[Transcript] – 7 Surprising Reasons Your Sleep Surface & Sleep Environment May Not Be As Optimized As You Think, With Essentia Mattress CEO Jack Dell’Accio.

Affiliate Disclosure

Transcripts

From podcast https://bengreenfieldlife.com/podcast/jack-dellaccio-podcast/

[00:00:00] Introduction

[00:00:56] Podcast Sponsors

[00:06:04] Guest Introduction

[00:08:50] How Jack got interested in sleep and mattresses

[00:12:19] How Essentia tackles the allergens issue

[00:16:41] Essentia differs from most memory foams on the market

[00:27:06] The 7 sleep environment stimulants that keep you awake at night

[00:35:29] Podcast Sponsors

[00:39:37] How the Essentia mattress helps with EMF

[00:45:17] Gold standard mattress setup

[00:54:41] How to get a hold of the mattress

[00:56:51] Pillows and foundations

[01:03:30] Hybrid mattresses to help out with the wallet

[01:05:34] Podcast Sponsor

[01:07:29] End of Podcast

Ben:  My name is Ben Greenfield. And, on this episode of the Ben Greenfield Life Podcast.

Jack:  So, we're always trying to look at what's perfect environment and how we get people sleeping better, and stronger, and coming out of it fresh and thriving.

And they came to work at Essentia for a few months in the off-season. And, we came up with all these algorithms, 256 formulas based on the questionnaires. And, we've been testing it ever since and it's worked to a charm.

Unexpected. We can tell that the players notice the difference, feel the difference, appreciate it. And, that's kind of what drives me is kind of interaction with customers.

Ben:  Faith, family, fitness, health, performance, nutrition, longevity, ancestral living, biohacking, and a whole lot more. Welcome to the show.

Well, the dog days of winter are here. We all know what that means. The days are shorter, temps are colder, there's less healthy natural sunlight that we all need. But, here's the deal, you don't have to sweat these dreadful winter months because you can get all of what you're looking for in terms of the healing spectrum of red light from being outdoors, but you can get it in the comfort of your own office, or your home, or even if you wanted to stick one in your sauna. They're called the Joovv Lights. They've got thousands of peer-reviewed research articles on the benefits of red and near-infrared light for things like skin health, and reduced pain, and inflammation, and faster muscle recovery, and even hormone enhancement. But, the problem is, it can be tough to actually get access to a device that's powerful enough to not need you to stand in front of it for hours. And then, a device that also allows you to adjust the settings. The Joovv Lights, they have ambient mode, which uses a lower intensity red light designed to be used at night as a healthy alternative to lighting your office or your home instead of using bright blue light. You can literally just flip a Joovv on and have that be your light. And, it doesn't affect your melatonin production when you do that. They have little go devices that you can take with you on the go. My wife's got one up in the bathroom. She does her clay mask and then she'll stand in front of that while she's doing her other makeup or whatever mysterious things that women do in the bathroom are doing. And, she'll have the red light shining at her the whole time that she does that. So, I think it's fantastic. I got them all over my house. Even one at my guest house. People come to my house and they just bathe in these Joovv red lights. They love them.

So, if you want to get one of these with my discount, go to Joovv.com/Ben. And, you can also use code BEN over at Joovv, J-O-O-V-V.com. They'll give you a big fat discount VIP treatment when you use my code Joovv.com/Ben. And, the code over there is BEN.

You guys know I talk about the microbiome and probiotics all the time because there is so much BS and misinformation in the probiotic space. When I heard about this company called Seed and interviewed their amazing team of crack scientists over there with leading academic partners across microbiology, immunology, genetics, metabolomics, and gastroenterology, I realized somebody had actually formulated a probiotic that I like. It's a patented delivery technology to ensure the probiotic arrives at its final destination, no loss luggage, no misconnections because it's engineered in this special cap called the ViaCap, which not only contains some prebiotics in it to help to feed the probiotic but it shields it against oxygen and moisture, and heat, and light, and stomach acid. So, your probiotic strains get delivered and this is near unheard of alive and well to the end of the small intestine to then be delivered into the colon where they give you all those health benefits including probably the most important very, very nice bowel movement regularity, and stool consistency, and ease of expulsion and bowel movement comfort. So, enjoy. It's called the Seed Probiotic.

And, I'm going to give you a 15% discount on it. It's shelf-stable, by the way, no refrigeration necessary. It's sustainably delivered to your door every month. I take three a day on an empty stomach. Sometimes I take a little bit more when I travel because jet lag and traveling can disrupt the microbiome, but it's just a great probiotic. It's wonderful. So, go to Seed.com/Ben, S-E-E-D.com/Ben. That'll get you 15% off your first month of their — they call their Daily Synbiotic, S-Y-N-biotic.

So, what would you say if I told you that I could jam-pack beets, freeze-dried berries, blueberries, acai, pomegranate, raspberry, cordyceps, Siberian ginseng, rishi mushroom, and rhodiola all into one potent teeny tiny little scoop, give it to you, have it not taste like ass, save you 20 bucks from buying the same equivalent of that juice from something like your cold juice bar and it's USDA organic, certified gluten-free, certified glyphosate residue-free, dairy-free, soy-free, vegan, non-GMO, 100% organic whole food, and it makes you feel like your blood got the biggest boost ever with no coffee and no stimulants, whatsoever? That's what Organifi Red Juice is. And, that's what Organifi has created. This stuff is amazing. I even use a meat rub. I use it in my cooking. I sprinkle it on my salad. I put it in my smoothie. It's just basically the best stuff ever for your blood, for your inflammations and adaptogens, great for just general energy, and it tastes amazing.

So, it's called Red Juice. You get 20% off of this amazing blend, Organifi.com. Am I saying amazing enough? Geez. Organifi.com/Ben. Organifi with an I.com/Ben. That'll get you 20% off.

Well, folks, my guest on today's show has actually been on the podcast a long time ago. He's actually spent the past 16 years studying sleep health, and particularly mattresses and sleeping environment. He has a super interesting story, which I talked a lot about him with on the last episode that we did but he's going to fill us in now because he's been up to a lot lately. He actually had emailed me a few months ago about some work he's been doing on getting data on sleep environments and specifically what are called sleep stimulants, but not sleep stimulants that you might think about say, I don't know, caffeine or having a five-hour energy at 10:00 p.m., but stimulants like toxins, and off-gassing, and allergens, and pain through lack of proper support in your sleeping surface, and numbness through improper pressure redistribution, and poor thermoregulation from the fabrics that you're on during the sleep cycle. And so, I thought it'd be really interesting to get in this whole concept of kind of sleep hygiene 201 as opposed to 101. You got maybe your room kind of cold and your room's dark and quiet. But now, what are some other things that you could take into consideration especially in terms of your sleeping surface and what your body and your head are laid upon?

So, my guest on today's show is Jack Dell'Accio. And, he's the founder and CEO of this company called Essentia. Now, they make this natural memory foam mattress, which actually have it my house and they do a lot of really interesting things with the way that they create these sleep surfaces. So, Jack, welcome back to the show, man. It's been a few years.

Jack:  Ben, good to reconnect. It has been a few years. And, so much has changed. I mean, when we first met, we were just getting on to the pro athlete scene. We were really focused on people who were ill and helping people in recovery for their challenges. And, we were really at the infancy of how we were working with professional athletes, and we kind of just scratching the surface of what we were discovering. So, yeah, I think we've come a long way, it's been a while, good to reconnect with you again.

