The Latest Health Hacks, How To Use Methylene Blue, The Guy Who Ate A Human Finger, Alcohol Microdosing & More With The UK's Leading Biohacker, Tim Gray.

My name is Ben Greenfield, and on this episode of the Ben Greenfield Life podcast.

So yeah, I saw you on your Instagram having a procedure done with methylene blue, antibiotics, and ozone therapy being injected into your prostate.

Yeah.

Oh yes, Dr. John Lawrence. I actually had ketamine IV because it's obviously legal there. I had 50 milligrams twice. I left the planet, saw the divine, didn't even know the needle went into me. I was, I was gone.

I was on one of his, uh, the advantage of that, by the way, is the ketamine stays in your system after You're probably less sore than I was.

I wasn't sore at all. I just, uh, it was a bit weird going for pee for the first time, but apart from that, it was fantastic.

Fitness, nutrition, biohacking, longevity, life optimization, spirituality, and a whole lot more. Welcome to the Ben Greenfield Life Show. Are you ready to hack your life? Let's do this. Ben Greenfield: I just got done with a fantastic podcast episode.

I interviewed this guy named Tim Gray. He's known as the UK's leading biohacker. Anyways, we talked about methylene blue, ozone, the guy who ate a human finger, alcohol, microdosing, the latest health hacks, and plenty more. One of the things that came up was— or I mean, London, So, if you want to go to this event in London and join Tim and I and try out all the crazy stuff we talked about, go to BenGreenfieldLife.com/HOS24 as in Health Optimization Summit 2024, BenGreenfieldLife.com/HOS24. In addition, if you want the show notes for everything that we talk about in today's show, go to BenGreenfieldLife.com/BiohackerTim. That's BenGreenfieldLife.com/BiohackerTim. I'll link to episodes mentioned, products, supplements, technologies, everything we talk about. The show notes will be juicy for this one. So, BenGreenfieldLife.com/BiohackerTim and the show notes are there. And then, hit us up at the summit in London this coming June 15th and 16th at BenGreenfieldLife.com/HOS24 where you can get your ticket or your VIP ticket. I hope to see you there.

Ben, it's great to have you on the podcast or the dual podcast today. Looking forward to this riffing session.

Yeah, it's kind of turned into an annual thing. I've seen in the headlines you advertise as the UK's leading biohacker and I've heard me advertise as America's most foolish biohacker. So, the great minds unite. So, here we are yet again.

Totally. It's funny the labels that people give us.

I know. This is always fun though. It's kind of like our annual random show review of all things biohacking and health optimization. So, I get a kick out of it.

Yeah, totally. Me too, me too actually. Yeah. So, I guess it's our third year.

Oh, third year. Yeah, probably was. It's the third year I've been coming over to the— we usually do this as the lead-up to the Health Optimization Summit. So yeah, I get to pick your brain about all the crazy technologies you're going to have over there. Yeah, man. So, what's been new lately? You added anything? Interesting into the daily routine.

Well, I'm going to start right on in with the most extreme thing I've done in the year actually that you recommended on your Instagram a few months ago. Oh yes, Dr. John Lawrence. So yeah, I saw you on your Instagram having a procedure done with methylene blue, antibiotics, and ozone therapy being injected into your prostate. And, And, just like Ben is definitely out there and—

Yeah. I mean, I want to hear your feedback on it, but I was on a walk with John when I was down there in Florida and he's telling me about this protocol that had plummeted prostate-specific antigen in people and resulted in a marked reduction in nighttime urination frequency. And, my ears kind of propped up when he talked about that just because what guy doesn't want to wake up at night to pee less? So anyways, it involved like a— I mean, you did it, Tim, super long needle that goes into the prostate. Fortunately, there's a little bit of numbing and what's it called, the nitrous oxide, the laughing gas that he has you breathe as you're doing it so you don't feel as much pain during. But yeah, he injects the prostate using ultrasound-guided imaging with methylene blue and ozone. And interestingly, there's a little bit of an antifungal antibacterial effect of that as well. So, hurt like a mother. This is probably bad advertising for him. Hurt like a mother for 2 or 3 hours after he'd injected. It was just sore down there. I had an ice pack on my crotch. And, I'll be interested to hear your experience. But basically, nighttime urination reduced significantly. And, what's super interesting, I didn't expect this, this might be a little bit of a grimace TMI for people, but my wife for the longest time had been kind of having almost cloudy urine in the morning, almost like a yeast fungal type of thing most likely, and totally went away after I did the procedure. And, I think that, and Dr. John verified this often happens, men carry yeast fungal infections, et cetera, in their prostate. And, this seems to have nuked that because as soon as I got home, whatever I had likely been passing on to her during sex just completely disappeared.

Yeah, I concur. I mean, when you shared out about it, I was like, "This is out there." But, I'd had prostate issues on and off for years. When it's used too much, it flares up a bit. And also, my partner at the time was getting frequent urination after sex. So of course when I saw it, I thought, I'm going to dive in and I'm going to Miami anyway, so I'm going to take a drive up and see him in Sarasota. And well, I obviously didn't have the nitrous oxide. I actually had ketamine IV because it's obviously legal there. And I had 50 milligrams twice. I left the planet, saw the divine, didn't even know the needle went into me. I was gone. I was on one of his—

The advantage of that, by the way, is the ketamine stays in your system afterwards. You're probably less sore than I was.

I wasn't sore at all. I just, it was a bit weird going for pee for the first time, but apart from that, it was fantastic. And so I went back and did it a second time as well a few weeks ago. And as I was lying on there high out of my head on ketamine while they were doing this procedure and I could, you know, I was listening to this meditation device on a vibrating warming pad and whatnot. And I was just like, what do I get myself into? What am I doing? But to be honest, the frequent urination has been fantastic. I've not been waking in the night to go pee at all. There's a lot less pressure there and I'm peeing faster as well. So, for the ladies listening to this, sorry we've gone on about this for men, but I think the benefit, as Ben said, for the females in our lives is fantastic because getting UTIs after sex is quite common for women and that's because men harbor bacteria and yeast in their prostate.

Yeah, Tim, you can't gloss over what you said there, the interesting urination afterwards, because that's the only time I've ever pardon the expression, earmuffs on the kids in the minivan farted out of my dick. As a matter of fact, Dr. John came up to me afterwards and said he wants to rename it the Barking Elephant Protocol because that ozone gas has to go somewhere. In this case, it came out the urethra. So, instead of pee, it was just gas.

I had that and I was like, "I'm pretty sure I should not be having air coming out of that thing." And, it was very strange. I was a bit freaked out. So, I'm glad you had it too.

Everybody needs at least one opportunity in their life for the wrong stuff to come out of the wrong orifice.

