Latest / Gladden Longevity Podcast / The Power of Nature in Health and Longevity - Episode 308

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The Power of Nature in Health and Longevity - Episode 308 · Gladden Longevity Podcast

0:00
So hydration status is not just about drinking.
0:04
And my rule of thumb still is.
0:06
half your body weight in ounces in water, and I'll call it ionized water, mineralized water, hydrogen water, coconut water, whatever, as opposed to things like coffee or
0:17
alcohol or soda.
0:18
I'd like to replenish your fluid that your body has with sort of, I'll call it nutritional water, if you like, that actually has much more potential benefit for healing.
0:30
The lymphatic system that people say, well, yeah, if I get a cold, can feel something swollen in my neck or in the groin per se.
0:38
But your lymphatic system is a huge part of your immune system.
0:41
And for lack of a better term, along with your cardiovascular system, it technically is your sewer system.
0:48
It's how the body removes cellular debris, cellular waste from where the cell is, whether it's in your big toe or in your brain.
1:26
Welcome everybody to this edition of the Gladden Longevity Podcast.
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I'm your host, Dr.
1:30
Jeffrey Gladden, and we're here answering the questions we're most interested in.
1:36
Quite honestly, how good can we be?
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How do we make 100 a new 30?
1:39
How do we live well beyond 120?
1:42
How do we live young for a lifetime?
1:45
And how do we develop a 300 year old mind?
1:48
And on today's episode, I'm going to be talking with a dentist who became a naturopath.
1:53
His name is Dick Thom, T H O M.
1:56
He lives in Scottsdale, Arizona.
1:58
He's Canadian by birth.
1:59
And we're going to talk about some things that have such a massive impact on life itself, joy, satisfaction, health, longevity to an extent.
2:10
But we're not talking about gene therapy or telomere lengthening or even plasma, phoresis, or things like that.
2:16
We're talking about some other things.
2:18
related to nature and the profound impact that being outside of nature can have on our nervous systems.
2:25
And I think you're going to find it really interesting.
2:28
We go a lot of different places here.
2:29
I haven't done a justice in this introduction, but it was a very fun conversation.
2:34
I think you'll enjoy it.
2:36
Welcome everybody to this edition of the Gladden Longevity Podcast.
2:39
I'm your host, Dr.
2:39
Jeffrey Gladden.
2:41
And today I'm here with Dick Thom Dick, welcome to the show.
2:46
Thank you very much.
2:47
I always appreciate the opportunity to share with listeners who may be not new to the topic, but maybe I'll give a little bit of spin on them from a healthcare perspective.
2:57
Yeah, I think you've got an interesting take on, on some things.
3:00
So, where are you in life?
3:03
You're, mean, we know you're in Arizona.
3:05
we know that you've been around the sun a couple of times.
3:09
so how would you characterize yourself in terms of where you're at?
3:14
Well, what I would like to characterize myself is I'm a student of learning.
3:20
I'm a student of learning.
3:21
have 55 years ago, I entered med school initially as a dentist, practiced dentistry until the late 1970s, 1970s and actually 80s to the 1980s.
3:40
Mm-hmm.
3:40
You know, basically went back to school, became a naturopath and for the last six decades, I basically have uh witnessed a change in the health of the population.
3:52
And what's curious to me and interesting is, as I look over those six decades, the issues that patients came to me for in the 1970s as hypoglycemia and adrenal stuff changed to...
4:07
chronic fatigue and mold stuff.
4:11
every decade we had a new name.
4:13
But yeah, it's the same problem.
4:15
Nothing's really changed.
4:17
We have the same physiologic and biological problems that we had in the 70s that we have in 2025.
4:23
And so I realized that even though I've seen six decades of health names of diseases, the underlying problem has never changed.
4:33
And so where I'm
4:34
is trying to help people understand that it's more what they do than what any doctor can ever do for them.
4:41
And so the reality of going back to, you know, real health care is self care.
4:46
And, you know, a common thing I say to patients now is, what the first thing you should do in the morning is you should look in the mirror and say to that person, what am I going to
4:54
do for you today?
4:56
And if it's nothing, you're going to have a problem.
5:01
Yeah, that's a good perspective, right?
5:03
It's a little bit like paying yourself first when you get a paycheck.
5:06
It's like, well, let me pay myself first now, right?
5:08
And so I start paying everybody else or whatever.
5:11
Yeah.
5:12
So it's really what we're talking about is people coming to grips with the fact that they their bodies are mortal and prone to break down and, you know,
5:24
focusing time and attention on it on a regular basis, on a daily basis, quite honestly, becomes one of the keys.
5:29
It's kind of like taking care of a horse or a pet or even an automobile for that matter, right?
5:34
You got time and attention, that's what it takes.
5:36
And some resources, yeah.
5:39
So what do you like to do when you're doing your self care?
5:42
What does that consist of?
5:44
Well, I start every morning with, you know, I get up and I feed my dogs and then I put my running shoes on and I disappear for the next 45 to 60 minutes.
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And, you know, I will walk, jog, run, you know, climb, talk to neighbors.
6:01
So I'm outside, out of the house and living in Arizona, I live in a place where it's easy to do every day.
6:08
I never feel of a snowstorm or a rainstorm and very enjoyable thing.
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And so.
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Besides having a glass of water before I get started, that's the first hour of my day of what I do.
6:22
So there's a couple of different things about that.
6:24
You know, one is getting that early morning sun is we know is very helpful for kind of setting up your circadian rhythm, actually starting melatonin production that you'll use
6:33
the following night.
6:34
And, um and then movement.
6:36
And I think movement early in the morning before you've eaten anything, I, I tend to
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exercise when I'm fasting, except for a couple of exceptions where I know I'm going to do something that's going to be pretty protracted, you know, like over an hour, over an hour
6:51
and a half, and I'll I'll fuel for that.
6:53
But other than that and being outside, right, there's a lot to be said for being outside away from a screen.
