Enhance Your Physical & Mental Resilience (HRV, Respiratory Rate, RHR)

Interactive Transcript

spk_0 The science and practice of enhancing human performance for sport, play, and life.

spk_0 Welcome to Perform.

spk_0 I'm Dr. Andy Gumpen.

spk_0 I'm a professor and scientist and the executive director of the Human Performance Center

spk_0 at Parker University.

spk_0 And today we're going to be talking about how to control your nervous system.

spk_0 My favorite example of this actually comes from a TV show.

spk_0 Many of you probably remember this show, the office, at least the American version.

spk_0 And I'll never forget one of the classic scenes, one of the characters to white

spk_0 truth.

spk_0 I was telling and bragging actually about how he had superior genes and he was able to

spk_0 at his own will raise his blood cholesterol levels.

spk_0 And of course, the bewildered friends of his, and asked him, why would you even want to

spk_0 do that?

spk_0 And his response in classic Dwight fashion was so that he could lower his cholesterol.

spk_0 That had made me laugh and I've never stopped laughing at that.

spk_0 And I highlights one example, albeit admittedly, not sure why you would want to do that,

spk_0 or if that's real or not.

spk_0 But it highlights the point of how can we actually have control over aspects of our physiology

spk_0 that most people think we can't?

spk_0 Maybe we have some control, but it's subconscious or otherwise.

spk_0 And that's what I'm referring to when I say control your nervous system.

spk_0 There is actually a bunch of science behind this, probably the most famous initial scientific

spk_0 document experiment came in 1970.

spk_0 There was a famous gentleman, I think his name is Swami Rama.

spk_0 I hope I pronounce that appropriately.

spk_0 But Swami was able to do a host of feats that still baffle most of us.

spk_0 What eventually happened was he sat in a room with a handful of scientists and they placed

spk_0 what are called ECGs to measure electoral conductivity of his heart, as well as EEGs to

spk_0 measure directly into his brain.

spk_0 And he performed again this whole host of insane physiological feats without moving.

spk_0 Not parts critical.

spk_0 Right? So when he did things like take his resting heart rate from 70 beats per minute

spk_0 to reportedly 300 beats per minute and he held that for several seconds and then brought it back

spk_0 down, he did that not by running sprints up a hill or anything, but by just simply sitting

spk_0 there and having the conscious ability to control that aspect of his physiology.

spk_0 Another really impressive thing Swami was able to do was actually shock the scientific team.

spk_0 They thought he was in cardiac arrest because his ECGs stopped working and what happened was he

spk_0 was able to bring his heart rate below 20 beats per minute at the same time, give himself

spk_0 what's called aphib.

spk_0 And so the machine itself thought his heart had been stopped for like 20 seconds.

spk_0 I guess he's signaled that I'm fine, I'm okay here and then eventually brought it back up.

spk_0 Arguably more impressive was some of the stuff he was able to do with his physical temperature.

spk_0 So they had him on the same hand change the temperature by I think like six degrees Celsius

spk_0 in his same hand again only inches away.

spk_0 And so clearly demonstrating some not only control of his whole body temperature,

spk_0 but extreme precision of where that temperature was going and where it was not.

spk_0 But nonetheless that was documented and published.

spk_0 And again to this day is probably one of the more famous cases of such incredible control of

spk_0 ones what's supposed to be autonomic physiology. A decade later and I'm going to highlight this one

spk_0 as well. I think it was 1982 actually. A similar thing was done in a more extensive group.

spk_0 And so what actually happened here was a paper was published in nature. Now that's one of the

spk_0 most blue ribbon highest esteem journals in all of science and physiology. And so preaminent journal

spk_0 it was published and they looked at a bunch of Tibetan monks that lived in the Himalayas studying

spk_0 and utilizing a practice that's called tumo, TUMMO. And they were able to do a bunch of similar

spk_0 things that that Rami was able to do. I won't draw them out, but temperature controls raising

spk_0 their body temperatures by like eight degrees consciously without moving. In fact, one of the things

spk_0 that they did was them they put wet sheets on top of them and put them in very cold if not sub-zero

spk_0 conditions. And these individuals were able to not only stay neutral with temperature,

spk_0 stay neutral with a heart rate, but they were also able to physically dry the sheets within like

spk_0 30 to 60 minutes. And so you can go on and on. You can probably find many other case studies like this

spk_0 and again thousands of anecdotes and other stories throughout history. But I think one thing that I'm

spk_0 trying to highlight here that is inarguable. There is clearly the ability to run control over your

spk_0 physiology if you really take the time and attention. Is it tumo? Is it visualization? Well, probably

spk_0 realistically we've got tons of different options. And so what I'd like to do today is talk about

spk_0 just a few of them. What do we know? What does it mean to control your nervous system? What can we do?

spk_0 What can't we do? And then what are a bunch of tactics and strategies so that you can have a more

spk_0 resilient nervous system? To start us off, I want to make sure we're on the same page when I say

spk_0 nervous system. The easiest way to conceptualize it is think about on two large branches. The first

spk_0 is what's called the central nervous system. This is your brain and brain stem and spinal cord.

spk_0 And the second is what's called your peripheral nervous system. So this is everything else that

spk_0 goes out and comes back to the central nervous system. Now focusing on the peripheral nervous system,

spk_0 that's where most of the action happens. In this case, the peripheral nervous system is broken

spk_0 up into a couple of other categories. One being what's called the somatic system. This is what you

spk_0 can actively control. We're not going to talk about that much today. It's stuff you already know you

spk_0 have control over. What I want to focus more on is the other branch. And that's what's called the

spk_0 autonomic nervous system, the ANS. And so within the autonomic nervous system, we're talking about

spk_0 things like the parasympathetic system. You may have heard of that as rest and digest.

spk_0 There are probably better ways we can describe it and the more interesting applications of it.

spk_0 But nonetheless, we'll just keep it simple right now and say that the parasympathetic

spk_0 is rest and digest. You also have this sympathetic that is your fight and flight. And so most of us

spk_0 stop right there. We think, okay, parasympathetic. I'm relaxed. I'm lethargic. I'm down. I'm chill.

spk_0 I'm zen sympathetic. I'm fight. I'm flight. I'm up. I'm focused. I'm aroused and so on and so forth.

spk_0 Reality of it is there's probably more things like the freeze mechanism. There's also the

spk_0 enteric system that happens here. This is kind of like most specifically referring to your gut.

spk_0 But for the most part, again, for the sake of time, we're going to focus on the interbulent

spk_0 between the parasympathetic and sympathetic nervous system because that

spk_0 provides us the ability to have a lot of control over what our nervous system is doing. And as I'll

spk_0 show here very soon, that has a significant impact on how you're looking, feeling and performing

spk_0 in the short and long term. And I'm highlighting that because again, people don't necessarily

spk_0 realize how much control they actually have over those systems. They are autonomic, but you have

spk_0 the ability to move them up and down. You can recalibrate them and you can consciously

spk_0 critically control them as I've given many examples of already. If we were to zoom all the way out

spk_0 focusing on that autonomic nervous system, the ultimate goal is to not have too much time and

spk_0 attention spent on this thing. If it is firing and functioning appropriately, it's running in

spk_0 the background. It is the software that's running your computer. You don't need to be worrying about

spk_0 it. It's making your life easier and better, but you shouldn't spend a lot of conscious control over

spk_0 it. That said, sometimes it gets a little bit out of whack and you want to have the ability to

spk_0 toggle it and recalibrate it so that you can bring it up or back down based on a particular thing

spk_0 you're trying to do. And so all we're talking about really in today's episode is what happens when

spk_0 it gets again out of whack or it's not as finely tuned to a particular thing that you'd like and

spk_0 what can you do about it. That is ultimately today's version of controlling your nervous system.

spk_0 Now to be really clear, because we could go in a lot of different areas here, I'm also going to

spk_0 qualify this talk even further. We're not going to be talking about stress management and motions

spk_0 or even really mental health. I fact, I would encourage you to go listen to a recent episode of

spk_0 the human lab podcast, one of the ones that's in the essentials catalog where they break down a

spk_0 bunch of different tools and tactics on overall stress management and neurological control.

spk_0 I'm not going to cover any of those things today. We're going in an entirely separate route.

spk_0 I'm also not only talking about down regulation. I know personally for many years,

spk_0 I had this connotation whenever I thought about parasympathetic or recovery or relaxing,

spk_0 I just always, or breath work for that matter. I just always thought it's all about down, down,

spk_0 down, down. It's not. In fact, I'm not only going to focus exclusively on breath work today,

spk_0 either. We're going to go well past those things. What I really want to get at is again fine

spk_0 tune control, the ability to go down, but also go back up and making sure that system is

spk_0 functioning how you'd like it to function. What we will talk about are of course the three

spk_0 eyes. If you're new to the show, what that means is how to investigate it, how to measure your

spk_0 nervous system, what that even means, what you should look for. The second eye is interpret.

spk_0 So how do you make sense of how do you judge or evaluate that information that you got from that

spk_0 previous test? And then the third one, which is intervene. What do you do about it? What are protocols,

spk_0 what are tools and technologies, what are things you can do at home, what are things that can be done

spk_0 at a higher level that will make those positive impacts, no matter which direction you're going.

spk_0 So that overall is our game plan today. Talk about how we can control a nervous system in all those

spk_0 forms and fashion. Today's episode is sponsored by AG1. AG1 is a vitamin mineral drink with probiotics,

spk_0 prebiotics and adaptogens. Initially, I was extremely skeptical of AG1 as I am with all supplement

spk_0 companies, but after months of discussions with their lead nutrition scientist and the general

spk_0 team at AG1, I've been impressed by AG1's commitment to sourcing the highest quality ingredients

spk_0 and constantly updating their formulas to have the right ingredients in the optimal amounts.

spk_0 By now, it is abundantly clear that the gut microbiome plays a critical role in everything from

spk_0 body composition to bone health to mental health and the probiotics and prebiotics in AG1

spk_0 helped to promote a healthy gut microbiome, improved digestion, reduced food cravings, and increased

spk_0 short-chain fatty acids, which play a critical role in regulating metabolism and immune responses.

spk_0 It's for these reasons and many others that I personally take AG1 almost every day. Now,

spk_0 it's of course not a replacement for eating whole healthy foods, but it is a great way to make

spk_0 sure that you're plugging in any gaps in your nutrition to improve your energy, bolster your

spk_0 immune system, and just generally help promote a healthy gut microbiome and more. If you'd like to

spk_0 try AG1, you can go to drinkag1.com slash perform to receive five free travel packs plus a year

spk_0 supply of vitamin D3 plus K2. Again, that's drinkag1.com slash perform to receive five free travel packs

spk_0 plus a year supply of vitamin D3 plus K2. Today's episode is also sponsored by David. David makes

spk_0 protein bars unlike any I have ever encountered. They have an amazing 28 grams of protein, only 150

spk_0 calories and zero grams of sugar. That's right, 28 grams of protein and 75% of its calories come from

spk_0 that protein. This is 50% higher than the next closest protein bar. Honestly, it's the best

spk_0 tasting protein bar I've had by a mile. While I often talk about the importance of getting one

spk_0 gram of protein per pound of body weight for things like muscle health and recovery and the

spk_0 promotion of lean body mass and satiety, the reality is that for most people getting that one

spk_0 gram of protein per pound of body weight is really challenging. However, David makes that easy.

spk_0 Their bars taste incredible and are each packed with 28 grams of protein. I eat one almost every

spk_0 day and always have two or three in my backpack when I'm traveling, like literally always. It probably

spk_0 sounds funny, but I eat them as dessert all the time. When you try them, you'll know exactly what I

spk_0 mean. The macronutrients one more time are 28 grams of protein, 150 calories and zero grams of sugar.

spk_0 And if you're interested in trying these bars for yourself, you can go to Davidprotein.com slash

spk_0 perform. Again, that's Davidprotein.com slash perform. So to start us off, let's remember the

spk_0 ultimate goal. We would like number one, that system to be operating independent of us. We want

spk_0 it to be that software that's running. And then too, we want to have some active control over it

spk_0 when we'd like. But we don't want to be spending our entire day mitigating and managing what's

spk_0 going on in our number nervous system. So that goal is important because it lays the foundation of

spk_0 what we're trying to do. And so really, you can bucket control of the system in two main areas.

spk_0 Number one is what we simply call read. All right, you need to be able to read your current state.

spk_0 You can use this with technology. So you can buy something or use something that tells you what's

spk_0 happening in your own internal physiology. Or you can learn what's called an interoception or

spk_0 interoception, which means you can feel it yourself. Now, some people are really good at that. Some

spk_0 people are completely terrible at it. But either way, we've got to figure out what you where you

spk_0 currently are. The second then step is to regulate. So nowhere, I'm at number one, number two,

spk_0 move it. And when I say regulate, I'm going to break today's discussion up into two parts,

spk_0 what I call acute things that move it right now. So you're feeling fostered right now. What can

spk_0 you do about it in this second? Are you feeling tired right now? You're losing focus right now.

spk_0 What are tips and tricks we can do that'll instantly change my state. And then the chronic ones are

spk_0 ones I refer to of what are going to move the baseline permanently? Where we get confusion or

spk_0 oftentimes people that have tried things like this, where they maybe didn't disappoint in the past,

spk_0 is they're using things that are acute stimuli and hoping it makes a chronic or permanent change.

spk_0 I'm really hopeful by the end of today's talk that you'll understand the difference and you can

spk_0 use the ones in the right form and fashion appropriately. But that's what we're after. In either case,

spk_0 what we're really trying to do is make sure that we're widening the range of our sympathetic and

spk_0 parasympathetic experience rather than sensitizing it. What do I mean by that? It's not about just

spk_0 reducing stress. It's not about just down regulating. It's the opposite. In fact, maybe not the

spk_0 opposite, but it is complimentary. The analogy I like to give here is imagine driving down a road.

spk_0 And you're going down a one lane highway. It's very likely for you to hit the guard rails on one

spk_0 side of the road when another car comes by because it's just not a lot of room to work. But if you

spk_0 expanded that highway from a one lane road to a seven lane lane road, you're far less likely to

spk_0 hit the guard rails. That's what I mean. When we become overly sensitized to the down regulation

spk_0 or the up regulation, we're driving on a one lane highway. We want to not only become

spk_0 better drivers. I want you to have more control so you're not weaving as much. That alone will help

spk_0 you reduce your likelihood of hit the wall. But mostly what we're after is widening out that lane,

spk_0 giving you seven lanes so that when you do lose a little bit of control, you can feel it, see it,

spk_0 but you're not smashing up against walls. When I teach this, I like to use that highway analogy.

