The Rich Roll Podcast - Dan Buettner On The Secrets For Living Long & Well

Episode Date: March 9, 2020

Chances are you've heard the term Blue Zones, coined in reference to five hidden slivers of the world that boast the highest per capita populations of centenarians — people who thrive to 100 and beyond. Places where people forgot to die. This is the work of Dan Buettner. A true renaissance man, Dan is a National Geographic Fellow, longevity expert and world explorer with 3 endurance cycling world records to his name. A multiple New York Times bestselling author, he's a seemingly constant presence on the TODAY show, has appeared on Oprah twice and has been profiled on every respected global media outlet, from CNN to David Letterman. Over the last decade Dan has delivered more than 500 keynotes, including speeches for Bill Clinton’s Health Matters Initiative, Google Zeitgeist, and TEDMED. His TED Talk “How to live to be 100+” has been viewed over 4 million times. The Blue Zones Kitchen is Dan's latest New York Times bestseller. Technically a cookbook with over 100 recipes inspired by decades of research studying Blue Zones cultures, Dan elevates the genre with extraordinary photography and an anthropologist's lens on the specific foods, cooking methods and lifestyle practices proven to increase longevity, wellness, and mental health. In addition, Dan is the founder of Blue Zones Project, a community well-being improvement initiative designed to help people live longer and better through community transformation programs that lower healthcare costs, improve productivity, and boost national recognition as great places to live, work, and play. Long time listeners will remember Dan's podcast debut (RRP #139), where we explored Dan's adventurous backstory, his fascination with longevity and the research behind all things Blue Zones.  Our second conversation (RRP #323) focused on the nature of not only living long, but living well — a dissection of the habits and practices that produce that which we seek most — happiness. Today we synthesize all of it in a primer on how to live a long and fulfilling life. Not surprisingly, it begins with food. It extends to building better communities. It's underscored by finding purpose. And sharing what you've learned for the betterment of others. The visually inclined can watch it all go down on YouTube. And as always, the audio version streams wild and free on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Hero, friend and mentor, Dan is a true visionary whose life and work has positively, permanently and quite unequivocally improved the well being of millions. I love this man. I aspire to his level of impact. And it's an honor to share his powerful message with you today. May you take his wisdom to heart. Peace + Plants, Rich

What really explains longevity is complex and it's multifactorial. But at a certain point, I realized that when it comes to changing your health behaviors, for most Americans, the change comes through their mouth. Americans probably lose six years of life expectancy eating the standard American diet. This is that middle age, by the way, overeating, say a Blue Zones diet. So this idea to do a Blue Zones kitchen and capture these recipes and these images was really an idea to appeal to a wider spectrum of Americans and kind of lure them into this deeper and more complex prescription for longevity. But the thing is, this is a 500-year-old food tradition

that is disappearing because in all these blue zones, the American food culture is coming and replacing this way of eating that has produced the statistically longest-lived people. You know, 20-year-olds aren't eating like this. So I was sitting with 70, 80, 90, even 100-year-olds watching them cook the foods of their youth. So this is almost a project of anthropology as much as a food book. That's Dan Buettner, this week on The Rich Roll Podcast.

The Rich Roll Podcast. Hey, everybody. Welcome. My name is Rich Roll. I am your humble host. I am grateful to be here and grateful you decided to join me today. First things first, thought I'd do what I do from time to time and share a listener email I got a few weeks back. This one is from a military pilot and a father of four. He's called Frank. It's lightly edited for brevity and it goes like this. Rich, I wanted to let you know the influence you had on me, my journey to wellness, and my gratitude for the knowledge you so freely share with those of us wanting to improve our lives. On my 40th birthday two years ago, I came to much the same realization as you did in your book, Finding Ultra, that my

life had taken a left turn. I didn't recognize the man that I saw in the mirror and knew that I needed a change. I was 5'9 and 198 pounds. Since then, with the support of my insanely awesome wife, I've made serious changes in my life that allow me to be a better husband, father, and person, at least I hope so. I've gone back to exercising, adopted a plant-based lifestyle, and compete in triathlons. I'm doing my first 70.3 this year in Tempe. Since my birthday a year and a half ago, I've been able to shed 42 pounds, feel better than I did when I was in my 30s, and devote more positive and intentional energy into my relationship with my family. Those at work are seeing the benefits of my new lifestyle. I'm an instructor pilot in the F-16 and a squadron commander. Fellow pilots and the troops that I

lead have noticed my positive changes and are beginning to ask questions about how they too can make these changes for themselves. To sum this up, you and your story have changed my life. I religiously listen to your podcast on my 40-minute drive to and from work, and it continues to fuel my motivation to sustain my healthy lifestyle and continue to strive to be a better person. For all of these positive changes that you have influenced in my life, I simply wanna say thank you. Thank you for sharing what you've been through and thank you for continuing to care for all of us with your messages of positivity and growth.

Signed, Frank Slap, quote unquote, Slap Lusher. I guess Slap is his call name, kind of like Maverick. Anyway, very cool. Thank you, Frank. It is this kind of feedback that keeps me going that makes me proud to do what I do and really reminds me why I keep doing it. Your words inspire me and keep me motivated. Plus, let's face it, you guys,

it's just cool to hear from an F-16 pilot. Anyway, congrats, man. Awesome work, Frank. And I appreciate you reaching out. For all the rest of you looking to make that plant-based upgrade, the best resource I can provide is our Plant Power Meal Planner,

which basically sorts everything for you with thousands of customized recipes, support, tons more. It's super cheap. So check it all out at meals.richroll.com. Okay, so what do Okinawa, Japan, Costa Rica's Nicoya Peninsula, Icaria, Greece, and Loma Linda, California all have in common? Well, I appreciate you asking the question. They are a couple of the very special select locations called Blue Zones, slivers of humanity that boast the highest number of centenarians, people that live past 100.

The term Blue Zones was coined by today's guest, Dan Buettner, who is back for his third appearance on the show. Long-time listeners will well remember his debut. well remember his debut. That was episode 139, where we broke down blue zones, the longevity research behind them, and the keys to maxing out your years on this lovely planet we call home. Our second exchange, which was episode 323, Dan took it to the next level, teaching us not only how these folks have lived so very long, but also how they live well, live in happiness, live fulfilling lives that continuously propel their health. But today, we're gonna dive even deeper, breaking down the factors that make you live long

and live happily. We're gonna synthesize all of it, so to speak. And what I think is a pretty powerful primer on all things wellbeing, beginning with food. And I got a bunch more I wanna say about Dan and this conversation, but first. We're brought to you today by recovery.com. I've been in recovery for a long time.

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go to recovery.com and take the first step towards recovery. To find the best treatment option for you or a loved one, again, go to recovery.com. All right, Dan B., the Renaissance Man. For those unfamiliar, Dan is a National Geographic fellow, a longevity expert, and a world explorer with three endurance cycling world records to his name. He's a seemingly constant presence on the Today Show.

He's appeared on Oprah twice and has been profiled in every respected global media outlet from CNN to David Letterman. The latest in his slew of New York Times bestsellers is entitled The Blue Zone's Kitchen. It's technically a cookbook with over 100 recipes inspired by his decades of research studying Blue Zone's Kitchen. It's technically a cookbook with over 100 recipes inspired by his decades of research studying Blue Zone's cultures. But what I think makes this book different and what I really love about it and what we discuss in detail today is that Dan really elevates the genre by attuning his unique anthropological lens with extraordinary photography and stories on the specific foods and culture and cooking methods and lifestyle practices proven to increase longevity, wellness, and mental health. In addition, Dan is the founder of Blue Zones Project,

a community well-being improvement initiative designed to help people live longer and better through community transformation programs that lower healthcare costs, improve productivity, and boost national recognition as great places to live, work, and play. So this one begins with food. It extends to the importance of building better communities, how crucial it is to find purpose, and sharing what you've learned for the betterment of others. He's a hero, he's a friend, he's a mentor, and very much a modern day visionary whose life and work has positively, permanently, and quite unequivocally improved the well-being of millions of people. I love this man. I aspire to his level of impact and service, and I sincerely hope you take his

powerful message to heart. So let's do this, shall we? So- Wait, did you hit record this time? I did. Here's the thing. We got to preface this whole thing by saying that we took a stab at this a while back before the holidays, and we had a technical snafu, which happens from time to time. Although I think it's only happened maybe two or three times in the seven years that I've been doing it. And it's just, when that happens,

the pit in my stomach, it's the worst. It's the worst feeling. So first of all, my apologies for our technical snafu and thank you so much for coming back. No, no problem at all. Give me another chance to hang out with the king. I realized where we went wrong though and why we had a technical problem.

I don't know if you'll remember this, but I did not wear the uniform last time. You were wearing a black t-shirt and I almost invariably wear a black T-shirt for the podcast, and for some reason I was wearing something else. And I think that that just threw everything off. Yeah, threw the planet off its ballast a little bit. So anyway, here we are.

