The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 534: Dr. Will Cole - Healing The Shame Fueled Relationship Between What You Eat and How You Feel (Gut Feelings)

Episode Date: July 2, 2023

Text Hawk to 66866 to become part of "Mindful Monday." Join 10's of thousands of your fellow learning leaders and receive a carefully curated email from me each Monday morning to help you start your week off right... Full show notes at www.LearningLeader.com Twitter/IG: @RyanHawk12   https://twitter.com/RyanHawk12 You can't heal a body you hate. We only get one body. It's all we have. If it stops working or is working poorly, that affects all other elements of our lives. It's worth it to make this our top priority. We're looking for optimal, not average. If you're listening to this podcast, you probably do not want to be average. And when it comes to the most important thing in your life (your body), I would hope that you don't want that to be average. To be an effective leader for others, our body needs to be in optimal shape. Cut these 5 foods: Gluten-containing grains Industrial seed oils Added sugar, Conventional dairy Alcohol After over a decade as a functional medicine expert, Dr. Cole discerned that shame can cause gut inflammation and sabotage wellness through what he's named "Shameflammation." When you send signals to your brain that you are overwhelmed, overworked, or overtired, your body reacts. Shameflammation can be the cause of chronic health conditions such as autoimmune disorders, depression, and more. Chronic stress is the ultimate junk food." Too much sugar has consequences beyond the waistline. Functional medicine is informed consent. 75% of your immune system is in your gut. Get back on track. Days are long, years are short. Testosterone Replacement Therapy? Work with a doctor, get labs, and choose to use based on what your doctor and your labs say. "Use meals as a medicine and a meditation." "Ask yourself... Does this food love me back?"  

Staying in my lane and relentlessly pursuing a passion, which my passion has been to impart wellness for people. When you are a conduit for that flow state, good things happen and you love what you do and you have great outcomes. People can see that and want the best. And that's what we strive for. Welcome to The Learning Leaders Show presented by Insight Global. I am your host, Ryan Hawk. Thank you so much for being here. Text, Hawk to 666866 to become part of Mindful Monday. You, along with tens of thousands of other learning leaders from all over the world, will receive a carefully curated email for me each Monday morning to help you start your week off right.

You'll also receive details about how my book, The Pursuit of Excellence, will help you become a more effective leader. Text, Hawk to 66866. Now, on to tonight's feature leader. This one is super important. Dr. Will Cole, health advisor to Gwyneth Paltrow, top functional medicine practitioner and New York Times, bestselling author has dedicated his career to teaching people to apply skepticism to nutritional trends and instead pay closer attention to their own intuition.

His new book, Gut Feelings, Demystifies the Gut Brain Connection and provides a framework to repair the relationship between what you eat and how you feel. During this conversation, we discuss what exactly a functional medical doctor is and how one could help you. Then the relationship between your physical and your mental health. Then at the end, Dr. Cole prescribes a plan you can put in place right now to set yourself up to be in prime condition moving forward. Ladies and gentlemen, this one is so important. It's Dr. Will Cole. All right, Dr. Will Cole.

It's great to have you here on the Learning Leader Show. Welcome. My friend. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it. So I'm curious, what is a functional medicine expert? So I'm a functional medicine doctor, functional medicine practitioner. Those are like the technical term.

So people call me an expert and I guess that works too. I mean, we started one of the first functional medicine telehealth centers over 13 years ago. And that's been my day job ever since. from typically I'm home right now, but typically throughout the work week, 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., I'm running the telehealth clinic, and we get to consult people around the world and provide a functional medicine perspective on what they're dealing with. So what functional medicine is specifically, if I had to boil it down, like what are the main differences between what we do and what we to compare and contrast it with conventional medicine? And it doesn't have to be either or.

I think that this is really the way that health care will be in the future or should be. We have mainstream institutions like the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio. They have a functional medicine center. All the doctors there at the Cleveland Clinic's Functional Medicine Center are trained through what's called the Institute for Functional Medicine or IFM. That's who's trained myself, my team. So this is not an either or us versus them. It should be a both-and approach to health care.

So the main differences is we interpret labs using a thinner reference range. So anybody that's listening or watching this, they'll know, hey, here's my lab. There's my number on this lab that I got from my PCP. And then this reference range that I'm being compared to, this X to Y interval of numbers, we get that reference range that you're being compared to largely from a statistical bell curve average of people who go to labs. Think about it for a moment. People that are predominantly going to labs are sadly people that are feeling some sort of

way. They're dealing with some health issues. That's why are they going to the labs. So comparing yourself with people that don't feel good, that don't have good health, is no way for you to find out how you can feel your best. So in functional medicine, we're looking at optimal, not average. And many people go to the doctor and the doctor runs basic labs and they say, everything's fine, even though they know this fatigue, this weight loss.

resistance, this anxiety, this brain fog, these digestive problems, this whatever sort of inflammatory symptoms, this isn't normal for me. And they're told, you know, you're just stressed, you're just depressed, you're just getting older, you're just a new mom. Many new moms are told this. What they're intentionally or unintentionally telling you is you're a lot like the other people with health problems that we're comparing you to. So that's the first thing we're looking. We're looking at a tighter interval of numbers within that larger reference range. Where does vibrant wellness reside. Where does optimal, like longevity, long, healthy lives live? That's the functional range or where our body is functioning the best. That's where we get our name, functional medicine.

Second thing we do differently is we run more comprehensive labs. So we're data driven. And our top patient base, statistically, I think, is not a coincidence. Are people, entrepreneurs, leaders, people that run things. We see a lot of school teachers. We see a lot of nurses. because they have a love of spreadsheets and getting to the root cause and seeing improvements, seeing good outcomes based off of effort and intention and protocols. So we want to look at what's the underlying root issue of why I have the problem in the first place. So we look at things like underlying gut problems or chronic infections or nutrient deficiencies or hormonal imbalances or things like how does things like unresolved trauma and chronic stress

impact our physical health. We want to look at these confluence of factors based on data and see that data improve. And then we realize we're all different. That's the third thing we do differently. It's bio-individuality. And you're not going to have a cookie cutter one-size-fits-all approach to getting healthy. So it's really curated, tailored health care based on the individual. So we use food as medicine.

