Neuromarketing and the Science of Getting What You Want. Dr. Robert Cialdini #507

July 9, 2018 by Dave Asprey

Today’s guest is Dr. Robert Cialdini. This guy has spent his entire career researching the science of influence. Earning him an international reputation as an expert in the field of persuasion, compliance and negotiation.

Dr. Cialdini says, “The best persuaders are the best through pre-suasion, the process of arranging for recipients to be receptive to a message before the encounter it.”

In this episode of Bulletproof Radio we’re going to talk about how that process works and also how Dr. Cialdini became known as the “Godfather of influence.

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Neuromarketing and the Science of Getting What You Want. Dr. Robert Cialdini #507

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Show Notes

Natural Pain Relief: 5 Ways to Relieve Pain Without Ibuprofen

July 9, 2018 by Dave Asprey

[tldr]

Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) like aspirin, ibuprofen, and naproxen can do you more harm than good.
NSAIDs can damage your gut lining, wreck your gut bacteria, and increase your risk of heart attack and stroke.
There are better ways to hack pain and inflammation. Some of your best natural pain relief options are cryotherapy, compresses, herbal remedies like curcumin and Boswellia, PEMF therapy, and TENS.
NSAIDs are not the best way to deal with pain or inflammation. You have a lot of other natural options. Try them and see what works for you. [/tldr]

My road to discovering natural pain relief was a long one. Years ago, when I was inflamed and weighed 300 pounds, my doctors said I should take NSAIDs (think aspirin, ibuprofen, and naproxen) every day. A lot of mainstream doctors suggest ibuprofen or aspirin for managing chronic pain and inflammation.

I didn’t know any better at the time, so I followed their advice and took ibuprofen daily. It wrecked my gut, stressed my liver, and destroyed my sleep.

I’m not saying NSAIDs are useless. They have their place. If you’re recovering from surgery or a major injury, traditional over-the-counter pain relievers are good for controlling inflammation, swelling, and pain, but NSAIDs are far too powerful for over-the-counter, everyday use. Unlike a lot of natural pain relievers, NSAIDs also don’t address the cause of inflammation or pain; they just mask the symptoms.

If your doctor suggests you take an NSAID long-term, I would look for a functional medicine doctor and get a second opinion. There are safer, natural pain relief options to deal with chronic inflammation and pain.

Ahead, I discuss the downsides to NSAIDs, and offer my go-to natural pain relievers for inflammation that you can use instead of popping ibuprofen or aspirin.

Why natural pain relievers are better for you

1. Ibuprofen, aspirin, and other NSAIDs damage your gut lining

When I was taking NSAIDs for pain management every day, my gut was the first place I felt them. After a little research, I figured out why. It turns out NSAIDs damage your gut in two ways.

The first is that inflammation-lowering NSAIDs destroy your gut lining. Check the bottle of ibuprofen or aspirin in your medicine cabinet. You’ll see it right on the label: “NSAIDs such as ibuprofen may cause ulcers, bleeding, or holes in the stomach and/or intestine.”[ref url=”https://medlineplus.gov/druginfo/meds/a682159.html”] Long-term low-dose aspirin use is particularly likely to cause ulcers and tear holes in your intestine.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3607744/”]

NSAIDs work by blocking prostaglandins, hormone-like compounds that stimulate inflammation. But prostaglandins do a lot more than control inflammation, and one of their most important roles is protecting your gut and stomach lining.

When NSAIDs block prostaglandins, they also rob your gut of much-needed protection and the lining starts to break down, which can give you leaky gut syndrome. Your intestines become permeable, letting food and other molecules slip into your bloodstream and cause massive inflammation. Leaky gut can also lead to autoimmune issues.

Traditional wisdom says that NSAID pain relievers only damage your gut lining if you take them every day for a long time, but recent research disagrees. High-level athletes with stress-related intestinal damage tried taking ibuprofen to improve muscle soreness and recovery. Ibuprofen ended up damaging their gut lining even further after just a couple weeks; it increased inflammation and made their original pain issues worse.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22776871″] In fact, a single dose of aspirin can significantly increase your intestinal permeability.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22757650″]

This is one of the big reasons I avoid NSAIDs altogether. Using them even once can cause problems. If you’re coming out of surgery or have a major injury, it may be worth the risk, but they’re way too strong for chronic pain management or everyday aches and pains.

