Why Whole Foods Founder John Mackey Is Tackling America’s Health

In a world where healthcare often focuses on treating illness rather than promoting wellness, what does it really take to live a healthy, vibrant life? In this episode of The Dr. Hyman Show, I sit down with John Mackey, co-founder of Whole Foods Market, to explore his journey from building one of America’s most iconic food companies to rethinking health, purpose, and consciousness. We talk about his new venture, Love. Life, and how it fits into a bigger philosophy that includes conscious capitalism and living with meaning. You can catch our full conversation on YouTube or listen wherever you get your podcasts. We unpack: • What psychedelic insights can teach you about health and consciousness • How conscious capitalism can create “win-win-win” outcomes in your life • Steps you can take to break free from habits driving weight gain and poor health • Why building the right community accelerates your health journey • What living with purpose can do for your well-being at every stage of life This conversation reinforces a belief we both share: that true health comes from love, community, and a comprehensive approach. View Show Notes From This Episode Get Free Weekly Health Tips from Dr. Hyman https://drhyman.com/pages/picks?utm_campaign=shownotes&utm_medium=banner&utm_source=podcast Sign Up for Dr. Hyman’s Weekly Longevity Journal https://drhyman.com/pages/longevity?utm_campaign=shownotes&utm_medium=banner&utm_source=podcast Join the 10-Day Detox to Reset Your Health https://drhyman.com/pages/10-day-detox Join the Hyman Hive for Expert Support and Real Results https://drhyman.com/pages/hyman-hive This episode is brought to you by Seed, PerfectAmino, Function Health, BON CHARGE, Big Bold Health and Pique. Visit seed.com/hyman and use code 25HYMAN for 25% off your first month of Seed's DS-01® Daily Synbiotic. Go to bodyhealth.com and use code HYMAN20 for 20% off your first order. Join today at FunctionHealth.com/Mark and use code HYMAN100 to get $100 toward your membership. Head to boncharge.com and use code DRMARK for 15% off your order. Get 30% off HTB Immune Energy Chews at bigboldhealth.com and use code DRMARK30. Receive 20% off FOR LIFE + a free Starter Kit with a rechargeable frother and glass beaker at Piquelife com/Hyman.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Coming up on this episode of the Dr. Hyman Show. You founded Whole Foods. It's changed the face of food in America for the better.

• 0:06Speaker 01

  First store was called Safer Way, changed the name to Whole Foods Market. And it took off. It became the highest volume natural food store in the United States, six months after it opened.

• 0:13Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Why have you sort of turned your attention from groceries and food to healthcare?

• 0:18Speaker 01

  I had a tab of LSD and it was incredibly powerful, the strongest dose of any psychedelic I've ever taken. And I basically was swept away.

• 0:25Speaker 02

  John Mackey, co-founder of Whole Foods Market.

• 0:28Speaker 03

  Grew one store into a $22 billion natural foods empire.

• 0:33Speaker 02

  And champions conscious capitalism.

• 0:35Speaker 01

  To elevate humanity. Today, chronic diseases, not infectious diseases are what are killing us.

• 0:40Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Chronic disease can be contagious. You're more likely to be obese if your friends are overweight than even your family's overweight.

• 0:46Speaker 01

  We spend almost 18% of our GDP. But where are we in terms of longevity? When I checked it out today, we were 48.

• 0:53Dr. Mark Hyman?

  You started basically a movement called conscious capitalism.

• 0:55Speaker 01

  We had some shareholder activists that were trying to take over the company. Basically, Amazon was the best solution for us in a very situation where we didn't have a lot of good solutions. Conscious capitalism has four basic principles, Mark. First principle is.

• 1:13Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Okay, John, welcome to my podcast. We've known each other a long time. It's great to see you here. We're in LA. Actually, we both live in Austin, so I don't know how we end up in LA doing a podcast.

• 1:21Speaker 01

  Because we both had some business here.

• 1:24Dr. Mark Hyman?

  You founded Whole Foods, which everybody now knows. It's changed the face of food in America for the better. You know, you sold food, but now you're kind of focused on healthcare, which is really interesting. And, you know, if you understand that food is medicine, it's not such a big leap, right? But it's interesting, why have you sort of turned your attention from groceries and food to healthcare?

• 1:46Speaker 01

  Well, I do think it's a continuum. They're both about helping people to become healthier, to be the healthiest version of themselves. And, I mean, I did co-found it Whole Foods. I led it as CEO for 44 years.

• 1:59Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Forty-four years.

• 2:00Speaker 01

  Forty-four years, exactly. We sold it to Amazon, not because we wanted to sell out. We were independent publicly traded company for 25 years, well, for a long time in 25 years as a public company. So, uh, but we had some shareholder activists that were trying to take over the company and Amazon, it's a long story, which I detail in my book, the whole story. The short version of that is basically that Amazon was the best solution for us in a very situation where we didn't have a lot of good solutions.

• 2:29Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 2:29Speaker 01

  So I signed on for five years with Amazon to help integrate Whole Foods into Amazon, make sure that the culture, the values of Whole Foods were protected as best I could protect it. And then those five years were up and I, I retired from Whole Foods. So, and also I didn't want to work as hard, to be honest.

• 2:48Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 2:48Speaker 01

  I mean, uh, uh, I was getting older and I wanted to-

• 2:52Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Play more pickleball.

• 2:53Speaker 01

  I want to play more pickleball, exactly. And read and travel and spend time with my wife and friends and family, et cetera. That's how I got out of Whole Foods. But here's the thing, it's like, I really felt like I knew how to help thousands of people and maybe in the long term, millions of people be healthier, to live a healthier, more vital life. How could I not do that? Would I, would I get to the end of my life with a regret? Yeah, sure, I could get, like, lay on a beach and, and read and do whatever I wanted. I'd made enough money. But I don't think that would be fulfilling for me. I'm a very purpose-driven human being. I feel like I needed to be contributing in some way to helping.

• 3:32Dr. Mark Hyman?

  So you, you, you started your career basically working at Co-op, you know, mop, sweeping the floors, moved to create, you know, one of the most iconic brands in America, uh, that has really improved the health for so many people who shop there. And now you're, you're, you know, 72 and you're still at it.

• 3:50Speaker 01

  Hey, I've got three weeks.

• 3:53Dr. Mark Hyman?

  You're biologically 60, but you're-

• 3:55Speaker 01

  I'm gonna enjoy them as well as I can.

• 3:56Dr. Mark Hyman?

  But you, you know, you, you're really now focused on a, on a new venture, which is very ambitious. And, you know, I'm just curious, what was your early experience in your life that, that shifted you to think this way, to, to have this philosophy around food and health and consciousness? And, cause you've not only, you know, done, you know, the work you've done around creating a business like Whole Foods, but you started basically a movement called Conscious Capitalism, which is how we do capitalism better.

• 4:22Speaker 01

  I'm gonna give you, I'm gonna give you like a three to five minute- History there.

• 4:25Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Great.

• 4:26Speaker 01

  In my book, the prologue.

• 4:27Dr. Mark Hyman?

  The whole story.

• 4:28Speaker 01

  The whole story. Exactly.

• 4:29Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Really, you gotta get a copy.

• 4:31Speaker 01

  Adventures in love, life, and capitalism. And starts out, the prologue, I just turned 22 years old. And I'm living by myself, not in a very good space, an atheist, studying philosophy, existentialism.

• 4:45Dr. Mark Hyman?

  That'll make you depressed.

• 4:45Speaker 01

  I took a very, I didn't know it, because back in that day, you didn't know what you were getting in terms of dosage. But I, I had a tab of LSD, I took it by myself. And it was incredibly powerful, the strongest dose of any psychedelic I've ever taken. And I basically was swept away. I use the metaphor, it's like, imagine Niagara Falls, and you're hanging onto a rock with one hand. How long can you do that? Not that long. And so, I got swept away. And then, I found my ego dissolving, basically, that separateness, you're Mark, I'm John.

• 5:20Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 5:20Speaker 01

  It's water.

• 5:21Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Right.

• 5:21Speaker 01

  It all disappeared.

• 5:22Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 5:22Speaker 01

  I was, there was really no thoughts. I'm, I'm now reflecting back on that state of consciousness when there was no thoughts, really, there's no separation. And what I realized, I realized that, that A, I was a manifestation of the one being. As are you, as is everything. Because that's, that's all there is, is the one being. I realized I'd always existed.