6:59
And at that time of day, you're really not that prone to a sunburn, quite honestly.
7:03
So.
7:04
That's right.
7:05
So so it's it's really the safest time to be out in the sun.
7:08
And if you were to do something barefoot, you know, in Arizona, you don't have as much grass.
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A lot of people have yards that are made out of rocks or things like that.
7:17
But if you get some grounding, right, if you get a little bit of grounding in, that's that's a good thing, So.
7:23
Well, the good thing about that, you're right.
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I can't walk or run, jog with bare feet, but that's the only time I pretty much wear shoes.
7:34
I can walk around everywhere else without just being bare feet, which is very
7:41
that's good.
7:41
I was talking to a gentleman at a conference a couple of years ago who had a number of different health problems.
7:47
And he became so enamored with the idea of sleeping on the ground as actually being close to the human residents and close to the negative ion charge of the planet and all the
8:00
different things that
8:02
we know are actually healthy for us.
8:04
He started sleeping in a tent on the ground, not on an inflatable mattress or a mattress, but literally, I mean, it was a sleeping bag or something, but he was essentially on the
8:15
ground, right?
8:16
And he did that, and initially, of course, it was pretty uncomfortable, although he kind of found some land or whatever that wasn't poking him in the back or whatever.
8:26
But he claimed that over the next 30 days.
8:30
his entire body transformed just from the healing impact of being grounded like that.
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So he, you know, he still sleeps on the ground.
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I met him at a hotel.
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don't know if he had taken a room at the hotel if he was sleeping, you know, out in the woods next to the hotel, but I didn't ask him that.
8:49
But I find this idea of getting outside into nature.
8:54
and the grounding impact and the sun and even being out at night.
8:59
I know it's warm there in Arizona, but if you happen to be awake at 10 o'clock and you walk out and you feel that warm breeze and you see the sun and maybe you go for a walk
9:08
then too, right?
9:08
It's like, my gosh, this is such a good feeling.
9:11
I think there's so much to be said for that.
9:13
I think it's a natural law.
9:15
And if you look in areas that, you know, basically are the, what are the blue zones where they have the most centurions that live.
9:23
That's one of the things that they did.
9:24
They got out, they get outside of their four walls of where they live and literally are experiencing the breathing fresh air.
9:34
Mm-hmm.
9:35
I think that's critical.
9:36
Yeah.
9:36
so, but that raises, you know, you can't do that everywhere, right?
9:39
It's a little harder to do in Manhattan.
9:40
You can't do it in, you know, downtown Denver or, you know, even downtown Dallas can be difficult.
9:46
So it comes down to choosing the context in which you're going to reside really as a health choice, as much as an aesthetic choice or a convenience choice, right?
9:57
So.
9:58
ah I think that's a really important thing to factor in.
10:01
Well, certainly the aspect of, you you leave and leaving in a city, hopefully, perhaps not Manhattan, although I've not been there, is like, near a park?
10:09
Are you near where there's trees?
10:11
Are you near Are you near where, you know, you can actually get away from concrete, away from buildings and that type of thing.
10:22
And so even that uh is of, and my patient population anyway, has created the aspect of being supportive and
10:30
So, know, I do what we call basic treatment guidelines for every patient, which includes things like you mentioned, grounding and drinking and moving your body, you know, and
10:42
eating foods that are ideally more for your temperament, which to me is, for everybody, is the ideal diet that we should all follow, is something that gets hard.
10:53
somebody identify that diet based on temperament?
10:57
Well, I mean, the easiest way to do it is to fill out, you know, the questionnaire.
11:00
I mean, there's dozens of books that have been written on temperaments.
11:03
And, know, one of the books that I have a long time ago is just, you know, I think it's just called temperament.
11:10
Randy Rolfe was the, was the author and I think she was a lawyer, but in the middle of the book, she has like 18 questions, 18 things to try and help you identify it.
11:20
You know, if you cause, and nobody's a perfect, you know,
11:25
I mean, we're all a mix of whatever, but that at least gives you a groundwork.
11:29
And then in that book or any book on temperaments, it'll say that these, these are the specific foods.
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what most people will say, but I don't like those foods or those foods.
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And that's because they're not in balance as far as their own temperament is concerned.
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And over time as they move towards that.
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And so, you know, the, the common one of course becomes.
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uh, you know, with women anyway, and we'll blame them.
11:56
We'll pick on them, but, know, menstrual wise, it's very common to hear a woman say, I love to eat chocolate.
12:01
And then after a period of time of, you know, moving health in a positive direction, I'll come in and say, you know, it's interesting.
12:09
I don't really like eating chocolate anymore because it does your own temperament, but whether chocolate or beef or milk or a vegan or, know, a carnivore, whatever it is, we are
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destined by.
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and inherited temperament.
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People said, what's temperament?
12:25
Well, if you've read any of Shakespeare's plays, will, every character in his play was different temperaments, which they talked a lot about in the middle ages.
12:34
We don't talk about it as much anymore, but it's been prevalent since the time of Hippocrates, know, 24, the 25th century.
12:41
I think we've subsumed it into personality almost, right?
12:46
Like they have this kind of personality, but uh you can sort of tease out the temperament element of that.
12:53
Yeah, so I think that's probably how we do that.
12:57
Yeah, it's interesting.
12:58
You know, one of my approaches to eating is to, and it's based on some of the testing that we do here.
13:05
What we find is that when people eat the same thing over and over again, their immune system will start to actually react to it.
13:11
And if you have a wider variety of nutrient dense foods where you're not eating the same stuff all the time, we seem to find that people have the most health that way.
13:21
Their gut biome has the most diversity, their immune system and food sensitivity is sort of lowest, you know, kind of.
13:28
And so, and...
13:29
their nutrient status is good because, you know, they don't eat Brazil nuts every day, but they're having them, you know, a couple of times a week.
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And then they're having some artichoke and then they're having some asparagus and whatever else.
