The Biology of Architecture: Building a Fatal Convenience-Free Home From the Ground Up

0:03Darin Olien:Welcome to Super Life with me, Darin Olien, a podcast where we explore, discover, and share solutions that promote a healthier life and a better world. Together, we'll ignite possibilities, inspire change, and build sovereignty, creating a roadmap towards a super life for you and for all. Get ready to start living your super life.

0:32Darin Olien:By 2050, there will be more plastic in the ocean than fish. Over 500 toothpaste tubes have been thrown away since I've started this ad. You don't think of these small little things, but they add up a lot over time, and we can do something about it. That ends up to be over a billion plastic toothpaste tubes a year alone that ultimately end up in our environment and in our waterways and ultimately ends up in the ocean. Do you want to add to this or do you want to do something different? Plus, maybe that exposure to that plastic, getting the plasticizers and the endocrine disruptors and then putting that toothpaste in your mouth also is not a good idea.

1:21Darin Olien:There's some great solutions. You can DIY stuff. I've got many of these in my fatal conveniences. But the easy ones that I use every day and I'm about to travel a lot more and the traveling makes them really easy, I go to bite. I bite down on a little tablet, which is not interacting with any plastics because it's in a glass bottle and it's refillable and reusable and sustainable. And there's no unwanted toxic fluorides, flow agents and solvents in my mouth. So my favorite is this Bite Toothpaste. 100 % home, compostable pouches, subscription models. You don't even have to think about it again.

2:07Darin Olien:You're helping you by putting clean products in your mouth and you're helping the environment because Bite Toothpaste is one of the best companies I've seen looking at all aspects of their supply chain and their refillable, reusable, sustainable, regenerative practices. So Bite is offering you, all my listeners, 20 % off your first order. Go to trybite.com, T-R-Y-B-I-T-E, forward slash Darren20, or just use the promo code Darren20, D-A-R-I-N, and you can get 20 % off your first order with a great new toothpaste without using the tube. Hey, everybody. Welcome to the show. This is Darren O 'Lean.

2:50This is the Super Live Podcast, and I am diving into a subject that many of you have talked about and asked about, and that is building my homes. After losing everything, being in the yurt for a lot longer than I thought, my guest house is going to be put up in two months, but it's being built right now. So we're going to dive into many of the things, most of the things that I'm doing to be sovereign. But more importantly, to build a fatal convenience-free home. The biology of architecture. How you live. What if the most overlooked health intervention isn't a supplement, it's not a biohack, it's not a protocol, but the structure you live inside.

3:39Of course, your biology, what's going on in your cells, but what I'm talking about is your home. I'm getting close to moving into my new guest house after many years, but this isn't just a normal guest house. It's a biological experiment to live better. An experiment in removing the fatal conveniences from the build environment, as well as what I will be living in. because modern homes, even the beautiful ones, are filled full of combustible materials, formaldehydes, VOCs, flame retardants, mold-promoting materials, endocrine disruptors, artificial light disruption, EMF oversaturation, poor water quality, and the list just continues.

4:28This isn't to make you feel bad about your house because there's always things you can do to better your environment. Indoor air quality, open the windows, use better materials, what you're sleeping in, all of those things. But the thing is, if you don't question things, then you're a victim to the modern world, which is the fatal conveniences. So I asked myself, even though I won't be living in my guest house all that long because I'll be focusing on my main house, but it's still going to be at least a couple years. So I asked, what would a house be like, look like, if I designed it for a toxic free zone, a nervous system regulation, and of course here in California, surrounded by the natural world, fire resistant, fire resilience, and reducing toxic load of just normal building materials or what we're putting on our floors, our walls, particle boards, you name it and the list goes on.

5:30So I'm going to walk you through exactly what I built and the science behind why. So the first thing is, obviously I don't want my house to burn down again and this is a fire zone. Most of California is a fire zone. It's a natural part of this environment. It needs to burn down But here's the thing, over 90 % of the fires in California and other places, but mostly in California is what I'm talking about, starts not from the natural environment. It starts from a derelict power pole. It starts from us. However, you still need to manage the forests, which I really wish California and other places would actually follow suit with many of the indigenous cultures.

6:14But I don't want to regress too far on that. But I do live in a wild, wildlife country. That's where I live. That's where I choose to live. And wildlife research is clear. Most homes ignite not from direct flame contact, but from the embers and the radiant heat. That's from the National Fire Protection Agency. Wood ignites at approximately 300 Celsius or 572 Fahrenheit. wildfire temperatures can exceed from 800 to 1500 degrees Fahrenheit so just from the heat alone you're going to have a lot of issues the consistent heat the embers coming off of that and then if there's no one here to put out the embers your house is more than likely to start on fire and the materials used are horrible in traditional building so we need to change that they're flammable.