spk_0 That said, if you were to look at the research or talk to clinicians that work in this space,

spk_0 you're generally going to see it describe more as resilience. And what that means is you have the

spk_0 ability to experience high and low levels of changes in your autonomic nervous system without

spk_0 having a dramatic impact on your lived experience. Whether this is your psychology,

spk_0 your happiness, your anxiety, your depression, your perceived stress load, or your actual physiology,

spk_0 your hormone health, your energy, your metabolism, your sleep, your recovery, your physical

spk_0 performance. We want you to all to be able to live a life that is your best, meaning you can

spk_0 handle things that challenge and change your body from a psychological perspective or a physiological

spk_0 perspective. And those things don't have dramatic consequences for you in this short or long

spk_0 term. So I feel comfortable in saying that most of us are better off with the more resilient

spk_0 rather than sensitive nervous system. What does that technically and practically look like?

spk_0 I will give you some tangible examples a little bit later. But one thing you want to think about

spk_0 here is if you are somebody who feels like you are on constant sympathetic drive, you work out

spk_0 really hard, high intensity, you have a high stress personal life, a high stress place that you live,

spk_0 personal experiences, jobs, so on and so forth, then you might need to just focus on down

spk_0 regulation. That's fine. We have hundreds of randomized controlled trials on people only doing

spk_0 down regulation work and it creating tons of positive experiences in their life. We've done this

spk_0 a bunch and my coaching programs. I've done this with my clients and athletes. No question that

spk_0 works there. But that's a little bit different and not always the best scenario when somebody is

spk_0 having issues on both sides up regulation and down regulation. Because what can happen is if

spk_0 you're only ever paying attention to that down regulation size, that highway starts to get smaller.

spk_0 What you probably want to do and if you actually look at the research in this space more carefully,

spk_0 a lot of the interventions strategically implement both up regulation and down regulation.

spk_0 Even if somebody is highly stressed, has a lot of anxiety or has other markers of overall

spk_0 dysfunction or problems in the nervous system, you're going to see careful integration of both

spk_0 up regulation and down regulation. That's because it works like a Hormetic Stressor.

spk_0 I've talked about this for many many many years as one of my favorite things to talk about.

spk_0 But effectively what you're doing is you want yourself to down regulate. We'll just telling

spk_0 yourself to calm down doesn't always work very well. Sometimes the easiest way to calm down is to

spk_0 actually give yourself a super charge up so that your body naturally swings back down as an equal

spk_0 and opposite reaction and the other way. So that is the framework with what we're going to talk about.

spk_0 Let's get right into how we measure our nervous system, what tools we can use and then we'll go into

spk_0 evaluation and interpretations from there. With that all in mind, let's dive into our first eye,

spk_0 which is investigate. How do you measure this stuff? Well, there's no one answer here. I think it's

spk_0 easiest to describe this in three major categories. First one are what I call performance-based tests.

spk_0 So in the sporting world, you'll see groups do this where they'll take a vertical jump test every day.

spk_0 So you'll come in and every single day, you'll do say three or four maximum effort vertical jumps.

spk_0 And they look at the change, the assumption there being if your vertical jump is much lower today

spk_0 than it normally is, then there's a strong likelihood your nervous system is a little bit fatigued.

spk_0 That is a very common and classic approach in the sport performance world. Others do it with

spk_0 things like grip strength. Again, simple test easy to do. Are there a reaction time drills?

spk_0 There's a ton of different apps and low or fairly inexpensive technologies to look at

spk_0 firing rates, fingering tap tests. How quickly can you move your thumb? Lots and lots of different

spk_0 technologies here. Others I've seen and we've actually explored this a lot have looked at things

spk_0 like range of motion and flexibility. And I've actually personally seen this one land pretty well.

spk_0 So a basic sit and reach test of your hamstrings and low back, a rotational test, a forearm or

spk_0 flexion extension test. I've seen all these in the field a ton and I'll be totally honest with you.

spk_0 They're pretty good. We spent many years probably over four years

spk_0 testing some of these things every single day. We stuck them directly up against other more scientific

spk_0 about 80 measures. And they all came in pretty much the same. And so these are absolutely fine

spk_0 ways to measure it. It's obviously mostly used in the sport performance world. And so they are

spk_0 hedging towards the performance aspect. If you're not jumping as high or moving as well,

spk_0 that's what they're concerned about. A totally different approach to this is more of a psychological

spk_0 assessment. Again, you'll see research and I've seen now huge databases. You're talking about

spk_0 millions of data points stacked directly up against something like mood. How you feel today?

spk_0 And you'll be stunned, stunned on aggregate and large populations.

spk_0 Moot is a very strong predictor of overall nervous system state. How tired are you? So fatigue is

spk_0 another question. When we see often it's called RPE, so rate of perceived exertion.

spk_0 Just different ways to ask about how do you feel today? What's your effort feel like today?

spk_0 How interested in training are you today? Tons of different questions there. That's hedged more

spk_0 towards your subjective experience where the previous ones are obviously looking at objective

spk_0 performance, but there is classic overlap between both of them. The third one, though, that is

spk_0 more objective and where the bulk of the published research is, which doesn't mean they're better,

spk_0 by the way, it just means they're more used more scientifically are in what I call the physiological

spk_0 markers. Common ones here are blood tests. I've spoke in season one. We had an entire episode on

spk_0 overtraining and overreaching. We also had one on how to interpret blood tests for high

spk_0 performance. In both of those, I talked about a number of different blood and salivary markers

spk_0 you can use to assess overall fatigue and readiness and performance. We'll have direct links to those

spk_0 episodes in the show notes. You can go check them out and see what I'm talking about. But we're not

spk_0 going to get into that stuff today because we've covered a lot of it already. What we will get into

spk_0 for the most part are what I call the respiratory physiology markers. This is everything from

spk_0 resting heart rate to something called your heart rate variability or HRV to respiratory rate and

spk_0 CO2 tolerance. HRV, heart rate variability is the king here. Not saying it's the best, but it has

spk_0 the the overwhelming majority of the research is on HRV. You don't see a lot anymore on resting

spk_0 heart rate. And that's because it's not very sensitive. We used to look at it a little bit more.

spk_0 We kind of walked away from it. If you get really shot for a long time, you're over trained or

spk_0 highly chronically stressed or have a chronic disease, you will start to see increases in resting

spk_0 heart rate that are not being explained by a lack of physical fitness or cardiovascular fitness.

spk_0 So you can see changes in heart rate as a result of this autonomic nervous system

spk_0 being pushed into a direction. In this case, more sympathetic than you'd like. But it takes a long

spk_0 time. You're not going to see the resting heart rate move for several weeks before you would

spk_0 really notice. And then the amount of movement is small. So it's hard to understand kind of signal

spk_0 to noise ratio there. So honestly, kind of cross off resting heart rate. Not a great marker.

spk_0 I don't know too many people that use it by itself or certainly use it as their first line of

spk_0 measurement. Now, heart rate variability is much more documented. Respiratory rate is growing.

spk_0 That's something we're learning much more about. And CO2 tolerance is something that I have

spk_0 used a lot. But there's not a ton of research behind that either. I will share with you my personal

spk_0 experiences with all these things. But I want to spend most of our attention today on HRV

spk_0 because we have so much more information to go off of. So let's dive into HRV. What is it?

spk_0 Why do you care? And how do we manipulate it? Heart rate variability is exactly what it sounds like.

spk_0 It is the variation in your heart rate. Let me use an example. Let's say your resting heart rate is

spk_0 60 beats per minute. You would then assume that since there's 60 seconds in one minute,

spk_0 that your heart is then beating in this example every second on the second. And then if you

spk_0 spend your heart rate up to 670 or 80 or 90 or 100 beats per minute, you would simply shorten the

spk_0 time between each heartbeat. But at the time between each heartbeat would be the same. It'd be one

spk_0 second or half a second or three quarters of a second in whatever the case is. Well, in that

spk_0 particular case, there's no variation in your heart rate. That's not actually what happens.

spk_0 If your heart rate is 60 beats per minute, what's going to happen naturally is maybe it beats

spk_0 at 1.1 second. And then the next beat comes at 1.2 seconds later. And then the next beat after that

spk_0 comes 0.9 seconds later. And then it comes at 0.8 and then it goes to 1.3. And so there's variations.

spk_0 At the end of the 60 seconds, you'll still have done 60 beats. But it won't be a metronome. It

spk_0 doesn't happen every second on the second. How variable that is is the marker we're talking about.

spk_0 It's a little bit counterintuitive, but the more variation, the more parasympathetic you are.

spk_0 So the more variation your heart rate, the more down regulated. If it becomes like a metronome,

spk_0 every second on the second, it's dialed in. That means you're in sympathetic drive. Now, as I said,

spk_0 parasympathetic and sympathetic aren't on off switches. They toggle back and forth. So HRV is

spk_0 telling us where at on that entire spectrum we are. Generally, on average here, we want to spend

spk_0 more time in parasympathetic, meaning a higher HRV and less time in sympathetic. Most people

spk_0 struggle with spending too much time in sympathetic and therefore have a low HRV. Now, you can have

spk_0 the opposite problem. And we have seen that. I've coached people through that with their HRVs

spk_0 extraordinarily high and then lethargic with no energy, no motivation and so on and so forth.

spk_0 But that's way more rare. Generally, I would probably say 95 times out of 100, it's the opposite.

spk_0 We're getting people out of so much time in sympathetic drive and more in parasympathetic.

spk_0 A million explanations for this, but just as a practical example, you can imagine going from a

spk_0 high stress job, sitting in traffic, even if it's not a high stress job, but it's a job. You're

spk_0 around people, you're performing, you're in traffic, you're listening to podcasts, you're coming home,

spk_0 you're watching TV and it's just sensory input all the time that requires your attention and reaction

spk_0 if you're managing children, if you're managing other stuff. And there's just not enough quiet time

spk_0 that used to be around us. Plenty of other reasons to explain it, but that's a good way to kind of

spk_0 understand the idea here of why most people are probably in sympathetic drive. If you want to say

spk_0 that that means we're in a more stressed life than we used to be, I don't know, I'll leave that up to you.

spk_0 But just from a practical perspective, we have way more arousal coming in, way more frequently

spk_0 than we probably had for most of our experience as a human species. So that's what HRV is. It's

spk_0 that variation and that's what it tells us. It is a snapshot into the autonomic nervous system,

spk_0 specifically parasympathetic and some of that drive. It is only one metric. It is not perfect.

spk_0 There's not a single metric I will show you today that is perfect, but it does have a lot of research

spk_0 behind it. So that's roughly what HRV is. It is at our best guess, 50% genetic and 50% lifestyle.

spk_0 Admittedly, I am not thoroughly impressed with that research. I think that number is going to

spk_0 change over time. But it is inarguable that some point of it is not within your control and

spk_0 some part of it is. Why that matters? When we get to the interpretation stuff later,

spk_0 it's not VO2max. I can't just look at your HRV and tell you you're good or bad. You have to

spk_0 consider the fact that a large part of it is not within your control.

spk_0 Toft and interpret the numbers themselves aren't as specific as they are for other variables,

spk_0 again, like VO2max. There's also a age-related decline that happens in your HRV. So it gets

spk_0 lower as you age. That said, a recent paper just came out, I think, actually last year.

spk_0 And it argued pretty strongly that at the age-related decline in HRV is not inevitable.

spk_0 And if you maintain function and fitness through life, that HRV should not drop as much

spk_0 if any. But certainly not as much as you think. And so those are things that we are learning more

spk_0 about, but that paper just came out first time I've seen anybody even examine it. So we're

spk_0 now HRV is generally associated with better health. And you could look at this in a variety of

spk_0 different ways. But from a physical cardiovascular, cardiovascular, pulmonary fitness perspective,

spk_0 it's generally pretty tight. It's not perfect. Just because VO2max goes up doesn't mean HRV

spk_0 will go up and the opposite as well. So they are related, but they're definitely not a one-to-one

spk_0 correlation. And it's, I'd say, a moderate correlation. So much so, we basically factor them in

spk_0 independently. I've seen plenty of people with smashing the high VO2s. And that will tell you

spk_0 almost nothing about their HRV and the opposite. Okay. Now, the research will show, and I have seen

spk_0 this personally in my experience, we've coached a lot of men and a lot of women. Women just tend to be

spk_0 a little bit lower with their VO2max. Doesn't mean it's worse, but it is just a little bit lower

spk_0 of a score, meaning more sympathetic drive, right? Not worse. Now, that may not actually not mean that,

spk_0 but that's the conversation for another day. But nonetheless, a little bit of calibration on what

spk_0 this thing actually is. We now know HRV influences, and I won't say directly and only causes,

spk_0 something like attention and focus has dozens, if not hundreds of things that regulate it. So,

spk_0 we need to make sure that we're here in this correctly, right? It is just associated with,

spk_0 and it does influence, but it's not the only influence of. Everything from attention to decision-making

spk_0 emotional control. And then other things like what are called mental endurance. Now, this

spk_0 particularly matters because mental endurance under stress is resilience. This is why we're talking

spk_0 about it, right? I want you to be more resilient to stress. In this particular example, can you

spk_0 maintain decision-making? Can you maintain focus? Can you maintain attention and memory skills

spk_0 in the presence of stress? Not just when you're baseline, not when you're fresh and okay,

spk_0 but what about when you become fatigued? That's what a higher HRV allows you to do. And that's why

spk_0 we're going to press forward and give you tools to improve it, enhance it, or if it's already good

spk_0 to maintain it. You could drown yourself in data, whether you want to look at systematic reviews

spk_0 or meta-analyses, but you'll find them. Heart rate variability is associated with an enormous

spk_0 number of health implications. Everything from being a little aggressive here, but basically every

spk_0 psychological or mental health metric, anxiety, depression, PTSD, and so forth, two things like

spk_0 cardiovascular disease, all cause mortality, inflammation, hyperglycemia, hyperliplidemia,

spk_0 hypertension. I mean, pick your metric and you will find the meta-analysis or systematic review

spk_0 that shows man a bad HRV is going to be associated with bad health outcomes. One example I can give

spk_0 you here is things like that hyperglycemia. Now, that's high blood sugar, right? So think type

spk_0 two diabetes. What's your thing about this way? If you were in a straight-of-fighter flight,

spk_0 or you were fighting for your life, your adrenaline would be up. When your adrenaline goes up,

spk_0 your body releases a bunch of glucose into the bloodstream. And it does that because glucose will

spk_0 then go to your skeletal muscle. It gives them short-term energy and it can prepare for combat

spk_0 in this particular case. It doesn't actually matter if you're fighting. General point is this,

spk_0 stress goes up, adrenaline goes up, blood glucose goes up. Well, if this is happening consistently

spk_0 throughout the day, you're effectively giving yourself stress-induced diabetes because you're

spk_0 constantly smashing your insulin system, smashing the pancreas because you're throwing blood glucose

spk_0 up and down and you didn't do anything with food. This is why high stress and chronic stress

spk_0 management, one of the many reasons at least, why these things are associated with obesity.

