond to saturated fat. Again, it's about the context in which that fat is being consumed. So if you look at your diet, you know, if you're consuming a lot of polyphenols and plant materials and things like that, you know, I'm almost positive that the saturated fat is going to be better tolerated. But they've done studies, I believe in pigs, but, you

Starting point is 00:37:53 know, the mammalian digestive tract is pretty strongly conserved. And they find that, you know, pure saturated fat leads to a translocation of this endotoxin stuff. Basically, this bacterial, these bacterial fragments that are really powerfully inflammatory From your gut, lumine into your circulation. So it's basically like saturated fat consumption. You can increase inflammation. You can increase inflammation. Yeah, Interest certain people. It also One of the things that it does, you know, we all know that it raises cholesterol whether or not that's good or bad that's debatable Actually, we probably don't even know the full picture, but it does tend to raise LDL cholesterol and HDL cholesterol.

Starting point is 00:38:31 One of the mechanisms by which it does that is it reduces the amount of LDL receptors on the surface of the liver. This is a really important thing. The liver basically serves hundreds of functions in the body. One of those functions is recycling lipoprotens and lipids, right? And it does that by popping these like LDL receptors up to the surface of the liver liver and then taking in the LDL particle before it gets, you know, they're all sort of shipped out from the liver initially when they're large and buoyant. They're like the large dense.

Starting point is 00:39:03 The big fluffy ones are what? Yeah. Or not large dense, large and buoyant, fluffy LDL particles is like the sort of, you know, the cardiovascularly favorable pattern of like the LDL particle. And before they get too small, they're supposed to be sucked back up by the liver. But saturated fat, what saturated fat does is it basically reduces the amount of LDL receptors on the liver, which I don't think we want, especially for people that are genetically perhaps less effective at that recycling process. Very interesting.

Starting point is 00:39:31 So what I've noticed, this is for me personally, what I've noticed is if I eat a diet that's high in saturated fat and a diet that's higher in carbohydrates, I personally notice more inflammation. Now I have a very, very obvious sign and that's gut issues, but I'll also notice stiffness in my joints. If my saturated fat and takes high, but my carbohydrates very low, and I'm eating more of a keto style diet,

Starting point is 00:39:54 I notice my inflammation is quite low, and it may have to do with the anti-inflammatory effects of ketones themselves or something like that. Now let's talk about protein. In our space, protein is the magic macronutrient. You can't have too much of it. or something like that. So now let's talk about protein. In our space, protein is the magic macro nutrient. You can't have too much of it.

Starting point is 00:40:09 Just as much protein as you possibly can, because you're gonna build more muscle and a lot of the stuff. What about protein's role in overall health, or even in brain health? Are there studies that show that there's ideal amounts of protein or is it a huge range? Yeah, I mean, I sort of like to walk that line between body composition.

Starting point is 00:40:28 I learned a lot from you when you were on my podcast. I appreciate it. Yeah, but no, protein's important. It's the most satiating of the macronutrients. I think as people get older, especially, you know, I like to kind of talk to people of all ages, but sarcopenia is a real thing. People do begin to lose muscle mass.

Starting point is 00:40:44 As you guys are well aware, it becomes begin to lose muscle mass. As you guys are well aware, it becomes harder to gain and maintain muscle as you get older. Having stronger muscles is directly related to better brain health and better brain function. For many reasons, it's a great way to maintain insulin sensitivity by having stronger muscles. It's also one of the least or lesser appreciated roles of having more muscle on your body is a greater ability to dispose of glucose. Glucose is highly damaging in the body. And it's one of the reasons why we have such conserved homeostatic mechanisms to get your blood sugar down whenever we decide to spike it, right, with like sugar, sugary

Starting point is 00:41:21 foods and carbs and things like that. But we only have like, we have limited places in our body with which, you know, in which we're able to store sugar, right, we've got our liver, which can only, you know, store about 125 grams if you're a big person. And then our muscle tissue, and muscle we have, you know, a much larger amount, but if you are, if you don't have a lot of muscle tissue, then your ability to store sugar is pretty limited. I would think, you know, and that sugar, when you consume it, has nowhere to go, especially if you're chronically sedentary.

Starting point is 00:41:52 It's a bit of a positive feedback loop because I just read another study that showed that sitting for long periods of time reduces blood flow to the brain. We also know that, you know, BDNF, which is a wonderful, I don't know what you want to call it, chemical or whatever, that's released in the brain, helps improve the function of your neurotransmitters and your neurons in your brain. And it's very, it's like bathing your brain in some field of control. Yeah, there you go. Miracle grow.

Starting point is 00:42:22 And movement does that. And so there's this kind of positive feedback loop where older, because I've seen this in my career as a personal trainer where someone gets older, they hurt themselves so they can't move. Their mental degeneration accelerates rapidly, very, very quickly. I have personally seen this myself where I've trained people in their 70s and 80s and I, you know, for 10, 12 years, and I'll see like, maybe a barely subtle decline

Starting point is 00:42:48 in mental cognitive function, and then they'll get hurt, and they'll be bedridden for two months, and then I'll see them, and it's like, we accelerated it by like 10 years. It's like, boom, because they couldn't move, and then there's that positive feedback loop, so it's like, not have enough muscle, don't have a lot of strength,

Starting point is 00:43:05 increase your immobility, maybe hurt yourself. That's not good for your body, so in your brain, so indirectly protein just to help build muscle, may help with that. Protein super important. And I also think that we have a biological imperative to not be wasteful and eat the whole animal. Certain amino acids found in certain parts of the animal

Starting point is 00:43:23 help us better metabolize amino acids found in other parts of the animal help us better metabolize amino acids found in other parts of the animal. So they've done really interesting studies in rats where they've fed rats, high methionine diets, methionines, amino acid concentrated in muscle meat, and we're getting a pretty high concentration of that if all we do is eat muscle meat like the steaks and things like that that were that we tend to eat in the modern world. But glycine, which is an amino acid found in collagen. Cardolid, connective tissue, right? Yeah, actually when they fed those mice

Starting point is 00:43:53 as high, methionine and rich diet, it actually shortened their lifespan. But that shortening of their lifespan was abolished once they started supplementing the mice also with glycine. So I think when it comes to eating lots and lots of protein, I think it's also really important to wear all the proteins coming from, right?

