Blending Eastern Wisdom with Western Science: Dr. Hosen Kiat's Roadmap to Longevity

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— Video Chapters and Critical Takeaways —  [0:00] | Introduction: Why a Top Cardiologist Blends Eastern Wisdom with Western Science  [0:11:53] | The Five Pillars of Longevity: Nutrition, Movement, Sleep, Connection, and Purpose  [0:19:11] | The Dangers of Alcohol: WHO Category 1 Carcinogen  [0:43:21] | The Science Behind Autophagy (Cellular Repair)  [0:52:29] | Dr. Kiat's Top Food Recommendations: 'Stress Foods' (Broccoli, Onion) vs. 'Building Foods' (Cysteine-Rich Proteins)  [0:56:20] | The Science of Beneficial Stress: Understanding Hormesis and Cellular Resilience  [01:20:35] | Universal Health Checks After 50: Why a "Once-in-a-Lifetime" Lipoprotein(a) Test is Recommended for Heart Health  In this essential interview, we sit down with Dr. Hosen Kiat, a globally recognized cardiologist, clinical researcher, and one of the world's most-cited medical scientists in cardiovascular health, to discuss the evidence-based roadmap to a longer, healthier life.  Drawing from four decades of clinical experience and his philosophy of blending the best of Western and Eastern medicine, Dr. Kiat outlines his Five Pillars of Longevity—a whole-of-person strategy based on clinical research and observational data:  What We Eat (Nutrition): The foundational role of diet in cellular health and disease prevention.  Movement (Exercise): Incorporating routine movement for cardiovascular vitality.  How We Rest (Sleep & Recovery): Optimizing sleep for physical and mental resilience.  Connection (Community): The vital importance of social connection and its impact on heart health.  Purpose (Meaning): How finding purpose can sustain healthspan and improve quality of life.  Dr. Kiat also dives into the science, including a clear explanation of autophagy (cellular repair), and points to critical, evidence-based health facts, such as the WHO listing alcohol as a Category 1 carcinogen.  This discussion is a powerful call to action, empowering viewers to take control of their own health through preventative measures and reinforcing the crucial need to seek advice from qualified health professionals.  About Dr. Hosen Kiat: Dr. Kiat is a Professor of Cardiology and a clinical researcher with over 200 peer-reviewed publications. His work focuses on preventative medicine and evidence-based integrative care.  Disclaimer: The information provided in this video is for general educational purposes only and is not intended as a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your qualified healthcare provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition.  You can find more evidence-based health advice on Dr. Kiat's official YouTube Channel: @drkiat  #Longevity #Cardiology #PreventiveMedicine #Autophagy #HeartHealth #Nutrition #Hormesis #EasternMedicine #WesternScience #DrHosenKiat #Healthspan #CellularRepair #WHOHealthFacts #IntegrativeCare

Transcript

00:00we have a path, a chemical pathway to build, and we've got a chemical pathway to repair.

00:10It's a bit like we have two servants at home. One is to repair all the holes and repaint,

00:23blah, blah, blah. And one is to clean the house. But surprisingly, they cannot work together.

00:33And that's why the mTOR pathway and the AMPK pathway, they function in a separate time frame.

00:42So we have to give this a go by shutting this down.

00:53Dr. Hozen Kiet, it is a genuine honour to be speaking with you today and to have you on the

01:22channel for the second time. We did do an interview together a few years ago now. And

01:29the results speak for themselves that people really loved what you had to say.

01:34Yeah, it's a pleasure to be invited back, even though I probably was too relaxed last time. But

01:45obviously, yeah, hopefully that was not such a bad outcome. I have been since day one a practicing

01:57cardiologist. But my journey was that I have spent 10 years at City Sinai Medical Center and initially

02:09doing a research fellowship and a few years later became the director of cardiac imaging research.

02:17So yeah, and that got me into research. And I love it because research gives me the tool to answer questions.

02:30Ultimately, really, practicing medicine, every patient comes to you, you have to answer some questions,

02:42because they have come to you with a problem. So, you know, you just have to think about,

02:48well, these are the questions that I have to answer. Because if I can't answer them,

02:56I can't treat them, or I can't manage them. And a lot of people, you know, if you don't know the

03:05methodology, how to answer questions in certain specialty, it just makes it a lot harder to do.

03:11And knowing that it just just facilitates my clinical practice as well. So I saw this combination.

03:19But even when I was director of imaging research at Cedars, I continued to practice cardiology.

03:28I was also a staff cardiologist, as well as conducting cardiac imaging research.

