Your Brain Health Is EVERYTHING ft. Dr. Daniel Amen 01:03:26

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Well, it's so nice to meet you. I'm honestly, I'm so excited for today because I absolutely love you. I mean, following you on social media and seeing everything that you post, it's a lot of times it's like a slap in the face to me because I will say I do not live my life in the cleanest, healthiest way. But it's just an honor to be sitting in front of you. So thank you. Well, thank you for helping me spread the

the message. No, for sure. And over time, the more you love yourself, the more you do the right things. Yeah. Because it's never because, oh, I should do this or I should do that. Yeah. It's because you want to.

the best life possible. - For sure. - And so I help people do things that help them feel good now and later versus now but not later. - Yes, so let's introduce yourself. And for people who may not know who you are, what you do, what you stand for,

And all of those things. So I'm a psychiatrist. I'm a general psychiatrist and also a child and adolescent psychiatrist. Did not know that. And I'm board certified in both. Okay. And about...

Well, I'll start a little bit earlier. When I was 18, Vietnam was going on and I became an infantry medic. And that's where my love of medicine was born. Okay. But about a year into it, I realized something really important about myself.

I don't like being shot at. It's not my thing. Some people, they like run toward fires. They like that. No, I'm not okay with that. And so I got retrained as an x-ray technician and developed a passion for medical imaging. Our professors used to say, how do you know unless you look? And then in 1975, I got out of the army and

and finished college, went to medical school. And when I was a second year medical student, someone I cared about tried to kill herself.

And I took her to see a wonderful psychiatrist and I came to realize if he helped her, which he did, it wouldn't just help her. That I realized, oh, this will help her children. It'll help her grandchildren because they will be shaped by someone who is happier and more stable. So I fell in love with psychiatry.

the only medical specialty that never looks at the organ it treats. And back in 1979, I knew it was wrong and I knew it would change. I just had no idea I'd be part of the change. And about 1991,

I went to a lecture on brain SPECT imaging. SPECT is a nuclear medicine study that looks at blood flow and activity, looks at mitochondrial function, it looks at how your brain works. And I just loved it. Given my imaging background, psychiatry, I started to scan most of my psychiatric patients, little kids, old people, and it virtually changed everything.

I do. And over the last 32 years, we've built the world's largest database of brain scans related to behavior. We have over 225,000 scans on patients from 155 countries. And I learned, you know, the big lesson, most psychiatric problems, anxiety, depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, panic attacks, OCD, PTSD,

are not mental health issues. They're brain health issues. If I get your brain right, your mind behaves so much better. Yeah. But now people start with the mind

They try to drug it into submission with an SSRI or they try to send you to therapy and you have no idea if your brain is healthy or not healthy. You have no idea is it because of a concussion that you're acting badly. You have no idea because it's COVID, because COVID attacks the brain. You have no idea if it's Lyme disease. And when you optimize the physical functioning of your brain,

your life is better. And it starts there. So I always think of people in four big circles. What's the biology? What's the physical function of your brain and your body?

What's your psychology? How do you think? So often talk about ants and killing the ants, the automatic negative thoughts that steal your happiness. What's the social circle? So how are you getting along with your partner, with your kids? What's happening in society? We're just coming out of a pandemic.

And what's the spiritual circle? Which most psychiatrists never talk about. I've never heard one speak about that. Why do you care? It's like, why do you think you're on the planet? What is your connection with God as you know him or her? What's your connection with the planet? What's your connection with the past? And what's your connection with the future? And why? Because when you know your purpose...

you're happier. You live longer. And so ultimately it's biology and psychology and social circles, spirituality, all working together all the time. So when you do these scans, what does it show? It shows basically three things, healthy activity, too little or too much. And then my job,

is to balance it. If it's working too hard, I want to calm it down. If it's not working hard enough, I want to repair it. And one of the things that you do believe in is obviously if medicine is needed, that's a different story. But you do believe there are other alternatives to getting where you need to get to without it. Well, all doctors in medical school learn first do no harm,

And all medicines, all psychiatric medicines have black box warnings, which means you give it to the wrong person, you can hurt. First, do no harm. Use the least toxic, most effective treatment. And if you just think of it, head to head against antidepressants.

exercise has been shown to be equally effective. So walk like you're late, 45 minutes, four, five times a week. The end of 12 weeks, equally effective. At the end of 10 months, exercise is more effective. Head to head against antidepressants. Omega-3 fatty acids have been found to be equally effective. In one study from New Zealand, they were actually more effective. Take fish oil.

head to head against antidepressants, learning how to not believe

every stupid thing you think. So a treatment called cognitive behavior therapy was found to be equally effective. So why not, if you're depressed, start walking like you're late, take omega-3 fatty acids, and whenever you feel sad, bad, nervous, or out of control, write down what you're thinking. And then just ask yourself, is it true? And let's just start there. Not to mention, if you're depressed...

