October 31, 2024 • 64 mins
Join us for an enlightening conversation with Dr. Jenny Powers, a former academic turned writer, as she reveals how evolutionary biology can unlock the secrets to modern wellness. Discover how societal structures might be at the heart of your burnout and how embracing our ancestral roots could be the key to reclaiming your health. Through the lens of her book "On the Origin of Being," Jenny invites us to rethink our relationships with sleep, nutrition, and nature, providing a fresh perspective on aligning our lifestyles with our biological design.
Ever wondered if the paleo diet is really all it's cracked up to be? Get ready to challenge popular misconceptions about ancestral diets with our exploration of evolutionary nutrition. From the diverse diets of ancient cultures to the impacts of the agricultural revolution, Jenny breaks down why whole foods are essential and how our bodies have adapted to different dietary needs. We also emphasize the importance of personalized nutrition, revealing why there is no one-size-fits-all approach to eating well.
As we wrap up, the conversation shifts to the profound power of nature in enhancing our well-being. Listen as we discuss the benefits of syncing our lives with natural light cycles and the stress-reducing magic of the great outdoors. Reflecting on cultural attitudes towards work and productivity, we look at how practices from different parts of the world can inform a more balanced and fulfilling lifestyle. Don’t miss this opportunity to gain practical strategies for navigating the complexities of modern life through a timeless, evolutionary lens.
- Learn more about the book and Dr. Dr. Jenny Powers here: https://www.ontheoriginofbeing.com/
- Origin of Being Book Trailer: https://youtu.be/O32XPxMSi5c
- Instagram: @ontheoriginofbeing
- Facebook: @ontheoriginofbeing
- Jenny’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jenny-powers-terry-b8a5a658/
Contact Wellness Musketeers:
Email Dave at davidmliss@gmail.com with comments, questions, and suggestions for future guests.
Follow us on our social media:
Support our Sponsor:
- Elite Sports: https://www.elitesports.com
Subscribe to our newsletter:
- Contact our co-host "Aussie" Mike James and sign up for our newsletter: Wellness Musketeers Newsletter
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
And it's because we don't live in the present moment
.
We are not aware of the cuesour bodies give us, we are not
aware of the things that aregoing on around us.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Welcome to the Wellness Musketeers podcast,
your guide to navigating theworld of health, wellness and
the art of living.
I'm your host, dave Liss, ajournalist and podcaster based
in Washington DC, joined by myco-host, ketel Veeney, an
economist with 35 years ofexperience, including 24 years
with the IMF, and currently anadjunct lecturer in economics
(00:46):
and politics at Sciences Po X inFrance.
In a world inundated withwellness advice, we aim to
provide actionable strategies tohelp you thrive.
Today, we are delighted towelcome Jenny Powers, a PhD
scientist, mom, writer andathlete from Colorado.
Dr Powers holdsa bachelor'sdegree in chemical engineering
(01:10):
and a PhD in immunology from theUniversity of Colorado.
After leaving academia to raiseher two kids and pursue a
writing career, she co-authoredthe book On the Origin of being
with Luke Comer.
This book delves into howevolution by natural selection
can inform and enhance ourmodern lives.
(01:30):
Luke Comer, although notjoining us today, conceptualized
the project and has a richbackground in studying human,
biological and culturalevolution.
This episode is a must-listenfor anyone interested in
understanding how aligning withour evolutionary design can
improve health and well-being.
Jenny Powers, phd, will sharefascinating insights from her
(01:56):
book on the origin of being,revealing how our ancestors'
lifestyles can guide us tobetter sleep, nutrition and
overall wellness in today'sfast-paced world.
Before we begin, pleaseremember to subscribe wherever
you listen to this podcast andif you're there, please also
leave us a review.
Five stars do amazing thingsfor the podcast, and with that,
(02:18):
here's our conversation withJenny Powers.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
Hello Dr Powers.
I hope I can call you Jenny.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
Oh, of course, Please do.
Speaker 3 (02:29):
I read your book with great interest.
It does go through quiteinteresting thing about the
evolutionary mismatch andsomething called biohacking.
Can you tell us a little bitabout how you actually came
about to actually spending a lotof time dealing with this and
actually writing a whole bookabout it?
Speaker 1 (02:45):
Yeah, yeah.
Well, first of all, thank youso much for having me on your
podcast.
I really appreciate it.
So my whole life I was kind ofan overachiever and
perfectionist.
So I, you know, had high gradesin school and I was a
basketball player and but myworth was always wrapped up in
my achievement.
Then I went to grad school.
(03:06):
I had 70-hour work weeks.
I was burnt out, I wasdepressed and I thought I was
the person.
I thought it was a personalfailing of mine.
I never really realized that itmight have been something like
our culture of work in thiscountry that is causing me to
feel these things.
And I always wanted to be awriter, but again, wrapped up in
(03:26):
my achievement is my worst.
A PhD scientist, you know, islike a big achievement, whereas
a writer might not, you know, bea good thing.
Then, around the same time, inthe early 2000s, climate change
began to show up in scientificjournals and news and I was
feeling this agonizing, likedistress Solastalgia is called
why people weren't caring aboutour environment.
(03:48):
But at the same time I wasgoing through all this stuff, I
was too depressed to do anythingabout it and I felt more of a
failure.
So I started a spiritual pathand began to heal.
And when my kids were born, Iactually did quit academia and
start being a writer and I metLuke.
I was looking for writing jobsto do and I met Luke and he
(04:10):
described his vision for thisbook, this vision that he'd had
for many, many years, as he wasresearching nutrition and other
things, and he was telling meall the ways that we aren't
living in accord with ourbiology, with our evolved nature
, all the ways that we aren'tliving in accord with our
biology, with our evolved nature.
And he started listing them offsleep, nutrition, work, nature,
(04:32):
you know, child rearing, socialgroups.
And because this is actuallythe first book of a three-part
series, then it soon becameglaringly obvious to me when I
was talking to him that my twobiggest pain points at that time
in my life were work and therelationship with nature, and it
just blew my mind and ittotally opened up this new world
of well, maybe I'm not doing itwrong, maybe our society is
(04:56):
doing it wrong because we're notliving how we used to live.
And so that's how I becameconnected with the project and I
researched and wrote itaccording to Luke's foundation
and vision.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
What will the other two books in the series be?
Speaker 1 (05:12):
So this book focuses on kind of more of our basic
needs our sleep, nutrition, work, relationship with nature, and
then you kind of look at it aslike a triangle, kind of like
Maslow's triangle of needshierarchy of needs.
The next book will be moresocial groups, like social needs
, so social groups, childrearing, the sexes,
(05:32):
relationships, and then at thetop of the pyramid will be more
cultural needs, like how weevolved rituals and religion and
the arts and ceremonies andthings like that.
So each book kind of builds oneach other and hopefully will
give a total of 10 things thatpeople can start addressing in
(05:54):
their own lives that mightactually help them have better
well-being.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
Interesting.
So the top is a little bit thespiritual part.
Speaker 1 (06:04):
Yes, definitely.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
Okay, yeah, but let's not dive a little into what
this is telling us, because I'msure that a lot of the listeners
are interested in knowing youknow, how they might want to
adjust their life.
On the basis of this bookthere's a lot of talking about,
you know, let's start maybe withdiet, but it relates to other
things as well.
But you know about the paleodiet which is kind of raising up
(06:30):
a similar story as what you aretelling.
It's basically far back.
We ate a certain way.
Our genome has not changedenough for us to deal with the
rest.
But how does this differ from alot of what we read about the
paleo diet around?
Speaker 2 (06:51):
Can we maybe go back a little bit just to explain,
like, what is an evolutionarymismatch in biohacking?
I think that's sort of a bigtheme of what we're going to be
discussing here.
Now that will tie into thedietary parts.
Speaker 1 (07:05):
Yeah, yeah, that's a great question.
So environmental mismatch isthe environment that we live in
today is so radically differentthan the one that we evolved in,
and our world, especially overthe last hundred years, is
changing so rapidly that we havenot, unlike in other times in
history, we haven't it'shappened so fast.
(07:28):
We haven't had the time toevolve and adapt to this modern
world.
So I like to say we're kind ofrunning hunter-gatherer software
in a world that looks nothinglike our hunter-gatherer's world
.
And so when we werehunter-gatherers and we lived in
accord with our evolutionarydesign, we had physical and
mental health.
But when you're in discord,when you have this mismatch
(07:50):
between what your genes and whatyour body and mind need and the
environment around you, weexperience pathology.
So these are like the diseasesof modernity diabetes, heart
disease, hypertension, obesitythese are all diseases that
didn't really affect ourancestors the way they affect us
now, Because I think it's ahuge lifestyle change and our
(08:14):
lifestyle now is there's justthis huge gap between what we
need and what we're actuallydoing.
Speaker 3 (08:22):
So, when it comes to Princeton's diet, does it mean
that we should eat like acaveman and cavewoman?
Speaker 1 (08:31):
Well, actually the paleo diet is a little bit of a
misnomer because there is no oneoptimal paleo diet.
Our hunter-gatherer ancestors awildly different macronutrient
ratios and a variety of plantsand animals and different ratios
depending on what they couldacquire in what season in their
(08:52):
environment.
So if you think about the Inuit, 95% of their food came from
animals and only 5% came fromplants.
But on the other extreme, inthe desert, the Jihonzi and the
Kalahari Desert, they had 65%plants and only 35% animals, and
yet both groups adapted tosurvive in those environments.
(09:14):
And if you think about wherehunter-gatherers used to live
before they were pushed to theextremes, I mean think of all of
the fertile land in betweenthese two areas and all of the
different things that ourenvironment would provide us to
eat, and so I think the paleodiet is kind of a misnomer.
But there are things that arevery similar to all of our
(09:35):
ancestors that did have to dowith diet.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
What would you say?
Those things are.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
Well, I think, no matter where we lived, we always
ate the whole food.
We ate the skin, the pulp, theseeds of plants.
When we ate animals, we ate theconnective tissue and the
organs and not just the musclemeat.
Nothing was up.
Nutrients were not strippedfrom it, fiber was not stripped
from it the way that it is inour modern world.
(10:01):
So, I think, no matter where welived, the one thing we did was
we just we didn't just pick andchoose like, oh, I'm only going
to eat the sugar out of thatplant and I'm only going to eat
the flour out of that plant andI'm only going to eat the oil
out of that plant, and I'm onlygoing to eat the flour out of
that plant and I'm only going toeat the oil out of that plant.
We actually ate the entireplant and got all the nutrients,
vitamins, minerals andeverything else that we needed
along with it.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
And so, even if it's a meat-based diet, it's still
the same kind of considerations.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
Yeah, well, so people that inuit and people who live
more meat-based.
So what's interesting is thatthe human body is very adaptive
and so we have the ability toany nutrient that we don't get
in our diet.
That's not one of the essentialnutrients.
There are these essentialnutrients that our body can't
make, that we have to get in ourdiet.
(10:50):
So, aside from those things,our body can make conversions so
we can turn fat intocarbohydrates, we can turn
proteins into carbohydrates, butit also there has to be a
little bit of care taken,because when we're doing a lot
of conversions, it costs a lotof energy and we get byproducts
that might build up in oursystem and might cause us to be
(11:14):
pretty sick, might build up inour system and might cause us to
, you know, be pretty sick.
So there are ways for us tolive in a variety of places
because our body can convertthem, but we need to make sure
that, well, I think, ideally, ifwe can get in our diet all the
things that we need and we don'tneed to do any conversions,
then A it'll save energy andit'll help our bodies not have
any kind of side products thatmight not be wanted.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
So then, about a whole period in between the
cavemen or cavewomen and nowthis is the agricultural
revolution.
So then, a lot of things we eatnow, including bread, milk, eat
or drink milk products arethings, and legumes, more
(11:59):
generally beans, are things thatwere cultivated during the
agricultural revolution.
And consider the large part oftoday's diet.
Should we cut out all that?
Speaker 1 (12:11):
No, well, I think so.
For instance, with milk thereis actually humans have adapted
to eating dairy.
Some humans or I don't know, Idon't know the percentage but
the persistent of the lactasegene that breaks down lactose.
You know, by the time a lot ofyou know most animals, when they
pass their childhood, theirgene kind of gets downregulated,
(12:33):
meaning the expression of thegene is kind of turned way down,
and so that's why some peoplehave trouble digesting milk, but
in a lot of people theirlactase gene doesn't ever get
dialed down, so we still havethe enzyme to digest lactose.
Yeah, so I think it's going tovary from person to person,
(12:54):
because someone might eatlactose, might drink milk and
have really severe cramping andgas and things like that, but
other people won't.
So to me I feel like dairyneeds to be a personal decision
based on your personalphysiology.
As for legumes, well, I thinkthat legumes are a great source
(13:14):
of fiber and a very sustainableplant-based protein, and a lot
of the reason people don't wantthem is because there's lots of
lectins in them.
So legumes like lentils andpeas and chickpeas and soybeans
and beans and peanuts, eventhings like raw potatoes If all
of those things are eaten raw,it has lectin in them and it
will cause digestion problems.
(13:35):
However, it's very easily.
The solution is very easy.
Once you cook these things forfive to 10 minutes, the lectin
gets denatured and it doesn'thave the same effect, so it's
not going to affect your diet.
So I feel like the way that wecan process beans makes it safe
for us to eat and again, itmight be a personal thing Some
(13:58):
people might be a lot moresensitive to maybe the smaller
amounts that might still be leftover.
But this is what I think is soimportant to people to know that
there's not one diet.
There's not a carnivore diet.