03:35So it never left me. And then when I came back to Australia for personal reasons,

03:42it turned out to be blessing in disguise. And I love coming back to Australia and continued then to

03:51practice clinical cardiology and research. But then I started to discover that, well,

04:00Western medicine that I practice, very powerful, the stents, the pacemakers, the surgeries, the

04:08resuscitation, the ICU, fantastic, especially like antibiotics, you know, just save people.

04:16But there are a lot of things that we don't do well. And one of them is really chronic conditions,

04:25you know, like a lot of pain, people suffering from pain, for example. Western medicine just doesn't

04:33cover this very well. And as a cardiologist, I want my patient to be pain free so they can move.

04:41Because movement is so among, if not the most bang for the buck, means to live longer for my cardiac patients.

04:54And therefore, I try to do everything to help them to mitigate the pain, whether back pain, neck pain,

05:04all sort of beside us pains. And I started discovering that there are a lot of complementary ways to do that.

05:11And as you know, because you interviewed me for this, one of them is laser therapy or photobiomodulation.

05:19Very, very good. But of course, acupuncture or laser acupuncture or needle acupuncture,

05:27they have been clinically proven to be useful. And that's why I started going into this searching,

05:36basically, trying to answer, are there other ways that I can help my patients? And sure they are, because

05:46despite the fact that we who live in Western countries think Western medicine is everything,

05:51in fact, the rest of the world practice often not Western medicine, but we just don't know.

06:00And certainly, for example, TCM being used in one billion people, how many Western people know

06:08about this vast knowledge over thousands of years? And to me, this is quite eye-opening when I started

06:16learning traditional Chinese medicine. And I'm still learning. I'm still such a beginner in it.

06:23But it is exciting because I have helped to try to validate which traditional Chinese medicine

06:31may help through rigorous research, trying to answer specific questions.

06:38For example, Tai Chi has been practiced for thousands of years. But under what situations would that help

06:47cardiac patients, for example? And the way that we've done it is we put through Tai Chi

06:54the robust Western-style clinical research and demonstrate its limitation, but its benefits

07:05in cardiac patients, where the language plays a part, where the ethnicity plays a part, all these questions

07:12we need to answer. Because we know they're practiced all over the place in China. But does it apply if

07:19they're practiced in Caucasian population, for example? So these are the sort of systematic approach that

07:26Western medicine is very good at, is using the research methodology to answer questions.

07:34So there you are. Yeah, I guess I had the advantage that I was born in an Asian country in Jakarta,

07:40Indonesia. So maybe there is some what you call a genetic imprint that aligns me to be open-minded.

07:49to other cultures. It's possible. Yeah. I love that. I love it. I did watch your introduction on

07:57the YouTube channel that you've started. And it brought tears to my eyes because,

08:03you know, when you talked about holding a lady's heart, you know, that was just so moving. And that,

08:11you know, you sat beside your father's bedside. Yeah. Yeah. And, um, and you, yeah, you weren't

08:19able to help him. That's, that's one thing, I guess, that is kudos to Western medicine. That lady survived.

08:27Yeah. Because we have sophisticated Western medical technologies. And my father's life

08:36was prolonged by several years because of fantastic pharmacotherapy in Western medicine. But

08:45how about quality of life? I'm not so certain. Yeah. Yeah. And it sounds like, um, you're aiming to help

08:55people, um, prevent that heart attack, obviously. Like you, you don't want to be resuscitated in the,

09:02you know, resuscitation bay. You want to try and stop that. Obviously everyone does. And you've,

09:09you're bringing out a new book very soon. And the title of it really strikes me that it's wisdom from

09:15two worlds, a scientific journey into longevity. It's a real topic that more and more people I think

09:22are interested in. And you're right quality of life. You want to hit your eighties, your nineties,

09:27even a hundred, still being able to interact and perhaps play with your grandchildren or great

09:32grandchildren. Correct. Yeah, absolutely. I always remind my patients, the Western medicine I practice

09:42is very good at keeping them alive. Yeah. We're very good. We can keep cancer patients. We can keep

09:53heart failure patients alive for a long time, but in terms of quality of life, definitely we're not

10:04quite as good. And therefore it comes back to what you just said. The best thing is prevention.

10:12Then there is no disease that we have to sort of cope with to maintain quality of life. You can have

10:20your quality of life without the disease. So I always remind my patients that the best time

10:28for prevention for you may have already passed, but the second best time is now.

10:36Okay. So, um, you know, what else can we do? Right. I mean, the best time for your prevention,

10:44when I'm facing a 58 year old who just had a heart attack three months ago, well, it's too late,

10:52you know, your best time for prevention probably was when you were 38. Yeah. But well, you know,

11:00it's the second best time is now and let's do it. I mean, I've got a few things that I'd love to,

11:06you know, sort of ask you or chat to you about. One of those, I know it's really hard to put it into

11:11succinct ways because what I love as well as you say that what it's, what works for each patient.

