Bulletproof Radio

In this episode of Bulletproof Radio, I asked Dr. Michael Platt to come on the show to discuss all things adrenaline.Dr. Platt is a board certified in Internal Medicine and has nearly four decades of experience working with patients in varied clinical settings from medical groups to elder care medicine to health research. He’s currently the president of Platt Wellness Center in Rancho Mirage, California, where he specializes in bio-identical hormones, hormone balancing and the causation of illness.We talk about his focus on treating health conditions caused by excess adrenaline, which can include fibromyalgia, autism, ADHD, bipolar disorder, depression, anger, weight gain, and addictions, among others—and how progesterone plays a major role in the solution.“What people don't understand is that the primary reason why the body releases adrenaline is to provide fuel to the brain,” says Dr. Platt. “You can see from a survival standpoint, the body always wants to make sure the brain has enough fuel. It's normal for people to release adrenaline at certain times, but I use the term adrenaline dominance to indicate where those people have excess amounts of adrenaline, to the point that it actually has clinical consequences.”Our conversation covers an assortment of questions, such as:Is adrenal fatigue real?Can post-partum depression be eliminated with progesterone?Is fibromyalgia pain a build-up of lactic acid in the muscles?Is ADHD really about interest, rather than focus?Should you be intermittent fasting if you have excess adrenaline?Can you control adrenaline by controlling insulin?Does blocking adrenaline prevent or eliminate stress?Listen on to find out some interesting answers to these and many other questions during our discussion. Enjoy the show!

In this episode of Bulletproof Radio, you’ll meet tennis phenoms Bob and Mike Bryan, aka The Bryan Bros. Born three minutes apart, the twins have been in sync ever since—both on and off the court. They are American professional doubles tennis players, gold-and bronze-winning Olympians, and are the most successful tennis duo of all time.The two have won a record number of tour titles (118 at the time this episode airs) and have been finalists on 58 other occasions. They have a career Super Slam and 16 Grand Slam titles overall, which is more than any men's team in the Open Era.The twins’ parents began coaching them at the age of two. The brothers turned pro in 1998 after attending Stanford University and winning two NCAA championships. Since then, they have amassed 118 ATP Tour Titles together, including a record 18 Grand Slams. Their Gold Medal win the 2012 Olympic games made them the only team in ATP history to hold all four Grand Slam titles and an Olympic Gold medal. The Bryans also have achieved the ATP Tour year-end No. 1 ranking for a record 10 years, and Mike recently celebrated his 500th week at No. 1 on the ATP Tour doubles rankings.Their success is the result of a combination of hard work, mutual respect, and a passion for the game of tennis. (It also helps that one of the twins has a 140 mph lefty serve!)But both Mike and Bob have suffered injuries that threatened to end their careers, including Bob’s recent hip surgery. At the age of 40, no one thought they would come back and continue to win, but they have—several times over. They’ve changed up their training regimen and put serious focus on recovery.“You've got to set these goals and really work every day to do it,” Bob says. “It's being professional in every aspect of your life. I'm trying just to dial on the health as best as I can because when I'm done, I want to be able to play with my kids. I want to be able to walk down the street and not be limping or needing metal on every joint. That's my goal: to retire healthy but keep playing as long as we can.”Today’s episode is going to be a good one as we talk about all the ways these professional athletes biohack to their advantage, how music keeps them in sync, and how they are helping at-risk kids.

