48:14
11/06/2024
Episode 13

Epigenetic Hacks for Longevity: Strategies to Thrive at 62

In this episode of Everything Epigenetics, host Hannah Went sits down with Dave Pascoe, a retired network security architect who’s redefining the way we think about aging. Despite being 62, Dave has been able to have a lower “biological age” and slow pace of aging, a testament to his dedication to health optimization, epigenetics, and biological tuning. Known for ranking among the top contenders in the Rejuvenation Olympics leaderboard, Dave’s journey offers invaluable insights into affordable and effective longevity practices.

In this podcast you’ll learn about:

– Dave’s routines and habits for maintaining youthful epigenetic markers
– The Rejuvenation Olympics: what it is and how Dave has made his mark
– How personalized routines and lifestyle changes can slow down aging

About this Guest

Dave Pascoe

Dave Pascoe is a Rejuvenation Olympics leaderboard contender, biohacker, runner, antiaging , longevity, and P90X enthusiasts.

Website

Twitter (X)

Instagram

Introduction to Everything Epigenetics and Dave Pascoe

Welcome to the Everything Epigenetics podcast, where we discuss DNA regulation and the insights it can tell you

about your health. I’m Hannah Went, and I’m the founder of Everything Epigenetics.

I really interesting episode for you today. It is, different than what I traditionally do

Dave’s early experiences and what sparked his interest in health and wellness

with researchers or people who are maybe more involved

in the experimental or clinical space of epigenetics today.

My guest is Dave Pascoe. So Dave Pascoe is really known for,

doing a lot of epigenetic testing on himself and actually ranking among the top contenders in the Rejuvenation Olympics leaderboard.

We learn a lot about and have won personalized medicine in this episode with Dave.

I was super excited to sit down and talk to him about his journey. We actually dive into his story.

We go back to the beginning and talk about some of the early influences and experiences that sparked his interest in health and wellness.

He actually even started his AP genetic journey in 2012,

a little bit over ten years ago, which is really interesting considering these markers weren’t even able to be measured, until 2013.

We also talk about some turning points in his life that made him prioritizes health and some personal challenges

that motivated him to dive deeper into this field. We then really move and talk about the Rejuvenation Olympics,

which I don’t think I’ve ever talked about on my podcast before, and the goal of this, what it aims to achieve.

How it’s different from other longevity competitions and challenges. And then we also talk about Dave’s funny story.

That really got him inspired to participate in the Rejuvenation Olympics

and that initial spark that led him down this path. Also about his preparation and what he did, what he what he put into

Rejuvenation Olympics and its goals

in terms of, efforts to get ready for the Rejuvenation Olympics, talking about if he had a specific strategy or certain regimen that he followed.

He then gives us some more information about just his morning regimen, his afternoon,

regimen and kind of nighttime regimen. We talk a lot about this in an interesting way, where it’s just his lifestyle.

It’s his habitual routine. It’s how he lives his life. So he has an interesting take on it that I think you all well will enjoy.

Just a quick, introduction to my guest today. Dave, is is actually a recently retired network security architect and engineer.

He’s actually 62. I swear you will think he is like 38.

He looks and feels and behaves like a 38 year old he mentioned. And that’s because, according to some biological age

testing, Dave’s cellular age is actually 38. He also ranks, like I mentioned, among the top contenders on the leaderboard

for Jewish Nation Olympics with the pace of aging of 0.66, which for the past 12 months has actually placed him ahead of Brian Johnson.

Some say Dave’s approach to biohacking and longevity, costing him about $15,000 a year, is a lot more affordable and more attainable by the average person

compared to Brian Johnson, who spends about 2 million a year. And unlike Brian, what’s unique about Davis, he’s not vegan,

nor is he Clark restricted as well. So I’m loving this new kind of style of episode.

I hope I can get your feedback on it. I’d love to hear any of your thoughts if you want to comment in the sections

below. Now for my guest, Dave Pascoe.

Welcome to the Everything Epigenetics podcast, Dave. I’m excited to chat with you today.

I’m really excited to talk with you today. Thanks for having me. Of course, right before we hopped on, I mentioned

I’m really excited, but I’m also a little bit nervous. This is the first type of podcast

cast I’m really doing that has almost a different approach. So usually I’m speaking with, you know, PhD

researchers, epigenetics as it relates to maybe more of the science and almost like a futuristic way you can say,

just because it’s really hard to bridge the gap between the science that is happening in the laboratories all the way out to something tangible

or clinically applicable that clients, patients, providers can use. But I have Dave here today

who has been doing epigenetic testing for quite some time now. So I think it’s going to be more applicable to a broader audience.

So, Dave, I gave a quick introduction to you. I mentioned, you know, you’re a retired network

security architect, an engineer. And I even mentioned your chronological age,

and, your biological age and how you feel, how you behave.

Even more interesting. We we actually just met in person, like, a week before this recording at Rad Fest, too.

So it was great to see Dave in the flesh, and I get to know him even better.

But, would love to share a little bit more about you, Dave, if you want to give our listener, a little bit of an introduction.

