Dr. Ben Lynch | Health Freedom: The Truth About Genetic Testing, Histamine, Sinusitis, & Metaverse

Genetic testing, it should empower the individual versus scare them. Once you dedicate time to learn how to interpret strategene and determine the direction that you want to go. Because strategene is a map. It's a roadmap. It's not an answer. You know, we don't enable you at seeking health. We provide you information that allows you to determine where you want to focus, how you want to do it, and then what tools you need in order to do it. But you have to put the work into it. If you know your genetic variations and you know that certain environmental influences can really, really affect your genetic expression, either for the worst or for the better, that's extremely empowering.

Ben, welcome back to Wellness Force.

Awesome to be here, Josh.

You know, last time we talked, the world was a bit different. Things have severe, severely progressed in some ways, and in some ways they're still the same. So what have you looking back on, gosh, about 18 months since we interviewed, in the middle of the process that we're working through as a society when it comes to health, what have you been most surprised by in the past 18 months or so? Ben?

Well, I think the curve is flattened.

I think so.

Yeah, yeah, I think the curve is flattened. I think the midline is expanded in many people. I think the stressors and anxiousness is skyrocketed. And I think this is just all a real shame. And I also want to say that this should be a shining moment for humans to realize how important it is to implement the fundamentals. I mean, if we are implementing the fundamentals and we are much stronger as a species and survival as a fittest is really paramount. And to me, that's a really motivating and exciting factor. And I'm really excited, excited for people who have recognized that. And I'm really sad for those who are relying on a needle going in their arm to protect them.

So that's a really, really, really powerful way to say it. Because on one side there's the dependence on something outside of ourselves, on a governmental body, on someone else other than us to take care of us. And then on the other side, there's us, there's. There's the father or the mother that lives inside of us all. And we don't have to have kids, by the way, to be the father or the mother of ourselves and our own health. So one of the things I've loved so much about your work, by the way, we had one most downloaded shows the last time you came on. So I'm super Excited to have you back. And we explored a little bit about epigenetics and dirty genes and what this whole equation of what I'm born with really means. But today, I want to start here. You know, people have called you before an epigenetic pioneer. What exactly does that mean? Are you trailblazing that space? Who did you learn from? How did you get into the epigenetics? And why did somebody call you the epigenetic pioneer?

You know, I think somebody called me the epigenetic pioneer because they don't know who they're the real pioneers of epigenetics are. You know, I'm flattered by that statement, but, you know, when I hear the term pioneer, I'm. I'm thinking Oregon Trail.

Me too.

I'm thinking Lewis and Clark and, and, you know, people who actually beat the bushes and. And help coin the term epigenetics. So I. I was introduced to this by Bruce Lipton. And, you know, Bruce Lipton is a phenomenal speaker, and I witnessed his work first quarter, first year at med school. You know, remember those big old media things that would come into your classroom that had the. The wheels and the big old TV and like a VCR with a.

With a cassette deck?

Yep.

Millennials might not know what that is, but. Yeah. Oh, yeah, I know.

Yeah. And so, I mean, they pushed the tape in there, and I'm sitting in the front row. I was like, oh, here we are back in sixth grade. I'm going to fall asleep. But I was riveted when I. When I realized that what Bruce was saying about how our eyes and our ears and our. In our nose and our touch, Sense of touch, are signals from the environment, absorb these signals from the environment, and our body responds to those, and our body responds to those in a. In a deeper way. And it's. It's our perception, the environment, that triggers cellular response. And I never looked at it that way. I just took it for granted. When I smelled something, you know, a result happened, or when I touched something a result happened, or when I saw something a result happened, I didn't think that it acted on the cell membranes with receptors and signals, and it sense energies, and it's like, wow, thank you for sharing this. And it just. It just was exciting. And when I. When I started applying that to genetic expression in my own world, you know, MTHFR and other genes, I realized that, yes, genetic variations matter, but in comparison to the environmental influence, it's. It's very, very low. I mean, Josh, you probably know this. I mean, what do you think the percent is in terms of genetic risk for, say, all cancers? I mean, there's some cancers that are high genetic susceptibility. But what percent of cancers do you think are basically caused by genetic inheritance of unhealthy genes?

I'm going to give an uneducated answer because I don't know. But I'm guessing it's lower than 5 to 10%. If you take out all the environmental factors.

Yeah, it's actually one to five.

Okay. That was close.

Yeah, you were. And it's. It's. When I was doing research for. For presenting to the God. Some Cancer association, I. I was floored when I. When I read that statistic. I was like, wow, okay, this is. We're barking up the wrong tree here.

Wow. It's powerful because I've heard many people describe epigenetics as what you're born with and what gets activated, what gets turned on. I remember three, four years ago, Chris Kresser was on the show and he said, gen genetics, load the gun, but our behavior pulls the trigger. And I thought, wow, that's a very profound way to say this. But when we look at the way that you've modernized genes and SNPs and MTHFR, what has been one of your guiding lights as you look at the way that we're coded, the way that we're born versus how we actually live with health. In other words, what we're born with and what we turn on and turn off. What has surprised you the most about your work and modernizing this?

Well, I'll start with. I'll answer this with a story. When I first did genetic testing, boy, I think 2011, on myself and my family, and I got my genetic results back, I was terrified. I was so scared, Josh. I mean, I saw my genetic and I saw my MTHFR there, you know, having the two significant SNPs. So my MTHFR's function is reduced by about 75%. Um, so that leaves me about a 25% functioning MTHFR gene. And I was like, oh, that explains a lot. But damn, you know, then I saw one of my sons has the ApoE4.4 genetic variation, so he has increased susceptibility to early onset dementia.

I'm a three. Four.

Yeah. Yep. I think I am as well. I forgot. How about that for a joke? Yeah. Not funny. So. But I first, when I did genetic testing, I was terrified. And after seeing what I did and how I addressed it, after the fear went away, I was like, okay, this is who I am. This is what I've inherited. This is what my children have inherited. Now I better get off my ass and do something about this. And so I eliminated folic acid from my diet for the most part. Every now and then you go to restaurants, you don't know what's in there. Right. You're going to be getting some folic acid, but supplements. I don't intentionally swallow it. Um, and my son is like, dad, I love football. I want to play football. I'm like, you know, dude, I, I can't. I can't have your head getting hurt because you have a reduced ability to heal your brain and it's, it's too high risk for you. And he, he was nine years old when I told him this in 2011. He was only three, so obviously I didn't tell him then. Um, but now he understands a bit more at 13 and, you know, he's going to appreciate it when he's, you know, in his 20s and late teens, he's going to say, thanks, dad, for not, you know, banging my brain against the. My own skull.

Yeah.

So it leads me to be more proactive. And it's. Genetic testing is actually. It should empower the individual versus scare them. So that's the short answer.