If you’re worried that you have leaky gut or intestinal damage (from NSAIDs or anything else), you can use this guide to repair your gut and boost your beneficial gut bacteria.

2. NSAIDs feed bad gut bacteria

NSAIDs don’t just damage your gut lining. They affect your gut bacteria, too. A study of regular users found that different NSAIDs caused different changes in gut bacteria.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4754147/”] Ibuprofen and arthritis drug celecoxib (Celebrex), for example, increased pathogenic Enterobacteriaceae, a family of bacteria that includes E. coli, Salmonella, and a number of lesser-known bacteria that contribute to eye, skin, respiratory, and urinary tract infections.[ref url=”https://emedicine.medscape.com/article/216845-overview”]

NSAIDs damage your gut lining and feed bad bacteria at the same time. That’s not good.

3. NSAIDs put you at high risk for heart attack and stroke

NSAID pain relievers can also damage your heart — so much so that the FDA issued a long warning back in 2005, and strengthened the warning in 2015.[ref url=”https://www.fda.gov/Drugs/DrugSafety/ucm451800.htm”]

Researchers estimate that COX-2 NSAIDs (a specific type that is no longer legal) caused 140,000 heart attacks during their five years on the market,[ref url=”https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2805%2917864-7/abstract”] which led to a deeper study of ibuprofen, aspirin, acetaminophen, and other longer-standing NSAIDs used for pain and inflammation.

The FDA specifically warns that risk of heart attack and stroke increases significantly within the first week of taking an NSAID, and it gets worse the longer you take it, even if you have no heart problems to begin with.[ref url=”https://www.fda.gov/Drugs/DrugSafety/ucm451800.htm”]

Why this stuff is still available over-the-counter puzzles me. It’s very rare that the FDA issues warnings about drugs, then strengthens those warnings, but doesn’t change their legality.

Regardless, NSAIDs are bad news, and you shouldn’t take them to manage pain. Here’s the natural pain relief biohacks I recommend instead.

5 best natural pain relief hacks to use instead of NSAIDs

Instead of ibuprofen or aspirin, I use these natural pain relief biohacks to keep my inflammation low. Give them a try. You will be surprised by how good you feel.

Cryotherapy

Sudden and intense cold exposure makes you release cold-shock proteins, a special class of proteins that decrease inflammation and speed up recovery.[ref url=”https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00109-014-1136-3″] To get the benefits of cold therapy, you can take an ice bath or use a cryotherapy chamber, like the one at Bulletproof Labs. Cryotherapy’s benefits go far beyond inflammation, too. Get a full breakdown of how cryotherapy upgrades your biology.

Hot/cold compresses

When it comes to natural pain relief, sometimes the basics are the best. The temperature change from hot to cold and back again triggers anti-inflammatory heat-shock and cold-shock proteins (yeah, there’s a heat version, too), and the compression decreases blood flow to injuries, which keeps inflammation and swelling down.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3781860/”]

Curcumin and other herbal painkillers

Curcumin is the bioactive compound in turmeric that gives the herb its healing properties. It’s one of the safest anti-inflammatories you can take, and is an effective natural pain reliever too — even for severe pain. In fact, curcumin matches or outperforms ibuprofen, acetaminophen, and other over-the-counter painkillers without any side effects.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5003001/”]

Turmeric root contains just 2% to 5% curcumin, so when reaching for a supplement, be sure you’re buying curcumin, not powered turmeric root. Curcumin is not easily absorbed by the digestive tract, so choose high-potency curcuminoids and combine with oil, since curcumin is fat-soluble. Black pepper extract (piperine), though not Bulletproof, has also been shown to increase curcumin’s bioavailability by 2000%.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9619120″] However, some newer, high-tech curcuminoid formulas have been shown to offer the same potency levels without the use of piperine.[ref url=”https://nutritionj.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1475-2891-13-11″]

Combine curcumin with other anti-inflammatory compounds for an even stronger effect. The best-researched ones are ginger,[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3665023/”] Boswellia,[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17024588″][ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22457547″] and Stephania tetranda.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2365809/”][ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3950587/”]

Pulsed electromagnetic field therapy (PEMF)

Physical therapists use PEMF to heal fractures and torn cartilage faster, and surgeons recommend it as a post-op way to minimize soft tissue inflammation.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3669296/”][ref url=”https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15368370701580806?journalCode=iebm20&”] I use it to recover from workouts faster and keep inflammation low. PEMF machines send electromagnetic pulses through your tissue, gently stimulating anti-inflammatory and repair compounds.