Oh, man. Yeah. Anyway, so it was a fantastic procedure and I'm very grateful for you sharing it out even though it was the most out-there procedure I've ever heard.

Yeah, absolutely. So, related to maybe not fringe procedures but actual technologies, the past few years I've kind of picked your brain about anything cool that might be appearing at the at the summit this year at the Health Optimization Summit in London. Is there any kind of insider glimpses you can give us as to any new technologies? I think last year was some kind of a— what was that thing? It was like a big anti-aging plasma technology bed or something like that.

The Human Regenerator. So, yeah, ions, electrons in a 50,000-volt electric static field. So, basically recharging you on a cellular level. That was fantastic actually. I love that device. But a bit too expensive to have at home.

Ben Greenfield: Yeah, that was over $100,000, I think. I went and tried it and felt super relaxed afterwards. There's a bed over here that's been going around to the different health expos in the U.S. at least called the Amortal, which is ozone therapy, PMF, infrared, sound therapy, kind of all-in-one. And, it's a similar type of thing but just not that accessible to the general population to put in their own home. But, uh, what, what are you excited about this year over there?

Personally, it's not new, but I'm most excited about actually is BrainTap again, because, um, I lost track of my BrainTap. It actually broke quite some time ago, so I hadn't been using it, and I forgot how amazing it is in terms of putting you into alternative states. Uh, so if you're doing a ketamine journey, for instance, and you put your BrainTap on, it's fantastic. Or if you've had a stressful day, or if you want to get ready for bed. So I've actually refound my BrainTap, and they're at the show actually quite in a big way this, this year. So I'm really excited for that. Now they've got a really, really nice experiential booth set up.

We should probably explain to people what the BrainTap is, huh?

Yeah, so it's— think of it as headphones, similar to what I'm wearing right now, if you can see, um, with, uh, like a, a mask that comes down with LED lights behind it. So it changes different light therapy, um, for your eyes to help induce states and gives you audio which does have Dr. Patrick Porter's voice in it sometimes in terms of hypnosis. So you can hear chilled tunes with hypnosis over the top of it, and sometimes you have different words in each ear, so therefore your unconscious accepts because you can't listen to both. So it puts you into different brain states. And I find the best time for me using it is actually when I'm in a hyperbaric chamber. So I find that I fall into the state of dreaming, you know, the moment you just about fall asleep and, you know, you start having all the crazy thoughts. BrainTap puts me into that when I'm in the hyperbaric every single time, nearly every single time. And it's fantastic. When I come out the other side, I feel like I've had a, you know, I've had a 4-hour sleep, you know, a top-up. How about you? What's your thoughts on BrainTap?

The same thing. First of all, it's like turkey and cranberries when you use it in the hyperbaric, meaning If you want to use one of their sessions for meditation or hypnosis or deep sleep onset, or I mean, he's got all sorts of crazy sessions in there like turn your body into its own painkilling machine or there's one for low back pain, there's one for headaches. There's like 800 different recipes in it. But yeah, there's something about the hyperoxygenation and the pressure that occurs in a hyperbaric. Even though the BrainTap works well even if you're not in the hyperbaric, that shifts you into this— yeah, it's basically like a hypnotic state in which you're half awake, half asleep. It's basically hypnosis. And, I'm not hypnotizable. I've had many hypnotists try, but that BrainTap shifts me into that state within about 5 minutes flat. So, I've got about 20 of my favorite sessions downloaded so I can use it in airplane mode. In the hyperbaric or elsewhere, anything from 10-minute up to— my favorite protocols are 40 to 60 minutes long, particularly the ones where he's got that doctor in there that's walking you through these mind journeys to Egypt and outer space and Atlantis. And, there's something about this cartoonish exploration of the universe right in the middle of a busy day when you just need to check out and relax. It's absolutely incredible. And yes, it's something about the combination of targeting the photoreceptors in the ears, the photoreceptors in the eyes, the sound. As you noted, what's it called when there's the second voice, the dual voice? It's a—

Yeah, subliminal. It's subliminal, yeah.

Yeah, subliminal. That's the word I was looking for. Yeah, it's almost like a little bit of subliminal messaging worked in. And man, that thing just works. I've got it hanging next to my hyperbaric right now. So, absolutely, I agree. It's pretty incredible.

Did you do a track on it once? Was it on BrainTap?

Glad you asked. Yeah, I've got 6 tracks on the BrainTap. Most of them are spiritual in nature like gratitude exploration, breathing protocols, prayer protocols. And then, I've got this other app I've been working with called the Breath Source. I don't know if you've messed around with that one, but I was looking for an app that could combine spirituality and breathwork because I find that breathwork helps to shift me into a little bit more of a spiritual state and combines well with prayer, reading scripture, et cetera. So, I recorded a bunch of sessions for this Breath Source app. And, some of them are just like— there's one that's a total kick-your-ass 75-minute holotropic session all the way down to 10-minute-long Jesus prayer sessions. So, most of the stuff I've recorded that lives in an app is either in BrainTap or in the BreathSource app.

Yeah, it's good. It's really good. Isn't it crazy how breathwork is going literally exploding everywhere right now? I mean, in London, we have different breathwork session pretty much every night of the week in different locations everywhere. It's really catching on. Catching on quite quickly. I think it's bringing a lot of people into the space.

I have a new guy I've been following. I'll tell you about him. His name's Kitaro Waga, K-I-T-A-R-O Waga, W-A-G-A. My sons and I are going to go over to Germany in December and do a Wim Hof course together. Just as kind of like a little father-son adventure on the mountains with the ice and the breath and everything. Because they're leaving to go on their gap trip. They finish high school here in a few months and they're just going to go travel the world by themselves just to learn how the world works at 16 years old. So, they want to do Ireland, Iceland, and Scotland. They got a bunch of hikes and farm stays and hostels all picked out. And then, we're meeting up in Germany at the end of that for Wim Hof. And, a lot of these breathwork apps, Othership would be one example. There's a lot of YouTube channels obviously. There's that Breath Source app that I talked about. Many of them have kind of like a pranayama breath of fire type of feel to them. A lot of times, the demos will be like, "Whee, whoo, whee, whoo, whee, whoo, whee, whoo, whee, whoo, whee, whoo, whee, whoo, whee, whoo." A lot of really rapid sympathetically stimulating breathwork. That's really not classic Wim Hof though. And, this Kitaro Waga guy, he's got a bunch of free sessions on YouTube right around 20 minutes in length. And, this is what my sons and I have been doing in the morning. We did a session this morning, we just finished about an hour and a half ago. And, it's more of a cadence like this. It's belly, chest, head. And, you're just doing that for 2 or 3 minutes. And then, similar to what a lot of people have done Wim Hof are familiar with, You finish with a big inhale, you exhale. During the exhale, there'll be a body scan or a meditation or gratitude work or something like that. But, doing Wim Hof properly, slowly, mindfully with typically a real focus on a big belly, chest, head inhale has been a really different journey for me with breathwork. And, you know what's interesting is the first few times We did some of his sessions. I was sore as hell, low back, diaphragmatic muscles, inspiratory, expiratory muscles, even my stomach and my abs. So, there's something that's a little bit more activating for a lot of that musculature when you go slow but you go deep on the inhale. And then, the exhale is basically just a relaxed puff. And, what's also interesting is the exhale holds, you can go way longer with that type of approach. I suspect because you're not getting your heart rate up and almost fatiguing yourself with kind of the more rapid frantic breathwork. So, yeah, absolutely. I'm still into the breathwork, still doing it multiple times per week, and that Kitaro Awaga guy is my latest find.

