Isabelle Hof and Laura Hof on the Secrets of the Icewomen | EP 598

37:29He saw people healing from depression. And he gave it already when he was doing these practices. Well, it was not a method yet. He did it his whole life. That was why people were so drawn to him. He has a purity of heart, of mind, of being. That is my fault. That's a childlike purity. And he gave it to anybody who was willing to listen, anybody who needed it, you gave it to them. But it wasn't yet applicable in scientific studies. It wasn't studied yet. It was really because he was doing these crazy feats, science became interested in him. And that really started rolling the ball. That was really when everything lanced off, because then you could see what an impact these simple exercises had.

38:18And now it has become a method that is worldwide i love to travel i can't travel anywhere anymore without people not knowing the wim of method i'm now trying to see if i can go there incognito like my second now my name is sylvana or something like this why because everybody knows it everybody at a certain moment i thought i'm not going to call it wim of method because that's also a bridge to say like yeah as my dad I'm going to call it cold practice and breathing exercises and even then women so it's impossible but what it does show is that the impact that it has had and it all came from a very pure point it really came from a pure emotional impact which my mother's death really was the catalyst for and that's why I really and we really wanted to dedicate this book to my mother who had a lot of mental health issue and really i am really convinced that if she would have done the method then that she would still be here and for my father as well that's also good one to mention is because he because the mental issues she had and now he understood as well that this method is so good for the mental health for my father actually he for the most for him the most important group that he can reach is people with physical or mental issues that is what he wants to change because the impact is direct it's immediately immediate there's not a waiting of six weeks or months it's immediate and that's why it's so beautiful and effective and the graver your condition this is how i see but the bigger the impact there is to see and so even in one session of four hours people come to they leave transformed from a workshop and of course four hours only it's of course and it's an integration afterwards you have to keep continuing because if you're depressed or if you're bipolar it's not the cure in one session but it's definitely in one session you can feel the deep impact on an emotional level and as well on a physical level even spiritual level yeah and it's chemistry but you're also giving them hope that things can change and it's a big changer the chemistry changes so your biochemistry changes a lot of times these conditions and especially with mental health issues it has a lot to do with the biochemistry not being right and it's almost like a huge reset And of course, it can take some time.

41:04If your condition has been going on for a long time, it won't be maybe a quick fix. But the impact is immediate. I remember with, I love that one that you say, it increases the hope again, especially if you had a mental issue and it was going on for a long time and nothing helped. Then if you have something, if you found something that gives you a direct impact, then you want to continue. and I just remember now as well somebody coming to me with lung COVID she has well a family of three children she was a doctor three children but her nervous system was disbalanced you saw it a lot with people with who had COVID and she thought she said I'm coming home and I just want to go directly to my bed I can't even play with my children anymore or be with them and I feel guilty to my partner and then she came and then she did the exercises and then she felt the tremendous impact it has on her body on her mental being and later on she said well this was the entry point where i felt the hope again and then she continued the practice yeah the way that i always explain it it's one of the best tools to gain more sovereignty it's sovereignty this is how I see it because I think Wim Hof method it's as strong as medicine this is what I believe and it just gives you more sovereignty over your happiness health and strength and that's really what it is and we have this self-healing capabilities of ourselves it's our inner body it's already there we just need a little bit of help to ignite those and when they're ignited it just goes on by itself and this is really what it do that what it does so mentally giving you more reins more control over your own health yeah that is impact and as i said it's hope mentally you're giving them some hope but it's also physical you feel it immediate immediate it's a tool you're always carrying your backpack called life so you can if you're feeling down if you're not feeling well, then you can always start doing the breathing exercises.

43:18This is just like laying on the ground. So you don't have to go anywhere. You just can lay on the ground, sitting on the couch and start doing the breathing exercises and it will transform your being immediately. It is a little bit, but it will transform. Yes. I was going to say, I have a great book for you. A friend of mine, Emma Cappella, who's a professor at Yale University, wrote a book called Sovereign last year, and it ties into exactly what you're saying. She's herself a Buddhist and does a lot of work on breath work and how all these modalities lead to happiness and feeling more significant in life.