• 5:45Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 5:45Speaker 01

  There was no beginning, and there's no end.

• 5:47Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 5:48Speaker 01

  And I realized that life's this adventure.

• 5:50Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 5:51Speaker 01

  And it's like, I can make it whatever I want it to be. I can create whatever I want to create. And so, that was so life-changing. That changed my life. So, there's a funny story about this. So, I'm coming, I'm coming down on the trip, and I'm, I'm walking around this neighborhood now. And I run in to my, this.

• 6:10Dr. Mark Hyman?

  You were in the East Coast somewhere?

• 6:11Speaker 01

  No, no, I'm in Austin, Texas.

• 6:12Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Oh, in Austin, yeah.

• 6:13Speaker 01

  Yeah. I, I'm walking around, and I run into my philosophy professor that I idolized. He was my intellectual hero, a guy named Bob Solomon, Robert C. Solomon. And he's written 40 or 50 books, and on philosophy. And he was an existentialist, and he was, at that time, very influenced by Sartre, Camus, Nietzsche, and Kierkegaard.

• 6:32Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 6:33Speaker 01

  And he, he believed life was absurd. That there was no purpose and meaning to life at all. And so I ran into him and, and I mean, I think I ran into him. I think he was there. I had a conversation with him and I asked him, I said, Professor Solomon, it's John Mackey. I'm one of your students. I've been taking a few courses from you and kind of vaguely recognized me, but he didn't know my name. And I said, so Professor Solomon, I have two questions. First question is, you know, you teach that life's absurd, that there's absolutely no meaning whatsoever to life. That we're just sort of thrown into here. It's all been random chance and we're going to die and that's it. Our consciousness is extinguished. There's just really no purpose, but, but you take sort of a romantic stance to that.

• 7:15Speaker 01

  You said, there's no real objective meaning, but we can make something up. So we can be romantic. We can sort of throw our fist against a cruel reality and, and make our life into an adventure. And I said, is that what you believe, sir? And he said, yes, that's what I believe. And I said, I thought so was, but let me ask you a second question. Are you very happy? And he looked at me and he said, no, I'm not very happy.

• 7:40Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 7:40Speaker 01

  And he looked at me.

• 7:41Dr. Mark Hyman?

  He was honest with you.

• 7:42Speaker 01

  Yeah. He looked at me and I looked at him and we went our separate ways. And what I realized after that point is I just had this, I was still having actually this incredible.

• 7:50Dr. Mark Hyman?

  When you were in the trip.

• 7:51Speaker 01

  Well, I was coming down, but what I don't know for sure, was he still part of that trip? Or had I come down enough where he was actually, I mean, what's the difference? I mean, it's all a dream anyway. It's all Maya. Anyway, he's, I'm having this conversation. I think, I think I was down enough. Point is that changed my life.

• 8:09Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 8:09Speaker 01

  And, and you know what I started doing after I, I, I stuck out my thumb and I started hitchhiking.

• 8:14Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Across America?

• 8:15Speaker 01

  Not across America. I just, I was open for adventure. A guy picks me up and, and he says, um, he says, son, where do you want to go? And I said, wherever you're going, I don't really care. So he says, well, I'm going home. Great.

• 8:29Speaker 01

  He drives a couple of miles up the road and says, this is, this is home. I'm getting out. I'm looking around. I'm thinking, okay. So then I start walking back. And that's actually when I ran into Professor Solomon. Anyhow, after that mark, pretty soon after that, I moved into this vegetarian commune, co-op.

• 8:47Speaker 01

  And I wasn't vegetarian at that time. I really didn't know much about food at all. I didn't eat vegetables or I really ate, I ate the standard American diet. I was a junk food eater. I moved in and I had my food consciousness awakened. I must have put it. I, I, I started to cook. I, I learned about natural and organic foods. For the first time, I began to realize, my gosh, I'm not just a machine that needs fuel, driving to McDonald's and fuel up. I'm a living being. I need to nourish my cells with nourishing food. And, and, and that, that was, that was when it began. I, I went to work for a small natural food store. I became, and I worked there for a few months and I came back home one, went to the co-op, my girlfriend Renee.

• 9:28Speaker 01

  I went to Renee and I said, hey Renee, what do you think if we opened up our own natural food store? What do you think about that? And she said, I think that'd be cool.

• 9:40Speaker 01

  So we did it. I was twenty, twenty-three and she was nineteen at that time.

• 9:44Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Incredible.

• 9:45Speaker 01

  So, we didn't know what we were doing.

• 9:47Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 9:47Speaker 01

  But let's just say, we made a lot of mistakes and I was a fast learner. First store was called Safer Way. And Mark, it was so idealistically pure. It was a vegetarian store. We didn't sell alcohol. We didn't sell coffee. We didn't sell, um, sugar. We didn't sell white flour. We were very, very pure.

• 10:06Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Love that.

• 10:06Speaker 01

  We didn't do much business. Safer Way really struggled. And then we relocated it, merged with another small natural food store, changed the name to Whole Foods Market, started selling meat, seafood, beer and wine, coffee, tea, sugar and, and, uh, and some products from white flour.

• 10:24Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 10:25Speaker 01

  But then natural, organic focus. And it took off. It became the highest volume of natural food store in the United States, six months after it opened. It was a huge success.

• 10:33Dr. Mark Hyman?

  I've driven by there and I was downtown Austin, right?

• 10:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 10:36Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah, amazing. I had a similar experience. I, I actually, um, had a psychedelic experience in college. Very similar to that. And then I moved into a, a house with eight vegetarians.

• 10:47Speaker 01

  Really? You're kidding?

• 10:48Dr. Mark Hyman?

  In Ithaca, yeah.

• 10:49Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 10:50Dr. Mark Hyman?

  That was where Moosewood Cookbook.

• 10:51Speaker 01

  Moosewood Cookbook?

• 10:52Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 10:53Speaker 01

  I, I, that was one of my cookbook.

• 10:54Dr. Mark Hyman?

  That's right. Well, Moosewood Restaurant wasn't in Ithaca.

• 10:56Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 10:57Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And, and so we used to go there and then every night we had to cook and we, we took our backyard, which is, we rented a house in town and I had a room for a hundred dollars and then.

• 11:06Speaker 01

  How old were you?

• 11:07Dr. Mark Hyman?

  I was nineteen, you know? And, and, uh, we took the backyard, we tore up the grass and we planted a whole garden. Uh, one of the guys, we had these maple trees on the street in front of us. He was tapping the maple trees. And we made like a pint of maple syrup.

• 11:21Speaker 01

  Oh, my gosh.

• 11:22Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And we had to cook every night. And so we rotated. So every night we had basically a family dinner. And one of us was the chief chef and then one of us was like the helper chef.

• 11:30Speaker 01

  Right.

• 11:31Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And then, but we, we got fresh, delicious vegetarian food every.

• 11:35Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 11:35Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Night for.

• 11:36Speaker 01

  How long did you stay in that community?

• 11:38Dr. Mark Hyman?

  We lived together for a couple of years.

• 11:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:40Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And then I ended up moving on to a abandoned commune in Ithaca and lived in a yurt with no electricity or running water.

• 11:47Speaker 01

  We're both were hippies.

• 11:50Dr. Mark Hyman?

  No electricity, no running water. Uh, I had to take my water from a well like a quarter mile away with these two five gallon buckets.

• 11:57Speaker 01

  What motivated you to become a, a doctor?

• 11:59Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Oh, well, I don't know if you know this, John, but I, I was a, a student of Buddhism.

• 12:03Speaker 01

  So you had that first?

• 12:04Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah. So I was studying Buddhism and I.

• 12:06Speaker 01

  Do you still practice? Do you do Vipassana still?

• 12:08Dr. Mark Hyman?

  I do meditate and I, I still, a lot of the principles are kind of ingrained in me is sort of just my.

• 12:14Speaker 01

  You've got a more eclectic approach now.

• 12:17Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah. And, uh, I was, ended up, uh, taking a course called the Medicine Buddha. And about, you know, the kind of the healing framework of Buddhism, which is really healing of the mind.

• 12:26Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 12:27Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And, and I was like, well, I don't really want to become a monk. So what am I going to do? So I graduated, you know, basically with, what am I going to do with a degree in Buddhism?