Ben:  Yeah, for sure. I mean, actually, you and I didn't connect over mattresses, we connected over triathlons back when both of us were drinking the endurance athlete Kool-Aid and doing a lot of racing. But, you actually have–for people who may not have a chance to go listen to the other podcasts that we did, which I will link to. The shownotes for this show are going to be at BenGreenfieldfitness.com/SleepwithEssentia. That's E-S-S-E-N-T-I-A. BenGreenfieldfitness.com/SleepwithEssentia. Essentia spells with T.

Can you get into your story a little bit, Jack, about how you kind of got interested in this whole mattress thing in the first place because I know you have a little bit of kind of a little bit of a wounded healer twist on this thing?

Jack:  Yeah. I guess that's a lot of stories, or companies, or products are developed out of a certain need. For me, this dates back 20 years ago. Had people in my family who were going through cancer treatments, and that's kind of was a big shift for me in awareness of wellness up until then. Basically, I only saw the rosy path and never confronted it. And, through their treatments and both had different directions in what they wanted to take as far as one conventional and one alternative path, but both of them were undergoing their own challenges and in the path that they chose.

One thing that was interesting was the sleep environment. And, they both had really serious needs for a healthier home. And, that's when, as a family, we were doing a lot of research, a lot of discovery of what was good, what was not good. But also, we were seeing they would have reactions to certain environments, they became hypersensitive to everything whether it'd be chemicals, whether it'd be dust. Everything in the sleep environment, they became hypersensitive. So, I became very interested in that segment of a healthier home.

And, initially, my goal was to create a better material because what was popular then and still popular now are memory foams. But, anyone with severe illnesses can really be hypersensitive to the chemical. So, I initially started this by trying to develop a latex foam that had a slow response feature to it that it would have a behavior memory foam but yet still have the organic qualities of latex. And, we were successful with that 16 years ago when we launched Essentia. But, through the years, we've realized and worked on so many more things that are also quite vital in avoiding stimulants for sleep. But, that was our beginnings and we did a great thing there back then and continue to evolve and continue, I think, to be the leaders in the space.

Ben:  Yeah. Yeah, it is interesting because there's actually a name for that. It's called idiopathic environmental intolerance. I don't know if you knew that, but it literally kind of electro hypersensitivity, some people get brain fog at 2:00 p.m. in the afternoon after they've been around their Wi-Fi router at the office all day. And, that's a thing, but so is this stuff called idiopathic environmental intolerance, which means that people literally get these sets of symptoms caused by contact with different substances. And, it's also known as multiple chemical sensitivity.

And, I do know a lot of people who have everything right in the bedroom. Like I was talking about earlier, the room is cold, and maybe they even have one of those ChiliPads on, and their room is dark, and they're taking their lavender and all their sleep supplements, everything's still getting poor sleep. And, I think a lot of these people actually are staying awake due to this multiple chemical sensitivity, which is why I wanted to talk with you about this again because it's so interesting and so impactful.

And, there are some aspects of the sleep environment that I want to get into. But, first of all, when it comes to the potential for allergens on a mattress, can you explain what the issue is and then what you guys went about doing to take care of that? What kind of fabrics, what kind of materials you end up choosing?

Jack:  So, when it comes to allergens, there's three. One, which we don't refer to it as an allergens, is the chemical sensitivities. But, aside from that, it ultimately derives from protein. So, you'll have specifically most mattresses that are quilted, they'll kind of become nesting areas for dust mites. And, basically, dust mite feces, dust mite corpse, those proteins trigger an overreaction from the body. In organic mattresses, it could be from latex, the latex and proteins trigger overreaction from the body. So, what we do in hours is we have zero quilting pads on the surface so you're always directly, we have our organic cotton finishing cover and you go directly onto our beyond latex memory foam. And, the foam itself basically is very dense and high elasticity, so dust mites can't burrow through them. And, through our processing, we eliminate all of the proteins are in them.

We've actually been tested by Johns Hopkins' School of Medicine. They've analyzed our latex. They've analyzed our testing results in our covers. And, they basically identified that we're the ideal sleep surface for people suffering from allergies.

What's really cool and what I was talking to you about not long ago is that we hear about the people who are hypersensitive, who acknowledge the reactions from their body. But, some of the testing I was telling about, that's been what's really been cool working with pro athletes compared to those who are suffering from a challenge. Those who are suffering, it's always hard to pinpoint what stimulant is really affecting them. But, if you're really curious about the pro athletes, these guys are fit, the bulk of them are not having trouble sleeping. But, we've been able to do is with trackers is identify that these stimulants actually allergens, toxins, they're affecting how deep you sleep. And, we were able to do a double-blind test with about 64 players, I believe it was, for a couple of months and really able to see that there is an impact. Those are people who are hypersensitive to their sleep environment. Even those who are not are not getting the best sleep that they can.

Ben:  Okay. And, the main reason for the allergy part from what I'm getting based on what you're saying right now is that the mattress material that you're using is basically not allowing these dust mites to build up was just kind of nasty to think about that mattresses normally would have dust mites. And, that's the actual protein in the latex that triggers the allergy. And so, if you don't use, what do they call it in the mattress indices? Is it batting the material? It's like a wool or fiber batting, it's like a nesting ground for dust mites? You guys are not using that. But, what do you use instead? What's the materials that are actually used in the mattress?

Jack:  So, in our mattress, we just have really, really sensitive formulations that we don't need any batting at all. So, that's what's really interesting is typically a latex formula is a little rubbery, a little stiff, has a lot of balance and it doesn't have the comfort, the pressure redistributing qualities. But, we've developed 256 different variations of our foam formula so that we don't actually eliminate the need for any batting at all. Other than that thin layer of cotton, organic cotton that's on it, you are sleeping directly onto our foam material. And, every mattress has several layers with several different formulas of our latex to give us the feel, the comfort, the contouring, the support. So, we don't have any of the batting.

Ben:  Okay, got it.

And, we've already thrown around the term memory foam a few times. And, correct me if I'm wrong, but memory foam is it's a viscoelastic substance. So, viscosity or viscous fluids have a certain level of thickness and density. And then, elasticity is the idea behind how much it can stress or compress. And, what a memory foam does, I think, based on the name is it that kind of molds to the contours of your body and remembers the way that your body is shaped? What exactly is it that makes memory foam memory foam?

Jack:  Now, memory foam is a commercial term, but you hit it right on. The proper terminology for what's commercially sold out there is viscoelastic polyurethane foams. However, the concept of memory foam is a slow response foam, which means it reacts slower than just a conventional foam. And, that creates a body cast. That body cast is better for blood pressure redistribution and blood circulation. And, it eliminates that negative space so that you're fully supported.

The issue with the polyurethane memory foams is that basically, they're all chemicals. Traditionally, these have been high-density products. As of recently with a lot of bed in the box brands that are lower-priced, they're eliminating density so they're eliminating support and elasticity of the product. But ideally, it should be a high-density, highly supportive pressure redistributing product. What we have done is we have given those properties to latex foam. So that takes away the toxicity and off-gassing that comes with it. We're actually the highest density on the market. So, we're extremely high density but very high elasticity, which is quite unique for a latex foam. And, the beauty of it is that it's pressure redistributing, it creates this supportive cast of the body, but it's not temperature sensitive as a memory foam. So, the chemical properties of that memory foam, it kind of absorbs your body heat to create this cast, which is good for the support feature. Not good if you're changing position, also not good if you sleep hot. And, we'll get into thermal regulation, but sleeping hot is not a good thing for anyone and it's not a static temperature situation but something that is active throughout the sleep cycle.

