May 25, 2023
From podcast: https://bengreenfieldlife.com/podcast/anti-aging-podcasts/bryan-johnson/
[00:00:00] Introduction
[00:01:11] Podcast Sponsor
[00:06:33] Who is Bryan Johnson
[00:09:23] Bryan Johnson and all his work
[00:18:48] Bryan’s diet, supplements and measuring results
[00:26:16] Sleep routine
[00:30:12] Podcast Sponsors
[00:33:05] cont. Sleep routine
[00:38:18] Workout protocol
[00:46:35] The importance of relationships and community
[00:49:41] Bryan’s olive oil and chocolate selection
[00:52:57] Blue Print Protocol and biochemical individuality
[01:01:38] Risk factors to pay special attention to
[01:05:48] How to manage a healthy lifestyle when traveling
[01:09:05] Closing the Podcast with Bryan
[01:10:37] Ben’s age-reversal strategies
[01:21:25] End of Podcast
Ben: My name is Ben Greenfield. And, on this episode of the Ben Greenfield Life podcast.
Bryan: I kind of playfully say Blueprint0 is the best diet ever created for health in history. And if you want to prove me wrong, do so with your data. So, I do so like with a half-smile. Basically, we've tried to create this diet which produces perfect biomarkers. And we're just looking at the data, nothing else. There is no tribalism. There is no opinion. We're just watching the data. And in doing that, I did express a preference that we'd be plant-based. It does not mean that meat is bad. It doesn't mean that it can't be done with meat. It doesn't mean that meat is not better. It just means I expressed a preference, and said, “Is there evidence in the world that would allow us to build the protocol and could we achieve, basically, perfect biomarkers across hundreds of variables by doing this.”
Ben: Faith, family, fitness, health, performance, nutrition, longevity, ancestral living, biohacking, and a whole lot more. Welcome to the show.
Well, I'm pretty excited. As a matter of fact, at the time I'm telling you this, to my house, this weekend, I've got two amazing scientists coming to visit and talk all about the latest and the greatest in ketone research. Both of these guys work with what I would consider to be one of the most cutting-edge ketone companies out there. Now, ketones are basically a form of supplement that you can drink to shift yourself into ketosis, and to get all the mental clarity, the athletic performance, and the metabolic health from ketones, without doing things like never visiting an Italian restaurant, never having pasta or bread. Not that eating noodles or pasta and bread is good for you, but you get what I'm saying, like we want to have, even things like blueberry and sweet potatoes, but maybe also be able to unlock all the mental and physical power of ketosis.
By the way, ketones are also great for fasting. They're also great for keeping your appetite satiated for an incredible period of time, like when you're sitting on an airplane and you want to skip the airplane food that smells so good and that tastes so bad, or at least, it's so bad for you. You get what I'm saying? This drink is truly cutting edges.
Ketone ester and H.V.M.N.‘s is called Ketone-IQ, they made it through a 6-million-dollar contract from the U.S. Department of Defense and deep partnerships with some of the top researchers in ketone science. No insulin spikes, no caffeine jitters, no midafternoon energy crashes. And they stand by their product 100%. If you don't like their ketone esters, your order is free. That's how much they believe in the power of ketones.
You can get them online. I'll give you the URL in a second. You can also, if you live in California, lucky you, you can get them at California Earthbar locations located within Equinox Gym and also at Sprouts grocery store locations. So, there you have it if you're in California. If you're not in California, also, lucky you, ha-ha, sorry, Californians. Visit hvmn.com/BenG, hvmn.com/BenG, and use code BENG20 for 20% off any of purchase of Ketone-IQ. That's an exclusive offer for my podcast listeners, hvmn.com/BenG and use code BENG20 for 20% off any purchase of Ketone-IQ.
Okay, so one of the biggest issues when it comes to aging, aging poorly that is, is what's called senescent cell accumulation. Senescent cell accumulation. Senescent cells are referred to as zombie cells. They are not all bad. As a matter of fact, they serve a purpose, just like inflammation serves a purpose. But. If they remain in your body long after their functional lives, they can waste your energy and resources. And senescent cell accumulation could contribute to things like slower workout recovery and joint stiffness and discomfort, the kind of sluggish mental and physical energy you might associate with middle age.
Now, senolytic ingredients or so-called senolyte, are these evidence-backed molecules to help your body naturally eliminate senescent cells. So, we're talking about things like fisetin, piperlongumine, synactiv, and a whole bunch of other research-backed ingredients that help combat senescent cell accumulation.
So, this new product, you don't have to take it very often. It's a couple times a month, you pop a few capsules, and it nukes your senescent cells. That's a good thing. It's called Qualia Senolytic. They packed 9 vegan, non-GMO, gluten-free senolytic ingredients in the one formula, and that provides you with the most complete senolytic support of any formula that currently exists on the market. And they are going to give you 100-day money-back guarantee, and an additional 15% off.
If you go to neurohacker.com, that's N-E-U-R-O-hacker.com, and use code SENOBEN, that's [email protected]. That's how you can get your senescent cells, those zombie cells, nuked.
What if I told you, you could put on this little vibrating thing, and it could shift your focus, your mood, your sleep, your recovery near instantaneously, without taking any drugs or supplements? It exists. It was actually developed by a MAPS researcher who worked for a lot of plant medicines, as a way to shift the physiology, and he realized, “Hey, you can do this with vibration, too. Vibration on the wrist or vibration on the ankle.” So, you develop this thing, and sure enough. It's called the Apollo Neuro, and Apollo users experience 40% less stress and feelings of anxiety on average. They've done partnerships with Oura to check on deep sleep, 19, crazy, 19% more deep sleep on average, 11% increase in HRV marker of your nervous system resilience, up to 25% more focus and concentration.
I have mine scheduled. So, in the morning, it starts vibrating, give me focus and concentration wakefulness. About 8:30 p.m., after dinner, I have it set, to start to lull me into a relaxed mode. And then about 9:30, it shifts into sleep mode. If I wake up in the wee hours, I can push it again, and it goes right back into sleep mode.
This thing is amazing. You can wear it on planes. Oh, my gosh, it's amazing on planes, just go to nap, go to sleep, just like that, lulls you off. There is something crazy about these haptic sensations. I wish more people could experience this, and you can. So unlike wearables that just track your biometrics, leaving you to decide how to act on the data, the Apollo actively improves your health. And the more you use it, the better you notice that it works because it trains your nervous system to get used to those vibrating cues.
So, you should check this thing out. I'm going to give you a discount on it, BG15, gives you 15% off. You go to Apollo Neuro, A-P-O-L-L-O-Neuro, N-E-U-R-O.com/BenGreenfield, apolloneuro.com/BenGreenfield, use code BG15 for 15% off. That's significant. So check it out, the Apollo. Super easy, super effective. You're going to love it.
All right, folks, if you're into longevity, anti-aging, age reversal, or anything of the like, you've probably come across this incredibly popular age reversal Blueprint.
There's a guy who is really making waves in the longevity realm. His name is Bryan Johnson. Now, this dude comes from a corporate background, not like a health and fitness background. He is probably best known for founding Braintree, which he sold to PayPal for like 800 million in 2013. And then he started to develop all these different technologies, including one called Kernel, which is super interesting. It's spelled with a “K,” which is a company that's building advanced neural interfaces to augment human intelligence using, what I mean by that, is hardware and software systems to improve cognitive function.
And this guy has a crazy protocol that he is doing to live an incredibly long time, or at least marry health span and lifespan in a really elegant and scientifically informed way. So, I will link his entire Blueprint protocol and everything we talked about in terms of what he's done for age reversal, for gray hair reversal, for a decrease in his biological age, for massive improvements in fitness, in muscle composition, in fat percentage. He is aging slower now than the average 10-year-old based on his data, and he slowed his pace of aging by an equivalent 31 years.
And while I'm certainly, as I've said on podcast before, not a fan of simply living a long time just to do it and have bragging rights, this guy is like functional. He is a dad. He is running a big company and he is doing some amazing things in the longevity realm. So, we're super lucky to be able to tap into the brain of Bryan Johnson. Everything I talk about on today's show, you can find at BenGreenfieldLife.com/BryanJohnson.
And one last thing before we get to Bryan, you know, I didn't want to talk over him too much, but I get a lot of questions about my own age reversal strategy. And while I don't have a comprehensive website like Bryan does, that Blueprint website, where everything is laid out in great detail, I can share with you some of the big wins for me. So, if you stay tuned for when Bryan and I hang up and quit chatting to each other at the end of this podcast, I'm going to give you an overview of what my own longevity-enhancing protocol currently looks like, from supplements, to sleep habits, to temperature regulation, to workouts, etcetera. So should you be interested in that, just keep listening when Bryan and I finish chatting. And again, all the shownotes are going to be at BenGreenfieldlife.com/BryanJohnson.
Ben: Bryan, first of all, welcome to the show. And second, I'm just curious how you got into all this, man.
Bryan: Thanks for having me. I'm excited to be hanging out with you, maybe by mistake. I mean, I guess from a personal side, I was trying to fix a problem I had where I couldn't control my eating habits at night and led me to be 60 pounds overweight, and I was in a tough time with life. And then a second part of it was I was thinking about the future of humanity, what does the future of our existence look like, and the two of them kind of collided into a practical way to solve my own problems and a philosophical thought process on how we might understand ourselves as a species going forward.
Ben: So, for you, with this Kernel company that you founded to kind of optimize cognition, which I'd be curious to learn just a little bit more about, is that what initially got you interested in setting up on the human brain, the human body?
Bryan: I mean, it was a combination of if we zoom out on planet Earth, we try to contemplate what is the most important thing going on, I would say it's the creation of intelligence, where with computers, and now artificial intelligence, the cost of manufacturing and distributing intelligence is going to zero. Intelligence is going to be everywhere. I'll permeate all things. And with that, that is the case, contemplating what is our role going to be in this. We need to figure out a way to scaffold our progress in a way that is measured, quantifiable, and that we can take one step. We can go version 1 to version 2 to version 3. Not that we become our technology, but in a way where we can systematically evolve and improve ourselves.
And so, Kernel was the idea that our mind is one of the most important things we have, but yet it's now currently one of the only things we can't routinely and reliably measure. And so, to put it in practical terms, if you buy a, I guess, a washer and dryer, you don't think whether it's going to fit through your front door, you just know it's going to, because society has built engineering standards on. You build a washer and dryer to the spec, so it fits through everyone's doors, and everyone's door is roughly the same size. If you could measure the mind, you could re-engineer society around the mind, but we just don't know, we go by our feelings, and so it's kind of a disaster. So, Kernel was a way to try to build the world's first mass-market device that could measure the brain and the mind. Basically, be capable of measuring every brain and mind on planet Earth. So, we built, basically, wearable fMRI. It worked. It took us five years. It was possibly hard with the edge of physics, but it's not built.
Ben: You mean a wearable fMRI, like people would normally go and lay in one of those big MRI chambers to do something like a brain scan. I actually did something like this done in Florida, this Fountain Life facility, and they did a whole scan. It was super interesting as far as predictive data. What you're saying is you could do that same thing with like a headset that you wear?
Bryan: Exactly, like a bicycle helmet. You just put it on your head and it scans. With our technology, we don't get the full depth of the brain. You're getting, you know, 15, 20 millimeters into the cortex. So, you're sacrificing deeper structures, but you're still getting the entire cortex, which is something that just hasn't been possible. And so, whereas fMRI, MRI is too expensive, and too constraining to be practical for societal-wide adoption, and EEG isn't good enough. We basically got right in the middle of it to say, high enough quality that it's highly useful, and also scalable for the entire world, and also that you don't need surgery.
