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Super Human

The Bulletproof Plan to Age Backward and Maybe Even Live Forever

by Dave Asprey

|Harper Wave©2019·352 pages

Dave Asprey is a Silicon Valley tech entrepreneur and professional biohacker. In fact, he’s basically the founder of the whole biohacking movement. We’ve featured two of his previous books: The Bulletproof Diet and Head Strong. As we discussed in our other Notes, his explicit aim is to live to 180. This book is basically his operating manual on how he’s going after that astonishingly ambitious (and equally inspiring) goal. The book has three parts: Part I: Don’t Die. Part II: Age Backward. And, Part III: Heal Like a Deity. Big Ideas we explore include: The #1 rule of biohacking (and Optimizing), How not to die (aka Rules 1 ,2 and 3), Food = Anti-aging drug (how's your nutrition?), Sleep or Die (featuring a view of Dave's crazy Oura stats along with mine from last night), and getting ready to celebrate your 180th (!) birthday.


Big Ideas

“Are these ‘cheats’? No. They are tools we can use to control our biology. And what’s the first thing any one of us would do once we gained control of our biology? Not die. The second thing? Age backward. And finally? Heal like a deity so you can keep getting better with age instead of suffering an inevitable decline.

This is exactly what this book will teach you to do. First, we’ll look at the biological factors that cause most of the diseases of aging and how you can stop them. Once you’ve learned how not to die, you’ll learn how to age backward with strategies ranging from simple to cutting edge that will add more years to your life and more life to your years. Finally, we’ll explore some truly radical anti-aging techniques to help you achieve Super Human status. We tell ourselves that the one thing we can’t have is more time, but that’s simply not true. I’ve seen firsthand how much more life these hacks can give you, both now and in the future. …

Not only can you make changes that allow you to live longer than you think possible, but you must. We all have a moral obligation to live well for as long as we can to develop our own wisdom and share it with future generations. By choosing to live longer, you are not taking anything away from anyone. Instead, you are giving yourself an opportunity to share more with the people and the world around you. I see it as our duty to ensure that we are able to share our life experiences, and—just as important—to make them worth sharing.”

~ Dave Asprey from Super Human

Dave Asprey is a Silicon Valley tech entrepreneur and professional biohacker. In fact, he’s basically the founder of the whole biohacking movement.

We’ve featured two of his previous books: The Bulletproof Diet and Head Strong. As we discussed in our other Notes, his explicit aim is to live to 180.

This book is basically his operating manual on how he’s going after that astonishingly ambitious (and equally inspiring) goal. The book has three parts: Part I: Don’t Die. Part II: Age Backward. And, Part III: Heal Like a Deity.

When I think about Dave’s goal to live to 180 and to “Heal Like a Deity,” I think of Yuval Noah Harari’s book Homo Deus. That book is all about “A Brief History of Tomorrow” and features Yuval’s iconoclastic thinking on three quests for the future: Immortality + Happiness + Divinity.

This book is as close to a handbook on “How to live forever” (aka achieve Yuval’s first target of becoming Immortal) as we’re currently going to get—which is one of the reasons why the sub-title is “The Bulletproof Plan to Age Backward and Maybe Even Live Forever.”

It’s funny because I’m often told that listening to one of my lectures can feel like drinking from a fire hydrant. That’s how *I* felt reading THIS book. :)

It’s R I D I C U L O U S L Y packed with Big Ideas. (Get a copy here.)

I’m excited to share a few of my favorite Ideas we can apply to our lives TODAY, so let’s jump straight in!

P.S. The dedication of the book perfectly captures the spirit of Dave’s quest: “To my children, Anna (twelve) and Alan (nine), who diligently sat by my side and edited this book in a way that genuinely helped make it better. It’s my sincere hope that when you are both over a hundred years old, you’ll let me help you edit whatever you’re creating. I plan to be there for you.”

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Do not go gentle into the good night, Old age should burn and rave at close of day; Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Dylan Thomas
If you’ve read my other work, you’ve probably already noticed that the ancient Greeks were biohackers, as were the cavemen before them. When I created the groundswell movement around biohacking, I defined it as changing the environment inside of and around you to gain control of your own biology. (In 2018, Meriam-Webster added biohacking to the list of new words in the English language!
Dave Asprey
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The two rules of biohacking (and Optimizing!)