Yeah. I look at the way and we're going to dive into a lot of different things today because one of the focuses in my life has been the care and health of my sinuses. So we are going to explore histamine today. We'll talk about chronic sinusitis and go and unpack that onion. But one thing that is fascinating to me is that when I looked at my 23andMe, and I think it was back in the day, five years ago, I had to get it sequenced through Prometheus. And this is like early Tim Ferriss years here. And it was a little confusing to me. And then I noticed, Ben, that the 23andMe, it kind of morphed into this very vanilla carbon copy square. Not really actionable results that I got from my epigenetics and for my genetic coding. So can you talk about that field for people that don't know what exactly is genetic testing? How does it get done? Is it only through saliva? Is it saliva and blood? And what is the efficacy of 23andMe compared to your product, which is Strategene, which I love.

Yeah. So efficacy of 23andMe and strategy and efficacy of. In terms of the quality of the results of 23andMe is fantastic. So they've done a great job. They use a very good chip, they have really good processing. Their call rate, meaning the likelihood of, if you provide a good sample, a good saliva sample, the result that you're going to get back, the information you get back is, is 99% or so accurate.

And it's only saliva. No blood. Saliva is the key.

Yeah, blood. It becomes problematic because especially, you know, pregnant women, you can't imagine if you're, if you're doing a blood sample for genetic testing and a woman's pregnant, you're gonna be getting some fetal DNA coming through as well.

Yeah.

So saliva testing is actually very accurate. One of the reasons why you could have a bad sample, a bad genetic test comes, you know, genetic results come back and you get what's called a, a high no call rate. So a no call rate means that the genetic test was done, you provided the sample, you followed the instructions, but you don't see any snips, you don't see any like, information back. It says mthfr NC or a line through it. It's like, well, what the hell, I just paid for this and I don't know what I got. So what you can do is possibly take another genetic test, but you have to understand where your DNA is coming from when you spit. So there's bacterial DNA is a big problem in the sample. So if you have a high bacterial count in your mouth and your sample has a high bacterial count, the lab will look at that and it'll actually just throw it away. They'll just say, this is too high. Bacterial, we can't process this. It'll cause errors. But primarily the, the DNA in your mouth comes from. In your mouth. I thought it was from the cheek cells, you know, the insides. You know, our, our cheekbone cells have DNA in them. And I thought that was coming from there, but it's actually not. It's coming from our white blood cells in our mouth. So if you have a low white blood cell count, you're not going to be able to provide a good sample as well. So your folate levels have to be sufficient. If you're on immunosuppressants, it might not work very well. If you have a high infection in your mouth, that actually might work really well. But you have bacterial content. So quality of test matters upon your sample. But you're right. 23andMe When I first did it, I looked at what I was at risk for. Prostate cancer. I was like 1.7 times less at risk breast cancer. You know, I'm a guy. So, you know, you know, guys can't get it. But my BRCA gene, I didn't think it was there. My wife was reported and not found, so she didn't have any genetic risk with brca. But I'm going to pause right there because genetic testing is only as thorough as the test itself. 23andMe in fine print says your BRCA gene. We report two or three of the SNPs in the BRCA gene, which is the breast cancer gene. That's what it stands for, the breast cancer gene. And there are, however, many, many other genetic variations in the BRCA gene. And in fact, there might be combinations of these genetic variations which research hasn't looked at that may even reduce your risk or enhance your risk or have no effect on your risk at all. So when you get A snapshot of two SNPs in your BRCA gene and 23 mean says your genetic susceptibility, breast cancer is reduced, it's like saying, you drive up to my house, Josh. It's like I'm driving a white car and I get four white cars in my driveway. I don't know which one is yours. It's not enough information. I think 23andMe is doing a massive disservice by reporting the BRCA gene and giving false hope or false fear. Individuals who are testing their BRCA gene because it is not thorough. And not only that, but the BRCA gene is only one compound of, you know, increased risk for breast cancer. We don't know that. Your detoxifications genes, we don't know your. Your blood flow genes, we don't know your immune response genes. You know, we don't know a lot of these other ones. And so you have to look at the whole picture. And that's what strategene does. Strategene actually provides you a map of how your genes interact together along with environmental influences. And when you get strategene back, while you might not get, you know, information about your risk associated with certain conditions, because we can't. It's not FDA approved. Most genetic testing isn't. In fact, 23andMe got busted for that. But we.

That's what I was. I'm sorry. I'm sorry to interrupt you. That's what I was wondering is like, why don't they put more of the BRCA in there? Why don't they put. You said there were six, six pieces to look at. Oh, there's way more, way more. So why don't they put those in there? Is it a legal thing? Are they trying to protect themselves against false diagnoses?

I can't answer that. I can say, you know, if I was 23andMe and I'm. I wouldn't even report BRCA, Jane. First off, even if it was FDA approved, I wouldn't do it. But I think they do it as a marketing deal.

Got it.

You know, a woman wants to know there's family history of breast cancer in her family. There is definitely family history of breast cancer, but we can't just say it's brca. And when we hear in the news that so and so had the BRCA gene and she did a radical mastectomy that triggers fear among the entire population. And so now radical mastectomies are the results of testing positive for the BRCA gene. And it's not even a complete picture. And, you know, if you have immune, healthy immune responses, you have great detoxification responses. Your life is great. You're living in healthy environment, your stress isn't that high. You know, there is absolutely no need for you to lop off your breasts. And it's. It's a major disservice.

It's really sad, too, because this is why I'm so happy we're talking about this. I didn't know we were going to cover this in depth, but I'm glad we are. I think of how many people get really captivated by fear. They get hijacked by fear. We're seeing it with what's going on with health right now, with jabs and with mandates and masks and being people forced at home. Australia. Australia is a war zone. Australia is absolute insanity right now. And how does that one type of mindset where we're putting our health in other people's hands, we're trusting the status quo. We're looking to movie stars for health advice. We're looking to people that really don't have a passion like you have a passion. This has been your work for so long. Bastyr University was your alma mater. And you learned from Bruce Lipton. Like, this has been how many years that you've been studying this work?

I've been studying it when I got sick in India. I was really, really sick in India in 2000. God, no. Excuse me. No. 96. Yeah.

Wow.

Yeah. 1996. I still have my prescriptions from the Ayurvedic doctor behind me on my shelf.

I was in high school.

Yeah. So it was. It was 1996 where I started really, really learning about this. And it started with Ayurvedic medicine, which, you know, took me from what I thought was my deathbed, and it wasn't. I was just extremely, extremely sick. Maybe it was, I don't know, but I was very ill. And ayurvedic medicine lifted me out within, you know, an hour. I felt amazing. Well, amazingly better. I was still sick, but I've been doing this for a long time and it's really unfortunate, Josh. You know, it's. I even don't like saying this, but it's just follow the money, follow the influence. And I just finished Dopesick on Hulu about how Purdue Pharma was a mastermind of OxyContin and pain relief and destroying millions and millions of lives. I think Dopesick is an exact parallel to what's going on with Pfizer in Covid. I mean, it's in the fda. They're all in bed with each other. Purdue Pharma and the FDA was in bed with each other with OxyContin and the FDA agent who approved the labeling for OxyContin saying it was non addictive. And they put that on the label of OxyContin and all these people got addicted to it. That FDA person left at the FDA and worked for Purdue Pharma. Now if you look at Pfizer, now we've got, you know, FDA rep approved for a lot of stuff for Pfizer and now they're working for Pfizer. It's just like, are you, are you serious? So watch Dopesick, folks. Watch it, be informed and look at it with the eyes of what's going on right now in this, in this world.

