Episode Highlights

• What sparked Dr. Jenkins interest in studying the brain and getting into functional and integrative medicine.
• The difference between integrative medicine and functional medicine.
• Alopathic medicine does not adequately train doctor’s in diet and nutrition
• The reputation of the Cleveland Clinic and how it’s at the forefront of functional medicine.
• What is the MORE Model
• Alzheimer’s is the result of modern life.
• The research from UCLA doctor Dr. Dale Bredeson that explains why brain cells die and documents the reversal of Alzheimer’s in it’s early stages.
• Managing inflammation, coupled with mindfulness meditation and focus is a good recipe for improving brain health.
• Changing the priority of health is the first step to be take before a doctor can
• The discovery of the glymphatic system and how it relates to your sleep
• How bad sleep leads to brain fog and why.
• Melatonin is a hormone and what you need to understand before taking it.
• Bumping up nutrient density in your diet is excellent for brain health
• The special way to eat your broccoli sprouts to extract the most beneficial detox and brain boosting effects.
• The contributing factors that lead to Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s that starts early in life and can be reversed if caught early.
• White bread is worse than sugar for the brain.
• The evidence that shows why movement is so crucial for brain health and longevity.
• The hippocampus is the first pat of the brain that is affected by Alzheimer’s. You can grow this part of the brain with exercise.
• How you can get started creating habits that will improve your brain health.

Useful Links

• Dr. Dave Jenkin’s Website
• Dr. Dale Bredesen says we CAN end Alzheimer’s | The Dr. Gundry Podcast
• The Food Pyramid: Its History, Purpose, and Effectiveness
• Sitting is the New Smoking | Mayo Clinic Connect
• Tired of Holding it Together All the Time? Here are Five Basic Needs to Get You Back On Track

About Guest

Dr. Dave Jenkins qualified from Otago University Medical School in New Zealand in 1982. His career included general practice when he had one of the largest rural practices in New Zealand. He is the founder of “The More Model” that helps clients reverse disease and achieve ultimate health and longevity. This includes a special interest in brain fog, cognitive decline and Alzheimer’s.

He has already retired as a doctor (which means he is not currently practicing as nor registered as a doctor) to pursue education through senior lectureships at Auckland medical school, executive director for education for an Asian corporate health project and founding NGO SurfAid International where he currently works part time.

Facebook, Click to visit our guest’s website

Transcript

[0:00] Zack Arnold: My name is Zack Arnold, I'm a Hollywood film and television editor, a documentary director, father of two, an American Ninja Warrior in training and the creator of optimize yourself. For over 10 years now I have obsessively searched for every possible way to optimize my own creative and athletic performance. And now I'm here to shorten your learning curve. Whether you're a creative professional who edits rights or directs, you're an entrepreneur, or even if you're a weekend warrior, I strongly believe you can be successful without sacrificing your health, or your sanity in the process. You ready? Let's design the optimized version of you.

Hello, and welcome to the optimize yourself podcast. If you're a brand new optimizer, I welcome you and I sincerely hope that you enjoy today's conversation. If you're inspired to take action after listening today, why not tell a friend about the show and help spread the love? And if you're a longtime listener and optimizer O.G. welcome back. Whether you're brand new, or you're seasoned vets, if you have just 10 seconds today, it would mean the world to me if you clicked the subscribe button in your podcast app of choice, because the more people that subscribe, the more that iTunes and the other platforms can recognize this show, and thus the more people that you and I can inspire to step outside their comfort zones to reach their greatest potential. And now onto today's show, which is actually a follow up to last week's episode. Kind of sorta, if you missed my previous interview, I had a very candid conversation with UK editor Jim page, who told the story about recently being fired from a job because he requested one single day off for mental health reasons. So for those of you who battled mental health problems, I wanted to provide a deeper discussion about how our modern society is damaging our brains and causing things like chronic anxiety, depression and burnout, and most importantly, how to reverse that damage through simple lifestyle changes. Now if I were to ask you what your greatest asset is, in producing quality creative work on a consistent basis, you would most likely say that it's your computer, right? Duh. However, despite technology being incredibly important for your work, ultimately, it is your brain that is responsible for every function you perform. And how well you perform creatively depends on the overall health of your brain. Yet, as a creative professional, you most likely fuel yourself with caffeine and afternoon sugar rushes, you fend off brain fog and the inevitable afternoon nap. And you'll most likely deprive yourself of sleep for however long it takes to make your latest project perfect. However, do you know how your modern lifestyle is not only affecting your general health, but also your brain health? And how much do you really know about what your brain needs to function optimally? Now what if there were simple steps that you could take to improve your brain function so that you have more consistent energy and more creativity? And what if there were easy ways to improve your mood, reduce stress, anxiety, burnout, and even stave off degenerative diseases like Alzheimer's in the process? Sounds pretty good, right? Well, my guest today is Dr. Dave Jenkins, who's the co founder of the more model, with experience in both traditional medical fields as well as functional and integrative medicine. Dr. Jenkins specializes specifically in brain health. And he's going to teach you how you can optimize your brain function and fight back against what he calls the diseases of modern civilization. He shares with us some encouraging research that's being done in the field of brain health, and cognitive performance, and how all of us can take a proactive role in optimizing our brains. This conversation is going to make it very clear why paying attention to your brain health is vitally important to your career, while also giving you a few simple and practical ways for you to increase your creativity, your productivity, and give you more consistent energy so you can feel those long days at your workstation. And all these things might even help extend your life as well. Now, if you're struggling with creative burnout right now, or you find yourself sacrificing time away from family, when you know deep down that it doesn't have to be this way that I invite you to download my ultimate guide to optimizing your creativity and avoiding burnout, which offers over 50 pages of my best tips, tricks and strategies to consistently stay focused and energized throughout your long work days. When you're trapped in a dark room that most likely has no windows. You can download my ultimate guide 100% free at zackarnold.com/UltimateGuide. Alright, without further ado, my conversation with Dr. Dave Jenkins made possible today by our amazing sponsors Evercast and Ergodriven, who as always are going to be featured just a bit later in today's interview to access the show notes for This in all previous episodes, and to subscribe so you don't miss the next inspirational interview, please visit zackarnold.com/podcast.

I'm here today with Dr. Dave Jenkins, who is the co founder of the Moore model. And I'm super excited about this conversation because anybody that listens to the show on a regular basis knows that I have very little formal knowledge about the brain. But I love talking about how the brain works. And you, sir, are brain experts. So it is a pleasure to have you here today.

[5:31] Dr. Dave Jenkins: Oh, hi, Zack. Yeah, it's fun to be here too.