And so, I think we really is spreading the needle nicely, now we're on to the difficult part of can we figure out the first markets for adoption, which is always equally as hard as building the technology.
Ben: Yeah, also doubles up as a protective device for your head during any mountain biking excursions.
Bryan: Yeah.
Ben: I saw you on the web, really expensive mountain bike. I saw you wearing it on your website on the Blueprint website. And by the way, folks, you're going to want to check out Bryan's website. I'll link to it in the shownotes. If you go to BenGreenfieldLife.com/BryanJohnson, and his name is spelled with “Y,” by the way.
Bryan, I saw you wearing what I assume is the Kernel on your website, like this big kind of bicycle helmet, techie-looking device, but is that actually available for people right now, or is it just selling in beta and under wraps?
Bryan: It's in clinical studies.
Ben: Okay.
Bryan: So, we have a few clinical partners where we're exploring early detection of cognitive decline and also depression. So, we'll find a market somewhere in those areas. But yeah, it's not yet ready for a consumer device.
Ben: Okay. I assume you probably scanned your own brain with it. I know you do a lot of self-quantification. And actually, before I even ask you about like your intriguing protocol, which goes all over the map, I'm just curious if you could tell folks what it is that you've experienced as far as like the age reversal that you've quantified, or perhaps qualify, because, honestly, for people watching the video, you look like you're like 16 years old. How old are you?
Bryan: I'm 45. But right now, can you see my face? Can you see how it's all peppered up?
Ben: Well, I wasn't sure if it was the pixelation on Skype or if you'd done some kind of a facial protocol. What is going on? You almost look like a little bit avatarish.
Bryan: Yeah, if you look at my neck, I did a pretty intense laser treatment on Saturdays, two days, 48 hours ago. And we have this new laser protocol we've been adopting, and the technician I have is wonderful. She tells me I have the highest pain tolerance she's ever worked with it. So, she really gets after it. And so, yeah, Saturday was the most intense we've ever done. I mean, it felt like the worst sunburn I've ever had in my entire life for 24 hours. It just was excruciating.
Now, it was a little bit better. Yeah. I mean, I look like — I basically got tattooed all over my face with these red dots.
Ben: Yeah, it's funny because I actually have a guy locally who does that Cameron Chestnut, and he's been on the podcast, and I've had a few celebrities come up and crash at my house to get their laser treatments. And they come back, and it literally looks like their face is peeling. It's nasty. They are sunburnt. They are embarrassed to go out in public. You actually don't look too bad considering, it's, what, Monday today, and you did on Saturday.
Bryan: Yeah.
Ben: So, anyways, though, besides the spotted neck, you look pretty good, dude.
Bryan: Thanks.
Ben: So, tell me about what you've experienced as far as your actual results.
Bryan: I think the most interesting results we have are the reduction in the speed of aging. And so, we use this algorithm using DNA methylation built out of Duke, called the DunedinPACE. It's a longitudinal study out of New Zealand, looking at five decades now. And they basically are trying to say, can you peg someone's — the speed at which they are aging with the DNA methylation test. And we like it because we feel like epigenetic clocks are emergent. They are interesting. They are not yet gold standard. They are civil standard. This pace of aging has been highly responsive to all the things we're doing.
So, in short, I've slowed my speed of aging by the equivalent of 31 years, and I now accumulate aging damage slower than the average 10-year-old. A lot of people don't realize that 10-year-olds accumulate agent damage. They do. We accumulate agent damage our entire life. It just accelerates as we get older in compounds. And so, I'm accumulating aging damage slower than 88% of 18-year-olds, and 90 — I think, 4% of people, my chronological age.
Ben: Okay. I think actually that that clock that you mentioned, the DunedinPACE, Ryan Smith, who runs TruAge Diagnostics, he sent me this website called Rejuvenation Olympics, where it shows like all the different people with the top age reversal scores. I think you were at the top, but there is actually like this competition where you can see how slowly people are aging. And I think the way that I contextualize it, because I think I brought it up on a podcast before, was let's say that your rate is like, I don't know, 0.73 or whatever, that would mean you're only aging, like what, 250, 260 days out of a 365 day a year?
Bryan: Right. Yeah, that's how I've explained it, to simplify it. That's right. So, like every year, I get September, October, November, December for free.
Ben: Yeah.
Bryan: I launched the Rejuvenation Olympics with Ryan, and so the idea was to have some fun because, as you know, it has been better than anyone in the world of anti-aging health and wellness. There is an endless number of choices for gurus. And the difficulty for the average person trying to decide what to do is, what do you do, and why? And I know like my parents are just totally confounded by this thing. And so, I wanted to create a competition to say, all right, let's actually put some numbers on the board, let's have some fun to compete. So, yeah, we created the rejuvenationolympics.com based upon DNA methylation. And so, I did out of the 1,750 people that have been measuring their speed of aging over a multiyear period, I ranked number one as having reduced my speed of aging.
Ben: So, you have kids, right?
Bryan: I do.
Ben: Are they like jealous? Are they doing the same thing, or are they concerned that their dad might eventually be younger than them?
Bryan: They have different responses. My 17-year-old is all in. He does everything that I do. My 19-year-old is at college, and it's difficult being at college. My 13-year-old daughter, you know, she's got different priorities in life. But I mean, it's definitely a family conversation. It's fun. Over the holidays. we did a Rejuvenation Olympics as a family. So, we did like sit and reach. We did some grip strength and a few other things. So, we play around with it a lot. It's just part of our culture. It's family. It's fun.
But, you know, also like it's a big contrast, like my son took, what I call, this super veggie to school, lunch them every day, a bunch of vegetables. And his friend tweeted out, taking a picture of him eating it. I don't know what's wrong. Wait, what did it says? “This boy has been eating this every day for the past month. I don't know what's wrong at home. I hope everything is okay.” But it was just like it was so jarring for his friend that he was eating vegetables in comparison to his friends eating Doritos, pizza, and soda for lunch, that he was like, “What's wrong with him? Is he okay?”
Ben: Yeah. Actually, that leads in, and so I wanted to ask you, what does your diet look like? Like before we talk about like fancy supplements and hacks or anything else, I'm just curious what you eat in a typical day?
Bryan: 2,000 calories. It's primarily vegetables, berries, nuts, and seeds. So, for breakfast, it's a broccoli, cauliflower, black lentils, garlic, ginger, mushrooms. Then, for midday, the second meal of the day, it's macadamia nuts, flaxseed, walnuts, pomegranate seeds. And then the final meal of the day is just the vegetables, berries, and nuts. And then, yeah, take a hundred supplements, but yeah, 2,000 calories. Oh, then I take three tablespoons of olive oil, so 45 milliliters of extra virgin olive oil, and then dark chocolate, for a total 2,000 calories.
Ben: Oh, Amazing. I could get on the olive oil, dark chocolate bandwagon. Actually, I think I heard you talking about that at one point, and obviously, now I've seen a lot of other stuff on cacao flavanols and some of the omega-3s and benefits of olive oil and started putting about a tablespoon of olive oil and sprinkled up dark chocolate in my morning smoothie. And so, you feel absolutely fantastic with that. But is it literally the same thing every day for you?
Bryan: Yes, except for the third meal, which varies every day. It is. So, 75% of what I eat every day is the same.
Ben: Even on days that you work out, do you adjust calories at all, or is it just like the same thing?
Ben: Is it the same thing every day for you?
Bryan: Yes, except for the third meal, which varies every day, it is. So, 75% of what I eat every day is the same.
Ben: Even on days that you work out, do you adjust calories at all or is it just like the same thing?
Bryan: Yeah, that's the thing that surprised me. It's no matter what I do, the exact same thing every single day. And we have this experiment, could I basically be plant-based? Could it be 2,000? Could I work out for an hour a day if we just hit pilot and let it run, what would happen? And, so far, so good. We can't find any deficiencies in everything. We did a full body MRI of fat, muscle across my entire body. We're measuring hundreds of biomarkers. We're optimizing them for optimal clinical outcome ranges. It all looks fine.
There's a few things we had to crack for like when you're on caloric restriction, your testosterone goes down. So, I do TRT with the patches. But other than, that seems like everything is okay?
Ben: Yeah, yeah. As far as like what you described for your meals, I mean, it sounds like a little bit of like a typical vegan-esque diet. And, it also sounds, though, like you're taking some of the steps. It sounds like some of this stuff is fermented or in its whole food source and not necessarily ultra-processed, but possibly even more bioavailable through fermentation or whatever. Have you taken a dive into the why buying each of those meals or is this just like what you like to eat?
Bryan: No, it definitely is so that the calories we have, because it's 2,000 calories, every calorie has had to fight for its life, every single ingredient is based upon evidence. And so, from the broccoli and the cauliflower and the black lentils, it's not to say that they're the only thing that can be done, it's to say that they are thing that can be done. And so, we say food in and the output is the few 100 biomarkers and we say, “Are they pegged in the optimal clinical outcome range?”
So, for example like this week, I was looking at my liver enzyme sum, ALT, AST, GGT and I think this number was 49. And I tweeted that out and I said, “Has anyone else have a better liver enzyme sum than this?” And so, we really are looking at the outputs of do the biomarkers hit the ranges we think are optimal. And again, if you look at my pace of aging, my liver markers or other markers, they're all ideal. And so, certainly diet, it has some relationship with that.
None of these things were really based upon my genetics or anything of sort. It was just we found evidence that in gestation of these things had these relationships with these certain markers. So, I don't eat anything that we can't measure.
Ben: Yeah, most 45-year-old dudes who are working out an hour a day would be kind of hungry on 2,000 calories. Are you hungry all the time?
Bryan: Yeah.
Ben: Really.
Bryan: And that's the thing that's been really interesting is the way that my body to recalibrate and say, “Actually, we're okay, we don't need food.” Because my body fat hovers around 5% or so. I don't have any drawbacks. I'm not experiencing any symptoms. As far as we can tell from all the data, everything is working as expected.
Ben: Yeah, I did notice you said on the website that your body temperature is running cooler than when you first started, which obviously can sometimes indicate a slight drop in the metabolic set point, which could mean your body kind of adjusted to that lower calorie intake. Do you think something like that could happen?
Bryan: Yeah, quite possibly. I mean, routinely when I measure every single morning when I wake up, I measure my waking body temp and it's routinely 95.9, 96.1. That was never the case before. And so, yeah, possibly.
Ben: Yeah. Do you take anything for thyroid or iodine or anything like that?
Bryan: I do, yeah, 125 entities of iodine. And then, I also take — I got diagnosed with hypothyroidism minus 21. So, I've been taking levothyroxine and Armour Thyroid for the past 20 years.
Ben: Okay.
Bryan: But all the thyroid levels, T3, T4, TSH, they're all normal.
Ben: Okay, got it. And that body fat percentage is pretty low as well. It's pretty rare. Actually, I interview somebody who has kind of like the same issue as I do. The difference for you and me is I eat like a horse it seems but my body fat percentage just ranges like 5 to 7%. People always ask me, “Dude, why do you starve yourself?” I'm like, “I don't. That's my leanness,” based on DEXA scans and everything and it just is what it is.
Bryan: Yeah. What's your caloric can take?
