Tim Ferriss: Hello, boys and girls, ladies
and germs. This is Tim Ferriss for a rare in-person podcast. I know that's become the norm on YouTube and
elsewhere, but this is a rare occasion and I am thrilled to have Andrew Huberman here
with me. So great to have you here in person, Andrew. So Andrew Huberman, who is this Andrew Huberman? Dr. Huberman, PhD, on Twitter @HubermanLab,
is a neuroscientist and tenured professor in the Department of Neurobiology at Stanford
University's School of Medicine. He has made numerous important contributions
to the fields of brain development, brain function, and neuroplasticity. Work from the Huberman Laboratory at Stanford
Medicine has been consistently published in top journals including nature, science and
cell. For those who don't know, that's like having
a sweep at the Oscars. But back to the bio, Andrew's the host of
the podcast Huberman Lab, which is often ranked as one of the top five podcasts in the world
by both Apple and Spotify. The show aims to help viewers and listeners
improve their health with science and science-based tools. New episodes air every Monday on YouTube and
all podcast platforms. You can find all things Andrew at hubermanlab.com,
on YouTube that is Huberman Lab, Instagram, HubermanLab, and also on Twitter as mentioned
@HubermanLab. Andrew, nice to see you. Andrew Huberman: Great to see you. So happy to be here. I want to say I grew up listening to your
podcast, although I think I was in my 30s when I started listening. And so for me, I'm really tickled to be here
because so much of how I ran my laboratory when I first became a professor was based
on principles from The 4-Hour Workweek. Now mind you, my work weeks were like 100-hour
work weeks. I actually lived in my laboratory with my
dog — my students and postdocs can attest to that — but I incorporated a ton of the
principles. I was following The 4-Hour Body slow carb
diet. I was training. I had my cheat days and on and on and on. So for me, this is kind of being transported
forward and back in time. Tim Ferriss: Oh, man. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. Well, I can't say enough positive things about
you and your podcast and what you've done, and as you know, this is not just because
I'm sitting here in front of you because I text you all the time. In fact, I will say this, I have a notebook
that dates back over a decade where at the time I was pretty lonely. It was just me and my dog. Eventually, a great girlfriend at the time
came along. But I was running my lab and there's a lot
of social buffers between professors and students, understandably and necessarily. And so I was pretty lonely, and I thought,
who are my friends going to be? I was in a new town, I didn't know many people,
and I have this list, and I read the list the other day, I'll send you a photo, and
the list was of about five or six people that I really admired and whose principles and
work I was trying to incorporate into basically every aspect of my life. At the top of the list is a guy named Tim
Armstrong, lead singer for Rancid, who I've recently become friends with. And so totally, that's another amazing story. Joe Strummer, who unfortunately I never met,
the great Joe Strummer, which explains my attire. He always wore a buttoned-down black shirt
in his adulthood, so I decided to do that. At some point and much more related to your
name, because The 4-Hour Workweek and your podcast which eventually came along, Rick
Rubin, who I've had the great blessing of having on my podcast and learning from, and
then Oliver Sacks, who unfortunately passed away before I ever had the chance to meet
him. But anyway, I had to tell you that you were
already my friend before you knew who I was. And I did that because I would look at that
list and think, okay, who do I want to try and embody in terms of ways about going through
life and trying to do things right in my professional and personal life? So that was my shortlist, and I'm very proud
of that shortlist. I still have it. I sent Tim the list the other day and he was
like, "No way, man. This is pretty wild." And I'm like, "You think it's wild for you,
just imagine how wild this is for me." So anyway, to set the context. Tim Ferriss: Yeah, well, I appreciate that,
man, and I've been incredibly impressed, not just with your research and academic bonafides
and what you've accomplished there, which is a lot in and of itself. And of course we've spoken before, but the
incredible focus and force with which you have just blown the barn doors off with the
podcast, which is really a service to people. So I am happy to have you here, thrilled to
be spending time in person after COVID and recording remotely. So we have a ton to dive into, and hopefully
I will not be the hero with clay feet. As they say, it's all downhill from here as
far as what I can do in this conversation. But I thought we could begin with perhaps
revisiting in some respects, our last conversation, not to rehash it, but to simply ask the question. Since we last spoke, which was a while ago,
I guess it was about maybe two years ago, what have you changed your mind on and what
have you doubled down on if you have answers to both of those? Andrew Huberman: Yeah, I'll start with what
I've doubled down on. I've doubled down on the idea, which perhaps
I stated last time we spoke, and perhaps not. But I certainly believe that our state of
mind and body at any point in time is strongly dictated by our state of mind and body in
the hours and days prior to that. And on the one hand, people are going to hear
that and say, "Well duh, if you're sleep-deprived, you're going to feel like garbage. And if you're well-rested, you'll feel great." That's kind of the top contour of it. But when one looks at the neuroscience, for
instance, of sleep, you start to realize that the amount of rapid eye movement sleep that
you're going to get in any 90-minute bout of sleep, because your sleep is broken up
into these 90-minute segments, more or less, is strongly dictated by the ratio of slow
wave sleep, AKA deep sleep and rapid eye movement sleep that you had in the previous 90-minute
bout. And then when you start to look at the research
in terms of waking states, you start to find that your ability to be focused, say, for
a bout of work in the morning or the afternoon, or a creative brainstorm session, or I don't
know, to maybe drill into some personal issue that you're dealing with during therapy or
just on a walk or while journaling is not a square wave function. None of us should sit down and expect ourselves
to just drop into that state. Much of our ability to move into that state
effectively, whatever effective means, whatever the target or goal of that bout as I'm calling
it, is going to be dictated by what happened in the previous moments and hours. And so when I zoom out from that, what I've
doubled down on in this is this idea that there are just a core set of foundational
things that we have to re-up every 24 hours. I think thanks to the incredibly hard work
of Dr. Matt Walker at Berkeley, The Sleep Diplomat on Twitter, it's such a great name
because it's so appropriate. A decade ago or so, it was like, "I'll sleep
when I'm dead." That was the dominant mentality out there. And yeah, sleep's great, but getting stuff
done is more important. Matt has really impressed on everybody that
our mental health, our physical health, and our ability to perform is so strongly dependent
on our ability to get quality sleep — maybe not every night of our life; we have to be
realistic — but that sleep is vital. So a hat tip is insufficient. So sleep is critical, but sleep is just one
of about, I would say five things that really set the buoyancy or the foundation upon which
our nervous system is able to accomplish these transitions that I'm talking about at all. And those five things are sleep — in the
absence of quality sleep over two or three days, you're just going to fall to pieces. In the presence of quality-sufficient sleep
over two or three days, you're going to function at an amazing level. There's a gain of function and a loss of function
there. It's not just if you sleep poorly, you function
less well. You sleep better, you function much better. So sleep, I would say, is at the top of the
list. Nutrients, and there you can think macronutrients
and so your carnivores are only eating meat and your vegans are only eating plants and
your omnivores, which is I think probably 90 percent of the world, is eating a combination
of those. But quality nutrients, I think that when I
look at all of the nutrition, literature, and arguments out there, it seems that everyone
can agree on one thing, which is that probably 80 percent or more of our nutrition should
come from unprocessed or minimally processed sources. Minimally processed would require some cooking,
but it survive on the shelf as opposed to packaged foods or highly palatable foods. So you've got sleep nutrients. But then we should also put in micronutrients,
and this is where maybe we'll get into a discussion about supplementation. I think that there's supplementation or supplements
is a bit of a misnomer because it implies vitamin supplements and people say, "Well,
can't you get all that from food or that whey protein, isn't that just food? Wouldn't you be better off with a chicken
breast?" Okay, well then when you talk about convenience
and the absorption, okay, but then there's this huge category of things ranging from
the kind of esoterically named things like Ashwagandha and Shilajit and tongkat ali and
Fadogia agrestis — Tim Ferriss: I'm in! I'll buy all of them! Andrew Huberman: Exactly. All the herbal stuff, right? Tim Ferriss: Yeah. Andrew Huberman: You're not going to get that
from food. Tim Ferriss: Yeah, totally. Andrew Huberman: So should we call them supplements
at all? And so let's just say the third thing is,
or the second thing is nutrients, and that includes macronutrients, and that includes
micronutrients as well. So those two things. Then the third would be movement. And this has also been an enormous transition
in the last, I think just five years, which is not just for people interested in body
building or power lifting or for competitive athletes, but now it seems everybody, including
the elderly, understand that you need a combination of cardiovascular exercise and you need resistance
training, whether or not it's with body weight or weights or machines, etc, that you need
both. Not a week goes by without seeing an article
in one of the major publications out there, standard media, let's call it traditional
media, we'll be nice to them, traditional media that highlights some study showing that
resistance training in elderly people can offset Alzheimer's or that as our friend Peter
Attia has pointed out so many times that many of the end-of-life-creating injuries are due
to older people stepping down, the eccentric movements. So you need movement, that's the third category. Fourth, I will argue, and I like to think
that maybe I've helped this movement, if you want to call it that, is light. In particular, sunlight in the early part
and throughout the middle of the day, and trying to minimize the amount of artificial
light that you're exposed to in the evening and late night hours most of the time, because
you have to live life, just fundamental. And then I think the last category that's
important is social connection, AKA relationships, let's just call it relationships, because
that can include relationship to self. So those things set up the core foundation. And I think one way to think about them is
just as a list. Another is to think about them in terms of
a schedule basis. And that's how I've really doubled down is
I realize that every 24 hours I need to invest something into each one of those things. So I think that 10 years ago, or five years
ago, or even two years ago, I used to think, okay, what's the workout split? Or how am I going to eat for the next couple
of months? What am I trying to optimize for? Is it muscle? Is it fat loss? Is it just maintaining? Is it energy? Is it focus? That's all fine and good. But sleep, nutrients, exercise, light, relationships,
those really establish the foundation of what I consider to be all of the elements that
create our ability to move as seamlessly as possible between the states that we happen
to be in and the states we desire to be in. And when I zoom out and I think about what
are the major struggles that I, and it seems everyone deals with, it's like how to get
more focused. So we can talk about what do you take, what's
the supplement? But you have to say, "Well, how are you sleeping? Have you done any exercise?" You really always find yourself, or I find
myself taking 10 steps back and then moving through the sequence of five things before
you can even begin to talk about whether or not taking three or 600 milligrams of Alpha
GPC and how often to do that and does it work, and yes, it works, etc. But those things really set the foundation. And so I like to think of those five things
every single day. You have to re-up on sleep every 24 hours
or try to, you have to re-up on movement every 24 hours. You can go a day or so immobile, but you better
move the next day. And ideally, you're moving seven days a week. Doesn't necessarily mean trained to failure
and running a marathon seven days a week. You can Goggins your life or you can not Goggins
your life. For those of you who don't know, I'm referring
to David Goggins there, by the way, who seems to never stop moving. Although I just learned meditates two hours
every night, every night. And I'm inclined to believe when he says that,
that he indeed does that. You need nutrients, even if they come from
stored sources, even if you're going to fast. You're going to fast for a day or two, okay
fine, I've done that. I know you've done that. I would put hydration under nutrients too. So you can drive nutrients from stored fat,
protein, etc, glycogen. The relationship it's light is you're going
to need that every 24 hours. You're going to need sunlight, even if through
cloud cover, and you're going to want to avoid bright artificial lights at night, not every
night, but most nights of your life. And then that relationship's one is the one
that maybe we can go into in a little bit more depth at some point, but it requires
focus, it requires attention, every 24 hours. Now, that doesn't necessarily mean you have
to see friends, talk to friends, text friends every 24 hours. Some people are far more introverted than
others, but then you're working on your relationship to yourself in that solo time, and hopefully
when you're spending time with others as well, that has some internal repercussions. So if I've doubled down on anything, it's
the understanding that there is no so-called optimization. There is no real interest, at least from me,
in trying to layer in other things unless I'm paying attention to each and every one
of those things every 24 hours. You have to re-up on each and every one of
those five things every 24 hours. And if you don't, you can get by for a day
or two, but pretty soon you're going to hit that wall where you won't be able to do any
of the things that most people are actually seeking to do. And the last thing I'll say about that is
I think people hear a list of those five things and they think, "Gosh, okay, well that must
be nice for you, Andrew and Tim. You wake up, you look at sunlight, you guys
don't have kids, you don't have to worry about kids running around. You can exercise." There are ways of layering in the protocols
that re-up as I'm referring to, these five things every 24 hours that also include other
people in your life, kids, pets, etc. Exercise certainly can include that as well. But I would argue that there is no showing
up properly for yourself and for the other people in your life unless these things are
being handled. And it's not about becoming soft and cushy,
it's actually about becoming quite resilient and effective. And I think this for me it seems so simple,
but as our friend Paul Conti said to me recently, he said, "After all the analysis and pouring
through things and the complicated notions of the subconscious…" he's a psychiatrist,
after all, "...in the end, really great mental health is about simple practices, like first
principles of self-care." So to which I raised my hand and said, "Well,
what is a first principle of self-care? I'm a biologist, after all." And he said, "Aha. It's basically the things that we were just
talking about." There's those five things. And so I'm doubling down, I'm tripling down
on those as essential to the point where nothing else really happens for very long unless those
five things are tended to. Tim Ferriss: Question. Of those five, let's just say, if you had
to pick one that you were — neglecting may be a strong word, but underweighting, that
you are now weighting differently, what would it be and what have you done? What have you added or changed or subtracted? Andrew Huberman: I'll have to pick two. Let's do —
Tim Ferriss: Both, then. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. The two are movement, really changed the way
that I train and exercise to some extent. And actually my whole philosophy on what's
possible in terms of training and how to incorporate it into a week in a way that really works
to build strength and endurance and feel really good in one's body all the time. And then the other one is relationships, which
probably reflects place in life where I'm 47 now. I've chosen to delay having a family, but
that's a primary focus. But also having done a lot of personal work
toward my mid-40s, I thought I was "there." And then realizing that —
Tim Ferriss: It's a trap door. Andrew Huberman: It's a trap door. And then realizing that, I guess here again,
I'll use a language that Paul uses, which is that there were some unresolved core conflicts. And this idea of core conflicts is really,
I think, the most appropriate way to put the important psychological stuff that people
need to work through. Everyone has them, many people have trauma,
not everyone has trauma, but as defined as an event that fundamentally changes the way
that you nervous system works, such that you function less well in some or many domains
of life. Again, I've robbed that definition from Paul
Conti. I'm far less eloquent than he is in delivering
it, but I think realizing that there's still some core conflicts that I needed to resolve. And I'm going whole hog on that, and it's
been interesting to say the least. Tim Ferriss: So let's start with perhaps the
easier one. Movement. What have you implemented? What have you embraced or cut back on in the
movement category? And I'm very interested in this personally
because I have really taken this as one of a few of those five to focus on myself in
the last, I would say year. Because I've done a lot of training, let's
just say in the last 10 years, but I've not done a lot of competition and I miss developing
athleticism. And if I take as an assumption that we have
largely evolved to move through space to actually move and navigate, ski touring is just one
example. So putting on skins, these are actually, they
used to be actual animal skins, now they're synthetic, but you put on skins on the bottom
of skis and you effectively NordicTrack your way up the mountain with switchbacks, and
then you take them off, you do a transition, you ski down, you rinse and repeat. But the experience of being, if you choose
your environments in a location where you get lots of sunlight in the morning and early
afternoon, symmetrical exercise, movement where you're not too heavily weighting one
side or the other, there are benefits to asymmetrical types of exercise. But I have found this to just be absolutely,
I don't think it's an overstatement to say revolutionary for my physical and mental well-being. And you also get, in this particular case
for me, a degree of hip extension that I really just do not get in my day-to-day existence
otherwise. So I'm putting that out there just as an example
and an explanation for why I want to dig a little bit deeper on the movement side. So what have you ended up implementing? Andrew Huberman: Well, first of all, let me
just say that your statement about movement being so fundamental to who we are as a species,
the Nobel Prize-winning — physiologist is really what he was — Sherrington said that,
"The final common path of the entire nervous system is movement." Which I sometimes think about because we often
think that our emotions somehow impact the world, but they really don't, except insofar
as we say things or do things. The other way to put this is the evolutionary
biologist will say, "There is no fossil record for the brain." If you look at brains, it's only what people
actually did with the internal architecture of their brain. It all boils down to movement or vision, I
would say, because I'm a vision scientist. But when you look cubic millimeter by cubic
millimeter through the brain, if you take the circuits devoted to movement and the circuits
devoted to vision, you've got about 75 percent of the human brain. So that's a lot. The rest is important too, of course. Movement wise. Okay, so we did a guest series. This was a six-episode guest series with Dr.