“The key to success with any of these interventions is to start them now, even if you don’t think you need them. After all, humans are good at avoiding things that hurt. You don’t need to step on nails or burn yourself because you feel the impact of those cuts immediately. But when it comes to aging, you’re the proverbial frog in a pot of slowly heating water. You keep taking the hits because you don’t feel the impact right away. But cutting down on just a few of those hits by making small changes in your environment can really ramp up what’s possible for you. Perfection is not required.”

That’s from the second chapter of Part I: Don’t Die called “The 7 Pillars of Aging.”

I repeat: If we want to live for a long time, Step 1, again, is to make sure we DON’T DIE. That’s an obvious statement but worth reflecting on for more than a moment.

In the first chapter, Dave tells us about “The Four Killers.”

Get this: If you are average…

  • You have a 23 percent chance of dying from heart disease.
  • You have a 25 percent chance of diabetes.
  • You have a 10 percent chance of developing Alzheimer’s.
  • You have a 40 percent chance of cancer and a 20 percent risk of dying from it.

The optimal response to those startling stats?

Start hacking.

Which leads us to the two rules of biohacking (and Optimizing).

Dave tells us: It’s a matter of preventing as much damage as possible, which happens to dovetail nicely with the first rule of biohacking: Remove the things that make you weak. This is in and of itself a powerful anti-aging strategy.

So, Rule #1 of biohacking (and Optimizing): REMOVE THE THINGS THAT MAKE YOU WEAK.

Can you guess Rule #2?

I say it’s: “START NOW!!!”

We can’t wait until the chronic diseases “officially” show up. Unfortunately, those Four Killers work behind the scenes for years/decades before they show up and then, far too often, quickly take us out—which is why all the great teachers/functional medicine doctors constantly remind us that it’s FAR EASIER to PREVENT chronic illness than it is to treat it.

Remember that frog in the pot. The heat gets turned up slowly and it gets cooked.

We need to jump out of the pot NOW.

On that front: What’s one thing you KNOW you could do to stop “taking hits”?

Today a good day to make that switch?

P.S. As I read this, I was reminded of an interview I did with David Perlmutter years ago. We were talking about Alzheimer’s and he was making the same point Dave makes in this book. Namely, that it’s a LOT easier to PREVENT it than to REVERSE it.

He quoted Kennedy to make his point. JFK once told us: The time to repair a roof is when the sun is shining.

P.P.S. When I think of that Kennedy quote, I think of another one about thinking long-term. He also tells us: “I am reminded of the story of the great French Marshal Lyautey, who once asked his gardener to plant a tree. The gardener objected that the tree was slow-growing and would not reach maturity for a hundred years. The Marshal replied, ‘In that case, there is no time to lose, plant it this afternoon.’

Here’s to fixing our roofs and planting the trees.

TODAY.

How Not to Die

“You’ve probably noticed that these simple interventions—good food, the right environment, moderate exercise, stress control, and quality sleep—are the best and most effective ways of avoiding all Four Killers and even slowing down or reversing many of the Seven Pillars of Aging. And you’re right! The vast majority of the hits to your mitochondria that cause aging come from your food, your environment, and your lack of quality sleep. So, before we move on to aging backward, let’s take a closer look at the most important ways to avoid dying. After all, what’s the point of being a Super Human if you’re dead?”

After walking us through the mechanics of “The Four Killers” in chapter 1, Dave walks us through the mechanics of “The Seven Pillars of Aging” in chapter 2.

From “Shrinking Tissues” and “Mitochondrial Mutations” to “Zombie Cells” and “Telomere Shrinking,” Dave masterfully walks us through what’s going on behind the scenes as we age.

The point I want to make here is that, although Dave is ALL (!) about SUPER cutting-edge hacks to live forever, he STARTS with the basic fundamentals.

Eating. Moving. Sleeping. Etc.

We need to get those basic fundamentals Optimized if we want to have a shot at playing the edges over the long run.

We could actually make that Rule #3.

Rule #1 = Remove the things that make you weak. (Aka your Kryptonites!)

Rule #2 = Start Today. (Aka NOW!)

Rule #3 = Start with the fundamentals! (Aka Eat + Move + Sleep!)

