Dr. Andrew Huberman’s Path to Fame, Money, and Total Human Optimization

We probably shouldn't box. I I boxed I had my boxing card and boxed pretty consistently. uh various times. I'm not very good. You don't get a nose like this through yoga. Yeah. I feel like I can rule the world, I know I could be what I want to I put my law in it like my day song on the roadless travel never looking back. Andrew Huberman was just on the podcast. If you don't know who he is, I'm gonna try and describe him very simply.

He's this guy who works at Stanford, I believe he's a neuroscience doctor Huberman is his name. And he's got this YouTube video uh series and a podcast called Huberman Labs, where basically he picks one topic like sleep, stress. Building muscle. Um depression, addiction. And he'll do like an hour to two hours of just talking into the camera and talking into his mic and explains

Very easy ways to understand what it means. and how you can overcome or like what supplements or what exercises you can do to address. He's only been around for ten months and he's already one of the top ten most popular podcasts. He's everywhere on YouTube. This guy is a badass. We just had him on the podcast. I what I'm kind of like Starstruck a little bit'cause I'm such a fan of his. Um, I think you're really gonna dig this. It's a little bit health. Focused. Um, towards the end we get into a little bit more business stuff.

But if you're into business you Have to be healthy, otherwise you're not gonna be able to perform well. And so we talk a lot about that. We talk a lot about morning routines, and these aren't just like Well I write my journal. It's like well no if you do this uh based off of science, based off peer review research, if you do this, you're gonna feel this way and that's gonna help with X, Y, and Z. So it's like kind of a evidence r research uh based podcast that that we've just done. It's pretty freaking cool. So enjoy it. Ben, what do you think?

Um he he just Sean used the term shortcuts. He's really good for giving little hacks. I just feel like I took away like six to ten little hacks I can use in my life that are gonna make it better. mostly biologically, like it's gonna actually improve my sleep or uh imp improve uh my ability to focus and things like that. So uh I think there's a lot of great little nuggets for people in it.

So check it out. And by the way, we're giving a thousand dollars to six people. What you have to do is you go to ratethispodcast.com. Slash M FM. So that's MFM as a my first million. So ratethispodcast.com slash MFM And leave us a review. All you gotta do is leave a leave us a review. I don't even care if it's a negative review. Tell us how you f think about anything. One star, five star, I don't care. Do whatever you want. And uh at the end of the month we're gonna pick like I think six of them and give a thousand dollars away. So rate this podcast dot com slash M F M.

Write something cool, write something funny. Maybe if you stick out we'll we'll uh we'll pick you. Um, let us know what you think about the podcast. Enjoy the episode. Do you check notifications on YouTube? Uh n I do not. Okay, so let me tell you something really quick. So about

Two weeks ago. So I'm a big uh Bay Area punk rock fan. So I listen to like I used to live in San Francisco for years. I listened to like old Rancid, old Green Day. And I was looking at an old interview with Tim Armstrong from Rancid. And it has like very little views and I was loving this interview and I was gonna comment how much I love it, and I scroll down and you were the first comment on there and I replied to you. Uh and so I thought that was funny. We have similar interests. I did not expect to see you there on an old Tim Armstrong from

Yeah, I'm a huge uh Rancid and Tim Armstrong fan. I mean without taking up too much of our Time on this. I've never met. Tim personally, um

But uh yeah, growing up I was a Operation Ivy fan, big fan of a band called Crimp Shrine. And then Um Ranted.

Came out. Yeah actually Tim and Matt Freeman had a band called Downfall. In between. Um you can find some of those tracks and I love those tracks.

I just love it. Um they cover such a huge range. uh styles and they've just done amazing things and Yeah. So if there's any content out there that's, you know, rancid acoustic or

Downfall, rare Rancid tracks. I scour the internet for them. If I don't know about'em, send them to me because I Yeah. Devour that stuff.

And we'll have Sean kinda do like an intro on you, but really quick, this is one of the reasons why I think people like you and why your podcast has taken off because you're this intellectual powerhouse. But you look like an athlete. Yeah, you kinda have this like Punk rock side to you, like you gotta tell that you have that to you. And I think that you're just like a really like eclectic, interesting person. And I think that's why So basically, Sean, you can do the intro, but you've had this podcast that just launched like a year ago. You're already the biggest guy there is, uh or top ten, top five. It's pretty amazing.

Um and I think that's one of the reasons why why you're you're kicking ass is'cause you are quite eclectic and very different from what we're used to. Oh, yeah. Oh, go ahead. I guess to say we can kind of like set the scene so uh so we have Uh Andrew Huberman here, Dr. Huberman, and uh known known for Huberman Lab and

You're a neuroscientist. uh professor at Stanford and sp you have a whole bunch of you have an interesting podcast and I've I've seen you everywhere recently. So I don't know if this is like I don't know if you have hired an amazing PR person. I don't know if I'm just late to the party, but You went from

N I've never heard of you before, like three months ago, let's say to I only hear about you. My YouTube feed is basically just giving me more and more of your content every day. So i is that Is that a new thing or or am I just like discovering you now? No, it's a it's a very new thing. I mean to just give you the quick arc, um you know, leaving out all the pre academia stuff. You know, I did my training in

Neuroscience and in physiology, things like temperature regulation and uh things of that sort and over the years I worked on a number of different problems. Um Formally meaning in laboratories as a PhD student, postdoc. uh junior professor or tenure professor. Things like stress and regeneration and

What happened was right around twenty fifteen I started getting curious about um how scientific information is making it out into the general public. Um, but there really wasn't a a cause or a venue for doing that. There were these um meetings, like big summit meetings and things like that that weren't really my flavor, to be honest. They're perfectly fine, but

Um They were typically go something like, you know, yoga class, group of meditation, one talk, buy my product, by my book, and then people would go. And so what happened was in twenty nineteen I have a good friend, his name is Pat Dossett. Um he's a Wharton grad, uh former Navy SEAL.

operator um Did nine years in the SEAL teams as a good friend of mine. We swim together. Um he much further ahead than I. O course um You know, those guys definitely have extra gears.

Um I've you know seen that and and Pat Uh also has a company called Made for, which is a um behavioral health company who started with Blake Mykowski, who's uh a founder of Tom Shoes. So what happened was that in twenty nineteen Uh Pat asked me a question. We were literally getting out of the water. We'd done it early morning. Cold water swim.

And he said, Yeah, what are you gonna do in twenty nineteen to make the world a better place? And I was like, Well, you know, I'm trying to figure out neural regeneration stress and how to sleep better in my lab. And he said, Yeah, but what are you really gonna do? He was kinda poking at me. And I said, Well you know, I think um It'd be fun to just teach science on the internet. And just put quality information out there because I don't see that. So I started doing that in twenty nineteen, little short posts, pretty nerdy stuff, mostly on Instagram.

And People seem to like it. And then in twenty and I got a book deal. Um in twenty end of twenty nineteen I thought I would do what most academics do, write a book. Sell a book.

And then twenty twenty hit. And a couple of things happened. One is I realized there was a tremendous need for people to have the tools for managing stress. and circadian rhythms and sleep and managing mental workload and et cetera, because everyone was locked down and stressed out.

And confused. As was I, frankly. Um But I had access to these tools. So I started disseminating the tools by going on podcasts. And on Instagram. And then eventually the podcast led to a You know, the Rogan appearance certainly had a lot to do with it. A Rich Roll appearance, um, that did

Uh well it also in Lex Friedman at the end of twenty twenty. Great. Podcaster and also a great friend of mine now. um said you should start a podcast. So January of twenty twenty one.

Potom likes. Set it up. I uh look to my skateboarding punk rock past. I have a friend named Mike Blayback, uh known as Blayback Photo in the skateboarding action sports community. He shoots all the stuff of Jin Cana and

Ken Park driving rally cars of Danny Way, Tony Hawk, all the Um there are only a few. uh superstars of skateboarding and action sports photography, Mike happens to be one of them and he said, Let's build an aesthetic that kind of represents you. I always wear the same black shirt. I own twenty six of these. That's not for the podcast. You know, I I always keep my hair short and just You know, this is me on any day. It's just that the kind of camera showed up and

I started sitting down and thinking, Well, what would I do in a classroom? If someone was interested in stress and how to manage stress, well I would give four lectures on that. And so a big feature of the podcast that's a little different is that than most podcasts is that I try and stay on theme.

Uh and I try and keep it Like I would in a classroom. But then offer a lot of tools, which is a little different. And so that's really how it happened. And uh no no PR firm, no um Uh, you know, big no no contract signed, everything we've got.

How did you get on roads? Yeah. How'd you get on Rogan?'Cause that was a big obviously inflection point. And then that leads to Tim Ferriss, that leads to m more and more. So how's you get on, Roger? Yeah, and that was all this year. So then um well Two things about that. Um

I'll just wanna make sure I close the hatch on. So I haven't written this book. Um, I haven't released it uh for two reasons. One is that In twenty twenty, I didn't want to sell anything. I was coming to the table as an academic with a tenured position and a salary Frankly, we don't make big salaries even at Stanford.

Um yes, if my dean is listening, the salaries at Stanford are not in keeping with the cost of living in the Bay Area, which is why most people sit on company boards and things of that sort. So Um you do science for the love of it. Um But I didn't want to talk about my work. um and be self promotional. I really love learning and teaching.

And I have one mission in my professional life, and that's to share the magic and the utility of biology. I I mean that for me just fills me up. And Talking about my work is fun. We can do that if you want, but there's so much terrific work out there. So what happened was The second Rogan appearance is

Yeah, Joe said, you know. Huberman's doing this podcast thing and people seem interested in it. Let's get him back on to share some of this information. And but how did it uh happen in the first place? Well I have a good friend and business partner at my podcast. Um, his name is Rob Moore.

And no, he's not taking new clients. Um so uh because he no longer does what I'm about to describe, which is that Rob uh came from the world of P R But then he got really interested in podcasts. He's in his mid thirties. And he started a podcast called The Fight with Teddy Atlas. He loves boxing.

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. I listen to that every week. Yeah. Okay, you work you work with that guy. Yeah, but he's got like the a thick Boston accent, right? Uh that can ride out. who's a friend who I met through Rob. Rob, you're not gonna see, you're not gonna find. He sits behind an email wall and he's a a a close friend of mine

Um that uh you know October this time last year, October, November of twenty twenty. We went for lunch and I said let's start a podcast Lex thinks that we've got traction with a podcast and I think he's right. And he said.

Great, let's do it. Let's Buy the mics. Let's You know, we built the studio with our own hands. Mike showed up, got the D C team in there'cause they're friends. with of mine, um D C shoes, D C skateboarding and They helped me, you know, create an aesthetic that we thought would would work for make people feel like they were in a classroom.

Um And You know, Rob. uh was the one who connected me To the person who connected me to Joe.

Uh there's a little bit of I since this is a public venue, there's a little bit of a of a wall there just because they get flooded with requests. And I'll be honest, you know, I don't know what their process is. Um I think that They have a process and and If I I'm not privy to it.