Andy Galpin, who's a professor of kinesiology, Cal State Fullerton, and his laboratory works
on, does everything from muscle biopsy all the way up to working with competitive athletes. So they'll do deadlifts or boxing or whatever
it is, or students running on treadmills, huge range of subjects, and then they'll stab
out some muscle — the little cork of muscle. And you've had this done right? This was in The 4-Hour Body. Tim Ferriss: Yeah, I did a muscle biopsy and
videotaped the entire process in the Sports Science Institute of South Africa. "Tim tartar" is what I called it when it came
out. So good. Turns out my muscle enzymes are, if it's possible
to be below some type of graph representing Homer Simpson, like citrate synthase and these
various elements, it would be very helpful for endurance which I seem to lack. Andrew Huberman: Bur you're built for explosiveness. Tim Ferriss: I'm built for a very short-duration
explosiveness, which is ironic when you consider that I'm embracing ski touring because I am
— I'm not like Kílian Jornet or any of these folks who would be very well-built for
such a thing. Andrew Huberman: Well, we make a good team
because I've never had a muscle biopsy. But I assure you that when I start running
distance, I can progress very fast. I'm not particularly strong, I'm not particularly
weak, but I'm just not particularly strong and very little explosiveness, very little
hops, which is why skateboarding wasn't the right sport for me. Despite my deep desire, it just didn't happen. But in terms of what I learned from Andy,
a couple of key principles fell out of the, and keep in mind, these are peer-reviewed
studies from his laboratory and many other laboratories of which he's an expert. And I went deep into this literature with
him for that series. Concurrent training, meaning getting better
at distance and getting stronger is absolutely possible. I did not think that was possible. I'm a big fan of the late Charles Poliquin
and others who said, "You want to build muscle, build muscle. You want to be a runner, be a runner." And I think at the extremes, that's true. But the data really pointed to the fact that
you can train for many things concurrently. I took a step back from everything I learned
from Andy over the last few years in that series and resculpted my training program
so that on any one given day, I'm training for something very specific with the understanding
that one can make progress in a lot of different domains of fitness. In fact, the way that Andy puts it, I think,
is better than fitness. He says techniques and methods are many, but
they're only a few set of core adaptations that your body can make. So you're really just trying to create adaptations. Whether or not you do it with a kettlebell
or a bar or a dumbbell or a hammer strength machine doesn't really matter. You're trying to create certain adaptations
by using certain loads, moving things at different speeds. But that is also true of endurance and running. So what I figured out was that there's an
optimal training schedule for me that allows me to target one specific thing each day. Tim Ferriss: What are some of those specific
things? Andrew Huberman: Yeah, endurance, strength,
hypertrophy, VO2 max, heat and cold tolerance. I can talk about why that is. And also, I should mention each one of those
days, and I can spell this out very, very simply for you, each one of those days is
also designed to indirectly support one of the other adaptations I'm trying to accomplish. So let me explain in short form, and if you
want more detail, I can give you more detail. My training week starts on Sunday because
Sunday sits leftmost on the calendar. Sunday, I make it a focused effort to move
as much as possible, ideally outdoors. I'm thinking endurance. I essentially want to be like a mule. I'm just thinking "Be like a mule." I actually have this shirt —
Tim Ferriss: That's going to be in the headline of this episode. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, yeah, exactly. I actually have this shirt that I sometimes
like to wear on those days. It's not a black buttoned-down shirt, but
it has a picture of a sloth and it's crossing its three sloth fingers like Wolverine, and
that's like what I'm trying to embody. I'm trying to embody the sloth. So what I'll do on that day is, because sometimes
it's a social day with other people in my life, if I'm on my own, I'll throw on an eight
or 10-pound weight vest. They have these thinner ones now that aren't
these mirror vests that where you don't look like you're in law enforcement or you're trying
to pretend you're in the seal teams, which I'm not, never was. But they have these thinner ones that sit
a bit more flush. I forget the brand name now, but I don't have
any relationship to them. I'll get it for you, but I really like this
one. And I'll head out for probably a 75-minute
to a 90-minute slow jog with some hills. And I'll try and nasal breathe the whole time. I'll often listen to a podcast or a book. Sometimes I'll just let my mind drift. That's if I'm on my own. If I'm with other people, what I will do is
I'll fill up a backpack with a bunch of heavy stuff, usually some water in there too, and
drink it as I go. And I'll do three or four or five hours of
just hiking and just trying to be outside as much as possible. The specific goal of that day is endurance. Just keep going. And what I notice is because of the other
things I do in the previous days, the 10 or 20 minutes, which come at the start, really
suck. I either want to go faster, like these little
aches and things. But what's amazing is somewhere in that 25,
30-minute period, you start to feel really good. You actually start to adapt to it right then. You kind of go, "Okay, this is about the heart
rate I'll use. This is about the breathing rate. So this is zone —
Tim Ferriss: What is happening at that point physiologically or neurologically or both? Andrew Huberman: I'm glad you mentioned neurologically. I think physiologically, they're the standard
things that happen during exercise. You're getting warmer, so joints are more
fluid. If your cardiovascular system is able to fuel
the relevant muscles, but you're not over, not shuttling too much fuel to specific muscle
groups, etc. Because of course, I could be stressed when
I start that. I could be relaxed, I could be tired, depending
on how well slept the night before. But neurologically, what happens is really
important, and we know this from data, what you're starting to do is you're starting to
incorporate what are called central pattern generators. Central pattern generators are what allow
you to engage in a repeated movement without voluntary attention to it. Very different than say, squatting or front
squatting or doing curls or something where you're trying to focus on each rep, fundamentally
different. Tim Ferriss: So it's like the autopilot button
appears on your steering wheel after 30 minutes.. Andrew Huberman: That's right. And at that point your mind can really attend
to other things. And of course, as your body warms up, you're
also able to achieve much more output. So you actually are getting better and more
efficient as you progress. Now that that's weird. Most exercise doesn't work out. Tim Ferriss: It is weird. But as an intrepid, pseudo-endurance athlete
who's at least really embraced this ski touring, I've done a lot of it in the last six weeks,
the first 30 to 45 minutes are generally terrible for everybody. And then you click into a rhythm and you feel
like you've accessed an extra set of batteries. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. It's neural, and I think Andy would agree,
it's neural. You're engaging the proper amount of what
are called upper motor — you have upper motor neurons and lower motor neurons. Lower motor neurons reside in the ventral
spinal cord. They're the ones that degenerate in ALS. They're the ones that, fortunately most people
don't degenerate and cause contractions of the muscle fibers. They are directed by upper motor neurons,
which are the ones in your brain that allow you to generate voluntary movement. However, the upper motor neurons and the lower
motor neurons are happy to engage in a central pattern generator type circuit if you carry
out something repetitively for long enough. So as you are able to take your mind off of
the voluntary parts of the movement, it just becomes easier. And what you end up finding is that your system
becomes very, very good at doing, forget small steps or jogging, I'm not going excruciatingly
slow, but for some people it seem really slow. But that run or that long-weighted hike accomplishes
the endurance piece. It checks off the box of the zone two cardio
requirement. Not all of it for the week, but a lot of it. Tim Ferriss: And for the lay folks out there,
zone two would be, you could have a conversation, but you really don't want to. Andrew Huberman: That's right. Tim Ferriss: As Peter might describe. Peter Attia. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. And Peter's big on doing long Sunday rucks. He throws on a rucksack because he's tougher
than me. Tim Ferriss: Well, you're doing the same thing. You're just filling it full of water and other
heavy — Andrew Huberman: I have a feeling his rucksack
is heavier than mine. Peter is, I've trained with Peter. Peter likes to push himself. These Sunday long, slow jogs or hikes are
really for my mind as much as they are for my body. And I'm convinced that they also carry over
to my ability to endure boring stuff during the week. But also it just my ability to work longer
for longer bouts. So that's Sunday, also gets me outside a lot. And oftentimes on Monday, because of the constraints
of the work week, I'm not going to be able to be outside as much as I would like. So you get a lot of sun and movement on Sunday. You feel pretty terrific on Monday. And let's just earmark what we, or go back
to that earmark earlier, which is that the state that we're in on Monday has a lot to
do with what we did on Sunday. So I'm trying to optimize for Monday in some
ways too, but it's really about endurance. Then Monday is, the goal for me is to train
my legs, just get a leg workout on Monday. First of all, I just like the way that sounds
to myself, like legwork workout on Monday, but it also sets up the work week really nicely. Here's why. I'm going to train my legs the way that's
always worked best for me for training, which is a warmup, and then two to three, maybe
four hard sets, kind of Mike Mentzer or Dorian Yates. It's not with four straps and all of that. But what we're talking about is warming up
and then doing hard sets that are heavier or more repetitions than the last time. Tim Ferriss: And just so I'm clear, are we
talking about multiple sets of the same exercise, single sets of four different exercises? What are we talking about? Andrew Huberman: Yeah, we're talking about
two to four sets, but usually two to three of two exercises per muscle group. And I'll explain what that is in a moment. I should mention that the reason we're training
legs is that everyone should train legs. So your large muscle groups, I'm trying to
maintain some lower body strength or build lower body strength and explosiveness. The data that I see on longevity and just
simply ability to perform different sports and to just feel strong throughout the body
is strongly rooted in the legs. So don't skip leg day. Tim Ferriss: Legs and hips, folks. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, exactly. Tim Ferriss: Feed the wolves. Andrew Huberman: It's kind of funny how glutes
have become the new biceps. This is what I heard, glutes are the new biceps. Growing up, this was not the case. It was like, the '90s,. everyone was like
these waify — I went to a school of waify hacky sacker dudes with the flowy hair. I wasn't one of those. All the girls liked those guys, a bunch of
skateboarders, the skinny skateboarders, and it was the kind of waif era. I don't know what it is now, it doesn't matter,
but train your legs, folks. Having strong legs is great and —
Tim Ferriss: Or learn to hacky sack. Andrew Huberman: Exactly. Hacky sack. I'm sure that's a great skill for the mind
for other reasons. So the '90s are coming back popular in a popular
— Tim Ferriss: That's huge. Andrew Huberman: Style. Tim Ferriss: Yeah. You see the youngsters with the Nirvana shirts. Andrew Huberman: That's amazing. Tim Ferriss: It's all coming around. Andrew Huberman: Amazing. Tim Ferriss: What was old is once new again. Andrew Huberman: Exactly. Those were good years. So good years, bad clothes. So Monday is really about getting that leg
work workout in to make my whole body strong. Tim Ferriss: And what exercises do you perform? Andrew Huberman: It's walk in. Oftentimes I'll do calf work because, unlike
you, I need work there. Tim Ferriss: Oh, I need calf work. That was the weak link in the chain for all
of the winter sports I've been doing for the last six weeks. Andrew Huberman: I definitely do a lot of
calf work. So I'll just walk through it, I am really
big on tib raises. I warm up with tib raises. Training the front —
Tim Ferriss: Tib raises meaning the tibialis anterior? Andrew Huberman: Yeah. Tim Ferriss: Like dorsiflexion, raising your
toes towards your knee? Andrew Huberman: Yeah, so this is a huge addition. My program, I'm a huge fan of Ben Patrick,
Knees Over Toes Guy, as he calls himself on Instagram. I started doing tib work about two years ago,
seriously doing tib work. So tibialis raises, you can do this also leaning
against a wall at an angle with your back against the wall and your feet out in front
of you with your heels on the ground and touching your toes to the ground, and then lifting
them up for repetitions of 25 to 30. Or if you can have a tib raise machine, as
they're called, that's great. I warm up with tib work. Why? Training my tibs, as they're called, definitely
makes the calf work more effective, never could grow calves or getting my calves strong,
gotten them substantially bigger and stronger by training tibs, but more importantly perhaps
helps posture, got rid of my right side sciatica. I always had this right side leaning in pain,
and I'm going to get teased for saying this, for me, anyway, I can run like a beast now. No knee pain, no back pain, no shoulder pain. I can just run and run and run. So training your tibs turns out to be key
and it turns out it has everything to do with the, we'll avoid jargon here, bringing your
toe closer to the kneecap as you generate your stride, not having the floppy feet. So if you lay down every night and your toes
are just flopping towards the end of the bed, your tibs are weak. A lot of people with knee issues have weak
tibs. Tim Ferriss: Well, hold on. So if you're in the bed, you've got your sheets
and blankets on top, and your feet are flopping forward, are you sleeping like a G.I. Joe figure with your toes pulled up to your
knees, or what's happening? Andrew Huberman: No, I just mean that if your
toes are in a state of flaccid relaxation, if your feet are flaccid, not good. Tim Ferriss: flaccid toes, folks, red light. Andrew Huberman: A lot of people who run are
smacking their feet against the ground. Ben cued people to this, tib work is great
for the calves, it's great for the knee, it's great for the hip, that's all very clear. And I think just a lot of people have overtrained
their calves and not balanced it out with tib work, it would be doing a lot of bicep
working and not a lot of tricep work, or a lot of quad work and not a lot of hamstring
work. You have to work both sides of the limb. And I think our friend Kelly Starrett would
agree. Tib work has changed everything for me. Posturally, I have no pain any longer. Tim Ferriss: I just want to lodge a formal
complaint against Kelly Starrett, people should look him up, because he is a large man. Andrew Huberman: Very. Tim Ferriss: He's Quadzilla. He's 230, maybe, former high-level competitive
kayaker. I think he celebrated his 40th birthday by
doing a standing back flip, running an ultra, and something else, and he's a really good
skier. And I just want to say it really upsets me. That he has no discernible physical weaknesses. It's very irritating. Andrew Huberman: And a nice guy. Tim Ferriss: Yeah, and a nice guy. Andrew Huberman: And a nice guy. He's very, very strong. 600-pound deadlift. Tim Ferriss: Yeah, he's a strong unit. Andrew Huberman: He's a beast. Tim Ferriss: So tib work. Andrew Huberman: Tib work. So I start with tib raises, so it's going
to be a couple warmups, maybe a 12-rep warmup, an eight-rep warmup, and then I'll do three
sets per tib of anywhere from six to 10 reps. Andy Galpin told me, and the literature supports
— people like Brad Schoenfeld and others have shown that for hypertrophy, for muscle
growth, six to 30 reps, anywhere in there can get you hypertrophy if you go to failure
and if you go hard. I personally like to keep my work resistance
workouts an hour or less. I like to train in the more or less the five
to 10 repetition range for strength and for hypertrophy. And I'm going for a mix of both. So I train tibs, then I do calf sled or standing
calf raises, same thing, two to four sets, five to eight, maybe 10 repetitions. Tim Ferriss: Are these sets to failure? Andrew Huberman: These are sets to failure. And long ago I had gift of learning from the
great Mike Mentzer and these are sets to failure. I can't budge another micro inch, but I'm
not quaking and I'm not breaking form. I'm trying to keep everything nice and taught
and rigid because I can't afford an injury at this point. Not because I'm a competitive athlete —
Tim Ferriss: No flaccid feet. Andrew Huberman: No flaccid feet, yeah. I'm telling you the tib work is a game changer,
and Knees Over Toes Guy, Ben Patrick, is the one who's been teaching people that, yes,
everyone can dunk, most everyone can dunk. He does dunks into back bends and all this
stuff. And it largely hinges on tib work and quality
posterior chain work, things like Nordic curls. So I'm training calves, that takes about 10,
15 minutes total. I try and move relatively quickly through
that. It's only two to three minutes rest, maybe
four if I'm going for a heavy set. Then I'm weaker in the hamstrings than I am
in my quads so I do two warmups and then two to four working sets of lying leg curls, pretty
standard stuff, and then I go to — Tim Ferriss: Lying leg curls meaning on a
machine? Andrew Huberman: Yeah, on a machine. Tim Ferriss: Not reverse hamstring? Andrew Huberman: I have a Nautilus machine
or something. Not seated, doesn't work for me, just lying
leg curls, and not the hoist machines that move with you to make it easier. No. And maybe the occasional forced rep if somebody's
there to help me. Then I go do two to four sets, but typically
three, of glute-hammer raises, which is an incredible exercise. The equipment isn't in every gym, but I'm
doing about three or four sets of glute-ham raises going slow. And this is basically if you were going to
do a deadlift, everyone knows what a deadlift is, but now take the ground and rotate it
90 degrees and make it the wall. That's what a glute-ham raise really is. It allows you to do a deadlift, but then at
the top do a leg curl. So if you think about it that way, you just
tilted the ground, you just rotated it counterclockwise 90 degrees. Tim Ferriss: We'll get a link to a YouTube,
folks. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, exactly. Glute-ham raise is a great lower back, so
entire posterior chain. So then I'm done with calves and hamstrings,
and then I'll do two or three sets of leg extensions, so maybe a warmup and then two
or three sets of working leg extensions, which for whatever reasons are incredibly painful,
I hate them, but they work to isolate the quads, and then two or three sets of working
hack squats after a warmup hack. Hack squats, heavy, heavy, heavy, heavy. And then I'm done. I'm out. Monday's done. Now this is, again, going back to the overall
theme, the idea is to — Tim Ferriss: Why hack squats specifically
versus other forms of squats? Andrew Huberman: Back squats, for me, I always
got a internal hip pain, I had every squat coach in the world tell me how to do it better,
even tell me I was doing it, and then I end up with the same thing, and I don't really
care if I can squat X amount of weight. I'm doing it for strength. Tim Ferriss: You're not doing it for a power
lifting competition? Andrew Huberman: No, doing it for strength
and aesthetics. Aesthetics just because it's some balance. I'm not trying to get huge legs, but I'm 6.1,
220. I sit more or less right there all the time. My body fat goes up and down, might gain five
pounds or lose five pounds, but I'm hovering around there. I don't have any interest in being much larger
or much smaller. I want to keep my strength, maybe build some
as I get older. And so hack squats allow me to put a lot of
weight on there and keep my nice right angle between the hip and my back. Tim Ferriss: Can you describe for folks, just
in case they're going to go searching for this, what is the visual of a hack squat? Andrew Huberman: Hack squat, you're sitting
back, you're back is against a sled, you're holding the handles up near your ears, and
then you're squatting down, your feet are on a 45-degree or, ideally if you can find
it, a 30-degree platform below you. So it's not a leg press, it's a hack squat. Now for people that don't have access to these,
and unfortunately a lot of gyms don't have them anymore or just don't keep them around
for whatever reason, weighted sissy squats, as they're sometimes called, can work where
you're holding onto a plate and you're squatting down while holding onto a pole. Tim Ferriss: It's deceptively hard to do if
you do it under control and with good technique. Andrew Huberman: And if you're doing your
tib work, you don't have to — Tim Ferriss: Great way to stretch your quads
in ski boots too, if you're going up in — Andrew Huberman: Recently our podcast team
took a little ski trip, I was snowboarding, and it's been a long time since I've been
on a snowboard, but you start to feel how many of these movements translate, as you've
pointed out. And I should say that the sissy squats, a
lot of people think you can't bring your knee out over your toe. And this is what Ben Patrick has really been
trying to impress on people, look at skateboarders land, their knees go out over their toes,
a foot beyond their toes. Look at parkour, gymnasts —
Tim Ferriss: Olympic weight weightlifters. Andrew Huberman: This whole knee can't pass
the toe thing is just silly. So you can feel very comfortable and very
strong at the bottom of one of these sissy squats or hack squats that way. And so the whole purpose of that Monday workout,
it's the opposite of what I'm doing on Sunday, it's get stronger, maintain some size, but
really get stronger in the legs. Tim Ferriss: And just for people listening
who are like, "For fuck's sake, it's going to take us six hours to get to Saturday,"
part of the reason that I want to dig into this day specifically is because it's so neglected. People do not tend to exercise with a focus
on their legs, but the direct and collateral benefits are so numerous that I want to just
drill into this. Andrew Huberman: When you look at the literature
on cognitive improvements from resistance training, it's not from bicep curls, it's
not from bench presses. I suppose it could be from things like dips,
which are like a upper body squat of sorts, especially if they're weighted or with rings
or something, but training the legs is key. And so, as I said before, there are two goals. One is to get the legs stronger, the other
is that I'm trying to create a systemic anabolic effect on the body. Tim Ferriss: Yeah, I was just about to say,
if you want to lose body fat also, the systemic endocrine/anabolic effect from doing this