Well, I've just followed him on Instagram, so I'm sure after people hearing this, he's going to get a few more followers. It's something that I had a about a week ago, no, 2 weeks ago now, was I've been practicing my breath holds for swimming underwater actually. And since I've been doing nose breathing now for quite a few years, my being able to hold under the water and swim, you know, using oxygen as well as holding breath has got better and better and better. But I found the other last week or the week before that when I took methylene blue and I was at 50 milligrams, I could swim underwater significantly further and with more activity, i.e., not having to restrict my, or should I say, use less energy to swim. I found that I could do almost double as much underwater as I could do without it. So, I don't know if you pair your methylene blue with breathwork or anything like that.

Yeah. I mean, I have it. It's interesting. Methylene blue is not just something you inject into your prostate, fellas. It's a very interesting selective antioxidant. So, for example, it'll quell the formation of some reactive oxygen species like endogenous nitric oxide synthase, which can cause harm and cell membrane damage long term while it also acts as a pro-oxidant. That's a mild oxidative stressor. As well as an antioxidant. The only other thing I think kind of works similarly is molecular hydrogen. But, methylene blue, of course, also— I shouldn't say of course as though people know this, but it helps to activate the cytochrome c oxidase pathway, meaning that in response to photons of light, oxygen, even radiation that you might get from PEMF for grounding or earthing something or something like that, It'll increase ATP production and hence, the oxygen that you might be holding for a breath hold is going to go for a longer period of time because less is necessary for ATP production. Now, of course, we should come right out and say this, Tim, shallow water blackout is a thing. Don't do something like, you know, Wim Hof like we were just talking about and then underwater hypoxic swimming. Now, Ben Greenfield: When I am at a hotel, when I'm traveling and I have access to a good pool, I love to get in the water in the morning, take a big breath, hold my breath, swim to one end of the pool, get up, take a few deep breaths, hold my breath, swim to the other end of the pool. And for me, it's got this real nice underwater yoga type of feeling to it, but I never push myself farther than maybe 80% what I could actually do for a breath hold because a lot of people have passed away with shallow water blackout. And sometimes, you don't know that you're going to pass out until right before you do and then you do. And that's actually happened to me on dry land before in some freediving and spearfishing expeditions. My last spearfishing expedition, 5:00 a.m., I knocked myself out on the dock and just woke up with my son standing over me asking me what happened. So, you do need to be careful. But yeah, methylene blue, it's interesting in that sense. And this is actually something I was thinking about mentioning or talking about at the Health Optimization Summit in more detail when I come over to London this June. And that's this idea of mitohormesis. Have you talked about mitohormesis much in your podcast, Tim?

No, not yet.

Okay. When you look at oxidative stress and the whole free radical theory of aging, which is also known as the mitochondrial free radical theory of aging, and somebody can make an Emmer-Effer joke somewhere in there, the mitochondrial free radical theory of aging, it's this idea that reactive oxygen species, superoxides and the like, hydroxyl radicals in the body can cause cellular damage. DNA damage and accelerate aging, which is a reasonable hypothesis. But, when this was proposed way back in the '70s, one of the proposed mechanisms therefore to fight aging was the consumption of a high amount of antioxidants. And paradoxically, consuming a high amount of antioxidants seemed to actually slightly shorten lifespan in a lot of these fruit flies and worms and yeast and the like that they were doing these experimentations on. So then, upon further investigation, and this has gone all the way up till this year, it turns out that appropriate kind of like Goldilocks zone doses of reactive oxygen species induce this so-called hormetic benefit, like damaging the mitochondria and the cellular membranes just slightly to an extent to where you get a large amount of endogenous antioxidant production and a life extension effect. And, this would be true for everything from exercise to heat to cold. So, hyperthermia and hypothermia do it. Hyperoxia and hypoxia do it. So, something that you said for breathwork, exercise with oxygen therapy, intermittent hypoxic training, hyperbaric therapy, and then radiation like low-dose radiation, even something as simple as what you get from the earth while earthing and grounding. Sunlight radiation, mild amounts of UVA and UVB radiation, and even alcohol interestingly as one of these mild hormetic stressors that induces mitochondrial biogenesis and increased efficiency of mitochondrial pathways while also inducing cellular resilience in the body because of the body's ability to produce its own antioxidants. As a matter of fact, It's kind of funny because some of the literature I've been reading on this refers to this idea of mitohormesis from mild oxidative stressors being a sublethal stressor. That's literally what one of the papers I was reading the other day calls it, a sublethal stressor. So, it's basically this whole like what doesn't kill you makes you stronger type of effect. And, any of these things you could do in excess. One of the ones I didn't mention, for example, Tim, is wild plants and herbs and spices, berberine and curcumin and the like. Sulforaphane is also a perfect example. You could overdo any of those and get gut distress. You could obviously overdo alcohol. You could overdo exercise. You can stay in the sauna for too long. You can get too much sympathetic activation from cold. You get excess radiation. You get sunburns from the sun. But, in small doses, these things are all inducing a mitohormetic response. And, back to methylene blue, the fact that methylene blue acts as a selective antioxidant, so rather than high-dose vitamin C or vitamin E or some kind of antioxidant powder that would quell the hormetic response, methylene blue and hydrogen would be two examples of an antioxidant that is not going to limit mitohormesis. And, that's not to say that other antioxidants aren't appropriate, but you wouldn't want to do them close to a heat session or a cold session or an exercise session. And, you'd want to be careful with dosage. So, yeah, I am a fan of methylene blue.

Yeah. I mean, I read a book on methylene blue recently. I can't remember what the title was, but it had methylene blue in it. So, it's going to be fairly easy to find on Amazon. But, I was shocked by the amount of benefits and how selective it is for bad cells and damaged mitochondria, apparently, and how it avoids the cells that doesn't need it and goes to the cells that does need it. It's so very selective, and it's fantastic how it donates an electron to the electron transport chain for obviously energy production. It's a fantastic molecule, a fantastic drug, should I say. And I love how it's, seems to be popping up everywhere now. It was first introduced, I think, well, reintroduced by Dr. Teg Akikoso with the TroScriptions guys. Yeah, they made it popular again and now it seems to be everywhere.

