#112 - Dave Asprey: Bill Gates and His Quest for Synthetic Meat is a “Missed Steak”

Hi, my name is Jorge Cruise and I'm the number one New York Times bestselling author and leading fitness, nutrition, and peak performance trainer to the world's busiest celebrities. You may have seen my work with Oprah Winfrey, Khloe Kardashian, Tyra Banks, Kelly Clarkson, or even Dr. Oz. My career started because in my early 20s I was out of control and addicted to sweets, carbs and salty snacks, and experts told me to simply count calories to get control. They were wrong. My passion to get control of my hunger led me to find simple ways backed by science that would turn off physical hunger as well as my emotional eating instantly, and I know I can help you too. Welcome to the Jorge Cruise Show. Well, happy Sunday everyone. This is Jorge and welcome to the Jorge Cruise Show. I'm thrilled you're here. This is the number one podcast that's going to help you overcome your addiction to sugar, carbs, and salty snack foods. And underline the word snack foods because the salt is our friend. It's the snack foods like the potato and the corn chips. And you know, I'm also the creator of the Zero Hunger Plan, which is kind of a revolution. It was just covered in Woman's World magazine, uh, just last week on the February issue during the Super Bowl. And it's claimed as a revolutionary, uh, simple way to truly turn off your hunger by using minerals, sodium, magnesium, potassium to truly turn off hunger. And you can literally then create a zero hunger window the last 23 hours and you eat within an hour and you drop 2 pounds a day. Guys, we're talking efficient results here. Safe. This is a program that is study-proven. Doctors like Dr. Jason Fung and all the people I've interviewed on the podcast are supporters of this plan. So I'm thrilled that Woman's World did that. And this is the home for that as well, guys, because really is about creating a zero hunger window so you can learn how to utilize, uh, the greatest gift our bodies can give us, which is autophagy. It's a fancy word and you're going to learn about it on today's podcast because literally I'm thrilled, guys, here on this Sunday to share with you an interview I recorded earlier in the week with Dave Asprey. He is the father of biohacking. He's probably going to be known as the most incredible Renaissance man. He's like a Steve Jobs of health. Truly incredible, brilliant man. He's a year younger than me. And so we're in that age group where in our late 40s, you know, we want to maximize our performance, our health, our libido, our muscle, everything, right? Our sleep, everything. And so we are talking about what, in his opinion, this is his passion right now. And that is, it's a book called, let me show it to you, it's called Fast This Way. If you're on Apple or not on YouTube or on Spotify, the book is brilliant. The subtitle says burn fat, heal inflammation, and eat like a high-performance human. That is our intention here. Uh, you were meant to be, uh, and, and it really is about giving you the greatest insights on why fasting works. It just is. And Dave Asprey would not have written a book on this unless it was powerful. He's also the creator of the Bulletproof Coffee, which is everywhere you go to Whole Foods, Target, it's everywhere. He sells Brain Octane Fuel. He really is an amazing man. I met him a few years ago. I had the honor of becoming friends with him, and this conversation was lengthy and long. And the best part of all, and, and, um, you know, in current topics right now, I'm sure you guys heard last Sunday, a week ago today, Anderson Cooper interviewed Bill Gates because he has a brand new book on how truly we can, as a species, try within the next 30 years to save our planet. And we have a 30-year window, and then time's up. So that means by the time— if I'm 50, by the time I'm 80, uh, we're going to have a planet that is destroyed. And, you know, and I plan on living way past 100. So I think his book is an incredible read. We're going to try to get Mr. Gates on the podcast as well, because right now he's doing a book tour and he's doing podcasts, he's doing Anderson Cooper's show. But unfortunately, and this is my question to Mr. Gates, so get this to him if you guys know him, you know, one of his tenets in the book is about eating synthetic meat, a plant-based meat, because he claims it's better for the earth. And, you know, we've had on the show Robb Wolf, which talks about in his book Sacred Cow how regenerative Farming is the solution because we as humans need to eat meat because of the collagen, the protein, the healthy fats in there. It is the best thing. And I'm a big believer in that. Um, and synthetic meat, you're going to hear from Dave Asprey, number one world's premier biohacker, how this does not work. And it's how we start the conversation. So if you're into current events and hot topics, listen to the beginning, especially if you're interested in this Impossible Meat that Bill Gates has put his own money into. It's truly a missed steak. You guys get that there? A missed steak. Steak, like a steak. I'm sorry, I thought it was clever. But we're going to talk about Bill Gates and why this quest for synthetic meat is wrong. So listen to that, guys, and then we get into intermittent fasting, and you're going to learn how important this is. It's going to blow your mind, I hope, because as much as I can talk about it to you, I think it's, it's very powerful to have truly the leading mind on, on, on this planet talk about it. And so I'm thrilled for you guys to hear this interview. We're going to start in just a minute, but first we have to give thanks to our sponsors. They're the reason I can do this show. So very special special thank you to Elemental Labs. Shout out to these guys. Robb Wolf is the creator of this, uh, and Robb Wolf is a biochemist, New York Times bestselling author, um, the author of The Sacred Cow, as I mentioned, and truly created this to help his clients perform at their best. Now I use it, uh, when I'm on the go because his ratio matches my ratio of what I call zero hunger water, which is half a teaspoon of salt and a little bit of magnesium potassium. But he adds these flavorings. So when you're on the go, when I'm at my gym every day, because I go there for mental health, I want to not be I'm hungry and I always work out in a fasted state. Always. I never eat before I work out. I always eat at the midday or end of day and it's one meal. So this is one of the products, if you're on the go, that will turn off hunger. It's called Elemental Labs and they have an incredible offer for all our listeners that if you order a value bundle, you get a box of, of these electrolytes and they're delicious, a $45 value for free. So you've got to check it out, guys. You, you owe it to yourself to check this out. Uh, let me give you the URL. You can create a custom order too. Whether it's all chocolate. That's one of my favorites with cacao powder, no sugar. You know, it's a stevia-based sweetener, so it's not going to be toxic in any way at all. And it's delicious. And he has many varieties. Lemon Lime is one of my favorites. There's an orange one that tastes better than Tang, and I used to love Tang as a kid. So check it out. Go to drink element.com/jorge. I'm going to give you the URL because it's tricky to spell. Let me spell it out for you. It's D-R-I-N-K, drink, and then it's L as in Larry, M as in Mary, N as in Nancy, tom.com/jorgecruise. Boom. All right. And please support this, guys. This is how we support the show. I appreciate it, guys. Check it out. You're going to love this. And if you're trying to follow my plan, Zero Hunger, this is approved. It's the first and only product that I've approved for Zero Hunger plan. So shout out to Rob. Thank you for that. Julian Bakery is our next sponsor. They're incredible. Think of them as the non-sugar, all-natural Willy Wonka factory. I love them. They make chocolate bars with MCT oil, the very thing Dave Asprey puts in his coffee. For Bulletproof. This is amazing. I had a game night last night with some friends here at my house, and my friends, you know, they make my life hard sometimes in a fun way. They brought a box of these incredible donuts from Pacific Beach that are like desserts. Like, they're not just donuts, they're like cake with frosting and all that. And I had a little bit of it. I'm going to be honest because I eat late to be able to enjoy whatever we're going to eat. I had, you know, my grass-fed meat sticks and cheese. Those were kind of my snacks that I was eating just prior to them coming. But I had a little bite. But because I was out of Julian Bakery, that's why. Next Saturday I'm serving their brownies, their chocolate chip cookies. These are the things you want to serve at your parties. These are the things I enjoy on a Friday or Saturday night, like I did last night. And, uh, literally they're giving us 10% off exclusively for listeners of the show. So anything you order at Julian Bakery, he also sells everything, monk fruit sweetener, um, collagen, delicious powders. Just check it out. Go to the website. It's julianbakery.com. Let me spell the URL and then I'm gonna give you a coupon code. They do it slightly different than Elemental Labs. It's J-U-L-I-A-N Bakery, B-A-K-E-R-Y.com. All right. So Julian Bakery. And then the promo code or coupon code is Jorge Cruise. And if you don't know how to spell my name, it's J-O-R-G-E-C-R-U-I-S-E. And that's it. And check it out. Delicious stuff. Get their chocolate bars, guys. They're the best. You can have a little piece of chocolate every day. It's really good. And then finally, we're brought to you by my website, ZeroHungerPlan.com. Zerohungerplan.com, and that's with a Z, Z-E-R-O, zerohungerplan.com. We're relaunching on March 14th, and I'm so excited because this is how I coach my clients around the world. If you want to join us, this is now our third kickoff. We've had incredible experiences and this is going to be all new. It's even better than the last two. So check it out. Get on the waitlist, go to zerohungerplan.com, get a free coaching session with me. I'm going to send that to you. They're coming up next week. And what's great also, you can sign up for a newsletter that comes out today, Sunday, if you're not signed up for next Sunday, go there right now. Go to zero, zero hunger plan.com. Sign up for the newsletter, the coaching alert, uh, and get a free coaching session with moi, with me. All right, guys, with that said, I'm done. Let's do this, guys. I'm excited. I want to watch it again too. Uh, Dave is incredible. Um, and, uh, this, this interview is incredible. So please share with your loved ones. You're going to enjoy it. Uh, with no further delay, here's Dave Asprey. Peace and purpose. Have a great Sunday, everyone. Welcome everyone to a very special edition of the Jorge Cruise Show. I'm so thrilled to be talking to a dear friend of mine. We met a couple years back in San Diego. You guys know him as the father, the godfather. I think he's the father of biohacking, but the godfather. He's a young guy and he's super smart. He's also the creator of the Bulletproof Revolution, which when I was living in Malibu, I'd always stop in Santa Monica and have a cup of his is having a little coffee right now, a little cup of his healthy fat coffee. So joining me on the other line is Dave. Dave, are you there?

I am here. Good to see you, Jorge.

Great seeing you, buddy. Thank you for being on the show today. We're thrilled to have you here because there is some big news we have to tell everyone. There is an incredible new book that I want to say is the Bible now of fasting and just came out in 2021. So it's a new book. I'm so excited to be talking about it because the subtitle says it all: Burn Fat. We all need that. Heal inflammation and eat like a high-performing human you were meant to be. And I mean, I think that that sets the tone for today's conversation. And I'm just so grateful that you're here. And, you know, when I think of people that have changed the way people eat and think, you're definitely— you've had a huge impact on me. So my hat's off to you always, Dave. So thank you for being here today.

I appreciate that. That's just knowing my work has made a difference for one person makes me happy. That's That's what motivates me.

I mean, we're going to talk later why healthy fats are okay on a fast because I'm having a mug with a green logo on it.

That wasn't the Mermaid logo, was it?

Well, maybe. Let's try to turn it that way.

Sorry, I feel dirty.