lower body exercise is significant. Andrew Huberman: It's real work. And resting long between the sets, especially
the hamstring and quad work, four or five minutes, so you start to feel lazy, but you're
going all out, you're breathing really hard after the set, sometimes you feel like you're
going to pass out. I haven't puked from a leg workout yet, which
people tell me means I haven't really trained hard, but I just say that I just don't have
a weak stomach like the rest of them. Tim Ferriss: Look, as Kelly Starrett would
say, "20-rep squats work just great and you'll puke into a bucket, but you're not going to
be able to do much else for the next week if you do them really intensely." It's going to hurt you every time you sit
on a toilet seat, so you're not going to be doing a whole lot of basketball very well. Andrew Huberman: I want strong legs, I want
a strong body, I want a body that can accomplish endurance, and I want the cognitive effects. So you get that systemic anabolic effect. There's another practical reason for doing
this on Monday, which is sometimes I might not train again until Thursday. And if you've trained your legs properly,
you can know that you initiated a number of good processes in your brain and body. Tim Ferriss: Made a down payment for the week. Andrew Huberman: You made a bit of a down
payment. Also, if you think about the neural circuits
involved in generating the kinds of movements I just described for the Monday workout, they're
fundamentally different than the kinds of movements and neural circuits required for
generating movements. So the Sunday long workout, they're both legs,
you're running on your legs or walking your legs, of course, but very, very different. Different muscle fiber types, different motor
neurons involved. Tim Ferriss: Different range of motion too. Andrew Huberman: Different range of motion
and different mindset required. And keep in mind the entire leg workout takes
10 minutes of warm up and about 55.0 minutes of training. Tuesday is very different. Oh, and by the way, Monday is a very heavy
workday for me. Typically, we launch podcasts, I do all my
own social media, so I post the assets, I really like doing that, respond to comments,
dealing with grants, dealing with papers. So Monday is heavy work day, so getting the
leg workout done early on Monday is really key for me. These days, I don't ever really do resistance
training past 11:00 a.m. and ideally earlier in the day. And we won't go into whether or not it's fasted
or fed or other because I've covered that. I have a toolkit where I list out some of
that and how different processes layer together, and I can link to that. Tim Ferriss: I would also say, not to interject,
but I will, if people are like, "But wait, I can't start until I know if it's fasted,
or non-fasted, or if I should be swinging the dead cat over my head on Tuesday or Wednesday
night." It's just get started. You've got plenty to get started. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, I do it fasted, but
I drink caffeine first, and water. And listen, I usually eat a bit more on the
weekend. This is great. Sunday night you're putting in your fuel sources
for your Monday workout. There are all sorts of ways this layers together. Tim Ferriss: Cookies. Andrew Huberman: I'm not a cookie guy. Tim Ferriss: I'm just kidding. Andrew Huberman: For me it's like pizza is
the — I do love pizza. No cheat days anymore for me however, I haven't
done one in a while. I'm actually thinking of going back on The
4-Hour Body, just try it and do it. It's got to still work. Tim Ferriss: I said cookies, I'll make a very
embarrassing admission, which is I am going to be going back onto strict slow carb, and
so I had these incredible cookies last night. We're not going to spend a lot of time on
this because we do need to get to Tuesday, but it was my last hurrah before locking down
the fort. So yes, I'm getting back on —
Andrew Huberman: Let me know, I'll start with you. Lots of stories about cheat days. My ex-girlfriend, we used to do the cheat
days together, and at one point, I'll blame myself, we were in couple's therapy and they
were asking, "So describe a week for yourself." And she's like, "Well, then on Sunday we're
eating eight croissants." And this therapist was looking at us, laughing
so hard, trying not to laugh like, "What in the world is this?" But we had a good time with it. She was one of these mutants that could just
eat anything, drink anything, and feel fine the next day, and never put on pounds. Tim Ferriss: I know the type. Andrew Huberman: So the Tuesday is very different. Tuesday, I don't want to call it a recovery
day, but Tuesday I'm doing something really different. First of all, my legs need recovery, so what
I'll do is substantial amounts of deliberate heat exposure and deliberate cold exposure. Yes, I do cold showers in the morning first
thing nowadays. Yes, it is a bad idea to do cold water immersion
after hypertrophy training. So just for the record, you don't want to
get into an ice bath in the six hours after a hypertrophy training because it can blunt
the hypertrophy. It blocks the inflammation, which is exactly
what you want to trigger the adaptation of hypertrophy. But Tuesday is really about getting the maximum
effect of heat exposure and cold exposure. I've done multiple episodes on each one of
those, I learned about deliberate cold exposure from you, so thank you, Tim. I do a protocol which is pretty intense, designed
to amplify growth hormone, stimulate a bunch of positive, mood-promoting hormones that
last not just days but weeks, say the literature, and just get better at it. So I'll do 20 minutes of sauna, hot sauna. Tim Ferriss: What does hot mean? Andrew Huberman: I'm up to 260 now. But I worked up to that. You can check out the Banya, I'll give a plug
to these folks, they're Spa 88 on Wall Street in New York. They are amazing. They are incredible. They have a hot Russian sauna. Tim Ferriss: They have very hot sauna. Andrew Huberman: And Archimedes Banya in San
Francisco is great. A couple of notes about that one, it's clothing
optional. I wear my swim trunks. Tim Ferriss: Boo! How are you going to show off those glutes
you're working so hard on? Andrew Huberman: But it is, so just know what
you're getting into, it's co-ed and clothing optional. And it is in Hunters Point, Bayview, which
is a rough neighborhood. Tim Ferriss: Yeah, I wouldn't go for a jog. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, don't leave anything
in your car, but don't do that anywhere in San Francisco now. So 20 minutes in the sauna, very hot, three
to five minutes in the cold plunge up to the neck, back into the sauna for 20 minutes,
back into the cold plunge for three to five minutes, back into the sauna for 20 minutes,
back into the coal plunge for three to five minutes. It's work, but it's amazing in the sense that
you recover very well from the leg day, you generate all the hormone neurotransmitter
type of adaptations that one wants, and you get very, very good at tolerating heat and
cold. And I should mention, during these times,
if there isn't someone else there, I'm listening to books, I'm thinking, I'm putting this work
and time to use, so there's multiple things going on there. Then Wednesday, I do one of two things. I'm either going to do a shorter duration
than Sunday cardiovascular training workout, so I'm thinking about five minutes of warmup
and then about 25 to 30 minutes of usually running for me, where I'm just trying to get
out and cover as much distance as I can at a fast clip but steady, so I'm not sprint,
stop, sprint, stop. That's typically what I'll do on Wednesday. Although, if my legs are still a little bit
sore, and here the body builders are just going to go, "Ugh," they're going to scoff,
I train what I call torso. What do I do? I try to get pushing through the chest and
shoulders, I'm trying to pull for the back. I already got my lower back with the glute-ham
raises, so what I tend to do is overhead shoulder presses after a warmup, two to three sets,
working sets, or maybe four. I like ring dips and dips these days, those
are hard for me, but I do two or three work sets of those, so chest, shoulders. And I'm going to upset some people here, but
I don't tend to train back every week, I do it every other week because just I have some
genetic abnormality where those grow really easily and I can throw proportions off really
quickly. But I might do three or four sets of max rep
chins slow, with slow, eccentric movements, the lowering as well. Tim Ferriss: Now, slow eccentric, four seconds,
10 seconds, what are we talking about? Andrew Huberman: Yeah, usually about four
or five seconds, and then slowly pulling up, contracting whatever muscle group. So all of the movements are done trying to
move as much weight as possible as quickly as possible on the concentric phase, and then
lowering it anywhere from two to four seconds, loading it like a spring and then trying to
explode. I want strength and I want explosiveness,
and some hypertrophy sneaks in because I'm working in that five to eight rep range. So that's what I call torso because it's chest,
shoulders, back, every other week I'll throw in those chins. And I think everyone has a muscle group like
this where if they train it just grows like a weed, but I want to keep proportions right,
strength proportions as well. And I do train my neck that day as well. I know you wrestled. I can tell very easily looking at somebody
whether or not they need neck work or not, if your neck comes down where your jaw is,
you don't need to do a lot of neck work, you don't look like a head placed on top of a
little neck. Laird Hamilton's neck is out to the lobes
of his ears, genuinely. Danny Way, great skateboarder too, he trains
his neck quite a lot. He broke his neck surfing years ago. So having a strong neck, why is that so important? Well, it's important because you want a strong
spine and it's the upper portion of your spine. The other thing that I notice that it does
is it completely changes my psychology to train my neck. I just naturally stand more upright, I find
it easier to look people in the eye, it's not hard for me to look people directly in
the eye when I speak to them, but I find my posture and presence is just better in a chair
or standing when I train my neck. And I think it's because my head, let's just
use the word again, it's not flaccid, falling of the chin towards the chest, that word just
freaks everybody out. You want flaccid feet, you don't want a flaccid
neck, so neck work is very important. Tim Ferriss: How do you work your neck? I've been thinking about it for decades, I
bought a four-way neck machine, and it's actually, I got it on —
Andrew Huberman: Wait, you got the full four-way neck machine? Tim Ferriss: I was going to get a Hammer or
one of these great, giant contraptions. And look, do your homework folks, because
you can hurt yourself on these things if you get too aggressive too quickly. I bought a four-way neck machine on Amazon
for 350 bucks. I was like, "You know what? Let me try this before spending five grand." Works great. Nothing fancy, but it works. Andrew Huberman: You have great proportions. Why do I say this? It's not just about aesthetics, it's about,
in general, balanced proportions are synonymous with balanced strength, which is synonymous
with not getting injured. One of the things that looks ridiculous and
frankly is ridiculous, you see these guys with big delts, wide shoulders, long clavicles,
and their head is placed on this little neck —
Tim Ferriss: It's just a popsicle on a stick. Andrew Huberman: And they look especially
ridiculous, there's no other word for it, in street clothes, it looks mutant, and not
in the good sense. So strong neck is great. Strong neck has helped me also avoid injuries
in a number of sports. It's life insurance if you do any kind of
martial art, or you drive a car. I've been rear-ended in a car and felt fine,
a little bit of neck soreness, but train the upper spine and lower spine. So I do some neck work at the end. And the way I do it is take a plate, wrap
it in a towel so you don't end up with an imprint of the weight number on your forehead,
and I usually lie on my side and I'll do somewhere in the 10- to 15-repetition range. I'll usually do one light warmup and then
three work sets. Tim Ferriss: How do you hold it on your head? Andrew Huberman: You just hold it with your
hand on your side. It also works your oblique somewhat. Tim Ferriss: So you're on a bench or on the
ground? Andrew Huberman: On a bench. You have to be careful, especially getting
into and out of the movement, that's how you often get injured. And then I'll lie on my stomach, and this
is probably the most important one, and I'll put the plate behind my head, again, wrapped
in a towel, and do head raises. You're trying to get your head sitting on
top of your shoulders as it's supposed to, because everyone now is bent over in this
C-shape. And no one's nerdy enough, except my good
friend Brian Mackenzie, who cares enough about his posture — shout out to Brian. He does amazing work in breath work and human
performance. When he texts, he uses his phone up near his
eyes. Tim Ferriss: I've seen that. Andrew Huberman: It's so good. He's like, duh, duh, duh. No one else does that, Brian. So the neck work comes at the end, but is
absolutely critical. And whenever I don't do it for a week or two
out of laziness or just some other reason, I start getting postural things you start
noticing elsewhere in your body. Tim Ferriss: I find, I don't think it's placebo
because it's not something that I expect, or maybe it is now, but not initially, fewer
headaches, just better circulation and better mobility also. Especially if you're spending a lot of time
in front of a computer. My rotation, even though I'm not actively
training with resistance, the rotational aspect, left, right, turning your head, the mobility
of the neck in all dimensions and the movement of the head seems to improve as well for me. And for folks, just one option I want to throw
out there, if you train with someone or can train with someone, manual resistance —
Andrew Huberman: With a towel, some will say. Tim Ferriss: With a towel or just pressure
on the head, and doing it really slowly, super slow style, 10 seconds, 10 seconds is very
effective also. Andrew Huberman: I can't overstate the importance
of neck training. Now for women who often don't want the aesthetic
of a larger neck, just use, I would say, lighter weights or hand-based resistance. You still want that strength and balance. Some women might want a big neck, but, in
general, the two things that can — and you put some of this in The 4-Hour Body. Tim Ferriss: Throw a wig on Laird Hamilton,
that's my type. I'm just putting it out there, ladies. Andrew Huberman: In terms of aesthetics, the
two things that I think can really throw off the most commonly desired female aesthetic
by women from what they tell me, because I've trained with a number of women, is excessive
trap work, upper trap work cause rounded shoulders and then larger neck. Some people might want that, but in general
that tends to be avoided. For guys, I think that neck work, it's so
essential, and for women it's essential for a strength and protection of the joints reason. I will also say this, and anyone who wants
to challenge me on this will do it accordingly, it actually increases your confidence. And the reason is when you're upright, you
embody a different stance. I'm a big believer that the physical stances
we embody have everything to do with the psychological stances we embody and vice versa. So it's not just about standing up straight,
being able to stand up straight, look people in the eye, it's something that is assisted
by actually having a head that isn't flopping forward all the time. So this is a real thing from a number of standpoints. So if, for whatever reason, I do the cardio
workout that I mentioned, the 25 or 30 minutes of running, that's what I do, but some people
might do it on the AssaultBike or something like that, or cycling, or rower, on the Wednesday. Then I'll do that weight workout I just described,
torso, on Thursday, or I'll swap them. So there's some flexibility built into the
week, travel, et cetera. By the way, the cardiovascular workouts can
be done in the morning or the evening, but I always prefer to do them in the morning
and just get it done with. Then Friday is a really important day because
Friday is the day that I do a short workout, usually only about three minutes of warmup
and about 12 minutes of training, and the goal is to get my heart rate as high as I
possibly can, I learned this from Andy Galpin. Just increasing VO2 max, getting those really
fastuous muscle fibers. My favorite way to do this is I'll get on
the AssaultBike, so the ones with the handles with the fan, which is not designed to keep
you cool, it's designed to create resistance, folks, and do 20 second on sprint, 10 second
rest, 20 second on, 10 second rest. Tim Ferriss: Tabata style. Andrew Huberman: Tabata type thing for six
to eight rounds. And then what I like to do is take a band
and tie it to something like a chin-up bar or something, and I'll squat down and jump,
and I'll do it as high jumping as I possibly can, but I actually control the eccentric. I'm holding the band as I come down. And so I learned from Peter Attia, I've learned
from Andy Galpin that our ability to jump and land is strongly correlated with physical
longevity. Or you could do broad jump. So you could do a bunch of broad jumps, you
could do some hit workout, and then I'm just showered and out the door to go do my work
or to work. So it's a really short workout. And then Saturday is the fun one because I
still enjoy this, I'll go into the gym in the morning, usually it's mid-morning, and
I'll do small muscle groups, biceps, triceps, rear delts. I'll do another tip and calf workout, a little
bit lighter than the one on leg day because leg day is coming in two days, and the next
day I'm doing that long hike. So that day is really to round out the smaller
muscle groups that need work. And I have a short torso, long arms, and so
torso muscles grow very easily for me, get stronger easily, long arms, but they require
a little bit more work, so I like to do a dedicated day for that. Same way, warmup plus two to four work sets
of two to three exercises. I always include dips at some point during
the week, bench dips, tricep extensions with cables, basic stuff, preacher curls, incline
curls, so very basic stuff. But I just want to backtrack one step because
I failed to say that Friday the idea is to get that VO2 max up. But guess what? It's also designed to indirectly hit the legs. We hit legs on Monday, and they've recovered. We now know that protein synthesis maximizes
after these training workouts at about 48 hours and then starts to taper off. Now, you read that, you hear that a lot, especially
on social media, and people think you have to hit a muscle group every 48 hours. But no, you hold onto the protein synthesis,
you generate it for another couple of days, so that Friday sprint on the bike workout
or sprint on a field workout and jumping is indirectly targeting the quads and calves
and hamstrings. And so you're keeping them online for hypertrophy. So when you hear all this, you might think,
gosh, that's a lot of working out, but what we're really talking about is a long hike
with friends or family on Sunday or by oneself, 90 minutes to three hours. You're talking about an hour workout on Monday
morning, you're talking about sitting in the sauna and cold on Tuesday, you're talking
about running for 20 or 30 minutes on Wednesday, you're talking about doing some dips and overhead
presses, maybe some chins and a little bit of neck work on Thursday, you're talking about
doing a 12-minute workout on Friday, and you're talking about going to the gym for an hour,
hour and 15 minutes, more casual — I don't want to call it what it is, but you could
call it a vanity workout. I called it that to Joe Rogan and he was like,
"That's ridiculous, bicep is key muscle group." And I was like, "Give me an example." And he's like, "Well, when you're grappling
and you're about to choke somebody out." And I was like, "Okay, well, that's you." But he's absolutely right. Actually, I chipped my tooth really hard once,
I was trying to fix something with a wrench, and you're pulling with your bicep and your
arm towards you and it broke loose and chipped my tooth. Keep your head out of the way. Tim Ferriss: Good thing you train your neck. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, this is mostly a falsey,
this one front tooth. Exactly. Good thing. I could have knocked myself out. But there's a lot of things that a bicep is
good for, forearm strength is good for, so Joe's absolutely right. But I think that when you look at all of that,
it's not that much time in the gym, you can do all of that at home. There are ways to do the leg workout even
at home or in natural terrain for the hikes and things. And so that's the schedule. And again, if you think about that schedule,
each day you're accomplishing something, endurance, leg strength, cold and heat adaptation, and
all the neural stuff that goes with that, torso, to keep the torso strong. But here again, and we can say the torso work
is indirectly hitting biceps and triceps. Then being able to run a couple miles is a
good skill. And what you find is that if you trained your
legs properly and you give them enough rest, and the cold and heat really helped too, you
are so strong on that 20- or 30-minute run, your tibs are strong, no floppy feet, no back
pain, you're running with vigor and you go, "Wow, this is great." And so what I've noticed in the last 24 months
or so is that I continued to get stronger and better in each of these areas, and supposedly
that's not supposed to happen. I'm 47. Attia the other day said, "You and I were
both far more physically robust when we were in our teens." I was like, "Speak for yourself. I was getting injured all the time. My body hurt. I was unhappy." Then again, I was skateboarding then, so I
was slamming a lot. But I find that this routine has really helped
me because I think it takes into account the slower recovery, that is just me. My nervous system doesn't recover that quickly. And it also embraces the fact that our nervous
system and musculoskeletal system can train for different adaptations simultaneously across
the week. Now the one cap on everything that's vital,
and again here a hat tip to Charles Poliquin, is if you start training for longer than 60
minutes with resistance training, cortisol levels go up, you start feeling lousy, you're
not sleeping well, or you find you can't sleep enough and you don't recover. So keeping the workouts relatively short has
really helped. And then the final thing is that I'm a scientist
slash, I guess now, podcaster and I'm not interested in being a competitive athlete,
so I don't want to spend all my time training. I really want to be able to get the most out
of my training routine to feel much better than I would otherwise when I'm doing cognitive
work. And I'm a big believer that this workout schedule
captures most, if not all of the neural circuits, that are wanted or one would want to activate. Perhaps the one thing missing from it is there
isn't anything in there that's really about dynamic movement in multiple planes, I'm not
doing jiu-jitsu, I sometimes play badminton or something, badminton is fun. I'll do an hour of play type stuff, non-competitive,
low stake stuff, big fan of the book Play It Away. I think I learned about that book from your
podcast. Tim Ferriss: Yeah. Andrew Huberman: Charlie —
Tim Ferriss: Charlie Hoehn. Andrew Huberman: Having an hour a week where
you're not trying to get fitter, you're not trying to burn calories or accomplish any