[5:33] Zack Arnold: So what we're going to get into today is going to be a deep dive into the brain, but especially aging of the brain, understanding how we're hurting our brains, and some understanding maybe leading us towards Alzheimers and all these other things, but how it can actually really start much earlier than people might think. But before we go into the rabbit hole, and we will go into the rabbit hole, I just want to get a little deeper understanding of your background, kind of your your credentials, and then how you got to where you are today creating this model.

[6:02] Dr. Dave Jenkins: Right? Well, basically, I'm a functional medicine physician. And how I got into this was I actually am the founder of a nonprofit organization called SurfAid that do a lot of work in Indonesia with the tsunamis and mother child mortality rates. So I found that on a surfing holiday to the paradise of reverse surfing called the mentalities islands we call it the Disneyland of surfing. And that's what I do in your neck of woods. in Malibu, we run fundraisers and things like that. But through five tsunamis, I had my own health crisis, taking care of hundreds of 1000s of other people, but not myself. And I really had to ask the question, you know, how do I reverse what I've done to myself just through the stress and the poor diet and focusing on you know, other things apart from health. And that led me down a rabbit hole, if you like called functional medicine, which is the medicine of really taking a look at your biological systems and what goes wrong with them and how they work together to create disease and then reversing that process to literally reverse disease. And one thing led to another my parents got died, both of them at the same time with early Alzheimer's. And so I went to my medicine to, to look at what was happening there. And I discovered an extraordinary series of case trials that will where you can talk about that, the first time has reversed early Alzheimer's, a cognitive decline. And so that's what I'm specializing in. Largely, I do have other clients, you know, younger people with prostate cancer and other things that we provide an alternative but scientifically based plan and process with.

[7:48] Zack Arnold: Okay, now, I want my audience to understand a little bit further, what functional medicine means, because there's a lot of different terms now, in both the medical fields, and the non medical fields, where people are talking about all these different types of holistic medicines and natural medicines. And people immediately have this reaction like, Oh, yeah, you're, you're not a real doctor. Yeah, whatever. And I know that that's not the case. So because this is so kind of a burgeoning field, that I've had an integrative medicine specialist on the show several times. But I want to make sure people really understand what functional medicine means from a medical perspective, so we can then go deeper into the brain.

[8:24] Dr. Dave Jenkins: Okay, so, yeah, there's a lot of commonalities between integrative medicine and functional medicine, the strict definition of functional medicine, is it a highly personalized system, which we will we look at the biological systems of each individual, and look at where their sub optimally functioning. And then we optimize those functions, understanding that one system will be affecting the other. So it's looking at how they integrate, for example, if you're not sleeping very well, we know sorts of things are happening to your hormones, that's going to drive your desire for carbohydrates, that's going to inflame you, that might make you anxious and depressed, blah, etc. So we look at each of those systems, find out where the weak spots are, and create personalized plans to optimize those knowing that they will affect other things optimally as well.

[9:22] Zack Arnold: Yeah, and that's very different. I'm assuming you're you're a kiwi, correct. You're in New Zealand, right? Yes. So I know that, at least in the US, the medical system has gotten to the point where medical doctors are just that they are just there to prescribe medicines. And I'm not saying that people shouldn't go see medical doctors, but I've talked with other very, very certified very professional medical MDS that agree that the system is broken. Now, it sounds like with the functional medicine, you're looking at the root cause of problems and trying to solve them. But do you also see a lot of the same systemic issues in the more like, quote unquote, traditional Medical Systems over there in New Zealand and Australia.

[10:03] Dr. Dave Jenkins: Oh, absolutely. Look, I was an academic for five years. And part of my job was to train doctors about the latest evidence based protocols that they should be using. And the only place I could get sponsorship for conferences was drug companies now drug companies have a place, but they're basically buying out and they are in the process of buying out medical education. And they know that's what works. Yes, we are trained in what we call allopathic medicine, which is a very linear model. So you have high blood pressure, take a drug see me in three months. Now functional medicine would say you have high blood pressure, why? What is that mix of genetics and epigenetics, that means the interaction of genes with the environment, it's giving you high blood pressure? And what do we do to reverse it and to get you Well, again, so you know, we're not trained. And that's what actually motivated me, I was highly embarrassed by how little I knew about nutrition after, you know, nine years of training. And I just knew very, very little, we had a total of four hours of training on nutrition. And that was really the basics about protein, carbohydrates, etc. We knew nothing about how molecules in you know, food molecules influence and turn on and off our genes. So yes, it's becoming better. But it's we're swimming up against a real heavy tide and heavy strain, for sure.

[11:32] Zack Arnold: And I'm so glad to hear that from a licensed medical professional, because I'll try to tell that to people in casual conversation. And they'll say, Well, my doctor said, I should eat this, this and that. And I'm like, No offense, your doctor has years and years of experience. But I myself with zero, licensed medical knowledge, probably know more about food, diet and nutrition than a licensed doctor that's done none of the work, because that's not part of the curriculum. And I hear that from so many doctors, I've gone to conferences that have doctors that say the same thing, like I left my practice, because I was embarrassed with the way that I was taught to treat people. And I had to find a better way to allow people to be well, rather than just make sure that they didn't get sicker.

[12:12] Dr. Dave Jenkins: Absolutely. And that's why I feel in any of that. I think that's a real common thread when you when you listen to doctors who have moved into integrative functional medicine, because we were motivated to help people. And what we find is that, yes, there's a place especially in acute medicine, trauma. I mean, modern medicine is extraordinary. And we celebrate that. There's no place I want to be if I have a car crash, but an intensive care ward of a teaching hospital. But that's only a small part of things. And the biggest burden we all face is this risk of chronic disease. And just to let you know, they just came out that the life expectancy in America for the first time ever just dipped downwards. And this is telling us about what's going on with with how we're living our lives. So look, it's definitely swimming upstream. But you know, there are things happening. Like the Cleveland Clinic, every doctor learns about the Cleveland Clinic wherever you are in the world, because they're real leaders. They just opened functional medicine unit, and they've come out publicly stated, this is the future of medicine. This is the 21st century medicine, and we're getting going with it. Yeah, there's these are exciting times.

[13:28] Zack Arnold: Yeah, and I'm my understanding is that Dr. Mark Hyman is the one that's doing a lot of the like building that that movement, correct?

[13:34] Dr. Dave Jenkins: Yeah, he's definitely a leader. And then there's people that I work with with the Alzheimer's like Pat hanaway and Nate and there are definitely other people but he's certainly been a leader in the field.

[13:45] Zack Arnold: Yeah, he's certainly one of the the faces of all of it didn't, you know, I've worked in lived in Hollywood for 15 years. So anybody that talks to me like, oh, have you met Leonardo DiCaprio? And have you met these people? And, like, yeah, I've met some of them. And you know, I've like, I've sat next to Leonardo DiCaprio at an awards event. And to me, that's no big deal. But then somebody says that they know Mark Hyman I'm like, Oh, my God, you know, Mark Hyman. That's so cool. So I'm that I'm that geeky about this stuff. But anyway, that's a total tangent. I wanted to start to go a little bit deeper now and start talking about your More model, what that stands for, and then really talk about this idea of how modern life is really damaging our brains. But we don't realize it and creating, like you said, for the first time ever, the life expectancy of the younger generation is no shorter than our own.