First of all, congratulations on the success of the Blue Zones Kitchen Cookbook. I mean, once again, there you are at the top of the Blue Zones Kitchen Cookbook. I mean, it's, you know, once again, there you are at the top of the bestseller list. It's pretty cool to see. Well, I spent years writing deeply researched books that were, I like to think, artfully crafted when it came to the pros and only to discover what America really wants

is beautiful pictures and bean recipes. That's it, right? But this is not an ordinary cookbook. I mean, this unfolds much like one of your expeditions. This is a deep dive into these cultures as much as it is about like, here's the thing you can make in your kitchen. Well, yeah, I cringe at the title cookbook because actually we tried to make it more like a 250 page national geographic article so i i wrote um the the introductions are all uh science driven the science of why these foods are helping these people make it to 100 i i think we have the best national geographic

photographer in this genre david mLean, shot all the photos. There's no studio shots there. It's all editorial photography. And the recipes, none of them are recopied down. I sat on a stool and watched these old ladies cook and captured the recipes. And then sent them here to Los Angeles, actually, where they were corrected in test kitchens. They don't have tablespoons and measuring cups up in the blue zone. You sent the actual people or just?

No, just my observation. But the thing is, this is a 500-year-old food tradition that is disappearing because in all these blue zones, the American food culture is coming and replacing this way of eating that has produced the statistically longest lived people. You know, 20 year olds aren't eating like this. So I was sitting with 70, 80, 90, even a hundred year olds

watching them cook the foods of their youth. So this is almost a project of anthropology as much as, you know, a food book. Creating an historical document. I like to think it is. Yeah. You've been doing this for 15 years, sort of blue zone specific type work. What are the changes that you've seen specifically within the blue zones over the last decade and a half and which ones have been the most impacted by kind of Western development? I'll start with the negative and then we'll move to the positive. So the place that's been hit the worst is Okinawa.

When I first started there, I actually first went there in 1999, which was 21 years ago, and our kind of test expedition. It was at the time producing the longest-lived people in the history of the world, about 30 times more female centenarians in people over 60 than you'd have in the United States. And now it is the least healthy prefecture in all of Japan. It's got the highest rates of obesity, the highest rates of diabetes, and it has undergone the worst degeneration of any of the blue zones. But you also see it hit pretty hard in Nicoya Peninsula of Costa Rica,

where Nicoya itself, this place where they have this beautiful, simple, elegant three ingredient recipe that is driving much of their longevity. You come into town now and the first thing you see is a KFC and it just makes your heart sink. And at the same time, longevity is plunging and the chronic diseases like diabetes and heart disease that are killing Americans are rising there. And within a half a generation or so, these blue zones will just be part of the mosh. That's tragic. I mean, it feels like in the same way that certain neighborhoods within cities

kind of protect their historical heritage and won't let you build, and you have to build to a certain way or you can't build or you can't renovate these buildings to protect and preserve the kind of historic nature of them, is it not possible to go to the governments of these blue zones and give them some kind of certification that protects the heritage there?

Is that even possible or is that just a weird idea? No, it's a great idea. And in fact, I've met with the presidents of Costa Rica and now onto the good news is the government there has proclaimed Nicoya Peninsula, the Blue Zone, as sort of a national heritage site, which has afforded it protections for older people and more funding to help preserve older people and the cultures of older people. You see that more organically in Ikaria, Greece, which is another blue zone. A real kind of tourist industry has sprouted up around people interested in longevity. So

what you see there is older people, where in many cultures they're kind of marginalized, they're the heroes. They're the repositories of wisdom and kind of the local celebrities, especially the centenarians. And in the blue zone of Sardinia, and this is where the world's longest lived men come from, there are six villages there in the Nuorl province. And they're in one of them, a place called Seulo. There's a blue zone center and there's one street, it's probably a hundred meters long. And there's like 12 centenarian houses on that 100 meters. And out in front of the house, there's huge posters, photographs of the centenarians. So they're really celebrating this as a national, as a treasure.

And in these places, there's a kind of an act you know, keep at bay these modern influences. So is that the positive side of this coin? When I asked you that question, you said, well, I'll start with the negative. Yes. The positive is in some blue zones, they're seeing what a resource, they're older people specifically, and they're this lifestyle, and they're trying to preserve them both. Yeah. Are you optimistic that they're going to be able to kind of preserve and protect the heritage and, you know, the sort of culture of these places? No. Yeah.

I don't think so because- Oh, no. There might be in sort of a museum sort of way, an effort to do it. But I think the forces of the world we live in are too strong. The urge to motorize, mechanize, engineer out physical activity out of our lives with ease and air conditionings and power tools and kitchen gadgets and electronics and packaged food and ultra processed foods. And it's that, that, that tsunami is just too powerful, I think to, to, um, for, you know, point old traditions to hold up. Yeah. Do you have a favorite blue zone? I have two favorites. Uh, Icaria probably. Icaria, probably.

Icaria is where my- It seems like the one you keep going back to the most. Yeah, I go back almost every year. My son got married there. Oh, wow. And there's a place called Thea's Guest House in Nass, which I like to think is the center of the Blue Zone. It's very, you know, you go there and during the day,

it looks, you don't see any furniture. There's kind of this empty terrace and there's nobody around. But at night, the terrace has a trellis, which is lit up and you're overlooking the Aegean Sea and people from the village come in and you'll get Israelis and Europeans and Americans. And it tends to be people who are making a life transition and they all meet on this, on this terrace and they eat blue zones foods and they drink wine. And, and, uh, during the day they go out in the fields and they hike and they, they go by the sea. And, and it's nice to see this, um, this place in the world where you can go find your own blue zone, so to speak. Are these places, because of the work that you've done, now becoming tourist destinations? Are there

people that seek them out and want to visit them because they've read about them in your books or heard about them? They're all tourist destinations. And for that, I think they appreciate. But when tourist comes, it creates problems of its own. But yes, they're all tourist destinations. I think Nicoya Peninsula of Costa Rica is most embraced blue zones. So there's lots of hotels that are climbing in blue zones. And you land in the airport in Liberia, and the first thing you see is a blue zone store.

Oh, wow. But it's on the other side of the peninsula from like where all the fancy hotels are, isn't it? No, it's on the same peninsula. Oh, it is. It's just the Koya Peninsula. It's Tamarindo, and people also know of Nosara, which is kind of a-

Tamarindo is the surf village place, right? That's Montezuma. Montezuma is on the Southern tip of the Nicoya Peninsula and more towards the North is Tamarindo and there's where the Four Seasons is. Okay. And kind of halfway between is Samara, which is a hipsy dipsy beach town. and then Nosara, which is kind of a

vortex for surfers and for the yoga scene. It's actually a cool place. Both of them are cool places. That's actually not the Blue Zone. The Blue Zone is actually inland, up in the highlands, in the villages. And they're the type of villages where tourists drive through and leave in a cloud of dust and don't really realize what they see. To find the blue zone, you need to go into people's homes. And you need to stop long enough to see detail and to get a feel for what it's like to live in these places, to see how they cook, to see how they downshift, to see how they live out their purpose, to see how they connect socially. There's all these sort of non-food characteristics that account for as much of their longevity as eating beans or tofu. Yeah. I mean, to do that work, you would have to have a lot of emotional intelligence and a lot of patience.

You know, you, I mean, you're a very charismatic personable guy. You've got to engender the trust of these people to even get into the position where they're going to allow you to come into their home and participate in their traditions. You do. I was blessed, Rich, with curiosity and a genuine affection for traditional peoples everywhere. I mean, they fascinate me. So I'm not going in trying to get the story and get out. When I did this original work, I was spending months at these places. There was a three-day stretch where I moved in with a 102-year-old woman in Okinawa, neither of us had a common language. And I just sat and watched her. And what counted, she got up and down off the floor 40 times in one day. It's like doing 40 squats. Watched how she made her breakfast, how she stood up on a stool and was washing her dishes. At a certain point, she pulled out her denture and scrubbed them with the same brush and put her dentures back in. But just saw this sort of

constant movement and the flow of people who came and visited her and that she'd sort of toddle out to her garden and that range of motion. And you don't really get, you can't really just go in and ask them about their lives and leave because people don't really get, you can't really just go in and ask them about their lives and leave because people don't really remember their lives. To do this project right, you have to live with them and pay attention to the detail and the nuance. And then you can sort of go into the academic literature and say, find out, well, they're doing this one thing.

Is there any sort of academic underpinnings or evidence for why this would be yielding longevity? So in the example of that particular woman, what does she think is going on? You're just like, who's the guy in the corner? Like, what could I possibly be doing that would be so interesting to that guy? I'm sure she had no damn idea. Yeah. I was introduced to her and I remember it was a rainy, like, Tuesday morning. And I took off my shoes. And you sort of step up to one of these stilted houses. And I sat across from her on a tatami mat. And we looked at each other and smiled.