There's not, you know, vegandiet.
There's not one diet that'sgoing to fit everybody.
So you need to take intoaccount what makes you feel good
(14:19):
and what doesn't Like.
If being a carnivore makes youfeel awful, then add some plants
to your food.
You know, if you're a vegan andyou are lacking protein in your
diet, you might need to addsome animal products just to
help boost your energy in yourdiet.
You might need to add someanimal products just to help
boost your energy, your abilityto build muscle.
Speaker 2 (14:36):
Oh, is a differentiator sort of that?
You know, nowadays we have alot of ingredients in food that
don't grow in nature and can'tbe easily pronounced.
Speaker 1 (14:47):
That's exactly it.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
And that is something that our ancestors didn't have
homogenized corn oil in their.
Speaker 1 (14:56):
Whatever it might be, yeah, so I think all the people
who follow these diets.
They might argue over what weshould eat, but what they don't
argue over is what we shouldn'teat, right, we ate whole foods.
We didn't eat nutrients thatwere stripped or food that was
stripped of nutrients andstripped of fiber.
(15:16):
We didn't ever, like in ourentire evolutionary history, we
were never exposed to rawrefined sugar, except for honey,
maybe occasionally.
But the abundance of just sugarwe went from eating four pounds
of sugar a year to over 150pounds of sugar a year in like
two 300 years.
The flour, processed flour,ultra processed oils, vegetable
(15:40):
oils, and then, like you said,the fake foods, artificial
colors, artificial flavors,trans fats all of these things.
We didn't encounter any ofthese when we were evolving, so
our bodies don't know how tohandle them.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
So how has your consideration of nutrition
changed from when you were abasketball player at college and
to now as a master's athleteand as a parent?
Speaker 1 (16:16):
part of our training.
It wasn't.
I mean, this is 30 years ago,you know we did weight training
and we sort of had some, youknow, healthy foods versus dorm
foods, but it wasn't ever taughtto us in the way that this is
how you need to fuel your body.
You need to eat these foods soyou recover faster.
It was never, never taught likethat.
We were also under a lot ofpressure and there was a lot of
body standards and actuallythere were a lot of eating
disorders on our team.
(16:36):
So the mental health aspect ofthat wasn't really talked about
either.
So happy to see the athletesnowadays, you know, like Simone
Biles, they're really startingto address the mental health
aspect, not just the nutritionand, you know, working out and
things like that.
So now that I'm older, you knowI've had two kids, I'm going
through perimenopauseno-transcript.
(17:22):
I feel like my overallinflammation levels because of
the foods that I choose to eat.
I'm really helping my body kindof just calm down Interesting.
Speaker 3 (17:32):
Maybe you can talk a little bit about sleep.
This is another big chapter ofyour book and one of the again
the way I'm thinking hours inthe middle of the night doing
all kinds of things.
Apparently the summer nightdream was during the middle of
(18:01):
the night, but you're kind ofsaying there was a lot of sleep
patterns that existed then.
Some of these characterizationsare a little bit too I mean a
little bit wrong.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
Yeah, that's a good question.
So I feel like people look backin history and kind of have all
these misconceptions aboutsleep, like you just said, and
if people think about ourhunter-gatherer ancestors are
like, oh, they went to bed whenthe sun went down and they woke
up when the sun came up and theygot 12 hours of sleep a night
and they were well rested.
And that's simply not the case.
The hunter-gatherers thatsurvived into modern times were
(18:37):
able to be studied and trackedand even with the influence of
the outside world, all of thegroups studied had very similar
sleeping patterns.
They slept for maybe sevenhours to eight or nine hours,
depending on the time of year.
But the one thing that they hadevery morning they woke up at
the same time every morning.
(18:57):
They got bright sunlight in themorning and all throughout the
day, and then when the sun wentdown, the only light they had
was firelight.
So this is important becausesunlight is one of the best ways
to entrain our circadianrhythms.
These are the rhythms that tellour bodies, you know, when, to
make certain hormones atdifferent times of day, so we
can wake up, so we can fallasleep.
(19:19):
You know when are we going todigest, when are we going to
repair?
So all of these hormones thathelp our bodies function and
repair are under the control ofthese circadian rhythms.
And so what these indigenous andyou know hunter-gatherer groups
found, or what they found aboutthem, is that they're so
entrained with their naturalenvironment that their bodies
(19:40):
are always synced up with thecycle of day and night in the
earth.
And nowadays we live a twilightexistence because when we wake
up, most of us don't go outside.
This is the peak of sunlightthe hunter-gatherers are getting
.
We kind of hang out down here,you know, all throughout the day
we have light, we have light,we have light, and when the
(20:01):
light cuts off forhunter-gatherers, we still have
the same level of light allthroughout the day, all
throughout the night, up untilthe moment we've tried to shut
our eyes, to go to sleep.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
Oh, dr Huberman.
He talked about how one of thethings that's important for
setting your mind right, so tospeak, for the day is to get a
few minutes of sunlight beforeyou start your day.
Speaker 1 (20:24):
And that's exactly why he says that it's because we
evolved to respond to the cuesthat the earth gave us.
And this evolution to respondand have circadian rhythms went
back to the very first cells oflife.
They needed to know when theyneeded to come up and do
photosynthesis and they neededto know when was it okay to
(20:45):
undergo cell division and cellcycle, because they didn't want
to do that during the day,because the sun could cause UV
damage and cause mutations, butthey needed the sun to undergo
photosynthesis.
So even the very early cells oflife had these mechanisms that
entrained them or synced them tothe natural light and dark of
(21:06):
the day and night.
Speaker 3 (21:08):
So maybe go back to my story.
My story is that you know Iretired.
I have then started napping.
There's one issue there, ofcourse, my naps might have been
a little long.
And second, I also haveexperimented a little bit with
light.
So by actually having a mask, Ifound that that is worth like
(21:31):
three sleeping pills.
Wow, yeah, I mean it's very,very powerful.
And actually it's a little bittoo powerful for the morning,
because then the body wants tokind of start feeling the light
probably.
But you know, and again I canregulate it better.
But in the evening, even thoughoutside my bedroom there's a
(21:52):
little bit of a light, it's notmuch, it's a street light, but
that's enough.
It really matters.
Yeah, that's amazing and it'sjust how powerful that light is.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
Yeah, well, after I researched this book I started
this is one of the things thatcompletely changed.
I would get up every morningand take the dogs for a walk in
the morning and get lots ofsunlight, and I would try to get
outside as many as much as Ican.
I'd eat lunch outside, you know, just to get as much bright
light as I can, and then at fouro'clock all of my devices turn
(22:28):
to that night shift or red shiftthat gets rid of the blue light
.
Because we are exquisitelytrained, our brains are the
circadian rhythms are entrainedby blue light, interestingly
because that is the wavelengthof light that can penetrate the
ocean.
So it could have been anywavelength of light, but it's
blue light because of thebeginnings of life, and so I I
(22:51):
turn everything.
I have blue blocking glasses.
I'm sure you guys have seenthese very fashionable things
that clip on.
Speaker 3 (23:00):
Every evening you work on like that.
Speaker 1 (23:05):
Well, if I'm not on a device that's turned down, it's
blue light and red shift.
Yeah, I can use this.
So you're not.
You know, we don't want totrick our bodies into thinking
that it's not time for bed.
Yet you know for every.
You know half hour before bedthat you have blue light.
It postpones melatoninproduction for at least an hour.
Speaker 3 (23:26):
So what happens if you put that on when you watch
TV?
Will you actually notice it?
Because there is this thingabout when I, you, you wear
different google ski masks, skisis that, yes, scheme yeah
goggles and then colors, yourbrain kind of adjusts to it and
recreates the same colors butit's interesting.
Speaker 1 (23:49):
Yeah, I think the same.
It's the same thing.
Your eyes do adjust, but if I'mon my computer at four o'clock
when it shifts, it's like whoayou know, it's really obvious,
but like a minute later I can'ttell the difference between if
it's on or off.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
So that's kind of is interesting how the brain kind
of adjusts that we have talkedto like different psychologists
in the past, and they talk aboutsleep hygiene.
You know the idea.
I hadn't thought so much aboutthe blue light at that hour of
the day, starting at four, butyou know that to power off your
devices and to avoid stimulationand to, you know, change how
(24:27):
you consume caffeine, you know,or?
things like that, so, and thatyour bedroom should be where you
sleep and maybe do one or twoother things.
That, for the most part, it'sthat you're recreating.
And what's the second?
Leave it to your imagination.
But, but, but what do you?
Is this all sort of sleephygiene?
Speaker 1 (24:51):
Yeah well, yeah, this is sleep hygiene I mean.
That is, people say, you know,don't look at screens before you
go to bed.
It's because of thisevolutionary response that we
have to blue light.
But other things, like one ofthe sleep hygiene
recommendations is to have yourroom set at a temperature like
68 degrees or lower, becauseanother signal to our bodies is
(25:12):
falling temperature.
We are in ourtemperature-controlled homes.
We don't get full sunlight, weget like a minimum of.
We get light, but it's a veryfraction of what sunlight is,
and we don't feel any changes inthe temperature either.
We are temperature-controlled.
So, again, turning down thethermostat is actually an
(25:33):
evolutionary thing, because ourbodies are tuned, are as needed,
to the rhythms of, you know,getting cold, colder in the
evening.
It helps us relax, it helps usfall asleep, and so and of
course, caffeine just messeswith everything very late in the
day.
And alcohol too, alcohol too.
Speaker 2 (25:53):
Are your kids receptive to these kind of
things?
Speaker 1 (25:57):
So we're working on them and I think it's hard when
and I'm going to say this forall of the things it is really
hard to make these lifestylechanges when you live in a
society that doesn't supportthem per se.
So I think you know, once theyget a little older, you know
we've put lots of things inplace, you know their devices
(26:19):
all go to redshift, they don'thave screens an hour before bed,
we're eating more and morewhole foods.
So, like, hopefully thesehabits will stick and hopefully,
by the time they're my age,there'll be more support around
them, more people choosing tolive this way, more resources,
more just support.
Speaker 3 (26:38):
So one thing about alcohol and sleeping.
So one thing I thought you know, okay, you drink alcohol, you
fall asleep, fine, but then youwake up and there's your own
problem.
But apparently there's anotherproblem, and it's an interesting
problem is that even a coupleof drinks can affect you.
So you reduce your REM sleepearly part of the night and
(27:02):
increase it later part.
Therefore, you remember itbetter and they're a little more
kind of vivid, they're maybe alittle more traumatic.
I don't know if it's always true, but it's kind of an
interesting thing, because Ihaven't noticed any reduction in
REM sleep from drinking alcohol, but that might just be a bias
(27:22):
by the fact that you rememberthe things that happen early in
the morning.
With other stimulants, likeweed, I think it's less studied,
but it's a similar thing.
That they think that it reducesREM sleep.
And REM sleep, I do think, is,what I understand, very
important for your mental whatactually happened during the
night.
Because sleeping, as I've saidearlier, is a pleasure, fun, but
(27:46):
because you go through thingsthat you might not even remember
but they happen to you, right,the thing that you said about
the importance of REM sleep.
Speaker 1 (27:56):
So humans have the most REM sleep of any primate
and we also have the shortest.
I mean other primates do fallasleep when the sun goes down
and do wake up when the suncomes up.
They do get these long hours atnight.
Humans actually evolved to havethe shortest amount window of
all primates because, well A, wewere able to go to deeper sleep
(28:19):
.
Because of our intelligence,because of our social groups, we
were able to be more protectedfrom predation.
We were able to be moreprotected from predators, like
because of fire, because ofsentinels, because of all these
other things because of fire,because of sentinels, because of
all these other things.
But what's important, too, isthat we needed more time.
Our social structures and ourintelligence there was just so.
(28:47):
We needed more time to pass onknowledge.
We needed more time to figureout how to live with each other,
we needed more time to innovate, and so there's a hypothesis
that that is another reason whyour sleep cycle shortened and
why our REM sleep is so deepbecause we needed more time to
do things.
And then we needed our sleep tobecome such that it gets.
You know, our memories getrecorded, our bodies and brains
(29:08):
recover properly.
So, yeah, go ahead.
Speaker 2 (29:12):
What I think has been interesting to me is like I use
a Fitbit or an Apple Watch iswhen I look at my sleep analysis
, how little of my sleep is REMsleep.
I don't know if how much ofthat is just.
Is that something I need toworry about?
Or just in general, even ifit's what that means or how
important it is?
But at the same time, howlittle of your sleep, relatively
(29:33):
speaking, is comprised of deepREM sleep?
Speaker 1 (29:37):
Yeah well, so I think because our REM sleep is so
deep, we usually get our longestREM sleep, like kind of first
thing once we fall asleep, andthen our REM sleep cycles get a
little shorter and shorter, andshorter until we wake up.
I don't know the exact lengthof time, the ideal length of
time that someone needs REMsleep in order to feel good.
I'm not sure how accurate someof those trackers are in terms
(30:03):
of REM sleep.
If someone was really worriedabout it, I would go get a sleep
study done where they put allthese things on your head and
they can really measure that,because I don't necessarily
trust 100%.
Like oh, oh, my gosh, I gotsuch a horrible night's sleep
last night.
It sometimes generates a littlebit of anxiety when there
shouldn't be any.
Speaker 2 (30:22):
Yeah, just by knowing that.
You don't want to have anything, something else to lose sleep
over, because you're worriedabout how they're sleeping.
Speaker 1 (30:28):
Exactly.
Speaker 3 (30:31):
But it's kind of interesting.