I think that what's beautiful about the Rogan podcast having been a guest on there and obviously a big fan, is that They I think what you see is the real deal. Uh you know, Joe sits down with people that he'd like to have a meal with and or conversation with and has a conversation. And um

And the human appetite for that. Is obviously huge. uh people seem to really resonate with that and of course Show is a tremendous reason. Um, so he's been tremendously helpful, Tim Ferris.

Uh, Rich Roll and Lex Friedman. And I will say that Lex has been my uh kind of guiding light in this whole process about bringing certain elements of my own

person and personality to things. You know, yeah, I am I mean this is gonna sound weird to anyone who's looking to this for science information, but And it might not even make sense, but Sam, you'll get it and uh I don't know other people will too, which is like, yeah, I'm a diet in the wool. Punk rocker, I grew up in that. And if this that scene I think people think of as like loud music, loud clothes, loud everything.

That scene at its at its essence, the reason I gravitated towards it early is that it's it Very varied. It's about showing up Like heartful. strong it's not a it's never a victim stance, but it's not an aggressive stance, but it's not a weak stance either. And

For me it just resonated. And so it was like let's Yeah, the opening track of my um Podcast, for instance, is a song. I don't um want to get the copyright people on me. So uh uh that's familiar from the punk rock culture. And I just wanted to bring all that forward. And I think Lex was the one. Who really said

Mm. Pick two or three things that you really feel. Represent your relationship to science. And that

Give you energy for that. Lex is a is a genius. I have to say what you see there with the jacket and tie and all the interviews, Lex works so hard, he thin so hard. About where he's going with all this. And um he just interviewed the director of the National Institutes of Health, Francis Collins. That is not an easy grab. Um so in any case, that's a long winded. I don't tend to be succinct, so I'll stop. Yeah, I wanna ask you about I'll ask you about Lex in a second, but

For those who who are listening and and don't know who you are, basically I I have your channel up right now. So your first video was launched ten months ago. Your video is basically You And you're This is weird to say to you, but you're a you're like a good looking dude. You've got like a goatee. You look kinda like a football player. You're w you're wearing you're wearing a black shirt with a black background.

You're pretty serious. Um and you're just sitting for like sixty minutes to almost two hours sometimes and you're explaining things that sound complicated Like how your nervous system works and changes, master your sleep. um using failures, movements, and balance to learn faster. So these are like things that are somewhat complicated, but you sit down and you look at the camera for one to two hours and you tell you you you explain what what it all means. And then you do something that's interesting where it says like all right, so how do you take advantage of this and apply this and use this?

Um, and you're long winded on purpose because you said you're like, I'm not gonna I w I need you to to know exactly how this works so you can decide what you wanna do versus Me just telling you exactly what to do. Yeah, there's like a a balance of uh You can simplify something so people can understand it without dumping. Remove their own. agency to to un to to to dive in.

Yeah, yeah, th uh thanks for that description. You know, my um like I said, that the the goal And and really my purpose in life. I I know mission statements and purpose sound kinda s they're kinda cliche. But It is really is I get So I have this process that I've used for a long time, which is

I like to Just Pay attention to what puts energy into my body. Um the music like I'll hear a song, you're familiar with this. You hear a song like yes, you know, it just fills you with energy. Whether or not that's dopamine or adrenaline or whatever, we could dissect that, but that's not the point. But that energy

is a is a neural energy. It doesn't have to do with calories. It ha doesn't But that energy is your source, right? Like in in the eastern philosophies they would call qi or whatever it is. So I've always sensed what I really enjoy. And for me, learning cool information and sharing it is what I want to do. So what I try and do is Paint a

uh a tapestry at the beginning of Here's a topic like stress or sleep or dopamine or ADHD or eating disorders or whatever. And arm people with the language and ri and make them realize that the nomenclature is just words. We can replace some of those words and let's get a functional definition of things going. And then once they understand how things work a little bit.

Some of the the algorithms, so to speak. Then let's talk about what you can do with this and how you can use light to change your circadian rhythms or uh particular patterns of breathing that are grounded in physiology to Destressed rapidly, etcetera.

And so Yeah. And can you explain this first video? So your first video the Sean was saying that like you're you came everywhere You you're everywhere very quickly. Your first one was only ten months ago. That first video has six hundred and fifty two thousand views. It's a

Slick looking thumbnail. Can you walk me through How much did you spend to build that studio and like how did the first traction do you think come to this video? Your very first video, six hundred and fifty thousand. The very next one looks like a month later, n uh a million views, the next one six hundred and thirty. I mean you hit right away. You were you were you were hitting right away. How did that happen?

Yeah, that's a good question. So a big part of that What I don't think it was the thumbnails because actually we were told by YouTube That our thumbnails. weren't legible. I had these fancy d anatomical drawings. Um You know, that uh now we've changed them a bit. Um, we've learned some things, you know, faces do better than images, et cetera. But if you thumbnails that are really clickbaity are thumbnails where someone's going like

Where they said the wider the eyes, the more people click and kind of crazy Stuff um We didn't do that because I want people to know that I'm here with a serious You know, serious information.

'Cause I'm serious about them. It's so like why always the black shirt? These are actually the black sh I'm literally own twenty six of these that I like these particular shirts. Um I'm not trying to get picked up by the By the maker, so I won't mention it, but I've always worn them. I like like them. But there is w me and Sean always wear black typically because it's easy to hide. If you're fat. Or wrinkles.

Right. Or tattoos, not that I'm confessing that I have any tattoos. But the uh if I was neck to knuckles tattoos, I would just do it, but I'm not. But the um and kids, uh Yes, you should be able to d dress however you want and do whatever you want, but that's not the way the world works. People are always evaluating. So you decide. It's your gamble. I always say authenticity is not the same as oversharing. Uh these days I think there's a big tendency to think, oh, because you can deadlift five hundred pounds that you should put that on the internet. Um

One th so this is part of my answer, which is that By the end of twenty twenty, the Instagram channel had grown to several hundred thousand, but that mind you took two years and a fifty five zero podcast appearances as a guest. So Um we announced that we were going to

launch a YouTube channel to get over there and subscribe. And then We just started pushing out content frequency is a big deal. Um You know, we do one a week. We may advance to one and a shorter one um each week next time.

But You know free. Consistency. You know, not surprisingly counts. And

There's consistency of aesthetic too. Uh, you know, the st the building a studio was fairly straightforward. Um, thank you, Mike Blayback, my good friend in D C I mean it the The one thing about skateboarders that they really, really know how to do well is to create original content in a DIY format.

Okay, so actually Mike is out on a shoot right now, uh with Spike Jones. Right. So I grew up With I don't know Spike, but I grew up with a lot of the guys who ride for girl. Mike uh Spike Jones owns girls a portion of girl skateboards. So I grew up around people that took video of us playing around in the streets on skateboards. And made videos that became these iconic things.

And so Well scateboarders were kinda like the first YouTubers. Uh you know, if you look at old Trans World or four one one videos or old D C or um Like the like uh like what Bam was doing with Jackass, you know it was the CKY videos. We were the Skaters were the first YouTubers. That's right. No, they really were. And um you mentioned four one one, so you definitely uh you know, four one one is like No, I still skate. I I I was just hanging out with Mikey Ta Mikey Taylor this weekend, professional skateboarder.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, and to be clear,'cause I want to maintain my um integrity with that can be I wasn't a great skateboarder. I was okay uh Thunder trucks put me on out of sympathy. Spitfire put me on out of sympathy. Um

But I wasn't gonna be one of the big guys. It was just a community I really felt a part of and when I went off to college 'cause my high school girlfriend went to college. I've tripped and fell into biology. I thought I'd be a skateboarder or a firefighter or something that was more physical, but I fell in love with biology and and just that's what I've been doing ever since. But I think the aesthetic keeping a a A fairly narrow messaging too.

You know, we've turned down Every option to make a little bit of extra money doing affiliate codes. I mean we do have advertising and affiliate codes, but to just Pepper. things with you know advertising everywhere. We just I want people

to have a zero cost Trusted source. For science, health and fitness information. Of course we're not gonna get everything exactly right, but to know that if they come

to the Hugh Roman Lab channel. Um that they're going to get information that's vetted. that I've I always consult with at least two or three colleagues professional in a given area before I do a a podcast of just me. Because I don't work on ADHD. I know the

a fair amount about it, but I consult with experts and so I have a kind of advisory board, so I use the scientific community and the it's a kind of a beautiful um ecosystem where Our advertisers are happy, we're happy. Alright. But the main thing is the consumers get it at zero cost to consumer.

And I think that's very different than a book. Uh and that's very different than a behind paywall strategy. I've seen a lot of Health and science. Uh Podcasters who are quite good move their stuff behind a paywall because you can make much more money.

Charging you know, ten, thirty dollars a month or something. And I like to think that people would be willing to do that for our content. However, I feel best about the fact that For Some kid sitting in halfway across the world.

Who wants to understand weight training or ADHD or dopamine or sleep. They just as long as they have an internet connection. They have to tolerate a few ads, but the information is free to them. Uh well I I'm

I mean. I guess academically masochist because um well it's a it's a dream. I'm happy to announce this now. I actually took um I'm not I I love doing research. Uh we have a big project on human stress. Um we

It's been working on human fear. I love doing research and actually a uh fairly sizable portion of the Hubertman Lab podcast income. is going to be donated to research and to scholarships for students.

Um I I'm not I'd be very honest, I'm not I I'm not extremely wealthy, nor do I

um suffer, you know, I and I I it's money is important. I always say money but can't buy happiness, but it absolutely can buffer stress. No question about that. Um anyone who's ever had s uh significant funds throughout their lifetime don't won't truly understand that statement. People who haven't will understand exactly What I mean.

And I I think money is very important, but So is the ecosystem between academia Public health and science communication. And the private sector.

And For the time being. It just makes sense for me to continue to teach at Stanford. I teach medical students uh in the winter. on neuro anatomy, I direct the neuranatomy course and I really enjoy academic conversations.

Um They're slow. They it's like laden through steel. one l uh thin layer at a time, but what you get too often is a kind of granularity. Where

It's a process. It's it's not so much you get to answers, it's it's you get to a process of getting to answers. Um and I don't think I'd be happy without doing that. Actually a couple people.

They fans of the pod and they are I knew they would be excited to have you on because we we mostly this is a business oriented podcast is why kind of we're asking you some things about the business of how you create you became a content creator, how you got your audience. Sean, we've not even we've not even told them what we do, I guess. I I I didn't even know. I I did I did uh a little bit of research. Um And I I was delighted when you guys asked. I mean, I'm new to Twitter. Uh uh frankly, I didn't like Twitter when I first got on and I was like wow, people are really combative compared to Instagram.

Um and I think it's because you don't have to show your face. And I'm a very like I'm not an aggressive person, but if somebody I go wants to go toe to toe. I still have that in me. I'm not suggesting anyone get violent out there, but people would come at me and on Instagram it's well show yourself, let's go, you know, let's let's have a conversation. And um You know, so I don't get into back and forth in comments. I found Twitter to be an incredibly combative neighborhood. And then you guys showed up.