[14:31] Dr. Dave Jenkins: Yeah, so the More model was just a way of being able to describe how to get more life, more health, more energy, more happiness, but the M O R E, have more stands for movement over optimizing your environment R for rest and rejuvenation and E for eating and supplementation. So it was just a nice, tidy way of putting it together. And that's really the power of pulling these things together. As I said, biological systems strong influence each other. So if you really want to have joy, happiness, health, and productivity, you can't do it without integrating all of these systems. And so there's really just a simple way of being able to explain it to people, when we use that to design plans for people.

[15:17] Zack Arnold: Well then I'm glad that I have some form of proof, I hope that I put together my website before I found you. Otherwise, you could sue me for plagiarism, because the four things that I have on my website are movement, fuel, meaning nutrition, balance, meaning sleep, and anxiety reduction, stress reduction, and meditation, and then productivity, which is all about optimizing your time. So as soon as I was introduced to your website, by mutual friend, I was like, This is awesome. And oh my god, I feel like I've just copied this guy. So it's, it's, it's really cool the way that even though we're literally across the globe from each other, we have this kind of same general holistic overview about how to really approach these issues. So let's just go into the brain science, let's start digging in. And let's talk about what is it that modern life is actually doing to our brains that we're not seeing?

[16:07] Dr. Dave Jenkins: Yeah, so the epidemic of neurodegenerative disorders. And some people would even include depression as as part of that, but the epidemic we're seeing is the tip of the iceberg. And so it's really the perfect storm of modern life. You know, there's a gene, which puts you at very strong risk of Alzheimer's. So it's called the APOE4 gene, all my clients get tested for it, because it changes the way we what we plan for those people. But you know, there's places like Nigeria that have very high incidence of this gene, yet they have almost no outsiders. So all of this epidemiological research is telling us, Alzheimer's is a result of modern life. It's a perfect storm. And we can burrow down into that, but it includes all the things that you talk about. And the MORE models so, you know, the stress for and it turned out that Alzheimer's and other neurodegenerative disorders are the brain's attempt to actually protect itself from the multiple disturbances, toxic what we call perturbations, that are flaming our brains. And the brain produces these proteins, such as amyloid beta and tau, in an attempt to actually protect itself. So when they take a close look at these plaques that cause these things, they will find bacteria, spyerakeats, and they'll find you know, that the brain has produced these things to try and protect itself. So what it tries to do is like, downsize itself. And this protection, unfortunately, has this collateral damage, if you like, and it causes shrinking of the brain and brain cells to pull apart. But when you look at the risk factors, Alzheimer's, there are so so many, you know, so the diet, the diabetes, the sugar, carbohydrates, the stress, the lack of sleep, other inflammatory, the gut brain access that we're talking about. No one was able to really explain to us, why do so many very different things, cause the same proteins to be laid down until a man from UCLA Professor Dale Bredesen with 30 years of research of asking the question, why brain cells die, has come up with a very strong theory of how that works. And this is what I'm talking about the protein protecting us that not only is the theory, he's the first person to describe over 100 cases of reversal of early cognitive decline, mild cognitive impairment, which is the precursor of Alzheimer's, and full blown Alzheimer's, in its early stages. So he has described many cases now over I think it must be getting up to about 150 now, but certainly 110, when I went to training with him, and he documented brains actually growing. So the hippocampus which is the memory side of the center of the brain, he's documented a doctor actually, who had shrunk to the 17% of growing up to the 80th percentile on his program. So using functional medicine, finding out all of those perturbations, whether it's inflammation, gut, brain access, hormone problems, fixing them, and allowing the brain to heal itself. So this is extraordinary, unprecedented work.

[19:41] Zack Arnold: And that's one concept that I think very few people in the general public really understand is that they assume Well, I was born and I have this brain, and I'm just as smart as I am. And, you know, over time, I'm gonna lose my memory and when I get old, there's there's a chance I'll have Alzheimer's. It just it kind of happens. But in my program, I talk just a very little bit because I'm not a licensed professional, but I talk about the concept of neuroplasticity. And just that concept alone, it really helps people's eyes open and they say, Wait, you mean that my brain can actually grow and repair itself and I can actually enhance my intelligence and my creativity. And I'm not just who I am. That's a huge revelation to people. And now you're saying that there's like, very clear, documented science showing this happening.

Yeah, absolutely. It's unprecedented. That being said, I'm involved in, we're now doing a multi site trial. So we're literally in discussion with Mark hymens group at Cleveland Clinic for we're doing a trial in Australia, we're going to join together forces because we had to prove that this can be done outside professor Dr. Bredesen, and he's all for it. So yeah, we've we've still got more research to do. But this is the unprecedented And the key thing is that yes, the people who get diagnosed with Alzheimer's, the tip of the iceberg, people with, you know, reversible and preventable brain damage, sitting underneath the iceberg, the vast majority of people. And you know, I've done a bit of corporate health, as you know, and, and one of the things that was really frightening is you talk to people, and and most people in corporate jobs are getting through their afternoon on coffee, Coca Cola, candy, anything they can do to just boost their glucose up because it's crashing, and to calm down inflammation. And just to get through the day. Now, we should not underestimate the damage that it's doing the brain when the brain, you know, when the glucose drops, because it's had too much high carbohydrate lunch, and you get this reactive, high production of insulin, and then the glucose drops, that's creating inflammation at the brain cell level. And that over the years, will damage and shrink your brain and your memory and your productivity and your function. And it puts you at risk of anxiety and depression, etc. So it's a real concern that this generation, the way we're living, are damaging the brains. But and but the cool thing is, there's ways to do it. And to prevent that and in the process be happier and more productive.

And the key word there is inflammation. And that was one of the discoveries that I made in my own personal quest, trying to learn all the stuff about my own health and then start to teach it to people is we are absolutely indoctrinated to believe that better health is about the amount of calories consumed, and the amount that we move during the day and finding a balance between them. But when I realized that if you just focused on the amount of inflammation in your body and in your brain, and you stop worrying about counting calories, and you look at the types of foods and the types of activities and behaviors that either increase or decrease inflammation. That's kind of like the magic secret sauce that nobody talks about. Because once you learn how to manage inflammation, that's kind of like an on and off switch for your creativity and for just your productivity and really feeling like you're awake and you're alert. It's all about the inflammation.