Ben: I range from 3,000 to 3,500 calories a day. And I do a lot of — it looks like the type of like Mediterranean and Asian type of vegetable and plant-forward foods as you do. But I have the same thing for breakfast every morning. For me, it's a raw liver smoothie with bone broth and colostrum, so it is a little bit more like nose-to-tail meat base. And then, the afternoon, my lunch is usually like a really good cut of fish served with vegetables or miracle noodles or Japanese yam or something like that.
And then, dinner is widely varied but it's always a very good like grass-fed, grass-finished meat or pastured pork or something like that with roasted vegetables. Honestly, like even on that calorie intake, I'm still kind of hungry. But I use these drinkable ketones. Have you ever messed around ketones to keep your appetite satiated in between those meals?
Bryan: I have.
Ben: Yeah, an interesting DNA protective effect. I think they actually definitely play a role in longevity-based diet. Do you like them?
Bryan: We tried it and they spiked my liver enzymes.
Ben: Oh, really?
Bryan: Yeah. So, we immediately discontinued them. After 19 days, they spiked it from — it was like 200% in 19 days.
Ben: Yeah. Sometimes agents that upregulate autophagy cause a short-term rise in liver enzymes. So, it could have possibly been the case. So, you also said that you take 100 different supplements a day.
Bryan: That's right.
Ben: How do you decide what it is that you're going to take from a supplement standpoint?
Bryan: The same as the diet. Every single supplement has to justify its existence. It has to fight for its life. And everything needs to be measured. And so, nothing is included because it's trendy or cool or sounds interesting or because others do it. Everything has evidence, everything has an endpoint. And if we can't measure the endpoint, we don't do it. And so, they're all tied. So, the basics, like you, would expect a D and a C and a E. But then, others like metformin, rapamycin, and carbos, everything has a purpose and it's just kind of grown to about 100.
Ben: Are there any in particular supplements that you use, that you really feel that are non-negotiables for you as far as not keeping your fingers crossed that they might be having a protective effect or longevity-enhancing effect but you're just like, “I feel amazing when I take these particular supplements.”
Bryan: The only thing I feel that way about is my sleep. I sleep, I just can feel — maybe you, like me, I can just feel it so thoroughly. If I get a bad night's sleep, my next day is wrecked. But otherwise, I don't eat junk food, my diet's so stable. I don't think I really necessarily fill the supplements. I don't recall a time when I could —
Ben: Sandra Kaufmann, who has a pretty good anti-aging protocol and a book and is also some I have interviewed in the past kind of like priority ranks that hosted different longevity-enhancing compounds like astaxanthin, NAD, C60, etcetera. Of the supplements that you take, would you say that certain ones have really let out to you as hell yes in the longevity category? In terms of the research that you've seen or the effects on your own age reversal?
Bryan: My team has systematically reviewed every lifespan study and every health span study. And then, systematically ranked each one according to the evidence and assessed each one according to the quality of the trial that was run. And then, we stack rank all the studies, look at all the evidence, we try to prioritize which evidence we think is worthy. And then, we take those — Then, it's also as like in animal models then human. And then, we go from there. And so, we've tried to go from highest value add and work our way down. So, I guess the protocol is built based upon that methodology.
Ben: Yeah, that's interesting. It's data-driven. You've mentioned a couple times you have a team. Is this like the team at Kernel who's kind of like moonlighting overseeing your health protocol or do you actually have a team that you've specifically hired just to manage Bryan Johnson and measure Bryan Johnson?
Bryan: Yeah, there's several full-time and then several part-time. So, like the 30 for example, we have an EPIQ 5 ultrasound machine here at the house, medical grade system. And we have several sonographers. We have one that specializes in the heart, one that does muscle-skeletal and one that does all other organs of the body. And so, that's, for example, three members of the team. And so, it's basically built up on everyone we need for every organ and every diagnostic protocol we have. And because we do full-body ultrasound on a regular basis, we need to have that kind of expertise that can do it. We don't want an MSK person to be doing a cardiac. We really want a person that is an absolute expert in their given area.
We value really measurement above all. That's the whole thing that enables Blueprint. If I can't measure anything I'm doing, it's very hard for us to know the cause-and-effect relationship.
Ben: And I assume you're tracking and measuring your sleep because you mentioned that as being something that's really important to you. I'm curious how you set up your sleep. Are there any particular steps that you take to optimize sleep?
Bryan: Yeah, I mean it's honestly the number one priority of life because I know from my personal experience, and Matthew Walker said this, that the difference between hope and despair is a good night's sleep. That is definitely the case with me. I mean, life feels doable and amazing with a good night's sleep and without it, it feels irritable and frustrating.
Ben: Yeah.
Bryan: Nothing affects my conscious experience of reality more than sleep. And so, as a result, I make it my number one priority. So, I mean, I basically built my life around sleep. So all the things you would expect like I stop eating around noon or so. So, I have 10 hours of fasting that allows my resting heart rate to get to about 45 or so before I go to bed.
Ben: Wait, I got to interrupt you real quick. So, all three of those meals you're having before noon?
Bryan: Yeah.
Ben: Oh, wow.
Bryan: 6:00 am to noon roughly is my eating window.
Ben: So, a six-hour compressed feeding window. Wow.
Bryan: Yeah.
Ben: And, sorry, one other question related that before we get back to sleep. So, are you like eating that first meal? Like right when you get up or you wait a little while till after you're you've kind of gotten that cortisol awakening response?
Bryan: I drink what I call the Green Giant when I wake up. This concoction of collagen peptides, and amino acids, creatine, cinnamon, and spermidine with the chlorella powder. I take 50 some other supplements. Then, I work out. And then, I eat breakfast around 7:00, 8:00. I eat my next meal around 9:00 or 10:00. The final meal around 11:00, 12:00.
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So, back to your sleeping protocol. You finish eating at noon and that obviously can help with body temperature. I'm the opposite by the way. I'm hypoglycemic and wake up at like 2:00 am unless we have these big glorious family dinners at like 7:00. It's a little bit different than me. I've experimented with the compressed feeding windows. I usually have my first meal around 10:00 or 10:30 am right before I jump into a podcast like this. And then, I'm generally kind of shutting off calories around 8:30. But I've got a solid 10-hour feeding window compared to your six just because if I eat as early as noon, I can't sleep but you seem to do okay with it?
Bryan: Yeah. It's actually better. So, you're saying your first meal's around 10:00, your final meal's around 8:00 or so?
Ben: Yeah, exactly. So, leading up to sleep, are you doing any type of anything from like biohacks, mats, the cold water devices, supplements, things like that to enhance sleep?
Bryan: It's really analog. So, I just one hour before sleep I try to turn off. So, I'll hang out with my family, will stretch, talk, read, watch something, just low-key. But I try to basically stop the world and its tracks because I know that when I go lay down and go to sleep and I work up to the very moment, whatever I'm ruminating on, of all the to-dos or some fire that I need to put out or whatever high-stress situation that's on my mind, I'll dream about it all night and I'll be having a restless night. If I can have that one hour to wind down and just kind of tune out the world, I get high-quality sleep.
So, one hour is a non-negotiable. And then, I do small things like blue light-blocking glasses, I'll take 300 mcg of melatonin. I don't really do a whole lot. I think what I really went at is every single night is the same. So, the routine never deviates. My lifestyle built in a way where I don't have things that are disrupting like alcohol or I'm not eating pasta or something like that. It also have negative effects. I have a blackout bedroom. So, truly, I think it's just the consistency of the routine. My body expects it and it's in a system now where every night I get high-quality sleep and for my entire life. I never could knock out high-quality sleep. It was like a roll of the dice every night. I had no idea what was going to happen. And now, every single night, it's high quality.
Ben: Wow. What's a blackout bedroom?
Bryan: Just there's no light.
Ben: Okay. So, it's not like full-on EMF kill switches, Faraday cages, stuff like that? It's just no light.
Bryan: Yeah, [00:35:27]____.
Ben: Yeah, I mean, you laugh but I actually have a kill switch in my bedroom and a push button, remote control Faraday canopy. I had to make it look aesthetically pleasing for my wife and everything. So, it's like a princess poster bed and you push the button. You cannot send a text message, you cannot take a phone call and you're completely cut off to anything electronic the entire night in that thing.
And my only complaint about it is it gets a little bit muggy if my wife's at home and sleeping in bed because she's like a freaking furnace with her metabolism while she sleeps. So, I have a little oscillating fan on one of the bedposts and that keeps the air circulating. But, for me, that's amazing because I can just be totally cut off from electricity during my night of sleep. It seems to help a lot. What time do you go to bed?
Bryan: Around 8:00, 8:30.
Ben: Okay. And, I'm assuming you're doing like 8 hours.
Bryan: Yeah.
Ben: Okay. All right, cool. Do you do any napping or siesta or anything like that?
Bryan: Nope. I try to avoid it because, yeah, it messes things up.
Ben: Yeah, our protocols are a little different because I go to bed typically by the time I get the kids to bed and have done some reading and stuff. I'm usually asleep by 9:45, 10:00. But then, I usually get up around 3:45 or 4:00. Just because that allows me time for my spiritual practice and my me time and prepping for the day and some of the early work. But then, every day after lunch, usually, either in the hyperbaric chamber or on this like big — Are you familiar with pulse electromagnetic field frequency, like these PEMF mats?
Bryan: Yeah.
Ben: So, I'll lay on one of those or climb inside the hyperbaric chamber and I'll do about an hour of meditation or yoga nidra or something like the BrainTap device which is like a light sound hypnosis device. And the reason that I've developed that protocol is it's a little bit of a hack because it buys me an extra hour to an hour and a half every day because, even though on paper, I'm shorting myself on sleep during the night's sleep cycle, I'm getting what feels like a full sleep cycle or two in the afternoon which is an hour dedicated to that. So, it's not quite that like that Uberman sleep cycle that some people talk about but for me, it frees up so much productivity.
Bryan: Do you find it in these rhythms, your markers change with these protocols?
Ben: You mean sleep specifically or–?
Bryan: Yeah, I mean just the things you're watching, your measurement? Do they track with these things?
Ben: Yeah, typically as long as I get that siesta in, what I track would be like the Oura Ring‘s resting heart rate, readiness score based on heart rate variability, sleep cycles, etcetera, it does fine. If I don't get that nap in, obviously, I'm sure doing that short of a sleep cycle, everything goes to crap after a couple of days. So, it is kind of hypercritical to make sure my team knows, “Don't schedule Ben for anything between about 2:00 and 4:00 pm,” because that's kind of a time that I'm tucked away.
Bryan: I understand that.
Ben: You mentioned that you worked out for about an hour a day. I'm curious how you developed your workout protocol and what it looks like.
Bryan: Basically, I try to flex and stretch every muscle of my body. It's about 40 movements inspired a lot by The Knees Over Toes Guy.
Ben: Oh, you mean Ben Patrick?
Bryan: Yeah.
Ben: Oh, he's great. Yeah, he's been on the podcast before and his protocols are amazing, especially when you're talking about the longevity stuff. So, tell people about it.
Bryan: Yeah. So, Ben's wonderful friend. He came and hung out with me, and showed me some of his stuff, which was wonderful and appreciated. And so, it's 40 things. It's upper body, lower body, cardio, flexing, stretching muscles.
The other day this YouTuber came and visited me and he's like, “Hey, but wait a second, what if you're dropped into the middle of the jungle and you need to fight a wild animal?” It's like, “Well, I don't know. I might get eaten.”
Ben: Pretty farfetched, hypothetical.