adaptation, you're just trying to play and enjoy your ability to engage in low stakes,
maybe competitive, but generally low stakes type movement where you're very focused, which
is how I define play. That's also great, but that's not really exercise. That's play. Tim Ferriss: There's a difference between,
sometimes, recreation and exercise if we're talking about provoking adaptations. So I just want to underscore a few things. One is you talked about nervous system or
central nervous system, CNS recovery, which is I just want to make note of that because
I think a lot of folks think in terms of muscular recovery but not nervous system recovery. And depending on what you're doing, certainly
that's very important. Question on a few things that I just took
notes on. So Ben Patrick, Knees Over Toes, I might need
to connect with him at some point. Andrew Huberman: Oh, yeah, he's terrific. Tim Ferriss: I have questions about tib work,
but before I get to that, maybe you can answer the question that I have. You mentioned Nordic curls in passing. What the hell are Nordic curls? Andrew Huberman: Yeah. Nordics are a great semi-substitute for the
glute-ham raise. The glute-ham raise allows you to fix your
feet and then put your head down towards the floor and go up into a back raise and then
into what's effectively a hamstring curl. It hits the whole posterior chain and the
lower back. And Nordic curls are when you either brace
your heels underneath a heavy piece of equipment, or you use a lifting belt and strap yourself
to a bench or someone strong enough or heavy enough holds your ankles down. And you're lowering down and you're touching
your hands to the floor and coming back up. Or you can do the Ben Patrick, Ben Bruno. Ben Bruno's another excellent Instagram trainer
and professional trainer. He trains Justin Timberlake and a bunch of
other kind of famous — not kind of famous people. Justin Timberlake's not kind of famous. He's famous. And he can do the cookie challenge, which
is to put a cookie in your mouth and dip it in milk without putting your hands to the
floor. Tim Ferriss: That's incredibly hard. Andrew Huberman: It's interesting. Ben is deceptively strong because he's not
that large, but he's very, very strong. BenBrunoTraining is his handle. Tim Ferriss: Cue break dancers. You want to see some strong people who are
deceptive. B-Boys, B-Girls. Andrew Huberman: So Nordic curls are great. There are now machines that — or an apparatus
you can buy where you can fix your heels under something, do Nordic curls. Even a portable one for when you travel that
goes under the door. Ben Patrick, AKA Knees Over Toes Guy, he has
a system called ATG training. I confess, I didn't subscribe to ATG because
I've got what I need now. But a bunch of those portable equipment type
things are available through him. And I think he's really changed the way that
I think about how the whole body moves and works. He insists that he can get me dunking a basketball,
which, who knows? Maybe that should be the challenge before
our next conversation. Tim Ferriss: So Nordic curls, unbeknownst
to me, because there's some other term for this particular exercise, but I have a piece
of Sorinex equipment that actually sits my garage and is for this exact exercise. Andrew Huberman: I think if I had to pick
just three — I will never just pick three. But if I had to pick three exercises to do
and I could only do those, it would be glute-ham raise/Nordic curl, something for the posterior
chain, it would be ring dips because then I could throw in some leg raises too, or something
like that. I could make it a multi-compound movement
and I would sprint. If that's the only thing I could do, that's
what I would do. Put me in a small prison cell, knock on wood,
let's hope that doesn't happen. That's what I ask for. Tim Ferriss: Scientist/podcaster/inmate. Andrew Huberman: Hopefully not. Listen, we talked last time, I've been behind
locked doors before. It's not an experience I want to recreate. Tim Ferriss: Not fun. Andrew Huberman: Not fun. Tim Ferriss: Not an indoorist. Andrew Huberman: No. Tim Ferriss: So on the tib work side, this
may be a question for Ben or someone more qualified, but one of the challenges that
I've had for decades: shin splints. And my dorsiflexion is actually seemingly,
from a strength perspective, pretty decent. Ankle mobility, also pretty decent. Although the left ankle's been broken so many
times that it's a little crunchy. But I have done training with this fellow
named Jerzy Gregorek, who holds multiple world records in Olympic weightlifting, or he held. Andrew Huberman: Also deceptively strong. Tim Ferriss: Incredibly strong. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. I met him and his wife. Tim Ferriss: She also has world records in
Olympic weightlifting. And just to give you an idea, folks, he's
got to be in his, I want to say, he's probably 67, 68 now, and he can do a full barbell snatch,
ass-to-heels while on top of an INDO BOARD, which are those balance boards on top of a
cylinder. Andrew Huberman: Sounds very dangerous. Tim Ferriss: And I don't recommend trying
to replicate that. But he's quite a physical specimen. So the point of all of that is that my ankle
mobility's pretty good. My dorsiflexion strength seems pretty good,
but I always feel like the front of my shins are about to explode. Someone could just pop them like a balloon
with a pin. And I've not figured out a way to address
this. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. I vote tib work. I used to have terrible shin splints. Tim Ferriss: Okay. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. Terrible shin splints, and also pain in my
shins just from skateboarding, taking so many shiners as they're called, from doing a little
bit of Thai boxing when I was in high school and college and thinking I was being smart
by conditioning my shins with coke bottles like I heard they did it over in Thailand. Just made a mess of my shins. The tib raises have changed everything. Also, I used to think I had flat feet, "I
have flat feet. That's the source of my problem." And I'd do all this toe strengthening, foot
strengthening stuff. All these people in the yoga community in
San Francisco were like, "Oh, I'm going to train your feet." Turned out, I don't have flat feet. It turns out that my tibs were weak and so
the foot wasn't resting in the right position. So for me, it's been a game changer. Also, you don't need any specialized equipment. There is that movement of resting your shoulders
against a wall. So you're in a plank, you make your body rigid,
your heels are on the ground about a foot out in front of you, and then you're touching
your toes down to the floor and then back up. And you're just doing that while you're on
the phone. You do 25 or 30 repetitions of that, your
tibs will be screaming. Tim Ferriss: So it's as if you're basically
a statue. You can't articulate any of your joints minus
your ankles. And you're just standing, what, like a foot
and a half, two feet away and then kind of —
Andrew Huberman: Shoulders against the wall. Tim Ferriss: Getting your shoulders to the
wall, but you're leaning like a book against a bookend. And then moving your toes. Andrew Huberman: Yup. Tim Ferriss: All right. I'm in. Count me in. I am also, in the, apparently, I think this
is possible, the lying to myself about the flat feet part. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. I was convinced I have flat feet. You want to hear something really wild that
has nothing to do with fitness, but has everything to do with metabolism and the obesity crisis? Tim Ferriss: Wild metabolism and obesity crisis,
tell me. Andrew Huberman: And tibs. There's a very important paper published from
the University of Houston this last year where they had people sitting for a couple of hours
and every two or three seconds they would keep their toe on the ground and they would
do what was effectively a seated calf raise. Think about the jumpy kid in class or when
you've had too much coffee. They're doing it slowly and they're measuring
the contraction of the soleus, the longer, flatter muscle of the calf underneath the
gastro. Turns out that muscle is very unique. It does not use the same fuel sources as other
muscles in the same way. It's not so much a glycogen-dependent muscle. It is designed, of course, to carry you very
long distances over — it's an endurance muscle. They had people do this while seated for a
couple hours a day, and they looked at glucose uptake and they looked at overall insulin
management, and there was a significant and meaningful improvement in insulin sensitivity. Now, this is not about caloric burn. This is about essentially doing exercise while
seated. Now I put out some stuff about this on social
media and people understandably laugh, like, "Oh, that's ridiculous." First of all, they call it a soleus pushup
in the study. You're like, "That's a seated calf raise." But most people don't know what a seated calf
raise is. So gym rats, you're only laughing to yourselves. I throw myself in that. I mean, it's true. Tim Ferriss: Most of the internet. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. But what's very interesting is this is something
that a lot of people can do who are trying to improve their metabolic status. Of course, they should also exercise, but
as the paper describes, it's no surprise why this works. Were we quote/unquote "designed" to walk around
more or move more during the day? I don't know. I wasn't consulted at the design phase, but
we were definitely moving around a lot more than we probably are now. But it's very interesting that — this muscle's
small. It's only one percent of the body's total
musculature, can account for well over 15 percent — well, over, it depends on the
person, but at least 15 percent of your total energy expenditure during the day. Tim Ferriss: That's insane. Andrew Huberman: So if you're on a plane like
this and you're bouncing your knee or doing this thing, it's actually a meaningful — it's
not a replacement for exercise, but in terms of its metabolic impact, is meaningful. I find that really interesting and perhaps
of all the things that we'll discuss today, if you're unwilling to try that, then your
bar for entry is just way too high. Tim Ferriss: So have a few extra cups of coffee,
folks. Bounce those knees. Andrew Huberman: Exactly. And don't get on kids about bouncing their
knees in class, teachers. I was one such a kid. Tim Ferriss: All right, so we've covered a
bunch of exercise and a number of things as fundamental pillars that you've doubled down
on. Anything that you've changed your mind on? Andrew Huberman: Well, one of them was the
fact that I always believed that I had flat feet. I also believed that we couldn't obtain multiple
exercise adaptations at once. I'm convinced we can because I track my numbers. I'm not super neurotic, but I keep a handwritten
training journal. Or at the end of the day, I generally can
remember what I did in the gym and didn't do, or on a run. And I'm improving over time. So that's great. I thought I would have had hit my peak ability
and it was all downhill from here, but I feel much better. Tim Ferriss: How do you track, if you track
the Tabata, for instance? Are you looking at wattage? Are you looking at anything? Or is it more subjective? Andrew Huberman: I tend to add another round
or two. I just do a little bit more work or go a little
bit harder. I tend like to do things pretty subjectively
when it comes to exercise. My calendar will say, for instance, for legs,
it'll say tib, calf, ham, quad. And I'll put anywhere from level one to level
10. Level 10 would be the workout with forced
reps and drop sets, just all out. I rarely, if ever, do those. But typically I'm trying to make that workout
at least a level 7.5 to nine. And generally, the shorter workouts are the
harder ones. Occasionally, just because of schedules or
I'm not feeling great, I'll do that Wednesday run and it'll end up being a 15-minute jog
or something, and I'll just say, "Level five. Lame," or something like that, like I didn't
— or something like that. And then push a little bit harder the next
day. So I'm kind of my own coach. I'm sort of observing myself rather than getting
really deep into the metrics. But I'm always trying to put a little bit
more weight on the bar, go a little bit slower with the repetition, or add a set or a rep
or two, or all three. Tim Ferriss: So let's hone in on sleep, my
perennial favorite and the bane of my well-being, depending on the quality. But last we spoke, I remember you spoke about,
I think it was magnesium threonate, apigenin, and there may have been one or two or two
other — Andrew Huberman: Theanine. Tim Ferriss: — Lucky Charms in there. Andrew Huberman: Theanine. Tim Ferriss: Right, theanine. Andrew Huberman: Yep. Tim Ferriss: Are those still the holy trinity
for your sleep, or do you have other things that you've added, things you've subtracted? What is your current cocktail? With the understanding that as much as people
want to fix everything with silver bullets, light exposure in the morning, exercise, all
of these are contributors to good quality sleep. Andrew Huberman: I still use the same sleep
stack. So it's magnesium threonate, spelled T-H-R-E-O-N-A-T-E,
theanine, and apigenin. And I've added every once in a while, I'll
take 900 milligrams of myo-inositol. Myo-inositol has a rich literature associated
— Tim Ferriss: Interesting name. Myo as in muscle? Why myo? M-Y-O. Andrew Huberman: That's a good question. Yeah, it must be. Tim Ferriss: It must be. Andrew Huberman: So it's amino acid, but it
can be a neurotransmitter mimetic, extensive literature on inositol for improving insulin
sensitivity. There's also something called D-chiro inositol,
which is important for female fertility. We can talk about that. But what I've added in the 900 milligrams
of myo-inositol for is I do sometimes, like many people, wake up at three in the morning
to use the restroom. And although there's a simple solution to
that that I just recently learned that really works, and I'll share it in a moment —
Tim Ferriss: Catheter. Andrew Huberman: — it helps me fall back
asleep after that. And I am tracking my sleep. Because I sleep on an Eight Sleep. And that has good sleep tracking ability. What Attia has taught me, that a lot of the
wristbands and rings for tracking sleep, while they can be quite good and are quite good,
WHOOPs and Ouras being the two most popular ones, they can get movement wrong because
of movement of limbs. Whereas the Eight Sleep seems to really capture
slow wave sleep, rapid eye movement, sleep ratios really well. Tim Ferriss: Yeah, I use both Eight Sleep
and Oura at the moment. Andrew Huberman: Great. Yeah. So the myo-inositol, it has helped quite a
bit with that going back to sleep thing, one way to not wake up to urinate so much in the
middle of the night I learned from a colleague is it turns out that it's not just how much
fluid you drink, which dictates whether or not you need to urinate because that's sort
of a duh. It's also how quickly you ingest that fluid
if you gulp fluid down because of the way fluid is absorbed, it actually, in the kidney,
and the way filtration occurs in the kidney, the way it signals to the bladder is that
it makes you have to go to the bathroom fairly urgently. So if you have your final beverage of the
day, sip it, don't gulp it. For morning hydration, the opposite is true. You actually want to gulp down quite a lot
of liquid in the morning. You can absorb quite a lot of liquid in the
morning. I'm reading this really nerdy review in Nature,
it has these wonderful review series on circadian rhythms and the kidney. Your kidney is not the same organ first thing
in the morning as it is at night. So this is what circadian biologists have
been shouting for a long time, every organ is this way. But you want to hydrate pretty heavily first
thing in the morning, and then over the day you can titrate off that liquid. Tim Ferriss: So I'm going to ask you to pick
some favorite children here. So you've got the magnesium threonate, L-theanine,
apigenin, which am I understanding correctly, that is effectively chamomile tea on steroids? Andrew Huberman: Mm-hmm. High concentration chamomile extract. Tim Ferriss: All right, got it. And then the myo-inositol —
Andrew Huberman: Myo-inositol. Tim Ferriss: All right. Andrew Huberman: 900 milligrams, which it's
a big pill, but turns out to be pretty low dose for insulin sensitivity, and for depression,
they give people up to five grams of myo-inositol a day. But it's a mild sedative. So I don't know how people get away with that. I'll take the four of those. I will occasionally be so fired —
Tim Ferriss: Pop five Trazodone before my workout, yeah. Andrew Huberman: Occasionally, I'm so tired
that I'll wake up with the pills in my hand or on the nightstand. So I don't think I'm dependent on them in
any way. Tim Ferriss: The question is: if you could
only choose two of those? Andrew Huberman: Oh, easy. Mag threonate and apigenin. Tim Ferriss: Okay. Yeah. Got it. Andrew Huberman: Theanine is not going to
be good for people that have very robust dreams or nightmares because it will increase how
vivid your dreams are. So night walkers, night terrors, that kind
of thing. For those of you that have sleepwalking, night
walkers — Tim Ferriss: Skinwalkers, beware. Andrew Huberman: Sorry. And I didn't mean to interrupt you. This is something I'm working, my colleague
at Stanford, Carol Dweck, told me that it's a sign of enthusiasm for the conversation. Tim Ferriss: Oh, yeah, no. Andrew Huberman: So I apologize. Tim Ferriss: Oh, are you kidding? I'm not going to throw stones in my glass
house here. I interrupt constantly. But you were talking about the kidneys, you
were saying not the same organ in the morning as it is at night. This is what circadian biologists have been
screaming from the rooftops, and now that's coming home to roost. And these papers that you're reading, or maybe
it's a meta-analysis, I don't know. And you were saying sipping water at night
or just slower intake. Gulping in the morning, and I threw your train
of thought off the rails. Andrew Huberman: All good. I mean, basically you want to look at the
first half of your day very differently than the second half of your day. Morning part of your day, you want sunlight
or bright artificial light. Why? It increases cortisol 50 percent above baseline. You want cortisol high early in the day and
you want it low, low later in the day. Not because it disrupts sleep, but because
late-shifted cortisol is associated with depression. Screws up your immune system to have it late-shifted. Beautiful work from Bob Sapolsky and David
Spiegel at Stanford School of Medicine have shown that. So hydration, caffeine, sunlight, movement,
bright light if you can't get sunlight early in the day. You really want what are called the catecholamines,
which are dopamine, epinephrine, norepinephrine. And you want cortisol, which is a glucocorticoid,
elevated in the early part of the day, and that's what's going to give you energy, focus,
alertness, all that great stuff throughout the day. And then you want to taper that stuff off
as the day goes on. Now the recent data have shown that if you
want to improve your rapid eye movement sleep — why would you want to do that? Well, rapid eye movement sleep is when you
get the unpacking of emotions from previous-day memories. This is your —
Tim Ferriss: Yeah, read or listen to our mutual friend Matt Walker. Andrew Huberman: Right. How do you get more rapid eye movement sleep? High-intensity interval training early part
of the day or cycling appears to greatly improve different stages of sleep as well, compared
to running. Although running will do it as well. Tim Ferriss: Why is that? Andrew Huberman: I don't know. I think it has to do with the central pattern
generator thing. That high-intensity interval training, when
you're peddling on the bike or you're sprinting, so it's repetitive, but it's not repetitive
for long enough that you're engaging certain brain circuits. And it's going to deplete different neurotransmitter
systems. It's going to engage the endorphin system
rather than — Tim Ferriss: I wonder if it's also a study
bias in the sense that it's so much easier to get your slaves, AKA, like, undergrads
or grad students or whoever recruited in a university setting to sit on a bike. So if you have a hundred studies with bikes
and you have five studies with running that maybe it's a selection bias in some respect
because there's just such a higher volume of studies. Andrew Huberman: I don't know. I don't know. I love bicycling when I can be upright. Think your Dutch bicycle, moving through a
city, seeing things, optic flow, which we know shuts down the amygdala to some extent,
suppresses activity in the amygdala. It's beautiful. You see things, you see people. How anyone in the world could want to be hunched
over in a partial seat position and pedaling as one is on a road bike. I have zero minus one interest in doing that. Sounds horrible. And then I heard it gives you all these prostate
issues and it can give erectile dysfunction from the pain. They now put grooves in the seats because
— I just think, why would anyone be a cyclist? This is terrible. Tim Ferriss: Turns out having a pool cue shoved
into your perennium for hours at a time isn't good for you. Andrew Huberman: No, hunched over, like a
seat. And I realize that I have many friends who
are triathletes and cyclists, so I realize there's really an allure there. Moving fast through space feels really good,
but also the danger of cars — so riding a bicycle recreationally to me makes sense,
as does walking or running or skateboarding or whatever. But to me, cycling hunched over like that
just seems like a dreadful form of exercise. But that's just me. Tim Ferriss: So let's go from the dreadful
to the sublime perhaps. We mentioned a couple of supplements, and
I don't want to fixate on that, but I follow my own curiosity here. And there's a list here. So on the omegas, because we discussed omega-3
fatty acids, EPA/DHA, and I increased my intake. I'm so curious to know. Because I do observe, seemingly, a very consistent
improvement in mood and sleep. However, I've tried multiple brands and I've
tried to do the homework and look at the various certificates of analysis to make sure that
I'm not eating rancid garbage. I end up getting mild nausea after a week
of, I suppose, higher intake. Maybe if I'm taking, I might be getting the
amount off, but maybe two grams total, something like that. Andrew Huberman: In liquid or capsule form? Tim Ferriss: In capsule form. Andrew Huberman: With food or without food? Tim Ferriss: That's a great question. I probably wasn't even paying attention, although
I tend to take fat with food. So probably with food. Or maybe just before food. I'd be curious to know anyone on the internet,
if you're listening to this, if you've experienced anything similar. Because I see the benefits and then let's
just call it five to seven days in, I'd just get this low-grade nausea, almost like a motion
sickness. And then I stop for a washout period and then
I'm fine. And I'm like, "God." Andrew Huberman: So you know it's the fish
oil. Tim Ferriss: A bummer. Yeah. Andrew Huberman: There's obviously some great
high quality fish oils out there. For liquid, the Carlson's brands, the ones
that are lemon-flavored to make them less fishy, it's going to be the most cost-effective
way to get fish oil. It has to be refrigerated after opening, but
that's definitely the most cost-effective way. And here we do have a supplement affiliate
for the podcast, and it's not them, but that's just the truth. Tim Ferriss: What is your dosage target for
omega-3s or EPA specifically? Andrew Huberman: Minimum one gram per day