spk_0 They are associated with inflammation. They're are associated with high blood pressure and so forth.

spk_0 There's a direct physical reaction that happens from your psychology in this case,

spk_0 all the way down to your molecular biology. And it has consequences across systems. I could keep

spk_0 giving you examples, but I think you get the point right now. In fact, many of you may have already

spk_0 realized or known that bad HRV is associated with lots of bad health implications and that's no good.

spk_0 What is less discussed and less understood in my experience is how it directly relates to resilience.

spk_0 And there's a couple of interesting papers that highlight this point and so I want to dive in

spk_0 in them in just a little more detail now. But if you remember, your heart re-variability is driven by

spk_0 our autonomic nervous system. And one of the main things within that is called your vagus nerve.

spk_0 Now, when we hear vagus, we often think down regulation, but it's not just that. If you were to

spk_0 stimulate the vagus nerve, you could get a rousella as well, up regulation, excitement, so on and so

spk_0 forth. It is this toggle, right? Is this ability to go back and forth between them? Well, we have

spk_0 evidence now, molecularly, of how the vagus nerve can directly activate and change the immune system.

spk_0 No surprise here. What happens when you are really cooked, your shot, overworked, overstressed,

spk_0 your immune system gets compromised, right? Why? Well, in part because of this. Now, I'm not saying

spk_0 HRV caused that, but HRV would provide you that signal and says, hey, this is why you're not as

spk_0 resilient right now as you used to be. Vegas nerve overused, altered immune system function,

spk_0 and now you got sick or got more sick than you should have got because of that overall

spk_0 stress response you were less resilient to. Now, another example of that is a really complicated

spk_0 study, but it was so beautiful. I wanted to point it out. What they looked at here was this resilience

spk_0 or what's called reactivity marker. And so what they found is kind of getting to the end of the

spk_0 paper here was when you were in the state of low HRV, sympathetic drive, that gave you higher

spk_0 sleep reactivity to stress, meaning when we exposed you to the same stressor, you had a exaggerated

spk_0 sleep response. In this case, a bad sleep response. That's exactly what we're talking about.

spk_0 So the same thing happened to you when you had a higher HRV didn't affect your sleep. Now,

spk_0 when we give that thing to you and you have a low HRV, it affects your sleep a lot.

spk_0 That's higher reactivity. That is being less resilient to the same stressor. So same stress,

spk_0 big response. This is in circular, right? Because we also know at the same point, less sleep or

spk_0 worse sleep increases your risk of all kinds of problems. And in this specific paper,

spk_0 the problem that they're looking at was depression symptoms. So the lower amount of sleep

spk_0 increased the risk of experiencing higher depressive symptoms.

spk_0 Many examples of this, but that really does, again, encapsulates what I'm trying to talk about here.

spk_0 It's not just up or down. It is being more resilient to everything that happens in your life.

spk_0 And our autonomic nervous system is a great tool to measure and pay attention to for that.

spk_0 So if that doesn't convince you, I don't know what will, but I'm assuming at this point,

spk_0 you're all on board. So how do you actually measure it? Let's talk about different ways we

spk_0 actually investigate your HRV level. Today's episode is sponsored by Element. Element is an

spk_0 electrolyte drink mix that has an ideal electrolyte ratio of sodium, potassium, and magnesium,

spk_0 but no sugar. Hydration is critical to performance, both physical and mental performance.

spk_0 Countless studies have shown that even a slight degree of dehydration, even as small as 1%,

spk_0 can lead to decreases in physical output and mental performance. We also know that

spk_0 electrolytes are critical to proper hydration, which I've been harping on for years. But you can't

spk_0 do that, proper hydration, by only drinking water. You need to get the right amount of electrolytes

spk_0 in the right ratios, and that's why I'm a huge fan of Element. In fact, many of you will probably

spk_0 remember that I featured Element in my YouTube series on optimizing hydration nearly five years ago.

spk_0 I featured Element in these videos because they're blend of 1,000 milligrams of sodium,

spk_0 200 milligrams potassium, and 60 milligrams of magnesium really is unique and different than any

spk_0 other electrolyte in the market, and it has great scientific support. I use Element constantly,

spk_0 particularly when I'm sweating a lot, and I routinely make it a part of my clients' optimization

spk_0 programs. If you'd like to try Element, you can go to drinklmt.com slash perform to claim a free

spk_0 sample pack with the purchase of any Element drink mix. Again, that's drinklmt.com slash perform

spk_0 to claim a free sample pack. Today's episode is also sponsored by Momentus. Momentus makes the

spk_0 highest quality supplements on the market period. Many of you know me, and you know that I do not

spk_0 trust the vast majority of supplement companies. And for good reason, many studies have shown that

spk_0 anywhere between 10 to up to 40% of supplements have accidental contaminants, intentional alterations,

spk_0 mislabeling, or other serious issues. But Momentus is different. I literally spent years vetting

spk_0 the company, their products, and leadership team, before personally officially partnering with

spk_0 them in 2023. Every single one of Momentus's products is third party tested to ensure quality,

spk_0 and many are even NSF certified for sport. Now, while I love all of their products, the ones I use the

spk_0 most, both personally and with my clients, are what I call the big three. And these are the Omega

spk_0 three fish oil, creatine, and newly improved way protein formula. These three supplements have fantastic

spk_0 data supporting their benefits. Way protein for lean muscle mass, Omega threes for brain health,

spk_0 and creatine for both muscle and brain support. And they have been shown to be very safe across

spk_0 basically all populations of people, young, old, men, women, etc. Now, nobody has to use supplements,

spk_0 and I hope you never feel pressure to do so. But if you're interested in supplements,

spk_0 it's important that you get them from the highest quality providers. You don't want mercury and

spk_0 your fish oil are lead in your way of protein or anything like that. So that's why I stick exclusively

spk_0 to Momentus. If you'd like to give Momentus a try, go to livemomentus.com slash perform to get 20

spk_0 percent off your order. Again, that's livemomentus.com slash perform to get 20 percent off. Because HRV is

spk_0 so ubiquitous and you can get it all from just your heart. There's a ton of different cheap

spk_0 tools to measure. I have used historically something called Morpheus and it is amazing for

spk_0 looking at changes in HRV over time, especially at a baseline. It's fantastic for improving your

spk_0 conditioning and knowing what exercise to do for the day. But the other ones I want to get into

spk_0 today function a little bit differently. And that is kind of more understanding and acute sense.

spk_0 What am I at right now? And if I go do something, can I see that change instantly?

spk_0 So for that, actually, I like a device that's a combination of a couple things. Number one,

spk_0 I'll use a chest strap, Polar H10. I have no affiliation to Polar. I buy it. It's about $100

spk_0 or so. This is the gold standard. And I like this the most because it is actually directly measuring

spk_0 EKG or ECG in the heart. Others that ones that are worn like on your arm or on your wrist

spk_0 are not directly measuring the heart. They're using a different technology or methodology,

spk_0 which doesn't matter. And they're okay. In some cases, some of them are very good. But for me,

spk_0 if I'm going to make a change, if I'm going to pay attention, if I'm going to coach somebody on it,

spk_0 I'm not going to try to save 30 bucks and buying something that's slightly cheaper.

spk_0 100 bucks is pretty reasonable for most people to get to. And so I want the highest standard there.

spk_0 So for me, I've just personally had the most success with the Polar H10 strap. On top of that,

spk_0 I have recently been shown by a colleague of mine, Dr. J. Wiles, WILES. J is phenomenal in this area.

spk_0 He does a ton of research and clinical experience in this stuff. He recently showed me an app

spk_0 called Optimal HRV. Again, I have no association to them. I pay normal full price for it. It's about

spk_0 five bucks a month. It's really, really cheap. It pairs perfectly with that Polar H10 strap.

spk_0 So you can put the strap on. You can pull up the app and you can see your HIV in real time.

spk_0 So we can see it right now. We can go test something. We can go try something and we can see the

spk_0 response. It's very intuitive. So you're talking 100 and 115 bucks or something like that. You

spk_0 could get yourself a nice HIV tool. One more time to be really clear. If we are concerned about

spk_0 HIV, we're going to go with one of those devices. We're going to measure it directly from the chest.

spk_0 We're not going to measure it from the finger or the wrist or anywhere else unless we absolutely

spk_0 have to. Now, it's been a long time since we talked about this, but earlier I brought up respiratory

spk_0 rate and I'm going to come back to it now. There's not as much research here, but it is growing.

spk_0 And what's clear about respiratory rate is the information you get from it is different than what

spk_0 you get from heart rate variability. And so ideally, you're going to pay attention to both of these.

spk_0 Respiratory rate like HRV. It is a non-specific but highly sensitive measure of your nervous system.

spk_0 In other words, if your HRV is up or down or your respiratory rate is up or down, something's

spk_0 happening. It's very sensitive to changes. You will see changes within a day as I just described.

spk_0 You can change these things within minutes or seconds. If you see changes over a couple of days,

spk_0 it means something, but they're non-specific. They're not telling you, oh, this was

spk_0 your nutrition or, oh, this is your mental stress or, oh, this is hydration or bad. It's like,

spk_0 you don't know what's happening. It's simply telling you something about the overall

spk_0 allostatic load, the total stress of the environment. So then you got to go work to figure out what's

spk_0 happening there, but they are both highly relevant. Why I like respiratory rate, the arguably the

spk_0 most here is because I have personally, and now I'm walking away from the research here. I can't

spk_0 show this scientifically yet, but I have found it personally to be more sensitive. It'll show up

spk_0 fast, oftentimes, not always, but oftentimes in my personal experience, you'll see changes in

spk_0 respiratory rate before you'll see them in HRV. Anything that matters, but not always. So we really

spk_0 pay high attention to both. There's a really wonderful article in a technology journal,

spk_0 actually called Sensors, published a couple of years ago by a scientist that I just love in this

spk_0 field, Andre Nicolom, called the importance of respiratory rate monitoring from health care to

spk_0 sport and exercise. And in that paper, they walk you through a ton of the research, what's going

spk_0 on here. The fact that it is a critical vital sign. It has been associated with everything from

spk_0 cardiac events in pneumonia to heat exposure and cold and exercise emotional stress, cognitive

spk_0 load, and so on and so forth. You can go read about more of the details of respiratory rate there.

spk_0 I've thrown this out a couple of times at the beginning, but I wanted to finally tie a bow on

spk_0 this as well. What does this have to do with CO2 tolerance? If you're not familiar with that,

spk_0 this is a similar metric. So when we're looking at respiratory rate and we're looking at

spk_0 resting heart rate and HRV, we also like to pay attention to CO2 tolerance. This is a

spk_0 different way of examining the state of your nervous system, specifically the way that we have

spk_0 defined CO2 tolerance. This is developed, or rather was brought to me by a gentleman named Brian

spk_0 McKenzie. I don't know who created it initially, but Brian is the one who taught me about it.

spk_0 And the way that this works is it's effectively like a little bit of a breathhold test,

spk_0 where you exhale continuously and you can see how long that you can continually exhale some small

spk_0 amount of air. It's a maximal effort test. In the show notes, we'll put a direct link to a video

spk_0 Brian has made that shows you how to go through the CO2 tolerance test. And I like it. We've used it

spk_0 a bunch. I also feel like it tells us something similar, but slightly different than both HRV

spk_0 and respiratory rate. So while I told you earlier, we look at both of those. We also look at CO2

spk_0 as much as we can. I can't get CO2 tolerance though from a simple test on a resting test. You

spk_0 actually have to actively do it. It only takes about a minute. But because of that, people won't

spk_0 necessarily do it every day where I can check their heart rate easily, whether they're doing something

spk_0 or not. So that's the only reason why we don't use it necessarily every day. But here's the connection.

spk_0 The way that your physiology works is you will bring in oxygen when you take a breath in. And

spk_0 you're doing that because oxygen's primary job is to regulate metabolism. It's energy production.

spk_0 It's robin metabolism, which is what most of your body is doing most of the time.

spk_0 When you breathe out, you're breathing out CO2. The difference between oxygen and CO2 is that carbon

spk_0 molecule. That carbon is a byproduct of any metabolic process. So whether you're breaking down

spk_0 carbohydrates or fat, whether you're using that resulting energy for exercise or digestion or

spk_0 immune function or cognitive performance, it doesn't actually matter. It all is going to net

spk_0 result in you, leaving a little bit of the water left over, making some ATP and having a

spk_0 much of free-floating carbon. That carbon in your system is highly problematic. And so your body

spk_0 will immediately attach it to an oxygen molecule forming CO2. And so the way we say this is the net

spk_0 end result of all metabolic processes are water, ATP and CO2. Now, if you're in the case of, let's

spk_0 just say exercise. It doesn't matter, but let's just say we are doing that. The more

spk_0 metabolism you go through, the more CO2 is generated in your muscle, your muscle then

spk_0 puts it into your blood and then transmits through your blood, goes into your lungs, and then you

spk_0 exhale and get it out. That's the entire cycle of life. Plants do the opposite. They breathe in CO2,

spk_0 pull out the carbon, keep it, hold on it to themselves, and then get rid of the O2. That's the

spk_0 relationship. Living beings have with plants in terms of oxygen in CO2. Why this matters? Again,

spk_0 you breathe in oxygen to regulate metabolism. But your CO2 levels are there to regulate your pH.

spk_0 It has nothing to do with your exercise performance. Your body will regulate blood pressure.

spk_0 It will regulate electrolytes, and it will regulate pH over almost anything. And one could

spk_0 argue it will regulate pH literally over anything else in the whole world. That is because most of

spk_0 your body, the vast majority of all enzymes in the world, have to run at a very specific pH. To

spk_0 acidic or to alkaline, they don't work. If they don't work and your heart can't pump and your brain

spk_0 can't operate, you die pretty quickly. So your physiological pH levels are maintained at an

spk_0 incredibly tight number. Your testosterone can easily triple in a few minutes. Your adrenaline

spk_0 can go up many multiples. Your pH stays within an extremely tight window. It will move everything

spk_0 else around it to keep your pH at the right level. The primary way your body regulates your pH

spk_0 is by changing the amount of CO2 that lets be in your blood. If CO2 levels get too high in your blood,

spk_0 this will tell your autonomic nervous system to breathe more. You don't feel it. This is subconscious.

spk_0 You're just breathing more. You have no idea what's happening. Not an active process,

spk_0 autonomic nervous system. It does that. It gets rid of the CO2. It brings the acidic level down.