I was like, oh wow, I guess there's some nice people in the neighborhood. So sort of like finding the other punk rockers and skateboarders. It's like you and me, we got the same thing. And we're good. So that's the was the feeling I had, and then it turns out that's actually the case. Twitter you get rewarded every network rewards you for a different Wit, which is like the put plus side. So you know, being witty in hundred forty characters.

But then on the other side it's basically uh You know, th if you have the sharpest insult at somebody, you also get rewarded and you don't have to show your face and there's all these other benefits. And so so it it brings out a different side. It's actually YouTube used to be this way too. The YouTube comments. I don't know if you people remember this, but YouTube comments used to be the running joke as like, what is the most cesspool of the toxic commentary that exists? It was called the YouTube comments. And now YouTube comments are extremely I don't know what they changed in the algorithm or the the flagging or what whatnot, but YouTube comments are on the whole, you know, either funny or supportive or whatnot. They really change that. TikTok's doing Um comments. Uh before I forget, sorry to interrupt, but vis a vis

Because I know that's your your main audience is One thing that I did on Instagram early on and that I do on YouTube is Comment sections are great, but Better to make them interactive. So I actively request and we read every single comment. I say tell me But give me give us feedback, but also give us suggestions.

and give us ideas about future podcasts. And then I've devoted entire episodes. We haven't done one in a while, but To what we call office hours. Which is where I go through the most frequently asked questions. And it addressed those. So now there's an incentive to ask uh to put stuff in the comments. And I think that's a really good non combative use of the comment section. And we of course still get some

uh crazy stuff in the comments and people being combative, but um they should just know that we don't actually read those. No I'm kidding. We read them all. Yeah, for sure. Um so I wanted to talk about a couple things. One was what we talked about now. How how did you where how did you break out what And I think it's great, you know, I teach science on the internet. It's such a simple a simple like sort of philosop a simple, you know, business statement of what do I do? What am I here to do? And then the mission. I I enjoyed that as well. But I wanna actually go through some of those greatest hits. So some of the reasons that you've grown in popularity is that you put out nuggets that are interesting to people. And when I was talking to friends

Saying you were coming on, they said. You know, we ask a lot of the kind of like Oh, you know, we have a billionaire on the podcast. Hey, you're super successful. What's your morning routine? And they tell us, Oh, you know, here's what I do in the morning, you know, and people sort of equate that to If I do this, I will I too will become a billionaire, which is obviously not not the right way to think about it. But I think If I ask you about your morning routine, which I'm guessing is centered around health, mental health, uh fitness, um and and sort of regulating your body.

that that actually will be applicable to more people. So take us through what is the uh what is the morning routine. I know you've talked about this on the some other pods, but I I bet the majority of our audience has not listened to all your stuff. So you know, these are the greatest hits. Let's do them. Yes. So uh

I wake up. Uh, for me that's usually somewhere around Somewhere between Five thirty and six thirty. Depending on how early I went to sleep.

Uh I wake up and I do an assessment. Of whether or not I feel rested or not. Most days the answer is no. Uh just because of uh life.

Um staying up too late, uh stress, et cetera. So I do a ten Yoga Nidra session first thing in the morning. Uh Yoganidra is a passive listening. You can find these Yoganidra links

uh on YouTube. There's one which is ten minute yoga nidra. Um there's one that actually made for put out for free called um N SDR non sleep deep rest. That's a 30 minute one. It's a script where you just listen. It brings your brain into a state that's like that's pseudo sleep. After that ten or thirty minute Yoga Nidra?

I feel like I've slept as much as I need to sleep. It's a really remarkable reset and it It avoids your brain going into this state of planning and organization, what we call duration path and outcome in the neural circuitry uh world. And keeps it in that kind of liminal state. Um adjusting and there are some interesting data

Published show that these Yoganidra Meditations, if you will, are Uh. can upregate some of the neurotransmitters in the brain, including dopamine that make you prepared for action. And so

Uh they're very restorative, uh, especially in the absence of complete sleep. If I I feel great, I might just get out of bed. The first thing is always Yeah. I have to be careful'cause to list every step because sometimes people say, Wait, he doesn't even go to the bathroom in the morning? I'm I mean, obviously I go right foot, left foot to the bathroom, then I use the restroom. Then I go downstairs, I I drink water, I hydrate, and I go outside and I get some sunlight in my eyes for ten to thirty minutes. Foundational абсолютні критико практи.

When I don't do it for more than two days in a row. I start Messing up all sorts of aspects of my life. And most people are not doing this, even on cloudy days, do it. Don't wear sunglasses.

Unless you have a medical reason why you need to. It's fine to wear corrective lenses or contacts. You don't need to stare directly at the sun. Orсі the сан раз. And these are the questions I most often get. This is why I'm hitting these as bullet points. And if you wake up before the sun rises, flip on as many lights as you can in your

Space if you want to be awake in your artificial light environment. And then once the sun is out, go outside. I don't care if you're in the depths of Scandinavian winter, the sun comes out at some point. Some people might need a daylight simulator, but The discussion about daylight simulators is usually an excuse to avoid

Having to just go outside. And get sunlight in your eyes for ten to thirty minutes. You can check your phone if you want, or bring the newspaper if people still read those or a book. I usually bring a journal. And I write down some things that I wanna do that day and try and make sure that I'm clearing away some of the clutter. Um If you have a dog, you could do this while walking, etcetera. And then I sometimes will combine this with a walk.

Optic flow when you're just walking through space. w not looking at anything like your phone or anything in particular. That optic flow is known to uh suppress a circuit in the limbic system that involves the threat detection centers. It is very calming to walk through space and it reduces your overall levels of anxiety. Many people just being indoors.

Not getting sunlight. uh not getting enough sleep, life is stressful, they're not doing this. So basically all of that can be accomplished in one hour. It's wake up, Yoga Nidra for 10 to 30 minutes. Use the bathroom, drink some water, of course, all the basic biological functions. Uh theanine and coffee. Okay. So I don't ingest theanine

During the day I ingest it as part of a sleep cocktail before sleep. Some people will take L theanine with coffee. It's now in many energy drinks because it uh takes away some of the Jitters that It's a mild sedative and it it

Takes away some of the jitters that caffeine can Induce. I don't drink any caffeine until ninety minutes or ideally a hundred and twenty minutes after I've woken up. For the following reason. Uh

During sleep uh you Well, during wakefulness. You and the longer you're awake, adenosine builds up in your system. Caffeine is an adenosine antagonist functionally. I realize it's a competitive agonist for you. But it it basically blocks the adenosine receptor Functionality, so to speak.

But when that caffeine wears off, you're gonna get a big crash. Because there's gonna be a surplus of adenosine. By waiting ninety minutes to two hours to ingest caffeine, ninety minutes to two hours after waking to ingest caffeine, it's a little bit of a struggle to learn how to do this. But your natural adenosine system that the adenosine tapers down very, very low as a consequence, and you don't get that rebound in the afternoon. I drink

Mate, a yerba mate tea, I love it. Um There's a great br I don't like the the uh really smoky ones. I have no business relationship to any Yerba Mate company, by the way. But the one I love is by I don't know who this person is or if it's even a person is Anna Park. It's a really delicious when it comes loose leaf and Um, it's very high caffeine content, so you don't need very much of it.

And it also has a lot of what's called GLP one, glucocon like uh peptide one, which is actually being used now as an anti diabetes and uh obesity drug. Um, there's all sorts of great things about GLP one, upregulates dopamine receptors, et cetera. So I'll drink mate. Starting about ninety minutes after I'm awake.

And then That's kinda my morning, but After the walk I go inside, I s I do try to Avoid social media at that point. Maybe a quick check of ten minutes. I set I'll even set an alarm.

Um and then Typically on a phone. I'd like to move more to the computer, but I'm in transit a lot these days and Um Y you have to uh Be thought, obviously. But

I think maybe ten minutes on social media, but I want social media to continue to be a pleasure and uh because of the dopamine system and We can talk about that. I I don't want to get I don't want to go down the rabbit hole of s someone else's um psychology or neurology. Um, I wanna stay in my own frame. The the orientation I have in the early part of the day.

With that notebook is I want to be in my own mental frame. I've just slep. During sleep is when we have neural plasticity. The actual rewiring of neural connections occurs during sleep. I'm a big believer in the subconscious. And you're when you wake up, you are now in a position to

extract whatever it is that these new neural circuits have have figured out about the previous day and days Events. And so if I immediately bombard myself with sensory experience. or input or distractions.

I'm not able to ex uh do that. So this morning, for instance, I'll just give an example. I'm preparing an episode of the podcast on time perception. I've been reading a lot about this, and I woke up this morning. Went outside with the notebook and just sat there. And then realize that There's a way to organise this

Episode that has to do with frame rates and sort of Slow motion versus Fast motion. cognition or hopefully it'll be clear by the time the podcast happens. It's not fully formed. But that came to me, so I wrote that down, thought great.

And then um I'll move into some more Typical type work. Uh it's great if you can avoid email. until after twelve noon, but that's very hard for a lot of businesses. So I will usually do a brief check in on email critical items. Uh but then I like to write. So I will

Uh I'm working I am working on a book finally. Um I will work on scientific papers. On grants On reviewing papers. I try and make that pretty heavy intellectual lifting.

Um And take that till about noon. And then I'll I'll look into and then we can talk about you know food and other things. At this point I haven't eaten anything. Do you have a so you have not eaten till noon, but uh one thing that you meant did not bring up and I'm wondering, do you have a family? Uh no, I have a relationship and uh I had a dog until recently he passed away. So I I do understand people have different things. Yeah, have different constraints.

Um, he was a big part of my morning routine. I had this big ninety pound bulldog mastiff named Costello, and we would slowly do our walk, we'd get the sun together. Animals are perfectly happy to do these'cause these are very innate behaviors. But no cats. No children. Um, but the but there I don't have any children. Yeah. You remind me of Henry Rollins. Yeah, no. Except his except his jaw goes to about here. Right, you know, like Henry's head is like this big. Sean, do you know who Henry Rollins is? No.

One time I Sha okay, Sean doesn't know who Dally Parton is. He didn't know who Jimmy Buffett was Sean doesn't know like white people shit. Um we're gonna put this in the category of white people shit Henry Rollins, w was he the was it Black Flag that he was the lead singer of? Yeah, so well, all right, I have to be careful not to go down this um path to I mean, I'm a big Ian McKay fan, so minor threat. Right, then minor threat.

And then there was black flag. So and yes, but Rollins was part of Black Flag Um And uh He was early in the punk rock scene to

I get into lifting weights. I a lot Ian and those guys were straight edge. Straight edge means different things in different eras, but at that time it meant No alcohol, no drugs. Pretty firm stance in the eighties compared to uh the rest of the culture. Yeah, um I don't know, Henry.

Uh I don't know, Ian. Um, but I listen to minor threat all the time. But Sean, so h Henry is like this guy. He's like this punk rocker. He's like He might be in his sixties now. But he ba he basically like was singing punk rock.

