Clean Anti-Aging with Brian Vaszily

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Hey, this is JJ Virgin. Welcome and thanks so much for joining me. This is Ask the Health Expert. Here I put the power of health in your hands and give you access to the top people, people in health and wellness. In each episode I share safe ways to get healthy, lose weight, heal your gut, detox, and lots more. So if you want to get healthy and get off the dieting for life merry go round, I'll give you strategies that will help you look and feel better fast. Welcome to Ask the Health Expert. Now we talk about a lot, lot of stuff on this podcast. We talk about how to heal your metabolism, how to be able to build muscle and burn fat, how to look and feel younger, longer. And that's what we're going to be digging into today. How to look and feel younger, longer. And I'm going to tell you that this interview kind of blew up one of my limiting beliefs. And it started a while ago when I met Dr. Brian Vastly Vasely. He's taught me how to say his name and I'm just going to call him Dr. Brian V. He surprised me with some organic products and I was like, wow, this kind of blew my mind of really being able to have organic products that also give you anti aging benefits. And so we're going to unpack today why you need to really pay attention to what you put on your face. I was actually doing an interview with him for my what to Eat, Eat, when to Eat and why summit. And he said something so provocative. I was like, all right, I got to get you on the podcast. He said, you know, we would never take some of the things we put on our skin and say rub them on our kidneys, you know, or our heart. They wouldn't do open heart surgery and do this. And yet we're like slathering the sun. I went, oh, huh, Your skin's a sieve. So you know, we talk a lot about toxicity and how to detox and what to worry about with your friends food, but I'm going to dig into much more about what you do want in your skin care. Products and why some of these natural organic and I'm going to stress organic ingredients can be incredible anti aging.

Products.

And then what you don't want. So that's we're going to dig into. I've got Brian with me. He's a prominent natural health leader, a researcher and advocate. He's been in this world for 20 plus years. He created a the Art of Anti Aging.com that's got over 400,000 members. Holy smokes. To help people empower them in the 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s and beyond with the most effective evidence based natural solutions to look and feel their best, avoid and overcome disease and live long. So he has created a lot of these health and longevity summits like the one that I just did. He's created a bunch of them herded by over 800,000 people. That's just crazy. He's also the past founderpuritywoods.com and that is the product line I was talking to you about that where you can get natural. No, not natural. We're going to blow up the word natural on this show too. But organic skin care, that is anti aging, that works. So we'll be talking about that as well. So lots to unpack in this interview. If you are wondering what you can do to make sure that your skin looks as good as you feel, then you're gonna want to stay tuned. And I will be right back with Dr. Brian.

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Doctor Brian Vashly. Did I do that well?

No.

Vagely Vasely.

Hey Dr. Brian V. I'm super excited to have you here. There are so many different things we could be talking about and so what I'd love to do is really hone in on anti aging great skin, how we do that. But before we go there, I'd love to just look at since you've been in the field for so long here which is a testament to you knowing anti aging and great skin. Cause you don't look like it. Oh sure. What got you, you're in health. What made you decide to really start to focus in this direction? Cause now you have purity woods. You have great skinc. Like why this?

Yeah. Thanks again for the kind words about the skin and kudos back to you on that front by the way. You also have great skin so been.

Using your purity woods. So there.