13:39
Right.
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So they just keep moving around.
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It's like you keep moving around and getting this wide variety of nutrient dense foods.
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And I think that's a good way to eat in general.
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So you probably temper that with your temperament as well.
13:51
So one of the other ideas that came out now probably 10 years ago was the idea of the colors.
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How many different colors of foods are you eating to get from phytonutrients?
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And when I started or years in the 70s, it was more like three foods and then it went to five foods and then I went to eat for the rainbow.
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And now the study says the ideal is 10.
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And statistics are quite relevant to
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decreasing heart disease, decreasing cancer rates, increasing autoimmune disease, et cetera.
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Just because of what you just said, a variety of different foods, a variety of different colors, whole variety of different nutrients, as opposed to eating what people
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unfortunately do, which is the same food over and over, because they know how to prepare it and it tastes.
14:40
And it's convenient.
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uh, you know, the interesting thing about our taste buds is that what we eat kind of trains our taste buds to want that flavor.
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So if you had a burger for lunch yesterday and it's lunchtime again, and you're hungry, you know, it's, you're going to want something kind of in that vein.
14:56
Well, I think I'll have pizza today and a burger tomorrow.
14:58
You you kind of stay in that vein, right?
15:00
But if you, but if you mix it up intentionally and it takes a little bit of, uh, overriding your appetite to do this initially.
15:08
And then you start to actually like it, but you've got to say, Oh, well, I feel like this, but you know what, what would actually be good is I think I'll have some bell pepper and
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do some of this and whatever else.
15:17
Um, I've actually gotten into a thing where I go to whole foods and I will get one of their soup containers and I'll put in, you know, they usually have a row of about five or
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six soups.
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I put some of all of them in, in the, in the soup container.
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mix them all together.
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And then I go over to the vegetable section.
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And I started dropping in the cauliflower and the broccoli and kale, whatever else is there.
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And so this, this concept is that soup has now become the new salad.
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And w and when you eat it, my gosh, you've never tasted anything better in your life.
15:50
It's it's unbelievable.
15:51
should try it.
15:52
I'll challenge you to try it.
15:53
Send me a text and see, and if you're listening to this, try it and then send us a message.
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If you go in and you don't have to do five soups or just pick a soup you like.
16:02
Fill it up halfway and go around and stick vegetables in for the rest of it and eat that.
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It's unbelievably satisfying and flavorful.
16:09
It's really cool and it's a good way to get a lot of variety.
16:11
So kind of cool.
16:13
It's a great way.
16:13
And I liked the idea of warm because many of my patient population, probably yours, as so many digestive problems, and they're always looking for something to improve their reflux
16:26
or their bowel problems or whatever.
16:28
I said, a wider variety of foods.
16:31
And commonly because of testing that we do, I often find that their digestive system is very cold.
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And from a Chinese perspective, eating cold foods like a salad.
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or having a drink is really not good for your digestive system because you're making it so much harder to digest whatever great that you're eating.
16:50
So, warm food is totally, I'm a huge fan of not eating anything out of the refrigerator at any time of year.
16:59
Okay.
16:59
Interesting.
17:00
I guess you're not a big ice cream guy, but okay.
17:03
Well, that's interesting.
17:04
Um, yeah.
17:05
So warm foods.
17:06
Well, anyway, that's a way to kind of, uh, mix and match your foods inside some soup.
17:11
yeah.
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different things in there.
17:13
You call it a stew or whatever.
17:16
I think it's a great idea that would help many people's uh health and their digestive system for sure.
17:22
Yeah, they get a wide variety and it's warm and it's flavorful.
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And if you try it, you won't believe how it's like, why haven't I done this before?
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It tastes so good.
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It's not like, well, I'm going to have to put up with this.
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It's no like you take the first bite.
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It's like, my gosh, this is the best soup.
17:38
This is the best salad I've ever had in my life.
17:40
It's crazy.
17:41
Yeah.
17:43
Yeah.
17:44
So what are some of the other key things that you think are important?
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We've talked a little bit about outside grounding.
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Face away, tie it.
17:54
So a big issue for people is sleep.
17:58
I think it's such a chronic health problem for people and they take all kinds of sleep aids and they can't sleep or they fall asleep and wake up and they're restless and it's
18:10
unrefreshing and it's everything but falling asleep for seven to eight hours, wake up ready for the day to begin.
18:19
I would, find for those people that their biggest challenge typically becomes not the fact that they have a sleep problem, but it's instead of taking a sleep aid, their issue is
18:29
their nervous system.
18:30
They live in this sympathetic place of dominance and they never really get into.
18:35
even though people wear a watch or a whoop or an order ring or something, sort of during their sleep, they say, well, I'm sleeping, but how much deep sleep are you getting?
18:44
How much REM sleep are you getting?
18:46
So I think having sleep hygiene.
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is something that's incredibly important.
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Mostly trying to go to bed more or less at the same time, more or less getting up at the same time, including weekends and weekdays, and turning all your Wi-Fi devices off or not
19:05
having them around you in the bedroom.
19:08
But people use their iPhone or whatever to wake up.
19:13
Or alarm clock, which is a...
19:14
And so can we figure out some other way of doing that?
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The idea of sleep becomes critical and we know that since we're sleeping one third of our life, ideally, eight hours out of 24 would be an ideal.
19:31
we know that you can only heal during sleep.
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It's only when you're in the parasympathetic state, rest and relax and heal state.
19:41
And since many people have such poor sleep, it's no wonder that they're
19:48
Energy is lacking or they don't feel well because they never get really rejuvenated over time.
19:54
So I think putting sleep as a priority, as diet and a variety of foods is a huge importance for what's going on.
20:04
I do everything I can.
20:06
we're not, for many people, we're shutting everything down by eight or even nine PM.
20:11
Goal, be asleep by in bed by 10, asleep by 10 30.
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reading a book, not on an iPad, actually reading a real book to do things.