I tell you, coffee's good. No, well, you know, I think my kids got it for Christmas, the cup. But, uh, but what— but I thought before we get into fasting, I saw what you posted this week on social media, and I watched the 60 Minutes interview with Anderson Cooper and Bill Gates. And we're not talking about Microsoft here. Do you want to tell everyone what we were just chatting about before we started? I think you're dead on. This is a hot topic. And I think it's important because we all are in alignment that— well, will you tell him? Because he's got a good mission. He's trying to help the planet, which I think, who wouldn't want to help our planet, right?

Well, Bill Gates just came up with this idea that, okay, we should all be eating synthetic beef or synthetic meat. Which is, on its face, saying, "Well, it's going to save carbon inputs." It's one of those things that's surprising because I know Bill's a smart guy. There's a system, it's called an ecosystem though, and it doesn't run like computer code or robotic code, and it has self-regulation built in. It's more like AI, which was not the history of Microsoft. Microsoft was programmatic. By the way, I was a computer hacker, studied computer science. This is my people.

This is your sweet spot. Yeah.

I was present when Microsoft was founded.

Yeah.

No, like, for real, my mom was pregnant with me and she was the first employee of the company that became Microsoft called—

You're kidding. I had no idea.

That there were 3 founders of Microsoft. One of them bought my crib. This is not a joke.

What? No kidding.

Ed Roberts bought my crib.

And to set the scene further, I want to tell people because he was on with Anderson Cooper on 60 Minutes and he's got a new book that's really— I think his intentions are good. I mean, he says— what do we have, Dave? Like 30 years before there's no— there's a tipping point. So we got to take action now to help improve the planet's atmosphere so we can all live here. But he says one of his methods is to stop eating meat. And it's the opposite message. Do you know my friend who's a biochemist, Robb Wolf? He wrote a book on the opposite, how eating meat and doing it through, you know, the right ways of agriculture, you know, regenerative agriculture, it's actually good for the planet. Well, you know, so I mean, it's like the opposite of what Mr. Gates is saying, but tell everyone your thoughts because you posted something brilliant this week, and I think it's so dead on.

I have looked at regenerative agriculture for years. I live on a 32-acre farm, and I'm actively building soil. I have grass-fed sheep, and I have pastured pigs and chickens, and we are adding thickness to the soil to make healthier vegetables. Love that. I've also studied carbon capture probably more than the average bear. You just heard about Elon Musk's $100 million XPRIZE for carbon capture.

Yeah.

I was the first donor, and I was on the prize committee for that, the first donor to get the first half a million dollars in, uh, in order to— it was me and 8 other people, um, put our heads together and kind of forced the X Prize through so it could even be offered for Elon to be so generous. Wow. And yeah, soil is the number one carbon capture technology on the planet right now. We have 60 years before the world runs out of topsoil. Topsoil is made by buffalo roaming, except they don't do that anymore because we killed them all. And it's made by cows shitting, if I can say that on your show.

Please. I mean, we talk about poop on here a lot, so it's poop, basically. It's poop.

It's precious poop.

And I like that. Hashtag that, everyone. Precious poop. But it's true, Dave.

It's true.

Tell us why. Tell us why that's good for the planet. And how did Mr. Gates get this wrong? I mean, I feel like we need to send this to him and have an intervention with him, you know?

You know, I There's, there's always assumptions. So people generally are trying to solve a problem, but there's unchallenged, unquestioned assumptions. The assumption here is that, well, because most meat today is fed corn and soy and wheat, which is destructive of farmland, therefore let's eat less meat.

But okay, so there's a thread of intelligence here.

Of course, Bill's an incredibly smart guy.

So one more time, say it for us at home. So this is the theory he's saying.

The theory is that because most meat is fed inefficiently with corn and soy and grain, therefore we need to stop eating meat because it's inefficient. You could eat a pound of wheat or you could eat 10 pounds of wheat focused into a steak, right? But you don't want to waste that. So on its head, you're like, "Okay, that makes sense," except when you realize that roaming animals that poop all over the soil make the soil thicker, which sucks carbon out of the air, and those animals are very healthy for you. So it's fine to say, "Let's eat less meat," but the number one thing would be tomorrow, shut down every industrial meat producer on the planet. No more feeding food crops to cows. The cows walk around on areas that aren't farmland and they eat grass, and the grass has an ecosystem, and it's grass that has butterflies and frogs and mice, and it's actually alive, and the soil gets thicker and thicker and thicker, and the cows are abundantly healthy, and when you eat them, you get abundantly healthy. So what we need to do is distribute agriculture around. So we should have small farmers. And the industrialization of our food supply is one of the major challenges here. It's not cow poop. Cow poop is the good stuff. It's industrially raising cows that's the problem. So for Bill, he's saying, well, what if— and by the way, he is now the largest owner of cropland in the US. He owns more farmland than anyone else. So he's saying, I'll raise the corn and soy and I'll spray it with glyphosate. Right? Genetically modified, all that stuff. And then we'll take that and we'll put it in vats with cow cells. And then the cow cells are going to grow on this toxic substrate. And then you're going to eat that. The problem is, where does the poop get back into the soil so you can do what farmers like me actually do? It doesn't work. So for 10 years, the Bulletproof Diet— actually 11 years now— the Bulletproof Diet's been out there saying eat grass-fed stuff because it makes your body work better.. And if we were to replace that with— it's not even industrially raised meat, it's synthetic meat that doesn't have collagen, it doesn't have the healthy fats, it doesn't have the carotenoids, it doesn't have conjugated linoleic acid. It's basically just protein mush, gray protein mush. That's been—

it's fake meat made from plants.

What do you make it out of, Dave?

What do you recall? What is he—

well, the synthetic meat is grown in— it's basically stem cells from cows grown in sterile vats. And then there's these other fake Frankenmeats that are made out of corn and potatoes and soy. And let me tell you, I don't care if it tastes like a burger, it will not affect your brain like a grass-fed burger. This is why my restaurant, the Bulletproof Cafe, it's been open for 6 and a half years now in LA. We only serve grass-fed or we won't serve it.

That's my favorite place when I'm in LA.

It's like, you gotta have the feeling after you eat. And no one who eats synthetic meat is going to feel like, wow, I got a buzz from that. Cause it's missing the fat. It's missing all the different parts of it. So we need to get connected back to the planet as an ecosystem. So if Bill could say, you know what, I've accounted for creating soil instead of depleting soil, and a new study came out, we've lost a third of our topsoil in the last 20 years, but no one's talking about it. And this is from satellite imaging. We've got to fix our soil. The soil bacteria, it gets reinoculated by animals. So the sheep who walk around my property, those bastards shit everywhere. And I'm like, oh my God, could I just keep you in the pasture? But everywhere they go, what they're doing, is they are putting probiotics back in the soil, right? And this allows the soil to become incredibly healthy, right? And the areas where they're allowed to go, the, the cabbage and other things I grow, it's like really tall and where they don't get to go, it's half as tall. And this is how we fix the planet. We restore the integrity of the soil and industrial meat will not do that. It is a step down from where we are now. Synthetic meat is worse than industrial meat for you and for the planet.. And yes, do we want to stop industrial meat? We have to do it. And the assumptions that are behind that behavior, I don't think they make sense. And when it comes to things like human hunger and cravings, yes, when you eat grass-fed meat with healthy fat in it, you are not hungry for many hours.

Amen. Zero hunger.

Yes. You're starving all the time. You can't fast. You feel like crap when you eat that stuff.

Dave, tell everyone from your opinion, because I think this is such such a dead-on topic because I just did a podcast this week about how the meat— it's called The Meat of It All. And the meat really is so important to reduce hunger. It's one of the most satiating macronutrients, correct? If it comes from an animal source.

If it comes from a grass-fed animal source. There is no one on earth who's ever felt full after a kale salad. I was a raw vegan for a long time. Yes. Yes. It made me very sick. And if you eat—

Inflation, bloating. I mean, yeah, we could tweet all that out. No pun intended, but a lot of tooting. Right?

Yeah, exactly. And Jorge Cruise farting and pooping. Yeah. And, and brain fog, to be honest.

Yes.

And if you eat a big old fatty ribeye that was fed corn and soy with glyphosate and, you know, all of the bad fats that get formed in the animal when you have a diabetic cow that was eating an unnatural food.

Yeah.

Well, you feel one way when you eat that and it's not good. And then you replace that with a grass-fed ribeye. Yeah. And you eat that and afterwards you have this like, oh man, like I'm vibing with energy. And then you don't think about food for hours. So one of the things that I learned, one of the reasons I wrote the fasting book, I've been fasting. The Bulletproof Diet was one of the first big books, probably the first big book that said you should do intermittent fasting.

Yes, you did. Yeah. And that's why people would drink your coffee to help them not feel like they're suffering. I mean, not to segue from Bill Gates, but let's get into this idea of fat because, you know, I'm a huge, huge advocate. I wrote a book 3 years ago on fasting, and I'm working on a new project called Zero Hunger. And it's all about giving people— well, no hunger, because hunger is pain and suffering. And I wrote down in my notes here, you know, a lot of people think fasting doesn't work unless you suffer. You must suffer. It sounds like a, like, like, you know, like it's birthing a child and, you know, you got to suffer, you got to like be painful, but your Bulletproof diet and plan brings in healthy fats. Can we talk about how healthy fats are good for you? And they don't break a fast because I've been talking about that for at least 3 years. You've been doing it now 11 years, right? Created a whole industry on this. And I think people think of fat as a bad thing. They're like, oh, it makes you fat. Do you remember this crazy woman? I mean, you and I are about the same age.

Susan Powders. Yes, I got it right. I was guessing it. Okay.

With her little— but she had spiked blonde hair, those big red nails. And, you know, she said that makes you fat. You remember how she used to do that on those—

and hold up this bag, like, see the grease on this bag? It's grease. It's bad for you. Lady, what do you think your brain is made out of? Your brain is—

take us through this now, Dave. Correct this because we got to fix the damage from the '80s because Susan Powder is still— a lot of my clients are women in midlife, 50, 60, 70. They remember Susan Powder and she looked thin, but she wasn't healthy, you know. And so why must we have fat? And how does fat not only take away hunger, but does it break a fast? Because I've interviewed Dr. Jason Fung, you know, Dr. Fung in Toronto. He agrees, he agrees. He wrote the introduction to my Cruise Control book 3 years ago, and I know you agree with this. I mean, this is your, your base.

Let's talk some science there, please. Yeah, every cell in your body has a cell membrane. We've all heard of that, and it's kind of— plants have cell walls and there's cell membranes, uh, in animals. Cell membranes are made out of tiny droplets of fat. Every cell in your body is not just protein, it is fat and protein. They come together in nature all the time. And what that means is that your body needs building blocks to make fat. And when you eat the right kinds of fat, what happens magically is your body incorporates it into your cell membranes. And when you eat the wrong kinds of fat, your body makes dysfunctional cell membranes. And think of it, if you have like a dim bulb, you have 6 things in a light fixture, one of the bulbs is dimmer. That's the bulb that's made out of the weak fats and the other ones are made out of the good fats. And the more bad fats you eat, these are seed oils, omega-6 oils, The more of those you eat, the dimmer your bulbs get.