You can get PEMF therapy at a physical therapist’s or chiropractor’s office. It costs between $30 to $60 per session. Or, you can get PEMF equipment to use at home, but be prepared to pay. The cheapest PEMF mats go for $1,300 or more.

Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS)

TENS is another powerful biohack for pain and inflammation. It’s similar to PEMF, but uses electricity. TENS sends a mild electrical current through muscle and soft tissue, stimulating repair compounds and pain-relieving endorphins.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2746624/”][ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8892136″] Bonus hack: you can also use TENS on your brain to make you more mentally resilient to stress.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28213205″]

Do you have any go-to biohacks for pain or inflammation? Any bad experiences with NSAIDs? I want to hear about your natural pain remedies in the comments. Thanks for reading, and don’t forget to subscribe below for more biohacking advice.

How to Find Your Zone Through Meditation and Samadhi

July 5, 2018 by Team Asprey

Have you ever known what someone will say before they say it or been able to predict future events?

Yogic texts suggest that through an advanced state of meditation known as Samadhi you can consistently experience these seemingly telepathic and clairvoyant occurrences. What’s more, science backs up these claims.

In a recent Bulletproof Radio podcast episode (iTunes), bodybuilder Frank Zane, aka Mr. Olympia, attributed his 1977-1979 Olympic gold medals to his meditation practice and the state of Samadhi. “[Through Samadhi] I was able to convince myself that I was the winner. I think that’s the secret of winning — is to win it ahead of time.” By putting himself in an altered state, Zane secured the medals before the competitions via this intense form of visualization and positive thinking.

Read on to learn how you can tap into Samadhi to upgrade your human performance.

What is Samadhi?

Yogic view of Samadhi

Samadhi is an intense state of concentration or awareness that’s achieved through disciplined meditation. In this heightened state, you become one with the object or thought you’re meditating on. In other words, you’re so completely absorbed in your task that you completely lose track of yourself.

The “Yoga Sutras of Patañjali,” a collection of guiding truths on the practice of yoga, explains how to sit in meditation by paying keen attention to your mind as a means to gain supernormal powers. These powers include telepathy (knowing what someone will say before he/she says it); clairvoyance (predicting the future); and psychokinesis (the ability to move objects without touching them).

Before you dismiss this Eastern philosophy as complete woowoo, here’s what science has to say about the practice.

Scientific view of Samadhi

In science speak, think of Samadhi as an altered state of high performance in which you achieve mind mastery. In “Supernormal: Science, Yoga, and the Evidence for Extraordinary Psychic Abilities,” Dean Radin, Director of Research at the Institute of Noetic Sciences (IONS), offers his take on Samadhi in more contemporary terms.

“Many ancient teachings [ie, “Yoga Sutras”] tell us that we have the capacity to gain extraordinary powers through grit or grace. Techniques used to achieve these supernormal abilities, known as siddhis in the yoga tradition (from the Sanskrit, meaning “perfection”), include meditation, ecstatic dancing, drumming, praying, chanting, sexual practices, fasting, or ingesting psychedelic plants and mushrooms. In modern times, techniques also include participation in extreme sports, floating in isolation tanks, use of transcranial magnetic or electrical stimulation, listening to binaural-beat audio tones, and neurofeedback.”

Ready to dive into the neuroscience of such techniques, specifically Samadhi? This comprehensive report[ref url=”http://nspb.net/index.php/nspb/article/view/260/155”] reveals how meditation, leading to Samadhi, creates focused stability, which in turn helps to uncouple cyclical negative thinking patterns in the brain, and ultimately lead to increased joy. In this report, researchers replicated a number of previous studies to get at the root benefits of Samadhi for enhanced concentration and cognitive function. Findings revealed:

Improved cognitive performance after six weeks of meditation, including processing speed and quality of performance. (These factors were measured through a number of modern-day cognitive tests like Stoop task and d-2 concentration tests.)
20 minutes of meditation for two weeks improved Graduate Record Examination (GRE) reading comprehension scores.
Those who participated in a three-month long retreat for 5 hours of daily meditation had improved vigilance and ability to sustain attention.