Actually REM sleep is still,you know, as you say, is
important for us humans.
But apparently there are pieceassociated with post-traumatic
stress disorder where actuallythey are kind of working on the
REM kind of you know, the eyemovements part of it, and kind
(30:52):
of recreating a little bit ofwhat is happening during the REM
sleep.
So I don't know much about it,but I know that there is a
therapy like that.
But I wouldn't worry too much,dave, it might be inaccurate.
I think you probably have muchmore REM sleep than that.
Speaker 1 (31:07):
The question is how do you feel?
Do you feel like you?
Speaker 2 (31:09):
get a good night's sleep.
Sometimes I mean it's, you know, I guess not universally every
day and I think I do notice, youknow, if I have caffeine or
something later in the day, likeI think my body's okay after
about noon you don't need to bedrinking any caffeine.
Speaker 3 (31:28):
The half time is six hours, so I think something like
that.
You can correct me, but so ifyou drink at noon you might
still be okay, but if you drinkat four you're probably not okay
.
Yeah, that was me yesterday,unfortunately, Things that the
(31:49):
cave people didn't have.
They didn't have coffee, coffeeis a custom revolution, if not
later, right.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
The few words that I've heard you should use in
diet or relationships are alwaysand never.
This is true, but you're alwaysgoing to have that afternoon
when you need something, at 3 inthe afternoon or a donut, yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:16):
Yeah Well, and I also the people who are listening.
You know a lot of this stuff.
We don't want to be so rigidwith our lifestyle changes that
we fall off the wagon so easily.
Like allowing myself.
I knew I was going to havetrouble sleeping, but I needed
that cup of coffee.
It was a social cup of coffeeand it was worth it to me.
(32:36):
You know eating.
You know totally restrictingyourself, never letting you eat,
have any processed food or anytreat at all.
That's like the first thing youdo if you want to not follow
that diet anymore, becauseyou'll just, you'll just crave
it more and more.
So a lot of these things are,you know, diet things 80% whole
(32:58):
foods and give yourself 15, 20%to not have these rigid food
controls and that's witheverything.
Speaker 3 (33:08):
So I was thinking that that kind of relates to the
whole studies about habits.
So habits is something we usenot to make decisions all the
time, used not to have to makedecisions all the time and in a
way, for instance, if you allthe time are being kind of in
front of you, you make thedecision.
Should I eat a donut or nottoday, or a croissant, whatever
(33:31):
is?
your evil, your poison, thenit's going to wear you down.
I mean one thing where youdon't and the only solution
there is yeah, okay, don't putanything in front of me.
I mean you cannot really choosethat, but you can create habits
that allow you not to makethose choices.
And that's a little bit of wayto create good habits that
(33:55):
allows you to follow a littlebit of a healthier path.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
Because I know I've done some personal training with
people and I think the firstthing is you always never kind
of thing and then you're goodfor a couple of days and then
you have some family obligationyou have a donut and your whole
life is ruined.
And then you have this guiltand you can go off your
(34:19):
intentions from there.
Speaker 3 (34:21):
Yeah, so you're going to maybe talk about the next
book for the social too.
I mean, there's a lot of thingslinked with that donut that
somebody offers you.
Somebody offers you a donut.
Saying no to that is hard andit has cost.
It doesn't mean that you shouldnecessarily accept it, but it
(34:41):
means that you know it's notthat easy to disavow from or to
kind of disengage from all ofthese connections, and neither
should we completely Right.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
Well, and that talks about what we were talking about
before, you know how do youlive this life in the world we
live in, there has to be someflexibility and I think, ketil,
you were saying at the beginningnot to be down on ourselves
when we're not doing thesethings.
I think people who actually wantto change and have these high
lofty ideals are much harder onthemselves than anyone else
(35:14):
because they're like, oh I ate adonut now I have to go run
three miles, when actually youjust ate a donut.
Don't eat one tomorrow or makea different choice.
You know, don't walk by thecommon room on your way to the
bathroom, because there's alwaysdonuts sitting there.
You know, walk the other way.
Speaker 2 (35:31):
One thing I always thought was kind of interesting
was some writing.
I've done like this Everyholiday season, most every
magazine has something aboutholiday weight gain.
Most every magazine hassomething about holiday weight
gain.
And maybe your Christmas dinneror your Thanksgiving dinner is
2,000, 3,000, 4,000 calories,but you don't eat generally that
(35:55):
many calories in a meal or in aday other than those days.
But I've met a lot of peopleand they feel like they've got
to punish themselves or thisfeeling of guilt or, like you
said, eat like that every day.
Speaker 3 (36:04):
It is tricky, I think , because reality is that we, as
you explained very well, we aresocial beings.
We sleep better together ingroups.
Actually I think that's in yourbook as well we eat together.
That is something we do less,at least in this country.
I've been actually quiteshocked culturally by how people
(36:28):
don't eat together.
This is only from Europe tohere, Because I think that and I
might be wrong, but I don'tthink I'm wrong it's something
every society since thebeginning have been doing, and
this is the first time we arenot eating together.
It's an important social thing.
Speaker 1 (36:48):
It is.
Well, it also goes back to howwe used to have food.
We used to share food.
Yeah, that's how we would allcome.
Everyone would come together asa group and what did you get
today?
What did you get today?
And they'd share it.
And, like you said, you wereastute in thinking that this is
something we address in thelater books.
(37:08):
Yes, I mean, food is a hugething that people use, the
cultures use, to celebrate, notonly just to be together every
night, but to celebrate whatnature gave them, celebrate life
, celebrate all kinds of things,and food's a central part of
that.
So I agree that we need to keepa lot of those things in our
(37:30):
lives.
Speaker 2 (37:31):
You mentioned that modern work is out of sync with
our evolutionary design.
Can you talk about how adoptingan in-the-present-moment
mindset can enhance ourwork-rest balance, and what
should we understand from thatoverall thought?
Speaker 1 (37:47):
Yeah, well, I think.
So being in the present moment.
This is something that I thinkis a thread that kind of goes
through the whole book, and it'sbecause we don't live in the
present moment, we are not awareof the cues our bodies give us,
we are not aware of the thingsthat are going on around us, and
we used to be in an immediatereturn economy.
And that means we're hungry,we'd go get it, we'd eat it, we
(38:10):
get our return immediately,we're tired, we go to bed.
You know, we actually have thisconcept of time that's more
circular instead of linear.
But when the agriculturalrevolution came, we now changed
into a delayed return economyPlant the seeds now, harvest six
months later, do the work now,collect the paycheck at the end
(38:31):
of the month.
So time became very linear andwe became very future-oriented.
And so we became sofuture-oriented.
Or some people are very pastoriented.
They can't let things go thathappened, or they have so much
anxiety of things that haven'thappened yet or may never happen
.
Being able to be present and inthe moment was really helpful
(38:54):
for lowering your stress.
I mean, that's such an easything.
Well, mindfulness is such apopular practice because it
lowers your stress, and if youlower your stress, you can
decouple what you're working onfrom the future, like, okay, if
you're so stressed about thisdeadline that you can't even
write, you can't even getstarted, then of course it's
(39:15):
going to be a struggle until thedeadline.
But if you can decoupleyourself from the future and be
like, okay, what do I have to donow?
Deadline.
But if you can decoupleyourself from the future and be
like, okay, what do I have to donow?
What is the most important taskthat I do now?
That will be very helpful inyour work by focusing on the
task at hand, so you're notoverwhelmed looking at the
entire list of things to do.
You're just in the present,doing what you have to do right
now.
Does that make sense?
Speaker 2 (39:36):
Yeah, I mean like I've been reading a lot about
stoicism also, and one of thethings that came up was Seneca
or Marcus Aurelius.
He talks about how I fearedmost things that often never
occurred.
But you know, if you can, likeyou said, live in the moment.
And, kel, was there somethingrelated to work that you were
(39:59):
thinking as well?
Speaker 3 (40:00):
Yeah, so as you say in your book or write in your
book the Princess Keynes hewrote, I think, just after the
war, second World War.
He kind of talked about what hethought was going to be the
future of work and he basicallypredicted that we are going to
spend a lot of time in leisurebecause productivity was
(40:23):
increasing and giving maybe aproductivity increase of one or
two, even 1% per year over timeshould allow us to do that.
Now we had the productivity atleast 30 years after the war,
but then maybe we've beenfalling down a little bit, but
it's still been kind of everyyear on average productivity
increase.
(40:43):
Yet we just work more andthat's a puzzle.
And it was also picked up byGraeber about his very
poignantly called book BullshitJobs.
His idea is really that a lotof jobs are there just to kind
of doing nothing really.
(41:05):
And so what we are actuallymeasuring as productivity
increase might not be correct,but also that we are kind of so
used to working that maybe wedon't even have the imagination
to take leisure seriously.
Maybe you have some comments onthat?
Speaker 1 (41:22):
and how we can solve it.
Yeah, well, I think our cultureis not necessarily a unique
American culture, but I thinkthe American culture is
spreading.
But we have thisindividualistic I can do things
by myself kind of a little bitof a meritocracy.
The people who are successfulare the people who work hard.
So we have this mindset thatthe people who work hard, the
(41:46):
people who are successful, thepeople who make a lot of money,
have the most worth, and so weare trickles down that okay,
well, now we have to work forwork's sake.
We don't work to meet our needs.
We work for status work's sake.
We don't work to meet our needs.
We work for status.
You know, we work to pay ourbills, but we also work to buy
things that we think that weneed, you know.
(42:08):
And so I feel like we'regetting on this treadmill of
work for work's sake, when,really, if we can simplify our
lives, we will, you know, notbuy as much stuff, not need as
much stuff, be able to work lessbecause we don't need as much
money, we don't need that status.
If we can disassociate ourworth as human beings, if we can
(42:29):
disassociate from what we dorather than who we are, I think
that'll help our mindset torealize that work for the sake
of work, we're just spinning ourwheels and burning ourselves
out and you're like, for whatyou know?
Are we spending more time withour family?
No, we're spending less timewith our family.
Are we enjoying being alive?
(42:51):
Are we going on vacations?
Are we, you know, gettingtogether with friends and
drinking coffee?
You know, too late in the dayso you can't sleep.
And drinking coffee?
You know too late in the day soyou can't sleep.
No, we're not doing thosethings.
In fact, people have leave thatthey don't take.
They don't even take lunchbreaks.
They eat at their desk becausethey're afraid of this
(43:12):
perception that they're notworthy or they aren't working as
hard as somebody else.
And so I really feel like andthis needs, this is something
that kind of comes from the topdown.
The US is the only country thatdoesn't have any mandated leave
as a government.
There's no mandated leaverequired for employers to give
(43:32):
their employees, and youcontrast that with the European
countries, and I mean it'samazing, and I think europeans
actually take their breaks, theytake their vacations.
They're away for like a monthat a time, you know, and it's
mandated and it's not mandated,but they, it's required for
(43:54):
people to have those kinds oftime off yeah, some of this
problem is not only american butthe but some of these issues
you mentioned are only Americans.
Speaker 3 (44:04):
For instance, the lunch break.
That is not an issue in Europe.
The vacation is taken.
It was amended that the companygive it to you and if you don't
take it, that's actually thecompany has to give you that
vacation and it's at least amonth and it can be taken in one
go.
(44:24):
I do think it helps a lot.
The company has to give youthat vacation and it's at least
a month and it can be taken inone go.
I do think it helps a lot.
It's one of the problems that alot of economists are pointing
to, to be kind of that economyand these are not doing as well
in Europe, et cetera, et cetera.
But I still kind of personallyI think it's the better system.
I see the country where you seeyou said the exporting of this
(44:45):
way of working to the world.
You see that a lot in Englandbecause in England they do have
some restrictions on I meanbasically regulations about
vacation, but it's not as muchas in Europe, the rest of Europe
.
But I just read recently aboutAmerican law companies coming in
and taking over in Britain andyou could just imagine what kind
(45:09):
of work goes there in posting.
That's completely unseenamongst lawyers in Britain and
they also work hard.
But the American lawyers comein and they work around the
clock, absolutely to the deathnearly.
And you know this is thecompetition that is happening in
certain sectors the financialsector and in law in particular.
(45:31):
But the bigger issue still is,in a way, the work and why we
don't find there's a puzzle, whywe don't find time, more time
for leisure if you want.
But even leisure is kind ofopposed to work.
Speaker 1 (45:46):
So maybe it's the way we're thinking about work yeah,
well, if we bring this back toour ancestors I talk about this
in the book.
So keynes, when he was talkingabout productivity, he
envisioned a world where you orwe would only work about 15
hours a week and then haveleisure to do time.
And people think that the lifeof a hunter-gatherer was hard
(46:09):
work all the time.
It was brutal and there weretimes when it was but studies of
our ancestors orhunter-gatherers who survived
into modern times.
They work at getting food, somuch less.
They've actually met King'sprediction and they had no
technology and nothing to makethem much less.
They have actually met Keynes'prediction and they had no
technology and nothing to makethem more efficient.
They were just the way thatthey saw that they integrated
their life, and when they wereworking, they were telling
(46:31):
stories, they were buildingthings, they were dancing, they
were celebrating.
They were just living theirlives.
And so we have not evolved towork 80-hour work weeks.
We have not evolved to sit inthese chairs and look at a
screen for eight hours a daywithout any breaks.
And so we talk a lot about howwe used to work and how we work
(46:54):
now and trying to bring some ofthe things back into it Because,
again, this is a culture, thisis a system that we are working
within.
We are not getting support.
There are some companies whoare going to make the four-hour
no, not the four-hour thefour-day work week and they are
finding that they're moreproductive and their employees
(47:14):
are happier and they have lessturnover.