spk_0 If the acidic level is too low, meaning your too alkaline, it will have you slow your respiration

spk_0 down. You'll hold your breath. Again, you won't even know this. It'll let the CO2 levels increase more

spk_0 until it gets the spot at once. And then it'll bring your respiration back up. If you go start

spk_0 exercising, you start putting a bunch of CO2 in the blood. That's why your body makes you breathe

spk_0 more. Because it has to dump that CO2. In normal circumstances, the primary reason you get air

spk_0 hunger or you feel like you have to breathe if I were to make you hold your breath right now,

spk_0 it's not because you're running low on oxygen. It's because CO2 levels are rising. CO2

spk_0 concentrations in your blood are the primary mechanism that drive you to feel like you need to

spk_0 ventilate. So it can be conscious. You can feel it. But most of the time, this is happening without

spk_0 you having any awareness at all of what's going on. If you are chronically breathing, not enough,

spk_0 you're under breathing, which doesn't happen much. CO2 levels will be getting really high. You'd

spk_0 be acidic. What's more common is the opposite. And there are papers on this, right? You can see it.

spk_0 If you are breathing too much, whether you want to call this over breathing, like we tend to call it,

spk_0 or if you are actually truly into what's called chronic hyperventilation, this is a medically

spk_0 diagnosable condition, chronic hyperventilation is over breathing. What that really is, is you're

spk_0 putting too much CO2 out of your body into the atmosphere. So because of that, your CO2 levels in

spk_0 your body get too low. This is called hypocapnea, too low of CO2. This is incredibly problematic because

spk_0 again, one, we are out of PA change now. We're not acidic. We're alkaline with the opposite. So because

spk_0 of that, your kidneys, someone within a couple of days, or a couple of hours to a couple of days,

spk_0 maybe even a few weeks, can respond to that. They don't always, but they can respond to that

spk_0 by putting you into what's called metabolic acidosis. And it's doing that because it's again

spk_0 trying to reestablish some acidity in the system to make everything happy. This then has a whole host

spk_0 of renal and kidney issues, hydration issues, and sodium potassium and electrolyte issues, and a

spk_0 bunch of other stuff that is just overall problematic. The other major problem with this overbreeding

spk_0 strategy is CO2 is a vasodilator. And so if you are exhaling too much of it and CO2 constructions

spk_0 get too low, you get vasoconstriction. This means decreased cerebral blood flow. This means decreased

spk_0 blood flow everywhere else. It also alters what's called boors effect. In general, what all this is

spk_0 meaning, you don't have as much oxygenation. Not exactly what it is, but if that helps you

spk_0 conceptualize what's going on here, then that's fine. And so we're seeing problems and health,

spk_0 cognitive performance, physical exercise performance, all of this stuff can be a response

spk_0 to chronic hyperventilation or overbreeding. However, you were to find those things. That said then,

spk_0 if I'm seeing HRV is fine, resting heart rates fine, but I am chronically overbreeding,

spk_0 I still have some work to do. And it is indicating something is happening potentially from a stress

spk_0 situation that's not going to be necessarily picked up by changes in sleep or changes in HRV or

spk_0 changes in overall resting heart rate. Why this becomes really problematic is they can then turn

spk_0 quickly into what are called sustaining factors. And so while something caused hyperventilation,

spk_0 which is a normal and healthy response, remember, I say I get scared right now. I want to go into

spk_0 sympathetic drive. I want adrenaline up. I want to start an anticipatory overbreeding strategy.

spk_0 I know CO2 is going to start increasing because I'm about to start doing something physically. So I'll

spk_0 start overbreeding. That's great. Normal reactive strategy there, healthy one, that's what we want.

spk_0 But if we're chronically doing that, we're chronically overbreeding because we're chronically in

spk_0 this sympathetic drive, we're chronically in this high stress environment, that can be sustained.

spk_0 It can turn into a habit. It can turn into misattribution. It can turn into lots of different things.

spk_0 We have increased that sympathetic adrenerate tone. We are ready and dialed and primed for the same

spk_0 situation, the same smell, the same thing we hear, the same thing we see to drive us back into

spk_0 that hyperventilation strategy. We then can be causing the same problem and it can be cyclical,

spk_0 right? Because that hyperventilation itself can cause the same physiological problems.

spk_0 So it's hard strategy to break. So really important to pay attention to respiratory rate as well.

spk_0 I could go on, but again, for the sake of time, we'll stop right there.

spk_0 Important, highly correlated, highly overlapped with some of the other markers we've talked about,

spk_0 but it tells us unique information. Now, how do I measure this?

spk_0 Most of the wearables you have will measure respiratory rate. I will give you fair warning.

spk_0 There is no industry standard though on how that's calculated. So just like HIV,

spk_0 don't put a ton of stock in the absolute number. You want to pay most attention to trends and

spk_0 things like that, but at least be consistent with the device that you're using. Use whatever you

spk_0 like. It doesn't matter what you get, how you use it. It's a very simple measure that basically

spk_0 everywhereable either directly has or it can have. If they're not reporting it, they're measuring

spk_0 it. They're just using it to calculate other stuff. So that can be done in a bunch of different

spk_0 ways. Hopefully that gave you some more information about how you can calculate HRV, how you can

spk_0 calculate respiratory rate. You probably can infer how to calculate resting heart rate. And I gave

spk_0 you some tools on how to calculate and measure CO2 tolerance as well. It's time for us to now move on

spk_0 to where we figure out how to make sense of all that information and determine how do we interpret it

spk_0 all. We're going to start off by talking about HRV. Anyone who works in this area will be squeamish.

spk_0 When you ask them the question of what's a good one or bad one, we all say the same thing,

spk_0 which actually to me is like a badge of honor that that person knows that they're talking about.

spk_0 When I hear them say that, it's a hard thing to put a number on. I'll give you something though to

spk_0 get started. On most wearables, most men are going to be something in the like 40s to 60 range on

spk_0 their HRV score. Women are a little bit lower than that. If you are older, then say 60 years old,

spk_0 then maybe think that down a little bit. That all said, I wanted to start off the number, but I don't

spk_0 know what that even means. That's because every device actually has a different calculation they

spk_0 use to measure HRV. We're not even necessarily always talking about the same thing. More importantly

spk_0 than that though, there is a misuse of HRV and a bunch of different scenarios. You should pay

spk_0 attention to it. I made a long argument of why it's important. It's relevant. I just started

spk_0 off by also saying the measurement itself is not the same between devices. We want to use this as a

spk_0 measure of progress or regression rather than just comparing a score to score, especially if you're

spk_0 comparing your score to your friends and you're on a ring and they're on a watch or something like

spk_0 that. The number is actually the calculation. The equation itself can be completely different. There's

spk_0 many, many ways to calculate HRV that are scientifically validated and the numbers are

spk_0 digits different than the other ones. That's an important point to pay attention to. I've already

spk_0 also talked about the fact that it could be normal for you when you have an HRV score that is to put

spk_0 numbers on it, say 25. Well, that actually might be normal for you. I don't know. If we look at your

spk_0 respiratory rate and your resting heart rate and your CO2 tolerance and your subjective feeling

spk_0 and your recovery and your performance and your cognition and they're all great, well, then I might

spk_0 not be super worried about just your HRV. We're never going to take it of itself by itself and only

spk_0 and overinterpret its meaning. If you are going to calculate it, please collect good data. What do I

spk_0 mean by that? However, you're testing it. Be consistent. If you're wearing a ring, wear a ring. Use

spk_0 the same one. If you're testing it with a chest strap every morning, use it in the same position.

spk_0 Don't take it seated one day. Don't take it lying down the next day. Don't wake up and go to the

spk_0 bathroom one day and then check it and the next day you did it before going to the bathroom or you

spk_0 had a giant pancake breakfast and you get the point here. Test it under the same consistent

spk_0 terms always. We want to pay attention mostly to trends over time and the recommendation I'll give

spk_0 you here is to establish your own standard deviation. Here's what that means. Let's say you test

spk_0 your HRV for 30 days and within those 30 days, don't do anything about it. Don't make any changes.

spk_0 On a piece of paper and an Excel file on your computer, just jot down the score on all 30 of those

spk_0 days. Then ask it to run a standard deviation calculation. Then so basically tell you what your normal

spk_0 average number is and how far off, up or low, you tend to go within a 30 day window. This matters

spk_0 a ton because the amount of that deviation number one tells us something about your physiology. That's

spk_0 maybe arguably more important than the actual number itself. Let me give you some mathematical

spk_0 examples. Let's say your HRV was 30 on your device. Whatever 30 is, whatever that means it doesn't

spk_0 matter. You calculated it after a month and it said your average is 30 and your standard deviation

spk_0 was 20. That means you swing all the way down to 10 all the way up to 50. That is a very large

spk_0 standard deviation. Other people, your standard deviation might be 3 or 5. So you have to know

spk_0 what matters to you. If your standard deviation is 20 and you wake up one day and instead of

spk_0 being at 30, which is your average, you're at 27, that means nothing to you. That is nothing because

spk_0 that's so low percentage of your normal deviation. The opposite person whose standard deviation is

spk_0 normally 5 and they wake up and they're 7 higher low, then that actually tells them something's

spk_0 going on that their system is responding to. So if you want my honest answer of how to use HRV

spk_0 the most appropriate, this is what we're paying attention to. Typically, again, just a rule thumb

spk_0 here, people that are more stable in their HRV are generally better. If you have a score that is

spk_0 doubling every other day, we would immediately start thinking, all right, this person's hyperreactive.

spk_0 Whatever they're doing is causing a huge change in their autonomic nervous system. We need to

spk_0 create more stability here. That's how we become more resilient. That's how we become more

spk_0 predictable. That's what we're after. If you're so tight, no matter what you do, we're going to

spk_0 the same response every day, then we know that system is actually quite stable and no matter what

spk_0 insult hits you that day, work stress, environmental toxin, who cares? Your body is able to handle it.

spk_0 You're not hitting the wall on the highway. You're moving left and right. Your car is swarving,

spk_0 but you're not hitting the wall so those numbers aren't changing. That's what we're bringing back

spk_0 that highway analogy and that's what we're talking about when we're talking about nervous system

spk_0 stability. We never make changes based on one day. We never use a cheap consumer wearable to tell

spk_0 us how to live our life, to exercise today or to not exercise, to sleep today or not sleep today.

spk_0 That is, and I think the people behind most of these companies would say the same thing,

spk_0 that's not the best way to use something like an HRV score. Interpret your numbers in the

spk_0 appropriate context, but regardless, we should be able to get better and become more resilient

spk_0 and our overall nervous system responses to stress back to our highway analogy.

spk_0 What causes people to be more stable versus less stable with their HRV is a bunch of different

spk_0 stuff, genetics, but then it's also the dumb stuff. It is in a regular sleep schedule. Once we get

spk_0 people sleeping in a consistent time, HRV almost always goes up. In fact, so much so it is

spk_0 very often the first thing I look at. When somebody asks me about their HRV or we're going through

spk_0 their overall analysis of all their data and we see HRVs pour, my eyes go right up to sleep

spk_0 regularity. If they're asleep, is irregular, then I honestly don't go much past that. When our

spk_0 sleep regularity goes up, HRV just goes up. So if you're like, man, I'm doing everything. I've

spk_0 been doing that. Bob, Bob, Bob, Bob, Bob, Bob, Bob, Bob, I'm HRV doesn't go up and your sleep's

spk_0 irregular. Well, that's stop number one of the train. Other stuff is, honestly, sorry,

spk_0 you beat sound this way, but it's kind of what I call the dumb stuff. It's alcohol. It is lots of

spk_0 bad negative health habits. All this stuff will bring it down. So if you remove all those from the

spk_0 equation, it's probably going to go up. Another one I wanted to bring up here that people don't pay

spk_0 a lot of attention to. Two things have stood out when I was diving back through some of our databases.

spk_0 One was wild changes in exercise within the same week. So I mean, but that is, if you're pretty

spk_0 standard throughout the week, and then you're the type of person who goes bonkers with your exercise

spk_0 in the weekend, we see this huge instability of HRV. So whether you do your 10 mile run in the weekend

spk_0 or you do the multiple classes or you like to play five hours of pickleball or whatever,

spk_0 and it is drastically different than your week, that will also explain a lot of instability.

spk_0 With your HRV and your resting heart rate for that matter. So that one will sneak up on people.

spk_0 The last one I'll bring up is actually nutrition related feeding frequency of food. Specifically,

spk_0 we have had a number of people come in for sleep related issues, whether that is really bad sleep or

spk_0 just kind of suboptimal sleep, and they're eating one milliday. Now I'm not fundamentally opposed to

spk_0 one milliday, but in our experience, this has led to really, really compromised HRVs. What has

spk_0 happened many times is these individuals feel good, okay, or great, for 30 days or 45 days,

spk_0 maybe up to 90 days. But then you see the nervous system just starting to pay the price.

spk_0 I'm not trying to indicate that one milliday is bad for your health. Again, I'm going on my personal

spk_0 experience in the day that we have in our companies, and we've just seen it not go well. And we've

spk_0 at the same time seen people then who eat more frequently. In terms of they were eating one

spk_0 milliday and they change and go to two or three. And the nervous system sends recover.

spk_0 Want to be real clear here. I don't only mean their HRV score. That does happen. But it's other

spk_0 signs and symptoms as well. It's objective measures of say sleep quality, cognitive function,

spk_0 performance and so forth. They feel good, but their physiology in the longer term isn't

spk_0 responding how they think or hoping it really is. So if you are a one milliday or fine, great,

spk_0 if you feel awesome, awesome, keep doing it. I'm only bringing this up to where if you've made a

spk_0 change recently and you're like, what the heck, why is my HRV going down? That I think is the most

spk_0 appropriate way to interpret it as this is maybe one of the things that happens with lack of feeding

spk_0 throughout the day is it creates some potentially somewhat of a neurological or nervous system

spk_0 stressor that will alter HRV. So lots of other things I could bring up here, but those are the

spk_0 ones that I thought were most interesting. It's a combination of some of the stuff that is most

spk_0 well documented, the alcohol, the emotional regularity, so on and so forth. With some things I thought

spk_0 that maybe some of you would find interesting in that we've just seen behind the scenes that

spk_0 is not necessarily in the peer review literature. Today's episode is sponsored by 8 Sleep. 8 Sleep

spk_0 makes smart mattress covers with cooling, heating, sleep tracking and more. I've personally been

spk_0 sleeping on an 8 sleep mattress cover for years now and it's absolutely glorious. I love it so

spk_0 much that I hate traveling away from home because it means I can't sleep on my 8 sleep pod for ultra.