43:55Well, I wanted to go a little bit into the Wim Hof Method for those who might be listening and don't know the keys of the modality, but I wanted to do this through an angle you bring up in the book. You talk about Dr. Marian Hopman at the beginning of the book, who's a professor of physiology studying chronic disease and their underlying mechanisms. And she did this really interesting study in 2010, where she gave 112 people E. coli bacteria, an injection of it to try to see the inflammatory response. And when your father was given it, He reacted quite differently from the rest of the participants.

44:39He didn't show fever or fatigue. In fact, even after a week, he was showing strong, high concentrations of white blood cells, much higher than the other participants. And it really laid the foundation of studying his method that you write about in the book. And if you could break it down, do all components of the method need to be done together? Or is their value in also using them broken apart as well? Good question. Love the question. Yeah, so we did a follow-up. So it started with WIM. And it's one, they saw this effect on the, these are not the real E. coli bacteria, but these are parts of a dead bacteria, the E.

45:25coli bacteria, because I think that E. coli could even kill you. But it is a part of that bacteria, the E. coli that they injected in these people. And normally, yeah, you see a fever, a lot of headaches, etc. And with Wim, you didn't saw it, but you saw it as well that he had a low inflammation in his blood. And even after six days, when they withdraw the white blood cells, or when they analyzed the white blood cells, it still had an increase. So Wim was just one person. So they wanted to first see if others as well had the same effects after practicing the methods so they took 28 people and the half of them went to poland trained with my father did four to four days they went they did the breathing exercises cold exposure and they climbed up mount a mountain in their shorts okay freezing their butts off and what they saw when they went to the hospital that was 10 days later so after four days they came to holland they trained six days six more days and then they went to the hospital so they injected them again with the bacteria and they saw the same results as my father so that was the first thing that they saw that other people could as well influence their autonomic nervous system and their immune response.

46:54So it's a huge finding because it was actually the first time in history that they saw that your autonomic nervous system can be influenced. And normally they say you can't influence your autonomic nervous system. That's why it's called autonomic. Okay, so that was a huge breakthrough. later on about university they wanted to as well see which component actually had that effect yeah and so they break it said that broke it down mindset is a bit different to measure although we find it very important i think without the mindset yes it's very important so they left that out so they did the breathing exercises and they did the cold exposure so in the end they were four groups one only doing the breathing exercises the other one the cold exposure one group breathing and cold and it was a control so what they saw is that the group with the breathing exercise who did the breathing exercises you saw again a lowering of the inflammation with the group of the cold exposure as well but as well but not so much as the breathing but the best results were in the group of the breathing and the colds.

48:17So yes, both components have an effect on the inflammation, but the breathing and the colds were the most potent ones. And then they didn't add on the mindset, but we know that, yeah, mindset, how you're approaching the cold, how you're approaching the breathing exercises, it has a very big effect. So there is a synergetic effect between the components themselves. And it seems that combined, they make each other stronger. So it is the reason also, I think that my father, naturally speaking, he's a prophet. He goes out into the nature, comes back with the answers. He already found out just by his practice why these three components work so well, right?

49:07And so we know about the power of the mind through placebo nocebo right how important the mind is just by visualization you can increase your muscles what is that people can yeah improve on their tennis just by watching tennis matches that's actually what i did when i was younger and playing tennis i because i knew it would improve my play that's as a kid i was doing that and so next to the practice that is yeah but we to practice And then as well with visualization, with the help of the visualization, you can actually as well enforce that neurological pathways and the circuities that enforces you do the next time a better hit, for example, practice.