Bryan: But really, I'm optimizing for a singular thing which is my speed of aging. I'm not trying to do Iron Man. I'm not trying to be dropped in with another wild animal. And so, everything I'm doing for the routine is all about that. And so, we really watch the evidence on what would an elite athlete in their early 20s be capable of in basic things like a single rep bench, single rep leg press, sit and reach, VO2 Max, all the above. So, we watch those variables as the guiding.
And then, we also use ultrasound, for example, look at my tendon and ligaments, and whatnot. So, we watch my body changes the exercise protocol.
Ben: Is it the same your nutrition every day, the way you workout?
Bryan: Yes.
Ben: So, every single day of the week, it's the same?
Bryan: Yes. Interesting.
Ben: My workout routine? It's similar from week to week but definitely not the same every day. I'm curious to hear your thoughts on this since I kind of hung up the hat myself on athletics. Namely, for me, it was obstacle course racing and Iron Man triathlon, and now mostly it's just pickleball and walking and a little bit of tennis. I've adapted my routine to really be based around two primary modalities, blood flow restriction training, I don't know if you've messed around with that at all, like these Katsu bands or anything that that kind of increases lactic acid and muscle and increases blood flow to the brain, etcetera, post-workout. And then, single set to failure training for which I use one of these, it's called an ARX device. It's a 2-horsepower engine that just completely exhausts each muscle group in about two minutes.
And so, three days a week, I do the single-set-to-failure training, and then I use this thing called a Vasper that circulates cold water through blood flow restriction bands for a 21-minute HIIT workout. And so, that's typically Monday, Wednesday, Friday. Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday are all sauna, cold, breathwork, walking, and tennis or pickleball. And then, Sunday's a free day off day for frisbee, golf, or whatever.
But that single-set-to-failure training using something that magnifies, from a super maximal standpoint, the E-centric load like the ARX or there's another device called the X3 bar. You've probably seen that before, that wall-mounted device that kind of throws you around. That, combined with the BFR training are two things that are really the staple of my program and it is kind of the same Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday split. Have you messed around with much of that like the single set-to-failure or the blood flow bands?
Bryan: We looked at the blood flow bands. We couldn't find the evidence to justify it.
Ben: Okay. So, even from the fitness standpoint, you pretty much have your team looking at evidence for every last move that you do.
Bryan: Everything. I guess, the reaction here to Blueprint, you know. I'll say I'll do a given thing, like I do the same thing every day, seven days a week. And then, inevitably you'll get like 100 responses. “But wait, what about–,” you know. And there's a million “Wait, but what about–?” things. And one can consider or do or shortcoming this or that. The objective is not to say that we've covered every possibility in the universe on what can be done. It's just simply to say, “We have a very specific goal of trying to slow down the speed of aging and reverse aging damage that's happened and we're trying to do things that have evidence because we're measuring hundreds of biomarkers and we're tracking them.” And so, if something has the evidence to get into the conversation we looked at it.
If the Blueprint is different in that we're so focused on this specific objective, that leaves a lot of people confuse what their “wait, what abouts.” They don't understand how we're guiding our objectives on this thing.
Ben: Yeah. And I'm curious, from the Blueprint standpoint, you talk about the Kernel, which is obviously a piece of technology that you're using for your brain. I mentioned the hyperbaric and the PEMF, for example. But if there are there any technologies whether it be for recovery or for longevity or for immunity or anything else that you use on a regular basis.
Bryan: Yeah, the major pillars we've got diet, the pills, we've got the prescriptions, which is rapamycin, metformin, and carbos. I'm taking alpha-estradiol-17, the E2, which is the non-feminizing estrogen. Those are the big ones that we're doing. Then, exercise and sleep.
Ben: So, you don't use anything like — because you hear a lot of people in the longevity world, including myself, of course, I've talked about this before. Hyperbaric chamber, for example, or infrared sauna or heat-cold therapy, modalities like that. Do you mess around with any of that stuff?
Bryan: We just completed an extensive look at hyperbaric and we couldn't find the evidence to do it. In our analysis, it appeared as it was interesting for acute injury. But we couldn't find it for rejuvenation. And so, we didn't move forward with it.
Ben: Yeah, I think that from a tissue oxygenation standpoint, it has some utility. This is for me based on just N equals 1 anecdotal information because on the Tuesday and Thursday and Saturday that I do breathwork, it's kind of like the bonding activity that I do with my sons. So, I have 15-year-old twin boys and we go into the sauna and just sweat our eyeballs out. And do anywhere from 20 to 45 minutes of breathwork. And we especially focus on the inhale locks and the exhale locks. Whenever I'm using the hyperbaric chamber regularly, I get an extra 30 to 40 seconds on my exhale and typically an extra 10 to 20 seconds on my inhale. So, I know there's something going on from an oxygenation standpoint, even though I'm using a home unit that only goes up to about 1.5 atmospheres.
And I think for me the other thing is, I used to have one of those float tanks. You've probably seen those before.
Bryan: Yeah.
Ben: The upkeep on it was horrific but it was nice to be locked away with nobody being able to bug you. For me, the hyperbaric chamber, since I'm using that in the afternoon for relaxation, is kind of similar. You got to zip yourself up, you can't hear anything outside, and it's almost like a self-inflicted sensory deprivation chamber. And there's something about yoga nidra or self-hypnosis or these light-sound stimulating machines that went combined with the oxygen mask just allow you to check out and drop ruminating thoughts almost right away. So, for me, it's a very, very relaxing session for the day.
Bryan: I would imagine people visiting you, you're like PT Barnum's Circus. Coming to your home with all your stuff, with your Faraday cage and whatnot. I'm sure it's going to be very exciting for people to see all the infrastructure you've built. What opinions we hear people expressing.
Ben: Yeah, I mean, typically, if I'll have a podcast or come to my house to record a show or company over, they do what we do. They do what the family does. So, I'll lay them out on the sound healing table and turn the PEMF mat on and let him kind of do like a little 15-, 20-minute journey on that. They'll climb in the hyperbaric chamber for their naps. They use this thing called a BioCharger in the basement. It's like an electrical medicine modality. Before dinner, we'll typically have breathwork parties in the sauna and then go jump in the cold pool. They'll use the Vasper and the different machines. So, it's just kind of fun. It's just like a wacky adventure. People inevitably wind up feeling pretty good.
But of course, I balance that out. We meet for family meditation every morning at 7:30 and family music time and story time and prayers and more meditation in the evening. And we have many, many special comings and goings as a family. At 7:00 pm, all work gets shut off and we just have this massive, glorious family dinner, playing games, talking, playing table topics, etcetera.
And you're no doubt familiar with a lot of the longevity-enhancing effects of just not being lonely and prioritizing relationships. So, from a softer side of things, do you focus on much of that? The relationship or the happiness piece from a more psychological or spiritual standpoint?
Bryan: I do, yeah. I've kind of been through different communities in my life. I was raised in a deeply religious community that was actually pretty amazing to be inside. Only as I grew older, I kind of learned the trade-off where if you're in a certain group, there's an out-group, in-group good, out-group bad. Or like, you want the outcome to become the in-group. And then, I've kind of moved throughout various communities throughout my life and I feel like I'm now in a good spot where I'm creating new community around this new way of being. That really takes a lot of synchronization because if I'm going to bed at 8:00 or 8:30, a lot of the activities that are societal norms would just not be conducive. And so, building a community around people who are also on the same page has been really great.
So, I say it's been nice to settle in because then based on how to get a resynchronization with people who are cool with this kind of thing, I'm there now. So, it's been a nice recalibration.
Ben: Yeah. What's it like with your kids? Are they joining in a lot of these activities with you? Are they still preparing their own meals? Or how do you align this with your children? Real quickly, the reason I ask is like at our house, it's kind of like the shoemaker's wife wears no shoes. My wife doesn't have anything on her side of the bed for sleeping. She's very analog like you. My sons will sometimes take some of the supplements that I set out for them and encourage them to take based on some of the genetic testing that they've done. But I mean, they're eating cinnamon rolls and Mom's sourdough bread and pretty carbaholic diet all day long, whereas I'm kind of keto. The family kind of sort of watches what I do but doesn't engage with that much of it. How's it look like it in your house?
Bryan: My 17-year-old basically does everything I do, which is great. He does this by choice. So, he's invited to participate and I'll support him, but it sounds like you do the same thing I do. I'm pretty hands-off.
Ben: Yeah.
Bryan: But I'd say, in the house, we don't have anything that one can be naughty with. If you go into the pantry and you're feeling naughty, you can drink olive oil or take some supplements.
Ben: Or some dark chocolate. Dark chocolate, you could be a little naughty with.
Bryan: Yeah. Yeah, you're exactly right. 100% dark chocolate. But it's just nothing. And so, that's one of the rules I have in the house is we just don't want to keep that stuff around because it's just no good.
Ben: Yeah.
Bryan: But yeah, I'd say the family, they all have their different places in life, different priorities. They're dealing the best in the circumstances they're at. But generally, my son and I, we're kind of in synchronization on doing this together.
Ben: Yeah. And I know people are going to ask, so I'm going to beat them to the punch. Are you particularly selective about your olive oil and your chocolate? And if so, what kind of metrics do you look for?
Bryan: We're extremely particular about everything. And so, we think about this really as five levels. So, if you start at the level 1, you say chocolate is good for you, that may lead someone to believe a Snickers bar is okay because at least some portion of that bar is chocolate. Level 2 is dark chocolate, level 3 is dark chocolate undutched, level 4 is dark chocolate undutched without heavy metals, and the 5th is dark chocolate undutched, no heavy metals with high polyphenol. And so, with everything thing we do, everything is five layers deep. And so, nothing gets a cursory look for every single protocol.
And so, yeah, we source our chocolate and olive oil from all over the world. It's been really hard to find the performance specs on those things. It's so hard. So, that actually, since Blueprint became better known, we're going to make these available as products because we ourselves had so much difficulty trying to find the product specs that we needed ourselves. So, we're just going to make it easy for others. But yeah, those two are such important inputs of diet and they're so hard to get.
Ben: When you say “undutched,” just for people who might raise an eyebrow and not understand what that is, what's that mean?
Bryan: So, there's an alkalinization process that can happen that can eliminate a lot of the benefits. And so, there's a way that chocolate needs to be managed so you get the highest nutritional value. And they do it to eliminate the bitterness.
Ben: Okay. I got it. When was the last time you had meat or have you always been a plant-based eater?
Bryan: I had my whole life up until three years ago.
Ben: Okay.
Bryan: I kind of playfully say Blueprint is the best diet ever created for health in history, and if you want to prove me wrong, do so with your data. So, I do so like with a half-smile. Basically, we've tried to create this diet which produces perfect biomarkers. And, we're just looking at the data and nothing else. There's no tribalism, There's no opinion. We're just watching the data. And in doing that, I did express a preference that we'd be plant-based. It does not mean that meat is bad. It doesn't mean that it can't be done with meat. It doesn't mean that meat's not better. It just means I expressed a preference that said, “Is there evidence in the world that would allow us to build the protocol and could we achieve basically perfect biomarkers across hundreds of very variables by doing this?” That's it. So, that's just a preference on my side, but I would love to see someone else do it on meat and see what data it produces.
Ben: Yeah, that'd be interesting. I've been thinking about that myself because I've seen your protocol and of course, as I've alluded to, have some different things that I do. But the meat part of what I do is what I would consider to be a very healthy approach to me. Very glycine-rich, including a lot of organ meats, a lot of bone broth, a lot of really clean fatty fish, and really not very much methionine-rich meat. I don't do a lot of red meat. I don't do a lot of the dirty bird, the poultry. For me, it's a lot of bone marrow, bone broth, organ meats, fatty fish, and clean products primarily.
