107. Mario Lopez: Daily Routine for Success in Hollywood and Health

Can a person really live comfortably to.

Like, 110, 115, 120 to 140? No question. Yes.

Are you serious?

80 is about to be the new 40. We know now so much about cellular physiology and human biology that within the next five years, it will be our choice whether or not we want to live to age 120 or 140 or we want to take the opposite route.

Wow, that's amazing. As I've gotten older, one of the things I always say is that I always train for sanity, not so much vanity, and the activities that I'm involved in, jiu jitsu and boxing, however, the BO body doesn't respond the way it used to or the way I like it to being in chronic pain. It's an awful, awful feeling.

Chronic pain will wear down the strongest of human beings.

That's the thing.

It's relentless. What's incredibly powerful is the big data is starting to show that things like exercise are more powerful than SSRIs. Talk a little bit about, what does your routine do for your mental health?

I think the real answer, not to be corny or anything, but.

Welcome back to the Ultimate Human Podcast. Today, we are joined by a true icon in the entertainment world who's graced our screens for decades. But beyond his incredible career as an actor, host, and producer, he's a dedicated advocate for health and wellness. We're going to talk about a little scare that he had very, very early in life and how that may have impacted his current fitness journ. Mario Lopez has truly made wellness a priority in his life, and today he's here to share with us some of his insights on how to stay fit, healthy, and mentally strong while balancing a thriving career and family life. Mario, welcome to the Ultimate Human Podcast.

Thank you. Brca. You're so serious. I love it.

It was. That was, like, so. It was so serious.

60 Minutes voice right there. Okay.

I know. I do have a radio voice.

You know, it is.

It's the microphones in, like, the studio.

Intimacy.

I feel a need to, like, just lower my voice, and that's all right. And talk right into the way, bud. How you doing, brother?

I'm doing well. Nice to see you.

Good to see you again, too, man. You and I have had a great journey together, man.

We have. I love how we initially met through our mutual friend Dana White, and who, as you know, speaks incredibly high of you and. And was anxious for us to meet. He was, because, like you said in your intro, health and fitness is a top priority. In my life, I always say, if you don't take care of your health without that, nothing else really matters. And you think a lot of other stuff is important until something happens health wise, and then you realize what really is important.

Yeah. I mean, even. Even since we started our journey, you know, you had a little bit of a health scare on our journey. I mean, you and I were gonna shoot an episode of Access Hollywood.

Oh. With my neck in that studio. I was like, what else cares? That's right.

We're just gonna throw it out there.

I did. That's. Well, yeah, that's an injury. But no, you FaceTime me in a neck brace.

And I was like, bro, what's up?

Yeah, that's. Well, that the thing too. And I mean, I could turn this into a therapy hour, but, you know, as I. It's okay.

I want to dim the lights in.

As I've gotten older, and I think we've talked about this before. One of the things I always say is that I always train and work out for sanity. Not so much vanity. It's like a de stressor. You get rid of any sort of anxiety. I like to get out of the way in the first thing in the morning. So the rest of my day is sort of easy. And it just allows me to kind of just be alone. My thoughts and you just feel good. You get the endorphins going. You just feel good right off the bat. Right. And the activities that I'm involved in usually are that of a much younger man, you know, which is trying to.

Get me to talk you out.

I know.

So she's quietly like, can you talk?

Some rest of everyone in my world, but like jiu jitsu and boxing and, you know, very physical, violent activities. Even though I liken it to, like, physical chess, it takes a toll on your body, and I really do it. It's. I'm sparring out there, and I'm not just kind of hitting pads. And so I. And I. And I like it. And I. And I love it. One, again, it' physical chest. You're constantly problem solving. But two, makes me feel alive.

And you're problem solving under stress, which I think is a metaphor for life.

Exactly. And. Exactly. And it makes me feel alive and it makes me feel young. However, the flip side to that is that the body doesn't respond the way it used to or the way I like it to.

Right.

So I've had to make adjustments on how I approach it and how I go about my physical activities, or else I won't Last. And I'll start. I'll start falling apart. Remember the movie the Blues Brothers?

Yeah.

I'm dating myself now. Remember how that car hit? The car that they were driving was in the best chase, like one of the greatest car chases of all time. And then when it finally parked, it just. Boom. Yeah. It collapsed. That's like my body. Like, in this last year, I've been going a thousand miles an hour. And then one year after another, I tore my rotator cuff. I tore my Achilles, I tore my biceps. Wow. All in jiu jitsu, my hand boxing. And then in jiu jitsu, my first serious injury. From what. What you're full circle to what you were talking about. I had a pinched nerve, which doesn't sound bad, but when it was right under the neck and the disc, it was the most excruciating pain. And it shot down my arm, and I had, like, this tingling, and it made this finger and pinky go numb. It's about 95 gone, but still a little, you know, a little bit, but it's about 95. But that's because I still do the activities.

Right.

And so it wasn't something you just work on through mass massage and what have you. We started to treat it and do some stuff. Then I had to start getting shots and all that. And you do have to lay off, which is hard for me. But the best know when to rest, so you. You got to do that. So it's more. And that did a number on me kind of psychologically too.

So I remember, man, I remember when you told me, you called me and you told me you had to cancel the show. You were supposed to be in Orlando. I was coming up there to meet you to. To do the show.

I mean, being in pain and chronic pain and for. And it just doesn't let up. It's an awful, awful feeling. Your mind just.

Oh, yeah. It will wear down the strongest of. Of human beings. I mean, I. I've watched it break family members of mine. I mean, low back pain, neck pain and neck pain and low back pain, especially because you just can't get away from it. Right? Right.

It's relentless.

Yes.

The thing. It's relentless.

And you were getting the cortisone injections, and I remember I sent you some turmerics and I sent you the hydrogen bath. Right? Yeah. I'm gonna overnight you some stuff to. To try to accelerate this healing process. As much as we could. We. We use some 157, which is a body protection compound. 157. It's a. Technically a gastric peptide, but it's really, really good for wound healing. And you eventually were able to walk your way out of it. I mean. And you say you're 95 now.

Yeah, I'm back.

Still do feel it, though.

Thank God. I mean, if I'm being very meticulous. Yeah, just a little bit. And maybe because of the. The same movements in the wear and tear, I'm very cognizant now of the positions that put me in, because I'm a grappler. And so it was a lot of the shooting and messing with these big guys. And the thing about jiu jitsu is the size is really supposed to be sort of irrelevant when it comes to the technique, but size does matter.