But this is definitelysomething that people.
You can't just say, oh, I'm notgoing to work on Fridays, we
have to work within the system.
Then it's the system that kindof needs to change and, like you
said, the mindset needs tochange.
Speaker 3 (47:28):
There's another thing as well is that you know, my
personal story is that I retiredbut my work was I mean, we
worked hard in periods, but it'snot like the 90 hours work week
it's also but I think this istrue for everyone it did provide
a lot of social network.
So when I retired I lost allthe social network.
I go into a slum, okay, andthat kind of, but my blood
(47:53):
pressure falls.
It's just no.
You take naps, but I was like alittle bit too tired and maybe
also depressed.
And now, thanks to this podcast, amongst other things, I mean
I'm kind of recouping, recoringsome of that kind of activity.
Also the network I, you knowI'm kind of establishing that.
(48:16):
But one of the issues obviouslyis also that, despite the
poison that maybe work is, it'sthe social network for most
people.
Speaker 1 (48:26):
Yeah, well, that is something that we recommend
trying to bring some of what ourancestors did into the workday,
because they always went out ingroups, they gathered in groups
, they hunted in groups, theylaughed, they joked.
They were together in groups,they laughed, they joked, they
were together.
And so I think I work from homeand I felt the same thing,
kettle, where I've really missedsocial interactions with my
(48:47):
co-workers.
So it's something that we haveto, logically, you know, make a
decision, make a differentdecision.
Okay, I'm going to go to lunchwith my friend.
I'm not going to work throughlunch sitting here at my desk
all by myself.
So these are things that wejust have to.
We can change our behavior.
The great thing about humanbeings is that we don't need our
genes to evolve to change ourbehavior.
(49:08):
We can use our intelligence andwe can use our creativity and
we can decide to change ourbehavior, and that's the good
news.
We just have to do it.
Speaker 3 (49:16):
It's kind of interesting.
So what happened a little bitwith the work from home thing is
that these groups that kind ofexist or existed in the
workplace are a little bit kindof suffering from that and
that's bad.
But on the other hand, itallows you to have more time
with the family, which is good,but those that don't have a
family maybe it's not so good,and loneliness, of course, is a
(49:41):
big issue.
Oh yeah, so you know, you're alittle bit damned if you do and
damned if you don't.
I mean, it's in a way, we're alittle bit in a bind.
Speaker 1 (49:53):
Well, I also think it's always a work in progress.
You know, individual peoplehave different needs.
So somebody who doesn't have afamily, they need to find a
social network that's outside ofwork.
So it's an individualized thing.
And I think again, we need tohave people who are deciding to
live a different way, are goingagainst the current, and so it's
(50:15):
hard right now to find theseother ways to be.
More people need to startswimming against the current, so
the rest of society andcorporations will be like oh, we
can help them somehow ratherthan just go with the flow.
Speaker 2 (50:31):
Yeah, that was one thing.
Edel was working with one of theIMF with the International
Monetary Fund was working tofind ways to introduce
mindfulness or to considerdifferent.
I mean, the whole thing, likethe whole world, had to change
without question.
You know, once the pandemicstarted and most people the day
before the pandemic startedwouldn't have considered working
(50:55):
from home as an option Then allof a sudden it's what you have
to do.
Then all of a sudden it's whatyou have to do.
So how has the disconnectionfrom nature affected our mental
and physical health?
We touched on some of this alittle bit earlier.
But what kinds of things shouldwe do, or could we do, to
reclaim a more engagedrelationship with nature and the
(51:20):
outdoors?
Speaker 1 (51:21):
Yeah, well, I like to say that we're the only species
on Earth that doesn't live inour natural habitat, because we
did not evolve.
The majority of our evolutionoccurred when we were actually
living in nature and we didn'tevolve all these millions of
years indoors eating processedfood.
So our connection with natureis I think some people feel like
(51:43):
it is not as important.
But, as Ketil was saying, Ithink, before we started, nature
kind of wraps everything up.
Entraining your circadianrhythms with nature helps you
sleep.
Eating the food that natureprovides in season helps not
only your health but alsosustainability.
Where do we get all of ourresources?
(52:04):
From nature.
So I really feel like naturekind of brings everything
together.
Because we are nature, and Ithink there's this disconnect
that people are like, well, Ihave dominion over nature or
nature is to serve us, and theydon't realize that destroying
nature is going to actuallydestroy us and that's like the
big extreme example.
But being in nature lowers yourstress, it decreases your blood
(52:28):
pressure, heart disease, itbolsters your immunity.
There are all these new studiescoming out where you know one
group goes into nature and onegroup walks in the city and then
they test their cortisol levelsand the people who went for a
walk in nature had much lowercortisol levels.
So I really feel like peopledon't realize how much we need
(52:49):
nature and I think once peoplerealize how much we need nature
and how much nature does for us,it'll help them do the opposite
.
It'll help them realize thatwhat we need to do for nature
not what nature does, so naturedoes things, them realize that
what we need to do for nature,not what nature so nature does
things for us.
And then we need to help natureso it can continue to do this,
and we need to maintain ournatural habitat, even though we
(53:09):
don't live there.
Speaker 2 (53:10):
Is there a certain amount of time we should target
to be outside on a daily, weeklybasis?
I mean, should we step outsideevery morning before we start
our day in some way, or howshould we?
Incorporate.
Speaker 1 (53:24):
I mean, I don't think if we say, oh, you need to be
outside for two hours a day, youknow that's just not going to
happen for a lot of people andpeople might say I'm going to
forget it.
I try to go outside whenever Ican.
It helps to have dogs to go forwalks because they need to go
outside every day.
It helps to have kids to go toparks and camping and stuff.
But you need to start not onlyjust being out in nature so you
(53:47):
could go for a walk and not bein nature.
You can be in your head thewhole time.
To actually be in nature, youhave to be in the present moment
.
You need to open your eyes andyou need to observe what's going
on around you Observe the leaf,observe the flowers, observe
the sky, observe the wildlifethat you run into.
There is this theory.
(54:07):
What is it called?
It's stress reduction theory.
So natural environments promoterecovery because nature has low
levels of information toprocess.
If you compare walking on ahiking trail versus walking
downtown on a city street, youknow there's.
It's no wonder that we're.
You know we're walking on acity street, where it were
there's cars coming in, there'speople and there's smells and
(54:30):
there's all this informationcoming at you and so your body's
in this continuous state offight or flight.
But if you're in nature thatcan relax because there's a
stress, because there's not asmuch information coming into you
, you can be more in the presentand actually not be overwhelmed
by your senses.
You can actually use yoursenses to become more present
(54:53):
and become more relaxed.
Speaker 3 (54:56):
Yeah, I had like, at least during the pandemic.
We want to do a podcast aboutwalking and one of the things I
felt again another culture shockby moving to the United States
is that you know, I discoveredthat you don't walk unless you
have a purpose.
So you walk a dog, you walk achild, you run or you walk and
(55:19):
looking at your Apple, yourapple watch or your hike.
You just don't walk to beoutside.
And this actually went, goes asfar back as the romantics in
germany days, kind of.
It's true in the history wehaven't really been walking in
nature and looking at naturebecause we've been part of
(55:41):
nature, but the romantics inGermany in particular were kind
of putting forward the idea thatyou can go outside and observe
the walk and going to themountain, going to the Alps, and
it also affected a lot of theidea about nature in Norway,
because in Norway we basicallyit's nearly a quasi-religious
(56:02):
thing, our nature is us and wego there to seek silence and
seek connection.
And then I feel that's hard.
Here I was walking outside andI feel like people are looking
at me because I'm alone,especially a guy.
What is he out walking foralone, especially a guy.
What is he out walking for?
(56:22):
And then it really takes me.
It kind of annoys me that howmuch people are kind of in a way
, abusing nature by actuallyalways having to achieve
something in nature.
I'm a little extreme, you know Ihave a thing you have to kind
of run, even you know.
Okay, it's maybe not nature.
We go to a swimming pool and Isee them.
You know somebody's trying toswim faster than the other.
(56:43):
I mean just being in the wateris fantastic.
Speaker 1 (56:47):
You know we talk about competition versus
cooperation a lot in the nextbook.
Yeah, and how that's changed.
Speaker 2 (56:54):
I mean, I was just in Ireland a few weeks ago and one
of the things that was reallyinteresting was they built these
steps that go down into theocean.
All this all over differentplaces in ireland and it's not
like, like, and I met this man.
He's been doing it for 50, 60years every day and he's not
(57:14):
like going out swimming a half amile or a mile.
He's going out getting in thewater and then he's just talking
with everyone that he sees whenhe in and out of the.
He he's his late 70s and therewas an older man and there it's
cold.
I mean it is a cold plunge on adaily basis, like I mean, and
then just, uh, socializing, butthat is something like.
(57:36):
On the one hand, it's there areprobably people that are
swimming laps or something, butI know, like when I go on the
bike trail near where I live, Imean there are a lot of people
alone or with couples or onbikes, or you know, looking
ahead, what gives you hope forthe future of health and
wellness, as more people becomeaware of the importance of
(57:57):
aligning with evolutionarydesign and the concept of your
book or biohack.
Speaker 1 (58:03):
Yeah, well, interestingly, we didn't start
using the term biohacking untilafter we wrote the book and we
were trying to figure out wherethis book fit in the health and
wellness sphere.
And that's where we realizedthat you know biohacking, when
someone biohacks, they takesmall incremental changes in
their life and then they see howit works.
(58:24):
And we made the connection like, well, that's what evolution
already did for us.
Evolution is the originalbiohacker because it took our
genes and made incrementalchanges and then whether or not
those changes were passed onwere totally dependent on the
success of the change.
You know, if it was a positivemutation and an adaptation to
(58:45):
our environment, then it gotpassed on, but if it wasn't,
then you know it wouldn't bepassed on.
So that's why we kind ofentered the biohacking field,
because most, if not all, of therecommendations in our book are
things that biohackers andhealth and wellness, you know,
functional medicine, doctors andcoaches and all kinds of people
(59:06):
that it's what they are tellingtheir clients or their patients
or you know whoever to do.
And it actually I was offsocial media for 12 years and
they just got back on in Aprilfor the purposes of this book
and I was really, really worriedbecause I'd never seen the good
part of social media.
(59:27):
I'd only ever really experiencedthe bad part.
But now that I'm on socialmedia and I'm following all of
these amazing people who reallywant to help they want to help
humans live better lives, andthis is what I have I've had the
most hope because I see itchanging.
I see more and more peoplebecoming aware of our
(59:47):
shortcomings, not only in thearenas of health and wellness,
but in social issues andenvironmental issues and things
like that.
I'm seeing more and more peoplejoining and becoming voices and
influencing the people aroundthem.
So I still feel like we have areally long way to go, and we
talked about this before severaltimes.
(01:00:07):
It's because we're the countercurrent.
You know, there's not a wholelot of support for people who
are trying to live a new way,and so we just have to be each
other's support.
You know, find the people whoare the same, who want to do the
same kinds of things that youare, and rely on those people to
be your support, and then moreand more and more people will
hopefully join, and because onceyou start changing your
(01:00:31):
lifestyle and you realize thatit's working, it's easier to
make more lifestyle changes.
So when you're at the beginningand you're and you're miserable
and you're sick and you'retired and depressed, you know
it's really, really hard tostart those lifestyle changes.
But if you pick one or two andthey start working, then it's
like oh, I want more of this,please, you know.
(01:00:53):
So it gets easier and easier tomake other lifestyle changes.
So, just like that builds oneach other little, small
incremental steps.
I think, as a society, makingsmall incremental steps together
is how we're going to change it.
Speaker 2 (01:01:06):
What kind of takeaways do you have for people
that are, if they know nothingelse, about what this book is?
About how they should start tothink, about how they might want
to make changes in their ownlives?
What are the coreconsiderations that people
should carry?
Speaker 1 (01:01:22):
Yeah, well, I think Kettle talked about this a
little bit before with habits.
When I first startedresearching this book, I had
been aware of some of the thingsthat I personally, or our
family or our society wasn'tdoing in accordance to our
evolutionary design.
But as the more I researched it, I actually got really
overwhelmed and a littledepressed of how far we are away
(01:01:45):
from some of these things.
And so I know, when you knowpeople are wanting to change
their life and they see, youknow, at the end of every part
we have kind of actionable stepsthat someone can take, and it
can be really overwhelming, butit's so important that you start
somewhere.
So I would recommend thatpeople can take, and it can be
really overwhelming, but it's soimportant that you start
somewhere.
So I would recommend thatpeople just take something that
(01:02:06):
resonates with them, somethingthey think is easy to do, and
start with that, and then, likeI'm saying, don't let it
overwhelm.
You Take one little step, makesure that's working Good.
Okay, I'm going to trysomething else.
That's more accord in my accordwith my biology.
Oh, that's working good.
You're slowly but surelybiohacking yourself by learning
(01:02:28):
about how we used to live andtrying these things on.
You know we don't want to goback to living as cavemen.
We don't want to go back 15 000years.
There's child mortality and noantibiotics and you know that we
have so much comfort and youknow so much we can do.
That's more than back then.
But we can bring some of thethings back into our lives, just
(01:02:50):
one at a time, in slow,incremental steps.
Speaker 3 (01:02:53):
Maybe more nature.
Speaker 1 (01:02:56):
Yes.
Seek nature and nature willgive the answer no.
Yeah, I would agree.
That's the first chapter that Iwrote, or the first part that I
wrote, and it's my favoritepart that spoke to me the most.