Yeah. My dentist doesn't like it though. My dentist doesn't like the Trochies. As a matter of fact, so much so because I've been doing a lot of holistic dentistry at a place down in Phoenix. This gal I've had on my podcast, Dr. Aniko Loud, she just reinvents your whole mouth. She does cone scans, CT scans, X-rays, analyzes the jaw, the bite, the teeth, reforms the jaw using mouthwear that you wear at night and during the day. And then, once she's done all of that, and I'm on the tail end of reshaping my jaw up to a year, she then goes in and does the actual work as far as whether it be reshaping the teeth, veneers, the like to really improve your smile. But, she complains the past few times I've been in, that she can find little specks of blue in my teeth. So lately, I've been using this stuff called BioBlue. It's a form of methylene blue that bypasses liver digestion. It's a dropper and I like it because I can put it right towards the back of the throat. It's got NAD, gold, silver, minerals, and methylene blue in it, really high-quality pharmaceutical-grade methylene blue. So, company's called BioBlue. It's I like it for anybody who wants to avoid the Smurf mouth phenomenon.

Yeah, I get a brand from a clinic here in London. They have a compounding pharmacy make one for it and it's IV Boost in Wimpole Street that do it. Yeah, they do it capsules at 20 or 40 milligrams, something like that. And, I find that to be fantastic. It bypasses the mouth. And, I think I did hear the other day that if you have it in the mouth way too much, then it can completely disrupt your oral microbiome, which then obviously affects nitric oxide production and, um, your gut bacteria a little bit too much. But if you take it and it goes straight into the stomach, apparently it has a different effect on the microbiome. So that's just one thing I'm quite conscious of.

It's kind of similar to ozone in that sense, you know, excess use, whether it's like blood ozonation or, you know, swallowable capsules or rectal insufflation or whatever, If you overdo it, there is a thing as far as the idea behind being too clean. It's kind of the opposite of the hygiene hypothesis. Kids who have stronger immune systems grow up with a lot of brothers and sisters and are on farms and kiss their dogs in the face and get outdoors a lot. And kids who are kind of live in a bubble with an N95 face mask on in their bedroom playing TikTok have weaker immune systems because they're not getting all that exposure. Well, we as biohackers could create the same scenario with excess methylene blue or ozone or anything like that. Yet, I think there's a protocol that Dr. John Laurent suggested of about 4 to 5 days on, 2 to 3 days off with methylene blue. And then, with ozone, my own approach is I actually do mouth swishing with ozone. And, I do that every morning for about 2 to 3 minutes. And, I've had my oral microbiome tested and it has improved remarkably after doing that for about a year and a half. I get this ozonated oil pulling oil from this company called Simply O3. Put it in my mouth, I swish when I get up. And then, I have a home ozone generator from Simply O3 also and I do rectal ozone once a week. And then, typically about once a quarter, I'll do a blood ozonation protocol like the EBOO, what is it, the extracorporeal blood ozonation and oxygenation or some type of ozone plasmapheresis. But, methylene blue and ozone wouldn't be an everyday thing because you don't want to totally clean yourself out with excess dosages or frequencies. But, I think both are good medicine, especially for people who travel a lot. Might be exposed to mold, mycotoxins, viruses, bacteria, et cetera.

Well, that's one thing about the, when I went to India, I went to a retreat in Chennai recently and people, English people, or should I say Westerners, get food poisoning or Delhi belly quite quickly. But when the Indians come to England or the West, they don't get London belly or whatever. And I think that's just, you know, I think that shows quite clearly how, you know, we are wrapped in, you know, bubble wrap or cotton wool or whatever. And we are so clean these days that it causes us problems. And, you know, they don't have the same health problems that we do, you know, and I think their microbiome profile is significantly better than ours in the Western world.

Yeah. Well, they don't have the same gut, obviously chronic, disease like obesity and diabetes, especially since seed oil has replaced ghee and coconut oil and some of the common cooking oils over there. Those are all issues. And, I've seen this as well, the actual microbiome of the Indian population is more diverse as far as microbial diversity compared to those on a standardized Western diet. And, that's likely due to the high intake of plants, legumes, a lot of fermentable carbohydrates. The flip side of that is because I recently got back from India as well, guys there want to put on muscle and they have a hard time doing it because it's hard to get enough protein and calories from plants without getting a little bit of bloating and digestive distress. Yet, on the flip side, their microbiome is very healthy. I don't know if I ever told you this, Tim, but that was my second time doing a tour of India. And, my first time, which was about 3.5 years ago, I did a pre- and post-gut test and I ate the Indian diet when I was over there. Again, a lot of foods I don't even like, frankly. I'm not a huge fan of legumes and beans and not eating much meat and huge platters of plants, but I took one for the team and I did it. And, my pre- and post-gut test with India, and this is published on my website, 3 or 4 years ago, the microbial diversity was through the roof. At the same time, I had a lot more gas and bloating because probably my gut had to get used to it. But yeah, you're right that there's something to be said for the immune-boosting effects of increased microbial diversity from eating a diet that is rich in a wide variety of plants and legumes and herbs and spices if your gut can actually handle that. And, if it can't, there's other things you can do like immunoglobulins from colostrum or the human milk oligosaccharides you'd find in yogurt or dairy, the use of some of those other things we were talking about like ozone or methylene blue, fiber sources that don't ferment quite as much like a lot of kimchi, sauerkraut, things like that. But yeah, it is interesting to compare the diets of different populations.

Before we move on to the next point, which, 'cause you just mentioned colostrum and I want to ride on that one, but I just want to point out something. So I find that not a lot of things really upset my gut like they used to 'cause I've worked on it so much. However, one thing that does hit me quite hard is when I have artichoke and I give off 30-foot, you know, I'm walking along for 30-foot worth of gas. And it's, I heard the other day that someone was saying that if that starts happening, they should power on and have more because it's the prebiotic that's causing the bacteria to actually repopulate. But I tried that, but to be honest, I just kept on having serious bloating and farts for ages. So, I don't know, what do you think?

