Optimal Pillar 1

Brain Gut 16: Adrenal Fatigue Rx

What is Adrenal Fatigue at its core? Many websites will tell you it is an adrenal gland function problem that is best assayed by a salivary adrenal stress panel. I wont and I do not. The cause of adrenal fatigue is a brain injury at the hypothalamus all caused by bad signaling. My Adrenal Fatigue Rx is best called Metabolic Neurosurgery: It is all about energy and energy utilization that allows for perfect signaling of environmental signals. When your energy is bad your signaling falls off a cliff. The ASI is just like a gauge on a car. It tells you some info but it does not tell you why it is happening. How we understand adrenal dysfunction in 2012 has radically changed because of a relatively new science called neurohumoral-immunology. What does this mean? It means adrenal fatigue at its core is a brain illness and not an adrenal gland problem. What is the PVN? How do we know if our PVN is shut off? What are some of the symptoms? We can’t sleep, our guts do not work, our body composition goes way off, we sweat at the wrong times, we develop cognitive haze, blurred vision, migraines, and reactive hypoglycemia. Many times fatigue is only relieved by eating foods we should not. It also means we have lost allosteric control of leptin!

Brain Gut 14: Personal Ground Zero

READERS SUMMARY: HOW DO YOU FIND OPTIMAL? MEET INGER, AN AMAZING EPI-PALEO STARFISH. HOW DO YOU FINE TUNE YOUR BRAIN, THE INSTRUMENT THAT YOU SENSE THE WORLD WITH? WHAT IS THE BIOLOGIC CORRELATE BEHIND TUNING YOUR INSTRUMENT? WHERE DOES THE MAGIC OF LIFE REALLY OCCUR?     THE EMOTIONAL GEEK: From a thread on my forum, [...]

BRAIN GUT 13: WHERE OPTIMAL MEETS ALL WORLD PERFORMANCE

READERS SUMMARY: 1.  WHY IS DHA IN ITS EVOLUTIONARY PACKAGE THE KEY TO THE MASSIVE METABOLIC RATE OF THE HUMAN BRAIN AND HEART? 2. WHAT EVER MAKES CELLULAR SIGNALING "CLEAN" FOR AN ORGANISM LEADS TO OPTIMAL HEALTH. 3.  WHAT THE BIOCHEMISTRY OF NEURAL LIPIDS MEANS FOR HOMO's SOLUTION? 4.  WHAT ARE THE KEY METABOLIC NEUROLOGIC [...]

BRAIN GUT 12: DARE TO DISAGREE?

READERS SUMMARY: 1.  IS NUTRIENT DENSITY FROM A USDA CHART IMPORTANT IF IT IS OUT OF CONTEXT FOR THE SPECIES IN QUESTION? 2. PALEO SAYS PUFA'S ARE BAD.  ARE THEY REALLY; OR IS OUR UNDERSTANDING OF THEM LACKING? 3. WHY IS IODINE A CRITICAL FOR A HUMAN? 4.  IS GETTING A HASHIMOTO'S DIAGNOSIS LIKE GETTING [...]

BRAIN GUT 11: IS TECHNOLOGY OUR ACHILLES HEEL?

READERS SUMMARY:   1. A QUESTION DURING AN EDUCATIONAL CONSULT STIMULATES A DISCUSSION 2.  HOW DOES ARTIFICIAL LIGHT DESTROY THE SIGNALING OF THE CORTISOL/DHEA/MELATONIN AXIS? 3. HOW DOES ARTIFICIAL LIGHT AFFECT  THE GUT FLORA? 4.  CAN ARTIFICIAL LIGHT AFFECT HUMAN BIOLOGY DIRECTLY? 5.  IS BODY COMPOSITION TIED TO ARTIFICAL LIGHT AND IMPAIRED SLEEP CYCLES?   [...]

Brain Gut 9: What Really Killed Michael Jackson

Today, we are going to dive into the gut flora story a bit deeper than we did in our first gut flora post to help you understand how a a change in gut flora might lead to changes in your health by altering your hormone panel. Obesity is an inflammatory brain condition. Where does the infection come from? The gut flora actually is what causes humans to become fat. It has to due with shear numbers and the species of bacteria in our gut. There is a particular flora that produces adiposity and obesity in humans. These bacteria make something called FIAF (Fasting induced adipose factor) that control this process. This factor blocks lipoprotein lipase (LPL) in fat cells. LPL allows us to convert dietary Free Fatty Acids carried in lipoproteins into neutral fats that are stored in adipocytes. Non Geeks: Our gut bacteria makes humans fat. Geek Alert: The FIAF is made by our liver, muscles, and our small bowel wall when food sources are in short supply. This is the signal to stop storing fat in our fat cells when food is scarce. What is not well appreciated by many is that the FIAF in our intestinal wall is controlled 100{a7b724a0454d92c70890dedf5ec22a026af4df067c7b55aa6009b4d34d5da3c6} by our gut flora. When we have a simplified gut flora it favors fat cell creation. When our gut flora is complex and healthy, it has 100 trillion cells with 250 species. We tend not to make fat in this instance either! Moreover, when the bacteria are active metabolically due to the presence of simple sugars, production of FIAF ceases, and fat creation is signaled. This implies that our gut flora is directly tied to fat creation in humans. The gut flora’s action is directly signaled to the brain via the afferent nerve fibers in the vagus nerve. In those newly created fat cells, a protein called leptin is also produced, and acts as a score keeper for the brain of how much fat is stored in the body. This messenger is sent to the brain around midnight when we are sleeping allowing the brain to assess total energy balance in the body.