But it kind of makes me think about this idea of biochemical individuality and certain people obviously responding differently to different protocols. If someone were to come to you, because it sounds like maybe they have, and like, “Hey, I want to follow the Blueprint protocol A-Z,” do you ever consider about their body perhaps responding differently to the supplement regimen or the dietary regimen or the exercises than you?
Bryan: Yeah, of course. So, the Blueprint is basically just a demonstration of evidence and measurement. That's it. It's just saying, let's have a discussion on what we do and why we do it based upon data. That's all I'm trying to do.
Ben: Okay.
Bryan: So, just eliminate human opinion, eliminate tribal warfare, just look at the data. And the data is the strongest thing we have because we know where optimal clinical outcome ranges are or we know that that data is very good. It's really just trying to move health and wellness away from a religious style, infighting and tribalism warfare between humans, and to be this passionate scientific endeavor of what actually achieves the results that we care about.
Ben: So, if somebody were like, I don't know, riding on an elevator with you, maybe a little bit longer than 30 seconds, and you were to be able to tell them, “Hey, these are no matter whether or not you follow some of the nitty-gritty details of the Blueprint diet, these are the huge wins behind the Blueprint protocol.” For example, you've established that sleep is one. Would there be others that you're just like, “Yeah, these are non-negotiables.”
Bryan: Yeah, I would say actually the most powerful anti-aging protocol is to stop self-aided destructive behaviors. We are a society that's addicted to self-destructive behaviors. So, eating too much, eating junk food, not prioritizing sleep, skipping exercise, infinite scroll, binge-watching content, smoking, drinking. I think we all intuitively feel that we're kind of helpless against our own selves. That if we get ourselves in a situation where our mind gets to decide whether we do this naughty thing or not, we're going to lose most of the time. We're just we're unreliable creatures by default. If we subconsciously process that, we say, “Well, if we're not reliable, we ignore it and we try to bury it.”
But I'd say that even more positive than trying to take a supplement or two or this or that thing. Is to try to stop the self-destructive behavior. So, most of the time as you probably experience yourself is when I talk about Blueprint, you get these very common responses of, “But wait, what about–?” And then, the person brings their thing to you that they're interested in. And then, secondly, “What is your opinion versus NR NMN, and then when I get into the debate of some specific thing –“
Ben: Or the famous will X, Y, or Z break my fast.
Bryan: Yeah, exactly. You get the same questions every time. Meanwhile, and this is nothing about them, this is like me too, right? You've got a bag of Doritos in your arm, it's 3:00 am, and you can't stop watching videos or whatever. And so, the thing really that I found to be most powerful for me in my life was getting control of my own self-destructive behavior opened up everything else. But it's not something I could have fixed by trying to cover it up by some positive things. I really had to stop it at its root.
Ben: Yeah. So, it sounds like to me, more of an omission approach than the commission approach. It's less of the “do this and take this supplement” than “don't do these specific self-destructive behaviors.”
Bryan: Exactly. I would say, if you look at these things and try to say where are the power laws, and everybody wants the power laws. I'd say, my guess would be the power laws aren't stopping bad things.
Ben: And that makes sense. You mentioned like Doritos, I mean there are biggies that I think most people are aware of. Ultra-processed foods, vegetable oil, poor sleep. Are there destructive behaviors that you think fly under the radar or that more people should at least be aware of?
Bryan: In a couple weeks' time, I'm wanting to get a group of people together, maybe a few hundred people, and working on people eliminating SAD from their life. Self-aided destruction. And so, we could start with the basics we all agree upon. Like eating junk food is not good, eating too much food is not good, skipping sleep is not good, skipping exercise is not good. So, we are all cool there. And then, there's like a second layer where it's gray area. You know, like, is social media engagement good or bad? For how long? What ways? Like, there's going to be a lot of disagreement, and the science isn't that great. And then, gaming, is that good? For how long? What type? The same thing.
But basically just try to refocus the health and wellness community counterintuitively away from positive actions like taking supplements, doing this and that, and moving to the other side of stopping bad things. And I want to have five different behavioral therapy coaches present their different schools of thought, whether it be CBT or something else. And then, they present their school thought and say, “This is my methodology, this is my practice, here's what I do. If this is interesting to you and it appeals to you for your personal time, come hang out with me for a month. And then we just do this fun experiment.” Where we just try to bring awareness to how many things are we all doing in our daily lives?
And I would say the easy bifurcation is, if an activity accelerates your speed of aging, it's self-aided destruction. If it slows your speed of aging, it's rejuvenative of nature. And because we've been using this so much in our own work, you're basically just looking at information theory. Are you causing entropy to happen? In an accelerated pace or not? Are you calling it causing information loss in your biological systems? Outside of that, we can put other abstract layers on top and say gaming blank, social media blank, whatever. But really, if you're just getting a biochemical reaction, accelerate or slow the aging, period, and you have a fork and you point it in different directions. But to me, that would be really cool. That was the thing that got me on this path is getting my head around self-destructive behaviors. Because no matter how many times I woke up in the morning, I was like, I'm going to exercise, and eat well all day, I would just blow it. In some moment of weakness, everything will go out the door. Maybe others will experience something similar, maybe not but that's what I'm going to try.
Ben: Yeah, two people that come to mind. They'll be interesting from a researcher standpoint. One researcher and one more of an author would be a BJ Fogg. I don't know if you've looked into some of his work on “Tiny Habits.” I think he's at Stanford. And then, author Mark Manson, who's obviously written a lot about habit and willpower etcetera. Those two guys would both be interesting as a part of that.
And obviously, from an entropy standpoint, you no doubt have to take into account to a certain extent, hormetic factors, right? If I stay in the infrared sauna or the cold bath or even in the, you know, radiative exposure of sunlight or over-exercise or anything like that, there are obviously excessive hormetic factors that cause stress and excessive entropy. Yet, it seems like the slight surges or dips of the toes into the entropy pond, so to speak, seem to cause a cellular resilience effect. So, I mean, do you kind of account for that when it comes to destructive behaviors? Like a little bit is good of these certain behaviors, but then you need to draw the line at a certain point?
Bryan: Yeah, I would pose that question to my team. One thing also, I'm sure you've experienced as well, is you can have five scientists read the same few set of papers and all five prescribe different protocols. There's just no consensus even with, again, the same information. It's fine if the science is still emergent but typically how we handle these kinds of questions, whether you do blank or blank or blank, my team has a process where the literature is reviewed, we evaluate the evidence, we decided on a protocol, yes or no, we follow, and we measure it. But we try to basically just settle all discussions with data. Any time an opinion creeps into the room, it's out. It has to be solved with evidence of data. So, yeah, I posed this question to my team and I'm sure there would be a wide range of opinions on this or that. But I try to myself avoid walking down each path because these are hard scientific questions. It's still a really a new world that's emergent.
Ben: Obviously, kind of a non-health related question but related to your team, have you begun to experiment with things like autonomous agents to assist with research and from a GPT standpoint or anything like that?
Yeah, we have that seems like it would be incredibly helpful in scenarios like this just to map out some of the complexities. The thing is nobody's perfect and I know you've done a lot of quantification and a lot of imagery of the body. Are there specific scenarios for you that are like risk factors that you're paying particular attention to?
The reason I bring this up is I do a lot to optimize my health. But for example, I know I have a high predisposition to type 2 diabetes. I have a big family risk for both colon cancer as well as cardiovascular disease. And I even have, probably due to years of racing, Iron Man Triathlon, and some of these other excessively masochistic sports, a buildup of plaque, stable plaque, but plaque nonetheless. And so, there's certain things I'm paying particular attention to, right, diabetic factors related to carbohydrate intake, cardiovascular factors related things like red yeast, rice extract, CoQ10, niacin, etcetera. And from a colonic standpoint, you know a lot of attention paid to butyrate and fatty acids and care for my colonic flora. So, for you, what would some of those factors look like?
Bryan: Yeah, we're looking at all those things you mentioned. So, every single organ is being evaluated according to its markers. Brain, lungs, heart, skin, all of it. So, I agree with you just down the line. And so, I guess we haven't parsed it in terms of genetic predisposition. We've just looked at every single organ according to the data we acquire. And then, what outcome range just would be for those and we pay those for the targets.
Ben: Is there anything that concerns you right now that you're paying more attention to from an organ standpoint or health standpoint?
Bryan: Yeah, I mean, I spent the majority of my life destroying myself. Yeah, I grew up on sugar cereal. So, does when the idea was sleep was a waste of time. In my 20s and 30s, I was a startup entrepreneur wearing the mythology of sleep under your desk, work hard, be racketed, and then, a couple babies. Chronic depression, I guess I'm really surprised I'm actually okay, given how much I destroyed my body for so long. But I'm also equally happy with how fast my body bounced back with some care.
And so, I'd say it's much easier, as you know, to prevent damage than it is to fix the damage. It's really hard to fix damage. It's so weird, Ben, my lungs like my diaphragm strength is aged 18, but my B-lines, which is like accumulation of fluids or solids in my lungs are like age 67. And so, my lungs have these 10 different biomarkers for my lungs ranging from 18 and 21 and 22 and 33 and 37 and 67. And so, we found this extensive measurement that's like same as my heart. Some parts of my heart are fantastic, you know, age 20s, others are like 60s. And so, these measurements has allowed us to go in and focus on these hyper-specific areas for the organ. We've made some good progress in some areas. We're starting to make a lot more ground now that we've kind of solved the basics of diet, sleep, and all the other stuff, we can do these hyper-focused endeavors of finding the science behind a marker and going after the therapy.
Ben: Yeah, it's kind of cool. You can break things out from an organ system-by-system standpoint. And what you've just described about your youth obviously speaks to the regenerative capacity of the human body, and of course, the encouraging idea for folks listening in that the best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago or today.
I was reading a small biography of Benjamin Franklin this morning and it said, “Well, at age 42 he retired from the publishing business, and then he invented like a catheter and 10 different inventions. And then, started down the path of writing a whole bunch of books, stepped onto the advisory board for –” but like at age 42 he started all of this. And so, obviously, we're capable of, I think, a lot more than what we often perceive or what we're taught and health can bounce back a lot more quickly and efficiently than I think that some people might perceive in a defeatist manner.
One thing that comes to mind for me because this is something that I run into and I'm curious how you tackle it. You developed these complex protocols, these hundred supplements a day and the special diet and everything but do you travel? And if so, how do you manage this stuff when you're on the road?
Bryan: Yeah, I've gotten really good at it. So, this past month, past two months, I traveled for eight days, I think. So, I pack the supplements. I take olive oil, dark chocolate, my Green Giant, some protein, and then I'll go to the grocery store wherever I'm at, buy some avocados, some vegetables, and I'm good. I really figured out how to do this. I don't do, of course, other protocols when I'm on the road, but I've been able to get high-quality sleep and get my dietary intake done, so it's actually much simpler than I thought.
Ben: Yeah, I'm a little bit the same. I don't like to check bags so I have literally like one hard shell. I forget the brand, but I basically searched for the highest packable storage unit, the one could use for a carry-on for a hard shell. So, that's my hard shell. And then, I have one of those giant expandable backpacks that's also carry-on friendly. And essentially, everything that I need can fit into those two. And then, like you, and often if I'm staying a hotel or an Airbnb, I'll just basically have my assistant type in the Whole Foods or that's the same wherever I go. You know, it's like bottled glass sparkling water, sardines, avocados, organic greens, dark chocolate, some kind of like special mustard, couple rotisserie chickens or salmon patties and it just kind of shows up at the hotel when I'm there.