• 12:36Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And I ended up.

• 12:36Speaker 01

  My degree in philosophy, about as useful.

• 12:38Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah. Taking a, a hike for a week in the Shenandoah Mountains and I took Moby Dick and just me and myself and I and. Ended up realizing, well, maybe I should try to go to medical school and see if, see if I liked it. And if I didn't like it, I would quit, you know, but so far, so good.

• 12:52Speaker 01

  You have a doc med, one of your, either a parents doc?

• 12:55Dr. Mark Hyman?

  No, no, nobody. My, my, the story was that my great, my grandfather's grandfather, Russia, was a doctor to the czar, the last czar, but I think it's probably made up. I, I don't believe it.

• 13:07Speaker 01

  So, so you were, you were not pushed into the?

• 13:10Dr. Mark Hyman?

  No, no, no, no.

• 13:11Speaker 01

  You, we'll say you were led by your?

• 13:13Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah, I was led.

• 13:14Speaker 01

  You're led by your heart or your, your soul, your deeper spirit.

• 13:17Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And I was studying all these ancient healing systems and I learned Chinese and studied Chinese medicine. And so I was very much thinking differently from the beginning.

• 13:26Speaker 01

  You have to write your story.

• 13:27Dr. Mark Hyman?

  I know, I will, I will.

• 13:28Speaker 01

  You've got a lot of books out there. You know, I always tell people, everybody should write a memoir.

• 13:33Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 13:33Speaker 01

  Because in some ways, only looking retrospectively, a lot of patterns and threads came together in writing the book. It's like, wow, I'd never quite thought of it that way before. You know, as you know, when you write, it's a discovery process.

• 13:46Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 13:47Speaker 01

  You're, you're, you're creative and you're, and you're discovering things. Uh, it's hard, but you are discovering things that you didn't necessarily put together before. And a memoir is also a gift to your family, your children, your descendants.

• 13:59Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah, it's true. I think, you know, you, you're right, John. You, you can't always tell going forward where things are connecting. But looking back, you can see all the threads and all the choices and all the decisions that led you to the moment that you're doing what you're doing.

• 14:12Speaker 01

  It helps you actually, I think, moving forward as well, because you, when those pat, when you're clear about those patterns, then you have less sort of uncertainty.

• 14:20Dr. Mark Hyman?

  I think people live a lot in fear. I think it's one of the, the challenges.

• 14:23Speaker 01

  Fear is what keeps people from following their hero's journey.

• 14:26Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 14:26Speaker 01

  I think we're all called to a hero's journey in all in our own unique ways.

• 14:30Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 14:30Speaker 01

  But, you know, we're, we're too scared. It's scary we might fail, scared of ridicule.

• 14:34Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 14:35Speaker 01

  Scared our parents won't approve, blah, blah, blah, blah. I just did it anyway.

• 14:38Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 14:39Speaker 01

  And so did you.

• 14:40Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah. I don't know what makes some people like that and others not. I, I was always like that. I, I actually, I have a title for my memoir, which, uh, uh, I, I've started, but I haven't really finished yet, which is called Notes From God and Stumbling Toward the Truth. And it's basically.

• 14:54Speaker 01

  You shouldn't sell that. Don't, that's such a great title. Keep that title to yourself.

• 14:58Dr. Mark Hyman?

  That's okay. But you can actually, you could write Moby Dick. Nobody can change, nobody.

• 15:02Speaker 01

  Copyrighted title. So it's okay.

• 15:03Dr. Mark Hyman?

  But the the idea is basically that, you know, when you're moving through life, there's these little doors that open, these little posting notes from God, let's call them.

• 15:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 15:12Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And you can choose to go through or not. You somebody gave you a tab of acid and you're like, I'm gonna try this and look what happened. And then, you know, you need a job. So you went, you know, you worked in a whole natural food store and just one thing get to the next, but you chose to actually do those things. And I think people live less from fear and more from love, which is why I love the title of your new company, the name Love Life. It's like

• 15:37Speaker 01

  Not an accident.

• 15:38Dr. Mark Hyman?

  No, it's not accident. Those those moments we often don't pay attention to in our life, those little, those little notes from God. But I think the more you pay attention to those and listen to those things, the the better your life's gonna be. And I think what's happening around chronic disease in America is that people are not listening to their bodies or not saying to their conversation that there should be having with their soul. And so they end up in this narcotized polluted

• 16:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:03Dr. Mark Hyman?

  self that's sick and unable to think clearly and feel right.

• 16:08Speaker 01

  Hundred percent. You know what I think about the notes from God is that they're always being written. And you can, even if you haven't been listening to them before, you can start listening to it.

• 16:16Dr. Mark Hyman?

  It's true.

• 16:16Speaker 01

  Have to, it's always so you just have to quiet, have to be still, be quiet. And and it's always speaking. And even if we make bad decisions, there's new notes.

• 16:25Dr. Mark Hyman?

  It's like Totally true.

• 16:27Speaker 01

  That's always waiting for us to listen to it and follow it. I had been thinking about Love Life or something like that for a long time.

• 16:35Dr. Mark Hyman?

  I was thinking Just for people listening, what is Love Life?

• 16:38Speaker 01

  Love Life is a holistic health center, a one stop holistic health wellness center. It's big. We we our first flagship location here is in the LA area. It's down in El Segundo, Manhattan Beach. Uh, it's got, it's an old Best Buy, so it's big. So we have forty five thousand square feet in there. So just real quickly, you go in and and of course, I want to get you there. I'd love to love to give you a tour and and

• 17:04Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Get tuned up.

• 17:05Speaker 01

  You go in, first we have a healthy cafe. So healthy food is one of the foundations for uh people to be as healthy. As possible. So start, starting with food. Then we have sort of this whole community space, co-working space, but also a big gather room, community room where we can do lectures. So let's say you were to come do a talk on functional medicine, then we would invite members and the outside community and we can, we can get in that, expanding it in the cafe, we'd probably get 75 people in there pretty comfortably. Then you go into a fitness center. So we've got like the category, most people try to fit us into is like a gym, because we have a really nice gym.

• 17:44Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 17:45Speaker 01

  But of course, that's just one little, small part of what we're doing.

• 17:48Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 17:49Speaker 01

  And then in that fitness center, we're sort of state of the art, like I think Equinox in a way, sort of upscale, lots of the most recent cool technologies in there. We have a physical therapy room. We have a physical therapist on staff. We really think physical therapy for many people that have injuries is very, very efficacious.

• 18:08Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Or you can go for your pickleball injury.

• 18:10Speaker 01

  Well, uh, yes, I, we have lots of, uh, sort of biohacking stuff, which I'll get to in a sec. Uh, speaking of pickleball, we have three pickleball courts there. So I did hurt myself on the court. One of the, one of the biohacks we had, there's a PIMF machine. So I went, I did that a couple of times and I think that's helped.

• 18:27Dr. Mark Hyman?

  That's post electromagnetic frequency, which helps to sort of reduce inflammation.

• 18:32Speaker 01

  Yes. Yes, it does. And I think it helps a little bit of the circulation and starts to move some of the, the inflammation out of the, out of the injured, injured, in my case, my calf. So then we've got a yoga studio. We've got a Pilates studio. In that yoga studio, we do breath work. Besides yoga, we do breath work. We can do, we do sound baths. We do meditation classes. We're, we're about all things to help people be the healthiest version of themselves, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. Those are all part of the love life vision. We have a really nice spa. So for you can do things you'd do in any really nice spa with lots of different kinds of massages.

• 19:15Speaker 01

  Facials, wraps, uh, it's not a medical spa per se. We're not doing Botox or other, other type of medical injections uh, for that in that way. We have all this recovery stuff and all these sort of bio hacks. So we've got our Pimp machines. We've got hyperbaric, two ox, hyperbaric oxygen chambers. We've got cryotherapy. We've got four red light beds. We've got four infrared sauna rooms. We have a huge steam room. We have six cold plunges and we have the biggest sauna you've probably ever seen. You can jam like 40 people in that sauna if we had to. So those are the recovery things. And then of course, what the real thing that sets us apart is that we have, you know, we have primary healthcare. We have a center.