20:23
a lot of, there's a lot to be said for that.
20:25
for sure.
20:26
I, when you started to chat about this, and you were talking about people struggling with their sleep, you mentioned the nervous system.
20:32
and I agree that, and this may have always been true, quite honestly.
20:36
I don't know that it's more true today than, than ever, but, you know, people have a lot of stress and they are in sympathetic kind of overdrive.
20:46
We were.
20:47
We do a test on people when they come in here, called a neuro check as a brain tap neuro check.
20:52
We took two clips on their wrists and they sit there for roughly four to five minutes.
20:56
And with that, can monitor heartbeat and then they can, we can also get heart rate variability and we can also start to intuit through the software, you know, neuro hormonal
21:07
stress, how much energy is actually in the, in the Vegas nerve and the parasympathetic nervous system.
21:13
And it becomes an incredibly useful tool.
21:16
We just had a guy in, who, when I spoke with him initially, and this is not uncommon.
21:23
He is a very successful gentleman, financially successful.
21:27
And he, um, said, I no longer have any stress, you know, like 15 years ago, I was working really hard, you know, things have kind of come to fruition.
21:36
I don't really have any stress.
21:38
It's like, Oh, okay.
21:39
Well, that's.
21:40
Let's test you, right?
21:43
my gosh, this guy's system is completely stressed out.
21:46
mean, and, and it's not uncommon.
21:48
We had another gentleman in who, uh, it was a very successful attorney who stopped his litigation practice about 10 or 15, maybe 10 or 12 years ago.
21:58
Now, he wants some big, very big cases and very hostile environments.
22:02
And, he said, I thrived on that stress, but now that I'm not doing that work.
22:06
I don't really have any stress.
22:08
He's kind of now working more on the investment side of things.
22:11
I said, well, great.
22:12
Well, let's measure you.
22:12
Right.
22:13
So again, just completely stressed.
22:16
And what I don't think people understand they do now because they see it and they're actually intrigued is that when we go through stressful situations, that stuff gets
22:26
imprinted into our nervous system.
22:29
And it's not just the fact that the stress is now removed and you feel better.
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We tend to carry that.
22:34
And the other thing is that as humans, we tend to normalize what's there.
22:39
Like we don't, we don't recognize stress because it just feels like a normal day.
22:43
It's like, of course I feel this way.
22:45
Right.
22:45
So if you're listening to this, I think the idea of, having yourself tested is really, really good.
22:52
And, um, if you find that you have not enough power in your vagus nerve, which is bringing all that healing parasympathetic energy into your organs, you can train that.
23:01
Right.
23:02
You can train that.
23:03
so we, we recommend people using something called brain tap, which is basically a, a visor and a set of headphones.
23:11
And, it uses photobiomodulation and binaural beats, you know, the beat in the left ear and the right ear, like a couple of Hertz different, and you can put yourself into any of the
23:19
wave forms that you want.
23:21
So my point about sleep is that you can in the evening, before you're going to go to bed, you could put yourself in theta, which is the,
23:29
waveform just before you're to doze off the hypnagogic state.
23:33
And what I do is if I wake up at three in the morning, you know, I usually get up once a night, go use the bathroom, come back.
23:39
If my head is still kind of engaged, let's say, and I'm thinking about something, one thing I've learned is I can never think my way back to sleep, right?
23:46
You can, right?
23:47
You can never think your way back to sleep.
23:50
It's like you have to stop thinking, right?
23:53
So,
23:53
Anyway, I'll put on the brain tap for 11 minutes and just put on a program, you know, and it's, it's remarkable.
24:00
It takes your brain and trains your brain into a Delta state.
24:04
Now set it up for Delta, which is super slow way, which is the actual sleep wave.
24:08
And you actually entrain your brain back into Delta.
24:11
And I take the headset off and I fall asleep again.
24:14
Right.
24:14
And so it's, it's to your point.
24:17
I think it's really about having some hacks to,
24:21
understand the status of your nervous system and then being able to retrain it.
24:25
So, yeah.
24:26
Well, 100 % it's about retraining.
24:29
I would agree in many aspects.
24:31
And, you know, uh I often say to a patient, what do you think the first stress in your day is?
24:37
Well, whatever.
24:38
And I say, actually you missed the point.
24:40
The first stress of your day is when you go from lying to standing.
24:43
Because then your nervous system thinks, you have to defend yourself.
24:47
You're standing up.
24:48
Who's attacking you?
24:49
So you immediately move in, and I'm sure with your testing and with mine, we see immediately, because it's one of the tests we do in the offices at HRV also, is we find
24:58
that people go into a stress mode literally from lying to standing.
25:02
They said, that wasn't stressful.
25:03
Your body thinks it was, per se.
25:06
And this gentleman, as you said, who thinks he isn't in stress, those are exactly the people who are the most stressed because they don't realize that one way is their body is
25:16
stressed.
25:17
Yeah, it's one of the, it's been one, quite honestly, when we started doing this test, which we've now done for uh quite a number of years.
25:24
But when we first started it, it was actually surprising to me that how somebody felt about their stress and what we actually measured was really so different or could be so
25:37
different.
25:38
There are some people that come in that are really relaxed, right?
25:41
And they've met, they meditators or they've been using brain tap or whatever.
25:45
and.
25:45
They look actually quite good.
25:48
There are also people that have meditated their entire lives that come in and they don't look that great.
25:54
Just because you meditate doesn't mean you're actually getting there.
25:57
If you're listening to this, it's pretty interesting getting some testing done to say, okay, well, let me just find out where I'm at.
26:02
It can be super helpful.
26:04
Then if you want to use different devices to help pull you in, there are different ones out there.
26:08
I mentioned Brain Tap, but...
26:09
to kind of pull yourself into these brain states that are very relaxed and restorative.
26:14
That's a great thing to do, quite honestly.
26:16
You sleep better, you're able to handle stress better.
26:19
Your system isn't upset subconsciously.