49:52So this 2010, and then it was also the follow-up study with 12 others, where 100 % proven everybody could do it exactly the same as WIM did, which was to influence their autonomic nervous system and their immune system at will, whenever you want. And that was simply just four days of really going deep into the breathing, the mindset, cold exposure, and then six days of practice at home all by themselves. In 10 days, they were able to replicate the exact results. And that's revolutionary. And usually in science, it can take weeks, months. I don't know how long it takes before you have these really drastic results.

50:39And so it's almost that it shows how impactful it can work like a medicine. These inflammatory markers, they just went down immediate after one breathing session and some conditioning with training, of course. But after that breathing session in bed and you even saw this master regulator of inflammation. And I like this one, the TNF alpha, X alpha. It was reduced by 53 percent. Now, for me, that is major through a natural. It's a natural method. You're doing it with your own breath. And for me, that's crazy if I think about it that way. Right. So I always like to think like a normal person walking down the street.

51:23I'm not a medic. But when I hear these numbers, I go berserk because you have medicine. They promise like one third of improvement of inflammatory markers. and that what after six weeks maybe or months of being on the medicine and then you don't know if they work and so for me this was one of the groundbreaking studies that I see that it really changed the way that we have to look at health care that we have to look at what we as humans are capable of and of course how much influence we do have how much autonomy how much sovereignty We do have, and we get to play in that just by tapping into these healing capabilities, again, of our own being.

52:11And we have those. We just need those keys to ignite them. One thing I wanted to get into was stress response. And something that really piqued my eye as I was reading the book is back in 2016, 17 timeframe, I had a real major incident happen when I walked into my house and encountered a burglar pointing a gun at me. And I found this research in your book pretty interesting that although that event was horrible, it doesn't have the same impact that the tiny stress responses that impact us every single day have. And it was interesting in the book that you put out that the vast majority of people, when they're going into a doctor's office, are going there not necessarily because of a physical ailment, but because of a stress response.

53:09And I think this is a really important thing to talk about because stress is causing so many things to go wrong with us globally. And it's affecting our health in so many ways, physical health, emotional health, mental health. how does this method help that stress response? First of all, I do want to note that if you have a gun pointed to your face, you can as well get a PTSD. That's an entry for post-traumatic stress order. So hope you're good. You look good. So in that sense, but it can be the difference between stress response, which we really want to point out is that you have this acute stress.

53:50The acute stress is indeed if at that moment you're facing a gun to your head and you know perfectly how to handle you run for example you can run the adrenaline goes up you are in the flight of flight modus and if you run successfully run or successfully fight the guy if that is possible and you manage to overcome that situation and afterwards in the longer run you feel psychologically okay, that's a perfect way that a stress response can influence our bodies and our minds and being. That's something that we want. The same as with a deadline or same as if you're avoiding something in the street that can be very dangerous.

54:35You want to have this quick stress response. And we actually don't have to think about the stress response. This is going automatically. and in many cases it can help us but the thing is in our society these big triggers are not the main stress responses we are facing actually what now happens is that you have a lot of little stresses here and there it's psychologically it's physiological it's from the environment there's there are many things coming to our door little stresses that eventually it can turn to long grade stress and lower grade stress and this lower grade stress has an impact on our bodies so at the third in the beginning your adrenaline when something happens your adrenaline goes up and if the stress or the stressor in this case is not going away then the adrenaline another stress hormone takes over because adrenaline you can sorry cortisol is taking over because cortisol is a more longer lingering response of the body so cortisol for a week is okay for two weeks is also okay but if it turns to longer than months months or years then that leads to low-grade inflammation and your body is actually saying yeah there is something happening outside we have to be in an alarming state of being so there is inflammation constant inflammation in the body and that constant inflammation that can lead to diseases because you are deregulating the immune system and this can lead to diseases as autoimmune diseases like a thyroid for example thyroid issues or but even as well in our opinion mental diseases because your brain can't heal himself anymore we are either in a restorative state or in a stress state so stress is good if it's getting balanced with the restoration if you're a long term in a stress state your body can't restore and this eventually leads to deregulation and that is the danger in our society because nowadays we have way too much stressors around us which in the long run can lead to diseases if you think about it we wake up and we have this upsurge of cortisol which really is an activating hormone but it's also a stress hormone and it goes up and in a very healthy line of a day it goes up when you wake up because you need to be active.