spk_0 As you'll hear me talk about endlessly on this podcast, there really is nothing you can do that

spk_0 makes more of an impact on your health and performance than getting tremendous sleep and getting

spk_0 great sleep requires having your body temperature drop a couple of degrees at night and that's hard

spk_0 on your own. The 8 sleep has been a game changer for me because I run hot at night or as my wife

spk_0 calls it, I'm a furnace. If I don't have something like an 8 sleep helping me cool down, I'll wake up

spk_0 in the middle of the night overheating and not feeling great. This is something I've also found in

spk_0 many of the people that I coach, especially those who are really physically active. The 8 sleep

spk_0 pod for ultra has two times more cooling power, yet is virtually silent and it has high-fid-ally

spk_0 sleep tracking and even has snoring detection that'll automatically lift your head a few degrees

spk_0 to improve air flow and stop your snoring. If you'd like to try 8 sleep, go to 8 sleep.com

spk_0 slash perform to save $350 off your pod for ultra. 8 sleep currently ships to the US, Canada,

spk_0 the UK, select countries in the EU and even Australia. Again, that's 8 sleep.com slash perform.

spk_0 We have a little bit of an algorithm we use when determining if the changing HIV matters to us.

spk_0 So how do you interpret this context? Number one, we always check to make sure we got good data.

spk_0 I talked about that earlier. If they don't, then I disregard it. But let's say they do. Most of the

spk_0 time they do. So we've got good data, however you define that. Next question I'm asking is,

spk_0 are we talking about one day or is this been happening for more than three, ideally more than

spk_0 five to seven days? If it is acute, single day, second day, third day, only, then I'm asking the

spk_0 next set of questions, which is, okay, what are we doing with your training right now? If we're in

spk_0 a phase where we're trying to cause physiological adaptations, I'm trying to stress you. So if your

spk_0 HIV is lower and I'm seeing signs of stress, that's exactly what we're pushing for. That's a good

spk_0 thing. We're not changing anything. This is one of the huge flaws of general technologies that just

spk_0 tell you what to do with your workout, your nutrition based on today's score. Oh, your HIV's low,

spk_0 therefore take a day off. That's a really bad approach because it doesn't understand what you're

spk_0 trying to do in the long term or even the medium term in this case. So if we see an HIV that is low

spk_0 and it's been down for two or three days and we're in a phase where we're in the off season,

spk_0 we're trying to build up change. We're in a caloric deficit and we're working hard. I don't care.

spk_0 You are a little bit stressed. That's the point that's going to cause adaptation. We're going to

spk_0 ignore that said if we're in a phase where we're supposed to be peaking, I'm trying to feel good,

spk_0 whether we're peaking for sports performance or you're simply saying I need to be on today. I

spk_0 need to have a great day. This is a really important thing I'm doing in my family life or work

spk_0 life or something like that. My HIV has been down for a couple of days and I got to get fixed because

spk_0 I'm trying to perform on my best right now. Then we're going to do what I call acute state

spk_0 shifters and I got a whole category of these things to cover for you here in one second. But I'm

spk_0 giving them tons of different strategies that can pull out one or more of these acute shifters and

spk_0 I promise you these will make that HRV go up right now. They'll go up today. They'll probably be

spk_0 up again tomorrow and you'll be fine. Going back in the sweet spot. Going back up our algorithm a

spk_0 little bit. If we got good data and this has not just been a one or two day thing, but it's been

spk_0 here for five or seven or 10 days or longer. Then I'm going to ask the same follow up question.

spk_0 Number one, are we trying to induce adaptation? If so, I'm not going to ignore it,

spk_0 but I'm going to watch it carefully. I'm not going to say they're going to change your workout

spk_0 program today. We are going to watch it carefully. If it is really suppressed, meaning it's more

spk_0 than two standard deviations outside your normal. For more than five days, we're going to take action.

spk_0 We're going to do something. If that was really technical for you, if it's a really big chain,

spk_0 and it's around a long time and you're really feeling bad, your motivation, your energy,

spk_0 you feel junky, then we're going to take action. If we're in a phase where we're trying to

spk_0 perform our best and that's been down for a long time, then we're going to go to what I call

spk_0 chronic solutions. We have our acute solutions and our chronic solutions. Ultimately, we want to make

spk_0 sure we're using the right tool for the right task. I'm going to go through all those briefly

spk_0 but before we do that, I want to finish talking about respiratory rate as well because it's a

spk_0 little bit of a different interpretation. I've given you some sample numbers earlier. I kept saying

spk_0 14 breath for a minute or 15 breath for a minute and I'm doing that because the literature will

spk_0 show you the cutoff line seems to be about 16 breaths per minute. If you are over 16, there is

spk_0 clear and consistent literature tying that to everything from risk of a cardiovascular event,

spk_0 myocardial infarction or stroke or things like that is tied to clinical deterioration,

spk_0 pain, emotional stress, cognitive load and a whole host of things that you don't want to be anywhere

spk_0 near. If you are at 16, you're right on that line. I'm not trying to overly scare you but if you're

spk_0 above that, I'm going to make the case that you as long as our data are accurate, which is again

spk_0 a whole other question. But if you are up there, then we have a case of chronic overbreeding,

spk_0 whether that is chronic hyperventilation, that's a medical diagnosis, not for me to decide,

spk_0 but you are overbreeding in my opinion and we're going to want to bring that thing down.

spk_0 Most of the time I'm looking at if you are in the 10 to 14 range and then I don't see anything

spk_0 else, I'm good here. If you're 15, I'm asking a lot of follow up questions. If you're 15, 16,

spk_0 I'm probably going to ask us to do something. If we have a bunch of other major issues, maybe I'm

spk_0 not too worried about it. But if you're over 16, then this is going to be one of our top-tier

spk_0 priorities. Because of all the reasons I shared earlier about what happens when you're over ventilating,

spk_0 lots of short and long term issues. This is exactly how we interpret those numbers. Let's say you're

spk_0 at 16 or 17. Okay, very first stop in this train. I want to make sure your breathing mechanics are

spk_0 okay. Very simple first principles here. If you are ineffective with your breathing strategy,

spk_0 whether you're breathing through your shoulders and your neck, or collivically, or breathing,

spk_0 whether your diaphragm doesn't work appropriately, your inner costos are weak,

spk_0 your position or your posture is bad, so bad that it's infecting you. Well, then you can't

spk_0 breathe well, you're going to have to bring more often. This is simply if you're weak in a spot,

spk_0 you have to do it more often. If you can imagine being hunched over, touch your front of your

spk_0 shoulder to your knee and try to breathe. You can't. So you're going to breathe more frequently to

spk_0 get the same amount of air in. That's an exaggerated example, but you get the point. So number one,

spk_0 before I'm worried about some long-term intervention with you, I just want to make sure that it's not

spk_0 a mechanical issue. Past that, we're going to look at breathing problems. And what I mean by that

spk_0 are everything from allergies to nasal blockage to clinical sleep disorders. If you can't breathe

spk_0 through your nose, there's a strong chance you're going to be hyperventilating. It's not a guarantee,

spk_0 but we've just seen that really highly associated. So step number one, the way that we're going to

spk_0 interpret this high respiratory rate. Okay, maybe it's a sign that mechanical breathing technique is

spk_0 not great. Nope. How's your nose? Oh, yeah, I'm stuffed up all the time. Hmm, how polyps. Can you

spk_0 breathe through your nose ever? No, never. Are you mouth breather? Okay, great. Then we're going

spk_0 right there. I'm not going into anything else past this until we fix breathing out of your nose.

spk_0 Dehydration can do the same thing. So if you just notice your

spk_0 respiratory rates up one particular day, oh my gosh. And then you properly hydrate, it probably

spk_0 goes back down. Nothing to worry about long-term there. After that, things get a little bit more

spk_0 work intensive. So it could be a CO2 intolerance thing. If you're highly sensitive to that CO2,

spk_0 your brain can sometimes get miscalibrated. It thinks there's way too much CO2 in the system

spk_0 that actually is. So you're either hyperstressed or or hyper sensitive. And so it starts asking you

spk_0 to dump and offload that CO2 way sooner that it needs to. You're intolerant or hyper sensitive.

spk_0 One of those two. In that case, we can confirm that. So we see your respiratory rate is elevated.

spk_0 We also then run that CO2 tolerance test on you. Oh, that's also poor. Then great. We don't need

spk_0 to do anything else to the respiratory rate. We fixed your CO2 tolerance and that respiratory

spk_0 rate will take care of itself. Other things to think about here if your respiratory rate is high,

spk_0 it could just be a long-term pattern. Remember earlier when I talked about how these can go from

spk_0 initiating factors, sustaining factors. If you and we've experienced this a lot in our middle

spk_0 to later aged adults, right? These are often folks that came from high stress environments,

spk_0 high stress careers. Whether these have been lots of former surgeons, military individuals,

spk_0 entrepreneurs, things like that. Or they just had high stress for a long period of time.

spk_0 The overbreeding was appropriate because they were in a stressful environment. And then they

spk_0 sell the company. They retire. They reduce their hours. And then years later, they're still overbreeding.

spk_0 And in the cases where we've had years of data on people, we've seen this confirm pretty well.

spk_0 That pattern just exists. You're just overbreeding and you don't know it. So that has happened a lot.

spk_0 You got to go break that pattern. One of the biggest causes of this has actually been pregnancy.

spk_0 A lot of things can happen post having a child for women. And those patterns can be

spk_0 established and stay permanent unless you go back in there and actively reframe and rebuild

spk_0 the new pattern. Last one then here is what we would finally call general elevated allostatic load.

spk_0 Whether this is physical or mental. Remember allostatic load is that colloquial term for

spk_0 kind of like global stress on your body, no matter how it comes and or not.

spk_0 I went through all that list for a bunch of reasons, but one of them is I mean, to realize that

spk_0 that stress thing is at the last one. We don't look at respiratory rate and go, oh, you're stressed.

spk_0 That's that could be, but it could simply be the fact you can't breathe out of your nose.

spk_0 It could be something you're not hydrated. It could be the fact that you're just intolerant

spk_0 or sensitive to CO2 or any of the number of reasons. And that is the pecking order. That's the strategy.

spk_0 We go off of when we try to solve those simple problems first. And in our experience,

spk_0 you get through one through four mechanics, breathing problems, hydration and CO2 tolerance.

spk_0 Most of the time your situation is solved. Whether you pick any of the metrics I just talked about

spk_0 today, heart rate or respiratory rate or anything else, or you pick something else entirely different.

spk_0 I think most of us in this field would agree you should not be overly fixated on one metric.

spk_0 There is no best number here. And there's problems with data and interpretation and

spk_0 normative values and so forth. Things like stress, things like recovery are multifaceted.

spk_0 You need multiple objective and subjective measures before you get too excited. Let's actually

spk_0 finally talk about what some of these interventions are and how we can improve overall nervous system

spk_0 resilience. It makes sense for us to start off with the acute changes. This is the stuff you can do

spk_0 right now in any given moment and it will change how you're feeling and experiencing life. It will

spk_0 shift your state. You already know this. This is what I call the four by four matrix. So picture

spk_0 on one part of the matrix, your physiology on another part, your autonomic nervous system.

spk_0 What I'm going to share with you is how physiology can change autonomic nervous system

spk_0 and they can make it go up or it can make it go down. Autonomic nervous system can do the same

spk_0 thing with physiology. So it's a four way street here. Really easy examples. If you want to make your

spk_0 physiology change your autonomic nervous system and you want to make it go up. Just scream.

spk_0 YELL right now. Flex your muscles as hard as you possibly can. You do anything like that with

spk_0 your physical body. That will cause your autonomic nervous system to change instantaneously. Heart rate

spk_0 will go up. Breast Brewery rate will change adrenaline levels. You pick your metric. Physiology

spk_0 directly increasing autonomic nervous system activity. You can also do the opposite. You could do a

spk_0 physiological double-side. You could do progressive muscle relaxation. You simply relax your forearm

spk_0 and this could cause a change in your autonomic nervous system. You get the idea. That is physiology

spk_0 to ANS. ANS to physiology is basically the opposite. You get scared. Big shot of adrenaline happens.

spk_0 This will physically increase your strength capacity, force production and power output in your

spk_0 muscles. An autonomic nervous system change. You could do this with a supplement or a drug. We could

spk_0 go down. You could be more zen. You could take again a medication. It could lower your heart rate

spk_0 and because of that, it could have a physical response as well. You intuitively know the answer.

spk_0 You want to change and regulate your autonomic nervous system. You have the capacity and you already

spk_0 know the basics of it. I break these acute and chronic actions up into a bunch of different

spk_0 categories. For me, that looks like there are food-based solutions. There are supplements. There are

spk_0 courses. Breathwork. There are what I call brain distractions or brain alterations. Basic rest or

spk_0 sleep. There's light things you can do like physical light. There's movement stuff, physical movement.

spk_0 And then there's what I call motivation. Tons and tons and tons of examples. Most of them though

spk_0 are acute. Let's take motivation for example. If you scrolled on social media and came across a

spk_0 phenomenal camera and hands or jocke-willing quote, you might get inspired. That could change your

spk_0 autonomic nervous system. That could change your arousal state right now. You go ahead and have

spk_0 been low energy, lethargic. That could put you in more sympathetic drive. Your HRV will change

spk_0 if it is actually sufficiently motivating to you. You could read your story or a book or watch a

spk_0 movie. You could do a physical warm-up. Start training to some hops. I mentioned earlier. Flexus

spk_0 state in the moment. None of those are going to make your chronic HRV improve over time.

spk_0 These are mostly short-term solutions. The chronic ones are a little bit more difficult.

spk_0 This is when we get into stuff like biofeedback training. If you have sleep issues,

spk_0 getting a chronic sleep improvement. If you are chronically under-exercised, start exercising more.

spk_0 If you are really off, particularly if you are low in caloric intake, your hypochloric for too

spk_0 long. This might have a chronic effect of bringing more calories back. There are things like

spk_0 thermal exposure that can have a chronic effect. Most of that stuff is pretty direct and acute.

spk_0 Give you a really easy example. I've been doing a cold water immersion, cold water exposures

spk_0 for a very long time. I do not use them because I think it adds a minute to my life. I do not use

spk_0 them to burn more fat. You guys can all debate whether or not you think those things exist.

spk_0 For me, we have used it for stuff like this. We actually ran a bunch of experiments. We

spk_0 never published this stuff. We didn't take it through our RBI. We just ran it with a bunch of our

spk_0 athletes. What we found was if you look at somebody's HRV very specifically,

spk_0 then you put them in a cold bath, cold water for two to five minutes. How cold? I don't know.

spk_0 In American units here, somewhere between 30 to 50 degrees. It didn't really matter that much

spk_0 to be honest. You sat them there. Here's what will happen. Your HRV immediately post the ice

spk_0 bath when you got out would go down. No surprise. If you get in cold, really cold water, you get shot

spk_0 immediately into sympathetic drive. Low HRV. Remember, fight or flight. However, as quickly as 30

spk_0 minutes post, your HRV will be 10 to 20% higher, more down regulated than you were before.

