Fix Your Brain Health By Starting These Habits [MASTERCLASS] EP 1308

Today’s episode is a masterclass around how to fix and improve your health. Three experts on health & nutrition share their perspectives and advice to anyone wanting to improve the quality of their physical and mental health. In this episode, Dr. Daniel Amen, psychiatrist and brain disorder specialist, explains the significance of what we eat and how to put yourself in an anti-aging environment. Dr. Mark Hyman, physician and author, elaborates on the connection between food and mood and the basic principles of healthy eating. Dr. Uma Naidoo, nutritional psychiatrist and author, tells us the foods we should be eating to increase the function of our brains and why you aren’t getting enough antioxidants. For more, go to lewishowes.com/1308Full Episodes:Daniel Amen: https://link.chtbl.com/1120-podMark Hyman: https://link.chtbl.com/1075-podUma Naidoo: https://link.chtbl.com/1214-pod Get more from Lewis! Get my New York Times Bestselling book, Make Money Easy! Get The Greatness Mindset audiobook on SpotifyText Lewis AIYouTubeInstagramWebsiteTiktokFacebookX

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

• 0:00Daniel Amen?

  Omega-3 fatty acids decrease inflammation. Fruits and vegetables decrease inflammation, flossing. And probiotics, getting your gut healthy. There's this huge connection between the brain and the gut.

• 0:16Lewis Howes?

  Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, a former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week, we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin.

• 0:40Lewis Howes?

  Welcome to this special masterclass. We've brought some of the top experts in the world to help you unlock the power of your life through this specific theme today. It's going to be powerful, so let's go ahead and dive in.

• 0:58Lewis Howes?

  What I'm hearing you say obesity is a big factor to mental health, stresses and brain stresses.

• 1:04Daniel Amen?

  And Alzheimer's disease.

• 1:06Lewis Howes?

  And Alzheimer's.

• 1:06Daniel Amen?

  Yeah, I mean, it all sort of goes together from depression to problems in school to memory problems later in life.

• 1:16Lewis Howes?

  What's your thought? I mean, I'm all for people loving themselves for where they're at, where they're at in their life, and loving their bodies for where they're at and not shaming themselves. And the self-love movement of accepting yourself for where you are. But that's only going to hurt our brains if we're not actually saying, okay, I accept and love myself where I'm at and the decisions I've made to be here, but I've got to start working on these things. Otherwise, there's going to be some challenges emotionally, mentally, anxiety, depression, if I don't work on it, right? My health.

• 1:48Daniel Amen?

  The don't worry, be happy people die the earliest from accidents and preventable illnesses. And I want people to love themselves. But doing the right thing is an act of love. Like if you're really unhealthy, walking is an act of love. And so, so it sort of catches me in this funny place. I remember I was on a plane once and I'd figure out this connection between.

• 2:26Daniel Amen?

  As your weight goes up, the size and function of your brain goes down. And I was sitting next to someone who was very overweight. And we were on a tiny plane going to Des Moines, Iowa for public television. And in my head, I'm like, oh, you want to talk to her about that? And then I talk to myself all the time. It's like, no, you don't want to say anything. Don't need to upset her day. And but then I went to Pittsburgh and I went to GNC, you know, the supplement company. And one of my core values is being authentic. I live the message of my life. And the message of GNC is health.

• 3:09Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 3:10Daniel Amen?

  And their number three guy, their marketing director, took me to dinner, was morbidly obese.

• 3:15Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 3:15Daniel Amen?

  And and that thought in my head is you should talk to him about this. And and he made the comment, he opened the conversation. He's like, you know, I don't know why I'm overweight, but my numbers are OK. And I'm like,

• 3:33Lewis Howes?

  What numbers?

• 3:34Daniel Amen?

  And I'm like, Tom, you don't want to be a dinosaur. Because I had figured out, big body, little brain, you're going to become extinct. And we had this great conversation because my favorite verse in the New Testament is John 8:32. Know the truth, and the truth will set you free. I'm like, do you not want to be like the number two guy or the number one guy? You're not going to do that if your brain's not healthy. And that conversation, the next year, he lost 80 pounds.

• 4:08Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 4:08Daniel Amen?

  Most people don't know that this is a serious health, mental health, brain health risk.

• 4:18Daniel Amen?

  And I just wanna tell people the truth and I want them to get healthy. And people go, but I don't like any of, one of my NFL players, but I don't like any of the foods that are healthy for me. And I'm like, none, not one? And we did this great exercise and it turned out he liked like 70 of the foods.

• 4:41Lewis Howes?

  Right, right, right.

• 4:42Daniel Amen?

  You only wanna love food that loves you back.

• 4:47Lewis Howes?

  What are the five foods that we should have to help our brain the most?

• 4:53Daniel Amen?

  Salmon, wild salmon, blueberries, walnuts, olive or avocado oil. Yeah, healthy protein, chocolate. I make this great, brain healthy hot chocolate. Every night for my family.

• 5:12Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 5:12Daniel Amen?

  I just look at the six of them that live at home, I'm like, okay, who's up for it tonight? So Costco of all places, organic vanilla, unsweetened almond milk, raw cacao, it's a superfood. So organic raw cacao and a little bit of Sweet Leaf is a company that makes flavored stevia. They make chocolate flavored stevia and put it in a blender, heat it up, it's phenomenal. Good for me, I love it and it loves me back.

• 5:47Lewis Howes?

  It loves you back. So salmon, blueberries, walnuts, avocado or avocado oil, raw chocolate are some of the top favorite foods for the brain?

• 5:56Daniel Amen?

  For the brain.

• 5:57Lewis Howes?

  Why are these foods, is it high in antioxidants? Is it proteins that they have?

• 6:03Daniel Amen?

  So blueberry, it's the phytonutrients. They've actually done studies showing cognitive enhancement with blueberry juice. Salmon, it's the omega-3 fatty acids and the complete protein. Avocados, it's the healthy fat, especially omega-3 fatty acids, same with walnuts. Your brain. Is fat, low-fat diets are bad.

• 6:29Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 6:30Daniel Amen?

  For your brain. People who go on low-fat diets actually have an increased incidence of depression.

• 6:35Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 6:36Daniel Amen?

  Yeah. So, now you don't want bad fats, fried fats particularly. You want healthy fats. Avocados, nuts and seeds, green leafy vegetables.

• 6:46Lewis Howes?

  Olive oil is in there.

• 6:47Daniel Amen?

  Olive oil, avocado oil, damien nut oil.

• 6:52Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. So, how much?

• 6:56Lewis Howes?