57:25You need to go out into the world, right? Meet your deadlines now or facing a lion or whatever what it is. And then it really, in a natural state, you go home and then cortisol goes down and then the melatonin goes up so that you can go to sleep. Nowadays, actually, we have a constant mode of little stressors all around. It's our phone. It's the boss that's sending you a late email in the night. And that creates stress in the night when you actually should be socializing, relaxing, metabolizing your food and then going to bed. But with these constant stressors, this constant cortisol flooded in our bloodstream, that means that we are on high alert.

58:09We're running from a tiger the whole day long, even when we're in bed, and then we wake up again. And if that happens for a long time, these constant stressors, modern day stressors, that creates a lot of problems in the long run. Because cortisol, if there's no clean, it also makes sure that we have a little bit of inflammation, which is absolutely okay. When we come into the restorative phase of our day, which is in the night, and then we need to go to sleep, it's a restorative phase. That's when the inflammation gets cleaned up. That's when the rearranging in our brain is being done. And so when this doesn't happen, you get a build up of this inflammation because you're stressed all the time.

58:53No restoration going on. And that build up that creates all of these different problems that we have. And we know inflammation is pretty much the basis of all modern conditions. And this is my statement. We had to look over. OK, what? Where does it say? Well, there are a lot of physicians and at least 95 % of chronic conditions, for example, there are based on inflammation. But for me, it really comes down to inflammation. If we deal with that, and what is it? Just being in the restorative state of our body, which is our natural state of being. We shouldn't be in a stress state all of the time.

59:33That's not how our body has been built. We have been built to deal with short-term stressors and then to go home, relax, so that we kick in the restorative part of our bodies, our self-healing capabilities, so that we can, again, restore and deal with the next stressors coming in. That's when we also built up some resilience. The resilience is being built up after the stressor. And it's even on cell level. This is why, for example, eustress, what we do with the Wim Hof Method is eustress. So it's a short burst of stress. And that's actually how our bodies have been built. We like a little bit of stress, but then it has to stop.

1:00:20So we like to run from the tiger and then to hide from it or we're being eaten. It's one of the two. But when we are hiding and then the tiger goes away, okay, everything comes down again. the system calms down we can clean up the mess the inflammation but also on cell level the cell understands oh my god what was that okay for the next time we need to be a little bit stronger and so it begins a little bit of a house cleaning inside of the cell it begins to wrap itself around a little layer a protective layer and so we become stronger for the next bout of stress and that is building stress resilience we're not built as modern human beings to deal with this constant short-term stressors we're not built yeah and this is why this method is so great as well as regulating stress so at one hand laura said it very beautifully eustress hormetic stress it gives a big stress point, the adrenaline goes up and it goes down and then like emotions etc when you're facing an issue your cell has that as well, afterward it becomes more resilient okay more resilient so that is just one entry and the other one of the Wim Hof method what we are doing actually with inducing controlled stressors because these are controlled stressors is that But yeah, you get a big bounce of stress and then you're relaxed.

1:01:56And then as well, what we have seen in research while doing the method, so they put some people in fMRIs, they check the brains, did some research, brain research. And then they saw actually that this endocannabinoids, the ECB1 receptors, endocannabinoids says receptors one, increased. and what it means actually these are widespread in the brain 10 percent 10 percent of the cells are you have these receptors on the brain when you have more of these cells you actually are increasing your stress response because these receptors if you have more of these receptors they act as a stress buffer so for a next time if you're practicing it for a long run they did this measurements for during six weeks so they measured just one week before the methods and one week after but there they saw an increase of these receptors and that means a better stress response so that means actually when stress comes in you are less reactive you're more responding So stress hits you less harder.