We talk about the power of our mitochondria and how to remove some fundamental Kryptonites in our Notes on Head Strong. Let’s revisit his comments on Kryptonite Dust from that Note: Imagine that you’re Superman (or Superwoman). One day, Lex Luthor pulverizes some kryptonite and sprinkles just a little bit of it around your house. If you eat (or inhale) a small amount of kryptonite dust, it won’t kill you. You’ll still be able to push through the day and save people, you’ll just feel slightly off. In fact, you’ll get used to feeling that way and believe it’s normal. But as you keep ingesting a little bit more kryptonite every day, your ability to help people will slowly, invisibly decline until your body reaches the point where it’s spending all of its energy trying to overcome the effects of the poison.

So… What are YOUR top Eating + Moving + Sleeping Kryptonites? How can you -1 to +1 Today?

  • My #1 Eating Kryptonite = _____________________.
  • My #1 Moving Kryptonite = _____________________.
  • My #1 Sleeping Kryptonite = _____________________.

P.S. Here are some universal kryptonites you might want to make sure you address:

Top Eating Kryptonites = Sugar + Processed Carbage. (Have I mentioned that before? :)

Dave tells us: Quit eating sugar. If you make one change to improve your gut health, make it this. Recall that Nobel Prize winning telomere researcher Elizabeth Blackburn echoes this wisdom in The Telomere Effect: Adding healthy foods to your diet is great, but it may be even more important to avoid the kind of processed, sugary, junky foods that feed cellular enemies.

Top Moving Kryptonites = Being sedentary. (AND overtraining.) Back to The Telomere Effect: If you have a high-stress life, exercise is not just good for you. It’s essential. It protects you from stress-shortened telomeres.

Top Sleeping Kryptonite = Late-night blue light! (Have I mentioned that before? :)

As Dave says: “A hundred years ago there was simply no way any human could encounter a light brighter than fire after the sun had set.

Plus: Most modern light sources contain unhealthy amounts of blue light and far too little of the beneficial spectrums to help balance it out. This is what I call junk light. Shining these junk light sources into your eyes close to bedtime is like Superman taking a little soak in a kryptonite salt bath to prepare for sleep.

Shall we vacuum up the kryptonite dust a little more Today so we have a lot more tomorrows?

Food is an Anti-aging drug

“By the time it became clear that inflammation made me feel like crap and was aging me rapidly, I had conducted enough semi-successful experiments on myself to know that of all the things I could control, food had the biggest impact on how I felt, how I performed, how inflamed I was, and therefore how quickly my body aged. Armed with this experience and the lifetimes of knowledge distilled from medical reports, biochemistry, and experts at the Silicon Valley Health Institute, I set out to determine once and for all which foods and compounds supercharged my mitochondria and reduced inflammation and which led to inflammation, dysfunctional mitochondria, and rapid aging. Fortunately, most of the good stuff also tastes good!

Years later, I wrote Game Changers, based on a survey of almost five hundred people who had done big things in the world—I wanted to figure out what made them tick, what qualities these superstars had in common. The results showed that high-performing people know that getting their food right is the number one human upgrade, even though different people found that different foods work best for their individual biology. Nutrition is essential not only for Super Human biology but also for Super Human success.”

Those are the first words from Chapter 3: “Food Is an Anti-Aging Drug.”

The chapter is packed with a range of fascinating studies and practical tips to Optimize. Here’s a quick look at a few of my favorites from the end section of the chapter called “Bottom Line.”

Want to not die? Do these things right now:

Avoid all conventionally grown grains, produce, and animal products. Even better, skip grains altogether and opt for tons of organic vegetables, limited organic fruit, and meat from pastured animals.

<- That’s the first tip. (Quick check in: How are you doing with that?)

Next up: Don’t eat fried stuff. Ever.

Then Dave tells us to: Eat enough protein (from pastured animals, eggs, wild fish, or nonallergenic plants) for tissue repair and an additional 20 plus grams of grass-fed collagen, and don’t fry, char, blacken or barbecue meat.

He tells us that’s 0.5 grams of protein per pound of body weight for lean people. 0.35 for obese people and 0.6 grams per pound of body weight for athletes or elderly folks or pregnant women.

Plus: He goes OFF on the power of intermittent fasting as he introduces us to “clock neurons.”