Ben:  Okay, got it. And so, for the way that you would make this memory foam, if you're using latex, where exactly are you getting the latex from to be able to call this natural? I assume, it's, I don't know, grass from the Himalayas sprinkled with unicorn tears. How exactly does the latex piece fit in?

Jack:  Basically, it's certified organic Hevea milk. So, the Hevea brasiliensis tree. There's plantations of these in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India. Originally was from Brazil, but basically very little of any production comes from Brazil these days. So, we buy our certified organic Hevea milk from India and Sri Lanka. And, we froth it and formulate it and make all of our formulas at our plant in Montreal, Canada.

Ben:  Okay, got it. And then, I think it was the last episode, we were talking a little bit about this idea of the actual oils or petroleum products that are commonly used in mattresses. And, from what I understand, the oils are actually necessary as part of the memory foam creation process. Can you explain that?

Jack:  Well, we don't use any of the petrochemical products that are used in memory foam. So, conventional memory foam is polyurethane foam, which is a complete chemical product. We use the Hevea milk and we use essential oils. And, our essential oils are really that's creating the different feels, the different elasticities for all the different variations that we make because like I mentioned, every single layer of the mattress is based according to posture, is based according to, if we want somebody to have something a little bit more adaptive, something that reacts a little quicker to movement. So, we work with plant extracts, essential oils, and Hevea milk and really have our own patented version and proprietary formulas that make ours unique and not having to go towards the chemical variations, which are basically the only known memory foam aside from Essentia is a fully chemically-derived foam.

Ben:  Alright, got it. So, you have the hypoallergenic materials because it's this natural latex. You also mentioned that it's better at not storing heat that the body puts off while you're asleep. And, that's the one thing that kind of annoys me. That's why I actually use a ChiliPad a lot of times when I'm at home because I sleep so hot, so does my wife. I still need the added ChiliPad on top of that. And, I just sweat buckets when I'm at a hotel room or something that doesn't have my usual at-home mattress cooling pad circulating setup.

But, what's the deal with the mattress throwing body heat and how do you keep it from doing that?

Jack:  So, that's the interesting thing is everyone just generally thinks you have to sleep cold. And, I enjoy sleeping cold as well. However, what we've been tracking through our data is that through the assumed eight hours of sleep, whether it'd be six, eight hours, whatever everyone is going for. But, throughout that process, we've noted that what's really important is that if your body is releasing its heat and the decline of temperature through that eight-hour time lapse, your central nervous system is slowing down and it keeps you into your deep sleep cycles longer. And, that's our goal. Our goal is eliminate stimulants. And, heat is one of the stimulants. And, we want to get people to stay in deep sleep and REM sleep longer because that's the creation of healing, recovery, both mental and physical.

And so, the way that our mattress does that is it allows for that permeation of a body heat to go through. It doesn't trap it at the surface. So, no matter what's being done whether you have a lower room temperature or you're using a ChiliPad, which I suggest using the blanket version and not the mattress surface version because what we're trying to achieve is coolness in your environment but also allowing that your body heat exits and is flowing outwards because what we want to achieve is that temperature is constantly on decline. And, that will extend sleep, that will extend deep sleep cycles because it's sort of the body in its environment. You have to think back where we were before all this technology. If you had to imagine yourself sleeping on the sand, and at night, the environment is cold and sand is one of those materials that does not trap heat, it escapes. So, allowing that body heat to escape lets you sleep deeper unless you sleep longer. When the environment is warming up, that is stimulating the central nervous system and gets your internal clock towards its awaken stage, so it keeps you in light sleep or an awaken stage. So, ideally is not trapping heat, allowing coolness for comfort but also allowing that body heat to constantly be eliminated and discarded throughout the sleep cycle.

Ben:  Okay. And, you said for ideal temperature control, you actually don't like the ChiliPad underneath the body between the body and the mattress. You said you would prefer for people to use the blanket, which just so folks know a ChiliPad also makes a blanket that unlike the sleep surface that you sleep on, the blanket, actually it's kind of cool. It's like a gravity blanket, it circulates cold water through the blanket itself. And, what you're saying, Jack, is ideally, you're sleeping on top of the mattress with the cool water blanket on top of you?

Jack:  Exactly. Yeah. I think that's the optimal way of using the technology.

Ben:  I don't know if it's possible. I don't know if it's possible, do the ChiliPad on the bottom and then the ChiliPad blanket on the top. But, are you saying that in an ideal scenario if you have something like an Essentia mattress that's not trapping the heat anyways, then you can kind of have the best of both worlds by having the cooling surface on top of your body and then the non-heat trapping surface underneath your body?

Jack:  Exactly. And, you're not having anything obstructing any of the pressure redistributing properties, the precise elasticity that's for posture support eliminating negative space. So, really, you're not interfering with what the mattress is supposed to do and having the coolness on top. So, the coolness on top doesn't work with every mattress because again, if you're going to be on a polyester mattress or a chemical mattress, you're going to be cooling from the top, you'll be sweating from the bottom. That's where the regular ChiliPad is helpful. But, when we're talking, what we've engineered these mattresses to do, it's best to use the mattress as design and have the Chili blanket over it.

Ben:  Okay. Okay, got you.

Now, early on, as I was introducing you, I talked about this idea that you had emailed me about that kind of made me want to interview you again. In the first place, this idea of sleep environment and stimulants, and at first, again, when you emailed me, I thought you talked about coffee and stuff like that. But, you're actually talking about some of these stimulants that wake us up during the night. We talked a little bit about toxins and off-gassing of chemicals, which is obviously an issue in terms of the material used to make the mattress along with the allergens that could potentially be in something like a latex-based protein if you're not careful with the choice of that.

But, what are some other reasons that people would have stimulants using your definition of a stimulant like an environmental stimulant during the night of sleep? And, one other that we already talked about was thermoregulation. But, what are some others that you're aware of in terms of sleep stimulants?

Jack:  We've identified seven. And, how we are defining stimulants is whatever external entity or that basically takes you from REM sleep / deep sleep and keeps you in the lighter sleep. So, again, our goal is to keep people as long as possible in REM and deep sleep. One helps you log in your memories, it helps with happiness, anxiety. There's so much that happened at night in your REM sleep and then in your deep sleep cycles where you're building muscle and you are physically healing. So, we want to keep people as long as possible in those sleep cycles and achieve great healing.

So, the seven that we've identified, we've named a few, is your clean air, avoiding any VOCs and toxins. Thermoregulation is an important stimulant that we have to actively be dropping the body temperature through the night sleep. Heat would be considered the stimulant. Allergens are stimulant. Allergens basically cause an overreaction of the body, so it's stimulating you out of those deep sleep cycles. And, 25% of the population realize that this is happening because they have an overreaction that they're able to identify whether it'd be respiratory issues or skin irritation. But, everyone else is fighting it so that's a stimulant as well. But then, there's obviously the obvious ones from a mattress, pain management. So, pain is a stimulant. And, through proper posture support, through dense adaptive very high elasticity foam, we eliminate having any of the pain. Then, there's adapting to movements.