How do you attain Samadhi?

When it comes to any meditation practice, including one geared toward the ultimate state of Samadhi, posture is key. Aim for your head, neck, and trunk in absolute alignment. Your shoulders should be relaxed and your breath, as easy and calm as possible. This allows energy (or prana) to move through you freely.

Next, your goal is to focus on your breath. This helps you concentrate with the least amount of distraction, so you can focus for a longer period of time.

Prolonged concentration becomes meditation, which, with time and practice, gives way to spiritual absorption, or Samadhi.[ref url=”https://yogainternational.com/article/view/a-seekers-guide-to-samadhi”] Here are the key elements of each phase to consider in a Samadhi-focused meditation practice:

Concentration (Dharana)

Focus your attention on your naval, heart, or between your eyebrows.
Select an object to envision in the center of that bodily space. For instance, you can envision a mantra, an image of a spiritual guru, or a cross at the center of your forehead or heart. This helps your mind to fix itself to the space you are creating in the meditation.
You may notice distractions arise – sounds in the room, thoughts, etc. Acknowledge them without judgment. Then gently bring your mind back to your meditative space.
You’ll know you have reached a state of concentration when the object of your focus remains in your mind for longer than the objects that distract you.[ref url=”https://yogainternational.com/article/view/a-seekers-guide-to-samadhi”]

Meditation (Dhyana)

Fixed concentration evolves into meditation when the experience of your mind in focus is uninterrupted by much distraction.
Meditation is simply a continuation of concentration into a more evolved state.
Many yogis believe that if your mind remains concentrated on a particular object for more than 12 breaths, you are meditating.[ref url=”https://yogainternational.com/article/view/a-seekers-guide-to-samadhi”]

Spiritual absorption (Samadhi)

As your mind becomes entirely absorbed with the object occupying the space in which you envisioned or confined it, you are entering Samadhi.
In this final phase, the actual process of concentration (which gave way to meditation), the object you are concentrating on, and you (your mind doing the concentrating) are unified.[ref url=”https://yogainternational.com/article/view/a-seekers-guide-to-samadhi”]

Your fast-track to Samadhi

Bulletproof founder Dave Asprey runs a neuroscience institute called 40 Years of Zen that’s focused on a fast-track to deep meditative states like Samadhi. By first studying the brain wave patterns of Zen monks who meditate, the institute then uses a neurofeedback machine to simulate such experiences. (Neurofeedback teaches your brain to respond differently through positive and negative reinforcement.)

Instead of spending years in a cave meditating, the neurofeedback mechanisms prod you along. A computer, connected to your brain via electrodes, tells you when you are distracted and off-track and gently guides you back to your meditative state. Dave notes that “while it’s exhausting, you can experience states like Samadhi more quickly.”

How do you know when you’ve reached Samadhi?

According to Zane: “[Samadhi] is peace — past the place of understanding. There’s no explaining it. You just have it. It just descends upon you. [You’re] just tremendously joyful and peaceful. And then, [when I said to myself] ‘I’m tremendously joyful and peaceful now’ — then it went away.”

While Samadhi may only last for 30 seconds to 2 minutes — and can take years to cultivate the natural way — it’s as profound as it is fleeting. As Zane’s life testifies, it can open the door to altered states of consciousness and excellence in human performance.

The Science of the Perfect Physique at any Age: Mr. Olympia Frank Zane #506

July 5, 2018 by Dave Asprey

“I was able to convince myself that I was the winner and I think that’s the secret of winning is to win it ahead of time.”

Frank Zane is a American former professional body builder. Author of more than 15 books on fitness, nutrition, and body building. But calling him a body builder doesn’t really do him justice.

He’s a three time Mr. Olympia and his physique is considered to be one of the greatest in the history of body building, due to his incredible focus on symmetry and proportion. He was called the king of aesthetics in the body building world.

Enjoy the show!