of EPA. Tim Ferriss: Okay. Andrew Huberman: Minimum, sometimes more. Tim Ferriss: Do you take it in one dose or
split doses? Andrew Huberman: It ends up being three capsules
with my big meal of the day, which tends to be a midday meal. And then I do take a tablespoon of the Carlson's
oil and people gasp when I say this, but I actually like it on my oatmeal with salt. Tim Ferriss: Oh. Andrew Huberman: It tastes good. Tim Ferriss: When I've spent time —
Andrew Huberman: If you stir it in — Tim Ferriss: — in Iceland and Scandinavia
— Andrew Huberman: It's delicious. Tim Ferriss: — I've had these little shots
of cod liver oil and so on. I can do that. But on top of the oatmeal? Andrew Huberman: No, I'm telling you. It's really good. And I hate sardines. I despise sardines. I despise anything smoked flavored. I'm really boring. And I absolutely loathe anchovies, like fishy
oil smell. I don't even really like eating fish. Tim Ferriss: Yeah, I can't eat anchovies. Still like sardines. Andrew Huberman: I like sushi. I like sushi. That's about it. But even there, I'm boring. Tim Ferriss: You spoiled brat. Andrew Huberman: I don't even uni. I'm a good person to go to sushi with because
you get all the eel, all the uni. I just want the yellowtail and the —
Tim Ferriss: Least offensive. Andrew Huberman: Maguro. Yeah. Tim Ferriss: Least offensive fish available. Andrew Huberman: I'm boring. At least I'm not ordering chicken teriyaki. Tim Ferriss: All right. And just so people are hearing it from you
and not from me, not to say it's even the same thing. What are the primary benefits that you observe
or that are supported by literature? Either or, with the intake of say, one gram
minimum of EPA per day? Andrew Huberman: Mood. Antidepressant effects. Absolutely clear. And there are so many clinical trials supporting
that, people can get away with taking lower doses of antidepressants or even coming off
antidepressants. Of course, always check with your psychiatrist
before you do that by increasing their omega-3 intake above one gram per day, even as high
three grams per day. Tim Ferriss: Okay. So question for you. I remember last time we spoke, we chatted
a bit about the ability for the gut. Let's just say, some people refer to it as
the second brain, to sense the intake of sugar, fat, and a handful of other things. What is the mechanism of action by which the
EPA is affecting mood? Is that known or is —
Andrew Huberman: I think so. It's probably two-pronged. One, the EPA is a fundamental structural lipid
for neuronal membranes and for the neurons in particular, that release neuromodulators
such as serotonin and dopamine. That's one. The other is that these neuropod cells in
the gut, as they're called, since, as you pointed out, sugar, essential fatty acids,
and essential amino acids signal via the vagus to the dopamine centers of the brain. So your gut is subconsciously signaling to
your brain what kinds of nutrients are coming into your system. And when you have a lot of flavorful food
and/or high caloric food, but it's not high in nutrients, it sets that system totally
out of whack because there's an increase in dopamine for sure, from the taste of the food
that's not matched by that subconscious parallel signal. And by the way, this is not woo-woo biology. This is coming from the laboratories of Diego
Bohorquez at Duke University School of Medicine. Charles Zucker, who's a Howard Hughes medical
investigator at Columbia University, has done this for sugar sensing. And a number of other laboratories have shown
that this pathway from the subconscious signaling from the vagus to the dopamine centers of
the brain are driving an appetite for certain kinds of foods. However, when these neurons, these neuropod
cells in the gut are "satisfied," they're seeing the nutrients they want to see, they
signal to the brain dopamine release within the brain, but they also are signaling satiety. And that's really what you want. So in many ways, we are a essential amino
acid, essential fatty acid foraging machine. It just also so happens that at least in the
short term sugar will trigger the same pathway. This is also why people who increase their
intake of omega-3s, get above that one gram per day of EPAs, or who take small amounts
of L-glutamine, reduce their sugar cravings. You're activating the same neurons. You're giving the alternative stimulus. Tim Ferriss: So the L-glutamine is vis-a-vis
the neuropods. Andrew Huberman: Likely. That hasn't been directly established, but
it's long been known that increasing intake of certain essential amino acids can reduce
craving for sweets. And whenever people say, "How do I kill my
sweet craving?" Well, it's not a conventional approach, but
you get a quality branch chain amino acid or essential amino acid powder, which sometimes
have some non-caloric sweetener or something and fruity taste and mix it in there. People will find, oh, yeah, I don't actually
crave chocolate the same way. In my opinion, a little bit of dark chocolate
is wonderful every once in a while. So I don't want to give the impression that
you're never supposed to have sugar. But there are people who very much feel a
slave to their sugar cravings. So giving these neurons the alternative stimulus
really helps and you're getting effectively the same dopamine release. This makes sense evolutionarily, why we would
crave essential fatty acids and essential amino acids. Tim Ferriss: Yeah, totally. Andrew Huberman: This is also why, the non-meat
eaters won't relate, but a really great steak is very satisfying despite the fact that it
has no glucose, essentially. There are people who feel quite good, whether
or not they're healthy or not, we could talk about, but who feel quite good just eating
steak. Now, I'm not one of those people. But if you had to pick a food that would keep
you feeling good and would repair the tissues of your body and would give you enough fats
to keep going and protein synthesis, et cetera, if you had to feed your children, you would
give them a steak. You would not give them a sweet potato. And if you look at the amount of food that
one eats when given as much meat as they want, fatty meat in particular, not gross fatty
meat, but high-quality fatty meat versus carbohydrates, you're quite satisfied after a certain amount
of protein intake. So I'm not pushing people towards a carnivore
diet. I don't follow a carnivore diet. But I do think that our nervous system, from
the gut to the brain, is a sensing and foraging system that subconsciously and lets our brain
know, "Aha, I've got enough of what I need and now I can stop eating if I want to." Tim Ferriss: So we're going to leapfrog from
delicious fish. I think the move for me might be to go to
just pure liquid refrigerated. Try that. I mean, who the hell knows. The fish oil. Just to try something, even if the expiration
date looks fine. Maybe I just got a couple of bad batches. Who knows? Andrew Huberman: Or maybe it's the capsules
themselves. There's so many things going into these capsule
formulas and then there's shelf life and all of that. But gut health overall, it's hard for most
people to do what they need to for their gut. In addition to all the things to avoid, too
frequent use of antibiotics and things of that source, it's pretty clear that one serving
of fermented foods a day is not going to be enough. That you need three or four servings of low-sugar
fermented food. So nattō for people that can stomach it,
sauerkraut, kimchi. A good Bulgarian yogurt. I like these really sour Bulgarian yogurts. They're so good. Tim Ferriss: Bulgarian yogurt? Andrew Huberman: Oh, there's this amazing
Bulgarian yogurt. You have to try this stuff. It is so good. Except they don't have — the full-fat one
in particular — Tim Ferriss: What makes the Bulgarian yogurt
so magical? Andrew Huberman: I wish I could remember the
name of this brand. Tim Ferriss: We'll put it in the show notes. Andrew Huberman: It's so good. But I don't want people to — they run out. Because they only put two or three of these
in every Whole Foods. And I'm buying those two or three, of the
full-fat ones. But it's hard for most people to get that
much low-sugar fermented food per day. And so most people just don't do it. And then high-dose probiotics are very expensive,
need to be refrigerated. So that's why I think the AG1 checks off a
number of boxes there. But if people can ingest low-sugar fermented
foods, that's going to serve them really, really well. So, say, the data from Justin Sonnenburg's
lab. And Chris Gardner's lab. Tim Ferriss: Enjoy your kilo a day of nattō. Tell me how that goes. Andrew Huberman: That stuff is so slimy. Tim Ferriss: It's so wicked. There are two things that — yeah, I've lived
in Japan and was there as an exchange student and so on, there are two, well, let's see,
three food items that Japanese people find hilarious to watch foreigners try to eat. Nattō is definitely number one. It's just like spiderweb, cobweb, stink. It's so gnarly. I can eat it, but it's not my favorite, even
to this day. Umeboshi and other types of pickled super,
super salty plums and so on, that's another one. And then I would say uni also. Especially before it was really making the
rounds in the US. The first time a foreigner would go over —
Andrew Huberman: — can't do it. Tim Ferriss: Just get the seagull poo on top
of the sushi rice. It's so hardcore. Uni is what I'm talking about. Just consistency wise, it's very, very similar. Andrew Huberman: It just feels like it's a
tongue. Tim Ferriss: Yeah. It's not my favorite. Andrew Huberman: But people love it. Tim Ferriss: Some people do. Andrew Huberman: People are told that it's
an aphrodisiac and so they put it — Tim Ferriss: That's the best way to sell anything. Andrew Huberman: That's right, the best way
of selling. That's right. Tim Ferriss: I wanted to ask you, because
I have a couple of notes here, tongkat ali, Fadogia agrestis, if I'm pronouncing that
correctly. But the one I want to ask you about first
is actually, if I'm getting the pronunciation correctly, Rhodiola rosea. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, Rhodiola rosea. Tim Ferriss: All right. Andrew Huberman: Impressive supplement. Tim Ferriss: Please tell me more about this,
because I have heard in my conversations with athletes over the years, of people using this
for various endurance purposes, altitude acclimation. Andrew Huberman: So Rhodiola rosea is a really
interesting compound because it falls into this category of what people call adaptogens. But normally when you hear adaptogens, first
of all, that's a very vague term. Doesn't actually mean anything specific. It means an ability to adapt generally, or
specifically. No one's really pinpointed what that means. But typically the adaptogens are going to
reduce cortisol. So, for instance, Ashwagandha is a very potent
suppressor of cortisol. There's some evidence it can indirectly increase
testosterone, but probably through suppression of cortisol, since those are in the same synthesis
pathway. Ashwagandha is an adaptogen. Ashwagandha, because it lowers cortisol, should
probably be taken late day, not early day, because you want cortisol high. Ashwagandha as a cortisol-suppressing adaptogen,
probably also should not be taken in high amounts, not low amounts, but in high amounts,
meaning four to 600 milligrams prior to exercise. The whole goal of exercise is to trigger the
adaptation through a spike in cortisol. Or one of the goals. Rhodiola rosea is a very interesting compound
because it's an adaptogen in that it greatly reduces perceived effort and allows for greater
power output and endurance output, as you pointed out a moment ago, but it does not
do that by suppressing cortisol. So, 200 milligrams of Rhodiola rosea prior
to, say, a resistance-training workout, or even on one of your ski tours, you will notice
you have more vigor, you can just go longer, and your perceived effort is much lower. It's kind of striking. Tim Ferriss: What is it doing? Andrew Huberman: Now, this is interesting. It's kind of striking how after the workout
you don't feel as depleted. That perhaps is the reason I started, perhaps
the main reason I started taking it is I found I could train harder, but then I suffered
quite a lot from a post-exercise dip in energy. Especially if I ate a big meal. I no longer experience that if I take Rhodiola
rosea 30 to 60 minutes before workout. The effects of it last about four hours. So what's happening during that workout, it's
clearly having an effect on the central nervous system by reducing the total amount of adrenaline
that's released, or the efficacy of adrenaline epinephrine during high intensity effort or
long duration effort. So, what this effectively means is, in principle,
one is able to generate the same amount of effort without the same amount of energy depleting
neurochemicals. I mean, epinephrine, norepinephrine help you
generate energy, but there's always a trough afterwards. Always. And so if you can generate the same amount
of physical output in the absence of X amount of adrenaline or norepinephrine, then you're
essentially better off. It also seems to catalyze recovery better. I would not take it more often than just before
training, however, because there are a few studies showing that the effects of it can
kind of taper off if you're taking it all day every day. Tim Ferriss: Now, would that be true for,
say, Ashwagandha? Let's just say someone's taking it before
sleep. Would they want to cycle off of that? How would you think about cycling if recommended? Andrew Huberman: Yeah. Low dose of Ashwagandha, 25, 50 milligrams
a day, taking continuously, no problem. I actually think AG one has low dose of Ashwagandha
in it. But when people are taking Ashwagandha to
offset high stress of mental or physical stuff, or both for a period in life, I'd say after
about two weeks, you want at least two weeks off. You really don't want to suppress cortisol
chronically unless there's some clinical reason for that. Rhodiola rosea is probably the best addition
to my kind of physical performance stack that I've added in a long time, and it's really
striking. I mean, I think so much so that people could
try it. And it really does seem to work the first
time in every time, for me. If it doesn't work for you the first time,
all other things being equal, you got a decent night's sleep, you're doing everything in
the same way you normally would and you take Rhodiola rosea and you don't really notice
much of an effect, you might try and increase the dose slightly and give it another go. Tim Ferriss: And what was the dosage range? Andrew Huberman: 200 milligrams is what I'll
take. And I found that to be really striking. Now, I'm not going to take that before a long
Sunday jog or a hike. I might, but chances are I'm not going to
do it before the leg workout. I'm going to do it before a hit workout. Again, of course, I'm mainly doing it to make
sure that I can train really hard and then go do other things really hard, too. Again, as not a competitive athlete, I loathe
the experience of training really hard and then feeling like I gave everything to that
training session and therefore I don't have much energy or focus to give to the other
things in life. And I think most people are like that. Tim Ferriss: Are you still taking the tongkat
ali and the Fadogia agrestis? And for those who are not familiar, because
I think we may have made mention of this in our last conversation, but just in brief,
what do these two things do? Andrew Huberman: Yeah. Tongkat ali is an Indonesian ginseng. There's a Malaysian version too, but you want
the Indonesian one if you want to pursue these effects, which are, it's known to decrease
sex hormone-binding globulin, which frees testosterone, which is important in both men
and women. It turns out in women there's more testosterone
circulating in a healthy woman, post-puberty woman, then there is estrogen. Peter Attia taught me this. If you normalize for nanograms per deciliter,
women have more testosterone than estrogen, healthy women do. So, testosterone is associated with libido,
ability, and desire to generate effort, mood, et cetera, in men and women. Probably the best way to describe testosterone's
effects are it makes effort feel good. Tongkat ali frees up more testosterone, mild
libido enhancer for some, more extreme for others, increases energy, will increase feelings
of well-being. And typically the dosages are 400 milligrams
a day in single dose or divided doses, with or without food taken early in the day, before
noon or 2:00 p.m. because it can increase energy.You don't want to disrupt your sleep. There are a number of good sources of it. We can provide links to a couple of those
sources. And Fadogia agrestis is a Nigerian shrub. It's taken from a Nigerian shrub and it stimulates
the release of luteinizing hormone, which is going to come out of the pituitary. And in women, will stimulate anything that
comes from downstream of luteinizing hormone in the ovary. So typically estrogen, maybe even testosterone
to some extent. And in men, it will increase testosterone
output from the testes by way of increasing luteinizing hormone, maybe subtle increase
in estrogen as well. This is important. Men hear that something increases estrogen
and they go, "Ooh, I don't want that." Well, keep in mind that if you flatline your
estrogen, so if men are taking anastrozole or crushing their estrogen, their libido is
going to be zero. Their cognitive ability will be diminished. Estrogen is important in both men and women. Tim Ferriss: It's also cardioprotective. Andrew Huberman: Cardioprotective, the endothelial
cells. We think of our blood vessels and our arteries
in capillaries as tubes, but they're really tubes, imagine Silly Putty kind of rolled
out, Play-Doh made into little flat sheets and then rolled up to comprise those tubes. So it's many, many endothelial cells that
make up those tubes. And the flexibility of those tubes is very
important. Obviously, you don't want them rigid, you
need them to expand and contract as needed. And estrogen's important for some of that
signaling, leading to that malleability of the endothelial cells. Fadogia agrestis is typically taken in dosages
of 300 to 600 milligrams per day, with or without food. Doesn't seem to matter if it's early day,
late day. There's some evidence in rats it can be toxic
to the testicular tissue. But that's in very, very high concentrations. It's interesting, the number of studies on
humans for both tongkat ali and Fadogia agrestis have greatly expanded since our last conversation. And especially for tongkat ali, there's quite
good support. Safety margins are good within the dosage
ranges that we've talked about. I've heard of people taking up to a gram a
day of tongkat ali. That just makes me cringe. I think taking herbal compounds in very high
concentrations is going to be risky no matter what, because these things can trigger immune
responses. 400 milligrams of tongkat ali, 300 to 600
milligrams of Fadogia taken daily should be fine. I don't cycle them and never have. Some people cycle the Fadogia because they're
afraid — Tim Ferriss: Why not? Andrew Huberman: Why don't I cycle them? Because they just keep working. Tim Ferriss: I mean, Louie Simmons could have
said that about anabolics, too. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. A couple of reasons. I do blood work twice a year. Liver enzymes are included there. We can talk about fertility perhaps if you
want, today. The last year, because of my age and the fact
that I don't have children yet, but I'm cognizant of the fact that I do want them at some point,
I got really down the rabbit hole, interesting figure of speech, for sperm analysis, including
everything from DNA fragmentation to how to increase sperm numbers and motility and quality,
and egg quality. I got really —
Tim Ferriss: So you're a gambling man. If you're making your swimmers world class,
but you don't want kids — Andrew Huberman: Well, right. It's all about readiness, I suppose. So, what is it in the SEAL teams, they say,
"You fall not to the level of your hope, but to your level of your preparation." Tim Ferriss: "You do not rise to the level
of your goals, but fall the level of your preparation." That's actually a quote from Archilochus,
who is a Greek poet and, I believe, philosopher also. But yes, also widely used in the special forces
system. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. So, I've been monitoring sperm parameters,
freezing sperm, because I might want to do IVF someday with somebody, this kind of thing,
or conceive naturally. And because we're talking about — and I've
talked a lot about tools, supplements, et cetera as it relates to vitality and fertility,
I think there is a way to optimize for both of those things. And so I don't cycle them because I haven't
felt a need to or seen a need to. Some people choose to just take a week off
from Fadogia every once in a while or go five days on, two days off. People should do what makes them comfortable. You'll notice, males will notice an effective
Fadogia, it actually will increase testicular size somewhat and density, and that's just
because of the increase of the LH luteinizing hormone is going to stimulate —
Tim Ferriss: — it's just going to be like avocado pits hanging between the legs. Andrew Huberman: It's going to depend on where
you start, but it will do a number of things related to increasing luteinizing hormone
similar, although not to the same extent, as something like taking hCG, human chorionic
gonadotropin. Tim Ferriss: Well, that I was going to ask,
if you were to inject yourself with hCG, you would probably cycle at some point or maybe
not. I don't know. You tell me. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, I've done experiments
with hCG. I think you have too. Tim Ferriss: I have too. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. I mean, it definitely will increase sperm
volume. Tim Ferriss: Significantly,
Andrew Huberman: Yeah, significantly. hCG is essentially luteinizing hormone. There's actually a movement within the testosterone
augmentation world now to — we don't want to go too far down this path, but so-called
TRT replacement therapy, a lot of people are interested in what I call TAT, which is augmentation
therapy. I think it's a safe —
Tim Ferriss: That's a rebrand, like we were talking before. Andrew Huberman: Nomenclature. Tim Ferriss: Like Patagonia and Toothfish
goes to Chilean sea bass and taking 'roids goes to testosterone augmentation therapy. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. I mean, I think every male should be aware
that taking exogenous testosterone like testosterone cypionate or otherwise is going to suppress
your endogenous testosterone. However, there are people that want to do
that. I think one of the goals for most people is
to neither be out of range — there are a lot of people who don't want to be bodybuilders
and take so-called steroids, but obviously even estrogen's a steroid. Tim Ferriss: Yeah, sure. Andrew Huberman: And cortisol is a corticosteroids. But to be high end of normal range, right? High end of normal. So if the range is 300 nanograms deciliter
all the way up to 1,200 or 900 in some countries, it depends. Being somewhere between 600 and 900 I think
is going to be preferable for most people. And tongkat ali and Fadogia agrestis, I think,
represent a good place to start if you don't want to pursue these other more aggressive
methods. Tim Ferriss: Well, tongkat ali is particularly
interesting to me because I almost always have very high range total testosterone, but
my free testosterone is low and my sex hormone binding globulin is high. Andrew Huberman: Which is itself is not necessarily
a bad thing. The 900 milligrams myo-inositol can also increase
free testosterone indirectly through mechanisms that aren't entirely clear. There are also some other ways if people want