So, for example, when a mattress does not quickly adapt to any movements, and on the extreme, some people are hyperactive in bed and that they're basically not in their deep sleep patterns long enough. But, even those who are sleeping well and are generally not moving too much, there are still movements that happen to the body in REM sleep when your brain is very active can cause movements, dreaming, and dreaming can leave, so a few body movements through the night. And, the longer your mattress re-adapts to those movements, so for example, a regular memory foam is body heat activated. So, two things need to happen. If you change position, not only does the new surface of the bed need to remold your body, which doesn't take too long, it takes maybe 30 seconds to do so, but the area where you were is still hot and not allowing a proper border to encapsulate your body. That takes about six minutes to cool down. So, basically, you're looking at six and a half minutes where your body is stimulated by not being fully supported. So, what we do is our formulas because they're not body heat activated as a chemical version, they basically take about six to eight seconds to do so. And, again, that's not stimulating the body's awareness in the lack of support.

Ben:  Okay. So, explain that part one more time. They're taking six to eight seconds to do what exactly?

Jack:  To re-adapt to a new position.

Ben:  Okay.

Jack:  So, if you happen to roll over the way our formulas are designed, they immediately re-adapt to your new position. So, they have the body heat imprint that has been left behind on a typical memory foam is not left behind on an Essentia foam. So, because it's not body heat-activated, your old position has firmed up immediately, your new position has re-engaged and re-adapted to your new position instantly. And again, that allows you to because when this change of position happens, it typically gets you back into a light sleep pattern. And, the sooner we fully adapt it to you, we see through tracking that we get you back sooner into these deep sleep cycles. So, that's, again, adapting to movements and the lack of support in those movements is one of those triggers, one of those stimulants.

Another one is blood flow. Basically, pressure redistribution, if you're getting a slower flow of oxygen obstruction causing numbness, again that becomes a stimulant. And again, it takes you out of those sleep cycles forcing you into a position change. The body is sending messages. And, the more the body is sending messages that it needs to change, well, it's taking you out of those sleep cycles.

One of the latest ones that we've done in the last two years now that we've been doing a lot of exploring on has been EMFs. And, EMFs has been one of those things where people have been talking about, but before we were able to do anything at Essentia, we take an evidence-based approach to everything. So, everything involves sleep testing and really seeing how the body, the brain is reacting to any of these environments. So, we'll always do a double-blind test and see if there's any differentiators. And, what we've seen with EMF is a different form of testing which was a dark microscopy. And, we're able to see that the behavior of the blood cells are critically disrupted by EMFs. So, we were able to see that during active phone calls, streaming, downloads, the blood cell activity was creating the cells to cluster. And, the idea is that if they're all clustered together, it's preventing proper blood flow from flowing throughout the body.

So, what we've been exploring with and achieved about, I guess, two years ago is rather than completely sheltering yourself and shutting down technologies because one of the things I've noticed with our pro athletes is that I'm able to tell them a lot of great things on sleep hygiene and sleep environment. But, the one thing no one's willing to do is shut off their phones. Phones and streaming. So, it's always been back of my mind is how do we adapt to technology instead of asking the technology to adapt to us, which the two sides are never in agreement. But basically, with Dr. [Volare 00:34:16], I worked with a doctor out of Switzerland. And, the theory that he had is that we had to have organic products that overpowered the behavior not to block any signals from coming in, but to overpower those signals. So, we did a lot of work, a lot of research, and we did adapt our formula. So, we do have an EMF that we call it an EMF barrier formula. All it really does is it overpowers the behavior. So, it maintains an organic non-chaotic blood cell behavior.

We've done tests during phone calls, active streaming, downloads, your blood behavior has not changed because of the formula's frequencies of our phone. So, that's been pretty cool. We normally used to say we addressed seven stimulants. We used to say six and now we have the seventh with the EMFs. So, we're always trying to look at what's the perfect environment and how we get people sleeping better and stronger and coming out of it refreshed and thriving.

Well, folks, my new book “Endure” is flying off the shelves. I've talked to a bunch of people already who have expressed to me that it really is something that's been helping them like helping them deal with temptations, and struggles, and taking care of their spirit, and everything from their prayer time to their devotions, to their relationships. I mean, the book covers everything for men, porn, and for couple's sex and polyamory, for people who are trying to build a spiritual fitness, how to put on your spiritual armor, all about my own faith, my own journey. I wrote this book as a sequel to my book “Fit Soul.” And, it's out now. It's ready for order. It's called “Endure.” And, you can get it at GetEndure.com, GetEndure.com. And, we're going to give you an instantly downloadable e-book with the first three chapters of Endure. And, big discount on the journal that I use each day with my family to do our Spiritual Disciplines Journaling. So, all of that is available right now at GetEndure.com. So, check it out.

Well, I'm getting an interesting morning this morning because I am going to be jumping into my barrel. That's right. I have an ice barrel and I know I've talked about all these super cool, super spendy done for you cold bathing systems that exist, but the Ice Barrel sits in my backyard right now and it's super-duper simple, 100% satisfaction, 30-day money-back guarantee. You can pay as low as 100 bucks a month to get one. It's got a limited lifetime warranty. It ships in one to five days. It's made in the USA using 100% recycled material. It's durable. It's compact. It's portable. It's lightweight. It is literally a barrel that you get inside. Just get in and it's super simple. Fill it with water. Fill it with ice and just get in. You can even put a little bit of food-grade hydrogen peroxide in there when you get in or get out if you want to clean a little bit. It's that easy. And, they're giving all of my listeners 125 bucks off. It's got a sleek design compact footprint, get cold therapy from the convenience of your own home or your own backyard.

Code BEN. Here's where you use it. Go to IceBarrel.com/Ben, IceBarrel, B-A-R-R-E-L.com/Ben. They'll get you 125 bucks off a pretty sexy ice bath. So, check it out.

Well, I can't believe it's time, once again, for me to host this special little spring transformation challenge I put on over at BenGreenfieldCoaching.com/Challenge. We're calling this one The Tribal Transformation Challenge because it's team and community focus with layers of accountability structured in to keep you on track and give you community support. You get a team of 10 to 15 people led by your coach. You get paired with an accountability buddy leadership opportunities like becoming a team captain if you fit the bill for that. Weekly huddles to connect with your team. Q&A time with leading experts in the field to help you absorb the information presented each week. We're going to be deep diving into aspects of optimized living like nutrition, and fitness, and recovery, environment, sleep, community building, a whole lot more.

And, my team and I have really put together a really great Transformation Challenge, a lot of bonding, huge quantum shift in your entire life, mind, body, and spirit. The results of our last Transformation Challenge that happened in January were so astounding. People were getting better sleep, better energy, better weight loss, better relationships tapping into old hobbies. We had one guy who lost over 20 pounds, weighs over under 200 pounds. For the first time in over 10 years, another gal started her new website and reignited her passion for editing and writing. These are the kinds of success stories that happened with the Transformation Challenges I put on because it's not just about six-pack abs and quadriceps, it's about your whole life getting better. So, if you want to transform using all my principles, my biohacks, my tips, my tricks, my strategies, and my amazing team of coaches that I've trained along with a whole community of like-minded transformationalists, go to BenGreenfieldCoaching.com/Challenge to secure your spot. It's going to take place from April 25th through June 12th. That's April 25th through June 12th. There's only 150 spots available on a first-come, first-serve basis. So, make sure you claim your seat at the table today.

Tell me more about this EMF thing. You didn't say you're blocking the signals, but you're creating a surface or you're adding something to the mattress that allows the body to better handle EMF. Can you explain a little bit more?