  How much food should the brain have? Is it, you know, your buddy, our buddy, Dave Asprey talks about fasting a lot. A lot of people are in this fasting craze. If we're not giving the brain food or nutrients for a day, three days, five days, does that help the brain? Does it reset the brain? Does it hurt the brain?

• 7:15Daniel Amen?

  So, intermittent fasting, where you go 12 to 16 hours from dinner to breakfast or lunch, is good. They've actually found your, there's a term called autophagy.

• 7:28Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 7:29Daniel Amen?

  Where your brain begins to clean up some of the trash.

• 7:32Lewis Howes?

  So, it works in the brain too, not just in the?

• 7:34Daniel Amen?

  It works on the brain as well. Now, I grew up Roman Catholic and long suffering was one of the gifts. And I never got that one. I'm not a fan of long suffering.

• 7:48Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 7:48Daniel Amen?

  I'm not doing a marathon. It's like way too much stress for my brain. And I'm not fasting for three days, but I can go 12 hours. I mean, like, that's not a big deal. And it helps people lose weight. It helps them be healthy. And I come from a family of fat people. My dad used to hate when I would say that. But I have a brother who's 150 pounds overweight, despite me loving him, nudging him. And you just have to be thoughtful. Know your vulnerability in bright minds. The G is genetics. So, know what you're genetically vulnerable to. And, you know, I have to work on it.

• 8:27Lewis Howes?

  Right, right. How, you mentioned you don't do marathons. If you're not traumatizing the brain through contact sports.

• 8:37Lewis Howes?

  But you're an endurance junkie. You love to run marathons. You run them every year. You do triathlons. You do ultra marathons. You're doing mountain climbing. Are these activities good for the brain? To put some extreme stress on it? Even if it's not physical contact to the brain? Or does it long-term hurt the brain?

• 8:56Daniel Amen?

  The scans I have of extreme athletes are not good.

• 9:00Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 9:00Daniel Amen?

  Yeah. I think it's too much stress for the brain. I love HIIT training, high intensity training. That's been shown to increase mitochondria and cells. I'm not a fan of putting your body under a lot of stress. It's just not good for it. Some stress is good. We call it e-stress. A little bit, so your fibers grow. That's why weight training is important. The stronger you are as you age, the less likely you are to have Alzheimer's disease.

• 9:34Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 9:35Daniel Amen?

  But you want to love your brain. You want to make sure you're sleeping for your brain. That's the S in bright minds.

• 9:42Lewis Howes?

  So if someone's like, you know what? Okay, I hear what you're saying. But I really love to do a marathon or two a year. And a few times in my life, I want to do, you know, I want to climb Everest or something like that. I want to do something to challenge myself.

• 9:56Daniel Amen?

  And I'd go like, awesome.

• 9:58Lewis Howes?

  Is that going to hurt the brain long-term?

• 9:59Daniel Amen?

  It's not going to. If you're doing everything else right. So one of my NFL players just signed an $80 million deal.

• 10:06Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 10:06Daniel Amen?

  So he's going to play. And so he's going to play. And but if you're going to do something that is potentially damaging to the brain, make sure you're doing everything else right. So for example, being a firefighter is a brain damaging profession. We need to own that. Just like we need to own playing football is a brain damaging profession. It's like, own it. Everybody knows it. Now, when I started my work in 2007, very few people know it. Now, everybody knows it. But they don't know that being a firefighter, because there are heroes. Those are the people we need when we need them, and we need them healthy.

• 10:51Daniel Amen?

  But because of the toxins they breathe, because of the emotional trauma they see, day in and day out, because of the head traumas they experience, they have a higher incidence of depression, a higher incidence of suicide, and a higher incidence of early death. We should not be okay with this. But it doesn't mean we're not gonna have firefighters. What it means is we should put their brain in a rehabilitative environment all the time. We should be teaching them about brain health, like with NFL players. Currently, we should be teaching them, "Look, if you're gonna do this, own it. It's a brain-damaging sport, so let's just do everything else right."

• 11:34Lewis Howes?

  What are the other things right that you talk about? Are there a few main keys? Is it nutrition? Is it sleep?

• 11:39Daniel Amen?

  Well, if we think about bright minds, it's such a good model. So, blood flow, B is blood flow. So, exercise. And foods like beets that increase blood flow, or supplements like Ginkgo that increase blood flow. The R is retirement and aging. New learning is absolutely critical. You know, your work and studying greatness, you're always learning something new, which is great for the brain.

• 12:08Lewis Howes?

  Retirement plus aging, is that what you said?

• 12:10Daniel Amen?

  Retirement and aging.

• 12:11Lewis Howes?

  So continuing to learn in those stages?

• 12:13Daniel Amen?

  And always putting yourself in an anti-aging environment. So, the food you eat, the exercise, new learning, being passionate, never retiring, right? I mean, maybe you go and do something else you like better because you have enough money, but never retiring, because when you start, when you, when you start not doing things, your brain actually starts to disconnect itself.

• 12:40Lewis Howes?

  So when we, say, say someone retires at 60, 70, 75, and they say, "You know, I'm just gonna sit on the beach for the next however long, enjoy my family time, enjoy the money I've had, and relax." What happens to those people if they don't have a purposeful mission in their life beyond relaxation? What happens?

• 12:59Daniel Amen?

  Their brain disconnects itself.

• 13:01Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 13:01Daniel Amen?

  They have a higher incidence of dementia. And my dad worked until he died when he was almost 91. And he's like, when my friends retire, they die.

• 13:13Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 13:13Daniel Amen?

  And now, if you retire, because you really didn't love what you were doing anyways, and you go off and do something you love, maybe not golf, because you're around all those toxins on the grain, maybe not golf. But when, if you're doing things you love and you're always learning, well, that's awesome. That's a really good thing.

• 13:34Lewis Howes?

  So you can retire from your job, don't retire from your life.

• 13:37Daniel Amen?

  Don't retire from your life.

• 13:38Lewis Howes?

  Stay connected in some meaningful pursuit.

• 13:41Daniel Amen?

  Absolutely critical to staying, keeping young. And then the I is inflammation. This is the big bad actor. Because inflammation in your body, which comes from eating processed foods. One of the surprising things comes from gum disease. If you're not a flosser, you need to floss. I'm a flossing fool.

• 14:02Lewis Howes?

  I did twice a day.

• 14:03Daniel Amen?

  I wasn't that way until I started reading the studies that people who have gum disease have a higher incidence of heart disease, but also a higher incidence of brain disease. They actually found gum bacteria in, higher in the brains of people with Alzheimer's disease. And so omega-3 fatty acids decrease inflammation. Fruits and vegetables decrease inflammation, flossing. And probiotics, getting your gut healthy. There's this huge connection between the brain and the gut. Because inflammation often comes from having an unhealthy gut.