I don't know about you, but kind of, for me, gotten to the point we're packing, because I travel so much, it's like brushing my teeth. I know where the bags are, everything goes in there. Some stuff stays at home that are nice to have, not need to have. But once you get to have it down, it seems like you can do it pretty easily.
Bryan: The thing I find really I guess encouraging is, I think you and I are both like a traveling circus for 99% of people, it's just not doable for them for a variety of reasons. I like the idea of the idea that they can control stopping bad behaviors as the most powerful anti-aging intervention. Because I certainly can imagine being on the other side of this conversation and feeling very overwhelmed, like, I want to be better. I want to do better. I want to feel better. I am my own worst enemy, there's no way I'm going to learn all this stuff myself, and it all feels overwhelming, and how do I trust these people and all the above. But really, the thing it gives me a lot of excitement is that these things are in our control just by stopping bad behaviors. I know I would have won really big if I could have come to that simple conclusion in the earlier time of my life.
Ben: Yeah, and obviously, that's a much more widely available, accessible, and affordable solution to start with, along with a lot of the freebies like going outside barefoot, getting sunlight, being with family, eating real food that's as close to the planet as possible, avoiding ultra-processed foods. I mean, there's these so-called non-negotiables that I think are accessible to anyone before they stick the laser lights up their nose and wear the fMRI headset, this Kernel. Although I am intrigued with the Kernel. I'm going to have to follow the development of that because I just love technologies like that.
Bryan, obviously, I would imagine that Blueprint is the best place to be able to follow what you do. You have a newsletter there. I know you're robustly involved with social media, but anything happen in the background, like are you working on a book or video series or content that helps people assimilate this a little better into their lives?
Bryan: Yeah, I'm actually providing a pamphlet right now.
Ben: Oh, cool.
Bryan: Basically about the philosophy around Blueprint and what I think are some contemplations about the future of being human.
Ben: Okay, well, cool. Well, I'll certainly read it. And for people listening in, if you go to BenGreenfieldLife.com/BryanJohnson, I'll link to Bryan's website. I'm in the process actually of working — because I was driving down some notes for this podcast of a little article myself on some of the age reversal things that I do that I alluded to in this podcast like hyperbaric and PEMF and some of the supplements that I take, etc. So, if that's done, I'll include a link to that or a special audio for that in the shownotes as well.
And, Bryan, it'd be fun to get together sometime and compare our circuses, as you call them. So, we'll connect at some point in the future. But in the meantime, thanks so much for doing this, man.
Bryan: Yeah, Ben, thanks for taking your time. I would love to come see your stuff. It sounds like a wild ride, something a lot of fun.
Ben: Yeah, well, next time you're up in Washington state, I know a lot of people have no excuse at all ever to come to Spokane, WA. But if you ever do, here we are.
So. Alright, folks. Well, I'm Ben Greenfield along with Bryan Johnson of Blueprint. Shownotes are at BenGreenfieldLife.com/BryanJohnson with a Y, thanks for listening in and have an amazing week.
Okay, so, Ben again here. Now as a promise, I wanted to give you a little glimpse into my own age reversal strategies. I will also link to an article that goes over all these and of course all the podcasts are transcribed as well. So, if you go to BenGreenfieldLife.com/BryanJohnson, you can check that out.
And obviously, as Bryan and I alluded to, there are the basics, right? Your relationships and social life, your sunlight exposure, your time outdoors, avoiding some vegetable oils, etcetera, etcetera. But, just to make your eyes bug out in your head, I suppose, here are some of the things that I'm doing right now that are big wins for me. And, I actually did recently do this rate of aging clock, the DunedinPACE test that Bryan alludes to, and my own results show my rate of aging is .73. That means for every 365 days I only age 266 and that actually is one of the lowest aging rates currently on record. Plus, perhaps more importantly I feel like I'm 18 years old.
So, these are some of the things I do. Movement. As I talked about a little bit in the podcast with Bryan, three times a week weight training and two to three times a week, high-intensity cardio. My weight training is mostly all single set-to-failure. I use an ARX machine when I'm at home or a Tonal which is a wall-mounted machine I have in my garage. When I'm traveling, I'll use something like the X3 band setup. And for me, it's just six major moves. Chest press, pull down or pull up, squat or leg press, overhead press, and seated row.
I also use blood flow restriction bands pretty extensively when I travel combined with body weight training in my hotel room. And I also travel with what's called an electrical muscle stimulation suit, a Katalyst electrical muscle stimulation suit, and that thing I'll hit just once or twice a month right now to recruit a whole bunch of muscle fibers that I might not normally recruit.
Now, when I'm doing my home high-intensity exercise routine, I do use intermittent hypoxic training, meaning I use this machine called a LiveO2, and I'll breathe pure oxygen combined with limited oxygen during the actual workout. So, I kind of outlined my workout during the podcast with Bryan, but that's some of the more specifics of the actual modalities I use. And then, for all my warm-ups and cool-downs, I use like Bryan does, some of Ben Patrick‘s moves. He has a great book called “ATG.” I think that stands for Athletic Training Group at ATG for Life on Amazon. I'll do a lot of PowerPlate Vibration work to warm up and some moves from Dr. Eric Goodman called Foundation Training which is fantastic for the back and for turning on the glutes. And then, some self-inflicted facial stretching using a protocol called Eldoa, E-L-D-O-A, which I also have a podcast interview that I'll link to in the shownotes.
So, my total time commitment for my weight training sessions is about 30 to 40 minutes, three times a week. The cardio is 15 to 25 minutes, three times a week. The injury prevention protocols, foam rolling, movement stretches, etcetera, is 10 to 15 minutes every day. And then, again, like I mentioned in the podcast, everything else is walking, pickleball, tennis, occasionally go for a swim, and then a lot of sauna, cold, and breathwork. As a matter of fact, three to five times a week I'm 20 up to 40 minutes in the infrared sauna doing stretching and breathwork, and that always finishes with a 3- to 5-minute cold plunge. And most of my showers are as icy cold as possible. So, I'm getting a lot of the longevity benefits of the hormetic effects of temperature stress.
I outlined my sleeping protocol a little bit in my chat with Bryan, but I sleep anywhere from six to seven hours per night. I use a PEMF mat made by company called BioBalance during the entire night of sleep and also the SleepMe Cold System set at 55 degrees Fahrenheit. So, I'm on cold water and PEMF during the entire night of sleep. I will often use something called a Hapbee which is a magnetic stimulus device, and also an Apollo which is a haptic device to increase relaxation and to decrease my sleep latency. I typically will play ambient noise. I use something called a SleepSpace app for that to drown out noises, to lull me into sleep more quickly.
And my supplement protocol before bed is pretty simple, KION Sleep, Element Health CBD, and Magnesium Breakthrough. So, I use KION Sleep which is basically an inhibitory neurotransmitter kind of cocktail. CBD which is a non-THC form of cannabis, and then magnesium. And when I travel I throw in high-dose melatonin from a company called Mitozen, and by high-dose, it's like 100 to 300 milligrams, but that's only for the first few nights when I'm traveling. And then for proteolytic enzymes to heal up the body more quickly during sleep, if I've had a hard workout day, I'll take three capsules of the KION Flex which are proteolytic enzymes designed for recovery.
And then, I nap like I mentioned in this podcast, every day, 20 to 40 minutes in the hyperbaric chamber or on the PEMF mat. And a lot of times use these compression recovery boots made by a company called Hyperice, and also the NuCalm or the BrainTap light sound stimulation machine to improve my relaxation.
During the workday, I'm usually walking on a manual treadmill. I was walking on a treadmill during this entire podcast that you just heard or I'm standing in front of a standing desk. I use earthing or grounding mats during the entire day at work so I'm still grounding and earthing while I'm indoors. I have what's called a NanoVi device that generates air that I can breathe that assists with protein folding while I'm working. I have what's called a Vielight red light stimulation device for my head and a Joovv full body red light therapy device. And so, all of those are just kind of like on and off at different points throughout the day. To optimize my cellular health, during an average day of work.
Once a week I do a detox, meaning every week, I clean out my body. I take a binder like activated charcoal. I'll do a steaming session or coffee enema. And if you don't know what a steaming session is, check out the shownotes. It's literally what it sounds like. You're steaming your nether regions, which feels great, using some kind of herbal tea. And then, I always follow that up with a deep sweat in the infrared sauna. And for me, usually, that's Wednesdays, I just detox and clean out the whole body.
My diet is largely low carb, Mediterranean, a lot of organic vegetables, fermented dairy and plants, organ meats, clean fish, bone broth, extra virgin olive oil, like Bryan, vinegar, dark chocolate, like Bryan, very dark chocolate. And I do an overnight intermittent fast at 12 to 16 hours. I rarely do additional fasting besides a quarterly three- to five-day stint of lower calorie intake or sometimes water fasting.
When I wake up, I do take supplements. I'll take 100 like Bryan does, but I take a decent amount. So, I drink 32 ounces of water right when I get up. That's after I've done like some coconut oil pulling and clean my face and everything. First thing, go down giant Mason glass of water. I put the Jigsaw Health Adrenal Cocktail in there which is vitamin C and minerals. I put a few hydrogen tablets from Water and Wellness in there. I put typically electrolytes in there like a Quinton electrolytes or the Manna Shilajit minerals or Protekt electrolytes. I kind of go bounce around between all those. And, along with that water I drink NAD, spermidine, a good probiotic. I used one made by Seed, and then, some kind of nootropic or brain support, usually something like Qualia Mind or Nootopia.
And then, a couple hours after I've woken, I'll have a cup of coffee or a cup of cacao or some medicinal mushrooms like the Four Sigmatic mushrooms. Sometimes with a little bit of extra salt and minerals added into them, and I still haven't worked out at that point but that's just as I'm banging through work.
And then, when I work out, typically around 9:00 am before breakfast, I'll usually have a shot of Feel Free or an Update energy drink or some nicotine gum to really boost me into the workout. And then, breakfast, which is almost always like a liver, bone broth, colostrum, smoothie. Along with my breakfast, I take fish oil, the KION Fish Oil, I take a little bit of C60. I use the stuff made by Wizard Sciences. My friend Ian Mitchell, who's been on the show before. And KION Creatine, and that's it.
And then, with lunch, usually it's a bed of vegetables or some good clean fish. I'll usually have a big dose of ketones with lunch and I'll also throw in an adaptogen like reishi extract. If I'm going to nap after lunch.
All day long, I'm hitting KION Aminos to pulse anabolism. So, I take 10 to 20 grams of KION Aminos throughout the entire day. And then, before my meals, I'll take a shot of apple cider vinegar or digestive enzymes or something that will help me to digest the meal. And before dinner, to help me manage my blood sugar response to the meal, I take KION Lean.
Now, from an anti-aging standpoint also, once a month I take a two-day protocol of a senolitic formula from the company Qualia called Senolyt which helps to clean out so-called zombie cells. And then, twice a year I'll do a peptide protocol, usually 10 days long, using the bioregulatory peptides that I discussed in my podcast with Phil Micans. And I can link to some of my podcasts or my peptide sources in the shownotes.
Like I mentioned to Bryan, I do have a high genetic risk for heart disease and a beat apart from years of hardcore endurance training and an elevated plaque score. So, I also supplement with red yeast rice extract, which is like nature statin at night because the body does a lot of its cholesterol metabolism at night. And then, I take niacin and coenzyme Q10 in the morning along with what's called annatto, which is a mixed tocopherol, tocotrienol, vitamin E extract in the morning.