In this episode of Bulletproof Radio, I take a deep dive into my favorite topics—anti-aging and longevity—with James Clement, who is leading research and groundbreaking developments in these areas from a particularly personal perspective.A self-described transhumanist, he’s now is the president and director of Betterhumans, the world’s first specifically-transhumanist bio-medical research organization. James’ view of longevity is focused on healthspan and the humane aspect of being human over the long haul. He doesn’t want to cheat death, he wants to extend life in the best way possible.James has an interesting backstory as a former international tax lawyer who became an entrepreneur and then a scientist. He’s currently running anti-aging clinical trials and engaged in anti-aging molecular biology research with top science researchers. He participates in the clinical trials, too.Join us as we talk about the current science biggies: senolytics, NAD, exosomes and rapamycin, and what makes supercentarians so super.“There are two simultaneous things that we have to do to live longer,” James says, “and I divide it up as first we have to get to 100. Getting to 100 is, for those of us who weren't lucky enough to inherit supercentenarian genomes, it means doing everything we can in our lifestyle to live longer.”“And then the idea of ‘how are we going to live beyond 100?’” he continues, “There's going to be a lot more that we have to do and that's going to be where more radical therapies, which include nutraceuticals, pharmaceuticals, lifestyle changes, but also genome editing, will all be necessary to get us far beyond the 100 threshold.”

In this episode of Bulletproof Radio, we get into the pros and cons of mind-wandering—why it’s good for you, when it’s too much, and how to use it to your advantage.My guest is Jonathan Schooler Ph.D., a professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences at the University of California-Santa Barbara. He has studied mind-wandering extensively, and his research includes mindfulness, cognitive psychology, memory, and consciousness. “The idea is that when people are mind-wandering, it's basically sort of stirring the pot and allowing unconscious associations to reorganize and consolidate, and allowing new things to come to mind,” Dr. Schooler says.He explores topics that intersect philosophy and psychology, such as how fluctuations in people’s awareness of their experience mediate mind-wandering and how exposing individuals to philosophical positions alters their behavior.Our conversation goes deep into mind-wandering, why we often have a deficit of it, and why it’s vital to human performance.Listen on to find out:How to identify four types of mind-wandering;How meta-awareness helps you realize when you’re mind-wandering instead of paying attention;Why mind-wandering is important to the creative process; andWhy the most effective techniques for helping with mind-wandering and focus are mindfulness and meditation. Stick with this episode all the way through because I’ve added a special feature and a bonus topic. Enjoy the show!

In this episode of Bulletproof Radio, I’m interviewing a guy I just met at the Consumer Health Summit in Scottsdale, Ariz.Kyle Cease is a well-known comedian who has two No. 1 Comedy Central specials to his credit. He’s also a “New York Times” best-selling author of “I Hope I Screw This Up” and a transformational speaker who helps people release anxiety and fear on stage. Kyle comes from an extended family of entertainers. He started asking to do stand-up routines for his classmates in second grade. By 18, he was on a wild ride more than 250 nights a year headlining comedy shows. He did this for years at the expense of his physical and mental health. A bout of pneumonia took him down after a particularly brutal touring schedule; he developed crippling stage fright out of nowhere; and he was disparaged by the comedian community of which he’d been such an integral part. After that, he reassessed everything about himself and the life he’d been living.I did not know who Kyle was until I met him at the summit. I sat next to him at dinner and thought “This guy has an amazing brain where we can talk about humor, and we can talk about how that turns into letting people really talk about what's going on.” His wit is sharp, and his improv is hands-down amazing. Prepared remarks? Nah. Bullet points on a presentation? Nope. He’s the master of riffing and creative flow in the moment. And while he may be spontaneous, he’s deeply grounded in self-awareness. He believes strongly and says so. So instead of jokes, he shares insights about our all-so-common human condition during our interview. (As well as his foray into raw veganism and tuning into his body vibrations.) Here are some of his zingers:Happiness: “I find that one illusion that every human is in, is the illusion of when something happens, I'll be happy.”Expectations: “I have a belief that no one can break your heart, but they can break your expectations.”Creativity: “I believe if you're not continually creating, your mind will creatively sabotage you.”Life: “A lot of us spend a lot of our life trying to protect a life that we're not living.”You’re going to learn a lot today from this interview, because Kyle uses humor in a way that gets way underneath what's really going on with you.