We use natural medicines. We use biohacking, mind-body practices. We use medications when needed to really be like what's the most of, effective, what's the biggest needle movers in my life to get a good outcome. So that's my long-winded answer of what we do. So would you ask? I appreciate it. I'm actually curious to potentially be a patient of yours if that's even a possibility. Yeah, of course. Take the place of a primary care practitioner? We don't because we're in telehealth. And we working can, well, and let's just say this, if somebody has a local PCP or endocrinologist or rheumatologist or whatever,

specialists, we would work. If we need to work in conjunction with them, we will. Most of the time, we don't need to because we're serving as a coach in a way where we are coaching them into wellness. We are running labs and showing them the data on their health and getting them healthy. And if they are on a medication, their local doctors adjusting that based on what we're doing and we're looping them in. We have like a fax and email relationship with their,

local doctor if we run labs and they want to loop their doctors in. It's up to the patient if they want to loop them in or not. I was going to say, so I told you before we're recording Will that that I learned a lot about you from my wife and she kind of gets info from you will pass it on to me to say you need to tell your primary care practitioner these are the labs you have to run because he's a very nice man. I've known him for a long time. Good guy. However, it seems to be the way the industry is set up as I say I have this pain or this issue. and here is some medicine, right? Yeah.

And what I would prefer, whether it's my health or really anything in life, is let's figure out what's the root cause there. It seems like that's where you're at. Instead of just saying, this pain, take this pill, this pain, take this pill, do this surgery, whatever it may be. Well, no, let's try to figure it out so we can be, I guess, live a more optimized life and be more knowledgeable about what's going on as opposed to just waiting for pain and then fixing the pain temporarily until the next pain happens.

Right. Yeah, it's the way the system set up. So like you said, it's not an individual doctor doing one thing wrong or not. It's just the training in the standard model of care is largely to diagnose the disease, like you said, and match it with a medication. It's pharmacology. That's basically it. Things are changing.

Like I said, the Cleveland Clinic now has a functional medicine center. Most of my colleagues are conventionally trained medical doctors who then were like, I want to get to the root cause. I got into this to help people, and they did postdoctor training through the Institute for Functional Medicine. So things are changing. But then, okay, then they're in a system that tells them they have 10 minutes with them and their insurance will only cover the medication.

So it's not a lack of doctors trying. It's just the system is really based off of pharmacology, which serves some people and some people need that. And many of us will need it at some point in our life. But it shouldn't be the only tool within our toolbox. Yeah. So do you work with insurance carriers? I mean, it has to be a part of it, right? It's it is a part of functional medicine. And it is, it's less of a part of my world because I'm in telehealth and we are a concierge functional medicine clinic, which allows us the freedom and the flexibility to provide people what they need and not what the system says they get. But insurance does offset some of the cost of labs. So that's where insurance does play a role in what I do.

Because if you do blood tests, if you have insurance, you can go to LabCorp request when we run the requisition forms. And that is covered by insurance. But now there are other labs that are not covered by insurance. So even that does not cover some of these more specialized labs that are not yet as of yet. Other than health savings accounts and flex spend accounts, if someone has an HSA or FSA, that's different. They typically can use that like for how they wish and use that for our services.

Got you. So I want to dig into some of your most recent work, gut feelings, right? Great title for a book, by the way. Great cover, everything about it. But you initially start writing about this bi-directional relationship between your physical and emotional world. Can you tell me more about that? Yeah. So it's a central part of our work. And it's just now an outward conversation I'm having with somebody that's not a patient of mine. But it's the fact that mental health is not separate from physical health. And in the West, well, we have done that. We've separated it. But things are changing. And I wanted to have a functional medicine conversation about it. The fact that it is one and the same, mental health is physical health. Our brain is a part of our body just as much as anything else is. So we relegate it to this sort of abstract, quote unquote, chemical imbalance, which is, you know, flimsy science at best. But the really understanding the bidirectional relationship. between mental health and physical health. So that title gut feelings, why I titled it,

many reasons, but one of it is both sides, gut and feelings. But also our ancestors, and somehow within like our modern lexicon, the cliches of, I feel it in my gut, you know, butterflies in my stomach, gut feelings, gut instincts. Why do we say these things? Somehow our ancestors knew that our seat, the soul was in the gut. Somehow people knew that intuition and like a, you know, gut feeling and a knowingness is in somewhere there, right, either metaphorically or physically. And it's both. It is metaphysical, but it is also physical. Because the physicality of it is your gut and brain are actually formed from the same fetal tissue. So when babies are growing in their mother's womb, they are grown from that same tissue and they're inextricably linked for the rest

of our life through what's known as the, in the research and the scientific literature, as the gut, axis or the connection between the gut and the brain. They actually refer to the gut as the second brain. And if you think about it, the intestines kind of even resemble the brain. 95% of serotonin, you're happy a neurotransmitter, is made in the gut. 50% of dopamine, your pleasure neurotransmitter is made in the gut. And they work upon what's called the vagus nerve. How your gut produces these neurotransmitters and does, they don't pass through the blood-brain barrier. It's not a chemical imbalance, it is a chemical messenger to what's called a the vagus nerve, which is the largest cranial nerve in the body, which is responsible for that resting, digesting state, that regulate nervous system

regulation state. So many people that are struggling with different health issues, metabolic issues, anxiety, fatigue, digestive problem, they have what researchers call a poor vagal tone or weak vagal tone. Their vagus nerve is weak. And a lot of what I do is looking at how do we strengthen the vagus nerve, how do we improve gut health and the innervation between the gut and the brain to optimize brain function, optimize gut health and the connection between the two, and how we have to do with both sides, gut and feelings to do so foods play a major role in that on the gut side. And on the feeling side, these mind-body practices are very important to improve vagal tone, the breathwork. and meditation and somatic practices. And we implement EMDR for people that need it, like trauma work. So these are the functional medicine tools within the toolbox that we have to explore.