Yeah, the response to prebiotics, resistant starch, green bananas, artichokes, so-called high FODMAP foods, fructans, oligosaccharides, disaccharides, and polyols like you would find in wheat, garlic, onions, and apples. A lot of people, especially those who have small intestine bacterial overgrowth or SIBO, they have genetic predispositions in terms of their microbiome in their gut that dictate high amounts of hydrogen or methane production in response to those foods. And, even with an herbal eradication protocol, or Rifaximin or certain things to just nuke the bacteria in the gut, those people always struggle with not fermented carbohydrates but fermentable carbohydrates like some of those I've just listed including artichoke, a lot of these common gut healing powders that are high in inulin and other resistant starches. And, really the best approach to something like that if that truly is the way that you're biome is genetically hardwired is to try to fight through the gas and the bloating and the discomfort that you experience from eating those foods or simply avoid them. And, for me, for the most part, I avoid wheat, apples, garlic, onions, artichoke, resistant starches, inulin because even after following a low FODMAP diet and trying a reintroduction, those highly fermentable foods still cause issues. Yet my microbial diversity, I actually just recorded a podcast I didn't release yet on this with a gut testing company called Vitrect. My microbial diversity is very high, and that's because I still do homemade yogurt, homemade kefir like water kefir and dairy kefir. I do sauerkraut. I do kimchi. I do natto. I do small amounts of kombucha. And so, I've got a pretty wide variety of fermented foods. And then, I do a lot of sprouts and microgreens and plants that have been fermented or sprouted or soaked or rinsed, et cetera, slow prepared. And so, I think you can have good microbial diversity and not have to deal with all the gas and the bloating that occurs from the way that a lot of people try to get microbial diversity, which is via the consumption of resistant starches or highly fermentable carbohydrates like the fartichoke.

Fartichoke and chicory root was another one. I remember when I first had the Bulletproof bars Dave brought out and I was just like, these things are amazing, they're great. And, I was at a Tony Robbins event and I must have had 3 or 4 of them.

Yeah. Well, with those or with these newer keto snacks. I went to the keto conference a few years ago and the party for the speakers was catered by this keto donuts and baked goods company. I must have mowed through 6 donuts before I started to just bloat like a pregnant Ben Greenfield and horrific gas the rest of the night. And, that wasn't because they contained a lot of fermentable carbohydrates, that was because they contain a lot of sugar alcohols. Alright, so that's the other issue is sorbitol, erythritol, even in some people xylitol. Those sweeteners are sometimes just as much of an issue as the fermentable carbohydrates.

Actually, my colleague Isabel can't have any of those alcohol sugars actually because it really affects her gut so badly. It's one of the worst things for her actually. So anyway, let's move on because one of the things you mentioned a minute ago was colostrum. And, this is a personal favorite of mine actually. But you recently shared your morning beauty routine including ozone oil pulling and clay masks and colostrum. Tell me about this.

So actually, I've been a fan of colostrum for a while. The reason that I got into colostrum was because I used to race Ironman and I used to race Ironman a lot of hot places, Thailand, Japan, Hawaii, Louisiana, Florida, California. And, there was a large body of evidence that suggested that the intake of colostrum prior to exercise and especially prior to exercise in the heat would reduce gut permeability and a lot of the digestive distress that athletes experience when exercising in the heat. So, I found this small goat farm in Washington owned by a guy who I went to church with at the time, Joe Stout. Mount Capra was his farm and he was making colostrum from goats, from goat milk, which is the very first part of the milk that comes out and it's got a lot of growth factors and immunoglobulins and things that help to seal up the lining of the gut in it, which makes sense because a baby mammal is born with a relatively permeable gut. And, When that baby mammal consumes colostrum from its mother's milk, that helps to heal up the lining of the gut, preparing them for solid foods and a wider variety of foods later on in life. That's also why women who do not breastfeed should make sure that they feed their baby some type of formula that contains human milk oligosaccharides or immunoglobulin or colostrum. But, back to racing, it worked for me very well. So well in fact that when I started a supplements company, Kion, we contract with a grass-fed, grass-finished cattle source for colostrum and we make this powdered colostrum, which is in my opinion a better way to supplement with colostrum compared to a capsule because the salivary enzymes in your mouth activate the growth factors in colostrum. Again, that makes sense if a baby mammal is kind of suckling, the colostrum is first going to hit the mouth, and the salivary enzymes before it gets into the gut. So, this powder, you put it in your mouth for about 30 to 60 seconds. I do 1 scoop in the morning, 1 scoop in the evening, or I put a few scoops in my smoothie because a lot of times the smoothie you're working that in your mouth anyways. But, I don't put that stuff, the Kion colostrum, on my face. This other company called Alitura, and I thought this was a joke when I got my first bottle of the Alitura clay mask. It contains a bunch of different types of clay, bentonite clay and kelp and a bunch of different healing factors for the face. But then, it also contains, I think they call it 4-hour post-milk colostrum, something like that, some kind of— it's kind of like unicorn tears harvested by a one-armed monk when you read it on the label. But, they're serious and it turns out that colostrum has very beneficial effects on the skin, on healing, on scars, on collagen and elastin formation. And so, it's part of my weekly beauty protocol. I put it on my face after I derma roll my face and my scalp and then I let it dry. So, it's on there for about 30 to 45 minutes. I typically do some kind of red light therapy that's close to the face during that time, not a sauna session because it'll all just melt off clay on the floor of your sauna. But usually, a red light face mask or just standing close to one of these red light panels and then just rinse it off and get on with the day. And compared to probably a more effective but also more expensive microneedling beauty type of protocol you could have done at a medical spa, it's a pretty cool way to DIY your own version of that at home. I've been doing that for 3 years now. And, I feel like my skin is pretty healthy, particularly on the face, and it seems to have an effect on hair growth and hair quality as well.

So, I'm a fan. Amazing. Yeah. I mean, so it's Allaterra brand. I mean, obviously, Andy from Allaterra that brings out— has got a really good range of products actually out there. And, they did a scent once that I really used to like.

Yeah, Presence, their cologne, their fragrance, Presence. It's fantastic.

Yeah, so that's Alitura, um, is the brand. There's one thing you just said about, um, having red light on your face after you had, um, put the colostrum on and the clay. There's actually a mask that is called the Cure Mask, Q-U-R-E, and it's a red light or colored light therapy mask. It's a proper one. It's not like a lot of them on the market actually look like a plastic sheet, you know, something like your Hannibal Lecter. This thing is, uh, has got silicon lining It's got various different protocols for different light therapy and things like that. Actually, they sent me one of these things. It's actually really nice and I find that using copper peptides serum and the face mask together as well works really, really well.

Yeah. Was that the red light mask that was in the video about two biohackers going on their first date? Did you see this video?

Yeah, they had something similar.

Yeah. I mean, it looks nice. I have probably one of the cheapo. Wraparound red light ones that I steal from my wife's drawer. But yeah, that's interesting that you say that about copper peptide. It's probably a good insider pro tip for people. Not a lot of peptides are absorbable transdermally, but GHK copper peptide is about 50 Daltons as far as the size goes. So, that one actually has a lot of beneficial effects and anti-inflammatory effects for the skin. And, you can apply it topically or transdermally. Just like you could magnesium on a sore joint. And, it's fantastic for joints and for the skin. And then, the other thing that's interesting about these peptides is a lot of the injectable sources are becoming frowned upon at least by the FDA over here in the U.S. So, I've been getting more and more into oral peptides. So, there's a One company called Limitless Life Nootropics over here and they have some really great performance peptides like one called 5-Amino-1MQ, probably the top of the totem pole. The guy that told me about it, Ryan Smith, who runs True Diagnostics, he improved his vertical by several inches, didn't change his training at all and just started supplementing with this. And, even though this wasn't a study, obviously, it's pretty anecdotal, he said that he feels that that was the thing that did it. And, this other company out of Australia, called Level Up Health. They've got oral BPC-157, terazepptide, KPV, GHK copper peptide, a bunch of stuff that's orally bioavailable. And so, they're one of the better oral peptide supplement companies out there is Level Up Health out of Australia.

Ben Greenfield: This is interesting for anyone who wants a done-for-you complete biohacked home. I am selling my entire tricked-out house located on 8.5 acres of forested land in Spokane, Washington. It includes a guest house, pool house, barn, whole setup for garden, goats, chickens, herbs, fire pit, along with a ton of biohacking goodies. The air, the light, the water, the electricity is all completely completely tricked out for optimized human biology. The highest quality air filtration systems, natural lighting friendly to circadian rhythms, low EMF, dirty electricity filters, EMF-blocking equipment throughout, built to be off-grid when necessary with buried propane and solar grid, toxin-free and low VOC construction materials, the most advanced water filtration systems one can find, a massive vegetable garden, greenhouse, herb garden, outdoor fire pit, goat and chicken grazing pasture and barn, all in a beautiful forest that's about 25 minutes from the airport and 20 minutes from downtown. This can all be yours. If you're looking for a place to get away in a safe natural area and you're looking for the best of the best biohacks done for you, here's where you can go to check it out and to fill out a form with your interest. Biohackedspokanehome.com. That's biohackedspokanehome.com. Check it out.

So do you want to, do you want to just explain, uh, what a peptide is exactly for, for the listeners? I mean, because I can give a very simplistic version of it, which, which I always say that proteins are made up of amino acids, and those amino acids when chained together, you know, they're usually 2 or 3 or 4 or whatever, um, then are peptides. You have peptides, polypeptides, and then amino acids, which are the basic building blocks of it. And, proteins are a lot of these amino acids altogether. It's like human growth hormone, I think it's 91 or 92 branch amino acids chained together in a link and then folded over on itself. So, it's super sensitive. So, yeah. So, how would you describe peptides specifically?

Yeah, you're kind of on the right track. I mean, a human being is just one giant clump of a bunch of chains of amino acids folded in different configurations, but a peptide's pretty short. It can be anywhere from 3 amino acid sequences up to a few dozen. And, the way that an amino acid configuration is architected will influence which cell receptors and which organ systems that that peptide acts upon. Insulin is probably the most well-known peptide because it interacts with the cell surface receptor for uptake of glucose. Another one that's very popular now is the glucagon-like peptide like Ozempic or Wegovy. And, these would allow for the upregulation of glucagon-like peptide, and that is an internal signal for a feeling of fullness or lack of hunger. I don't think that those peptides, the glucagon-like peptides are without risk. There's some data about acute pancreatitis and some different mental type of issues, even depression and anxiety. And I'm not a huge fan of those. I think they're one giant human experiment. And considering that there are certain extracts from hop, the same stuff you'd use to make beer, as well as certain probiotic strains, particularly Akkermansia and a few others that work similarly I think that there are ways to suppress hunger really, really well without taking glucagon-like peptide. I would say the top 3 would be drinkable ketones, a product called Calocurb, which is made up of these hops. And, I actually do a couple capsules of that after lunch and I don't think about any food until dinner. And, dinner is usually a good 6 or 7 hours after lunch for me. And then, Pendulum. The company that was made famous by producing this akkermansia-based probiotic, which is fantastic for the gut, they have a new one that's basically, I think it's actually called GLP-1 something, but it's a probiotic strain or series of strains that simulate the same feeling of fullness as the injectable GLP-1 agonists do, the actual peptides like Ozempic. But basically, these peptides will act on different areas in the body. Like, BPC-157 is very anti-inflammatory. It's like a healing gastric peptide. Another one called TB500 works on the thymus gland and on tendons. There are so-called peptide bioregulators, very short peptide chains, one that will work on the pineal gland, one that will work on the thyroid, one that will work on the gonads for testosterone production. There's a whole host of different peptides. And, I actually recently released, I think it's on my— it should be on my Instagram page still, a peptides cheat sheet that's got 20 of the different most commonly used peptides listed and what they're good for and how to take them and whether they're orally available, injectable, et cetera. So, maybe I'll link to that in the shownotes if people want to see it. But yeah, peptides are, I mean, they're kind of spendy and you got to know why you're taking what because there's a billion of them. You don't want to take all of them. But, if you have specific issues that you want to target with the peptide, they're kind of like a laser pointer as far as the precision with which they can be used.

Yes. I mean, one thing that I think is so fantastic about them actually is that— and someone once said to me, "I think it's the future of medicine because obviously peptides are naturally occurring often in the body." So, for instance, the things that the body produces itself to heal itself. So, for instance, BPC-157, I remember a piece you did on it said "Heal Like Wolverine," I think it was. Like years ago, it must have been like 5 or 6 years ago now. And, um, that, it was, that was my introduction actually to BPC-157, was your article on it. And, uh, and it's funny because the BPC-157, for instance, if you cut yourself or you need to heal from something quickly, then using BPC-157, and I think it's almost the, the indicator for your body to start healing itself in some way. And so I always stack that with TB500 and BPC-157. For instance, I had a surgery and it was supposed to be, you know, quite a long healing time. Red light therapy, BPC-157, TB500 and red light therapy, and I was healed in no time. It was like a third of the healing time. The surgeon said it was a miracle, and I said, "No, it's biohacking." Yeah.

Hey, I was going to ask you, do you have any crazy guests who are coming over to the symposium this year? I think last year I met this guy named Jack— is it Jack Alocha?

Jack Alokha. Jack Alokha.

Yeah, Jack Alokha. And, he's this crazy guy who's eaten just about everything on the human planet including a fried human finger. And, he's this crazy shaman guy who does intravenous DMT infusion, just super wacky but intriguing dude. But, I don't know, you got anybody interesting coming over this year?

I love Jack. He's a very dear friend of mine, neuroscientist. Yeah, he did an hour-long DMT IV study in London last year. It was pretty heavy stuff. I mean, the lineup this year is looking— actually looking quite amazing. We don't have anyone quite as weird and wacky as Jack. I don't think anyone can top Jack, to be quite honest. But some of the stories I heard from Jack are just incredible. We've got Stephen Gundry coming this year, which I'm really looking forward to actually, and JJ Virgin as well.

Be sure, I'll be sure not to buy any kale at the cafe out there.

You're right. Um, and Sadia Khan as well, um, Sadia Psychology from Instagram. I'm not sure you've heard of her, but she's, um, big psychology and dating and relationships and whatnot. So she's actually someone I'm really interested to, uh, hang out with this year. But also Kelly Means, uh, I don't know if you know Kelly or not, or if you've recorded with him yet.

Yeah, it's, uh, Casey Means' brother, the guy who's been kind of going around doing a little exposé on Pharmaceutical industry and metabolic disease.

Yeah, that's exactly—

yeah, I haven't interviewed him yet, but he's fascinating.

Oh, he's brilliant. I love, I love Kelly. He's awesome. Yeah, I mean, I, I can't remember where I heard him. I saw him on TV somewhere or other, and he was like, we used to work for, you know, the, the cola corporations, and, uh, you know, was a whistleblower on it. So he— all the tricks behind the scenes.

Yeah, well, better hope you get him over there soon because he could probably get assassinated.

Yeah, I hope not. Gary Brecker, actually. So yeah, Gary's coming. Yeah, really, really interesting. I mean, why I wanted him was when I first met him, he told me about his history, and I won't go on about it for too long, but basically he was a health insurance mortality statistician. And instead of a pharmaceutical rep trying to sell drugs, he was the opposite side of that, which was a mortality statistician. So looking at statistics to see what indicators actually meant that people live longer or shorter. And so their financial interest was keeping people alive longer, or should I say, making sure they don't insure the people that are doing certain things that shorten their lives. And one of the interesting things is the thing that cut expected life expectancy in half, but so by 50%, was bad or no relationships. And the other thing that they noticed was high cholesterol generally meant longer life. Statins meant shorter life. So this is super interesting. So when, when I heard these, I recorded with him when I was in Miami.

So prioritize relationships and pork chops.

Exactly. Pork chop, uh, couples night in with pork chops. Yeah. So, so it's gonna be a really interesting talk on that. I couldn't believe it when he started. I mean, there was a lot more stats that he went, he went on about on our podcast. So, It'll be out soon.

Yeah. He's a fascinating dude. That'll be super cool. And, by the way, folks, the coolest part about this is you get to come over and meet and party and hang out with a lot of these folks who are traveling and also try out all the things on the expo floor. But Tim, I wanted to ask you because I know we're limited on time even though we go on for hours on this thing. What would you say is the— besides the methylene blue and the ozone into your prostate, the number one personal upgrade either to your psychology or your body or your mind or your spirit, your relationships, anything that comes to mind for you this year?

I would say healing childhood trauma, whatever that may be, is probably the biggest win of the year for me. And working with— actually, I recorded with Trevor Sylvester. He's a cognitive hypnotherapist who's actually my mentor for many years., and I hadn't caught up with him for 10 or 12 years and did an episode with him. But I realized with my relationship, and I was going through troubles at the time, that I had some work to do because there was repeated patterns coming up of how I was reacting to things. And in fact, as a result, the relationship was quite stressed, therefore I was quite stressed, therefore my health took a turn. And even with all the biohacking, it, like, you know, I was stressed, unhappy, losing weight, and putting a smile on my face and continuing. And I realized that until you actually heal your childhood traumas and work through those things, um, you know, a lot of these patterns are going to keep on coming back up. So I'd say that's my— actually, my personal biggest win for the year is actually doing cognitive hypnotherapy and working through those things. And I'm still working through them. I'm— I don't claim to be perfect by any means, but I think biohacking typically focuses on the body supplements, technologies, um, you know, and Daniel Amen obviously with the brain and looking at the brain and then optimizing your life for it. But often our programming, you know, the software that's gone in— because you could have the same, you know, two twin brothers that go through different experiences and become very different humans and don't react in the same way. And I think having cognitive hypnotherapy and, you know, ketamine therapy and various other, you know, things like that have actually really helped me. I would say focusing on your stress levels and reducing or improving childhood traumas so you don't fall into the same negative patterns is probably being— it's underrated and should be rated more in our space, I think.

Yeah. Related to that, I don't know if you've heard of this before, the idea of journaling or writing. There's even a certain series, I think Dr. Huberman did a story on it at one point, Dr. Andrew Huberman, about writing for about 4 or 5 days in a row or for 4 weeks in a row about some experience. And, I actually have the journal somewhere up on my bookshelf. I didn't try it yet because I had such a boring childhood. I actually opened it, I couldn't think of anything dramatic at all. Literally, I had the most plain Jane homeschooled out in Idaho just living out in the sunshine and hiking up rocks and reading books and playing the violin. So, I mean, I don't want make people feel bad who have been through trauma. I couldn't use the book, but I thought it was interesting, this idea of writing to process. And I do a little bit of that. I have always an open Word document on my Chrome browser, and that document is simply there to write problems that I have because I process really well when writing. And similar to that concept of if you have, let's say, a business issue, and you start to write to an associate or employee or employer or a virtual assistant or anybody like that about the problem. And, by the time you finish the email, you solve the problem. You don't send the email. The same could be said for relationship issues, whatever. Sometimes you just need to get it down in writing in front of you to process it. And, I actually process better through the written word than I do verbally. So, I always have that document open on my computer for that.

That's brilliant. I mean, so I have a I created a group WhatsApp chat with just myself in it and then pinned it to the top, and it's Tim's Tasks and Reminders. So whenever I have a stressed message to send to someone, I'm triggered or something or other, I write it to myself and then I leave a few hours and look back. And then often I like, Tim, you're a dork. Why would you ever send that? And sometimes I tweak it and then send it. So that's one of my strategies.

I love it. That's like the old movie with Bill Murray. Roses are red, violets are blue, I'm a schizophrenic, and so am I.

So am I. Yeah. But I also have a task app, it's called Things 3. And every day at the end of the day, it gives me the task of gratitude. So what are 3 things you're grateful for? But I also have a task that says problems and solutions daily. So every day I'll list down any problems that have come up in the day and write down potential solutions for each one of those. And then each week I'll copy those into a Word document and see actually how many are actually left. And it's actually quite funny because on the day you think it's a major problem, you write down a solution for it, you put it into a Word document, and then at the end of the week, most of these problems are not problems and they were never problems in the first place. And they kind of like just almost dissolve. Occasionally there's a big whopping one that you take a few weeks to resolve. But I find that my brain is always then looking for solutions to any problems and then trusting that they're going to go quite quickly if I'm focused on the solutions.

Yeah, there's a little bit of a manifestation there. It's like when I do my prayer in the mornings, I have a notes app that I keep track of my prayers on and what I've asked for and what prayers have been answered. But, even just the fact of waking up in the morning and naming your problems to God usually results in you acting on those problems because you've brought them to the front of mind first thing in the day and working to solve them rather than running from them. Also infused if you believe in God with the idea that you have a higher power behind your back that you've asked for help to solve the problem. So, yeah, I suppose a little bit of a similar approach with my prayer journal.