Starting point is 00:44:08 Yeah, yeah, to get like a broad array of... It's your organ meats, and all that other stuff, you know? And also, occasionally maybe take breaks from protein consumption, you know? Get that endocrine taste. You know, they have studies that show that you, when you take it, when you fast from protein or you go low protein, you actually increase increase what they say is increase your sensitivity to protein

Starting point is 00:44:28 and utilize it more efficiently for what we want it for, which is repair and rebuild. Now I noticed this as a somebody who's trying to build muscle and I noticed this when I would fast or when I go I used to have vegan days where I would just eat nothing but vegetables for one or two days. Then I go back to eating protein and I feel like this get this rebound effect. go back to eating protein and I feel like this rebound effect. When I'd work out and I feel like I build more muscle. And I brought this up to our friend Ben Pekolsky, who was a pro, you know, was a pro, I have be bodybuilder, massive human being.

Starting point is 00:44:57 And he totally loved it. And he's like, he agreed. He's like, oh no, I have my athletes do the same thing, which I'm like, oh shit, you're a bodybuilder. And you said that. That I never thought he would have said that at all. I want to talk to you a little bit about your podcast, Max. I know that you just started this,

Starting point is 00:45:10 like what has been your strategy going forward with your podcast? So it's a different, it's a different platform entirely. Do you have like, you know, a goal with it? Is it different than, you know, talking about your book? Yeah, we're kind of guests of you at all that kind of stuff. My strategy, my goal is to be a fraction as good at podcasting as you guys.

Starting point is 00:45:30 Oh god, that's tough. Oh, stop it. Oh, stop. Thank you for that, Andrew. Thank you. I'm almost finished. You do a fucking great job, I'm a good fucking thank you, man.

Starting point is 00:45:38 I'm a great fucking. Thank you. No, thank you. I like people, people have really responded to it, but it's one thing that I'll definitely tell you that I do is I edit a little bit to make sure that, because I come from a school of thought where I used to work in TV, and everything I put out, in the back of my head, I'm like, is this in the service of the audience?

Starting point is 00:45:59 So I'm always trying to cut down and make more concise and more clear and things like that. And so if there's like, if I ask a question that's not as clear as I wanted to, you know, all like cut out the, you know, whatever is distracting and all like work on the intros and things like that. But I also think that there's like an amazing thing about just putting the raw stuff up and like being really present and just putting up,

Starting point is 00:46:19 you know, a conversation as it happens, which like, I feel like you guys do. Well, there's definitely, we're seeing this happen right now in our space. And it's really fun and interesting to watch is there's a place for both of those, right? There's definitely, you know, a place for the Joe Rogan, the Mind Pump style of podcasts, where we could potentially carry on for three hours and bullshit about topics that have nothing to do with brain health. You know, we're talking about your sex life in the first half of this, which, you know,

Starting point is 00:46:45 somebody who's tuning in just to hear Max speak about brain health could give two shits about. But somebody who really wants to know more about you may really appreciate that. So I think there's places for both, for both types of podcast. Long, long form seems to be growing quite a bit. I think part of it is the bandwidth was limited

Starting point is 00:47:03 because you came from, you do a lot of old media and new media, right? The TV radio, you are in that space. Now you're in the new media space where we're not limited with bandwidth. So we don't have to make our point in 10 minutes. We could just go for three hours if we wanted to. And it was a bit of a gamble, but people seem to appreciate it. Are you having fun having these long conversations with people? I love it. It's just another platform for me.

Starting point is 00:47:28 I used to have a TV show, and then I was, you know, and I still am working on a documentary. And I reached out and interviewed a lot of researchers for my book, but many of those interviews were untapped. They were just kind of like me taking notes. So the podcast is an amazing way for me to be able to, just connect with people that I find interesting and have conversations with them, tape them, learn more about topics that I'm interested in.

Starting point is 00:47:53 I think what's different about my show, The Genius Life, compared to my book, is that my book is really a deep dive into nutrition. And The Genius Life really is about, you know, my goal is for it to be broader than just nutrition. So I've been talking to a lot of people, anybody who can offer a crumb on the sort of scavenger

Starting point is 00:48:10 hunt trail to truth for me, like I want to have them on. But one of my favorite episodes that I did recently was with a singer songwriter named Matt Nathanson, who's very well known in the singer songwriter space. He's had a number of hit songs. And he was on the road recently with the band OAR who you know, a lot of you will know. Matt's is a great guy who I was actually a fan of his music long before I became friends

Starting point is 00:48:35 with him and I got to meet him and we became friends maybe 10 years ago. And aside from being an insanely talented artist in singer-songwriter, he's just a brilliant guy. And I was like, you know, this guy, you know, has tons of wisdom to drop. And I want to be able to have a platform where I can just have conversations with people that I find interesting.

Starting point is 00:48:53 You know, so that was a great episode. I had you on sale. Obviously that was great. I had Dr. Setchan Panda, who's one of the leading researchers in circadian biology. That was, yeah, that was an amazing thing. Was there anything on there that kind of blew you away from what he was talking about? Dr. Setchan Panda, who's one of the leading researchers in circadian biology, that was, yeah, that was an amazing thing. Was there anything on there that kind of blew you away

Starting point is 00:49:06 from what he was talking about? Man, I just think it's, you know, it's just so cool how complicated we are. It's intimidating, but at the end of the day, it's like, it's just amazing that like evolution really has thought of everything, you know? And we're just trying to figure it out. We're like just scratching the surface.