7:14They're toxic. Some of the materials I'm using, steel frame, no wood, no wood whatsoever, except for something I'll get into a little bit later, but not on the outside, not the frame. It's a recycled steel frame, and three quarters of the structure is glass. Inside, I'm using an incredible, for the interior walls, not weird sheetrock or tapes or glues or all of that stuff. I'm using magnesium oxide. This is something I've learned about for last 15 or 20 plus years and we're finally able to start using it. Mold resistant, somewhat flame resistant, and it's toxic free. On the outside where it doesn't have glass, I'm using hempcrete for the exterior walls.

8:03Very fire resistant and very beneficial in the natural environment. As well as high-powered exterior sprinklers, dedicated sprinkling lines. So if water goes out, I have power for my own water system to create umbrellas around the property of the structures. So the steel framing. Steel frame obviously is non-combustible, significantly reduces the structural ignition risk that obviously wood framing was. So embers hit steel, it doesn't burn. So this is important. The magnesium oxide, these are non-combustible, mold resistant, low VOCs, durable under heat. Unlike conventional drywall, magnesium oxides does not rely on paper facing that can promote mold growth under moisture exposure.

8:58Think about it. You create plumbing and fixtures on that plumbing and you have heat, you have cold, you have hot and cold water. What are you getting? You're getting moisture buildup and then you're trapping it behind walls. And then those walls are made out of wood. There's no airflow. Unfortunately, most homes don't even consider these things and mold starts to progress extensively in most of the homes, especially when you're fairly close to the ocean, as well as smoke inhalation is a leading cause of fire death, not the burns. So reducing toxic combustion byproducts matters a lot. Getting into the hempcrete exterior walls, this is basically a mixture of hemp, salts, and water.

9:49Very natural, extremely, it's basically lime mineralization, inhibits flame spread. regulates moisture, reduces mold potential, and reduces thermal mass. European fire testing has shown hemp-lined walls char but resist structural ignition. It also contributes to carbon sequestering. And the exterior sprinkler systems is a must. I don't know how anyone couldn't have extremely strong sprinkler systems and there's a lot of research that proves that from wildfires and behavior studies show that ember exposure is the primary ignition pathway for homes in wildfire zones, which is my house. External high-powered sprinklers help reduce this ignition risk in and on these surfaces.

10:43This is acknowledging where you are putting your home. The challenge that I see and people wanting to get their homes up. Obviously, I want to get my home up. I want to get it up a lot quicker than what it was. I won't even get into the bureaucratic craziness and mess that it's been taking to last seven years to get where I'm at. But you have to acknowledge where we live and not just do the same old things. So it's taken a lot for me to push back on old building systems. And spoiler alert, I hired two separate building biologists that look at systems in the house and give me better alternatives for electrical, plumbing, using different materials that I may or may have not known about, resources, where to find those.

11:35It's probability management when it comes to what your home will off gas and give you, or in this case, from a fire.

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13:23Darin Olien:Go to manavitality.com. That's M-A-N-N-A vitality.com. Use the code DARREN20 and you get 20 % off your order. This isn't about health. It's about living in harmony with your greatest and highest potential. A fire will come through here again. So it's not about fear. It's about understanding your environment. So eliminating the toxic load, the fatal convenience is in the house. Obviously, I didn't want to lose my home, but it's the opportunity now to build from the ground up in the right way. Indoor air is often two to five times more polluted than outdoor air. That's directly from the EPA, and that is pretty solid throughout the last couple decades.

14:09Many homes contained urea-based formaldehyde resins in the particle boards. So every time you see a construction guy lifting those particle boards that's full of toxic chemicals and many voc emitting paints if you don't step in and there's a lot more on the market which is great and then all the glues and adhesives all throughout your house caulks sealants all of that stuff plus you really have to look at where flame retardants are hidden in a lot of that stuff formaldehyde classified as a group one carcinogen. A group one carcinogen. Why would formaldehyde be used in a structure you are living in?

14:54It goes beyond me. So this is classified by the International Agency of Research on Cancer. Group one carcinogen is formaldehyde. It also shows up in your clothes, shows up in your furniture, shows up in a lot of places. Chronic exposure, the nasal cavity, increase your cancer risk, connected to leukemia, asthma, asthma in children, pets, creates a lot of issues, especially it's time, consistency, and proximity that we are in these spaces. So pressed wood products are a major indoor source. So I eliminated these things. I glues, particle boards, they are gone. Not going to use them. I'm using polished floors, no chemical coatings, no polyurethane finishes.