Jack:  Yeah. So, what we've done is we've been putting minerals in our formula. So, what's happening is that every organic product can absorb and release signals in their own way. And so, minerals basically can give off stronger signals than some weaker–

Ben:  Yeah. I'm wearing a necklace right now with a bunch of minerals in it for that very reason. My dad actually, it is a water filtration company, one of the things he sends out with the water filters is this special bracelet that you strap on. Actually, my sons wear. For some reason, I can't even explain why. But, yeah, you're right, if you look at red blood cell clumping or the dark blood-filled analysis with this type of mineral-based clothing, or jewelry, or I've never tried a sleep surface but I get the idea behind it, you see less of the clumping. There's something going on with the minerals that allows the body to better be able to handle EMF. And, I can't explain it scientifically, but it's really interesting.

Jack:  It is. It's super cool. And, we've analyzed the blood work and we know that it works. The results are incredible. And, that's why we follow through and implement it. So, what we do is the mineral is put throughout our formula within the latex. And, because the sleep surface is such a large surface and so dense, it actually impacts the complete room. So, your complete bedroom with about a 10 by 10 space is kind of protected by this overpowering frequency that's being powered by these minerals because the signals get through, signals always get through, but they're just chaotic. And, that's how technology is. They're chaotic signals that affect blood flow, but these minerals normalize it.

Ben:  So, based on that, just actually a quick question about the EMF thing, what about all these new smart mattresses? Because Eight Sleep, right, that's the one that comes to mind right away, I'm sure they're fantastic people. I've heard great things about the mattress, but the one thing that has kind of kept me from looking into it more is how much EMF could be generated by this. Same reason I don't like smart vacuums and smart refrigerators, I just don't like a lot of Bluetooth, and Wi-Fi, and EMF. And, when I do get devices, I disable the Wi-Fi and the Bluetooth wherever I can. This whole Eight Sleep system, I'm not asking you to throw anybody under the bus, but what do you think about this idea behind EMFs and smart mattresses?

Jack:  First of all, it's been around the issues with EMFs. It's not the world it used to be. In the past, EMFs, the solution was grounding pads and grounding your bed. However, EMFs today are the modern version of them, 3g, 4g, 5g, all the data signals. It's not from what you plug into the wall, it's what's being transmitted everywhere. And, you don't have to say in it because this transmission is happening from outside your home as well. So, the products like Eight Sleep, I think–Again, I don't really want to talk negatively about any specific product. I mean, when we look at ChiliSleep where they make cooling blankets, Eight Sleep initially was just about data collection. I think, the company's value is in data capturing and data collection. And, I believe that that's how they've done their capital raises has been about that data is important today, data is customer base. Initially was just about tracking your sleep and they've kind of taken a different direction and they've gone more towards cooling your sleep. But, ultimately, I sleep and a mattress is so much more than just the tracking and just the cooling aspect of it. And, that's where we look holistically at everything that impacts sleep.

Ben:  Yeah.

Jack:  And, basically, you can't just do that out of a single generic product. Again, don't like to talk necessarily about that. I've actually heard good things about the people there as well.

Ben:  Yeah.

Jack:  So, I don't want to sound negatively. I'm sure it's a decent product. But again, I don't think it addresses sleep to the level that we address sleep.

Ben:  Yeah. Yeah, I think I tweeted at them a couple of years ago. And, I don't know if they changed. This is back in 2009. I sent out a tweet because somebody was asking about these Eight Sleep mattresses and I said I was curious how much EMF it churns out. And, they replied to my tweet and said they passed the FCC safety requirements, but they said the only emissions that come from it are from the Wi-Fi radio from the hub next to the bed. And, my reply was something like, “Oh, well you lost me at Wi-Fi. I don't want to sleep with the Wi-Fi radio next to the hub beside my bed.” And so, you know what I'm saying. But, maybe you can disable it. I don't want to bad-mouth them. Also, Jack, I know all mattress conference people probably wind up at the same events and I don't want to get beaten up at a bar for bad talking Eight Sleep on some cat's podcast. But, regardless, I'm suspect about it so I'm a little bit careful. Yeah, I wear a ring, but even that, I put in airplane mode at night to track my own sleep.

Now, I wanted to ask you about kind of a fun question. Okay. People who listen to my show a lot of times like to own nice things. And, I want you to walk me through gold standard scenario because I don't remember the names of all your models and stuff. But, walk me through. If somebody wanted the best of the best of the best mattress that you could make, walk me through what it is, what's built into it, and how much a mattress like that would actually cost? Imagine you're talking to somebody who just wants the ultimate best mattress of all time, what are you going to put in their bedroom and why?

Jack:  That'll be interesting and maybe for fun, I'll give you a little secret at the other end of the spectrum. Let's say, for example, pro athlete reaches out to me and it's without question it's an investment. So, they need to look at what's most important for them. It's not only for pro athletes, but I'm giving you the scenario of ABC hockey player calls me up and says, they all know about us, we've got 25% of the league sleeps on our product. So, the process with them is they go through a questionnaire, which is a posture ID questionnaire. It's about 20 questions. We send them a link. They go through that.

Once we get the result or there's an algorithm that chooses the combination of our 256 formulas to make the proper posture adapting surface for this individual, what that mattress is composed of is a four-layer of our formula. And, we've programmed our robotic injectors to create all these formulas within an individually molded product. So, there's no glues or adhesives, it's just one full latex block with different layers of formula throughout. So, what this will be is your surface for all of them will be high elasticity pressure redistribution for proper blood flow comfort. 

The second layer underneath that has a high elasticity. But, based on your posture, identifiers will be something that will either allow you to sleep deeper into the mattress or on the mattress. What that means is if you have a flatter back, we're going to want to have more lumbar support because your weight distribution will be towards your lumbar and you're hammocking in the mattress. Whereas, if you have a very pronounced or regular lower back posture line, we'll want you to get deeper in so that we can eliminate that negative space and make sure that you're always in a balanced approach. The third one below that is the third support layer and then our base layer of latex, which is typically our firmest and, yeah, quickest response time for our latex.

Ben:  Okay. And, a quick question, Jack, for this custom sleep system primes to your individual sleep profile or your posture, your muscle tension, or weight distribution, or spinal deviation, or whatever it is that you're measuring. How are you measuring that? Are you asking the person who buys this mattress to send you photos or is this some kind of a body scan? Or, how do you actually know this stuff?

Jack:  I was working with the Montreal Canadiens hockey team several years ago. And, in working with their medical team, I saw that the way they were diagnosing treatments for neck and spine injuries were going through personality questions, which I was trying to understand what you guys doing. And basically, they had a whole thesis that was made with over 1 million case studies where they cite that the personality and postures were directly linked. So, through a series of questions, they were able to identify posture, muscular strength, and muscular weaknesses. And basically, from there, we're able to identify the treatment.

So, in the off-season of that year, I hired the person in charge of this whole treatment and they came to work at Essentia for a few months in the off-season. And, we came up with all these algorithms and we made these 256 formulas based on the questionnaires. We tested on the whole team and we've been testing it ever since, and it's worked to a charm. So, it really without any pictures, without any scanning, we're able to know muscular strength, muscular weaknesses, and posture of a person based on the personality questions.

We're going to send you a link so you can do it yourself. It's pretty fascinating and simple. And, that allows us [00:50:18] _____ with players.

Ben:  Yeah. I think if you send that over, I'll link to that questionnaire in the shownotes, Jack. And again, for people listening, it's at BenGreenfieldfitness.com/SleepwithEssentia.

And then, Jack, in terms of the other elements that would go into the ultimate mattress if somebody wanted the best setup possible, they're going to fill out this whole questionnaire, and then what happens next?