Speaker 2 (01:03:10):
So I totally agree.
So we're just rediscovering thepath to health and wellness
that we've had throughout ourhistory, but bringing it into
today's life.
Exactly had throughout ourhistory, but bringing it into
today's life.
Exactly Well.
(01:03:30):
A huge thanks to our guest,jenny Powers, a PhD, and her
co-author, luke Comer, for theirbook on the Origin of being
Understanding the Science ofEvolution to Enhance your
Quality of Life.
To learn more about their book,please visit their website on
theoriginofbeingcom.
Thank you for joining us forWellness Musketeers.
Tune in for upcoming episodesto learn how to live with a
(01:03:50):
greater understanding of theworld we experience together.
Please subscribe, give us afive-star review and share this
recording with your family andfriends.
You can make a contributionthrough a link provided in our
program notes.
To allow this podcast to grow,let us know what you need to
learn to help you live your bestlife.
Send your question and ideasfor future episodes to
(01:04:12):
davidmliss at gmailcom.
You.
And it's because we don't live in the present moment
.
We are not aware of the cuesour bodies give us, we are not
aware of the things that aregoing on around us.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Welcome to the Wellness Musketeers podcast,
your guide to navigating theworld of health, wellness and
the art of living.
I'm your host, dave Liss, ajournalist and podcaster based
in Washington DC, joined by myco-host, ketel Veeney, an
economist with 35 years ofexperience, including 24 years
with the IMF, and currently anadjunct lecturer in economics
(00:46):
and politics at Sciences Po X inFrance.
In a world inundated withwellness advice, we aim to
provide actionable strategies tohelp you thrive.
Today, we are delighted towelcome Jenny Powers, a PhD
scientist, mom, writer andathlete from Colorado.
Dr Powers holdsa bachelor'sdegree in chemical engineering
(01:10):
and a PhD in immunology from theUniversity of Colorado.
After leaving academia to raiseher two kids and pursue a
writing career, she co-authoredthe book On the Origin of being
with Luke Comer.
This book delves into howevolution by natural selection
can inform and enhance ourmodern lives.
(01:30):
Luke Comer, although notjoining us today, conceptualized
the project and has a richbackground in studying human,
biological and culturalevolution.
This episode is a must-listenfor anyone interested in
understanding how aligning withour evolutionary design can
improve health and well-being.
Jenny Powers, phd, will sharefascinating insights from her
(01:56):
book on the origin of being,revealing how our ancestors'
lifestyles can guide us tobetter sleep, nutrition and
overall wellness in today'sfast-paced world.
Before we begin, pleaseremember to subscribe wherever
you listen to this podcast andif you're there, please also
leave us a review.
Five stars do amazing thingsfor the podcast, and with that,
(02:18):
here's our conversation withJenny Powers.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
Hello Dr Powers.
I hope I can call you Jenny.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
Oh, of course, Please do.
Speaker 3 (02:29):
I read your book with great interest.
It does go through quiteinteresting thing about the
evolutionary mismatch andsomething called biohacking.
Can you tell us a little bitabout how you actually came
about to actually spending a lotof time dealing with this and
actually writing a whole bookabout it?
Speaker 1 (02:45):
Yeah, yeah.
Well, first of all, thank youso much for having me on your
podcast.
I really appreciate it.
So my whole life I was kind ofan overachiever and
perfectionist.
So I, you know, had high gradesin school and I was a
basketball player and but myworth was always wrapped up in
my achievement.
Then I went to grad school.
(03:06):
I had 70-hour work weeks.
I was burnt out, I wasdepressed and I thought I was
the person.
I thought it was a personalfailing of mine.
I never really realized that itmight have been something like
our culture of work in thiscountry that is causing me to
feel these things.
And I always wanted to be awriter, but again, wrapped up in
(03:26):
my achievement is my worst.
A PhD scientist, you know, islike a big achievement, whereas
a writer might not, you know, bea good thing.
Then, around the same time, inthe early 2000s, climate change
began to show up in scientificjournals and news and I was
feeling this agonizing, likedistress Solastalgia is called
why people weren't caring aboutour environment.
(03:48):
But at the same time I wasgoing through all this stuff, I
was too depressed to do anythingabout it and I felt more of a
failure.
So I started a spiritual pathand began to heal.
And when my kids were born, Iactually did quit academia and
start being a writer and I metLuke.
I was looking for writing jobsto do and I met Luke and he
(04:10):
described his vision for thisbook, this vision that he'd had
for many, many years, as he wasresearching nutrition and other
things, and he was telling meall the ways that we aren't
living in accord with ourbiology, with our evolved nature
, all the ways that we aren'tliving in accord with our
biology, with our evolved nature.
And he started listing them offsleep, nutrition, work, nature,
(04:32):
you know, child rearing, socialgroups.
And because this is actuallythe first book of a three-part
series, then it soon becameglaringly obvious to me when I
was talking to him that my twobiggest pain points at that time
in my life were work and therelationship with nature, and it
just blew my mind and ittotally opened up this new world
of well, maybe I'm not doing itwrong, maybe our society is
(04:56):
doing it wrong because we're notliving how we used to live.
And so that's how I becameconnected with the project and I
researched and wrote itaccording to Luke's foundation
and vision.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
What will the other two books in the series be?
Speaker 1 (05:12):
So this book focuses on kind of more of our basic
needs our sleep, nutrition, work, relationship with nature, and
then you kind of look at it aslike a triangle, kind of like
Maslow's triangle of needshierarchy of needs.
The next book will be moresocial groups, like social needs
, so social groups, childrearing, the sexes,
(05:32):
relationships, and then at thetop of the pyramid will be more
cultural needs, like how weevolved rituals and religion and
the arts and ceremonies andthings like that.
So each book kind of builds oneach other and hopefully will
give a total of 10 things thatpeople can start addressing in
(05:54):
their own lives that mightactually help them have better
well-being.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
Interesting.
So the top is a little bit thespiritual part.
Speaker 1 (06:04):
Yes, definitely.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
Okay, yeah, but let's not dive a little into what
this is telling us, because I'msure that a lot of the listeners
are interested in knowing youknow, how they might want to
adjust their life.
On the basis of this bookthere's a lot of talking about,
you know, let's start maybe withdiet, but it relates to other
things as well.
But you know about the paleodiet which is kind of raising up
(06:30):
a similar story as what you aretelling.
It's basically far back.
We ate a certain way.
Our genome has not changedenough for us to deal with the
rest.
But how does this differ from alot of what we read about the
paleo diet around?
Speaker 2 (06:51):
Can we maybe go back a little bit just to explain,
like, what is an evolutionarymismatch in biohacking?
I think that's sort of a bigtheme of what we're going to be
discussing here.
Now that will tie into thedietary parts.
Speaker 1 (07:05):
Yeah, yeah, that's a great question.
So environmental mismatch isthe environment that we live in
today is so radically differentthan the one that we evolved in,
and our world, especially overthe last hundred years, is
changing so rapidly that we havenot, unlike in other times in
history, we haven't it'shappened so fast.
(07:28):
We haven't had the time toevolve and adapt to this modern
world.
So I like to say we're kind ofrunning hunter-gatherer software
in a world that looks nothinglike our hunter-gatherer's world
.
And so when we werehunter-gatherers and we lived in
accord with our evolutionarydesign, we had physical and
mental health.
But when you're in discord,when you have this mismatch
(07:50):
between what your genes and whatyour body and mind need and the
environment around you, weexperience pathology.
So these are like the diseasesof modernity diabetes, heart
disease, hypertension, obesitythese are all diseases that
didn't really affect ourancestors the way they affect us
now, Because I think it's ahuge lifestyle change and our
(08:14):
lifestyle now is there's justthis huge gap between what we
need and what we're actuallydoing.
Speaker 3 (08:22):
So, when it comes to Princeton's diet, does it mean
that we should eat like acaveman and cavewoman?
Speaker 1 (08:31):
Well, actually the paleo diet is a little bit of a
misnomer because there is no oneoptimal paleo diet.
Our hunter-gatherer ancestors awildly different macronutrient
ratios and a variety of plantsand animals and different ratios
depending on what they couldacquire in what season in their
(08:52):
environment.
So if you think about the Inuit, 95% of their food came from
animals and only 5% came fromplants.
But on the other extreme, inthe desert, the Jihonzi and the
Kalahari Desert, they had 65%plants and only 35% animals, and
yet both groups adapted tosurvive in those environments.
(09:14):
And if you think about wherehunter-gatherers used to live
before they were pushed to theextremes, I mean think of all of
the fertile land in betweenthese two areas and all of the
different things that ourenvironment would provide us to
eat, and so I think the paleodiet is kind of a misnomer.
But there are things that arevery similar to all of our
(09:35):
ancestors that did have to dowith diet.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
What would you say?
Those things are.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
Well, I think, no matter where we lived, we always
ate the whole food.
We ate the skin, the pulp, theseeds of plants.
When we ate animals, we ate theconnective tissue and the
organs and not just the musclemeat.
Nothing was up.
Nutrients were not strippedfrom it, fiber was not stripped
from it the way that it is inour modern world.
(10:01):
So, I think, no matter where welived, the one thing we did was
we just we didn't just pick andchoose like, oh, I'm only going
to eat the sugar out of thatplant and I'm only going to eat
the flour out of that plant andI'm only going to eat the oil
out of that plant, and I'm onlygoing to eat the flour out of
that plant and I'm only going toeat the oil out of that plant.
We actually ate the entireplant and got all the nutrients,
vitamins, minerals andeverything else that we needed
along with it.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
And so, even if it's a meat-based diet, it's still
the same kind of considerations.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
Yeah, well, so people that inuit and people who live
more meat-based.
So what's interesting is thatthe human body is very adaptive
and so we have the ability toany nutrient that we don't get
in our diet.
That's not one of the essentialnutrients.
There are these essentialnutrients that our body can't
make, that we have to get in ourdiet.
(10:50):
So, aside from those things,our body can make conversions so
we can turn fat intocarbohydrates, we can turn
proteins into carbohydrates, butit also there has to be a
little bit of care taken,because when we're doing a lot
of conversions, it costs a lotof energy and we get byproducts
that might build up in oursystem and might cause us to be
(11:14):
pretty sick, might build up inour system and might cause us to
, you know, be pretty sick.
So there are ways for us tolive in a variety of places
because our body can convertthem, but we need to make sure
that, well, I think, ideally, ifwe can get in our diet all the
things that we need and we don'tneed to do any conversions,
then A it'll save energy andit'll help our bodies not have
any kind of side products thatmight not be wanted.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
So then, about a whole period in between the
cavemen or cavewomen and nowthis is the agricultural
revolution.
So then, a lot of things we eatnow, including bread, milk, eat
or drink milk products arethings, and legumes, more
(11:59):
generally beans, are things thatwere cultivated during the
agricultural revolution.
And consider the large part oftoday's diet.
Should we cut out all that?
Speaker 1 (12:11):
No, well, I think so.
For instance, with milk thereis actually humans have adapted
to eating dairy.
Some humans or I don't know, Idon't know the percentage but
the persistent of the lactasegene that breaks down lactose.
You know, by the time a lot ofyou know most animals, when they
pass their childhood, theirgene kind of gets downregulated,
(12:33):
meaning the expression of thegene is kind of turned way down,
and so that's why some peoplehave trouble digesting milk, but
in a lot of people theirlactase gene doesn't ever get
dialed down, so we still havethe enzyme to digest lactose.
Yeah, so I think it's going tovary from person to person,
(12:54):
because someone might eatlactose, might drink milk and
have really severe cramping andgas and things like that, but
other people won't.
So to me I feel like dairyneeds to be a personal decision
based on your personalphysiology.
As for legumes, well, I thinkthat legumes are a great source
(13:14):
of fiber and a very sustainableplant-based protein, and a lot
of the reason people don't wantthem is because there's lots of
lectins in them.
So legumes like lentils andpeas and chickpeas and soybeans
and beans and peanuts, eventhings like raw potatoes If all
of those things are eaten raw,it has lectin in them and it
will cause digestion problems.
(13:35):
However, it's very easily.
The solution is very easy.
Once you cook these things forfive to 10 minutes, the lectin
gets denatured and it doesn'thave the same effect, so it's
not going to affect your diet.
So I feel like the way that wecan process beans makes it safe
for us to eat and again, itmight be a personal thing Some
(13:58):
people might be a lot moresensitive to maybe the smaller
amounts that might still be leftover.
But this is what I think is soimportant to people to know that
there's not one diet.
There's not a carnivore diet.
There's not, you know, vegandiet.
There's not one diet that'sgoing to fit everybody.
So you need to take intoaccount what makes you feel good
(14:19):
and what doesn't Like.
If being a carnivore makes youfeel awful, then add some plants
to your food.
You know, if you're a vegan andyou are lacking protein in your
diet, you might need to addsome animal products just to
help boost your energy in yourdiet.
You might need to add someanimal products just to help
boost your energy, your abilityto build muscle.
Speaker 2 (14:36):
Oh, is a differentiator sort of that?
You know, nowadays we have alot of ingredients in food that
don't grow in nature and can'tbe easily pronounced.
Speaker 1 (14:47):
That's exactly it.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
And that is something that our ancestors didn't have
homogenized corn oil in their.
Speaker 1 (14:56):
Whatever it might be, yeah, so I think all the people
who follow these diets.
They might argue over what weshould eat, but what they don't
argue over is what we shouldn'teat, right, we ate whole foods.
We didn't eat nutrients thatwere stripped or food that was
stripped of nutrients andstripped of fiber.