Dave’s evening and morning routines supporting epigenetic health

Wow. Okay. So I have to apologize for that because I’m dealing with a head cold.

So my my voice is a little rough. Keeps going out, and my sinuses are pretty clogged, and so are my ears. So,

hopefully have the volume cranked up enough that I can actually hear what you’re asking me. Gosh, where do I begin?

I mean, you really left that wide open. Yeah. Maybe I’ll give you a little bit more targeted. Question two.

So when did you start your health journey? When did you start measuring epigenetics?

Let’s make it a little bit more, more relatable as well. If you could put a spin on that. Yeah.

So my health journey started like way earlier than that. But the epigenetics part probably started around 2012.

I was just training for my first marathon, and I thought I was like, Mr. Joe Cool, you know, like

Mr. Athlete doing my P90x and all that great stuff. And I heard about this little test for telomeres

and that, you know, telomeres got shorter as we got as we get older. And so I was kind of curious to see what my telomere length would be.

And I really expected the results to come back and say I had the telomeres of a 20 year old right.

So I got the test and I was shocked because my telomeres were the length of a 68 year old, and I had just turned 50.

So that obviously was not good and I was kind of shocked. So I wanted to know, “What is it that I wasn’t doing correctly?”

Because here I thought I was, you know, getting good sleep, I was getting great exercise and thought I was eating good

as far as you know, standards go of what good eating is, so it really thought I was doing everything right,

but obviously I was missing something huge. And, it was the epigenetic piece that I was not even aware existed.

So I did a consult, a consult with the, the staff physician for that particular company,

and they started asking me questions about my lifestyle. And I’m like, okay.

I mean, I knew lifestyle, like the exercise and how I eat and that kind of stuff, how I sleep.

I knew that had something to do with it, but they wanted to know, like, what was my life like? I thought that was a weird question.

So I started explaining that, yeah, I have a really stressful job as a network security engineer, and, oh yeah, I’m

also taking care of, you know, both of my parents who have cancer. So I’m the sole care provider for them.

And, I’m doing P90x training for my first marathon, and they’re like, whoa, whoa whoa, wait wait, stop.

Okay, so we’ve seen this before. We’ve seen this before in caretakers of elderly parents

that, you know, the telomeres are shorter because of all the stress that that entails. We’ve seen it, you know, with really hard charging people

that work very stressful jobs. We’ve seen it with endurance athletes who tend to run themselves down

and get shorter telomeres as a result. And of course, the you know, the P90x is very extreme.

So we know that’s not really helping you with everything else. So basically, I was slowly,

killing myself with stress, and I wasn’t really aware of it cause I was never actually coming down from one stress to the other.

I just went immediately from one to the next to the next. And their recommendations were that I, you know, do some stress mitigation

strategies like yoga, Pilates, things that I had left because the things I used to do.

But before life got in the way and all the stuff started accumulating, I used to do, but they sort of fell off.

I forgot about them. So yeah, I had to start implementing those and just really getting a handle on my,

Dave’s “AHA” moment and lifestyle changes

my inner zen, you know, my peace… Yeah, I love the story.

Thanks for sharing. So you really just took us back to the beginning of your health and wellness journey.

And I would say 2012, that seems pretty early to, in my opinion.

Right? I think telomeres are still something that’s really popularized to today. We now know we have some better predictors of,

quantifying, your, your all cause mortality morbidity like the, the epigenetic, more related test.

But it seems like there are a lot of influences and experiences that that sparked that interest in health and wellness.

Like you, you probably felt you were being super healthy by doing the P90x. The training.

And obviously being a caregiver is such a hard job. And then you took this test. That’s something tangible.

You look at it and you’re like, oh, wow, that’s not good. I actually have to make a change.

So was it then that conversation that you had with the medical provider at the Telomere length company?

Was that like the specific turning point where you were like, “Okay, I need to prioritize my health”,

I need to become Zen or find that that inner peace was were there any other challenges,

you would say, that motivated you to dive deeper into this field? Well, as a kid, myself and my brother and sister,

we were always sick kids and I didn’t know that that was anything unusual.

I just thought everybody was like that. So we always had something, and I had eczema on my hands that were was really bad.

I didn’t realize that was an autoimmune condition because they didn’t even know of such a thing. Back then, I was told that it was, not genetic, but,

but yeah, I guess it was when it was handed down from hereditary. Yeah, yeah, yeah, because my mom had eczema

when she was a kid, so they just said, that’s the reason why you have it. And then I would outgrow it,

and I did, but then eventually it turned on my thyroid. So, you know, my thought right then took a hit.

So there was all those things that, I mean, I never really considered because it just seemed normal. It seemed like everybody else had those conditions as well.

But I don’t know. I mean, as a kid, I was a weird kid. I was always looking at what successful people were doing in their lives,

and I would see people that were like, I don’t know, really successful in relationships, you know, like couples that just got along like best friends

and, you know, others that fought like cats and dogs and just couldn’t seem to get along, just bicker at each other all the time, or even,

you know, people that were wealthy and others that were struggling. And I wondered, like, what is it that make these people either

successful in these things or not successful? And health was one of those things as well,

because I would watch as people would age and I would see some people that age really gracefully, you know, just vitality, all kinds of energy.