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The Science of the Perfect Physique at any Age: Mr. Olympia Frank Zane #506

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Show Notes

What Frank tells people who just can’t seem to lose fat 00:09:04
I haven’t been in shape for 61 years, I have gotten in shape 61 times 00:12:08
What happens when you eat too few carbs 00:18:24
Make lighter weights feel heavier 00:19:55
How Frank used meditation to get through his day 00:27:31
The secret to winning 00:29:35
People don’t see themselves 00:35:42
Cultivating emptiness 00:52:07
Weight lifting is meditation 00:54:56
The things Frank does (and takes) to make his mitochondria work better 00:15:25
Saying a mantra a million times per year 00:29:00
What is the state of Somati 00:31:20

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If you like today’s episode, check us out on Apple Podcasts at Bulletproof.com/iTunes and leave us a 5-star, positive review.

The Best Healthy Sources of Protein

July 5, 2018 by Dave Asprey

[tldr]

When you’re following the Bulletproof Diet, roughly 20 percent of your daily calories should come from protein, but the type of protein that you eat matters.
Protein is found in virtually every part of the body. It performs many vital functions like building and giving structure to your tissues, organs, and muscles.
You generally want to eat complete proteins, which contain all eight essential amino acids. Meat, fish, and eggs are all complete protein sources.
Choose wild fish, grass-fed meat, and pastured eggs.
Eat poultry and pastured pork in moderation, and avoid factory-farmed meat, farmed seafood, and soy.

[/tldr]

When you’re following the Bulletproof Diet, roughly 20 percent of your daily calories comes from protein (the rest you get from healthy fats and vegetables.) The type of protein that you eat matters, but that’s where things get a little confusing. Is grain-finished beef pretty much the same as grass-fed? Is it ever OK to eat plant protein? And what’s the deal with chicken? Read on to discover the very best protein sources for your body.

What is protein?

Protein is found in virtually every part of the body. It performs many vital functions like building and giving structure to your tissues, organs, and muscles; forming antibodies to fight off infection; making hemoglobin to carry oxygen around the body in the blood; creating hormones; and so much more.

Proteins are made up of tiny building blocks called amino acids. There are at least 20 amino acids, and nine of those are essential to your diet, since your body can’t manufacture them.

Think of how protein is structured in this way: The amino acids are letters. Put two or more of these letters together and you form a word — these are peptides. Then string the words (peptides) together in a sentence and you get a protein. That protein can say anything to your body like “die now” if you have scorpion venom in your system, or “grow muscles and reduce inflammation” if you eat a protein high in the amino acid cystine, or “grow more collagen” if you’re consuming a lot of glycine, another amino acid.

The best sources of protein

You generally want to eat complete proteins, which are proteins that contain all eight essential amino acids. Meat, fish, and eggs are all complete protein sources. Here are the Bulletproof-approved options:

Wild-caught fish: Wild fish is high in healthy omega-3 fatty acids, vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants. Make sure you choose fish that are low in mercury like sockeye salmon, wild trout, anchovies, haddock, and sardines. Too much mercury can damage your nervous system, immune system, and heart.[ref url=”https://www.epa.gov/fish-tech/2017-epa-fda-advice-about-eating-fish-and-shellfish”]

Grass-fed beef and lamb: Organic, grass-fed meat is hands-down the best source of protein there is. Make sure you choose beef or lamb that’s been grass-fed and grass-finished, meaning the animal only ate grass. You may be wondering whether grain-fed meat is really that much different. The short answer is yes, it really is inferior. Grass-fed meat provides you with more nutrients and less toxins than conventional meat. It’s also jam-packed with antioxidants, omega-3 fatty acids, trace minerals, and vitamins. One study found that grass-fed beef had more omega-3s and more conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) than grain-fed cattle. And that included grain-finished beef — grass-fed cows that ate grains 80 days before slaughter. The longer the cows ate grains, the lower the quality of their meat.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16500874″]

Pastured eggs: Most of the nutrients in eggs can be found in the yolks, so don’t choose an egg-white omelette thinking it’s the healthier choice. Go for pastured eggs — a 2007 study found that grain-fed eggs have lower levels of vitamin A, vitamin E, and omega-3s.[ref url=” https://www.motherearthnews.com/real-food/free-range-eggs-zmaz07onzgoe”]