And for anyone listening, we don't recommend healthy fats, particularly are not vegetable seed oils. They are inflammatory. I mean, throw some shade, no pun intended, on seed oil and then tell us why healthy fats do not involve vegetable fats, correct?

They do not involve vegetable fats at all. The healthy fats, the things that animals are made out of, are at least 50% saturated fats. And on my recommendations in Fast This Way and all of my other books, at least half your fat needs to be saturated. And saturated fat is awesome because it cannot become inflammatory. It simply doesn't have any sites where oxygen can stick to it. So it's a stable fat. Imagine you're building a wall. You need bricks in the wall because they, they're solid, they hold weight, and then you need some mortar between them. And then you probably want to put some paint on the surface of it. So it turns out that to make a good cell membrane, you need a lot of saturated fat. Then you need some monounsaturated fat, which is like the grout, and you need a tiny little bit of omega-3 and omega-6, which is basically the paint or the stucco on the surface of it. And when you try to build a wall out of paint and stucco, which is what happens when you eat those seed oils, man, you get constant inflammation, you get insulin resistance, and you get constant chronic gnawing hunger. And you feel like crap, you get brain fog. So I weighed 300 pounds. I had serious brain fog. I had all the diseases of aging before I was 30, high risk of stroke and heart attack, cognitive dysfunction, prediabetes, and arthritis. And I don't have any of those now. And I'm 48. So how does that happen? Well, it happens because I have been eating a grass-fed only diet for more than, uh, actually, geez, more than 15 years now. And I eat a ton of saturated fat, but I eat grass-fed butter and I eat some coconut oil and I eat monounsaturated fat. And I've minimized the omega-6 fats, which means I don't eat industrial meat and I don't eat corn oil, soybean oil, anything fried at a restaurant. Uh, and I don't eat safflower and I don't eat sunflower.

No canola oil.

No soybean oil. Canola is the worst.

Tell everyone, when I go to Costco, I'm happy that they do have avocado oil. You like the avocado. It's a fruit, right?

Avocado is pretty good, but avocado—

tell us your thoughts on the avocado.

It's still pretty high in omega-6. So if you're going to eat avocado, eat it in guacamole and you're fine. But if you eat tons and tons of it, it does have higher amounts of that omega-6. But I would say it's hard to eat too much avocado oil. So it's hard to eat too much avocado. It's easy to eat too much avocado oil. So it's an okay oil. If you want an avocado mayo, that's cool. But if I wouldn't use it as an added oil, even olive oil, Yeah, a couple tablespoons of high-end olive oil, don't heat it up, it's fine. But when you go beyond that, and some people say it's healthy, I'll just put it in everything. That's not the kind of oil— it's, it's too slippery for making cells. And if you were to say, let's go to all synthetic meat, like we talked about before, it would probably be free of fat or very low in fat, and the fats that would be added would be the cheap crappy fats. And now you're getting something that isn't compatible with your biology, and that creates hunger. So I don't want to suffer. I don't want to ever be hungry again.

Amen.

What I did when I was writing or in preparation years before I wrote Fast This Way, I was afraid of fasting. I'm like, I'm going to be hypoglycemic. I'm going to yell at all the people.

Hangry, we call it, right?

Hangry, right?

I thought I would pass out and literally fall down at the gym because I love going to the gym. But now I do it on a fasted state.

There you go. You're doing it exactly right. Right, right. But I hired a shaman to drop me in a cave. I'm like, I know you—

I learned about this in the book, right? It was for 4 days, is that right?

4-day fast with no one around, no, no food to tempt me, no people. So I'm like, okay, nothing, nothing. It was just water.

Okay, water. All right, so this was a spiritual type of vibe.

It was a, it was a vision quest, right?

Wow. And she was a shaman, a woman, correct?

Yeah, a woman shaman. Um, and she literally dropped me off. She's like, I'll pick you up in 4 days. Every morning, you know, you're going to turn on your smartphone and send me a text that says, "I'm okay." And she looks at me and goes, "Don't worry, I'll know anyway." And I didn't believe her, but by the end, in the book—

So this was your induction into fasting.

It was indeed.

Were you alone with your spouse or?

I was completely alone. It was okay with my wife. She was a little bit nervous about it. And she was like, "What's going on here?" I'm like, "Well—" You weren't in India in a cave.

Were you close to home at least?

I was in Sedona or outside Sedona, just in the middle of the desert. Desert. I was in a cave that's been used ceremonially for 10,000 years by indigenous tribes. So it was an honor to be there. And, and it was, it was quite an experience. But the idea there was, I was scared of fasting because I didn't understand it. And the idea when someone would tell me, Jorge Cruise, you should try fasting, someone told me that. And I'm like, are you kidding me? Don't you know if you don't eat 6 times a day, your body goes into starvation mode? And then I'll get fatter and I don't ever want to be fatter. I've already lost 50 of those pounds. I'm not going to go back. I'm going to fight that other 50 pounds off. I'm going to work out all the time. That's what we've been conditioned to think, right? False assumptions. The same ones that are driving, I think, you know, our friend Bill there. He's, you know, he didn't question and test the assumptions behind what he's doing. I did the same thing. That's why I worked out an hour and a half a day, 6 days a week on a low-fat, low-calorie diet and stayed 300 pounds and a 46-inch waist. It's frustrating and hunger and suffering, and it was a waste of time.

I agree. And tell me if you agree with this, because I've done a lot of historical research, and I've had really great people on the podcast. And I feel like, as much as Bill Gates is obviously— I mean, we're going to say he's going in the wrong direction with that aspect of it. The big picture is great. Let's save the Earth as soon as possible. Let's be aggressive about that. But I feel like what I've learned is, before the advent of the refrigerator in the early '30s, You know, we ate a high-fat, high-protein diet. Maybe, you know, if there wasn't refrigeration, it was high in salt too, but we were fine with it. And we weren't eating carbohydrates night and day, let alone seed oils, right, Dave? It didn't exist. We were eating just what we could, even beef tallow. Do you ever do the beef tallow sometimes when you cook with it? I like that. Yeah.

I save all of the fat from my pigs, uh, which is lard. And pigs, if they're pastured and actually eat vegetables instead of eating corn and soy, pig fat isn't high in omega-6. Omega-6, but if it's the typical stuff you buy, it's going to be higher in omega-6. And then I eat a lot of grass-fed beef as well. So my main protein sources are lamb from our sheep, all grass-fed with fat, and beef and pork, and occasional wild-caught fish, usually fish I catch myself. Vancouver Island is kind of awesome for that. And tell me what—

tell me, just interrupt for a second. Tell me your thoughts, because you're very passionate about grass-fed, and I have interviewed many people. Paul Saladino, you know him from The Carnivore Code, Mark Sisson, some other people.

Absolutely.

And then I talked to people like Robb Wolf, which I respect, and he's a biochemist. And he says there's a huge difference for the earth. No question. He wrote that book on really how meat and all that. There's a movie too about it, about how it really is beneficial to the earth, as we've been talking about. But when he says from a biochemical point of view, and this is his opinion, you know, so I let everyone listening make their own opinions, you know, but we can— I want to share yours because he says for human health, it's negligible. I can't say that word. Say that word for me, Dave. Negligible. Thank you. Thank you. And that grass-fed versus Costco meat, that is a ribeye, you know, that isn't grass-fed. They have some grass-fed at Costco, which I like to do. But, you know, that he says it's not that big of a difference. But I'm hearing what you're saying here, because corn versus, you know, grass is a big deal. And I know pork can eat grass. I think it's just cows, right? The beef. But tell us your thoughts on that. But some of the science was, I feel I feel like that has been an interesting point. Many experts say yes, some say no, say it's not necessary, save the money. I want your thoughts because I—

I think there has to be some ego there in what Rob's talking about. He's always been, I mean, you know, he's been a bit of an angry dude. Yeah. I don't understand how you can look at the studies and say that they're the same. The balance of fatty acids is different. You are eating different fat when you do that, but more importantly, There's stuff that they don't always test. One of the things that completely proves that calories in, calories out is garbage is something that they do in industrial agriculture. Yes. Take a mold toxin called zearalenol. It's a well-known one. You could look it up. They make a little waxy pellet they put in a cow's ear and then it melts into the blood flow there and it enters the circulatory system. It's called zearalenol, those little things. This is a real thing. Thing. And when that happens— this is a synthetic estrogen that comes from mold that's 1,000 times stronger than normal estrogen. And when they do it, the cow gets fat on 30% less calories. It changes the feed efficiency. Now, if such a magic potion is possible, then calories in, calories out is disproven permanently. So if they're putting stuff into the cow that makes the cow more marbled and gain weight more quickly, and then you eat the cow, might you become more marbled? So did Rob look at the levels of xenoestrogens added? No. Did he look at the glyphosate contamination, which is well known to cause all sorts of problems with cell membranes, the parts of the body that I've been hacking? All of my books talk about how do you make more energy, have healthier membranes, right? So what about that aspect of it, right? So it's not just about the earth, and I'll be really blunt, Jorge Cruise. None of us are going to change our lives lives just to make the Earth healthy, because if we did, we would have to kill ourselves. We're kind of a virus on the planet and we're destroying the planet. Oh, you know, I'm holier than thou. I do this thing. I'm like, do you drive a car? Yes. Stop. Right? You know, do you consume anything that was shipped to you? Stop. Right? We're not going to go back to that. So what's happening here is what we care about most, and all of the products I've ever designed for any of my companies, including Bulletproof. Number one, how are you going to feel after you eat it? That's— we care about our energy more than anything else. Energy is the most precious thing on earth, and energy comes from healthy cell membranes, eating the right foods, taking in air that's clean, mixing them up. And if you're good at that, you live a long time, you feel good, and you're full of energy, and you show up the way you want to. And if you're bad at that, you start to get sick and you act like a jerk because you don't have enough energy in your brain to control your behavior.

And you're sick and you have these underlying health conditions which puts you at risk for everything— the old-school diabetes, heart heart disease, cancer, and then the new stuff, COVID-19. I mean everything, right? Everything, right?

So you look at that and like, how am I going to feel if I eat the grass-fed stuff? Well, you just got synthetic estrogens. You got glyphosate that breaks your cell membranes and you got the wrong fatty acid composition. Now you can ignore all that and you can say, well, from an amino acid ratio, as a biochemist, I'm going to tell you that, well, the amino acids are about the same. Who cares?

Like there's no— sure, that part is accurate. Most likely.

Yeah, yeah, but who cares? Amino acids are cheap and easy to get. You can isolate them from anything, like it doesn't matter. And it's more the fat, it's more the fatty acids, right, that are all fatty acids. And the lack of glyphosate, the lack of antibiotic residues, and the fatty acid composition— that's what matters. It's the fatty acid.