Yeah, I would say that inflammation is at the center of it, it's not the only thing because you also have to consider your habits, behaviors and your neural pathways. So like, for example, you now doing quantitative literature, and kefla grams, EEG's, were able to now look at the brain, and how the various waveforms of our brain create a neural pathway for us. Now, that's what we need to also hack into, because you can have low inflammation, but still have a neural pathway and a thinking process that's equivalent to someone with post traumatic stress disorder, for example. And that's going to affect you, and it's gonna affect your longevity, performance and function. So things like focus, mindfulness meditation are also I would put up right up there with inflammation. Of course, nothing's separate, they infect each other. So a highly focused, relaxed mindful person is reducing his inflammation all the time through the cortisol in the hypothalamus pituitary adrenal complex, that's been well shown but not used. How many people know that, you know, it's way less than 1%. And and how many people are using it in their daily lives to improve the quality of their life, which is what you and I are talking about?

Well, and I think that part of it is, for example, if you're talking about meditation, or you're talking about sleep, the reaction is why don't I just don't have time for that? Like, do you have any idea how busy I am? How many hours that I work, I don't have time to meditate. Like if I get six hours a night, I'm totally winning, but I'm getting everything delivered. I'm getting it done. And yeah, sure. I need a couple of coffees. Couple of Starbucks rounds at four or five pm and I might have to, you know, have a candy bar at seven or eight. But what's the big deal? I've gained a few pounds? Like, who am I harming? And you're saying, well, it goes much deeper than that. And you really got to look at what it's doing to your brain long term.

Yeah, absolutely. And I think it's also a mindset approach that we have handed on our health to the medical profession. Whereas what we should be doing is saying, you know, what? Health is actually, what are we without our health? What do we have? You know, what's the point in gathering the latest iPhone and three cars in the garage? If we end up in coronary care unit at the age of 45, which is not uncommon, or my friend who is 50, and got secondary prostate cancer, you know, what's the point of all that and what we seem to be seeking in gadgets and material resources as a priority over our health and our well being. And that has to change in people's mindset. And I, I say to clients, look, if you don't have that, right, you know, go away and go to the mountaintop come back to me when you are prepared to accept that health is one of if not the most important aspects of life. And then we're ready to work with you. And so I think, you know, we people out there listening to this, make that decision first, and then people like myself, we have processes for you. We have plans, we have the science, come and go and see your functional medicine Doc, get your inflammatory markers tested, find out where you're at, get a baseline done, and get a plan to fix it.

Yeah. And that's something that I think I check if it's not twice, it's at least once a year, but I'm pretty sure it's twice a year where I always make sure when I'm working with my integrative medicine specialists, we're doing all of the inflammatory markers. And like I said, I'm a total geek about this stuff. So when I get my blood tests back, of course, I want to know my cholesterol and blood pressure and all that. But I'm like, Yeah, but what about the inflammatory markers? What about what about my hscrp? You know, what about the like cardiovascular risk, like the all that stuff, and he's like, I mean, these numbers are spot on like I don't, it's it he can tell that it's because of the the lifestyle, the amount of movement I have throughout the day, the fact that I try to avoid inflammatory foods and the fact that I prioritize sleep. So where I want to go to next is when we talk about Alzheimers, much of my audience is fairly young. They're all ambitious, creative professionals. They're go getters, they just want to dive into the world and make their mark in their career. And it's kind of the sleep when I'm dead mentality, so Alzheimers to them. That's not even a thought. But you say that you really need to start looking for the science very, very early. And I think one of the most common phrases that I hear is one of the complaints from everybody that works with me, is lack of focus and brain fog. So let's talk a little bit if we're, if we're speaking to an audience saying, Well, my grandparents have Alzheimer's, I'll deal with that in 50 years, let's start to make the connection where it is, they need to start realizing that this stuff happens very, very early.

[28:03] Dr. Dave Jenkins: Yeah, there's two things to this. I mean, you've got a younger audience, they're gonna see it and their parents, they are starting to notice I've got a client that bought to me by his son, that finally you know, is kind of kicking and screaming and said nothing wrong with any kind of thing. And in the end, his son had to remind them all the mistakes. So yeah, actually, that j your generation is very important, because it's the family that notice the changes first, and they need to know that there is a reversal process now, don't ignore it. If you think mum and dad are slipping, get, you know, contact me contact us find out there's a simple online test, I can do 15 minutes that will screen them and see whether they've got a problem or not. But so that's one thing. I think the the younger generation play a critical role in being aware that this that there's reversal, that this can actually be fixed in the appearance because I can tell you with two parents with Alzheimer's, it is absolutely terrifying. What what happens in the fixed everybody, no one escapes and it's very stressful and you just don't want to. So yeah, get onto that. But I think the brain fog side of things. It's the same process that leads to Alzheimer's is happening in a younger age. What happens is inflammatory molecules get into your brain, they turn on your immune system, the system that is in there, we call on the micro glial cells and the astrocytes they're in there to try and protect your brain. But if that turned on too much, they actually start to get in between brain cells cause swelling cause inflammation and kill off brain cells literally. They not only do that they signal for the brain cells what we call the signups as we're one brain cells join another they start to pull apart. This can be actually seen on microscopes. And so brain fog is a serious warning. You have not got your holistic approach to life, right? And you need to look at look at getting that sorted.

[30:06] Zack Arnold: Well, I'm glad that you brought up the the glial cells or the glial cells, as you call them, because that helps me transition to one of the areas I want to focus on, which is sleep. And I just recently had Sean Stephenson on and we did a deep dive into sleep. And we talked about the glymphatic system, and the lymphatic system, and how one serves the body and one serves the brain, but it only serves the brain during sleep. So can we go a little bit further down the rabbit hole as far as how important sleep is to brain health?

Yeah, no, sure. And, you know, it was surprising. And I was delighted to read about the glymphatic system. But it was just, you know, relatively recently that we discovered this extraordinary network of what is the lymphatic system for the brain, the glymphatic system? I mean, yeah, go get people, if you're interested in Google it and look at the scans of this incredible system that weaves in between the brain matter, and cleans up the crap at night. So at night, this glymphatic system, it does work during the day, but it's like four or five times more active at night while we sleep. And the whole process has turned on by over 300 genes. So we've got at least 300 genes that only get turned on while we sleep. And that's one of the things they do is they turn off the glymphatic system. And it goes looking for the garbage from the metabolism of the brain cells. Of course, it's the most active organ right consumes 25% of our calories, the brain. So it has a lot of metabolic waste. That's what it does during sleep going around mopping up the metabolic waste the garbage disposal, and you don't sleep well enough or long enough, you're leaving that garbage left behind in your brain, what does it do? It does what garbage does, that rots, edit and it affects other things. And it causes you a massive amount of this glial activation, which actually kill off brain cells. So yeah, don't take insomnia lightly. You need to do something about it until you find your own personal solution we can get into those. But sleep is a top road, I got to be able to have those day I do cry. My friends say to me what, you know, I leave parties to prioritize sleep. And you know, the timing of sleep is important. And again, look at how our genetics we weren't, we were meant to go to bed, it's or at least sit around the fire and tell stories and sing songs. You know, for 2 million years, it's our genetics have evolved not to turn on lights and look at computer screens, and drop out melatonin by 25% in the process. So we're not designed to stay up. We designed to go to bed at sunset or just after an awake up with sunrise and all the science of circadian rhythms strongly support this. There. We're just not living a life that optimizes our brains or our physiology.