11:18So I understand everybody is an individual, but, um, I guess your longevity top tips for like that,

11:25that sort of things are actionable things we can, we can start doing. And I, I remember you said

11:32movement was one of them. And I remember you said that grandma's running after their grandchildren,

11:37your, you saw them, their hearts were healthier. And yeah, like I, I do remember that. So I'd love you

11:45to tell us a bit about what general, general longevity tips that you think we could do now. Yeah.

11:52Yeah. It's probably a mixture of observational science and true, what we call a clinical research.

12:05Yeah. Yeah. That gives us a very clear blueprint. What is the best bet that you can live longer

12:19and live well. Okay. The first is of course, what we eat.

12:25The second, as you said is movement. Absolutely true. It's to me, that's the second most important.

12:46The reason is because the nutrition of food is the first, because we all die without the food, right? In

12:53theory, you can live without moving. Okay. And that's why food is always the first. And how we look

13:02after ourselves, food is always the first. And how we eat them is a nuance. Second, definitely movement.

13:12The third is how we rest. We have to, we have to rest. And of course, rest, for most people,

13:19equal sleep. But not always. There are other ways to rest. Scientifically proven, beneficial type of rest.

13:29Okay. The fourth is connection. Now, these last two, connection and purpose, are not strictly speaking,

13:39physical. Okay. Although connection is sort of physical. But in theory, you can be very much connected to your

13:47toys, you know, as a child, too. Yeah. Or your imaginary theory. Okay. But connection is so important.

13:58As soon as you isolate yourself, whether physically or mentally, you will go downhill. And purpose is the last one.

14:08To me, if I were to give my own opinion, the food and the purpose are truly the two most important pillars.

14:22I read books about Winston Churchill. He lived till 90. And he was probably reading the book,

14:32book, biographies. He was probably the most unhealthy person among the most. He drank, he ate rubbish, you know,

14:44he just ate anything, you know, like he didn't care, you know, right? He's not moving much, okay? He's not ever small.

14:55Yeah. And yet he lived very well. Till 90. He was still mentally so sharp and so on, right?

15:08So that's like counterintuitive to what I just said. But he has such a big purpose. He is just so focused,

15:19so dedicated to a course. And as part of that, he is extremely connected.

15:26He has such a big purpose. He has such a big purpose. He has such a big purpose.

15:27He has such a big purpose. He has such a big purpose. He has such a big purpose.

15:32And that took him to 90 with a sound mind. So therefore, yeah, this last two,

15:39we now become more and more recognised as very important sort of part of that blueprints to longevity

15:52and good health. Yeah. So those are the five little silos, which ultimately, of course, interconnected.

16:02Yeah. And do you think the digital age is probably harming at least a couple of those points?

16:09Perhaps. Or, you know, like maybe the rest? Correct. Yeah. It's tricky.

16:19Yeah. It's too short in terms of time for us to actually know the real long-term impact.

16:28Yeah. There are certainly good sides and bad sides.

16:32Yeah, because it does help you be connected in some way, doesn't it?

16:36Yeah. To overseas relatives and... Correct.

16:39Absolutely. Because it makes connection so much easier.

16:45Texting each other is connection. Yeah.

16:48You don't feel lonely when someone asks you, how are you doing today? Okay.

16:52So it gives you a reason to say, I'm not doing as well, if you want.

16:57And that's connection. But yes, rest may be sacrificed because if you overdo it, but in moderation, I think it is a good thing.

17:12And you certainly can use digital age to facilitate fulfilling your purpose easier in many, many ways.

17:22Yes. And there's no doubt that it gives a lot of young people new purpose.

17:31Yeah. So it's a tricky situation, but definitely we haven't had good data to know what the long-term effect is for the next generation.

17:44Yeah. Yeah. Well, let's talk about fueling your body then.

17:49Let's talk about these foods because it is such an important topic, isn't it?

17:53Because I did see one of your shorts, I think it was on coffee, you know, that perhaps black coffee.

17:59I drink green tea, but then if I'm going to have a coffee, I'll always have milk in it.

18:04Yeah. But does that mean, um, well, yes, um, yeah, I guess, um, I never say you must abstain from this or this or this.

18:21But ultimately, I think everyone really should have that power to say, no one tells me what to do.

18:35Okay. My financial advisor advises me. He doesn't tell me you must invest in this.

18:44Otherwise, you're not going to be as, you know, happy or whatever.

18:51But he would advise me, in my opinion, of all this smuggish board of investments, this would do you the best.

19:01So that's an advice or recommendation.

19:04So I would recommend certain things, including, of course, stop smoking is a no brainer, right?