Grass-fed collagen protein: Collagen is a structural protein that builds bones, teeth, muscles, skin, and all other connective tissues. Eating foods rich in collagen or drinking a collagen supplement carry huge benefits — collagen plumps your skin, strengthens your joints, improves sleep, burns fat, and boosts gut health. Since people eat primarily the muscle of animals, and not the collagen-rich cartilage and organs, it’s a good idea to supplement with a grass-fed collagen protein powder. Throw it in a smoothie, or use gelatin to make puddings and gummies, and to thicken soups and sauces.
Colostrum: This is the milk that a calf drinks for the first 1 to 2 months of its life. Colostrum is full of antibodies, growth factors, and proteins, particularly lactoferrin, which reduces inflammation and helps the gut.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10195738 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25082351 “] Choose colostrum from pasture-raised cows (you can find it in Bulletproof’s Whey Protein powder.)
Whey protein concentrate: Whey protein helps your liver produce glutathione, your body’s master antioxidant. Glutathione mops up free radicals and supports your immune system.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1782728″] Take 2 tablespoons a day at the most, unless you’re working out a ton, then you can up that dose to 4 tablespoons a day. You don’t want to get your entire daily protein requirement from whey — it’s high in the amino acids cysteine and methionine, which can cause inflammation if consumed in high amounts. To avoid this, add some collagen protein powder to your whey powder so you get a nice balance of different amino acids.

Eat these in moderation

Poultry: It’s ok to eat poultry like chicken and turkey a couple of times a week, but you won’t get all the same health benefits that you would from high-quality fish and ruminants. Poultry also tends to be high in omega-6s — too much of these fats can cause inflammation.
Pastured pork: Most farmers feed their pigs grains, which fattens them up before slaughter. The problem is, the feed is often tainted with mold toxins. When pigs eat moldy feed, the mold toxins get stored in the pigs’ fat tissue.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/6231019″] Low levels of mold toxins cause people to lose their edge. At high levels, mold toxins put you at risk for serious disease like cancer, cardiomyopathy (heart muscle disease), and hypertension.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7586128?dopt=Abstract “] If you’re going to eat pork, choose pastured pigs that were raised and finished on grass.

Stay away from these

Farmed seafood: Eating farmed fish is just a bad idea, both for your health and for the environment. Farmed seafood is high in pesticides, toxins, parasites, pathogens, and environmental contaminants.[ref url=”https://www.researchgate.net/publication/10698966_Do_Fish_have_Nociceptors_Evidence_for_the_Evolution_of_a_Vertebrate_Sensory_System “] The antibiotics and chemicals used to treat disease in fish farms spill over into wild fish populations, damaging local ecosystems.[ref url=”https://aquaculturereform.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/bp-lobster-or-non-target-toxic-effects.pdf”]
Factory-farmed meat: These animals are fed all kinds of junk — contaminated grains, garbage, and leftover animal parts like chicken beaks and feathers. Factory animals live in deplorable conditions rife with disease, so they’re pumped full of antibiotics to keep them alive until slaughter. If that’s not enough reason to switch to grass-fed, consider doing it for public health — the antibiotics dumped in animal feed is directly tied to the terrifying rise of antibiotic-resistant superbugs, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Soy: Soy milk and soy protein like tofu are marketed as health foods, but they’re not. Soy crops are often contaminated with mold toxins, while the protein in soy is highly allergenic, especially when it’s genetically-modified (GMO). Soy also contains plant estrogens (phytoestrogens) that mimic estrogen in humans. Studies have found that soy phytoestrogens cause infertility in male rats and breast cancer growth in female rats.[ref url=”https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0303720709001397″]

What’s the deal with plant protein?

You may have heard of ricin, the extremely toxic poison that even in small doses can kill you. What you might not know is that it comes from the lowly castor bean. Plants contain proteins called lectins that protect themselves and their seeds from predators like bugs and other hungry animals. Plants actually have zero interest in being a food source for you. Not all lectins are bad, but the lectins in plants like legumes and beans, as well as nightshades such as tomatoes and potatoes, love the different sugars in your cells. Lectins bind to your joints, disrupt gut health, and cause bacterial overgrowth.[ref url=”https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/proceedings-of-the-nutrition-society/article/nutritional-toxicity-of-phaseolus-vulgarls-lectins/7C72FD3202127016E8F54230F8259FC2″]

Here’s the thing: A little bit of plant protein can sometimes be a good thing — it all comes down to how you feel after eating it. Hemp protein is your best bet. It’s high in GLA, or gamma linolenic acid, an omega-6 fatty acid that lowers inflammation.[ref url=”https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17168669″]

Most people don’t know this, but when you’re in ketosis for a long time, it tends to deplete GLA. So there’s a case to be made for eating hemp protein, like hemp oil, to replenish your GLA stores. Hemp is also the most bioavailable (i.e. best absorbed by the body) of all the plant proteins and has the highest immunoglobin G (IgG) — the most common antibody found in your blood that protects you against infections.