Yes. And it's such a deep rabbit hole because I remember when we interviewed during the craziness, when it first started, I was, I was living back in Encinitas. We moved to Texas because we wanted to be more sovereign in our health. We wanted to have more control over the health and really the landscape for our son and for ourselves. And a lot of people, they're not really willing or maybe they can't financially or whatever it is. They haven't designed a life where their epigenetics and their health can be expressed in the most beautiful way. And I think this is a call to arms for all of us. I think this is a decision point for humanity, for us as a society to decide, am I going to live my life health focused or am I just going to survive? Am I literally just going to pay taxes, go to work, have kids, white pick a fence and die? I say hell no. I say hell no to that. And so how does knowing our genetic coding, something like with a tool of strategene, how does this fortress us? How does this buffer against the environmental and even the mental things that might come our way?

It's an empowerment tool. I mean, once you. Once you dedicate time to learn how to interpret strategy and determine the direction that you want to go with strategy. Because strategy is a map. It's a roadmap. It's not an answer. You know, we don't enable you at Seeking Health. We provide you information that allows you to determine where you want to focus, how you want to do it, and then what tools you need in order to do it. But you have to put the work into it. So. But if you know your genetic variations and you know that certain environmental influences can really, really affect your genetic expression, either for the worst or for the better, that's extremely empowering. And I'll tell you, Josh, when I was working with the research, I mean, Strategene is a. Is a compilation of literally thousands of research papers. When you look at just a diagram of a certain pathway, like the histamine pathway, and you see 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10 different genes on there, and then you see the epigenetic influences on each one of those genes in purple text or orange text, every one of Those might be six to 10 research papers just on the histamine pathway. And so what I want to share right now is a lot of genetic influences on these genes that are expressing in your histamine pathway are influenced by the common issues. Inflammation, stress, anxiety, over training, under training, nutrient deficiencies, nutrient excesses, macro and micro. So high protein, low protein, low minerals, low vitamins, high vitamins, certain combinations of vitamins, where, you know, some people respond really well to certain combinations of vitamins and other people don't. Well, if you look at your map on Strategene, you can actually realize, like, oh, that's why when I take this particular supplement, that might be one of the reasons why I'm feeling a certain way. You know, we have a supplement at Seeking Health that is extremely effective for a vast majority of people called histamine block. And it's. It's the DAO enzyme. And people look on their genetic report on Strategene and they see that their DAO enzyme is actually genetically inherited to be less effective at processing histamine in the gut. And then we say, well, what does that mean? It's. What it means is it your ability to process Histamine from wine or alcohol or kombucha or fermented foods, which you've been told are so good for you, or bone broths. And you eat this stuff and you actually got feel worse. And you do your strategies like, oh, my God, I've been pounding the histamine type foods and drinks. And then they. They start doing the lifestyle shifts, they start removing those foods and changing their diet a bit, and they start feeling better, but not quite enough. So then they. They try the histamine block. By seeing health, and some people is like, they got their life back. I mean, it's. It's great. And other people say, I felt nothing. It didn't work for me at all. And then if you look on the strategy and report, you look at the next gene below that of DAO is a first step in processing histamine in your gut. And there's another gene underneath that called aldehyde dehydrogenase. If your aldehyde dehydrogenase gene isn't working very well, then DAO is just going to process histamine into histamine and aldehyde, histamine, aldehyde, which then can actually increase histamine itself. So histamine breaks down in histamine aldehyde by the DAO enzyme. But if histamine and aldehydes increase too much, then your histamine levels can increase. So now you need to support the histamine aldehyde dehydrogenase gene. And that is done by niacin, thiamine, and other environmental factors. And so now you support that. And now they're saying, oh, okay, yeah, now I feel good. So histamine block plus is really helping those people who didn't do well, which is histamine block. Wow. Because I just looked at the histamine pathway and I was like, I'm going to design a supplement to open up this whole pathway. And I did that. And I. I kid you not, Josh, it's just like it's a magic pill. It's unreal. What's. What people are experiencing.

I gotta pause you right there. I felt like I was on your shoulder in the lab for a second. So people, people, rewind that and feel free to look up what you want. But what I heard from you on a high level is that strategene is a map. We still have to walk the trail. And it's a map for us to understand who we are on a genetic level, on an epigenetic level, to see what foods and also what supplements are gonna be deleterious for our health, even if they're totally lifestyle factors. Yeah, and also lifestyle factors. So, so tell me if I'm wrong, please correct me. Is it food and is it also supplementation that we can alter that we can modify by getting a strategene test A hundred percent?

Yeah. And what I want you to do, as I explain very, very clearly in the book Dirty Genes, in fact, when you order a strategene genetic test from seeking Health, we ship you a book that comes with it. We ship you include the dirty genes book and we, we also include the dirty jeans course. I mean we, we are giving you an arsenal of tools for you to study and empower yourself. And it's, it's amazing how much information we provide you that is actionable and insightful. But you have to put in the work if you don't want to put in the work. And if you want strategy and just give you a bunch of answers and do this, do that, you're going to hate it. You're going to hate strategy. It is not for people who want A plus B equals C. It's for people who want to have the entire Alphabet, but to make their own words out of that Alphabet. So you got to be able to, to dedicate time to learning it because it's, it's, it's not easy. I mean, I'll just be straight up. But when you, when you look at this, the map, and you start understanding what the map is informing you. Josh, the first step of histamine production is your diet and your lifestyle. So the step one is diet, lifestyle and the environment. If you're over training, you're making more histamine. Exercise induced asthma. Research shows exercise induced asthma is a result of a couple things. Elevated histamine and elevated adenosine. Adenosine is the breakdown of ATP, adenosine triphosphate. If you are increasing your adenosine higher than you're actually generating ATP, your mitochondria are not going to be working very well. They can start to break down and then you get an accumulation of adenosine and that causes all sorts of immune responses and issues histamine. As we know, if someone has a elevated histamine, you can have breathing difficulties. That's why people turn to Benadryl if they have a, if they eat something or, or they get stung by something they have a serious ige reaction to. And so with exercise induced asthma, your histamine levels are really high. So if you lower these individuals histamine, then Their excise induced asthma is gone permanently if they maintain healthy levels of histamine. Now histamine exercise induced asthma can come back and rear its ugly head at any moment in your life. There is no cure for exercise induced asthma because there is no cure of maintaining your histamine levels at a perfect level your entire life. It requires work from you. I always say that health is a four letter word spelled W O R K and you have to be able to understand what empowers your genes to work efficiently and what makes your genes work harder. Exercise is phenomenal. But if you work too hard, then your genes start getting too dirty, they can't handle it and they start calling on other genes to support it and then they get overworked and overburdened and then you start breaking down.

A lot of people get sick when they train too hard. I've done that before where I actually will cause myself to get a cold or a flu if I've trained really, really hard. So that makes perfect sense.

Yeah, because your genes are overworked. And that's the, that's step, that's gene 1 that converts histidine and amino acid into histamine by the histamine decarboxylase gene. It is heavily influenced by exercise, it's heavily influenced by infections, inflammation, stress, all these things are influencing it.