1:03:14It's also the endocannabinoid system, opioid system. It's the same system that we actually also give a boost when we use painkillers. So actually Wim Hof Method, it's a natural painkiller. Well, I love all that explanation. The last area I wanted to spend a little bit of time on is we started this whole conversation about purpose and talking about your dad and some of the feats he did and how his method led him to become passion struck, given the title of the show and the sense of agency and empowerment that he has. But a lot of what I've been talking about lately is I think there are a lot of people out there who keep going through the motions and they don't feel that their actions and their lives matter, that people really see them.

1:04:06How does the Wim Hof Method help people reconnect with their sense of self-worth and empower them to feel that agency, to feel that sense that they belong in the world? Wow. Well, for that, I really think you need to have this deep connection with your inner self and if you lost that then you can not understand what actually your road is or what you want to be or what you believe in what is important for you if you don't know those things that are important for you how can you act on it and that deeper self is for me intuition as well so connecting within the self and what we have seen and noticed a lot with practitioners is that they really can connect with a deeper layer of themselves what is important well you have to know that and with the breathing exercises i don't know if you have done that john but with the breathing exercises with one good session you go deep in that system and the and what is important for that moment what is important like it comes out you feel first of all very connected to the body a lot of love and a clear sense of direction as well so the noise that can be created by the external us like all these demands in society that falls off those layers are gone so you can really connect with that deeper self of you once you're very good connected with that deeper self of you what are your values what is important for me in life you don't have to have always a clear plan and i think but you do need to have that connection yeah that's that connection and then once you're connected to that you know the direction better and that gives the purpose you don't have to be the present of the world yeah sometimes people want to be very big but what impact from you in life what is the impact from you for yourself for you the people around you yeah the circle around you and then if that is completed if that is more clear then you can think oh actually this is already it matters and then you can see as well what more impact do you want to have but first start with yourself and then what as well with the people around you yeah there's such a thing that is called interoceptive focus and that is really the deeper connection within that we get to sense what is happening within our body that we have an internal world which you cannot see from the outside right and we get constantly triggered from the outside and that means that our brain is going on yeah repeat start that it's like a monkey mind that cannot be still and actually with this method what you really do well try to sit in an ice bath and think about your problems it's impossible right you really have to really connect with the body mind body in that moment to really center yourself and go through that transition in the ice bath coming out unscated and preferably with a feeling of bliss that's what I have I think an ice bath for me it's a complete feeling of zen and so it stops you thinking about the past it stops you thinking about the future it puts you in the here and now and I think that is a instant meditative practice you can do that through meditation but it's very difficult for a modern human being to sit still and meditate for 15 minutes.