• 20:00Speaker 01

  We do, we do very comprehensive testing like function health, blood tests. We do a comprehensive blood test. We add a gut, gut test because we work with, partner with Viome's. We do a gut test. We do oral test. We do, we're checking, you know, we're doing checking the feces. We're doing a VO2 max.

• 20:17Dr. Mark Hyman?

  It's your fitness level.

• 20:18Speaker 01

  Yes, trying to grip strength. We're doing a, we're, we're doing, we're doing lots of stuff.

• 20:22Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Body composition.

• 20:23Speaker 01

  Yes, body composition. We have a DEXA scan.

• 20:25Dr. Mark Hyman?

  It's really one stop shopping.

• 20:26Speaker 01

  It is.

• 20:26Dr. Mark Hyman?

  All things health and wellness.

• 20:28Speaker 01

  One thing we don't have, although we have access to MRI, because we have a deal with Pernova on that one. Like functions bought a company there.

• 20:36Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 20:37Speaker 01

  But I think in our next center, which we plan on that being in Austin, although we don't have the location yet. We will put the MRI in because we really want to have that executive health. So you can come and do everything there. Bring a dermatologist in, uh, maybe do a colonoscopy and just so people can get a complete report card in depth. So, but after you get the testing, now we sort of know where you're at. You, you get your, you know.

• 21:03Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Your baseline.

• 21:03Speaker 01

  But that's the starting point. I mean, unfortunately I've learned kind of the hard way. Knowledge is not enough to get many. Some people get the knowledge. That's all they need. They never look back.

• 21:14Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 21:15Speaker 01

  Others, that's, that's interesting, you know, but they don't really want to change anything they're doing.

• 21:20Dr. Mark Hyman?

  They want to eat my ice cream.

• 21:21Speaker 01

  That's right. I want to eat my ice cream. It tastes good. I like it and I feel okay.

• 21:25Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 21:35Speaker 01

  Most people actually I've found actually don't want to get tested because they don't want to know because they don't want to change. Anyway, so once we've got that, we now have a well care team. We have a medical doctor that is function medicine trained. We have a nurse practitioner. She can do IVs. She can, well, she can do everything. The doctor can really just, we don't have to pay quite as much. We've got a registered dietitian, nutritionist who really knows her stuff. We've got medical assistants. We obviously have DEXA scan operators. We've got a whole well care team. And so then, then the whole idea is first we, first we test, then we create a plan, and then we track. We track

• 22:18Speaker 01

  through additional testing, but also we can download into our app their Oura Ring results, their Apple Watch results, Garmin. We've got like, I don't know, 10 different devices we can put in, continuous glucose monitor, can put that data in there. That's another thing we test, by the way, is we have people wear that for a couple of weeks. So we get all that information out. But mostly, it's about the care team. Problem, you know, Mark, what's wrong with our medical system is basically, I call it, it's a plumber's model. It's when you get a plumber.

• 22:51Dr. Mark Hyman?

  When your sink's broken.

• 22:52Speaker 01

  When your sink's broken, your pipes are leaking.

• 22:54Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Toilets clogged, right.

• 22:55Speaker 01

  Exactly. Most people don't go to a doctor until something breaks. And that might have been fine 150 years ago, but today, chronic diseases, not infectious diseases are what are killing us. And so we know heart disease is our number one killer. Then we got cancer. We know medical care itself is one of the leading causes for death for too many prescription drugs, mistakes made, infections they get in hospitals, et cetera, et cetera.

• 23:19Dr. Mark Hyman?

  It's true. People don't realize that, but I think it's the third or fourth leading cause of death.

• 23:22Speaker 01

  It's the third leading cause of death. And obesity. Americans, I'm sad to say, is that 73% of Americans are overweight, 73%, and 43% are obese.

• 23:34Speaker 01

  Those and the trend lines are continuing. It's not like we've peaked. It's still going up. The standard American diet is killing people.

• 23:41Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah, I mean, when I graduated from medical school in 1987, there was in a single state that had an obesity rate over 20%. Now, there's not one under 30 and most are over 40.

• 23:49Speaker 01

  Is Colorado and Utah over 30? They were, they were the two best.

• 23:55Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah, I think they're popping over 30 now.

• 23:57Speaker 01

  Those trend lines keep going up and basically, America, the United States, as you know, spends far more than any other country on healthcare. We spend almost 18% of our GDP.

• 24:10Dr. Mark Hyman?

  That's $5 trillion.

• 24:11Speaker 01

  Yes, exactly. But where do we, where are we in terms of longevity? When I, when I checked it out today, we were 48.

• 24:18Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 24:19Speaker 01

  So, most money on healthcare, we have terrible results.

• 24:23Dr. Mark Hyman?

  I think we're worse than Q, but I think they spend $184 a year.

• 24:26Speaker 01

  So I'm saying all that because Love Life, we think is one of the solutions. Is that we want people to join Love Life. We want them to enter into our medical programs. We do primary healthcare. We will see them. It's not a concierge program, but besides the doctor times to go over your test results and work on your plans, we have 10 acute visits a year you can use that are part of your membership. As part of the membership, exactly. What, and I, I'll tell you one other story. So how I got to this thing. So.

• 24:54Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah, because you know.

• 24:55Speaker 01

  At Whole Foods, we were self-insured. So we paid, means we had, United Healthcare might have been the administrator and they might have had a network, but we were actually paying all the cost of it. What we discovered was, as we tracked it, was the 10% of our employees, team members, were spending 90% of our healthcare dollars.

• 25:14Dr. Mark Hyman?

  That's right.

• 25:15Speaker 01

  So we began to think, how can we take these 10%? If we can get them healthier, that's going to be a win-win-win, right? Be good for them, and it'll be good for Whole Foods.

• 25:24Dr. Mark Hyman?

  That's right.

• 25:24Speaker 01

  And it'll be good for everyone else as well, their families and everyone else connected to it. So we began to create what we call a total health immersion. And we worked with four different sets of, four doctors and we, we, we worked, uh, four different times a year. And we, we would invite any team member to apply for it. We'd cover all the cost. Of course, we favored those who we knew were in our magic 10%. What ended up happening was pretty extraordinary.

• 25:50Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 25:51Speaker 01

  We'd go in a retreat setting for a week. And my biggest takeaway from the retreats was, did you know, I mean, you know this, the human body is far more resilient than I realized.

• 26:01Dr. Mark Hyman?

  A hundred percent.

• 26:02Speaker 01

  If we just stop poisoning it, it starts to heal.

• 26:05Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Bingo.

• 26:06Speaker 01

  It's incredible.

• 26:07Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah, it's.

• 26:07Speaker 01

  I had not known that personally because I'd sort of been on this gradual health journey for decades, right?

• 26:12Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 26:13Speaker 01

  So I never had any radical improvements, but what we saw in those, in those weeks were people that if they were obese, they generally lose seven to 10 pounds in that week. We saw type 2 diabetics that could actually, in even just a week.

• 26:27Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah, normalize.

• 26:27Speaker 01

  Get normalized and get off their meds.

• 26:29Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 26:29Speaker 01

  Uh, we saw people's cholesterol drop 30 to 40 points in that week and we saw blood pressure and sometimes drop 30 to 40.

• 26:37Dr. Mark Hyman?

  That's what people don't realize, John, is that people are just a few days away from feeling better.

• 26:41Speaker 01

  They are.

• 26:42Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And they don't know it.

• 26:42Speaker 01

  They don't know it.

• 26:43Dr. Mark Hyman?

  It's like Dorothy in the ruby red slippers, you know?

• 26:45Speaker 01

  That's right. That's what's so powerful about a type of retreat-like setting because now, here's another takeaway though. Again, like knowledge, we taught people the principles, we showed them what to do. Some took that knowledge, Mark, and they never looked back. Their life was transformed. I'd travel around and visit our stores and they'd come up and hug me and say, thank you, thank you, thank you, Mr. Mackey, changed my life. You know, I'm gonna see my grandchildren now and I'm playing with my kids. It's so great. Thank you so much. And others who were apologizing because they had, they'd lost weight and then they gained it back because they went back to their diets. And the, and the takeaway was, when you look a little further was, for people to really make lasting change, some people can do it on their own. Most people need a community of support.

• 27:28Dr. Mark Hyman?

  A hundred percent.