spk_0 That continued to increase for about the next three hours or so. We ran this stuff by

spk_0 checking HRV every 15 minutes for several hours. We had 30 minutes post, 45 minutes post,

spk_0 60 minutes post, etc. All the way up to 180 posts. We stopped measuring that. Still,

spk_0 180 minutes post-called water immersion. HRV was higher, significantly higher, 25 to 50%

spk_0 depending on the person higher, three hours after the cold bath. While I know the most of us

spk_0 think about it as that short-term thing, no, I don't have peer-reviewed publications on this.

spk_0 We saw this enough to where I was like, yeah, okay, great. It also stacked up with what I feel.

spk_0 It's going to last. Will this last weeks and months? I don't know. I don't think so.

spk_0 Probably if I had to guess. But it certainly will give you a nice acute bump. By acute, I mean

spk_0 several hours and several days. If you hate the ice, you think it is terrible or you don't like it

spk_0 at all. Fine. I got 50 more examples that can give you. It's just one that showed up as really

spk_0 clear evidence to us. Changing gears entirely. You can do this without moving your physical body at

spk_0 all without suffering by just doing what are called visual resets. I mentioned him a couple of times

spk_0 now. But thank you, Dr. Andrew Heberman. Some of his early podcasts on his platform, his show

spk_0 talked a lot about this. But visual resets, I know his lab worked on it a lot, are really compelling

spk_0 and really effective. Lots of ways you can do this. There are simple drills like eye circles.

spk_0 So you stand there and basically run a big loop with your eyes circling around. That will change

spk_0 your sympathetic drive. Other ones that, again, my colleague Emily Hightower, I know uses a lot are

spk_0 things like a smooth H. You can see this and the literature is really clear. There's lots of different

spk_0 cortical and visual resets. But this stuff is really fantastic and super effective. A different one

spk_0 entirely that I think a lot of you exercises and strength channels will like. It's a modified

spk_0 Valsalva maneuver. The Valsalva maneuver is that intro abdominal pressure that you create when

spk_0 you're doing things like lifting weights or having a bowel movement. This is exactly how you use it.

spk_0 Again, we're still talking about chronic or acute rather. This is something you're going to do right

spk_0 now. It's not going to fix your long term stuff, but it'll give you that change when you're feeling

spk_0 like you need it right now. So you're going to hold your breath. You can do an inhale and hold or

spk_0 you can do an exhale and hold. It doesn't really matter. But you're going to hold and then create a

spk_0 bunch of intra abdominal pressure. And what's really key about this is the pressure needs to be in a

spk_0 true 360 degree range. Here's the analogy I like in this one. Imagine you are a can of soda. So

spk_0 you're a barrel, if you will. And the bottom of the barrel that sitting flat on the ground

spk_0 is your pelvic floor. And the top is your diaphragm. So these are running parallel to each other.

spk_0 And then the barrel, there were the can of soda. However, you like to think about it is everything

spk_0 from the front of your stomach to the side of your stomach all the way to your back. You want to

spk_0 create pressure against all of those surfaces. So imagine you're trying to explode that barrel

spk_0 every way. You're trying to blow the bottom out. So blow the bottom into the ground. You're

spk_0 trying to blow the top up in the air and you're trying to blow every side out each individual way.

spk_0 Right. That's how we do is not just a crunch. It's not a back extension. It's not anything else.

spk_0 It is a all quadrants vertical and horizontal. And you're going to do that and you're going to hold

spk_0 it for 10 seconds. In doing that, you're going to see your heart rate jump from 60, 70 beats per

spk_0 minute to 120. It'll shoot way, way, way up in the air. But then at the end of those 10 seconds,

spk_0 you exhale. And actually the literature suggests that it doesn't really matter how you exhale.

spk_0 Go slowly, go through your mouth, go through your nose, kind of let it all dump out quickly. It

spk_0 all the way now down to like 40 or 50. So before you started the drill, you were at 60 or 70.

spk_0 And now your new baseline is significantly lower. Really effective. You can do it anywhere. It takes

spk_0 just a few seconds to do. It doesn't cost you any money at all. And it is particularly good

spk_0 at altering what are called barrel receptors that have specific action on that Vegas nerve. And so

spk_0 here in a second, but there's different technology you can use to directly stimulate your Vegas

spk_0 nerve. But the magnitude of effect is much lower than something like this Valsalva. So it's free.

spk_0 It's cheap. It's easy. You can do it a bunch. And it has a big magnitude of effect.

spk_0 Couple of caveats here with this modified Valsalva though. If you are prone to orthostatic issues,

spk_0 you pass out a lot. You have low blood pressure. Don't do this. Don't do this if you're by water or

spk_0 in a pool or in the ocean. Don't do this a whole bunch of times. Probably don't do this immediately

spk_0 during your workout. All the caveats aside, right? You're going to create a bunch of

spk_0 intra-abdominal pressure. You're going to block a lot of blood flow if not included entirely.

spk_0 Don't pass out. Don't fall into water. Don't drown. Don't do all that stuff.

spk_0 Another option like I just mentioned are what are called those vagal nerve stimulators.

spk_0 These are somewhat new. There are a handful of FDA approved devices that you can use.

spk_0 You generally have to have a prescription to get them though. You can buy a ton of these

spk_0 as normal consumers and I have not been impressed with any of them.

spk_0 The data are, I would say, weak at best on them. I have personally used many of them and

spk_0 found like I got nothing out of it. The people we had try it got nothing out of it at all.

spk_0 The studies that are the most supportive are ones that are funded by the companies themselves.

spk_0 So that doesn't inherently mean the data are wrong or bad or manipulated, but you all know what

spk_0 that means. So for me, when it comes to these commercially available nerve stimulators,

spk_0 until we can see some more independent testing done and the data are more impressive,

spk_0 I generally don't like to use them. That said, if you've had a different experience

spk_0 and you like a lot, that's by all means. That's great. Use it.

spk_0 I have tried some of the clinical ones, the FDA approved ones, the ones that require

spk_0 a prescription and those are far more powerful. Those have been effective. I specifically have

spk_0 used one called the Gamma Core. You have to have a RX for it as I mentioned. No affiliation

spk_0 to the company, but it is quite effective. You'll notice it pretty substantially. Your data will

spk_0 change almost instantaneously if you're measuring it and monitoring it. Mostly when it comes to

spk_0 these things, these are coming from neurologists, people who severe migraines. This is generally the

spk_0 application. This is not something that we often think about as somebody is like trying to make

spk_0 their HIV score better today. So don't swing a sledgehammer at a fly if you know what I mean.

spk_0 But these things aren't out there. Hopefully that gives you a sense of a bunch of different

spk_0 tools and strategies. I intentionally picked things all over the map, cold water, to a breathing drill,

spk_0 to technology from free to a little bit more expensive, and a whole bunch of other things in

spk_0 between that can shift or improve that state instantaneously. We're going to transition now and

spk_0 finish up by talking about some of the things that will actually make improvements chronically.

spk_0 So let's get you out of that hole and let's make you a more permanent, more resilient,

spk_0 nervous system. Remember our goal. We want to desensitize. We want that system running in the

spk_0 background and for us to have the ability to have some control over it when we want.

spk_0 If you think about basic desensitization, the exact same principles apply here,

spk_0 which means you can already intuit a lot of the solutions. I'll give you some again what the

spk_0 science shows us, what we've experienced. But there's obviously many, many more things are on

spk_0 an ending list of stuff you could try. Think about this from the perspective of the immune system.

spk_0 Now I'll tell you a personal story. My daughter has an incredibly severe allergy to cashews.

spk_0 We put her through a treatment. It took us about 18 months and she now each cashews every day.

spk_0 We were in a position for when she was younger to have to carry an epiphen with us.

spk_0 If there was cashew dust in the air, there's a non-zero chance that she could die. It was that

spk_0 severe. How did that program work? Basic desensitization. You give them a very, very, very small load.

spk_0 Don't put anything else in the system that could irritate them. As time goes on, you give them a

spk_0 slightly higher amount of load until she got up to eating again, multiple cashews a day.

spk_0 If you look at a totally different system, another personal experience I had many years ago,

spk_0 I had an athlete who was struggling a lot with low back pain. I called a colleague of mine,

spk_0 a physical therapist, Dr. Quinn Henock. Quinn was fantastic. Any basically said, hey,

spk_0 you're dealing with low back pain. Take her all the way up to the point of low back pain.

spk_0 Go right below that line and then train a bunch. Don't hurt her. Don't exaggerate it.

spk_0 Don't give my daughter a bunch of cashews and causes huge reaction. That makes the system

spk_0 worse. More sensitive. It's on high alert. Small doses and then build those doses up and

spk_0 desensitize the back pain. Works perfectly well. The athlete has this been years that

spk_0 athlete not had back pain, chronic low back pain ever since. Completely different. Again,

spk_0 I'm showing you wildly different examples here because I want you to understand, in my opinion,

spk_0 this is a ubiquitous physiological thing. This is not specific to HRV, specific to the nervous system.

spk_0 It seems to be just a renowned physiological principle. It carries a ton of weight.

spk_0 This looks a lot of different ways. I'm just going to give you some samples.

spk_0 The research is going to show you most of the time practices in this area. You're going to

spk_0 start to see changes in three to four weeks. You should feel noticeable changes, but it won't be a

spk_0 week. It won't be a day. Three to four weeks seems to be the number. The biggest impact seems to

spk_0 come around the six to eight week mark consistently dosing for that long past eight weeks.

spk_0 Don't see as much continued progress. What oftentimes happens is you can whatever you're doing,

spk_0 you can back it down from doing it once or twice every day to maybe two or three times a week.

spk_0 You're about a maintenance dosage from there. That's what my daughter is with her cashews.

spk_0 She has a little bit of cashews a couple of times a week and that keeps her immune system totally

spk_0 at bay. As far as we understand it, if we were to do that, pull the cashews away for a couple of

spk_0 months, she might actually regress all the way back to the beginning. Again, some analogy that

spk_0 helps help there. If you were to think about this from a growing muscle perspective, nobody in

spk_0 their right mind would go do one workout and then go to bed that night and go, my biceps aren't

spk_0 even bigger. This stuff sucks. It doesn't work. Strength training is a joke. It's fake.

spk_0 Woke up the next day. My arms aren't any bigger. You just know that doesn't work, right?

spk_0 But yet we expect the same thing to happen when we do breath work. I've been doing it for two days.

spk_0 Nothing happened. My HRV score is the same. Sure. Of course it is. This is a system approach. This

spk_0 is a decentralization. You're reframing. You're building a new road here. It's going to take several

spk_0 weeks. That's where the benefit comes. If you feel better right now when you do it, great. That

spk_0 was an acute thing. But we're trying to get to chronic changes, right? So we want to be active now

spk_0 so that it can be passive later. What that means is during these first four to eight weeks,

spk_0 it's work. It's a lot. You're going to have to dedicate 10 to 15 minutes a day of doing something

spk_0 that you're not going to have to feel that much better in doing. But if you do this appropriately,

spk_0 we reset this baseline, then you can be on to maintenance dosage and not have to actively do

spk_0 this so much. There's a bunch of examples for you. I'm going to go through a handful right now.

spk_0 And again, I've intentionally tried to choose these from a wide variety of activities. So let's dive

spk_0 into them. Very first one we're going to start with is exercise. You know about the

spk_0 a whoremedic stressor effects of exercise, right? You break it down to build it up. Not exactly

spk_0 what happens, but that's what hormis is. Small insult come back better. We saw this with cold.

spk_0 You get really, really cold. You dive in a sympathetic drive, which then has this compensatory response

spk_0 into parasympathetic. Same thing here. Same thing else. You can look across the research. I've got

spk_0 some papers specifically I pulled up that'll be in the show notes. Strength training. Low intensity

spk_0 cardiovascular training, high intensity intervals, all of it works. If you want to directly compare

spk_0 them, looks like high intensity interval training seems to be the best for this specific marker.

spk_0 Same time. If you're doing max effort, high intensity intervals every single day, you're going to run

spk_0 into a hole. You're going to run into a wall and it's going to go down eventually. So dose appropriately.

spk_0 We use a little bit of all of it. If we feel like somebody's doing way too much high intensity work,

spk_0 we will pull it back and HRV will improve respiratory rate will come down. Resting heart rate will

spk_0 come down. I've seen that more times than I can count. That said, if you're not exercising at all,

spk_0 or you're exercising a little bit or a moderate amount, or you don't go that high of intensity very

spk_0 often, we will see the same positive responses by adding high intensity training, whether that's

spk_0 higher intensity strength training, higher intensity interval training, or cardiovascular training.

spk_0 Same thing. So this is just about the right dose for the right overall experience.

spk_0 Totally dependent upon your lifestyle and sleep and nutrition and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,

spk_0 so not a one size fits all answer here, but pay attention to those things. So overall exercise wins

spk_0 and this has been again, documented so many times, I can't even count. Next one on that stop is breath

spk_0 work. Remember earlier, when you exercise more CO2, so you breathe more. So when you start thinking

spk_0 about it, what is structured breath work doing? It's kind of like manipulating a little bit of a lower

spk_0 level amount of exercise. It makes sense. The same physiology happens. This same basic benefits.

spk_0 It's really consistent. The framework we used to think about it is in three basic steps. If we're

spk_0 going to implement a specific breathing protocol for somebody, here's how we do it. Again, for these

spk_0 particular purposes, number one, before we actually put somebody on a breathing program,

spk_0 we reduce a rousal. I said this a while ago now, but this is actually step number one. Before you have

spk_0 to go through this meditation or intentional breath work protocol, we just got to reduce the

spk_0 sense for input. We have seen this a lot. Go for a walk in nature, no podcast, no music,

spk_0 not as much time. Don't you can't wake up in the morning and immediately go to your heavy metal

spk_0 music, work for 15 hours, come home, answer emails, and then fall asleep. You can, because you burn

spk_0 a lot of energy, you're going to be tired, but that's going to keep you in a pretty high state of

spk_0 rousal. So I'm telling you right now, if you want to do breath work, you're into it cool. We've had

spk_0 a lot of people who just don't like it. I'd be totally candid with you. I'm not the biggest fan

spk_0 myself personally. Always feels good, always works, but it's not like on my high list of things I

spk_0 enjoy doing every day. And so I would rather just be like, man, I need some recovery. It's easier

spk_0 for me to just reduce physical rousal, give me some more quiet time, no more sensory input for the day.