19:10And, but again, a lot of people don't realize that alcohol is a group one category.

19:20Food that WHO put in group one category as a carcinogen.

19:27Okay. So you do have a choice, right? If you want to, to say, okay, the science is there.

19:35How much do I want to drink or not drink at all?

19:38Alcohol. That's up to you. Okay. Yeah.

19:41If you don't know, then you don't know.

19:43Yeah. Is alcohol, it hasn't been shown now definitively that it is like smoking, that it,

19:50there's, there's no, there's no little amount that's good for you. Is that?

19:55Yeah. So WHO publishes group one category of carcinogens.

20:03Very few are foods. Wow. Very interesting.

20:07And alcohol is one of them. Okay. Yeah. So there are mainly three.

20:13One is cured or smoked meat. Ah.

20:18One, alcohol. And the third is not even food. It's called aflatoxin, which is

20:25when you eat nuts, that's, that's, um, like from moldy that, you know, that it could produce this

20:36toxin. So it's like, how often do we, you know, eat that? Okay. So it's not even really food, but it's,

20:44it's like a by-product of rotten food or something like that. Yeah.

20:48If you think about it, wow. All these other things in group one carcinogens in, uh, in WHO are all

20:57pollutants, smoking, nicotine, you know, there's only two main ones. Now, why shouldn't people know

21:05about this? I didn't concoct this. Anyone can Google WHO and type in group one carcinogens and, and

21:14found this too. So it's simple. It's there. The science is there. WHO is not going to say anything

21:20unless the science is so solid because it's the World Health Organization body. Okay. So, yeah.

21:29So there's no, no safe limit for alcohol. It's in the number one. No, that's right. We don't know

21:36what is the safe limit above zero. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Now, milk is more of a nuance. Okay. I,

21:49being Asian, I guess, um, I didn't grow up with a lot of milk and coming to Australia,

21:56all of a sudden I was exposed to dairy world. Okay. So growing up, because I went to high school

22:06in Australia and I wanted to be, you know, as strong as my big Aussie, bulky colleagues, uh,

22:14student friends, I used to eat a box of Kraft cheese every day. And I used to drink milk like crazy.

22:23Okay. So thinking that that's the best thing, right? For protein.

22:30And people always say, well, if I don't milk, drink milk, where do I get my calcium from? Okay.

22:37But they never think that in fact, more people in this world get their calcium, not from milk,

22:45because they're more non-Caucasians than Caucasians. People in Africa, they don't walk around

23:02getting their calcium from milk. Most people in China don't. And there's more than a billion people.

23:09People in Asia, as I said, I didn't grow up with milk because my family doesn't drink, didn't drink milk.

23:19So yeah. So do they run around with all these old ladies with osteoporosis?

23:28No solid evidence that they have a lot more osteoporosis at all. Okay. There may be in select

23:36population. But in general, you know, like the, the Japanese ladies, they are not world renowned for

23:49osteoporosis. Okay. And yet they have very little exposure to dairy products.

23:56So, you know, so I look into it. And I found that, yeah, there is nothing in milk,

24:07except for, I guess, even the lactose. Yeah, I guess, except for the lactose, I can get

24:14nutrients in milk from everything else.

24:17And then, Sylvie, I look into, is there any mammals? We are one of them. Yeah. Continue to drink milk

24:31as adults. Yeah.

24:35They steal eggs.

24:38They never try to surreptitiously

24:42in the middle of the night, go to a milking cows and try to drink milk, or try to drink milk from

24:52a bucket in a farm or something like that. Yeah.

24:56No, they survive very well as soon as they cut off, you know, from whatever age, depending on the

25:03animals. Yeah. No mammals drink milk as adult mammals, except us.

25:10So, and then historically, I found out, which I mentioned in the book,

25:17Wisdom from Two Worlds, how this sort of milk habit or dairy habit developed.

25:25So, I can categorically say, people grow up and die as long as they could without milk,

25:37will be as fine as people who drink milk, or maybe more fine.

25:43So, I sort of quoted an example of a study that showed that how milk increases IGF-1,

25:51which is a very not-so-good stress hormone.

25:56Oh, interesting.

25:57Yeah. And in that study, they got

26:01the group to also drink the same amount of Coke full of sugar.

26:06Oh, no.

26:08And they showed that, you know, milk markedly increased IGF-1,

26:16while drinking Coke, even though it is such a not-so-good drink.

26:21It didn't at all increase IGF-1. So, you know, it's a study, and it's a

26:30tongue-in-cheek study, I guess. Yeah. But it sort of shows that, well, it's,

26:36you know, it's not necessary to drink something that increases your IGF-1.