But he would didn't drink or anything and he lift started lifting weights. So he was like uh Kinda like a meathead a little bit, in not in a bad way, but he was like jacked. And now at this point in his life, he's completely single, he doesn't have kids or anything, and he's a poet. And he's an actor and he just look kinda like a Renaissance man. Where and if you Google'em, you'll recognize them. Did you did you Google'em?

He's um He's like an int you'll definitely recognize him. He was um in he was he he's sometimes in movies, sons of sons of anarchy, things like that. And anyway. Just this like really, really interesting guy and he'll go into like a TED talk or something like that and he'll just talk about his philosophy on anything. He's kinda like Mike Tyson a little bit. He just kinda like every time he talks, it's just like wisdom.

Um anyway. Uh Huberman has this like uh this like Henry Rollins vibe a little bit. And that's why I was asking about kids because y you're s this interesting guy who's kinda like I s in my head I picture you as this like guy who's alone intensely studying and try to figure out like crack a problem. And I and I think that that's really in that's just like an interesting

Part of you. In my head, that's what I'm making you up as. Sure. I mean I I uh in the spirit of um authenticity but not oversharing, uh what I can say about this is Um, I mean I've been blessed with great friendships. I've always I think because of that skateboard and punk rock era and because it was mostly guys back then, I have a community, a a lot of friends.

who you know, swim who work out, who uh play music. I'm really good friends with a guy named Michael Muller, who's a photographer who does all the Marvel stuff and Um I'll train with him. I train I'm sometimes up at uh Laird Hamilton and Gabby Reese's pool. I like those workouts.

They're good friends of mine when I'm down there. But yes, I at this point in my life, um, I live in a somewhat remote area. Uh I have a a gym and a sauna and a cold dunk. Uh, I spend a lot of time with the books. I I dying to get another dog and I do live that kind of monastic lifestyle.

Um I do have a relationship, uh and That's great. And uh You know, the children thing is interesting because I started off studying brain development. and neuroplasticity and brain development. And so

Let's just say that if I do something. I do it a hundred percent. So I have no children now, but if I do have kids I I genuinely want five of them. I want a big family or n or none at all. So that's uh So, yeah.

We we should talk'cause you're you're kinda your specialty. is around the eye, right? And I've heard you say this before And I'm gonna I is essentially part of the brain that exists outside of the the sort of the w the cranium where the rest of the brain is stored. It's actually like an it is the same is it what the same tissue or it's like developmentally that it like kind of segregated at some point, but it's basically it's the only part of your brain that's like Facing the world.

That's right. Uh you got you got several points there, right? And none of them wrong. These two bits are two pieces of your central nervous system. They got extruded out of the skull, or we should say out of the cranial vault, because technically they're still in the skull. Um Extruded out of the cranial vault during development.

And they are The way that your brain figures out where it is in space and time. Right. Um by the rising and setting of the sun. And the changing of the

of the amount of light throughout the year, regardless of where you live. And Uh they are Responsible for Delivering forty percent of the inf uh let's just say

Forty percent of the brain's real estate is devoted to vision in some way or another. We are incredibly visual animals. Especially Even in blind people. that real estate for vision that's in the back of the head, the so called occipital cortex is overtaken by areas that respond to touch and hearing. That's why they're so good at tactile and and hearing. But um incited individuals

uh vision is the predominant way not just that we represent and see objects around us, oh blue car, um tall, uh good looking woman or man, whatever it is, it's also the way that we orient ourselves in space and time. And that we set our frame rate. Um and we can talk about this, but Essentially you when you as you move through life

You're either batching time in big chunks or in small chunks. And that has to do with how you're viewing the visual world. So you're either thinking in slow motion or thinking it fast. um depending on your visual environment. That's probably a little abstract, but yes, these two bits are brain outside your crani. Why you say kind of in the morning you want to go Uh y you know, one of the key things of your morning routine was get outside, let the sun hit your eyes.

It's basically alerting the body that hey, the sun is up. kickstart all your start your engines because it's daytime, uh is regulating that way. And I think there's different things throughout the day that you've talked about. Anxiety, maybe help you go to sleep. And um I'll I'll give you kind of two questions that came from the audience that that when I tweeted out that you were coming on. They're both in the same vein. And so one question is

Um we talk a lot on this podcast about the 80 20, right? We are fans of the shortcut. Uh shortcuts get a bad bad rap around the world. Uh, you know, it's sort of seen as the uh the lazy, I don't care thing to do. Um, but in many ways a shortcut is great. A shortcut is basically saying, How do I identify the highest leverage points uh that if I did those I would get maybe the biggest impact or how do I get the result I want faster instead of slower. And so what would be the eighty twenty, meaning if you could change for all the people who are listening to this, right? So imagine a hundred thousand people listening to this right now. If you could implant sort of one or two behavior changes that they could do in the day.

So maximum of two. Which two would you pick that you think have the highest ROI, the highest return uh for the investment of what it takes to do them? What do you think would make people happier wealthier. It doesn't matter. Anything that's an anything to make you feel better, have a b yeah, whether it's improve your health or improve the way you feel throughout the day. Uh, what would be the one or two that you would point to as like your kind of Yeah, so you know, uh it's a great question. I think we need to think about foundational practices.

Um and the two things that set the foundation For Optimal. Mental and Physical functioning.

are going to be really good sleep. And really good. mental frame and mental frame is going to be the ability to toggle between different states of mind. And so let me give you the practices first so that I don't get accused of being in an intellectual to the point of um

you know, uh curing insomnia, right, during this podcast. The first one is That morning sunlight in your eyes? should be a non negotiable thing. Three hundred and sixty days out of the year. If it's raining, stand under an overhang. I'm very unsympathetic to the well, I wake up and it's early and then I gotta drive to work. Stand outside for five minutes. I I don't t you know, I

I I got plenty of rest last night, so I'm not ornery about this, but I I've grown a little bit exhausted of the well You know, I can't do that because uh I've got kids where take them outside with you. They need this too. That sets. A cortisol increase in the morning, which is a healthy cortisol increase that provides wakefulness.

triggers your metabolism in the proper direction if that cortisol spike happens too late because you didn't view light, then you step out during noon. Too often. Remember, one day is no big deal, but Step out in the sunlight too late. Off to

Often late in the day, you have a delayed cortisol spike, which is associated with insomnia, depression. They're good data on this. So get that morning sunlight three hundred and sixty days out of the year. You will thank me. I promise. Um everything gets better now, it's a slow, subtle shift. It's not like popping, you know

thousand milligrams of L tyrosine. and drinking in a double espresso and going to the gym. It's not a it's not um It's a foundational practice, so I like to think of it as it raises the tide so that your boat can leave. harbor. That's how I think of it. Rather than oh, this is like putting another outboard motor on the on my vessel.

Okay. So that's the first one. And the second one is A little bit of a broader category, but it's get sleep right. You have If you're

St until you're sleeping well eighty percent of the time. Or more. Get your sleep right. And for this I can just defer people we do have a newsletter. It's completely free. But we have our privacy policy. We don't share your email. It's at hubermanlab.com. Just go to newsletter. All the prior newsletters are listed. There's

Um, the key tips for sleep. You can watch the Master Your Sleep episode, or you can just download that 12 Steps for Optimal Sleep. Yes, there is a segment on supplementation. With some of the considerations and warnings. There's also Sections on non sleep deep rest protocols, links to those. So get your sleep right and get that light ear in your eyes early in the day. If you're a blind person, Th there's another protocol. I've done some work with blind people to try and help them with this. Many blind people still maintain that

cells in their eyes that can reset these that can set these mechanisms. And what's the mental framework? Yeah, so mental frame is is something that I don't think has been formalized in the kind of health and fitness uh optimization Sean's really good at that, by the way. Like Sean I mean. Sean is very good at that, where he he does a really good job of deciding what what frame he's going to be in.

Uh differently my My the number one priority, my number one mission, the thing I work on is not even my business Being able to c being able to be in the state of mind I want. So which is Basically being able to experience The experiences I want the way I want it.

Beautiful. I I just made it my top priority in life. So then I started to get good at it because I realized Oh shit, this is the cheat code. This is like You know, you've got stressed out. uh billionaire over there, and then you've got, you know, joyful uh single mom over here. And like what's which quality of life do I actually want? Well I want the one where my state of mind uh

is in these states that I enjoy and not fear, anxiety, stress, depression, not these other states that I'm trying to That's my quick quick rant on. Yeah, no, it's it's great. A mental frame is is is so key. And um most I will say uh

And I wanna be very respectful of everything, all the work that's preceded when I showed up. Um, but you know, a lot of the stuff that's out there in the self help and business literature Um It frankly is kind of nipping at the margins. Of some of the stuff. Like

Um And look, I don't wanna throw out names because it it it becomes disparaging. I think the one person who really deserves a nod who's Truly a pine there are two people who are Incrediers in this space. And one is Cal Newport. Right.

So so good they can't ignore you is an incredible book. Everyone should be required to read that book. Um deep work. Is this I'm essentially paraphrasing some of the protocols from Deep Work, but Cal who I don't know have never met, but have great respect for. Um a computer science professor uh back east.

Um Uh That it's about setting mental frame and Context switching is dangerous. Wh which book? Which which book are you? So he so he has a book, So Good They Can't Ignore You, which was written some years ago. And that was more towards like not trying to find your passion, but getting really good at skills. Um

But Deep Work is an excellent book. Um, he has he's not on social media, but he has given some TED talks. Um And that book is about uh getting in the right frame. It's sort of f it's a lot about flow, right? It's about

Not Succumbing to distraction so you can do work that actually moves the needle. But that's not what you're talking about, is it? I thought that you were talking about it. No. So yeah, and then there's a f another one which is a world without email that he wrote recently that here's the key essence of the Cal Newport work, okay? The the key essence of it as it relates to to mental frame is that The brain is extremely good. and the body at context switching. Like I could be doing this podcast right now, and if a fire alarm goes off or someone comes knocking on the door, I can switch up my

Context. And respond to that. But Ninety percent of the work. That we are

Yeah. Moves the needle, meaning that we are rewarded for or that enriches professional life and relationships. It we used to talk about this about mindfulness and presence, but it's really about s getting the brain to start doing certain operations more Uh in a more facile way.

And this is why habits are important, but 'Cause going to the gym is different than reviewing a paper or writing a scientific paper, it's different than podcasting. Or being a guest on a podcast for that matter. So what happens is early in the day When you get the download from sleep. You identify a few things that are key. You've already you're starting to funnel your neural networks toward

What I'm calling frame setting. And what you're not doing is allowing something that came in from the external environment to adjust your frame. So you get a depth of connection. With the work.

A depth like I knew I was doing this podcast today. At noon. And I wasn't walking and thinking about it, but I set that as a as a goalpost and Because I wrote it down, my brain is orienting toward

What I need to do so that when we clip on, we're ready to go. And So Mental frames are very important. Context switching is deadly. I'm stealing Cal's word, so forgive me, Cal. Um

Some people will put freedom the the computer program so that they are not Able to engage with the internet. Um, this device, which I've turned off, or I guess it is on, but it's it's on airplane mode for the podcast, I try and keep away from me for the first half of the day very hard. Very hard, especially when you need to post on social media, but I try And I want to have here's the goal in the morning to make this simple.