Let me send you to the lab and make sure your thyroid's okay. Let me make sure you don't have inflammation in your body. Let me check your testosterone levels. We're living in an epidemic of low testosterone. I saw that. There was an article that was released. And what were the numbers? Wasn't it something crazy? Well, it's like 40% of young males have suboptimal levels. And why do you think that is? Because we're poisoning them.

We live in a society of plastic and plastic leeches, and we get it in our body and all of a sudden we're exposed to phthalates and BPAs and toxins.

that steal your hormones. - And do you believe that any of it has to do also, something you speak about, marijuana, alcohol, do you think that has anything to do with it? Especially with marijuana being such a-- - Especially with marijuana and testosterone. - Yeah. - It's a shit show. I mean, I always try to come up with a word that's not,

Hey, there's no other word. Obscene. It's a shit show what's happening in our society with fast food. The idea during the Super Bowl, there were 30 alcohol commercials. Wow. The idea that alcohol is innocuous is a complete lie or alcohol is a health food. It's a complete lie. Marijuana is innocuous. It's a lie.

Teenagers who use marijuana in their 20s have a higher incidence of anxiety, depression, suicide, and psychosis. And I published a study on 1,000 marijuana users, largest imaging study ever on marijuana. Every area of the brain is lower in activity. Then if you take, if you're overweight, I don't know if you know this, but as your weight goes up, the actual physical size,

and function of your brain goes down, which should scare the fat off anyone. And in our society, 20% of children are overweight or obese. 72% of adults are overweight or obese. 42% are obese. And this is the biggest brain drain

in the history of our country. And if you want to keep your brain healthy or rescue it, you have to prevent or treat the 11 major risk factors. So that's a theme of my work. It's called Bright Minds. You need to attack each of these 11 bright minds risk factors. If you're overweight, you now have seven of them.

Wow. So I have obesity in my family. If I just ate everything I wanted to eat, I'd be fat. I have a brother that's 150 pounds overweight, which horrifies me. And I love him, but of course he doesn't listen to me. It's...

We live in a society where the weapons of mass destruction, I often say ISIS has nothing on our food industry. You know, the terror group. They have nothing on our food industry. Well, because in the U.S., we have, there are things that are in our food that are like overseas. It's like illegal for it to be in our food. Right, but we're trying to export all of those things. And...

I often say the weapons of mass destruction, highly processed, pesticide sprayed, high glycemic, low fiber food like substances stored in plastic container. And it's just, and then they take beautiful women like Charlotte McKinney, who's so beautiful.

and they put it half naked Charlotte with a cheeseburger from Carl's Jr. in her mouth. And the message is, is if you eat Carl's Jr. she will want you. Well, one, there's no way she looks like Charlotte.

And if she's eating these cheeseburgers. No, there's no way. They actually have spit buckets on the sets, so she'll take a bite and spit it out. But the underlying message is if you eat this, she will want you. Yeah. And it's a lie. Or I even think as a young girl looking at it, wow, she eats that and she still looks like that. Right, which of course is a lie. Which is, yeah, which is so not true. Wow.

See, I didn't know that about obesity. I did not know that. We are in a war for the health of our brain. Everywhere you go, when you just sort of pay attention, if you go to the airport or you go to the ballgame, everywhere you go, someone is trying to shove bad food down your throat that will kill you early. Now, going back to...

the marijuana usage, because I think that's such a big thing with young kids right now. Middle school, high school, you're seeing it younger and younger and younger. What would you say to the kids who say, "Oh, it's not bad for you, it's medicinal, it's, you know, it's not a gateway drug." It's stupid, it's a lie.

So we have a high school course called Brain Thrive by 25. And we've been teaching it for the last 15 years. Okay. And it's in seven different countries. Wow. And we had an independent group study it. It decreases drug, alcohol, and tobacco use, decreases depression, and improves self-esteem. Why? We teach kids to love and care for their brain. And if you love yourself,

And you're reasonably smart. You realize your brain controls everything you do, how you think, how you feel, how you act, how you get along with other people. Yeah. So why would you poison the organ of success? And so we have one lesson. So it's a 12-week course. Okay. And week five.

things to avoid to have a healthy brain. And marijuana is on it, alcohol's on it, undisciplined digital behavior's on it, sugar's on it. And invariably, toward the end of the class, a 14-year-old boy, never a girl, it's really interesting, never a girl, raises his hand and go, how can you have any fun? And so we play a game with the kids called Who Has More Fun?