26:23
It's very cool.
26:25
Excellent.
26:25
And so in addition to that areas that I think people may not be as familiar with, to the I mean, they're familiar with it, but they don't know what to do about it is we check
26:35
people's breathing because, oh, I pretty much have every patient every time once a week check their bolt score, which is like, you know, how many times a minute do they have?
26:46
Do they feel that they have to breathe?
26:48
historically, you know, it's
26:51
patients, it's like 14, 16, yet in reality, it should be five or six.
26:57
uh So teaching people how to breathe properly, most people don't know how to move their diaphragm or can't move their diaphragm.
27:05
And they actually don't get enough oxygen.
27:07
And we're not talking people who necessarily have an illness related to their breathing, but just in general, because of the stress effect for what's going on.
27:16
I think breathing and training and learning people
27:19
how to breathe properly is a simple type thing.
27:22
And I think every stress management will tell you if you slow your breathing down, you'll calm your system down.
27:28
You'll calm your system out of a sympathetic dominance state and try and get into this parasympathetics that you're talking about through the vagus nerve and all the activities
27:38
that you can do for the vagus nerve splash cold water on your face saying hum, you know, take a moment.
27:44
Deep breathing and kind of.
27:48
I think is important.
27:49
So that's another habit that's like, well, you don't have to think about breathing.
27:54
But if you're only going to breathe five times a minute, you're going to think about it because your body is actually going to do that in general.
28:03
So I think that's another important thing that people should...
28:07
So I have people every day, I tell them to put signs up around their place and said, oh, you see the sign breathe?
28:14
I have several in my office here.
28:17
You know, and then it's like, oh yeah, I need to stop for the next minute and just slow my breathing down.
28:22
Mm hmm.
28:23
Yeah, that's a really good point.
28:27
My take on that is the way that I slow my breathing down is I breathe more deeply.
28:34
Right.
28:35
And I think, you know, we also measure PFTs here to get an idea of somebody's capacity for not only force, vital capacity, which is how much air you can move at a breath or FVB one,
28:47
which is how much you can expel in a second.
28:50
but we look at their maximum voluntary ventilation.
28:52
So how much air can you move in a minute?
28:55
Right?
28:55
And that's a function of intercostal, the muscles between the ribs and the diaphragm, how strong they are.
29:01
And it's really interesting because if you're not breathing deeply enough, you're not exercising those muscles and you can't really move the amount of air in a minute that it
29:11
takes to keep up with any kind of, you know, true level of exercise.
29:15
So.
29:16
We have ways to train that using an elevation training mask where it's, you you put it on and then it's harder.
29:23
The aperture, you close it down, it becomes harder to suck the air in.
29:26
So you got to work your muscles to get it in.
29:28
But the other thing is you breathe more deeply because to your point, when you breathe in deeply, you've already paid all the overhead or filling all the pipes.
29:37
Right.
29:38
last, that last 10, 15 % that goes in, it all goes to exchanging gases.
29:43
You're getting oxygen in and CO2 out.
29:45
So it's, it's really changed the way that I breathe when I, mountain bike and things like that.
29:50
By breathing more deeply, I can climb a hill, and not have to speed up my breathing.
29:56
And when I get to the top, I can, in four or five deep breaths, I can get, get my breath back, so to speak, as opposed to a minute of.
30:05
more shallow breathing, right?
30:07
So it's really, it's a very powerful thing.
30:09
And the other thing that I've learned just recently actually, is that by slowing my breath down and breathing really deeply and actually feeling the cool air run in, if you, if you
30:21
pay attention to this, can.
30:25
You can feel the air just running through your nose, down the back of your throat, down into your lungs.
30:30
And I have this sensation that goes all the way down, right?
30:32
Lower than my lungs, right?
30:34
Like all the way, almost through my entire torso.
30:36
I can feel that being activated.
30:38
But when you, when I do that, I find it's actually very comforting.
30:43
It's right.
30:44
It's almost like a, it's almost like a self soothing kind of event.
30:49
to take that really slow deep breath.
30:51
And I think that self-soothing goes along with activation of the parasympathetic nervous system, right?
30:57
If you're feeling that sense of soothing and relaxed and comfortable and safe and things like that, then you're really kind of moving into that parasympathetic space.
31:08
So anyway, that's just, I know that's personal that I'm sharing, not probably everybody does that, but I think it's very cool.
31:14
There are many traditions that obviously focus on deep breathing, right?
31:17
And you too.
31:18
think the whole idea of yoga is less about the poses and learning more about how to breathe.
31:25
You know, from the original of it.
31:27
I mean, it's great to do the postures, but, and I'll tell somebody if you want to learn how to breathe properly, go and talk to a yoga instructor.
31:35
Yeah, there you go.
31:36
That's right.
31:37
That's right.
31:39
Yeah.
31:40
No, it's cool stuff.
31:41
Cool.
31:41
What else?
31:42
What else do you like to focus on?
31:44
Well, one of the biggest challenges is, and I'm sure your testing is mine, I find most people are dehydrated.
31:51
uh And they'll say, well, I'm not hungry, I'm not thirsty.
31:58
And I said, well, if you are thirsty, you're already dehydrated because you're down about 3 % if you're actually getting it.
32:04
So you need to drink routinely throughout the day in order to be able to satisfy your cells since
32:12
A woman is about 55%, body weight is water, and a man is about 60%.
32:18
And I rarely find that in a patient population, young children, sure, teenagers and athletes probably, but not otherwise.
32:28
In addition to that, even the people who are hydrated adequately, or women, what I find is that the water is in the wrong compartment.
32:39
And by physiology, most of that percentage of water should be inside your cell.
32:46
physiology says it should be about two thirds.
32:50
And only one third of that water should be on the outside of your cell, which never happens.
32:56
So in other words, 66, 33, sometimes it's the reverse.
33:00
sometimes if you have more water outside than inside.
33:04
I'll say I can get without any other tests.