15:48Polyurethane floors emit a huge amount of volatile organic compounds during curing and many off gas for a long, long period of time. Move into a new house and you're just sucking in all of these chemicals. So reducing all these these synthetic sealants and chronic potential for inhalation. And there's a, again, like I said, there's a lot of natural low VOC paints. These can be connected to a lot of respiratory irritation, headaches, and there's a thing, really a thing, a growing population over 10 % of the people have sick building syndrome, and many go undiagnosed. So indoor air quality is vital, and there's a lot of paints these mineral based paints these things are amazing and they're great and I look forward to that and they look good and they last a long time mold mold is a big one mold resistant materials mold exposure has been linked to just horrible conditions respiratory systems immuno dysregulation people have a very hard time getting chronic mold out of their system increases all causes of inflammation connected to many diseases.

17:08So a lot of the magnesium walls and the hempcrete regulate this moisture more effectively than plant-faced drywall and synthetic vapor barriers that are all over in the house. So the building science is clear on this. We just need to get this legacy building apparatus changed. So if you are remodeling, if you are looking at homes, If you are looking at building, please push back on all of this. And if you're buying a house, hire a building biologist. It's not that expensive. But if you're investing your hard-earned money and putting your family in a new home, hire a building biologist and have them go through your house.

17:49It's really, really important. One thing I'm really excited is the EMF reduction, elimination, hardwired infrastructure that I have in your home. You heard it. So the RF frequency exposure, it's so clear. Thousands of research is causing stress on the body, free radical damage, penetrating the brain, affecting the immune system, increasing inflammation, all of this stuff. We just don't need to do that. So guess what? I'm getting rid of it. I don't want that in my environment at all. Also, smart meters on your house. It's a big no-no. Eliminate those. go back to regular reading meters or put a Faraday cage over that smart meter.

18:37This is very important. The research around RF, electromagnetic fields and exposure in cancer, is a probable carcinogen to humans. So the exciting thing is I'm hardwired Ethernet all over with spaces around my house. So places where I feel, okay, I'm going to sit here, guest is going to sit there. And you're not necessarily walking around with the computer all the time. You basically have a few places that you're going to do the work. So in the guest room slash office, I have one and, you know, in different places. So I hardwired that in. Techwellness.com is a great go-to. So you can get all the adapters for your phone, for your computers, all of that stuff.

19:26I will not have Wi-Fi. So if you're coming over and you're gonna connect to Wi-Fi, guess what? It won't work. So it's great. I'm so excited for that. And then and by the way, internet works better when it's wired in. It increases your security and approves your health. Signal is more stable. All of that stuff. So super excited. And on that note, you know what I also did? You put a foundation in, you put the house on top of it. And by the way, my home is 85 % done when it shows up. So the guest house, I have a partially prefabbed home. It's a super life home. And actually, it will become available.

20:09You can actually be able to order this thing and have it. And I'll tell you more about that down the road. But in the floors, I've integrated copper wire that is then grounded into the ground outside. So every step I take inside on the top floor and the bottom floors, two floors, you will be grounded because you will be touching the earth via electrical conduction of the copper integrated floors. How freaking cool is that? So grounding to the earth all the time. You know, we always had contact with our skin to the ground, the Schumann resonance, balancing us, eliminating this overly biologically unassimulative electromagnetic fields that we created that is stressful to the body.

21:00There's more and more research on grounding or earthing, reducing blood viscosity, so allowing for blood flow to improve, lowering cholesterol, improving circadian rhythms, reducing muscle soreness even, and improving heart rate variability. So we need more tests, but the tests are really supporting be connected to the Earth, man. It's not rocket science. It's natural science. So this grounding, I'm really excited inducing our own natural body voltage with the Earth and the ambient electrical fields that we get, biologically assimilative frequencies that we get from the Earth in a way that our bodies can harmonize with.

21:47And it is fantastic. So copper, highly conductive, not expensive, embedded into the flooring, connected to the true earth ground. This allows walking around on barefoot, I am grounded to mother earth at all times. How awesome is that? So super stoked. The other thing I'm doing is water sovereignty, man. Water, water, water. So municipalities obviously have got their issues. You've heard me talk about pesticides, herbicides, PFAS in our waterways. Well, we have to take that on. So I'm having whole house water systems. I've also started the process of testing both my well water and the city water.

