Bookish Weapon Number Nineteen

This book, “Boundless,” by Ben Greenfield will not be available until January 2020 so no, I have not read it yet. However, it is a way to help promote his book for him and provide me the platform to tell you about some of the things I have learned from listening to his podcasts for several years now. This will be a bit longer than my typical post.

Of course, I recommend you read his book and even his older book called, “Beyond Training.” And don’t forget the podcasts! Yes, I know some of you don’t listen to podcasts or read books, but just things that summarize all of that. So let me jump around a bit and see if I can give you a little bit of everything. But remember, this is really an overview and based on my experience and opinion so please research this on your own. It does give you a starting point.

Anti-aging – The Number One Supplement

It surprises me somewhat that younger people have so much interest in not getting old. I would think that you’re so busy you don’t start to think about that until you are, well, older. Yet, this is a hot topic.

Under this subject there are a whole lot of things to discuss. First, supplements. The most popular and well researched supplement for anti-aging is an NAD precursor called Nicotinamide Riboside Chloride and sold by two main companies, Elysium and Chromadex. Elysium sells a product called Basis and Chromadex sells one called Tru-Niagen. I will let you decide which is best. I do take one of them now and have taken the other in the past. Where did I hear about these two products? On the Ben Greenfield podcast!

Wait, I went too fast. You may be asking what, pray tell, is NAD? NAD stands for Nicotinamide Adenine Dinucleotide. As we age NAD levels deteriorate so the idea behind this supplement which is basically Vitamin B-3, is to increase NAD levels in the body. Research has shown that it indeed does just that. So why is that important? Because NAD energizes your cells so you have more energy. You can climb mountains when you’re 74!

There is another product that is supposed to increase NAD levels, but has no research behind it that I know about and that is Nicotinamide Mononucleotide or NMN. David Sinclair takes it.

The Others

Other Ant-Aging supplements recommended by Sandy Kaufman in the Kaufman Protocol (one of Ben’s guests) include Resveratol, Pterostilbene, Astaxanthin and Curcumin for those over 45 years old. There a slightly different recommendations for other categories of people.

Sleep

This is my favorite subject. So I want to pass on what I have learned from Ben’s guests and Ben’s recommendations. Then tell you my experience.

First, getting to sleep can be difficult for some people. Ben recommends Dr.Parsley’s Sleep Remedy, CBD oil and Quiksilver Melatonin. He also recommends a product called Circadia. Think it is expensive? Well NuCalm is almost $5000. He recommends it too, but Circadia is less than a thousand.

Let me throw my two cents in as well. I have had great results with CBD oil and Dr Parsley’s product, but now I am using a product called Mag R&R which helps me with tight muscles and prevents night cramps from long mountain hikes. It contains melatonin, 5-HTP, Rhodiola, Ashwagandha, Gaza, ad Oasis Flower.

Dr. Steven Gundry in his recent book on anti-aging recommends that you do not eat anything for at least four hours before you go to bed. He claims that in order for your brain to be “cleansed” by something called Glymph, your body can’t be focusing on digestion.

Another recommendation from Ben is a grounding mat. It is supposed to eliminate pain while you are on it. Get it from Ultimate Longevity. Why? Listen to the podcast that features the owner for the answer to that.

Blood Tests

When you get your annual physical your doctor orders the standard blood tests. Pretty basic, but what do you really need to order? Here is Ben’s 11 Best Biomarkers:

RBC Magnesium
Estrodiol
High-Sensitivity- C-Reactive Protein
Tryilyceride to HDL Ratio
Full Lipid Panel
Omega Three Fatty Acids
IGF-1
Insulin
Complete Blood Count with Differential
Iron

Toss that at your doctor next time you see him or her. If you want a lengthy explanation for each one visit Ben’s website and search for 11 Best Biomarkers.

Recovery

Hopefully, some of you the read these posts are hikers or engage in some kind of regular exercise. If so, then you are gong to have times when you tweaked or injured something. Maybe it is just being extremely sore which I guarantee if you go hiking with me.

So it is with that in mind that I am introducing you to something called BP 157. Yes, I heard about first on the Ben Greenfield podcast. You can now take it orally, but before this the only way it worked was by injection. There never was an oral BPC 157 that worked. However, Greenfield had the owner of Dr. Seeds dot com on his show and they discussed their oral product. Ben tried it and said it worked, but that because it is oral it took three weeks before you felt any difference to an injury for instance.

What exactly is this stuff? BP 157 is a peptide and it works with your blood to help heal injuries faster. What I didn’t know was that it also dramatically reduces soreness after a workout or training session. I used it for two months and discovered, to my delight that Ben was right. The stuff is amazing and there are no side effects. Dr Seeds sells the only (so far) oral product that works. He calls it Body Protective Complex (clever, right?). If you decide to try it know that the black bottle is the higher dose. That is what I used.

Other Peptides

Peptides are a huge topic. BPC 157 is only the beginning. There are peptides for energy, better sleep, etc. You can dive deep. However, as far as I know all these other peptides require an injection.

For example, there is DSIP or Delta Sleep Inducing Peptide. If you try this let me know how it works as I have not as yet. I tend to stay away from injections.

Surface Scratching

This post has only scratched the surface of what is in Greenfield’s books and podcasts. I hope you will start listening, because it could have a huge impact on your health.

Now, at least you have a place to start. It is a fast changing world of bio-hacks and everything to make you better so you can go hiking of course.