26:40Wow. Yeah, it's, and therefore, I devoted a chapter to discuss why, personally,

26:55I don't think it is an important part of our diet, because we can get calcium from many,

27:03many different sources.

27:04There are a lot of vegans in this world.

27:11They don't look unhealthy to me. Okay. And they don't line up in the osteoporotic clinic,

27:18basically. So, and a lot of vegetarians who also don't have lot of dairy. And therefore, yeah,

27:26it certainly doesn't have either epidemiological observational studies

27:32to show that dairy is important for your health.

27:40It's only important if you don't have other balanced diet.

27:46And it sounds like it could actually be doing you some harm.

27:49Correct. Yeah. So in my chapter, I wrote several very good

27:55observational studies. And one of the strongest one against milk showing the harms, in fact, came from

28:07Northern European country, Sweden, who initiated the revolution about dairy many years ago.

28:16Okay. And so that was a bit ironic. Yeah. So yeah. So I thought that I like to

28:23lay it open and let people read the literature. I summarize them all to show them the pros and cons,

28:32how strong the data is that milk in adults probably don't confer a lot of benefits, unless you don't have

28:41very good balance diet. And may actually harm.

28:46Cause harm. Yeah. Oh, that's a real pity because yeah, like the stress, I think stress hormones,

28:52that's a, that's a big thing. I think living on the Gold Coast and you're in Sydney, living in a city

28:57environment, a lot of people are under quite some pressure. I mean, you just have to go out into the

29:02traffic here and people's heart rates go up or blood pressure goes up. Right. Yeah. We, exactly.

29:09To me, we certainly don't need food that increases IGF-1. Okay. Yeah. So we want to help ourselves,

29:15obviously. Even though that study was, you know, a little bit like a, as I said, tongue in cheek study,

29:21you know, no one will endorse that drinking Coke is good, but it's just for that comparison. Okay.

29:27Okay. And in the chapter I quoted, and this is obviously most people don't know. So

29:37if we feed animal galactose, which is a sugar in milk, they age quicker. So we, in fact, we need these

29:50quickly age mice too, so that we can study anti-aging, blah, blah, blah. Right. Okay. So we feed them

29:59galactose and they age very quickly. Then we can use it to test all these different drugs. And most

30:07people don't know this. Okay. Oh, that's terrible. So I'm not saying that drinking milk will

30:12age you quicker. No, but I just want to point out that the galactose comes from milk.

30:18So. How unfortunate, because I do love milk. I don't know. Is that why the Koreans and Japanese

30:27look so much younger? I don't know. And you know, like, all I can say is that that's how we

30:34do our research is we feed them galactose. Yeah. How interesting. Yeah. And to speed up the aging.

30:43Yeah. Well, what if you, because obviously everyone's living, everyone has stresses on them,

30:51obviously, in, you know, in this world, including raising young children that wake you up a lot during

30:57the night. Like, you know, sleep, you know, you can't always get optimal sleep. You can't always

31:03choose your environment. Like, like I said, you go out in traffic, your blood pressure goes up,

31:07things are pressured, things are stressed. Do you have any sort of reliable foods that you can put

31:13into your own body that are going to then just help you, you know, like help mitigate some of these

31:19other things that are happening to you? Like, so rather than raising your stress hormone could actually be

31:26lowering it. Yeah. Well, it's probably, in general,

31:38things that increase IGF-1 would not be good because they're pro-inflammatory.

31:45And anything that contains a lot of antioxidants, they are anti-inflammatory. And so,

31:56as a broad category, that's the direction. And therefore, WFPB, which is whole food plant-based

32:05rainbow color diet is generally very anti-inflammatory versus obviously the other spectrum,

32:17which is, say, what they call a double cheese hamburger or something like that, you know,

32:23so, and fried chips, which will be for sure, no one will argue with me here, they're pro-inflammatory.

32:31And plus a big glass of milkshake or something like that. So, this spectrum really dictates the health

32:43in terms of diet. And then the other thing that is important, I think, is the way you eat.

32:51The more you eat, in fact, ironically, counter-intuitively, in fact, the more you become revved up, essentially.

33:06Okay. And that's why intermittent fasting has been shown to really subdue inflammation.

33:14And that goes along with the idea of intermittent fasting generally means that you are restricting,

33:26you are, in quote, calorie deficit artificially for a longer period of time. And that's rest.

33:36Okay. Because as soon as we have food, we're not resting.

33:40And that's why it is counter-intuitive because I know a lot of people say,

33:45when I'm stressed, I eat. I understand that. Okay. But in fact, when you eat, you don't rest.

33:52Okay. So, and that's why part of the benefits of sleep is if you don't eat, because your body rests as well.