spk_0 That'll take care of most of it. If that's not enough, the next step we go to is more time doing

spk_0 nasal only breathing. Close your mouth, breathe through your nose, whether this means you tape your

spk_0 mouth close while you're working, or you go for a walk and you're breathing only through your nose,

spk_0 or you're doing some or all or any portion of your exercise with nasal only breathing. I don't

spk_0 really care. It activates a diaphragm more. It tends to on itself slow respiratory rate down because

spk_0 you can't move air like you can. You will notice hyperventilation through your nose when you won't

spk_0 necessarily notice hyperventilation through your mouth. You'll feel that. You'll hear that that

spk_0 would be very different than coming through your mouth. And we also know that nasal breathing is

spk_0 more parasympathetic on itself. So by doing that, reducing a rousal and then forcing people into

spk_0 some nasal only breathing time, this basically takes care of all of our problems. If you like or want

spk_0 to still need to do more things, pass that at that point, we will instill a specific breathwork protocol

spk_0 and it could look a bunch of different ways. But again, here are some samples intuitively here.

spk_0 Just make your breath do what you want to feel like. What's that mean? Let's say you're trying to go

spk_0 up more energy. You're failing with tarjik or lack of motivation and you're down and you're not

spk_0 breathing very much and everything that heart rates low and energy is low. Think about what would

spk_0 your breath look like if you were at a high energy state and then do that. Force your breath to do

spk_0 something. And as I talked about earlier, your physiology will respond to match it. This is

spk_0 hyperventilation. Breathe more. Any of you have ever done hyperventilation breathwork. You'll know

spk_0 within a few seconds tingling in your arms, you might start sweating. Temperature goes up really

spk_0 acutely. So just do that. Just hyperventilate. If you're in the opposite and you're trying to come down,

spk_0 just don't breathe as much. Tons of protocols, yeah, extended exhale, sure, sure, sure. But the basic

spk_0 concept is slow your breath work down. That's as complicated as it has to be. If you want individual

spk_0 protocols, cool, fine, got to. But that is the top blind strategy here. Most of the research and most

spk_0 practitioners who are effective at this are going to use a combination within one protocol.

spk_0 So you're going to do not just only extended exhales, not just slowing your your breath rate down,

spk_0 not just speeding it up, but you're going to use a combination to develop that harmatic stress

spk_0 so if you want to truly down regulate, you can just simply slow your breathing down.

spk_0 But actually within one session, a combination of slower and faster and slower and faster

spk_0 will lead to that harmatic response. And if you finish especially on low, it's been our experience

spk_0 and the research would support this. You're going to oftentimes see more of a parasympathetic response

spk_0 than if you were to just do parasympathetic alone. So most of the time we're looking for a combination

spk_0 of up and down for the same reasons that we talked about with exercise. In other words,

spk_0 conflicts of interest here. I am a board member. No pay here for a nonprofit. I called the health

spk_0 and human performance foundation. I've been a part of this group for many years. It was one of

spk_0 the founding members. I'm bringing that up because that group led by Tanya Bentley recently published

spk_0 a phenomenal review article. We'll link it in the show notes. But I want to share with you what they

spk_0 found. They were looking directly at the relationship between breathwork for stress and anxiety.

spk_0 What do we know? In that review, they found I think 72 papers and something like 75 or 80%

spk_0 of the papers found that the breathwork helped. So just on a surface, if we want to say like,

spk_0 this breathwork actually helped for anxiety and stress, I think pretty clearly the vast majority

spk_0 of time it does. But what was really interesting that Tanya did there is she started breaking down the

spk_0 papers and saying, well, what was true among the papers that worked and what was true among the

spk_0 papers that didn't and can we glean anything from that? And the answer was yes. So here we go.

spk_0 There were a handful of things. In fact, five things specifically that were common among all those

spk_0 papers that showed it worked. And here they are. Number one, they avoided fast only breathing practices.

spk_0 I know these are very popular. People love the the max inhalation, exhalation stuff. They like

spk_0 hyperventilation breathing. If your goal is to try to reduce stress and anxiety chronically,

spk_0 pretty clear evidence at this point, that alone will not do it. Doesn't mean you can't hyperventilate,

spk_0 doesn't mean it can't be part of your practice. But if your only practice is chronic hyperventilate

spk_0 or consistent hyperventilation, probably not going to be effective for reducing your stress and anxiety

spk_0 long term. Number two, the breath practice needs to be longer than five minutes. Number three,

spk_0 generally needs to be human guided. So people that do it by themselves, initially,

spk_0 probably not the best strategy, whether you're physically in a room with somebody that doesn't seem

spk_0 to matter. But you need to have somebody coaching you through something at some point, especially

spk_0 initially. Number four, it takes multiple sessions per week. You can't do this once in a while.

spk_0 You can do it and feel that acute effect, but it won't have that carryover chronic benefit.

spk_0 Number five, there need to be a little bit more of longer term practices. This is that four

spk_0 to six to eight week thing. So if we're to recap that, if you're using

spk_0 non-exclusively hyperventilation, you're doing it more than five minutes, ideally multiple times per day,

spk_0 someone that knows what they're doing has designed it. And you're giving yourself four to five,

spk_0 six weeks. You got about a 70 to 80% chance that it will meaningfully and clinically improve your

spk_0 anxiety and your stress. That's some framework for breath protocols should work. Most of that

spk_0 will take care of HRV, CO2 tolerance, resting heart rates, and respiratory rate. The next big

spk_0 category I want to talk about are what are called biofeedback mechanisms. There's a lot of things here,

spk_0 tons of research. I've actually been tinkering with this stuff for probably 15 years or so at this

spk_0 point. I want to categorize them for today's conversation in the two main areas. One, what I'll call

spk_0 internal, and the other that are called external. So the internal ones are when you're trying to

spk_0 have that interoception. You're trying to pay attention to your heart rate. And I'm intentionally

spk_0 telling you to slow your breathing down. So that's an internal focus. External is when you're actually

spk_0 watching your physiology on some screen. And you're just trying to make that thing improve.

spk_0 So I'm not telling you how to do it. I'm telling you what I want the response to be. And you're

spk_0 using that direct visual feedback to make alterations. Both are great. They're a little bit different.

spk_0 And there's a lot of tools within them. So getting a starter with a handful that I'll call

spk_0 internals. And these ones are free or close to it. The very first one is any sort of hypoxic

spk_0 exposure. I've talked about that earlier. Hold your breath. The Valsalva maneuver.

spk_0 Anything like that. This will give you an acute change. And I'll absolutely reset you. It will

spk_0 change your subjective feeling by simply holding your breath. If you want to cue that to some

spk_0 physical exercise, like the Valsalva, or you want to do jumping jacks or pushups or something,

spk_0 you'd be surprised. But a very short burst of holding your breath combined with physical activity

spk_0 for a couple of seconds can change perception pretty immediately. And I'm calling this biofeedback

spk_0 because you're going to feel it. You're going to do it. I'm telling you to do something to your body.

spk_0 One that are more chronic though, which is what we're trying to get into now.

spk_0 Is a cascade of them. One that we've used a lot is actually a meditation app, if you will,

spk_0 called Waking Up. This is by Sam Harris. There are plenty of ways to learn

spk_0 a meditation. There are many different strategies for it. But I'll highlight this one because we've

spk_0 used a lot as well as because it is a progressive system. So you can kind of take it

spk_0 follow the course. And if you don't know anything about meditation, the lessons are pretty simple

spk_0 and small and it kind of walks you through it. I've personally been paying for Waking Up for many

spk_0 years. We've given it to lots of clients plenty of times. But I've only recently learned you can

spk_0 try it for free for 30 days by going to WakingUp.com slash Sheberman. That's my friend, Dr. Andrew Heberman's

spk_0 sponsored his podcast over there. So you can try it all there. And I hope you enjoyed. It's

spk_0 truly phenomenal. We've used it a lot. And why, again, I'm saying that is we maybe sometimes

spk_0 someone's done breath work or they won't do breath work or they're not interested in meditation.

spk_0 We can just send them that say, hey, this is the only thing we're going to ask you to do.

spk_0 And they can kind of get hooked on a little bit. They can gamify it. They can get there.

spk_0 Just focusing on paying attention to their breath, which is effectively what Sam is doing in that, of course,

spk_0 it's biofeedback. They have no connection with their breath. They don't understand what's going on.

spk_0 They're learning to connect to their breath. And it makes a big difference. That's why that's in biofeedback.

spk_0 Another super simple one is what Brian McKenzie calls gear one walking. So you're going to walk

spk_0 30 minutes, 45 minutes. We have one client who we have walking almost two hours a day like this.

spk_0 And why we're calling a biofeedback here is you're breathing through your nose, but you're

spk_0 breathing at a very specific and intentional breath rate. Two second inhale, two second exhale.

spk_0 That's a four second rhythm. What that matters is four multiplied by 15 is 60. That's 15 breaths per

spk_0 minute. Right? As I said earlier, 15 is kind of that respiratory line where we start to be concerned.

spk_0 If you're sleeping and you're breathing 15 breaths per minute, we think that's a little bit high.

spk_0 But if you're walking 15 breaths per minute is appropriate. So in doing this, what we're trying

spk_0 to do is match an appropriate breath rate with an appropriate, chloric expenditure. You're not having

spk_0 you do sprints or you're running where your heart rate's really, really high and you're under breathing.

spk_0 We're trying to retrain your baseline of saying this is what 15 should feel like. Now when you go

spk_0 back and sleep, bring it down to 10 or 12 or more of the cases. So it's a very intentional two in,

spk_0 two out. It feels very, very weird. It's nasal only. You can't listen to a podcast. You can't

spk_0 tick work emails when you're this. You have to be in that space and you got to spend some time

spk_0 there, but it is quite effective. Third one here we'll talk about is the cold exposure. Now what I

spk_0 didn't say earlier is how you can use cold exposure for biofeedback and retraining things like

spk_0 respiratory rate. Common one we have used many, many times. Get in your cold. Whether this is your

spk_0 shower or your bath or whatever you're doing. I'll give you the first say one to three breath cycles

spk_0 to kind of calm yourself down. And then past that, we're not sitting in here for a particular amount

spk_0 of time. What we're trying to do is take 10 breaths under control. We are using the cold

spk_0 to regulate breath. We are learning resilience. I put you in a very physiological and psychological

spk_0 stressful situation. Your hormones, your adrenaline, your heart rate will be flying up. And I'm asking you

spk_0 to control them despite the fact that they are wanting to go up. That is exactly how you build

spk_0 stress andoculation. That's walking you up to that line of low back pain, but not pushing you

spk_0 over the edge. You're not scared. You can get out anytime. There's no danger here. But your body

spk_0 will be screaming at you that this is a all those things. But you know, it's not. You might panic.

spk_0 You might do a bunch of different things. Fine. Get out. No problem. That's the game we're practicing.

spk_0 Just like Dr. Harris and waking up, the practice is not how much focus you can have on your breath.

spk_0 The practice is when you lose focus, can you bring it back? Same thing here. We're using the cold

spk_0 to intentionally put you out of control. And then we're saying, can you practice regaining control?

spk_0 That's all we're doing. Now, the things I just mentioned, I call biofeedback, but they're not

spk_0 the true scientific definition of that. What we're really getting into this field is stuff more

spk_0 specific to HRV based biofeedbacks. And so we'll we'll cover those things right now. A couple of

spk_0 examples. Many years ago, I had a colleague who's actually a sports psychologist who used biofeedback

spk_0 this way. He would put athletes in front of a computer screen and he would have a thing in

spk_0 electrode attached to their ear that was measuring things in a pulse oximeter. And they would look

spk_0 at a screen and it was say a picture of a landscape or maybe kids playing at a park. And it was all

spk_0 in black and white. And he would not tell them anything, but he was simply say, make that picture

spk_0 turn into color. And they're staring at a screen and like, what? And then all of a sudden,

spk_0 the screen would start filling in color. And then it would go away back to black white. And it

spk_0 would take people a while once they realized, oh, wow, when I bring my heart rate down,

spk_0 I get more colors on the screen. And so they would bring their heart rate down and the

spk_0 colors to start filling in. And then they would get excited. And then the colors would go away.

spk_0 And so they're not paying attention. He's not telling them bring your heart rate down. Stop

spk_0 breathing as much. Extended exhales. He's asking for an external solution. And they are figuring

spk_0 out internally how to get there. Awesome. Awesome. And then there's lots of different tools and

spk_0 technologies for that. But an awesome way of developing biofeedback that way. Really simple

spk_0 examples of stuff we've used for many years are things like a weight belt. It had 20 bucks on

spk_0 Amazon. You put this strap around your stomach and you can actually see increased proprioception

spk_0 in your core muscles. Lots of research on this. If you take a weight belt and you cinch it down

spk_0 really, really tight and you go to lift your weights. There's been many studies show a reduction

spk_0 in core strength and response to that. You make it so tight. Think of it this way. The core muscles

spk_0 turn off. They don't have to do their work because the belt's doing it. That said, if you put

spk_0 the belt on just kind of a little bit, you can see increases in core strength. Why? Because you

spk_0 give you a little bit of a tactile feedback. You know that you're not pressing hard with your core.

spk_0 You're not activating it in all spots because you can feel the belt pressing back up against it

spk_0 when you're contracting hard. So because of that, it gives somebody a biofeedback reminder, a

spk_0 tactile feedback. Keep your core engaged. Keep your core engaged. And so by keeping the

spk_0 engaged more often, you get more of a training effect. Same exact principle can be applied here.

spk_0 You can put people through a specific breath protocol or you can put a weight belt on them.

spk_0 Put a bigger one. A lot of ones we'll use are fat burning stomach belts. The ones you put on,

spk_0 you're plastic on them and they're there to help people think they're going to have a six pack.

spk_0 But what it's just doing is giving you that feedback. You don't necessarily have to give them a

spk_0 program. You can just say, hey, where are those for 20 minutes? Where are those for a couple of hours?

spk_0 You'll start to feel, man, I'm not breathing through my core. I'm breathing through my shoulders.

spk_0 I'm breathing through my neck. So number one, we're starting to make improvement and progress

spk_0 and breathing mechanics. It also generally tends to slow people's breath rate down because you feel

spk_0 you'll hear that belt crunching and moving and going back and forth and you're like, geez,

spk_0 that's happened a lot and you tend to just slow it down. Simple biofeedback, easy solutions,

spk_0 no complicated schemes at all, very effective. For those of you that want more structure and

spk_0 specific protocols to follow, this last one will get you really excited. There's a whole bunch of

spk_0 research on what's called resonant breathing. This is HRV biofeedback resonant. There's lots of

spk_0 different terms for it. But if you Google that phrase, this is what will come up. Same goal,

spk_0 trying to give you more ability to recognize and control your HRV.

spk_0 I mean, recent meta-analysis found very positive benefits for self-reported stress and anxiety.