Hey thanks. None of that was planned anyone. I mean that's awesome that you are. Appreciate that. So you know that's, that's a long story but I'm going to make it short. So I've been in health and wellness, natural health, heavy duty focus for geez over 20 some years now. And I came to a crossroads five or six years back where I could have taken any path. So you can kind of cut my life. I'm 52 and you could cut it down the middle sort of. First half of my life was pretty darn rough when I was very young. I grew up in inner City Chicago. 20 some years there where you know, I had friends. I lost friends to gangs, things like that. Also even more challenging I guess we'll call it at a very young age. My dad was a good man until around my age of nine he became severely alcoholic, abusive to me, abusive to my sister and my mother. His life read like a novel that no one would believe. He was a spy in World War II. He lost his first wife. Sorry, no, he didn't get married. So he was a spy in World War II, he fell in love with this woman, found out she was a Russian sp, and one day, you know, they were going to get married after the war, and then she was disappeared. And then his life after that seemed to be one tragic event after another, as well as some good stuff in there. So don't get me wrong, but back in those days, JJ People did not deal with a lot of internal strife by seeking therapy. You know, it was considered for crazy people. So he took it out on the bottle, he took it out on us. So I went through a lot of strife as a very young age, became a very young father, married, you know, to my first wife, very young age, was dirt poor, living in studio apartment. I would routinely. We were on a pair of twin mattresses on the floor, me and my wife and my. And my baby. And we were visited at night by mice, routinely. Rough times. I was really quite down and depressed in those years. And long story short, what saved me was powerful women. You know, my mother, my sister, certain teachers who are all women, really held me up and frankly, honestly kept me alive in some situations. And there's a lot of story that I didn't just share behind all that. The point is that strong women have been central to my life. So then, fast forward. Now I'm in the world of health and wellness and at a crossroads a few years back, like I said, where I could have taken many directions. And I have been working with so many and helping so many wonderful doctors and researchers in integrative health and natural health behind the scenes, sometimes in front of the camera, and learned so much. And I saw this oppressive myth really impacting people in general as they hit their 40s, 50s, 60s, but especially women. And that myth is that getting older, hitting your 40s equals being over the hill, and getting older equals becoming undesirable, incapable, doomed to suffering and disease. And I saw it impacting even these powerful women who literally saved my life. And I'm like, that does not jive at all with what I know, what I've learned, what folks like you and many others have been sharing over the years, which is that these ought to be the best years of life, 40s, 50s, 60s, and beyond. And they can be, and they should be, really, in all regards. And so I'm like, you know what? I know what I need to do. I need to share this message as much as possible with people, with those in their middle years and golden years, so to speak, and give them insight and guidance and research, basically, on how to achieve that. And why this way of thinking is so counter to the reality that these ought to be your best years, not over the hill years, you know. So with that, you know, I launched the Art of Anti Aging which, you know, we now have four or five hundred thousand, you know, subscribers over there. And that's all information based over there. And then I kind of stumbled, you know, in a way into Purity Woods. In the skin care, I was the first customer, my wife as well. And a real brief version on that. I had all this knowledge about, you know, which I'd love to share today if you want me to, you know, the best things to feed your body, to feed your skin and oh yes.

We definitely want that, Brian.

Yeah, and I'm going to go there. And also the worst things that you want to keep out as well. I had all that knowledge in my head and then I started noticing the mirror, some crow's feet around my eyes. So I went looking, I'm like, okay, you know, I know a lot and I'm going to go find a product that has at least many of the good ingredients and none of the bad stuff. And I couldn't find it is the real short version. So the even shorter version is I'm like, well, I'm going to, you know, work with some formulators which I did, you know, and have it created. So that's, you know, the signature product, I guess. Our first product, which is our bestseller today is called the Age Defying Dream Cream. And it contains all of these, you know, wonderful powerful ingredients and it's USDA certified organic. So it contains none of the junk you don't want to feed your body.

Which is really hard to find in skincare.

Oh my God, it's hard work. I mean, you know, we only, I make no claim that we have a vast line of dozens or hundreds of products. We literally have five or six now in our lineup because it's really hard. But I promise you that the products we have in our lineup work incredibly well. But you're right, it is painstaking to make products for the skin, especially toward anti aging, that are USDA certified organic. But testament your face, look at her everyone. It's doable. And we did it with that product and our serum and everything else. So that's kind of the story, I guess I gave you the mid length version, but that's how I came to be in this spot, I guess.

Well, you threw this provocative thing out there and I think it's important for people to hear because we don't hear this enough that Our skin's a sieve. And someone said this to me the other day, maybe you said it. I think you said it when we were doing the what to Eat interview. Were you the one that said, you know, we put stuff on our face, that if you were putting it on your heart or your kidneys or your liver, you'd never do that. And yet you're slathering it on your face. And I go, that is the best description of it. Your skin's a sieve. So you said, hey, I'm gonna tell you what not to eat, but also not what to put on your face and what to eat, what to put on your face. And I think we have to see them as, as the same. Like if you wouldn't eat it, don't go shoving it on your face. So what, what are the key things that we should be looking at in terms of what we should be putting both on and in our body for the best skin to slow that aging process, to, to stay younger, longer?

Yeah, yeah, I was, I'm glad you remembered that. Yeah, we were talking about that before. And again, let me repeat that because, you know, there's really, I mean, health, if it really boiled down to, you know, I had 10 seconds, it's all about what you allow in and what you keep out of your body. And there's multiple ways into your body. Remember those ways? That's all nourishment or the lack of nourishment that you're feeding. So whether you're putting it in your mouth, on your skin, breathing it in through your lungs, or taking it in through your brain, you know, these myths and these truths out there, you know, that can bring us down or put us up, that's all different forms of nourishment. But literally what you put on your skin is literally a form of nourishment. You know, if the molecules are small enough, they penetrate the skin and in these products that are out there. And again now I'm going to expand that a little bit. Any personal care product, this counts, this matters. Be super hyper conscious of what you are allowing on your skin because the vast majority of those ingredients are going into your body. And when it comes to moisturizers and anti aging creams, they are designed to go into your body. And then there's some horrible ingredients that, that are called, you know, a lot of them are synthetic, called penetrators that pull these ingredients deeper into your body. So we could talk about the toxins you want to keep out. We could talk about the good Stuff you want to feed your skin, therefore your body that actually helps your skin. Now, so which, which way do you want me to go here?

Because we gotta do both. Let's so pick one to start with, then we'll do the other one. We, obviously we need both. Brian, I want it all.

You got it. Yeah. You deserve it all. So here we go. The ones to keep out are incredibly long lists that none of us, including me and I geek out on this will ever remember. Let me give a statistic and then I'll give you some valuable tips on what to look for. So in the European Union, in about 40 countries actually, there are over 1,300 different chemicals that have been banned from cosmetics because they are toxic, potentially toxic. That means they're carcinogenic or potentially carcinogenic. Endocrine disruptors, that is hormone disruptors, allergens, you know, and other issues. 1300 elsewhere. If you're listening to this here in the United States, take note, only 11 ingredients have been banned here in the United States.

Only 11.

It's so, it's like, it's like that in our food, it's like that in our wine. What the heck?

It's a powerful crazy. You know when they say how much is the beauty care industry worth, they'll throw around a figure often here, about $500 billion. But it does not include the chemical industry. If you throw in the chemical industry, feeding them all the ingredients and there are thousands that they use, I mean it's got to be, you know, well over a trillion dollar industry because of all these chemicals. So I will also say state this to everyone listening. Still. Today, most cosmetics, including your anti aging creams, your deodorants, anything, personal care products, most you want to try to avoid and make more conscious decisions. If we're having this interview five years from now, at that point, I'm hopeful that I'll say many and not most. But today, when you are pushing your grocery cart down a cosmetic and personal care products aisle, I want people, if they remember nothing else to remember. That is a food aisle, you are pushing it down. And most of those products that if you put them on your skin, they're going to feed your body toxins. Now another statistic to get more specific. In the US the average woman uses 12 different personal care products daily, of which they contain an average of 168 different chemicals. That's the average woman. It matters. It matters. And I will say this, these companies are well aware that some of these thousand plus ingredients that ought not to be in these products. And there's probably more like 3,000 that shouldn't be. And in the European Union, you know, a lot around the docket to examine. But, you know, of these thousands that ought not to be in their, their claim is, yes, we know they're potentially carcinogenic.

Potentially, yeah.

Or indeed carcinogenic. I mean, there's formaldehyde in so many products. That's. Everyone knows it's carcinogenic anyway. But, but their statement on that is, hey, sure, we might know that. But it's in such minute quantities.

No worries.

We, you know, we did experiments on rats and we fed them this once and it was a very mild, if at all, any effect. Don't worry, it's negligible. Great. And if I use deodorant one day of my life only I would buy that. I'd be like, cool, okay. But the problem is that again, 12 personal care products daily, day after day, year after year, decade after decade, this stuff adds up. And when it penetrates, all these chemicals penetrate into our body. And of course, they're not going to put anything in these products that are trying not to, that immediately impact you because, you know, you're going to be able to trace it back to them. But it's like death by a thousand cuts. Jj, you know, and when you add up the fact that. Let's go back to high school chemistry, what happens when you mix one chemical with one chemical? You get a different chemical. Right. And the 168 daily nobody studies, nobody's required to study the impact of these different chemicals together. When you add these synthetic chemicals together, right.

And that's just the, that's just. Then you add in like you put artificial sweeteners and colorings in your food and you did like, you know, you just start. And then there's the cleaning products and then there's the dry cleaning fluid that's in the air. And I like, you know, add it up.

It's ridiculous. And what's going on inside our bodies that you're so right.

And you know, and what's going on inside just, just because it's like you could hear this and go, eh, okay. But the reality is, I always like to say our body's not a bank account, it's a chemistry lab. But it's not just a chemistry lab, it's a history book. And if you are not actively getting this stuff out, which I don't know how you could get all the stuff you're bombarded with out. Like, you'd have to, I Guess live in an infrared sauna, right? You know, so what is this doing to someone's body? Because they're sitting here doing this because they want to look better, right? They want to look healthy. What's it actually doing to them?

You want to smell good, you want to look good. You know, whatever the reasons that you don't want to smell bad, whatever the reasons are that you're throwing chemicals on your, on your skin, it's so what? You know, direct carcinogens are one category, hidden carcinogens another. It's in the name carcinogens, cancer causers. In other words, what these vast array of chemicals that people are feeding their bodies are doing is destroying our health at a cellular level. I mean, let's, let's start there and take it out. You know, there's hormone disruptors and the carcinogens are probably the two most concerning categories of ingredients. And, you know, we can go, we can go again. Boy, people ask me all the time, what are the worst ingredients? I'm like, when there's 1,300 to watch out for, it's going to be kind of hard to tell you that. But I can tell you some of the more common ones. Formaldehyde, I mentioned it's used as a preservative in cosmetics. And it's a known carcinogen that's also linked to neurotoxicity. In other words, it's screwing with your brain. If you want to have a clear brain late into life, it's never too late. Right now is the time to reduce as much as possible these toxins in your cosmetics. And as you noted in your foods and elsewhere, Phthalates folks might have heard of that one. It's like a plasticizer in these products used to, you know, for the avoiding brittleness and what have you. And it's also linked. It's a, you know, carcinogenic. And I can go on, on parabens is probably the one that most people have heard of. But, you know, they, they.

That's probably just the tip of the iceberg, right?

Oh, yeah. Oh, my God.

That's what I mean.

There's so many of them, you know, to watch out for.

And they, well, then, are you safe? Are you safe then? Because it sounds like trying to know all of those is sort of ridiculous. Like, it sounds like the easier way to go. It's kind of like with food, hey, here's what you can do if you really want to eat healthy. The easiest thing is don't buy things in packages.

Boom, boom.

You Know, that's like step one easy. So with this, would it just be that step one is, is buy organic. Are you safe?

If you do that, you're much safer. But don't just read their labels. Meaning if I, you know, I'll say this purity wisdom if I'm proclaiming in my, you know, marketing organic and natural.

Well, natural means nothing, right? I know.

And so honestly does organic.

What matters really? It doesn't have to be certified.

That's what matters.

Okay.

That's where I'm going, is watch for independent certifications in the United States. The most prevalent one, the one that I know of that you know you can most trust is USDA certified organic. Look for that, because that is an independent certification. I can tell you as you brought up at the start, you got to go through a whole lot of very strict steps to get that certification on your product, whether it's food you're eating by mouth or products that you're feeding your skin. In other words, cosmetics. So again, look for, for the independent. What, what I'm trying to say is I. You could call something yourself. You know, you can have a product have one organic ingredient in there, JJ and 40 synthetic. And you could scream organic on the front because you got one in there that's called.

It's different than food. Like you can't do that in food, but you can do that in products.

That's.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, that's a. That's naughty.

Naughty, naughty.

Holy smokes, folks. I know that's a mom word. We are going to take a short little break. I just wanted to let everybody know before we do this and we'll be right back. Is you are going to be giving an ebook out to everyone. It's the 22 essential natural steps for your youngest looking skin. So if you're listening to this going okay, but what, what, what? You're going to get the book. All you need to do is go to jjvirgin.com youngskin and you'll get it. All right, stay with us. We'll be right back.

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Okay, so I know that was a little bit of a cliffhanger here. I honestly am still, I had to get up off the floor, so I had to take a little break because, you know, I know the food stuff. And if a food wants to be certified organic, it has to be 100% organic, right? Otherwise it has to say it's 70% organic. So in skincare, if there's one organic ingredient, it can be considered organic, or they can just put the label claim on it.

That's called greenwashing. Here's very important. A company can put one organic ingredient in a product and in its marketing, it could say organic, but that doesn't mean the whole product's organic. In order for it to be USDA certified organic, that's a whole different ballgame it has here. What we have to do is we have to certify, we have to demonstrate to the USDA that every. That the ingredients, that there's no toxic ingredients, number one, in our products, okay. That they're, in our case, they're all, you know, are all plant based ingredients. And they are, in the end, two, that even the ingredients that are included were farmed organically, I. E. Not using any pesticides and herbicides and other junk like that. So it's a strict process. And what I'm saying is look for that independent certification, USDA certified organic. Because what some of the players out there are doing, for lack of a better word, is they can say on their own, just put a big word, organic. And that means turn around and shirt. And I have one single organic ingredient in it along with 10 synthetic ingredients. In other words, don't believe the hype, don't believe the marketing on any of this. You know, with natural, all natural, wildcrafted, whatever all these phrases are.

I love the wild crafted. No, that means nothing. Wildcrafted and natural means nothing. So artisan. I love the artisan one too. So I'm gonna play devil's advocate. I'm throwing this at you. I didn't tell you I was gonna ask you this.

Oh, yeah, here we go.

Well, I love skincare and I think that I am. I think that probably most of the women listening, if you went down and looked at their, not only do I have like, you know, a ton of skincare products, I actually had a new closet built and I have all this, like, I just love stuff. But there's very few things that make it to the. I'm going to use it all the time. But I had a limiting belief prior to, to some of your stuff, that, that the stuff that was natural, that was organic, could not move the needle like some of these other things that we use. And I would love you to talk on that before we talk about like, like what you want or maybe some, on what you should be putting on your face. Because that's, that's one of the things, if you go to, to like some of the medical spas, et cetera, you're not getting organic products.

Nope, nope, nope, nope. You know, first of all, side note on that, you know, it's kind of a, you know, retinol is a superstar ingredient out there in all these spas and it's probably the superstar right now. And I would urge people, and this leads me into answering your question, I would urge people to be cautious with that because first of all, retinol is typically. First of all, it's derived from either animals or it's derived synthetically. So when they say vegan friendly, it means synthetic. And yes, retinol is like kind of like fast food, let me put it that way. It will deliver the results, but it can do some serious, you know, longer term damage, frankly. Certainly if you have sensitive skin. I mean, it promotes redness and irritation and things like that in a lot of people. And without getting too deep into the science, it kind of like rebuilds your cells on a steroid level, meaning it creates cheap cells that are not high quality cells in your body so your skin can degrade more quickly over time. That's a bit controversial. Go look it up if you don't believe me. The wonderful news is that for that and virtually any other superstar synthetic that is not natural, I guess we'll say ingredient out there. There are natural alternatives and they do work. For example, you know, instead of retinol, look for something called bakuchiol. Now are you going to remember that?

Wait a minute, slow. What?

Bakuchiol. B A K U C H I O L It comes from a plant called the Babshi B A B C H I plant which has long been revered in Ayurvedic and other traditional medicines for its skin benefits. Real studies have shown that it's just as effective. It does what retinol does without many of those, you know.

Wow.

Yeah.

All right. That's really exciting. That reminds me of bone. You know how bone remodeling, like if you, if you are doing, if you've got bone issues, you can actually like create bone problems with excess bone remodeling getting too Dense the bones that it's, it sort of feels like that when you're trying to trick mother Nature. Mother Nature goes haha, no way. Right?

Yeah. And that's exactly it. It's kind of a, you know, a bunch of cheap cells with retinol are being developed. So short term, you know, I suppose if, you know, I was going to say, I suppose if you're like 98, you know, maybe that's not going to worry you too much because you can look. But if you're in your 40s, 50s, 60s, even 70s, think twice with retinol if you don't believe me, which is true, go look up the science. But if you don't believe it, do know that it does cause redness and irritation in a lot of people. And if you have sensitive skin, be real careful. And the real biggest problem with retinol, by the way, is that there, it's, it is such a ragingly popular ingredient, J.J. that, that there's all kinds of forms of out there. And per our earlier conversation, I want everyone to remember, I've heard it said that the cosmetic and personal care products industry is the most unregulated. Now there might be positives to that for some people, but what that basically means is that, and it is, it's a wild west. And you can. The last time there was any legislation of substance passed it was 1938 and the FDA said, hey, personal care products industry and cosmetics industry self regulate, you're on your own. And nothing has changed since then. So literally you can take any amount of ingredients, throw them into something, make it a deodorant or you know, toothpaste or a anti aging cream, stick it on a shelf and sell it. No oversight whatsoever.

Oh my God.

That's how it works.

I can't believe the industry itself hasn't created some oversight.

Well, they claim to have and they, but they've demonstrated time and again with all these, you know, these, these toxic ingredients out there. It's, they're not doing a good job of it. You know, buyer beware, just buyer beware, be super cautious of what you're feeding your skin. Now on the note of, you know, yes indeed, you're again, just same way that the food you put in your mouth matter. And like you said, the closer to whole foods that you are, the further away from these packaged foods, the better it's going to be for your health. Is a very general but true statement. It's no different from the food you're putting on your skin. Mother Nature, God, whatever, you want to call it knows far better than mankind because it has eons more of experience of what it's doing now. You know, can I throw out a little theory that this is. This is not. I haven't seen research supporting this yet, but it's my own theory. We walked around for eons outside. We spent most of our lives outdoors. Today, we spend about 90% of our life indoors. But for eons, JJ, we walked around outside, and what we were doing, we were hunting, and we were gathering and wandering and brushing constantly against plants. We have an intimate relationship of plants on our skin. It's a form of nutrition going back forever as far, you know, far back as humankind goes. And again, you're talking eons of history with that. It's a form of nutrition. So if anybody believes that putting good stuff on your skin and therefore into your skin and body doesn't work, well, you're wrong. Just put it that way. There are great ingredients out there for your skin.

Well, it just makes sense. I mean, I think back to, like, how we look at nutrition and we go, all right, what did we eat 5,000, 10,000 thousand years ago? Well, that's what I was thinking. I was like, all right, what did we do back then you know, for, like, what. What were we doing for this? You. You hear about what they were using for cosmetics back then, but it's like, what were they doing for their skin? So it is. Obviously, they weren't manufacturing things in labs.

Exactly. Natural stuff. I mean, and, you know, some have stood the test of time. Again, I've been around this natural health industry is so cool. To me, two things to see. To see everything that was once called quackery, you know, so many of those things, you know, become valid. Some don't, but some do. Man, when I started in all this 20 some years ago, people thought you were crazy to suggest that, you know, Whole Foods itself was all, you know, those were. That was for the.

Oh, I know. Well, we were. We were considered to be health nuts or health freaks.

Right.

And I remember always thought about that. I go, wait a minute. Why would it be weird to be interested in your health? Like, wouldn't it be weird to not be interested in your health, to not do things like, it's just. So it definitely has come full circle. Probably because the baby boomers are all, you know, getting older.

Yeah. And they want to live and live well.

It's like, you want to look good, feel good for a long period of time. And, you know, I think it's in the, this community, we've talked a lot about toxins. We do a detox. I'm actually starting them back. I used to do them twice a year. We're going to start that back. And you know, we talk a lot about toxins and what they do with weight and hormone imbalance, but geez, you know, and, and I say, hey, make sure you're using organic products. But then it was like, all right, well, you know, I didn't really think there were great anti aging organic products out there.

So this is super duper exciting.

Yeah, awesome. And they're super duper exciting ingredients. You know, the other one I was going to mention is to see how smart these civilizations and these ancient medicine systems were because again, I, I'm a research geek. I read all these white papers and stuff that would bore the heck out of most people. And it's like, wow, you know, Amla, there's, there's one. Ama is also known as Indian gooseberry. And you know, it has been revered in different medicine systems, you know, again, Ayurvedic and others for eons. And now, you know, research comes along and you know, says, okay, maybe there's something to this. Let's study this. And they're like, holy cow. You know, Indian gooseberry is sky high in antioxidants. It's sky high specifically in vitamin C. You know, many people will be familiar, but many others. And if you're going to feed either topically, we'll call it that because again, I want people to remember when you're putting it on your skin, you are feeding it to your body. But look for products that contain Indian gooseberry to feed your skin. And also it's not so popular here as a fruit because it's not native to the United States. But products containing it or eating amla is sensational for your skin as well. Let me mention a few ingredients, but give people the real basics on the three areas of focus for grapes. Skin. One, your elastin. Two, your collagen. Three, moisture or hydration. Right. So those three areas are what you want to have in mind when you're looking for any ingredients, any real ingredients, Mother Nature's ingredients. Now in the case of those first two, elastin and collagen, I liken it to a old old time mattress where there's springs and stuff. Stuffing. And the collagen is the stuffing. You know, these are both proteins. The collagen is kind of like the stuffing. And yes, as we all know, you know, if the stuffing in your, in your Old spring mattress starts to go, it gets lumpy. In other words, you know, you'll have, you know, the look of some wrinkles and things like that. The elastin are the springs itself. And, and that's really kind of sort of in a metaphorical way the purpose that both serve in your skin and when that elastin goes, everything concaves in and that's when you get some real wrinkles and, and sagging, you know, saggy looking looking skin and such. The good news is, as I think many people are more aware of the collagen equation, lately a lot of focus has been put on that there's some great ingredients out there that help the collagen. Particularly look for vitamin C boosting and other antioxidant boosting ingredients like AMA that I mentioned, you know, is an outstanding one. Mango seed extract, super high grapefruit from South America that you can find. You'll find it in our products at Purity Woods. Camus Fruit Fruit, sky high in vitamin C, great to feed your skin. And yes, by the way, also great to eat lots of vitamin C rich fruits and veggies by mouth for your skin as well. Now on the elastin side, there is a superstar ingredient and it's something that's rather unique to Purity woods products. It's in certain products in other countries, but we're one of the few that have it here for elastin, which naturally can break down with age. And then there's other factors that can exasperate, you know, push that breakdown even faster. A lot of common lifestyle choices, you know, that elastin breaks down.

Well, like what, what bad things could people do?

Oh, yeah, the usual suspect.

Smoking.

Smoking, the toxins we've been talking about, bad diets, the usual, you know, the usual suspects. Same with the collagen for that matter. Both naturally can decline with age. The good news is you can, you can do a lot to boost that them. And then all these bad habits that so many people have, you know, pushes it even further, right?

And stress. Smoking and sugar are like three of them. Worse, worsty worse. Okay, so elastin, I'm dying to know what this thing is.

Oh, well, you know, you're using it because you're using our products. It is maple leaf extract. Specifically out of the University of Rhode island in 2018, there was a study done on red maple leaf extract. And it showed that it has over 100 unique 100 compounds, 17 of which are unique nowhere else that they've seen yet in nature that actually can Block elastase. Now I'm going to get a bit geeky, but elastase is an enzyme that breaks down the elastin in your skin. Well this blocks it like nothing else out there. So maple leaf. Now this is interesting again because I go back in time, the North American Indians, the Native American Indians revered maple trees. Not just because they were pretty, not just because they gave certain ones of sugar maple some cool syrup. But they used virtually every part of the tree for different health purposes. And it turns out they're onto something because again, maple leaf extract is outstanding for helping the elastin in your skin. So that's a couple of tips with the elastin, the collagen, hydration, moisture. A lot of people are a little bit more aware of that one than the others. But there's great ingredients, you know, out there for that. Good old maple, I'm sorry or aloe vera. It's one of nature's wonder drugs, so to speak. Does so many things and it's outstanding indeed for your skin. Some of the certain oils are outstanding. Some of the old standbys are great. Cacao seed oil, sunflower seed oil is outstanding for the moisturizing components. It. And again, let me just throw in organic is important for all of these.

You know, I could talk especially with oils. Oh my goodness.

Oh yeah. You know, sunflower smokes or it's organic, whatever you're choosing, please.

Yeah, yeah.

Well we know like we know in diet do not eat these damaged seed oils. Right. So don't put them on your face either.

Exactly. Yeah. That's where it becomes incredibly, I mean really for all of these, it's important to have truly clear, clean versions of these. Otherwise it's counter, you know, counterproductive. It's like you're trying to do something good and you're stuff feeding your body toxins. So it's super important. But yeah, those, those are a couple, you know, that come to mind ask the xanthin is. Oh let me, I can't leave at all without astaxanthin. Both taking it by mouth and also use our age defining dream cream has it in it for good reason. Astaxanthin comes from red red algae and it's the same red algae that give salmon its pink color and that give flamingos their pink color.

I didn't know gave flamingos their pink color.

Oh yeah, that's, that's one of their primary food sources.

Really important. I didn't just to know this for salmon. Just if you buy salmon and you See that? It's gray and pink. It's not really astaxanthin. They have done dyes because it's not wild. So that astaxanthin is what makes that salmon have that great. And especially what is it the Copper river salmon. That's super, super red. So you want that red color in the astaxanthin.

So. And flamingos.

That's crazy. So what does it do for us?

So, you know, I mean it does a lot for us actually. I mean beyond skin. And that's the great thing about all these ingredients I'm talking about, by the way, is that they certainly, as I've noted, help your skin, but they do so much more. So astaxanthin in general, you know, people take this and it can help with sore joints and muscles. It's a powerful anti inflammatory which is one reason it helps the skin in so much more. But it's great for your heart. It's, I think I've heard 6,000 times more potent antioxidant than anything in oranges. I mean it's sky high in antioxidants, including some unique antioxidants for skin specifically. This is why it's in our age Defying dream cream. Is that like little else out there that I've discovered or seen, it helps reverse really the look of weathered looking skin. Now what that really means is it goes to work on UV damaged skin. And this is a big deal to a lot of us who are 40s, 50s, 60s and beyond because when many of us were younger, we didn't get the message on, you know, be cautious about the sun. You need some sun, as we all know, for vitamins D. But you don't want to be outside getting over tan and burned, you know?

Right. Would we have listened anyway when we were young?

No, we wouldn't have. But we might not have put like baby oil on to make the problems.

Laid on those silver blankets.

Yeah, all that. And so a lot of people, you know, in middle age and beyond, you know, they have sun damaged skin. Astaxanthin is remarkable and unique for that. And so I really wanted to throw that one in.

Yeah, important. All right, well I want to remind everybody about the ebook too because you've just dropped a load of stuff and you can get more when you go to jjvirgin.com young skin you will get 22 tips and tricks that you can do for younger looking skin. And again, I hope that it's like gotten through you now that while you're doing all of These careful things with your food. You're doing the virgin diet, you're getting rid of the high fives, you're doing the sugar impact diet, you're bumping out the shape sugar that it also, it's equally important what you're putting on your skin as well because it's a sieve. So if you're cutting the sugar out so that you can look and feel younger, you got to make sure that you are complementing that with the right stuff on your skin too. And what Brian, you've opened my eyes to is that you can actually get clean products that are anti aging. Because I will tell you that I have for the longest time I was like, well, I can get great, you know, things that clean my skin, you know, and some good body moisturizers, but shoot. So this is really, really good information and especially that information on Retin A because I might have been a little bit of a closet retinol user. We're cleaning it out. So, so thank you so much for that. I super appreciate your time.

Been my pleasure.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

All right, lots of information in that interview. Thankfully you didn't have to take notes because you're going to get his 22 essential natural steps for your youngest looking skin for free. All you need to do to get that is go to jjvirgin.com youngskin grab it. And now you have no excuses for not only only feeling your best, but looking your best too. So there you go. Hope you enjoyed the show. And if you've not yet subscribed, holy smokes, I don't want you to miss out on any of the good stuff. So go to subscribetojay.com and sign yourself up and I'll see you next time.

Hello listeners. This is Anne Bogle, author, blogger, and creator of the podcast what Should I Read? Read next. Since 2016, I've been helping readers bring more joy and delight into their reading lives. Every week, I check all things books and reading with a guest and guide them in discovering their next read. They share three books they love, one book they don't, and what they've been reading lately. And I recommend three titles they may enjoy reading next. Guests have said our conversations are like therapy, troubleshooting issues that have plagued their reading lives for years and possibly the rest of their lives as well. And of course, recommending books that meet the moment, whether they are looking for deep introspection to spur or encourage a life change or a frothy page turner to help them escape the stresses of work, school, everything. You'll learn something about yourself as a reader, and you'll definitely walk away confident to choose your next read, with a whole list of new books and authors to try. So join us each Tuesday for what Should I Read Next? Subscribe now wherever you're listening to this podcast and visit our website what Should I read next podcast.com to find out more.