Yeah.

That's why there's way. Process.

Yeah.

I manage the. The expectations with the way I approach, and I had to change my game a little bit. Yeah, but. But it's okay. And so just like, in life, you have to evolve, you have to adapt, and that's what I've been doing. But it's sort of hard to get your mind around it. And listen, I'm gonna be 51 in a couple weeks.

I can't believe that, dude. Look, I. Like, I should be. I'm 54. I turned 54 on Saturday. But you look 25. And, I mean, I might look 48. You know.

I feel lucky, man. People ask me, I mean, there's no. I know. I came up to me at the.

Ufc, and you were like, I really would love to work with you. I'm like, dude, I want to know what you're doing.

Well, people ask me, I just, you know, I usually just kind of answer with, you know, I drink a lot of tequila. It's like embalming fluid. But I think that. I mean, I think the real.

That from the official record, I think.

The real answer, not to be corny or anything, but, I mean, I really am, like, genuinely, like, I think, happy person.

Yeah.

And I feel. I know I'm very blessed, and I don't take it for granted. And I've got my mom and dad still with me, who are very much still together. I got a great wife and kids, and. You really do. I'm happy. And I think being happy has a lot to kind of do with it. And obviously, I'm not. Look, I like to have a good time, but I'm not partying with crazy, you know, extracurricular.

Yeah, you're in the party capital world out here in la, too. So you have plenty of occasion to do that.

So, you know, I'm not, I'm not burning the candle at both ends and in that sense. But, you know, I do like to have a good time. I do like my tequila. I do like to have a good cigar. Yeah. Here and there. And.

Well, I think it's, you know, it's the 8020 rule. I talked to my, my daughter talks about it all the time. You know, she's 26 years old and she spends 80 of her time, like really, really taking care of herself. And 20 of her time, she acts like a 26 year old should act.

Balance.

Yeah, you got to have balance. I think when the pendulum swings too far in one direction, you know, then, then you end up quitting. And you know, that's a lot of the clients that I work with. I'm like, look, the, the secret here is not that you go hardcore dogmatic in one direction. It's not like keto, paleo, carnivore, you know, pescatarian, vegan, vegetarian. It's, you know, start with a whole food diet. And you cannot supplement your way around a poor diet if you're not eating whole foods. If you're, if you're eating like, you know, a highly processed diet, you're eating a lot of high glycemic sugars. You know, if you're eating a lot of food, dyes, pesticides, herbicides, insecticides, preservatives, glyphosates, you know, eventually you're just bathing your cellular biology in a toxic soup.

It's sort of irrelevant. You can't outwork a bad diet. Right. And what are your thoughts on intermittent fasting?

So I'm a big fan of intermittent fasting. Sort of right. For the right profile. Right. It's again, intermittent fasting is one of those things that can be a complete life changing game changer or it can be a worst nightmare. And when I say it's a worst nightmare, especially for early menstruating females, we're sort of flipping the script here. Now, now I'm on your podcast, but that's okay.

I'm sorry.

Well, no, I should be interviewing you, but.

No, but, no, but I asked because I, it seems like, did I try it for a day? For. I just think as active as I am, I was concerned about the energy level.

Well, so, so in your case, you actually have the polar opposite issue that most people have. You actually have very good blood sugar regulation. Right. So. So when you have, when you are highly insulin sensitive, not insulin resistant, when you're insulin sensitive, it means that your body actually reacts very well and controls your blood sugar very well. You measure this with something called hemoglobin A1C. It's the three month average of your blood sugar. And you look at that compared to your insulin levels. You know, if you're in the low single digits for insulin, then this means that your insulin is, is reacting very quickly. So in other words, when you go prolonged periods without eating, I. E. Intermittent fasting, you get hypoglycemic, you get low blood sugar, which actually robs you of your, and your pituitary, which is sort of the master puppeteer. It's regulating all of our, you know, and women, it regulates their menstrual cycle. And men, you know, regulates the amount of testosterone that we secrete amongst a ton of other things, growth hormone, our sleep cycle, our circadian rhythms, our body temperature, our metabolic rate. But the pituitary is there to save your life. It really doesn't care how fat or skinny you are, how pretty or ugly you are. It doesn't care about your hair, your skin and nails. It cares about survival. And so what happens is when you go prolonged periods with really, really low blood sugar, the pituitary perceives this as starvation and it begins to throttle back your metabolism. It has the opposite effect of what you want. Starts to actually slow you down in an effort to save your life. If you think ancestrally if we went prolonged periods without food, then energy conservation was a priority, right? I mean, if there was, if food was in abundance, well then we wouldn't be so worried about energy conservation. But we, we didn't evolve with a cabinet of crackers three feet off of our elbow, right? I mean we, we didn't eat 24 hours a day, even have access to food 24 hours a day, seven days a week. We regulate everything now. Our body temperature, our lighting, you know, the amount of food that we eat. So most of us, most Americans are eating 17, 11 to 17 hours a day. And it's hard to imagine, but most people, the first thing they do when I get out of bed is, you know, coffee, something goes in their mouth, and right before they go to bed, something else goes in their mouth.

And so, so that's, I'm sorry to interrupt, but. So that's okay to have something go in your mouth right before you can go to bed. Because the old ad used to be that try not to eat. Right, right before you go to bed. But that's a fallacy.

Well, I, I would say try not to eat A big meal within two hours of going to bed. You know, I would take something like a perfect amino. A non caloric full spectrum. Yeah, full spectrum amino acid. The last thing you want to do is stuff yourself and go to sleep.

Right. It feels good, though. You know, when you suffer something, you're just laying down, it feels so good.

Yeah.

But then when you look at your sleep.

No, I don't know.

I know, I know.

It's like, it's like the two glasses or four glasses of wine before bed.

You know, counted a bottle.

Everyone listening to this podcast, everybody says they have a glass of wine before they go to bed, is absolutely lying, having a bottle of wine before they.

Go to bed that you mentioned wine. So my ADD keeps kicking in. So my wife and I recently, we.

Yeah, I think we finished the topic so far. I got like six open ones in.

The back of my mind.

People listening to this are like, well, you guys just seriously complete a coherent thought.

I think we are. I think we are. It's the conversation.

It's like two politicians just writing our own questions.

The thing about wine, like, I enjoy wine. Why is it. And I don't assume it's really cheap wine because it doesn't seem to be. But why is it? I'll have a couple and I still wake up a little sort of groggy as opposed to if I have some nice tequila or something, I'm fine. It helps me go to bed. I. So now I'm always. It's almost deterred to. To have it unless I know I can sleep in.

Yeah. So three things with, you know, alcohol, and then I'll be specific to red wine. But I mean, you know, alcohol, it's not really the alcohol. It's what the alcohol becomes. Right? Alcohol becomes something called acetyl aldehyde. So the, the liver converts it into this compound called acetyl aldehyde, which is a very acidic compound, highly acidic compound. So it actually lowers slightly lowers the pH of the blood. Now the PH range of the blood is very narrow, Right. It's about half a half of a point. And so as we get more acidic, lower in ph, this is what gives us aches. It interrupts our cellular metabolism, doesn't allow us to get into deep sleep or even REM sleep for that matter. And so what happens is in deep sleep, like, first of all, let's. Let's just put sleep on the proper platform. It is the human superpower.

It really is. I always.

Absolutely human.

It's incredibly underrated. Right. These people that always Say, well, our friend, always our Dana, as a matter of fact, because I was just having a conversation with him the other day. He tells me only sees like three, four hours a night. I go, how do you do that, bro? I'm still training everything, trying to push.

Him to five, six hours a night. But one thing about Dana is if you look at his, his sleep ro routine, like he lays down and in three to five minutes, he's, boom, he is in, he is in deep sleep. And he, you know, he was on a CPAP machine when I first started to work with him. He's not on the CPAP machine any longer, and his sleep scores are actually pretty good. But, you know, sleep is the human superpower. But people don't realize, you know, why is sleep our human superpower? I understand that I'm resting and I'm, you know, I'm calm and, you know, my mind is relaxed. But, but what's physiologically going on during sleep? Well, during deep sleep, something really, really special starts to happen. The. There's a there waste elimination system in the brain called the glymphatic system. We know our lymph system, right? Our lymph nodes, our lymphatic system. You know, your lymph nodes get swollen in your neck or they get swollen in your upper axillary region when you get sick. So our lymph nodes in our lymph system, you know, detoxifies and eliminates waste from the body. And by waste, I don't mean stool and urine. I mean cellular waste, right? And the glymphatic system is in the brain. So when the brain is eliminating waste, repairing, detoxifying, regenerating, this happens during deep sleep. When deep sleep occurs, it activates the glymphatic system. So your brain flushes toxins. Well, if you don't get into deep sleep, you never flush those toxins. You never actually use that glymphatic drainage system. So people wake up foggy, drowsy, groggy. The other thing it's doing, aside from lowering your, the PH of your blood, is it's actually causing your blood sugar to rise. So you think about what, you know, what does wine become two, three glasses of wine become after it gets metabolized? It becomes sugar. So now you're. It helps you fall asleep. Alcohol is initially a stimulant, then suppressant, but it helps you fall asleep. And then as you're sleeping, your blood sugar's starting to rise. As your blood sugar's starting to rise, your PH of your Blood is dropping as the PH of your blood is dropping, you're not going into deep sleep because you're not going into deep sleep. You're not eliminating waste, repairing, detoxifying.

That makes perfect sense. May I ask a question?

You may.

How are your, what are your thoughts on, on naps? I'm a big fan, huge fan of naps. But does it, does it suffice for like, let's say you get six hours sleep, but you take maybe an hour nap during the day? It's still not as good as seven.

Not as good. But the research on napping, believe it or not, is really starting to validate that. You know, no less than 20 minutes, no more than 90 minutes, right?

No more than. Okay, that's a good rule. No less than 20, no more than.

90, no less than 20, no more than ninety. There's something that they call sleep inertia, right? So after 90 minutes, sleep has now taken over and is the priority, like a choo choo train going down the track. You know, I mean, you know, a parked locomotive can be stopped by putting a quarter under the a tire. You know, a locomotive going 40 miles an hour cannot be stopped by a dump truck. Want to get an extra hour of quality good sleep every single night? Let me tell you how I do it. My wife and I sleep on 8 sleeps pod 4 ultra. This is a technology that fits over your mattress to cool or warm each side of the bed, giving you up to an extra hour more of quality sleep every single night. My wife likes her side of the bed warmer than mine, but I've noticed that I've improved deep sleep at cooler temperature temperatures. It even elevates automatically when it detects snoring to improve airflow. With 99 accurate sleep tracking, you can leave your wearables on the nightstand. And I even had this thing independently EMF tested to make sure that I was not getting any extra EMF at night, which I'm not. Get 350 off the Pod 4 Ultra@8sleep.com forward slash Gary. That's 8sleep.com forward slash Gary. And use the code Gary G A R Y for your discount. Transform your nights and elevate your sleep. Now let's get back to the ultimate human podcast, right? So sleep inertia is, is, is very similar. You know, what happens is as you get further and further into the sleep cycle, it gets harder and harder to pull you out. So you don't want that sleep inertia to start carrying you into the rem, the deep and the Deep.

So just enough to. Okay.

20 minutes minimum, 90 minutes maximum. Absolute game changer. I, I don't want to quote the statistics, but there was. There is a significant high double digit reduction in all cause mortality in people that regularly nap.

Wow. So an active individual for myself, I mean I should strive for eight at least.

Correct, you should strive for eight. But you know what's, what's really interesting is, you know, now that we're really, really getting data on sleep, not everybody needs eight hours of sleep.

So it really is based on the individual.

It is really is based on the individual. And, and what you should do is begin to develop a measure your sleep aura. Whoop. Fitbit 8 sleep mattress. Find a way to measure and track your sleep because the things that are really affecting your sleep are probably not the things that you think.

Really? Yes, because I have fortunately now no problem falling asleep and I'll go to sleep. The thing is staying there. Do you have to get up to go to the restroom?

No, no, I'm actually just trying to face the camera. I realized that.

No, no, no, no. I meant do you have to get up to go to the rest right now when you're sleepy? Cuz like I can't. Full disclosure, I can't make a whole night now.

I'm fidgety so I thought I had. I just have ADHD and I, I don't have to piss.

No, I meant I can't make it through a whole night now. I have to at least get up once. Is that just an age?

Getting up once is, is, is perfectly normal. Okay. That's getting up three to five times.

Which a lot of people do. No way people got three to five times.

There's so many people listening. Get out of here.

You get a three or five. How do you have a. You get out of here three or.

Five times because they're pissing all night.

Wait, is it the fluid intake or is it just.

It's. It's the, it's the food and fluid intake. Right? I mean you're eating and drinking right up until the time that you go to bed.

Yeah.

So all that.

I'm a one timer.

That's fine.

That's okay. And I got it. Master tour. I barely opened my eyes like Yoda and I just kind of like go and put my hand and then, you know, go do what I got to do and then go back and so then I'm good to go. That's fine.

Then I do the same thing and then I, I always deny like, like being on the seat. And then my wife is like, no, it was you. And then lately, I've been taking this methylene blue, which is a. It's actually a blue fabric dye. But there's a lot of science around methylene blue. I don't want to go down that rabbit hole, but it actually turns your urine blue. So now every time I dribble on the seat, there's no way for me to, like, get away with it because my wife doesn't take. Yeah, yeah. She's like, well, what are the blue drops on the seat? And I'm like, I don't know. That's a coincidence. Wow, that's weird. They weren't there when I went to sleep. That's according.

It's a cool party trick.

You want to see me blue? Yeah.

Yeah.

Methylene blue, by the way, amazing. You amazing compound. I mean, it's. It's. It's. I mean, the implications for this in. In health and longevity are just tremendous. It's probably one of the least expensive, if not the least expensive supplement I've ever encountered.

I'm gonna jot that down.

Yeah. Methylene blue. Okay. What it does, you know, without getting too deep down the science rabbit hole, is it actually changes the state of iron inside the cell from a ferric state to. To a ferrous state and pulls oxygen out of the blood into the red blood cell, where it's bioavailable for our mitoc. Loses energy. And remember, if the. If the mitochondria, if the powerhouse of the cell gets oxygen, it's 16 times more efficient. It creates 16 times more energy for every revolution of this little cycle called the Krebs cycle. So if you really want to stimulate your cellular biology, you got to get oxygen into the cell and into the mitochondria, and methylene blue helps do that. So.

Last question about sleep.

Yeah. Y.

Is it me, or does it seem like as you get older, you need less of it?

This is true. As you get older, you need less of it. I mean, it's. It's interesting. I was talking to some folks on RFK's team and some. Some of my other.

He's in great shape, by the way.

He's in great shape.

He's in great shape.

Yeah. And, And. And I love his philosophy on the food supply and, and, you know, the research going into our, you know, nutritional research. And, you know, I just. I'm. I'm really on message with him about what he wants to do at a governmental level, you know, to improve our food supply and and to fix the pandemic, chronic illness, not just in this country, in the adult population, but also in the population, children. We have, we have the sickest generation of, of young children we've ever had in this country. Again, a total other topic, but, you know, we're, we're covering a lot. Two guys with adhd. So I want to circle back to your house. Yeah. You know, this is about Mario Lopez.

Okay.

But I want to talk about for, for you because, you know, I, I, I love to kind of back my listeners into a corner and say, you know, what's your excuse? Because clearly you have a very busy schedule, and you don't dictate your schedule. You don't have, you know, you have to be certain places at certain times. Access Hollywood.

Exactly right.

So what's a typical day for Mario Lopez look like? Like, walk me through, you know, you wake up in the morning, you take the supplements that I've got you on?

Yeah, no, I wake up, you know, around six, sometimes earlier if I need to, and get the kids all ready, kiss them off to go to school, and then I go, and then I go to train to get it out of the way.

Yeah.

Like I said, it's either boxing or jiu jitsu, which I do two, three times a week each one, and then.

One day down the street from your.

House in the neighborhood on the way to work, and another one, again, not too far from work. So it's pretty geographically convenient. So I'll do something like that. Then usually on the Wednesday, I'll take a break. I'll do that Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, I'll take a break and do a little. Not rehab, but just kind of, I'll go, I'll make myself go see my PT guy sometime. Right. And stretch and kind of get something worked on because I'm usually banged up. Then on the weekend, depending on my body, I'll listen to my body, how it feels, and I'll train either a little bit harder, and then one other day, I'll go do a spin class with the wife or something.

Right.

Just to kind of mix it up. But I do try to do something every day, to be honest, unless I'm traveling. When I'm traveling, I take the time off, but again, I do it just to feel awake. I don't feel like I woke up unless I did something and to kind of clear my head. And, you know, there's a lot of stress going on with the stuff I'm juggling, so it just kind of helps me check out for a Second. So I get up at six, I get that out of the way. Then after that I'll come get something to eat. I'm making calls on the way. I'll come do my radio show. I have a nationally syndicated radio show called On Mario.

We're in the room right now.

We're in the moon right now.

We're in the room right now on with Mario Lopez.

There we go. So that's a lot of fun. So we do that. So I go, if I come and I'll do that. Then from there I'll go down the hill. Cause it's all here at Universal Studios. And I do Access Hollywood, the first show, which is the nighttime show. Right immediately after that I got about a half hour break to kind of get prepped and prepare for the daytime show Access Daily, which you've been a guest on a lot now. And that's sort of our Regis and Kelly type show and lifestyle, pop culture and all that. And we have guests and so then that takes me through the afternoon. Then after that I usually either have have if it's not another gig because at some point I was either doing another TV show or I squeezed in a holiday movie or I was doing something else squeezed in a holiday movie.

Just throwing that out there.

So you know, I'll do, I do a podcast that I do once a week called the three Knockdown Rule of five Podcasts or I'll have meetings or different stuff in, in my, that I've got on deck to producing what have you.

Yeah.

So it's pretty much 100 miles and running from the time I get up to when I'm wrapping it up, which could be about from four to six. But then after that I'm dad for a little bit. I'll either got a jujitsu or wrestling practice, one of my sister, my daughter's chair and then I'm home in time.

Your kids are in jiu jitsu and wrestling?

Yeah, my boys are too. Yeah.

That's awesome.

So we got. No, I got them, you know, and want them to learn and again I think just builds a lot of character and, and helps her confidence. A lot of attributes for, for, you know, as a, as a young man growing up. So then after that I'll have dinner with them unless I have a dinner meeting and then maybe watch tv. I try to at least watch TV for about an hour.

Yeah. And just to calm the mind.

Just to calm the mind and then go to sleep. Do it all over again.

Yeah. No, that's great, man. And, and you know, there's, there's a, a pandemic of what we, what I think is improperly phrased as mental illness in this country right now. And what's, what's incredibly powerful is the big data is starting to show that, that things like exercise are more powerful than SSRIs, than these selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors and the actual chemicals and the synthetics and pharmaceuticals that we use to, quote, unquote, improve our mental health. 28 or 38 reduction in all cause mortality by, you know, exercising on a right regular basis. 28 reduction in cardiovascular risk. But talk a little bit about what, what is your routine do for your mental health?

It makes all the difference in the world. That's why I try to do it in the morning and get it out of the way. Because again, any stress or any sort of issue I'm dealing with or things I'm juggling or worried about, schedule and all that helps me kind of clear my head. And I have to focus on whatever it is I'm doing. And in the activities that I'm doing, I'm either gonna get choked out or knocked out. So I gotta really get, There's a.

Real physical risk there.

Yeah. So I gotta really focus and allows me to kind of escape. And then after that, that after you've been choked out your days. Nothing, nothing's gonna get harder than that.

Yeah.

You know what I mean?

So you're a purple belt, Right?

A purple belt, one strap away from a brown. And I always tell them I want to take the hard road. I don't want any sort of gimmes. And I'm proud to say that, you know, I feel pretty confident that they've been hard on me and, you know, I've earned it.

Yeah.

So. But it does helps me with anything that I don't really get bothered by anything after that.

You know, I, I, I'm a huge fan of Jiu Jitsu. I don't practice it myself, but I, I work with a lot of fighters and I find some of the most composed people that I've ever met are people that regularly and intensely either practice yoga or Jiu jitsu. And I think it's going back to that, you know, being calm under stress. Right. Think under stress.

Right.

Because exactly. There is always in your mind that you could get hurt.

You're exactly. You have to be comfortable being uncomfortable.

Yes. And I think that is such a metaphor for life, you know, like when you're holding certain really intense yoga poses and, and you're Trying to just focus on your breath when your thighs feel like they're going to peel off the bone. And for.

And for you, that's a serious yoga class you got.

Yeah, dude. You ever do a candlestick pose and try to hold that while you're breathing? Yeah. Stick with the little.

I haven't had this next level.

You don't have a good yoga. You know, you walk in and I'm like, all these chicks are in the candle pose, and I'm like, you guys look actually comfortable in this thing. And I squat down, and then I'm.

Like, yeah, you're intense. Like me. You go all the way.

I go. I. I do. I go all the way, man. Nothing makes me sweat like. Like yoga does. But I'm just such a fan of. Of. Of jiu jitsu and the martial arts, because I think people think of it as just teaching you to be violent, but it actually teaches you the polar opposite. Exactly. You know, And I remember seeing an interview with Dana White one time. I forget. Forget who he's being interviewed by, but he's. They said, if you could just pick one word on what makes the difference between a good fighter and a great fighter, what would it be? And he said, composure. And that's exactly what you're getting out of the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.

Absolutely.

Is learning to be composed.

You're exactly right. And I think it complements every aspect of my life. When I have to give a speech, if I'm hosting something, if I don't get nervous, like, I just. Just. Well, maybe I've been doing this a long time, too, but at the same time, I think that does help.

Being.

Growing up wrestling, boxing and doing jiu jitsu and all that. I think it does. You're. It doesn't.

Those.

That atmosphere and being in those sort of. You're completely vulnerable there. Right. In the sense that there's no team. It's all you. You have to rely on yourself, and you got to figure it out. And I think once you start getting comfortable and being able to do that, the rest of life is sort of easy. In what. In what's thrown at you. So I don't really get too excited about too many things. I go, I. I'm in. My attitude's like, I'll figure it out.

Yeah, no, that's great, man. I mean, where do you find, like, the daily motivation to keep doing it? Because I think that so many people with careers that are maybe not as demanding as yours will gravitate towards their career, and they. And they don't take that time for self care. I mean, and just talk about, like, what motivates you to do it every single day.

Well, I make it a priority. And like, I. I think I started off our discussion, you got to make health your top priority. And I stress that with. With people that I care about. My family, my mom and dad, you know, and as hard as, like, my old man is who drinks and smokes every day. You know what I mean? I know I'm not going to change this. We butted head so many times. I know I'm not going to change who he is, but I'm like, dad, can you at least. Let's do it. Let's be a little physical. Pardon me. As far as exercise, because he's very physical. He's always working. He's always doing something. We couldn't just hang out at my house and watch tv. If I did for a little bit, then I wasn't allowed to do it the next day because he would put me to work. He would just.

Sounds like my dad, Captain John Brecker.

Yeah, you can't. You just. He did not like laziness. He just. Just didn't want to see anybody just sort of hang out. But my point is, I make it a priority. Those that I care about, I always stress and tell them, you got to get your body moving. A body in action or in motion stays in motion. And more mentally, what it helps me. Like when we talked about how it helps me just kind of mentally and with stress and what have you, I feel it's been a big advantage and now it's addicting in how you've just. You just feel good. And, you know, as I get older, I'm even. And I made it even more of a priority. That's why I was lucky enough to hook up with you and. And to get educated on all these. I mean, obviously I'm learning so much, but. But it's sort of never ending because as you get older, your body's changing, you're evolving. You've got to adapt with it.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I. You know, you and I have had an amazing journey with the gene test. We did some blood work. You know, it was really cool was how. How really you have this childlike fascination with it, which I. I have the same with, you know, modern medicine and science. And I have this very childlike, you know what?

I'm gonna go.

Curiosity.

Do you know what I'm doing?

You want me to tell you?

Because I know that was your deal for A while. I've been meaning to ask you. I'm like, I wonder if Bracket knows what I'm gonna die.

You know, that's got so out of hand. Because I want to know, by the way.

Don't tell me.

No, Well, I wrote. I wrote it right here.

And is it true? Is it true that we can now if we take care of ourselves? If I'm taking this, like, for example, this Gary Bricker root. Can a person really live comfortably to like, 110, 115, 120 to 140? Come on.

Yes. Come on.

Are you ser.

80 is about to be the new 40? I'm not kidding.

How good is that? Isn't that awesome?

Is the best news ever is going to be the new 40. And I sincerely mean that if you are alive in five years from today.

Yeah.

It will be your choice whether you decide to live to 120 or 140 years old. The data is there. Absolutely.

Wow.

We understand cellular human biology and the communities in the ecosystem of the human body better today than we ever have in modern history. The challenges that, that, you know, the modern medicine and, and the regulatory environment can't keep up. I mean, we have the convergence for the first time, big data, artificial intelligence and, and early detection. And so we can take trillions of independent variables and create an actionable result. That's what we did with your gene test. When you did that cheek swab, it wasn't like, you know, two or three variables that went into deciding how you were going to supplement. It was trillions of variables because of the infinite possibility of combinations.

Right.

Of your means. And now we know how to supplement for deficiency, not just the sake of supplementing. And a lot of this has to do with us just getting back to the basics. You know, this. So we were talking before the podcast. This is my third city in three days. So I woke up day before yesterday in Las Vegas, you know, after the fights, UFC 306. And then I. I woke up, I went to bed in New York. Then I had a day of meeting. I was only on the ground for 21 hours in New York.

New York.

And then I woke up in New York City and went to bed last night in LA and woke up this morning in la. And here. Here we are.

Look at that. And your energy through the roof still, dude.

Through the roof. Like, I'm having a hard time sitting here.

Really.

I really am. And I mean, part of it is like I'm just, again, I have this like, childlike fashion. I really feel like I live somebody else's life, but is. I just am so enthralled with what I do. And yeah, to meet great people like you and do these podcasts and talk about what I love. But the truth is that, you know, we know now so much about cellular physiology and human biology that within the next five years, it will be our choice whether or not we want to live to age 120 or 140 or we want to take the opposite route. Wow.

No, I want to go 140.

I do too, brother.

Wow, that's crazy.

50 years.

I'm not a middle aged guy then if I'm gonna go by that, by. No, no, no.

You're young. You look 25. Yeah. Yeah, you are. You are a baby. I know you never get tired of hearing.

I love this 140 day. Cut myself short.

120 to 140, easy. You know, it's. It's because, you know, we have, we've always focused in, in my opinion, on the macros. You know, how do we look, how do we feel? But we never really, you know, the, the. The good anti aging science, you know, is. Is not only inside the cell, it's gone through the cell into the mitochondria. And we realize that mito, that aging is a mitochondrial disease is a shift in the metabolism of the mitochondria. And to the extent that we can stop this or slow it down or prolong its decline, you are extending life. Hey, guys, I want to talk to you about something that could truly change your health. Your gut. The gut is the foundation of your overall well being, impacting your energy, mental clarity, immune system, and even your mood. If you've been dealing with issues, gas, bloating, diarrhea, constipation, irritability, fatigue, brain fog, then there's chances that your gut is out of balance. That's why I created the ultimate Gut Reset Challenge, a simple but powerful three day live program designed to reset and rebuild your gut health. We start on October 28th, and over the three days, you'll experience a complete gut transformation. Each day focuses on a different aspect of gut health. You'll get daily meal plans, expert tips, and access to a private community where I'll guide you every single step of the way. Plus, we've partnered with top health brands like Body Health, Baja Gold, Soul Salt, and Echo Hydrogen Water to provide the best tools for your gut journey. So if you're ready to take control of your gut health and feel your best, sign up today with the link below. And don't miss this chance to reset, rebuild and restore your gut. Join me in the gut reset challenge and transform your health from the inside out. Now let's get back to the ultimate human podcast.

Going back to exercising, being healthy for your, your mental health, your well being. I would imagine that then stress and anxiety does take a lot of toll, is a toll, and can or age you become debilitating at some point. Is that true?

You know, there, there are stresses that are good for the body. You know, not all stress is bad. Oh, no question. You know, I think, I think we take a very myopic view of stress. I mean, if you think about certain stresses and how the body responds. So there's a, there's a response in the body called hormesis, right, where, where a hormetic stress, where you stress the body and it strengthens in response. If you don't load a bone, it doesn't strengthen. If you don't tear a muscle, it doesn't grow. If you don't challenge the immune system, it weakens. Right. Coming out of the pandemic, you saw the effects of the global weakening of the immune system. I don't care what side of the aisle you're on. The worst thing that we ever did for humanity, social distancing, residential quarantining and masking, there is no question. And the reason for that is that we actually took human beings out of contact with other human beings. We didn't come in contact with the normal pathogens and, and things that actually cause our immune system to fight and to strengthen.

That used to be the approach before. I don't know why it changed or why did it.

I, you know, I don't want to get into, like, sinister motives for it, but, you know, the truth is, I think most people right now are of the mindset that maybe the governmental elites don't necessarily have our best interests at heart. Not that they have a sinister interest or a sinister outcome for us, but maybe they don't have our best interests at heart. There's a lot going on behind the scenes that influences public policy, things like that. And so what we should do are things like what you're doing. Just take health into our own hands. I mean, you know, people ask, you know, how do you wake up with so much energy every day? Well, I do the same routine every day, every day. If you look at my Instagram this morning, you know, I took all the kids, everybody that's off camera back here, my son, my daughter, my cameraman, my wife, and, and we have this Airbnb in la, it was a big patch of grass outside. So we went outside barefoot, sat on the grass around. We did a round of family breath work. We. We actually let the sun hit our skin, gazed in the direction of the sun.

Love that.

Hydrated, took some amino acids, took some mineral salts, mineralized the body. We feel freaking amazing.

You feel great. You're exactly right. I've done that as well. When you've told me. And it's such an easy thing. Inexpensive. Obviously, he's got to go outside, find a patch of grass, and you do.

You feel.

You feel so much better in the sun. I know it gets a bad raps beautiful backyard yards.

Oh, thank you.

Thank you.

It's not done.

I wait till it's done. But yeah, the sun kind of gets a bad rap in the sense that there does have some benefits. Like you said, I do feel better when I'm. I know what the people are saying with the skun skin cancer and this and that, but do it just like anything. Not as long as it's not too much.

Look at the trajectory of skin cancer. You know, we had the highest rise in. In skin cancers after the advent of. Of sunscreens. Really. No question. I mean, if you look at the number of the rate or the incidence of skin cancer, and you were to chart that year over year, starting, let's say, in the mid to late, and you were to see this parabolic rise in skin cancer, and it's concomitant with the launch of sunscreens. And so. So you would think if. If sunscreens are preventing sun damage, we would have a reduction in skin cancer, but we haven't. There's significantly more skin cancer now than there was even in the 40s before we had sunscreen.

That's why.

And I think, you know, the truth is most of us are not getting enough sun. It's not that we're getting too much sun. I think there were 23 brands of sunscreen since 2018, or, sorry, since 2008 that have been pulled from the market for directly causing skin cancer. Wow. Sunscreen. Right.

Wow.

I mean, especially the aerosol versions. So every time we try to step in the way of mother nature.

So I should avoid the airsoft versions just as a general.

Yeah.

Okay.

I mean, I mean, unless you're spending a prolonged amount of time in the.

Sun when you're at the beach and what have you. But no, not really. But okay.

I mean, deep tallow and beef tallow and zinc. Probably the best sunscreen that you can use. Okay. Ispf no, no, no, no. Damaging forever chemicals and, and you know, hormone disruptors in, in, in these natural compounds. Lots of sunscreens are made naturally. My, my favorite is the combination of beef tallow and zinc because those not only leave your skin not feeling oily, but you know, they block the scone and they, they do a lot for you, but you're, you're all of complex, man. You're, you're meant to have sun. In fact, the, about half the population is clinically deficient in vitamin D3. The darker your, your pigment of your skin, the more deficient you likely are. This is why, you know, when, when the pandemic happened, they go, well, it disproportionately affected minorities. Well that was true, but it had nothing to do with the fact that they were minority. It had to do with the pigment of the skin. Right. So, so African American, Latino, dark complected populations have lower levels of vitamin D3 and that's what we need to build an immune system. Right. Second leading cause of morbidity and Covid was cause clinical deficiency and vitamin D3. You know, and that's, and, and, and this is why I wanted to get the message from you is yeah, you know, because you're, you're living a fast paced life. You're in the public eye. You, you don't control a lot of your schedule. I mean you have times and places that you have to be. You, you, you have a career, you have contracts, you have responsibilities that you don't get to just shift around. You can't just call Access and say I'm not feeling it today, you know, I'm not showing up. You, you have to produce. And so, so you know, the point that I wanted to drill into with you because you look great, you're in great physical condition, you're still dominating your career. I know that you still have aspirations for your career. I want to talk about some of those. But it's because you've made health and wellness a foundation of, of this journey. And, and I deeply respect you for that.

Thank you. I appreciate it.

You know, to that point, you know, what is on the horizon for Mario Lopez? I mean, well, I, I, you know.

Acting, dancing, I mean, kind of all the above. I feel very blessed to be as busy as I am, especially at this stage in my life. And I don't take any of it for granted. I love doing my radio show. I love, I love doing Access daily, Access Hollywood. I love being able to do a holiday movie a year, sometimes one more.

You got A holiday movie coming up.

This year I do with my new relationship with the Great American Family, which will simultaneously be played on Hulu. My grown up Christmas wish. And my wife's in it, my son's in it. So it's a very awesome family affair. A bit of a musical. We're singing and dancing in it and shot it outside of Chicago and happy with the way it turned out.

It's done.

It's done. It's done. It'll be airing the first weekend after Thanksgiving.

And is it a feel good?

Oh, yeah. Holiday Feel good? Romantic. Yeah, Romantic and. Yeah. And like I said, it's got musical elements so that, you know, so that's a lot of fun.

Fun.

So you know me, I like keeping busy.

Yeah. What's your preference though? I mean, you, you do like the Access Hollywood segments. You do a radio show, you do movies. You know what, where do you find the most joy in that giant sphere of, let's put it just under the sphere of acting.

Well, I, I love the entertainment business as a whole. I, I really do. I'm a fan first and I think like that helps when I'm interviewing and hosting because I do, I love tv, I love movies, I love music. And I think. And I'm just fascinated by it and I like being around these incredibly talented people. I love learning about them. I love, I love hearing there's backstories and I'm just kind of genuinely inquisitive person. I always want to hear, well, how'd you get here? What was your route? I want to hear your journey. And so, and I, I get fascinated by that and that. I haven't, I haven't lost that. That's, I've been, I'm doing it like now 15 years. The show in the radio show. I think it's like 10, maybe 12. 12 years. So. Yeah, so 12 years. So.

And Voice of God just came in. Yeah. Yeah.

Our producers here. And. And I still have a great time.

Yeah.

And I love it. And I still have a great time and I look forward to talking to the, the guests and, and I genuinely enjoy what I do and I don't want to stop doing it. I'll do it as long as I can do it. So I continue to want to do that. I would love to. As far as on the horizon and goals, I want more things. I've got some really cool docs coming up.

So going behind the camera.

Behind the camera.

Creating the content.

There you go. And creating some more content. So I think that if anything I'd probably start focusing a little bit more on that. And then, you know, you get to the point where kids start getting a little older, you got to start figuring out what they're going to do and probably be hitting you up for advice on that. But, but, yeah, so, but I don't take it for granted and I know that everything's just sort of a temp job and it can be gone like that. And so, so I try to attack it every day with, you know, some.

You know, I've been, I've been so blessed with just really, really great kids. And it's, you know, I, I, I think it'd be fair to say that I'm inspiring to them, but they're actually more inspiring to me than, than, than I am to them.

Yeah, they, they, they create incentive and motivation.

Exactly. They create motivation. Like watching them pursue any kind of dream or have any kind of success is like, you know, multiples more of an impact on me than any, you know, the milestones that I set for myself. So. I agree. It's really, it's really interesting, you to live through their eyes. I mean, you get to act in a movie with your son. That's got to be a, an absolute milestone.

Oh, yeah, yeah. With, with him, my wife, and the last movie I had my daughter. And so those are just like kind of priceless moments that, Are they giving.

You crap off set, though? Like.

No, because if they didn't, what am.

I giving the kids?

Are the kids, they look, did they.

Take direction from you or.

No, they're pretty, you know, they're pretty. I make sure they're dialed in. They're well prepared. They know it's not like some game that we're playing. And, and they've made me proud so far.

So. For you, because you, you've been in this entertainment business for so long, you've seen good actors, average actors, great actors. What makes the difference in your opinion between a good actor and a great actor? And I'll give you a little preference. You know, I, I have a very well known, very, very famous, you know, dj, DJ friend of mine. And, and I asked him one day, I was like, what, what makes the difference between a good DJ and a great dj? And, and he gave a one word answer that I thought was really profound. He said, the transition, right? The transition between songs like, you should never feel this. You should never feel an abrupt stop start, stop start. Because, you know, it's a good dj, takes up the crowd journey.

I agree.

That reads the crowd, knows when to stand on them knows when to back off him. And he went down this whole cycle of how he, he's, it was Steve Aoki but how he really.

Oh, he's been here.

Yeah, he's, yeah, he's, he's, he's amazing. Yeah. Great guy. A great human. Talk about somebody who's on a wellness journey too. I mean the guy doesn't drink, doesn't have any extra. He likes to what he does like to throw cake. And I'm like is that a sugar free cake? Right. But what in your opinion as you observe this industry and you see greatness. Right? Because I think there's a large pool of good actors.

Right.

But then you have these iconic great entertainers. Some of them have been on top of their game for decades.

I will, I'll say this because a lot of them, most of them are really, really talented. It's either God given or they put in a lot of work. But I think the ones that stick around that are here for decades and that have been mega stars, I really feel it's, they're nice people and they know how to communicate and they get the game. Either they're really good act where they're acting outside of the script and but they know how to treat people. They know how to communicate. They know how to sort of galvanize and make everyone sort of kind of feel good about them. And I think that goes a long way. It seems like the, the people that I've interviewed, the, the Tom Cruises, the Jamie Foxx, the Gabriel, sure. The cab of the world, these are guys that, they're nice guys. It seems like the bigger the star, they're nice. They're, they're, they're good people and they get it and they don't. I, I feel at least they don't necessarily take it for granted and, and they're, they're there. I think they've, they've been blessed for a reason. So it's the ones that maybe you have those middle, those, those, those reality stars that are trying to, you know, that they're kind of, then those kind, you know, you can see kind of the attitudes. I see many an actor come and go in their windows.

That's what I mean, be short.

But I feel like the ones, they're actually nice people and I think good things do happen. Good people.

So, so if you, if you were going to give advice to a young, aspiring upand cominging actor about how, how do I have a career that stands the test of time in Hollywood? Because Hollywood is a nasty place. I mean, it's a tough place.

Absolutely. I think nasty was right the first time. It really is. It's cutthroat. And look, this is the. I would, I'll say this, this is the best time ever in the, in the history of television cinema ever. Just in life that one can get into the entertainment industry. Why? Because now you can create your own platforms, create your own content, get your own buzz and you have control of something. Before growing, they didn't have. There was no Internet, There was no YouTube, there was no any sort of.

Social media or nothing.

Now I just rather doing like four or five pilots. You know these television shows you test to see if they're going to become TV series off of someone's social media account because they were witty, they were telling personal stories, they created this content where it created buzz and attention. So now you're sort of in control of your own destiny if you want it to be as much energy and work as you want to put into it. Where that wasn't the case before. If I grew up right now I'd be hustle. I'd be one of those YouTube kids with like hustling with like these million. I would have been. I'd be damned if I didn't have like millions of followers. So I don't know what I'd be, you know what I mean? But I'd be probably, I don't know what it would be like. I see my kids watch these like kids open toys and play. It's like nonsense that there's like. I know I'm a lot more personable than that. Yeah. Because I'd figure out whatever was resonating out there and I'd start to hit it hard. But right now, especially if you're a young person, there's no better time than to get into this business. If you really want to and you really want to bust your ass like a little savage, then create your own content, be consistent with it, be disciplined. And that's all, that's all you need. You can use auditions over zoom now. You know, my mom used to drive me two and a half, three hours every day or every other day, whatever, when I would have auditions for five minute auditions and then drive me right back down to San Diego. Now you could do like five or six a day in a zoom. Yeah, that wasn't the case. So now it's better than ever to get in there as far as opportunity, as far as you, you, you making something for yourself and not having any sort of excuse.

Yeah, that's so awesome. I know a lot of people are worried about AI and the AI impact on, on the industry, and I see both sides of the coin, but it's not going to be a big deal or it's actually gonna, you know, eliminate all of acting and they're just going to produce, you know, movies on AI and people won't even be behind a camera anymore. What's your thought on.

I, I too see both sides of, of that equation. I think we're long ways away scary.

Coming at the same time, right?

It is, it is, it's, it's, it's, it's exciting and scary, but I think we're a long way away from replacing actors.

I think so too. I, I don't think you ever.

Yeah. Emotion component in that human component I think are irreplaceable. But that's again, not so our take right now. But I still think it's going to take a minute before we get even.

So what would be your takeaway health advice to people that have busy schedule. Schedule that have kids that are, you know, that have careers and a marriage and a schedule that they've got to keep up? What would be your takeaway health advice? What would, what would you want them to know?

Stop making excuses. Everyone's busy. Everyone's got a lot on their plate. Everyone says, I don't have time.

Yeah.

And so they try to justify it that way. You got to make the time. You make a priority. You make it a priority, you'll make the time. Just like when you're in love, you'll make the time to meet that girl.

Yeah.

Nothing's going to get in your way. You're going to find that time. You're going to make that time. Well, that's how you got to look at it. You've got to make that time. Whether that's shaving an hour off of your sleep, maybe not going out that night as late as you wanted to, but you really have to look at it as part of your everyday routine and start being consistent with it. And it's all about discipline. At the end of the day, life is about discipline and the choices you make. And I think the best choice that an individual can make, make for themselves is making their health a top priority. So quit making excuses and just do it. To paraphrase Nike, I love that man.

You know, I, I wind down every, every one of my podcasts by asking all my guests the same question. So there's no right or wrong answer to this question. And as what is what does it mean to you to be an ultimate human?

What's it mean to me to be the ultimate human?

What does it mean to you to be an ultimate human?

Well, well, I think try to be the best version of yourself and grow in the right direction every day, physically, spiritually, emotionally. And being a human means we're going to make mistakes. But as long as you learn from those mistakes and keep moving forward, not veer off track, I think you'll be the best human you could be. Hence, ultimate human.

Yeah. Love it, brother. Man, I, I, I love chopping it up with you. I'm excited.

I can talk to you like I talk to you all day. I can't believe. All I know is I.

We are going to do a podcast in 50 years, guys. So stay tuned.

That's right.

Yeah. Right here in this studio. That's right. 50 years from. From today, 2075.

Oh, my God, you're good at math.

We'll be back for the follow up episode. I love you, brother. Had a great journey with you, man. I'm looking forward to be on the show this afternoon. And as always, guys, that's just science.