And I knew, like, one arigato, one Japanese word, arigato. And then we looked at each other, stared and smiled, sat there for about 10 minutes. And finally, she got bored and got up and went's worried how he got to and then we looked at each other stared and smiled sat there for about 10 minutes and finally she got bored and got up and went about her day and i just followed her like he's still there yeah i don't know what he's doing i'm obviously not gonna get rid of him uh-huh no but no i later on her her granddaughter came and we had a translated conversation was very nice well just by way way of background and context, for those people listening or watching who are new to kind of your work, I think it would be helpful to just kind of provide a quick synopsis of what this whole Blue Zones thing is about.

It started out as a National Geographic project to, in a sense, reverse engineer longevity. out as a National Geographic project to, in a sense, reverse engineer longevity. Something called the Danish Twin Study established that only about 20% of how long the average person lives is dictated by genes. The other 80% is something else. So the project began by hiring demographers to find places where people are living statistically longest. And that alone took two years, cost about a quarter million bucks before I could even start. But you don't want to go to a place that's just hearsay and try to distill out lessons. So with demographers, we found these longevity hotspots, which I've dubbed blue zones, and then brought in another team of experts to find the correlations. And we use the methodology of anthropology, epidemiology to kind of tease out

the common denominators. So we found longevity hotspots in Okinawa, Japan, Sardinia, Italy, Ikaria, Greece, Nicoya Peninsula of Costa Rica, and not far from here, Loma Linda, California, and the Seventh-day Adventists. And over the past 15 years, I've been studying these cultures in an effort to preserve this interconnected set of factors that are common to all these places that are yielding longevity. And the first big breakthrough was a cover story for National Geographic, Secrets of Long Life. And then came a book, Blue Zones, Nine Lessons on Living Longer

from the People Who Live the Longest, Blue Zones Solution, Blue Zones of Happiness. And now at a certain point, what really explains longevity is complex and it's multifactorial. But at a certain point, I realized that when it comes to changing your health behaviors, for most Americans, the change comes through their mouth. So this idea to do a Blue Zones kitchen and capture these recipes and these images was really an idea to, I guess, appeal to a wider spectrum of Americans and kind of lure them into this deeper and more complex prescription for longevity. And seemingly it's worked. Right.

So amongst these populations, none of them are striving for longevity. And seemingly it's worked. Right. So amongst these populations, none of them are striving for longevity. They're not thinking about it. They're not going to the gym. They're not dieting. Their lifestyles are set up in a certain way that is conducive to them becoming centenarian, right? The foods they eat, the manner in which they interact with their community and interact throughout their daily lives in a physical sense, all of these things kind of contribute to this set of parameters that you have kind of distilled down and canonized. That's right. So I would say the big epiphany, it took me 10 years to make this realization. You know, in America, we tend to pursue health. We find a diet or we find an exercise program or we get a coach or we get on

a supplement program. And we think, well, we got to find this program. We need the discipline, the focus of mind, and we're going to go after it. And the vast majority, 90 plus percent of people fail at what they start at within a year. In blue zones, these people are eating mostly plant-based foods. They're moving every 20 minutes or so. They're hugely socially connected. They're suffused with purpose, So they're hugely socially connected. They're suffused with purpose, not because they've tried. It's because they're a product of their environment. They live in places where the cheapest and most accessible foods is peasant food.

It's whole grains, it's nuts, it's greens, it's tubers. So it's cheapest and most accessible. And they have these time-honored recipes to make them taste good and their kitchens are set up so they can make them easily so of course they're going to eat that it's a lot easier to eat that than you know to travel to a big city and buy processed foods they don't have these mechanized conveniences in their houses so So they're not turning to some power tool to do their work. They're kneading bread by hand or grinding corn by hand. They're doing garden work by hand. The option to implode into their homes onto their electronics isn't there because within a day, if you're not showing up to

the village center or the party or church, somebody's knocking on your door to show up. Yeah, there's a certain expectation. And nobody wakes up wondering what their position is in their community. There's always a very clear sense of purpose and sense of responsibility. You know, the Okinawans use this word ikigai. People are starting to use that word a lot, sense of purpose. And it really does make a big difference when it comes to longevity, probably eight extra years of life expectancy. But the purpose experience in Blue Zones isn't the sort of follow your passion purpose that we think of in America. You know, we think, well, we're going to retire or, you know, I got some free time on my hand.

I'm going to travel or I'm going to play golf or pursue knitting, whatever it is. Purpose in Blue Zones is spliced with responsibility. So when people think of purpose, it's always connected to putting the focus back on somebody else. It's making sure the younger generation thrives. It's making sure that the community is taken care of, making sure certain practices are preserved. There's always an altruistic element to purpose in the blue zones.

Yeah, and a corresponding aspect of responsibility, right? That's right. So it's almost a hybrid between purpose and responsibility. Right. You fuse those two, and that's the blue zone purpose. Right. Infuse those two, and that's the Blue Zone purpose. What's really interesting is this perhaps somewhat counterintuitive notion that infuses the work that you now do with cities by virtue of the Blue Zones Project, which is kind of a rejection of human self-will in a manner of speaking to say, look, you know, getting people to exercise, making them feel bad if they don't, even if you incentivize them to do

so, whether it's dieting, weight loss, whatever, all of these kind of health parameters that underpin how we think about health and fitness and wellbeing in the developed world just don't work. Yeah. They don't work. And the solution can be extracted from these traditional communities by observing the way that they live their lives and trying to create environments that are conducive to making the right choice. Yes, so it burns me up hearing these finger-wagging politicians saying that it's individual responsibility. It's your responsibility to be healthy.

But then you unleash people in the toxic food environment. You know, we blue zone the whole state of Iowa, and there was a lot of sort of local politicians who were saying, well, endorse blue zones, but we think it's mostly individual responsibility. How are you going to ask a single mother who's barely making ends meet with her 10-hour day job to go out into the food environment where 97 out of 100

choices are bad and say, go find good choices for your kids. I actually believe that if you're unhealthy and overweight in this country, which is 71% of American populations, it's not their fault. You go back to 1970, we had about a third the rate of obesity we have today. And is that because there were better exercise programs or people were more responsible in the post-hippie age, 1970, or because we had better diets or were better educated? No. uh better diets or we're better educated no you know our environment has changed and the very clear lesson that we get from blue zones is here's environments that we know are producing the statistically longest lived and healthiest populations and when i say longest live i don't mean they have better genes that are going to make them live to 120. What I am saying is they're avoiding heart disease, cancer, diabetes, and dementia,

the diseases that foreshorten your life. So they're getting the full 95 years or so, which is the capacity of the human machine. If you're listening to this right now, your body is right to the extent we science understands the human body. your body's capacity is 95 if you do all the right things. These populations are achieving that 95-year mark better than any other population in the world, and they're doing it because they live in the right environment. Right. They don't have to go out of their way to do it. It's just right in front of them. It's mindless. That is the choice to be made.

So when you look at the United States of America, I mean, where do we fall on longevity right now? Like 49th or something like that? Like right up there with Bangladesh or something. No, we're not that bad. I mean, it ain't good. And it dropped the last three years too. Yeah.

There's been a little bump upward We're not that bad. And it dropped the last three years too. Yeah. It dropped. There's been a little bump upward because we're seemingly getting this opioid crisis a little bit under control. But the previous three years, we've seen life expectancy drop for the first time in living history, first time in a century since the big flu epidemic in 1917. So no, we're going the wrong direction here. And the percentage of our GDP we spend on avoidable diseases, about $3.7 trillion, keeps going up every year. It's a statistical certainty it'll bankrupt our country

if it continues on the trend. And it's all because of diseases that result because of the environment we live in. And when you look at the environment, the culprits that I see are subsidized, cheap processed food, suburban sprawl, the advent of the automobile. Like there are certain kind of like seismic forces, cultural forces that have kind of led us to this place.

Like people are more separated geographically. We're reliant on our own personal cars versus public transportation. We're not living in consolidated, well thought out urban environments. Our access to healthy food creates socioeconomic problems. And we're dealing with that kind of like suburban growth, we see the degeneration of inner cities and thus the kind of food deserts that spring up that further exacerbate that socioeconomic and health

divide. It's a lot like, remember that old experiment, if you threw a frog in boiling water, it would leap out. But if you threw it in lukewarm water and turned up the water one degree at a time, it would cook the frog. That's kind of what's happening to us. I mean, in the 1940s, 50s, even 60s, the American food and built environment was actually pretty healthy. Most people walked, you cooked at home. There was a better balance between animal foods and plant-based foods. Going out for a hamburger and French fries was an occasional treat,

not a daily event. And what's happened is, first of all, every city engineer since the Eisenhower administration has been taught to build a street that gets as many cars as possible down it. So there's this sort of pervasive mindset among city planners that we want to build for cars and traffic. So that starts marginalizing the human. It's unsafe. There's no decent sidewalks. The streets are ugly. They're stressful because cars are whizzing by.

There are cities that are trying to reverse that trend, but it's going to take some years. Our food environment, ever since Earl Butts, Nixon's Secretary of Agriculture, he made trans fats before his time were used only as an industrial lubricant. He made them a food. That's been a problem. But also this system we have that favors corn, soybeans, sugar beets, and wheat. None of those products are bad by themselves, but they're mostly grown in the service of feeding animals. And there's too much of it.