spk_0 Other papers have looked at this and found positive benefits for cognitive function and depression.

spk_0 It has the same basic prescription of the other breathwork. You probably got to do it for about

spk_0 20 minutes per day. It takes four or five weeks, ideally morning, night, morning and night,

spk_0 and so that stuff is fixed. But what is specific about this? It's really, really clever. A lot of

spk_0 the research here came from a guy named Paul Lear, L-E-H-R-E-R, I believe, at a Rutgers. In general,

spk_0 this resonance is supposed to be consistent throughout life. Now, I don't know if more research

spk_0 comes out that that'll change, but that is as far as we understand it seems to be about the same.

spk_0 So this resonance frequency is something internal to you in which your respiratory rate

spk_0 starts to match up with your HRV and your heart rate. Here's what I mean. It's really,

spk_0 really clever stuff. It's just like really fascinating research. I used that optimal HRV

spk_0 app I told you earlier, five bucks a month. The studies oftentimes will use another app called

spk_0 Paste Breathing. That is just simply an app that helps you watch the app and breathe in and out

spk_0 at the right time. All right. So on that optimal HRV app, you can do this test that I'm about to

spk_0 take you through as well as the training. It's why I like it so much. So I can send people that

spk_0 pull or strap. I can send them this app, say, do this resonance test. And then our training program

spk_0 is based upon the results of this particular test. It's telling you how long to inhale and exhale.

spk_0 Remember earlier where I've said kind of like five in five out or six in six out. It's a good

spk_0 starting place. That's true. But the individual responses people is different. And this is a

spk_0 phenomenal way to figure out which cadence is best for you. The test takes about 12 minutes.

spk_0 And effectively what happens is you start at a breath rate of about seven breaths per minute.

spk_0 Now depending on the study you'll find, most will actually start you at about six and a half.

spk_0 I think the optimal HRV app. Remember quickly starts you six and a half. And then some have

spk_0 gone all the way down to as low as three breaths per minute. But most are going to start you at like

spk_0 six and a half breaths per minute and drop you to four or so breaths per minute. He's exactly

spk_0 what I'm talking about. You breathe for two minutes at this specific cadence. Let's say six and a half

spk_0 seconds in six and a half seconds out. And you do that for a total of two minutes. While you're doing

spk_0 that it's measuring your HRV. Okay. What is trying to identify is when your HRV gets the highest.

spk_0 So you're breathing in and out at seven a six and a half breaths per minute. And then you go

spk_0 from six and a half to six. So every two minutes you lower your breathing rate by half a breath per

spk_0 minute. Now for some people when they go from six and a half to six their HRV goes down.

spk_0 And some people it goes up. And then you go from six to five and a half to five. All the way down

spk_0 like I said, someone's down as three. At some point in that spectrum your HRV will be its highest.

spk_0 Where that lands is totally dependent upon the person. So let's say we do the test and my optimal HRV

spk_0 happens at six breaths per minute. And yours happens at four. That's that's called our resonance

spk_0 frequency. I now know you will get the highest HRV right now when you breathe at four breaths

spk_0 per minute. So then you're going to spend more time breathing at four breaths per minute where I'm

spk_0 going to do six. That makes sense. Right. So we're looking at how can I actually optimize my

spk_0 inhalation exhalation strategy to get the highest impact on my HRV? Well it turns out this

spk_0 strategy is highly effective. I'll go over more of those details here in one moment. But when

spk_0 we're defining high HRV, it's really actually important that the highest HRV score like you're

spk_0 going to see on your wearables is not what we're necessarily talking about here. That there's three

spk_0 criteria that are used to determine best HRV score in that. Yeah, that RMS S thing is the lowest one.

spk_0 Highest on this is what's called low frequency power. This is another way of kind of defining and

spk_0 measuring your vagal nerve power. This is parameter. This is a thing we're optimizing for rather than

spk_0 that actual HRV score. Another really interesting one is looking at your HRV amplitude. I've talked

spk_0 about that before. It's the difference between kind of your maximum heart rate and your minimum heart

spk_0 rate in one breath cycle. Remember when you breathe in, heart rate goes up when you breathe out. It

spk_0 goes down. And so let's say when you took a breath in, you went to 80 and you took a breath out and

spk_0 went to 40. 80 minus 40 is 40. So therefore your amplitude is 40. One thing that you'll see is

spk_0 people that are really well trained physically have a really big amplitude. People can go like a

spk_0 well trained individual cardiovascular fit individual might have a resting heart rate of 40.

spk_0 And they might jump from 40 to like 90. So that amplitude to be 50 or someone who's not very

spk_0 physically fit might go from 60 to 70. The amplitude is 10. I know I'm throwing a lot of numbers and

spk_0 most of you are listening. So that's hard to follow along. But just the amplitude, the difference,

spk_0 your ability of your heart rate to go for really high to really low within one breath cycle is a

spk_0 positive thing. That is an indicative of a really, really resilient nervous system. And remember

spk_0 from the very beginning, that's what we're talking about today. The HRV score itself again. Cool. It's

spk_0 on there, but it's the bottom left. So that's what we're optimizing for. And I needed to draw that

spk_0 little technical detail out there because I wanted to make sure that it's landing so deeply in your

spk_0 brain that we're trying to go off that resilience, not the score. And those other two measures,

spk_0 that frequency power and that heart rate amplitude are the things that are more important than just that

spk_0 HRV score. So more to be said about the resident breathing thing, but it's just really phenomenal

spk_0 area that we love. I wish I had something to do with those companies. I don't, but they're just

spk_0 phenomenal products. So I wanted to make sure you had some specific example of something you could go

spk_0 try that I personally used. And then I like last thing I wanted to mention. And this is what some of

spk_0 you might need to be outrageous. But again, full disclosure here, I have one of these things. I don't

spk_0 have anything to do with the company. But this is something that I've seen pop up a lot. I was just

spk_0 traveling around the country recently and saw a bunch of different professional and other groups

spk_0 using it. I have one at my home. And this is a chair called the shift wave. It is $10,000. But it

spk_0 is phenomenal. You lay in this chair. It has haptic feedback. So it will vibrate. It has sensory

spk_0 control. You what you're seeing what you're hearing. And it has a whole bunch of programs. It will

spk_0 directly measure your heart rate and HRV. And you can do guided biofeedback through again, movement

spk_0 through light and sound. And I bunched different strategies. I've used it a bunch. We use it a lot

spk_0 with, again, special groups of individuals. And it's been really impressive. So those are you

spk_0 that just want to know what the best in the world are doing behind the scenes. I can't say that

spk_0 everyone's doing it. But I know some are. And it is really pretty awesome. And so there you go.

spk_0 Check out the shift wave chair. If you'd like, if that is completely ridiculous, you'd like

spk_0 $10,000 for a chair. I totally get it. And so we'll move on to our last couple of things that

spk_0 I just couldn't leave off the table. No good podcast can be done without talking briefly. And

spk_0 I do mean very briefly about supplements. First and foremost, what we're talking about here

spk_0 mostly are acute benefits. Take caffeine, take a stimulant. You're going to change sympathetic

spk_0 drive. And you all know that. But what's more interesting. And I drove into a lot of was,

spk_0 what do we know about chronic benefits? So if you're in that hole and HRV is way down for

spk_0 a long time, can supplements do much to bring you out of that hole and bring that HRV back up?

spk_0 Bring that respiratory rate down or however we're defining autonomic control.

spk_0 The short answer is not really. Well, maybe they can, but there's not a lot of evidence to support

spk_0 that. Closest thing I found was there was actually several review articles and meta analyses

spk_0 on omega-3s. Benefit doesn't seem to be huge. We know a lot of positive benefits on omega-3s,

spk_0 but this doesn't seem to be a massive one. But there's some indication that there's some

spk_0 help here. So that was pretty cool. Other ones that we'll see, I actually found a study on

spk_0 watermelon juice. Now this may surprise you, but people don't realize that citrulline and

spk_0 arginine, that nitric oxide capacity and and watermelons is pretty high. So there's a pretty

spk_0 cool study. They actually did it in combination with like an oral glucose tolerance test.

spk_0 And what they're effectively found was it doesn't improve HRV, but what it does do is it blunts

spk_0 the HRV response when you dose them with something that should normally compromise it.

spk_0 It's stress andoculation. In fact, if you look at other things like ashwagandha,

spk_0 very similar types of research. So it's not that these things will take your resting HRV and

spk_0 make it get better. But what it will do is it helps you not be as responsive to a stressful

spk_0 stimuli. That is the true benefit. So whether this is high intensity exercise or a psychological

spk_0 stressor, things like watermelon juice or ashwagandha may blunt how much of an impact those things

spk_0 make on you. So kind of stress andoculators, if you will, but they're not really recovering

spk_0 you from that hole. But were they have mentioned, nonetheless? A final one that I thought were you

spk_0 talking about was actually review article on human studies that found an association between

spk_0 low vitamin D and B12 and low HRV. This was not a randomized controlled trial. This was not an

spk_0 intervention study, but it was interesting nonetheless. So I'll keep my eye out for more work in this

spk_0 area. Maybe we'll see that maybe if you take people who are low and get in vitamin D and B12,

spk_0 you will actually see a chronic improvement in HRV over time. Maybe you won't, not sure.

spk_0 I'd be willing to bet if you take and just give people who are normal in vitamin D and B12,

spk_0 those supplements, it probably won't do much. But we'll have to wait and see how the data pan out.

spk_0 So we've covered a lot of ground today. I think we should finish on a little bit of a wrap up.

spk_0 Want to keep this stuff in proper context. Remember that a hormesis. We want to stimulate,

spk_0 but we don't want to annihilate. You want to touch the boundaries. You want to desensitize,

spk_0 but we don't want to push people so far into an area where it actually creates a greater stress

spk_0 response, a greater protective mechanism. Small bump and uncomfortableness gives you a nice rebound.

spk_0 That's what we're looking for. But a huge trauma is not helpful or potentially even sends us

spk_0 backwards. There are a couple of types of people in this world in this regard. I call them big

spk_0 feelers. People that have that high interception, they pay attention to themselves too much and

spk_0 they cause themselves way too much stress because they're hyper focused on every little thing.

spk_0 In that case, maybe don't use that technology. Use more of the feeling type of stuff or don't do

spk_0 anything. Pull them off of a lot of these things. And then you have the dull knives is what I call

spk_0 them. People that just have no contact with their body whatsoever. Maybe you want to use more of

spk_0 these technological solutions to get more calibrated and more aware. Other big conclusion we talked

spk_0 about is overall, the first step is just reducing a rousal. This is a free thing you can do.

spk_0 It's probably going to have multiple benefits across multiple areas of your life. And so before we

spk_0 start worrying about specific protocols or supplements or anything like that, let's just start by

spk_0 reducing our overall stress cup. Number three, find things that work best for you.

spk_0 This is feel your recovery cup. This is something I haven't said yet. But it's really what I've

spk_0 been getting at the whole time. It's not enough always to just reduce stimuli. Sometimes you got

spk_0 to actively recover. Most people don't think about actively recovering until they desperately need

spk_0 it. So not being stressed is not the same as fully recovered. Spent time figuring out what hits

spk_0 it for you. I know some of the things that land for me. And they're not the same for my wife. They're

spk_0 not the same for my family members or some of the others I work with. What really fills your

spk_0 recovery bucket up? Spent time tinkering with that and then use it honestly quite often in as

spk_0 much each bus can. Final thing I'll say here is don't expect those acute solutions, whether it's

spk_0 the supplements or the thermal emergence or the motivational quote or the music. Don't expect those

spk_0 acute things to fix chronic problems. When you use the chronic problem solution stuff, probably looking

spk_0 at more than five minutes a day, ideally every day if not multiple times a day, at least for the first

spk_0 four to six weeks, pass that. You can back it down maybe even as little as just a couple of times

spk_0 per week and you should be in a pretty good spot. Want to finish it up by giving some thank yous

spk_0 as people have mentioned several times now. Thank you, Dr. J. Wiles. J. You are phenomenal. You

spk_0 were so helpful here. We had a lot of conversations and I deeply appreciate your help there.

spk_0 Jill Miller, I mentioned in your book, Body By Breath, covered a lot of these concepts. It was also

spk_0 incredibly helpful. Emily and Brian, it shift adapt. And then somebody else, Martin McPhillamy,

spk_0 who I haven't had a chance to speak about yet, but done a lot of great work in this area. So

spk_0 all you people, thank you so much for your help. I appreciate all of you for listening. I hope you

spk_0 have some new skills, some new things to try, some direct tools. Some may be more interesting to a few of

spk_0 you. Others may be less so. But either way, I would really love to hear feedback. Which ones did

spk_0 you like? Which ones have you had different experiences with? And if any of you do take the time to

spk_0 go try something. Comments on YouTube would be a great place to fill me in on what work, what didn't,

spk_0 and any other feedback you have. Thank you so much. And I look forward to doing it again.

spk_0 Thank you for joining for today's episode. My goal as always is to share exciting scientific insights

spk_0 that help you perform at your best. If the show resonates with you and you want to help ensure

spk_0 this information remains free and accessible to anyone in the world, there are a few ways that you

spk_0 can support. First, you can subscribe to the show on YouTube, Spotify and Apple. And on Apple

spk_0 and Spotify, you can leave us up to a five star review. Subscribing and leaving a review really

spk_0 does help us a lot. Also, please check out our sponsors. The show would not exist without them

spk_0 and their exceptional products and services. Finally, you can share today's episode with a friend

spk_0 who you think would enjoy it. If you have any content questions or suggestions, please put those

spk_0 in the comments section on YouTube. I really do try my best to read them all and to see what you have

spk_0 to say. I use my Instagram and ex-profiles also exclusively for scientific communication. So those

spk_0 are great places to follow along for more learning. My handle is at Dr. Andy Galpin on both platforms.

spk_0 We also have an email newsletter that distills all of our episodes in the most actionable takeaways.

spk_0 We have newsletters on how to improve fitness in a few of you to max, how to build muscle and

spk_0 strength, and much more. To subscribe to the newsletter, just go to performpodcast.com and click

spk_0 newsletter. It's completely free and we do not share your email with anybody. Thank you for

spk_0 listening and never forget in the famous words of Bill Bowerman. If you have a body, you are an athlete.

Enhance Your Physical & Mental Resilience (HRV, Respiratory Rate, RHR)

Interactive Transcript

Topics Covered

Related Episodes

Yusuf/ Cat Stevens' "Tea for the Tillerman"

Where To Get Royalty-Free Podcast Music

What’s Going on With the New U.S. Sunscreen Filter? Plus: Selena’s Wedding and an Update on That Bubble Campaign

Welcome to the Slumber Party — V/H/S/Halloween

Share Episode