A few times a month, I'll do vitamin IV, a vitamin cocktail IV. I get them from Dr. Craig Koniver has a company called FastVitaminIVs. And then, two up to three times a year I'll do stem cells, V cells, and exosomes, usually with Dr. Matt Cook at BioReset Medical. One or two times a year is kind of an oil change for the body. I'll also do an ozone treatment like ozone plasmapheresis. Practitioners for that tend to vary. Sometimes I'll go to NextHealth down in LA, sometimes I'll go to Dr. Matt Cook's office for that. It really depends.
And then, over the past decade, I've done two full-body stem cell makeovers which are a game- changer. They're expensive but they are a game-changer. I plan to keep doing that once every five years with Dr. Harry Adelson at Docere Clinics in Park City, Utah. When I travel, a lot of times get an NAD IV or use an NAD patch when I'm on airplanes.
And then, from the skin standpoint I mentioned, I do coconut oil pulling typically with coconut oil or ozone oil, little bit of peppermint essential oil. I do that in the mornings. I brush my teeth once in the evenings for about 5 minutes, and then I floss or water pick regularly. I get a massage about one to two times per month and always include focus on the jaw and the cranial sacral areas during the massage. I also do once a week a clay mask for the entire face along with derma rolling and red light and that's kind of like my home anti-aging protocol.
So, those are a few of the biggies. So, that's basically what my whole routine looks like. As far as all the different hacks I use for anti-aging. I get a lot of questions about this so I figured I'd address it. Perfect time to do it is obviously on this show. So, I hope that's been helpful for you. I hope this entire podcast has any help before you. And again, the shownotes are at BenGreenfieldLife.com/BryanJohnson, spelled with a Y.
More than ever these days, people like you and me need a fresh entertaining, well-informed, and often outside-the-box approach to discovering the health, and happiness, and hope that we all crave. So, I hope I've been able to do that for you on this episode today. And, if you liked it or if you love what I'm up to, then please leave me a review on your preferred podcast listening channel wherever that might be and just find the Ben Greenfield Life episode. Say something nice. Thanks so much. It means a lot.
Bryan Johnson is a successful entrepreneur, investor, and visionary thinker – and now, based on his incredibly popular age reversal Blueprint here – is now an icon in the age reversal and longevity communities.
- 5.1 yrs epigenetic age reversal
- Slowed pace of aging by equivalent 31 years
- Now aging slower than the average 10 yr old
- Ideal muscle & fat (MRI)
- 50+ optimal clinical outcome biomarkers
- 100+ markers < chronological age
- Several fitness tests = 18yr old
- Body runs 3°F cooler
Johnson's passion for using technology to enhance the human experience led him to launch Kernel, a company that is building advanced neural interfaces to augment human intelligence. Kernel's mission is to create a new era of human intelligence by building hardware and software systems that can augment, repair, and improve cognitive function. Johnson believes that these technologies have the potential to fundamentally transform the way we live and work, and could ultimately help us solve some of humanity's greatest challenges.
In addition to his work with Kernel and OS Fund, Johnson is also a philanthropist and supporter of various social and environmental causes. He has pledged to donate at least half of his wealth to charitable causes, and is a signatory of The Giving Pledge, a commitment by some of the world's wealthiest individuals to give away the majority of their wealth to address society's most pressing problems.
In this discussion with Bryan, you'll learn how to use deep science and quantification to push the boundaries of what's possible for you in the realms of lifespan and health span.
During our discussion, you'll discover:
- From a corporate background
- Founder of Brain Tree
- Developed different technologies – Kernel
- Age reversal Blueprint protocol
- Ben’s age reversal strategy at the end of the podcast
- Ben's recent “Age Reversal” article:
-How Bryan got involved with age reversal?…09:23
- Bryan had his own problem and a philosophical question
- He couldn’t control his eating habits and gained weight
- At the same time was thinking about the future of humanity
- Kernel Company
- Intelligence will permeate all things
- If you can measure the mind, you can rearrange the society around that mind
- A way to build the first mass-market device that can measure the brain and the mind
- Wearable MRI
- Currently in clinical studies
- Exploring early signs of cognitive decline and depression
-Bryan's experience with his age reversal protocol…13:37
- Age Reversal Blueprint
- Bryan’s age reversal laser treatment
- The results of age reversal strategies
- The reduction in the speed of aging by the equivalent of 31 years
- DunedinPACE
- Bryan’s accumulation age damage slower than the average 10 year old
- slower than 88% of 18-year olds, 94% of people his chronological age
- Podcast with Dr. Cameron Chesnut:
- TruAge Diagnostics (use code BEN50 to save $50 off your Tru Age Kit)
- Podcast with Ryan Smith:
- Bryan launched Rejuvenation Olympics with Ryan Smith
- Measuring speed of aging – Bryan ranked no. 1
- How Bryan’s kids are responding to the protocol
-Bryan’s diet, supplements and measuring results…18:48
- 2000 calories a day
- Vegetables, berries, nuts and seeds
- Breakfast – cauliflower, broccoli, black lentils, garlic, ginger, mushrooms
- Mid-day – macadamia nuts, flaxseed, walnuts, pomegranate seeds
- Dinner – vegetables, berries, nuts
- Supplements
- 400ml of extra virgin olive oil and dark chocolate
- Every day the same except for the third meal which varies
- Measuring hundreds of biomarkers – no deficiencies
- Every single ingredient is based on evidence
- Doesn’t eat anything that can’t be measured
- Hungry all the time, but doesn’t experience end drawbacks
- Low body temperature -measures waking body temp every morning
- Diagnosed with hypothyroidism at 21
- Takes Iodine
- Currently, all thyroid hormone levels are normal
- Ben takes 3000-3500 calories a day
- Raw liver smoothie every morning with bone broth and colostrum
- Lunch is usually fish with vegetables with miracle noodles
- Dinner is grass-fed grass-finished meat or pastured pork with roasted vegetables
- Drinkable ketones (use code BENG to save 20%)
- Bryan tired them and spiked his liver enzymes
- 200% in 90 days
- Bryan takes a 100 different supplements a day
- Every supplement has to be justified
- Everything needs to be measured
- Nothing is included just because it's trendy
-Sleep routine…26:00
- Sleep is essential
- The Kaufmann Protocol: Why we Age and How to Stop it by Dr. Sandra Kaufmann
- The Kaufmann Protocol: Aging Solutions by Dr. Sandra Kaufmann
- Astaxanthin
- NAD
- C60 (use code BEN to save 15%)
- Podcast with Dr. Sandra Kaufmann
- Bryan’s team systematically reviewed every life span study
- Arranged by the quality of evidence
- Bryan’s team are experts in their given area
- Measurement is valued above all; the whole thing that enables Blueprint
- A good night's sleep is Bryan’s no.1 priority
- 10 hours of fasting before sleep
- All meals are before noon in a 6-hour feeding window
- Drinks a green giant after waking up with 50 supplements
- Green giant has
- Collagen peptides (use code BENGREENFIELD to save 15%)
- Kion Aminos
- Kion Creatine
- Cinnamon
- Spermidine
- Work out
- Meals
- Eats breakfast around 7-8
- Next meal around 9-10
- Last meal 11-12
- Ben's feeding window:
- First meal around 10-10:30
- Last meal around 8:30
-Bryan's biohacks for sleep?…33:49
- Turning off 1 hour before sleep is non-negotiable for a good night's sleep
- Blacked-out bedroom
- Every single night is the same
- Goes to bed around 8 to 8:30
- No napping
- Ben’s protocol:
-Workout protocol…38:18
- 1 hour every day
- Try to flex and stretch every muscle of the body
- Inspired by Ben Patrick’s protocols
- Podcast with Ben Patrick:
- The goal is to reduce aging
- Every day the protocol is the same
- Ben’s workout routine
- Blood flow restriction training – BFR bands and Kaatsu bands (use code BEN to save 5%)
- ARX Device for single set to failure training
- The Vasper circulates cold water through BFR bands
- Sauna
- Cold pool
- X3 Bar or Tonal
- Bryan used blood flow bands but could not justify them
- Bryan’s measuring has a specific objective
- To slow down aging and reverse the damage aging has done
- Blueprint is focused on specific objectives
-Other technologies that you use on a regular basis…43:03
- Major pillars are:
- Diet
- Pills
- Prescriptions like
- Rapamycin
- Metformin
- Carbos
- α-estradiol-17
- E2, the non-feminizing estrogen
- Exercise
- Sleep
- Bryan's team did not find evidence to use hyperbaric; their analysis found it interesting for acute injury but not for rejuvenation
- Ben’s family routine with the hyperbaric chamber after sauna
- Get an extra 30 to 40 seconds on exhale
- Get an extra 10 to 20 seconds on inhale
- Typical activities Ben's visitors do
- Sound healing table
- PEMF mat
- Hyperbaric chamber (use code BEN to save big on your hyperbaric chamber)
- BioCharger
- Breathwork parties in the sauna
- Cold pool
- VASPER
-The importance of relationships and community…47:06
- Was raised in a deeply religious community
- Moved around different communities later
- Currently, building his own community around people who are also on the same page
- How does he align his protocol with his children?