But keep in mind that people tend to get too many omega-6s in their diets already, so you want to watch out for that and not overdo it with the hemp.

The Liver Autoimmune Connection: How to Reduce Symptoms

July 3, 2018 by Dave Asprey

[tldr]

Your immune system keeps nasty infections away. Things get complicated when you have autoimmune disease, and the immune system turns on you and starts attacking healthy tissues.
There’s no 100% pure and perfect meal or habitat, so you need a liver to deal with low-level toxicity in your food and environment.
Some experts think the rise of autoimmune disease is because the toxic burden of modern living outpaces our body’s ability to eliminate those toxins.
Read on to find out how your liver keeps your insides squeaky clean, why that matters for autoimmune disease symptoms, and how you can support your liver so that it can keep up with everything life throws at it.

[/tldr]

You can pick up a dirty shovel even if you have a cut on your hand, and you can go to the supermarket without catching a cold every time, because you have an immune system to keep nasty infections away.

Things get complicated when you have an autoimmune disease, where the immune system turns on you and starts attacking healthy tissues. There are over 100 types of autoimmune diseases, and the number of people who suffer from them increases year over year, which makes you wonder, what’s causing the uptick?

One suspicion is that the toxic burden of modern living outpaces our body’s ability to clean house. Even in the purest possible environment, there’s no 100 percent pure and perfect meal or habitat, so you need a liver to deal with low-level toxicity in your food and environment. It’s also there for us when our own cells make waste products just by doing its day-to-day thing.

When your body has to deal with the extra toxic load that comes with things like air travel and mass-produced agriculture, your body’s detox systems can fall behind and struggle to play catch-up.

Read on to find out how your liver keeps your insides squeaky clean, why that matters for autoimmune disease symptoms, and how you can support your liver so that it can keep up with everything life throws at it.

Related: Instantly download a free grocery shopping guide and stock your fridge with liver-friendly foods.

What does the liver do?

The liver cleans the blood in three phases:

Filter
Breakdown
Emulsify

Filter

The liver does a first-pass cleaning of the blood to separate out larger toxic compounds.

When your liver filtration is working well, it’s like a strainer filtering a trickle of water from your faucet. When it’s not operating as efficiently as it could, imagine what happens when your strainer is full but the water is still running. You get spillover of unfiltered water.

Breakdown

The liver uses specialized enzymes to break down certain toxic molecules into less toxic or non-toxic compounds. Your liver produces enzymes based on demand.

When your liver enzymes are in healthy ranges, that means your toxic load is manageable. When you have elevated liver enzymes, either your toxic load is high or your liver isn’t filtering or producing bile, your body’s fat emulsifier, as well as it could be.

Emulsify

When you eat, your brain sends a signal to the liver to make bile. Bile is a substance that helps turn large fat globules into smaller ones, and it’s a main way to get cholesterol out of the bloodstream where it could accumulate and harden your arteries (you want cholesterol in places like your brain where it can do good things). The gallbladder stores your bile and releases it when your small intestine senses the presence of fat you ate. Bile emulsifies fat-soluble toxins and kicks them down the digestive tract for elimination.

When your liver isn’t producing bile efficiently, you don’t digest your fats well. This could lead to dry skin, digestive discomfort, floating stool, or even bile duct disorders and gallbladder attacks from stagnation.

Your liver processes carbs and sugar

Your digestive system also tasks your liver with processing carbohydrates and sugars. When your blood sugar is high, the liver responds by packaging it up as glycogen and storing it in the liver itself or sending it off to muscles for storage.

If your carbohydrate intake is low, your liver isn’t spending a ton of energy on digesting carbs. If it’s high, your liver is dealing with those at the expense of the molecules that make you sick.

Liver congestion, and do I need a liver cleanse?