to tickle these pathways. Shilajit, right? Fulvic acid, which is Shilajit, is a mineral
pitch. It's used in Ayurvedic medicine. Tim Ferriss: I thought that was a 1980s lead
vocalist. Andrew Huberman: It stimulates the release
of FSH, a follicle-stimulating hormone. So you have LH and FSH coming out of the pituitary
and LH will stimulate testosterone production via the leydig cells of the testes. The FSH is going to stimulate spermatogenesis
by increasing what's called androgen binding protein, which is the protein that the testosterone
binds to, which then is going to give rise to more sperm at risk of —
I never want to do kind of a podcast plug on another podcast, especially not yours,
but I did a four-and-a-half-hour episode on male and female fertility that goes through
essentially the ovulatory cycle and the spermatogenesis cycle, and then all the dos and do-nots for
both men and women who wish to conceive either now or in the future, or who do not wish to
conceive children, but want to use fertility as a proxy for vitality. Which is something, by the way, I have to
say, I have to credit you for. Years ago, you said basically if you optimize
for fertility, you're optimizing for vitality. Again, I want to just thank you because that's
an extremely efficient, but also extremely sage way to think about optimizing for vitality. So, it's not just about wanting to have kids,
it's about maintaining all your biological systems that they're tuning. Tim Ferriss: Super helpful proxy. Super helpful. In this case, what do you mean by vitality? Andrew Huberman: Waking up feeling well enough
to want to begin your day with enough energy to complete your day and to be able to move
back and forth along the continuum of driven and relaxed. I mean, if you think about that kind of eliminating
relationships to others as a component for the moment, of course it is a component, setting
that aside rather, what I just described, to me, is the definition of mental health:
the ability to lean into effort, but also to relax and restore your system and to feel
good about what you're doing and being able to move from driven to reflective and these
kinds of things. So many people we know, I don't want to give
a geographical, they all left the Bay Area anyway. I just said it was the Bay Area, successful
but miserable. We knew a lot of those. Or people that can't seem to get enough energy
to focus and get down a path of a pursuit. So you want both. That's vitality to me. And this is getting kind of Eastern philosophy,
which is more your domain than mine. I'm always eager to learn here. But when you think about chi, or kind of dopamine,
or life energy, I mean the desire to create things in the world, including offspring,
but just to birth ideas, birth businesses, birth relationships, birth podcasts, whatever
it is, is essentially from the same place of having some idea in mind and trying to
construct that overcoming fear, your notions of fear setting become really relevant here,
et cetera. And so vitality has a lot to do with the ability
to generate effort with feeling like at least, if not a fast upward spiral, at least a slow
upward spiral. And certainly not a slow downward spiral or
fast downward spiral. Tim Ferriss: I'll take any of the upward spirals. Andrew Huberman: I'm around a lot of graduate
students and postdocs, and you see how an early success, like publishing a paper early
on in one's career, creates an upward spiral around the whole concept of effort thereafter. You see this in dating and relationships. You see how an early failure can set people
along a downward spiral. And so I think having drive comes from the
catecholomines. It's dopamine, epinephrine, norepinephrine. And sure you need the serotonergic systems
and the endogenous opioid systems that smooth things out, but in the absence of that get
up and go, we wouldn't be here. I wasn't consulted with the design phase,
but you can be pretty sure that this is what allows any animal or human to move toward
a milestone. Tim Ferriss: I'm going to ask you yet again,
a lazy but perhaps productive question that will satisfy my own curiosity. Omegas, tongkat ali, Fadogia agrestis, and
Rhodiola rosea, you get to pick two. Which would you pick? Andrew Huberman: Tongkat ali and Rhodiola
rosea. Tim Ferriss: Okay. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, especially since —
Tim Ferriss: That was surprising. I thought the EPA would be a shoe-in. Andrew Huberman: Oh, I'm sorry. EPA was included there? Tim Ferriss: Yes. Andrew Huberman: Sorry, sorry. Tim Ferriss: Omegas, tongkat ali, Fadogia
agrestis, Rhodiola rosea. Andrew Huberman: I apologize. So, then it would be omegas and tongkat ali. Tim Ferriss: Okay. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, if I think about fundamental,
kind of baseline supplementation, things that are hard to get from food, but that represent
key micronutrients that really move multiple needles in the right direction, it's going
to be getting above that one gram per day threshold of EPAs. So, omegas. It's also going to be anything that moves
the hormone system toward the green zone, which is going to be tongkat ali. Now, of course, doing all the other things
right, trying to get sleep, exercise — sleep, movement, nutrients, sunlight, all that. In fact, there's a really wonderful study
out of Israel that showed that if people got 20 minutes, three times a week, of sun exposure
to their skin, their face, and they removed their shirts, or if it was women, there wore
tank tops, and shorts for both men and women three times a week, significant increases
in free testosterone. And this was afternoon sun. It wasn't morning sun. Increases in free testosterone and estrogen
and significant increases in libido. Also, if you chart out the amount of free
testosterone across the months, even in places that aren't really far north, you're going
to see significant variations in free testosterone in men and women, toward the summer — spring,
and summer months. So, we are somewhat seasonal, and some people
robustly seasonal depending on your ancestry, so that sunlight thing is real and the mechanism
just so that people aren't like, "Oh, get sunlight. He's just saying sunlight again," is that
the keratinocytes, which are a component of the skin, signal through this, for you nerds
like me, the P53 pathway and impinge on the pituitary to signal luteinizing hormone and
follicle-stimulating hormone release. It's so interesting because what we think
of as the skin, which is protecting our organs and a place to put tattoos, and earrings,
and jewelry and stuff, is actually an endocrine organ. The skin is a hormone-producing organ, hence
the vitamin D thing and everything else. Tim Ferriss: A lot of fat cells too, which
a lot of people don't think about. Andrew Huberman: Definitely the omegas and
tongkat ali. Rhodiola rosea is great to enhance workouts. Fadogia is definitely a boost on the hormone
system for sure. I have a friend who [was] single. Now, he's in a great relationship. We can't say it was because the Fadogia, but
he was taking Fadogia and he was like, "I've got to stop taking this stuff." Because obviously he was flying solo at that
point. He was like, "This is just really, it's really
intrusive." Tim Ferriss: Intrusive because he was just
humping the walls or what? Andrew Huberman: I don't know. I don't know if we want to go here. There's this whole online —
Tim Ferriss: Too many shiny objects, too much libido? Andrew Huberman: Well, there's this whole
online community now about semen retention and things like that. He's not part of that community. But there's this idea that — well, we're
adults here. I mean, there's this idea that —
Tim Ferriss: Speak for yourself. Andrew Huberman: If you look in the journals
of sexual health — and I'm really interested in sexual health and urological health. There's a ton of interesting stuff on pelvic
floor. This stuff just isn't often discussed. What you find is that masturbation for women
turns out to, their self-reported notions of well-being, of mood, of immune system function,
of knowing their bodies and what gives them pleasure, et cetera, all increase. If you look at the data in men in terms of
masturbation, and here we're talking about masturbation to the point of ejaculation in
men, they report lower mood, less willingness to pursue relationships. They're home watching porn. We have to be very careful with statements
like masturbation is bad or something like that, because that's not true. It's going to be gender — well, we should
stay out of that discussion. Biological sex-dependent because that's clearer
ground. We'll just leave it at that. And then there is this whole notion that a
whole generation of young males are becoming porn-addicted and masturbation-addicted, but
can't look someone in the eye or ask them out on a date, or learn how to navigate healthy,
consensual sex. They're not doing neck work, so they can't
look anyone in the eye. I'm just kidding. Tim Ferriss: They've got flaccid feet and
they don't do neck work. Andrew Huberman: And here, I'm not trying
to create notions of hyper males. We're really just talking about a radical
shift in the way that sexual health has evolved over the last 10 years because of the accessibility
— in hardcore pornography, its relation to the dopamine system. Here, I'm not trying to be evangelical or
anything like that. I'm just saying these are serious neurotransmitter/hormone
systems, and a whole generation of males is making themselves sated enough to not actually
pursue a number of what used to be considered milestones toward the transition between young
adulthood and true adulthood. Birth rates are low, dating is low, people
are having less sex. A few people are having a lot more sex, so
this is great for the people out there who are comfortable in social interactions. Anyway, we don't want to go down that path
too far. But these are deeply wired systems. Tim Ferriss: Yeah. To they who have much, much will be given. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. So, for those of you willing to date and find
relationships, what hopefully leads to healthy relationships, Fadogia. Tim Ferriss: Thank you, Fadogia. So, before we move on, I do want to ask you
about, because we were chatting a little bit before we started recording, psychedelics
and your current and developing thoughts on that, or any commentary you'd like to add. But before we get to that, since you were
talking about fertility, understanding people can go to the Dances with Wolves episode where
you cover all things comprehensively, but we're talking about a number of tools in the
form of these supplements, for lack of better way to phrase it, goosing the system. These are ways to augment certain endocrine
functions or the sort of composition, let's say, of free versus bounded testosterone,
et cetera. Where did you end up after doing your research
on environmental endocrine disruptors or things that we should be subtracting rather than
adding? Because it's hard, for me, as someone who
is, say, certainly a non-specialist in reproductive health, to find the time or even maybe just
the dedication to sort this signal from the noise with all that, because there's a lot
of hysterics too. There's a lot of nonsense out there. Where did you land with what is important,
if anything, to be mindful of or subtract? Andrew Huberman: So, for cutting through that
— I love the the Dances with Wolves reference. It is a long movie. Tim Ferriss: People should — well, hey,
I love Dances with Wolves, so I'm not knocking it for the length. I think people should listen to this podcast,
but specifically just to hone in on this piece. Andrew Huberman: No, it was designed for individuals
or couples who are thinking about these issues. And also in particular for women who are interested
in banking eggs. Most women don't know the cutoff after which
you can't freeze eggs, you can only freeze embryos. So, in California, if you're 42 years old
or younger, you can freeze eggs. You might meet someone later and decide you
want to conceive children or use a donor. After 42, I think it's 42 and a half, you
can only create embryos and freeze those. The eggs are, on average, are just too aged
out. Males, if you want to be a sperm donor, ideally
you're going to do that before 45 or you might want to do IVF someday. Now, there is a significant increase in the
incidence of autism with each half decade for the father. So, as you go from 30 to 35 to 40, the sperm
age matters, but the increase is still incredibly small overall. So it's not something you can really point
to and say, "Oh, it's the sperm." Or "It's the egg," for that matter. Okay. Now, dos and don'ts. We can now easily look back to the beginning
of our discussion, it's very clear that quality sleep on a regular basis, sunlight, keeping
stress in check, healthy relationships, all of that is going to support sperm health and
egg health. No question about that. It's also clear that getting sufficient Omega-3
fatty acids is going to support sperm health and egg health. I'll just point out that if there were one
supplement that really seems to move the needle in terms of egg quality, which is a morphological
but also a meaningful physiological metric for sperm quality, which is going to be shape,
motility. You don't want dead sperm. There are always going to be some in a sample
because of the age of the sperm, et cetera, and the way the spermatogenesis cycle go. But you want forwardly motile sperm. The other ones are called twitchers, so they
just twitch in place. They can actually take twitchers and force
them into the egg during IVF, something called ICSI. But in general, the greater number of forward
motile sperm, I'm swimming them toward you. Tim Ferriss: Yeah. Andrew Huberman: I'm actually swimming them
at an angle away from Tim. But they are —
Tim Ferriss: So forward on our first in-person podcast date. Andrew Huberman: Exactly. Can be greatly increased by supplementation
with L-carnitine. So egg health and sperm health greatly enhanced
by L-carnitine. Pretty remarkable results there. Injectable L-carnitine of about one mil, one
mig per day. Now that has to be prescribed by a doctor. Tim Ferriss: And that's IM? That's intramuscular. Yeah. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. Oral capsules are available over the counter. Then you have to get up to four or five grams
per day. Tim Ferriss: Oh, wow. I was going to ask. Yeah. Andrew Huberman: And that can increase TMAO
and some other markers that aren't great for cardiovascular health because of the way it's
processed by the gut. But you can offset that by taking 600 milligrams
of garlic, because of the allicin in garlic. Okay. Smoking cigarettes, vaping cigarettes —
Tim Ferriss: Really good for sperm. Andrew Huberman: Terrible for sperm, terrible
for eggs. Smoking cannabis, vaping cannabis, also terrible,
eggs and sperm. People don't like to hear that. 15 percent of women, I can't believe this
statistic, but I've seen it over and over, had to check my eyes, but 15 percent ingest
cannabis at some point during pregnancy, 15 percent. Probably not a good idea. Now, a lot of people say, "Oh, I smoke weed
every day and got my wife pregnant." You never know how healthy your children would've
been. You just never know. I'm not saying your children are unhealthy,
but you never know. Tim Ferriss: There're also going to be, there
will always be edge cases where, "I smoke crack every week and never slept for 14 days
straight. My kids are great." And you're like, "Okay. Just because you happen to be the one mutant…" Andrew Huberman: Right, yeah. If you want to optimize for sperm health. Tim Ferriss: If you could thread that needle. Andrew Huberman: Exactly. Tim Ferriss: Doesn't mean you're a good model. Andrew Huberman: Exactly. So L-carnitine can really help. Avoid smoking anything. The issue of tinctures and edibles is a different
subject altogether. I think the big wow for me was something,
again, I'm just going to tip my hat to you, which is that in 2015, I taught a class at,
I was then a professor at UC San Diego, on neural circuits and health and disease, and
I decided to do a lecture on whether or not cellphones inhibit sperm health and, or testosterone
level. The data were very mixed, frankly. There were essentially two good studies in
rats, each of them taking a standard smartphone, putting it under a rat's cage, and then looking
at some metrics related to testicular health, sperm health, et cetera. One showed increases in the testosterone. The other showed decreases. So it was a disappointing situation. So I would present both. Now, there is an extensive meta-analysis. I can send you this for the show notes if
you like, an extensive meta-analysis of dozens of studies. Tim Ferriss: I'll add it to the next reprint
of The 4-Hour Body. Andrew Huberman: And it very convincingly
shows that keeping the cellphone in one's pocket, so this isn't putting it to your head,
this isn't putting it on the desk in front of you, but keeping it on and in one's pocket,
and it does not matter if it's on wifi or you're using cellular. Decreases sperm quality, which means forward
motility, number of healthy sperm per ejaculate, et cetera. Even ejaculate volume to some extent, N lowers
testosterone overall, which is perhaps not surprising, giving the known heat effects
of the phone. So even though it doesn't feel hot to the
touch, there are heat effects. Sperm don't like heat. In fact, the most promising male contraceptive
that's out there that's not a condom, it's like a cuff that goes around the vas deferens,
which is the portal from the testes to the urethra that allows the ejaculate to leave
the body, that heats that. I mean, a sauna, it's not a great form of
contraception because it's not sureproof, but it will reduce your total number of motile
sperm by 75 percent or so. When I go in the sauna, because I do hope
to — Tim Ferriss: 75 percent is a lot. Andrew Huberman: — I do hope to conceive
children in some way, so I wear shorts into the sauna and I actually put a cold pack at
my groin while I'm in there. When the sauna's really hot, it's also, it
makes it a little less unpleasant. It's a little painful, but you definitely
don't want to do that on bare skin. But I'm chuckling too, but heat is part of
the problem with the cellphone, but it turns out, yes. And here people are going to think I'm a crazy
person, but they might think that already, the EMFs, that business is real. Now is it so real that it's giving us gliomas? Unclear. I'm not going to go there. The data aren't in, but it is very clear that
the radiation from phones, the EMFs and the heat are combining to reduce sperm quality,
motility and overall testosterone. So it's a simple thing. Turn off your phone completely, or even better,
just don't put it in your front pocket. If you have to put it in a pocket, put it
in your back pocket. Even better would be to put it in a shoulder
pocket or a backpack. And I'm a weirdo perhaps, but I don't like
keeping the phone to my head too long. But that's also because I don't like holding
the phone to my head too long. We don't know very much about the effects
of EMFs and heat effects on the different tissues of the body, but we now know a lot
about the effects of heat and EMFs on sperm quality, and it's not a good picture for the
sperm. Tim Ferriss: Where does airplane mode fit
into this equation, if at all? In terms of between on and off. I mean, does it prevent or mitigate some of
the effects? Andrew Huberman: It seems to, it seems to. Here's what's really scary about this meta-analysis. Their conclusion is that the total amount
of time spent with the phone in the pocket is not a strong determinant. That it's not all or none, but that the threshold
beyond which you start seeing these damaging effects is pretty low. So again, here we're talking about a don't,
not a do. And so it's pretty straightforward. Don't keep the phone in your front pocket
if you're concerned with sperm health and testosterone production. Now, why is sperm health and testosterone
production so correlated? And you say, well, duh, it's because testosterone
and sperm. But if you're not interested in conceiving
children, you might not think this is an issue. But remember that the two types of cells,
those Leydig cells and the Sertoli cells of the testes combine testosterone in the androgen-binding
protein to give rise to sperm. So anytime you're seeing a reduction in sperm,
you are definitely seeing that as a reflection of reduction in androgen-binding protein,
which means whatever testosterone you have around is also not having the effect on that
local organ that it should. In other words, the testes and the ovaries
are very interesting organs because they secrete hormones into the body to go have effects,
but they also have effects on themselves and it's self-amplifying. And so this just seems like such a straightforward
one to me. And you said this back in, when was The 4-Hour
Body published? Tim Ferriss: Came out in 2010. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. And I remember you and Poliquin and a few
other people saying, "Don't keep the phone in your pocket." And I remember lecturing to about 400 students
about this, and I would say about half, just by my read, about half of the guys in the
class took the phone out of their pocket when they heard this. I think young people who aren't thinking about
having children at all right now are absolutely the ones that should be most concerned. Now, it is true, as they told us in high school,
it just takes one sperm, "But it just takes one sperm!" But in order to get that one sperm to the
egg in vivo, not IVF, but it's called natural conception, there's a lot of territory that
needs to be covered. There's a lot of chemical environments that
need to be dealt with. You want the healthiest sperm. Tim Ferriss: So I would say also having gone
through this process with an ex to create embryos, even though you can say it only takes
one sperm in IVF as well, you want to stack the odds in your favor, which means you need
good morphology, good motility, and you need a good count of non-crippled sperm. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. I mean, sperm analysis, it can be a humbling
thing because no matter what, no one's getting 100 percent motile, forwardly motile. You learn a lot about everyone, males and
females learn a lot about their biology, what they're doing well, what they're doing less
well when going down that pathway of IVF, I think. I think for women, one of the big surprises
is that it doesn't take much ingestion of alcohol to diminish egg quality, beyond two
or three drinks per week — per week — you really start to see reductions in egg quality
that are probably indirect, through effects on diminished sleep and changes in stress
hormones. And so again, some people will be more resilient
to this than others. People always like to make jokes about how
alcohol facilitates the conception process, et cetera. I think that in general, if women are having
very regular cycles, whether or not they're 28 days long or 35 days long, is less important
perhaps than they be fairly regular. Women in general tend to know more about their
bodies because they cycle than men. But if I could go back in time to my 30s,
I sure would've banked sperm then. And I feel good about where I've got my parameters,
but it's really interesting as you learn this, you just realize that freezing sperm, freezing
eggs is a great idea, and freezing embryos makes sense if you have the appropriate pairing
or situation, and that life gets so much easier for those wishing to conceive when you have
healthy embryos frozen in the bank. And anyway, for those challenged in that area,
it also becomes this incredibly expensive, emotionally and financially expensive battle. Tim Ferriss: Yeah. I will say much to my surprise that within