Starting point is 00:49:23 Well, because you have that knowledge, it's also, you also deliver a message, and I really appreciate how you deliver that. You don't speak in these certainties that a lot of people... They're not dogmatic. Yeah, you're not dogmatic about anything that you talk about. And I feel like that's something that we all share

Starting point is 00:49:36 that's in common. I think why we've had a lot of success is because of that is like, you know, we kind of present the information that we've learned in our journey, and it's not this is the way where I think there's a lot of people out there that tend to do that. They learn a little bit of knowledge, they get a little bit of information and then they form a camp and then it's all about that. They get a lot of attention. Because you get a lot of attention when you're dogmatic. It's much more difficult to say it depends. We have this unfortunate cognitive bias

Starting point is 00:49:58 as humans. The less we know, the more we feel like we know. And the more we know, the less we feel like, well, it's so true. And it's really unfortunate, but it's true. Like most experts that I would interview in the space, I mean, look, I've been called an expert. I wrote a New York Times best song book. Like, I'm, you know, I'm, I get, I brought onto these shows to talk about,

Starting point is 00:50:21 you know, nutrition topics, health topics, and things like that. The word, the word expert to me, me, I don't even like it honestly, because there's so many more unknowns, and I'm so excited to learn more and ask questions. And I think a real expert really kind of just knows the right questions to ask. That's what it's all about. When you look at this past year,

Starting point is 00:50:41 what are some of the things that you think you've learned recently? What are some of the things you've picked up? I know you mentioned, I know you had Sal on it, I'm sure he dropped some great fitness knowledge for you and so about that. When you look at this past year, what are some of the things that you think you've learned recently? What are some of the things you've picked up? I know you mentioned, I know you had Sal on it. I'm sure he dropped some great fitness knowledge for you and so on that. But when you think about all the guests and your learnings, I know your guy is constantly growing and reading

Starting point is 00:50:53 and learning, what are some of the bits of knowledge that you've picked up over the last year? Man, I mean, I think, you know, learning more about circadian biology, it's definitely become really interesting. The natural inclinations of our body during the specific times of day, you know, in the morning, the fat burning window that we have at night in the kitchen closes, so to speak in the body. And just sort of honoring, talk about that. Go a little bit deeper than that,

Starting point is 00:51:25 like how you've started to apply some things in your life. Are you subscribed? You use the blue blockers at night when you're on your computer and things like that? Like what are some of the things that you're doing personally because you've this newfound knowledge? Well, I'm a big fan of blue blockers. I wear those, especially if I'm doing work

Starting point is 00:51:41 or watching TV into the wee hours. I always have those on. Blue light really does send a signal to our brains that it's daytime. It's been one of the biggest game changes that I've done. We recently got a sponsor. It's a silly, but it was. Felix Gray and what I love, so I've always tried

Starting point is 00:51:55 the Blue Blocker thing and in the past, when I would do Blue Blockers, the one thing I would hate about them is they're so orange that it distorts the television and the computer. Well, these ones that Felix Gray has, they're like clear, but they still block out the blue light. So I can sit there and enjoy a movie or be on my computer and not feel like my colors are stored.

Starting point is 00:52:15 And I notice a huge difference when, if I just notice as soon as the sun goes down and I'm in the house, lights are all on still, I'm on computer or watching TV, I just throw them on, and man, my sleep has been night and day difference. And so, yeah. Conversely, I would often realize, and only now, can I sort of identify why I would feel this way,

Starting point is 00:52:34 but I, you know, when I'm in New York, I spend a lot of time with my brothers, and they have more traditional jobs. So one of the things that they love to do is binge watch, like Netflix shows, when they get home from work So I would do this too with them and you know for a while I was like game of thrones things like that and I would always notice that you know on then on the

Starting point is 00:52:51 Mornings after the nights where we would just watch like show after show after show up until the point You know that we would go to bed. I would always feel hung over the next morning You know, I would have like a light hangover and I couldn't describe Why that would be because I'm not a you know, I don't really drink. I'm not a big drinker. You know, I certainly wasn't drinking on the, you know, nights before I had these hangovers. But at a certain point, I realized it was the light. But the light was affecting my ability to have rejuvenating sleep. And I started wearing these blue-lyblocking glasses, amber-colored glasses. And it was like a sort of night and day, no pun intended, like difference.

Starting point is 00:53:25 I would feel much better the next day, rested, rejuvenated, and yeah, and I also don't, I don't eat for two to three hours before I go to sleep. I feel great the next day when I don't do that. It also helps my body. I feel regulate, you know, signals related to hunger. When I do sort of break that circadian inclination and eat late at night, you know, I related to hunger. When I do sort of break that circadian inclination and eat late at night, you know, I'm counterintuitively more hungry than next morning. You would think that wouldn't be the case because I had maybe an extra head of calories,

Starting point is 00:53:53 but I think it just throws everything out of whack. And then in the mornings, I don't eat for an hour, two or three after I wake up. You know, in the mornings, we have that amazing cortisol spike, which is the body's like top fat burning hormone. It's the body's chief catabolic hormone, and that's elevated when we wake up. So I try not to mess with that.

Starting point is 00:54:12 And I also definitely don't eat if I have to wake up earlier than my natural time in which I wake up. Oh, interesting. Yeah. Oh, that's interesting. So our buddy Ben, he does, he's big because he flies back and forth like yourself too a lot.

Starting point is 00:54:27 So I'm curious if you've tried this, he's big on, as soon as he gets in, he says this is, if he's flying across country or even across the world, he'll, as soon as he gets into town, he looks up an infrared sauna and does an infrared sauna and supposedly that's supposed to reset your circadian rhythm. Do you know anything about that? Or have you ever tried that?

Starting point is 00:54:44 No, I don't, but I have a theory that using cold water, like showers, because it's a stress around the body doing that first thing in the morning, could jumpstart. That early morning cortisol knew you, but I don't know. That's just a theory. One thing I do know, and that I learned when I interviewed Touch and Panda, which is super cool to know, if you have to wake up, you know, due to an alarm clock, so before you would naturally arise,

Starting point is 00:55:15 your body is melatonin, probably has not yet come down, and your cortisol certainly hasn't spiked if you're waking up due to an alarm clock, which I did today to fly in for this. So, you know, melatonin, when melatonin is elevated, we have less insulin sensitivity, because melatonin is the body's sleep hormone. So once melatonin starts getting going

Starting point is 00:55:32 in the evening hours, that's when the kitchen is closing. So that's when metabolism is slowing down and things like that. The problem is you can also have elevated melatonin in the morning if you wake up really early due to your alarm clock because you gotta get to work. So eating in that window, especially sugar and carbohydrates and things like that is like the worst idea Wow, and now what about like coffee too? What if you were to have because it wouldn't be ideal to have coffee in that situation either Well coffee would get the cortisol up that wouldn't well. Yeah coffee does get the cortisol up

Starting point is 00:55:58 So then it would be advantageous and coffee also helps to reset the body circadian Okay, yeah coffee sort of has a similar effect on the brain as bright light. So, interesting. We can use coffee. It gets that a dino-sign to circulate or whatever. Yeah, dino-sign. Dino-sign there. I said it wrong, didn't I?