They were just fantastic. They looked like older young people. And then there were those people that were way younger,

but they looked so much older, you know, they were just beat up and run down aches and pains and all kinds of things way before their time.

And so I started paying attention to what is it that these people are doing. You know what? All these people are having these bad results.

What are they doing in common? What are the people that are doing all the good things have in common?

So everywhere in my life, I’ve tried my best to emulate the things that I saw successful people doing.

And so when it came to like health and nutrition again, I thought I was doing everything right.

I mean, I eat lots of fruit and vegetables. But I also, you know, did a lot of McDonald’s and processed foods.

Mom loved to make things that were simple that came out of a box or a bag, you know, or canned whatever she could get her hands on.

Biohacking techniques and tools for longevity

That was just simple to make. We didn’t know that was a problem. Right? Yeah.

Yeah. Oh, I got chills kind of when you were saying that, when you’re like, oh, I just saw, you know, couples who were so loving

and others who would bicker and you know what, what it really successful people do for maybe like even a career standpoint and what they all had in common.

And it was kind of putting health as a priority or at the forefront. So, super, super interesting and I feel like I’m kind of going through

my own personal journey, and that way I’m just like a high functioning individual. I feel like I have a lot on my plate, but that’s all relative.

Like, doesn’t everyone have a lot on their plate? Right? It sometimes drives me nuts when people say they’re busy.

I mean, like, everyone’s busy, right? Everyone has their own life. You’re only as busy as you make yourself and what you actually choose to prioritize

in your life, whether it is, you know, work out in the middle of the day walking,

you know, taking ten, 20 minutes to sit in your car or maybe have a couch or sofa and your office where you can meditate and

take a step back. So I feel like I’m starting to learn how to work that into more of my

my daily routine and have made a couple steps in that direction. I’m curious, Dave, how you mentioned,

okay, then I realized I wasn’t doing the right thing. We’re walking through your health journey. You then had to find your your peace or kind of go back

maybe to those original ways of yoga. So, so what does that look like? What… What did that—maybe I don’t I don’t know what to call it,

maybe, like reawakening process, look like to you? Also, I just wanted to add to what you just said, that the,

the busyness, it really matters how you look at your busyness. Is your busyness stressing you out, or are you enjoying your busyness

because how you think about it is going to make all the difference in the world. So, when it comes to yoga, it’s more or less just trying to take your mind

off of all your daily stuff and maybe just let your mind go blank a little bit, just to let yourself breathe and decompress

and just let that stress all melt off. I ended up getting a sun and not too long after that,

and I could just go into my sauna and bliss out. I also started volunteering more at my church, which was my happy place.

So, that was wonderful because that helped take things off of my mind. And I had community and people that were pouring into me, and,

that helped tremendously to. So, yeah. And then I started learning to love running because I really hated running.

I was doing the marathon training, simply for charity. And it was not a I was not a marathoner prior to that.

In fact, I got 250 of us from my church that were nun runners to join in for,

it was Team World Vision. We were trying to raise money to build wells in Africa, so,

yeah. So that it was it was a great charity and that was the only reason why I was running. But I hated it. Yeah.

And that was not helping my, my stress level either. But once I finally found my groove and started

enjoying it, it made the whole experience so much better. And again, that stress that I was putting myself under by hating

Practical steps for longevity accessible to a broad audience

something finally just disappeared. And now I started to find ways to love it.

Yeah, it’s a mindset. It’s totally a mindset. I do not like running. I have a bad relationship with it right now.

I have a bad relationship working out my legs. I do—I love lifting. Cannot stand lifting, like doing squats and things like that.

But I’m trying to say, all right, like, I know I need to do these things. I will play maybe certain games with myself

or, you know, get more into that competitive nature of like, how quickly can I run a mile, a couple miles and, things like that.

So I’m changing my mindset around it and still struggle, still go back and forth. Right? But I notice when I look at it from a positive light,

number one, I’m actually like doing better at it, that thing. And then number two, like enjoying it as well and just not tying

like my performance to, how I feel like it’s just it is what it is, right? It’s not good or bad.

It’s just—yeah, the way it is. So, thanks for for shedding light on that.

You know, Dave, you’re you’re really interesting because,

you’re where I really understood and started to get to know you

is because you’re one of the top contenders, as I mentioned in the introduction on the leaderboard, we have with the Rejuvenation Olympics, right?

With the pace of aging, the DunedinPace clock of 0.66, which for the past 12 months has placed him

ahead of of Brian Johnson. And I know you have your your specific routine

which, which will dive into I want to learn all about what you’re doing from like an epigenetic lifestyle standpoint.

But I don’t know that I’ve even actually, on the podcast, introduce the idea of Rejuvenation Olympics.

I love to hear it from your standpoint, Dave. And what it is, how like how how you’re involved, how people can get involved.