It's a very cheap input. So American ingenuity takes these cheap core products and they process them and they add value. They market the heck out of them. They strip them of most of their nutrients. And now the $10 billion a year is spent marketing us things like sugared cereals and chips and sodas and crackers and these things that actually have their roots in pretty good food. But by the time they get to us, they're stripped of the nutrients and they're metabolically horrible for us and you can't get away from them. Mm-hmm. What about the car? Well, we all need cars, but there's this idea of induced demand.

What happens in most cities is there's a popular part of town, cars start to, traffic chokes it, and the politician under pressure does the intuitive thing. They widen the lane or put two more lanes in or rise the speed limit from 30 to 50. So cars, and what happens invariably is when you make it easier for cars, it induces the demand for more cars. So you put two more lanes in and within three to five years, those lanes are full. Because people say, no, it's easier to drive places.

But when you do the counterintuitive thing and you narrow lanes and you slow down traffic, we call it a road diet, and you widen the sidewalks and you make a bike lane, which actually causes cars to slow down even more, at a certain point, people do one of two things. They realize, wow, it's actually easier for me to walk or take the bus or bike to these places, or the driving pressure is such that they move closer to work or they move into a neighborhood. And this happens gradually. We want things to happen overnight, but we could probably eliminate 20 to 25% of the obesity problem in this country

if we designed our cities for human beings and not just cars. And that's a big part of the approach when you go to these cities and work with them to try to create a Blue Zones certified urban environment, right? Like how can we create systems to promote human movement over personal automobiles? So let me just give you some context on these Blue Zones projects. So most of the time when people think of community health, they're trying to promote diet or exercise programs, et cetera. We don't do any of that. We assume that people are genetically hardwired to crave sugar, fat, salt, and take rest whenever they can. And instead of trying to fight that by, as you point out, incent them or guilt them- Shame them.

trying to fight that by, as you point out, incent them or guilt them. Shame them. Shame them. We say, no, we're just going to set these individuals up for success, to make the healthy choice, not only the easy choice, but in some cases, the only choice. So how do you do that? So in each city, I have three teams. The first team is a policy team. teams. The first team is a policy team. And we have experts on building streets for humans,

on changing the food environments to favor fruits and vegetables over junk food, and to favor the non-smoker over the smoker. And we don't come in and try to nanny-steak the city government. We come in and say, here's a menu of 30 evidence-based policies that have worked elsewhere to make a city healthier. You've hired us to come in. Actually, the insurance company hires us to come in. We help them choose from each of these policy areas, eight to 10 policies that would be feasible in that city and effective in that city. And then our experts help make sure they get implemented.

So an example, if you live in a neighborhood where there are more than six fast food restaurants and 500 feet from the average house, the obesity rate in that neighborhood is about 35% higher than the same neighborhood with fewer than three fast food restaurants. So one of our proposals is that you limit the number of licenses for fast food restaurants. If you live in a neighborhood where there are billboard advertising for junk food,

the obesity rate in that neighborhood is about 10% higher than the same neighborhood without billboards ads. So one of the things in our menu is a ban on billboard advertising. And nobody misses the billboard advertising. And lo and behold, the obesity rate goes down in those neighborhoods. So we're going to try to get eight or 10 policies passed. Then we have a second team that administers a Blue Zone certification program for schools, restaurants, grocery stores, workplaces, and churches. And it's sort of like LEED certification for health. And then we have a third team that gets 15% of individuals. It's kind of a tipping point at 15% to take a blue zone pledge. And we get them

to take checklists into their home to optimize their home environment for better eating and more movement, optimize their social network. We create these MOIs. And then we give them a free purpose workshop and get them volunteering. And if you can orchestrate the perfect storm, people, places, and policies, and keep enough energy behind it for five years, in every case, obesity drops, five years, in every case, obesity drops, diabetes drops, life expectancy goes up, and people's life satisfaction, as reported to Gallup, goes up. And it's not because we changed individuals or shamed individuals. It's because we optimized their environment. Right. And the insurance companies love it. Then the phone rings again. Dan, you're doing a great job. We've got a new city for you. We're saving so much money. Well, Fort Worth, our biggest, Gallup estimates that our project occasioned about a quarter of a billion dollars a year in avoided healthcare costs.

And that will continue to accrue because we change. And now we're starting with Orlando, Florida. Tom Settema over there and the Blue Cross Blue Shield plan. We got a blueprint in place for Orlando, which is now 3 million people. It's actually all of Orange County. So the challenge gets bigger every time, but it's a worthy challenge. Yeah. And look, we can talk about plant-based diets and Ikari and stew and, you know, planting a garden in your backyard. But first, we got to get the soda machines out of the schools.

We got to get people, you know, walking and riding their bikes a little bit, maybe not sitting so much, you know, at their job, like very basic, simple things, some of which I would imagine are kind of easy to implement when you go to these cities and others, you know, perhaps require, you know, zoning and other kind of regulatory changes in order to implement. Yeah. See, if you get focused on the silver bullet, you're going to fail. We have what we call silver buckshot. So between our people policy and places strategy, we probably unleash 80 to 90 long-term nudges and defaults that are going to favor the healthy choice over the unhealthy choice. We're going to fail with 20 or 30 of them. But the other 50 or 60 have enough influence, enough of that sort of Adam

Smith silent hand nudge that you see behaviors change. And that's the big secret. Until we have the courage to take on our environment and stop with this fairy tale that we're magically going to get 330 million Americans to A, find the right diet, B, muster the discipline to stay on the diet, and three, have focus of mind to keep on it for the decades necessary to avoid a chronic disease. We're not going to, as they say, bend the curve. We're not going to do much with this obesity problem. It's till we sort of take on the places we eat our foods, where we go to work, our city, our city policies and the, the, our food and built environment where America is going to continue to spend needless money and suffer needlessly from chronic disease. Yeah. I mean, I just know it in

my own life. We live, you know, my life is an embarrassment of riches. We live in this beautiful, you know, part of the world. I have an incredible view and I'm surrounded by mountains and sunshine and, you know, it's phenomenal. But I live very far from an urban environment, so I'm not doing a lot of walking. And I'm also geographically distant from most of my friends. And I feel that in my life. I go to New York City. I'm walking from Soho to Midtown. I'm seeing tons of friends in a single day. It's a completely different experience that is dictated not because I'm making choices, but because the environment lends itself to me making different types of choices that then

completely change how I live my life and experience that day. Yeah. And they're not even conscious choices. Right now, if you want a bottle of soy milk, you got to get in your car here and drive. But if you live in New York or downtown Minneapolis, like me or Santa Barbara up the street, you can walk to that. And it's just easier to, you know, walk to the corner store than it is to- And you probably know the guy in the store. Yeah. And you run into your neighbors on the way by and it, you know, fends off this other huge, toxic epidemic we're suffering in America around loneliness, which is also- I mean, friendship and connection is a huge part of your work and focus. So maybe let's spend a little time on that. Well, first of all, I think your social connectivity is a function of your environment as well. If you live in a cul-de-sac

in some soulless suburb where there's no sidewalks to the neighborhood, you have to walk out in the street to get to the neighbor. If you want to go to a church or a cafe to have a cup of coffee, you have to get in your car. The number of spontaneous social interactions, which may lead to a connection or a friendship, just the numbers go down by a factor of 10 as opposed to living in a more population dense walkable community where people are bumping into potential friends all the time. But in our blue zones project cities to our earlier discussion, people are imploding into their handheld devices and their iPads.

And we have this very intentional program called Moise where we bring auditoriums of people in and we actually manually connect them with four or five other friends, helping them connect based on shared values, shared interest, and shared schedule. And then we just get them walking together for 10 weeks or eating plant-based potlucks together for 10 weeks. And about 60% or 70% of the time, they stay together for, so far, we've been able to track them as much as seven years. And so they're staying together seven years. And we know you are hugely influenced by your friends. So if you're hanging out with people who are drinking or smoking, you're 60 or 70% more likely to drink and smoke yourself.

Whereas if you're hanging out with people who are walking every day or are gathering around great plant-based food, those behaviors are going to become the contagious. It's the same sort of nudge philosophy that pervades all of our work. Maori. Is that an Okinawan word? Moai. Moai. M-O-A-I. Right.

It comes from, and actually has its roots in agricultural past where there weren't banks. So five farmers would come together and they'd meet every week and they'd throw in money every time they met. And then when one of them had a need to buy seed for the next, there was a fund of money that they could draw from. That tradition exists to this day, but it's mostly social. from. That tradition exists to this day, but it's mostly social. And it's essentially a committed circle of friends who travel through life together and support each other when the chips are down and share when the chips are bountiful. That's beautiful. I love that. It's not just about

cooking the food together or participating in a healthy activity, it's the connectivity. It's the congealing of the group and the relationships that are formed. Yes, and it's a constant thing. I sat with five women from the same Moai who get together every night, drink sake, argue about who the hot guy they like best back in 1941. Is this another one of you, you found your way into the house and you're sitting against the wall? Yeah, exactly. I'm sure they had no idea what the hell I was

doing there, but their average age is 102. They've been meeting almost every day for 97 years. And you could see that I sat with them two nights. Second night, one of the ladies didn't show up, and the other four put their kimonos on and shuffled over to their neighbor's house to check on them. So instead of a nurse or some sort of electronic gadget checking on, it's this beautiful social construct that worked without government intervention or without business getting involved. business getting involved. You just create it, give it some momentum, and inertia can keep it going for decades.