The kid with the good brain or the kid with the bad brain who gets the girl and gets to keep her because he doesn't act like an ass. The kid with the good brain or the kid with the bad brain who gets into the college they want to get into, who has the best jobs, makes the most money, has the most meaning and purpose, has a life they love. Yeah. The kid with the good brain or the kid with the bad brain. And then you realize you're not really depriving kids.

yourself of you're only depriving yourself of things that hurt you yeah it's like the famous comedian drew carey said he lost a lot of weight and when i heard him said say eating crappy food isn't a reward it's a punishment

I'm like, oh, he's going to stay healthy. Yeah. Now you live in Nashville where they're famous for bad food. Yes. I mean, like awesome food that will kill you. 100%. Early. And the level of obesity in Tennessee is really high. Yeah. Because we're not thinking beyond the moment. No, not at all. And so I know for me, like my guilty go-to is soda. Like Dr. Pepper is...

That's my breakfast. That's... That's like my coffee. What is...

I already know. I feel it. I feel it. I know it's bad for me. But what are... Of course, it's terrible for you. What does that amount of sugar do to the brain? Or is it just sugar in it? So what it does... No, it's not just sugar. It's sugar and caffeine. Sugar and caffeine. It's a bad... It's just like a Red Bull. What it's doing is it jacks up your blood sugar

And then about 40 minutes later, because your pancreas sees that high sugar level, it drops your blood sugar. So you feel good. And then you feel like your brain's in mud. But it's also addictive. And so if you just stopped, you'd feel like you had the flu for a few days. But if you go, okay, on average, I have 20 ounces of Dr. Pepper a day.

Well, all you have to do over three weeks, just decrease it by one ounce. You won't get withdrawal and you'll get rid of the devil, which has hijacked your brain to need it in order for you to feel normal. And why would you want to put something in your body that addicts you? It's like, oh, but it's a habit. Yeah. Right? It is. And I want your habit to be love.

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There's a lot of small habits because I like to make things super easy. Yeah. So when you go to the Dr. Pepper, just ask yourself, good for my brain or bad for it? And if you can answer that with information and love, you're like, oh, this is hijacked me. And what do you love more? See, I do the right things. Why?

Because I'm crazy about myself. I love myself. Yeah. Right? I have a wonderful family. I have a mission I love. I want to live a long time. It's like, what do I really want? And it's an interesting question for you. What do you really want? Because you've been through a lot of stress. Yeah. Right? And I've been through a lot of stress. I've had a lot of people hate me over the years because I'm trying to disrupt everything.

what's happening in psychiatry. I think it's broken, I think it's wrong, I think we can do way better. So I have a lot of hate. And so I need to be strong mentally, brain-wise, in order to survive the stress that comes my way. And so if I'm crazy about myself, what do I want? I want energy.

I want memory. I want clarity. I want good decisions. I want connection. And I want purpose. Dr. Pepper doesn't fit any of those. Dr. Pepper steals. It steals. And so if I asked you, Savannah, what do you really want in your life? Yeah. What would you say? Genuine happiness, not filled with control.

And anxiety. And Dr. Pepper controls you. Yeah. And the caffeine and sugar withdrawal will always make you anxious. And so... That is very true. So it's a weapon of mass destruction. So if you just go into the grocery store, there's a whole aisle dedicated to sugar. And it's the soda aisle.

But what you could do is get sparkling water, put a little. There's a company I like called Sweet Leaf. They make 10 different flavors of stevia. Wow. Like they make a root beer flavor of stevia. My favorite is a chocolate flavor of stevia. Really? Squeeze a lemon or a lime in it. Yeah. It tastes like a soda. No calories. No caffeine. I love it.

And it loves me. Because whatever you do, I want you to ask yourself, do you love it? I want you to have an abundant life. Yeah. Do I love it? But does it love me back? Like alcohol doesn't love you back. It hurts you. It damages your brain. Marijuana doesn't love you back. It hurts you. It damages your body and your brain. Have you ever been in a bad relationship? Yes.

Me too. I'm not doing it anymore. No. Absolutely not okay with it. I'm not going to be in a bad relationship with food or drink. I'm only going to love stuff that loves me back. How do you, how does someone overcome being in that toxic cycle of a relationship or food or of saying, well, that's where I find my comfort. Like I feel good when I'm doing it. That's what saves me.

