Optimize With Brian Johnson | More Wisdom In Less Time

Robert Lustig is a Professor of Pediatrics in the Division of Endocrinology and a member of the Institute for Health Policy Studies at University of California, San Francisco. He has authored 120 peer-reviewed articles and 70 reviews and is a leading voice on childhood obesity. And, his YouTube video “Sugar: The Bitter Truth” has been viewed over 7 million times. Obesity is a global pandemic. It’s astonishing how rapidly it’s expanding. And it’s COMPLETELY preventable. Lustig has dedicated his career to helping us understand the causes and how to “beat the odds against sugar, processed food, obesity and disease.” Big Ideas we explore include: Meeting the Darth Vader of the Food Empire (“Hi, sugar!”), two hormones driving the show (insulin + leptin), which fat you need to worry about most (big belly vs. big butt fat!), why so many diets work (reduced sugar + fiber), exercise (best ROI in medicine) and voting with ever dollar we *don’t* spend.

With all this talk about sports heroes and scoring touchdowns and winning forever, I think it’s time to remind ourselves that sports simply provide the perfect (over-simplified) context for SPIRITUAL truths.    That’s why we love watching the Olympics, Super Bowls and World Cups so much. When we watch an athlete performing at their absolute (optimus!) best we’re simply reminded of our own heroic potential.   Of course, we want to make sure we get off the couch and get into the arena of life and use their demonstration of greatness as an inspiration for our own pursuit of excellence (rather than as mere entertainment by people who are somehow gifted in ways in which we aren’t).   (Remember: According to Anders Ericsson, the preeminent researcher on what makes great people great: We ALL have “The Gift.”)   So…   Bringing it back the spiritual arena, Today we’re going to talk about Rumi.   As you may know, Rumi was one of the greatest spiritual beings in history and his beautiful poetry is beloved

Elizabeth Blackburn won the Nobel Prize for her discovery of telemorase - “the enzyme that replenishes telomeres, which protect our genetic heritage.” Elissa Epel is one of the world’s leading health psychology researcher. Together, they have created a great book that walks us through the best of what we know about telomeres, why they’re so important and what we can do to Optimize them. If you’ve ever wanted to learn more about telomeres, THIS is the book to read. Big Ideas we explore include why telomeres are the secret sauce to aging well, the fact that your cells are listening to your thoughts (#1 tip? Shift from a threat response to a challenge response!), how to mind your telomeres (move from negative thinking to resilient thinking), how to eat, move, sleep your way to happy telomeres, and a challenging question: What will YOUR cellular legacy be?

A couple +1s ago, we talked about Optimizer Jessica’s kind words and then had fun talking about Mr. Anonymous Troll Guy as well.   Today I want to talk about a line from Jessica’s little note that I didn’t share before.    In addition to her kind words about my commitment to sharing my own struggles and how that has helped her build resilience, she said this: “Furthermore, the partnership he and Alexandra have built is exemplary — I only wish they weren’t so hard to emulate!”   Now, again, I’m super touched by that and honored that we serve as potential relationship exemplars and I know Jessica wasn’t saying that she thought we were perfect…   AND…   (Laughing as I type this…)   As Maslow said and we discuss ALL THE TIME (but still nowhere near enough!), THERE ARE NO PERFECT HUMANS. And, by extension, THERE ARE NO PERFECT RELATIONSHIPS.   And, as I always like to say: You and I won’t be the first perfect people. Nor will we have the first perfect relationship. (At least Alexandra and I certainly wo

James Clear has a super-popular website (jamesclear.com). Millions of people visit it every month and hundreds of thousands subscribe to his email newsletter. After reading this book, I can see why. He’s a great writer and distills the essence of habit formation into, well, its fundamental components—the “atomic” structure if you will—while showing us how those TINY little incremental improvements add up to MIGHTY results. I rarely say a book is a must-read but this one’s as close as it gets. Big Ideas we explore include: The math behind 1% gains compounding over a year (and a decade!), navigating the Plateau of Latent Potential (ever given up on a habit? Take note!), the importance (and etymology) of our Identity (get this: it *literally* means 'repeated being ness'), The 4 Laws of Behavior Change (remember: cue + craving + response + reward and... make it obvious, make it attractive, make it easy, make it satisfying), and the Sorites Paradox (can a single habit change your life?).