And the ideal fatty acids come— one more time to beat this horse to death, because I want people to hear us, because I'm so like— this is why I always think we're such kindred spirits, you and I, because I really do believe what Susan Powder did in the '80s, you know, she was obviously not educated. I hate to say it, not that she's comparable to Bill Gates, but I feel like he's in that same realm. And I feel like to educate him, her, anyone listening right now about why fat, specifically animal-based fat, healthy grass-fed fat, is so good. Talk to us, give us that nutshell again, and then connect it to fasting, because I think one of the most brilliant things one of the things that I know that you are an advocate of, and you've done this for so many years, and now it's a highlight of this book, is use that as a way to not suffer when you're fasting. And it does not break a fast. It doesn't raise insulin. That's usually what I explain to people is the thing that breaks a fast, but you can do it while you're fasting and enjoy the process and have zero hunger, right, Dave?

You can absolutely do it with zero hunger. And, you know, not to, not to pick on Bill Gates here. If you have that core assumption, like kind of people are meat robots, then you treat it very differently. We are in part biochemical, right? But there's also an emotional aspect to us. And there's, I'm going to call it a spiritual aspect for lack of a better word. I was so stoked a while ago when Bill said, you know, I finally learned how to meditate. I think he used Headspace. He's like, I'm actually doing this now and it makes a difference. So what meditation does is it lets you get a sense of what all the cells in your body are doing. That body awareness that comes from inner reflection. Like, wow, I actually do feel different when I eat this piece of steak versus this piece of steak, right? And what's interesting with fasting, there's two kinds of fasting. And by the way, Jorge Cruise, writing a book on fasting is not that hard. Don't eat for a while, step one. Step two, it's good for you. Here's a bunch of studies. We got to make it enjoyable.

No suffering, right? And that's why fast That, yes, is a tool to make it— well, tell us, give us a little biochemistry class on why we don't get hungry and why it doesn't— there you go— fast. Can you take us there?

Yeah, I'll take you there. And that was why I wrote this book, is like fasting without the hunger, because a water-only fast, you can do it, but that's just because mice did it. And I call that hair shirt fasting when you don't have the things that turn off hunger. You want to do a spiritual fast for 2 days on a weekend? Like, I'll teach you how to do that in the book. Like, sure, they're like, I'm gonna go in. But the rest of the time, there's not a lifestyle. Yeah, that's— no, you can't do that. There's a working fast. Like, what do you do Monday morning when you want to show up and you got kids running around the house and you're trying to focus? That is not a time to be in this kind of floaty, I'm tired state, which is a good state some of the time. Yes, right.

It's what you did in the cave, correct?

That was that what I did in the cave, right?

Let's do it now, Monday morning. Tell everyone why our coffee, or whatever beverage, a tea, coffee, hot water, When you put healthy fat in, why it turns off hunger and you have zero hunger, and then why it doesn't break the fast. And then it's insulin, correct?

There's two things to it. Tell— take it away. So the two things that happen during a fast that are most important, and during a water-only or a no-fat fast or no other hacks fast, there are some gut microbe things that may be important for some people, but not most people most of the time who are fasting for energy or weight loss. But the two things that happen are number one, insulin stays constant. It doesn't raise at all. Number two is your mTOR levels are low. Most people don't know what mTOR is, but what happens when you fast is something called autophagy, which is when the body takes the digestive energy that was going to go into breaking down your food. It says, I got no food here. Maybe I'll use that to clean up my cells. It'll break down old weak cells. It'll replace the dim bulbs with bulbs that are brighter, right? And this is an ongoing cellular cleanup process. It's like a housekeeping, right? Housekeeping, right? And if you, if you eat either protein or carbs, it raises mTOR, which means your housekeeping stops. So now if you keep insulin low and mTOR low, what happens? Hmm. You're in a fasted state. So you could say, I'm going to have water and I'm just going to muscle through. I'm going to muscle through my work. I'm going to muscle through this podcast if I even had to muscle for it, but I'm not going to muscle through hunger. Right? So there's 3 fasting hacks that make a difference. Tell us. And one of them has never been written about in the world of fasting in Fast This Way. So the first one, black coffee during a fast. There is abundant evidence for this, but the study that most people don't know about is the amount of caffeine in a small or in 2 small cups of coffee doubles ketone production. And ketones, as your audience probably already knows, but ketones are these fat-burning molecules. Or really molecules that come from burning fat that can be used as energy in your cells. And a small rise in ketones, much less than full-blown nutritional ketosis, is enough to change two hormones in the body. One is called CCK. It's the Calvin Klein hormone, or cholecystokinin is its technical name.

Calvin Klein, I like that.

What that does, that's the fullness hormone. It makes you feel full. And then there's a hunger hormone called ghrelin. And when that's lower, you're just not hungry. So it turns out fullness is not lack of hunger. Fullness is different. But if you turn off hunger and turn on fullness, you're good. So just black coffee makes fasting easier. I have a question.

And this is just because we did an interview with Andy Weil and we did one with Paul Saladino, both doctors. They say, and this is Paul Saladino, you know, no disrespect to him. I love him. He's a great guy. But he talks about the bean of the plants of the coffee bean that that it can be something that in the toxicity spectrum he talks about can be at times toxic. So maybe address that. And then Andy Weil says the caffeine, that people are overdosing on coffee. And he, you know, he's the original integrative health doctor from the '80s and '90s. And he has his white beard still, but, you know, he looks great. He's in better health now, I think, than he was 30 years ago. And he told me, don't drink coffee because it keeps you up and you're not going to sleep. And he says everyone's different, but he's like, majority people, keeps them up. I have coffee. I mean, I'm having it right now. So tell us how maybe that perspective isn't the only perspective because I think you obviously know why it's good for us.

Both Paul and Andy have been on Bulletproof Radio. They're both friends. I have a lot of respect for both of them. Now, it's interesting. Andrew Weil is— he has a matcha tea company, which is the highest caffeine tea you can make. It's true. Now, how is it that caffeine from tea isn't keeping people up at night, but caffeine from coffee is? Yeah, I know.

We talked, he talked about it when he was on the show. What's your take on that?

Say again? It's because of the L-theanine, probably he's saying, but—

Oh yes. Yes. You, you, you've heard the interview.

I mean, it's L-theanine is a commonly available amino acid that you can pair with caffeine, but you don't need to. 10% or so, maybe 5% of people have a liver that doesn't break down caffeine. They either shouldn't drink it or they drink it in the morning. For the rest of us, you can drink coffee up until about 2:00. Now— Amen. I like that. Now with Paul, I'm— I love it because on the Bulletproof Diet Roadmap, and people have downloaded this like many, many million times, and it's sort of the Bulletproof Diet in a nutshell.

I will put it in the show notes.

Yeah. And it's, it's a part— there's a new one for Fastest Way where I've updated it. And what it comes down to, it's like always eat grass-fed meat. Okay. That's pretty darn carnivore. Right. But then Paul's saying, well, you know, guys, I think the ultimate diet might end up being nontoxic plants and organ meat.

Don't forget the organ meat. Yeah.

And organ meats, of course. And I've, I'm a big supporter of organ meats, nose to tail, and actually have the whole animals. And I have eaten a pig nose. They're not that That's good. You make sausage out of that.

I stuck to liver and heart, but I, you know, but go ahead, please continue.

But you, and also you want to eat, you know, the sweetbreads and all that sort of stuff, but you can powder them the way Paul does, which I like. I don't really like liver, so I take my liver in capsules. But when you look at this, like, okay, so some plants are okay. I'm like, that's funny because on the Bulletproof Diet, here's the plants to eat and here's the plants that make you hungry. So don't eat those unless you're starving, right?

Coffee's not one of them, right?

Well, it turns out Well, coffee is in hundreds of studies. A new one just came out yesterday saying, oh, that's funny, up to 5 cups a day for guys with prostate issues, that it reduces risk of prostate cancer. And people who drink up to 5 cups a day have a— even of decaf— have a reduction of all-cause mortality. So if you look at the preponderance of evidence, there is no way to say that coffee is bad for you. It does create some hormetic stress on the body, much like other things do., but it also involves something called AMPK signaling, which is good for you. Yeah.

And I know it, I know some people have said, Rob Wolf mentioned this about how you leach 1/8 of a teaspoon of salt. So I take electrolytes and I know you believe in electrolytes, but I feel that's easier, correct?

Yeah. Rob has his Element electrolyte brand. I mean, they've, I've talked about it on my show and you know, even before that, it's like, what have, what's the recommendation been forever? It's like take a half a teaspoon to a teaspoon of sea salt or crystal salt, like Redmond salt or Himalayan salt. Yeah, put it in, uh, in water when you first wake up and there's a circadian reason to do that. So yeah, before the coffee, you're okay with that before coffee, right? Have a little— Yeah, you can have before coffee, you can do it after coffee as long as it's present in the body or just drink some mineral water too. That'll make a difference. So, um, I think that the evidence for coffee, it's almost impossible to stand up credibly and say coffee is bad for you. I will say Everything you put in your body has 3 things in it. One is energy. Okay. We measure that in calories. Energy is not a bad thing. You have to have enough energy. People are chronically caloric deprived. They hate their lives. Right. Yeah. And that's why when you break your fast, you eat enough food. You don't— this isn't a chronic starvation program. This is a period of time without food, then enough food. So there's energy, then there's nutrients, right? These are things that are good for you. Coffee happens to be the largest source of polyphenols in the American diet. Polyphenols are colored plant compounds that are really important for for you.

Tell people some of the benefits of these beautiful, um, benefits.

Polyphenols, when you eat them, feed a type of gut bacteria you can't take as probiotics. And these are the kind of gut bacteria that thin people have more of. And polyphenols also directly influence mitochondrial function and they improve it. On top of that, the polyphenols in coffee are what allow your body to make melanin, which is something that gives you a tan. And melanin is also active in the brain and in the very back of the eyes. So having more melanoids, they're called, is beneficial for you. So coffee has those nutrients in it. And then everything has anti-nutrients, including meat, but it's a question of the ratio. So kale, very high in anti-nutrients. It's got no energy to speak of in it. It's got some nutrients, but the anti-nutrients cancel out the nutrients. So you end up worse off after you eat the kale than you did before.

I've been trying to help Beyoncé and her trainer, who's a friend of mine, this Cuban man. I'm sure you know Marco Borrago. Yeah. The Green Print. And you know, the plant-based revolution. I mean, they're right there with Bill Gates. I feel like, holy moly. I mean, and I love Beyoncé. She looks great, but I remember her in that Austin Power movie. She looked different. She had a tremor back then. And I feel like so much kale, it's also inflammatory, right? That part you would— oh man, saladino and all. We got to stop kale.

I mean, I— talk to us about kale. Why? Why? I went on the Joe Rogan Show about 6, 7 years ago.

Yeah, I was on several times and, uh, You know, Andy Weil also serves kale at his restaurant, and I used to eat a kale salad. I thought it was amazing, but then I would have the worst gas, bloating. But, but you, you say it from your perspective.