- 17-year-old does everything he does
- No “naughty” things in the house
- Other members of the family have their different places in life, different priorities
-Bryan’s olive oil and chocolate selection…49:42
- Extremely particular about everything
- 5 levels of chocolate
- level 1 – there is at least some chocolate in that bar
- Level 2 – dark chocolate
- level 3 – dark chocolate undutched
- level 4 – dark chocolate undutched without heavy metals
- level 5 – dark chocolate undutched, no heavy metals and with high polyphenols
- Like chocolate, everything they do has 5 layers
- Very hard to find the best products; going to make these products available
- Undutched chocolate is non-alkalized (acidity in not neutralized)
-When was the last time you had meat?…51:17
- Ate meat until 3 years ago
- Blueprint diet is the best diet ever and based on data
- Diet created that produces perfect biomarkers
- No tribalism, no opinion, only data
- Plant-based was Bryan’s preference
- Does not mean that meat is bad or meat is not better
- Bryan would love to see someone do it with meat
-Blueprint Protocol and biochemical individuality…52:57
- Blueprint is a demonstration of evidence and measurement
- Discussion on what we do and why we do it
- Eliminate opinion
- Move health an wellness away from infighting among humans and to be this dispassionate scientific endeavor
- Huge wins and non-negotiables of the protocol:
- Sleep
- The most powerful antiaging protocol is to stop self-destructive behaviors at its root
- Take control of self-destructive behavior
- Bryan’s plan for an experiment with 100 people to eliminate self-aided destruction (SAD)
- Start by agreeing on the basic bad things
- Junk food is not good
- Too much food is not good
- Skipping sleep is not good
- Skipping exercise is not good
- Second layer and gray area
- Social media engagement
- Gaming
- 5 different behavioral therapy coaches to present their school of thought
- If the activity accelerates your speed of aging, it’s self-destructive
- Tiny Habits: The Small Changes That Change Everything by BJ Fogg
- Mark Manson
- 5 scientists read the same few set of papers and all five prescribe different protocols
- Settling all discussions with data
-Risk factors to pay special attention to…1:01:40
- Ben’s predisposition to certain diseases
- high predisposition to type 2 diabetes
- risk for both colon cancer as well as cardiovascular disease
- buildup of plaque
- Bryan's team are looking at all those factors, every single organ is evaluated according to markers
- Bryan lived a destructive lifestyle in his 20's and 30's
- Body bounced back with some care
- It’s easier to prevent damage than fix it
- Uneven aging of different parts of organs
- Biography of Benjamin Franklin books
-How to manage the protocol and healthy lifestyle when traveling…1:05:53
- Bryan packs his supplements, olive oil, black chocolate, Green Giant, proteins
- Buys vegetables locally
- Other protocols are not done while traveling but dietary intake is followed
- Get high-quality sleep
- Ben’s protocol when traveling
- Search for hotels or Airbnb that serve whole foods like
- Glass bottled sparkling water
- Sardines
- Avocados
- Organic greens
- Dark chocolate
- Rotisserie chicken or salmon (use code BENGREENFIELD20 to save $20) patties
- Search for hotels or Airbnb that serve whole foods like
- For 99% of people, it's not doable for a variety of reasons
- People usually feel overwhelmed
- It's the idea of stopping bad behavior as the most powerful anti-aging intervention
-Blueprint is the best to follow what you do…1:09:01
- A pamphlet is now being provided
- Its basically about the philosophy around Blueprint and some contemplations about the future of being human
- Kernel
-Ben’s age-reversal strategies…1:10:37
- Ben's recent “Age Reversal” article:
- Ben’s got one of the lowest aging rates currently on record
- Movement
- 3 times a week weight training
- 2-3 times a week high intensity cardio
- Weight training
- Single set to failure
- ARX machine
- Tonal
- When traveling
- X3 Band setup (use code BEN to save $50)
- BFR Bands
- Kaatsu bands (use code BEN to save 5%)
- Katalyst electrical muscle stimulation suit
- 1-2x a month
- When at home, high intensity cardio on the VASPER
- Intermittent hypoxic training
- LiveO2 machine
- For warm ups and cool downs
- Podcast with Ben Patrick:
- Weight training session is about 30-40 minutes 3 times a week
- Cardio 15-25 minutes 3 times a week
- Injury prevention protocol 10-15 minutes every day
- Foam rolling, movement, stretches
- Walking, pickleball, tennis, swim, sauna, cold, and breathwork
- Sleeping protocol
- 6-7 hours a night
- PEMF mat by BioBalance
- SleepMe cold system (use code BEN to save up to 25%)
- Hapbee magnetic stimulus device
- Apollo Neuro haptic device (use code BG15 to save 15%)
- SleepSpace App (use code GREENFIELD10 to save 10%)
- Supplement protocol before bed:
- Kion Sleep
- Element Health CBD
- Magnesium Breakthrough (use code BEN10 to save 10%)
- When travelling
- Mitozen High Dose Melatonin (use code BEN to save 5%)
- Kion Flex 3 caps
- 20-minute naps in the hyperbaric chamber (use code BEN to save big on your hyperbaric chamber) or PEMF mats
- Compression recovery boots by Hyperice
- NuCalm brain stimulation machine
- Walking on a manual treadmill
- Standing desk
- Earthing / grounding mats
- NanoVi device
- Vielight
- Joovv red light therapy device
- A detox once a week
- Diet
- Low carb, Mediterranean
- Overnight intermittent fast between 12 and 16 hours
- Quarterly 3-5 days of low calorie intake or water fasting
- Supplements
- 32oz of water
- Vitamin C and minerals
- Hydrogen tablets
- Electrolytes
- NAD/Spermidine
- Probiotics
- Nootropics for brain support
- Qualia Mind or Nootopia (use code BEN10 to save 10%)
- Later a cup of coffee, cocoa or medicinal mushrooms
- When working out
- Shot of Feel Free (use code BEN40 to save $40)
- Update Energy Drink (use code BEN to save 10%)
- Lucy Nicotine Gum (use code BEN20 to save 20%)
- Breakfast
- Liver, bone broth, colostrum smoothie
- Kion Fish Oil, C60 (use code BEN to save 15%), Kion Creatine
- Podcast with Ian Mitchell:
- Lunch
- Vegetables and fish (use code BENGREENFIELD20 to save $20)
- Ketones (use code BENG to save 20%)
- Adaptogens (reishi mushroom)
- Kion Aminos 10 to 20 grams throughout the day
- Before meals
- Apple cider vinegar
- Digestive enzymes
- Kion Lean before dinner
- Podcast with Phil Micans
- Twice a year peptide 10-day protocol as discussed in the podcast with Phil Micans
- Once a month 2 Senolytic protocol from Qualia (use code SENOBEN to save 15% off any purchase)
- FastVitaminIV at Dr. Craig Koniver's Koniver Wellness
- Stem cell makeovers at the Docere Clinics
- Ozone treatment at Dr. Matt Cook's Bioreset Medical or NextHealth
- Skin and oral health
- Oil Pulling
- Brush teeth once in the evening
- Floss or pick
- Massage
- Clay Mask with red light and derma rolling (use code BG20 to save 20%)
-And much more…
Upcoming Events:
- Health Optimisation Summit: June 17th – 18th, 2023
Join me at The Health Optimisation Summit in London! This is your chance to be part of a community of 2,500 like-minded people and learn from world-leading health speakers. You'll be able to fast-track your health journey, discover cutting-edge secrets and hacks, explore the latest tech and gadgets, and find the cleanest and healthiest supplements and nutrient-dense foods. Don't miss out on this incredible experience! Use code BENGREENFIELD for 10% off regular and VIP tickets. Learn more here.
Don’t miss this incredible opportunity to learn from the best in the field and take your biohacking journey to the next level. You’ll get the chance to be involved with a private network of biohackers, a live discussion with myself and Dr. E, a live Q&A, an experiential biohacking experience, tasty food, and a chance to win some mind-blowing prizes! Learn more here.
- Keep up on Ben's LIVE appearances by following bengreenfieldfitness.com/calendar!
Resources from this episode:
– Podcasts And Articles:
- Ben Greenfield’s Latest “Age Reversal” Lab Testing Results, Diet & Supplement Stack, Top Tactics To Slow Aging, Longevity-Enhancing Stacks & Much More.
- The Big Beauty Podcast: Anti-Aging, Hair Growth, Gray Hair, Baldness, Beauty Myths & Beauty Truths, Dermarolling vs. Microneedling, Scars & Stretch Marks, Testosterone, DHT & Much More With Dr. Cameron Chesnut.
- Is This The Most Advanced Anti-Aging Analysis & Epigenetic Diagnostic Test Of The Future?
- The 7 Different Reasons You Age (& Potent, Proven Molecules To Enhance Longevity & Slow Aging)
- How To Get Rid Of Knee Pain Forever, The Best Knee Rehab Exercises, The Ancient Chinese Technique To Keep Your Knees Young & More With Ben Patrick, The “Knees Over Toes Guy.”
- Quantum Biology, Breaking Performance Records, Reversing Alzheimers, Ozone Suppositories, Frog Poison & More With Crazy Mad Scientist, Biohacker & Inventor Ian Mitchell.
- The New Darlings Of The Anti-Aging Industry & The Russian’s Secret Age Reversal Weapon: Peptide Bioregulators With Phil Micans.
- How I “Turned On” My Butt: Why My Posture Completely Sucked And How I Fixed It Fast.
– Books:
- The Kaufmann Protocol: Why we Age and How to Stop it by Dr. Sandra Kaufmann
- The Kaufmann Protocol: Aging Solutions by Dr. Sandra Kaufmann
- Tiny Habits: The Small Changes That Change Everything by BJ Fogg
- ATG for Life by Ben Patrick
- Foundation: Redefine Your Core, Conquer Back Pain, and Move with Confidence by Eric Goodman
– Gear, Equipment, Devices And Apps:
- HBOT (use code BEN to save big on your hyperbaric chamber)
- PEMF mats
- BrainTap (use code BTPARTNER2023 to save $100 off the BrainTap Power Bundle and the BrainTap Headset)
- Oura ring
- BFR bands
- Kaatsu bands (use code BEN to save 5%)
- ARX Device
- Vasper
- Sauna (mention Ben Greenfield at checkout save $500 OFF regular prices and receive a free gift)
- Cold pool (use code BENFORGE to save $350 on the personal use model and code BOUNDLESS to save $500 on the PRISM Forge)
- X3 Bar (use code BEN to save $50)
- Tonal
- Biobalance Acoustic Mat
- PEMF mat
- BioCharger
- Katalyst
- LiveO2
- Foam Roller
- SleepMe (use code BEN to save up to 25%)
- Hapbee
- Apollo Neuro (use code BG15 to save 15%)
- SleepSpace App (use code GREENFIELD10 to save 10%)
- Hyperice
- NuCalm
- Standing Desk
- Earthing And Grounding Mats
- NanoVi
- Vielight
- Joovv (use code BEN for an exclusive discount on your first order)
- Power Plate
– Food And Supplements:
- Fresh Pressed Extra Virgin Olive Oil
- Dark Chocolate
- Bone Broth and
- Kion Colostrum
- Miracle Noodles
- HVMN Ketone IQ (use code BENG to save 20%)
- Astaxanthin
- NAD/Spermidine
- C60 (use code BEN to save 15%)
- Collagen peptides
- Kion Aminos
- Kion Creatine
- Cinnamon
- Bottled Sparkling Water
- Sardines
- Organic Greens (use code BEN to save 20%)
- Kion Sleep
- Element Health CBD (use code BEN15 to save 15%)
- Magnesium Breakthrough (use code BEN10 to save 10%)
- Mitozen High Dose Melatonin (use code BEN to save 5%)
- Kion Flex
- Activated Charcoal
- Vitamin C
- Quinton (use code GREENFIELD to save 10%)
- Hydrogen Tablets (use code GREENFIELD to save 10%)
- LMNT Electrolytes
- Probiotics (use code BEN to save 25% on your first month's subscription)
- Qualia Mind (use code BGF to save 15%)
- Nootopia (use code BEN10 to save 10%)
- Kion Coffee
- Cocoa
- Four Sigmatic Mushrooms
- Feel Free (use code BEN40 to save $40)
- Update Energy Drink (use code BEN to save 10%)
- Lucy Nicotine Gum (use code BEN20 to save 20%)
- Kion Fish Oil
- Apple Cider Vinegar
- Digestive Enzymes
- Kion Lean
- Red Yeast Rice Extract
- Niacin
- CoQ10 Enzyme
- Annatto-GG
– Other Resources:
- Oil Pulling
- Clay Mask (use code BG20 to save 20%)
- DunedinPACE
- TruAge Diagnostics (use code BEN50 to save $50 off your Tru Age Kit)
Episode Sponsors:
HVMN: Visit hvmn.com/BenG and use code BENG20 for 20% off any purchase of Ketone-IQ️.
Neurohacker Qualia Senolytic: Take this cutting-edge formula just 2 days a month to help your body eliminate senescent cells, which is KEY to optimal aging and feeling younger. Give your body what it needs to fight senescent cell accumulation with Qualia Senolytic at neurohacker.com, and code SENOBEN scores you an extra 15% off.
Apollo: Apollo is a safe and non-invasive wearable that actively improves your sleep. Head over to apolloneuro.com/bengreenfield and use code BG15 for 15% off
BON CHARGE: Holistic wellness brand with a wide range of products that naturally address the issues of our modern way of life. They can help you sleep better, perform better, recover faster, balance hormones, reduce inflammation, and so much more. Go to boncharge.com/GREENFIELD and use coupon code GREENFIELD to save 15%.