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Here’s a disconnect for you – I hear this all of the time – I need more hours in a day… and while this is actually an impossibility… the modern solution to this problem is work into the evening, sacrificing time otherwise spent sleeping. AND we don’t really think too much of that – because we can always hit the caffeine in the morning for a jolt of energy. I think this is a pretty common scenario – and I also think that we’re sacrificing a lot more than sleep when we live our lives this way.

My guest today is Dan Koifman, a nutrition and sleep health coach working with people around the world to help them lose weight, sleep sounder and live better.

Dan and I discuss what IS sleep (because he suspects that we don’t really know what it is), what are circadian rhythms (which are different than sleep), how humans used to sleep, what is it about our modern environment that gets in the way of quality sleep, the importance of actually getting quality sleep, and some tips on how to make that happen.

You might even learn something about your broccoli. You’ve been warned.

Although we didn’t discuss it in any detail during the show – Dan mentions that recognizing that he had sleep apnea was key in figuring out how he could get quality sleep. I later asked him how he treated it, and he provided me a link to a product called SnoreRx. After using this product – he no longer has clinical sleep apnea.

Dan’s Bio

Dan Koifman is a nutrition and sleep health coach working with people around the world to help them lose weight, sleep sounder and live better. He is passionate about nutrition and sleep after battling decades of obesity, insomnia and sleep disordered breathing

At his peak Dan lost 70 pounds and is now an early bird sleeping soundly through the night for the time in his adult life after decades of being a night owl with insomnia and a severe sleep disordered breathing condition called obstructive sleep apnea. Dan founded the popular online Facebook group named Circadian Biohackers in which physicians, clinicians, researchers and laypeople alike share information, news and resources on improving sleep, health and circadian rhythms which currently boasts about 3,500 members worldwide. He is also an inventor and founder of a sleep and circadian rhythm health company currently in stealth mode, and studies biomedical science at the City University of New York.

You can subscribe to The Roots of Health at WebTalkRadio.net and also on iTunes.

Click here to go right to the show in iTunes or on WebTalkRadio.net.

100% of my clients can tell me 3 things that they could do to improve their health. I hear things like ‘I need to exercise more’ or ‘I need to eat less sugar’ or ‘I need to get more sleep’ or ‘I don’t drink enough water’… But apparently it’s one thing for yourself to KNOW, and another thing entirely for yourself to actually DO. If we could somehow crack the code on this disconnect, we might all be making progress toward our health goals.

My guest today is poised to help. Steven M. Ledbetter, aka “Coach Stevo” has BA in Philosophy from the University of Chicago, an MA in Sport Psychology and is the CEO of Habitry, Co. – A community for coaches who want better for their clients.

The topic of habits and motivation is important for anyone seeking to change their health – particularly as I am busy throwing all sorts of ideas at you aimed to inspire you shift your perspective and make some changes in your life. In this show – we discuss ideas about how to actually start making those changes.

Coach Stevo and I chat about why we can’t seem to do what we know that we need to do, what a habit actually is, what percentage of your day is composed of habitual actions, how best to recognize & shift your habits (hint: maybe you need a community), the value of incremental change, how to construct a ‘habit statement’ – with an example of the habit to eat less sugar, and about the importance of process goals rather than focusing on the desired outcome.

Coach Stevo’s Bio:

Coach Stevo has BA in Philosophy from the University of Chicago, an MA in Sport Psychology and is the CEO of Habitry, Co. that sponsors the Motivate Forum and Motivate Summits. He writes a weekly column on habits and motivation for the 80mil users of MyFitnessPal and contributed to Intervention by Dan John. He lives in Oakland.

You can subscribe to The Roots of Health at WebTalkRadio.net and also on iTunes.

 

I have this ability to bring together to seemingly disparate topics into a relatively cohesive thesis. In the past – I’ve applied the formula for change as it relates to business growth – to your own humanness to help understand your own resistance to change…

And in this installment of The-Life-of-Meredith-Theater, I’m going to chat about a topic that I learned while working as an exploration geologist.

Managing Uncertainty for Value.

Let me provide some context. As part of a team seeking to find, appraise, develop, and produce oil & gas from the depths of the Earth, there are at least 2 things that are known truths:

• Nothing is Certain.
• The End Game was Value.

Can you see the conundrum?