I think I don't agree. It shreds your gut even if it's cooked. It's, it's better if it's cooked. But here's what's going on with kale. In fact, in Fastest Way, there's 5 categories of things that cause cravings. These are plant, usually plant, but sometimes just food toxins. That are bad for you. Kale is very high in two things that are seriously dangerous. One of them is oxalic acid, and oxalic acid is there— this is why horses and sheep and even pigs will spit out kale. And kale's there to keep animals from eating it and keep bugs from eating it. Or not kale's there, but oxalic acid's there. What it does is it finds calcium in your body, not in your bones, but free calcium. It sticks to the calcium and it forms these tiny crystals crystals and then they circulate around. There are huge numbers of people with kidney stones caused by eating raw kale right now. Yes, I've read all this. Yes. And those crystals cause inflammation, so they cause muffin top, they cause brain fog. It's associated with some of the causes of autism. That's not the only cause. There's many things that cause neurological inflammation that's autoimmune-based, which is autism, but it makes it worse basically. And we've all heard of unleaded gasoline because we know lead's poisonous, right? Do you know what they replace lead with in gasoline? Oh God, don't say it. Thallium, which is 1,000 times more toxic than lead. Thallium was called the poisoner's poison because it goes into your cells and it replaces potassium and it pushes out the potassium, which makes the cells unable to function. So if you want to poison someone in a real sneaky way, you put a little bit of thallium in their food for a little while and magically all their cells stop making energy and then they just get weak weak, tired, and then they die.

And why do I feel like you're gonna say this is also found in Beyoncé's favorite plants? The one— Beyoncé's favorite thing, kale.

The one plant of all plants that sucks thallium out of the environment the most is thallium. So people eat a lot of kale. If you get an advanced toxic metal screen, you will find high thallium in your body. So you're getting this stuff that we're now pumping out through our exhaust pipes into the environment, and then kale sucks up. So you got oxalic acid, which goes into your joints, the sore joints in the morning, the stiff back, yes, the pain along your spine, inflammation everywhere.

Oh, and vulvodynia. How did Andy Weil miss this? He's the, he's the father of integrative medicine. How did he miss it? I love Andy. We miss this. We all were taught this.

Like I said, I was a raw vegan. I ate buckets of kale. I mean, I had giant salad bowls bigger than my head.

But you've evolved. Look at you, Dave.

You've— I have evolved. Evolved. You know who else has is Dr. Mercola. I've talked with him a lot. We're friends. He's been on my show a few times and he was all about this raw veggies in the '90s, but he has evolved and he does high fat, low omega-6, high saturated fat, low omega-6, does periods of carnivore and eats low toxin vegetables.

He's not eating kale anymore. Good.

No, no. He's— also Dr. Gundry, right? So I talked about kale in the Bulletproof Diet. I talked about oxalic acid and lectins, and there's these 5 categories. And then, you know, Gundry came out, and when I interviewed him, we talked about kale and how it pokes holes in the gut lining, much like wheat does, right? So look, you can believe something is healthy, right? But then if it isn't actually healthy, and we know the mechanism, and you can measure— for me, if I eat kale, the next morning, like, why do my joints hurt again?

That's when you're bloated, right?

On top that wasn't there. It's like, why do my hips hurt? I, I don't have pain in my body the way I did in my 20s.

My clients don't believe that kale does that because it's so low calorie. But again, it's not about calories in, calories don't matter.

You can overeat calories, but calories do not make you fat. It is what— it's what you eat. And if calories were the end-all be-all, when I was really stress testing the Bulletproof Diet before I was willing to publish a book, yeah, I went on a 4,500-calorie-a-day diet. I stopped exercising and I restricted my sleep to 5 hours or less per night. I was going to do it for 30 days and I was going to gain 3 pounds, but do the math and say, guys, why didn't I gain 15 pounds? What just happened? But what I did is I lost weight and I ended up doing that for more than a year. By the way, eating more calories than you need is proven to be bad for you. It is not a good idea, but eating less calories than you need, it doesn't work. And here's what no one talks about. About. Your body, that ghrelin hunger hormone I talked about. Yes. Your, your ghrelin levels. Look, like, let's say I go back to when I was 300 pounds. I had the hunger of a 300-pound person. So if I went on a low-calorie diet and I actually lost weight, which I did lots of times, I could lose 20 pounds, gain 30, lose 30, gain 40. It happens all the time. So what's going on there is your hunger is always at your fattest set point. And there's no way that you're going to win over the course of months against hunger because hunger is a biological thing driven by your cells. Well, it turns out if you go into ketosis, ketones, even at a level of 0.5, most people with a cup of Bulletproof Coffee can get their ketones up to 0.5 if they're using the, the Brain Octane in it, which is a direct source of ketones in the body. When ketones go up, it resets your ghrelin levels to your current body weight. So now you have the hunger of a 250-pounder instead of a 300-pounder, and then you're much less likely to regain your weight. This is why fasting is so critically important and fasting without hunger. Yeah. So this is a part of the thing about calories we don't know about, but let's go back to talking about fat during a fast. Please, please. There's 3 hacks in the book for turning off hunger. Like the weakest of them is coffee and coffee is good for you. Just Google any, any medical condition you can think of in coffee and look at the studies. I mean, it is ridiculous.

What's your number 1 study you would suggest? And maybe we'll share that. Um, the king of the studies.

Well, my favorite one is that coffee doubles ketone production from UC San Diego, Dr. Canaan. But just, just Google coffee all-cause mortality.

Hey, it's Jorge, and I just wanted to interrupt the show just for a moment to invite you to head on over and sign up for my daily zero hunger email that will give you each day a simple what to eat to get radical control over your sugar, carb, and salty snack food cravings. Cravings. And if this is something you want to conquer and make a lifestyle, the newsletter is important. It will really give you tools every day to keep building that momentum to create a lifestyle where you're in control of sugar and carbs. So if that sounds good, check it out. Simply go to zerohungerplan.com. I'll spell it for you, it's with a Z, Z-E-R-O, zerohungerplan.com. And it's all free. I'll see you there. Let's get back to the show.

And you'll find that up to 5 cups a day of caffeinated or decaffeinated is associated with a reduction. And the more you drink, up to 5 cups, the less you die.

And this was done at one of the studies at UCSD, my alma mater, right here in La Jolla. I'm in Del Mar, so like 5 minutes from here. All right, I love that. So the coffee, number one. What are our other two?

Number two is Bulletproof Coffee. And look, I'm not here to sell Bulletproof Coffee. Is a very successful company and Bulletproof has done great. We've created 3 new categories in the health industry. So this is there because it works. And grass-fed butter, when you put even half a teaspoon, you don't have to put a lot in when you're fasting, but you need some. And the reason you get that—

I like the Kerrygold. Do you use that sometimes? I use Kerrygold.

In fact, we drove a global shortage of Kerrygold in 2014 from Bulletproof Coffee.

It's by the brick now at Costco. Moscow, so thank God it's not there.

Someone got arrested smuggling butter in 2014 during that shortage. I love it. It was awesome.

So we've got our Kerrygold, we love— shout out to them.

Thank you. And you put it in there, and when you blend it— and it's driven me nuts— why do you have to blend coffee with butter for it to work? You can't just float it on the top, or at least shake it up really well? Like, it tastes good. Well, it tastes good, that's for sure. It goes back to what was the inspiration for this. I'm in a very remote part of Tibet drinking yak butter tea and going, why Why do I feel so good? Well, why would Tibetans who don't have running water— these people that like live with a yak that travels around, they're nomadic. Well, they blend their coffee every morning. And if they have a blender, great. Otherwise they use a butter churn to do it. Oh, okay. Or not coffee, they blend their tea. Why would you do that? Well, tell us. No one could tell you. So I funded research at the University of Washington with Dr. Gerald Pollack, who has studied basic water chemistry in cells. Remember those fats that our cells are made out of? When you drink water or any liquid, your body takes the liquid and it puts it next to your cells where there's fat, and then it exposes it to 1,200 nanometer light. It's called body heat, so basically infrared light. And when you do that, after a little while, the water transforms from bulk water into exclusion zone water. And people say, well, that's a bunch of hocus pocus, water's all the same. Well, you can see this on a microscope. It's actually there. It's visible.

And it's not the It's not the same.

And for you to do any enzyme process, for you to make ATP in your cells, for you to refold proteins, for you to do autophagy, you must have exclusions on water. Well, Dr. Pollack's new research that just came out this year, it was like 2 years out, right?

University of Washington?

Was it the University of Washington?

Oh, please send that to us, Dave. We'll include it if you don't mind.

Yeah, I'll send that. Um, I think I might have the pre-publication, but I think it's been published. I'll make sure that we get it for you. Thank you. And what happens there is that when you blend that, butter fat and MCT oil— he tested both— create the largest exclusion zone he's ever seen. So you're making the water in your coffee when you blend it so that when you drink it, your body can immediately use that liquid to burn fat, to burn ketones, or even to burn glucose. It increases the ability of your body to do metabolic processes. So blending the butter in really matters, and it doesn't have to be 200 calories of butter. It can be 30 calories of butter. You just need tiny droplets of butter fat to transform the water in the coffee. And you add the MCT oil because it also does that. But the MCT oil— and this is C8 MCT, the Bulletproof Brain Octane— is different than bulk MCTs, which don't—

no, it is the same thing. And tell people, just give them a moment of how it comes from, because I know it comes from coconut oil, but this isn't coconut oil. And MCT oil, I've had people say, oh, it's great, but then some people say they get disaster pants. Tell them why it's important and how to use it so you don't get a disaster.

Okay. I love this. We're talking about poop again. We are, man. We always go to poop. The people like to say, oh, coconut oil is mostly MCT oil. Well, coconut oil is 52% MCT oil. However, there are 4 different oils that do different things that are all legal to call MCT oil. The one that is most abundant, probably 40% of the oil in coconut, is a 12-chain MCT oil that doesn't have any special powers. It's the same as any other fat in the body. It goes into the liver, has to get broken down. But the shorter-chain MCTs, the C8 is the one that has the most studies also from the University of California. They actually studied the Bulletproof C8 in the studies they did. It's 4 times more ketogenic than the most common MCT oil. And the C10 oil is about twice as ketogenic. But what's happening is people are saying, "Oh, I've got coconut oil. It's mostly MCT," or they buy cheap MCT oil that has that has the lauric acid in it and it doesn't work. It doesn't raise ketones the way it must in order for this hack to work. So Bulletproof, the Brain Octane that I put together, it's substantially more expensive because I don't kill orangutans with it. It's coconut only, not from palm oil where most MCT comes from. You're kidding. It comes from palm oil? Most MCT is from palm. Yeah.

No, I thought it was only from coconut oil.

No, the expensive good quality stuff is from coconuts.

And they don't have to even say it on the label probably. You don't have to.