Starting point is 00:56:12 But can you talk about this documentary that you're working on? You used to said that earlier, and it got my interest perked up a little bit. Yeah, so the first project that I ever decided to do in the health space is a documentary called Breadhead. And we're still working on it. But in the very beginning of 2015 I did a Kickstarter campaign for it. And people can go to BreadheadMovie.com if they want to see the Kickstarter teaser.

Starting point is 00:56:35 But essentially, it's the first ever dementia prevention documentary. And it really follows me going to talk to the top researchers in the world that are proving that our cognitive fate is something that falls within our control. And I've, you know, have filmed my mom over the years and it's a sort of a more, there's a lot of science in it, but it's also a very personal look into what it's like to have a loved one, you know, a mother specifically with dementia. And my goal is to really awaken people to the notion that dementia is a potentially preventable condition for most people. I don't think a lot of people realize just how much of an, we're already seeing explosion of Alzheimer's in dementia,

Starting point is 00:57:19 how much worse it's gonna get with all the diabetes that people are getting. Because don't they call it type three diabetes? Yeah, I mean, if you have type two diabetes, your risk for developing Alzheimer's increases two to fourfold. So, I mean, it's like, it's just crazy. And right now, five million people in the US have Alzheimer's. That number is set to triple by the year 2050.

Starting point is 00:57:37 So it is going to explode. And Alzheimer's is just one form of dementia. So I mean, like, my mom doesn't have Alzheimer's. She has another form of dementia. There's a lot of people out there that I've loved with other forms of dementia. So I mean, like my mom doesn't have Alzheimer's, she has another form of dementia. There's a lot of people out there that I've loved with other forms of dementia and there's virtually no research on, you know, like, I mean, the Louis body dementia, Parkinson's disease dementia. There's, you know, frontal temporal dementia. There's like, all, there's all these little different variants and all the money is going into Alzheimer's disease because it's

Starting point is 00:58:00 the most common form of dementia. And so, you so, I can tell you that we have a lot of information on diet and lifestyle and how it pertains to these more common versions of it. Alzheimer's disease, maybe mild cognitive impairment, things like that. But for people that have these more niche forms, it's like literally grasping its straws. And so, I think we're in trouble. And that's why my passion really has become to get this message of prevention out to young people. And also to try to like figure out how to make it more enticing for them to start thinking about their brain health

Starting point is 00:58:38 and things like that because I know, and I was guilty of this before I was directly affected because of my mom. Most young people think of Alzheimer's disease as like an old person's condition. You know, like something that's not gonna affect me. Way down the road, not gonna affect me. Maybe it's an inevitable part of aging,

Starting point is 00:58:54 maybe if my grandmother had it, it had it, it's sort of like baked in the cards for me. But these are all misconceptions that I'm trying to dispel. When you look, you know, with your knowledge that you have, especially in this arena, and you look at the younger generation coming up, you know, with the video games, the processed foods, the high sugar diets, the lack of movement,

Starting point is 00:59:14 what are the things that concern you? Like, what do you think, or what are we gonna be dealing with in the next 15, 20 years? I mean, definitely circadian disruption, you know, that's something that today we have disruption you know that's that's something that today we have you know all different types of entertainment digital devices things like that to keep us entertained 24 hours a day. It's taking it's you know making rest really difficult and it's affecting sleep where more

Starting point is 00:59:41 stressed out than we've ever been you. I think that we have fewer and fewer healthy ways of dealing with that stress. Exercise, leisure time, recreational activity is at an all time, or exercise activity is at an all time low. Diets, our diets have become so mangled. Our food supplies become so industrialized. Most of the calories that we now consume

Starting point is 01:00:07 come from ultra processed foods. I don't really see it getting any better. I mean, I think people are becoming more informed, which is a great thing. But at the end of the day, I think people need to take more accountability for their own health. And, you know, I don't know.

Starting point is 01:00:23 It is, I mean is the biggest producers of foods are found in market economies. And those markets will follow the consumer. So I think if people are more educated and start to make decisions that are different, then you'll start to see the market follow. But right now, what people are going for is the convenience. And then the, you know the, for lack of a better term, addictive properties of processed foods, because they're engineered to be so hyper palatable that, you know, and they're easy. So it's like, if you have kids and you don't got time and,

Starting point is 01:00:55 well, they don't eat this, but they'll eat that. So let me buy them and they'll eat whatever I get. You know, Netflix, baby, so don't. Yeah, exactly. And so I think that tends to be a problem. We have friends in our, in this fitness and health space that get really angry when people say things like process sugar is bad and they say no no the evidence shows that if the calories are low and the macros match or whatever yeah sugar is not bad would you would you well it's but the thing is it's not just it's not just about marketing and the onus isn't just on the food manufacturers. I mean, I think we live lifestyles today that are so disharmonious with the kind of environment in which our brains evolved, that they're literally leaving them whether or not we're conscious of it, screaming

Starting point is 01:01:37 out for help. I mean, people that sit behind desks for nine hours a day, literally like zero dopamine over the course of your workday, right? They get home from work, all they want to do is emotionally, you know, get a tiny hit of dopamine from the kind of food that brings them the most pleasure. Sure, right. It's like a way of relieving stress. I mean, I was having this conversation with one of my brothers

Starting point is 01:01:59 the other day who does sales for like this tech company. And his job is so difficult. It's like suited for his personality, but it's literally like no dopamine. Whereas us, we have these entrepreneurial lifestyles that thankfully we've had the mental and emotional fortitude to go and pursue these kinds of jobs that we have.