You mentioned adenosine too. And I think about the pathway for coffee and I don't know if it's coffee or caffeine because this isn't my specialty. For people it's caffeine. So for people that. Because part of caffeine's job is that I believe it blocks the histamine receptors, the functionality in the body is that. Receptors, receptors. So if somebody's drinking coffee and they have potential proclivity for exercise induced asthma, that would be something that they would need to modify asap.

Yeah, it's, it's informative. And we show actually the adenosine receptor genetic variations on strategene and we show the metabolism a bit of adenosine. So if you look at your histamine pathway and your adenosine metabolism and also we look, if we look at your COMT gene and if, if you say, okay, I'm super caffeine sensitive and if I have just a sip of coffee in the evening, I am anxious and I can't fall asleep at night.

Yeah, that's me.

And then you order your strategy and you're like, okay, yeah, I've got the cmt. It's slightly slower, I've got my adenosine receptors are very, very sensitive to, to adenosine and other things. Um, it, it gets complicated really fast. But you, you, you put it together and you're like, oh, okay, I need to cut back on my, my caffeine. And what caffeine does is it. It literally blocks the adenosine from attaching to the receptors. And adenosine naturally accumulates as throughout our day. And it's called a sleep pressure. I learned about this in the book why We Sleep, I think is the name of it. Phenomenal book, actually. I don't like saying this and giving the guy credit, but I will. Bill Gates turned me onto that book on his Instagram.

You're gonna give a shout out to Gates? Oh, my God.

No, no, no. Shout out for him recommending that book.

Okay, cool.

But why isn't he talking about that during. Yeah, whatever.

Yes.

Okay. But it's a fantastic book. And adenosine naturally increases our sleep pressure and caffeine reduces that sleep pressure. So if you reduce your sleep pressure by lowering your adenosine levels, well, you've got issues.

Yeah. And you can cheat for a while, but eventually it'll all catch up. Like, that's why people get nausea and they go through caffeine withdrawals because probably they had some fun, some dysregulation with the way adenosine is supposed to work. Yes.

Yeah, I would say it's so multifaceted. And that's the other thing too. We are so inherently human that we over. We tend to oversimplify things. And we want to oversimplify it because our reptilian brain requires a huge amount of dopamine and acetylcholine to process this type of information, which then uses up a lot of energy in calories, which then tells us we have to get off our ass and go hunt and gather food. And so we, we tend to reduction. You know, apply the reductionist theory to things in order to safeguard and protect our nutrients in our brain. And that's just a reptilian old thinking, even though we got a fridge right behind us. So if you're oversimplifying things, be careful. And that's why strategene is such a useful tool for a lot of people, because it does not oversimplify things, but it can frustrate you at the same time because it is very comprehensive.

Yeah, it's a powerful tool. You guys find it@wellnessforce.com store. The code is, Josh, you can get the strategene as well as all the Other products from Seeking Health. One of the things that I focused on in my own life is my sinuses and the care of my sinuses. And it's been just a long, arduous battle, Ben. I can't share it enough. Like, I've had three sinus surgeries in my life. I've had balloon sinuplasty. I'm now using a glutathione spray. But I remember when I was at your house and weit was about three years ago, and I was with Mike Mutzl from High Intensity Health, and Mike had a nose that was a little bit stuffy and you're like, here, take this, snuff it up your nose, go into the sink. And immediately it made him feel better. And that sparked my curiosity. I'm like, okay, what is histamine? What is histamine intolerance? What is the function of histamine in our bodies? What do we need to know about histamine for overall wellness?

Without histamine, you are stupid, tired, and unable to fight any infections or deliver blood to your extremities or other parts of your body. It's a signaling molecule that does so many important things. It stimulates your stomach acid. If you don't have enough histamine, you don't digest your food, you don't move your bowels to your gut. You are unable to focus. If you take a over the counter medication as an anti histamine, you turn that over, it says may induce drowsiness. So histamine is extremely important for alertness and focus and learning and just having a good day. It's important for your immune response. If you don't have histamine, then your immune system is just kind of sitting on idle. I mean, if there's a fire down the street and the fire department doesn't get the warning, they just sit there playing cards, you know, and eating pizza. So they're there, but they're not responding. And histamine allows your immune system to respond. So it's extremely important if now if you have too low, that's an issue. If you have too high, that's an issue. You don't want the fire department always responding. You don't want your stomach acid always being produced. You know, you don't want histamine so high in your gut that you're always on the toilet having the runs or having headaches or irritability or have difficulty falling asleep. So it's really simple, actually. Biochemistry. If you think the first thing that you always need to do with biochemistry or genetics is always ask, what's the function of blank? And what's the function of this particular gene? Okay, it does this. Well, what is the result of that? This. And then what happens if I make too much? What happens if I make too little? And then you amplify a response or you diminish a response. And it's really that easy. With histamine is a continuous balance. The half life of histamine is literally a minute. It, meaning it just breaks down in your body very, very quickly. It's supposed to. Anyway. So if you do histamine blood testing, let's say you had an anaphylactic reaction, meaning you have extreme difficulty breathing, you basically almost died. You took Benadryl and some other steroids to knock it out and it helped. It saved your life. And the doctor checks your histamine level. Fine. You're like, what the hell? I just had an anaphylactic reaction and my histamine levels are fine. Yeah, because your body already got rid of it. So histamine testing is inherently not very useful. That is why histamine tolerance is so undiagnosed. People struggle for decades, literally decades, Josh. I think it takes. I read an article years ago, so my numbers are going to be wrong. I'm going to pull this one from my hip and guess I think that it was. On average, histamine intolerance goes undiagnosed for a minimum of six years for people they're struggling with all these histamine associated issues. Sensitivity to WI fi, sensitivity to perfumes, excessive irritability, difficulty falling asleep, headaches, migraines, exercise induced asthma, eczema, psoriasis, diarrhea, chronic sinus issues, you know, bloody noses, ringing in your ears. Am I ringing any bells?

Sure, yeah. The one that's ringing in my right ear, I've had tinnitus since I was 23.

Yeah, there it is. And it's, you know, it's. That is a high histamine response and it could be associated with blood flow. And if your nitric oxide levels are reduced, then histamine comes in and tries to save the day. So nitric oxide is a compound that signals your blood vessels to widen to allow blood flow to the area. And that's called nitric oxide synthase 3. That particular gene that works on that. And I cover this gene in the book Dirty Genes, has a whole chapter on Nos 3. And histamine is also covered in the book under the gene dao. So the genes that we're talking about right now and if we've left you kind of giving you kind of pieces of the puzzle, but you want more of the puzzle, grab yourself a copy of Dirty Genes or get the strategene from Josh and you get the book with it. But we give you kind of a more along the road and less sciency, less geeky, more pathway oriented approach.