But I'm assuming by this point that we've genetically adapted to Netflix at night, though, right?

Then exactly not, you know, it takes 10,000 years to adapt. I mean, it may be sooner with some jeans, but something in that order on average. So no, we're not adapted to light to blue light. This is a completely modern phenomenon. And so, you know, let people know you're dropping your melatonin and your key sleep hormone by up to 25% by watching your screens at night. I always do when I do corporate health a I ask everyone in the room who has one of the last things on the day look at their you know, their iPhone, and 95% of the hands go up and and just even a small amount of exposure to blue light will drop your melatonin now. Look, I put a lot of my clients on melatonin. It does drop with age. So that's one of the reasons brains get more inflamed with age but Melatonin is an extraordinary hormone has got a lot to do with reducing inflammation and it's an antioxidant for the brain. You know, one of the things you need to do is take care of your melatonin levels when we can actually measure and then you'll find functional medicine doctors doing that now.

My sincerest apologies for the interruption in the middle of this interview. But if you are a content creator or you work in the entertainment industry, not only is the following promo not an interruption, but listening has the potential to change your life. Because collaborating with Evercast is that powerful. Here's a brief excerpt from a recent interview that I did with ever cast co founders, Brad Thomas and award winning editor Roger Barton

[34:45] Roger: Living this lifestyle of a feature film editor has really had an impact on me. So I was really looking for something to push back against all of these lifestyle infringements that are imposed on us both by schedules and expectations. When you guys demoed whoever cast for me that first time my jaw hit the floor, I'm like, Oh my god, this is what I've been waiting for, for a decade.

[35:08] Zack Arnold: I also had the same reaction when I first saw Evercast two words came to mind game changer.

[35:14] Brad: Our goal, honestly, is to become the zoom for creative, whatever it is, you're streaming, whether it's editorial, visual effects, Pro Tools for music composition, LIVE SHOT cameras, it's consistent audio and video, lip sync, always stays in sync, whether you're in a live session where you're getting that feedback immediately, or you can't get it immediately. So you record the session. And you can share those clips with people on the production team where there's no room for any confusion. It's like this is exactly what the director wants. This is exactly what the producer wants.

[35:41] Roger: What matters most to me is it makes the entire process more efficient, which then translates to us as creatives who spent way too much time in front of computers, we get to shut it down, and we get to go spend time with our friends and family.

[35:54] Zack Arnold: The biggest complaint and I'm sure you guys have heard this many, many times. This looks amazing. I just can't afford it.

[36:00] Brad: Tesla had to release the Model S before they released the model three. So by the end of the year, we are going to be releasing a sub $200 version a month of Evercast for the freelancer, indie creatives. Anyone who is a professional video creator outside of Hollywood.

[36:16] Roger: I think what we've learned over the last few months is that this technology can translate to better lives for all of us that give us more flexibility and control while still maintaining the creativity, the creative momentum and the quality of work.

[36:30] Zack Arnold: I cannot stress this enough Evercast is changing the way that we collaborate. If you value your craft your well being and spending quality time with the ones you love, Evercast now makes that possible for you and me to listen to the full interview and learn about the amazing potential that Evercast has to change the way that you work and live visit zackarnold.com/evercast. Now back to today's interview.

I'm glad you mentioned that Melatonin is a hormone because I've actually seen in Facebook threads in my industry, where people say, Hey, I'm having a hard time sleeping. What are some suggestions that you have? And I'll say, Well, you know, I drink a couple of glasses of wine before bed or I do Tylenol pm or I take a you know a melatonin pill. But they think that Melatonin is a sleeping pill, not realizing that it would be no different immediate it is different in some sense. But it's kind of like saying I'm taking a testosterone pill. Like once you start taking and relying on something like that you're actually screwing up your abilities to regulate it. If you're not very careful.

[37:29] Dr. Dave Jenkins: I couldn't agree more. And you can go you know, down to your local pharmacy and buy five milligram melatonin, I would never put someone on five milligrams unless there was a good reason sometimes. But you only need 100 micrograms. What's that a 50th of that. And you know, I take it, I take that and I take 100 You know, I'm 57 years old. I know my melatonin production is down to what it could be I've two parents with Alzheimer's. So I have to be careful. So yeah, it has a and I came to that dose from the science and it just works really well for me. So take a bit of ashwagandha and a tiny dose of melatonin at night. And along with meditation, you know, I sleep really, really well. But that but people need to come back to this personalized thing people need to understand the physiology and genetics are different to everybody else's. And they need to have the motivation and the energy and the prioritization of finding their own personal solutions. But that being said, there are a lot of commonalities. Like I said, you know, ashwaganda, and a tiny dose of melatonin with meditation, that's going to take care of I would say 70 to 80% of people who have sleep problems. You so yeah, so your Melatonin is a powerful thing, but don't abuse it because it will turn off your natural production if you had take too much.

[38:48] Zack Arnold: Yeah, exactly. So we could go down this rabbit hole alone for hours because I'm talking about sleep. It's a huge passion of mine. And I'm the same way when I look at my calendar, and it's like, oh, there's this Meetup group. Oh, it starts at 9pm. Like, no, I just can't do it. I love these people. But I got to get my seven eight hours. Because if I don't get it, I'm mortgaging like a week of my productivity. So it hits me really, really hard. Where if I do one night, what's even like six hours, and I used to sleep four hours a night thinking that I was a machine, and I would just get work done. And I would sleep when I was dead. And I just about did sleep when I was dead, meaning I almost died because of that. But now if I have just one or two nights in a row where I even had just six, we're not talking three or four hours, or pulling an overnighter if I get six hours of sleep over two nights. I'm useless for a week, at least a week. So to me I'm not saving any time or productivity by losing an hour to asleep. It doesn't make any sense.

[39:44] Dr. Dave Jenkins: Absolutely now and if you can get that out to people, that's a fantastic message and just look, everyone should think about their brains full of garbage. If they're not having a good night's sleep, it's just lifted a rock and it'll rot your brain cells at the same time. You know it does, it affects your neurotransmitters, these essential things. So that's going to affect anxiety levels, depression levels, abilities to focus, to have relationships effectively. So it's just absolutely imperative if you want a good quality of life.