Even with the most highly skilled professionals on the job… there was no way on Earth that we could – with 100% certainty – answer questions like:

• Where is the oil field?
• What shape is it?
• How much oil is there? Is it oil?
• What rocks will we drill through to get there?
• Is the velocity model right?
• What pressures will we see on the way down?
• How long will it take to drill this well?
• Will the economy favor making this investment to drill?

Yet – those were the questions that we answered everyday.

Soooo challenging for someone who suffers paralysis through analysis. Also so challenging for someone who thinks outside-of-the-box. There are JUST SO MANY POSSIBILITIES.

What we had to do was to literally manage that uncertainty for value. Because, the objective was to drill a profitable well despite all of the uncertainty that surrounded drilling a profitable well.

AND – each of those questions up there compounds uncertainty. Crap.

So how did we answer those questions? Let me show you what that looks like.

No, in fact, let yourself show you what this looks like.

I’m going to ask you a couple of questions… your job is to manage uncertainty for value. I’ll take it easy on you, I promise. Here’s the first one: (fill in the blanks)

I am _____ % sure that there were between ______ & ______ people living in the United States in the year 1900. 

Now play with the inputs here… How about this:

I am 100% sure that there were between 100 and 1 billion people living in the US in the year 1900.

I am 10% sure that there were between 100 million and 150 million people living in the US in the year 1900.

Notice that – in this case – as I narrow in on a more reasonable answer, my certainty erodes.

(no cheating – there was no Google in 1900).

I based my answer on understanding the estimate of the population today to be somewhere around 300 million – and then taking away two-thirds to a half of that estimate. It’s an educated guess really. It helps that I live in the US and that I’ve actually wondered about the number of people that live here before. It’s harder to characterize the % that I’m sure… I might be more sure if – for example – I was a historian or a statistician and had some more insight into the topic.

Go ahead and have a think about how you would answer this question… and then read on when you’re done monkeying around.

OK – I just looked it up – the census says there were 76,212,168 million people accounted for in the US in the year 1900…

So how did you do with your estimate?

I didn’t do too bad. That number falls within my 100% certainty estimate. I was right!  It might not have been a very useful estimate, but it was correct – and I accurately characterize my uncertainty.

It also falls outside my 10% certainty estimate… which also means I reasonably characterized some uncertainty – or in other words, I was 90% sure that I would be wrong.

Your answer to that question and your characterization of uncertainty will depend upon your experience, your current knowledge, your skill set, and your perspective… It can be challenging to do, but anyone can play this game.

Now let’s try a few more that hit closer to home. This time, answer this question at least 3 times with different levels of certainty.

I am ___ % sure that I will live to be between ___ & ___ years old.

I am ___ % sure that I will live to be between ___ & ___ years old.

I am ___ % sure that I will live to be between ___ & ___ years old.

So, what informs your answer here? Your current age, your current health, whether or not you feel in control of your health outcome, your optimism, your social connectivity, the environment you live in, how old grandma or great-grandma lived to be…

Here’s my point… Managing Uncertainty for Value isn’t just about making money using educated guesses. It’s what we do everyday to manage our wellness. Every decision that we make to live our life in a certain way has a compounding effect on our health and outlook. From our food choices, to our sleep habits, to how much time we spend inside, to the company we keep, to the way we move, to the products that we use, to the medications we take, to the joy we cultivate, to the stressors we choose to face, to what we choose to believe…

And a key consideration to all of these things – is that despite the uncertainty of health & wellness information out there – you can manage to gain health.

Despite the motives of people like me… always seeking scientific evidence for this way or that… you have all you need to make positive change.

This is the reason that I have veered into this field of ancestral health – it’s like starting from square one. Strip away the things that humans have created without the full benefit of really understanding how it affects human health (re: uncertainty), and you have a fine perspective to evaluate your health from a new perspective.

And now, I make & evaluate uncertainty statements like this (consider what your answers are in light of your own perspective):

I am ____ % sure that GMO’s & their associated chemicals are detrimental to human health over a period of ____ years.

I am ____ % sure that all vaccines are safe and effective for ____ to ____ % of the population.

I am ____ % sure that inactivity results in ____ to ____ fewer years of life.

I am ____ % sure that cultivating a rich and diverse gut microbiota will add _____  to ____ years to my life.

I am ____ % sure that working ____ hours a week will enable me to sleep ____ to ____ hours every night.