34:02And there's absolutely no doubt. Our body, as soon as there's food, the brain will say,

34:11we have energy, let's go to work. Okay. So that's why it's, it's very, very important that whether you

34:23truly create daily calorie deficit to lose weight slowly or gradually in a healthy manner,

34:33or to me, the better way is for someone like you and I to have periodic, quote, artificial calorie

34:43deficit by not eating for a longer period of time to rest our body. And in fact,

34:50the total calorie can be the same. So Hugh Jackman was the one that popularized the 16-8 diet.

35:03And everyone knew that he was so healthy looking muscly when he played werewolf,

35:11but he was using 16-8 diet. Okay. So in a sense that he was fasting 16 hours out of eight hours,

35:27including when he's asleep. So there's not much room for eating really. Okay. So in the sense that,

35:36yeah. Is that when you eat everything that you're going to eat in an eight hour night?

35:40In eight hours. Yeah, that's right. He famously said that

35:46his then wife and him were antisocial because they couldn't eat after 6 PM.

35:52So, yeah, but there's no doubt that he ate a lot to be so muscly.

35:58But again, that makes him a lot less inflammatory, improves recovery, for example, because he was

36:09training really hard with F45 training program. So, yeah, so he injured himself a lot, you know,

36:17pumping and so on, but he was adopting this, what we call low inflammation eating habits.

36:24That's interesting.

36:25By artificially going into calorie restriction for longer period of time.

36:32That challenges the three meals a day type thing, doesn't it? In a way, like, you know, breakfast,

36:39lunch, because he probably was eating more like snacks, I guess, during that eight hours or to fit in all

36:45those calories. But correct. Yeah. So from 10 to 6, 10 AM to 6 PM, he'll be eating. And no doubt that he

36:53was guided by any nutritionist, but for sure he'll have all the protein he needs, the carbs he needs,

37:01the fat he needs in that eight hour window. Yeah. And for sure, he'll be eating a lot of calories

37:11to bulk up and so on. But at the same time, he remains low inflammation state.

37:18And there is no doubt what you said is a thousand percent true. There's no circadian rhythm

37:28in evolution that says we need three meals a day. Yeah. Like I, I do see all this wisdom coming and it,

37:37it seems like so much comes from the cave days, like that we're really, that that's actually how we evolved,

37:43like to live that way, you know, rise when the sun comes up, you feel tired when the sun starts to go

37:49down, you know, um, and, and yeah, the eating, like, that's so interesting what you said about rest,

37:56because there was an anti-aging doctor on the today show, actually just the other morning,

38:00I just, cause I am really fascinated in this topic and he's got a three to one rule and it's three

38:07hours before bed, no food, two hours before bed, no fluids. So that doesn't disrupt getting up to

38:15the toilet and one hour before bed, no screens. And, and the one hour before bed, no screens is

38:21quite easy for me to do in a way because I have tried to be fairly strict with screens because

38:25that's been such a big thing because the quality of sleep I get with a small child when I am sleeping,

38:31it's got to be really good. But the eating three hours before bed, that's, that's a, that for me,

38:39anyway, that's a challenge because I've always traditionally had dinner as the very last relaxing

38:46thing I do at the end of the day. And for me, that would be then eating dinner because I tried to get

38:51to bed very early with my toddler, would be eating dinner as early as 5.36, like Hugh Jackman. And then

38:58that's it. I could elaborate on that. Yeah. Yeah, do, please do. I'd love you to.

39:06No drinking or not as much fluid before bed is sensible, especially, of course, if you've got

39:14prostate problems or, you know, you try and prolapse or something like that. Right. But it's not a must

39:21in the sense that some people, you know, they just can hold water. They don't have to get up.

39:29Okay. I've got patients like 80 years old and still only wake up once a night. And I've got,

39:36of course, a lot of patients wake up four or five times a night with prostate enlargement. Right.

39:41So it's not like other than the fact that if it disturbs your sleep, it's not a must. But

39:51going to bed with an empty stomach makes sense. Because as we said before, when we rest, we like to just

40:03rest. That means that our digestive system has also turned off. Okay. So if you eat an hour before bed,

40:17you still have probably 70% of the food in your stomach, it hasn't even gone down to your intestines

40:24yet. So you'll be working half the night. Okay. So you're really sacrificing that rest period

40:34by part of your department is still burning over time. Okay. So it's not because your digestive system,

40:46as long as it is still working, your brain has to work. Okay. So, and, and therefore, yes, it does make

40:56sense. Ideally, I don't know, three hours, four hours, six hours. There's no real science to this, but the

41:03real science is if your body all shuts down is better than a couple of departments still working.