When you come into contact with an amount of toxins your liver can handle, this system works well. If you lived outside in a non-industrialized forest with a clean stream of water and all wild and foraged foods, your liver would have no trouble at all keeping up. That’s not our world, though. Today, you’re exposed to countless toxins your body isn’t equipped to deal with efficiently, like:

City air and fumes
Chlorinated, fluoridated water
Vegetables coated with chemical sprays
Meats pumped full of antibiotics and hormones
Off-gassing from particle board furniture and stain-resistant carpeting

When your liver gets overloaded, toxins stay in your bloodstream for another trip around the circulatory system. If all goes well, your liver will process these compounds the second time around, but what usually happens is you have a fresh batch of toxins coursing through on top of the original.

Your body has a few back-up methods. Your sweat, lymph, and immune system come into play when your liver is overloaded, and that’s in addition to their day jobs.

What does liver function have to do with autoimmune disease?

If your body can’t get rid of toxins by normal methods in a timely manner, your immune system activates, and the first of many steps in the immune response is inflammation. If you’ve had an autoimmune disease for a while, you may know that the one thing you want to avoid is inflammation. With an autoimmunity, inflammation causes the immune system to attack healthy tissues.

The liver is so central to autoimmune flare-ups that in an episode of the Bulletproof Radio podcast, Dr. Izabella Wentz, PharmD., (iTunes) recommends you do some hefty liver support as a crucial part of reversing thyroid problems from Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis, an autoimmune condition that causes the immune system to attack the thyroid.

Ways to support your liver

If you search for a liver cleanse or liver flush, you’ll find a zillion ways to cleanse the liver — some effective, some not so much. Some seem mild, some sound downright violent. Here are some gentle ways to support your liver every day.

Adopt a low-carb diet. Since your liver processes carbs and sugar, you can help keep your liver’s burden low by staying away from sugar and keeping your carb count down.
Get your antioxidants. Your liver is busy, and its day-to-day processes release free radicals that can weaken its own cells. Eating a diet rich in antioxidants, and taking supplements like vitamin C and glutathione can boost your antioxidant counts to protect your liver. Not only that, but the liver uses antioxidants to convert toxic compounds into inert ones.
Check your stomach acid. A large portion of the population has low stomach acid, even if they’ve been told their symptoms point to high stomach acid. Low stomach acid results in the liver receiving food particles that aren’t ready for liver processing. That’s hard on your liver.
Incorporate liver support herbs. Certain herbs like dandelion and yellow dock have bitter resins that stimulate the digestive system and keep everything flowing. Milk thistle shows a protective effect in rats against the effects of alcohol on the liver.[ref url=”https://uic.pure.elsevier.com/en/publications/hepatoprotective-properties-of-silybum-marianum-herbal-preparation”][ref url=”https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691509005936″]

There are times when your immune system is going to activate, and there’s nothing you can do about it. With liver support, you can free up your immune system to react to actual invaders instead of toxic overload. The key to managing autoimmune disease is to get your immune system in a place where it activates when you need it to, and stays quiet when you don’t.

Show Notes

Show Notes

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Neuromarketing and the Science of Getting What You Want. Dr. Robert Cialdini #507

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Show Notes

Why natural pain relievers are better for you

1. Ibuprofen, aspirin, and other NSAIDs damage your gut lining

2. NSAIDs feed bad gut bacteria

3. NSAIDs put you at high risk for heart attack and stroke

5 best natural pain relief hacks to use instead of NSAIDs

Cryotherapy

Hot/cold compresses

Curcumin and other herbal painkillers

Pulsed electromagnetic field therapy (PEMF)

Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS)

What is Samadhi?

Yogic view of Samadhi

Scientific view of Samadhi

How do you attain Samadhi?

Concentration (Dharana)

Meditation (Dhyana)

Spiritual absorption (Samadhi)

Your fast-track to Samadhi

How do you know when you’ve reached Samadhi?

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts

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Links/Resources

Show Notes

What is protein?

The best sources of protein

Eat these in moderation

Stay away from these

What’s the deal with plant protein?

What does the liver do?

Filter

Breakdown

Emulsify

Your liver processes carbs and sugar

Liver congestion, and do I need a liver cleanse?

What does liver function have to do with autoimmune disease?

Ways to support your liver

Get on “The Inside Track” with Dave

See What Trouble Dave’s Getting Into on Social

Start hacking your way to better than standard performance and results.

Get on
“The Inside Track”
with Dave