Starting point is 01:02:19 But my brother, he works nine hours days at this desk, zero dopamine, zero pleasure, zero joy, having conversations with people about, we were joking about meeting, the kinds of phrases that people use in meetings all the time. Like, let's circle back on that. I don't know. Like, these phrases that everybody has in a meeting,

Starting point is 01:02:41 they just have them sort of on like, they press buttons and it's like, let's circle back on that. I'm gonna loop this person in. I'm gonna keep the S reports out I keep the S reports. Yeah, or like I'm gonna fuck and so that's basically For most people's lives what they have to sort of wrap their brains around so that by the time they get home Or you know by the time the weekend comes around. It's like they go overboard with escapism

Starting point is 01:03:03 You know, it's either escapism through food or escapism with drugs or going to a concert and blasting out your eardrums to feel a sense of connection with the people that you're standing with and listening to music together with. So it's just like, we've become really at a balance. And I just think it's...

Starting point is 01:03:21 So when you help somebody like that, and I can't imagine what your DMs look like. I know a mind look like it, and I don't post it as good of information as you post on yours. So I imagine you get flooded with questions, and I know how hard it is for us to answer questions because there's so many variabilities. Do you have like big rocks that you tell someone

Starting point is 01:03:38 in that exact situation like where to start? Man, you know, I've been pretty lucky in the sense that my parents always kind of pushing me to follow my bliss. And so that's, you know, that's, I would start there. I would start, you know, kind of listening and kind of hearing the message behind the message. And I don't know, I think, I think many people don't live the lives that they've imagined for themselves out of fear, maybe. And I feel like once you're able to, I don't know, shed the fear and do a level of introspection, I guess,

Starting point is 01:04:21 and to kind of put yourself out there and to discover, to try to discover what it is that you're that you're into. You know, it might take a little bit of experimentation. Malcolm Gladwell calls this concerted cultivation, but really kind of like opening the door to enough experiences where you can allow yourself to feel what it is to come alive. You know, I think once you have that, you should go in that direction. I mean, we're only here for like a blip on the radar. So when you talk to your brother,

Starting point is 01:04:49 is that kind of like what you're nudging him to do? Is like, hey, bro, like, I have. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, I have. I mean, I think, you know, especially for, you know, one of my brothers had, he has like ADD, which I think we all have ADD. Um, what did you say?

Starting point is 01:05:04 ADD. That I think we all have ADD. What did you say? ADD. That's cruel. Yeah. But yeah, I mean, there's a disproportionate amount of entrepreneurs that with ADD, and I think it's because an ADD brain is essentially a brain that's hardwired for novelty seeking, and would have been the ultimate hunter gather.

Starting point is 01:05:19 I mean, you would have been like a tribe leader, if you had ADD as a hunter gatherer. It's essentially a brain that rewards you for seeking out new foraging opportunities and bridging new connections and maybe doing a little more exploring than the average person. And today, that person, I feel like,

Starting point is 01:05:34 is gonna struggle under the constraints of, a desk job. So. I read an interesting article on that where this author was, he was speculating as to one of the reasons why there ADD is so much higher in a country like America. And one of the speculations he had was well, you know, this is a country made up of totally of immigrants, bunch of people who left countries in safety and came to a totally unknown place. It's like, I bet a lot of them had ADD and about a lot of us are from these people with ADD.

Starting point is 01:06:04 Totally, totally. I mean, I think we've path them had ADD, and about a lot of us are from these people with ADD. Totally, totally. I mean, I think we've pathologized ADD, but I don't think it's a problem. I think it's a context-specific problem. It's a problem if you're trying to fit yourself in a nine to five job, where you've got to sit in a cubicle all day, answering phones and doing things like that.

Starting point is 01:06:20 But for somebody who's like me, like getting, every day is different, I mean, it's amazing. Right. It's also amazing what a difference, I have two kids, and so I look at, you know, I look at how they behave and the friends behave, and then I do a lot, read a lot about children behavior,

Starting point is 01:06:34 and it's funny how much you can control or seem to get rid of ADD symptoms or ADHD symptoms, by having kids go outside and play and exercise and then feeding them a good diet. It's incredible. The difference you see in them. 100%. I mean, there's really, there's some small studies using omega-3s and kids with ADD seems

Starting point is 01:06:54 to improve executive function. ADD is considered a problem related to executive function, which is sensory gating, attentional control, tuning out distractions, delaying gratification, all prefrontal cortex stuff. And they're mediated, it seems, according to the literature that I reviewed, by in a significant way, by our diets and our lifestyles. Exercise, I think, so important. Eating a healthy diet, really, really important.

Starting point is 01:07:20 I never had good grades growing up in elementary school. My grades always suffered. I was always a favorite of the teachers because I always asked good grades growing up in elementary school. My grades always suffered. I was always, you know, a favorite of the teachers because I always asked good questions, but when it came time to actually doing my work and preparing for the test and whatever, I just like always came up short. And so my grades were always extremely mediocre.

Starting point is 01:07:38 And that's one of the reasons why, despite always really being fascinated by the human body and health and nutrition, I didn't go into medicine because I just didn't think that I'd be able to keep up in medical school. And I also grew up consuming things like corn oil, not eating any fish ever, eating only lean protein and not really eating too many eggs because my mom told me that eggs could clog my little arteries. arteries, you know? And so I'll never be able to, you know, prove with, you know, any kind of certainty that my academic problems were caused by my diet growing up, but certainly they were related. And ever since I changed my diet and started eating moral megathreys,

Starting point is 01:08:19 fewer megacixis, more vegetables, things like that, I mean, my brain I feel like has turned on. Can you speak to the benefits and maybe the misconceptions that people have with taking an omega-3? Because there's a lot of information out there in regards to taking omega-3 supplements. You've got some doctors that just tell every patient, just take it and you should take it. Everybody needs it.

Starting point is 01:08:45 We don't get enough of it. And then I've read literature that, you know, if you're over consuming six and nine, six and nine's will outcompete the threes anyways. You may as well be flushing the fucking pills down the toilet anyways. Then I've even heard some people say that they're worthless completely.