No, but it's a lie. Yeah. It saves you for the moment. It helps you feel good now, but not later. And I want you to always do things that help you feel good now and later.

Like if somebody gives you an antidepressant that helps you feel good now, maybe they don't work really well. Maybe. There's a lot of side effects because before we came on, I had stated during this past year, I went to a doctor and he gave me medicine for depression. And I just sat there and I was like, am I really doing everything I could possibly do to maybe fix this on my own?

Laying in bed watching TV being on social media. No, that's all that I was doing. I was kind of staying just like a little you know I was in my own little bubble not coming out of it and I wasn't working out I wasn't eating right none of those things so I was like, okay, I'm kind of being lazy I'm not doing what I think mate would make me feel better so

That was kind of that part with the depression medicine. So that's the easy answer. And some people need it. But you do the right things. Now, if you absolutely can't get out of bed, then maybe that'll be a bridge. But most people who start them don't stop them. And last year, there were 337 people.

million prescriptions for antidepressants. A quarter of the American population is on psychiatric drugs. This is not okay. This is like, no, this is not a genetic problem. This is a gene environmental toxin interaction with people who've never been taught to manage

their minds. And so learning how to love your brain, because it all starts with love. Yeah. Right? I love myself, so I do the right thing. My granddaughter's here, and she's four, and I love her. She's a character, but she's four. So when Haven...

wants something, she will have a tantrum to get her way. Now, the rule is, if you have a tantrum to get your way, the answer is no. It's always going to be no. Throw the tantrum. Yeah. But if you're 22 and you want your way and you don't get it and you throw a tantrum,

You drink when you shouldn't drink. You smoke pot when you shouldn't be smoking pot. You eat bad food. You're like, "No, I want what I want." And I'm like, "Come on, that is not a mature mindset." - Yeah. - Right? If you just gave in to your children, every time they had a tantrum, you create entitled, spoiled children. - Yeah. - Whenever you give in to your tantrum yourself, you're creating your own behavior disorder

And the way out is, is this good for my brain or bad for it? And then treating yourself with love. Yeah. But firm, right? The best parents are firm and kind. It was, my dad would always say, I'm here to be your parent, not your best friend. So I'm not here to make you happy all the time. I'm here to love you and loving you means...

Saying no to things that you shouldn't be doing. Right. And then supervising you. I know where you are, what you're doing, who you're with. I'm tracking you. Yes, literally. And children hate that.

They hate it more when you don't do it. That's what I was about to say. As an adult now, I am... I remember I was so mad growing up. My dad, he would know where we were at all times. And he was like, you can have as much privacy as you can afford. As much privacy as you can afford. And I would say that's none. And I remember being so angry. But now as an adult, I am so grateful for all the no's.

Because it taught me, you know, it really showed, okay, you loved me. You cared about me. And I have a lot of friends who never had that. And they were like, they were just pushing the envelope just to be told no. So that they would get the love and the attention. Which is, I'm lucky I didn't have to do that. And so with children, I ask this. I have a little sister. She's 10 years.

And what would you say for kids who are diagnosed with ADD, ADHD, that are put on medication? And are there alternative ways to deal with that? So ADD or ADHD is real. Yeah. And when it's left untreated, it causes all sorts of problems. But the simple 10-minute answer is,

is let me put you on Ritalin or let me put you on Adderall.

There's one called Quilevent. Quilevent. Yeah. There's also Concerta. There's Vyvanse. There's a whole group of them. But they're basically stimulants. And for some people, they're miraculous. Yeah. For other people, they're a nightmare. And so you have to know what the brain looks like to know that I can target treatment to them rather than...

than to a cluster of symptoms. But the natural treatments for ADD, exercise, so...

Don't give a DD kids gadgets. Don't give them gadgets until they're like an older teenager Yeah, because it steals their dopamine. So if you think of a DD think of a dopamine deficit disorder the stimulants work by increasing Dopamine so you never want to let someone's dopamine be taken from them. Yeah video games steal dopamine phones steal

Dopamine, pornography steals dopamine, alcohol, marijuana steals dopamine. So if you have low dopamine to start, we need to, you know, not thrill you to death because that's going to make things worse. And then we support dopamine. So there's a simple supplement, L-tyrosine, which is the amino acid building block for dopamine. That can be helpful. Other supplements like

rhodiola, ashwagandha, ginseng have been found to be stimulating. That can be helpful. So a study from Holland, they took 300 ADHD children and put them on an elimination diet. So they eliminated all the crap in their diet. They could eat rice, vegetables, fruit, pear juice, lamb, turkey. That was it.