the last year, I suppose, prior to the breakup, of course, but going through the IVF or at
least embryo-creation process, my sperm quality, because I have banked, starting probably — unfortunately,
not as reliably as I would've liked, but probably starting around 2010 or 2012. Andrew Huberman: Oh, okay, quite a while ago. Tim Ferriss: Banking sperm. Sadly, there was actually a technical issue
at this particular location in San Francisco because they were bought by some larger conglomerate,
and I think a lot of the samples were lost. But the point I was going to make is that
after trying to do a deep dive, taking copious amounts of L-carnitine, adding in a few other
things like maca and a handful of other basics, my sperm quality is actually better, seemingly
better now than it was 10 years ago, which is shocking. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. I mean, again, if one is doing the right things,
I do think that we can perform physically, probably in the domain of sexual health too. I think that's a misconception that men peak
in their 80s — 18. 80s! Excuse me. Tim Ferriss: I was like, "Sweet! Thank God!" Andrew Huberman: At 18. I've looked at testosterone levels as a function
of age in that there's a wonderful book on this, on behavioral endocrinology, and there
are some and in their 70s who maintain testosterone levels similar to men in their 20s and 30s. Highly individual, depends a ton on how much
people are moving, how much sunlight they're getting, how little alcohol and nicotine,
smoking nicotine, not nicotine the substance, but they're bringing into their system, exposure
to environmental toxins, these kinds of things. And we always think of BPAs and receipts. They are a problem. Handling receipts, not good, printed receipts,
but — Tim Ferriss: Wait a second, hold on. Andrew Huberman: But that's the major source
of BPAs. Tim Ferriss: No shit. Andrew Huberman: Oh, yeah. Printed receipts. Tim Ferriss: I had no idea. So BPAs, I always think, all right, cans,
bottles, this, that, and the other thing. Receipts? Andrew Huberman: Receipts. Tim Ferriss: Why the hell are there so many
BPAs in receipts? Andrew Huberman: Yeah. Shanna Swan, who's done a lot of the critical
work on phthalates and their influence on urogenital distance, which is a marker of
prenatal androgen and gets smaller, that the genitals and the anus are closer together
in females than in males of all species, including humans. Phthalate exposure. BPAs in particular is progressively decreasing
urogenital distance in males, penis size. In a somewhat contradictory way there's a
study that just came out in of Stanford from Michael Eisenberg's lab, he's a urologist,
an endocrinologist, showed that actually a flaccid, here it is again, flaccid, oh, no,
erect penis lengths have gone up 26 percent in the last 30 years. But testosterone and sperm counts are going
down. Tim Ferriss: I don't know. Andrew Huberman: There's a really interesting
study of tens of thousands of men. I haven't read the method section —
Tim Ferriss: How do they explain that? Because it makes, though, superficial sense
to me, because if your swimmers and your testosterone are just taking a nose dive, you need to get
closer to the goal. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. Closer to the cervix, cervical opening. Those data are a little hard to explain, but
they're very robust data. That study was just published and yeah, he'd
be an interesting — I don't know him. Tim Ferriss: So the balls are getting closer
to the ass, but the schlongs are getting longer. This is what happens apparently. Not to get too technical. Andrew Huberman: No. Well, I think people will understand that
urogenital distance is not a great term for most people to digest or think about. But we think about BPAs. So receipts, probably more than plastics and
things of that sort. But also if you look at the most that people
get the greatest exposure to these phthalates and that are impairing their endocrine system
the most in males and females, it's going to be in rural areas because of pesticides,
airborne pesticides. So we think, oh, people living in cities,
bus exhaust, drinking sugar-free Red Bull from the bodegas in New York City. No, you're talking about rural areas of the
country and airborne pesticides. Tim Ferriss: Airborne. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, airborne pesticides. Tim Ferriss: So I thought, I immediately went
to groundwater. Andrew Huberman: Dust cropping and this kind
of thing. Tim Ferriss: Wow. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. I was over in Copenhagen to give a talk last
year. Tim Ferriss: I would have totally whiffed
that. I would not have gone — I would've gone
urban. I would've thought contaminants. Andrew Huberman: Me too. And Shanna Swan, who's, I can't remember if
she's at Mount Sinai or one of the other, she's definitely at one of the big medical
schools in New York City, so forgive me, Shanna, but she's been the one really focusing on
this when no one else really thought much of it and was thinking, oh, that's crazy conspiracy
stuff. And no, there's real data funded by the NIH. So I think that avoiding plastics and things
like that, sure. But I think handling of receipts, especially
because they're serious endocrine disruptors and avoiding pesticides. And then alcohol, again, not trying to rain
on anybody's party here, but past two drinks a week is when you start seeing some negative
health effects in males and females. I did a long episode on this. By the way, I drink the occasional drink every
once in a while. I like white tequilas, things of that number. Tim Ferriss: Number-two most-shared podcast
in the world in 2022. Andrew Huberman: I did not expect that at
all. Tim Ferriss: "What Alcohol Does to Your Body,
Brain, and Health." Andrew Huberman: Yeah. I did not expect it to have that kind of traction. There's no agenda there. I think a lot of people think that I'm in
AA or something. I have deep respect for that community. But no, I've never had a problem with alcohol
or drugs. It's never been my thing. So there was no agenda whatsoever. I think that alcohol's a toxin, you're essentially
making a toxin for your cells, that's part the way it creates its effects. Look, it can be enjoyed. I also think that if people are going to drink
more than two drinks per week, they want to pay more attention to the other things that
we talked about at the beginning. Nutrients, sunlight, exercise, sleep, et cetera. So I'm not trying to say what people should
or shouldn't do. They should just know what they're doing. Tim Ferriss: Yeah. And talking about how the preceding 24 hours
leads to the current 24 hours, which leads to the next 24 hours. A friend of mine, I won't give him credit
because he probably doesn't want it, but he was quoting someone else, so it doesn't really
matter. But he said, "Alcohol is borrowing happiness
from tomorrow." And I was like, yeah, that's a good way to
put it. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. And I've never tried cocaine, but from what
I hear, cocaine is borrowing happiness from 10 minutes from now. I spoke to a guy recently who is a former
cocaine addict, and I said, what does it feel like? And he said, "Let me just explain it this
way." By the way, this is not a direct quote. I'm quoting somebody else. He said that the first time he did cocaine,
his experience was one of, "Wow, that was terrible. And when can I get more?" Tim Ferriss: Oh, God. Andrew Huberman: So that the gestalt of the
experience was a peak and then a trough that we know exists. The dopamine system drops below baseline. I'm too afraid to try cocaine. And especially nowadays with the fentanyl
it's laced in. So many street drugs. Tim Ferriss: I know two people, they were
at a bachelor party in Mexico. Otherwise, very responsible folks, but they
decide to do what a lot of people do at such parties and decided to do cocaine. They each did one line, not a copious amount. These were not cocaine users. Both of them immediately collapsed on the
floor. One died and one ended up in a coma for a
period of time. Andrew Huberman: Fentanyl. Tim Ferriss: Fentanyl. My best friend growing up, also was given,
unbeknownst to him, fentanyl. Died. Fell asleep, didn't wake up. So be very careful out there, folks. Fentanyl is no joke. And there are other things as well, but many,
many, many drugs are cut with fentanyl, including those that, at face value, you would think
make no sense. Andrew Huberman: Like Ambien. Tim Ferriss: Yeah, yeah. Andrew Huberman: Or cocaine. I mean, why they would cut fentanyl, which
is essentially a sedative, into a stimulant like cocaine makes no sense to me. Tim Ferriss: And yet, that's what's happening. So be careful out there, folks. So to move from cocaine to maybe a lesser
villain, I want to revisit cannabis for just a second. So cannabis in, I'm curious to know, because
I have experienced incredible — well, let's say, there may be trade-offs, but benefits
with respect to onset insomnia from low-dose edible, I could say cannabis, but in this
case, we're talking about in legal settings where state governments allow this, say 2.5
milligrams of THC. With CBD, it just takes too high — I mean,
I would have to consume just a mountain of it for it to subjectively help with that. What are the trade-offs, if any, with dosages
in that range? If you're aware? Andrew Huberman: Yeah. Depends on who you are. So I did an episode on cannabis, I also had
our mutual friend Nolan Williams, who's one of these freaks of nature. He's a triple board-certified psychiatrist,
neurologist, neurologist at Stanford, doing a lot on —
Tim Ferriss: Underachiever. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, a real underachiever. Doing a lot on combination of psychedelics
with transcranial magnetic stimulation. Talked about cannabis and I did a solo episode
on cannabis, which means basically all I did was think about, read about, and talk to people
about cannabis for months on end. Here's the story with cannabis. As you pointed out, it's going to be the ratio
of THC to CBD that's important. And for the real aficionados out there, and
boy, are they out there, because they let me know. Tim Ferriss: Oh, they are. Andrew Huberman: There's also the terpenes. They're going to be the lemon-like terpenes
and the other kinds of terpenes and chemicals in these things that are also going to matter. And then also it's going to be smoking, vaping,
edible, or tincture. So here's the deal. Smoking or vaping anything is bad. Nicotine or cannabis, or worse for you than
edible or tincture. Let's just move that off to the side. High-THC-concentration cannabis, of which
now there is almost pure THC cannabis available, is dangerous for the following reason. And there, I just pissed off some people. But first of all, it does have therapeutic
applications for glaucoma, pain management, maybe even some mental health effects, ability
to help certain people focus at low dose. But for, in particular, young males in their
teens, early teens and 20s, who take high-THC-containing cannabis, there is a much greater, 4X increase
in probability of psychotic episodes later, that don't ever reverse. In fact, when I spoke to the leading researcher
on this up in Canada, she told me that the probability that a lot of what we see as street
homelessness now, what people appear to be schizophrenic, was likely triggered by high-dose
cannabis use. Now, I'm not trying to return us to the 1960s
and talk about devil's weed and this kind of thing. It is clear that cannabis has therapeutic
benefits, but very high-potent CTHC cannabis can be a problem. At the dosage you described, 2.5 milligrams,
very unlikely to be a problem. Tim Ferriss: Psychologically speaking. Andrew Huberman: Psychologically speaking. Tim Ferriss: And I mean, I could be on 2.5,
I'm not, but I could be on 2.5 right now and it would not be discernible. Andrew Huberman: Sub-perceptible dose. It's like a microdose. Tim Ferriss: I would feel it, but it would
not be externally obvious. Andrew Huberman: Now, the pure CBD cannabis
is interesting too. So-called Charlotte's Web, I think is what
it's called, mainly available in Colorado, I'm told, is a powerful anti-epileptic. In fact, parents of epileptic kids move to
Colorado just so they can get Charlotte's Web CBD cannabis. In my mind, that should be available legally
everywhere, given that it has essentially no psychoactive effects. There are a few perhaps, so it's really that
the percentage of THC relative to CBD that's important. The age of the user, whether or not there's
a predisposition of psychosis. We might as well be talking about psychedelics. Tim Ferriss: We might as well be talking about
psychedelics, and I want to just pause for a second to say a few things. Number one, I don't categorize MDMA as a psychedelic. We may get to that, but just for a number
of semantic and phenomenological, I'll get fancy, reasons, I don't classify that as a
psychedelic. And I would actually categorize high THC content
cannabis as a strong potential psychedelic. And it has become, I would just say the standard,
the baseline of strength has become such a multiple of what anyone might have been used
to in, say, the '90s. It is almost beyond belief. And I do know of one direct example. This is the brother of an acquaintance who
had exactly the experience you're describing, which is chronic, short-term, but chronic
use of very high THC concentration cannabis, and I should say in fairness, that classical
psychedelics can also expedite the onset of schizophrenic symptoms in those who would
genetically be predisposed. So it's not limited to THC, but it is, I think,
under-respected and overused with the assumption that it's just cannabis. And I think that's a mistake. They can be so powerfully psychoactive. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. It's interesting how the proponents of cannabis,
which there are a lot of smart people in cannabis medicine, including a lot of MDs, always say
it's not as bad as alcohol. Which to me is just a ridiculous argument. I mean, to say that something is not as bad
as alcohol implies that you have to choose one or the other. I think that cannabis has been very beneficial
for a number of adults who are through the so-called critical period of brain plasticity. So older than 25, they need some way to quote,
unquote, take the edge off in the evening. They'll do an edible on the weekend, this
kind of thing. That is not what we're talking about in terms
of psychosis. We're talking about kids, 12, 13, 14, taking
a bong rip or smoking a joint or vaping a super high-potency, THC-containing cannabis
and just being high out of their gourd and feeling like it was a really good time, doing
that two or three times. And I've seen this over and over again. Their parents reach out to me often, in fact,
for whatever reason. And then you hear about this person being
17, 18, there's a failure to launch component. They're demotivated, they're claiming ADHD. They're basically a stoner who relies on cannabis
to relieve anxiety and hasn't done much else in the last five years, or certainly has not
managed to keep up with the mean. And here I'm sympathetic. By the way, you're listening to somebody who
barely finished high school. We covered that in the last podcast, so for
other reasons. But I think I do worry a lot about these super
high-potency compounds. I worry about super high-potency anything. I mean, I worry about, in the realm of hormone
augmentation, we're talking Fadogia, tongkat ali, not Dianabol. In the realm of augmenting mood and focus,
we're comparing very high-potency THC-containing cannabis taken in a youth, to 300 milligrams
of alpha GPC. This is night and day, right. It's chemical augmentation of a completely
different beast. So I think that it's clear that no cannabis
is going to be better for most people than any cannabis. Is occasionally used for an adult going to
be a problem? Probably not. Probably not. Tim Ferriss: I will also say, add to that
a few things. Number one, I am deeply interested in the
therapeutic applications of cannabis and all of its constituent parts. I think it is a very undervalued plant from
that perspective. And I think it is severely underestimated
in terms of potency. Just the standard available, particularly
in places where you can get the baker's dozen of any number of strains, Colorado, et cetera. To believe that you are using something of
almost no risk as compared to psychedelics, if it contains a lot of THC, is a mistake. So I would just say, consider it on par with
some of these very strong psychedelics. And just be informed and be cautious about
your use. I do think that there are probably some really
significant applications to sleep disorders. And I will add, just for people listening,
I have also tried CBN specifically, which has been recommended to me for sleep and have
not found it as effective. It probably depends on the specific variety
of sleep disorder, but for onset insomnia that is a product predominantly not of spike
glucose, well, I guess cortisol and or than glucose levels, but rather rumination, THC
seems to be, that seems to be one of the magic keys in very low doses. But let's segue from that to psychedelics. So how has your thinking, any observations,
commentary, beliefs around psychedelics changed over the last few years? Andrew Huberman: My beliefs and stance, and
also what I'm willing to say, has completely changed in the last 24 months. This last week, Stanford Magazine, which is
a magazine of the Stanford Alumni Association, goes out to many more people than just who
attended Stanford, put out an issue of this, it's a very nice bound magazine of the kind
that you would see at the dentist's office. On the cover and inside, there's a feature
article about psychedelics. I could not believe it at first, but it is
essentially a guide to psychedelics. It's not telling you how to do them, but it
explains what is ketamine. Now here, they're broadly defining psychedelics. So the classic psychedelics like psilocybin,
mescaline, and LSD are included there. Chemical structures, how they're used, the
history, clinical trials happening now, known benefits, considerations, and risks. For all of those drugs, plus ketamine, plus
MDMA. I was just shocked, positively shocked because
three years ago, five years ago, certainly 10 years ago, a conversation like this would've
been the conversation that would've ended my career, at least as a university professor. My understanding is that thanks to the incredible
work of the group with MAPS and a number of specific laboratories, Matthew Johnson's laboratory,
Robin Carhart-Harris' laboratory, Roland Griffiths' laboratory, and thanks to the philanthropy
organized by you and others, and also thanks to the public education efforts of people
like Michael Pollan, we are moving very quickly towards legalization of MDMA as administered
by either psychiatrists and or licensed clinical psychologist in the US. Psilocybin is probably a longer road, but
I'm told that we'll get there, quote, unquote. Why am I framing it this way? Well, I definitely have a — I'll just be
very direct. In high school, I took LSD recreationally
several times. Had not good experiences. The experiences were far too long. 11, 15 hours. I might have spent my senior prom in an elevator. Tim Ferriss: May or may not, cannot confirm
or deny. Andrew Huberman: No, my junior prom. My senior prom was a different story that
I definitely, and I'm not recommending people do this. I actually strongly regret doing that at a
time when my brain was plastic. I did not know what I was doing. I didn't know the sourcing. It was a terrible idea. Terrible idea. Tim Ferriss: Even riskier now. Andrew Huberman: Yeah. And keep in mind, folks, I was not a star
student, far from it. It took a lot of years to get my act together. Talked about this before on Tim's podcast,
Rich Roll's podcast, and others. So you know, that certainly did not help and
I don't recommend it. I tried psilocybin recreationally a few times,
didn't get much out of it. As an adult, not shy about the fact that I
did two and now three of the MAPS-appropriate, physician-guided sessions for trauma using
MDMA. I've found it immensely beneficial. I'm happy to talk about how each one of those
sessions was different. Again, this is with a physician as part of
a study. So what I know now is completely different
than what I knew two years ago, which is not just based on the legality, but in discussions
with Nolan Williams, this incredibly impressive colleague of mine and friend of yours and
colleague of yours, really, that the safety profiles on things like MDMA are actually
quite high. I was taught that MDMA was neurotoxic. Why was I taught that? Well, there's a paper published in Science
magazine looking at toxicity of MDMA, observing neurotoxic effects. Turns out, what were they looking at? Methamphetamine. Tim Ferriss: Oops, retraction. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, retraction. Except that never made the major headlines. Tim Ferriss: That never makes it. Andrew Huberman: Okay, so then you look at
the data on psilocybin. Here, I'm just going to hit the high points. Because it is not my work, it's the work of
Matthew Johnson and of Robin Carhart-Harris at UCSF. Intractable depression. People who are suicidally depressed, nothing
else works. Talk therapy doesn't work, antidepressants
don't work. TMS doesn't work. Do two high-dose, so it's 25 milligrams of
psilocybin that has to be translated for grams of mushrooms. But —
Tim Ferriss: It's roughly like the 25 to 30 milligrams of psilocybin, synthetic psilocybin
B equivalent. Let's just say, a Terence McKenna heroic dose
of five grams. I mean, you're getting enough for escape velocity. Andrew Huberman: Okay. In upwards of 60 percent, maybe 70 percent
of these patients that take that are getting substantial and ongoing relief. That's an amazing result. So much so that the big pharma has moved in,
and is trying to create non-psychedelic psychedelics to extract the benefits of these drugs that
don't induce hallucinations. Instead of raising interesting questions about
whether or not the experience under psychedelics is really the trigger for the antidepressant
effect, whether or not it's the insight or not, that's a whole ball of wax. And really, I'm not qualified to parse that. That's really the domain of Robin and the
psychonauts, and that's an interesting set of issues. So my stance nowadays is, there is a compound
out there that seems to have very high safety profiles. Very, very high, certainly for psilocybin. That, under the appropriate guidance and supervision
during and after in this so-called integration phase, one or two dosages of this stuff, yes,
takes people through a phase of anxiety, then a phase of deep introspection. This is also, I learned, essential. There are two components that I learned that
are essential, that were surprising to me. One, you have to be in the eye mask. Observing things in your external environment
the whole time seems to bypass some of the introspective/antidepressant effects later. That's interesting to me. It's not just about what you see, what you
hear out there. It's really about going inward, this kind
of trust, let go. Tim Ferriss: Yeah. It's also important to standardize for trials. Right? You can't have people looking at all sorts
of different stuff. Somebody's watching Finding Nemo, another
one's watching Jaws. Andrew Huberman: Right, exactly. And then the other thing was, I learned from
Robin recently, is that music seems to be a key component. Now, they've never teased out music/no music. But having music that starts as he described
it in the distance, drums and pacing or something approaching music, then instrumentals, which