• 27:28Speaker 01

  And so Love Life aims to be that community of support for people who really want to become the healthiest version of themselves. If, if just like I say, like, let's say you're an alcoholic and we send you to rehab for 90 days and you come back sober. You don't crave alcohol any longer, but if you go back into the same social network.

• 27:47Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah. All your friends are alcoholics, right?

• 27:49Speaker 01

  Yeah. And, and they're, and you're gonna be back off, you're gonna fall off the wagon pretty quickly. So you need a new set of friends, basically. We found that out and it's like, that's my takeaway from the total health emergence. You need community of support.

• 28:00Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And how did you apply that at Whole Foods after that? Because I, you know, I think that you're hitting on something that's very important is that. We we call chronic illness non-communicable disease, but that's completely wrong. It's not infectious, but it's contagious.

• 28:13Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 28:14Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And just as chronic disease can be contagious, you're more likely to be obese if your friends are overweight than even your family's overweight. Cause you're basically as healthy as your five closest friends. You know, if all your friends are drinking green juices and going to yoga as opposed to drinking beer and having burgers and fries, you're going to be healthier.

• 28:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's why they, you know, like you're, if you're a teenager, hang around kids that smoked, you more likely become a smoker.

• 28:39Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah, and community is medicine. And we did this at the Saddleback Church with Rick Warren. We got 15,000 people who lose a quarter million pounds by doing it in community. So. And it was powerful. And I'm curious how at Whole Foods, you you did the community piece.

• 28:50Speaker 01

  Well, this was, this was the flaw in the program. We're still doing the program. We still have follow up with people afterwards. Here's the problem. We've, you know, got over a hundred thousand team members and they're from all over the country and in Canada and UK for that matter, too. So they might go back, but they're the people they met, the community of people that they were with. They are scattering.

• 29:13Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 29:13Speaker 01

  So that community is not together. Now, if some of them came from the same store, then they have a little bit of community support. We can, we could put them in touch with others that were on the journey, but again, they're so spread out. We didn't solve for it. It's still a problem. It's still a challenge. I really do think these, what Love Life's doing and what other wellness centers, holistic health centers will create will be also social places for people to go and hang out. We've, we've designed it in that way. Our, when you see our space, you'll see the coworking space, the community areas, the cafe is the couches. The, the comfortable chairs are all set up for people to hang out, work, network with their friends that are there.

• 29:57Speaker 01

  You know, most health clubs formula is to get people to become members and just keep paying, but hopefully never come.

• 30:03Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Right.

• 30:03Speaker 01

  We have the opposite philosophy. We really like people to spend a couple hours or more every day at Love Life. Come, come in after work, do some of the recovery modalities, or do a workout, do some recovery, have a meal, meet some people, play some pickleball, take a class. We have all kinds of different classes there. There's so many, stay around for one of our talks, or one of our events that are happening, or really want to nurture community.

• 30:29Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And how, how do you see this intersecting with healthcare? Because you know, people have their health insurance and people aren't very motivated usually to pay out of pocket for healthcare, which they think this should be.

• 30:39Speaker 01

  That's the biggest challenge, to be honest. Of course, everybody asks about that. We do create super bills for people. And so if they, and, but most of our docs, our doctors are out of network, most likely for them. For a lot of the testing that we're doing, you can also use your 125, your HSA, your HRA. Those can all go towards this.

• 30:58Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 30:59Speaker 01

  I was, I was talking to somebody about it recently, and I just said, you know what? Insurance will be one of the last dominos to fall. It won't, it won't change until the market demands that it change, until people are complaining. And then until the government maybe steps in and starts saying, you need to cover this stuff, too.

• 31:17Dr. Mark Hyman?

  But also, if you, if you track your data at Love Life, you can see longitudinally how people do.

• 31:23Speaker 01

  Oh, we do.

• 31:24Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And that way you can actually show payers how this is actually saving them money. And that's going to change reimbursement.

• 31:30Speaker 01

  I, I really do think before we get, the insurance companies to change. Now, we have, we're, this is a, we think a B to B potential is big there. Like, remember I told you about how Whole Foods was self-insured? We think we can go to big employers in the area and, and do two things. We can say, look, give us your sick people, because we know if you're self-insured that like Whole Foods, 10, 10% are spending 90% of their money. Give us, give us those people that are motivated, only the ones that want to come, because we can't do anything if people don't want to heal themselves. And we can help them heal, and we can help them heal pretty quickly, and do that on a, you know, fee per person basis. And also, but also, we'd like to go to those same corporations and say, now, give us your.

• 32:13Speaker 01

  And comers, your executives and get and get them a optimized member optimized gold membership at at Love Life as a perk as a benefit. These are the people you're counting on to make the most important decisions in your business. The healthier they are, the more vital they are, the better their decision making they're going to be. And they're less likely they're going to leave because this is one of your perks. But competitors are not offering. Yeah. So there's two ways to approach the B to B. I think the again, the insurance will change, but it's like, it's just not.

• 32:43Dr. Mark Hyman?

  It's slow.

• 32:44Speaker 01

  It's it's that we got to go for the low hanging fruit first.

• 32:47Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah, no, I agree. I think you're right. And you know, I think the, you know, the question is, can you kind of force people into collective change together? I don't know the answer to that, but I know.

• 32:58Speaker 01

  Part in America.

• 32:58Dr. Mark Hyman?

  I know in Cleveland Clinic, we had a waiting list of 3,000 people for our Center for Functional Medicine.

• 33:03Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 33:04Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And so what we said was, you can't get into a one on one appointment, but you get into a group visit. And we were able to put people in group visits who, you know, necessarily maybe wanted to see someone privately, but they were willing to just get in. And what we found was that the health outcomes were three times better for the same condition treated by the same doctors in the same clinic. And we compared, you know, a doctor treating diabetes in a group versus a doctor one on one.

• 33:34Speaker 01

  Same.

• 33:35Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And it was three times better outcomes in the group. And and and the savings were far more so better outcomes, lower costs is what healthcare is. Is the holy grail, like value based care. So it was interesting because not everybody would kind of, you know, really opted in. I mean, I guess they sort of opted in because they they couldn't get an appointment, but it wasn't like they were motivated to be in a group. They they actually were motivated to be seen.

• 33:56Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 33:57Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And that just was what we found. So I think, I think if we can kind of encourage people to do that. And A is a great example. Weight Watchers is a great example. People change in in a collective.

• 34:08Speaker 01

  Totally agree. And that's why in the B to B approach, if we can get a group of peers that are coming in from the same company and they're motivated to try to heal themselves, we have a much better chance if they come in as a group, you might say.

• 34:22Dr. Mark Hyman?

  So, you know, you sort of, you're sort of an unlikely character, like a hippie from the 70s who started a health food store and, you know, now they're current of Whole Foods. And then you help build this movement around conscious capitalism, which

• 34:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 34:36Dr. Mark Hyman?

  is sort of, I'd love you to sort of talk a little bit about that because I think it's part of what you're doing with. Love Life, which is a business, but it's also bringing more light into the world as opposed to darkness.

• 34:48Speaker 01

  So Conscious Capitalism is a movement I co-founded and did, I wrote a book called Conscious Capitalism, co-authored that with my good friend Raj Sissodia. And as I built Whole Foods, what I began to realize was that, because I didn't have a business background, I hadn't worked for any corporations, I began to realize that Whole Foods was very different than most other businesses. And that, you know, we had this higher purpose, we were really cared about all of our stakeholders, we were trying to create these cultures where humans were flourishing, we wanted to lead with love. It was, and these were just, you know, I just thought we were sort of, just kind of one weird, a weirdo company.

• 35:30Speaker 01

  And then I read a book called Firms of Endearment by my co-author of Conscious Capitalism, Raj Sissodia.

• 35:36Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Firms, not terms, but firms.

• 35:37Speaker 01

  Firms.

• 35:38Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Companies.

• 35:39Speaker 01

  Firms of Endearment. And what thirty that he identified, they, he and his co-author identified. And a firm of endearment was one, all the stakeholders loved the firm.

• 35:46Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Not the shareholders, but the stakeholders.

• 35:48Speaker 01

  The shareholders do too.

• 35:49Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 35:50Speaker 01

  Shareholders loved them too, because they all performed really well economically. But the customers loved them, their employees loved them, their suppliers loved them, they're sort of universally loved. And so Whole Foods was one of those thirty companies. And you know what got me excited when I read the book? I said, "I'm not alone. There are other weirdos out there too, doing similar stuff."