James Clear has a super-popular website (jamesclear.com). Millions of people visit it every month and hundreds of thousands subscribe to his email newsletter. After reading this book, I can see why. He’s a great writer and distills the essence of habit formation into, well, its fundamental components—the “atomic” structure if you will—while showing us how those TINY little incremental improvements add up to MIGHTY results. I rarely say a book is a must-read but this one’s as close as it gets. Big Ideas we explore include: The math behind 1% gains compounding over a year (and a decade!), navigating the Plateau of Latent Potential (ever given up on a habit? Take note!), the importance (and etymology) of our Identity (get this: it *literally* means 'repeated being ness'), The 4 Laws of Behavior Change (remember: cue + craving + response + reward and... make it obvious, make it attractive, make it easy, make it satisfying), and the Sorites Paradox (can a single habit change your life?).

In our last +1, we met one of my heroes, Mrs. Kristie Kuehnast. I smile with joy (and in awe) every time I imagine her fifth-grade students coming back into the classroom after their mile run to sit down and watch a new +1 or PNTV.    High fives, Kristie. We appreciate you. (Oh! Please walk through a cloning machine about 50 million times. Thank you.)   We also briefly touched on Yuval Noah Harari’s perspective on the subject of Education. Today I want to revisit some more wisdom from his new book.   As we discussed, Yuval shines a spotlight on 21 of the biggest challenges facing humanity in the 21st century. With the rise of artificial intelligence, information technology and biotechnology, things are changing at an incomprehensible speed. And, it’s only going to speed up, not slow down.   He tells us: “The danger is that if we invest too much in developing AI and too little in developing human consciousness, the very sophisticated artificial intelligence of computers might only serve to empower

Weight. It matters. A lot. Although I’m obviously not a weight-loss guy, as I prepped for Energy 101 I realized that we needed to talk about Optimizing our weight. Enter, this class—which could more accurately be called Optimal METABOLISM 101. Fact is, if our weight is off, our METABOLISM is off. Specifically, our insulin levels (which disrupts another hormone called leptin that regulates our appetite). In this class, we take a quick look at why it’s so hard to Optimize our weight and how to make it easy (or at least a lot easier!). 

A few +1s ago, we talked about Walter Russell and the sound of joy.    Today I’d like to talk about another one of his powerful insights.   Here it is.    He tells us: “Mediocrity is self-inflicted. Genius is self-bestowed.”   Here’s the slightly longer version: “I believe that every man has consummate genius within him. Some appear to have it more than others only because they are aware of it more than others are, and the awareness or unawareness of it is what makes each one of them into masters or holds them down to mediocrity. I believe that mediocrity is self-inflicted and that genius is self-bestowed.”   Today’s +1 is very simple.   Are you bestowing genius upon yourself or inflicting mediocrity?   Well, which is it?   Genius. Mediocrity.   I agree with Walter (and countless other teachers). We ALL have “consummate” (Golden Buddha!) genius within ourselves.    Can you see it?

Jeff Volek and Stephen Phinney are both academic researchers and professors who have been studying sports nutrition, ketogenic diets and peak performance for decades. To put it in perspective, Dr. Stephen Phinney (with his MD from Stanford and PhD from MIT) coined the phrase “keto-adapted” in 1980. Big Ideas we explore include: the accepted dogma (vs. compelling data), two fuel tanks (you want to go hours or days?), veto-adaptation (how to), protein (necessary but in moderation), fat (your most important fuel; the good and bad!), and the macro breakdown (here it is!).