If you were given the task of creating a brand new city out of whole cloth, like there's just basically a blanket piece of land, and you're charged with constructing an urban environment, you're the new Pierre L'Enfant or whatever, looking at how to design Washington, D.C. or whatever it is. How do you begin that process? What is the city of the future, the ultimate blue zone city of the future look like?

And how is it kind of oriented around these principles? Well, I can tell you when developments are, are developed at eye level, you know, you have this model and there's somebody looking up above down that always fails. The design happens to, it has to begin, I think at, at eye level. But it, it, it starts with a core of you know, you almost look at these sort of Mexican cities where they have a zocalo. You want a social square in the middle of it. You know, the way cities evolved in Europe fairly consistently, no matter if you're in Spain or Italy or France or Greece. It's not a coincidence. There's a certain amount of human ingenuity and observed wisdom that's baked into these city designs in Europe. So if I had to design a city right here in the hills outside of Los Angeles, I'd start with a social square.

Around that, I would have restaurants and cafes, outdoor restaurants and cafes. I wouldn't let any cars in that central area. You want mixed use so people can live upstairs and they can do their shopping or the socializing on the first floor. You would have the streets would be designed first for humans. I would probably argue in the very downtown, maybe six square blocks, there'd be no cars at all. It would all be pedestrian. But at night, cars can come in and delivery trucks could come in and deliver food. But people don't miss their cars if they live close enough to the places that they socialize

or shop or go to work. I would loosen up on the density as you get towards the periphery, but what you see in all of the happiest and longest lived cities in America, Boulder, Colorado, Portland, Oregon, San Luis Obispo is a green belt. There's a certain, they're sort of designed like a donut and the donut holes where the people live and the donut itself is places to recreate, green spaces, places to go hike, places to bike. So you want to keep the development pressure focused inward and not let it sprawl outward, which is what the mistake the vast majority of cities make in this country. And if you have the economic influence pointing inward, that's when the ingenuity comes in. There's pressure to make a high quality of life. You can't just create huge spaces and to make better use of the roadways and the walkways

and the retail space. So of all the cities in the world right now, which city do you think best captures that ethos? Like who's doing it right? Which city do you think best captures that ethos? Like who's doing it right? Aarhus, Denmark is doing a great job, which is the second biggest city in Denmark. Or Copenhagen too. I mean, 1970, they were choked with traffic like a lot of American cities are.

Now over 50% of all trips are taken on bicycle. And this is in a cold area. And they did that. That didn't come about by coincidence, but it was this slow sort of pressure gently applied over decades to favor the cyclist over the motorist. Santa Barbara right near here, they're doing everything right. They're favoring a healthy food environment. right. They're favoring a healthy food environment. They've hired a bicycle coordinator to come in and make sure that the agenda... There's somebody always saying, well, if you're going to design this new street, there needs to be a pedestrian place. Other great cities, Naples, Florida,

believe it or not, has done a very good job in the United States. Boulder, Colorado, one of the best. But they're always intentional. They always stem from an enlightened group of leaders who shift their focus away from just economic development, which tends to be the thrust, to quality of life policies. tends to be the thrust to quality of life policies. And they just sequentially bring on quality of life policies and get them implemented. And lo and behold, after about a decade or so, you see obesity plummeting dependably. And you see people's reported wellbeing

or life satisfaction go up. I was in Copenhagen last summer. I was there right at midsummer. So everybody's out. It's light out until 11 o'clock at night. And I was delighted and very struck with just how different their lifestyle is compared to the way that I'm living mine. I mean, I was like, we just have it all wrong. You know, everyone is together. The cafes are packed, bicycles everywhere, people sunning themselves and jumping them

into the waterways and in boats. And it just, I don't know, it made a huge impact on me. And you said that it was once traffic choked. So what did they, like, what happened that they were able to like make that switch? There was an architect by the name of Jan Gehl, J-A-N-G-E-H-L, who first, one of the first in the world to realize

the importance of walkability and bikeability. And he went to the city council and he sort of pitched these ideas for redesigning their streets so that it favored bikes. It's just literally, you start with the bike lane, you slow down traffic. If traffic moves too fast, people get killed. You know that if you get hit by a car going 20 miles an hour, your chances of living are 90%. If you get hit by a car going 30 miles an hour, your chances of living drop to 40%. And if you get hit by a car going 40 miles an hour,

your chance of living drops 10%. So there's this whole sort of playbook where you look at the streets through the lens of a cyclist, calming traffic, narrowing car lanes, creating a protected bike lane. Trees make a huge difference. People like to walk on streets where there are trees. So it's minimizing the noise, minimizing the stress, minimizing the danger and maximizing the aesthetics and people come. And Copenhagen just did that systematically over the course of 40 years. And so quite frankly, is Boulder, Colorado and San Luis Obispo. Yeah. Aren't there all these crazy studies on sidewalks, like just how wide they need to be or how tall the lip on the curb needs to be in order to kind of make it as conducive as possible to people making use of them?

Yes. Yes. So as a rule, you want a sidewalk as wide enough to get a outdoor cafe on there if you're in a city. Yes. If one dangerous curb or one dangerous intersection, even though you might have a perfect sidewalk, but one dangerous intersection, and you have some old lady who would normally walk to church that way, but there's that one dangerous place, they won't walk. So you really do need to have an expert who knows how to assess the whole built environment and think of it as a whole, a continuum. We have a guy on our team named Dan

Burden, who is a direct descendant of that Jan Gehl in Copenhagen. So he knows all these techniques and he's developed them over 40 years. It's kind of a new science and it's counterintuitive because most engineers want more traffic. But when you sit down and listen to him and you see the results of a walkable city over a city that's overwhelmed with automobiles like Los Angeles. The quality of life is just vastly different. Yeah. I mean, what about making space for community gardens, like all these things where people can come together and participate in a joint activity, grow their own food together, right in an urban environment. What would happen if Manhattan outlawed all cars, except for perhaps delivery vehicles

or a certain limited number of taxis and really amped up the public transport? What would happen to that city? How would it transform? There would be two or three years of getting used to it and then they wouldn't miss it. It would be chaos at first, I would imagine. Yeah, I mean, you have sort of people

who can't walk eight blocks, not being able to hail a cab to get to work. But then I think they would be replaced by these sort of rickshaw cyclists, which you see going up and down the Avenue of the Americas all the time. We would adapt. I think more people would take the subway.

You know, if you just, Singapore does this. Singapore, Singapore is far more densely populated than New York City. Singapore is number two in the world with the highest population density, no traffic problem at all. Why? two in the world with the highest population density, no traffic problem at all. Why? Because they only allow a fixed number of permits to drive and those permits are available via auction.

So they get really expensive. Gas is two and a half times more expensive there than it is here. And then they take the money that these programs generate and they invest in this world-class subway system that's clean and it's on time and it's safe and it's pleasant and it's comfortable. And people don't miss their cars because it's a lot easier, faster, safer, and I would imagine is undermining this is the growth of all of these semi-human powered electric vehicles like electric skateboards and electric boosted bicycles. Like now, it seems like you can get an electric motor in almost every form of transportation that used to be human power, right? So people aren't really riding bikes. They're riding things that look like bikes, but actually are being electric powered. Oh, wait, I'll tell you something you may not hear. People who own an e-bike actually get more exercise than people on a bike. Do they? Because at least they get out. They're getting out. Wow. Yeah, they get on them more. And e-bikes, you know, I own seven of them.

So they can be a workaholic. Seven e-bikes? Yeah, you know the formula for the ideal number of bicycles, Rich? What, however many houses you have? I don't know. No, no, no. It's N plus one. N being the number of bikes you currently own. Oh, I see.

Oh, yeah. That's definitely a cyclist joke. Yeah. It should be everybody's joke. But e-bikes, you know, you get physical activity. It's just not necessarily... You know, in Santa Barbara, I live five switchbacks up from downtown. And, you know, you never go out to eat and then, you know, do this mountain gold bike ride back home. But I can flick on my e-assist and I'll actually use my bike now to go out to dinner. Right, that's a good point. Because I can, it flattens it out for the way back.