[40:16] Zack Arnold: Yeah. So the next area that I want to go staying in the same idea, still talking about Alzheimer's, talking about brain inflammation and actually doing permanent brain damage. Now I want to transition to food. Because people are not making the connection between food and brain. They're saying food, and my belly, or food and my hips and my thighs, if I'm a woman, but they don't realize how closely associated their food and nutritional choices are to their brain. So much so and you can go much deeper into this than I could. But they're now calling all simers in some circles, type three diabetes.

Yeah, no, absolutely. You got diabetes. And yeah, this is the crazy thing that Western medicine does, we have this cut off point, you know, we do a bell curve. And if you're out here, on the limb, you have diabetes. Well, that's, that's not how biological systems work. So there's, we've got to really address the diagnosis. So now they've at least come out and said you are pre diabetes. The point is, if you're having a diet of processed foods, refined carbohydrates, you're going to be spiking your sugar and your insulin levels, and creating brain inflammation, no doubt about it. And that's going to give you the brain fog, and it's going to give you anxiety. And so you need to have that the summary of it, of course, is like a nutrient dense, plant based, low refined carbohydrate, healthy fat diet. And that's what we put on. You know, there's all sorts of different types of diets, and it's different for people sometimes, you know, a lot of my work is customizing diets. But there's certainly some common threads and and, you know, the nutrient density is something that people forget about, that a lot of people will get themselves on. Yeah, I have five or six fruits and vegetables a day. And yeah, I do. But you actually look at the nutrient density of the diet, it's still low to medium. And you can you need to bump up that nutrient density, because that affects every organ in your body. And especially the brain, because of course, you know, so so and within that nutrient density, there's a lot of certain types of nutrients that we should talk about the polyphenols in fruit and especially in berries, critical, the flavonoids and the you know the things like cacao. absolutely essential I get all my clients on on pure cacao. And tha Of course with fish oil, FBI and DOJ on fish oil. And interestingly, just a hot tip for everyone. Please check out broccoli sprouts, sulfur refine, inside cruciferous vegetables are great, but is 100 times more of us active anti aging longevity substance called sulforaphane in broccoli sprouts, and is a special way of doing it. And here's how you do it. You get your broccoli sprouts, you heat some water to 60 degrees around, get a thermometer benefits 5060 degrees, pour it on your broccoli sprouts for 10 minutes, and then make it throw it in your smoothie. That is one of the most important nutritional things anyone can do. And almost no one knows about it. Go to the studies on software for brain 20% reduction of all cause mortality, less cancer, less heart disease, less brain disorders like Alzheimer's, and it helps you detox boosted glutathione levels, which is your major antioxidant that we all have in every cell, check out that as a and I don't have any financial interest in any broccoli seed companies. But I think that's a real hot tip for people.

Well, and that's the problem to the you kind of bring up is that there isn't multiple billions of dollars in broccoli sprouts. So that people are saying, Well, why haven't I heard about it? If I haven't heard about it, then I must not work. It's like, that's because you can't make billions of dollars off of it. And if you could, then people would market it and they would make billions of dollars. And what does is processed foods and things that are crunchy and things that are sweet. That's where the money is. But people don't realize that a lot of the nutritional information that they've been taught for the last four or five decades is driven by corporations and money as opposed to actual factual information.

Oh, absolutely. And it's criminal and no one's being charged. And I mean, I don't want to get into the whole story. But the summary is that the actual dieticians that they employed to come up with the food pyramid for America, came out with 10 recommendations that included of course plants, add the pyramid at the bottom and everything we've talked about and grains and processed food up at the top It was turned around because of corporate interests. So the grains got to the bottom. And the dietitians just held the hands up and said, Well, what can we do? We're out of here. That whole story, you can find it online, it's well documented. But no one was actually charged with the damage that that's caused. Not only America, the whole Western world, I mean, it is the primary curse. And the primary source of modern disease is our processed foods along with the roundup and glyco phosphate. And that can lead into a story about gut brain health glyco phosphate that's and everything. I heard the most horrendous piece of factoid the other day that 75% of the rains in America contain glyco phosphate, round up the number one insecticide that Monsanto and everyone uses. It's raining glyco phosphate. And what that does and why that's so important, as we now know, that gets into our gut, and breaks down the gut lining so that we get this thing called leaky gut. So the cells pull apart, and endo the inflammatory molecules from the food and the bacteria in our gut, get into the blood system in our brain, our blood system goes, What are you you are foreign, I don't know who you are, attacks it. And that leads to two main things. autoimmune disease, which is an epidemic, you know, one and five, perhaps even one in four Americans have an autoimmune disease, that a lot of that goes undiagnosed, whereas it used to be almost zero, and then also travels up. The zonulin is produced as a result of those gut cells pulling apart, actually open the blood brain barrier as well. So now the blood brain barrier is leaky, and these inflammatory molecules get in and that's what leads to Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease, or at least certainly contributes in a major way. And you know, when I read about this, I knew about this and I started seeing people with Alzheimer's, nearly cognitive decline. And I just can't get over how many of them almost all have gut reactions, and I'm just today I had another test come back, that's off the charts, this person's got the leakiest gut I've ever had. They haven't got Alzheimer's, but we're going to fix that. And they won't get us on as they're getting their brains going to come back. So this is a big deal for everyone. And so you need to understand again, and interaction between not only the carbohydrates refined, but what's in it the 80,000 chemicals that we've allowed into our system in the last 80 years, only 5% of those have been satisfactorily tested as safe. And so yeah, follow the money trail people. That's why because there's so much money to be made by getting you addicted. And there's all sorts of science to show that it stimulates the same pathways as cocaine does in your brain, getting you hooked on these rapidly absorbed powders. That's what it is our body doesn't, doesn't want to powder. Even white bread is worse than sugar as far as the glycemic index about pushing your sugar levels higher. White breads worse than pure table sugar. So get you addicted, make a lot of money thrown some preservatives that can stay on the shelf for you know, years, we can still sell it. And we're all very rich, but you're all very sick. So yeah, pay attention, people. This is happening to you right now.

Yeah, and we could this could be a multi Part Four Hour episode just on this one conversation. I mean, people have made entire movies about this one conversation. So I don't want to go too far, deep into that, why I wanted to go next is really my number one passion. And anybody listening to the show on a regular basis, or that as part of my online programs, knows that I focus all on movement throughout the day, if you are somebody that is sedentary in front of a desk for 12 to 16 hours, and then at 10 o'clock at night, you do your three miles of jogging or you get on the treadmill or you get on your bike, you're not making any dent whatsoever to the damage that you're doing by not moving efficiently and properly throughout the day. So now let's focus on how movement is affecting our brain health, both positively and negatively.