So gut feelings is just my explaining this functional medicine approach on these topics. It seems that you read about and meet people and people are more open about talking about the fact that they take antidepressants, that there are all sorts of anxiety issues, especially with kids, teenagers. This seems to be all everywhere. And to me, again, it gets back to what happens. You say there's an issue, here's a pill. You say there's an issue, here's a pill. And I just hate that that's the way it's become.

So one, why are we so quick? I'm not a doctor, so I may talk out of school and sound like an idiot here. But why are we so quick to say, oh, well, that's depression, here's a pill. Or here's how to manage your mood or whatever may be. Is it just because it's quicker and easier and everybody wants something quicker and easier or what is it that got us to this place? Because I feel like your way could be more natural, could certainly be healthier, could not have you be stuck taking pills every single day.

But it probably is the harder path because it takes more time, it takes more effort. You have to think about it, right? You've got to probably get blood work regularly things people don't want to do. So I'm just curious how we got here and what are some ways maybe if somebody is there that's listening, they could maybe move away from that and get more closer to stuff that you do. Yeah. And look, I think it's important for people to realize that functional medicine isn't anti-medication. So it's we're pro-choice, right?

Right. We're in pro-informed consent. We're pro people making the decision that's best for them. And to have informed consent, though, you have to know the risk factors and you have, you have to know the other options you may have. Many people think that's the only option they have. It is that pharmaceutical. Like that's, that's what I've given.

Well, there's actually a lot more options than that for most people, but it's not discussed. And they're not, and the side effects, potential side effects are oftentimes not discussed. And if it is, it's very flippantly and very in passing. So people just need to be educated and empowered about what they're putting in their body, what they're spending their time and money on. And we just ask the criteria, like, what is your most effective option that causes you the least amount of side effects? And for some people, those medications are going to fit that criteria. Some people are alive because of medications.

But oftentimes it doesn't fit the criteria. It's not the most effective, yet it's the only option given, and it has a lot of potential side effects, and not just potential side effects, but actual side effects. So that's what's at play here, not just for mental health care, but for any other sphere of pharmaceuticals you can talk about. So it should be people having choices, what they want to do. When you're talking specifically about antidepressants or things like anxiety and depression, right? The reality is this concept of a neurotransmitter deficiency is really not backed by

heart science. It's not. There is, it is a component of it for some people, but it is really more than anything brilliant marketing from an industry and lots of money over a long period of time. And, I mean, psychiatry, even if you look at this, psychiatry is the only sphere of medicine that does not measure or run labs on the organ that it's treating. So it's based largely on theory. And it's based largely on research shows this. It works antidepressants for most people work the same as placebo. That does not make placebo is bad. Placebo is mind over matter. Pacebo is believing in something going to help you and it does. So it may it's and I know antidepressants are lifesavers for some people. But we have to understand, well, what is the mechanism of action if it is helping some people?

Some researchers are postulating that it may be the fact that antidepressants act as a mild anti-inflammatory, which is interesting. There's a field of research called the cytokine model of cognitive function. Cytokines are pro-inflammatory cells. So it's researchers looking at how does inflammation impact mental health? How does inflammation impact things like anxiety, depression, fatigue, and ADHD and autism? And researchers found, well, inflammation is actually a part of all of those issues in most people. So if you have an antidepressant and it lowers inflammation slightly, that may be how it's actually working.

It's not actually the serotonin effect is actually not how it's helping people, which is interesting. But I would say for a vast majority of people that are given those medications, there are more effective ways with no side effects on how you can lower inflammation levels. And then you look at some of these medications that are given out, and I'm not shading PCPs, but I think in many ways, classes of drugs like benzos and some of these other medications really should prescribe if they're going to be prescribed by psychiatrists, because they are given out very flippantly and really can be difficult to come off of. It's impacting your neurochemistry. So I think if people are going to do it, they should just know what is their

most effective option that causes them the least amount of side effects and decide for themselves what they want for their life. I would just say there's a lot more effective options for many, many, many people. And medications may be a piece of their puzzle for a time. I've seen and think classes of drugs like this that get their head above water, right? It's helping them cope with the stressful season of their life or some loss of a loved one. But what's the end game here? Why do they have the problem in the first place? It's not a medication deficiency. So let's figure out why we have the problem in the first place and that's where I come in. How does exercise play a role in this? I know you're in shape. I try to stay in shape. Exercise seven days a week. I'm a no day off

guy because it fixes me mentally more than anything. It's the first thing I do every day. And if you took that away from me, I think that's the most powerful drug that I have is sweating, is doing something physically taxing, running, lifting heavy weights, stair climb, whatever. And so to me, I don't know if there is a better medicate. in the world than doing something physically hard every single day. So I'm obviously a big proponent of it. But how does that play a role in mental health? I know there's some science to back this up.

I've been reading a lot about this from Steve Magnus and Brad Stolberg have written a lot about this. These are performance coaches. You're obviously a doctor so you know probably even more. But how about movement of your body, exercising, stressing your muscles with resistance training? How does that play a role? Massive. When we look at the mental health epidemic, it is directly

proportional in many ways, and it's multifaceted. It's not just this, but it is a big component of why we are faced with such a loneliness epidemic, depression epidemic, anxiety epidemic, because people are not getting outside and moving their bodies. Not that you need to move your body outside, but both of those things. They're not, they're inside and they're not moving their body. Like the movie Wally, the Pixar film is prophetic because it came out 16, 17 years ago, 15 years ago, maybe. And that's where many people are 15 years later. They're just staring at a screen, not moving their body, lethargic. They just, it's, research shows that exercise, moving your body, picking up heavy things, walking, getting out in nature are very, very therapeutic in many ways. It's multifaceted.