• 36:07Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 36:08Speaker 01

  And so I got together with the authors and said, "Listen, I want, can you put me in touch with some of these other people?"

• 36:14Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 36:15Speaker 01

  And so they did, and, and I started to realize, "This is great. This is great." And I realized, more people need to know about this, because all of these people are financially very successful. Being loved by all your stakeholders and having a higher purpose is good business. It's a way to make more money. It's not, it's, the money comes from practicing those principles, in other words. So people think there's this dichotomy between...

• 36:41Dr. Mark Hyman?

  It's like, honestly, when you, when you're not motivated by money, you make more money.

• 36:45Speaker 01

  Yes. It's, there's a good metaphor for it. If you pursue happiness... You probably won't find it. Happiness, because you'll just, if people that pursue happiness the hardest, oftentimes end up being narcissists.

• 36:57Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 36:58Speaker 01

  Happiness comes from, it ensues, it ensues from love, from goodness, from compassion, forgiveness, kindness, generosity. You, you, you, you become happy because of, not because you're pursuing it directly, but because it's a byproduct of these other qualities. Meaningful work, caring, loving, family, these things lead to happiness. So anyway, it's the same way with money, ultimately. Profits come from creating value for customers, our members, or patients, or whoever you're working with. That's the ultimate way profits are, come about. They're indirectly come about from creating value in the world.

• 37:42Speaker 01

  So conscious capitalism has four basic principles to it, Mark. First principle is higher purpose. Every business has its potential for higher purpose. For example, my body has to produce red blood cells, or I'm going to be dead. But it doesn't logically follow that my higher purpose is to produce red blood cells. Similarly, businesses must make money, or they will die. That's not why they exist.

• 38:06Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 38:07Speaker 01

  The purpose of creating value for their customers, and Whole Foods' higher purpose was to nourish people and the planet.

• 38:15Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 38:16Speaker 01

  Love life is the, helping people to become the healthiest version of themselves. So every business has its higher purpose. Then you have stakeholders. They all are important, they all matter, customers matter, employees matter, suppliers matter, and investors matter, the community matters, the environment matters. And business has to create strategies where they're all simultaneously winning. Third is leadership. Leaders can't be in it just to line their own pockets. Leaders have got to be those who are purpose driven, are serving the stakeholders, and they're ultimately servant leaders. And finally, we create cultures, a conscious business, a conscious leader creates cultures where human beings flourish, where they are happy, where they're fulfilled, where their, where their work is meaningful, and they're part of a community that cares about them.

• 39:01Speaker 01

  That's conscious capitalism in a nutshell.

• 39:02Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah, that's beautiful. And has it taken off? I mean, you heard, I think the guy who's, I think Larry Fink, who writes this letter every year, one year wrote a letter about how we need to think about our... Stakeholders, not only our shareholders, but I wonder how much that's really filtered into the business world.

• 39:23Speaker 01

  Well, you know, it's interesting, it has filtered in. So when they had that round table, business round table came out, basically checking off the principles of conscious capitalism. They got a lot of pushback, a lot of controversy in business circles. I found out later that women that had been the leader of that, the conscious capitalism had been their framework, the book had been their framework for those principles. They didn't, they did not credit us.

• 39:47Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 39:47Speaker 01

  Nevertheless, what any author wants to hear is that their ideas are having an impact and influencing things. So, speaking of Larry Fink, so I'm going to, we're having a special conclave down in Cabo for CEOs of very large corporations. There would be about, I think, I don't know, thirty, thirty or forty, and Larry's hosting it down there. And we're not calling it conscious capitalism, it's principles of responsible business or something like that. Anyway, I got an invitation to that.

• 40:16Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Amazing.

• 40:16Speaker 01

  So I'm going to be going down and excited to talk to some of these other, there's some, there's some big, big names going down there. So I'm excited to be, be part of that.

• 40:25Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah, because we live in such an extractive world and we have extractive capitalism. It's the opposite of conscious capitalism. We have extractive agriculture. We have extractive healthcare.

• 40:35Speaker 01

  We don't have, it's just they don't take a systems approach. And really, what we're talking about with conscious capitalism is viewing things in a larger context, the larger system, that that actually leads to better business. It's harder. It's harder to do it. It's, think about, it's like, you think about healthcare, because that's what we've been talking about. As you say, that's like extractive healthcare, because it's just dealing with symptoms. It's not dealing with root causes, right?

• 40:59Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Right.

• 41:00Speaker 01

  I mean, functional medicine, you're, you know, you're probably the leader in functional medicine, that's going to root causes and trying to root them out and then help people to heal at the deepest levels.

• 41:12Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 41:13Speaker 01

  That's revolutionary medicine.

• 41:15Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 41:16Speaker 01

  It's a really, really big deal. So you should be really proud of what you've done.

• 41:18Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Thank you. Yeah, it's sort of what drives me is how do I, how do I, how do I end needless suffering for millions of people because

• 41:24Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 41:25Dr. Mark Hyman?

  People don't have to suffer like you're talking about before when you would bring the team members of Whole Foods to these retreats and they would have this radical transformation in a week and they were suffering before and then they end up in a short period of a week not suffering, you know, and I, I think that, you know, I, I created something called the 10 day detox diet, which essentially eliminates all the processed food and crap, it adds in all the good foods and it's, it's so powerful.

• 41:49Speaker 01

  10 days, it's like the seven day.

• 41:51Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 41:51Speaker 01

  10, 10 days is even better because it's three days longer.

• 41:53Dr. Mark Hyman?

  That's right.

• 41:54Speaker 01

  30 days is better than that.

• 41:55Dr. Mark Hyman?

  I know, but if I called the 30 day diet, no one would do it.

• 41:57Speaker 01

  That's, that's right. People, you know, you decide 10 days was kind of the, uh, that's most you could hope for the sweet spot.

• 42:04Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah. Uh, and it, and it was, it's amazing to see that. And I think when people have the experience of what it's like to feel good, they, they, they actually can connect to something and come back to it, even if they kind of veer off.

• 42:17Speaker 01

  Those notes from God are a little, or you can hear them a little bit better.

• 42:19Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Exactly. Yeah. And I, I think, you know, um, the work you've done around this conscious capitalism movement is, is so important because it's so much of the things that are happening in our world are all because of, of a lack of consciousness and a lack of awareness and a lack of understanding that value creation isn't just about the bottom line, it's about multiple bottom lines where everybody wins, where the planet wins, where you win, where your community wins, you know, where.

• 42:47Speaker 01

  Win, win, win.

• 42:47Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 42:48Speaker 01

  I just did a TED talk a few months ago on win, win, win.

• 42:50Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And what, what were you saying in there?

• 42:52Speaker 01

  The win, win, win is seeking in its simplest, it's, it's looking for everyone you interact with. You're looking a win for them, a win for yourself and a win for the larger whole that we're all part of. If all three aren't winning, bad strategy.

• 43:07Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 43:08Speaker 01

  So it's kind of giving your mind and your heart permission to go down that path. And so if you unleash your mind to look for the win, win, win, it will find it. And we generally make trade offs and we generally approach it win, lose. We're in a culture where sports and game metaphors are somebody wins, most people lose. Hey, that's the way life is.

• 43:30Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 43:30Speaker 01

  No, that's a particular approach to life and it's not the best approach for your happiness or for the betterment of the world. The win, win, win strategy, I argue, is a universal ethical system. I challenge you to think of any ethical, any ethical dilemma you're in where win, win, win isn't the best way to approach it.

• 43:59Dr. Mark Hyman?

  It's hard to get people out of the scarcity mindset and into it, this idea of abundance. And, you know, I find that the more I give, the more I get, the more I give money away, the more I give my time away, the more I give my love away, my energy away, the more it comes back.

• 44:14Speaker 01

  Because the universe is a mirror, reflects exactly back what you're getting. The more love you give, the more love you receive, the kinder you are, the more kindness comes back. If people could understand that we are all connected, we are all one, that when they attack someone else, they're attacking themselves. When, if we can understand that love is the deeper reality and that we share love, it comes back to us, we help light somebody, somebody lights the candle of love in us, we send it and give it to somebody else, and that's how this planet's going to heal. It's going to heal ultimately through people waking up and being more conscious about how, how they show up in the world and how transformative love is. I'm like, I'm a big apostle of love.