Of course. No kidding. So most MCTs though are contributing to environmental problems because palm plantations are disrupting orangutan habitats and they're burning jungles and things. So I, many years ago, switched to coconut and it increased my cost by 20%, but I didn't raise my price on the oil. I actually dropped the price because it was the right thing to do for the planet that we live on. Of course. And then when you make MCT oils, you're basically taking them out of the coconut oil. And there's something called C17 and C23. These are small amounts of contaminants. So in the very early days of Bulletproof, before I had my own MCT oil manufacturing, you could buy a couple of them, but you drink it and it was common to call it disaster pants and it would cause like a little burning in the throat and then you'd feel great, but then you like shit everywhere.

So I didn't do that.

Yeah, but it would happen. It was a problem. So the Brain Octane Oil eliminated that because we're triple distilling it and then we're filtering it through a clay medium. Which no one does in the MCT world, but that's why I make it the way I make it. And that said, look, if you want to use some other brand who was inspired by Bulletproof, give it a try. I think you'll see a difference. They're about the same price.

I don't know, but how much does someone use in a typical cup of coffee? Butter and then MCT. What would you say?

So it depends on how much energy you want and how much energy you need. And if you're in hunger control to get this, you're overweight, you might want to use a tablespoon of butter, right? Because your body actually needed that energy. Right. And you just, you had a high energy day. You want you want to do it, or maybe just want to use a half a teaspoon or teaspoon of butter. And then the MCTs, I recommend you start with a teaspoon or two, and then you can work up. Most people do about a tablespoon, right? And it actually works much better with the butter. So an equivalent amount of both of them usually resolves the digestive issues. Balance.

And you can do that with every cup or just one or two, or could you do all— we were saying 5 cups.

Could you do that? You could do it with 5 cups, but then you're going to be doing a 24-hour fast. The thing about this is it is profoundly just ending of cravings and hunger. So what'll happen if you have that Bulletproof Coffee at 10:00 AM, someone's going to bring in the donuts and you'll get the donuts and go, "I actually don't want the donut." Like, I'm just—

This is what we want. This is a perfect segue to the next question I have for you because it is liberating because I would love your take on this because we've covered fat so well. And I think without question, we know this is a good thing that Susan Powder, God bless her, and Bill Gates, I don't know how I can connect the two, but we just did, were maybe misinformed, to be nice. They're wrong, but let's say they're misinformed.

Look, a lot of people love to hate on rich people. Let's be honest. It's driven by envy. Envy is the hardest to detect of human emotions. I have had a chance to meet many global billionaires. Many of them have used my work and they'll fly me there and I'll go meet with them. Some of them are investors in my company. Big food companies, I've met the CEOs of most of the big food companies, they all want to do the right thing. And sometimes the assumptions behind what they're doing aren't, aren't correct. So they think they're on a path. And if you believe calories matter, you can go out there and make corn syrup beverages and fried corn stuff. As long as it's low calorie, you're fine because a calorie is a calorie. But if that assumption is wrong, you have to transform your business. So this is just about understanding truth and systems biology on the planet. On it. So I'm not going to jump onto that, let's all hate Bill Gates.

No, no, I think his intentions are honorable, and he's passionate.

I mean, yeah, he might be wrong, but he's passionate. And I don't—

Well, with the meat, he is wrong. I mean, between you and me, I'm sorry, Mr. Gates, we have to do an intervention with him. And it's funny, his publicist reached out to us for his new book. And so, I mean, are you going to be interviewing him? Because I think you should.

I would be honored to interview Bill Gates.

Let's do an interview together, the three of us, and I'll have you and him on here, and we'll see what he says. It'd be great.

Would that be fun? That'd be incredible. And here's the deal. Promoting his new book. It's not okay to hate on, um, you know, hate on any one person because hate actually costs you anyway, but you can just be like, look, I don't like the direction things are heading here, but I also have to say like, look at what Microsoft has done that's changed the world. I had, you know, Microsoft Windows 1.0 when I was a kid.

And he'll love that you were connected to the family or to your mom. Of back when, in the '80s, right?

Yeah. Um, back in— no, that was 1972. Holy smokes.

Yep. Wow. So back in the, the startup days.

But, uh, she worked half-time answering phones for the company when she was trying to— it's crazy. It's like a random family thing. She didn't get stock options though. So your mom— yeah, I love it.

Well, you know, not everyone does, but all right. So here's the thing, we were saying, hey, could we have 5 cups with the Bulletproof, uh, Magic? There are people who— you said you And you could say you could fast 24 hours. So I was going to ask you this question. Help me see how, uh, uh, we'll call it a 1-day fast. Could be— what are the health benefits of that? What are the health benefits of a 2-day fast? So people were going to do more coffee and, you know, or drink water, however. And then take us all the way to a 3-day fast. Don't take us to 4 because I think that— I, I don't think my clients would do that, but I have clients that do 1, 2, and 3. What are the health benefits? Take us through a 1-day, obviously autophagy, and then I think autophagy autophagy gets stronger as you go towards 3. I think Jason Fung has talked to me about that, but take us through your perspective of the health benefits. One day, then take us to, and then let's see what happens at 3, because I think it gets sexy at 3, right? Yeah.

It's hard to say for everyone it's the same. Well, no, I mean, it's very, very mushy, but essentially the longer you go, the more autophagy you get. Amen. And you also get some increases in growth hormone when you do the longer fasts. But what I want people to understand here, there is no one way to fast. In fact, Dr. Will Cole, another friend, is coming out with Intuitive Fasting in a little while, his book on that. And fasting is like weightlifting. It is a hormetic stressor. That means it is a stressor on the body. So this means, look, if you have a lot of weight to lose, you're highly stressed, maybe you don't need to fast that long. It doesn't have to be 3 days or 4.

I got you.

Keep it simple. Give me one.

Yeah, no, take a sip. I love that water, by the way. That's my favorite brand. Tell them what you're drinking there because I know everyone was drinking, uh, San Pellegrino.

Yummy. And it's because it has, uh, um, it has sulfate or sulfite— no, sulfate in it. Yeah. Which most mineral water doesn't. And you need that to mix with your cholesterol, especially when you're in sunshine, to make cholesterol soluble. Fit. So it's good stuff. No, it is.

It is. So let's set the stage. So say someone has maybe 20 pounds, 30 pounds to lose, 20, 30 pounds. They want to do a 1-day fast. Tell us what the benefits are there, a 1-day, you know, whatever, and then a 2-day and then a 3-day. Obviously more autophagy, maybe more for someone who has more underlying health conditions and more weight. But tell us what you think of the benefits, the positive of a 1, 2, or 3, please.

The benefits of a 1-day are are autophagy, and episode 2 in a 3-day are more autophagy and more growth hormone, to really simplify it the most. And after that, you are going to start burning your muscle, right? And that's okay. And people are like, oh, I might lose muscle mass. Here's the deal. Your body is not a block of muscle and other stuff like that. Your body is an eddy moving through the environment. It actually doesn't exist because the body you have at the end of this podcast is not the same body you had before the podcast. True. Some cells were taken out and removed and new cells were formed. So you're constantly building and unbuilding muscle cells and that's okay. So if you fast for 4 days, you will lose probably a couple pounds of muscle. You'll probably lose a couple pounds of fat, but it's the autophagy. It's what muscle cells and what fat cells did you get rid of? That's precious. It got rid of the weak cells.

That's what I love because there's a difference. I know Jason Fung has educated me a little bit where it's sometimes the tissue that we don't need. I mean, and that's good to lose those kind of protein cells that we don't need. It's not necessarily a bicep you're losing.

It's critical, right? There's something, something in my anti-aging book called Superhuman, and I went really deep on this. There's something called zombie cells. These are senescent cells, and this is one of the 7 pillars of aging that I identified in the book. And fasting, that was— yeah, fasting really helps on removing that. So it makes you younger because, yeah, some of the cells you're losing are the ones you didn't want. And I would just say for most people, look, if you're going to fast for 4 days, start by learning how to fast for 16 hours and then learn how to do one meal a day fasting. And there is no evidence that says you should do a 16-hour fast every single day. There is no evidence that says OMAD, one meal a day, you should do that every single day. And some people really do well on that. But what you want to do is not fall into the fasting trap. And that's one of the big reasons I wrote this book. Book. So look, The Bulletproof Diet was very transformative. It had intermittent fasting, it had grass-fed, don't eat toxic vegetables. Yeah. And you know, lots of things that— You were the first to talk about all this. You really were. It was, well, I don't know if I was the first, but I was the first major person to— I, some of these things were original Dave thinking, especially putting it all together that way. Right. But each of those has its camp. So there's like the keto bros. If you eat a carb again, it's like, no, it's supposed to be a cyclical, low toxin keto diet and you have to eat the right fats. Right? So what I'm finding is people go over keto and they actually get sick. Right. And it happens repeatedly and it happens first in women, then in men. Fasting is the same way. So overfasting is, is the risk.

So what I would agree, let's not do 4-day fast.

That seems too much. I've done a 4-day fast. 4-day fasts are great, but that was a special, special type of, uh, right, Dave?

Yeah.

Don't do it all the time. Don't do it even once a month. And it might be okay when you're younger, but I just interviewed a woman on my show. I haven't even put it up yet. Yeah. Margaret Paul. She's done intermittent fasting for 55 years. How's she look? Good. Oh my God. She's 20 years younger than her actual age. She's 80, I think 81. And she looks like she's 61. I love that. And you're just— and so this is an example of how that, how that can happen. And she says, I used to do 5 and 6 day fast when I was young, but they actually don't work. Work as you age. So let's focus on learn how to fast based on how much energy you have. So if you wake up in the morning, your Oura Ring says, oh look, today you're full of energy. It's an awesome day. Like you recovered really well. All right, maybe you should do a 24-hour. Maybe like, okay, I'm going to kick off my fast. But if you wake up like, I drank last night, I'm wrecked. I don't have enough energy. I have a big day. Do a 16 or an 18-hour fast. Feel a little more gentle. Yeah. Same fast every day is not a good idea. Long fasts are when you prepare ahead of time. You've already conditioned your body with intermittent fasting. And then, like, right in the middle of my book launch, I did a 72-hour fast just because I was busy and I wanted that energy that comes from that.

It's true. I do them on occasion too.

Yeah, yeah. But you don't start there. So, so for people like, you don't have to worry about the 3 and 4 day fasts. And honestly, if you say I'm going to do a 4 day fast, and then on the 3rd day, you go, well, I'm feeling absolutely like garbage. And you have 2 choices. One is you push through and say, I'm just going to deal with this. And that's when you lay on a couch, you're supposed to not be working out. You're supposed to be relaxed, maybe journal, and you're getting into the spiritual fast land. But if you're doing that in the middle of your day—

Yeah, yeah, that's extreme. I've never done a 4-day. I've not done what you've done, especially without the butter or without minerals or without some little biohack, because I feel like to do it the way you did it was pure. But you've experienced that spiritual enlightenment.

You get super flighty. But what's really neat, Jorge, is, okay, let's look at this. One of the things that happens from fasting is ketones. So with ketones, your brain works better. Your neurons actually have more energy than they did.