41:11Yeah, that's, that's so interesting, really. And it is wise. Because then, of course, you sort of go

41:18through your teenage years and 20s, and hopefully not your 30s anymore. But you go through that young

41:25period of, you know, you've probably heard of the thing like food coma, you know, you have a lot to

41:32eat, like a massive meal, and then you're asleep on the couch, or, you know, like, so what's happening

41:37there? So obviously, you're falling asleep after a big meal, or you're sleepy. But, but are you saying

41:45that that's still not good rest, like it's not quality rest for your body or, or your brain?

41:50Right. No, that's right. It wouldn't be as good as if you were sleeping at night. Yeah. When your

41:58melatonin is high, which is your sleeping hormone, and all your bodies, all your muscles, your stomach,

42:08your intestines, all

42:12slow down or stop. Because that's when your cells will ramp up the repair mechanisms.

42:22Oh, right. All right. So you have a full meal. In the middle of the day, melatonin is not high at all.

42:35But the weather is warm, you have a nice full stomach. A lot of your blood now is here.

42:44Okay. And therefore, you don't feel like doing anything. Because the rest of your body can rest.

42:56Because this is working hard, including your brain. Okay, so yeah. And, and therefore, yes,

43:03it's, it's, it's sort of, I guess, rest by default, in the sense. Yeah. But it's not repairing rest,

43:15the sort of rest that your body needs for. Yeah. How interesting. So what's happening in a really good,

43:22deep, good quality sleep? Your cells, is that where they're repairing things like DNA damage?

43:28Correct. Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. It's funny. In principle,

43:35every cell shares, almost every cell in our body works in a rather

43:44consistent way. We have a path, a chemical pathway to build, and we've got a chemical pathway to repair.

43:54It's a bit like we have two servants at home. One is to repair all the holes and repaint, blah, blah, blah,

44:09and one is to clean the house. But surprisingly, they cannot work together.

44:18Okay. So when your servant that builds doing something, this other servant cannot clean.

44:31They can't build and clean at the same time. You either build or you clean. Okay. So when you're

44:39building, you're not cleaning. You have to stop building to start cleaning. In terms of evolution,

44:46it's very efficient. Because if you're building and you're cleaning, building, cleaning is messy. Okay.

44:56So just like what we do when we want to do something, we focus on doing. After that,

45:04after we finish all our cooking, we start cleaning. Very few people in the kitchen will do all these

45:14things and at the same time cleaning around. No, not as efficient. Okay. And that's why the mTOR pathway

45:23and the AMPK pathway, they function in a separate timeframe. So we have to give this a go

45:32by shutting this down. So the building phase, is that awake time? And the cleaning phase is at night time?

45:44Well, in general, it is. Yeah. But it doesn't have to be. It's just that in general, if I'm exercising,

45:54yeah. I'm building, I'm tearing, I'm injuring myself. Okay. I'm pumping all this adrenaline.

46:04My mTOR system is working very hard. Yeah. Guess what? If I don't give two or three days of rest,

46:11as I get older, I don't have enough time to repair,

46:16to get rid of all these waste and so on. Okay. So yeah. So this function, obviously my building

46:27is also slower, but my repair tends to be slow, even slower. So I need to give myself more time.

46:35Yeah. So it's, yeah, it, so if you think about in that direction, then you can

46:43sort of more easily understand that just like in the kitchen, you know, it's just the most efficient

46:50way is that you build and then you rest. And when you rest, ideally you rest. You don't try to,

46:59yeah, because if you eat, it's like signaling, I have food to build. Yeah, right. That's making so much

47:07sense. Yeah. So the eight, the eight 16 system in those eight hours, you're building, you're giving

47:14your body the message that you've got that fuel. And then in the 16 hours, you're resting. So you can

47:20do the cleaning. You can. Absolutely. So when you rest long enough, like if you fast 16 hours, 20 hours,

47:2924 hours, 24 hours, then your cleaning ability significantly is enhanced to the point that they

47:40will look for old parts that are not working well, and then break them all down and reuse the individual

47:51parts. Okay. So if they're too short, they don't, it's called autophagy. That means that they will

48:01literally dismantle your old powerhouse, which is called mitochondria. Yeah. That's been, you know,

48:10just like any powerhouse, getting old, getting used much, it's not, not efficient. Yeah. Eat them up.

48:17This NPK powerhouse will eat them up and then reuse all the little proteins and so on. Yeah.

48:24How fascinating. And then when you start eating again, you build again, you've got such a clean house,

48:35very efficient. Okay. The builder can just walk around, no tripping into anything at all.

48:42How fascinating. So what, is there any, I mean, I know there's no guarantees, but is there any

48:49fairly surefire way that all of us could, could go into this, a tough? 100%. Yeah. Is there, tell, tell,

48:58what do we do? This is part of our, I guess, evolutionary process, right? Yeah. So there's no exception.