• 14:47Daniel Amen?

  Either from infections or the lousy food that you're eating. And the G is genetics. You need to know your vulnerability, but genes aren't a death sentence. What they should be is a wake-up call to know what you're vulnerable to. My, I have heart disease and obesity in my family. I don't have heart disease and I'm not obese. Why? Because I'm always on a prevention program. You just want to be serious as soon as you know what your risks. Right.

• 15:18Lewis Howes?

  Okay.

• 15:18Daniel Amen?

  Age is head trauma, which we talked about. Brain is soft, skull is hard. There are three million new head injuries every year in the United States. This is a big deal.

• 15:28Lewis Howes?

  Wait, three million new head injuries?

• 15:29Daniel Amen?

  Every year.

• 15:30Lewis Howes?

  Is that from car accidents or sports? Falls. Everything.

• 15:35Daniel Amen?

  Wow. You know, being hit.

• 15:38Lewis Howes?

  Domestic violence, whatever it might be, anything. Gunshot, whatever.

• 15:41Daniel Amen?

  Whatever. Three million.

• 15:43Lewis Howes?

  Three million.

• 15:43Daniel Amen?

  Which means, most people live, over the last thirty years, that's ninety million people in the United States who struggle with the effects of traumatic brain injury. Very high in prison populations, very high in people who struggle with psychiatric diseases. And then T is toxins. And so you go, what can I do to support my brain? Well, one, avoid them. Alcohol is not a health food. Um, my biggest blog last year was titled, "I Told You So." And when I dated my wife, Tana, and I think you met my wife. She's awesome. And when we were dating, she said-

• 16:25Lewis Howes?

  Your current wife?

• 16:26Daniel Amen?

  My current wife.

• 16:26Lewis Howes?

  Not the twenty year.

• 16:27Daniel Amen?

  Not the twenty year. But she said, "I'll never tell you, 'I told you so.'" She lied. She just flat out lied to me. It's like her favorite thing to say. And, um, but I've been telling people ever since I started imaging, alcohol's not a health food. And our first clinic was right next to the Napa Valley, so it was not a popular thing to say. And, but it's just what I saw. And then there's a study from Johns Hopkins that say people who drink every day have smaller brains. And then last year, the American Cancer Society came out and said, "Any alcohol is associated with an increased risk" in cancer. Seven different cancers.

• 17:11Lewis Howes?

  Oh, any alcohol.

• 17:12Daniel Amen?

  Any alcohol.

• 17:13Lewis Howes?

  Man, that hurts. Every wine drinker is saying, no, you're wrong. No, I'm not listening to this right now. What about a glass once or twice a week? What about the nutrients from the grapes?

• 17:24Daniel Amen?

  Well, again, if you're gonna do something that's bad for your brain, you should be doing other things that are good for your brain. Right? It doesn't mean you can never have a drink. But just know, it's not a healthy, healthful thing to do. So you wanna do the other things.

• 17:42Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, like when I eat a bowl of ice cream and pizza, I know it's not helping my brain.

• 17:47Daniel Amen?

  Right, and if you do it once a month, it's like not the biggest deal in the world. But then, because here we're talking about tea for toxins, you want to support the four organs of detoxification. So your kidneys drink more water. Your gut eat more fiber. In my shake every morning, I put fiber in it. In your, for your liver, kill the alcohol. And eat detoxifying vegetables. They're called brassicas, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, broccoli, kale. And take infrared saunas. People who take the most saunas have the lowest incidence of Alzheimer's disease.

• 18:31Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 18:32Daniel Amen?

  Because it detoxifies you. And it's also, there's actually a study in the Journal of the American Medical Association. People with major depression took one infrared sauna, their mood was better. Well, how cool is that? I mean, that's like simple. There's no side effects mostly to taking a 25-minute sauna.

• 18:54Lewis Howes?

  So is it infrared or any type of sauna?

• 18:57Daniel Amen?

  Well, it's probably any type of sauna. But the study was on infrared.

• 19:03Lewis Howes?

  Infrared, gotcha. But anything that's releasing the toxins? Any heat exposure?

• 19:07Daniel Amen?

  And sweat. Sweating with exercise or saunas.

• 19:12Daniel Amen?

  Is detoxifying for you.

• 19:14Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 19:15Daniel Amen?

  And this isn't hard, right? Like, not one thing I've said.

• 19:17Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 19:18Daniel Amen?

  So far, it's hard. The M in Bright Minds is mental health. This is where you learn to kill the ants and tame the dragons. So ant stands for automatic negative thoughts. The thoughts that come into your mind automatically and ruin your day. And the exercise is super simple. Whenever you feel sad, or mad, or nervous, or out of control, write down what you're thinking. And then just ask yourself if it's true. You don't have to believe every stupid thing.

• 19:45Lewis Howes?

  I was working with a therapist recently that said, just because someone tells you something about yourself doesn't mean, and they're trying to give you this thing, doesn't mean you need to receive that gift. It's not a gift you need to receive. They're offering you a gift that's a bad gift, doesn't mean you need to take it. You can just say, okay, I don't need that gift right now. I don't need to let that thought sink in and believe this. And I think, I'll speak for myself, growing up, anytime I heard someone say, you suck, you're dumb, you're an idiot, you're not enough, you'll never amount to whatever, I learned to believe those things. And I think a lot of us probably learned to believe whatever we hear from anyone, whether it was a side comment or a direct comment. And how have you learned, over the years,

• 20:30Lewis Howes?

  to really defend against those ants? Like, besides, someone might say, okay, I tried writing it down, that this is not true, and analyzing this. But what's a, what, how can we really show for ourselves where our thoughts don't consume us in a negative way?

• 20:45Daniel Amen?

  So you know that if you're overweight on Monday, and you have a salad, you are not going to be trim on Friday.

• 20:56Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 20:56Daniel Amen?

  That you need to develop practices.

• 20:59Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 20:59Daniel Amen?

  Right? That getting well physically is a discipline that occurs over and over, over time.

• 21:08Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 21:08Daniel Amen?

  Right? To be mentally well, you need to develop practices that you do, like eating well.

• 21:18Daniel Amen?

  Over and over and over. So for example, I start every day with today is going to be a great day. Soon as my feet hit the floor in the morning, and today was easier because I spent last night in Santa Monica and walked around the beach this morning, and I get to hang out with you. Today is going to be a great day. That way, my unconscious mind finds why it's going to be a great day. And then your brain is always listening. I talk about taming the hopeless and helpless dragon, the dragon from the past that feeds depression. And it's something I do called positivity bias training. I want to get my brain looking for what's right because it automatically goes for what's wrong.

• 22:02Daniel Amen?