I wanna have one ninety minute block. that I completely conquer. That I g that is Where I experience ex immense resistance to do something other than what I'm doing. But that I stay in

In Noodling away or gnawing away would be the better word at writing something or reading something or trying to comprehend something. And you have to be very careful. The moment you walk to the restroom, And then maybe like wash your hands and look yourself in the mirror and then you're like, oh, you know, I got this weird hair growing on my cheek or something. You're you're starting to switch mental frame. And so ninety minutes seems like nothing, but

It is remarkable what you can accomplish with this. But the more important aspect. Is that In that Exercise of getting good at

What we call no go operations in the branding of go and no go operations in pushing aside things and and forcing those blinders. You're able to bring that same Mental frame. To other things.

later in the day and in life and you're able to engage it much quicker. It's sort of like if you're a car you drive a car and you've never been up to 110 miles an hour. You don't really know how to get around a uh a semi in front of you that's breaking fast and you're on a downhill. But when if you have to do it, you can do it. You're comfortable at speed. And you're comfortable breaking and so That this mental frame thing is not just about the work you are able to do in that ninety minutes.

It's about getting better. at doing deep work even for shorter bouts because as the day goes on, we all have this experience, right? Things start coming in, we start getting bombarded, and we're starting to get that sh that kind of fragmentation of our of our goals and we're kind of getting pulled off. And some people the the the peak time is in the afternoon, some people it's in the morning, some people it's late at night, but you're getting yanked off center. And so you have to be able to recognize

Just how delicious. and effective that state is. And then you can apply it later. And um I'll let people use their imagination, but this comes into into use in many aspects of life that have nothing to do with work. Okay. Like being able to stay at that

At that groove. With somebody or in some interaction or you on a run. I mean you know, use your imagination. This is the The the important thing is it's all the same circuit.

It's this engagement of the prefrontal cortex, which is saying duration path outcome, meaning what how long is this gonna how long should I do this? What path should I take? What outcomes am I getting in real time? And not getting pulled off center. by someone else's DPO as I call them DPOs. In incidentally or not so incidentally, I I've been fortunate enough to do some

Work with the special operations community in the Canada and the US. In addition to those guys being really good at Shoot, move, and communicate. The really exceptional ones know how to flip this switch on. We think of it as like grit, resilience, and mental toughness. And yes, they're all gritty, but there are a lot of gritty people out there.

The difference is The ability to take your environment, narrow that environment and be effective. And cut a fine slice through something and then stop And move to something else.

That's a a a mental operation that involves multiple circuits. Multiple neurotransmitters. We couldn't say just dopamine, just epinephrine or something like that. It's gonna be that, but a bunch of other things too. And so ninety minutes, like learn that ninety minute battle and it takes time. And then you get very, very good at so I'll podcast for two hours. I drop into that that's the state I'm in when I podcast.

Two quick questions. One. What do you suck at? Because when I talk to you, I'm incredibly intimidated because Uh, when it comes to mental health and physical health and emotional health, I'm like I'm so inadequate because well, I like I I read your watch your YouTube

To see like You know, I stink at this, therefore I wanna learn what you're saying so I can be better. And then and when I hang out with you now, I'm like, This guy's got it together. I know that's not the case. You're human. You've got issues just like me. Definitely not the case. So I wanna know what you struggle with and also Do you just have

Loads of people dropping in your DMs hitting on you because I hear you talk and I'm like this guy he's probably or is it all just dudes. Is it all just a bunch of dudes like setting you pictures of like a mole on their back ask ask him what they they what you think it is. Um How do you know I don't find moles on backs incredibly? I'm just kidding. Every doctor has that. They just all my doctor friends, it's all just half of us say like, hey, what do you think this lump is? Exactly. So okay, so um just to make sure I close the hatch on that, so you asked for two tools. I gave three morning sunlight. Master your sleep, you can see that newsletter. offer the the tools and then

This ninety minute. But and look, some days it goes better than others. But remember it's not just about what you accomplish, it's about Getting into those frames. And you're controlling it. This is I I guess I wish I had said this before, is that you are setting the beginning, middle, and end of that frame. That's what's key. It's not happening because someone else said game time noon on Sunday. and you're showing up. Anyone can do that.

with some practice, what you're learning how to do is is flip the switch. You're learning how to engage that. But you have to be very judicious in your use of this circuitry. You can't do it for twelve hours a day. So that's when I do email and all the other Stuff. Okay, and I two ninety minute ballots.

Maybe. Um One last point about that, and then I'll tell you what I suck at, um, but there isn't time in the universe to get at all of it. Um, there's a second newsletter there, which is about optimizing learning and plasticity that touches into some of the details and some free links and protocols related to that. Also at the newsletter, it's the October newsletter.

Okay, so Um, what do I suck at? Oh goodness. Like what's your struggles. I mean, I imagine now that you're famous, your Instagram probably and your Twitter are like blowing up. So maybe you're it's hard to keep track of your email and stay on top of that. I mean I don't know. I'm projecting. So

Um Three things. Um That have been helpful. For

uh this but okay, I'm dreadfully poor at communic at um follow up communications. I'm really bad. I I really like comments. I try and respond, especially on Instagram. I I like to give people if you ask a professor a question, they're gonna give you an attempt at an answer. Whether or not it's accurate or not, they're gonna try. They're gonna try and get it right. Um So I have to control my impulse to respond to everything, just for sake of time, so I can do the the big important things. Um

I'm a terrible cook. I'm an absolutely terrible cook. I mean I Um I'm fortunate that that I have someone in my life who's an exceptional cook, but I am an absolutely Dreadful cook. I mean I can I could destroy toast. I just don't get it, right? I don't have the patience.

Do you think that's the same? Or do you eat really clearly? No. So my diet's pretty pretty s clean. It's basically um I do low carb I I'll eat some nuts and stuff in the morning if I'm hungry. I don't make a big deal out of it. I put salt in my water, which kills your hunger a lot of the time. A lot of people get shaky, they think they need sugar. your your electrolytes are low. Just put some sea salt or a little pinch of salt in water, drink it like oh and go another two hours and your brain functions great, blood volume goes up. Um

All right. Well, you know, I think we're gonna s I think twenty twenty two is gonna be the year that salt comes back. Uh Science Magazine has done a lot about the hypertension stuff. If you have hypertension, check with your doctor, but you know. Um I eat uh low carb throughout the day. Um, so meat and salad, maybe I might have a little bit of rice or something if I train. I do exercise. I train in the morning at some point. Usu I prefer to do it early, but I find some time where I do one hour of exercise every

It's weight train run. Like one day weight train, one day run. One day weight train, one day run, I take one full day off each week. I never train for longer than an hour after warming up. I hit it as hard as I can'cause I can't seem to come off the gas pedal. And uh that's my

My thing and I've been doing that for thirty five years. So I'm forty six now. So thirty two years, sorry. But I was gonna ask you w one one w one related question, which is you talked about health and kinda like you kinda mentioned you intermittent fast, basically you don't eat till noon. Yeah, about that.

And when it comes to health There's like you know There there's a high carb diet, there's a low carb diet. There's there's meat is good, meat is evil. There's this is you know, uh weight training is good, weight training is horrible. Cardio is good, cardio is bad. Uh so there's sort of this like bombardment of different side info. And I think, you know, what you're trying to do is is get to the source of it, get to the truth of things. What is one piece of conventional wisdom? that you disagree with, or maybe it's hipster wisdom, something that's a fad or a trend right now that you you say, Hey, pump the brakes on that, that might be able to help some people out. So what's something that's you hear a lot, but you don't you don't buy it or you don't agree with it, or you think it actually might be harmful? Sure. Um

I hate to always backpit a little bit, but I I have this thing about thoroughness of answers, so forgive me, I've got a little bit of a of a OCD on this. Um Uh I I'm terrible at cook so I suck at Cooking. Um, and I'm not a good writer.

I'm not a bad writer, but in ch exchange is how I do best. So I I solve this problem by I write into I I dictate into voice uh voice memos. And then I uh put it on what's it, Rev dot com. They got they have a lot of my personal income. And then I I sculpt from there.

And um because I'm not I'm not a very good writer. So and I'm a terrible musician. I love music. I'm I can't play a chord to save my life. Um and I That's okay. I'll live with that.

So I'm I'm terrible at a lot of things, Sam. Um And um And if you talk to any of my ex girlfriends that they you know, they'll give you their take on what I'm good at and what I'm not good at, you know. Um but trust me, there are plenty of things I'm like world class failure at and um I don't try and hide those, but I think I'm glad you asked the question because Um

Look, I I don't have it all figured out. Um, I've been greatly inspired I just want to give a nod to Tim Ferris. of no only through the podcast interaction. That podcast four hour Four hour work week. For our body.

Um especially Um Had a tremendous impact in accelerating my career. In science. because I was able to focus on things that really matter.

maybe not four just four hours, but uh the just the principles in those books. I think we should all be re reading those. Books they're so Damn good. And um

Yeah. So okay. Um The diet thing I do low carb during the day and then I eat carbohydrates at night. I like starch. I like pasta and salad. I try and limit my protein at night'cause it makes me so sleepy and I get into really great sleep. uh by eating my starches later in the day.

Usually around eight eight or so I eat dinner and then I go to sleep around ten thirty or so. I'll have a snack sometimes if I want one, but generally I don't want one. Um And that's really, really key. Because If I've trained early in the day and I'm running around like crazy, I'm also burning up a lot of glycogen, I want to repack my glycogen so I can train in the morning. So I tend to like to train uh early in the day. Okay, so

What's out there? Well, first of all, the um The Nutrition space is the Disaster. It's an absolute disaster.

Um, so much so that I'm already preparing for the attack about what I'm about to say, which is a Well accepted truth in science. Uh, there's a paper from Chris Garner. um slab at Stanford showing that As long as people ingest fewer calories than they burn. you're gonna lose weight, regardless of whether or not those calories are in a low carb regiment or vegan regimen or m pure meat regimen, et cetera.

So calories in, calories out is a Foundational principle. uh uh I've been accused of saying different, but the fact of the matter is It's true. Now the calories out portion is gonna be regulated by a number of things basal metabolism, how much you exercise. Are you hormone augmented? Are you Well's the controversial thing that you've you've just said, though? I I don't even understand. Well so so in the nutrition space there's this other idea. The other idea

It's grounded in some uh rationale which is like for instance when you eat uh Animal protein like chicken or beef or fish. There's a metabolic cost. There's a there's a calories out equation.

From the digestion and utilization and pro uh and use of that. Yeah, but that seems like a rounding air, no? It's not huge, but it's very different than if you were talking about um equivalent number of calories from From starch. Um so It now there but there are hormonal effects of of biased what I call biased diet. So

I eat a macronutrient complete diet. It includes fats and proteins and And carbohydrates. Carbohydrates are sort of on an as need basis. So if I'm training a little less, I might eat a few a fewer of them, et cetera. But The the nutrition space is a mess because

Everyone has to eat. And people have different preferences and so a lot of the stuff that you see out there are really just geared toward Um finding a match with an audience that uh prefers plants or prefers meat or Um prefers to fast. Uh you know.