Jack:  So, once we identify the posture, the top mattress has it all, has our EMF formula. It has our latest and greatest thermoregulation formula which drops surface temperature 7 degrees throughout the eight-hour time lapse. There are some things that all of our mattresses have. They're all certified organic. They've all got the pressure-relieving and posture qualities. Just that when we have three types, so our whole-body recovery has the best thermoregulation formula, has the best re-adaptive formula.

The difference between our ProCor which goes based on the analysis of the questionnaire to our off-the-shelf is our off-the-shelf really divides people into three body types, which would be a flatter back, overpronounced lordic posture, or regular posture. And, we have the mattress that matches to that. The ProCor goes 16 times that with all of the different variations to posture types, which can possibly be. So, ultimately, it's a formula that changes. But, our whole-body recovery all have the same benefits. And, whereas, the ProCor EMF is included.

Ben:  Okay.

Jack:  The whole-body EMF is an option. But, ultimately, we don't really make a bad bet and we try to make sure that our ProCors are somewhere around the 10k price point, but our whole-body recovery our 7-8,000 for something that is pre-designed and pre-determined based on three specific posture types which really covers 99% of people out there.

Ben:  Right. And, those mattresses, even if you don't do the big multi-hundred question questionnaire to get it super-duper specific, every single one still comes with the EMF blocking minerals, the temperature control, the allergy-friendly materials, the sleep surface that responds within those six to eight seconds versus several minutes when you move around during the sleep and then all the organic materials. All the mattresses have all of that, but then the difference is that the ProCor is just customized to your body.

Jack:  Exactly. Because we're not in the business of making and we're really, you mentioned about all of us mattress guys know each; unfortunately, I'm the odd guy out. I'm really [00:53:15] _____. And, I'm not at these conferences, my focus is completely on sleep, tracking sleep, improving sleep. And so, the reason we exist is just to make a better product. Our whole-body recovery whether it's the custom ProCor or our three models off-the-shelf, they address all of those seven stimulants and perform best like no other mattress performs to this level with addressing those seven stimulants.

Ben:  Well, I think the only thing that you're missing, Jack, is we should talk about this, you got to ship out all your mattresses with a bottle of Kion Sleep, our new sleep formula. I got to send you some of that stuff. Have you tried it yet?

Jack:  I haven't tried it yet. I only heard about it last week.

Ben:  Oh, my gosh.

Jack:  So, you can send something to me. We have our Essentia family and listeners and all that, so we'll spread the word on that. Yeah, I tried your Kion products, they're fantastic.

Ben:  Yeah.

Jack:  So, I'm a fan of everything you do. I love it. You make everything personal. Everything you have you've tested on yourself, you use it so which is pretty awesome.

Ben:  Yeah. Well, there's some things I've recommended that I haven't tested on myself say natural tampons, certain things that I just can't because I'm not equipped to. But, yeah, for the most part, I do test just about everything. I suppose that and birth control pill alternatives or something like that.

So, these mattresses, you can't get them at a local mattress store. Why not?

Jack:  Is it politics of sleep? We just serve direct to consumers. We have our website, MyEssentia.com. I realized about a year into this that not everyone was interested as I was in only improving sleep and only improving outcomes. So, I've been pretty stubborn about it where every time I develop an improvement, I make it available on all of our products because over the years, I don't remember if we've had a great financial year or a bad financial year, I remember the people I've helped, I remember the athletes that are so happy that they're sleeping better and performing better. So, that's what drives me. So, because of that, we've just kept our relationship direct with consumers. We've had so many great things over the years. We were featured in a lot of great properties. We're in the stable programs at the MGM Grand, Bellagio, Arias. So, a lot of great hotels from Marriott have Essentia sleep in their wellness travel rooms. So, we're proud of that relationship. But, we really just working directly with people. And, those are the ones that really care about the ingredients that we put in.

Surprisingly, I get invited to sports events from some of the athletes that buy our products. And, you can imagine that these guys are normally way more interested in Gatorade and high-profile products. And, sometimes I find myself in an owner's box watching a hockey game and everyone's looking at me, so what are you here for? And, I supply the team with mattresses. And, everyone kind of has a real odd look on their face. It's unexpected. We're not something, but we can tell that the players notice the difference, feel the difference, appreciate it. And, that's kind of what drives me is that kind of interaction with customers.

Ben:  Yeah, yeah. And, you guys, I didn't even realize that you got into the pillow and the foundation game. But, if people go to your website, and I think also maybe we can figure this out because I think we have a discount code somewhere where there's some kind of special goodie people get. I'll have to find what that is. I'll put in the shownotes at BenGreenfieldfitness.com/SleepwithEssentia or maybe you know it, Jack. You can let us know. But then, you got pillows and foundations as well.

Jack:  Yeah, pillows and foundation. The pillows are made out of the exact same material as we make for our mattresses. So, we love them, people love them. They're just very adaptive, very comfortable, very high elasticity products. And, the foundation is just really a heavy-duty foundation because one of the things our mattresses are heavy considering they're 8 to 10-inch profiles but they pack on a lot of weight, there's a lot that goes into these mattresses. So, we want to make sure that the foundation we get those made from a third party but to our specs to make sure that they can handle the weight and they don't start squeaking after a few months. So, that's really what's important and that it also opens up to the breathability that we want this mattress to always have, that free ability to breathe and have airflow going in and out, especially since it's allowing your body heat to flow right through it. So, we want to have the least amount of interference with that.

Ben:  Yeah, yeah. Okay.

And, that Wholebody pillow. By the way, I'm going to try because you have this sick-looking whole-body pillow that's U-shaped that gives you the part that hugs your knees and then the part for your head and neck, and the part for your lower back. And, I'm a guy who literally — I sleep with a pillow under my head, a pillow on top of my head, a pillow tuck between my knees, and a pillow behind me. So, it looks like this whole body pillow you guys make would actually cover all of those variables with one pillow.

Jack:  I'm going to give credit of that pillow design to [00:58:43] _____. He was the head of the Montreal Canadiens team. And, when he was working for me that summer, there was a pregnant woman who came into our showroom and she's trying out the bed and he's saying, “Oh, you know what you need,” and he saw that she was struggling with her back. And, as she's on the bed and he put a series of our pillows together and he adapted it for her knees and then set her up for her back, and so then we just built one huge pillow that did all of that based on his recommendations. And so, it's not just for pregnant women, but–

Ben:  No, it's pretty cool.

Jack:  –it ultimately gives that back support the proper alignment with the knees. In some cases, it replaces a partner though because it is pretty big but it works amazing.

Ben:  Yeah, yeah. It looks really cool. I'm going to try one.

And then, the other thing is this Rize foundation, this Rize foundation that you guys do. It's an adjustable foundation. Meaning, you could do head tilt. It's pretty cool-looking. It's almost those treadmills that you run on with the multiple pieces rather than the single long belt. It kind of looks like that. It's like that, but in a mattress foundation. So, I assume if you put a ProCor mattress on top of this, you could literally tilt and adjust your actual mattress to be adjustable to sit up, lay down, go backwards, be inverted a little bit.