You still have to pedal, but it's just not as easy. I'm a huge fan of e-bikes. Yeah, I've never ridden one. Oh, a treat awaits. Well, I don't know, you got seven, so maybe you can throw it away. When you look at these blue zones pillars, movement, plant-based, plant slant diet, faith, friendship, connectivity, all of these things,

are they relatively evenly balanced? They're certainly interdependent with each other, but is there one that stands out? Did you write this Blue Zones Kitchen book because the diet component of it is so important? Or how do you think about the interplay of all of those things? Yes. To your point, it is a mutually supporting web of factors. So people eat wisely. They move naturally every 20 minutes because their life is underpinned with purpose. They have a social network that makes this easy. Their friends are doing these things and they live in environments where the healthy choice is the easy choice. So they are definitely connected, but the most important variable there is eating. Americans probably

lose six years of life expectancy eating the standard American diet. This is that middle age, by the way, overeating, say a blue zones diet, which is largely beans, whole grains, greens, nuts, and tubers, and fruits and vegetables as well. So the problem is, except for a few people like you with heroic discipline and a great community supporting you, it's very hard for Americans to go plant-based and whole food plant-based, by the way, it's not, you know, Twinkies and chips.

You need to, it's whole foods, plant-based diet is the most important factor. But the only way to do that for the decades necessary to avoid a chronic disease is have the right social network, live in the right place, having that sense of purpose where it's important enough for you to be around that you're gonna make the sacrifices every occasionally to not order the hamburger.

Yeah. Also in this is stuff about portion size, time of day, when to eat. Like one of the things you noticed is like, well, the size of the plates that these people are using, you know, is just different than in America. And how does that dictate long-term how we, you know? So I'll spin out a couple of the insights

that I captured for Blue Zones Kitchen on how they eat. First of all, they're cooking, no matter where you go, they're only using about 20 recipes or 20 ingredients rather over and over and over. Of course, they know how to combine these ingredients to create a symphonic deliciousness, but not a ton of different crazy foods or superfoods, no superfoods, except for beans.

Beans is probably the superfood. Number two, they tend to consume all their food in about an eight-hour window. Breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, dinner like a pauper. Number three, they tend to say something before the meal that marks a punctuation between their busy life and now we're slowing down to eat, like a prayer, the Adventists or the Sardinians, or harahachibu, which is a Confucian adage that the Okinawans say before every meal to remind themselves to stop eating

when their stomachs are 80% full. They tend to eat with their family. They tend to not have electronics in their kitchen, so they're not eating to their favorite song or eating to their favorite TV show. They tend to cook at home as opposed to going out. These are all things that I would argue add to the ecosystem of eating that produces long-lived people.

And the core of which being this knowing how to make plant-based food taste delicious. To me, the most interesting blue zone is Loma Linda, because when you look at the other ones, they've just sort of matured over time as a product of this environment. The surrounding environment contributed to that, whereas Loma Linda is in contradiction to the surrounding environment contributed to that. Whereas Loma Linda is in contradiction

to the surrounding environment. So it's almost more, it's so much more impressive to me that they've been able to do this in the context of where you find this city. And that presents the great hope, doesn't it? Because- That's exactly right. Because if they can do it-

Yeah, they live, to get there from here, you drive down Highway 10, which is six lanes, often under a call to smog. You exit at Loma Linda, and the first thing you see is a wiener hut and a Del Taco. And it's like, what? This is a blue zone? But you go inland a little bit, and you see this community of Seventh-day Adventists. And they're conservative Methodists who evangelize with health and they celebrate their Sabbath on Saturday, not Sunday. Which makes them, you know, the other blue zones are kind of geographically remote. These guys are a little bit culturally remote because, you know, the kids aren't playing football on Friday night or going to dances. And Saturday, they're focusing on their religion and doing nature walks. But it shows a few things. Number one, that your social network, the people you hang out with has the biggest influence on your

health behaviors than anything else. They're hanging out with people who, other vegetarians, they get their diet directly from the Bible, Genesis chapter one, every plant that bears seed, every tree that bears fruit. So they're eating mostly a plant-based diet. They're deeply spiritual. They hardwired right in their religion as a nature walk on Saturday afternoon.

So because of this environment that's created around their religion, they are living seven to 10 years longer than the rest of us. And we know that demographically, but it just goes to show you don't have to be an Adventist to get this benefit. You proactively curate a group of four or five friends. You want one rich roll out there who gets you running and you want a friend or two as a vegan or vegetarian because when you're hanging out with them, you're going to be learning how to eat plant-based food. You want two or three friends who, when you have a crappy day, like we all do, you can call them and they'll care about you. And of course, vice versa. And it's this building an Adventist-like, I think,

social network is a takeaway. You got to make your moai. That's right. Right? Yes. So I'm just imagining somebody who's listening to this who lives somewhere where they're like, I don't, I've never met anyone who, you know, eats that way or aspires to live any differently than how we live. Like how does somebody who finds themselves perhaps, you know, geographically, you know, distant from these ideas, you know,

and can't find that in their own community, like how does that person proceed? I guess they can at least start making the food out of your cookbook. Yes. Right. Blue Zone's kitchen's a starter place. Well, first I would think about getting very clear on what my passions are, what I like to do, and what I'm good at. And once you're clear on those three things, I would volunteer.

When you show up to volunteer, first of all, we know that volunteers are happier than non-volunteers, but also you tend to meet other people who are passion driven. And that's a good pool from which to make new friends. Service-minded. Service-minded people. And, you know, if you're a dog person, you volunteer for the Humane Society and you walk dogs with other dog lovers, you know, and people who love animals are more likely to be plant-based, you know, more likely to not eat animals than, than, than, than, you know, people who shoot animals, for example. But I would find the vegetarian restaurants and try those or the vegan restaurants and try those in a community. And then I would, you know, I actually have a tool on the Blue

Zones website that allows you to go through your social network. You know, if we really take kind of inventory on the friends we have in our lives, and this inventory actually asks the questions about how active they are, what kind of food they eat, what their temperament is. We often don't do that. We often just, you know, phone rings and, you know, our buddy, Jim, come on down to the bar, you know, we're meeting. And you just sort of follow inertia as opposed to sort of proactively looking back in your own group of friends to find the ones who are going to help propel healthier habits than the unhealthy ones. I just see like doing this inventory of one's

relationships and going, holy shit, I need new friends. I can just see the red pen. I mean, just like speaking of being a product of your environment, like, holy cow, these are the people I'm hanging out with. Well, Rich, let me ask you. I mean, you have this terrific history and your New York days where you were a big partier and ate different. I mean, I have to guess you left a lot of the pals you were hanging around then behind. Well, yeah, I mean, in 12 Step,

they call them lower companions. But I will say this, like I had plenty of lower companions. I don't know. But I will say this, like, I had plenty of lower companions, but I also, like, I have, like, when I was in New York, like, a lot of that was fun. Like, and a lot of the people I was running around with are, like, really cool people. They just didn't have the problem that I did,

and I'm still friends with those people. But certainly, you know, when that, like, addiction thing turns and it starts getting dark, you find yourself spending time with not the greatest crowd of people. So, yeah, when I got sober, I had to completely change my environment. And I invested in the 12-step community here in LA. And I knew, I was like, I need new friends. I need a whole new set of friends because left to my own devices,

that phone is gonna ring and somebody is gonna say, hey, we're doing this and that's what I'm gonna go do. Exactly. So I had to, in my own unconscious, semi blue zone way, I suppose, had to like reconfigure my environment without moving geographically, but socially.

Well, and that's the other thing. I mean, making new friends is a, it's probably the most powerful thing you can do to improve your happiness and your longevity. And there's actually very good research around the impact of the people you hang out with. But the other thing is you say, well, without moving your geography, probably the most powerful thing to do if you're unhappy is move to a happier place.

And we know that by following immigrants from unhappy places like Moldavia or unhappy places in Africa and Southeast Asia, when they move to Denmark, very happy place, or Canada, a very happy place, within one year, their age doesn't change much, their education level doesn't change, their sex doesn't change, their marital status usually doesn't change, their sexual preference doesn't change. Nothing about them changes. But within one year, they start reporting the happiness level of their adopted happy homes. And that often represents a doubling of happiness. So, you know, if you're not happy where you're living, when you think about it, what's more important than the health and happiness of you and your

family? You ought to really think about moving. And, you know, I was on this Mel Robbins show this week. I taped it. She's kind of a cool chick. She's a kick in the pants. She's got a lot of energy. She does. Did you do her TV show? Yeah. Oh, cool. Yeah. I think it's going to be out soon. But at the end of the, I was on there the whole show and they, they brought out three divorced women, you know, we're having a really tough time. And one of the women is, you know, 57, her husband at 30 years did kind of a crappy thing and, you know, ran off with another woman, left her in this house and it's a house on the beach. You know,

she kept saying it's a beautiful house on the beach, but it's really isolated. And she can't find new friends and she's really lonely. And I said to her, probably the best thing is move away from this house where you have these 30 years of memories with this guy who did this crappy thing to you and move into a community where there's other people like you, homophily. We like people like us where you can walk places, you know, instead of trying to find a pill or, you know, even like joining a club or something like that move, you know, that's the biggest, most powerful thing you can do is so counterintuitive. The average American moves 10 times in his or her adult life. would have, the average American moves 10 times in his or her adult life. So it's not like something we don't do, but we, I think we under celebrate the power of it. Yeah. I think that's great advice.