One of the things that comes up quite a bit in our breathwork program, it's Breathe, breath and wellness. It's at Breathwork IO and from all the have in there, a lot of people say, Josh, I'd love to do the circular breathing, I'd love to do the breathwork, but I literally can't because I can't breathe through my nose. Which prompted me to create an entire video training about sinus care. Obviously the Seeking health product is in there because I don't know of any other products besides yours. Yours is phenomenal. So talk about what Mike did on your sink. When he pulled in the product through his nose, he felt better immediately. How does this help to clear sinuses? And how does one start working this supplement into their life? Specifically people like myself that deal with sinus flare ups? Sinus issues.

Yeah. And so one of the reasons why histamine intolerance support at Seeing health is so effective is because I struggled with it my whole life as well. And you know, I had all sorts of the histamine issues that I just, you know, rattle off not too long ago. I mean, probably all of them. And so when you have a pain point yourself and then you, you develop products to work on that and you test them on yourself and you find improvement, you're like, oh, okay, this is, this is good. You know, it's hard to work and develop a product for depression if you don't have depression. Right. I can't really test it on myself and like, yeah, I can help other people with it, but I really like tuning into myself and how I'm responding to a supplement. And so histamine intolerance of seeing health is just, it's hands down probably the best out there because it's so prevalent in my family and we get great results. So what happened with Mike is, you know, he came over in chronic sinus issues and I don't remember his. He ordered strategene and I went over his strategene and, and I don't remember what his histamine pathway looks like. And plus I can't share it anyway, but is like, here, try this. And he's like, what, what do you mean? And I say, well, this is a probiotic. It's designed to support healthy levels of histamine. And I said, I would like you to, to open up a capsule. We have a powder. Now, Probiotics makes powder, which you don't need to open up the capsule anymore. But this is an off label use, by the way, so doctors need to recommend this. But you, you wash your hand and you open up the capsule. If you have the capsules and you literally take like a tenth of the capsule and you can either just wipe it just inside your nose, or you sniff it and then you repeat it on the opposite side and you're like, really? I'm going to put a probiotic in my nose. I was like, yeah. And I remember when I was doing research on this, Josh, a buddy of mine had his sinuses drilled. And the EENT surgeon told my buddy that he had the worst impacted sinuses he's ever seen. And it was so full of fungus and garbage in there that he was, you know, the drilling helped, but he needed more support. So what did he do? What do you think the doctor prescribed when he said he had a massive amount of fungus?

Probably nystatin.

No, no, he prescribed an antibiotic. He should have prescribed nystatin. But he didn't. He prescribed an antibiotic. I'm like, dude, are you kidding me? What is that going to do? So obviously, my buddy wasn't helped at all. And he was really, really bad. I mean, here's a kid that had climbed Mount Rainier multiple times, Baker. He and I summited together each of those once together. It was amazing. Super fit guy. And now he's debilitated, literally debilitated with mold and fungus in his nose. And so I said, you know what? I did some research. And the research shows that if people have chronic sinusitis or they have chronic runny noses, or they have all sorts of sinus issues, their microbiome in their nose is not diverse enough. It is actually a problem. And if you look at the research in the microbial diversity of individuals who have healthy sinuses, their diversity in the microbiome is significant. And so I was like, well, try putting this probiotic in your nose because it also helps support histamine levels. And he is like, I'm not doing that. So then I took a screenshot of like the six research papers that I read. I showed him the research of each one of those. Bang, bang, bang, sent it over, and Josh, I should get those for your show as well, so you can have them.

We'll have those in the notes.

Yeah. And so then I didn't know if he was going to do it or not because he was totally skeptical. And then I checked in on him like a month or two later. I was like, how are you doing? He goes, dude, I'm feeling the best I've ever felt. And he goes, I actually, I did that thing. And I said, so what happened? He goes, I literally felt so much better within minutes. I was like, whatever, okay, now you're just weird. And then I just repeated it on multiple people, including my own son. And it's interesting when you put a probiotic in your nose that you get results in 30 seconds or less. And there was a woman, a girl, who tried that at our home, and she did a YouTube, a Facebook Live, actually, here at my house. And she had a completely occluded nostril. I forget which side. And she was having surgery the next day and she put the probiotic in her nose. She went in the bathroom because she's embarrassed about it. She came out with a little bit of white powder. I was like, you better wipe that off. A few minutes later, she's like, mom, I can actually breathe through here. And her mom was like, huh? And I thought, they're going to cancel the surgery. I kind of wish they did, but they didn't. So. But anyway, yeah, it's phenomenal. And what's happening is it the bacteria work that fast. If you enhance your microbiome properly, you're going to get results that quickly. And my appreciation and respect for the microbiome has exploded. And here I was for years also taking a wrong probiotic and I didn't know I was taking probiotic 12 powder by seeking health and for years, and I was actually increasing my histamine levels and I didn't know. And then I. I started learning about histamine intolerance and I looked at the ingredients on there and I believe we since reformulated. I need to look again, but I think I pulled those out because I reformulated it, but I was making my histamine intolerance worse. So if you're taking probiotics of Lactobacillus kci, Lactobacillus, fermentum, Lactobacillus bulgaricus, you are going to be enhancing your histamine intolerance and making it worse. So keep that in mind.

It's fascinating because going back to the map with the strategene, at least have. And it's so funny when we go anywhere in the world If I go on a hike, if I go, I'm going to a friend's house. I've never been. I always use a map. You know, it's either on the phone or if you want to go real old school. It's a Thomas guide. You remember those? You'd stick them in your pocket.

Use them all the time.

So we need a map for ourselves. You know, we have to have this map for ourselves about how our genes function. And I think about my chronic sinusitis and God bless my parents. They didn't know, right? They did the best they could.

Yeah.

But man, if I had this information earlier, I could have acted upon it earlier. So if you guys are feeling this, if you're understanding what's going on here, head to the store. Wellnessforce.com store these probiotics are activated through water. So Ben, as soon as they touch the sinus, they're. They're literally acting right then.

Yes, great point, great point. Very important point. Yes. So that leads to a few other things. First off, stability of probiotics. Probiotics are unstable because they get humid humidity in them. So if you are ordering probiotics, they have to stay in the fridge or freezer. It is because the container that they're in doesn't have enough desiccant or the encapsulation process isn't good, or the manufacturing process had too much humidity in the environment and so they already got shipped from the manufacturer with a high humidity. So for example, if you are, you know, we had a contract manufacturer in Florida, but they had very intensive humidity control in their manufacturing facility. So, you know, it's good. But if we worked and subcontracted with a manufacturing facility facility in Florida, but they didn't have humidity control, our probiotics would be already dying and ineffective. So probiotics, Dominix and our probiotics at Seeking Health are in a special expensive container where the entire container is filled with a desiccant inside the bottle packaging itself. So the whole packaging is a desiccant.

And the desiccant just absorbs moisture. Is that.