22:30And I'll have both being able to use in multiple ways. Eliminating pharmaceutical residues, PFAS, microplastics, all of that stuff that we get in the waterways. And having this whole house water filtration system based on my needs. So super excited about that. And plus with having a well, I have infinite water. I have so much water on this land because I basically live in a bowl. Also, gray water, waste remediation, microbiological waste remediation. So gray water, black water goes. The microbes do their process. It's underground. It's one of the most sophisticated bioremediation-researched gray and black water systems.

23:12So it breaks down the organic waste, reduces pathogen load, and restores the ecological cycling through the natural process of microbes. The nature has already shown us how to do this so we can process our waste safely. And we've done this for millions and millions and millions of years. So we use nature as the perfect intelligence for that. So that's fantastic. And then one thing I can lightly talk about, but can't give the whole thing, I have solar systems. I will have so much solar that I will have so much redundancy because I have a barn next to it and solar will go on that. So that's good.

23:57I also have other energy tech that I can't really talk about, but it's more energy generation for different systems and backup systems and redundancies. So power, I'm not going to have to worry about. And I'm also getting ready for my main house and other systems and water systems and pool systems and everything else. The other thing that I'm really excited about for this guest house is circadian lighting. So no more LADs. Those are not assimilative to the biological system. So I'm using light biology. Too much blue light exposure, all of that stuff in the light from LEDs, all of that stuff represses melatonin, doesn't let you sleep well.

24:46This is work out of Harvard Medical School in 2001. You need that melatonin to sleep for immune modulation, antioxidant activity, hormone signaling. It's a big freaking deal. LEDs often emit higher blue light wavelengths and intensity. So I've introduced incandescent lighting. And again, yes, it's higher energy needs, but I am solving my energy needs by creating energy myself here. Full spectrum bulbs, circadian aligned lighting timing bulbs, which is a thing. So your lights change the light spectrum as the actual day. So as the light changes outside, the light goes with the circadian flow of the lights turned on inside your house.

25:35Wow, right? So this supports the natural melatonin rhythms and your sleep architecture. The other thing that I want to talk about is I am putting some wood inside the house because I have a lot of fallen trees from the devastation from the fire. So a lot of very old oak trees, which is sad when they fall down but I have a lot that I can create for trimming for instead of plastic or particle board on the outside I can put natural oak which is what has fallen out here I'm having a had a group come over they're gonna mill the wood and they're gonna create the stair steps and the trimming and the door trimming and all of that stuff untreated no synthetic sealants biophilic design research shows when you have those natural materials, it lowers your cholesterol.

26:34It improves mood, improves cognition. That's the thing. Bring in nature and she knows what to do. There's some great work out of the University of British Columbia talking about biophila research literature. Natural materials actually regulate your nervous system tone. Credible, right the other thing is of course organic furniture no flame retardants pfos that you know stain resistant none of that stuff you've heard me talk about this formaldehyde treated fabrics none of that no polyurethane foam no more of that because the flame retardants the pfos all of that stuff thyroid disrupting neurodevelopmental concerns hormone interference endocrine disrupting carcinogenic not gonna happen not in my new home so I chose organic cotton hemp fabrics no flame retardants no formaldehydes better for your skin better for your pets the dust doesn't become microplastics and contaminated with chemicals so that's the opportunity the opportunity is that I I had a very destructive thing that happened.

27:47And now I get to reinvent how I want to live. And that's beautiful. It's been a painful, long process. But this isn't about perfection. There's a lot of other stuff that I'm doing. But those are the high-level things. It's about reducing this overall onslaught that is biological stressors in our life, in my life. And it's about doing things better and proving that it can be done. And in this case, you'll be able to actually buy or at least use this as a model. So I'm really excited for this process. Like I said, probably in about two months, I will be having this solo podcast from my new home that is toxic free, mold free, EMF free, circadian flowing, chemical free, water contaminated free, endocrine disrupting free, all of that stuff.

28:42I shift the load for a more biologically advanced system that we should always find as a number one. No more cheap corner, cutting corners and all of that stuff. Surround yourself in the architecture of biology. Surround yourself with love and kindness and intention. This is seven years of intention and I can't wait to tell you about my main house. It's gonna blow your mind. Okay, that's it. That is the biology of my belief that is being put into my home to make me thrive, to have this next chapter of my life be the best ever. I want you to have the best life ever. Like and subscribe and support this channel.

29:30It helps out a lot. We hit the top 10 in alternative health podcasts in the world. So thank you for listening. Thank you for learning. Thank you for caring about your health because it's not about me. It's about you. I don't do this for me. I do this for you, but I learn along the way and you get the benefit. Thank you. I love you. Peace. I'm out.