33:06
can tell you that your problem is straight toxicity.
33:09
I don't know how you what, but your body can't get rid of even your own endogenous cellular waste of CO2 and urea and lactic acid that the body is making.
33:25
so the two things
33:26
an ocean to dump them into to dilute it is what you're saying.
33:30
Yeah.
33:31
Right.
33:31
And so what I found from a clinical perspective, almost always those people are low in protein.
33:38
They don't eat enough protein for their body mass and they don't even need enough protein to basically satisfy the proper compartments as far as their intracellular water.
33:51
And the other aspect is when you have the ocean, you dump all these great nutrients in there, but they can't get across the cell.
33:58
Mm-hmm.
33:59
because the cell membrane doesn't have the right charge, which is what you talked about earlier, but the gentleman who's sleeping on the ground are the natural ions in near the
34:10
water or a waterfall or walking in the forest after a rainstorm, where we're getting the natural negative ions to replenish that.
34:19
But with the amount of toxicity that's sort of in our environment,
34:24
and the cell membrane that doesn't allow it in, you can't get nutrients in or hormones in or anything else.
34:29
And you can't get the stuff out of the cell that you need to be able to be, you know, to have a healthy cell.
34:37
And the stuff that Warburg found in the thirties was that to have a healthy cell, a cell membrane, you need about minus 80, minus 70, minus 80 millivolts.
34:49
And yeah, any...
34:50
Unhealthy cells like a cancer cell has about a minus 15 millivolt.
34:56
No wonder it can never be a healthy cell because you don't even have the right charge.
35:00
It's like having a, laptop where the light comes on and says you're in low battery mode.
35:05
can't do all the functions because we don't have power to do it.
35:09
So hydration status is not just about drinking.
35:13
And my rule of thumb still is.
35:15
half your body weight in ounces in water, and I'll call it ionized water, mineralized water, hydrogen water, coconut water, whatever, as opposed to things like coffee or
35:26
alcohol or soda.
35:28
I'd like to replenish your fluid that your body has with sort of, I'll call it nutritional water, if you like, that actually has much more potential benefit for healing.
35:41
Yeah, I would agree with that.
35:42
would agree with that.
35:43
I think using good quality salts are helpful also, you know, like a good Celtic sea salt or something like that.
35:50
So you get the right minerals in.
35:52
A lot of people are mineral depleted.
35:54
Getting the water in, getting the toxins out.
35:57
Yeah.
35:58
Well, that's cool.
35:59
It is interesting how good you feel.
36:01
And if you're listening to this, just remember it's...
36:03
It's interesting how good you feel when you're in the woods, right?
36:06
In a cabin or you're about to go fishing or you're about to go hiking or, whatever it is you're going to do outside or if you're at the ocean, right?
36:15
You're going to walk the beach or get in the water.
36:19
it's interesting how good we feel there, right?
36:22
I mean, it's like you wake up in that environment.
36:25
It's like, my gosh, this feels great, right?
36:28
You're surrounded by the trees or dumping all this oxygen in the air and
36:32
the negative ions are out.
36:33
It's like, we're built for this is the point I'm making.
36:37
We're really built for that.
36:38
And, and I think part of our health is, actually being inside structures as little as possible, almost on some level.
36:44
I'm not advocating we go live in a tent, but you know, the idea of being outside as much as you can is, there's no downside to it.
36:51
think.
36:52
Yeah.
36:53
you know, it's interesting because many people who will report that are not paying attention.
36:56
They just think I'm on vacation, so I have less stress or I'm.
37:01
Why they feel better, but the reality is, yes, or that's a piece of it.
37:05
But what you just said is actually the bigger piece getting getting away from concrete, actually allowing the earth to give you the electrons back the earth, the water that is
37:18
the oxygen.
37:19
etc.
37:20
And, you know, even if we look at where's the first place we get electrons from, of course, it's the sun, it's light, per se.
37:27
And what, what does this, what do we need sun for?
37:30
We need sun to grow plants.
37:31
So we eat the plants, because it gives us some electrons and some energy.
37:36
I mean, the way it works.
37:38
And we've got away from that, because, you know, people, you know, they, they stick something in a microwave and think that's nourishment.
37:46
And it so
37:48
terrible.
37:49
getting those electrons in is absolutely critical.
37:54
And everything you just said, the cabin, the camp, woods, et cetera, is, that's why I said, if you live in a city, hopefully you can find a park where there's at least some
38:05
grass and some trees.
38:07
You can get around somewhat what nature ultimately is trying to provide us with.
38:12
That's right.
38:13
You know, we mentioned Manhattan earlier in the, in the podcast here and I've been in Manhattan.
38:19
don't know.
38:20
I don't know how many times, a lot of times quite honestly, um, I find that central park is such an amazing park.
38:27
Like I don't, I think it would be completely unbearable except for central park.
38:31
But if you get in central park, I was in there doing a run one day and I just kept taking the pork and the
38:39
path.
38:40
I just kept taking the smaller fork and the smaller fork and the smaller fork.
38:44
I tell you, I ended up in a part of that park where I couldn't see the city.
38:49
I couldn't hear the city.
38:51
I was just surrounded by the trees and the land.
38:54
And I'm like, my gosh, this is in the middle of Manhattan.
38:57
I can't, I can't hear or see anything but nature here.
39:00
Right.
39:00
So, and it felt so good.
39:03
So the point you're making, if you do live in a city, is to find, you know, what is your escape?
39:08
Where can you go forest bathed, right?
39:10
So to speak, or whatever it is you want to call it.
39:12
So yeah, super important to get that in.
39:14
I actually started here in the offices.
39:17
If I have a break, I walk outside just to get a little sunshine for three minutes and, you know, get some fresh air and whatever else it's, I think it's super healthy.
39:28
to do that every opportunity you get.
39:31
It's like anything, it's they, we, nature has got away from it.