Brain Gut 6: Epi-Paleo Rx

This blog followed a very popular July 2012 Webinar that I put on for my members a few days ago. The webinar was over two hours long and had a lot of Q & A done after it as well. I promised my members I would get a quick blog post up for them on some of the core materials we covered. Today's blog is delivering on that promise. How to consider eating the Epi-Paleo Rx: Always Respect circadian cycles and eat according to seasonality, Lots of good quality proteins (see below), Lots of good quality fats (grass-fed/pastured animal fats - lard, tallow), Liberal uses of seafood broths and bone broth made from ocean and grass-fed animals (to heal the gut), and fermented vegetables and/or probiotics (to repopulate the gut with an Optimal Human flora)

Cold Thermogenesis 11: Paleo FX To Practice

Today, I want to introduce you to someone who is a true 'Paleo leader' by stepping up to the the challenge I put to our community at PaleoFx conference recently held in Austin, Tx. Kevin Cottrell is one of the co founders of Paleo Fx. The leaders of Paleo fx have to be commended because the conference they were able to put on in 150 days of prep time was nothing short of remarkable. The conference exceeded all my expectations and the reviews of many attendees have been stellar. The future of this community is tied to clinical application of what the science continues to show in the literature. For assimilation of the Ancestral Lifestyle to become mainstream we need to have more clinical conferences like Paleo fx, and we need to take them globally. Today, I am breaking new ground and presenting to you my first guest blog written by Mr. Kevin Cottrell, who has agreed to share his personal story and personal medical history with all of you so that he may help you in some way. I think what he has agreed to do here is the most noble and worthy things to do to help our community and mankind. I am indebted to him for this chance to publish his story for you to consider. The following post is written by Kevin, in his words, to share with you and yours, to help open your eyes and challenge your "own dogma and current intuition' to help you reach for optimal health.

Cold Thermogenesis 8

Radical Theory #1: If our brains can rewire, then Einstein’s theories predict our biochemistry should be able to as well. My Leptin Rx and the modern cochlea implant definitively prove this in modern humans. Radical Theory #2: Considering that 90{a7b724a0454d92c70890dedf5ec22a026af4df067c7b55aa6009b4d34d5da3c6} of the earth’s current biome lives in extreme conditions on our own planet today still, we might need to consider that what we think is “our normal environment” is not so normal for most of life on our planet or our evolutionary history. Life on Earth evolved in an environment much like we see on Titan today; in a deep ocean frozen solid at its surface with the capability of life buried deep with in it. The only escape was due to ejectants of water vapor from super heated water from underwater volcanoes. All these things are present today on Earth’s crust too. There is one major difference now between the two. We are a lot warmer today than when life began. There are others, but when one looks at Titan we see a frozen giant moon with a monstrous ocean beneath it. All life on our planet came from the oceans first. We know this to be true as well. And because of this, studying extremophile forms of life here on earth today might explain the complexities of how biochemistry allows for life to exist at all in a thermoplastic environment. What the bio-astrophysics found on Titan with the Cassini Solstice mission, may be a huge clue that life first adapted to extreme environments and then was naturally selected and adapted to a cyclic warming trend on our planet's crust over time.

Cold Thermogenesis 8

Radical Theory #1: If our brains can rewire, then Einstein’s theories predict our biochemistry should be able to as well. My Leptin Rx and the modern cochlea implant definitively prove this in modern humans. Radical Theory #2: Considering that 90{a7b724a0454d92c70890dedf5ec22a026af4df067c7b55aa6009b4d34d5da3c6} of the earth’s current biome lives in extreme conditions on our own planet today still, we might need to consider that what we think is “our normal environment” is not so normal for most of life on our planet or our evolutionary history. Life on Earth evolved in an environment much like we see on Titan today; in a deep ocean frozen solid at its surface with the capability of life buried deep with in it. The only escape was due to ejectants of water vapor from super heated water from underwater volcanoes. All these things are present today on Earth’s crust too. There is one major difference now between the two. We are a lot warmer today than when life began. There are others, but when one looks at Titan we see a frozen giant moon with a monstrous ocean beneath it. All life on our planet came from the oceans first. We know this to be true as well. And because of this, studying extremophile forms of life here on earth today might explain the complexities of how biochemistry allows for life to exist at all in a thermoplastic environment. What the bio-astrophysics found on Titan with the Cassini Solstice mission, may be a huge clue that life first adapted to extreme environments and then was naturally selected and adapted to a cyclic warming trend on our planet's crust over time.

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