1:07:59It's very difficult. But this is what we do also with an ice bath. You go into the ice bath, you sit in it for two minutes and there is no way you either connect with yourself, a deeper connection, or you disconnect and you go out. There's no cheating there. And that's why I find it so beautiful because it's like forcing. But once you get there, it's a deeper connection deeper that I cannot explain you can only experience you can only feel and sense it while you're doing it you can explain all you want but just do it and you feel a deeper connection that it goes through all of these conditioned layers it go the conditioned layers also this rumination and so we put ourselves in the here and now and in the here and now that's where you find acceptance that's where you find peace that's where you find clarity that's where you find a deeper connection with yourself and a deeper knowing and there there are no outside voices it's only you and not even your persona i think it's even you and your soul i cannot explain it any other way yeah you and your soul and that means that anything that is unimportant it just falls away and of course when you have that deeper connection with yourself and you bring that out and you are in a state of bliss after then it's so much easier to connect with the world you just are relaxed there's nothing to gain there's nothing that you need you're at ease you're at ease I love that explanation and it's had that connection with one of us but we i also believe that we are creative beings we are people who strive for growth so that is by doing the things that are important for us where do you want to create in a creative is not just painting it's as well solving an issue or excelling in another area that is important but first you need to understand what is important what do you want to create in and where do you want to go then and then have the discipline as well to make the proper steps because by that creating it gives that a sense of wonder as well and a sense of purpose and a sense of accomplishment and then you want to continue once you're in the flow I think that there you find the very big passion and that you also understand and have the confidence to follow that path that's actually i have to remind we have women that come to the workshop i have like the funniest stories actually sometimes they're anxiety written right they come in the workshop they have no idea if they want to do the ice bath like is it okay if i just sit in the workshop but the ice bath no not the ice bath is that okay yeah no worries at the end i make sure that everybody goes into the ice bath and they love it but I remember a woman that came to our workshop and she was very shy didn't really talk a lot but she had a major breakthrough and this was a woman that was doubting so much in her life actually busy with so many rumeration and she wrote us a letter afterwards that it she this workshop this couple of hours gave her the resolve the empowerment to go after her dreams she quit her job and started her own company and these type of stories we hear all of the time and why because it gives you just that clarity and that empowerment to really go after what you want it is with this clarity and this empowerment together coupled together.

1:11:48Then you go on your purpose. The shedding of these layers, this conditioning, that's what we're talking about. And then that's where your purpose lies. What you both said was beautiful. And thank you so much, because I think it's exactly what the audience needed to hear. I wanted to end today on this book was really written in many ways to create an ICE woman community. How do you envision this movement evolving to further support and empower women globally? And where can listeners learn more about the movement and how they can become part of it? For me, this book, and this is how I see it, it's our way of really helping these balance of male and females out into the world.

1:12:38We know that women struggle much more than men with all kinds of different stressors, their different societal expectations. And I just wanted to give women these tools that make them aware of what it means, what is stress and how does it affect women and what they can do with it and how the woman, the method can support their hormonal balance, which is a major one. And that all ties in the way that I see it with stress. And so when you give women these tools, it just makes sure that they get more sovereignty over their happiness, health, and strength. And we know that there's so little research with regards to women and health, while it is absolutely necessary, just because we have a different hormonal profile, and so medicine will have a different effect.

1:13:28This book was really to actually explain what we are already seeing in our communities with regards to the Wim Hof Method, women that have more regular periods, It's a woman that all of a sudden can get babies, a woman that are using it for the symptoms of their menopause. And so this book was a culmination of all of these questions of which we just had to deduct the reasoning based on information out there and what we have experienced as experts. And so I think this book is going to help so many women around the world. And that is why it was so important for me to give them really tools to deal with whatever they're dealing in their lives.

1:14:10That is first very practical hand-on tools, give them more sovereignty over their stress management and going after their goals. That's also one thing that I think is very important. This empowerment of woman from a very beautiful feminine place, but that they can do anything that they set their mind to. That is important for me because we need strong men. We need strong women because both will build up communities and really raise this consciousness of this feminine masculine divide that I see up into the world. And I want to make sure that this happens with all women around the world and then for next generations, all of the little girls out there that all have mothers.

1:14:57So that is why it was so important for me. Yeah, that's beautiful. yeah beautiful set and for us yeah both is to bring more woman to this practice because we can imagine that when you see Wim as a role model you think ah there's nothing for me the cold and then adding on the cold is nothing for me but it brings so much power and with that power as well the intuition but as well the vulnerability it goes all hand in hand yeah and by really practicing this method and try it out for yourself and then see what it does for you so for us this book is really bad to empower women and to answer the questions we have seen many times so the book is out there it is april 29 yeah and yeah we think it's a very valuable book for a lot of women who are curious about the methods, but as well about women's health in general.