Remind people what that means. I hate to always dumb things down, but I always say, let's keep it simple. Oprah taught me that years ago. And what would you use as a metaphor for a ketone? Like, how would you describe that?

When your body is burning fat, that has more calories than sugar, and ketones are what happens. Your body burns fat. Fat. The neurons in your brain, like, even if you give them sugar and fat next to each other, they'll take the fat because like, yeah, I needed more power because I'm like, I'm the processor of the body. I need this energy. So your brain is lit up. That's why when people drink the Bulletproof Coffee, they raise ketones like, yeah, I love this. It's like day 4 of a fast when you get all the energy, but they're getting it the first morning. So the ketones go up. So now your energy production is higher. All the energy that you used to put into breaking down food in the gut, it doesn't have to do that anymore. So now all that energy is now unleashed in your body for healing and for thinking. Amen. And we are wired when our stomachs are empty and they've been empty for a little while to open up our sensors. Okay, now I'm getting a little bit less sciency here, a little bit more shamanic and Eastern stuff.

But okay, we like a little soul fit here, right?

Yeah, exactly. That stuff exists and it's real and we all feel it in one way or another. And when your sensors are open, I mean the mitochondria themselves, the ancient bacteria in the body. This is from Autophagy. Correct. Um, they are part of autophagy. What they are though, these are ancient bacteria embedded in our cells and their job, they're the puppet masters of your meat. Like, so they run the operating system of your body and they have rules they follow. And when you don't have food, they be— there are sensors that sense the environment and then make energy, hormones, neurotransmitters in response to the environment before you can think about it. So they're very much in control. And they'll start saying, "Hmm, maybe you need to be more aware of the world around you in order to find food," and you literally open up and you're more perceptive. You smell better. One of the stories in the book is from a guy who did long-range patrol military stuff, you know, in the jungle, and their training was, "Well, here's an 80-pound backpack and you have no food. Here's a canteen. You have 3 days. You need to go, you know, 100 miles through the jungle and find the destination point. Here's a compass. And they'd hang a hamburger in the tree, or actually a cheeseburger. And then they would get within a couple miles of it and they could all smell it, right? Because they were so open. So any of the things like the Tracker Schools, all the people who really teach how to be in nature, when you do it with fasting, it is about picking up the world around you in a different way. That's what happens over a longer fast.

Well, this is— I mean, I may have to visit with you and we'll have to do a cave fast. I mean, I feel like I've never taken it to that level. Well, 3 days is my max, and I always look great. I mean, my abs pop. I feel great. I've never lost muscle. I've gained 19 pounds during the COVID time when I've done this. Not to distract from this, but I gave a lot of credit to Mark Sisson. You know, he's 67 years young. You've seen his body on his Instagram. He's doing well. He's a rock star. He's a rock star. So I said, Mark, whatever you're doing, I'm going to do. But I feel like— please continue, because this is definitely something, Mark, and no one has ever talked about this. This is kind of a soul fit, I call it, right?

Soul fit. It's the, the spiritual side of fasting. And there's a chapter in the book. I was in a cave, but you look at every tradition, whether it's Christianity, whether it's ancient European stuff, whether it's South American, Chinese, Indian, they always had fasting as a part of this because there is a level of clarity and sharpness that comes from fasting. And it's because the energy is not going into your stomach. The energy is going into your brain, and the energy that's going into your brain is a more powerful form of energy than the normal stuff when you eat protein and sugar. And that allows you to open up these sensors and reach new levels. This is why spiritual fasting matters. And this is why a working fast matters. And I wanted to put that both— both. And this is a different fasting book. This is not the don't eat for a while, it's good for you. We know that. But how do you actually do it? And then how would you do it to reach that state? State versus to reach a state, which is I just kicked ass all day and I was never hungry. And one of the other things that comes out here, I found a study in, in the book, please, 15% of the average person's thoughts every day are about what's for their next meal. Oh wow. And if you're metabolically unfit, it's probably closer to 40%.

I would say that's most people.

What if you were to get all of that thought back because you just didn't think about food because your body had enough energy? And that is a massive performance upgrade on day one of an intermittent fast when you're doing the fasting hacks.

I'm talking about in the book. Yes, yes, I do. I do OMAD quite often. I sometimes will do 2 meals a day if I need it. I listen to my body, which I think you would— I do want to say a good thing to do. And I think Jack Dorsey, he's a big guy, everyone knows him from Twitter and what happened during the last year with politics and how—

oh yeah, he's been drinking Bulletproof for a long time, right?

He's a huge advocate of this. And he, you know, he's a rich man, very well known, he's not fat, he's doing this for longevity. And if you do the OMAD, and then I think he takes— correct me if I'm wrong— 2 days. He does a 2-day fast.

I think every weekend he does a 48-hour fast and he does omad the rest of the time. He might be getting to the point of overfasting, but I say might, right? Because, you know, Jack knows his body really well. He's a biohacker. He measures things. He's got his Oura Ring and all that kind of stuff.

Oh yeah, I've got one too. I love the— tell everyone what an Oura Ring is because you've mentioned it twice now and I don't have mine on right now, but I took it off before the show.

So Oura Ring is It's a ring that has built-in sensors. You charge it about once a week and it tracks your sleep.

They can see it for you.

It tracks your sleep. It just looks like a normal ring, but it also tracks your movement and it tracks something called heart rate variability. So you wake up in the morning and it says, how well did you recover last night? And if your number for that, your readiness score is high, you can do a longer fast and a heavier lift. And if you wake up, God, I'm wrecked today. You might not necessarily feel it as much until you learn, but you look at the score and wow, from a data perspective, your body is not strong today. So maybe you don't need to push it so hard. I was CTO and co-founder of the first company that could get heart rate off the wrist. We sold it to Intel for $100 million years ago. It was called Basis. It's the stuff that's in the iPhone or so the iPhone— You're amazing.

You literally are like a Steve Jobs. You are such an innovator. I mean, there are very few people that have your depth, but continue.

Hey, thank you. I appreciate that compliment. Steve Jobs is a very unique human being. I don't know that I'm a Steve Jobs, but—

Well, you're sweeter. You're a sweet guy. I mean, I'm not saying Steve Jobs was an asshole, but some people say that, you know, but apparently he was, but just, I mean, he was a creative visionary of, of a very— We're all tormented, the creatives, you know. Hey, I was a sugar addict and, you know, we haven't even talked about sugar, but maybe we'll end on that.

But finish the Oura Ring. So, so, but I went really deep on, on this because I was, you know, in the space and the Oura Ring. I invested in Oura. I'm an advisor to the company and this is Ring is the holy grail of technology because it's, it's no work to wear a ring. It barely needs charging. And every morning I look at my score and it's valuable, actionable data that can drive my fast. It can drive everything. There you go. You've got your Oura Ring as well.

I had to pull it out while you were talking.

So if you go to Silicon Valley—

computer in here, really?

I mean, there's a computer, a battery, sensors better than anyone's I could ever make. And, uh, if, like, if we still had meetings, but if you went to meetings in Silicon Valley, if we still met Right. 80% of highly successful people have an Oura Ring now. The NBA is all using it. And it's just because it finally reached the convenience factor and the value factor to be worth doing. So this is one of the reasons, like, look, don't fast the same every day. If you're wrecked, you can sense you're wrecked, or you could just get the data to prove to yourself you're right.

And unfortunately, as much as I love the new Apple Watch, I've got the new one, the red one that doesn't get the sleep quite there. It's getting there, right? They're working on it, right? Or not yet.

There's a company called SleepSpace and SleepSpace will take the data from your Apple Watch and give you the most clinically validated sleep score you can get. They'll also take data from an Oura Ring and do that.

Where do we get— is it an app we can get to?

Yeah. It's an app you can get. We're going to download it right now. Full disclosure. I'm, I'm an early investor and advisor to that company. Will you send us the links to that?

And we'll put it in the show notes.

Dan Gartenberg has been on Bulletproof Radio, the founder, talking about— he's a sleep scientist from the University of Wisconsin who really went deep on sleep algorithms. Algorithms. So, you can get the data you need, but you got to pair SleepSpace with the Apple Watch.

And it's called SleepSpace for everyone listening. Yep. And that's the app. I love that. Both on Android and Apple?

I believe he supports both, yeah.

Oh, wonderful. All right. Not to digress and not that we're running out of time, but as we wrap up here, Dave, the one thing we mentioned briefly, but I know we didn't even talk about, we definitely covered everything, but end on this note because I feel like this is my passion. It started my career years ago because I was an addict to sugar. Addict, you know, to sugar, carbs, salty snack foods. And I always tell people it's not the salt, it was the potato or the corn chip, which is all inflammatory, you know, at least the corn oil and all that. And I feel like for all my sugar addicts that are listening, because a lot of the people listening to this show are trying to get radical control over that, what would you say to someone who struggles with getting off of sugar or carbs?

You know, this was me.

Give them some hope because you and I both were, I mean, I was fat too. I was, you know, 240, you were 300 though. So you were a little bigger than me. And I feel like a lot of people will, will relate to us because not everyone in this space that we talk about were overweight. You know, Susan Powter was, but whatever. I mean, that was years ago. And I feel like a lot of the new Instagram trainers and all that, they're always phenomenal shape, you know, they've probably never been fat.

I love it when you get a 25-year-old with a young person's metabolism who's never been fat going, just do what I do. You're like, man, you have not lived this. Totally. And then when they take heavy people and tell them to go run a triathlon and it wrecks them oftentimes for years. It's not good advice.

So we're both in midlife. I'm turning 50 next month, so I'm 50 on March 6th. Congratulations. And, well, you know, it seems to be working, the OMAD. I'm kind of following in your footsteps with the healthy fats, and I feel like for those that, you know, have not overcome sugar addictions and carbs and all that stuff, what would you give them as a— as a—

I would think I'm going to answer that, but I got to correct you in something you said before, okay? So we're about the same age. I'm, you know, a couple years younger than you. I just celebrated my 28th% birthday.

Ooh, tell us what that means.

I am nowhere near midlife, just so we're clear on that. I'm going to live to at least 180. Don't tell yourself you're in midlife. Like, that's old 1900s kind of thinking. Midlife for you and me— Yeah. Midlife for you and me is 80.

Yeah? Yeah. Tell us about what this test is that you did and where can people find out more? And we'll include it in the show notes. Well, this isn't a test, it's 28th%.

Like you, you pick how long you're going to live, and we all have the ability to live past 100 with the technology that's available today. And the stuff coming over the next 5 and 10 years is unimaginable. I know, I interviewed most of these people, I'm investors in the companies. It's real. So you're not, you're not middle-aged, man. You were middle-aged by the definition from 30 years ago. Yeah, you are.

So 50 is not middle-aged?

No, you're, you're 30%. That's where you are.

Wow. So the formula is just to know that we can live to? I mean, what's a conservative overall?

