Everything You Know About Health Is Bs
In this informal, slang‑filled YouTube monologue, Samir Gardner argues that most contemporary nutrition advice is wrong and promotes fasting and time‑restricted eating as a return to ancestral eating patterns. He references Steven Gundry’s The Energy Paradox and personal observations of Ramadan fasting, claiming that periodic fasting triggers cellular repair, improves mitochondrial function, and leads to a more youthful appearance. Gardner explains how circadian rhythms, sunlight, and blue‑light exposure affect sleep and hormone regulation, and he critiques modern habits such as constant snacking, processed foods, and multiple daily meals that cause insulin spikes. He cites a mouse study where a 1‑hour feeding window produced superior health outcomes, and he offers practical advice to start with a 12‑hour fast. Throughout, he weaves personal anecdotes about his own acne, hair loss, and gratitude for books and online resources, while urging viewers to reduce stress, limit phone use before bed, and emulate the lifestyle of people who lived 200 years ago.
Chapters
Yo, yo, yo, it's your boy Samir Gardner. Hope y'all doing good. So bro, everything you know about nutrition is probably wrong, bro. And sorry for my hair, bro. I literally look like this, bro. Look, bro, literally look like this, bro. You know Rocky when he was fighting Gara? But I literally look like this, bro. Literally have the same hair, bro. Okay. Bro, I just read this book called The Energy Paradox by Steven Gundry, and basically I read the chapter about like, um, fasting, bro. And bro, to be honest, bro, people, people nowadays, like, no, I can't just like insult people or just judge people, but Bro, the way people eat nowadays, bro, it's fucked up, bro. It's fucked up, bro. Just think about it, like, bro, our ancestors, right? Our ancestors, were they eating 3 snacks a day, 3 meals a day? No. Our ancestors literally did feast and then fast, feast, fast, feast, fast. That's the only thing they did. Right now, look, I might not be like the one that is like can really talk about health because I'm not like— I don't have like a lot of experience and everything. I still have my acne scars that really like I don't know what to do with them, but I'd be trying to heal them and everything. But bro, I don't think it's normal to, to eat like constantly. You gotta understand your body needs rest. You mitochondria, your gut, your microbiome, your brain, your organs— they need rest, bro. They need the rest. I've made a video like talk about stress, and I'll talk about this too, because, bro, your cells, when they're fasting, right, your cells are literally like repairing themselves because you give them like a sort of challenge, a sort of like natural challenge. For example, the cold or hot temperatures are sort of like this challenge that gives yourselves a sort of like perceived adversity. They'd be like, oh, okay, um, it might, it might be hard. And like, the, um, it might, it might, bro, it might be hard like in a couple of minutes of, or a couple hours. That, that's what happens when you fast. Your cells are like, okay, uh, we're gonna face a challenge. So what do they do? They repair themselves, they restore themselves, they basically like do everything so they can be like stronger. That's what happens. That's why fasting is powerful, because— and that's why a lot of people that fast look way younger and everything, because think about it, like, bro, I'm not gonna be like— I will, um, I was born in a Muslim family. My mom is Muslim and everything. And bro, literally, I don't know if a lot of people blame the environment, a lot of people blame the genes, but I don't— I really don't give a fuck, okay? I really don't give a fuck. That's, that's how I lie, bro. They blame the genes. Like, people from Morocco, my mom from Morocco, they look way younger. But guess what? They do Ramadan every year. They fast every year for 30 days, bro, eating one meal a day. They fast, they fast 30 days dry, like literally dry. And also they have a better diet because they're not like just eating some processed food, because processed food is not as popular as it is here, okay? And a lot— and you know, I told this, my mom was like Bro, people here look like— why, why do everyone got no hair on top of their head? Literally, I go to this, uh, Costco. I hate going there because, boy, it's just like pure society, like pure standards and everything. I go there, bro, I, you know, I'm not the, the— I don't want to insult people, I just look at things. And bro, literally Literally, bro, the person, uh, like every guy literally didn't have hair like here, you know. Uh, you know when people start losing hair here? Literally, bro, they had no ears. Like literally everyone that didn't have a hat literally didn't have hair, bro. They didn't have hair. They lost all their hair. I was like, oh, how is this possible? Why, why everyone has like this? And she told me, yeah, it's because of genes and I was like, no, bro, it's not genes, bro. They're the same people who eat hot dogs every day, bro. The same people eat McDonald's every day. There's no difference, you know. It's kind of bad, and it's kind of sad, bro. I know I can't talk like really too much, you know, because I still like got my acne scars, like I said. But bro, like, this, this stuff is like— bro, my energy level is great. I don't want to just brag about my health, but I'm not going to do this. But look, bro, you gotta understand, fasting is too powerful. Fasting is very, very, very powerful. And, uh, one of the things he said in the book is in the summer the sun is up for longer, so people can eat for longer. But in the winter, there's not much— there's not as much food in the winter available as it is in the summer. So So in the winter, you're sort of like rhythm, your circadian rhythm is not used to eat a lot of foods because in the winter your body is like in nature, there's not as much food as there is in the summer. So you gotta understand there's like clocks in your body. You know, the sun is so powerful. The sun, bro, look at the sun, bro. The sun, bro. The sun is so powerful, okay? The sun literally regulates your circadian rhythm. Okay, what does that mean? It means it kind of tells your body what to do, like your subs— like your cells and everything tells you what to do. They tell, tell them like, you know, oh, okay, there's no sun, so, uh, we're gonna start going to sleep, you know what I mean? We're gonna start, uh, basically, uh, secreting melatonin, all these hormones, so we can sleep. The sun, literally, like the light. And the problem with a lot of people nowadays is they go on their phone before bed. So that's blue light. It's like, it's like literally just think about it. It's like you go on your phone before bed with like this high, uh, with no, like, sort of like with a lot of blue light. Basically it's the same as you like going to sleep, it's dark outside, and