At the end of three months, 72% lost their ADD. Wow. So the great American diet, the standard American diet, the sad diet.

What does it start with in the morning? It starts with how quickly can I feed you and we can all get out of the house. Yeah. It starts with pancakes. It starts with waffles. It starts with sugar loaded cereals. It starts with pastries. It starts with donuts, muffins. It's a fucking disaster because if you take an ADD child,

and you give them a protein-based breakfast, so think eggs and sausage, their medicine actually works longer. If you give them a simple carbohydrate-based diet, an hour later, they're spacey. They're space-connected. And then we blame them even though we should blame their diet. Yeah, because you're setting them up for failure by not... You're setting them up for failure by not thinking about, okay, how do I feed them? Wow.

What did you have for breakfast when you were growing up? Chick-fil-A every morning on the way to school. And what from Chick-fil-A on the way to school? Like fried chicken and like chicken minis. You know, it's like the bread with the honey butter on top. I mean, it tastes great, but it probably wasn't the most healthy for you. No, it's engineered.

It has the perfect crunchiness, the perfect meltiness, the perfect aroma. It is engineered by neuroscientists to addict you. And I'm not okay about that. No, no. Right? That we're going to give, you know, the Chick-fil-A family billions of dollars as they hurt the health of America. It's so true. When you look at society, just like social media, it's...

They know what they're doing by getting you addicted to something. And that, like, social media is the... I just saw, I guess TikTok now has or is going to have, like, an hour...

limit for a kid but you have to opt into it okay so it's it's a little funny yeah um and then did you see the article in the one in the new york post where a 30 year old woman journalist pretended she was a 14 year old boy set up a profile like he was a 14 and within half an hour he's getting

pictures of boobs pictures of men being mean to women pictures of violence and if you go the algorithm is really that toxic is china really trying to steal the health of america now i have two million followers on tick tock but i'm very ambivalent about this i mean i'm going to feed them

Good content. Yeah. But there's and there is a lot of good content on TikTok. There's a lot of good content on it as well. And you just wonder, is it China's way of getting an edge over us by making our young people stupid? Yeah. And that's the thing is people don't want to read too much into that.

You know, whenever a comment like that is made, people because I have said that people are like, oh, you're such a conspiracy theorist. And yeah, but how many of these conspiracy theorists like the virus came from the Wuhan lab? Yeah. How many of them actually become true?

I mean, I think everybody should be thoughtful, but just because the media feeds you a line, they're not working in your best interest. - No. - The media is-- - Working for who? - They're working for their advertisers. - Yes, who they're getting paid from. - Let's just be really clear.

one of the weapons of mass destruction are news outlets. And I don't care if it's Fox or it's CNN or MSNBC or USA Today or the New York Times. In the Washington Post newsroom, they have a scoreboard of which articles get the most hits. And if it gets the most hits, it ends up on the front page. And

What gets the most hits? If you hate Republicans, that gets the most hits. If there's some sort of violence that happens, gets the most hits. Their interest is in selling copper underwear. It's not...

on educating and reporting the news. I start every day with the Good News Network because quite frankly, I don't need somebody else pouring crap down my brain. And the Good News Network, I always have a smile. There's always something heartwarming. There's always something cool. There's always something interesting. And when you understand it the way I do,

You get to direct your mind rather than have your mind hijacked for money. And I'm not okay with that. I mean, that infuriates me. So I want to direct my mind. And if you have a tragedy in your family, you have to be even more disciplined.

And, you know, less allowing the negativity into your sphere. You have to create your own safe space. You do. And I think that's the hardest part for me and for other people is just saying, no, like this isn't good for me. So I'm not going to entertain it. That's kind of where I find myself because I'm like, OK, I never want to hurt people's feelings. But really, when you sit back, you're like, OK, wait, but.

I'm hurting myself by allowing relationships into my life that shouldn't be there, that aren't healthy, just to please that person. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp.

I have been a huge advocate for therapy. You guys know that. I love my in-person therapy, but also I'm traveling a lot right now. And when I travel, I tend to get overwhelmed. I tend to maybe fall behind a little bit. And that's where BetterHelp has come into play for me. BetterHelp is my therapist on the go.

what I also love is that if one therapist doesn't work for you, that's fine. It's not one fits all and you can get another one. So if one doesn't work, don't shut it down. Try it again. And when you're at your best, you can do great things, but sometimes life gets you bogged down and you may feel overwhelmed or just

just like you're not showing up in the way that you would want to. So working with a therapist can help you get closer to the best version of yourself. Because when you feel empowered, you're more prepared to take on everything that life throws at you. So I really hope you guys join me on this BetterHelp journey. And if you want to live a more empowered life, therapy can help to get you there. Visit betterhelp.com.