Well, yeah, they call sitting the new smoking, right? I was the one. I presented this to conferences, actually. And NASA were the first people to get a little bit suspicious about this because their astronauts came back and they were like aging big time. And I got what, what is this? And so in the end, they did all these studies, and they now call it vitamin D, vitamin gravity and the impact on gravity and moving and resisting gravity simply by sitting up standing up. you resist gravity, right? That has a powerful physiological effect on our moldable systems. And so yeah, you're absolutely right the longest living cultures, the Blue Zones, we know what they are. We are researching them. These are not rich people. These are often poor farmers, you know, in the Mediterranean islands and Crete and Okinawa, they are working all day. They're in the gardens, interestingly enough, which is helping their microbiome in the gut, which is another side effect of that I'm sure of it. But they're working all day, they don't go to the gyms, they don't run miles, they're just moving all day. So there's the evidence people, but we can, we can come down to the cellular level, and show that the hormonal response to movement is helping you reduce your inflammation, and to optimize your your calorie burn, of course, but also your power and your strength. And then that also reduces cortisol levels. And so you feel happier and more relaxed, etc, etc. So yeah, I've been I've had a standing desk for years, because we knew the science of case first came out about five or six years ago, there's a little book called sitting as the new science, new smoking, you can read it in an afternoon, I recommend people read it. And it tells the story about the NASA scientists, how they discovered this. And so yeah, get yourself a standing desk. And what I do is, you know, I just try and stand on one leg, I put one leg up and kind of standing Lotus half lotus position and wobble around. While I'm talking to you, or doing my own work with clients, I'm constantly on one foot, and so that those micro movements, that constant adjustment and wobbling. That said, in my brain healthy messages, it's stimulating what we call brain derived neurotrophic factor, which is fertilizer for the brain, which you do get from aerobic exercise, and you do get from muscle resistance training, but you can get a much, much more just by this constant triggering of movement during the day. So it's a big deal.

Yeah, and what I'm so super proud to say that I actually did a full interview with Dr. Joan Verner, Coase, who was the head of the Life Sciences Division at NASA, when they were making these discoveries. And it was one of the coolest interviews that I've ever done. So anybody that's listening, that was not aware of that interview, I have that included in my move yourself program. I also have it included in the podcast archives, but we do an entire hour, just into some of these discoveries that NASA had about gravity, how it affects our body, negatively, but where I want to go specifically with you, because you're so into the brain. And I actually had a podcast as well with dr. john ratey, where we talked about the revolutionary new science of exercise in the brain. But what's really interesting to me, when you're talking, again, about brain degeneration, and Alzheimers, I want to focus a little bit on what's happening when you're not moving as far as atrophy of the brain and how they've actually proved that your brain is shrinking. If you're sedentary all day long, and how that's affecting your ability to be creative to spark new ideas and just produce creative thoughts.

[52:56] Dr. Dave Jenkins: Yeah, I mean, what's interesting is, you know, some of these studies come out, and they're really good studies and really strong, but they kind of go nowhere. I mean, I'm talking to the CEO of Alzheimer's, Australia, and at the moment about our program. And you know, she's listening, but she didn't even know about some of these studies. So like, this is how powerful exercise can be, they have shown that this brain center called the hippocampus, which is really the first part usually not always, but usually the first part that gets affected by Alzheimer's is why you start losing your short term memory. So it's the thing that takes you know, creates longer term memories from your short term memories, you can actually grow that part of your brain physically, by exercise. And why that's growing is because the number of synapsis is the number of communication points between brain cells is growing. And they've shown this in lots of rat studies where they can do stains of the synapsis, and they can show the density of those synapsis is actually increasing through an exercise program. So you know, it's just a direct motivation to grow brain cells in our motivation, but it's a physiological stimulus. Then, of course, there's all sorts of other things that the exercise does, that has this collateral benefit. And, you know, probably haven't got time to talk about that. But you know, one of them is that inflammation, again, exercise, causes as a stress or in through the process of homeostasis, the body goes, Oh, you just stressed me. But I tell you what, I'm going to create all these rejuvenating hormones or rejuvenating processes, in order to rebalance that stress. And it's that process, which also creates fertilizer for the brain, the brain derived neurotrophic factor, and stimulates what we call neurogenesis, the creation of, of new brain cells from the stem cells. So we have these these millions and millions of baby brain cells. I've got a client who says I've been losing my marbles As I said, Well, you've got billions of baby marbles just sitting there waiting to grow again, we just need to create the environment where they go, they pop their heads out and go again. Now it's time to grow a brain cell. And exercise is one of if not the most powerful ways to do it.

[55:17] Zack Arnold: What I try to tell my the members in my program and people that are just asking me questions, or say, and I get a really common question, which is, there's so many different things, they're asleep, I'm supposed to sleep better, I'm supposed to eat better, I'm supposed to manage my time better, I'm supposed to move I'm supposed to exercise like, I don't know where to start. And I always say the biggest Domino is not exercise, it's just moving. If you just start to move more, you're going to have a little bit more energy, you're going to have a little bit more clarity. And that's when the rest of the dominoes are going to start to topple over. You're a medical professional. So you can say that that's the wrong approach. But I really truly believe in my heart, from my own experience and seeing it happen to many other people, that just moving more is such an amazing first step to then starting to knock over these other dominoes.

[56:04] Dr. Dave Jenkins: Look, I think if you know you might be someone this would be the approach I take, you might be someone who used to be a sports person loved playing tennis as an example. And you've left that behind, and you've You know, you're a corporate, you're stressed, you're overweight, you've got to do what motivates you, you know, the first hump is the hardest, all these things, I do 1000 Health things in a day, and I don't even think about it anymore. Right? I don't even think about the smoothie I made this morning, the ice pack, I wore the photomodulation I'll put up my nose to get me into alpha rhythm to boost my sleep later. I don't even think about them. They're just habits, they're just automatic. But to get started, you got to focus on what will motivate you, and to support their motivation. So start with the most easiest, most powerful things to do. So if that is playing tennis with your old buddy that you haven't played tennis with for 10 years and used to love it, do that, or go for a walk, like you say, get a standing desk, don't do it straightaway all day, do it five minutes, 10 minutes, 20 minutes, whatever, just stay motivated, get motivated, start to feel the benefits, and then you know, adopt a new thing. I would say that, you know, learning about motivation and habit change is really empowering for people. And you know, Stanford University are really the world leaders in this and you can you can buy books on the on the thing. And just learning techniques, little tricks to motivate you and keep you motivated and to get such as getting an accountability buddy finding someone else, to go on this journey with you, you know, someone that that you respect someone who you can influence each other, maybe it's the person next to you in the corporate building, who's also a bit overweight, come on, buddy, we're going to go out at lunchtime, get a bit of vitamin d, go for a walk, we're going to have a whole food lunch, just these little things to start with and get a coach. I mean, you know, the science came out this the other day, we send it to someone online coaching doubles your chances of success in a health outcome. That, you know, there aren't many things that double your chances of success. So you know, don't be embarrassed, there's no one who won a gold medal at the last Olympics. Without coaches, they have a role to play, go get one that works for you and get on a change program.