Having explored the fasting science and literature, there's nothing holy about fasting that provides autophagy the cleaning up of dead cells. I mean, low calorie diets will do that also. Even if you're not so called fasting, but there are It appears some benefits to having periods of each twenty four hour cycle where you're not ingesting calories. um independent of the total number of calories. So the biggest issue I have, the the the the mess that I see out there that I hope will get resolved. Is that

People Are using social media And uh A certain type of Uh

He said, She said, they said We said to amplify controversies that don't really exist. Right. I I'm willing to bet, for instance, I'll just state my stance on this, that eating more plants and less meat. Forgive me, Paul Saladino, he's a friend of mine and you know, he's the carnivore MD, he's got great data to support what he's got. But I like plants. I'm gonna eat a salad.

Am I gonna die? Maybe. But I'm eating my salad. But I'm also gonna eat a steak. And so it's almost like crazy when we start talking about this. Like, are we really talking about this? Here's how I'd like to see. The carnivore MD, it's this guy on Instagram. So my neighbor Do you know who uh per do you know the perfect keto guys, Andrew? I know of them, yeah. is lives across the street from me and then Justin has been on this podcast a bunch. Okay. Um, and then their fr Anthony and this other guy went to somewhere in Africa, I forget To see how this tribe lives.

Eating mostly just meat and some honey. And that other guy his name is Paul, he's got this Instagram handle Sean called Carnivore MD. And basically he Pretty much only eats.

Meat. Organs and like butter. Just animals. Yeah, he'll do honey and some some berries and stuff. Look, very smart guy. And um

And People will come pi the battles on the internet like Does dietary cholesterol it impacts serum cholesterol. It is serum cholesterol Um impacting testosterone or not. I mean it's

It's so crazy. But the reason it's crazy is not because it isn't a valid conversation. I mean we all have to eat and people want to live a long time and feel vital. It's crazy because There's really no field. It's not like vision science or stress science or sleep science or

Um Іно когнитив психології, де ж но філ. It's bringing together people with very diverse frameworks trying to resolve the same problem. And so it's sort of like if I were to be in uh Yeah. discussion or agreement with someone who's a philosopher. I don't do philosophy. I don't know the principles of philosophy. So

I think that the issue on the internet right now is a is a big one. Who are the experts? I mean, we've seen this with everything related to COVID, right? Who are the real experts? Are they the people with government jobs? Are they the people who Who are You know, M D's, is it PHDs?

I think what I would like to see more of, what I know I'd like to see more of are more panel discussions. This is one thing that isn't happening on podcasts as much as it could. Panel discussions where People can get to the heart of the matter. Um

By combining Пhyзини, сієнтист, а практич. I do understand. the frustration and the angst of people who've devoted a career to being in the trenches of doing stuff. And then someone who has an MD or uh writes a book and comes along and says hey I've solved

weight loss, or I've solved it by way of eliminating one macronutrient. Which by the way is not what Paul Saladino is saying. I just want to be clear that I um that's I'm not pointing anything at him directly when I say that. So I think that um It's a kind of a a free for all right now. Nutrition is the worst. Um but

In terms of the battles, but there's some shining Uh bright lights in that space. Um, for instance, uh Dr. Andy Galpin is an exercise physiologist who's done work with a lot of athletes. He's a professor, Cal State Fullerton. In terms of training regiments. He's just for endurance and for strength.

For female athletes and for male athletes, for the everyday person. He's got His content is just so Damn solid. um and grounded in mechanism, all the way from muscle sarcomeres to this is how long you should rest between sets if this is your goal. Um And then in the nutrition space.

I've found what works for me. Which is this low carb starting around noon and then gradually transitioning into uh higher carbohydrates because I eat for health, but I mainly eat

For mental and physical functioning. I'm paying attention to how I feel. And I want to be able to do my work. And so I think that's very important too. And it's a missing piece of the equation, which is that

you know, I wouldn't survive a day doing uh, you know, six small meals uh of you know each macronutrient. I'd be I'd have to cook. Uh You know, you can break the population up into kind of these six or ten. This might be the ideal diet or optimal diet for you.

Or do you think it is hey I the solution you have actually might work for everybody. I like d do you think that I know it's not not to the T of like, you know, exactly what you eat, but in terms of On one side you got pl completely plant-based. On another side you got completely carnivore. On the other side is just sort of no carb or low carb or slow carb, right? There's all these different varieties.

Do you think the ans uh do you think when it comes to h humans knowing what is the optimal Is it that there are completely different configurations for different groups of people or that the actually for humans there actually would be one sort of optimal diet and then I have to assume that there's going to be some genetic bias towards certain

So for instance. I lucked out, but I also suffer because I don't like alcohol. It just makes me go to sleep. So I've I don't care if there's alcohol or not. Some people really like a drink. Um that's probably genetic. Um, it just doesn't it makes me feel bad. It's not just that it doesn't make me feel good, it makes me feel bad. Do you do do you like to get fucked up at all? What do you do you have dr you like drugs? Do you like anything? I don't really no I drugs? No. You don't even smoke weed? No, I I don't smoke weed. I never liked I never liked marijuana or alcohol very much. I'm

Uh my drug is learning and adrenaline. I do I've had to work on the adrenaline part. I've uh there's stories for another time. I've I put myself into some um unhealthy situations and dangerous situations. But I I come alive with Dopamine and adrenaline in my street. So you don't So y you don't do any drugs. You don't you really don't drink. I don't drink and do drugs either, but my advice is I'll eat like

A whole box of Twinkies when I want to party. That's like I'm like, Yeah, like uh I'll plan it like two weeks out. I'm like let's go eat a whole birth party. Yeah, you don't do any of that. No, w no oh sure. I don't eat uh you know, I would say about eighty five percent of the time I eat clean, but Um, but I'll eat bread. I love bread and I love butter on it. You know, basically bread is a vehicle for butter, in my case, you know, I

Um, and I now watch the plant people. are gonna come out. They already came after me. They're like you run says butter is look, if you increase your fats, your saturated fats a bit, do the blood work. You'll watch Your your Serum testosterone go up. And we could talk about testosterone if you want. Um, but it's not necessarily good for your heart. I didn't say it was good for your heart. I said it's good for your uh vitality, which is

different in the short run than in the long run. But in terms of of vices, I like caffeine. Um I do use certain stimulants. over the counter stimulants like I'll take um L tyrosine. These days I take three hundred milligrams of alpha GPC if I really want to laser in. Uh I do I don't do it any more than Two, three days a week maximum.

And that's also in that second um toolkit uh newsletter. Um That and phenolethylamine or phenolanine, um, those two combined, I mean you're you're in a You're in a focused tunnel. Um, but I don't touch midafinil, I don't touch stimulants, I don't do recreational drugs.

Um When I was in college Sure. I mean I I partied a bit. But also You know, I don't need

Any Chemical. To say exactly what's on my mind. Um Or to withhold.

uh some of the things that are on my mind. So I I'm I've just not been my thing and Uh But also I'm generally training in the morning.

And I generally want to get work done. And No, I I look I always admired people that could have a couple beers and relax'cause it's such a big part of our culture. Um but that just didn't That's not the way I went.

Um You asked about uh in terms of uh diets and genetic differences. Well You know, this is the same thing with sleep and chronotypes. We have people that prefer to stay up late and wake up late, and people that prefer to wake up early and then It's a fairly normally distributed uh population.

Ah, what should we do about this? Во фо інстанс. Um some people probably feel better eating more starches and less protein and maybe more plants and some people Look, it looks to me like Joe Rogan's doing just fine on his elk meat and whatever else he's eating diet. I don't know. I don't tr He he seems like he's thriving.

I will say Um in full disclosure that The people that I know who are hormone augmented. I'm not talking about big bodybuilders. I'm talking about people that are taking low dose of testosterone, whether or not it's to replace something or not. They tend to crave

Or at least eat. more proteins. Um because it increases protein synthesis. And um You know it's me.

Yeah. Yeah. So I'm on I'm on it. I'm on it now and prior to being on it. I I worked on it for I did it I tried doing it naturally for like two years To increase. It was like two hundred. It was so low.

And it was shit. And it was so low. And I was running a company at the time. I was so stressed out. So I like took time off. I ate meat, I squatted. And then I started taking TRT. And

My life changed. Oh yeah. It was crazy. And then I started to eat more meat. And I didn't do it for body reasons, I did it for emotional reasons, but my body changed. I feel like a professional athlete at thirty two. It's pretty crazy how much that changed. But what you said on your one of your podcasts is it seems true. is that means I'll likely live

le I there's a likelihood that I will not live as long because There was like some s I I I don't know if you said it or someone else. Sean, they did these studies basically for some reason there's this group Where they would castrate you in China. Um, I don't know if it was like done out of like being like a monk or something like that.

Yeah, yeah. And these guys didn't have Dicks anymore and they cash rated him. Well balls. Sorry. They didn't have balls anymore. Yeah. And they I mean I didn't do the experiment, nor did I check the data, but I was thinking of the discussion. Like they they consistently lived longer. It's and And like it's so like

Now that I'm on this, I'm like I'm probably maybe I'll I'll live to be ninety instead of ninety five. I don't know. I who knows what it's gonna be. But It's a pretty sick life, so that's kinda the sacrifice that I'm making. Yeah. Well the basically the the idea is that um that your story speaks to is is a true one, which is that Um vitality and longevity are on uh they're sort of orthogonal to one another. They're not counteracting one another.

But they're kind of orthogonal to one another. And puberty is the most rapid stage of aging in our entire life and it's accelerated aging. Right. I mean puberty is aging. It's just that you're not it's across the you know, you're thinking about it in the context of a portion of the entire life arc. So introducing Hormon of the sort that were robust during puberty. Um we'll accelerate that.

Process. You just you just said that vitality and longevity are orthogonal. Basically meaning The better and more optimized I wanna feel, the less I'm gonna live. Not necessarily that if they're They're sort of off center to one another, but the they're not counteracting one they're not antagonistic. So here let me explain and um how this would work in the real world. So Um

If you well, let's use you as a example, you decided to go on testosterone replacement. Um your t your uh toll testosterone you said was in the somewhere in the two hundred nanogram per deciliter range, which is uh below the the normal reference range. So you go on. And You c you're saying uh and quite aptly

that maybe that's gonna shorten your life because of the way that it can negatively affect lipid profiles and things, the way it affects the liver. There's a lot of biochemistry there we don't have time to go into, but that that's true. However Testosterone will also Whether or not it's coming from endogenous sources or From replacement. will also increase your energy level and your ability to lean into friction.