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The hallmark of a leader is his or her ability to say no. And you become...

like the people you spend time with. Yeah. And so if they're toxic people in your life here at Amen Clinics, we have the no asshole rule. I love that. There's a book by a Stanford professor called the no asshole rule. And I don't, and the no asshole rule starts with me, right? That I hire people that are kind purposefully. Yeah. That are competent. Yeah.

And passionate. And you got to be all three. You have to be kind, you have to be competent, you have to be passionate. And somebody goes, but what if this person is like really great, but they're an asshole? It's like they need to be really great somewhere else. Because people are contagious. 100%.

100%. So before I think I was like, we were talking before because I was just like, I wanted to ask you all the questions. And I had read up about how you've done a lot of research on traumatic brain injuries with the NFL and other sports. And my ex fiance was a hockey player, nine concussions. And I feel like I could see the effects in everyday life of those concussions. Um,

And obviously with the NFL recently, everything going on with the traumatic brain injuries, I feel like a lot of people aren't wanting to listen to it. And I think that's because that's where money comes into play. What are your thoughts in that field when it comes to sports and the traumatic brain injuries? Children should not play contact sports.

because they have developing brains. The brain is soft, the skull is hard, the skull has sharp bony ridges. Mild traumatic brain injury is a major cause of depression. It's a major cause of ADHD, addictions, depression, suicide. You want to protect your brain. Golf is good.

Tennis is terrific. Table tennis is the world's best sport. And now we have this pickleball epidemic, which is awesome. So I love football. And when I was a teenager, I played and I just, I loved it. I was like a crazy Los Angeles Rams fan. And, but when I started looking at the brain, I'm like, uh-oh.

This is clearly not good for you. I would see damage in high school players' brains. I'd see damage in college football players' brains. And then in 1999, Brent Boyd, who was an offensive guard for the Minnesota Vikings, he came to see me. His brain was toxic and damaged. And I helped him file one of the first workers' comp lawsuits against the NFL. And they just, like, laughed.

It's like, no, Imogene, that can't tell you anything. And 2007, Anthony Davis, the Hall of Fame running back from USC, came to see me. And at 54, his brain looked like he was 94. And it was bad.

and he had temper problems memory problems he'd get confused he'd be on the freeway and not know where he was going and one of the doctors at USC said you need to go see Dr. Raymond and I scanned him it was terrible I put him on a rehabilitation program multiple vitamin fish oil brain boost and

Within five months, he's dramatically better. And he said, "Hey, Doc, we have to tell people about this." And so he wrote to the commissioner. He didn't write back. But he got me to speak. See, that's the sad part. Well, it's so sad. He got me to speak to the Los Angeles chapter of the NFL Players Association. And I saw some of my heroes, like Freddie Dreyer,

at the meeting and they were clearly not cognitively their best. - Yeah. - And so I'm like, Anthony, we have to do something about this. And so the NFL Players Association partnered with me and I did the first and largest study on active and retired players. We've done 350 players, high levels of damage, stop,

lying about it. This is a brain damaging sport. Now I think everybody now knows, but in 2009 when we started our study, my brother actually, the overweight one, laughed at me and said, "You just want everybody to play ping pong. You really think you're going to make any on this?"

But when we published our first study in 2011, the NFL started changing its position. And now there's concussion protocols and they pay money for rehabilitation. They're so far from where they should be. But

Pop Warner went down like 50% because mothers started going, I mean, President Obama came out and said, I wouldn't let my kids play football. LeBron James came out and said, I wouldn't let my kids play football. And so, but you know, it's not just football. It's hockey. That's what I said is part of me feels like

Hockey could be even worse because you're going at such... But the point of hockey is not to tackle people. Yeah. The point of football is to tackle people. Yeah. But hockey's not good. I mean, I have...

Paul Correa, it's public, I treated him. He's a Hall of Fame NHL player. Had headaches every day for 12 years. And if you just see his injuries, they're wicked. Because not only does your head get hit by a stick or by somebody's elbow, your head then hits the glass and then hits the ice. And I mean, they're just wicked.