Well, okay, so the Rejuvenation Olympics, as I understand it, is, what a partnership

between you guys and Brian Johnson to try to see who, who is aging the best is.

That’s right. Yeah, yeah, you’re exactly right. No, it’s as simple as that. I think people really make it, a lot more difficult.

But you’re right. So, Rejuvenation Olympics is is a way that we’re able to basically,

put everyone on a leader board on a fair playing field, to say, hey, here’s how people are doing in comparison to one another.

Those who consent, at least I think there’s a lot of maybe mistrusted data or information out there where on social media you would see

people saying, hey, I’m reversing my age by, you know, ten years or I’m, you know, 21 years younger biologically.

And that’s just not true. Like, I’ve never seen that happened. It can’t happen. It hasn’t been published on in a peer reviewed way

Reflections on balancing stress, mindset, and communityJoin us as we explore practical longevity strategies and learn how you, too, can take control of your health journey!

with the second or third generation type of clock. So this was kind of a way to say all right, what’s

one of the best epigenetic clocks out there? And can we actually form some healthy

competition around this and create a really nice community? I think Brian Johnson has done a wonderful job at that.

I think he’s done a great job at that. And continues to kind of build this theme of being able to push out our death date, so to speak.

As crazy as it sounds, and really focus on age Rejuvenation in a way.

So, it’s been really interesting to see, to see the growth of it. You know, we’re working on getting our Symphony Age up there as well.

That’s a epigenetic clock we just created with Yale, which is the aging of 11 different organ systems.

Actually had the creator of that clock, Raghav Sehgal on my, podcast as well, when it was named MOSAIC.

But same clock, Mosaic Symphony, in systems age, there are all different kind of iterations of that same outcome.

So, yeah, you know, it’s different maybe from other competitions or challenges in the sense that, it’s an ongoing competition.

We update the leaderboard now, I think every week now, every 24 hours, maybe it.

But yeah. Daily now. Yeah. We’ve changed some of the rules more, more recently. So now it’s automated.

Which gives people a little bit more insights. But now we have thousands and thousands of people who who have consented to it as well

So Dave, you’ve been doing this testing. You’ve been taking us long and your journey, you have a wonderful website and your regimen and everything posted on there.

But like, what inspired you to, like, actually participate? Because you still have to consent.

You still have to go through the process. You’re now getting like some podcast interviews.

You’re talking to people, right? You’re like a big name in the space now. Like, why did you want to be a part of this?

Well, I mean, to be honest, it was completely accidental. It was it was not intentional at all.

I just happened to have my third epigenetic test with two diagnostic at the time that I learned that

there was even a Rejuvenation Olympics at all, because I was using you guys. I was using, like an age,

GrimAge. I mean, really, I was using pretty much every epigenetic age test out there

to help validate for me that I was on the right track with the things that I’m doing.

And so just, I mean, just the fact that I had my results in my hand and I’m like, oh, there’s this cool competition, what’s this all about?

And then I’m looking at my results versus the guy who is number one on the leaderboard. And I’m like, wait, no, I’m misinterpreting these results.

Like, I’m beating this guy. Yeah, I can’t be. And so I submitted my results thinking that, you know,

somebody was going to come back and say, no, no, no, you’re misunderstanding. That’s you’re not beating Brian Johnson.

Or maybe I was beating Brian Johnson. Are they even going to allow me to beat Brian?

But I mean, to everybody’s credit, the leaderboard was updated.

And at that point Brian had moved down to number seven and I was number six. And so, yeah, I guess that attracted some people’s attention

that here’s just a normal, everyday person not spending $2 million a year

that’s beating somebody who is. And I was surprised that anybody would be interested at all, frankly,

because nobody everybody that I know has no idea what biohacking is. You’ve never heard of Brian Johnson or Dave Astbury or Ben Greenfield.

You know, any anybody in that area. And when it comes to me trying to talk to anybody about health,

nutrition, biohacking, longevity, anti-aging, that was just kind of like, look at me like I have a third eye,

you know, it’s like, oh, that’s that weird stuff that Dave does. So the fact that anybody is always interested still blows my mind.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it’s, No, it’s and that’s why I like it. Right? It is. I feel like you and I would have never met

if there, there wasn’t this leaderboard, like, there wasn’t this competition. It’s funny, though, that you, you did it like, kind of on, I guess on accident.

Like, I didn’t know that story. So, that’s really, really funny to me in my follow up question was, you know,

where are you going to give any preparation to submitting for the Rejuvenation Olympics, but I may be guessing.

No, because you didn’t know you were going to, but obviously you had like a specific strategy or you were testing things

in between all of the testing that that you were doing. Correct? Yeah. Yeah.

Well, my lifestyle kept changing throughout that process too, because,

you know, my parents were still with me, I think when I started the first test. I may be I may be off on the timing, but,

you either stay with me or just past. I really don’t recall. And then I went through a period where I was

completely remodeling the house after they passed. And that was a pretty stressful period.

And so I wasn’t eating necessarily good. I was still doing my fruit and vegetables and stuff, you know, in the afternoon.