You're going to be running more. You're going to be able to exercise more. So I I've done a number of episodes on hormones, but One thing that's

really important to understand'cause I get a lot of questions about this is that Well the main effect of testosterone is it makes effort feel good because of the way that it imp uh you you it makes you there's a readiness for challenge of all kinds, intellectual challenges drop it challenges. The way that I describe it to people is I'm like I wanna fight all the time and and not necessarily fist fight, but I just wanna be in a battle, whether it's a battle myself or friction. Yeah. Yeah, I want I want fight. I wanna go fight. Friction feels good. And so Um and Robert Sapolsky, the great Robert Sapolsky, was on my podcast and he said you they've done these experiments also

um with in uh ultra with altruistic acts of of friction where people donating money for instance. It's not just beating people up and this kind of thing. So um But and I'm not suggesting people run out and get on out on TR get on TRT. I want to uh touch on that. But basically So you could say well. My blood Limpid profiles.

Perhaps a bit worse, but With that extra energy, you can now start exercising four times a week plus you know, cardio plus four times a week of weight training and recover. with no problem, provided you're doing the other things that you need to do. Whereas if you weren't, you would probably be depleted.

There's a depression component, uh And you know, f your finances would probably suffer these kinds of things. Now Some people do not need testosterone replacement. I I'm gonna just uh because I think I'm I'm kinda walking around the margins and people are probably wondering, well, you know, is Hubermine on TRT. Um I'm forty six years old. I didn't

I didn't touch it until forty five. Um, I went forty five years. I've talked about some of the supplements that can naturally increase testosterone. You you're on TRT? Oh so from I'm forty six now. I started on my uh at forty after forty five. But let me

Um so but but let me explain Because I'm actually coming off. So that um the So what I did is I'm I'm I'm researching a book. So I did forty five years of training and sleep and all the normal things. Found some supplements that will increase testosterone.

Um that's the Fadoja and Tonga Ali. You can see that on that Joe Rogan episode. I talk a lot about this on the episode with Tim Ferris. A number of women are taking Tonga Ali as a way to increase their free testosterone and getting quite good results. I don't have any relationship whatsoever to Tonga Ali or Fadogia Company. I don't care if you take it, definitely check with your doctor. Um, there are some kind of spooky reports out there about Fedogia and toxicity of the uh cells in the in the testes, but those seem to be limited to rat studies. Anyway, do your research. I'm not telling you what to do. Um and you're responsible for your health, not me. But those supplements done properly from the right sources can increase testosterone by about two hundred nanograms per deciliter. The

Most dramatic I've ever seen is a is a shift from about three hundred To Or High twos to like you know, eights and nines. But when I went, but I decided to try TRT in a s in a small dose, spread throughout the week.

Um My testosterone at that time was already sitting in the high eights, so I was doing fine. And you I did as an experiment for part of this book. And it changes your mental frame. It makes you more self directed.

More willing to lean into challenge and Counter to the popular belief, it makes you calmer. This is the thing that people don't realize. It gives you more energy, but it makes you calmer. The In primates, non human primates and in humans

Stressed. Angry People are the ones that are in the kind of low to mid range of testosterone typically. Typically there's their averages from a few studies that I and I always thought I always thought well it just makes me more confident and confident men don't get upset easily.

You know, like if someone's like yelling at me or like there's Like I I'm my masculinity's not being challenged right now. I'm not like I I'm not gonna that's why people are like, Oh, so you wanna fall the time? I'm like, Well actually no the opposite. If someone gets in my face, I'm I'm confident enough that I could I can I can walk away. You know what I mean? Yeah, you're in your own you maintain your own frame. You're not gonna get Um

pulled off by projection or nowadays the the the buzzword is gaslighting. Everyone's gaslighting everybody without really under I I'm very interested in psychoanalysis. I've been fascinated by this for years. And this whole concept of projection is very interesting. How do you actually shift someone's nervous system? This is not a good thing, but how does One shift.

their nervous system to sh change the mental frame of another nervous system. It's very interesting and kind of spooky stuff when you start to think about how your nervous system will frame shift your frame, someone else's frame. Now this is vital too, when your child or your partner comes to you and says I really I'm really stressed about something, it requires a a of an adaptive frame shift and you need to do that. People who are autistic or have Asperger's don't frame shift very well. They're very much in their own frame. And they're very good at certain kinds of things and less good at others. Um people that were highly empathic.

Alright. susceptible, empaths will know, to getting yanked down different Um frame shift. pathway such that they can oh my god, I haven't done anything with my life because I've been so consumed with so and so's thinking or feelings around things. So

Testosterone makes effort feel good. I'm talking about the effects on the brain. Let's leave aside all the effects on the body. And Yes, it might change blood lipid profiles, but in general The energy is the component. It comprises a neural energy and an activation stance where then it's a question of what you do with that.

So if you use that as an excuse to eat a little less well, train a little less then you're no better off and you might be worse off. If you use that as an opportunity to lean into life That's wonderful. I I work with a number of professionals and athletes in a kind of consulting

Um uh role to assist with some of this, uh, of course with an endocrinologist as well. New parents, for instance, who decide they don't want any more kids and they're Dealing with Lack of sleep and all these things. Oftentimes benefit.

from that and the relationship can often benefit. Um for a number of reasons. So this is probably a whole other discussion. I'd be happy to come on sometime and just talk all about the hormones because it's all estrogen is key. A lot of people, in particular men, are blocking estrogen when they're taking TRT, which is a terrible idea. Estrogen promotes brain longevity. Estrogen is good for connective tissues, it's good for libido. Blocking estrogen is a bad idea in most cases.

But of course. Some people are worried about water retention or breast development in males, and so they're blocking estrogen. You have to work with an endocrinologist. So it's not testosterone is good, estrogen is bad. That is absolutely Um Uh that's very sophomore thinking.

You know, it's it's it's more complex than that. Sean, did you get your you did you get your hit a bunch of people with that. Uh that's how I'm gonna combat people on Yeah, the gaslighting thing is funny because it you know, gaslighting It's but basically people are saying that they're triggering them. Right? Gaslighting is something very different and uh

Having um experience with borderline people that's a very It's a challenge both for the borderlines and for the people's in their lives. That's a real psychiatric challenge.

These these uh valid psychiatric terms being kind of bastardized on the internet. I get it I get a little bit um Uh Well that's that's one of the challenges, right? Like Pop science, pop you know, the sort of like popifying of everything.

It'll be more viral, right? Like, you know, it's easy to make something viral when you take away all Like this causes that. Blank statement. Yeah, blanket statement. Yeah, hearing that um it depends is not an answer that goes very far.

But And here's where I'm hoping there's a a tide change where Um, which is that if people can understand mechanism They can start to understand a little bit of You know

We have this stress system and we hear that stress is bad, but you know A brief I just did a podcast episode with Duncan French from the UFC Performance Institute. Duncan's work has shown in peer-reviewed studies that Short term stress raises testosterone. Stress that lasts more than a day or two or training sessions that go more than ninety minutes. That depletes testosterone. So is stress bad for for reproduction?

Depends. So but if people can understand mechanism Then they can start to understand, hey, an ice bath is stress. But it will protect you against illness because in the short term Adrenaline buffers you against infection because adrenaline is the signal by which your immune system says

Oh my goodness, I need to combat something. So if people can understand mechanism, then it doesn't matter if you're talking about acupuncture, cold bath, sauna. Lifting weights. Sprinting You know, Bikram Yoga. People can I believe

That people are smart. And that if you extend a hand Over Uh that Lend some respect to their intelligence.

that they'll come along for the discussion about mechanism. And that even if I were to get hit by a bus tomorrow, that then they could digest the next wave of information coming to them in a much more nuanced way. Of course, people still need protocol, they need a jumping off point. And so that's why My podcast has been mainly about that. But I think science and health information on the internet is changing very quickly.

Um thanks. I here again I just have to say It was seeing Lex Friedman's podcast. I don't know what the equivalent is in the in the finance and entrepreneurial area, maybe it's you guys, but in the kind of general landscape of podcasting, I saw Lex's podcast for the first time and I thought, this guy is having really intense

Intellectual conversation. Yeah, he's so good. He's so weird in a cool way. He's so interesting. He's unique. He he is kinda punk rock. I mean Lex is very punk rock. Uh I mean his his lifestyle if you think my lifestyle is unique, I mean

Lex Well, maybe just get him on the podcast. He's a he's a really I'll let him do the speaking uh for himself. But I think that once someone's out there doing that. It's very hard for people to follow suit. with um the kind of low level version of that. So what I love uh and I have listened to your podcast, so I love about your podcast, what I love about Ferris and Rogan and Lex and Rich Roll and I'm missing a few, all right, and I'm gonna regret it later though I'm not remembering these names, but

Um Because there are others, of course. Is that Yeah. Yeah.

Cigar and Jetty's news channel. for instance, uh remarkable is that If we all push each other to Constantly try and increase the quality And the value per unit time.

Of a podcast. And if it's not just protocols, but it's A style of discourse like we've done today. That To me

is going to elevate the the medium. А сам на серісне. Instead of just the you know, chatter. Do you uh how big's your audience, right?

Ten months, so you're that's north of a million. What about on uh on podcast? Uh yeah, so well on Instagram I think we're sitting somewhere around like seven hundred thirty thousand followers or something like that. Um Uh, but that's just really I do put out unique content there that's separate from the podcast from time to time. But um

You're you're gonna laugh, but I actually and I'm not cloaking anything. I actually don't know my values. No. I don't know. I don't know. So that's Rob So Rob and we have a web A web guy.

I mean you gotta if I had a guess, like five to ten million A month. That sounds about right. I I think it's on the higher end of that. Um I think I know That's right,'cause if it's about two million per episode in the first couple of weeks, is that something I don't know. I'm two million. You're at two million an episode.

I I don't know. I should ask Rob. You're killing me. Do you realize that later? Listen. Do you realize with two I'm surely Tim or whoever has talked to you and Joe has talked to you.

With two million downloads an episode, dude. You You're rich. You're you're very you can be very wealthy. I'm shocked that you're still uh Teaching. I'm still wear the same shirt every day. Yeah. I looked up before the podcast average salary uh before the podcast I was like

This guy could easily be banking few million dollars a year and kill doing the exact same thing you're doing now. It's not like you'd have to go shift to doing something else. Um and I looked at fine I thought what do professors make? Here's what I looked up. Stanford professor. This is what's on the internet. No idea if this is true or not. Stanford professor will uh the a average professor will make somewhere between two hundred to two hundred twenty five thousand dollars. Uh per year. Which is obviously a great living. But I thought that'd be a lot of it. That's high for an academic.

Um Yeah, doesn't for a non MD academic. Oh, the the pay is is it's not just stand for it's ever it's abysmal. um in in the Bay Area. And I wanna be respectful. People have different needs and costs and Um that but as uh in the Bay Area, that that's a tough tough life for someone with kids. Uh, you know, depends. Um not tough life, but anyway, I'm gonna get some haters for this, but you know what? Um come hang out.