It's improving oxygenation to your cells, oxygenation to your brain. It's improving mitochondrial function, which is your cellular energy. It's increasing so many different happy chemicals in the body. And it's what it's a especially high intensity interval training times of that. These are hormetic things, hormetic stressors. Even resistance training is a form of hormesis, which breaks down muscle to build it up stronger. This is important for resilience. And I think that in many ways, society lacks resilience on many different levels on a physical level, but also a mental, emotional, and spiritual level that moving our body is a central part to improving our mood physically, but on many other levels as well. And it increases something called BDNF.

It stands for brain-derived neurotropic factor, which is the ability, the brain's ability to actually make new neurons to repair. It involves neuroplasticity, which is the brain's ability to regenerate, which is hugely important for mood. And also, too, like getting healthy and all of that lowers inflammation, which I mentioned earlier, the research of showing inflammation's role on the way the brain is firing, the way the brain is operating. I sense this too. I mean, I speak with leaders all the time as part of what I do for a full time living. And one of the commonalities I've found that leaders who are making really tough decisions

that have a lot of stress, maybe they have thousands of people that report up to them if they're the CEO of a big company. And almost universally, the ones who are sustaining excellence over time have. a dedicated practice of exercising almost daily, if not every single day. And it seems when people ask me, what are commonalities and I bring up that one? You got to move. You got to lift. You got to run.

That's part of what seems to be people who are high performers. I know you work with them all the time. They have a really dedicated exercise practice. Yeah. It is so true. And you meet your body where it's at, where you're at. You know, if it's, I think the person out there that's like, dang, I'm not moving. Like, where do I start?

It's meet your body where you're at. You don't have to go and do like some hardcore stuff right out of the gate if you've if you haven't worked out in years or ever. Walking, which is not the sexiest thing in the fitness world, but it is very powerful to improve mood, to be easy on your joints if you have some arthritic issues or, you know, new to moving your body. Start with walking 20 minutes a day, every day, briskly, walking quickly. It can be powerful.

And then from there, lean in. I think that resistance training weight training is hugely powerful. People are not doing enough enough of it and we see that in muscle loss and people as we age. It's very important to pick up heavy things and that can look different ways for different people. If this is weird, I apologize in advance, but when you look at you, you have amazing hair, great skin, good looking dude, right? You look the part perfectly.

It makes sense. me, I try to deconstruct excellence. And whether that's just how you look, I have to believe that's from what you choose to do every day, what you choose to put into your body. So the natural question is I know we're all different and we all need to do our labs to understand how we're different and what works for us.

Let's say there's somebody who's not been paying attention to this, but I see this guy, Dr. Will Cole, who's good-looking man, right? Great hair, great skin, everything there. What is he eating? What does he do? What does he do every day? Maybe I could look as healthy as that guy. So can you kind of walk me through what you do?

Yeah, sure. No, I appreciate it. It's not weird at all. Look, to me, I take it as a compliment, right? We're all works in progress and, you know, whatever. I'm far from perfect. But I, it would be in a way like going to a dentist with bad teeth. I better look the part.

I better look the part because I'm talking about this stuff all day long. So here, here's the deal. I really implement all the things. I talk to my patients about, I do. It doesn't mean I do all of it, but I do what's relevant for me. I pick the tools that are the most effective for me, which we could talk about it. But I would say, too, I'm not an obsessive person in this way. I think you can get some people in wellness that are like very obsessive, which works for

some people. But I don't want to, stressing about wellness is the antithesis of what I want to do. I have enough things in my life that are high. pressure, right? I really, and that's part of the message that I'm talking about and gut feelings. I want there to be a grace. I want there to be a lightness. I want there to be an ease to wellness. So that's kind of the paradigm that I approach, whether it's movement or eating or mindfulness or sleep, as like, oh, wow, I get to do this stuff. This is a paradigm shift. This isn't like, oh, man, I have to get up and work out or I have to cook this healthy food. It's like, wow, I get to do this.

This is a privilege. This is a blessing to do it. How can I nourish my body with things that love me back? So I think coming at all of this stuff with that perspective, that mindset is a huge. It's huge because it's not this arduous, restrictive thing where it becomes this source of shame and obsession. That's the antithesis of sustainable wellness. Something I say, it's actually the back cover of gut feelings, is you can't heal a body you hate. You cannot shame your way into wellness.

You cannot obsess your way into health. You can use it as a springboard. I'm totally fine with that. If you want to get, if certain personalities are get that sort of type A all in, that can work. But the long-term relationship you have with food and your body and wellness has to be a form of self-respect and wanting to use self-care as a form of self-respect. So my day-to-day practice is I typically will intermittent fast in the morning. sometimes I flip it and I will eat, have breakfast and then just end dinner earlier in the day. My last meal will be earlier in the day.

So I'm normally getting around, I would say, a 16-hour intermittent fast. I go deeper sometimes. I go lighter sometimes to like a 12-12, but I vacillate somewhere around that. I'm not obsessive about it, but it works for me. I enjoy it. It kind of improves my brain function, my energy levels. helps my metabolism, but I'm not cutting calories, I'm eating food within that window of eating.

And it just ebbs and flows from that. But I eat lots of vegetables, lots of fruit, lots of clean protein, wild caught fish, grass-fed beef. And I will regularly implement like gut-supporting protocols that I talk about and gut feelings, lots of soups and stews, and people should regularly have these things. to be supportive of their health because your gut is such a massive influencer of your brain

and also 75% of your immune system is in your gut. Inflammation is a product of the immune system. So to deal with not just mental health and energy, but also systemic inflammation, if you're doing with joint pain or digestive problems or hormonal problems, you want to look at where the predominance of the immune system resides, which is in the gut. So I implement lots of soups and stews as restorative. therapeutic food, basically, to support gut health, digestive health. Yeah, I mean, I'm pretty basic

in that way. I'm not like, I have an infrared sauna. I use that. I love my infrared sauna. And I do cold shower, which everybody within the, you know, space is talking about. But we've used it for years. Cold plunges, cold therapy, contrast therapy, we implement for patients. I do it myself. We're alternating between cold and heat. I don't have a cold plunge at my house as of yet. but cold shower works great for me. And yeah, those are some basic things. And then it's like getting out in nature. It's free, low-cost things.