1:15:59So there is a lot of things that we still need to understand. And we did quite some research as well in women's physiology, the hormonal influence on our state of being and how you can be stronger, become stronger, more resilient and feeling more empowered. Yeah, this is, I think it's really a fantastic book and it should be in the hands of every woman. And if you are a man, give it to your partner, give it to your mother, give it to your neighbors. I don't know. And read it yourself as well, because it's, I think it's a really beautiful book with so much information, science backed where possible, and a lot of expertise of decades long.

1:16:43So we condensed it all into the book and yeah, April 29th. And it's, can we got through Barnes & Noble's Amazon major outlets. So please get the book and make sure that we can continue with this revolution and this beautiful movement that we try to ignite and support in many ways in this world. Well, thank you so much for coming on the show. It was such an honor to have you. And to answer your question, Isabel, I've been doing breathwork since I was in my early 20s. I first discovered it when I was working with Navy SEALs and we used it to help regulate our bodies so that when we were in stressful situations, we knew how to calm ourselves.

1:17:26That's when the whole journey started for me. And yoga has been a practice that I've done for decades. Amazing! A Navy SEALer. We actually trained the Navy SEALs as well. I was there, yeah. Oh man, you have to win the war within.

1:17:46The Navy Seals, isn't that the four square box breathing? Yes. Beautiful, beautiful. I thought so. I thought so. That's amazing. Breath work is just because we have this tool within. And by tweaking that, it changes your whole physiology. And that's beautiful. It's revolutionary. Well, something so natural, so simple can have such a big effect. So it's beautiful. And we hope that with this book, yeah, many more women will do cold exposure, breath work, and learn to use their minds. That's awesome. Well, thank you again for coming on the show. Thank you so much, John. Thank you, John. It was a pleasure.

1:18:29And that's a wrap on today's conversation with Isabel and Laura Hoff. And what a powerful one it was. One of my biggest takeaways, that healing doesn't always happen in warmth and ease. Sometimes it takes cold. It takes discomfort. It takes learning to breathe in the storm rather than waiting for it to pass. Whether you're navigating burnout, emotional pain, or simply seeking more clarity in your life, Isabel and Laura's story shows us that resilience is something we can cultivate breath by breath, moment by moment. So here are a few reflection questions to sit with this week. What discomfort are you currently avoiding that might actually be calling you towards growth?

1:19:09Where can you slow down and breathe, especially when life feels so overwhelming? And what might happen if you give yourself full permission to reclaim your power, your softness, and your stillness? If this conversation sparks something in you, I encourage you to check out their book, Secrets of the Ice Women, links in the show notes at passionstruck.com. And before we go, make sure you're subscribed because this Thursday, I'm sitting down with Dr. Stephen Gundry, world-renowned cardiologist and best-selling author of The Platt Paradox and Gut Check. We're diving deep into the science of gut health, longevity, and the everyday foods that may be silently sabotaging your energy, immune system, and cognitive clarity.

1:19:51If you care about living longer, feeling better, and thinking sharper, you don't want to miss this one. And don't forget, if you're in Tampa, I'll be interviewing Gretchen Ribbon live this Thursday evening at the Oxford Exchange. There are just a few tickets left for what promises to be a rich and inspiring conversation around her newest book, The Secrets of Adulthood. We are truly a symbiotic organism. And bacteria have been around for 3 billion years. The most successful life form ever. We've only been around in our current form for about 100 ,000 years. A lot of us now think that this bacterial part of us, the passengers are driving the bus.

1:20:39And they're driving the bus for a really good reason, because they've had a lot of experience with living. And again, I make the argument that they are sentient beings. They see, not with eyes like we see, but they can read the barcodes on neighboring bacteria. We've known this for many years. It's called quorum sensing. They know who's in the house. And you go, well, what the heck? How could that be? Well, they carry messages. Thank you for being part of this community, for showing up to do the work, and for choosing to live intentionally. If you found today's episode meaningful, please share it with someone who you care about and leave a five-star review.

1:21:26It helps us reach more hearts and minds like yours. Until next time, stay strong, stay curious, and stay passion-struck.