But evening time, taking shortcuts, doing pizza, and be making a Taco Bell run here and there.

And when I finally, when the house finally settled and I could start cooking my meals again,

that’s when everything changed for me, because I was already doing the exercise as well as I was already doing the sleeping well.

But the nutrition piece, that was the piece that wasn’t its best. And once I got that in line, that’s when I got the 0.66.

Oh, interesting. Yeah, the nutrition part is really hard too, right? It’s it’s like all about convenience.

I always try to go really quick. I’m like, oh, I don’t have time to make food at home when really if you even added up

or calculated sometimes, like going out and spending the money and everything else that goes behind, like going to the store,

definitely doesn’t outweigh, or does outweigh, excuse me, doing the, you know, fast food run or kind of cutting corners.

So when you crunch the numbers, it is kind of interesting. I’ve seen several people do like a comparison on that of social media.

Like, here’s the time I spent doing a home cooked meal and the the amount of money. Here is the time I spent and the amount of money

I did like running and grabbing food or something. So, I know that can be a really hard one to change,

especially with with someone certain lifestyle. Yeah, it’s way cheaper for me to eat at home and make my own food.

It just takes preparation time and as long as I, you know, batch up my meals in advance, then it’s really easy because I’ll just

pull something out of the fridge and, you know, thawed out. And then it is quick and easy. Yeah.

And that’s I think I want to get into that next. Maybe for the second half of this, this podcast Divas as well.

I want to learn a little bit more like about your routine, about what you do. And, you know, what you’re interested in testing in the future.

I think you’re you’re known as well to you for testing, even when you’re maybe not doing so well.

Right. If there’s a lot of traveling or are there certain things that you want to test? So let’s first to break this down for the listeners.

Let’s first go through like your routine. Maybe we can make it simple and do like morning afternoon, night.

And you can let us know if it’s like consistent or you do those things every other day. And then we’ll talk about maybe some of your like interesting, cool,

and have one test. How’s that sound? Sure. Yeah. We can do that. Well. Yeah. Let’s hop into morning regimen.

What does that look like? Dave Pascoe, you’re waking up. You’re getting out of bed.

What happens next until lunch time? So the funny thing is, when I started writing

all this down for my website, I didn’t even realize the enormity of the things that I do because they’re just habits, right?

I hadn’t really given them any thought. And when people ask me, like you just did like what my routines are,

most of the time I’ll draw a blank because again, I don’t have them memorized. They’re all,

they’re triggers. They’re visual cues that I see as I’m going throughout the house that remind me to do the next thing.

So I’ll stack things together, like as soon as I do one thing, it’s like, oh, yeah, I do these other things along with that.

So for example, when my I don’t have an alarm, right when I wake up, naturally, the first thing I do

well, the first thing I do since I have a smart home, I have a Amazon Echo Dot in every room.

And I say good morning to I just call her Amelia because I don’t want to say her name because it will invoke her.

I will say good morning to Amelia. And, she was a good morning. She’ll tell me the time, the date.

So tell me the weather. She’ll tell me what time I schedule for the day. She’ll give me a fun fact.

And then, then she will give me the rundown of the news from, like, CNN, Fox News and ABC news.

So while she’s doing all that and I’m listening, I’m still laying in bed, and I’ve got my, I have a a Beamer.

It’s like a PEMF mat. It’s already inside. It’s like underneath my mattress that’s on my nightstand.

So I just crank that on and I start that up because that helps for blood flow and,

oxygenation to the self. And then as I’m doing that, I also have, a nano V at my bedside and I can stick the cannula in

and I’m breathing in the vapors from that because that’s helps with oxidative stress and protein misfolding.

And so while all that’s happening, I’m also doing my morning stretches. So I’m like taking my legs and trying to stretch them

back over my head so that my knees are touching my chest. Am I toes are trying to touch the pillow behind me.

And so I’m listening to her while I’m doing all that. Then before I make my bed, because my unmade bed

is a cue to me that I need to take my own waking supplements, I’ll pull those out of my nightstand and I’ll take those morning supplements.

And then, I make my bed and the next thing I see along my path to the bathroom is a, a rebounder.

So I will get on the rebounder. I’ll start bouncing around on that. That tends to get the bowels moving really well.

Better than coffee would, because I don’t drink coffee. And then, if I don’t have to make a run straight for the bathroom right there, I will go.

And, I moved it for, for this podcast, because usually right behind me, I have an inversion table, and I think you can see right there is the top of,

it’s just out of frame. So we’ll do about five minutes inverted while I’m playing with my phone

and listening to podcasts, and I’ll go use the restroom. And, I might then go to the kitchen as, my way through the basement,

go to the kitchen and drink, when I call my morning tea, which is, lemon water, basically with,

so that and humic minerals mixed in a little sprig of,

gosh, rosemary and, mint just for flavoring. And then I’ll go down to the basement, I’ll wash my face.

I have my Carol bike right there, it’s an AI-driven bike. So I’ll do like a ten minute sprint.