  And so I start every day with today is going to be a great day. And then if I have a hard time, if I feel sad or mad or nervous or out of control, I write down what I'm thinking. And then I just go, is it true? And there's a whole bigger method in the book.

• 22:19Daniel Amen?

  And often I'll go to, what's the opposite of that thought? No one loves me, or no one respects me, or you're a failure. And so quickly, my brain, or if I go, my wife never listens to me, I've had that thought.

• 22:33Daniel Amen?

  I'll go, well, I never listened to my wife. And I'm like, oh, that can be true. Or she does listen to me, and then I find the times that she... It's just I don't believe what goes on in my head. And then when I go to bed at night, and this is so powerful, I say a prayer, and then I go, what went well today? And I put myself to sleep by reviewing the positive things that happened that day. And I find the little micro moments, whether it's that sip of hot chocolate that I made that I'm proud of myself for, or some cool text or interaction.

• 23:13Mark Hyman?

  How does food affect our brain? Well, I wrote a book about 13 years ago called The Ultra Mind Solution about how the body affects the mind. We often know about the mind-body effect, which is real, but there's also the other direction going on. And it turns out that food is probably the biggest driver of dysfunction in the brain when it comes to mood, behavior, attention, memory. And this is not just sort of hypothetical, but there's a whole department, for example, at Harvard of nutritional psychiatry. There's a whole department at Stanford of metabolic psychiatry. I've had both of them on my podcast, The Doctor's Pharmacy. The doctors from those institutions are talking about the role of food and the brain and the mood. And we see depression, anxiety, irritability, stress.

• 23:59Mark Hyman?

  It turns out that when you eat the American diet, or otherwise known as the SAD diet, the Standard American Diet, that people are damaging their brains in ways that create inflammation in the brain. And we now know that mental illness often is an inflamed brain. You know, when you cut yourself and you get infection, it's red and hot and sore and inflamed. If you sprain your ankle, it's sore. If you get a sore throat, it's sore and red. When your brain is inflamed, it doesn't hurt. The only way your brain knows how to say ouch is by getting depressed, or anxious, or angry, or irritable, or having even more serious consequences. And so the food that we're eating, predominantly this sugar and starch and processed ingredients, additives,

• 24:43Mark Hyman?

  the lack of good fats, the predominance of bad fats and refined oils, the nutrient depletion of our diet. I mean, 95% of us are deficient probably in omega-3 fats. You know, 90-plus percent of Americans are deficient in one or more nutrients at the minimum level to prevent deficiency, which all play a role in the mood, like folate, magnesium is credible for anxiety, iron, zinc, all these, vitamin D, all these play a role in the brain function. I mean, you hear about winter blues, you know, that's because of lack of vitamin D. So we know about this intimate connection between food and mood and nutritional status and mood. And the clinical trials have been really staggering, showing that people who eat a whole foods diet and get rid of the junk actually can get rid of depression.

• 25:26Mark Hyman?

  I see panic attacks, anxiety disorders, often caused by the food we're eating. Just an example, when you eat sugar or starch... Your cortisol level goes up, which is the stress hormone. Your adrenaline goes up. So if you eat a bagel or a cookie, your body literally has the same reaction as if you're running from a saber-toothed tiger.

• 25:45Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 25:47Mark Hyman?

  And, and that, and that can create anxiety.

• 25:49Lewis Howes?

  Internally with the insulin spike.

• 25:51Mark Hyman?

  Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I mean, you could be totally fine and calm and take five deep breaths before your meal, but if you eat all that crap, your brain is going to feel it, your, your body's going to feel it.

• 25:59Lewis Howes?

  So what hap- what happens to the brain when the, when you're eating a bagel or an ice cream cone or whatever it is, and it goes into your gut? Does it send signals to your brain and then it starts to, uh, you know? What does that do? Is it inflaming in that moment? Does it take time to inflame something?

• 26:16Mark Hyman?

  So, so there's a whole cascade of things that happens when you eat mostly the starch and sugar, that's 60% of our diet, right? It's ultra-processed food. It's the main ingredients of corn and flour and sugar that are in everything. And, and what happens is you get this spike in blood sugar, which then creates a spike in insulin. At the same time, you get an immediate spike in cortisol and adrenaline. That's the first phase of response. Of course, it affects your liver and screws up your cholesterol and all that. But what happens next is even more concerning. It, it drives all the available fuel in your bloodstream from all the food you've eaten, sugar and starch and whatever bad fats, drives it into your fat cells. And it's a one-way street into your fat cells, called your adipocytes around your belly, those belly fat cells.

• 27:01Mark Hyman?

  Those fat cells, in turn, create a whole series of chemicals, hundreds of chemicals, hormones, inflammatory marker, markers and messengers. And they're transmitters. It's, it's quite striking when you look at, they're not just like holding up your pants, it's fat there. It's like, it's actually doing stuff. And when you eat in that way, it drives hunger, it stores fat, it shuts down your metabolism and it slows, literally slows your metabolism. And even worse, it locks the fat cells. So that fat can't get out. Oh. It's like a one-way turnstile, only get in. And then on top of that, it releases all these inflammatory messenger molecules. We call them adipocytokines that go to your brain and then create inflammation in the brain. So it's a kind of a downstream effect over chronic eating this way.

• 27:46Mark Hyman?

  If you have one cookie or one bagel, it's not going to kill you, right? Right. But if you're constantly eating this stuff, and we're talking about the average American eats a pound, almost, of flour and sugar a day. Wow. A pound, like 152 pounds of sugar and 133 pounds of flour. You add that up and it's, and I know I'm not that, eating that much and you aren't. So a lot of people are making up for the difference. Right, right.

• 28:10Mark Hyman?

  So food affects your mood for sure. Yeah, and not only that, it's not even just, you know, it was striking, and I don't know if you had David Plomiter on the show, but he wrote a book called Brainwash and it really speaks to what happens to the brain when you don't eat real whole foods and you eat too much of this American diet that we're all eating. It disconnects the frontal lobe from the amygdala. Now, what does that mean in English? The frontal lobe is the grown-up, is the adult in the room. It's like, it's like you think you're going to punch that guy, but you go, I better not punch that guy, right? Right, right, right. It's that, it's that adult in the room that sort of is your higher self. And the amygdala is your reptile brain, it's your lizard brain. It's going to just run or fight or flee. Uh huh.

• 28:52Mark Hyman?

  And it's, and what happens is literally physiologically, these parts of the brain are connected, but when you eat crap, they get disconnected. And so you're constantly reacting from your amygdala with no grown-up in the room, which is why we see this level of divisiveness and hatred and I mean, just all the upheaval we're seeing in society now. I think a large part of that has to do with our brains being constantly triggered by this reptilian insult that is driving behavior change. And when we look at, and we look at the fact of other data to support, it's not just a theory, in prisons, if you give prisoners healthy food, swapping out all the crap they eat in prisons, which is pretty darn bad, there's a 56% reduction in violent crime in the prisons.