Jack:  You can adjust any position and also even a lounge position where you drop your legs down and raise your knees up. So, it has a versatile amount of positions. But really, what's unique is that I think our mattress was really the best designed for adjustability. And, the reason why is we have high elasticity on a regular adjustable bed as you try to put in, for example, a position where you're bringing up your legs or raising your back a little. The mattress itself won't adapt to that shape and depending on your body weight to force it down. Well, that's pressure. And, as we mentioned earlier, we have to eliminate pressure and redistribute pressure, not increase pressure. However, our mattresses are so high in elasticity that even if you're not on the bed and you raise your back or raise the knee position, the mattress will follow the exact contour of this base. So, it's not dependent on our body weight. When you get on, it's full zero gravity position. So, it's pretty awesome. Once you start using adjustable beds, it's actually hard to go back because it's just really versatile for reading, watching TV. If you're feeling congested or have a cold slightly incline the back and helps with breathing, less pressure on the chest. So, there's a whole bunch of benefits of using adjustable bases as well.

Ben:  Very cool.

Jack:  We have one that really checks off all the boxes of what you need.

Ben:  Okay. Do you remember, because I know the last time we talked, I think we did have some kind of a discount or a code for my audience to use or something like that, do you know if we're still running anything like that?

Jack:  I know that we are. I don't know what it is.

Ben:  We can figure out. I know it's pretty significant. We'll figure out later at the end. Sorry, sorry to not be able to tell you guys right now. I just don't even remember what it is. But, I know you guys get discounts and a pretty cool perk with Essentia. So, I'll find that out and I'll put all that over at BenGreenfieldfitness.com/SleepwithEssentia. That's BenGreenfieldfitness.com/Sleepwith-E-S-S-E-N-T-I-A. Check out their pillows and foundations, of course, but the mattress is the full meal deal. So, check that out too.

Jack, thank you so much for coming on the show and sharing all this stuff with us. I think it's a cool sexy mattress. I'm kind of happy. I have both my sons also sleeping on these things. They got a couple of the little twin mattresses and they sleep well. And so, I'm happy about my audience being able to find out about a good mattress that I think is one of the best ones that's made. So, thanks for coming on the show, man.

Jack:  I actually wanted to drop in a little something.

Ben:  Oh, yeah.

Jack:  And again, this was kind of inspired by your friend, James, that I spoke to a week ago. This was unplanned and I kind of want to just drop it in there because in none of our mattresses do we have any coils or springs that's never been what drives Essentia, it's all about our foam all the way through making sure that everything is made to perfection. But, I do realize it comes at a price. Our price points are anywhere from $3,000 to $10,000 depending on which category.

And, in talking to James, we had developed these hybrids and the hybrids are kind of a best-kept secrets because I normally don't talk about them because, again, coils, I don't promote coils, but we actually make the best hybrid from what people tell me. We make the best hybrid on the market but it's branded on the Urth Sleep Green mattress. So, we'll get you a link and a discount for your guys as well under Urth Sleep Green mattresses. And, what they are are hybrid versions of our mattresses. So, you get our performance mattress on a hybrid version. And, that is substantially less expensive where mattresses are $2,000, $3,000 rather than $5,000, $6,000.

It's an interesting thing. Again, it's not something I normally promote because I'm the latex geek. I mean, to everyone, I always feel that the most important thing in life is your sleep because it's a foundation to everything. But, I do realize that not everybody has that commitment to sleep as I do. So, it's good to have a few levels and options.

Ben:  Cool. I dig it, man. Alright, I'll put all that stuff at BenGreenfieldfitness.com/SleepwithEssentia where people can go and check out all the shownotes, shop around. You can listen to the other podcasts I did with Jack where we also geeked out on sleep for another hour. And so, you can pair that up with this one if you'd like.

Jack, I'm going to have to upgrade a few of my sleep habits after chatting with you. So, I appreciate you filling me in on the latest and greatest in the mattress industry and for coming on the show.

Jack:  Thank you. It was awesome speaking to you and reconnecting again. And, we've got to get you hooked up with a new EMF version. So, we'll get you set up and make sure everything's well. But, look forward to seeing you again soon. Thanks for everything. I appreciate being on and we'll talk again soon.

Ben:  Alright, cool. Well, folks, until next time. I'm Ben Greenfield along with Jack from MyEssentia signing out from BenGreenfieldlife.com. Have an amazing week.

I'm honestly shocked. Every time I see a bodybuilder or a so-called fitness influencer or anyone really promoting these things called BCAAs, branched-chain amino acids, aside from the fact that BCAAs contain only three of the nine essential acids that your body needs, BCAAs can cause all sorts of issues like messing with your serotonin levels, depleting B vitamins, deleteriously affecting your blood sugar. They're fancy expensive flavored water. They're known as a good money maker in the nutrition industry, but they're not that great. So, it's starting to catch on now in the industry that essential amino acids are the way to go instead.

There's a reason that essential amino acids, when I go out to dinner with my friends, just out to dinner with one of my friends the other day and he's like, “Dude, my body just won't stop responding to these things.” You take some pre-workout, post-workout before bed when he's fasted, when the gut's not feeling right, it's the cleanest most bioavailable form of protein period.

Some people, like the serious athletes, they're taking 40 to 60 grams of this stuff a day and dominating, 10 to 20 grams a day, even 5 grams a day makes a huge difference. If you haven't even experimented with or tried EAAs yet, you are totally missing out. It's so simple, it's so easy, and everybody's body responds to them because it's just amino acids. There's no crazy stuff that it might work for you, it might not, it's just they work. And, there's so much research behind them, it's silly to not throw them in pre-workout, post-workout, before you go to bed if you're fasted. I go through so many canisters of these things. It's nuts and they're good, they're the Swiss army knife of supplements. I can tell you that right now.

20% off though, you get 20% off of these things. You go to getKION.com, getK-I-O-N.com/BenGreenfield. That will give you that special discount for your first-time purchase, and it's got a lime flavor, we got a berry flavor. They taste amazing. They perform wonderfully. So, Kion Aminos, getK-I-O-N.com/BenGreenfield.

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.

 

https://bengreenfieldlife.com/sleepwithessentia

16 April 2022

My guest on this podcast, Jack Dell’Accio, is the founder and CEO of Essentia (btw, you can use code BG200 for $200 off their mattresses) which is the world’s only natural memory foam mattress. Jack has dedicated the last 16 years to studying mattresses and sleep health.

His journey began after experiencing a family member’s battle with cancer. After being made aware of the toxins in everyday items, the Dell’Accio family struggled to find a mattress that offered pressure relief and posture support without introducing toxins to the bedroom. He realized at that point how important this was not only for someone battling disease but also for healthy people.

After several years, Jack discovered a way to create a mattress that was toxin-free and healthy so that others wouldn't have to suffer from health issues as his relative did. His determination finally led him to create, patent, and invent a mattress that is handmade in Canada with the world's only all-natural memory foam, composed of natural latex, plant extracts, essential oils, and water.

Knowing that you spend a third of your life sleeping on what can be the most toxic item in your home is why Jack stepped in to develop Essentia’s patented natural memory foam, which is made using only the highest quality natural and organic ingredients, helping you “rest assured” you're not being exposed to toxic chemicals while you sleep.

The ingredients used in this no-spring, no-wool mattress are unlike any you've ever seen, including:

Hevea Milk: the milky white “sap” of the rubber tree, collected much like maple tree sap. This milk is processed to make the Essentia natural memory foam, which is known for its durability, support qualities, and purity…

Organic Essential Oils: a natural and healthy alternative to man-made oils or petroleum commonly used in other mattresses. Grapefruit seed, coneflower essence and jasmine essence all help achieve proper consistency in the Essentia natural memory foam while providing soothing and rejuvenating properties to your body…

Natural Plant Extracts: a substitution to harsh toxic chemicals used in conventional memory foam, plant extracts such as hydrolyzed corn help Essentia achieve the proper consistency for their natural memory foam…

Certified Organic Cotton: every Essentia mattress is wrapped in 100% GOTS (Global Organic Textile Standard) certified unbleached organic cotton, grown without any chemicals, synthetic fertilizers, or pesticides. Rather than using toxic glue, they use a non-toxic adhesive made from liquid latex and acrylic resin to hold their natural memory foam layers together.