Right now, we have people who are 120 years old. In fact, the lady who's 117 just had COVID and survived and is just fine. So if we know we can do 120— these are people who were born before there were cars, okay? There was no antibiotics, we couldn't spell DNA, we didn't know refrigeration. Yeah, I mean, it was a totally different world. They can do it. And if we can't do better with all of our current tech, 50% better over the next 100 years, it's because a comet hit the planet. Planet. So you're on a different path. So stop the internal dialogue about middle age.

That's not true. And thinking fit is stop saying lies that we've been fed about, you know, life expectancy and expand that. What is something people could read? I mean, obviously you wrote a book on this topic.

That's called Superhuman. And tell them about that briefly.

Give them 30 seconds.

Sure. Superhuman. We know the 7 things that make us old. And if you address those 7 things, then you're not going to age at the same rate as everyone else. And there's a whole bunch of new tech going through. And I went through, I did all this stuff like stem cells, all the stuff that crazy billionaires are doing. And then I wrote about the experience. I say, here's the expensive, crazy stuff that's going to be more affordable later. Here's the stuff that's $50 a month that activates the same pathway. And here's the stuff that's free. So the idea is you get to choose the speed at which your body gets old because we know now how to maintain it Susan Patter and none of these other people, no one knew this in the '80s or '90s or even 10 years ago. So the knowledge and the speed of change is amazing for our ability to manage our own biology.

And you mentioned stem cells and just kind of entice us because I know I've read enough where a 3-day fast helps. How would you say it? It helps improve, it helps produce it. How does it impact stem cells? Because if I remember right, when you get to that level, and I'm not saying 4 days, but about 72 hours, something magic happens with stem cells briefly, correct? It's true.

When you get to about 72 hours and probably somewhere in the, the 50s or 60s, but your stem cells get more prolific and younger. So you can actually use fasting to increase the quality of your stem cells.

And why do we care about our stem cells? Not that we see them, right?

I mean, stem cells are one of the 7 pillars of aging in Superhuman. As we age, they get weaker and they're less able to make new young cells. So you can redistribute your stem cells the way I have. You can strengthen your stem cells and you can even get younger stem cells from other people that then go into the body. They turn off inflammation, they turn up energy production, and they literally make you younger. And that's what people are doing there.

If they have the money, they're injecting younger stem cells.

I've probably had more stem cells injected in my body at one time than anyone else. We created something called the Six Hands Whole Body Stem Cell Makeover with Dr. Harry Adelson. Dr. Nelson. They pulled— excuse me. No problem. They pulled about half a liter of bone marrow out and some stem cells from my fat, put stem cells in my cerebral spinal fluid to get into my brain, along the inside of my spinal column, every joint in my body, face, hair, skin, reproductive organs, everything. Everything in a 4-hour procedure with 3 doctors working on me. That was part of writing that book. Whoa. And I did a podcast on it. There's videos of it as well. What the—

what, do you know the podcast number? Let's include that. Got a shopping list. We can get a twist later. Email.

I'll get it to you later. So powerful. It's powerful stuff. But you know what, if you're fasting, you're getting a stem cell upgrade, and you can still do a stem cell upgrade later, or you can do a stem cell upgrade whenever.

But if you're going to get it with Fasting. It's free. Fasting is the highest return on investment of anything you do because it costs less than eating and it gives you more energy and time, and you're not thinking about food all the time. I mean, for anyone that thinks— you and I— because some people think the F word is not, you know, the F word. They think it's fasting, and I've had to overcome it too. Why is fasting not just probably the most important tool for longevity, right? I think it's the most proven way to extend lifespan. Span. But why is it so important in 2021 with all that we've got going on? I mean, COVID-19, underlying health conditions, or more— I think I read, or it was on the Today Show this week, about how life mortality has dropped a year, you know, like, why do we need fasting right now? You know, even though it's not— and it's not the F word. It isn't. I mean, it is, but it isn't, you know what I mean? Yeah.

Well, what fasting does is it gives you a flexible metabolism. Metabolism. When your cells are stronger, you're harder to kill. You're harder to kill in a car accident. You're harder to kill from a viral infection, from a bacterial infection, from anything like that. And 42% of people in the US are obese and something like 80% of people have metabolic dysfunction. Uh, newsflash, guys, stop eating seed oils and lots of sugar. And if you just did those two things and fasted, it doesn't have to be crazy long fast, just some regular, even 3 days a week is proven to 3 mornings a week, have coffee instead of breakfast. You can do this. It's not as big of a challenge as you think. And when you do that, your metabolism gets stronger. And then if you do get sick, like, yeah, I felt bad for a week and I'm okay. Versus I went to hospital and I died. And that's what it's all about. You want to be hard to kill. This is the year to be hard to kill. And fasting is the cheapest and easiest way to give yourself a flexible metabolism. And you don't have to live in the gym. Yeah. You can like to work out. You cannot like to work out. Out, but you don't have to do it.

Yep. And you can do it while you're working out. You don't have to eat something. I do it every day in the morning usually, and I never eat until midday or something, you know.

Although, man, there's probably an upgrade for you, Jorge. Oh, well, but I do have my coffee. I talk about this mTOR compound we mentioned earlier. This is the thing that when it's low, your body isn't building muscle, but your body is also less inflamed. And when it's high, your body's building tissues, but there's more inflammation. Okay. And the way mTOR works is it's a spring and the more you push it down, the faster it's going to surge forth. 3 things push mTOR down. One of them is fasting. One of them is coffee and one of them is exercise. So if you want the most bang for your buck for your workout, you fast, you drink coffee in the morning with or without the Bulletproof stuff. And then at the end of your fast, you, you work out, you lift heavy, you do what you're going to do, and then you eat with protein. Yes, protein. You also want to have fat, but you can have some carbs too. Fat carbs will help. But when you do this, your mTOR is fully suppressed. And when you eat protein and carbs, turn mTOR on. So then the benefits of the workout are much higher because you spike your mTOR right at the end of the workout. But then you go into a fast later. And when you go into the fast later, you end up with, uh, um, again, lower mTOR, which is associated with living a long time. So then you got your, your maximum muscle build. But if you lift when you're fasted and you don't eat within about a half hour of working out, you get a 48-hour cortisol spike. Who overfast get cortisol, get elevated cortisol over time. And elevated cortisol is why women get problems with their monthly cycle, why men are waking up without a kickstand and their sleep.

No erections. We want erections. It's a healthy, healthy, vital sign assign things. We don't want belly fat. I think cortisol helps grow belly fat, right?

It does grow belly fat, and it also causes hair thinning in men and women. So what you'll find is that working out at the end of a fast is better than working out and staying fasted for most of the reasons you'd want to do it.

But say that one more time. So working out at the end of the fast— so if you finish your workout, work out, and then as soon as you're done working out, give yourself not an hour, half an hour, or how—

half hour is better, but an hour is pretty Good.

So quickly eat your meal. And if you're doing it with Jack Dorsey, have that one meal then. And yes, exactly. Maybe a ribeye, grass-fed.

That would be good. And it doesn't have to be a crazy workout either. You can literally, before you eat at the end of a fast, just do 20 or 30 squats and some pushups. Right. And that is still going to give you massive benefits because you're eating right afterwards. So it's, it's a pretty neat hack just to get more out of the exercise. So play with the timing of the exercise and the meal. I bet you'll actually put on more muscle more quickly.

Well, you know, I'm on it. I think that you are truly ahead of us all, and I'm so grateful for this time with you. I feel like this book is— I don't know how you write them so quick, but you know, I don't do as many books as you now, but Fastest Way is obviously available everywhere books are sold. I love that Amazon is doing it, but tell us something about Barnes Noble. I read that they're doing They have a special edition, and I love Barnes Noble. I mean, they're one of the original players out there and independent bookstores and all that. But tell us about what's going on with Barnes Noble.

What'd you do for them? Barnes Noble asked me to write a special chapter on meditation, actually, and immunity and fasting. So I put in some new research. So there's a special gift chapter at Barnes Noble. And I would just ask you guys, if you're going to read the book, I'd be grateful. Make sure you leave a review because it's like tipping a barista. You know, we spend thousands of hours. You know, Jorge, how much love and work goes into a book. Well, but pick it up at an independent bookstore. Like, small businesses around the country are just getting hammered right now. And if you can go into a bookstore and pick it up, it is a way of supporting your community. So I just got to say, you know, buy local if you can.

And it's a beautiful book. I mean, it's just— I love holding a book. And no disrespect to Jeff Bezos and his Kindle, but I love getting in there. And I feel like it's just, it's something to put in your house to see, because you see it, right? If it's on a Kindle, you turn it on. And I think it gives you good energy, right? Because there's, there's science in that. It's kind of that solfeggio. When you see good things, you think good things, right?

There's actually a name that I don't pronounce very well in Japanese, and it's the Japanese art of collecting books that you're not going to read.

Well, let's not do that. We want to collect them and read them.

But having the books around does something. And I do have books here that I haven't read. Sometimes people send them to me. Sometimes I buy that and go, I'm going to read this when I'm ready. But having books around, it does— it changes your brain. So I'm a fan of some print. I'm with you.

Hey, I mean, I think it's important. We have to train our mind. I believe it's all mental. And I think having good energy in our house and our present is important. So guys, get this book. It's available everywhere books are sold. It's an audio as well. You read the audio, which I think is amazing.

I read the audio.

Not everyone does Nobody does that anymore, you know?

No, it's a lot of work. It's almost a whole week. I took voice lessons from Roger Love, who taught Bradley Cooper how to sing for that movie.

I love that. Do you sing for us in the book? No.

I do not have a singing voice. I do not sing in the book, but I did learn to be better at enunciating things and just having the right tone. So I worked hard.

Always upgrading. I love that about you, Dave. And if people want to find you on social media, we remind them where to find you on social.

Dave.Asprey on Instagram. You can find Bulletproof Radio on your podcast platform, top 100 for 5 years, couple hundred million downloads. And, you know, I'm just easy. Just look for Bulletproof Coffee or Dave Asprey and you'll find me. Yeah, I know you're out there.

Thank you, Dave. I can't tell you how much I appreciate this time. I know we've talked for a while here, but this was brilliant. And congratulations on the success. It's already on the New York Times, correct? It is.

A couple of weeks in a row.

Love it. So let's keep it out there, guys. Pick up the book this weekend. Do it, guys. It's an important read, important book in your library of health. As always, thank you, Dave. Peace and purpose, everyone. And take good care. All right, today's episode is complete, guys. Thank you so much for listening, and I want to ask you to please subscribe to the show on Apple Podcast, uh, and please leave a review on Apple as well. Give it 5 stars if you think the show has helped you in some way to transform your thinking. I hope it has. And more importantly, share your comments, your review of what today's episode did for your thinking, how it shifted your thinking and what you got out of it, because I think that is how we spread this. And for me, this is a revolution. This is not a podcast, this is a way of life. And I hope to transform over a million lives in the next couple years, and I need your help. So please become part of the Zero Hunger Revolution by leaving that review on Apple Podcasts and subscribing today. Thanks so much, have a great one, peace and purpose, and I'll see you on the next episode.