• 29:37Mark Hyman?

  If you add a multivitamin, it's an 80% reduction. Come on. If you look at kids, and this is in juvenile detention centers, they've done clinical trials, because these got these people locked up. So you've got, it's a really great kind of study. Now, these kind of studies are hard to do because mostly we're free, we call them free living humans who don't really behave and they'll do whatever they want, they don't follow the study protocol. When you're locked up, you get what you get, right? And so they took these kids.

• 29:59Lewis Howes?

  The environment's the same for everyone. Yeah, all that stuff.

• 30:02Mark Hyman?

  That's right. And they took these kids and they, and they, uh, these were kids were disruptive, violent, aggressive, oppositional, suicidal. It was by cleaning up their diet and giving them whole foods, it was a 91% reduction in all violent behavior. You know, oppositional behavior, need for restraints went down, suicide went down 100%. I mean, it's the third leading cause of death in that age group. It went down 100%, no suicides. And so you see this incredible data that comes from understanding nutritional psychiatry. And you go, wait a minute, maybe some of our messed up society has to do with not only the problems with obesity and the problems with chronic disease and the fact that COVID is, is landed on a perfect,

• 30:43Mark Hyman?

  you know, laboratory for spreading in America because we're all so unhealthy and our immune systems are so sick because of our diet. But it's also led to this incredible disruption of our brain and our, and our mood and our behavior, which we're seeing it rampant in society today.

• 31:00Lewis Howes?

  What would you say are the three foods we should all stay away from in order to increase the happiness of our mental health?

• 31:09Mark Hyman?

  Oh, that's not hard. So, uh, I mean, I, you know, I, in my book, The Pegan Diet, it's called 21 Practical Principles for Reclaiming Your Health in a Nutritionally Confusing World. And, and it's really practical and there's a bunch of steps at the end, but, but I think, you know, the, the real dangers are, one, um, high fructose corn syrup. Because anything with high fructose corn syrup, almost by definition, is a highly processed food. It comes with all kinds of other bad crap. So if you're reading labels, like if you just can eliminate that, that would be like number one. Number two would be trans fats, hydrogenated fats, which.

• 31:45Lewis Howes?

  What is that? What's, what's that in? What foods is that in? Is that processed packaged foods?

• 31:49Mark Hyman?

  What? Hydrogenated fats or?

• 31:50Lewis Howes?

  Is that fried? Is that french fries?

• 31:52Mark Hyman?

  Yeah. So hydrogenated fats have literally been, have been banned by the FDA, essentially ruled not safe to eat. But they're still out there. Okay. You can still find them. It's less, but it's, and they used to be really, that's Chris Go shortening. So anything that comes with a baked good or any, any processed food. Uh, and the third thing would be, you know. You should only eat foods with ingredients that you would have in your cupboard, can pronounce and recognize. In other words, would you have butylated hydroxytoluene in your cupboard that you sprinkle on your salad, you know? No. Which is also known as BHT. It's a preservative that's been linked to cancer. It's banned in Europe. We have it in everything here. You know, so if you wouldn't have, you

• 32:33Mark Hyman?

  know, azodicarbonamide in your cupboard that you would use in your stir fries, you probably shouldn't eat it. And yet, this is in so much of our foods. In fact, in America, it's legal. This is an ingredient used in breads to make them fluffier. Subway used it in their Subway sandwich. Didn't they have to take it out? Didn't Vargie take it out? Yeah, yeah. So our friend, our friend shamed them into taking it out. But it's still legal here. It's not illegal. They just, she just shamed them publicly by trying to eat her yoga mat in front of the Subway and got them. But in Singapore, for example, if you're a food manufacturer and you use this ingredient in your food, you get a 15 year jail sentence and a $450,000 fine. No, you do not. Yes, you do. I swear to God. In Europe, a lot of these chemicals are banned. So

• 33:16Mark Hyman?

  basically, just eat real foods. Get rid of all those three things that would make you likely to end up in trouble. And then, you know, there's another hierarchy of how do you even upgrade the quality. But the whole principle of the Pegan Diet, food is medicine, and quality matters. And it's not just calories, it's information. And it literally can upgrade or downgrade your biology with every bite. And so when you're putting something in your mouth, you're literally speaking to your genes. You're speaking to your hormones, your brain chemistry, your immune system, your microbiome, your mitochondria. Everything is controlled by what we're eating. So the book is really focused on two key principles. One is food is medicine, and the other is personalized nutrition and medicine. Because, you know, I call it the Pegan Diet as a joke between paleo and keto, right?

• 34:01Mark Hyman?

  Sure. You know, and I had a, I was sitting on a panel with a friend of mine who was a vegan cardiologist, and another one was a paleo doc, and they were just fighting. And I was in the middle, and I felt like a ping pong ball going back and forth. And I was sort of, I was like, trying to break the, break the tension a little bit. And I said, hey, if you're a paleo and you're vegan, I must be Pegan. And it was kind of a joke, and everybody laughed. And I was like, whoa, wow, that was good. And then I thought about it on the way home. And basically, they're identical, except for where you get your protein. Animals or greens and beans. They both agree that we should eat whole foods. They both agree we should eat lots of vegetables, and nuts and seeds, and good fats, and get rid of processed foods, and low sugar. And even agree that we should not be eating dairy, which is a whole controversial subject, but they're pretty identical.

• 34:43Lewis Howes?

  Sure.

• 34:43Mark Hyman?

  And so the goal of this book is not to create a dogma, but to create a big 10 inclusive framework for people to think about food in a different way. So what are the principles of healthy eating that are adaptable to different cultures, different preferences, different belief systems? And I think, you know, I always encourage people to listen to their body, not to dogma. You know, a lot of our nutrition advice is based on, oh, be keto, or be paleo, or be vegan, or be this, or be that, be raw. And the truth is, it depends on you. If you are, if I do keto, my body doesn't respond great. I mean, I do higher fat, but, but, right? But another person who's a diabetic, they might do great on it.

• 35:20Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 35:20Mark Hyman?

  You know, one person on a vegan diet, like Rich Roll, may be able to run triathlons. I mean, you know, just incredible Iron Man stunts of heroic effort, but he may be a unicorn, or maybe he's figured out how to do it. And other patients of mine, see, are extremely ill after years of being a vegan because of their nutrition depleted, or they don't have protein, or their body, their body doesn't like it. I just had a patient, for example, this week, who was a young woman, 26 years old, who's been a vegetarian vegan. She was basically a vegetable and sugar vegan. And she didn't even like to-

• 35:51Lewis Howes?