- Yeah. - But how cool is it that we can rehabilitate it? And if you're in love with someone who's had nine concussions, well, pretty soon they're impulsive, which means they say things that hurt your feelings. - Yeah. - Or they might do things

that are hurtful or they don't remember things or they're more volatile. And it's not because they want to be, it's because the organ of behavior has been hurt. For sure. And I think too, you know, because everything with my ex was very public. And so that behavior that was exhibited was

headaches every day and it was like, oh, I have to lay in bed. I have to be, you know, and it does take a toll on a relationship, but also the quick, you know,

you know, going to lose my temper, going to make irrational decisions that make no sense. But we can see it and rehabilitate it. Yes. So how many relationships are lost because nobody recognized there was a traumatic brain injury? In fact, if you ask me, you say, hey, Daniel, single most important thing you've learned from 225,000 scans?

mild traumatic brain injury ruins people's lives. And nobody knows about it because they end up seeing a marital therapist and nobody's looking at the brain. And they're like, you need to sort of stop being an asshole. - But why are you doing those things? - Why are you an asshole? - Yeah, exactly. That is. And so when you go to traumatic brain injuries, would you say, obviously suicide has been rampant in the past few years amongst all age ranges.

attempted suicide is does that cause traumatic brain injury? Well, traumatic brain injury can cause you to be suicidal. And so I'll say suicide attempt.

can also cause a traumatic brain injury. For example, if you try to hang yourself and you have a lack of oxygen but you don't die, odds are you've damaged your brain. - So the reason I ask is from a personal experience. I had tried committing suicide, never really spoken about it before, but I took a bottle of pills and obviously didn't work.

Because I'm sitting here today, thank God. But ever since then, it's I feel like with my brain, like my memory, it's the most frustrating thing in the world because it feels so foggy. Well, we should look at it.

Yeah. I mean, because like, how do you know? Yeah. Unless you look. But if you had clarity and now you don't, something happened. Yeah. And if you can see it, then you can go to rehabilitate it. So many people go, oh, no, I don't want to be scanned because I don't want to know it's hopeless. It's hardly ever hopeless. Yeah. Right. There's always something. But it's like, well, let's get.

Let's get the plan, you know. Kill the Dr. Pepper gets you to take the right supplements. Exactly. Stop believing every stupid thing that comes into your head. Discipline your mind. And it's actually not uncommon to have suicidal thoughts. In one study from Washington State, 55% of the population at some point in their life had thoughts.

Women try to kill themselves three times more than men, but men are three times more successful because they tend to choose more violent means. Wow. I had no idea. Yeah. That is. And so with suicide with children.

You're obviously seeing an uptick. I mean, I can't tell you how many times I see a headline of a 10-year-old, a 12-year-old. It's heartbreaking. What do you think, where do you think that is coming from? Part of it's contagion, that they see someone else doing it. Part of it is isolation. There's a lot of bullying that goes on. Do you think COVID obviously had a big... Well, so many...

bad things happened with COVID. The lockdowns, totally bad for children. I mean, and now you hardly don't know someone who's had COVID. Right? I mean, they're trying to slow the spread. They didn't slow the spread. And then the virus by itself can cause inflammation in the brain.

and that can make you more anxious and more depressed. In fact, if you get COVID, you have a one in four chance in the next six months of having a brand new onset psychiatric problem. So I think the inflammation from COVID, the vaccines might also cause inflammation in the brain, which nobody wants to talk about. Well, I think that's becoming a big thing because now finally the news is picking up on

all the things that are happening with the vaccine and saying, "Okay, maybe we were wrong." Well, today, Congress voted 419 to 0.

to make the federal government release all the documents related to COVID. We need to learn from this so it doesn't happen again. But if you take isolation and then the social unrest and the political divide. So now we have family members hating family members. - Which is sad. - I mean, there was so much the year before last

at Christmas, there were families that weren't getting together. You're not vaccinated. You're a Republican. You're a Democrat. I don't want anything to do with you. I mean, it's just nuts. And this stress in the adults trickles down

to the children, children are like violins, they play the stress of their parents. And then they go to school, and if someone's vaxxed or not, someone's a Republican or not, now they bully each other. What's going on in our society is unlike anything that I've seen in my 68 years. - Well, you look good for 68. Tea and healthy, something I should follow up on.