He tells us: On some days, limit your eating window to eight to ten hours a day based on what works best for your schedule. Good options are 12:00 P.M.– 8:00 P.M., 9:00 A.M.– 5:00 P.M, or 10:00 A.M.– 7:00 P.M.. Have breakfast sometimes, especially if you’re tired or stressed.

The final tip is perhaps the most powerful: “Don’t eat after dark.”

Why? Remember the glymph!!!

Sleep or die

“My sleep deficit almost certainly contributed to the diseases of aging I faced as a young man. It turns out that lack of quality sleep doesn’t just leave you tired and unable to perform in the moment; it also rapidly accelerates aging. The good news is that you can learn to be a Super Human sleeper and cram more high quality sleep into fewer hours and still get all the benefits. For the past five years, I have been getting progressively healthier, leaner, and younger on six hours and five minutes of sleep a night, but I use every technique in this chapter to sleep like a professional.

Perhaps you will choose to get more sleep than I do. Regardless of how many hours you sleep, the information in this chapter is intended to help you make the most of the sleep you do get. It doesn’t matter how old you are, how busy you are, or how much money you have. Sleep is the ultimate tool to sharpen every skill and add more quality years to your life. So get better at it.”

That’s from chapter 4—appropriately called “Sleep or Die.”

Dave shares some of his most powerful hacks and his ridiculously Super Human ability to cram over 2 hours of Deep Sleep AND 2 hours of REM sleep in less than 6 hours of total sleep.

He actually shares his Oura report for a particularly Super night in which he got 2 hours and 23 minutes of REM and 2 hours and 20 minutes of Deep Sleep in 5 hours and 54 minutes of total sleep along with a 96% efficiency (which means he spent just over 6 hours in bed).

If you have an Oura ring, you know how RIDICULOUS that is. To put it in perspective, I’m feeling pretty good about my Oura score from last night. I clocked 2 hours and 2 minutes of REM and 1 hour and 30 minutes of Deep Sleep for a total of 8 hours and 31 minutes of sleep with a 92% efficiency (which means I spent a total of 9 hours and 18 minutes in bed).

Dave DEFINITELY approaches his sleep like a professional. Some of his top hacks include eating earlier (one more time: GLYMPH for the win!!); dialing in your HRV via meditation, stress management and moderate training; and reducing blue light exposure by not taking a Kryptonite bath at night by staring at junk light, investing in blackout curtains, switching to Night Mode on your iPhone and leaving it on all day, trying to shut down all screens TWO hours before bed, and increasing your exposure to high quality light sources before noon).

Remember: If you want to stay young, get more deep sleep.

Here’s to sleeping like a professional!

Your 180th Birthday Party

“As I was writing this book, I celebrated my forty-sixth birthday, a number that would strike many people as depressing because in their dark vision of the future, it marks the beginning of decline. At forty-six, my best years are behind me, right?

Screw that. I know it is possible that I can make it to a hundred and eighty with my biology and faculties intact. And with that in mind, I blew out the candles on my (Bulletproof, of course) birthday cake thinking about the fact that I was celebrating my 25 percent birthday. I’m not middle-aged at all, and I’m so excited to accumulate and share more wisdom over the next 75 percent of my life.

Thanks to all the information in this book, I’m not planning on plateauing or heading downhill any time soon. The dawn is not setting on my ability to make an impact. … In fact, I’m just getting started. And so are you.”

Those are the final words of the book.

As I typed them out, I was reminded of Ellen Langer’s research on the astonishing potency of an empowering mindset. Remember her research in Counterclockwise where she was able to help older gentlemen basically AGE BACKWARD in a matter of days by simply acting as if they were younger? Crazy stuff. How we see the world and ourselves in it matters. A lot.

I was also reminded of our Notes on Dare to Be 100 by Walter Bortz where he tells us: There is now a sufficient fund of data and experience to allow baby boomers—and, of course, younger generations—to plan their 100th birthday party with calm assurance, prepare the guest list, and muster enough respiratory reserve to blow out all those candles.

Of course, Dave takes it 80 steps further.

So… How many birthday candles would YOU like to blow out?

Here’s to having fun playing the game of life and seeing just how Super Human we can become as we give ourselves the best shot at adding more years to our life and more life to those years!

About the author

Dave Asprey
Author

Dave Asprey

Entrepreneur, author, biohacker, Founder and CEO of Bulletproof.