Peter Sullivan, CEO and founder of Clear Light Ventures, is a major environmental health funder who focuses on two things that I care a lot about: one is toxins and the other one is wireless safety. I actually really like my wireless devices. I think they're really useful, but I also know that they are not without a dark side.In this episode of Bulletproof Radio, Peter shares how he recovered from the effects of high levels of wireless and EMF exposure, as well as mercury poisoning. He’s also spent the last 15 years successfully recovering his two sons from autism and sensory issues.His efforts are now focused on raising awareness about the known health effects of wireless radiation and EMF (electromagnetic fields), both of which are listed as group 2B carcinogens by the World Health Organization. Peter is one of the leading funders in the country in this area of research, funding work at Harvard, Stanford, University of California-Berkeley and several leading environmental health non-profits.“What we need to talk about in this area in general—and this goes for autism and chronic disease—is that it's total load, that it's never one thing.” Peter says. This is a mistake I made. This is a mistake everybody makes. You start out thinking it's genetic. Then you do diet and you start stuff. You try to find the one thing.The human body, unfortunately, is so much redundancy that by the time you see a symptom you've had a cascade of failures.”“We're pretty awesome beings, but we're not above the laws of physics,” he says.The magnetic fields that are in our houses surround us but come from different angles and different frequencies. They create an interference pattern and can really disrupt sleep and many other biological functions. Peter and I talk through many examples of health issues disrupted by tech and how to take safety measures to reduce your exposure. We’re both convinced that in the future, safe technology is going to be a requirement—think seat belts in automobiles. We’re not there yet, but we're going to continue working toward making our now-omnipresent tech and devices safer.

In this episode of Bulletproof Radio, I’m excited to once again be talking to Dr. Steven Gundry, renowned heart surgeon, celebrity doctor, medical researcher and a New York Times best-selling author. You may know Dr. Gundry from either his previous appearance on the show, episode #417, or by his book, “The Plant Paradox: The Hidden Dangers in “Healthy” Food That Cause Disease and Weight Gain.” He’s a leading expert on the lectin-free diet and believes we have the ability to heal ourselves through nutrition when certain dietary obstacles are removed. He’s now tackling gut health and many of the myths surrounding healthy aging in “The Longevity Paradox: How to Die Young at a Ripe Old Age.” And he starts with the premise that bacteria, rather than our genes, makes us complex and defines our human-ness.We cover many facets of the microbiome that are contributing to how we age, and Dr. Gundry gives it to us straight:“Aging, at its core, is inflammation,” he says. “I, and others, believe that inflammation is from leaky gut, period.”“The deal with getting younger is your gut wall is your skin turned inside out,” he says. “What happens on the surface of your gut is reflected on the surface of your skin, they are the same organ.”“The reason we're all so screwed up is that our (gut) soil is also dead, just like our soil that our crops are growing in and no wonder we've got such a problem,” he says.Listen in on this informative discussion about how our bodies are wired to deal with environmental stressors; what long-term health looks like in other parts of the world; and how you can improve your own gut health.