Starting point is 01:09:00 I think I just saw an article floating around Facebook just recently just that said, oh, new study comes out. It says that, oh, mega, out says that omega taking omega 3s Is a waste of time. Yeah, where do you sit in all this? I'm a big fan of omega 3s And I've definitely seen many many randomized control trials that have used Omega 3 is to positive

Starting point is 01:09:17 result I think you know Not everybody is gonna need an omega 3 supplement if you already have an optimized Omega 3 index they look at the ratio of omega-3s to omega-6s and the plasma membrane. If you're eating a diet that is biologically appropriate, it has a comparable amount of omega-3s to omega-6s, taking an omega-3 supplement is not going to help you. If you already have a condition, an inflammatory condition, I don't think that omega-3s are

Starting point is 01:09:43 going to be enough to fix that condition. But if you're eating a standard American diet, I think most people are going to see dramatic improvement in many things once they write the ratio of omega-3s to omega-6s that we are meant to consume. So, that kind of confirms what I think I teach or I say, because I think that was the best information that I ever came across in red, which is, you know, if you're lacking in it, and so this is kind of how I supplement, I pay attention to my diet.

Starting point is 01:10:11 You know, I'm pretty consistent with eating fish. And so when I'm not consistent with it, I tend to supplement with my omega three. I also pay attention to how much red meat and beef I'm consuming. And if that's really high, I'm trying to bring that back. And then I try to cycle in like white meats and fishes and things like that into my diet. So is it true that if I have extremely high, you know, let's say that's all I eat is red meat,

Starting point is 01:10:35 like a carnivore type of diet and then taking an omega three, it might take, consuming too many of the six and nine's that the three won't even matter out competing because that's what I've heard. Is that true, do you know? I mean, no, I would speculate that that would help.

Starting point is 01:10:47 If all you're doing is eating red meat, I mean, I don't eat red meat if it's not grass-fed. I just, I think it's, you know, it's not worth the additional iron that you're getting. You know, we, we, guys, we can accumulate iron. I just found out that I have this polymorphism that, that, that makes me absorb more iron. And so I've become conscious of that. You know, you don't wanna overdo it on the, absorb more iron. And so I've become conscious of that.

Starting point is 01:11:05 You don't wanna overdo it on the iron. I can get toxic. I can get toxic. Yeah, and we don't have our periods like we don't period, so it's like we don't lose iron. And it's obviously concentrated in red meat. You can also get a significant amount of iron from just from using a cast iron pan.

Starting point is 01:11:24 I started using a cast iron pan. I started using a cast iron pan because I wanted to adopt a healthier coach. We just switched to that. Yeah. Katrina came in the other day and we've got in there, fucking heavy. Heavy shit.

Starting point is 01:11:35 Yeah, you had to do it heavy. That's why it cast iron's the best. And you don't even, like the way you clean it's different. You know what I mean? Yeah, we don't use dish soap or anything or a patina. Yeah, you just scrub it with what wichima colo or whatever,

Starting point is 01:11:45 and you just leave it, you just leave some. Yeah. How did you find out that you had that polymorphism? Was it a test, like a blood work that you did? I had kind of high levels of transfer and saturation, so like iron saturation. My iron was within a normal range, but, and I'm not, you know, I literally just found this out,

Starting point is 01:12:03 so I haven't done like two deep a dive, but one interesting thing that I discovered in the couple of hours that I spent researching is that you actually can, like the only known compound to significantly block iron absorption when taken concurrently with food as calcium. So if you have one of these polymorphisms,

Starting point is 01:12:25 because the risk is that you can develop something called hereditary hemochromatosis, which basically is an excessive accumulation of iron, and people that have that actually have to, I think once a week or once a month give blood to get rid of that excessive iron. Well iron oxidizes, obviously. Yeah, rust.

Starting point is 01:12:45 What's what happens to your body with too much of it? Crazy. It ages faster and the way oxidizes faster. Isn't that weird? So, yeah, so I mean, just, you know, I've become a little bit more conscious of that. And so when it comes to red meat, I really look at it as an amazing way

Starting point is 01:13:01 to get in a broad array of nutrients. But if it's not grass-fed, then I don't think it's worth it, because a grass fed piece of meat has an omega-3 to omega-6 ratio that mirrors that of a healthy human brain. Whereas when you get grain fed meat, it's much higher skewed in favor of omega-6s.

Starting point is 01:13:18 You get less CLA, you get vitamin K2, so it's just not as nutrient dense. Are you familiar with how different it is? So we're sponsored by Butcherbox, and one of the things I love about this is their grass-fed, grass-finished. Is there a major difference between grass-fed, grass-finished, and then just grass-fed that you're aware when it comes to the nutrient balance? You definitely want grass-fed, grass-finished, because if it's grain-finished, that really

Starting point is 01:13:40 is what moves the needle on the healthiness of the meat, because they essentially fatten it up with grain, and that dictates the healthiness of the meat because they essentially fatten it up with grain. And that dictates the healthiness of the fat that's going to be in the meat. So it is important because I think that's one of the hustles that you see in the grocery stores now is, you know, they're advertising it as grass fed within the final week or two. They're still pumpin' it full of grain to fatten it up. So it still tastes amazing too. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:14:02 I saw beef turkey the other day and it was like, it said 100% grass-fed beef and then in smaller fonts that used 100% grass-fed beef, grass-fed beef used, which means that they could use grass-fed beef, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it's all grass-fed. Oh. You know? It's just like, these, wow. So these are the ingredients.

Starting point is 01:14:20 You can get away with it. All right. Oh, we use grass-fed beef. Yeah. For like 10% of our. The grass-fed beef that we use is 100% grass-fed. Yeah, that's cool. That's cool. Oh, wow.

Starting point is 01:14:31 We're always getting hustled. That's such bullshit. What are the top, what would you say are the top things? People generally should avoid in their diets. Like, what are the big, you know, bad, evil things, and most people's diets that they should probably avoid? Man, I'd, I mean, you know, we've, I think we've talked about like the grain and seed oils,

Starting point is 01:14:50 those are pretty bad for you. They are. Like the hydrogenated vegetable oils or? Well, they're not even hydrogenated, but canola oil, corn oil, grape seed oil, they all have trace levels of trans fats. Five up to five percent trans fats found in, you know, organic non-GMO

Starting point is 01:15:05 canola oil that you buy at Whole Foods is gonna have trans fats due to the deodorization process. Well, and then that's what they actually use when they cook in their little, oh fuck. Yeah. Oh, that's why I don't need, I don't need it. That's toxic. Coconut oil is not toxic.

Starting point is 01:15:19 That's because there's no safe level of trans fat consumption. What a bummer, that's Whole Foods. We trust you, Whole Foods. What a bummer. That's all foods. Yeah, we trust you whole food Yeah, we can't anymore. I mean, you put all your trust in corporation. No I mean you guys know that's the brain. That's the oil they use the I don't ask. Yeah, I don't know why you know why food that's our Prisbee. It's cheap because it's subsidized right it's so cheap. It's a subsidized oil

Starting point is 01:15:41 Just like all the things that we like court, like why are they used? Corn syrup on you whole face. I know, it's not what, yeah. It's the same reason why corn oil, not health foods. Corn syrup is used instead of what was it called? Sugar, subsidized. Yeah, yeah. I would take food, my food,

Starting point is 01:15:58 sauteed in butter, coconut oil, any day over canola oil. It's really unhealthy. And you know, people tend to think that canola oil is healthy because it contains omega-3s, but omega-3s are actually even more vulnerable to the oxidation process than omega-6s. These oils, they undergo extraction using harsh chemical solvents, heat, machinery, then they go through these other industrial steps. One of them is deodorization, makes them tasteless.

Starting point is 01:16:28 I mean, taking oil like extra virgin olive oil, it's got a very distinct flavor, right? These, conversely, like corn oil, can oil, soybean oil, they're engineered to have no flavor. And manufacturers love that because it allows them to use them in anything from salad dressings to mayonnaise, which I've heard you guys talk about, to granola bars. They use it as a varnish to coat roasted nuts and dried fruits and things like that. So it's like, you know, they're pretty unhealthy. And so I would say that that is definitely one of the things that I've like, I don't, you know, if I'm traveling I'm on the road,

Starting point is 01:17:06 I'm getting some canola oil, I know it. But when I'm home and I'm cooking, you know, you're never gonna find anything made with canola oil in my house. Yeah. What about sugar? Sugar's bad. You know, it's funny when I talk about...

Starting point is 01:17:21 That's a sound bite we're gonna use right there. Yeah, that's it. Just a sugar's bad. Just stir some shit right there. Well, but the thing is, okay, so funny when I talk about... It's a sound bite we're gonna use right there. Yeah, that's what I'm talking about. Just a shirt's bad, just stir some shit right there. Well, but the thing is okay, so we talk about like on Instagram, I feel like there's this thing, there's the whole like calories and calories out. Yes. And so I know many people in the fitness community are like,

Starting point is 01:17:35 sugar isn't bad. If you're eating more calories than you're burning, that's bad. Yeah, I have a way of, bro. It's like the calories in calories outmodel, but I'm, you know, having chronically elevated levels of insulin in your body, which occur as a result of chronic sugar consumption is no bueno.

Starting point is 01:17:52 It's not good for anybody. Whether or not you're trying to gain muscle or lean out or whatever, so I eat a low sugar diet, I eat a very low grain diet, and the only times that I'll really eat sugar or grain is in the post workout window. When I know that that sugar, those carbs, that glucose is going to serve me by refilling my muscles with glygogen, you know.

Starting point is 01:18:11 Not to mention 90% of the population walk around 90% of the time in a fucking surplus. So, exactly. When you look at it, I mean, we're doing both. Because if we were all in a deficit and if everybody was equally in a deficit and we're having a little bit of sugar here and there we'd all be fucking skinny Exactly. That's not the case. No, it's like these Instagram fitness gurus. They're like pizza doesn't make you fat Eating more calories than your burning makes you fat. I'm like well obviously. Yeah, but are you telling people you know in a nation where 50% of us at least are either pre-diabetic or diabetic

Starting point is 01:18:45 and way more are hyper-insulinemic, that pizza is okay. And plus we all we look at is obesity. And yes, obesity is a risk factor for all these chronic illnesses. However, a sizable minority of people who have things like diabetes and dementia related stuff in chronic disease

Starting point is 01:19:05 are normal weight. There's a decent, there's millions of Americans who have diabetes who are never overweight. There's millions of Americans who get a heart attack who weren't overweight. So, the whole focus on being overweight, I can't base it on your physique. Yeah, no, that's the only thing.

Starting point is 01:19:22 In fact, sometimes I think it's probably a gift for some people to become overweight because at least they have an outward sign. Yeah, no, that's the only thing. In fact, sometimes I think it's probably a gift for some people to become overweight because at least they have an outward sign. Yeah, yeah. I'm like, oh, maybe I should clean up my diet. Exactly, exactly. Sadly, that's the incentive for most people, right? That's a side.

Starting point is 01:19:35 Not going to the doctor and seeing that you've got, an A1C of 5.8, almost, it's just, it's crazy. So I'm gonna take a left with you right now because we could talk nutrition all day long with you. I love it. But I like talking about your sex life and things that are off like that. So I mean, you're on TV, you've just got

Starting point is 01:19:55 a New York Times bestseller, you got a podcast going, you're traveling all over the world, you got beautiful women around you all the time. How happy are you right now? First of all, I don't know. I don't know. All those things are fucking

Starting point is 01:20:09 just training you in awesome pictures. Yeah, yeah. Most of the beautiful, I don't have beautiful women around me all the time. Just every time we see you. Every time I see you. Yeah. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:20:18 Every time. I do have a number of female friends who are very, who are brilliant, who are kind, who are attractive. Most of them have boyfriends and or husbands. But no, I'm, you know. We're teasing you. No, I mean, I'm very, I would say I'm mostly happy. I'm still very, you know, like, I'm very happy that I've been able to channel what's going on in my home life with my mom

Starting point is 01:20:47 into something positive and that makes me feel like I've got a career that's going well, that makes me feel really good. But I'm upset by the fact that my mom is very sick and that is horrible to have to contend with. I mean, I'm with her, like I was just yesterday, I spent a lot of time with her. She has like this stomach pain that's like non-specific and her ability to communicate is like extremely limited. She's becoming, you know, more catatonic by the day. And, you

Starting point is 01:21:22 know, she's still, my mom has pigments in her hair, she's blonde, like it's just horrendous to see what she's having to go through. And I'm the point person in my family, I'm the person in the family, obviously that has to, not has to, but that's, everybody loves to. That's equipped to take her to these doctor appointments and so, but at the same time, like, I also want own life. I'm super happy to be out here. But it has to be fucking so hard. Yeah, I'm going to Burning Man for the first time this week. I'm gonna be out of town for a while.

Starting point is 01:21:55 Ultimately, I wanna be back in LA, like most of my friends, girls and guys, like my dating life is in Los Angeles. It's not in New York, in New York. I don't date ever, because I'm just so wrapped up in my family. I live with my brother in this tiny little apartment. It's really difficult. I would be in LA.

Starting point is 01:22:13 I would have a normal life. I would have a car. I don't have any of that stuff. I'm back and forth. I can't. So that, to me, is stressful, and that's not ideal. So one of the major reasons why my dating life sucks Do you struggle with that decision sometimes of like doing that?

Starting point is 01:22:31 Where I'm sure you're constantly being reached out to like you said because you're the point man. Yeah situation where you're like I mean, well when people reach out to me it makes me feel so good that it like It makes it all worth it right like I mean, that's the fact that I've kind of like sacrificed in many ways my life for the family, but I also don't wanna, I also am cognizant of the fact that I could easily 10 years from now look back at my life and say that I regret not living more of it for me.

Starting point is 01:23:00 So I'm trying to sort of strike that balance and spend more time doing what it is I love. But the sole reason why I spend time in New York is because my family, I wouldn't be in New York if it wasn't for that. It wasn't for that. You're such a good person man, very, very likable and a very, very good person.

Starting point is 01:23:17 And I think your family's blessed to have you. But I do wanna ask you about Burning Man, you excited? To whom I'm so excited. I've never been. Yeah. Either of we. Oh man. We need to get back in.

Starting point is 01:23:29 We can't get us to go and we're like, ah! Are you going to remain sober while you're out there? Are you going to do what's going on? Because everybody out there apparently, I've never been out there. Yeah. But I know you don't smoke weed. Just give us a wink.

Starting point is 01:23:37 You don't drink. You don't do anything. You're just going to go on and watch everybody get weird. I'll tell you what, I do have lots of electrolytes. I brought lots of electrolytes. Oh, you're electrolytes with me. That is important, sir. You nerd. You nerd. I'm thinking about it. I got literally like a fucking vial of real salt in my backpack. I'm like I'm gonna be pounding that shit, putting it

Starting point is 01:23:58 in my camel back. No, I, I'm super excited. First of all, there needs to be a mind pump camp at Burning Man, I feel like that would be epic. Oh, wow. But no, yeah, I, like I have, you know, I would say, I don't really enjoy alcohol all that much. I definitely don't like weed, but I have experimented with, you know, mushrooms

Starting point is 01:24:21 and I do find them to be like a powerful Neuotropic. And they enhance my executive function. So I'm like, you're talking about micro-dosing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm thinking of mega-dosing, gonna do that. No, no, no, no, no. I don't like chemically induced anxiety and once I experienced like a little bit of anxiety from them

Starting point is 01:24:41 and I definitely don't want that feeling. But like, yeah, I don't like, I don't like ever losing control, ever. But I do feel like it's, you know, they've done these like really interesting FMRI studies where, you know, it, you know, creates connectivity between disparate brain regions that I'm normally talking to, you know, one another.

Starting point is 01:25:00 And to me, that's really cool. I definitely have noticed that, you know, and I've tried them. And I don't endorse trying them publicly because they're, you know, but the research out of Johns Hopkins and NYU, super fascinating, we've talked about this, yeah. And yeah, I mean, just, you know, personal experience,

Starting point is 01:25:19 like definitely have, who are you rolling out there with? What's your own secret? And what it sounds like. Big group or by yourself, what are you going with? Going with two close friends and then we're part of a camp and then just having lived in a life for such a long time, I have.

Starting point is 01:25:32 Gonna know a ton of friends. Yeah. Did you bring like weird, are you gonna wear like steam punk clothes and shit? No. I went, I'm such a like neurotic, like, I just don't wanna die. I wanna like make that.

Starting point is 01:25:44 Yeah. Like zinc oxide. I'm like, I neurotic, like I just don't want to die. I want to like make that. Yeah. Like zinc oxide. I'm like, I need my electrolytes. I'm like, should I bring like protein powders or like, but no, I went to this place, like uni-close, I don't know if you've heard of uni-close. We all were big fans of it on the East Coast because they make super high tech.

Starting point is 01:26:02 It's a Japanese company. They make super high tech like functional clothing that keeps you warm. And so I bought all this like warm shit to wear at night. So does that say no to you? So does that say no to you? No, no, no. Maybe next year, maybe the second year. All right.

Starting point is 01:26:15 This year I'm just, I'm literally- You're observing this year. All right. I'm excited that you're going because I feel like you're one of our buddies that we connect to what you do in the last- You're like a version of me going to Burning Man. Yeah, exactly. I'm saying, so I'm gonna wait for you if you come back okay.

Starting point is 01:26:28 Maybe I'll go. We got you in, I think you're at podcast hard, right? And at the end of September, we'll see you out in Tahoe. Won't we? Are you out there? Yeah, that'll be a fun event too. We're excited for that. We're just gonna be a party on Saturday.

Starting point is 01:26:39 That's gonna be cool. Well, I tell you what, if you haven't listened to Max's podcast, the genius life, you gotta listen to it. Excellent, excellent podcast. You are definitely one of our favorite people, so we'll do this again at some point. Absolutely. Either we'll see you down in LA or we'll have you back up here.

Starting point is 01:26:57 Have a great time in Burning Man. Please don't die. Yeah, yeah, don't die, man. Stay alive. We like you. We like you a lot, man. We like you a lot, man. And that's it, brother.

Starting point is 01:27:06 Good to see you again. Thank you, man. Sam, you guys rule. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health and energy, and maximize your overall performance, check out our discounted RGB Superbumble at Mind Pump Media dot com. The RGB Superbumble includes maps on the ball, maps to performance, and maps to static. www.mapsanabolic.com Over 200 videos, the RGB Superbundle is like having Sal and an adjustment as your own personal

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Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 847: Max Lugavere of The Genius Life Podcast

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