39:37
And I don't know, you know, growing up in Canada, you know, the, one of the things that we used to do is you go outside and play and now you look at kids and they, what do they do?
39:47
They come home from school and they go and they sit, they sit on some tablet and they exercise their thumb.
39:52
You know, where's the, where's the games of tag and basketball and baseball and, you know, soccer life of saying that we used to just
39:59
Naturally just go outside and play in the park and it's like It happened anymore.
40:04
You know, you drive around praying.
40:06
It's like how come there's no kids playing they got dogs in there, but Now where are the kids that are supposed to be playing?
40:12
It's like his are hiding indoors somewhere.
40:14
It's like wow He ever changed, you know significant
40:18
I will say this, I've got a son that lives in Denver who's married and they just had their fourth child.
40:25
They have two boys on either end of the spectrum and then two girls in the middle.
40:30
And she runs a school, they live in Colorado, but she runs a school in San Francisco because they used to live in that area.
40:37
And it's a tree school for preschool.
40:39
So these little two and three year old kids are in the park.
40:42
outside exploring.
40:44
It's like the classes are like two hours long or two and a half hours long, right?
40:48
And they get a break and they have lunch and they do snack, whatever they're doing.
40:52
But the beauty of it is they're out there with the pine cones and the squirrels and they're feeling, and if it rains a little bit, they put on their hoods and they're getting
41:00
all that exposure.
41:02
so with their four kids in Colorado, they actually live in a house that's right across the street from a park.
41:08
And then my son, he's a
41:10
mechanical engineer, he built a pump track in his backyard.
41:14
So they ride there and then they go mountain bike and then they, you know, so they have their kids outside all the time.
41:20
they turn their front yard into regenerative farm and the kids are always out there picking the berries and doing this and that.
41:26
So, you know, my point is that even if you live in sort of the suburbs or whatever, it's a mindset.
41:31
You can actually find access to these things.
41:34
You don't have to have your kids on a tablet.
41:37
And yeah, they're on a tablet, you know, 30 minutes a day or whatever, but.
41:40
Bye-bye.
41:40
they're outside 10 times over that.
41:44
So it's kind of cool.
41:46
Yeah.
41:47
Very cool.
41:48
Another area that is probably not talked about very much that I find is pretty routine.
41:54
In fact, I'd be hard pressed to find a person who has an optimal functioning lymphatic system.
42:00
Yeah, tell us about that.
42:01
You mentioned, I saw that in your notes.
42:03
The lymphatic system that people say, well, yeah, if I get a cold, can feel something swollen in my neck or in the groin per se.
42:11
But your lymphatic system is a huge part of your immune system.
42:14
And for lack of a better term, along with your cardiovascular system, it technically is your sewer system.
42:21
It's how the body removes cellular debris, cellular waste from where the cell is, whether it's in your big toe or in your brain.
42:30
And it moves it to a
42:31
a way to be excreted from the body, you know, in general.
42:35
and we know that naturally the way we, since the lymphatic system, unlike the cardiovascular system, it doesn't have a pump.
42:42
There's nothing that's pumping the lymph around.
42:44
except the muscles in the legs or whatever, know, it's, yeah, that's right.
42:50
That's right.
42:51
of the ways you are actually moving your lymph is that's why sitting still all day, you get lymph congestion in your ankle or you see the outline of your socks at the end of the
43:02
day, because you haven't moved enough to move your lymph out.
43:06
So you know, we recommend things like dry skin brushing it before bed and we recommend castor oil packs and
43:13
You know, those types of things which historically have been using to support the lymphatic system.
43:18
And, you know, I find a lot of people, whether it's brain fog or headaches or different types of things, you often see that their lymph is congested in their head and neck area
43:29
and they literally get it in or out.
43:31
And it's only in 2013 that they so-called discovered that we have a lymphatic system in our brain.
43:39
Yeah, right.
43:41
That aspect and what I just read recently is that system was discovered when they were doing research for Alzheimer's and dementia.
43:52
And they realized with the studies that at nighttime, our brain cells actually shrink, which gives more space for the lymph to move around.
44:01
I've seen a picture of how active the lymphatic system is at nighttime, which is going back to sleep, how important sleep is.
44:07
right.
44:09
because that's when your body is removing all this cellular debris, moving it, you know, towards your colon, moving it towards your lung, moving it towards your kidney.
44:18
So that in the morning, you know, your first morning urine is strongest.
44:22
The first bowel movement ideally is earlier in the day or breath is stronger in the morning.
44:27
Cause we're removing all these waste products from the body.
44:31
So.
44:32
According a lymphatic system.
44:33
And what's interesting in medicine, it's the one specialty.
44:38
where there's no specialist.
44:40
That's right.
44:41
No, there is no lymphologist, right?
44:44
Yeah.
44:45
organ has a specialist except that one.
44:47
They say, oh
44:49
no fascist either, I don't think, right?
44:52
No, that may put them into the rheumatologist category, but I don't think rheumatologists deal too much with the fascia.
44:58
They just deal with the joints and the muscles, you know.
45:02
it's interesting point.
45:03
You know, I was at a conference with Shelley Jordan and they were talking about the glymphatic system.
45:08
And I forget who the presenter was.
45:09
was several years ago, but they were talking about the fact.
45:12
And I actually put this in my book that the glymphatic system of course works at night during slow wave sleep as you were talking about, but it seems to work best when your
45:21
right cheek is on the pillow as opposed to your left cheek.
45:25
You actually improve lymphatic flow with the right cheek on the pillow.
45:29
So I had been sleeping with the left cheek on the pillow when I heard that.
45:32
I thought, you know what, I'm going to swap it around.
45:34
it, you know, it's a little, you know how it is when you're sleeping and used to a position when you change positions, it's a little, uh, not disorienting, but it's just a
45:42
little, you know, less comfortable.
45:44
Right.
45:45
So, uh, anyway, but you kind of break through that after a night or two.