I would add one caveat to that, which is, this is another thing I've learned in sobriety, like alcoholics and addicts love to move. They love to move. See, I didn't know that. Yeah. Well, first of all, you know, because they burned a bunch of bridges, so they got to get out of Dodge. But there is this sort of perverted idea that moving your geographic location is going to save your problems. If you have some kind of emotional disorder or situation or addiction, moving your geographic location is not going to solve that because you, the thing, the thing that you don't realize is you bring yourself with you. So you got to kind of work on that as well. But I, other than that, I agree with everything

that you said. Yeah. So it's not going to change the person you are on the inside. And if you're addicted or, you know, emotionally troubled, moving is not necessarily gonna address that. But it's gonna, if you're just a normal person struggling with normal things, I would argue even a mild depression and anxiety can be ameliorated by moving. And it's one of these things that it just stacks the deck in favor of a better life. It doesn't promise a better life.

It's not gonna release all of your demons. It just puts you in an environment where you're more likely to bump into people. You're more likely to get physical activity. You're more likely going to socialize. And everybody else is going to come on and say, I got this product that's going to help you. And I'm going to say, forget all the damn products. I'm the sort of the disruptor and saying, no, it's not your behavior, it's your environment. What did Mel say when you offered up that advice on the show? She liked it actually.

She let me go on and on. She has got this count to five strategy. Five second rule. The five second rule, which is not just for dropping your toast on the floor, but apparently whenever you're stressed out or you count to five. And what I love about her show is she,

so many Americans are struggling or half Americans don't have $400 saved and she brings them on her show. And she's trying to, you know, not the dazzling celebrities. She's trying to bring on, I think she's trying to address a growing number of people in this country who are suffering and, you know, doing the best she can in an education, I mean, entertainment format.

But nevertheless, you know, entertainment format, but nevertheless, you know, there's a true caring on her part and a marshalling of the available expertise. Yeah, a hundred percent. I mean, she has an incredible talent and facility for being able to communicate inspirational, practical ideas to that certain type of person who is suffering in that way. And I think it's profound. Like she's very talented at what she does. She's great. So I'm interested in, you know, we were talking about happiness, like if you're not happy, move. So much of the work that you've done, you know, we've talked about the blue zones of longevity, but you've also spent a lot of time working on these blue zones of happiness. And in the Venn diagram of longevity and happiness very much overlaps, but it doesn't overlap completely.

No. Which in and of itself is interesting. Yeah. If you can situate your life so you're among the 20% of the happiest people in America, it's worth about six years of life expectancy over being in the least happy 20%. So they're highly correlated. It's very hard to be happy if you're not healthy and vice versa. And the blue zones of longevity, by the way, are in the top 10% of the happiest places in the world. But the places I profiled for blue zones of happiness are different places. And once again, my approach on happiness is if you want to be happier, don't try to change your behavior, you'll fail.

You'll become a neurotic because none of these interventions, most of them don't work. And the ones that work don't work for long enough to make a real life change difference. Once again, I argue changing your environment. Happiness itself is a meaningless term because you can't measure it. But social scientists can measure life satisfaction, which is how you look at your life in the rear view mirror on a scale of one to 10, how satisfied are you with your life? And you can think of your whole life and yeah, you know, I got a good job. Give it a number. Then there's how you experience your life, which is how often you smile and felt joy in the last 24 hours. And then the third one is purpose. How often do you get to use your strengths

to do what you do best? And those three strands come together and they weave together to make what I think is of a rope of sustainable happiness. So I found the statistically happiest place in each of those three areas. And then I went and told their story in an effort to marshal in the science. And Blue Zones of Happiness is really, because we have so much data now,

it was really trying to tell a character-driven story of places that represent the data. So in other words, things you can do that stack the deck in favor of happiness. And how do those, where do those diverge from the pillars of the blue zones on longevity? I don't think they necessarily diverge. I mean, there's so much overlap. For example, we know that people are eating six servings of vegetables every day. They're not only living longer, but they're also reporting 20%

more happiness. People who have a strong social network, arguably the biggest thing you can do for happiness also favors your longevity. Having a sense of purpose. Purpose is one of the pillars we measure when it comes to happiness. So the best crossover in the world is Costa Rica. So Costa Rica is home to not only Nicoya, which is a longevity blue zone, but Cartago, which is up in the highlands near San Jose, which is a happiness blue zone. And Costa Rica, interestingly, produces more,

you know, there's a correlation between GDP. So generally the richer the country, the happier it is to a point, but it's not the whole picture, right? But Costa Rica produces more human happiness per GDP dollar than any place in the world. And it produces more health per healthcare dollar than any place in the world. So it demonstrates that when it comes to happiness and longevity, money's not that important. It's not nearly as important as we think here in the United States.

You need security, it's sort of security over prosperity. Well, they focus on the things that really lead to happiness. So if happiness were a cake recipe, the important ingredients. So you need food, you need shelter, you need some health care. Those all cost some money. You need some education. Flattens off after about two years of college.

So not everybody needs a college degree. Trusting environment is really important. Having the right partner in life, having a job with meaningful work, the feeling of giving back, these are all measurable ingredients in the happiness. And where you live is the one with the biggest variance. So Cartago, the happiest places, for example, people are socially interacting between six and seven hours a day and not on Facebook, not on social media. They are sitting across the table from their friend. So the place I profiled in Cartago was the Central Market, these produce salesmen. And it has the air of a bunch of 50-year-old frat boys, in a way, and frat girls.

They kind of tease each other. They help out each other. They joke around. When somebody gets sick, they all pitch in to help for that person. The cheapest and healthiest foods are the plant-based foods that they sell. They live on walkable distance from home. They have easy access to nature. These are all things that are going to favor happiness. They're not going to guarantee happiness. They're so at odds with everything that we've kind of, you know, premised our American dream upon. You know,

the idea of like, you get a house in the suburbs and you got two cars in the garage and you got the job downtown and you're, you know, you're just everything, you know, like you're climbing the corporate ladder and it's about getting ahead and that promotion and the two weeks off and putting the money aside for the retirement. There is nothing about that that speaks to what we actually have, what you have actually discovered and know about what makes people live long and live happily. That's exactly right. When it comes to happiness, most people in this country are misguided or just plain wrong.

And it's not because they're stupid, but because we're relentlessly marketed this idea that if we have more, if we look better, if we're younger, if we could just get this one thing, financial freedom, a better looking partner, a bigger house, that that's going to deliver us the happiness. And that's always misguided. Happiness is always a cluster of factors that need to come together. It's never just one thing. And we miscalculate the amount of happiness any one goal is going to give by about 50%. So in other words, this thing we think we want, we're wrong half the time. Yeah. Well, the thing is, we're constantly being presented with evidence that we're wrong, right? Like when you get that job or that promotion

or that car or that vacation, you have that kind of momentary excitement around it or sense of feeling good, but it so quickly fades. And rather than challenging the whole setup or dynamic, we say, well, yeah, that wore off, but like, I just need to get that next, want to get the next thing, then it'll really- Yeah, it's yeah, that wore off, but like, I just need to get that next, want to get the next thing. Then it'll really- Yeah. It's not bad to have goals, but it's bad to think that that,

to rely wholly on that goal and sacrifice too much. Let's just take the context of a day. And I'll tell you exactly what statistically, the things that you can do that stack the deck in your favor for happiness. First of all, wake up without alarm. The happiest people are sleeping between eight and nine and a half hours a day. If you're sleeping six hours, you're about 30% less happy. Number two, eat a plant-based breakfast. If you eat a big fatty breakfast or sugar cereal breakfast, you're going to be hungry midday.

You're going to have less energy throughout the day. Number three, make sure you have coffee with a friend. You have lunch with a friend. You want to make sure to engineer in four or five hours or six, if you can, of social interaction with people you like. Where am I? Number five, volunteer. Find a little time to give back every day. Worldwide, statistically speaking, volunteers are happier than non-volunteers. Take a nap.