(15:16):
We didn't ever, like in ourentire evolutionary history, we
were never exposed to rawrefined sugar, except for honey,
maybe occasionally.
But the abundance of just sugarwe went from eating four pounds
of sugar a year to over 150pounds of sugar a year in like
two 300 years.
The flour, processed flour,ultra processed oils, vegetable
(15:40):
oils, and then, like you said,the fake foods, artificial
colors, artificial flavors,trans fats all of these things.
We didn't encounter any ofthese when we were evolving, so
our bodies don't know how tohandle them.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
So how has your consideration of nutrition
changed from when you were abasketball player at college and
to now as a master's athleteand as a parent?
Speaker 1 (16:16):
part of our training.
It wasn't.
I mean, this is 30 years ago,you know we did weight training
and we sort of had some, youknow, healthy foods versus dorm
foods, but it wasn't ever taughtto us in the way that this is
how you need to fuel your body.
You need to eat these foods soyou recover faster.
It was never, never taught likethat.
We were also under a lot ofpressure and there was a lot of
body standards and actuallythere were a lot of eating
disorders on our team.
(16:36):
So the mental health aspect ofthat wasn't really talked about
either.
So happy to see the athletesnowadays, you know, like Simone
Biles, they're really startingto address the mental health
aspect, not just the nutritionand, you know, working out and
things like that.
So now that I'm older, you knowI've had two kids, I'm going
through perimenopauseno-transcript.
(17:22):
I feel like my overallinflammation levels because of
the foods that I choose to eat.
I'm really helping my body kindof just calm down Interesting.
Speaker 3 (17:32):
Maybe you can talk a little bit about sleep.
This is another big chapter ofyour book and one of the again
the way I'm thinking hours inthe middle of the night doing
all kinds of things.
Apparently the summer nightdream was during the middle of
(18:01):
the night, but you're kind ofsaying there was a lot of sleep
patterns that existed then.
Some of these characterizationsare a little bit too I mean a
little bit wrong.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
Yeah, that's a good question.
So I feel like people look backin history and kind of have all
these misconceptions aboutsleep, like you just said, and
if people think about ourhunter-gatherer ancestors are
like, oh, they went to bed whenthe sun went down and they woke
up when the sun came up and theygot 12 hours of sleep a night
and they were well rested.
And that's simply not the case.
The hunter-gatherers thatsurvived into modern times were
(18:37):
able to be studied and trackedand even with the influence of
the outside world, all of thegroups studied had very similar
sleeping patterns.
They slept for maybe sevenhours to eight or nine hours,
depending on the time of year.
But the one thing that they hadevery morning they woke up at
the same time every morning.
(18:57):
They got bright sunlight in themorning and all throughout the
day, and then when the sun wentdown, the only light they had
was firelight.
So this is important becausesunlight is one of the best ways
to entrain our circadianrhythms.
These are the rhythms that tellour bodies, you know, when, to
make certain hormones atdifferent times of day, so we
can wake up, so we can fallasleep.
(19:19):
You know when are we going todigest, when are we going to
repair?
So all of these hormones thathelp our bodies function and
repair are under the control ofthese circadian rhythms.
And so what these indigenous andyou know hunter-gatherer groups
found, or what they found aboutthem, is that they're so
entrained with their naturalenvironment that their bodies
(19:40):
are always synced up with thecycle of day and night in the
earth.
And nowadays we live a twilightexistence because when we wake
up, most of us don't go outside.
This is the peak of sunlightthe hunter-gatherers are getting
.
We kind of hang out down here,you know, all throughout the day
we have light, we have light,we have light, and when the
(20:01):
light cuts off forhunter-gatherers, we still have
the same level of light allthroughout the day, all
throughout the night, up untilthe moment we've tried to shut
our eyes, to go to sleep.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
Oh, dr Huberman.
He talked about how one of thethings that's important for
setting your mind right, so tospeak, for the day is to get a
few minutes of sunlight beforeyou start your day.
Speaker 1 (20:24):
And that's exactly why he says that it's because we
evolved to respond to the cuesthat the earth gave us.
And this evolution to respondand have circadian rhythms went
back to the very first cells oflife.
They needed to know when theyneeded to come up and do
photosynthesis and they neededto know when was it okay to
(20:45):
undergo cell division and cellcycle, because they didn't want
to do that during the day,because the sun could cause UV
damage and cause mutations, butthey needed the sun to undergo
photosynthesis.
So even the very early cells oflife had these mechanisms that
entrained them or synced them tothe natural light and dark of
(21:06):
the day and night.
Speaker 3 (21:08):
So maybe go back to my story.
My story is that you know Iretired.
I have then started napping.
There's one issue there, ofcourse, my naps might have been
a little long.
And second, I also haveexperimented a little bit with
light.
So by actually having a mask, Ifound that that is worth like
(21:31):
three sleeping pills.
Wow, yeah, I mean it's very,very powerful.
And actually it's a little bittoo powerful for the morning,
because then the body wants tokind of start feeling the light
probably.
But you know, and again I canregulate it better.
But in the evening, even thoughoutside my bedroom there's a
(21:52):
little bit of a light, it's notmuch, it's a street light, but
that's enough.
It really matters.
Yeah, that's amazing and it'sjust how powerful that light is.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
Yeah, well, after I researched this book I started
this is one of the things thatcompletely changed.
I would get up every morningand take the dogs for a walk in
the morning and get lots ofsunlight, and I would try to get
outside as many as much as Ican.
I'd eat lunch outside, you know, just to get as much bright
light as I can, and then at fouro'clock all of my devices turn
(22:28):
to that night shift or red shiftthat gets rid of the blue light
.
Because we are exquisitelytrained, our brains are the
circadian rhythms are entrainedby blue light, interestingly
because that is the wavelengthof light that can penetrate the
ocean.
So it could have been anywavelength of light, but it's
blue light because of thebeginnings of life, and so I I
(22:51):
turn everything.
I have blue blocking glasses.
I'm sure you guys have seenthese very fashionable things
that clip on.
Speaker 3 (23:00):
Every evening you work on like that.
Speaker 1 (23:05):
Well, if I'm not on a device that's turned down, it's
blue light and red shift.
Yeah, I can use this.
So you're not.
You know, we don't want totrick our bodies into thinking
that it's not time for bed.
Yet you know for every.
You know half hour before bedthat you have blue light.
It postpones melatoninproduction for at least an hour.
Speaker 3 (23:26):
So what happens if you put that on when you watch
TV?
Will you actually notice it?
Because there is this thingabout when I, you, you wear
different google ski masks, skisis that, yes, scheme yeah
goggles and then colors, yourbrain kind of adjusts to it and
recreates the same colors butit's interesting.
Speaker 1 (23:49):
Yeah, I think the same.
It's the same thing.
Your eyes do adjust, but if I'mon my computer at four o'clock
when it shifts, it's like whoayou know, it's really obvious,
but like a minute later I can'ttell the difference between if
it's on or off.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
So that's kind of is interesting how the brain kind
of adjusts that we have talkedto like different psychologists
in the past, and they talk aboutsleep hygiene.
You know the idea.
I hadn't thought so much aboutthe blue light at that hour of
the day, starting at four, butyou know that to power off your
devices and to avoid stimulationand to, you know, change how
(24:27):
you consume caffeine, you know,or?
things like that, so, and thatyour bedroom should be where you
sleep and maybe do one or twoother things.
That, for the most part, it'sthat you're recreating.
And what's the second?
Leave it to your imagination.
But, but, but what do you?
Is this all sort of sleephygiene?
Speaker 1 (24:51):
Yeah well, yeah, this is sleep hygiene I mean.
That is, people say, you know,don't look at screens before you
go to bed.
It's because of thisevolutionary response that we
have to blue light.
But other things, like one ofthe sleep hygiene
recommendations is to have yourroom set at a temperature like
68 degrees or lower, becauseanother signal to our bodies is
(25:12):
falling temperature.
We are in ourtemperature-controlled homes.
We don't get full sunlight, weget like a minimum of.
We get light, but it's a veryfraction of what sunlight is,
and we don't feel any changes inthe temperature either.
We are temperature-controlled.
So, again, turning down thethermostat is actually an
(25:33):
evolutionary thing, because ourbodies are tuned, are as needed,
to the rhythms of, you know,getting cold, colder in the
evening.
It helps us relax, it helps usfall asleep, and so and of
course, caffeine just messeswith everything very late in the
day.
And alcohol too, alcohol too.
Speaker 2 (25:53):
Are your kids receptive to these kind of
things?
Speaker 1 (25:57):
So we're working on them and I think it's hard when
and I'm going to say this forall of the things it is really
hard to make these lifestylechanges when you live in a
society that doesn't supportthem per se.
So I think you know, once theyget a little older, you know
we've put lots of things inplace, you know their devices
(26:19):
all go to redshift, they don'thave screens an hour before bed,
we're eating more and morewhole foods.
So, like, hopefully thesehabits will stick and hopefully,
by the time they're my age,there'll be more support around
them, more people choosing tolive this way, more resources,
more just support.
Speaker 3 (26:38):
So one thing about alcohol and sleeping.
So one thing I thought you know, okay, you drink alcohol, you
fall asleep, fine, but then youwake up and there's your own
problem.
But apparently there's anotherproblem, and it's an interesting
problem is that even a coupleof drinks can affect you.
So you reduce your REM sleepearly part of the night and
(27:02):
increase it later part.
Therefore, you remember itbetter and they're a little more
kind of vivid, they're maybe alittle more traumatic.
I don't know if it's always true, but it's kind of an
interesting thing, because Ihaven't noticed any reduction in
REM sleep from drinking alcohol, but that might just be a bias
(27:22):
by the fact that you rememberthe things that happen early in
the morning.
With other stimulants, likeweed, I think it's less studied,
but it's a similar thing.
That they think that it reducesREM sleep.
And REM sleep, I do think, is,what I understand, very
important for your mental whatactually happened during the
night.
Because sleeping, as I've saidearlier, is a pleasure, fun, but
(27:46):
because you go through thingsthat you might not even remember
but they happen to you, right,the thing that you said about
the importance of REM sleep.
Speaker 1 (27:56):
So humans have the most REM sleep of any primate
and we also have the shortest.
I mean other primates do fallasleep when the sun goes down
and do wake up when the suncomes up.
They do get these long hours atnight.
Humans actually evolved to havethe shortest amount window of
all primates because, well A, wewere able to go to deeper sleep
(28:19):
.
Because of our intelligence,because of our social groups, we
were able to be more protectedfrom predation.
We were able to be moreprotected from predators, like
because of fire, because ofsentinels, because of all these
other things because of fire,because of sentinels, because of
all these other things.
But what's important, too, isthat we needed more time.
Our social structures and ourintelligence there was just so.
(28:47):
We needed more time to pass onknowledge.
We needed more time to figureout how to live with each other,
we needed more time to innovate, and so there's a hypothesis
that that is another reason whyour sleep cycle shortened and
why our REM sleep is so deepbecause we needed more time to
do things.
And then we needed our sleep tobecome such that it gets.
You know, our memories getrecorded, our bodies and brains
(29:08):
recover properly.
So, yeah, go ahead.
Speaker 2 (29:12):
What I think has been interesting to me is like I use
a Fitbit or an Apple Watch iswhen I look at my sleep analysis
, how little of my sleep is REMsleep.
I don't know if how much ofthat is just.
Is that something I need toworry about?
Or just in general, even ifit's what that means or how
important it is?
But at the same time, howlittle of your sleep, relatively
(29:33):
speaking, is comprised of deepREM sleep?
Speaker 1 (29:37):
Yeah well, so I think because our REM sleep is so
deep, we usually get our longestREM sleep, like kind of first
thing once we fall asleep, andthen our REM sleep cycles get a
little shorter and shorter, andshorter until we wake up.
I don't know the exact lengthof time, the ideal length of
time that someone needs REMsleep in order to feel good.
I'm not sure how accurate someof those trackers are in terms
(30:03):
of REM sleep.
If someone was really worriedabout it, I would go get a sleep
study done where they put allthese things on your head and
they can really measure that,because I don't necessarily
trust 100%.
Like oh, oh, my gosh, I gotsuch a horrible night's sleep
last night.
It sometimes generates a littlebit of anxiety when there
shouldn't be any.
Speaker 2 (30:22):
Yeah, just by knowing that.
You don't want to have anything, something else to lose sleep
over, because you're worriedabout how they're sleeping.
Speaker 1 (30:28):
Exactly.
Speaker 3 (30:31):
But it's kind of interesting.
Actually REM sleep is still,you know, as you say, is
important for us humans.
But apparently there are pieceassociated with post-traumatic
stress disorder where actuallythey are kind of working on the
REM kind of you know, the eyemovements part of it, and kind
(30:52):
of recreating a little bit ofwhat is happening during the REM
sleep.
So I don't know much about it,but I know that there is a
therapy like that.
But I wouldn't worry too much,dave, it might be inaccurate.
I think you probably have muchmore REM sleep than that.
Speaker 1 (31:07):
The question is how do you feel?
Do you feel like you?
Speaker 2 (31:09):
get a good night's sleep.
Sometimes I mean it's, you know, I guess not universally every
day and I think I do notice, youknow, if I have caffeine or
something later in the day, likeI think my body's okay after
about noon you don't need to bedrinking any caffeine.
Speaker 3 (31:28):
The half time is six hours, so I think something like
that.
You can correct me, but so ifyou drink at noon you might
still be okay, but if you drinkat four you're probably not okay
.
Yeah, that was me yesterday,unfortunately, Things that the
(31:49):
cave people didn't have.