I am ____ % sure that reaching out to _____ friends per week will help me to reach my health goals in ____ year(s).

I am ____ % sure that human beings require ____ to ____ hours of sunlight per day.

I am ____ % sure that adding ____ servings of veggies each day will help me to *ahem* <poop> ____ times per week.

You get the drift.

Your future is uncertain because it hasn’t been written yet… but the possibilities are pretty incredible. When you stop to think about what your own awareness is around particular health topics, and start to experiment with managing this uncertainty for ‘health’ in your life… you’ll know where you stand, and begin to inform your story going forward.

And that feels good.

Click here to go right to the show in iTunes or on WebTalkRadio.net.

People are often put off by the sticker shock of organic foods. That bag of conventionally grown potatoes is easily half the price of the organic one. What can a financially responsible person do to reap the benefits of naturally grown foods? The solution is easier than you think… stop shopping at the grocery store, and start digging in your backyard.

My guest today can guide us in this backyard money-saving and health-gaining adventure. Holly Baird and her husband Joey are founders of The Wisconsin Vegetable Gardener, a resource to help the average gardener to use what they already have to create a simple, self-sufficient life at home.

Holly and I go through some basics of starting a veggie garden in your yard. We touch on the tools you’ll need, to picking your favorite veggies, to where to plant, to checking the soil, to watering… and a few tips to preserve the fruits of your labors and to repurpose household items for use in your garden.

Plus – this just in… in case you need more reasons to dig in the dirt… Soil bacteria are like ancestral happy pills.

Look outside, it’s time to start! Check your local extension office for planting schedules and soil information… you can do this!

 

Holly’s Bio:

Holly Baird and her husband Joey are founders of The Wisconsin Vegetable Gardener (thewisconsinvegetablegardener.com), a resource to help the average gardener to use what they already have to create a simple, self-sufficient life at home. They garden inside their home and in their backyard in Milwaukee area, and produce weekly online videos about how to grow your own food organically, what to do with the food that you grow, and how to reuse everyday items. They also write for a number of newspapers and maintain a quarterly digital magazine.

You can subscribe to The Roots of Health at WebTalkRadio.net and also on iTunes.

 

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What does it mean to be clean? Our daily routine is strongly influenced by our requirement to be clean… and, why not? If our perception is that clean = healthy – then we’re doing all of the right things, right?

Let’s consider this as we walk through a typical morning routine in your house. After you get up in the morning, you probably hop in the shower to scrub your body with soap & to wash your hair with shampoo and conditioner… Then you might use lotions & fragrances & deodorants to combat dry skin and future-potential-offensive odors… Then you’ll throw on some clothes that were washed with detergents and maybe tumbled dry with fabric softener… Next you head to the kitchen to make breakfast on clean – bacteria-free countertops and serve it from clean plates straight from your dishwasher…

We sure are clean. But what if clean – as we currently define it – is NOT healthy?

My guest today spends a lot of her time re-thinking what it means to be ‘clean’ in this modern world. Jasmina Aganovic is the General Manager of Consumer Products at a skincare biotech company called AOBiome. They are currently developing products for you based on the microbiome of your skin.

Jasmina and I talk about the definition of ‘clean’, about the skin ecosystem and how our current ideas of ‘clean’ may be doing us more harm than good, how can we re-define clean and what can you do in your life to cultivate your skin health. Jasmina talks about the AO+Mist, an ammonia oxidizing bacterial mist developed by AOBiome to re-balance our skin ecosystem – to get the benefits of soil bacteria on our skin without the dirt.

We end with the very interesting story behind the development of the AO+ Mist. It is David Whitlock’s story; he’s a man committed to reconnecting the human species with its natural environment in our modern world – and a picture of ancestral health. AOBiome proposes that the skin microbiome be considered as an important part of redefining what it means to be clean.

Enjoy the show.

Jasmina’s Bio

Jasmina Aganovic is the General Manager of Consumer Products at AOBiome, a skincare biotech company that is developing products based on the microbiome of the skin. She is a cosmetics and consumer goods entrepreneur who received her degree in chemical and biological engineering from MIT. Her unconventional path combined her technical background with roles at brands like LVMH, Fresh, NutraClick and Living Proof. She has extensive experience developing natural skincare products, brand-building, manufacturing partnerships, product launch strategy, digital advertising and direct sales.