  So she would eat sugar as well?

• 35:52Mark Hyman?

  Yeah. Oh, yeah. Well, a lot of people who are vegan eat sugar because it's, the body starts to crave the carbohydrates and sugar. So it's not uncommon. And, and so she wasn't overweight at all, but metabolically, she was super unhealthy. She had, you know, acne, and she had, her gut was a mess, and she had very low protein, like very, very low amino acids. She had very low vitamin D, extremely low B12, very low iodine, very low zinc. I mean, and, and, you know, she was extremely unwell, and, and her diet was just so not fit for her. So we've had, we had to sort of upregulate it and change it a little bit. I had to get her on some different protein shakes, which she needed. I had to upregulate her vitamins. I had to sort of get her off the sugar. I mean, but I, you know, it takes a lot of work.

• 36:36Mark Hyman?

  So the key is, how do you personalize a diet and get away from the, basically, religious nutrition that we-

• 36:44Lewis Howes?

  Which is either all vegan, vegetarian, keto, or carnivore. There's all these extreme diets, right?

• 36:50Mark Hyman?

  Exactly, yeah. And again, I always encourage people to listen to the smartest doctor in the room, which is their own body.

• 36:56Lewis Howes?

  Theirself, yeah, yeah.

• 36:58Mark Hyman?

  Right? Like, how do you feel? Do you feel great? Do you feel bad? How's your stomach? How's your head? Are you clear? Are you of energy? I mean, what is happening to you? So I think it's important to understand that, you know, we are all different and that the future of medicine is personalized medicine. There's a whole section here on personalized nutrition and how do you identify your particular needs by various kinds of testing, whether it's genetic testing, whether it's metabolic testing, food sensitivity testing, and how do you actually figure out how to dial in your perfect diet?

• 37:26Lewis Howes?

  Everyone's kind of swearing by their way is the way, but it seems so extreme in my mind, you know?

• 37:32Mark Hyman?

  Yeah.

• 37:32Lewis Howes?

  And I empathize with vegans and I'm like, yeah, I don't want to hurt animals either, you know? But then I've tried it for a while and I'm also like, gosh, but I miss meats. And it's like, what is the way? And what I'm hearing you say is that there is not one size fits all. You have to really figure out what works for you.

• 37:52Lewis Howes?

  You talk about brain foods, specific foods that we should be stocking our kitchen with. Can you share what some of these brain foods are? You have an acronym for them. I'm not sure if you have them all memorized, but...

• 38:05Speaker 03

  So I'll give you a few to get you started. So we use the brain foods acronym to really almost have be a checklist for people. I like people to take a photograph of it or read it or list it on their phone so that when they're at the supermarket, they're picking out those nutrients.

• 38:20Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 38:21Speaker 03

  So, you know, B is my favorite berries. And my favorite berry is blueberry. Now, they're rich in anthocyanins, they're rich in fiber. They are colorful. And that brings me to the R. One of the Rs is eat the color of the rainbow. And these are sort of things, Louis said, many people overlook. Their doctors have said it, or they've heard it, or read it. But what we're uncovering in the science is that the color of the rainbow, the colors of vegetables, the phytonutrients in those interact with the gut microbes. These are powerful antioxidants, powerful anti-inflammatory substances which impact things like depression, anxiety, and more. So it's no longer just eat a colorful salad.

• 39:06Speaker 03

  There's actual good evidence as to why we should be eating it.

• 39:10Lewis Howes?

  And is it matter if it's cooked or uncooked?

• 39:13Speaker 03

  You know, the science on that varies, but my, my feeling about it is the following. When you have raw veggies, they have, you know, their microbiome intact. They providing those bacteria, they giving you good nutrients. So I like to, I like to play, I like, like people to do the following, have some, say when they're preparing their vegetables for roasted veggie dish, you know, keep some chopped veggies that you munch on and then roast the rest or, you know, whatever you, whatever baking the rest, whatever. And so you're having a little bit of a combination of both.

• 39:44Lewis Howes?

  Some raw, some cooked.

• 39:45Speaker 03

  Some cooked, but in things like, say, spinach, you know, steaming the spinach can actually help lower the oxalate levels. So some of it is more specific.

• 39:54Lewis Howes?

  Okay, gotcha. Now here's a, there's a, I've heard a topic about fruits that some people say have as much as you want. Others say the less fruit, the better, or do it in seasonal times, or things like that. Yeah. Have you seen anything where if people are only eating fruit, that it helps or hurts them psychologically? Or can you never have too much fruit in moderation, I guess?

• 40:19Speaker 03

  So I think when it comes to psychological health, one of the biggest things is how mental health and metabolic health are now connected. What I mean by that is I talk about berries because they have a low glycemic index. So they have a powerful positive impact, eaten in moderation. So I'm not eat, I don't mean four cups of blueberries a day. But I do mean about a half a cup at least is one of your servings of fruit in a day. The issue with fruit is that the higher glycemic fruits, say the more tropical fruits, you know, mangoes and pineapples, those are actually less healthy for those with mental health because many individuals with mental health are, might have the struggle with weight and sometimes with metabolic health.

• 41:01Lewis Howes?

  Interesting. And so if you have a lot of these high glycemic fruits, they store more fat.

• 41:06Speaker 03

  They could increase your weight. They could potentially increase your weight.

• 41:09Lewis Howes?

  Which could make you psychologically say, ah, I'm overweight or not confident in yourself.

• 41:13Speaker 03

  That as well as your metabolic health because it could impact your insulin resistance, your insulin sensitivity, your glucose load. So because in my clinical practice, I often see people who are struggling with their weight. And I don't mean low weight, I mean struggling with a little bit of extra weight.

• 41:29Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 41:30Speaker 03

  They're taking medications like selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, Zoloft, Prozac, to name a few. One of the side effects is weight gain.

• 41:39Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 41:39Speaker 03

  Not everyone develops it, but many people do. And psychotropic medications, others, antipsychotics, also have a problem. They impact metabolic health and glycemic control and they impact weight. So you, as a psychiatrist, you really have to be tuned into that to realize if you're gonna save fruit, qualify better fruit for that individual to eat. Because a person could eat two bananas a day and that could totally increase their weight. Are bananas on their own unhealthy? No. To an average, you know, person of normal weight who's exercising and leading a healthy lifestyle, perfectly fine to eat a banana. But to that individual, it may not be the best solution. So it's that, it's that caveat with mental health that's important.

• 42:19Lewis Howes?

  So what's the best fruit to eat if you're trying to lose weight?