In this episode of Bulletproof Radio, we're going to talk about mushrooms, but not the magic kind. We're going to talk about the other kind of mushrooms. The kind that has medicinal value, the kind that, depending on which species you use, can do almost anything a lot of the big pharmaceutical drugs can do,as well as things that are really important for our soil, for our food supply, and things like that.Your cells, mitochondria, immune system, sleep patterns, inflammation, nerve growth pattern, and energy levels all benefit from mushrooms. These fungi are full of compounds and nutrients that your body will love. There’s a whole lot of science behind this now.Julian Mitchell—co-founder and CEO of the Australian-based company Life Cykel—and his team are doing amazing work with mushrooms as innovative food sources and medicinals in Australia.For day-to-day use, you’ll definitely want to go with cooked, not raw mushrooms. For those of you who aren’t fans of actually eating mushrooms, there’s an option for you, too: “Having it as a tincture makes it very easy to add to a coffee, add to a tea, add to a smoothie,” Julian says. “It's quite tasteless and at the same time micro-dosing it in small amounts straight into your mouth is a great way to have it as well and absorb it straight into your blood system.”You’ll also learn about the naturally (sweet!) ingredient infused into the Life Cykel tinctures and powders. It’s a native Australian fruit rich in antioxidants and antiviral properties that amplifies the benefits of the mushrooms.And for those of you who are chasing sleep, I found nothing else that increased my REM sleep as much as the specific extracts of one species, which I’ll tell you about during the show.Mushrooms are having a moment—and likely many more. Here’s what Julian says:“Mushrooms and mushroom-based foods are going to play a huge role in the future of food. They grow quickly requiring very little resources in terms of water, power, and land. They have an amazing nutritional profile, and of course, they are 100% natural.”“The more we look to the natural world for solutions, the better off we're going to be and so, mushrooms and the fungi kingdom are hugely important to our evolution.”“Mushrooms are almost an uncharted continent, with infinite applications not just in food but in biotechnology.”It's going to be a fascinating episode. You're going to find some things you didn't know about some of the mushrooms you already eat. As well as some of the mushrooms you probably should be eating but aren't. And I'm also going to ask the hard questions about why mushrooms suck.

In this episode of Bulletproof Radio, you’ll hear from an expert psychologist who is known as an innovative thinker, trainer and speaker.Joan Rosenberg, Ph.D., guides individuals to achieve their highest potential by helping them create, master and sustain desired life changes. Her newest book: “90 Seconds to a Life You Love: How to Master Your Difficult Feelings to Cultivate Lasting Confidence, Resilience, and Authenticity,” puts you in control of your own emotions.“My approach is centered on helping people experience and move through eight unpleasant feelings (or emotional states),” Joan says. “Sadness, shame, helplessness, anger, vulnerability, embarrassment, disappointment and frustration.”Within those eight, you’ll find a commonality.“The single most important thing I can do is to recognize someone's pain, and just in essence, hold a mirror up to it, even if it sounds like you're saying the things that are so obvious,” Joan says. “It has a huge impact of calming someone else's nervous system down.”And you’ll learn the art of productive confrontation.“If it’s coming from a place that’s positive, kind, and well-intended, people will feel more well-understood and validated,” Joan explains. “Confrontation is one of the deepest forms of empathy.”Joan puts it all out there and doesn’t let anyone off the hook—asking you to take a look at your life stories and then making sense of them through a series of questions that get right down into the impact and meaning of your life experiences.Dealing with unpleasant feelings, is, well, unpleasant. So, let’s get to it and hack those emotions.

In this episode of Bulletproof Radio, we take a deep dive into a part of your biology you may not be paying enough attention to.Your blood pressure. If it’s running too high for too long, it puts you at risk for heart disease and stroke.The American College of Cardiology and the American Heart Association recently redefined hypertension as a blood pressure reading of 130/80 or higher. Previously, that threshold was 140/90. That change resulted in 31 million more people falling into a range of hypertension—meaning about 105 million U.S. adults age 20 and older.Putting the power of health directly into people’s hands always makes me happy, so I talked with Mark Young, CEO of Zona Health, about a solution.Lifestyle factors play a key role in keeping blood pressure within a healthy range—diet makes a difference and so does physical activity. And medication doesn’t have to be inevitable. For those of you whose numbers may be higher than optimal, there’s a software-controlled, handheld device available that uses a series of uniquely-calibrated algorithms to determine the perfect hand grip exercise for each individual user.Hand grip? Well, yes. “It's a medical device that uses isometric exercise to ultimately lower blood pressure,” Mark says.“The Zona is helping you do exactly what your body's naturally programmed to do,” he continues. “The device is not solving the problem; the device is training your body to solve its own problem.” (It’s also hacking time, taking only minutes per day to use.)The cool factor? This device technology is based on decades of g-force experiments done by the U.S. Air Force. And did I mention the connection between nitric oxide production and erectile dysfunction? We chat about that, too.