Over the last few years, Jack has been working with Delos Wellness. Based on data from their Well Living Lab/Mayo Clinic collaboration, they consider Essentia the best-suited mattress for human sustainability, as it scores the highest on all sleep environment pillars.

There are six (actually seven, if you count EMF and Essentia's new EMF blocking technologies) factors that Essentia focuses on to give you a better night of sleep:

1. Temperature Control

Essentia mattresses naturally pull heat away from your body and out of the mattress, allowing you to sleep on average 7 degrees cooler* than your body temperature over an 8-hour time-lapse thus promoting ‘micro-hibernation.’

*Temperature drop varies by Essentia category.

2. Allergy-Friendly

Essentia mattresses are impervious to dust mites and do not contain latex proteins that may trigger allergies as reported by Dr. Robert G. Hamilton of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. Essentia also does not use any wool or fiber batting that may act as a nesting ground for dust mites. You can rest easy knowing you won’t be exposed to potential allergens on an Essentia mattress.

3. Accelerated Recovery

Essentia mattresses offer ultimate pressure relief, increasing blood circulation and eliminating numbness and soreness at night provided by Essentia’s patented natural memory foam. Fall asleep quicker, recover faster, and stay asleep longer on Essentia.

4. Optimized Sleep

Essentia Wholebody Recovery category mattresses feature Essentia’s patented molded technology resulting in a high-density natural memory foam comfort layer that reacts quickly to your natural movements at night, thus reducing sleep interruptions and keeping you in crucial REM sleep cycles.

5. Organically Clean

Essentia’s natural and organic components reduce VOC exposure so your body can spend less time fighting outside elements and more time healing. All Essentia products are manufactured in Essentia’s GOLS (Global Organic Latex Standard) and GOTS (Global Organic Textile Standard) certified organic factory.

6. Proper Posture

Essentia mattresses eliminate negative space to properly support the back for a more comfortable sleep. The natural hevea latex support core featured in all Essentia mattresses ensures proper spinal alignment.

Of course, Essentia also has 5-pound density memory foam throughout, an extremely low mm-HG (this is very important for your joint biomechanics as you sleep), and a 20-year warranty on the most durable memory foam on the face of the planet. So basically, you do not just get the best sleep ever on an Essentia mattress, but you could probably even eat an Essentia mattress.

These mattresses are also held to the strictest of strict standards. As a matter of fact, here's an extensive list of all the rigorous tests and certifications the Essentia mattresses go through.

In other words, Jack figured out how to manufacture the greenest, healthiest, and most comfortable night's sleep you'll ever have.

During our discussion, you'll discover:

– BGL article on Essentia:

-How Jack got interested in sleep and mattresses…08:50

  • Idiopathic environmental intolerance (multiple chemical sensitivities)

-How Essentia tackles the allergens issue…12:25

  • Derived from proteins
  • Become nesting areas for dust mites; dust mites feces, corpses trigger reactions in the body
  • In organic mattresses, allergens could be from latex and proteins that also trigger reactions from the body
  • Essentia mattresses have zero protein pads on the surface
  • The foam is very dense and with high elasticity; dust mites cannot burrow through
  • Essentia mattresses do not have batting
  • Essentia has developed 256 variations of foam formula; every mattress has different layers consisting of different formulations

-How Essentia differs from most memory foams on the market…16:45

  • Commercial term for “visco-elastic polyurethane foams”;
  • Memory foam is a slow response foam; creates a body cast – better for blood pressure distribution and circulation
  • Lower priced brands are all usually made with chemicals; eliminating density and support
  • Essentia has very high density and very high elasticity latex
  • Certified organic Hevia milk from India and Sri Lanka
  • Plant extracts and essential oils for different feel and elasticity; more adaptive and best for posture
  • Better at not storing heat
  • Chili pad blanket

-The 7 sleep environment stimulants that keep you awake at night…27:10

  • Stimulants are external entities that prevent deep sleep
    1. VOCs (volatile organic compounds) and toxins in the air
    2. Heat
    3. Allergens
    4. Pain
    5. Movement (6-8 seconds for the body to re-adapt to the new position)
    6. Blood flow (numbness)
    7. Electromagnetic frequency (EMF) (adapt to technology)
      • EMF barrier – adapted the formula to overpower the behavior of EMF; tested during calls, streaming, downloads

-How the Essentia mattress helps with EMF…39:38

-Gold standard mattress setup…45:25

  • Posture ID questionnaire to identify posture, muscular strengths, and muscular weaknesses
  • Personality and posture are directly linked
  • EMF formula
  • Thermoregulation formula that drops surface temperature 7 degrees throughout the 8 hour time period
    1. Whole Body Recovery mattresses have the best thermo-regulator formula
  • Off the shelf mattress divides people into 3 types:
    1. Flatter back
    2. Over pronounced lordotic posture
    3. Over pronounced regular posture
  • Kion Sleep

-How to get a hold of the mattress…54:45

  • To get started, simply visit the Essentia website (use code BG200 for $200 off Lifestyle, Performance, or Wholebody Recovery mattress), choose your mattress style and size, and your mattress conveniently shows up with white glove delivery (and complementary removal of your existing mattress) in just a few days, along with a 20-year warranty, and 60-day money-back guarantee.

-Pillows and foundations…58:14

-Hybrid mattresses to help out with the wallet…1:03:35

-And much more…

Upcoming Events:

Resources from this episode:

Jack Dell’Accio:

– Other Resources:

Episode sponsors:

JOOVV: After using the Joovv for close to 2 years, it's the only light therapy device I'd ever recommend. Give it a try: you won't be disappointed. For a limited time, Joovv wants to hook you up with an exclusive discount on your first order. Just apply code BEN to your qualifying order. 

Seed Daily Synbiotic: A formulation of 24 unique strains, each of which is included at their clinically verified dose, to deliver systemic benefits in the body. Save 15% off your first month's subscription when you use discount code BEN15

Organifi Red Juice: Enjoy all the benefits of the 11 superfoods and their micronutrients that help increase resting metabolism, support cardiovascular health, and remove toxins to turn back the hands of time! Receive a 20% discount on your entire order when you use discount code BENG20.

Endure: My new book, Endure, is now available for pre-order! I’ll gift you the first three chapters of Endure as an instantly downloadable e-book and I'll give you a sweet discount on the exact journal my family and I developed and use each day, The Spiritual Disciplines Journal.

Ice Barrel: With its sleek design and compact footprint, Ice Barrel, allows you to experience the benefits of cold therapy from the convenience of your home.

Kion Aminos: Building blocks for muscle recovery, reduced cravings, better cognition, immunity, and more. 

Spring Transformation Challenge: If you are looking to spring into action with our Spring Tribal Transformation Challenge, make sure to head over to BenGreenFieldCoaching.com/Challenge to secure your spot. The challenge will be from April 25-June 12. There are only 150 spots available on a first-come-first-serve basis, so make sure that you claim your seat at the community table today!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ask Ben a Podcast Question

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *