Why Success Is Not What We Think It Is with Gwyneth Paltrow

Coming up on this episode of the Doctor's Pharmacy.

What I've come to understand is, you know, the quality of my inner life, the quality of my relationships, how I feel in my body, those are, you know, the success of my relationships or not, when they don't succeed, like those are markers of, for me, how I'm succeeding as a person.

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Maybe we'll get her to sing on the podcast.

I don't know why that's in my bio. She founded, after a very successful actress career in the middle of it, an incredible company called Goop, right at her kitchen table. It's grown into this incredible lifestyle brand, that helps women make their own choices count in all these areas of their lives like lifestyle, travel, work, food, beauty, and all kinds of beauty, physical beauty, mental beauty, spiritual wellness. And now they're just big and they have an incredible digital shop, a book imprint, pop-up retail experiences, permanent retail experiences, live events series. I was invited to a bunch of them, but then I think COVID happened. They have their own product lines, skincare, fragrances, apparel, bath body, supplements, all kinds of good stuff. Welcome, Gwyneth.

Thank you so much. I'm very honored to be here.

Oh, well, thank you. Well, you know, I have to say, I think most people understand now what you're doing, but you really started out in a very different career, which was an actress, and they know you as a celebrity, and they don't really know maybe the origin story of why you got into this field of wellness, because you're not a doctor, you're not a nutritionist, but you really care about helping people to live healthier, better lives. So what happened with your father's cancer? I think that was a big moment for you. Can you share a little bit about what that was like for you and what happened in that experience? Sure.

So grew up with no interest in wellness whatsoever. My mom actually was very, she was an environmentalist. So I grew up more environmentally conscious as opposed to wellness conscious, although she she did want us to have like the healthier versions of soda and stuff like that, but I couldn't really be bothered with it. And I was like a Camel Lights and Diet Coke kind of girl for a long, long time.

And who knew?

Yeah, my 20, my teens and 20s, that was what I was subsiding on. And then, or subsisting on, sorry. And my, when I was about 20, Six years old, my father got diagnosed with squamous cell carcinoma of the throat, stage four.

Wow.

And my dad, you know, was kind of the love of my life until he died. And it completely turned my world upside down. And I was so terrified. And, you know, kind of just in shock and being with him through his treatments and stuff. And I was trying to, you know, I was filming the talented Mr. Ripley at the time in Italy, so I was trying to fly back and forth and be with him as much as possible. Thank you. And, you know, the radiation was really intense. He had a feeding tube in his stomach, and that's how he was getting his nutrition. And it's actually then that I had an aha moment. I was helping him kind of put, you know, this can of protein powder into the feeding tube. And I thought, like, what is in this stuff? Like, is this, is this the best possible solution for what he's going through? And it was kind of like the first moment that I made this connection with the sort of inner feeling around food and what was going into his stomach and his condition. And, and then I just started researching, you know, environmental toxins and pesticides and all of the stuff that you talk about, you know, and how it negatively impacts our immune systems. And I just thought, oh my gosh, you know, there has to be something more that he can do here. And, you know, so I was learning about macrobiotics and gluten-free diets and all this stuff. This is way, way many years before it hit the mainstream. And he really wasn't interested at all in approaching his cancer treatment from a wellness point of view. You know, he was, he didn't want to adjust his diet. I said, you know, there's research that cancer is really loves sugar, and I think you should at least try not to have processed sugar. And he was just like, if I'm gonna die, I want two spoons of sugar in my coffee in the morning. You know, he had this New York accent. But then I started experimenting with Wellness because I was like, I wonder if. I wonder if there's truth to this. Like, I wonder if there's agency in this and that you could start to make. choices about what you're eating or what you're doing that could actually make you feel better. And so I started doing yoga six days a week. I experimented with the master cleanse. It was the first detox I ever did in the early 90s and started having macrobiotic food and just really kind of anecdotally observing what was making me feel better and not so good. I'd quit smoking by that point, et cetera. So it was really my dad that set me on the path and really understanding that we do have an influence over how we feel. There is an autonomy there with our wellness and what we do eat, breathe, drink, absorb does fundamentally impact our health.

And what were the personal experiences you had around your own health that changed when you started to focus on wellness, things like diet, yoga, and other things?

Well, I just sort of couldn't believe how good I started to feel, you know? And I remember doing the Master Cleanse and, you know, the first few days or whatever, feeling terrible. And then this incredible lightness came over me and clarity of thought. And I just thought, My God, this is unbelievable. I don't know what is in this cayenne pepper, lemon water, but I-- there's the maple syrup. There's some other-- something other dimensional going on here. I just felt so good and I felt so good exercising and sweating and, you know, getting my spine more supple. And I think it's a little bit of an addiction, right? It's like when you start to realize how good you can feel, you just kind of keep going and you keep trying other things. And, you know, of course, I've ebbed and flowed over my life, and, you know, there was a period of time I was living in England and not being very conscious about certain aspects of my health. And, but it's a baseline that I keep returning to. And now for sure, I'm, I'm back in it. Yeah, we all are hopefully, this is a moment for us all to sort.

Of refocus on our health and wellness. Yeah. You know, I think, you know, people often think of celebrities, they have these great lives, everything's wonderful, blah, blah, blah. You win these awards, you got the Oscar, everything's great. And, and often it's not like that. And I, you know, I know a lot of people and, you know, no matter how much money you have or how famous you are, it doesn't mean your happy. And you've shared the story about how when you won the Oscar, which is the pinnacle of success for an actor, that you got really depressed and that you had this insight that what was driving you wasn't really good, that there was something unhealthy, unhealed, that needed to be looked at. How did that experience change you? How did it open up a path of self-discovery and healing for you? Because You think, oh, I won the Oscar, everything's good, I'm set. But then, I get it, I've had like 14 New York Times bestsellers. I'm like, All right, then now what?

Well, I think the Oscar is so emblematic of this thing that it's supposed to mean success and the pinnacle of success in that field. And so few people win them, right, of how many people want to act or make it their ambition to do it or even do it and do it successfully. It's really hard to win one. And so therefore it gets this extra amount of importance. And, you know, I won it. And as you said, I got super depressed. I felt, I think it was a few things. I think, first of all, it made me feel totally aimless because, you know, here I was 26 years old and theoretically having hit every bullseye that you can hit in that industry, you know, or many of them. But I do feel that all of the momentum that was driving me forward, it kind of dawned on me that without that carrot dangling in front of me, that I felt that I didn't know where to go, and I didn't know who I was, and I didn't know why I was working so hard. I felt for a long period of time very sad. And of course, I hadn't begun to do any work on myself, and I hadn't started to identify my traumas, which we all have. We all have childhood traumas. We're all parroting ways of existing in relationships that aren't necessarily healthy, things that we've picked up from various relationships that we've scene. And there were parts of me that were, you know, I was extremely hard on myself. My negative self-talk was just off the charts. It's nasty.

How do you extract that? You need to do like a brainectomy or something. I know.

And it's so funny, you're just reminding me of the story. So I was feeling terrible, terrible, terrible. And I went to go see my doctor in New York, my internist, who's this great woman. And I explained to her, I said, I feel exhausted. I don't know what's wrong with me. I don't feel like getting out of bed. And I was telling her all these things. And she said, well, if you were Elizabeth Taylor, I would tell you that what you have is exhaustion. And you're kind of Elizabeth Taylor. Like you have exhaustion, you have depression, you have to go sort your shit out. And she gave me a card for a therapist. And so I went to see my therapist. And then, that was one kind of, you know, path of this journey that I've been on for over 20 years.

So like when you look back, you know, you mentioned sort of there's unhealthy motivations that drive you to success, right? Yeah. I had them. I'm going to share a little bit of mine. Like my father, he died a couple of years ago, but he really struggled in life and he went bankrupt. He struggled in business. He, you know, I had to support him for many years. and, and my stepfather did the same thing. There were these two men who were really failures in, in the business world, in the financial world, and then also, you know, it was a really stressful, stressful growing up in that environment. And so I committed myself to working really hard and being successful because I didn't want to end up like that. Yeah. And, you know, a lot of that drove me to behaviors that weren't good for me, that was overwork and overdoing and over caring and over showing up and burnt out and ended up with chronic fatigue syndrome. It's a long story. But I think what was it for you that you discovered that wasn't coming from a place of goodness or health that was more from your dark story?

I definitely think that I had received messages around being what it means to be a good person versus not. And I think The culture is very punishing to, especially women. And I fundamentally didn't believe that I was good enough. And I think it came from a whole bunch of different circumstances. But I really, you know, and I really felt that I was lacking in character, in goodness, in every way. And so I was constantly trying to prove to the world and myself that that wasn't true, that I was, I could succeed, I was a good person, and like you bending over backwards, totally betraying my own limits to show up for somebody when it wasn't good for me, or to be, you know, who they, I thought they wanted me to be, whether it was in a romantic relationship, a work relationship, I, I just, I went too far in, you know, and I think like that post winning the Oscar, that was, you know, that was a rock bottom, but there were a few years after that where.

Where.

I really was kind of in an extended period of, you know, the culmination of all of that.

Yeah, you said, you know, the best part of winning an Oscar was it didn't mean anything to you, right? It doesn't really mean anything. So what do you mean by that?

Well, I don't mean to sound ungrateful and I don't wanna give it back because I think it's a great story. So I should just preface it by saying that, but just meaning that.

We.

Assign meaning to such an extreme degree in our culture to these material things. And at the end of the day, They don't mean anything. It's like everybody's decided that some physical thing means something and it means that you were good or if you didn't get it, you weren't good. And the truth of the matter is nothing external, whether it's money, whether it's an award, whether, you know, is a measure of success. In my mind, for me anyway, what I've come to understand is, you know, the quality of my inner life, the quality of my relationships, how I feel in my body, those are you know, the success of my relationships or, or not when they don't succeed. Like, those are markers of, for me, how I'm succeeding as a person, not, you know, a gold statue that isn't even gold. It's not even real. Come on.

They should have at least a gold statue. Gold plated. Maybe.

Maybe it's gold plated. Yeah.

Oh, my God. You know, you said something to their very important there that I don't want. floss over that, that what matters in your life. And I think for most of us, and we don't really pay much attention to this, is the quality of how we feel in our body, the quality of our inner experience and the quality of our relationships. And those are things we learn nothing about when we're growing up. No. You know, I know how to do Google on a test. I know how to get into medical school, but I surely didn't learn any of that. No. And, and yet that is what is the central feature of a happy life, of someone who's fulfilled and happy and feels like they're living their purpose.

And nobody gives us tools to kind of tune in to how we actually feel when we're 16 years old and what we actually want and what's actually right for us. You know, we're constantly trying to please other people, we're constantly trying to fit in societally, and it establishes a really dangerous pattern. You know, I think you don't. we don't take the time to, to really listen to ourselves and act from that place.

And it's really true. And so what, you know, within Goop, you, you offer a lot of resources and tools for helping people have a better inner life and have a better relationship with their body and have a better relationship with their partner or their family or their friends. So can you talk about what you've learned in that Journey from your experiences and also from the audience that's gone through it all.

Yeah, well, you know, I sort of started Goop because I just love connecting people to good things. And that could be, you know, I've, I was always that person, like, hey, do you know a good acupuncturist in Chicago? Or like, where's the best taco in Santa Barbara? I was always that person for my friend. And I thought, and I love sharing good information and I think, and I love saving people the time, you know? And so Goop really started from that. like I would, I would, I had the incredible great fortune to travel all these places and to find all this cool stuff and, you know, sit next to people at dinner like you and get to say, hey, like, you know, tell me about gut health and like, and these are just things that nobody was talking about at the time.

Right.

And so, and I was so passionate about wellness and this kind of emerging thing. And, And I remember when my son was two years old, he had some eczema and I was living in England at the time and my pediatrician there suggested that to take him off of dairy and gluten and sugar for a while and see how it was. And my pediatrician in the States thought it was insane. He was like, it has nothing to do with gluten and, you know, but my pediatrician in London, where, you know, I think that health care system tries to, for the most part, keep people well because the government pays for your health care. So I, I kind of set him on that path and, and it cleared up. And I thought, oh, my God, there's really something to, you know?

Yeah, it's true. I think, you know, there, well, there's two parts of it, right? One is, you know, your convictions and what, you know, is true. And, and nothing can really shake that because, you know, you know that you had a son who had eczema. and you stopped gluten, dairy, and sugar, and he got better. Like, no one's going to convince you that that's not true, it's nonsense, or it's some spontaneous remission, even if you're ridiculed or made fun of, right? By a doctor or by the media or whoever. Right. And, and I think, but, but the other part of it, it's hard, that, that's sort of more easy to handle. For me, the hard, the hard part sometimes to handle is if there's a personal tax or people are challenging your integrity or accusing you of doing things that are out of integrity and, and that are not, they're not good. And I, and I, and it's, it's a hard thing to sort through as, as a person who's sort of trying to help people getting all this pushback. And I just wonder if you've encountered that and how do you, how do you sort of personally deal with it? Because, yes, you, you don't, you don't necessarily have to, you know, feel bad about believing something that, you know, is true. That's going to be helpful, but there's a, like, there's a personal level on it that I think is a little bit harder sometimes to handle.

Yeah, so I basically have a master class in this, you know, life has given me at this point in my life. So for me, you know, how I've dealt with it is twofold. I think first I had to get the ego piece out of the way. And the ego piece is, oh my God, someone said something bad about me. Are people going to believe this? I don't want anyone to think anything bad about me. And that sort of takes a bit of work, right? It's sort of stripping the ego out to the point where you're like, well, and I just did it with a lot of examination. Like, well, why is it triggering? Why do I care if someone doesn't like who I am or what I say? Like, what's underneath that? And once I was able to sort of strip the ego piece out, I realized that if something still hurt my feelings that I was probably already holding a judgment like that against myself or pretty close to it. So, you know, if someone, if I was out of integrity when I said something or, and someone called me out on it, it's like, oh, you know, I wasn't totally myself in that moment. And that's why it's bothering me. And so trying to learn the distinction of those things and try to understand like, okay, sometimes something stings because I, there's something for me to learn here about how I showed up there or what I said. And sometimes it's just projection and someone being an and therefore you just have to realize it has nothing to do with you. It's not about you. And you take your ego out of it and you realize like, this. You could substitute anything in for me. This person is just angry and miserable. And so it's. I'm just gonna.

Yeah, that's so great. I mean, I had a business coach once who said, no, stop looking for ways to be offended, you know? And I thought that was a brilliant concept, because a lot of us are constantly taking things personally in a way that may not be related to us, or if there is, it may be some nugget of Truth in there. That's what you're saying. I remember when I was like 18, I used to get picked on a lot when I was a kid because I was nerdy and I had read a lot and just, you know, it was kind of different. I'm still odd, but now I get paid for being odd, so it's okay. And the insight I had was that, you know, these people are picking on me, but either it's just their story of something that they're dealing with or that they're projecting onto me that's not true, or if there is something they're saying that maybe instead of a nice way, maybe there's a nugget of truth and wisdom in there for me to look at myself. and so I always took an opportunity to, like, you know, be compassionate toward them or to really look at myself. And it really changed my life and allowed me to really be free from this constant stress of, like, what do people think of me? What are they, you know, how do I impress people? And it's just, you know, it's really, it really helped me, and it's a hard thing to do, but you're right. Taking the ego down is really, really powerful. Hey, everybody, it's Dr. Mark. I think this past year has gotten all thinking about immunity unlike ever before. But COVID aside, I regularly see so many patients who struggle with recurrent infections. Now, one of the most common infections is urinary tract infections. And these are actually the second most common infection in the United States, especially in women, and they result in 10 million visits to the doctor each year. Not only that, but the number of antibiotic resistant UTIs has doubled in the last 10 years. So I was really intrigued to hear about a line of products my team discovered called uKora. They make UTI relief products with non-cranberry urinary tract health supplements and well-researched ingredients like D-mannose, vitamin C, and probiotics. Two of my team members have been using urocora themselves and have been completely blown away with the results. Urocora also has over 10,000 unfiltered reviews. If you have a UTI, urocora has a UTI emergency kit with an at-home UTI test strip and pain relief They can also make several products for proactive urinary tract health that you can get in one comprehensive package in their Complete System. This contains their no Sugar Added Target Drink Mix to flush and cleanse the urinary tract, their Control supplement to eliminate biofilm, and their Promote Probiotic to rebalance the vaginal microbiome, which is a crucial component of urinary tract health. If you are looking for a new effective way to tackle UTIs, I highly recommend checking out uroora. Right now they're offering Doctors Pharmacy listeners 20,000 off when you go to ucora.com/doctor that's u q o r a u q o r a.com/doctor now let's get back to this week's episode of the Doctor's Pharmacy.

So it just so goop really came about me sharing my experiences about what was working for me, speaking to experts, doctors, MDs, therapists, whatever, sharing information, aggregating good information, helping people, you know, even create plans for how to start, right, how to start feeling better, how to start, there's such good get information on the site. So, and I don't purport to be an expert, as you say. I'm not a doctor. I'm not a nutritionist. I don't know a thing. I'm just a student.

I'm, that's good, because then you know what the questions to ask, right?

Right, exactly. And so I just, I love to learn and anecdotally test what works for me and then, and then share the information. And then also a group we have on the staff, a bunch of PhDs and scientists and stuff like that who are who can now, you know, as we've grown, they can now really answer questions and write great opinions on stuff and help us formulate amazing products, etc. Yeah, it's great.

I mean, it's really a nice it's sort of it feels like you're going into your friend's house and they have a lot of cool stuff that they've found and like, oh, where'd you get that? Oh, I love that dress. And no, that that's kind of I don't want to use that crappy sunscreen. What's a good sunscreen? And it's like, you know, it's just what you wish you had a friend like that. And it's almost like your friend who you trust sharing with you what they like and what works for them. And it's just, it's a very light touch, and it's, I really like it. It's really, it's very different than sort of a heavy-handed heavy-headed role. So, you know, you figured out this transition. You're still acting, right? But you're, you're not doing as much acting.

Right, right. So essentially, You know, when I had my daughter, I actually starred in my last movie, like, where I was in every scene of the movie when I was pregnant with her. And then I had her and I was like, I just can't go away from this kid. And I was really lucky because I was able to take off a few years and then get pregnant again and be home. And I started to notice that I wasn't longing for acting at all. I wasn't pining for it. I wasn't watching a movie and thinking, oh, shucks, I wish I had done, you know, movie like that. Like, I just had no desire to return to it. And that in and of itself was a little bit of an identity crisis for me because I was like, well, if I'm not, you know, Gwyneth Paltrow, like, what does that mean? I'm I'll be irrelevant if I'm not in the culture.

And.

Then I thought, well, who cares? I don't care.

That's amazing.

I was like, I have to start to listen to myself and how I want the rest of my life to unfold. And then kind of at the same time, I had for years sort of since the inception of the internet, really wanted to do something in lifestyle, but I was too shy. I was like, no one's going to, everyone's going to make fun of me and no one's going to take me seriously and all of which happened at the beginning when I launched Google.

Now who's laughing?

And I didn't go to business school and I don't know anything about e-commerce. So I slowly very started to ideate what it would be and send out the first newsletter in 2008 and I just loved it. so interesting and fulfilling and challenging and I loved being held to a deadline and I felt like I had so much to say. And I look back at those early newsletters and they were very earnest and sweet. And it was a nice way to start because it was just very authentic and it was really coming from my heart.

Hmm. That's amazing. And, you know, when you sort of think back on your career as an actress, what were the roles that sort of impacted you, not necessarily when you're doing them, but like that had kind of had long lasting effects on your worldview or how you thought about things or how you lived or what mattered to you? Yeah.

Well, I really, like as the decades go by, I really, I did a film called the Royal Tenenbaums and my.

Character- yeah, I love that movie.

It's a really good one.

Ben Stiller and...

So funny.

Oh my God.

And my character Margot, she was so mysterious and, you know, she wasn't really in integrity. She was living a secret life. But I just loved how kind of punk rock she was and how free she was behind all of the constraints of who she was supposed to be. So she sort of stayed with me. I also, My character in Shakespeare in Love stayed with me, that kind of unquenchable desire for the muses of creativity and poetry and life and magic. That's with me a lot. It's something that I still, I feel, is resonant, that spirit.

Wow. So how do you bring that now into your life? How do you bring the search for magic and creativity and wonder and awe into your daily life?

Well, I just, I try to get out of my head as much as possible because, you know, there's so much depth of wonder and freedom in the heart and the soul and the spirit. And it's like, I think when we're in our heads, you know, for me, anyway, I really can be easily disconnected from those, from those forces. And so I try to just, I try to be in my body as much as possible. And like, I touched on in the beginning, you know, that inner life that you cultivate that that kind of channel of creativity that can happen is is really important for me. It's like it's like a lifeline. And I and I've come to understand that I don't need to be on screen or, you know, it doesn't I don't need to be on set in order to have that feeling for me. It's like a fantastic meal or, you know, when your kid says something way more hilarious and smart than you would have expected or, you know, like those beautiful moments in life where everything kind of sings like that's how I find them these days.

That's really beautiful. And I think we miss those moments, you know, the way our lives are so fast and so full and so crammed. And COVID has sort of given us this hiatus. It was like God said, timeout humans, you are not doing this right. You need to go to your room until you figure out how you need to live in a way that is more in alignment with who you really are. And like, what's the deal? And I, I, certainly had that happen to me. And I imagine it's having a lot of people listening that they, they just had to all of a sudden face themselves, face their lives, face the way they were living. Did it work? Didn't. I mean, some people were great, some people weren't. But I think it's, it's just this incredible moment to stop and go, what really matters? Like, how do you, how do you get to what really matters? And, yes, it's, it's, it's so beautiful what you just said. Like, the, the, the, the quality of your experience, the quality of your inner life. It's a small moments, right? It's a quality of your relationships, it's a quality of your, your relationship with your body. And all those things are accessible to us. And we don't need anything for that. We don't need a lot of money. We don't need, we need time. We do need time, but we, we don't need a lot of money. We don't need a lot of stuff. We just need to focus on that experience of how life actually is. And it's so miraculous, you know, and if you can sort of, you know, people's joke is they stop and smell the roses, but literally, if you can stop and just show up, It's that's like 95% of it.

Totally. And there's this misconception, a deep false misconception that wellness is for the privileged. You know, wellness is for the people who have money. And I just believe that to be absolutely false. Like, you know, the things that connect you the most to your body, right? So the quality of your thought, your breath, Movement, the things that connect the body to the soul are all free. It's really about what you're talking about, right? It's about can you show up for yourself? Can you give yourself the time? Or can you challenge yourself to rethink something in a different way? And so, and that for me was like a beautiful outcome of COVID time, you know, where everything was was kind of stripped away and all of the things that you usually do to feel busy or feel better were stripped away and dealing with the initial discomfort of that and then kind of trying to go deep and figure out like, okay, well, you know, what is the opportunity here? What is the silver lining? You know, everything feels, you know, there's so much suffering going on. Economies are crashing. People are dying. We're all in our homes. like, if God has a plan for us, what are we supposed to be learning through this?

And what did you learn?

I think I learned, you know, how... I think the main thing that I learned, which was really startling to me, was how much I had been masking pain through doing. and traveling and working and responsibility. I had a whole layer of unprocessed stuff that I wasn't dealing with. And I'm still in the process of dealing with it. And...

Emotional pain, you mean?

Emotional pain, yeah.

Yeah. That's amazing.

And physical stuff too. I mean, I think You know, it all, there's a convergence of all these things, right? I mean, you talk about it a lot, that if you have unprocessed emotion and trauma, that it really can impact your health negatively. And so just kind of starting to unpack some stuff that I didn't know that there was, you know, and it's not like some catastrophic thing, but there was for sure another layer there that I thought, that I had dealt with that I had not dealt with yet.

Yeah. I mean, sometimes it takes a moment to slow down and to pay attention. You know, I've been sort of reflecting on, you know, how my life was before COVID which was really so full and fast. And I was on a plane, you know, most weeks, maybe even a couple of times a week. And it was fun. It was exciting. It was interesting. But It really took something from me that I didn't realize. And it was such a fast thing. And the Japanese have a word for this. It's called hurry sickness.

Wow.

And it's like in Okinawa, they're like, you Westerners, you have hurry sickness. Because, you know, I had a Japanese friend recently and I was just like, was watching this person, how they moved, how they lived, how they poured coffee, how they did anything, how they washed dishes. It was just totally different. and I was always trying to get to the end of things instead of being in the things, you know? And there's that, that famous saying, you know, before Enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. After Enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. It's like you don't do different stuff. It's the quality of your experience is different. Right. And, and so I've been thinking a lot about this and thinking about, like, what it means for me. And, and it's really inspires me to think about how do we create a slow life instead of a fast life, a slow life where you get to savor and simmer and enjoy and don't miss those moments like when your kid says something hilarious or, you know, when there's something beautiful that, I mean, like, even just right now, like I'm sitting up in my office and there's the sunlight pouring in. It's just beautiful. And like, there's a quality of that. And, you know, David White, I'm sure you're familiar with his poetry. He talks about this idea of developing a friendship with all things. So, like a friendship with the light coming through the window or friendship with the wind on your skin or the, rain or the dew on your grass, on the grass between your toes or the bite of food you're eating, whatever it is, we can be in relationship to our world in a way that's intimate and connected and alive. And, and most of us are just like so busy like, and I'm like, I'm not saying I don't do it. I definitely do that. But I, I'm really craving not doing that anymore. And I'm trying to design a life.

Where I don't have to do that. So how are you, what are some of the steps or tools that you're taking or, or incorporating?

Well, I'm saying no a lot more. Yeah. You know, my mother always said, no is a sentence. And, you know, I, and I felt part of my, and this is the identity thing we were talking about before. You know, your identity as a young woman was, I'm an actress. I'm an Oscar winning actress. And I'm Gwyneth Paltrow. This is who I am. And this is what I'm supposed to be in the world. And people relate to you as that idea or that ideation that they create in their head of who you are. But it's not necessarily who you authentically, truly are. And I'm like, well, gee, do I have to be Mark Hyman anymore? I don't have to be Dr. Hyman. That's a question for me. What is it that is it going to feed my soul and make me most alive and bring me back to what really matters? And so, and it might be that.

You do want to be Dr. Mark Hyman, but it might be at a different cadence or it might be not, you know, how much your book publishers want you to publish. No, it might be your way.

Right. Maybe it's before Enlightenment. Doctor be Dr. Hyman after Enlightenment be Dr. Hyman. But it's just different. It's like different nowhere near Enlightenment. I'm working on it, but it's a, it's one of those interesting moments where I feel like I'm just re-examining everything, re-looking at everything, and it sounds like you are, too. And it's just, yeah, it's an imitation for all of us to stop and look at our lives and go, what is the quality of our life experience? And is this, is this what we want to meet every day? And if not, How do we change it? You know, I've said no to a lot of things. I've stopped traveling as much. I do more Zoom stuff, which is fun, which I don't like Zoom. But, like, you know, but I mean, I just, I do stuff like, I wish I could fly to California, but normally I would have flown to California. I would have been in your studio. And it would take like three days and I'm like exhausted and eat crappy food and sleep in hotels.

And it's like, this is fine.

I'm going to go for a bike ride after our podcast. This is way better. Way better. Yeah, and I've also taken time unplugged time. The digital detox is something that we all need to think about. And I wonder what your relationship is with technology in that way because we're all tied in. But do you take a digital Shabbat? Like a lot, it's like the new book came out 24/6, which is about a digital Shabbat by Tiffany Schlain. It's really a great book.

It's a great idea. And, you know, I have, I can tell you, like, I have, on the Jewish side of my family, I have really some observant family members and I've seen they've, it's something that they've done for a few years now, and I can see the recalibration that happens. And I think it's a brilliant idea. I really, I really do. I think we're, you know, it's kind of like I'm a little bit of, to mine just in that, you know, every generation has its thing, right? That, that the older generation thinks is, is ruining humankind and ruining Society and degrading the quality of everything, right? Whether it's rock and roll or Refrigeration or, you know, Revolution or whatever it is. And so for us, it happens to be this incredible digital area.

Yeah. Yeah.

So we have, you know, connection all the time and we have access to information all the time, access to connectability. And so it's just, it's an axiom, right? This is the thing of our generation and it's here to stay. And there are certainly aspects of it, I think, that are, I don't know if I want to go so far as to say harmful, but I think that take a big degree of adjustment. And I think while we're adjusting, while we're, you know, a lot of us, especially our generation, Mark, like we did not grow up digitally native. We were probably in our 20s when the first cell phone came out. So I think we maybe need a bit of a break and need to remember what it was like. to walk to Blockbuster and to take time to select your movie and walk back home. And, you know, it's like we grew up with that cadence of life. Like things weren't so fast. And so we grew up wired that way and now we're expected to be wired this other way. And I think it takes a lot of adjustment.

It's true, it's true. I remember making playlists, you know, and we get these scratchy records, we put on a turntable, We'd hook up our cassette player to the record player and then we'd like stand there by it and like the song I had to play and you'd like stop just at the right time and then start the next song. It was like a project and it's such a project. And I was like, this is so easy. But I feel like it is, it's an exciting moment for the world in a way, even though it's sort of depressing and there's a lot of horrible things happening and there's climate change and there's, you know, racial and social injustice and there's COVID and there's the economic hardships and there's, all the things that we're struggling with, chronic disease, but within it all, I think there's a rising awareness that we humans have to sort of wake up and that people are being drawn to things like self-exploration. I mean, this whole movement around psilocybin and LSD and MDMA and all these substances are now entering the more mainstream science around therapeutic avenues. They're all about kind of that exact experience of how do we get more present? How do we get more present to our life?

How do we remove those veils that trauma has given us and whatever bad ideas we've gotten? How do you begin to remove those in an effort to get really close to yourself?

Yeah, it's really the key. And I'm like, I'm excited for this time. I'm excited for this time for my life and it sounds like you're creating a really a different way of living as well within all this, which is beautiful. And I just wonder, sort of, what are the practices that you love and that you engage with that help you come back to all this?

Yes. And what I would say is, you know, it's a multi-pronged approach for sure and it's something that evolves and definitely ebbs and flows. So at the moment, I've been, you know, my husband learned TM meditation about a year ago. And so we've been doing, or maybe more now actually. So through the whole pandemic, we, so we wake up and we do that together, which is a really, really nice way to start the day. So definitely meditation. And then there's, there's a new app that I found, I think it's called Aura, and it's little A-U-R-A. And so in the afternoon, if I'm feeling stress. Like, I really will remember. And, and I like something guided, too. So I'll put on, like, a three minute breathing thing, which I find really, really helpful.

Yeah.

I'm also paleo at the moment. So since, yeah. So since, since January 3rd, when, you know, I got a whole bunch of pretty iffy blood results back in November dealing with, like, some major inflammation from long haul COVID stuff and some mycotoxin stuff. I had been really not on a wellness kick in COVID, you know, which was not great looking back. But, you know, I was drinking the time, like I would look forward to my cocktail every day at five o'clock. Like I would make dinner with lots of pasta and bread and all that.

So, yeah, yeah, yeah.

So I had kind of gone off the rails and so I. So after. So January 3rd, I made a promise to myself to really clean up. So I've been, like, basically alcohol free. I've been paleo. I've been doing saunas and. And trying to take some binders to deal with this mold toxicity. And I've been, like, I've been on a pretty healthy streak for a while and. And feeling. Feeling good now. Feeling really good. I I didn't realize how bad I was feeling until, like, if you know, check back like now versus six months ago. It's a big difference.

You mentioned that earlier that, you know, a lot of people who are starting to get into wellness don't realize how bad they feel until they start feeling better. And I have so many patients say, Dr. Hyman, I didn't know how bad I felt until I started feeling good. And I'm like, yeah, we just sort of accept that there's this low grade brain fog, low grade achiness, low grade. whatever digestive issues, low grade mood issues, whatever it is. And we take it for granted that they're part of our human condition that can't be changed. And with functional medicine and the approach of food as medicine, it's so incredibly powerful and it helps people so much. I literally was with patients all day today and it was just so great, it's so gratifying. I was like this little kid who was just suffering as an athlete, 13 year old boy, and he had terrible pneumonia, recurrent pneumonias, and was having headaches and muscle aches and brain fog and couldn't do sports and was trouble breathing and lung issues and gut issues, just a mess. And, you know, it's seen all the top doctor Specialists was from a very prominent family. You know who they were. And, and it's like it was so easy to just clean up his diet, fix his gut, give him few supports for his immune system. And, I mean, it's been a year now, and he's, like, completely symptom free. I'm like, is there anything going on? He's like, no. Can I. I just finished surfing. Can I get to my soccer game? Because I gotta run. I'm like, okay, go. Okay, go to your soccer game. You're putting me out of business. I think, you know, that's. That's what's possible for people. And that's what your. Your. Your work is so important. The group has really created a platform for people to kind of aggregate understanding about how to take care of themselves, how. build up their sort of health bank, right? And it's the little things, it's the little things. And, you know, it's the things that are often not so obvious, whether it's the household cleaning products we use, the makeup products we use, the supplements we take, or the, you know, the kinds of things we put in our bodies or on our bodies, and then the tools you have on there are just so fabulous. So, you know, you kind of like the Indiana Jones of, Wellness. You basically an archaeologist who goes out and discovers all this cool stuff and, you know, all these great treasures and you bring them home and you share with everybody who you love and you share with us, you share with your family. Is there anything you found that's like, I'm like, oh, God, that was a bad idea. Or in retrospect, go, that, that was not what I thought it was. And I really, I kind of up on that.

You know what's weird? I feel like in every weird thing that I've tried, you know, every unorthodox thing that someone, someone has recommended it to me, right? It hasn't been like me deciding to hang myself upside down by my toenails or, you know, for circulation to my brain. Like, it's, it's always been suggested by a naturopath or a wellness practitioner or a functional MD, whatever. I honestly, Mark, have found value in everything. Like, not that it's for me, 100% or not that I've adopted it for life, but I've always understood, I've always understood sort of the intention behind it. And I sort of feel like there's value in all that stuff.

Yeah, well, there is. But, you know, there's some really wacky stuff people recommend, like, you know, I think, like what? Oh, I don't know. My God, some, a lot of you are in a coffee enemas and I just, I just never got into that, you know, I think, I mean, or Really weird. I know they do.

And I'm like, I'll verify them. And so, yeah, I mean, I did, the only thing that I feel like I tried once that I didn't feel anything was I did a color light therapy session with like different colors and, and, I sort of at that time I was like, well, I don't really feel anything, but then my, my infrared sauna has like a color therapy light system.

Yeah. Yeah.

And now I feel like, oh, this is great. So maybe I just wasn't ready for it. that point.

That's great. So, so take us through like, Gwyneth Paltrow's wellness routine. What is in a week, the components that you build, the, the, the structures that you build in your life so that you can feel good and thrive. And by the way, the purpose of wellness from my perspective is not just to feel good. It's about freedom. It's about freedom to do whatever you want to do. That's how I define health. Freedom to wake up in the morning and play the way you want to play, love the way you want to love, work the way you want to work. that's what helped us to me. So what those practices help you do that, help me do that. What are your practices and take us through what life of when it palcho in the wellness world is for a week?

Well, you know, as I said, meditation plays a big part. Exercise. I exercise seven days a week, even if it's just a long walk, hydration, supplementation. So I'm lucky enough to have my blood labs done every once in a while and see where I'm where I'm low and what needs a boost. So, you know, for me, understanding like, okay, I have leaky gut, so I need these few things to take every day and then really feeling an impact from that. So, and then just eating good, fresh, seasonal food that isn't sprayed with chemicals. That's like the biggest thing, you know, like eating meat, fish, birds, lots of, you know, as you say, like in, like Conda meat. So very small, very small portions. And we really focused on, on vegetables, fresh vegetables, local deliciousness. And, you know, it's, it's sort of based on food supplementation and, and getting connected to my body. I, I think, I do think that walking connects the body and soul. So I do that a lot and then trying to put positive Outlook, you know, and, and catching myself when I you know, and being mean to myself. My husband helped me with that, too, because I, I'm very critical.

Yeah. That inner dialogue, you know, you're your worst enemy inside your head. And, you know, I've been listening to a lot of ramdass's podcast, and it just is so funny because he, I, I was in some years ago, and then sort of got lately just sort of listening, and, and he, he really talks about, you know, this sort of the way our minds take over and construct a reality that's just not real and true and creates beliefs and ideas that create suffering. And then all of our suffering comes from our thinking. And so, you know, we talk about exercise, but how many of us actually do inner size? And master and strengthen our mental capacity to witness where our minds take a left turn. and not follow that and go, wait a minute, that's a stupid thought. It's like my friend says, you shouldn't believe every stupid thought you have, you know? And I think that's a really liberating thing once you can get free from that. I think meditation that you're doing really helps that.

And I think, you know, just to make a distinction, you know, and this is something that I've just started exploring, but the idea that there's a place for all those assistant: voices, right? Like we have all these different selves inside of us. And sometimes those voices are alerting us to something and sometimes they need acceptance on some level as opposed to being shut out, right? It's like, okay, why, why is this voice in me? What, what is it saying? Like, how can I show up for whatever self is presenting itself in this negative way? Like, how can I help heal that, you know, how can I integrate all of this as opposed to shutting it out.

Well then, yeah, that's the issue is like, where does it come from? Right. How do, how do you get to the root of that? And so like what you talked about when you, when you realized you won the Oscar and you were depressed because what was driving you wasn't really coming from an authentically healthy place.

Right.

And, and that's, that's a great invitation for people. And that's, I think that's, this is great. What you do. I really love you. This is, you know, this has been such a great conversation. And goop is just a great resource for people. I encourage everybody to check it out. There's a good podcast, there's a good website. It says goop.com. right. And, and it's such great resource. And you've got this new thing coming out soon, this metabolism boosting super powder. Tell us about that.

So this is, it's exactly what the title is, the metabolism boosting super powder. I'm over the age now where we start to lose, you know, some metabolic speed. And, and it's hard, you know, because being in perimenopause, being someone who's active and eats well, eating well, and yet unable to. turn food into fuel as quickly as I used to. So this is just a great, it's a great powder that we've added, which really does help with that process and just helps speed things up for us who are experiencing metabolic slowness.

That's the thing. Well, I'm sure you're aware of this, but 88% of Americans are metabolically unhealthy. So I think you hit the nail on the head with this one.

Yes, exactly.

Thank you so much for being on the Dr. Charlie podcast. It's really great conversation. I hope it inspired people to think about how to re-examine their lives and focus on what's important, which is the quality of your inner life, the quality of your relationships, the quality of your health. And that's such a great invitation. So thank you for that.

Thank you. Thank you for having me. As I said, I'm a big fan of the doctor's pharmacy. So it's a great career moment for me.

Thank you. All right. Well, you take care and everybody listening, if you love this podcast, podcast. Share with your friends and family everywhere. You think they probably need it, they probably do. Leave a comment. We'd love to hear how you take care of your health and whether your Wellness routines and subscribe wherever you get your podcast. And we'll see you next week on the doctor's Pharmacy. Hey, everybody, it's Dr. Hyman. Thanks for tuning into the doctor's Pharmacy. I hope you're loving this podcast. It's one of my favorite things to introducing you all the experts that I know and I love and that I've learned so much from. And I want to tell you about something else I'm doing, which is called Mark's Picks. It's my weekly newsletter. And in it, I share my favorite stuff from foods to supplements to gadgets to tools to enhance your health. It's all the cool stuff that I use and that my team uses to optimize and enhance our health. And I'd love you to sign up for the weekly newsletter. I'll only send it to you once a week on Fridays, nothing else, I promise. And all you have to do is go to drhyman.com/picks to sign up. That's drhyman.com/picks, P-I-C-K-S, and sign up for the newsletter and I'll share with you my favorite stuff that I use to enhance my health and get healthier and better and live younger longer.

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