In our last couple +1s, we talked about the lead-up to a recent keynote talk I gave and some wisdom gleaned in the process—including practicing the “Bring it on!” and “I’m excited!” tools THE MOMENT I experienced doubt/fear/etc. and… Hanging towels over mirrors to reduce the ol' self-consciousness.   Today I want to talk about being a ballet dancer. (Hah.)   Well, actually, I want to talk about some of my favorite feedback from the event. I had some great conversations with the people at the event but one nice little comment really stuck.   Short story: While I was holding Eleanor while Alexandra and Emerson were enjoying a quick little hot tub session at the hotel on Friday night, a woman who attended the event strolled by. We had a nice little Love 2.0 moment.    She told me that she was trained in Russian ballet and that one of the first things she noticed when I started talking was my posture.    She said that in her ballet training, she was taught to simultaneously go up AND go down. And

Tim Grover was Michael Jordan’s trainer and, basically, his mental toughness coach. Kobe Bryant’s as well. And Dwayne Wade’s. And... Well, a ton of other elite athletes. He’s one of the world’s top mental toughness coaches and this book is, as per the sub-title, a manual on how to go “From Good to Great to Unstoppable.” Big Ideas we explore include: relentless commitment (vs. "Meh, good enough"), Do. The. Work (eat frogs and dominate), Pressure (pressure, pressure! BRING IT ON!), the source of true confidence, greatness math (remember: effort counts twice; just ask Michael Jordan and Jerry Rice), and turning your dreams into reality (ready?).

We’ve been talking a fair amount about the idea that some of history’s greatest creators didn’t work all that much. To be clear, they worked hard and (very importantly!) CONSISTENTLY, but the fact is that it’s really hard to put in any more than 4 to 6 hours of really high-quality work.   Of course, we all have our own idiosyncratic professional responsibilities. And, in addition to Deep Work, we all have (and, for the record, all of history’s greatest creators had!) some Team Work and some Monkey Work to do. (Even hermits like me can’t get all that to zero—as hard as I may try! lol)   But I get the fact that, for a lot of people, the idea that we can structure our lives such that we’re basically hammering out four hours of deep work and then calling it a day feels a bit impossible.    Fair enough.    Maybe we can’t currently (or ever!) wave our wands and instantly manifest our ideal Masterpiece Days.    But…   a) Have you actually stepped back and REALLY thought about how you COULD str

In our last +1, we talked about the fact that we need to train our recovery the same way we train our Deep Work. We want to create nice, rhythmic waves in our lives and prioritize rest. One great way to do that? Deep Play.   I briefly mentioned the fact that, as Alex Pang tells us in his great book Rest, when we look closely at the routines of some of history’s greatest, most creative and most prolific creators what we find is that they don’t actually work that much.   Here’s how he puts it: “Figures as different as Charles Dickens, Henri Poincaré, and Ingmar Bergman, working in disparate fields in different times, all shared a passion for their work, a terrific ambition to succeed, and an almost superhuman capacity to focus. Yet when you look closely at their daily lives, they only spent a few hours a day doing what we would recognize as their most important work. The rest of the time, they were hiking mountains, taking naps, going on walks with friends, or just sitting and thinking. Their creativit

Jordan Peterson is one of the world's leading intellectuals. He's a Canadian clinical psychologist and professor at the University of Toronto. (Before that, he taught at Harvard.) He’s published over 100 scientific articles and he’s super-popular on YouTube. This book is wonderfully intense and equally thoughtful. Peterson’s integration of everything from evolutionary psychology, politics, religion and morality is astounding. After taking a super-quick look at all 12 Rules, Big Ideas we cover include the importance of mastering the flow or Order + Chaos (and why RULES are so important), Rule #1 (stand up straight, shoulders back! Remember lobsters...), Rule #2 (Treat yourself better! Remember pets...), Rule #6: Clean up your life (remember to start stopping...), and the fact that your Being is in your Becoming (which is connected to Rule #4...).