- But this is what I often tell women. I'm like, you do brain healthy stuff, your hair's gonna be thicker, your nails will be thicker and your skin will be prettier. - That's all you had to tell me. That's all you had to tell me. Now I'm on board. - Your skin is,

although your skin looks beautiful. Thank you. Skin is a reflection of the health of your brain. I was saying, that is so, because I can tell, like if I increase water, I do, you know, I'm eating healthier, I can tell a difference in my skin, so. Yeah, and what Dr. Pepper does, not to pick on Dr. Pepper, Hey, we love it, but. is sugar.

but it doesn't love you. Yeah. The sugar increases inflammation, which increases wrinkles, and the caffeine constricts blood flow, which is why I'm not a big fan of caffeine. You don't want anything that constricts blood flow because when you constrict it, your skin looks older. Yeah.

And so what do you say about, because you just spoke about caffeine, so these pre-workouts that are out here, and I ask this for my 16-year-old brother that takes an abundance of pre-workout.

Well, it depends what's in it. I mean, if it's a little creatine, that's probably okay. For you, if it's healthy protein that doesn't have a lot of crap in it, that's probably okay. Oh, no, it's just straight up caffeine. I want to say it's like a hundred something. It's ridiculous. Yeah. It's a drug. Okay. Yep. Hope he hears that. Perfect. That's the answer I needed. Thank you. So I think you have a new book coming out. I do. And...

You want to tell us about it? Because I'm excited for it. Change your brain every day. Okay. So I've written 40 books over the last 40 years, and I love them all. This is my favorite. Why?

It's the most important things I've said in the last 40 years. Wow. 366 short essays, just two or three minutes a day with an action step. Brain and mental health are daily practices. 100%. Just like physical health is a daily practice, spiritual health is a daily practice, brain and mental health.

Daily practices. You want to be happy. You want to be consistent. You want your life to be going in a positive direction. Change your brain every day. Super fun, practical, lots of stories.

I'm so excited. Okay, I'm excited for that. Because you just need a little boost every day. And to start your day off with something like that, it sets the tone. I'm a firm believer in that. So the last thing I want to ask you is, how do you want to be remembered when...

You know, I guess when you die, it sounds bad, but when you transition to another place, another state, another, you know, another beach somewhere. What is the one thing you want to be remembered for? That I disrupted.

How we take care of our brains, how we take care of our minds. I want to be that little voice in people's heads that just help them do the right thing. Because ultimately, that's where happiness lives. It's when you do the right thing. And sometimes, and I love what you say when you want to be known for disrupting that. Because a lot of people aren't brave enough to do it.

That's hard because when you go against the status quo, the status quo pushes back. I'm learning that in my life right now. But quite frankly, the status quo is the enemy. Yeah. And so we have a foundation called the Change Your Brain Foundation. And our mission is to end mental illness by creating a revolution in brain health.

Well, if you're creating a revolution, it means you need revolutionaries and there's an enemy. So the enemy is the shit show that is the status quo of diagnoses. You tell the doctor, I have these symptoms. He says, you have this problem and gives you drugs with no biological data. No, by the way, it doesn't tell you to eat right exercise, drink water and test your thyroid inflammation and testosterone levels.

No, it's wrong. And so I want to be part of what makes it right. See, and I am, I'm starting an organization for, I would say, prison reform, reentry, things of that nature. And this is one of the things that people don't realize yet.

someone that's been incarcerated, what that does to mental health and their brain, their brain health. - What was their brain like when they committed their crime? And if you don't rehabilitate that troubled brain,

they're just going to go back to jail. So shouldn't we make brain health, brain assessment, brain treatment, brain optimization part of the prison system? But America's prison system is not about rehabilitation. No, it's not. It's broken. It's about vengeance. And that's not okay. Well, I'll tell you. A normal meal is you'll have maybe some rice, maybe some corn, and like a tortilla.

Like there is nothing whenever it comes to meals. There's no nutrition. There is no nutrition. There is nothing to, like you said, it's just beating someone when they're down. And so there's nothing to rehabilitate. And when they're let out and they go to a halfway house, it's, there's absolutely nothing to rehabilitate. They can't even help you get a social security card. And so it's, it's sad to me that it's, we're not putting more time into the health aspect.

of these people when overseas it's a completely different ballgame. It is about health rehabilitation and not... - In some places. - Yes, yes. - In some places. - Yes, in some places. - Dostoevsky, the famous Russian author, he said you can tell about the soul of a society not by how it treats its outstanding citizens but by how it treats its prisoners. And our soul is broken.

Wow. I love that. Well, thank you so much. This is such an honor. I have so much respect for you. I'm like over here kind of fangirling. So thank you. And two, hopefully we can work together in the future with my initiative, your initiative. I feel like it could be awesome. Thank you. Thank you.

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