Yes, it's exactly. Yeah, yeah, that's his job. And so we've actually done testing on our probiotic histaminics and put them in a hot truck in UPS and put a thermometer in the box and it got up to like 115 degrees or something on the high heat. And then we sent the supplement in for testing and it was fine, didn't even phase it. So, yes, bacteria are triggered by water to activate. And so the moment they get wet, they. They become alive. And so if you take a probiotic and you've been having issues of them not working, maybe they're get becoming alive, but they don't have enough food to survive and thrive. So maybe you need more prebiotics in your gut. Maybe you need more vegetable fibers or something going on, or maybe you're taking it away from food. You know, there's various reasons. Or maybe they're just crappy probiotics. If your sinuses are really, really dry and you put the probiotic in your nose and you don't get much benefit, well, maybe put some water in your nose first. Maybe do a neti pot rinse. And don't put any antimicrobials in your neti pot wash at that point. Just use saline water and filtered water. So when you do neti pot, make sure you use filtered water and salt. Um. Cause your mucus membranes are naturally, you know, salty. Um, but yeah, they trigger from the. From the water. And another thing I want to say about the sinuses. Josh, too, is. Our oldest son is down in Cal Poly in college, and Cal Poly is lovely weather. It's just sunny all the time. In fact, he was just bragging that it was 75 or 80 degrees now. And here we are, we've got frost on our roof.

Yeah.

Literally, as we speak. But the humidity in his room. So he had sinus issues. And he. He sounded stuffed up constantly. I was like, taz, what's going on? And he goes, I don't know. My sinus is just a mess. There's no mold in his room. I. I looked and it smelled great. I'm very sensitive to moles, so I'm kind of the mold dog. And so his mold was fine in his room, but I said, what's the humidity? Because he has a humidity percentage on his alarm clock. He goes, ah, it's 25, 30%. I'm like, oh, okay. You got to increase that humidity. I said, why? Because your sinuses are naturally wet, and your sinuses have to have that wetness in them for your immune cells to be activated. Because your immune cells kind of move and your probiotics move around in your nose and microbiome moves around in there. And if they're too dry, then you're going to get more susceptible to infections.

That makes sense. People that live in Sedona, people that live in these super dry climates, Arizona. I wonder if there's data around more sinus infections for those areas.

I bet if you just typed in PubMed, low humidity chronic sinusitis or humidity sinus infections. You would find all sorts of papers. And so I said, I ordered a humidifier and order humidifiers from Amazon or elsewhere that you can control the percent humidity. You do not want those like Vicks humidifiers that you just plug in and they're just constantly spewing massive amounts of steam all night long in your room. And then you wake up in the morning and your sheets are wet, your windows are soaking, your floor is wet. That's not good. You want something. You actually. You can actually control the humidity level. And they have a humidity sensor built in. And so you want 55%. Anything above 60, you got no dust mites and bed. You know, dust mites can increase above 60%. So if your humidity is higher than 60%, you need a dehumidifier, and you want to get that to 55%. So. But he. I said, for the meantime, just get a towel, A literally a towel. Take it in the shower, ring it, and then hang it on a hook and just leave it in your room. And it humidity just from that. Because it's a small dorm room. I mean, it's literally like 7ft wide by 15ft long. It's like a bunker. The people who actually designed it designed Alcatraz.

Yeah, don't tell him that.

Yeah, well, he's the one who told me. Okay, but so his immunity went from 30 to 50 just from the wet towel.

That's fascinating to me because I think about all the different misconceptions about fungus and about how that impacts sinuses. Is there any. I mean, obviously we can't do the deepest dive ever, because that would take quite some time. But is there any early signs of fungal infection, not just for sinuses, but for overall health? Like, what are the markers for fungal infection? When we look at the body, I.

Would say fungal infections. So if you look on your strategy report, you look on your glutathione pathway. I'm going to preface with this. If you look at your glutathione pathway, you will see a particular gene that's called glutathione synthetase. Synthetase. The taste. See, I can't even say it. So it synthesizes glutathione and mycotoxins. Mold inhibits this. So mycotoxins prevent your own body from making glutathione. So then, as I said earlier, Josh, what you do is you step back and say, what does glutathione do? Well, glutathione is your body's number one antioxidant. It is highly concentrated in your mitochondria for a good reason. If your mitochondria are not healthy, you are not making ATP, which is actually processed to provide you energy. It's ATP is your power source. And so if you don't have sufficient ATP, you're going to be struggling. Where is ATP heavily used and where is glutathione heavily used? You have high, high amounts of glutathione. In fact, the most concentrated area in your body for glutathione is it where in your body, do you think, Josh? Just, just rough guess.

It's either sinuses or gut.

Nope. Think about the, the area of your body that gets a lot of work, that is very susceptible to oxidative stress and is working basically for you hard, you know, 16 hours a day. It's liver, your eyes. Eyes. Liver is a good one. Brain is another big one. But your eyes, if you notice that your vision is decreasing like faster than it should, you know, things are blurry, you know, you're kind of squinting or you're getting headaches on the computer. And it's not just blue light, you got the blue light blockers on, you know, it's just not right. Well, get some glutathione in you. And, and often what happens when people take glutathione. So they, they possibly take our optimal liposomal glutathione or optimal glutathione capsules, but the liposomal glutathione, I prefer you just put a few drops in your mouth and hold it and then you swallow it. You will literally, your, your field of vision will become brighter. So if you have a fungal infection or mold exposures, your vision will be less. In fact, there's a, there's an online test for vision health and I forget the name of it. It's on Dr. Ben lynch site. I'll get you that link too, Josh. So if you can, if you can shoot me an email or your team can shoot me an email of the research studies I need to get for this.

We got you.

And the vision test. And the vision test, vcs, I think it's called visual contrast sensitivity. And so if your visual contrast sensitivity drops, that is a sure sign of a persistent, ongoing infection, usually Lyme or some type of co. Infection or persistent viral infection or molds or yeast or some type of bio. Illness, biotoxin. It's a phenomenal test, but it's really, really important that you have Your contrast set. You have to program your monitor appropriately. And so you have to adjust the settings on your monitor before you take the test.

Would you have somebody go to the vision test before they looked at their nails or their crotch area or their feet? I mean, obviously those are key signs, right? As well?

Yeah, yeah. I mean, the VCS test is. It's free, I believe, with the donation. I've talked with the founder by email, not phone. And this was a test that I learned from Dr. Bill Ray, who was actually practiced in Dallas, Texas, the Environmental Health Center, Dallas. I don't know if that clinic is still around, but it was the number one environmental medicine clinic in the world. It was the best preceptorship I ever had. It was phenomenal. And he used the VCS test as well. So it's been around a long, long time. Yes, I highly recommend it. And if the curve is significant and lower, then yeah, you probably need to be jumping into a sauna. You need to be using some liposomal glutathione. You need to start looking at sources of infections and molds. They're out there. So if you're cognitively slower, your vision is less. But I would say brain fog is a big one. If you're constantly drinking caffeine or using simulants to stay. Stay energized, you probably got mole going on everywhere.

Have you heard of the work from Doug Kaufman? I think he wrote a book called the Fungus Link. Has that ever been in your atmosphere?

I know the name, but I've never read the book. No.

Okay. Yeah. Because he has the antifungal dietary approach, which I don't know if he talks about supplements. I haven't read the book in full detail, but I'm curious from a diet or a supplement perspective. So we have diet, we have supplements. Supplements, we have lifestyle. Which one of those three would be the starting place? Or maybe you do them all at the same time. I don't know if somebody is experiencing symptoms of a fungal infection.