• 42:24Speaker 03

  So the best, so the best answer to that is stick with a couple of servings of different berries.

• 42:31Lewis Howes?

  Okay.

• 42:31Speaker 03

  Um, stick with a, a lifestyle that is supporting your weight loss. Um, which, which goes from mindfulness all the way to hydration, to outdoor time, to good sleep and all of that, right? Cause it's not, we know it's not just one, one thing.

• 42:45Lewis Howes?

  Eliminating stresses in your life, yeah.

• 42:47Speaker 03

  Exactly. Stress is a huge driver of weight gain, right? Cause of the impact on cortisol. So I would say stick, stick with a couple of different types of berries. Um, and smaller servings and have those regularly. Cause of the fiber, the phytonutrients from them are still gonna help you.

• 43:01Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 43:02Speaker 03

  So I would never say exclude fruit completely.

• 43:04Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 43:04Speaker 03

  Unless, you know, your, your diabetologist has said, look, you need to do this in order to bring down your hemoglobin A1C. Then it's a different conversation.

• 43:13Lewis Howes?

  So when is fruit good for you then? Cause if you're trying to lose weight, I'm hearing it's not as good to have a lot of it.

• 43:19Speaker 03

  Not a lot of it.

• 43:20Lewis Howes?

  In moderation.

• 43:21Speaker 03

  Actually, to be honest, everything in moderation.

• 43:24Lewis Howes?

  Right, right.

• 43:25Speaker 03

  Because every, every healthy food, you want to eat it in a portion controlled sort of way. Fruit is actually always good for you. It's, it's, it provides nutrients, macromitronutrients, which are healthy for your body, healthy for your brain. So whether it's the vitamin C from kiwi, or you know, whichever, or you know, if you're having leafy greens, not a fruit, but if you're having folate from leafy greens, that's affecting you in a positive way. So fruit are always a good option. But then also comes from my food philosophy, which is I am diet agnostic and I don't demonize a food group. So if you come into me and say I'm vegan or carnivore, my role as a nutritional psychiatrist is to improve your mental wellbeing. You know, I will advise you how you can tweak your diet in a positive way.

• 44:08Speaker 03

  You may not agree with me, but I'm going to offer you that guidance. Because what I find is is that people fall into these eat this, not that mentality. Then they exclude entire food groups, then they crave that food group, then there's a rebound effect. And then they end up either gaining the weight or they end up being unhappy because they've started to consume a food that they previously gave up. It, it becomes a vicious cycle.

• 44:30Lewis Howes?

  Like I said, they weren't going to eat something, then they go eat it for a month.

• 44:34Speaker 03

  Yeah, depression, you know, feeling more anxious.

• 44:36Lewis Howes?

  Interesting.

• 44:37Speaker 03

  And then almost unable to get back on that saddle of just eating a healthier diet, which I want people to, to eat, eat healthier foods as part of their lifestyle. So it's a natural, if they, whether they're traveling, whether they're walking through an airport or whether they're at home, they're just reaching for those healthier options.

• 44:54Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 44:54Speaker 03

  Or carrying it with them.

• 44:56Lewis Howes?

  And what about antioxidants? Why are these so powerful for our mental health?

• 44:59Speaker 03

  So antioxidants have an extremely important impact through the gut microbiome, but also on the brain. You know, in the natural process of life, we, we encounter different things that form these unhealthy substances in our body called radical oxygen species. It left. If left on their own, they can actually lead to cancer, heart disease, lots of, lots of bad things, as well as, you know, worsening our mental health. So what antioxidants do is they, they kind of, they interact with these radical oxygen species to almost neutralize them. And that's why they're so powerful. So that's why we should eat antioxidants.

• 45:37Lewis Howes?

  Okay. What, what foods are rich in antioxidants?

• 45:40Speaker 03

  Starting with berries, but you know, there are also spices. That's, that's something people don't realize. There are spices that are rich in antioxidants, like turmeric with a pinch of black pepper. My, my nutritional psych high three no brainers add a black, add a pinch of black pepper because that makes the turmeric more bioavailable and bioactive to your body. So spices, many of them have rich antioxidants. So those are, your spice cabinet is probably one of the ones you're not tapping into.

• 46:10Lewis Howes?

  Interesting.

• 46:11Speaker 03

  To add antioxidants, as well as veggies, all these different colors of, of vegetables, are, you know, different bell peppers, different, different lettuces. All of these, you know, whether the purple, carotenoids from carrots have rich antioxidants because of their, because of the nutrients in them.

• 46:31Lewis Howes?

  What about the, the research that's been out about lectins and nightshades? Certain lectin, is this something that you would avoid or limit, or is the science from your research not really saying there's an issue with nightshades and lectins?

• 46:48Speaker 03

  So, you know, part of it depends on the person. If they are working with a physician who's asked them to, and their condition, if they've been asked to stay away from nightshades before, because of a certain condition, and it's been working for them. I'm not there to say, stop doing that and eat everything. If it's working for them, absolutely. But many people come to me a little confused about where, you know, what What foods include lectins and what they should avoid. But there are also some culinary techniques where you can get around by food preparation. For example, if you like nuts, you know, there's a way to, you know, there's a way to get raw, natural nuts, soak them in water overnight, rinse them out and slow, it's not even roasting

• 47:32Speaker 03

  because it's such a low temperature, almost dry them out in the oven at a very low temperature. And that circumvents some of the anti-nutrients in them. So there are always ways to think about food and make it healthier or look at a cooking technique which could improve the nutrient, either the nutrient value or get around things like that. So I'd rather have that conversation than ask people to exclude things, not about other people, other people's research, but more about my approach to how I feel I can help individuals when their mental wellbeing. Because you know, this is not just for someone with depression or anxiety. A lot of people in the last few years have just been feeling a little off, you know,

• 48:12Speaker 03

  and I use that term loosely, it's a little bit anxious, not sleeping well, feeling blue, just not, just feeling, there's a great article, quality at languishing, you know, just not, not feeling good, just not feeling quite themselves. And so eating in a good way can help a lot of that without a prescription.

• 48:32Lewis Howes?

  Right. What would you say is the best cooking technique that you've learned?

• 48:38Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 48:39Lewis Howes?

  To get the maximum result for optimal nutrition? Is it from the nuts? Is it from soaking something? Is it from some other type of food where you've seen, okay, here's the original raw form and by applying this technique, it actually enhances it to really help your mental health, your brain that much more? Is there a technique like that?

• 48:57Speaker 03

  I don't think there's one technique.

• 48:58Lewis Howes?

  Okay.