You can subscribe to The Roots of Health at WebTalkRadio.net and also on iTunes.

Click here to go right to the show in iTunes or on WebTalkRadio.net.

Odds are, you or someone you know has been diagnosed with breast cancer. Cancer of any sort is a scary diagnosis… and for many of us, this diagnosis is synonymous with radiation, surgery, chemotherapy, hair loss, weakness, and a life lived in survival mode. Modern cancer treatments can be so stressful that some people are choosing to opt out in order to maintain their quality of life to the extent that they have control of it. To someone looking in, the decision to go against conventional wisdom may seem reckless and uninformed… but is this really a death sentence?

My guest today is intimately familiar with this scenario and can help us to shed some light on our options. Dr. Véronique Desauliers – also known as Dr. V – has retired after 30 years in her health & wellness practice to devote her time to sharing her personal, non-toxic healing journey with Breast Cancer. She’s the author of the #1 best selling book on Amazon, Heal Breast Cancer Naturally.

Dr. V and I discuss what cancer is, how it tricks the immune system, and natural ways to treat cancer cells, to strengthen your immune system, and about the best options for early detection. Ultimately – a breast cancer diagnosis is a signal that some extreme self-care and self-love is in order.

Enjoy the show!

Dr. V’s bio

Dr. Véronique Desaulniers, better known as “Dr. V,” has maintained successful practices in the Wellness Field since 1979. Because of her passion for health and wellness, Dr. V undertook extensive studies in various fields of Energy Medicine. Specializing in Chiropractic, Bio-Energetics, Meridian Stress Analysis, Homeopathy, and Digital Thermography, Dr. V brings a unique approach to Health and Wellness. After 30 years in active practice, she decided to “retire” and devote her time sharing her personal, non-toxic healing journey with Breast Cancer. Her years of experience and research have culminated as The 7 Essentials TM, a step-by-step coaching program. Dr. V is a #1 best-selling author and has a # 1 Best Selling book on Amazon, Heal Breast Cancer Naturally. Her website and her personal healing journey have touched the lives of thousands of women around the globe.

You can subscribe to The Roots of Health at WebTalkRadio.net and also on iTunes.

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Let’s go way back… One of the traits that uniquely separates the human species from other primates is our upright posture where we walk around on 2 legs. We are bipedal. Based on fossil evidence, anthropologists estimate that this bipedalism evolved in early human species maybe 4 million years ago…

But another uniquely human trait that is more recent on the scene is our use of clothing and footwear. Today we’re going to explore how our modern footwear is messing with the original design of our feet.

My guest this week has great insight into this topic. Dr. Daniel Howell is a Professor of Biology at Liberty University where he teaches human anatomy & physiology. As an avid barefoot runner and hiker, Dr. Howell was nicknamed the “Barefoot Professor” by his students, and in 2010 published a book called, The Barefoot Book, in which he advocates going barefoot more often to improve your health.

Meredith and Dr. Howell chat about comfort, alignment, what shoes do to the shape of your foot, how they restrict and change the biomechanics of your feet, how the real barrier to going barefoot is cultural, how it’s legal to be barefoot, how going barefoot can improve neuropathy, how it can be therapeutic, and some easy ways to ease into being barefoot more often. Try some barefoot sandals on for size!

Oh, and Meredith shares her data collection methods.

Enjoy the show!

You can subscribe to The Roots of Health at WebTalkRadio.net and also on iTunes.

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Welcome back to Part 2 of my interview about Microbiome Research & Applications with Dr. Embriette Hyde. In Part 1 we learned that our bacterial genome contains roughly 360 times more genes that our human genome, and because our own microbiome is the product of our unique diets, environments, lifestyle, geography, and demographics, it holds the potential to create huge differences in health & immunity between any two people. This may bee the root of our bioindividuality. We chatted about a microbiome treatment and cure for the Clostridium difficile infection accomplished via fecal transplant – which is exactly what it sounds like. And finally, promising research into the science of obesity with respect to our individual microbial communities.

If you haven’t heard that show yet – follow this link to listen.

In Part 2 of my interview with Embriette we discuss how you can get involved in and contribute to the growing human microbiome database. And finally chat about ways that you can use your awareness of your own microbiome to begin to protect and cultivate it for your own health. Enjoy the show.