• 44:59Dr. Mark Hyman?

  I think you're right on to something, but we live in such a divisive world now, and I feel like we're less connected and more divided and.

• 45:07Speaker 01

  So it starts with yourself.

• 45:08Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 45:09Speaker 01

  Only you can transform the world. I don't mean that in a narcissistic sense. I mean, as we, as we offer love and peace, it is offered back to us. And right now, I can't worry about absolutely the whole world, that just puts you into despair. All I can do is show up every day. My, my wife has a mantra that I try to follow. It's just love everyone all the time, no exceptions.

• 45:36Dr. Mark Hyman?

  That's pretty good.

• 45:37Speaker 01

  Yes, exactly. She says, John, it's so much simpler. You don't have to worry about, well, I'm mad at him, I like her, I'm not so sure about this guy. She says, no, don't have all those comparisons. Just show up, open-hearted, and love everyone.

• 45:52Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 45:53Speaker 01

  And, yeah, she's, she's my teacher.

• 45:56Dr. Mark Hyman?

  That's actually an incredibly powerful. Way to live and you know, I don't know if I do that all the time in in my regular life,

• 46:04Speaker 01

  But most of us don't.

• 46:05Dr. Mark Hyman?

  But as a doctor.

• 46:06Speaker 01

  That's how you show up.

• 46:07Dr. Mark Hyman?

  I sort of reflected on like, what is, what is it that makes me good at what I do? And why do people keep coming back? And I think when I meet with someone, because when you're a doctor, you get to into this sacred space with someone where they're sharing their vulnerabilities, their suffering, their fears, their relationship stuff, like whatever their life story. And I, and I take a very deep life story. I don't, I'm not the eight minute doctor visit, you know, I spend a couple of hours with people initially and then, you know, I get to know them.

• 46:34Speaker 01

  And we can offer your job at Love Life. You're the kind of doctor we're looking for.

• 46:38Dr. Mark Hyman?

  I know, I wish I had more, more of me to go around. What I let myself do is, is love every patient is, is to see who they are as a human being. And no matter who they are, where they're from, but I used to work in the Idaho State Penitentiary, you know, when I, and, and I mean, as a part time gig when I was a doctor in Idaho, and I would walk in there with murderers and rapists and people who've done horrible things and I would just try to meet them and see who they were and love them. And what was really actually shocking to me was most of them were just scared little kids that didn't grow, ever grow up. And they did these horrible things out of their own trauma. And to be able to sort of see that and know, and if you just stop and spend enough time with somebody and talk to them like the homeless guy on the street.

• 47:21Speaker 01

  You were helping heal them because you're, you were actually, you're being present like that and open is love.

• 47:26Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 47:27Speaker 01

  You, you were radiating love to them, whether you're conscious of it or not. That was probably helping to heal them.

• 47:32Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 47:32Speaker 01

  Because that's what everybody wants.

• 47:33Dr. Mark Hyman?

  I'm sure, I'm sure. And also, it also, yeah, helped them to, you know, feel safe and it helped me to actually, you know, care for them enough to, to really work hard to figure out what was going on. And I, it's, it's like, I, I, I don't know why I started out like that, but I just, I've always been like that. And I, I remember being like three years old and, and seeing all these grownups who were just so unhappy and not nice and not acting out of love. And I'm like, didn't I, I didn't get it. I literally remember saying to my three year old self, I'm like, I just was full of love all the time and I didn't get why everybody wasn't all full of love all the time. You know, it's like, that's our natural state.

• 48:09Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 48:09Dr. Mark Hyman?

  You know?

• 48:09Speaker 01

  That's right. Love is the essence of what we are, but it gets blocked. It gets blocked by. Anger, fear, judgment, attack, envy, resentment. All those type of emotions clouded over so that the light doesn't shine through. But if we practice forgiveness and we work at opening and being present, the light begins to shine through us again. Here's an interesting thing I've learned. It's maybe one of the most important tips I will give. If you love everyone all the time, don't we forget that every day? At times, we go back into judgment. We judge, you're driving over here, somebody cuts me off, asshole. I'm not very loving what I'm saying, thinking that or saying that.

• 48:52Speaker 01

  But what I've learned is that the past doesn't exist any longer.

• 48:55Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 48:56Speaker 01

  All that's real is this moment. And no matter how many times I forget, I can go back in the next moment and choose love. I can choose to be present. I can choose to let my heart open. Even if I forget it, next moment I can choose it. If I forget it, next moment I can choose it. I can practice going back to it. And it's like, kind of like meditating.

• 49:17Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 49:17Speaker 01

  The more you practice it, the more skilled you get at it. The more you practice being present and opening to love, the easier it gets.

• 49:25Dr. Mark Hyman?

  It's such a simple idea, choose love over fear.

• 49:27Speaker 01

  Yes, choose love over fear. Kind of like that first LSD, that massive LSD trip I took. There's nothing really to be afraid of.

• 49:33Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 49:34Speaker 01

  Because the things we're afraid of, like death or suffering or pain, in an ultimate sense, those things really aren't real in any ultimate sense. We make them real through our, through our own minds.

• 49:48Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Our beliefs are what keep us in prison, you know?

• 49:50Speaker 01

  Anyway, I found that, uh, actually, anyway, important thing that I've learned is that no matter how many times I forget, I can always remember in the next moment. I'm always, I can be free in the next moment.

• 50:02Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Isn't that the truth, John? I mean, yeah, I, you know, I thought a lot about death and life because I almost died recently.

• 50:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 50:09Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And I, I realized that. The real secret, the meaning of life, like the purpose of life is to get free. So you can be love.

• 50:18Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 50:18Dr. Mark Hyman?

  It's like, most of us are in a self-made prison.

• 50:22Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 50:22Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Of our beliefs, of our thoughts, of our

• 50:24Speaker 01

  So true.

• 50:24Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Conceptions, of our ideology. And it, you know, we're, we're always in this trap, but it, there's actually a way to get free.

• 50:34Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 50:34Dr. Mark Hyman?

  And, and when you're free, all you want to do is love.

• 50:37Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 50:38Dr. Mark Hyman?

  It's kind of like a magic trick.

• 50:39Speaker 01

  You know, I felt that about you the first time I met you. I felt like you were a very loving person.

• 50:44Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Thank you.

• 50:44Speaker 01

  You just, you had a very open heart.

• 50:46Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 50:46Speaker 01

  And you're very caring and I felt that vibe from you.

• 50:49Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 50:50Speaker 01

  And you know what? Here's the good news. It's a lot stronger now than when I first met you. So.

• 50:55Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah, well, I've gotten more free. I've gotten shit, all the old stories, all the bullshit. Oh my God, it's hard work, you know? But I think, you know, this revolution in, in, in, um, health and well-being that you're part of and the revolution in mental health, which in, in some ways, love life is really helping to solve because you're building community and loneliness is this big, one of the biggest causes of illness. Uh, and you know, it's like the community aspect is such a, a big piece. And for me, at the end of the day, it's just about how do we, how do we sort of always move into the space of, of love rather than fear?

• 51:33Speaker 01

  We will forget, but we can choose it the next moment. Just remember, no matter how many times you forget the past, you don't, you don't have to bring the past into the present.

• 51:41Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 51:42Speaker 01

  You can be free of the past by just letting it go, realizing it's not real. And in this moment, be present, be conscious, let love flow.

• 51:51Dr. Mark Hyman?

  I think, I think the psychedelic revolution, and it was your awakening and certainly it's part of mine. And I think a lot of people's, to be honest with you, if you look at like Steve Jobs.

• 52:00Speaker 01

  It's what knocked me off the path my parents had programmed into me.

• 52:03Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Exactly. And you know, we think about some of the big corporations that are going on, I think that people don't talk about it, but like. Apple came out of psychedelics, right? And, and I think for me, and I think increasingly like for the population at large, it's this sort of psychedelic revolution around psychedelic therapy.

• 52:21Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 52:22Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Is part of the answer to helping people to let go of the idea of separateness and to let go of the idea that they have to meet life with fear or that they are stuck. And I think, I wish everybody could, I mean, I wish I could literally just take a giant bunch of mushrooms or LSD and put it in the water in Congress.