That’s, called a hit session. So there’s two 22nd sprints that I do on the Carol bike.

It’s actually less, it’s like seven minutes, not ten. But, Gosh, what do I do next?

Basically, I mean, you kind of getting the gist of it. That’s like my morning as I, as I see things on my path that reminds me to do them.

Yeah. You’re just, like, walking through your, your life, but it’s like, I don’t want to say unconsciously.

It’s it’s conscious, but it’s just like what you done for a very, very long time.

And I guess to an extent, we we all do that stuff, but we’re probably not as like regimented or in the flow as you are.

Like, we may be like, oh, I’m tired. I’m just going to lay back down for, for 10 or 20 more minutes.

And, you know, if you’re doing that, I know, if I’m doing that personally, I know I probably have

a less likely chance of actually getting up and meditating or going to the gym, right? Wherever that system stops

or breaks or I don’t do the next thing. It’s, you know, basically all going to falter and fall apart.

But I think you hold yourself maybe to a higher discipline. Maybe that’s what it is, right?

Where you say you’re walking. So I consider myself a lazy person. Oh, interesting. Interesting.

But I’m very disciplined with my laziness, if that makes any sense.

Like, all of that is very, very consciously designed and laid out so that I would not have to give it any more brainpower after the fact.

That way it becomes a habit. It becomes a flow. I don’t have to think about it and just it’s just something I do.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You said like, I just imagine you like. Oh, supplements and in the nightstand, right? You’re just like, you put those there for a reason.

So you remember to take them. And it’s the next step in your routine. And then you don’t have to worry about it. I also know when I like, don’t have my supplements in the supplement containers.

I’m probably not taking them—right, I’m like, oh, I need to make time to fill them up and to actually like lay them out and, you know, put them where they belong.

But yeah, if they’re like empty, I’m like, oh, I can skip one more day. And then it just ends up becoming a week and then two weeks.

And so on and so forth. Guilty. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Guilty as charged. Yep. It’s all of us.

– And if I. – Yeah… What about, if I have what’s the— If I have to think about things like if I have to think

about going out and running, I’m not going to want to do it… right? Yeah. I don’t want to go run right now.

I don’t feel like it. So I don’t think about it. I just do it because I make it the habit.

I found that sometimes when I’ve felt my crappiest like, I’m going to be terrible at this, I’m always terrible at my runs.

Let’s face it, I’m not a good runner. But when I feel like particularly rundown, those are usually some of the best runs I have.

And then if I feel like I’m really going to go out and crush it, yeah, kind of sucks. It’s not not the best run ever.

Yeah. It’s like when you give too much thought to it or you just let a little bit of it creep in like, oh, I’m not going to go to the gym or I’m not going to do this at the gym.

If you already plan on doing it, it’s like, just makes it that much more tough or actually harder to do.

So it’s interesting you say that because I think subjectively I get that, I get that same,

that same feeling, like if I’m not feeling too well, then I go and I feel even better afterwards.

And it was a great workout, or even better than what I would have done, if I wasn’t sick or wasn’t feeling into the mood of doing it.

So I just try to remove the choice. Try to remove the choice. That’s it. That’s the theme.

What about what about just, traditional, like lunchtime. Are you doing anything in particular?

A lot of time. I’m so busy, I completely skip lunch. But when I do eat lunch,

usually that’s something pretty simple too. I’ll have, you know, like some celery with hummus.

I’ll do an apple, an orange, some, like a banana. I do a banana first thing in the morning, too.

I forgot all about that. That time I went to the kitchen.

Yeah. So I’ll do that along with… I like canned sardines and mussels

and oysters and, mackerel. So sometimes I’ll eat all of those

or sometimes I’ll just choose 1 or 2 of those. I’m getting my omegas.

I’m getting some some good, some good meat in there. – Yeah, it’s… – Quick and easy.

Definitely. And, alright, so you’re you’re through through the morning. You are through the, the afternoon afternoon is usually really relaxed.

What about come maybe early evening or nighttime as well. Is there there anything in particular that you, you go through at at night?

I was going to say I did skip getting outside for sunlight because that that’s another thing I do early in the morning doing my, doing my P90x workout,

or doing a run. Depends on the day of the week. But in the evening, yeah, I,

I start my wine down pretty early because I try to eat dinner

at about 3 or 4 p.m. Oh, really? Yeah. So that way I’m done by five and six at the very latest because I find on

my sleep scores that they’re much better if I’m not digesting food. So if I give myself 3 or 4 hours of

no food before bed, I sleep much better. My recovery scores are better, and I think that’s just because my body is,

instead of spending all of its resources on digesting food, it’s doing the repair that would otherwise prefer to be doing okay.

And so… Yeah. So, so I’ll start that pretty early that I’m done eating,

my house. Being a smart home, I have all of my, my recessed lighting. It’s all Philips Hue bulbs.

So they’re they’re Bluetooth enabled, and they can be any color or intensity that I need them to be.

So I have them preprogramed to start. Well, they shift completely to red as soon as the sun starts setting.

And then throughout the evening, they progressively dim. And so it tends to help make me sleepy.