• 48:59Speaker 03

  You know, I think that, I mentioned the, I mentioned things like spinach and steaming it or applying gentle temperature, the nuts, that's, that's specific to a better way to enjoy the nuts. Some people don't have a problem with nuts, they eat them and they feel okay. Now, the lectin research may refute that, but again, you pay attention to how you're feeling emotionally, how you're feeling physically, what your doctor's telling you, and you either continue or you, you change direction a little. Um, with one, one, one thing I will say is that many people hear their doctor say, eat your vegetables, eat your greens, and they sort of, they're, you know, they roll their eyes and they move on, they don't do it. Often it's that action step. One of the things I can say is just gently roasting vegetables in the oven with delicious

• 49:44Speaker 03

  flavors, putting in colorful veggies, adding spices, even your kids will want to eat it, you know, because it's interesting, it's different. That, that I think is, is one of the things where you can really expand. And, you know, just little, simple tricks like you can do your roasted, colorful roasted vegetables with different spices for the flavor, plus you can do your protein on, whether you're plant-based, you eat tofu, whether you eat chicken, you can do it on the same sheet pan, and that makes it super easy for someone to prepare, prepare dinner.

• 50:13Lewis Howes?

  Right. The next thing you say is include lean proteins and plant-based proteins. Uh, from the science, you say you don't, you don't eliminate any diet or any food groups.

• 50:24Speaker 03

  I try, I try my best not to, yeah.

• 50:26Lewis Howes?

  There are so many people that try to say like, eat only meat and this is the way to go, and other people who say be vegan, this is the way to go. Is there science proving which foods are better, like, uh, lean proteins that are plant-based versus animal proteins?

• 50:45Speaker 03

  So, in, I will say that, you know, in nutrition science, they're usually things I can quote, and they're probably in the same day or same week or same year, at least three other articles which will refute that.

• 50:58Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 50:58Speaker 03

  Because that tends to be the spirit of nutrition science. You know, omega threes, I've seen clinically, um, help my patients time and, and time and time again. Whether, usually I like them to use food sources first, but some people prefer supplement or they do. And I've seen the improvements, yet there, there is research to say they're terrible, that, you know, you shouldn't use them, that kind of stuff. So, I say this with an open mind, understanding that.

• 51:26Speaker 03

  So I feel, you know, that the camps who, and they are sort of camps, right? Because they tend to be very polarized. Either only eat this and they, the individuals say who are plant-based will say, well, there's this studies to, um, you know, name a substance, uh, that is negative for your health because it is from meat. And then there are, you know, people, individuals who eat meat who will say, but you know, you don't get enough from just the plant. So there's always this polarization. And here's what I feel about it. I think that the more we continue to have these camps, the more confused we are going

• 52:11Speaker 03

  to continue to be as a country and the worse our nutrition is going to get. Because most people, that's not most people, a lot of people know the sad diet and are consuming that. So anything we can move from that to a healthier version of that food, understanding what healthy whole foods are, is better for us. I think it's much more about that for more people than camps. I'll eat this and not that. And I have difficulty with those because I feel that science can support both sides of the argument.

• 52:42Lewis Howes?

  I know. You can always find evidence for each side.

• 52:45Speaker 03

  Evidence for both sides.

• 52:47Lewis Howes?

  And something against the other side, probably, right?

• 52:49Speaker 03

  Exactly. And say, well, gee, you know, you're missing this nutrient because you're plant-based or you're missing that nutrient because you're, um, eating or consuming more meat. And, and I think that's where most people in the public get confused. Um, and they come in and say to me, should I exclude this entire food group? Should I give up whole grains? Should I never eat a slice of this or that? And, and I think that perpetuating that is not good for us as a country. But if we can find a sensible way forward to, for, for the most, so not the people in different camps, but those who just want to eat healthier, want to feel emotionally better and we, most of us need to right now with all that's going on.

• 53:31Speaker 03

  Um, I think it's a healthier way forward and more, and more sustainable.

• 53:35Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. Hmm. I'm curious about, um...

• 53:42Lewis Howes?

  Nuts. You mentioned nuts for a second. This is actually the next thing on the brain foods, the nuts. I'm a big fan of nuts, but can you overdo it? I don't drink milk anymore, but I have the milk substitutions, like almond milk and things like that. So if you're having the physical nuts, then you're having almond milk and then almond butter. Is there too much of that?

• 54:00Speaker 03

  So there's always, even a healthy food, we can overdo even a healthy food. So practicing, I'm not so much of a calorie counter as much as I am the source of food and the quality of food, and then paying attention to portions. So I mentioned blueberries. And I said, you know, that doesn't mean three cups of blueberries a day, because unfortunately then the load of the amount of sugar from that is not good for you.

• 54:22Lewis Howes?

  Interesting.

• 54:22Speaker 03

  Even though berries are healthy and they have lots of nutrients in them. So similarly with nuts. You want smaller servings and you want different types of nuts. My favorites are macadamia and hazelnuts. I eat them in smaller portions. I, you know, for someone who likes nuts and they're going to consume that portion of nuts in a day, you may want to switch to something like hemp milk, which by the way, you can make it like to literally make in two easy steps. And hemp milk has the advantage of having short chain omega threes in it, because it's rich in ALA. So there's a good solution for...

• 55:01Lewis Howes?

  So if you're gonna have nuts, don't also have almond milk.

• 55:04Speaker 03

  And nut butters and everything in the same day, that same 24 hour period.

• 55:07Lewis Howes?

  Have hemp milk instead.

• 55:08Speaker 03

  Have hemp milk instead, you know, have your nut butter, but you know, nut and seed butter, because you're getting the, you're getting other seeds and the value of that. And just don't have a ton of it, you know, so everything in moderation. If you, if you do eat more of it, then maybe have that the next day, you know, balance it up. It's similar to avocados. You'll have, you know, delicious avocados in California. The truth is, you know, a good serving in a day is about a quarter of a medium avocado to get the benefit of the healthy fats.

• 55:38Lewis Howes?

  Really? A quarter of a medium avocado?

• 55:40Speaker 03

  About a medium, medium to large avocado.

• 55:42Lewis Howes?

  So not a whole avocado?

• 55:43Speaker 03

  No. It becomes, what happens is it gets calorie dense at that point. And so, you know, it's balancing that up. Now, if you ate that for breakfast, that's okay. My, my policy around that is, you know, just cost correct at the next meal or the next day, because you understand something a little bit better.

• 55:59Lewis Howes?

  Thank you so much for listening. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and it inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's show with all the important links. And also make sure to share this with a friend and subscribe over on Apple Podcasts as well. I really love hearing feedback from you guys, so share a review over on Apple and let me know what part of this episode resonated with you the most. And if no one's told you lately, I want to remind you that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great.