They didn't have coffee, coffeeis a custom revolution, if not
later, right.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
The few words that I've heard you should use in
diet or relationships are alwaysand never.
This is true, but you're alwaysgoing to have that afternoon
when you need something, at 3 inthe afternoon or a donut, yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:16):
Yeah Well, and I also the people who are listening.
You know a lot of this stuff.
We don't want to be so rigidwith our lifestyle changes that
we fall off the wagon so easily.
Like allowing myself.
I knew I was going to havetrouble sleeping, but I needed
that cup of coffee.
It was a social cup of coffeeand it was worth it to me.
(32:36):
You know eating.
You know totally restrictingyourself, never letting you eat,
have any processed food or anytreat at all.
That's like the first thing youdo if you want to not follow
that diet anymore, becauseyou'll just, you'll just crave
it more and more.
So a lot of these things are,you know, diet things 80% whole
(32:58):
foods and give yourself 15, 20%to not have these rigid food
controls and that's witheverything.
Speaker 3 (33:08):
So I was thinking that that kind of relates to the
whole studies about habits.
So habits is something we usenot to make decisions all the
time, used not to have to makedecisions all the time and in a
way, for instance, if you allthe time are being kind of in
front of you, you make thedecision.
Should I eat a donut or nottoday, or a croissant, whatever
(33:31):
is?
your evil, your poison, thenit's going to wear you down.
I mean one thing where youdon't and the only solution
there is yeah, okay, don't putanything in front of me.
I mean you cannot really choosethat, but you can create habits
that allow you not to makethose choices.
And that's a little bit of wayto create good habits that
(33:55):
allows you to follow a littlebit of a healthier path.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
Because I know I've done some personal training with
people and I think the firstthing is you always never kind
of thing and then you're goodfor a couple of days and then
you have some family obligationyou have a donut and your whole
life is ruined.
And then you have this guiltand you can go off your
(34:19):
intentions from there.
Speaker 3 (34:21):
Yeah, so you're going to maybe talk about the next
book for the social too.
I mean, there's a lot of thingslinked with that donut that
somebody offers you.
Somebody offers you a donut.
Saying no to that is hard andit has cost.
It doesn't mean that you shouldnecessarily accept it, but it
(34:41):
means that you know it's notthat easy to disavow from or to
kind of disengage from all ofthese connections, and neither
should we completely Right.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
Well, and that talks about what we were talking about
before, you know how do youlive this life in the world we
live in, there has to be someflexibility and I think, ketil,
you were saying at the beginningnot to be down on ourselves
when we're not doing thesethings.
I think people who actually wantto change and have these high
lofty ideals are much harder onthemselves than anyone else
(35:14):
because they're like, oh I ate adonut now I have to go run
three miles, when actually youjust ate a donut.
Don't eat one tomorrow or makea different choice.
You know, don't walk by thecommon room on your way to the
bathroom, because there's alwaysdonuts sitting there.
You know, walk the other way.
Speaker 2 (35:31):
One thing I always thought was kind of interesting
was some writing.
I've done like this Everyholiday season, most every
magazine has something aboutholiday weight gain.
Most every magazine hassomething about holiday weight
gain.
And maybe your Christmas dinneror your Thanksgiving dinner is
2,000, 3,000, 4,000 calories,but you don't eat generally that
(35:55):
many calories in a meal or in aday other than those days.
But I've met a lot of peopleand they feel like they've got
to punish themselves or thisfeeling of guilt or, like you
said, eat like that every day.
Speaker 3 (36:04):
It is tricky, I think , because reality is that we, as
you explained very well, we aresocial beings.
We sleep better together ingroups.
Actually I think that's in yourbook as well we eat together.
That is something we do less,at least in this country.
I've been actually quiteshocked culturally by how people
(36:28):
don't eat together.
This is only from Europe tohere, Because I think that and I
might be wrong, but I don'tthink I'm wrong it's something
every society since thebeginning have been doing, and
this is the first time we arenot eating together.
It's an important social thing.
Speaker 1 (36:48):
It is.
Well, it also goes back to howwe used to have food.
We used to share food.
Yeah, that's how we would allcome.
Everyone would come together asa group and what did you get
today?
What did you get today?
And they'd share it.
And, like you said, you wereastute in thinking that this is
something we address in thelater books.
(37:08):
Yes, I mean, food is a hugething that people use, the
cultures use, to celebrate, notonly just to be together every
night, but to celebrate whatnature gave them, celebrate life
, celebrate all kinds of things,and food's a central part of
that.
So I agree that we need to keepa lot of those things in our
(37:30):
lives.
Speaker 2 (37:31):
You mentioned that modern work is out of sync with
our evolutionary design.
Can you talk about how adoptingan in-the-present-moment
mindset can enhance ourwork-rest balance, and what
should we understand from thatoverall thought?
Speaker 1 (37:47):
Yeah, well, I think.
So being in the present moment.
This is something that I thinkis a thread that kind of goes
through the whole book, and it'sbecause we don't live in the
present moment, we are not awareof the cues our bodies give us,
we are not aware of the thingsthat are going on around us, and
we used to be in an immediatereturn economy.
And that means we're hungry,we'd go get it, we'd eat it, we
(38:10):
get our return immediately,we're tired, we go to bed.
You know, we actually have thisconcept of time that's more
circular instead of linear.
But when the agriculturalrevolution came, we now changed
into a delayed return economyPlant the seeds now, harvest six
months later, do the work now,collect the paycheck at the end
(38:31):
of the month.
So time became very linear andwe became very future-oriented.
And so we became sofuture-oriented.
Or some people are very pastoriented.
They can't let things go thathappened, or they have so much
anxiety of things that haven'thappened yet or may never happen
.
Being able to be present and inthe moment was really helpful
(38:54):
for lowering your stress.
I mean, that's such an easything.
Well, mindfulness is such apopular practice because it
lowers your stress, and if youlower your stress, you can
decouple what you're working onfrom the future, like, okay, if
you're so stressed about thisdeadline that you can't even
write, you can't even getstarted, then of course it's
(39:15):
going to be a struggle until thedeadline.
But if you can decoupleyourself from the future and be
like, okay, what do I have to donow?
Deadline.
But if you can decoupleyourself from the future and be
like, okay, what do I have to donow?
What is the most important taskthat I do now?
That will be very helpful inyour work by focusing on the
task at hand, so you're notoverwhelmed looking at the
entire list of things to do.
You're just in the present,doing what you have to do right
now.
Does that make sense?
Speaker 2 (39:36):
Yeah, I mean like I've been reading a lot about
stoicism also, and one of thethings that came up was Seneca
or Marcus Aurelius.
He talks about how I fearedmost things that often never
occurred.
But you know, if you can, likeyou said, live in the moment.
And, kel, was there somethingrelated to work that you were
(39:59):
thinking as well?
Speaker 3 (40:00):
Yeah, so as you say in your book or write in your
book the Princess Keynes hewrote, I think, just after the
war, second World War.
He kind of talked about what hethought was going to be the
future of work and he basicallypredicted that we are going to
spend a lot of time in leisurebecause productivity was
(40:23):
increasing and giving maybe aproductivity increase of one or
two, even 1% per year over timeshould allow us to do that.
Now we had the productivity atleast 30 years after the war,
but then maybe we've beenfalling down a little bit, but
it's still been kind of everyyear on average productivity
increase.
(40:43):
Yet we just work more andthat's a puzzle.
And it was also picked up byGraeber about his very
poignantly called book BullshitJobs.
His idea is really that a lotof jobs are there just to kind
of doing nothing really.
(41:05):
And so what we are actuallymeasuring as productivity
increase might not be correct,but also that we are kind of so
used to working that maybe wedon't even have the imagination
to take leisure seriously.
Maybe you have some comments onthat?
Speaker 1 (41:22):
and how we can solve it.
Yeah, well, I think our cultureis not necessarily a unique
American culture, but I thinkthe American culture is
spreading.
But we have thisindividualistic I can do things
by myself kind of a little bitof a meritocracy.
The people who are successfulare the people who work hard.
So we have this mindset thatthe people who work hard, the
(41:46):
people who are successful, thepeople who make a lot of money,
have the most worth, and so weare trickles down that okay,
well, now we have to work forwork's sake.
We don't work to meet our needs.
We work for status work's sake.
We don't work to meet our needs.
We work for status.
You know, we work to pay ourbills, but we also work to buy
things that we think that weneed, you know.
(42:08):
And so I feel like we'regetting on this treadmill of
work for work's sake, when,really, if we can simplify our
lives, we will, you know, notbuy as much stuff, not need as
much stuff, be able to work lessbecause we don't need as much
money, we don't need that status.
If we can disassociate ourworth as human beings, if we can
(42:29):
disassociate from what we dorather than who we are, I think
that'll help our mindset torealize that work for the sake
of work, we're just spinning ourwheels and burning ourselves
out and you're like, for whatyou know?
Are we spending more time withour family?
No, we're spending less timewith our family.
Are we enjoying being alive?
(42:51):
Are we going on vacations?
Are we, you know, gettingtogether with friends and
drinking coffee?
You know, too late in the dayso you can't sleep.
And drinking coffee?
You know too late in the day soyou can't sleep.
No, we're not doing thosethings.
In fact, people have leave thatthey don't take.
They don't even take lunchbreaks.
They eat at their desk becausethey're afraid of this
(43:12):
perception that they're notworthy or they aren't working as
hard as somebody else.
And so I really feel like andthis needs, this is something
that kind of comes from the topdown.
The US is the only country thatdoesn't have any mandated leave
as a government.
There's no mandated leaverequired for employers to give
(43:32):
their employees, and youcontrast that with the European
countries, and I mean it'samazing, and I think europeans
actually take their breaks, theytake their vacations.
They're away for like a monthat a time, you know, and it's
mandated and it's not mandated,but they, it's required for
(43:54):
people to have those kinds oftime off yeah, some of this
problem is not only american butthe but some of these issues
you mentioned are only Americans.
Speaker 3 (44:04):
For instance, the lunch break.
That is not an issue in Europe.
The vacation is taken.
It was amended that the companygive it to you and if you don't
take it, that's actually thecompany has to give you that
vacation and it's at least amonth and it can be taken in one
go.
(44:24):
I do think it helps a lot.
The company has to give youthat vacation and it's at least
a month and it can be taken inone go.
I do think it helps a lot.
It's one of the problems that alot of economists are pointing
to, to be kind of that economyand these are not doing as well
in Europe, et cetera, et cetera.
But I still kind of personallyI think it's the better system.
I see the country where you seeyou said the exporting of this
(44:45):
way of working to the world.
You see that a lot in Englandbecause in England they do have
some restrictions on I meanbasically regulations about
vacation, but it's not as muchas in Europe, the rest of Europe
.
But I just read recently aboutAmerican law companies coming in
and taking over in Britain andyou could just imagine what kind
(45:09):
of work goes there in posting.
That's completely unseenamongst lawyers in Britain and
they also work hard.
But the American lawyers comein and they work around the
clock, absolutely to the deathnearly.
And you know this is thecompetition that is happening in
certain sectors the financialsector and in law in particular.
(45:31):
But the bigger issue still is,in a way, the work and why we
don't find there's a puzzle, whywe don't find time, more time
for leisure if you want.
But even leisure is kind ofopposed to work.
Speaker 1 (45:46):
So maybe it's the way we're thinking about work yeah,
well, if we bring this back toour ancestors I talk about this
in the book.
So keynes, when he was talkingabout productivity, he
envisioned a world where you orwe would only work about 15
hours a week and then haveleisure to do time.
And people think that the lifeof a hunter-gatherer was hard
(46:09):
work all the time.
It was brutal and there weretimes when it was but studies of
our ancestors orhunter-gatherers who survived
into modern times.
They work at getting food, somuch less.
They've actually met King'sprediction and they had no
technology and nothing to makethem much less.
They have actually met Keynes'prediction and they had no
technology and nothing to makethem more efficient.
They were just the way thatthey saw that they integrated
their life, and when they wereworking, they were telling
(46:31):
stories, they were buildingthings, they were dancing, they
were celebrating.
They were just living theirlives.
And so we have not evolved towork 80-hour work weeks.
We have not evolved to sit inthese chairs and look at a
screen for eight hours a daywithout any breaks.
And so we talk a lot about howwe used to work and how we work
(46:54):
now and trying to bring some ofthe things back into it Because,
again, this is a culture, thisis a system that we are working
within.
We are not getting support.
There are some companies whoare going to make the four-hour
no, not the four-hour thefour-day work week and they are
finding that they're moreproductive and their employees
(47:14):
are happier and they have lessturnover.
But this is definitelysomething that people.
You can't just say, oh, I'm notgoing to work on Fridays, we
have to work within the system.
Then it's the system that kindof needs to change and, like you
said, the mindset needs tochange.
Speaker 3 (47:28):
There's another thing as well is that you know, my
personal story is that I retiredbut my work was I mean, we
worked hard in periods, but it'snot like the 90 hours work week
it's also but I think this istrue for everyone it did provide
a lot of social network.
So when I retired I lost allthe social network.
I go into a slum, okay, andthat kind of, but my blood
(47:53):
pressure falls.
It's just no.
You take naps, but I was like alittle bit too tired and maybe
also depressed.
And now, thanks to this podcast, amongst other things, I mean
I'm kind of recouping, recoringsome of that kind of activity.
Also the network I, you knowI'm kind of establishing that.
(48:16):
But one of the issues obviouslyis also that, despite the
poison that maybe work is, it'sthe social network for most
people.