Work part-time instead of full-time. We know from every place in the world, people are working less than about 35 hours a week. They report the highest level of happiness. Of course, you need to make enough money to cover your basic needs. Belonging to a faith, it doesn't matter what the faith is, but belonging to faith stacks the deck in favor of happiness. Watching TV and social media, it seems that about 30 minutes a day of each is optimal. Actually, that provides a little bit more happiness than no social media and no TV at all. But after about an hour and a half of either one of those,

your happiness starts to drop off a cliff. So you want to spend about an hour a day exercising at least. And that can be somebody as simple as walking and gardening or it could be like you do, running a mini marathon every day. But doing those things are going to stack the deck in favor of happiness way more than shooting for this financial freedom or, you know, I want a house in Beverly Hills, or I'm going to get that promotion, damn it, no matter what it takes. Wrong-minded. Yeah. Where does risk come into this? You're somebody who very early on developed a certain kind of relationship with adventure and exploration and risk that is somewhat unusual in our culture and has kind of birthed this career that you're on. Most people

I would characterize as more fear-based and risk-averse in terms of trying to find that purpose in your life and the sort of willingness required to place yourself in uncomfortable, unpredictable situations. Like, how do you think about that in the context of happiness? Well, I go on expeditions, not adventures, and I never had much respect for the sort of the adventure risk-taking. I know, but you go, if you Google you, it's like National Geographic Explorer. I'm like, I want to be like that. That's like the coolest job title ever. It is pretty cool. And like, listen, you know, you've been on the show a number of times. The first time you came on, you went into detail on this previous chapter of your life where you set Guinness World Records for endurance cycling and you've ridden your bike and you've done a lot of other stuff prior to this. So

I would characterize you as an explorer. Thank you. I'm an explorer, but not an adventurer. Even though I biked across Africa, I biked Alaska to Argentina, I biked around the world through the Soviet Union, it collapsed right after I left. And you spent three days with a 102-year-old woman. Woman, yes. I think that's an adventure. It is, but they weren't risks. They were all very carefully planned out and calculated to mitigate risk at every- But every explorer and an adventurer says that.

Alex Honnold sat across from me and said, like, he doesn't think of what he does as being risky because the people, you've done so much work ahead of time to prepare for that kind of thing. I think what's more risky is sitting in front of your TV and eating hot dogs and chips because that will amount to a certain death and probably a certain kind of misery

through life. Heat check. I hear you. But I think rather than risk, I've been blessed with this irrational optimism that you can do these things that most people don't think about doing. Or in fact, people have tried to dissuade me from doing them, but very few of them require any risk. But in terms of how you think about finding your purpose,

right, like you have to be willing to try new things and perhaps even cut against the grain if you're in search of what that might be that will lead you to your, you know, ikigai. Yes. Well, I think it's a fairly simple exercise to take a piece of paper and people haven't reflected on this. Most Americans have never reflected on this. You, you, you put four columns, just all the things that you love to do. Then right next to it, same line, your passions, what you're good at. And then you, you look at the commonalities on where, where your gifts are, where can you put these passions and skills to work.

And once you're clear on that, if you then design your career around the intersection of those things, you're setting yourself up for success in life, not because you're going to enjoy the journey and we're, it's, we're doing what we're love. We're, we're more likely to be successful. It's like your podcast. I remember, you know, first time we met, you came over to my house with a little tape recorder and I got this podcast and I didn't know what it was. It, you know, it sounded like, you know, something you keep makeup in or something, but anyway, the, the, the, the, and you've, you've grown it into this empire. And I know enough about you that you're living your passion every day by not only

talking about your ultra endurance, but also using the life lessons you've learned in the life lessons of the people you bring on to better people's lives. And lo and behold, it grows. So it's getting clear on your purpose and then going from there. I think it also is about finding that thing that you click with, that you connect with, that you not only have some kind of natural affinity for, but also has been a transformative influence in your life. And then figuring out a way to translate that in service to others to perhaps have a positive impact on the world at large. That's well put.

And I've heard you speak about that in so many words before. That service to others is really important too because if it's just a selfish pursuit, it brings hollow after all. Well, that's, I mean, I think that's the secret sauce of happiness and it's so counterintuitive because we're in a selfish culture where we're taught that happiness is a direct result of somebody else's problem or issue, all your bullshit tends to evaporate and you find yourself more present, grounded, grateful. All of the things that we're seeking in wrongheaded ways come by virtue of doing that. I've heard it.

I'm saying that to remind myself. Yeah, well, you're reminding me too. It's not my natural inclination. I've heard it summed up really elegantly. So the four key ingredients to happiness are someone to love, something to do, something to look forward to, and something to give back. And if you can get those sort of four things into your daily life, you're pretty well set up. That's pretty good. I think that's a good place. I'll take pretty good. I'll take pretty damn good. Rich roll. What's your favorite recipe in the Blue Zones Kitchen book? It's the Melisse Minestrone. So I met the longest lived family in the history of the world, nine siblings, collective age, 861 years. Every day of their

life, they had the same lunch, a sourdough bread, a small two or three ounces of red Continental wine in this minestrone, which is made from black eyed peas, lentil beans, garbanzo beans, cruciferous vegetables, onions, garlic, tomato, a little bit of olive oil, some pasta. And together it creates this absolute longevity stew that's an absolute feast for our microbiome. And it's also, it freezes well, it's delicious. I fed that to an entire city, Elbert Lee, Minnesota. I made 2,500 dishes and this was a meat packing plant city. And their definition of vegetables before this minestrone was like the orange flex on hamburger helper. And I had two boiling cauldrons in this city, ate every last drop of that. Wow, that's cool. That's amazing. So

you've worked now with like over 40 cities, right? 50. 50. Yeah, we just hit 50 cities today. Holy smokes. Over 40 cities, right? 50. 50. Yeah, we just hit 50 cities today. Orlando, Florida is the big city coming on and Jacksonville, Austin, Texas, with our buddies at Whole Foods. Nice.

That's exciting, man. How many people are working for Blue Zones now? About 200. Wow, that's cool. Yeah, so it's grown. So is that like looking forward over 2020, is that occupying most of your time? I mean, I know you do a lot of public speaking

and the like, like what's on tap for you? Yeah, and we started out with an idea and now it's grown and the challenge now is scaling this and bringing enough top-notch talent. So it's almost like an adventure of sorts to build this team so that it can handle the size of the cities that are inviting us in.

And you're working on another book? Not yet, I'm taking a break. I have to do one more edition of Blue Zones. And we think there might be one more Blue Zone. And I'm trying to confirm that. If I do, I'll come out with another story in Geographic. Super secret. Super secret.

Wow. That's exciting. Yeah. Good. If it is, I can guarantee it's the last one on earth. You've milked this thing for a lot of books, my friend. I don't blame you though. It's amazing work.

How's Kathy? Is she good? Kathy Freston, my cruciferous girlfriend who says hi. She's the vegan vixen. She's been a great influence on really you know really an early pioneer and making uh plant-based eating cool yeah for sure yeah huge huge influence on mainstreaming what we now kind of almost take for granted like oh vegan options pretty much everywhere you go but like kathy played a huge part yeah you got oprah to go vegan for a while and Ellen DeGeneres and Crossworld Kitchens,

which I argue is one of the best restaurants in Los Angeles is all plant-based. That would have been seen as a heresy 15 years ago. Well, kind of also a big influence on you personally. Like I think even in the time that I've known you, you've had an evolution in terms of your plant-based diet, you know, relationship. Yeah, you know an evolution in terms of your plant-based diet, you know, relationship. Yeah, you know, I've come to a plant-based diet by observing the diets of the world's longest-lived people.

And 95% of what they put in their mouth is whole plant-based food. But she comes at it, you know, sort of the animal cruelty. And I never even thought of, you know, that the occasional piece of meat I ate occasioned, you know, just horrible pain and suffering from another sentient being. My favorite statistic she told me that an adult pig has the intelligence of a three-year-old human. It spends its entire life in a cage it can't turn around in, lives in its own feces, connects with its young the same way we connect with our young, wants to socialize, feels pain in the same way,

yet lives a miserable life and has a horrible death at the end, all in the service of bacon or pork chop. And when you add that to the fact that eating a plant-based diet is probably worth six to eight years over eating a standard American diet. It's just so overwhelmingly right to that.

Not to mention the environmental considerations. Yeah, it's the third prong, yes. Yeah. Well, we got to round this out here. I just want to say for the record and publicly that you have been a huge inspiration to me and a bit of a mentor. I appreciate you as an individual, as a human being, as a friend. And I have so much respect for the work that you are doing and will continue to do. You are truly changing millions of lives. And the ripple effect of that will be seen for generations to come because of

what you're doing in these cities. And it's really no small thing. I mean, you've basically created a term that has entered the modern lexicon. Like everybody knows what the blue zones are right now, and it starts with you. And so thank you for that. You're a gift to humanity. Oh, well, great. Glad to have you in my life. Brother from another mother. I consider you the core. Oh, well, Rich. Very glad to have you in my life. Brother from another mother, I consider you the core of my Moai, Rich. Okay, yeah, well,

I'm gonna have to get up to Santa Barbara then and solidify that, so thanks, Matt. Thank you for the kind words. You're welcome back anytime. And I think that we got this- Did you get recorded this time? I think it recorded. I think we're good.

All right, man, peace. All right, man. Peace. All right, what'd you guys think? Dan is a charismatic one, isn't he? Eat plants, love your neighbor, find purpose, be connected, move more, live longer, live happier. This guy rules. That was awesome. Hope you guys enjoyed it.

Do me a favor, let Dan know what you thought about today's conversation. You can find him on Twitter and Instagram at Blue Zones. You can go to bluezones.com to learn more about the work that he does. Please pick up the Blue Zones Kitchen. You won't regret it. And to avail yourself of everything we discussed today, you can dive into the show notes on the episode page at richroll.com.

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