[58:26] Zack Arnold: Once again, I'm in that kind of weird zone where I feel like I may end up getting sued by you because all of this is so similar to things that I'm doing where like I was just writing up stuff today for a challenge that I'm building talking about, hey, you have to get an accountability buddy, I use those exact words is that you are going to ensure your success so much more, if you have somebody that you're going to do this with. And then on top of it, I make it very clear that I can teach you all the lessons in the world. But if they don't become habits, and you don't understand how to form these things as habits, nothing's ever gonna stick and you go back into that same vortex of doing all the wrong things over and over. So it's, it's crazy how you and I are just in the exact same playbook just kind of looking at all the same stuff. And that really excites me knowing that we really I mean, I just found you totally by chance through a mutual connection, who's in Thailand of all places, but to know that there are other people that really see things through a similar lens, especially those that have decade's worth of formal education is very encouraging to me, because I've really felt like for years, I've been talking about this, and I'm just this outlier. And I'm like, I must be crazy. But it's it's very encouraging to hear that there are people with a lot of education that are saying, Yeah, all this stuff pretty much makes sense.

[59:39] Dr. Dave Jenkins: Yeah, I know. The key thing is for us to work together. I mean, it's not about competition, because we have to work with the new science and share it and get it out there because this thing will be you know, driven from the public. This will be demand driven. That's why Cleveland Clinic their commercial exercise they've opened clinic people are paying, you know, like four or five times more money than they would for a 15 minute appointment with a family physician, because they getting great value for money. They're getting to the bottom, the real underlying reasons of the problem. And then they're getting support in a in a scientific evidence based plan to fix that problem from the bottom up, that we are against multibillion dollar industry. And I'm not saying that we're against all of it, look, I prescribe drugs, that there's a place for them occasionally, but only as part of a holistic plan to actually address the underlying issues. drugs have a place. So it's not a dominant ask kind of war. It's just, we got to work together to give people the opportunity. And that's what is a massive opportunity to feel better, be happier and have a greater quality of life. So I'm always willing to come on these types of podcasts and share things i don't i don't believe that, you know, it's competitive. I've got plenty of work. I don't need, you know, there's demand driven, there's people out there suffering, so we just need to help them.

[1:01:07] Zack Arnold: I agree. Yeah, I've, I couldn't compete with you anyway. So I'm glad you have no interest in it, because you're on a completely different level that I am. So I'm just super excited to find other people out on the planet that have the same ideals and the same mission that I have, and are aligned with all the goals that I have as well. So I want to be very respectful of your time. So for anybody that's listening, this really intrigued by all of the work that you were doing, and they want to get involved, how can they find you and go deeper.

[1:01:35] Dr. Dave Jenkins: I look just email me I'm Dr. Dave d r d a v e @themoremodel.com T h e M o r e m o d e l.com. Email me if you're interested, you can check out themoremodel.com that we've also got to end Alzheimer's Australia but themoremodel.com check out the brain section check out the other sections about what the more model is all about. We do you know individualized reversal of diseases and corporate health as well. Man, we're specializing. I do do other things like I say, but I take on case by case and we're here if you need me.

[1:02:12] Zack Arnold: Well, it has been an absolute pleasure. I've been so inspired by this conversation. And I hope that it does the same for all my listeners as well. So thank you so much for being on.

[1:02:20] Dr. Dave Jenkins: All right. Thanks. Have a good day. Bye bye.

[1:02:23] Zack Arnold: Before closing up today's show, I would love to ask for just a couple additional minutes of your time and attention to introduce you to one of my new favorite products created by my good friend Kit Perkins, who you may recognize as creator of the Topo Mat, here's a brief excerpt from a recent interview that I did with Ergodriven co founder and CEO Kit Perkins, talking about his latest product, new standard whole protein.

[1:02:47] Kit Perkins: I'm into health and fitness generally, but I want it to be simple and straightforward. bout a year, year and a half ago, I started adding collagen into my protein shakes. And man the benefits were like more dramatic than any supplement I've ever seen. So I thought if I can just get this down to coming out of one jar, and it's ingredients that I know I can trust, and you just put it in water.

[1:03:06] Zack Arnold: And you don't have to think about it. When people think of protein powders. They think, well, I don't want to get big and bulky. And that's not what this is about. to me. This is about repair.

[1:03:13] Kit Perkins: So a big part of what we're talking about here is you are what you eat. Your body is constantly repairing and rebuilding and the only stuff it can use to repair and rebuild is what you've been eating. Unfortunately, as the years have gone by everyday getting out of bed, it's like you know two or three creeks and pops in the first couple steps and that I thought you just sort of live with now. But yeah, one starting the collagen daily or near daily, it's just gone. So for us job 1A here was make sure it's high quality, and that's grass fed 100% pasture raised cows. And then the second thing if you're actually going to do it every day, it needs to be simple, it needs to taste good.

[1:03:46] Zack Arnold: Well my goal is that for anybody that is a creative professional like myself that's stuck in front of a computer. Number one, they're doing it standing on a topo mat. Number two, they've got a glass of new standard protein next to them so they can just fuel their body fuel their brain. So you and I, my friend, one edit station at a time are going to change the world

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Thank you for listening to this episode of The optimize yourself podcast to access the shownotes for this and all previous episodes as well as to subscribe so you don't miss future interviews just like this one. Don't forget to visit zackarnold.com/podcast And as a quick reminder, if you would like to download my 50 Plus page Ultimate Guide to optimizing your creativity, so you can learn some of my favorite simple and practical steps to be more productive, and less distracted, stay more active throughout your workday and maintain more consistent focus and energy. Simply download this free guide and zackarnold.com/UltimateGuide. And a special thanks to our sponsors Evercast and Ergodriven for making today's interview possible. To learn more about how to collaborate remotely without missing a frame, and to get your real time demo of ever cast an action visit zackarnold.com/evercast and to learn more about Ergodriven and my favorite product for standing workstations the topo mat visit zackarnold.com/topo. That's t o p o and to learn more about Ergodriven and their brand new product that I'm super excited about new standard whole protein visit zackarnold.com/newstandard. Thank you for listening, stay safe, healthy and sane and be well.

Episode Credits

This episode was edited by Curtis Fritsch, and the show notes were prepared by Debby Germino and published by Glen McNiel.

The original music in the opening and closing of the show is courtesy of Joe Trapanese (who is quite possibly one of the most talented composers on the face of the planet).