Come hang out. And have you have you enjoyed being famous? Well, okay, so a couple of things. One about the the um the views. I really do need to check with Rob on the numbers. I don't know, I don't track that. Um I know we're doing well. One thing in the business side since you have this audience that um Yeah, I only advertise products I actually use. I've been using Athlet Greens for

over a decade, right? So I love that stuff. I don't we stay with a limited number of advertisers in Sight Tracker for a period of time. I bought them at Sight Tracker. I use I use my code Huberman. Yes. We work with Thorn thank you. Uh we work with um Atletic Greens is a is a ri for me was a really good supplement. It's the only one I set aside money for as a student and postdoc or as a postdoc and professor because it covered a lot of things. So expensive though. Yeah, it I I feel better when I take it, so that's why I take it, but I get it. There's a cost there. It it

Yeah, so obviously it has to be within the scope of someone's decisions of around finances. But the um Sleep cocktail. So we work with Thorn. Um because The the great thing about Thorn is the quality of their supplements is so good that you can actually take less of thorn supplements in my experience and get away with it. But there are other great supplement companies out there. I'd I'm not here to plug the the our sponsors, but I do

Um Obviously that's the way podcasts make money and I pay my staff. um, which is Rob and Mike and Ian, and we have a few others as well. I should mention one thing about the the medium Um and as a business model. So Yeah, I've never uh

talked about this, but the Humber Mid Lab podcast is but one of several podcasts um under a company that I founded. Um with Rob So David Sinclair from Harvard Genetics. Um Yeah, tenure professor of genetics at Harvard. Lifespan, right?

Lifespan. So he's launching the Lifespan podcast with David C and you're owning this? Yeah, I own that. Yeah, so um And so we're working on the front end and back end materials of that. Me and Mike Blayback are the creatives on that with the aesthetic and the And it'll be very different than mine, right? Because David, um

I mean he You know, I wouldn't th we're different. Dave is David and me. You're you're building this media business all center around longevity and healthy intern uh uh longevity and mental and and physical health. I don't know. We'll call it m mental fitness. That's a word that we've used, mental fitness. This is gonna be huge. Well the goal is really that Um, for instance, many professors have excellent information they can share. on gut microbiome, on addiction, on ADHD that goes well beyond the depth that I can provide.

In one of my episodes. And so they need to do six or seven episodes, but they probably don't need to do an a podcast in perpetuity. And so the idea is to have a set of podcasts that you can come to Mine if you like, David's if you like. Maybe you God forbid you have a uh relative dealing with Parkinson's and hear from somebody what you can really do about that, or Alzheimer's, or you have a kid and you want to know what are the science-based practices.

for getting a kid to sleep and for neuroplasticity in a child, well let's talk to a world expert in that. Um And w and so the the the idea is to have an umbrella for multiple podcasts, the Huberman Lab podcast is but one of those that I plan to continue. David's is gonna be the second and we've got a third and a fourth that are revving up now. And who knows, maybe we should do one on um

I don't know, something related to crypto or something. I don't I only know what I know and I know academics, I know science, and I know medicine. And so that's what I'm going to bring to the table. This is awesome. This is awesome. Thank you.

He was great. But he would And I just thought about like his kind of like sphere of impact. Like he could, you know, he w each class had about twenty kids. He would teach five classes a day. So he teach about a hundred kids a day. And so you know, his reach as like

My best teacher growing up. was a hundred students a day uh a hundred students a year essentially And then with the internet, I just thought, wow, this is gonna change. The best teachers in the world are gonna have millions of students and they're gonna make millions of dollars as they should um for being amazing teachers. And I've always been looking out for and I've been investing in every platform I can get my hands on. Anywhere I can see That teachers

are able to do that, where they're able to scale and have millions of students and have'cause you know, if I'm gonna learn math or I'm gonna learn about nutrition. I can either learn locally, like that's the way the world always worked, I just learned from my best local teacher that was available to me. Or now I can learn globally. So I can find actually who is the best at not only being an expert, but packaging it and con conveying it in a way that's entertaining, that's relatable, that's that fits me, right?

And so you know, that's what you're doing. You're the perfect example of something I've been thinking. Why isn't the world moving this way? And actually it is. It's just It wasn't through a online school, it was through things like podcasting or And and it's more popular in in other countries. You know, China and and does a really good job of this. They they've got uh we've done Chinese teachers who've who make tens of millions of dollars a year descriptions. They're like musicians and athletes.

Yeah. Same with India. You know, Sean, we had that uh you sent that you shared with me that really cool photo of a guy in India teaching math and it looked like he was a comedian because there was like a his name's Bju Yeah. I'll have to check it out. Teacher. He would teach in like local villages.

And people love learning math from him. So he would go to other cities and they would come find him'cause it had spread their word of mouth. Eventually he was filling up stums. Free f free you know, free to attend. He was just teaching math on a projector in a twenty thousand person stadium. And now he created an he created an app. It's like a ten billion dollar education app in India. But you know, like that was his origin story, and I thought that was I love it. You know, and and I love the model around podcasting,'cause yes, you have to tolerate some ads, but advertisers are happy.

Consumers are happy. And it's zero cost to consumer. That to me It's like uh if ever there was order in in a in a universe, not the universe, but in a universe, that's That's it. M d m do you know what do you know my company at all? Or did you know my company?

I'm afraid I don't know. So it's all good. So we owned this and then we owned this thing called the I o I started this company called The Hustle, which was a daily email that reached about two million people a day for business news. We just sold it to HubSpot for many tens of millions of dollars. And um We are making t you know, twenty million dollars on ads. Um so we made a lot of money. And

The problem with ads is it's cool when you're doing it now because you can pick and choose Thorn Athletic Greens, you can pick and choose cool shit. And that's exactly how we started. But then you get staff and you're like, All right, we're gonna try and triple every year And so in order to triple every year, like there's not that many thorns and athletic greens, then you gotta go look at like some other bullshit and you're like, Well We gotta hit these growth numbers. And so it's so it kinda you I don't think he worships at the altar of year over year.

Maybe we won't. No, but it you always think about it. For example What if I talked shit about athletic greens? And let's say they did something kind of wrong. And you you'll happen. Well that's my point. That's exactly my point. You will say, Well, I don't know. And good people

You are everyone we're all incentivized something, and so maybe like he would be willing to defend them a little bit more because they're giving him money, which is a natural thing. You know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah, so that that is an issue. I mean, I think that um and and we do care about growth. Um But and the reason we built out a philanthropic arm Of this company is because

I really I Empathize with the struggle that Academic scientists live in day to day, which is that

Uh They don't have time to do their own research. Let alone work for the world, which is what they're really hired to do. Their grants come mainly from public sources. So we're trying to think about ways that we can start to pump some money back into science through the podcast. So money coming into the podcast actually represents Some of it.

uh money going back into the scientific community to do better work. We're starting to explore NFTs and some of uh how that might be incorporated. Um Twitter's a great place to learn about that. I just want to say that the NFT landscape and crypto landscape, people are so kind. It's like they're kind of come on it's kinda all in. It kinda reminds me of the early punk rock movement. It's like you they know I'm paying attention to their energy. I don't understand a darn thing about the case. Punk rock. It is very punk rock. Everybody would love to sell you their token and their currency and why it's just possibly tell you about it because they are We're all, you know, selling our own holdings, basically.

Interesting. Wait until you say something bad about him though. Okay, well I I tend yeah, I I hope not to do that, at least not by accident, but I I just noticed that Um There's a there's I love the DIY spirit. Look I'm a patriot too. I'm sure you have an international audience, but look the

My dad's a first generation immigrant. This this country is amazing. From where? Uh from Argentina. So he's not, you know, he wasn't from some place where he was stricken, but he came here on a Navy scholarship. He's a physicist. Um You know, this is a country where You can make lateral moves.

It's hard to ascend, all right, and we we should acknowledge that not everyone starts in the same place and and the the the slope is different for different people, no question. But You can make lateral moves here and the You know, think about this. The the Nobel Prize is given each year. For instance.

Um, the world is big. The world of science is big. Most Nobel Prizes include or are given to people in the US. And we have one of the most difficult funding schem for getting money to do research in this country. Now compared to third world countries were very wealthy in the research realm, but compared to other countries where they s basically stock the laboratories With money.

It's it's incredible. Here we have these individual labs like doing little like startup style workshop stuff. It's that grind, it's that leaning into friction. But I really believe is is the Hallmark of Future development.

And so science doesn't have that. We didn't have a podcast. Platform. or information platform. And I'm hoping that

My podcast and the others like David's and And the other ones that come out on through our company will It will soon populate. I I'd love to see more of this done out there. There you know there's some smart

Guy or gal is out there thinking like Hmm, like I'm gonna I'm gonna do the podcast on amphibians'cause I I love frogs and I'm gonna like tell people which terrarium to get. And like it's gonna be the terrarium of the podcast. And you never know what's gonna what's gonna work, but I love that spirit, the entrepreneurial spirit. So that's what we're trying to bring. Well dude. Thanks for coming on. This is badass. We um we haven't done a podcast this long in a long time.

By the way, we had uh I'll tell you really quick, we had Rob Deirdic on recently. Oh yeah. And uh he is uh I forget what we were talking about, skateboarding and like wealth or something, but he's like the wealthiest. Yeah, Rob wouldn't know me, but he's tight with Mike Blayback because Rob and Big Big unfortunately passed away. Um and Mike Did all the photos for that. Um And uh yeah, look, skateboarders.

If you want to know What's really cool and how to do D real DIY spirit, you just skateboarders I they just I'm gonna bra I'm gonna brag after this. I'm gonna send my latest three. Oh yeah, I can't I can't I've got no tray flip. But the um I ride a pool, but I'm I'm not. I'm not that good.

Dude, you're you're badass, man. I'm I'm so excited to get to talk to you. I feel inspired after having a conversation with you. You're you're very you're you're very interested. Much bigger deal. Oh well, I wanna say genuine thanks for having me on. I felt immediate resonance. I'm very much like a Can sense that. So I I think it'd be great to get together in person sometime. Do people still do that? I don't know. Have a uh coffee. Uh huh.

Are you in California? Can you're in Northern California? I split my time now between the Bay Area and Southern California. So where are you guys? I'm a bear, yeah. Yeah, we both we both live there. I live in San Francisco for eight or nine years. I just bought a house in Texas and so I'm in Austin as of now, but I'm a little bit nomadic, so I'm Right. Well, I'm gonna be in Austin a bunch'cause I I hang out with Lex there. He's gonna

Take me to Jujitsu again last time and ended in a weird naked choke. He lives in Austin? I've never done it before, he's a black belt. I didn't know he lived in Austin. And I I I have people come over and we can lift heavy. I lift heavy. And also uh we could box. I beat people up all the time. So if you want to fucking fight, we could do that. We could we could row. I I do this is not this is not a uh we probably shouldn't box. I I boxed I had my boxing card and boxed pretty consistently uh various times. I'm not very good. You don't get a nose like this doing yoga. Um so it let's not box. Come on, man. I got a roller. We can do anything you want. I'm fit. This is this is the this is the TRT speaking, folks. Um It'll be great fun. I'll pass you guys my number by by email. Just let's text the we're we're in the room.

And uh we'll take it into the real world. Thank you, man. Talk soon. Great to have you. Thanks so much. I feel like I can rule the world. I know I could be what I want to. I'm put my law in it like my day's off On the road less travel never looking back

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