• 52:40Speaker 01

  That would be scary to people. So there, one way to think about it, I read this book a long time ago, which was a very simple little 50-page book, and it basically said, "The lazy man's light guide to enlightenment."

• 52:53Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Oh, yeah, I remember that book.

• 52:54Speaker 01

  And it had one big idea in it. And that big idea was, you're either expanding or contracting. So, expanding opens our consciousness and opens our hearts for love. Contracting closes it down.

• 53:08Dr. Mark Hyman?

  That's right.

• 53:09Speaker 01

  So, fear, judgment, hatred, anger, these all contract. The heart shuts down. And then forgiveness, love, generosity. I, I, I practice gratitudes every day. Gratitude is a huge expansion and everything, no matter how my, my, my little petty problems that might, might be there at work or whatever. Practicing the gratitudes in the morning is always expansive. It's always, reminds me, that's petty stuff.

• 53:38Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 53:39Speaker 01

  This is what really matters.

• 53:40Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 53:41Speaker 01

  I do think the daily practices are important for people if they want to help not get lost again.

• 53:46Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Why don't we, why don't we instead of close by having you share with us your, your practices? How do you keep yourself mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually contracted?

• 53:56Speaker 01

  Sure. I start out my day, pee, and then I wring myself. Then when I, then I, then I do my spiritual practices, which involve reading some type of spiritual text. I'm a longtime student of A Course in Miracles, so frequently that's what I'm reading. Then I, then I do gratitudes, the expansive gratitudes, that, and I just let my mind go whatever I feel ungrateful for and, and let that go as long as it feels right. Then I put forth, we can call them, you can call them affirmations, you can call them prayers, intentionality. I put out there things that I would really like to see manifest. I put it out in a clear visualization of it. And then I meditate.

• 54:39Speaker 01

  After that, I'm gonna, I'm gonna go make a smoothie. I start every day off with a smoothie. It's fifty percent fruit, fifty percent vegetables. It's got some protein in it, but it's extremely nutritious. And I make a whole two liters of that in a Vitamix. And I'm gonna have two glasses for breakfast and then the rest, my wife will have a glass and the other glass will get finished off sometime later in the day. And then I exercise. I'm usually going for a walk. I'm playing pickleball. I'm doing Pilates. I'm doing yoga. I'm doing a couple of those. Then I will go, I might read or I might go off to work, depending on what's going on, or I might have meetings. I will try to do some other kind of exercise at the end of the day. Now, for food, for me, I am ethical vegan.

• 55:23Speaker 01

  So a hundred percent plant-based. So I try to eat a whole foods, a plant-based diet, minimize salt, minimize oil, minimize processed foods of all kinds. Not perfect in that regard, but you know, probably compared to most people, I'm very high up the list there. I really think fruits and vegetables are extremely healthy. So I'm on, I'm, I would say I'm on a high, complex carb diet. I'm eating, cause I'm eating a lot of fruits, a lot of whole grains, a lot of beans. I do get a lot of protein because I, I really do eat lots of foods that have a lot of protein in them, greens. I eat tons of greens. I think my diet's healthy for me and I think work, I think having purpose. I read a lot.

• 56:07Speaker 01

  Also have, I think having purposeful work, like love life. I'm on six boards, so I've got other distractions that way. And so, and I, and then I want to spend a lot of time with my wife.

• 56:17Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 56:18Speaker 01

  She's kind of my spiritual.

• 56:20Dr. Mark Hyman?

  You guys have a remarkable relationship. I mean, you, you've had Whole Foods for a long time, but you've also had this marriage.

• 56:26Speaker 01

  I've been with Deborah for thirty-five years now. And she's, you know, I, I tell the story in the book, the woman in the dream, when I'd met her, she was seven years younger than me and, and I, I considered myself, my ego being what it is, thought I was a pretty conscious dude. But I was just blown away on the very first date. Talk about the notes from God, my whole soul was saying, this woman is the most awake person you've ever come across. Don't blow it.

• 56:48Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Don't screw it up, John.

• 56:50Speaker 01

  I pretty much did because I was so nervous. First thing I did when I picked, it was a blind date. I'd never met her before. First I pick her up and first thing I do, I'm nervous. She's the most beautiful person, woman I've ever seen. And, and, and I said, hey, uh, uh, mind if I look in your refrigerator?

• 57:06Speaker 01

  She says, that's weird, but sure.

• 57:08Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Refrigerator biopsy.

• 57:10Speaker 01

  You can tell a lot about a person in your refrigerator.

• 57:12Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Bookshelf in the refrigerator.

• 57:13Speaker 01

  I went to the bookshelf second. That was more socially acceptable. She was, she ended up being the great love of my life. And I will tell you a story that I tell in the book. I call the chapter, the women in the dream, because I had had a recurring dream. In this dream, that I had many times, I'm going to this park, Peace Park in Austin, near where my house is. Near central, in central Austin. I'm going there and I'm there, it's in the morning and I'm looking and this beautiful woman is walking to me. She's naked and she's radiating, she's shining. And she, and I, I, she comes up to me and I, I break up a conversation. I start a conversation with her and I say, so, um, uh, uh, who are you?

• 57:56Speaker 01

  And she says, you know who I am. I said, okay. Well, what are, what are you doing? She says, I've been waiting. What have you been waiting for? I've been waiting for you to catch up to me.

• 58:08Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Oh, wow.

• 58:09Speaker 01

  Well, why? And she grabs my hand and she says, so we can run together. And we take off running and then I wake up.

• 58:17Dr. Mark Hyman?

  That's amazing. Beautiful dream.

• 58:19Speaker 01

  After I'd had the blind date, I had the dream again. And the first time I knew who she was, it was her, Deborah.

• 58:26Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Wow, that's incredible. I got chills from that story.

• 58:29Speaker 01

  I know, incredible story.

• 58:31Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Note to end on, I, I'm just really honored to be able to know you and your wife and be in Austin with you and look forward to playing pickup ball and more things and more conversations.

• 58:40Speaker 01

  I really, I really admire what you're doing, making a big difference in the world and very appreciative. And I wish just love and happiness to you and always. Thank you so very much.

• 58:48Dr. Mark Hyman?

  Thank you, John. Thanks for being on the podcast.

• 58:50Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 58:51Dr. Mark Hyman?

  If you love, when it comes to supplements, you only want the best for your body, the kind with the highest quality, cleanest and most potent ingredients you can get. That's exactly what you'll find at my supplement store, where I've hand selected each and every product to meet the most rigorous standards for safety, purity and effectiveness. These are the only supplements I recommend to my patients and they're also what I use myself. Whether you want to optimize longevity or reduce your disease risk, or you're looking to improve your Sleep, blood sugar, metabolism, gut health, you name it. DrHyman.com has the world's best selection of top-quality, premium supplements, all backed by science and expertly vetted by me, Dr. Mark Hyman. So check out DrHyman.com because when it comes to your health, nothing less than the very best will do. That's DrHyman.com, D-R-H-Y-M-A-N dot com.

• 59:35Dr. Mark Hyman?

  For this podcast, please share it with someone else you think would also enjoy it. You can find me on all social media channels at DrMarkHyman. Please reach out. I'd love to hear your comments and questions. Don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe to The Dr. Hyman Show wherever you get your podcasts. And don't forget to check out my YouTube channel at DrMarkHyman for video versions of this podcast and more. Thank you so much again for tuning in. We'll see you next time on The Dr. Hyman Show. This podcast is separate from my clinical practice at the Ultra Wellness Center, my work at Cleveland Clinic, and Function Health, where I am Chief Medical Officer. This podcast represents my opinions and my guests' opinions. Neither myself nor the podcast endorses the views or statements of my guests. This podcast is for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional care by a doctor or other qualified medical professional.

• 1:00:19Dr. Mark Hyman?

  This podcast is provided with the understanding that it does not constitute medical or other professional advice or services. If you're looking for help in your journey, please seek out a qualified medical practitioner. And if you're looking for a functional medicine practitioner, visit my clinic, the Ultra Wellness Center at UltraWellnessCenter.com, and request to become a patient. It's important to have someone in your corner who is a trained, licensed healthcare practitioner and can help you make changes, especially when it comes to your health. This podcast is free as part of my mission to bring practical ways of improving health to the public. So I'd like to express gratitude to sponsors that made today's podcast possible. Thanks so much again for listening.