So fungal or mold, like, like a true, like environmental mold infection. Or are we talking like yeast?

I think more of the yeast.

Okay.

Yeah.

Yeast. I would say that is going to be more. I would say food related. Um, I think that's big. So because you. The. The statement of you are what you eat, you know, you can argue both sides and both sides will be right in their argument. Um, but, you know, ultimately the foods that you eat are feeding the bacteria in your gut, and this actually ties into histamine intolerance, oxalate Sensitivity and, and other things as well. So if you are eating pure sugar, I mean, we just had Halloween, right? So, I mean, how many kids feed, fed the yeast in their gut? Because the yeast actually take the sugar, they rely on sugar, and then they convert that sugar into alcohol, and that alcohol turns into acetaldehyde, and acetaldehyde just increases your histamine, and it causes all sorts of hangover issues and so on. Ant abuse, the drug that are prescribed for alcoholics, actually prevents the breakdown of acid aldehyde. That's his job. So if your levels of acetaldehyde or acetaldehyde increased a certain amount, you're going to puke and vomit and be super, super sick. And so if you are eating candies or drinking alcohol or eating sugars of various sorts, even carbohydrates, simple carbohydrates like bagels and pizzas, these can feed the yeast. And they, they multiply in significant number. And then bacteria and fungi, they release certain compounds and it kills their competition. So if you ever went in your yard and you saw dandelion growing in your grass, those dandelion leaves are covering the grass and they're, they're, they're purposely pushed down along with plantain and other types of weeds to kill the grass around it. So yeast secrete these toxic compounds and kill the healthy bacteria around your gut. And so if you're constantly eating sugar, the good guys are they don't live on sugar. Your good bacteria don't want to eat sugar, the yeast do. And so they multiply and they secrete and they kill the good bugs. Now if you shifted that and you started eating good foods, the, the yeast are going to start dying off and you start feeling sick and crappy. And then that, what does that do? That says, oh, I feel like crap. I'm gonna go eat some more sugar. Eat more sugar and you feel good again. So you, you're stuck in this conundrums like, I need to kill the yeast, but I can't because I feel like crap. So you need to just, you know, go slowly with it. You need to take binders, you know, you need to take the things which kill the yeast in the evening before you go to bed. And you do these things gradually and you take probiotics, you know, probably in the morning, away from the antimicrobials so that the bacteria can take hold. But there's going to be a period of time where you feel worse. But I would say food is going to be the number one the human.

Body is so fascinating. I mean, do you ever just have to stop and take a breath in awe about every day, all the things that you see inside of the body that are constantly being unfolded and learned about? You know, it's just so incredible. And I, and I think about the way that we really have been living for quite some time now, ever since really the Industrial revolution, definitely since the advent of Earl Butts and the agricultural revolution, the way we're ignoring how we're supposed to actually function and eat and breathe and move. And I think about where we are now with children being forced to wear masks at school and still this insane psychopathy that we're experiencing as a society. I mean, we truly, our Krishnamurti was right, you know, like, it's no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society. And our society is very sick right now. So what do you make of this? What is the call that you're putting out with seeking health? Obviously you have an intention, intense body of work and a huge body of education and products and supplements, but from your heart, you know, what do you feel right now as a father, as a business owner, as a human being on planet Earth?

Fundamentals are ignored. They're not sexy. And it's. It's actually bringing almost tears in my eyes right now saying it. It's, it's. It sucks. You know, my job is to make fundamentals sexy again. And I appreciate what you're doing with the breathing work. You know, we take for granted the air that we breathe every day, and we take for granted our ability to inhale that air and exhale the garbage. We take that for granted. And I do. I'm guilty of it, too. But there are moments when I tune in and think, okay, I get it. I need to really focus on my breath right now. In fact, I think it was this morning or last night. A lady reached out, she DM'd me. And I get so many DMS. And periodically I respond, periodically, I don't. So don't think you can always get me on dms, but it's just too many. But she goes, I'm super anxious right now. Any suggestions? And I was like, well, lithium orotate is amazing. Optimal adrenals is supportive as well, but breathing is key. If your breathing is not right, then you're going to be anxious. And I'm really scared, Josh. I'm really scared for humans and society as a whole, because what Mark Zuckerberg is doing is destroying humankind. Literally destroying social media is destroying humans. It's Pinning us, us versus them. It's. It's awful. Watch Social Dilemma, if you haven't already. It's. It's. It's mind blowing. And watch it with your family. Social Dilemma is a must. Watch with your family. Kids too. I don't care the ages. Maybe watch it with your older ones first. But it is phenomenal. But what Mark Zuckerberg is doing with AI is what's going to happen is your kids, or shockingly, parents, are going to put these things on their face and they're going to be attending ball games, they're going to be attending bars, they're going to be attending dance clubs, they're going to be attending prostitution rings with AIs and these suits which enhance sensations and all that. And so you're going to be living in this artificial world created by computers. And I don't mean to be an alarmist, but crap, this is happening. It's happening. And I own a lot of stocks and I do not own any stocks in Facebook or whatever he's called it now, meta whatever, or any pharmaceutical companies that are doing bad things. I just don't touch that stuff. But I think humans need to always remember that nature first. So anytime that you get stuck somewhere, you need to come right back to the basics. Take off your shoes and socks and walk in nature. Walk on a forest floor, not. Not, you know, grass that's been sprayed by chem lawn. You know, go out in nature on a. On a trail and. Or step into the ocean or into a lake and, you know, just immerse yourself in mother nature and breathe that air, hopefully in a clean environment. Because that's where we came from. That's where we're going to end up again, and that's where we should be.

I feel you with the sadness. I mean, I felt it from you. I feel it in myself. And I guarantee you that tens of thousands of people that experience this conversation feel it too, because it takes my breath away. The fact that we are so disconnected from ourselves, first of all, from people, second, and from nature, third, that somehow putting on an Oculus is going to reconnect us. It's an absolute sham. It's a lie. And it's done to propagate, really an unhealthy arm of capitalism. I am a pro capitalist. I believe in conscious capitalism. But capitalism has a dark side. And I think that's what's going on with this Metaverse and Oculus and this VR, where somehow we're going to have a better life in a virtual world. Than the one that we should be working on right here. Get the fuck out of here. Like, that's how I feel. And on top of that, the last thing I'll say is that when televisions came or when the automobile came, the Quakers revolted against it because they thought, oh, this is going to be the end of society. A lot of those things that came were really good. But when I look at Metaverse and when I see Oculus, I can zoom way above this entire story. And I know that this is evil. I know that this has nothing to do with blocking progress. This has everything to do with seeing things for how they really are. This is not something good for us. This is a very dark, dark energy. I'd recommend that all parents immediately remove their children from this mindset of living in a virtual world. It's super dangerous. And I think it's. I think it's an attack on humanity.

It is, it is. And, you know, look, I love artificial intelligence, you know, when. If it's used right. I love capitalism when it's used properly. I love a lot of things when it's used properly, but the moment it gets stretched too far, we really are in danger. And if you are considering virtual reality or AI for entertainment, don't. I mean, just don't. Just don't do it. And if your kids are jumping up and down and just say no, and be honest with your kids, you don't need to dilute it. Be totally upfront. And it's going to ruin mankind and humankind. Mankind was a word now that I'm a little bit gun shy with. I'm not a politically correct person, but mankind is one of those words that I think humankind is.