Yeah, it's powerful. It's really powerful. It's one of my top hacks along with my morning silence.

Yeah, I dig it. I actually just interviewed a guy who sits in the silence for 30 minutes every morning and his name's Justin Roethlisberger, and he wrote this book called "The Power of Ownership." After interviewing him, I decided to challenge myself with 5 minutes, and that's why I'm wearing this bracelet. It says, "Be still and know that I am God." It's just a bracelet that reminds me to stop in the morning and just do nothing for at least 5 minutes. And, it's actually been really interesting because a lot of people, if they have a spiritual practice, it's kind of like a 911 phone call with God like, "Give me this, give me that. Hey, I need help with this, I need help with that." But, when you just sit and listen, it becomes a two-way form of communication. And, a lot of times, you'll hear kind of a little bit of a nudge, a little bit of a voice, a little bit of direction. Sometimes you'll see a word or a phrase. And, I'm not quite up to 30 minutes, but even just 5 minutes of doing absolutely nothing in the morning but just thinking and listening to the voice of God has been something that I really Really been digging lately.

Yeah, it's powerful. It's very powerful, that morning silence. So one thing I want to touch on before we wrap up is just that you recently spoke about microdosing alcohol, which is really controversial to a lot of our listeners and followers because, you know, like, you can't drink alcohol, why are you doing that? Obviously, you know, I do drink alcohol from time to time. I love a Negroni. I like clean alcohol or Dry Farm Wines, biodynamic wine. But, why do you think microdosing alcohol is good for you, Ben?

Ben Greenfield: Comes full circle to what we were talking about as far as mitohormesis. The stress induced by 1 to 2 servings of alcohol induces an endogenous antioxidant production of things like glutathione and superoxide dismutase that unless people actually have some type of like acetaldehyde enzyme insufficiency or inability to break down the byproducts of alcohol outpaces the production of free radicals and any so-called toxic effects of the ethanol. And so, the idea is that a small dose of alcohol just like a small reasonable dose of exercise, heat, cold, wild plants, herbs, bitters, spices, radiation, et cetera induces that same hormetic response that I was talking about earlier. And, I got called out recently because I was like, "Well, yeah, I drink." I typically have a glass of organic wine in the evenings. Sometimes I'll have a clean mezcal tequila or gin or vodka with a little bit of soda water, fruit juice, lemon, or the like. A few times a week, I still do the ketone drinks, the KetoneAid Hard Ketones, which is 1,3-butanediol, which is technically an alcohol but it's a ketone. Doesn't produce acetaldehyde like alcohol does but kind of socially lubricates you in the same way that you might be looking for from alcohol without any of the side effects if you have a sordid past with alcohol or alcohol use disorder or something that might make alcohol a bad idea for you. But, I've also talked about, and this is what I got called out for, "Well, yeah, I do alcohol, but I'll take some glutathione or N-acetylcysteine and I'll take dihydromyricetin the next morning to make sure I sop up any acetaldehyde that might be left over in the liver. And people are like, "Well, if it's so good for you, bro, why do you have to do all that stuff to combat the damage?" I'm like, "Well, look, I do hot-cold contrast, foam rolling, and recovery boots to recover from exercise. I replenish with minerals and electrolytes and hydration when I've gotten out of the sauna. I do burpees and push-ups to warm up." when I get out of the cold. I take digestive enzymes to assist myself to digest a meal, including a meal that has hormetic stressors like plants and herbs and spices. And, even if I'm flying or something, get exposed to low amounts of radiation, I'll even take iodine to help out with that a little bit. But, the idea here is not— the idea should not be that just because you take certain things to enhance the effects of or mitigate any unwanted side effects of a compound, that doesn't mean the hormetic stress from that compound is still not doing you a favor. It's kind of like you can have your cake and eat it too, right? Literally, you could take berberine or bitter melon or one of those glucose disposal agents we were talking about earlier and have a piece of cake or a piece of bread or a cracker or cookie and experience a lower blood sugar response but also get the benefits of the sugar and the carbohydrates and the glycolysis and also the enjoyment of the cookie. And the same can be said for alcohol. It's like small frequent doses, not in excess. I haven't been drunk in over 15 years, rarely have more than 2 drinks, usually accompany the drinks with some type of something to sop up any excess acetaldehyde that might be left over like ZBiotics or DHM or something. But there's a lot of data behind the fact that there is no risk of mortality with 1 to 2 drinks a day. And in fact, there actually may be cardiovascular benefits and potentially even life extension benefits due to the endogenous antioxidant production, the cellular resilience, and the hormetic stress effect.

I concur. And I think the same with— for me, I find glutathione makes all the difference. And there's actually a brand that's at the conference, it's called Hanayo, and they are nano-liposomal basically. And I find if I have 3 droppers of that, after I've had a drink. My HRV doesn't get affected. My heart rate doesn't get affected. I don't wake up feeling groggy at all.

The reason for that is that glutathione gets broken down into cysteine, sulfur, and I believe glycine. And a lot of people are sensitive to sulfur and they have a deleterious response to oral glutathione even though it doesn't happen as much with liposomal. But the best form of glutathione is transdermal. Just like the peptides that we were talking about. There's one brand called Glutaril and you spray it on. And, for people who take glutathione and don't feel that great afterwards, that's a good solution.

Amazing. Amazing. So, we could go on forever, Ben. We've got a list of things to talk about. I mean, I think I'm really looking forward to seeing you again in June for the summit. Yeah, really looking forward to it. It's going to be the biggest show we've done yet with probably 30% more people we're targeting, we're projecting right now. And the show is 150 vendors, so 150 different biohacking brands to check out. And I expect about 3,200 to 3,300 people. So it's looking pretty big this year. Really excited for it, dude.

I can't, I can't wait. Our conversation is just a tiny taste of what people are going to get over there. And dude, you know this, like I freaking love it. I'm like a kid in a candy store over there every year. And so, yeah, if you want to come, if you're listening, you want to come party with Tim and I, I'm sure wherever you hear this, wherever you visit the shownotes, there'll be links to the summit. So, get in while the getting's good. Tim, it's always incredible to talk with you. I always learn—

Likewise, man.

—new things about what I can put in my body or write down or learn about.

So, thanks so much, man. Free access to comprehensive show notes, my weekly roundup newsletter, cutting-edge research and articles, top recommendations from me for everything that you need to hack your life, and a whole lot more, check out BenGreenfieldLife.com. It's all there, BenGreenfieldLife.com. See you over there. Most of you who listen don't subscribe, like, or rate this show.

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