suddenly the sun just pops up. Pops up in front of your eyes. It's the same thing. Are you gonna sleep well because the sun just, just, uh, just popped up in front of your eyes? You're not gonna sleep as well. So you gotta understand, bro. You really gotta understand. Your body is— take care of your body, basically. Just take care of your body. I'm not saying to overthink and be like, oh, don't, don't go on your phone for the rest of the day or something. Like, bro, just be smart about it. If you have problems dealing with, let's say, sleep, don't go on your phone. But it's simple like this before bed. I mean, you know, we really gotta understand, we really gotta go back. Like, I love talking about things like ancestors and, you know, uh, you know, the tribes, how they used to eat and everything. But when you think about it with like common sense, like I'm not trying to brainwash or anything, but our ancestors didn't just— like, a lot of people say eating a big meal is bad, but bro, do you think eating 5 small meals is good? No, bro. Spike— you spike insulin every time. You have high levels of insulin. So what happens? You cannot even burn fat. That's why, you know, they say to work out fasted is way better because you use your glycogen, or AKA your glucose, you know, your pretty much your carbs or sugar basically in your muscles because there are stored a lot of you in your muscles. And then when you— and then they get depleted very fast, and then you use your fats, AKA your ketones. You use your fats as fuel for your workout. You know, a lot of people really want to rely on those candies and everything before a workout or a run or something. Bro, it's not worth it, bro. It's not worth it. You can perform better just using fat. I'm pretty, I'm pretty sure, bro. I've been working out faster for so long, bro. And at first, like, mentally, I was— because a lot of people say things like, you know, when you're fast, you have less energy and everything when you don't eat. Bro, that's bullshit. I was just literally visualized, like, I was just literally just going against myself, basically, because it's not our words. Think about it. He said in the book, when people have been fasting for long because they didn't find any food yet, you know, when the tribes or the ancestors, you know, the hunters used to, to go, um, you know, really, um, how to call it, uh, hunt for food. Think about it, bro. The brain had to give them the proper energy and focus so they could literally just, you know, for example, uh, hunt, uh, a bear— not a bear, but hunt, uh, beef or something, hunt meat. Okay, do you think, like, bro, when, when they had to chase something, they— that's when they needed the energy. They were still fasting, but that's when they got energy because the brain basically gave, gave them to, to them. Because think about it, bro, if you need something, you're going to use your energy. You have energy in your body, you have fat as fuel, you have carbs, you have proteins. You know, proteins is in your muscle, carbs is like also in your muscle. But I'm not going to talk about this. But bro, you gotta understand this, like, we, we we are like way off the normal way of living and eating too, but living too, like living especially, living, bro. I know like, like this modern sort of society or way of living is stressful, and you know, that's the problem. A lot of people be too much stress, you know. If you got, you know, your parents are everything, you know, there's Most of the time they're stressed a lot, like they didn't learn how to manage stress or anything. They didn't have this access to technology, which you should be so grateful for, bro. All those books, bro, I have in my cabinet. Look, all those books, okay? Don't mind Attack on Titans, but look, all those books. I don't know if you can see, but all those books, bro, it gave— I'm not gonna be cringing, like, give me all the knowledge, but look It gave me so much knowledge, bro. I like— I'm grateful that I can literally, bro, I can literally change— some of those books changed my life. Just I don't want anything from one book and I'm grateful, bro. Read this book, taught me about entrepreneurship and everything. I'm grateful, uh, you know, really, uh, going on YouTube and seeing people change my life, for example, and really inspired me and really taught me things that I couldn't even know if I just kept on going with the same sort of routine in life and everything. But you got to be grateful for this because your parents, or AKA your grandparents and people like before, you know, older people that didn't have access to technology, even though technology can be very bad, you know, these people don't know things like this, bro. These people don't know things like this. And I'm not saying we all know the right things, they don't, and they just don't know the— they just have the wrong beliefs and everything. I'm saying we have sort of like the potential, like we have the potential, because yes, you can read a book and be like— and the book just lies to you and tells you like lies on top of lies and lies, but at least you would have a perspective of the author. Okay, I know I'm going way off topic, so yeah, I'm not going to talk about this, but bro, we got this. We gotta start like, if you deal with like things like low energy, um, you know, just low energy, because low energy tells a lot, bro. Low energy tells a lot about your, your body, how it's functioning, everything. If you're dealing with like Uh, you know, you can't manage your emotions, or maybe you— I don't know, you, you just feel bad and everything, or you just feel sick. Well, go to how nature used to live. Just, just try to replicate how nature used to live. Now I'm 100% because you probably couldn't with all those things in society, but try to replicate how we used to live back like at least 200 years ago, you know, when people didn't have food like in the refrigerator where they could just eat whenever they want. Because they did a study— well, I'm not going to talk about health again, but they did it. They did a study on mice where like the mice that were fed like the basically were fed, I think, the same amount of calories or maybe less, but they ate like in a 1-hour window. They were basically fasting 23 to 24 hours a day compared to mice that were able to eat whenever they want. So they basically just ate a bit and then ate a bit and ate a bit, then ate a bit towards the whole day. The mice who were fasting 23 to 24 hours, bro, they literally got like way better results. But bro, you do you, okay? You don't have to fast. You don't even have to do anything. I'm— if you want to start fasting or something, I say start with 12 hours. But you do you. Just go— if you feel like sick and everything, bro, just go back to nature. Just go back to nature. I'm not telling you to walk in nature, but I'm saying go back to how nature used to be, okay? How people used to live back in 200 years ago, okay?