There's research out of Japan and South Korea. The term is Shinran Yoku, which translates from Japanese to English as forest bathing. But it's not me getting naked in the woods, even though that sounds fun too, in a bathtub. It's actually using nature as a meditation. Like we know intuitively as humans, this is good for us, but now we know what randomized control trials and the mechanisms of how these things work. It actually shifts our microbiome. By breathing in the forest microbiome, we actually shift our gut microbiome, which improves our mood, the way that it works in the vagus nerve. It lowers inflammation levels. It lowers stress hormones.

So those are some things that I do, which there's more than that. But that's a spattering of stuff that's my day-to-day stuff. Let's talk about a person who, an avatar. This person is 43 years old. they've steadily risen the ranks within their Fortune 500 company to now they're a VP or SVP role. With that comes lots of stress in a packed schedule of back to back to back style. Sounds miserable to me, but I get it. I work with people. Some of these are my clients, right?

And they were a former athlete and not big time, but they played sports. And slowly they've gotten busier and busier because they have kids and they have kids. they're married and they have a stressful busy job and all of a sudden they're listening to this one which is different than most that i have because i'm really only focused on kind of leadership and this is focused on taking care of the most important thing you have which is your body anyway they kind of look around and say oh my god i've kind of let myself go what happened here i don't work out that much anymore i kind of eat whatever's around you know haven't really thought about it this guy though dr will cole sounds like he knows he's talking about for that person which i'm

I know is a lot, even these were high performers. How do they get started? What are the first few things they could do is the second this podcast is over to start implementing their way to getting back on track because life has happened and they didn't mean to. They just kind of got off track and without because they didn't put enough thought and tension to it. Yeah. I mean the cliche, this applies to parenthood, but it also applies to humanhood, just being human is the saying of the days are long, but the years are short. That is very true. And I hear this all the time. Most of our patients are overwhelmingly type A high performers, like I said, they are, they know more than most people do about health and all things, but they're not where they want to be. They let,

because life is the days are long and the years are short, time got away from them. And they realized, dang, I really put myself in the back burner. And they know intuitively, This is not sustainable. And to be a great leader, you need to be at your best, physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. So this, what we're talking about with health and wellness and optimization is, is leadership. I see people all the time that are kept back from what they're creative for, what they're passionate about, what they need to do because they don't, they physically cannot do it

anymore. They're at a breaking point and something's got to give. So if you if you're that person, that example, I would say start with first of all realizing that the body's amazingly resilient and the body is also has a lot of muscle memory. So if you were that former athlete or if you were that whatever younger itself, whatever that looked like, the body can bounce back. It's just not a quick fix, but it's very encouraging when you start seeing the needle move. in the right direction. So don't, you may feel like it's so far off to get back, but I see amazing things happen in relatively short periods of time. And that's encouraging. So practically speaking, I would start with labs. I think a lot of people that in that category get inspired and

encouraged by data because it's not this random, like, esoteric, conceptual thing. it is a they have a baseline they have data on a spreadsheet where they can see okay these are my inflammation levels this is where my metabolic markers are this is where my lipids are this is where my nutrient deficiencies are these are where my hormones are at how can we get these numbers improved so it's not some doctor pontificating on well this is what you do and it sounds abstract but you could actually see the benefits not just in how you feel which is first and foremost but you actually could see the data moving in the right direction labs or I want you to finish too, but labs.

So get blood work. But what are they testing? Because as we talked about, a primary care physician, a PCP is usually not ordering these. I know they're not ordering these labs. A doctor like you would. So they don't even know where to start. What am I supposed to test for? I think is the question.

Yeah, I think two things. One is we can run them. And that is what we all that we do. So they can reach out to us in the tell house center. But a lot of people do what actually your wife has done where she. I've written hundreds of articles. Yep. And that's all free on the site.

People can go to Dr.Rocool.com and just type out copy and paste on their notes, like what the range is. Most decent PCPs or specialists, even if they're not in functional medicine, will run the test if you have a decent relationship with them. Sometimes they won't. Sometimes they're going to be like, wait, what the heck? Especially if you're not a consistent patient and you're like, you're showing up and asking me to run these labs. Maybe they won't.

It's an individual circumstance. but more often times than not, they'll run it. Now, the caveat is they're not going to know what to do with those labs. Right. But it's at least, if you want to do it on your own, that's a DIY way to do it, because you can at least get the data for yourself and educate yourself on things you can do. And that's why I have a podcast and why I write books and why I write articles. These are free and low-cost things for people to do on their own if they don't want a functional

medicine doctor right now. But if you want to really take it to the next level, we can, run more thorough labs. We can do a solid workup. We can build a protocol based on what you need. And labs, like, if you're looking for, like, it's based on the case, right? So go and go to Dr. Rulecold.com, type in your goals and there are a lot of lab resources there. But some basic things that would run a comprehensive metabolic panel. You're talking about the 43 old guy who's having fatigue, using him, that avatar, these are some things I would consider. Comprehensive metabolic panel because that is, there's a lot of guys in that category that have a lot of dysfunction

there. Their glucose or their blood sugar is above 90, below 90 is where we want it. If it's for a fasting glucose, most guys are insulin resistant. Most women are insulin resistant. So they're A1C, which is your three month average of your blood sugar. We want it under 5.5. Most people are on the insulin resistant spectrum. They're struggling with fatigue, low testosterone, low sex drive, weight loss resistance, brain fog, not normal, but common. Reversible, not normal. And this is a conventional test, but you're going to have to ask for it. We can run in if they need us to. But it's called a nuclear magnetic resonance test. It's an NMR test, which is a sub-fractionation of the particles that carry cholesterol, which just means we're looking at the context of the particles

that carry cholesterol. Most kinds of the particles that carry cholesterol. Most have lipids that are off. They're really not good. And you can catch these things with these more detailed tests that are conventional, but are not oftentimes ran. I would say a more progressive cardiologist is going to run these. But other than them, like your standard run in the mill, they're just going to run a basic lipid panel. Why? Because the basic lipid panel is all they need to give you the statin drug. So they're running, they're diagnosing you with basic labs. They're they consider these labs largely superfluous because it doesn't change the outcome, which is the medication.

So it's extraneous to them, but it's important for us because it's the context and a baseline and we can understand the mechanisms and get these data numbers, get these numbers improved. So we just look at what's called small dense LDL particles, which are the sort of oxidized, inflamed, kind of BB bullets that can tear potentially through arterial walls. It's increasing heart attack and stroke, which a lot of guys, I mean, this happens to people that are relatively young. Party vascular events. It's not normal but common.

And we look at, I would run, if you were this guy, I would run high sensitivity C-reactive protein, HSCRP, which is an inflammation marker. We want it under one, the American Heart Association, the CDC. They have these low, average, and high relative risk factors for heart attack and stroke. A lot of guys have high HSCRP and they don't even know it. Inflammation is what's causing heart attack and strokes. It's inflammation that is causing the fatigue and the brain fog. It's inflammation that's making it difficult to lose weight because it's driving insulin

resistance, which is the fat-storing hormone. And then the last lab, I would say, before, I mean, we can run so much more than that, but we're just talking about the basic ones. The last one would be homocysteine. It's another inflammatory protein. I see it high on guys that you're explaining, you're describing all the time. It increases heart attack and stroke risks, but it also acts as an end. neurotoxin. It can contribute to neuroinflammation, which things like brain fog and fatigue and feeling

exhausted and just gross, inflamed and gross. That's a technical term. We need to get that down. We need to get that down. So look, this avatar, that's what I would start with. And then from there, let's do something about it. I guess there's no typical protocol. But what are some of the things that you do for somebody who has those numbers that are not at the levels that you want them at? Right. So I would say get a baseline so you can compare and contrast your efforts and make sure you're doing what you're doing is effective. And then that's sort of the science and art duality of all of this. Is that you can refine it? We can adjust dosages. We can adjust recommendations. We can lean back on some food aspects, increase other things.

There's so much bio-individuality with this conversation. But labs are a good baseline. Foods, I would say if they haven't cut these foods out or at least decrease them. or at least considered looking at, does this food love me back or not? And that's sort of the paradigm shift that I talk about and gut feelings. Avoiding things that make you feel like crap is not restrictive. It's self-respect. And continuing to eat things that don't love you back and wondering why you're still miserable,

it's like staying in a toxic, annoying relationship and wondering why you're still miserable. That's the paradigm shift that you need to have. Some of those. That pepperoni and sausage pizza on Friday night, though, man. You know how it tastes. It's so good. It doesn't love me back. It never, ever loves me back ever, but it tastes so good in that moment.

You're right. You're right. These foods are designed to be addictive and keep coming back for more. And there's no shame in that, right? It's for informed consent. Most people don't even know how foods make them feel. Really, they're not even paying attention to it between your mood and the food that you eat. I think people should use meals as a medicine and a meditation.

They may want to eat that pepperoni pizza on a Friday night, but they're hanging out with their friends and family and having fun. Then eat it and move on. Shame is worse than any food that didn't love you back. But you may, as you eat mindfully and grow an awareness with this sort of mindful using your meals as a meditation, determine, hey, dang, I like feeling better more than I want that pizza. Or even better yet, let's find a way to have that pepperoni pizza in a way that does love you back.

And that's the that's the secret too. you don't have to eat boring like rabbit food to be healthy. I make delicious pizza all the time and I don't feel like crap afterwards. So cutting these four food ingredients out, what I call the inflammatory core for, look at these people, look at these. Number one would be gluten containing grains, mainly wheat. It's what we've done to it. We've hybridized it.

We've sprayed it with glyphosate. We've bleached it, we've refined it, we've taken all the fiber out of it, and then we over-consume it. So it's a problem. And gluten has been shown to increase intestinal permeability or leaky gut syndrome and create inflammation levels in the body. Number two would be industrial seed oils, like canola oil, vegetable oil, soybean oil. It's the overconsumption of it. The modern American diet is too high in omega-6, not enough in omega-3. omega-3s, these are polyunsaturated fatty acids or poofas. And we need ratio, proper ratios of

omega's three, six, and nine. That ratio is off of the modern Western person, especially men, and in a pro-inflammatory state. So this is a lot of boxed and packaged foods, read the labels. Number three would be added sugar, which most people know this, but be, you will, people will be shocked when they look at the grams of added sugar they're consuming in a day. It is the least, leading cause of type 2 diabetes, inflammation issues, gut issues, accelerated aging, brain dysfunction. I mean, it's massively a problematic. But even the nicer sounding euphemisms like agave nectar, still is high in fructose. So read the labels. Look at the grams of added sugar. Fourth would be conventional dairy. I think that some people could do great. And I think,

I know some people can do great with better versions of dairy. like A2 milk, organic, grass-fed culture, like fermented yogurts and kaffirs and cheeses. There are exceptions to all of these four things because there are better for you versions for all of these things. If I had add a plus one to the inflammatory core four, it would be alcohol, which I gain no friends when I say this. But there's no, like the healthiest amount of alcohol is none. And it doesn't mean you're going to have none, but I want you to have informed consent on

this, that it is a neurotoxin. It will impact your gut health. It accelerates aging. And it's not your friend. Some people can have small amounts of it randomly and be fine, but I can't tell you how many bodies and lives are wrecked from alcohol. And they need to have a hard look on how does it love them back or not. And maybe have it randomly.

There are better for you versions of alcohol. Low alcohol, low sugar, organic, biodynamic wine can work for some people when they're having it on a special occasion. It's no shame. But most people aren't doing it that way and they're doing it way more often. And it's impacting their health. So I know I just, Debbie Downer now because they're like, this guy's no fun. But the reality is there's so much food you can eat.

And there's lots of recipes in the books. So people want to check it out. Yeah. It's like most things. You've got to do the work. Like it takes work. It's not the short term answer, but it's setting you up long term to be healthier. Do you drink alcohol ever?

I mean, not to say never, but I can't think of the last time I have. Okay. It was, it's been years. Honestly, years. How does it impact you socially? It's easy for an introvert that likes being in the woods. It's actually really, it's really fine. But I mean, we work with, like, I mean, we work with Gwyneth Paltrow.

You work with all these famous people. You're out and about, right? You probably are on the party scene from time to time, I guess. Yeah. I don't know. I get them not to drink. Like, Winneth Paltrow hasn't drank in years. She got does occasionally now.

She doesn't drink because of me. So I get them not to drink. We just, but look, she does occasionally, that's fine. Like other people that are patients of mind that people wouldn't know, they can make the decision for themselves. If they want to do it for a while and then see it, just take some time off of it. And then can you bring it back in a way that loves you back occasionally? Does it affect me? No, because I'm there to hang out with people.

I do not care. I don't feel out of place. I don't really hang out with people that are drinking too much anyways, right? They're not hammered. So if they're drinking socially, I'm fine with having the moktail or the seltzer water with lime in it. I'm fine. But if I wanted to have the glass of wine, I don't want to.

But if I wanted to, I would have a glass of wine and there'd be no shame about it. But I just don't really care about it. And it adds no value to my life. So I don't like how it makes me feel the next day. and it's just, I'm fine without it. I'm cool, but I still want to hang out with people. So it's just being confident in your decisions, but I've heard it said, and this is so true,

alcohol is the only drug that people ask if there's something wrong with you when you don't have it. And that's how messed up our culture is when it comes to alcohol. That's a great point. What have you done to attract all these celebrities that Gwen is of the world to say, hey, I need you in my life? Well, 99% of our patients are,

are just normal, like working middle class people, high performance. I said, like nurses, entrepreneurs, startup world. Like it, that's not the majority of my patients. It's just what people pay attention to, right? Because they're not seeing the nine to five people or whatever, the 12 hour day people, the 15 hour of day people. But the, it's to me, I don't know, because I'm in Western Pennsylvania.

I'm not in L.A. I am not in New York. I am sitting in a room in Western Pennsylvania in the middle of nowhere. So I think it's just no other answer other than it's just me being a channel for what I feel like I'm here for and just staying in my lane and relentlessly pursuing a passion, which my passion has been to impart wellness for people. And I think when you are like a conduit for whatever that is, that that flow state, if you will, things happen. Things happen and people see it. So I think that when, and I don't,

I'm not saying that I'm the best, but I'm saying we are really great at what we do. And I think that high performing, high outcome data driven things, like things that, good things happen when you are in that state and you're great at what, and you love what you do and you have great outcomes.

I think that people across in Hollywood or New York or whatever in London, Paris can see that and want the best. And that's what we strive for. One other thing that seems to be all around me, friends, both men and women, is TRT or testosterone replacement therapy, pellets, shots, all different types of ways people get this into their body. It seems to really help some of my friends. I know I've taken a look at it. I've gotten my levels checked. So far, I've been told that I'm at a good level to where I don't need to do that yet. But I definitely, it seems like it will be a good thing to do based on how

it's impacted others that I know. What do you think about that? It has its place. I think I like to think of it as like hormone replenishment therapy. Yeah. We're not shoving tons of testosterone or for women estrogen and progesterone just flippantly. It should be based on data. It should be based on labs. We should retest over time correlating it with symptoms and looking at the risk factors potentially for some people. But ultimately here, people, the vast majority of people that have low testosterone or any other hormonal problems, it, my goal would be to get to what's the underlying root mechanism of what's going on here.

If you're talking about low tea, most men have low tea because of insulin resistance. So there's what's called over-aromatization that's happening. The liver is making this enzyme called aromatase that's supposed to happen. but you don't want an over-aromatization where it's actually stealing testosterone and converting it into estrogen. So the low-tie epidemic is tied to the insulin resistance, which is tied to lifestyle issues in stress and environmental toxins. So we have to deal with that.

So yes, testosterone therapy, if somebody's dealt with all of the insulin resistance and just because of aging, it's decreased and they see some benefit from low doses of testosterone, I think that's where it shines because it could be a needle mover and it's a low dose. You're still like solidly healthy and you're just using this as a boost. That's great. I don't think it's a good idea for people that's fully inflamed, fully insulin resistant, they're fatigued, they have all these metabolic issues and then shoving exogenous testosterone in their body.

It is like a drop in the ocean. How about get your body to produce its own testosterone first and then if you need a boost, go there. but start with endogenously actually producing it yourself, which picking up heavy things, moving your body, getting some sunlight, and doing all the things that I said earlier with food and stress management, that will increase testosterone. Most people won't need testosterone therapy after they do that.

It is funny. I've gotten labs for the past three or four years since, again, I've thought, well, I'm going to do this. My friends are doing it. They look jacked. They feel good. But I started like trying to clean up what I eat, almost eliminating alcohol.

A lot of things. things and my levels, which should be going down based upon just aging, right, have significantly gone up. And I have to believe it's because of cleaning up the other things that are not the sexy fun things, right? Just basic vegetables and fruits and eating good protein and lifting heavy things every day. That seems to give me a chance for those to actually go up as opposed to they should probably be going down.

Yeah. I mean, it's such a, that's so amazing for you. I'm happy for you. And it's, I hear that so often for people who do these things and lean into these practices and tools. Just because something's common doesn't make it normal. Like feeling like crap and accelerated aging is certainly ubiquitous, but it's not normal. And many people will chalk it up to, I'm just getting older. Yeah. But they are selling themselves so short because comparing yourself to people around you, believe me, you can find people that are worse off than you. you and think that you're okay. But it's so common that they don't even know what their body's

capable of doing. So that's great to hear that. Great job. In your book, gut feelings, there's this 21-day gut feeling plan. Can you, I know we've got to run in a second, but can you describe what that is? Because I view this as another potential action step people can take immediately following this. For sure. Yeah. So they lean into it. Like if it's every day, there's a gut and a feelings tool. So there's a physiological and a mind-body tool every day. And it's all science back, all the peer-reviewed literature is in the back of the book on one day's maybe exploring the soups and stews that I talked about, like supporting your gut health, which is tremendous at calming that fight or flight, stressed, sympathetic overtone, right? And starting to activate that weak

vagus nerve, that resting, digesting hormone balance, like regulated, grounded, strong state. And a feelings could be, a feeling action item on a day could be a bright. breathwork meditation or breathwork practice or talking about the science of Shin Minoku, Forest Bathing, or talking about somatic practices or trauma work and how trauma will impact all of these things too. And a lot of what gut feelings the book is about is talking about, yeah, it's not just about what we're feeding our body, but what are we feeding our head and our heart every day? What's our relationship with technology? What are we looking at online? What are we spending our time on?

How is it impacting our sleep? Are our, do we have? One of the things we ask patients is to look at what's called an ace. We have them fill out an ACE questionnaire, which is at Adverse Childhood Experience or Event questionnaire. We're looking at things like sexual trauma and physical abuse growing up or emotional abuse growing up. There's a lot of people, any people, but if you're talking about men specifically, men just

aren't good at talking about these things. people are not good talking about these things. Men are extra bad at talking about these things. But we think it's a sign of weakness to deal with these things. But oftentimes it's impacting the choices we're making in our life. It's impacting the foods that we eat. It's impacting how our relationships. And it's impacting our health.

And we know now from research that trauma can be literally stored in our body. So part of what kept feelings is about is using these somatic practices and breath work. and I talk about the therapy of EMDR and how it really can be a great tool to metabolize store trauma basically in the body to calm the inflammation levels on that front. So I see people all the time that they deal with all the food stuff, they deal with the fitness stuff, but they haven't dealt with the stress and trauma part of it, which that will impact all those markers that I talked about in the labs. They will impact the trauma and stress will impact those markers just as much as the food.

So we have to look at both sides of the gut and feelings paradigm. It's just a more holistic approach. And that's what I sense with this is, again, this is the most important thing we have. If your body stops working, nothing else you're doing really matters. Like your family, nothing because you're not available. You're not there. It's like when you're sick, when you're sick, there's only one wish you have in the world. And it's just to not be sick.

And so to me, I think all the things you write about, all things you talk about are to do the things. things on a daily basis to give ourselves the best chance to be healthy. And that's all we can do. Let's control the controllables. Let's do what we can as best we can. And if we keep doing that, like that just that just gives us a better shot. And that's all we can do. We don't have all, we don't have the complete say on the outcome. But I just want to give myself as good of a chance as possible. And then the chips are going to fall where they may. Exactly. That's so true. And at the end of the day, it is having that awareness that you cannot control all things. And you have to just do the best you can, like you said, and give the rest of God because there are some

things out of our control. But the beauty of all of this is that we actually do have a lot of agency. We actually have a lot of, we wield a lot of influence in our biochemistry. I love it, man. Well, the book, it's super well done called gut feelings, healing the shame-fuelled relationship between what you eat and how you feel. Really awesome, Will. I would love to continue our dialogue as we both progress because I'm a pretty aware of this stuff, but I want to get even better because I think there's only upside here. So I really appreciate this, man. Let's do it. Let's do it. Let's run some labs. We can talk about it. I love to. All right, man. Thanks so much. Thank you. It's the end of the podcast club. Thank you so much for being here. If you are, send me a note.

Ryan at learning leader.com. Let me know that this episode with Dr. Will Cole was helpful. A few takeaways from my notes. You can't heal a body you hate. Now, we only get one body. It's all we have. And if it stops working or is working poorly, that affects all other elements of our lives. It's the most important thing. So it's worth it to make it the number one priority. Then we're looking for optimal, not average.

And if you're someone who's listening to this podcast, you probably do not want to be average. And when it comes to the most important thing in your life, which is your, body, I would hope that you don't want that to be average. To be an effective leader for those in your life that you're leading, whether it's at work or it's at home, our body, your body needs to be in optimal shape. And I think the stuff Will talks about can certainly help you. And then cut these four foods. Gluten containing grains, industrial seed oils, added sugar, conventional dairy, and he added a fifth, alcohol.

This isn't easy and it's not always fun, but it's worth it for us to put ourselves in the optimal position to do well and to feel great to think about what we're putting into our body each day as well as ensuring that we are exercising, which we talked a lot about. So once again, I'm going to say thank you so much. I hope you found this one useful. I certainly did. I've studied this quite a bit and I still learned a lot. I think Dr. Will Cole will help you become a more effective leader. And I'd love it if you would tell a friend or two. Hey, you should listen to this episode with Dr. Will Cole.

I think he could help you. And because you've continued to do that and you continue to go to Ryanhawk.net, which launches you into iTunes Apple Podcasts. And then once you're there, you write a thoughtful review and you rate the show, hopefully five stars. By doing that, you are giving me the opportunity to do what I love on a daily basis. And for that, I will forever be grateful. Thank you so, so much. Talk to you soon. Can't wait.