And also I will put on some like super dark red light glasses if I’m watching TV, even though all my TVs tend to shift

toward the red light in the evening, and so do all my, like my phone and my screens,

they all they all do the same thing and that. Yeah, that helps make me super sleepy.

And then I’m able to go to sleep at a reasonable hour, like pretty early. Yeah.

Yeah, that sounds awesome. It sounds like you’re doing, you know, a little bit of everything, right?

You’re you’re exercising, you’re hitting the, the the head on on nutrition and supplementation,

sleep and trying to limit and avoid environmental exposures. So a lot of those, kind of,

like filtered toxins and products. I really like the light example that you mentioned there as well. You mentioned infrared sauna.

You know, maybe doing a little bit of like non intentional

caloric restriction or fasting in a sense you’re like, oh, sometimes I, I eat, lunch, sometimes I don’t, but I don’t believe you.

You count calories either. So just, you know, listening to your body and listening to to how you’re feeling.

And then outside of that as well, you’ve even done some pretty cool things, even right before we we hopped on the call. You mentioned, I think you went and did some hyperbaric oxygen

chamber therapy and, have done, plasmapheresis. Correct as well. Yeah. Yeah. And

yeah, you had even some other things. Yeah. Was a little bit more. Plasmapheresis is, you know, having the actual procedure

is a little out of my, my pocketbook range because it’s about, 8 to $10,000 if you pay to have it done.

So instead, I’m probably I like to be a little more creative than that. I just go to plasma places and donate my blood,

and then they pay me for that, which is fun, you know, because I usually take the money

that I get from the plasma donations and I spend that on the spot sessions. Oh, interesting. Interesting.

Yeah, I, I misread that from your website then the regular plasma donation. So I actually did one of those and

like high school a long time ago and I haven’t been back. I actually passed out when I did it.

I think I could retry, I think I did it eat beforehand or something. It wasn’t like a super traumatic experience.

But I get blood regularly, like every eight weeks. I actually just gave it yesterday, too. So I’ve seen some, you know, correlations

or connections, you know, some articles even just saying, like, you know, getting rid of, of blood and getting that turnover with, with your,

with all the cells in your blood is actually going to yield maybe a better, kind of aging process.

But I want to take it a step further and do the, the plasma donation as well, because you’re like, oh, it’s a bonus.

You actually get paid. You’re helping people. It is, it is a little bit of a process. But once you get into the system and stuff, I think it’s much easier.

Yeah. The process itself is kind of a pain in the butt, to be honest with you. You know, it’s like three hours to do a donation sometimes,

depending on the center and how busy it is, the time of day you go in. But I look at it like, changing the oil in your car,

you know, you you could get away with never changing oil in your car if you wanted to, but your car’s not going to last as long.

You know, the engine’s going to break down much, much sooner. And I just look at our, our bodies and our body plasma the same way.

And we’ve got all these broken down proteins and, you know, oxidative proteins and misfolded proteins.

We’ve got just a lot of cellular waste in there that as we age, we may not be clearing as efficiently as we did when we were younger.

So it just helps to go do that little oil change every so often. Get rid of some of those things.

Yeah, yeah. No, you’re you’re exactly right. I, I like that comparison as well.

Well no, this is, this has been great I think from, from more of a,

like interventional treatment standpoint. Right? I mentioned the plasma donations kind of that,

that plasmapheresis part of things. Do you do the hyperbaric oxygen chamber therapy then pretty regularly or

what else? From a procedural standpoint, would you say you perform? Well, I like to do the sessions at least once a year,

and I just got stem cell therapy. Because when I, when I saw you, right after I saw you,

I got, Prenuvo full body MRI, and then the very next day was I had Doctor Joy Kong’s office, and I got the stem cell therapy that I needed

because I’ve had rotator cuff impairments on both side. But my right side, that’s been the worst for a long time.

And it’s been impacting my sleep. And, after getting that, well, prior to that, I did a couple of the,

plasma donations to help offload the the proteins, got the stem cells, and now I’m doing

like all this month, a series of sessions. So I’m trying to cover all the bases, and I’m doing methylene

blue and I’m doing stem region, pulling out all the stops, you know, just doing everything they can to make the, repair go better.

And so it’s only been not even been a week and I’m already feeling fantastic. So it’s it’s been feeling much better.

Yeah. How is the Prenuvo experience, I’m curious. Very cool. It went quick and easy.

They you able to watch TV in there. So I was watching my episode of Suits on Netflix

and it’s just like hanging out and watching TV. Yeah I did. Do you get your results back instantaneously?

Yeah. It was like the next day I got to be, okay. And so I wasn’t too surprised by the results.

I already knew that I had a deviated septum. They found that, I was at a car accident.

Oh, gosh. Probably 20 years ago or so, and I knew I had some neck issues, and they saw some issues with a couple of the cervical, spine area there.

And gosh, I’m trying to think of what else. But anyway, I was pretty pleased overall with the results.

So nothing. Those results. Yeah. Are they going to affect anything that you’re doing, from like a lifestyle standpoint?