Humankind sounds good.

Yeah. Yeah, I like that. And I also want to say that video games are really, really. They were used heavily during the quarantine times, and it really exploded the addictions behind the screens, adults and kids, and you really have to have conversations with your kids about it. Because my own son, Theo, was waking up playing Xbox, doing his online school, playing Xbox and going to bed at 10 o' clock at night, Xbox. And I. And I was like, God, I can't. I can't believe this is happening.

Yeah.

And I. I literally would get mad at him. I'd scream at him, you know, I was like, come down and eat. I'm not hungry. Well, you're not hungry because your dopamine is so damn high in your brain that you don't need to eat. So now he's getting malnourished too. And we're just fighting constantly. Go for a walk, you know, with me and the dog. No. So what I did is I. I literally pulled him down. Not pulled, but we had a conversation in the kitchen. He wasn't playing Xbox for a moment. And I was like, you know what, Theo, let me talk with you about Fortnite. He goes, dad, I know. I don't like it either. I said, the game is making you doing this. I know you don't want to do it, right? He goes, no, I'm really sad about it, actually. And he goes, I know you're mad at me. I'm mad at myself. And it sucked. It was a painful conversation. And he goes, but I just feel like I gotta play it. I said, the game is designed to do that. And so parents have this conversation with your kid in a non argumentative, just straight up way, and then just keep having this conversation when your kid is away from the screen and just tell them that, look, I'm not mad at you. I'm mad at Fortnite. I'm mad at these games. It's designed to be addictive, and your brains can't overcome that. Eventually, ideally, they do what Theo did. And Theo just literally turned off Fortnite one day, walked out of his room, and he goes, dad, I'm done. It's been almost two years now. No, hasn't been two years. I forget. I'll have to get you to have your team ask me the number of days. It's like aa, Alcoholics Anonymous. How many days have you been sober? And Theo has on his Snapchat. How many days he has not played Fortnite? And so just have the open conversation and. And you know, because it's not your kid's fault and it's not your fault as a parent. It's highly addictive games.

Wow. There's so much there to unpack, man. And it's. It's interesting because everything we're talking about from a behavioral perspective, whether we're an adult or a child, we are susceptible. Human beings are fallible.

We.

We are in an environmental soup, if you will, with WI fi and with video games and with all these things. So whatever happened to survival of the fittest? Natural selection? You know, if we continue down this road, are we doomed? Or do you believe in humanity's awareness to overcome this?

No, no, we're doomed. We're doomed. I call it unnatural deselection.

How so?

Well, natural selection is survival of the fittest. And unnatural deselection is where we are deselecting healthy survivable genes that are perpetuating the population. And we're doing it through unnatural ways, through AI, through chemicals, through propaganda, through fast binges and artificial ways to enhance our dopamine. AI is going to spike dopamine to the point where humans are not even want to have intercourse with each other. I mean, it's crazy. And again, I don't, I sound, I'm hearing myself and I'm thinking, dude, you sound psycho. But it's, it's, you have to look ahead nowadays, especially because technology is moving such a rapid pace that if you are not paint, if you are not aware of where the technology is going, you're going to get caught up with every new toy that's coming out and you're going to be increasing your susceptibility to it. So you have to stay ahead of where technology is going and say, whoa, I'm going to go for a hike today. I'm going to go wakeboarding with my kids today. You got to go back to the things which were simple pleasures. I'm going to play dominoes today. Actually playing dominoes, not on my phone, but the old school dominoes on a table. So it's really, really important. And there's a book called Countdown. Have you read it, Josh?

I have not.

It talks about how testosterone levels are plummeting across the world. Sperm banks can't get sufficient healthy, viable sperm. I think in China, the amount of men who are leaving sperm donations, it's only 19% now are fertile. So human beings are going to be artificially created because sperm is no longer going to be on this planet probably in about another 25 years.

So it's easy for somebody listening to go, what's the point? But I want to bring something to you that we all experience and that is duality. Because within singularity there is duality. There's love and fear, there's dark and light, there's pleasure, there's pain, there's high, low pressure, look at sodium and potassium in the body. There's always these equilibriums. So this is a really huge megaphone call for all of us to know our map, to know our health, to understand genetically what we've been blessed with, maybe what we've been cursed with and take fucking inspired action, right? I mean there's beauty here, there's definitely a path and it involves us being in nature, us communicating like this, open heartedly with no artificial intelligence present. Like taking my son for a walk this morning. I did the cold therapy. I did My breath, work. And Kerry, Michelle and I took Nova and the sun. Like, that's what we do, like, live like we were designed. And I do believe we will overcome. So I don't subscribe to the darkness that we're completely doomed. I know sometimes it feels like that, but damn, we must take inspired action right now. So, Ben, as we say goodbye, what is your road ahead? What's the road ahead for you for seeking health? And how is wellness for you? Now, I asked you this question almost two years ago. How do you define wellness? And we actually put your voice in one of the top 10 most downloaded podcasts. We have a beautiful montage with Ben speaking about his definition of wellness. But what is that road ahead for you now? What does that feel like? What does that look like for a father, a company, a man? And how does wellness play into that?

Wellness is freedom. Wellness provides you the freedom to do what you want, when you want, how you want. If you don't have wellness, you're a prisoner in your own body as a vehicle to move you around on this amazing planet. And you know, you can be a prisoner from not being able to cognitively think about doing things, or you're so emotionally unstable that you are angry all the time or you're sad all the time. And that's not freedom. So wellness for me is freedom. And freedom is so, so important as a human element. In fact, you know, those in Victoria, Australia, or in Melbourne are fighting for their basic freedoms right now. And, you know, kudos to those who marched, those a hundred thousand people who marched, it's like, why is it a million marched? So I'm with you, Josh. I'm very excited for people tuning into your podcast and follow me on social media and following others who have the awareness that the direction that humans are going is not good. But if we group together and we keep spreading the message that nature is amazing and fundamentals are sexy and breathing is key and doing things that are out. Nature is vital to human nature. We're the only species in the. On the entire planet, Josh. The only species out of I don't know how many species, I can't even imagine that wear clothes that live in buildings that use things that are made that are, you know, from a lab, the only ones, and take that into perspective for a moment and think, why are we the only species? Are we truly the only species that is so high level that we can do this? Are we actually pretty low level because we are not so connected to nature like they are? So I. Wellness is freedom and go get it and maintain it. It requires maintenance.

Dr. Ben lynch, always a pleasure. Thank you for coming on the show. Thank you for sharing your wisdom. You guys go to wellnessforce.com store, pick up Dirty Jeans. The book, it comes with the strategy and the code is Josh. It's a generous discount. Thank you to the entire Seeking Health team for giving us that. And as always, we're talking more about Dr. Ben's work in the group. Wellnessforce.com group. Ben, such a pleasure, man. Thank you for coming on the show.

My pleasure, Josh.

All right, you guys, until we see you again, I and Ben are wishing you love and wellness.

It.