raise people's emotional state while they're in the eye mask, and then some transition
period out, seems to be a critical component of all this, and guiding some of the kind
of funneling towards deep emotional introspection. I find this incredibly interesting. And again, I would've not felt safe talking
about this, keep in mind, a year ago, two years ago. Keep in mind that in the late '60s, early
'70s, there were professors at Harvard and Stanford mainly that were fired, or at least
asked to leave, for having discussions like this. And now Stanford Magazine itself is printing
this. And this is also, I'll use this as an opportunity
to say this. Because it's really about the listeners. Our Huberman Lab podcast is free on all the
channels. But we do have a premium channel. I'm not trying to solicit it here, but the
premium channel is designed to, we do AMAs and things of that sort, transcripts are available
to those folks, to raise revenue for research dollars for exciting work. And we have a donor that's been very generous
to do a match for that money. And we're giving money only to studies working
on humans, not animal studies. And two of the major areas that we're supporting
are the sorts of work that Nolan's lab is doing, and Nolan in particular, to combine
transcranial magnetic stimulation with psychedelics and these sorts of things. Tim Ferriss: Oh, that's great. I didn't know that about the premium option. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, that's really what
the premium channel is designed for. Tim Ferriss: Yeah, that's great. Andrew Huberman: And this is, again, I'm going
to say this again. People are going to think that I'm just here
kissing up to Tim, but I'm doing that over text all the time anyway. Because this is yet an another example where
you got into science philanthropy early, you reached out to your connects, you were very
vocal about what you felt was powerful and had worked for you and what you'd been observing. And I am absolutely clear, I've said this
on Twitter, I'll say it again. When we look back in five years, 10 years,
a hundred years, there's going to be a small subset of individuals for whom the transition
of psychedelics from these niche communities, hippie communities, carpet flyers, everything
from devil's weed craziness to truly effective compounds for treating psychiatric illness,
you're going to be on that list. Roland's going to be on that list. Matthew's going to be on that list. Pollan's going to be on that list. Robin's going to be on that list. And Nolan, I think, is going to be on that
list. There's going to be a small subset of people
that we're going to go, listen, research takes money, it takes focus, it takes a bravery,
and it also takes the willingness to take something that has been looked at as just
drugs, and turn it into something that's therapeutically meaningful. So yeah, we're just, all I'm trying to do
is raise some dollars through the premium channel. That's what we've been doing to pump into
research studies. So I mean, you can tell I'm super excited
by all this. What I see happening now is that soon, MDMA
for trauma is going to be available to the countless numbers of people out there that
have trauma. And I don't mean just take MDMA and have a
great time. I mean, people developing empathy for themselves. I mean, people really working through the
barbed wire stuff of their past, much of which they had no control over, that sets this transgenerational
thing that's been going on for so long. I mean, really, you've used the language to
bend the arc of history. These compounds are going to bend the arc
of history in the right direction. And if people out there are listening and
saying, "Okay, well this is recreational stuff and it's very precarious." I do not know a single major, let's just call
them what they are, CEO or company founder, we're talking about people at kind of billionaire-level
that are hyper creative, hyper creative, and hyperfunctional in their life. We're not telling you about mystic creatives. We're talking about people who, I don't want
to name names, but every single one of them already knows this is true. Because they've all done this stuff already. And I was kind of late to the train. Because I had such a terrible experience in
my high school years, and saw so many friends, dead, suicide, drug addicts in jail, wrecked
their lives. I had so many challenges taking myself from
essentially a loser with nowhere to go to a trajectory within academia and taking good
care of my body that I was like, no drugs, no drugs. I don't even put psychedelics in the category
of drugs. And here I'm lumping MDMA in there, provided
it's done with a licensed physician or clinician who can guide this stuff. It's been immensely beneficial for me. Tim Ferriss: What were your different sessions
to the extent that you're willing to share? Andrew Huberman: The first one I can just
summarize by saying was extremely somatic. Waves of — a lot of shaking. At the beginning of the session, I walked
in feeling like I could think and feel things from the neck up. I could feel things from the waist down, but
that my body wasn't integrated as a system. I left that session feeling completely comfortable
in my body as a whole system, and far more in tune with my emotions. Far more comfortable being, having emotions. Far less afraid of what emotions might do
to me, whether or not they were evoked from inside or from outside. I felt, as a consequence, I felt much braver
in the world. And I felt a kind of a healthy adaptive level
of fearlessness, because I felt like nothing can hijack my internal emotions. And even if they do, I'll be okay. And that was a significant thing. The second session, very different. I expected everything as I did in the first,
never works that way. Was one of deep, deep, deep acceptance around
resents that I had for people that I felt had neglected me. Or just did not do what they needed to do. Or that I felt a lot of, and you might be
able to sense a little bit of emotion here. It's hard because I can still sense the ways
in which thoughts about that are painful, but mostly because it seems so senseless to
me now. And yet I have truly zero resent. I look for it often, to just check myself
to it. No resent, complete forgiveness, which has
given me tremendous relief. And then the third session was interesting. Third session was a higher dose. I had never taken the booster, the MAPS booster. Took the booster, and I lay completely still
for about eight hours. And it was very introspective. And I think I left that session, and I still
maintained from all — everything I've described by the way, I feel I've maintained years later
now. The third session, which was more recent,
I felt I finally understood and kind of sealed up what I can only describe as boundaries. That other people can have emotions and experiences
that are truly separate from me. I tend to be pretty affiliative. I think that came out of an early, especially
with friends and in relationships, it came out of an early need to feel some sense of
family where I didn't feel that as much as I would've liked from my biological family. And there have been times when I've been unable
to really keep in touch with how my life is distinct from, and my emotions are distinct
from other peoples'.A little bit too much of empathic blurring sometimes. And I felt like that was just sealed right
up. And mind you, each time I went into these
sessions, I was afraid of all the standard things. Losing my mind, having a heart attack. Now granted, if you have heart issues, tell
your physician you don't want to do MDMA. It is an amphetamine in there. But I was afraid of all the standard stuff. Each time I felt like the window on introspection
and plasticity lasted much longer, weeks longer. And each time I just felt like I got better
and better at self-care. Which, in my mind, was always a very selfish
thing. I always thought self-care is selfish. Even working out, I used to hide working out
when I'd go to conferences. Because I thought no academic goes to the
gym and lifts weights. And I really liked doing that, but I realized
how much stronger I was mentally when I was taking care of my physical body. But I think that things have changed now. So the third session was very meaningful for
me, because I felt like it kind of sealed something up. Where I go, okay, I'm good. Things can happen around me, and I'm not going
to get pulled into it in a way that compromises my well-being. Of course, I still have a lot in there, and
work to do. And Robin Carhart-Harris said to me recently,
he said, "Well, psilocybin is really the honest psychedelic. Because you don't have the empathogen that's
woven into the MDMA, so you're really going to see whatever darkness still exists within
you." And I thought, oh, goodness. But now I am —
Tim Ferriss: Spoken as a true psilocybin researcher. Andrew Huberman: I know. So you hear about people, is it calling to
you? I'm afraid to do psilocybin for that reason. I definitely worked hard to suppress some
of the dark clouds in my head. But the fact that I'm still a bit afraid of
them is probably the reason why I should do it. Tim Ferriss: Well, it also, I think means
you're coming to it from an intellectually honest place. If someone has absolutely no concerns or misgivings
about extremely powerful psychedelics, I mean, you are playing with psychological nuclear
power. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, revealing the unconscious. I mean, I didn't even know what psychedelic
meant, but I mean Robin taught me, it means revealing the unconscious mind. Tim Ferriss: Yeah, mind manifesting. Andrew Huberman: And I still do extensive
amounts of psychotherapy and psychoanalysis. I look at that as just like going to the gym. I'm fortunate that my insurance can help pay
for that and I'm able to pay for it, so I understand not everybody can. But I still feel that if we don't actually
take the time to figure out what's going on in our head, how can we really trust that
we're on the best path? Tim Ferriss: Yeah. Or just representing reality to our benefit,
in a sense. Right? Because we're perceiving but also constructing
reality. And sometimes if you think your glasses are
scratched, or smeared, or foggy or whatever, you need to take them off and look at them. There are very few ways to do that with your
own psyche. There are very few tools that allow you to
do that. And I would recommend for folks if they are
interested in, and thank you for being so forthcoming with describing your experiences,
getting a good overview of how MDMA specifically can help with say, complex PTSD. And why it has become such a focal point for
many, many researchers and practitioners. I do recommend the Netflix, How to Change
Your Mind miniseries that Pollan was involved with based on the book of the same name. And specifically, the MDMA episode I thought
was spectacularly well-done. Andrew Huberman: I need to see that, still. Tim Ferriss: It's very well done, and includes
a lot of case studies in interviews with research subjects. And there's also a documentary that I helped
bring to, well, outside of Israel called Trip of Compassion. This was probably four or five years ago,
which contains session footage as well. Production value is going to be a bit lower
than Netflix, so you might want to try that first. But there are a number of forthcoming books
coming that'll be focused on these topics. A lot of good stuff happening. Andrew Huberman: It's exciting. Tim Ferriss: In terms of investigation, there
are risks. There are very non-trivial risks. And that is part of the reason why the fundamental
research is important, which is why people like, I have to mention Roland because he
was my gateway into so much of this. Roland Griffiths, and Robin, and Nolan and
others are doing very, very important work. Because there's the commercialization, there's
the development of derivatives and perhaps non-psychedelic options. And I think that they hold promise in certain
conditions like cluster headaches, for instance. However, I do firmly fall into the camp that
believes there are these mechanistic, receptor-level effects. And many other physiological, measurable effects
that exert or impart some of the benefits that we document in trials. But I am firmly in the camp that the content
matters, deeply. Andrew Huberman: Robin and I and Nolan and
I also discussed things like iboga, ibogaine, 22-hour long psychedelic journey, no hallucinations
with the eyes open, close the eyes, see — drop into very vivid imagery of previous experiences. That doesn't interest me so much, it seems
a little bit much. It's going to be hard also to do clinical
studies on that. As Robin pointed out, one of the reasons why
most of the trials are being done with psilocybin or MDMA is because the sessions are four to
six hours. With some aftercare LSD, double or triple
that. And of course, we should point out that street
MDMA could very well be, and is often laced with fentanyl. So the sourcing here must be through MAPS. I think they're the only ones that actually
have the clean sourcing of MDMA. I know people out there will be like, "I know
a clean source." But nowadays I think people need to be exceedingly
cautious about fentanyl because it's deadly. Tim Ferriss: Yeah, there's a great — I just
want to butt in for a second. There is an organization called DanceSafe,
which I encourage people to check out, which provides kits. Because I know that you know can tell kids,
"Abstain, no sex, no sex, just no sex until you're married." They're going to have sex anyway. So I recognize people who are listening are
probably going to use drugs from unclear sourcing, or it will be a game of telephone. It'll be from five different, 10 different,
12 different, a hundred different hands to theirs. DanceSafe has kits. I'm not recommending that you use drugs in
that fashion, but people are going to do it anyway. There are kits you can purchase which will
help you to detect some of these contaminants. So at the very least do that type of due diligence. Andrew Huberman: Yeah, yeah. So you asked how do I feel about these compounds
done in the clinical setting and how has my stance changed? Complete 180. Complete 180. I'm super curious. I'm super excited. And least of all for me, I'm excited about
what, my experience, it was very positive all around. But I'm most excited for the millions and
millions, maybe even billions of people out there. Billions of people certainly have trauma,
but the millions of people who are impaired, in terms of daily mood and basic functioning
because of depression, anxiety. I mean, there are psilocybin trials for fibromyalgia,
for anorexia nervosa, the most deadly psychiatric illness is anorexia. Of course, people with bipolar or schizophrenia,
these are not good candidates because of the propensity for exacerbating psychosis or for
manic episodes. But I think we are heading into really interesting
times. And a year or two ago, I would've thought,
ah, this isn't going to make it through the chute. Something's going to happen and the whole
thing's going to fall apart. I think it was the event that we were both
at, the Veterans Solutions event on Coronado Island. It's an incredible group that you're associated
with, and we have common friends from the special operations community who are doing
these iboga DMT combined sessions out of country, and then working with Nolan Williams to look
at how the brain changes. And we saw Governor Rick Perry there, a pretty
right-wing guy. Tim Ferriss: Yeah, he interviewed Rick and
Rick. About as far apart, politically, as you can
be. Andrew Huberman: And then Rick Doblin, who
stood up there and said in front of a room full of special operators that he'd been a
conscientious objector during the Vietnam War. And I thought, wow, if he doesn't get killed
in this room, he's going to survive forever. In other words, polar extremes politically. Standing there talking about psychedelics
and their value for treatment of intractable depression, trauma, offsetting the certain
amount of suicide risk in many individuals. Talking about, I think I heard Rick Perry
say the words "heart medicine." I almost fell out of my chair. I mean, this is super exciting. And it's super exciting because, the only
way to describe it is the way that Paul Conti sometimes describes things. There's certain things for which there's a
lot of work, a lot of potential hazards, but that done properly — and he wasn't referring
to psychedelics when he said this, but this particular, but there's so much goodness that
could come out of this. The amount of goodness that could come out
of everyone having access to great medical care, therapy, and potentially psychedelic
therapies. I mean, just imagine the magnitude of the
world change. That's the kind of stuff that gets chills
running up my spine. And you just think, well, gosh, but the scale
of that problem is just too big, legally, financially. But enough has happened now that at least
some of that, in terms of psychedelics, could very well happen. And again, to clarify, Paul Conti wasn't talking
about psychedelics. He just has this, occasionally he'll say something
— we're doing a series with him on mental health. And occasionally he'll say something like,
"Certain things are just goodness." And I love the sound of that because it sounds,
there's something so wholesome about it, but so real. I mean, waking up and feeling good enough
to pursue the basic events of the day, with some hardship of course from time to time,
good enough to set a goal, and fail, and then try again. Good enough to have a rough run through a
relationship, or a hard family life, or lose all your money and go bankrupt and come back. That's the stuff of real life. And I think that there's so many so-called
deaths of despair, and then there are 10 times more sort of lives of despair out there. And I think there's seriously the opportunity
for real healing, for lack of a better word. Tim Ferriss: High leverage, very high leverage. I'm excited to see where it goes. And I would tell people also, don't be shy
about following the money. In the sense that, there will be every possible
attempt to contort and change psychedelic therapies to fit into existing healthcare. And I do think there's upside to that. Not everyone is going to be able to afford
whatever the costs may be to receive bespoke medical care with a session that lasts 18
hours. Or whatever it is, 12 hours, let's just say
in the case of the sort of upper range for some people with LSD. However, if you see a company that's saying
5-MeO-DMT is the ticket because it's the businessman's psychedelic therapy because it lasts 15 minutes,
take a sniff test or two first. And also just because it's 15 minutes Earth-time
doesn't mean your experience 15 minutes. So just be cautious with that. The removal of psychedelic effects also makes
it much more adaptable, and plug-and-play with current healthcare practitioners and
things can be turned into maintenance doses. Andrew Huberman: Or for kids. Tim Ferriss: Or for kids, right. So you say, if you take generic ketamine,
and I'm not going to name too many names, but some of the sort of slight molecular changes
that have been made to create, say, maintenance doses with nasal sprays. I do think that, at least for me, and I may
be old-fashioned, but I do think that these compounds, in relatively few sessions, have
the potential to induce plasticity, provide experiences that have — I'm not going to
say, well, in some cases curative capability or potential, but extremely high durability. We're talking about the order of years. So I think people should be skeptical of companies
that aim to create maintenance drugs from these. Although that could be applicable to certain
populations that, say, may fit into exclusionary criteria because they can't take higher doses
for risk of say, psychosis. But they might be able to take very, very
low doses along the lines of, say, a microdose. Which wouldn't impart the perhaps content
experiences, but could have some effects on say, serotonin type 2A receptors, but intracellularly,
which I was just reading about. I would recommend if people want to keep up
to speed with these things, The Microdose from UC Berkeley is fantastic. That's sort of a news bulletin summary on
a weekly basis. If you want a good overview, I think How to
Change Your Mind is a great place to start. If you want to know how some psychotherapists
have worked with these things, I think an oldie but a goodie, The Healing Journey by
Claudio Naranjo, I think is excellent. Even if you just buy it for the introduction,
I think MAPS sells that. So a lot of good resources out there. Andrew, we've covered a lot of ground. Andrew Huberman: We have. Tim Ferriss: And it's so nice to spend time
together. We're going to grab some dinner. Is there anything that you would like to add,
point people to, any closing comments you'd like to make before we wrap up? Andrew Huberman: No. At one point we had thought we might cover
how to optimize a podcast, and there I'm just going to point people to the great series
that you did, I think it was one or two episodes. Tim Ferriss: I did an episode with Chris Hutchins
because he wanted to ask me a million questions about podcasting, and I said, "You know what? I get asked this all the time. Let's just record a podcast and then I can
point people to the podcast." Andrew Huberman: Perfect. Well, my whole team listened to it. My whole team listened to it, and talked about
it, and used it as kind of a checklist for whether or not we were doing things right. That was about a year ago, and things are
going well. So I'll just point people to that episode. Hopefully you can link to that episode because
it's really great. We thought, yes, yes. And oops, we better be doing that. No, I really just want to extend my gratitude
for the work you've done in the past. I know I've mentioned it over and over. And I'm sure some listeners are probably like,
here he goes again, thanking Tim. But I would not be podcasting were it not
for you, and Lex Friedman, who gave me the final nudge. And also, I've just gleaned so much valuable
knowledge from your books, and your podcasts, and learned so much from you. So again, for me, it's like pure delight to
be sitting here having this conversation. I feel very honored and I'm really grateful
to you and your team. And I hope you'll come on the Huberman Lab
podcast before long. Tim Ferriss: Oh, I will. Absolutely. Andrew Huberman: I can't wait. Tim Ferriss: Need to make a trip to SoCal. Thanks for saying all that, it really means
a lot. And it has been a fucking blast to watch you
just storm the front, man. It's really been fun to see the podcast do
as well as it has done to see that. Then also lead into other types of snowball
effects like providing funding, as I just learned for studies, vis-a-vis the premium
option. And keep it up, man. I am certainly learning a lot and taking notes
myself. You can see the notes in front of me. It may not be visible on video, but I've been
taking notes through the whole conversation, as I always do when I listen to you, listen
to you talk. Whether it's on your podcast or in person. So people can find you, hubermanlab.com. We will link to YouTube, Instagram, Twitter,
but it is Huberman Lab on all of these platforms. And I encourage people to subscribe. Check it out. And thank you, Andrew. And to everybody listening, we will have links
to all sorts of things, including that light vest that we'll figure out in the show notes
at tim.blog/podcast. You can just search Andrew or Huberman, H-U-B-E-R-M-A-N,
and all things will pop up. So until next time, just be a bit kinder than
as necessary to other people and yourself. And pay attention to those fundamentals, those
pillars. All good things come from paying attention
to those checklists. And as always, thanks for tuning in.