Dr. Embriette Hyde’s bio:

Dr. Embriette Hyde is a post-doctoral scholar in Dr. Rob Knight’s lab in the Pediatrics Department at the University of California, San Diego.  Embriette has four years of experience in microbiome research.  She completed her PhD at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, TX working on the oral microbiome and it’s potential role in cardiovascular disease. As a post-doc in the Knight lab, she continues to work on a variety of microbiomes, including plant, Komodo dragon, and human microbiomes, and she is developing protocols for high throughput isolation and phenotyping of individual species in a community.  Embriette is also actively involved in PR for the American Gut Project and is an active blogger on the American Gut site and on microbe.net.

You can subscribe to The Roots of Health at WebTalkRadio.net and also on iTunes.

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So after last week’s show, you’re no longer walking the earth blissfully unaware of the microbial communities inside of your body. (If you didn’t hear last week’s show – you might want to fire it up and listen to it before you hear this one). But why should you care about these communities? What are the health implications of culturing certain communities over others? And why should you be in awe of and maybe even a little excited about this so-called ‘forgotten organ’ that you live with?

My guest today will help to shed some light on these questions. Embriette Hyde is a post doctoral researcher who is intimately familiar with what a microbiome is, and is working to develop new protocols for characterizing microbial communities.

In Part 1 of my interview with Embriette, we learn that despite how genetically similar humans are (99.9% common human genome), our microbiota really hold the key for our ‘bioindividuality’. This could be the reason that our human health is so different, and that our requirement to gain health are really so different. Our bacterial residents may play a role in how our human genes are expressed… and they certainly play a HUGE role in the strength of our immune systems. We chat about fecal transplant as a new way to treat antibiotic resistant infections, such as Clostridium difficile. Have a listen to hear about other potential health applications of the human microbiome.

Dr. Embriette Hyde’s bio:

Dr. Embriette Hyde is a post-doctoral scholar in Dr. Rob Knight’s lab in the Pediatrics Department at the University of California, San Diego.  Embriette has four years of experience in microbiome research.  She completed her PhD at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, TX working on the oral microbiome and it’s potential role in cardiovascular disease. As a post-doc in the Knight lab, she continues to work on a variety of microbiomes, including plant, Komodo dragon, and human microbiomes, and she is developing protocols for high throughput isolation and phenotyping of individual species in a community.  Embriette is also actively involved in PR for the American Gut Project and is an active blogger on the American Gut site and on microbe.net.

I mention some research on the presence of the bacteria Oxalobactor formigenes in various populations, if you’re interested, you can see the poster here.

Check back next week to hear Part 2 of this interview.

You can subscribe to The Roots of Health at WebTalkRadio.net and also on iTunes.

Click here to go right to the show in iTunes or on WebTalkRadio.net.

You are likely humming along in your daily life, blissfully unaware of your non-human parts. Yep – you are a superorganism. Roughly 10% of the cells in your body are the cells that make up your human body. So what are the other 90% composed of? Here to acquaint us with the other 90% of our cells is Dr. Katherine Amato. Katie is a post doc at the University of Colorado Boulder where she studies the gut microbes of leaf eating primates. She’s also an instructor in UC-Boulder’s online course called ‘Gut Check’.

Meredith and Katie talk about what microbes – or more specifically, our microbiota – are, where they come from, how they change over time, what they do for us, and why we should care about them.

Bottom line: Your body houses communities of microorganisms that assist you in maintaining your health. You might want to consider being a more gracious host. The human microbiota co-evolved with us as a species, this ancestral bit of us does not thrive under modern human environmental conditions. <<< And your health may suffer as a result.

Come on back next week for more about our amazing microbiome.

Dr. Amato’s bio

Katherine Amato is a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Colorado Boulder. Her research focuses on the gut microbes of wild non-human primates and compares the gut microbiota of non-human primates and humans to provide a broader evolutionary perspective on the human gut microbiome. She is a co-instructor of the Gut Check: Exploring Your Microbiome course on Coursera and recently participated in TEDxJacksonHole. Katherine received her B.A. in biology at Dartmouth College and subsequently spent a year as a Fulbright Fellow and National Geographic Young Explorer doing fieldwork in Mexico. She earned her Ph.D. in ecology, evolution and conservation biology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2013.

You can subscribe to The Roots of Health at WebTalkRadio.net and also on iTunes.