Speaker 1 (48:26):
Yeah, well, that is something that we recommend
trying to bring some of what ourancestors did into the workday,
because they always went out ingroups, they gathered in groups
, they hunted in groups, theylaughed, they joked.
They were together in groups,they laughed, they joked, they
were together.
And so I think I work from homeand I felt the same thing,
kettle, where I've really missedsocial interactions with my
(48:47):
co-workers.
So it's something that we haveto, logically, you know, make a
decision, make a differentdecision.
Okay, I'm going to go to lunchwith my friend.
I'm not going to work throughlunch sitting here at my desk
all by myself.
So these are things that wejust have to.
We can change our behavior.
The great thing about humanbeings is that we don't need our
genes to evolve to change ourbehavior.
(49:08):
We can use our intelligence andwe can use our creativity and
we can decide to change ourbehavior, and that's the good
news.
We just have to do it.
Speaker 3 (49:16):
It's kind of interesting.
So what happened a little bitwith the work from home thing is
that these groups that kind ofexist or existed in the
workplace are a little bit kindof suffering from that and
that's bad.
But on the other hand, itallows you to have more time
with the family, which is good,but those that don't have a
family maybe it's not so good,and loneliness, of course, is a
(49:41):
big issue.
Oh yeah, so you know, you're alittle bit damned if you do and
damned if you don't.
I mean, it's in a way, we're alittle bit in a bind.
Speaker 1 (49:53):
Well, I also think it's always a work in progress.
You know, individual peoplehave different needs.
So somebody who doesn't have afamily, they need to find a
social network that's outside ofwork.
So it's an individualized thing.
And I think again, we need tohave people who are deciding to
live a different way, are goingagainst the current, and so it's
(50:15):
hard right now to find theseother ways to be.
More people need to startswimming against the current, so
the rest of society andcorporations will be like oh, we
can help them somehow ratherthan just go with the flow.
Speaker 2 (50:31):
Yeah, that was one thing.
Edel was working with one of theIMF with the International
Monetary Fund was working tofind ways to introduce
mindfulness or to considerdifferent.
I mean, the whole thing, likethe whole world, had to change
without question.
You know, once the pandemicstarted and most people the day
before the pandemic startedwouldn't have considered working
(50:55):
from home as an option Then allof a sudden it's what you have
to do.
Then all of a sudden it's whatyou have to do.
So how has the disconnectionfrom nature affected our mental
and physical health?
We touched on some of this alittle bit earlier.
But what kinds of things shouldwe do, or could we do, to
reclaim a more engagedrelationship with nature and the
(51:20):
outdoors?
Speaker 1 (51:21):
Yeah, well, I like to say that we're the only species
on Earth that doesn't live inour natural habitat, because we
did not evolve.
The majority of our evolutionoccurred when we were actually
living in nature and we didn'tevolve all these millions of
years indoors eating processedfood.
So our connection with natureis I think some people feel like
(51:43):
it is not as important.
But, as Ketil was saying, Ithink, before we started, nature
kind of wraps everything up.
Entraining your circadianrhythms with nature helps you
sleep.
Eating the food that natureprovides in season helps not
only your health but alsosustainability.
Where do we get all of ourresources?
(52:04):
From nature.
So I really feel like naturekind of brings everything
together.
Because we are nature, and Ithink there's this disconnect
that people are like, well, Ihave dominion over nature or
nature is to serve us, and theydon't realize that destroying
nature is going to actuallydestroy us and that's like the
big extreme example.
But being in nature lowers yourstress, it decreases your blood
(52:28):
pressure, heart disease, itbolsters your immunity.
There are all these new studiescoming out where you know one
group goes into nature and onegroup walks in the city and then
they test their cortisol levelsand the people who went for a
walk in nature had much lowercortisol levels.
So I really feel like peopledon't realize how much we need
(52:49):
nature and I think once peoplerealize how much we need nature
and how much nature does for us,it'll help them do the opposite
.
It'll help them realize thatwhat we need to do for nature
not what nature does, so naturedoes things, them realize that
what we need to do for nature,not what nature so nature does
things for us.
And then we need to help natureso it can continue to do this,
and we need to maintain ournatural habitat, even though we
(53:09):
don't live there.
Speaker 2 (53:10):
Is there a certain amount of time we should target
to be outside on a daily, weeklybasis?
I mean, should we step outsideevery morning before we start
our day in some way, or howshould we?
Incorporate.
Speaker 1 (53:24):
I mean, I don't think if we say, oh, you need to be
outside for two hours a day, youknow that's just not going to
happen for a lot of people andpeople might say I'm going to
forget it.
I try to go outside whenever Ican.
It helps to have dogs to go forwalks because they need to go
outside every day.
It helps to have kids to go toparks and camping and stuff.
But you need to start not onlyjust being out in nature so you
(53:47):
could go for a walk and not bein nature.
You can be in your head thewhole time.
To actually be in nature, youhave to be in the present moment
.
You need to open your eyes andyou need to observe what's going
on around you Observe the leaf,observe the flowers, observe
the sky, observe the wildlifethat you run into.
There is this theory.
(54:07):
What is it called?
It's stress reduction theory.
So natural environments promoterecovery because nature has low
levels of information toprocess.
If you compare walking on ahiking trail versus walking
downtown on a city street, youknow there's.
It's no wonder that we're.
You know we're walking on acity street, where it were
there's cars coming in, there'speople and there's smells and
(54:30):
there's all this informationcoming at you and so your body's
in this continuous state offight or flight.
But if you're in nature thatcan relax because there's a
stress, because there's not asmuch information coming into you
, you can be more in the presentand actually not be overwhelmed
by your senses.
You can actually use yoursenses to become more present
(54:53):
and become more relaxed.
Speaker 3 (54:56):
Yeah, I had like, at least during the pandemic.
We want to do a podcast aboutwalking and one of the things I
felt again another culture shockby moving to the United States
is that you know, I discoveredthat you don't walk unless you
have a purpose.
So you walk a dog, you walk achild, you run or you walk and
(55:19):
looking at your Apple, yourapple watch or your hike.
You just don't walk to beoutside.
And this actually went, goes asfar back as the romantics in
germany days, kind of.
It's true in the history wehaven't really been walking in
nature and looking at naturebecause we've been part of
(55:41):
nature, but the romantics inGermany in particular were kind
of putting forward the idea thatyou can go outside and observe
the walk and going to themountain, going to the Alps, and
it also affected a lot of theidea about nature in Norway,
because in Norway we basicallyit's nearly a quasi-religious
(56:02):
thing, our nature is us and wego there to seek silence and
seek connection.
And then I feel that's hard.
Here I was walking outside andI feel like people are looking
at me because I'm alone,especially a guy.
What is he out walking foralone, especially a guy.
What is he out walking for?
(56:22):
And then it really takes me.
It kind of annoys me that howmuch people are kind of in a way
, abusing nature by actuallyalways having to achieve
something in nature.
I'm a little extreme, you know Ihave a thing you have to kind
of run, even you know.
Okay, it's maybe not nature.
We go to a swimming pool and Isee them.
You know somebody's trying toswim faster than the other.
(56:43):
I mean just being in the wateris fantastic.
Speaker 1 (56:47):
You know we talk about competition versus
cooperation a lot in the nextbook.
Yeah, and how that's changed.
Speaker 2 (56:54):
I mean, I was just in Ireland a few weeks ago and one
of the things that was reallyinteresting was they built these
steps that go down into theocean.
All this all over differentplaces in ireland and it's not
like, like, and I met this man.
He's been doing it for 50, 60years every day and he's not
(57:14):
like going out swimming a half amile or a mile.
He's going out getting in thewater and then he's just talking
with everyone that he sees whenhe in and out of the.
He he's his late 70s and therewas an older man and there it's
cold.
I mean it is a cold plunge on adaily basis, like I mean, and
then just, uh, socializing, butthat is something like.
(57:36):
On the one hand, it's there areprobably people that are
swimming laps or something, butI know, like when I go on the
bike trail near where I live, Imean there are a lot of people
alone or with couples or onbikes, or you know, looking
ahead, what gives you hope forthe future of health and
wellness, as more people becomeaware of the importance of
(57:57):
aligning with evolutionarydesign and the concept of your
book or biohack.
Speaker 1 (58:03):
Yeah, well, interestingly, we didn't start
using the term biohacking untilafter we wrote the book and we
were trying to figure out wherethis book fit in the health and
wellness sphere.
And that's where we realizedthat you know biohacking, when
someone biohacks, they takesmall incremental changes in
their life and then they see howit works.
(58:24):
And we made the connection like, well, that's what evolution
already did for us.
Evolution is the originalbiohacker because it took our
genes and made incrementalchanges and then whether or not
those changes were passed onwere totally dependent on the
success of the change.
You know, if it was a positivemutation and an adaptation to
(58:45):
our environment, then it gotpassed on, but if it wasn't,
then you know it wouldn't bepassed on.
So that's why we kind ofentered the biohacking field,
because most, if not all, of therecommendations in our book are
things that biohackers andhealth and wellness, you know,
functional medicine, doctors andcoaches and all kinds of people
(59:06):
that it's what they are tellingtheir clients or their patients
or you know whoever to do.
And it actually I was offsocial media for 12 years and
they just got back on in Aprilfor the purposes of this book
and I was really, really worriedbecause I'd never seen the good
part of social media.
(59:27):
I'd only ever really experiencedthe bad part.
But now that I'm on socialmedia and I'm following all of
these amazing people who reallywant to help they want to help
humans live better lives, andthis is what I have I've had the
most hope because I see itchanging.
I see more and more peoplebecoming aware of our
(59:47):
shortcomings, not only in thearenas of health and wellness,
but in social issues andenvironmental issues and things
like that.
I'm seeing more and more peoplejoining and becoming voices and
influencing the people aroundthem.
So I still feel like we have areally long way to go, and we
talked about this before severaltimes.
(01:00:07):
It's because we're the countercurrent.
You know, there's not a wholelot of support for people who
are trying to live a new way,and so we just have to be each
other's support.
You know, find the people whoare the same, who want to do the
same kinds of things that youare, and rely on those people to
be your support, and then moreand more and more people will
hopefully join, and because onceyou start changing your
(01:00:31):
lifestyle and you realize thatit's working, it's easier to
make more lifestyle changes.
So when you're at the beginningand you're and you're miserable
and you're sick and you'retired and depressed, you know
it's really, really hard tostart those lifestyle changes.
But if you pick one or two andthey start working, then it's
like oh, I want more of this,please, you know.
(01:00:53):
So it gets easier and easier tomake other lifestyle changes.
So, just like that builds oneach other little, small
incremental steps.
I think, as a society, makingsmall incremental steps together
is how we're going to change it.
Speaker 2 (01:01:06):
What kind of takeaways do you have for people
that are, if they know nothingelse, about what this book is?
About how they should start tothink, about how they might want
to make changes in their ownlives?
What are the coreconsiderations that people
should carry?
Speaker 1 (01:01:22):
Yeah, well, I think Kettle talked about this a
little bit before with habits.
When I first startedresearching this book, I had
been aware of some of the thingsthat I personally, or our
family or our society wasn'tdoing in accordance to our
evolutionary design.
But as the more I researched it, I actually got really
overwhelmed and a littledepressed of how far we are away
(01:01:45):
from some of these things.
And so I know, when you knowpeople are wanting to change
their life and they see, youknow, at the end of every part
we have kind of actionable stepsthat someone can take, and it
can be really overwhelming, butit's so important that you start
somewhere.
So I would recommend thatpeople can take, and it can be
really overwhelming, but it's soimportant that you start
somewhere.
So I would recommend thatpeople just take something that
(01:02:06):
resonates with them, somethingthey think is easy to do, and
start with that, and then, likeI'm saying, don't let it
overwhelm.
You Take one little step, makesure that's working Good.
Okay, I'm going to trysomething else.
That's more accord in my accordwith my biology.
Oh, that's working good.
You're slowly but surelybiohacking yourself by learning
(01:02:28):
about how we used to live andtrying these things on.
You know we don't want to goback to living as cavemen.
We don't want to go back 15 000years.
There's child mortality and noantibiotics and you know that we
have so much comfort and youknow so much we can do.
That's more than back then.
But we can bring some of thethings back into our lives, just
(01:02:50):
one at a time, in slow,incremental steps.
Speaker 3 (01:02:53):
Maybe more nature.
Speaker 1 (01:02:56):
Yes.
Seek nature and nature willgive the answer no.
Yeah, I would agree.
That's the first chapter that Iwrote, or the first part that I
wrote, and it's my favoritepart that spoke to me the most.
Speaker 2 (01:03:10):
So I totally agree.
So we're just rediscovering thepath to health and wellness
that we've had throughout ourhistory, but bringing it into
today's life.
Exactly had throughout ourhistory, but bringing it into
today's life.
Exactly Well.
(01:03:30):
A huge thanks to our guest,jenny Powers, a PhD, and her
co-author, luke Comer, for theirbook on the Origin of being
Understanding the Science ofEvolution to Enhance your
Quality of Life.
To learn more about their book,please visit their website on
theoriginofbeingcom.
Thank you for joining us forWellness Musketeers.
Tune in for upcoming episodesto learn how to live with a
(01:03:50):
greater understanding of theworld we experience together.
Please subscribe, give us afive-star review and share this
recording with your family andfriends.
You can make a contributionthrough a link provided in our
program notes.
To allow this podcast to grow,let us know what you need to
learn to help you live your bestlife.
Send your question and ideasfor future episodes to
(01:04:12):
davidmliss at gmailcom.
You.
Popular Podcasts
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.