49:07The way that I talk about AMPK and mTOR. Yeah. There's no exception. Every cell is the same. Your cell,

49:15my cell, my muscle cell, my skin cells. Yeah. They all work the same way because it's based on our

49:23billions of years of DNA evolution. So, and there's absolutely no doubt that

49:30not building allows repair and makes building later on a lot more efficient.

49:44So is that 16 hour window enough for us to go into a little bit of a phophagy? No. No. There is no,

49:51no one cut off really other than animal models. Some experimental models show that 12 hours is

50:01probably the minimum. Okay. And then the longer, the better. Okay. And some people can easily do a

50:1424 hour fast easily. I have friends who, who do 24 hour fast every week. Easily like this because

50:23everything is habit. Okay. Uh, yeah. First is hard, of course, because it's a change. But in fact,

50:31it's not hard at all when you get used to it. That means that free water, if you want some coffee,

50:39you can have coffee with no milk, of course. And, uh, uh, I had a friend who said, oh,

50:46you know, I, I do six in eight and I just drink my collagen coffee. So I said, well,

50:51collagen coffee means you have collagen. Okay. So that means that you are eating,

50:57you're eating protein. Okay. So if you want to have tea coffee, then you have to have tea coffee,

51:04zero calorie. Yeah. Yeah. So funny. He just didn't realize that. Okay. Collagen coffee has

51:11collagen, you know, which is what about green tea. Just know that that is, that is okay. Wouldn't

51:16it be green tea? Yeah. There's zero calories. Coffee. Yeah. What about with a bit of lemon in it?

51:23Great. Oh, that's still okay. Yeah. Great. Yeah.

51:28Not good for my teeth though. It's so tricky, isn't it? Because everything seems to have

51:33a, oh, it is health is actually quite a challenge because you do one thing. Then you go to the

51:40dentist and you're told that you're dissolving away your teeth because you have lemon in your green

51:44teeth. It depends. That's why awareness is so important. Knowledge awareness for people. And I do

51:52have friends who have, what's it called? Cider or apple vinegar. Yeah. Apple cider vinegar.

52:01Every morning before breakfast to help digestion. But as soon as they have that little thing,

52:09they have a mouth full of water. Okay. Yeah. So, and I thought, well, yeah,

52:14that's a good habit because then you, you help to make it not so concentrated, but at the same time,

52:20you wash off all the acids. That's perfect. I thought, yeah. So, but again, it's knowledge. If you

52:26know, then you could prevent that. Yeah. So given, given it is like the big, you know, the rainbow,

52:33I mean, we, we roughly, most of us do know the rough principles of choosing whole foods and fruit

52:39and vegetables. And, you know, we're all looking for magic bullets. Like, are there particular foods

52:45that are better than others? Like in this rainbow? If you, if you had to pick your top ones that you

52:53can't live without say, like whether it's olive oil or I don't know what it is for you, but are there

52:58some foods that you really think others are the superheroes of this? Okay. If I were to just pick

53:07what foods, if I only can have certain foods, then I want to use foods that cause short-term stress in me.

53:18Okay. Okay. So there are foods which we call stress of foods. That means that they have substances

53:26in the food. And the typical one is broccoli with the glucoraphanine or sulforaphane,

53:33which in fact cause some oxidative stress in our cells. And by doing so, it in fact activates our

53:44antioxidant capacities of our cells. For example, onion is the gallic acid is, sorry, gallic and onions,

53:53uh, uh, uh, capsicums, uh, capsicums, uh, capsicums. They all have these compounds that either induce a

54:04minor inflammation or increases what we call RS, which is the redox oxidative stress within our cells.

54:13This short-term stress is called hormesis, H-O-R-M-E-S-I-S is like short-term bad, but it

54:25makes ourselves like react and increase our immunity, increase our ability to repair, etc. Yeah.

54:34Yeah. So these are foods which are very good. And the other group would be what I call the, uh,

54:45precursors to build glutathione. And these are cysteine rich foods. So glutathione is cysteine,

54:54uh, glycine and glutamate, um, but mainly the cysteine rich foods. And, uh, uh, there's a lot of foods

55:02with a rich in cysteine, legume, etc. So, yeah. And so those are probably the two because, um,

55:12I guess, you know, I prefer to tell people just fill it with as much rainbow color things as possible.

55:22Ultimately variety will give you the best balance, but yeah, for example,

55:28referatrol, uh, is one of these short-term stresses. Yeah. A lot of people don't realize that in fact,

55:34they're like a little pro-oxidants, but in return, they make your cells make more antioxidants.

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