45:48
And, uh, anyway, I've been doing that ever since, uh, for that very reason.
45:54
Yeah.
45:54
myself.
45:55
Yeah, try it.
45:55
See what you think.
45:56
So you're going to put vegetables in your soup and you're going to sleep with your right cheek on the pillow.
46:00
It's good stuff.
46:01
All right.
46:04
And the other aspect that, and which I ended up writing a book about is the effect of people's thoughts and emotions.
46:12
you know, I equated to, you know, trauma may be too strong a word, but in reality, it's not too strong a word because of the adverse childhood experiences which people
46:26
And I ask a patient about that.
46:27
No, I had a great, I had a polyana, everything was great.
46:30
We had meals together, we went on vacations together.
46:33
And I said, no, those are the big T's.
46:35
Those are the big traumas.
46:36
It's the little traumas that tend to add up that you tend to just ignore, but your brain doesn't forget.
46:43
As we talked about earlier, your brain remembers everything.
46:46
That's right.
46:46
gets imprinted.
46:47
It gets imprinted into the nervous system.
46:49
And interestingly enough, when it's imprinted, then we actually are living in reaction to that.
46:54
we're making decisions.
46:55
making, we're coming into a room full of people with on a particular tilt, so to speak, because of an experience we had or whatever it is.
47:03
Right.
47:03
So, yeah, I think this is super important.
47:06
I think there's a lot of disease that comes from that itself inflicted in a way.
47:10
Although we're also victims of it as well because things happened to us, he got imprinted, but we just haven't gone in and healed it or been able to transcend it and become grateful
47:19
for it, which is really the ultimate thing from my perspective.
47:24
But ah yeah, I think that's a really important thing.
47:26
Yeah.
47:27
Yeah, and what you just said, mean, Governor Mauté, who probably is one of the better known people and has researched and written books about the effect of trauma, his own
47:36
personal trauma, he was growing up per se, know, saying up to 80 % of people's chronic health problems has a root in some form of trauma and then piled on top of that are
47:49
people's experiences and
47:51
The experience that still to this day amazes me how things get imprinted on the brain is, this is years ago when I was still living in Portland, Oregon, for whatever reason, and
48:02
Portland, Oregon is the city of roses.
48:04
So I have no idea why this person lived there because she had anaphylactic reactions to roses.
48:09
How could you live in everywhere, every household has a rose?
48:12
How can you live here?
48:14
uh
48:17
yourself up.
48:18
How can I best set myself up for failure?
48:21
So for whatever reason, I don't know why, I had an artificial rose in my office.
48:27
Okay.
48:28
And she had an anaphylactic reaction to it.
48:30
She walked in and had an anaphylactic reaction, took out a Reppi pin and I said, what the hell?
48:35
It's the rose.
48:36
I said, it's an artificial.
48:37
But it was so imprinted in her brain that her body responded.
48:43
The classic example of there's no reason for it, but yet her brain said, that's a problem.
48:49
You're going to have a problem.
48:52
What you said about imprinting on the brain is something that I think we all should look at.
48:59
not don't think they have an issue, invariably at least patients in my experience with chronic illness, it is an issue that we need to mindful of for sure.
49:09
Yeah, I think in the, you know, I forget who wrote the book, The Body Keeps the Score, but I think these traumas all live there.
49:15
They're in the fascia, they're in the nervous system, they're in the, you know, the way our posture, you know, all these things.
49:20
And it's so important if you're going to optimize your health to kind of understand, there has to be a deconstruction process where I actually go in and discover what these are and
49:29
then go back and heal these things, right?
49:31
Because if you never get to the root cause of it, you're never going to actually be able to, uh,
49:37
get beyond it.
49:38
And I think that sometimes cognitive therapy is not enough, right?
49:42
Because it happened in an experience.
49:45
And I think the best way to actually get over it, once you do the understanding, understand what happened, etc.
49:51
Forgive everybody involved, including yourself.
49:54
It sometimes is to have another experience that overwrites the software.
49:58
It's right because yeah, because when you do that, then it's like, I have a new reality.
50:03
Right?
50:03
Otherwise it's like, I'm still living in the old reality, even though I know it's not true, but I'm trying to live not in that, but in something else.
50:09
But it's when you rewrite it, you see what I'm saying?
50:12
But when you rewrite it, it's like, okay.
50:14
Well, now there's, there's just a different reality.
50:17
So that's pretty cool.
50:19
That's, mean, the last book I wrote, that's exactly what it was about.
50:23
It's rewriting that.
50:26
And so you have a new reality when you have the same trigger, whatever that trigger is, without even knowing what the trigger is half the time.
50:35
You just like this, you with the roses.
50:37
I mean, she knew the trigger, but like, why did an artificial rose trigger you to have an anaphylactic reaction?
50:44
Yeah.
50:44
in mind is a powerful thing.
50:47
Well, Dick, it's been a pleasure chatting with you.
50:49
Appreciate you coming on the show.
50:51
m Wasn't sure exactly where we were going to go, but we ended up going some interesting places.
50:56
So it's good.
50:56
I appreciate the time.
50:57
I appreciate the opportunity and, you know, listening to your experiences, I have two new things to try for myself.
51:03
The soup, right?
51:05
Like you always learn.
51:07
That's why I feel I'm on this planet to keep learning and to try and share as much as I can with other people before I leave and go wherever.
51:16
Yeah.
51:17
Yeah.
51:17
I think it gets fueled by eternal curiosity, really.
51:20
I'm just eternally curious, right?
51:21
And I think if you go into it without attachment to the current construct, but it's like, okay, I'm just eternally curious what's really out there, right?
51:29
Then I think you have a really wonderful life of growth and development and, you know, progress.
51:34
So yeah.
51:35
makes it fun, that's why I'm still doing this after 55 years.
51:39
yeah, I it.
51:40
My wife calls it my hobby.
51:43
Yeah, absolutely, 100%.
51:50
My pleasure, thanks for the time.