No, not really. Not at this point. Yeah. Well, good. I’m glad everything came back positive.

That’s all that we can hope for. And there wasn’t anything that was was an unexpected. And they’re either, awesome.

So we’re getting to the end of this day. This has been awesome. Getting to learn a little bit more about you, your background, kind of what your focus has been, and how it can be like easy and simple too.

It doesn’t have to be something that’s that’s super hard or, that you have to put a lot of effort towards.

So it’s great getting to, to speak with people like you. I think what I want to talk about now,

and maybe you already answered this as well, is like, I’m calling this this, epigenetic moment, which is basically,

well, what do you think your moment was regarding epigenetics? Like where you what, like what was the biggest change you made your lifestyle

to positively influence your epigenetic markers, and again, maybe that was finding that inner peace more and just having

a better outlook on kind of these things we have to do?

Wow. Well, you know, you in researching the things that I could do

for my healthy aging, starting to take telomerase activators was a big one.

And then buying a sauna was, probably my very first expenditure that I think helped me greatly,

because then I started sweating out all the toxins, and I was getting the heat shock proteins, and I started doing the cold showers.

And that ice baths. Yeah. So all of that, I think, was that just listening to podcasts

like yours that came about and then Greenfields early on and, and Dave Breeze and Cash, there was so many others.

All of it has been leading to a big moment for me, really. But then I don’t know if there was one.

I don’t know if there was one, to be honest. It’s all aligned, right? You’re, you’re like on this path and like all of this has

had a major effect on your health and your outlook on life. So it’s okay to have a couple. I’ll let you have a couple big, big moments.

You know, it’s. it’s funny because some of the criticisms that I’ve read about myself, because I always read comments and people leave them in podcasts

and things is like, this guy is not strategic at all. He just does everything.

And I’m thinking, well, duh. Yeah. Because there is no one thing. It’s like opening up a just like opening up a puzzle box.

Like you buy a picture puzzle and you open the box and say, all right, Dave, pull out three pieces and tell me, you know, which are the three

that are most important in this puzzle? And I can’t do that because it takes all of them

to really make the full picture. Yeah, that’s the way I look at all the different things that I’m doing there.

They’re all synergistic. They all need to come together. It’s your lifestyle. It’s your habitual routine, right?

It’s what you make. It makes you feel good emotionally, physically, spiritually. And I think as long as you can.

Yeah. Check those boxes and you’re having fun then. Then no more power to everyone.

Awesome. All right, Dave, another interesting question too. So, we were about to schedule this podcast.

I think you you emailed me back and you’re like, oh, I’m going to, go hike Kilimanjaro.

Right? And then I think the trip got canceled, but I’m just curious as well. I never even asked you when we met in person.

What’s what’s the interest there? Is that something you’ve always wanted to do? Well, that was also for Team World Vision.

That was, that was to get sponsorship, child sponsorships. Got it.

I was interested anyway. So I mean, icing on the cake, right? I get to climb Kilimanjaro and you get to do child sponsorships.

I mean, it was just a win-win. Yeah. The, the great tech disruption then that, the cloud strike thing happened.

I missed two flights and was not able to go. Yeah, yeah.

And are you doing that next year then possibly. There is a possibility. I know they have something happening in February,

but I haven’t spoken with them yet about whether I can be a part of that or not. And so still to be determined.

To be determined. Cool. Well, we’ll follow back up on that. Alright. Well, we’re getting to the end here. You know, the question that I ask everyone

at the end of my podcast, since you’ve listened. So, Dave, if you could be any animal in the world, what would you be and why?

You know, it’s funny because I was on a beach and my birthday and I was sitting there on the sand,

watching as the sun was setting and this group of seagulls, they weren’t flying, they were just on the sand with me.

And they all just kind of came over and just sort of hovered around me. They’re just kind of walking around

like they had accepted me as one of their own, you know? And I felt like one of their own because we’re all just sitting there chilling, watching the sunset.

And I thought, this, this is the animal that I would like to be because I like I would like to fly.

I love the ocean. Yeah. And it’s funny, because I was, I was actually going to tag you on Instagram.

And I think your Instagram was set so that nobody could tag you. And I was like, darn it, because I really just wanted to send that to you.

I thought that would be funny. Yeah, you’re in the right moment and the right time. And the answer just came to you, right?

You didn’t even have to think about it. Well, this has been really, really fun. Dave, thanks so much for joining

and for any of the listeners who wanted to get connected, I know you obviously have your, your website.

If I’m sure you Google Dave Pascoe, you’re going to come up, but is there any other way you want people to get ahold of you

or to see any of your your work, your regimen, your routine, etc.?

Yeah. So all the website is DavePascoe.net and then I’m available on Instagram @dave.pascoe,

Awesome. Sounds good. Well, I will make sure to link all of that in the show notes.

Thank you so much Dave. Thanks for everyone else for joining us at the Everything Epigenetics podcast.

Remember, you have control over your epigenetics, so tune in next time to learn more on how. Thanks again Dave. Thank you.