Episode 104
James Schmachtenberger:
Mastering Gut Health for a Vibrant and Youthful Life with James Schmachtenberger
In this episode I am joined once more by James Schmachtenberger, founder of Neurohacker Collective, to discuss the importance of gut health for overall well-being and the gut-brain connection. We explore the concept of dysbiosis as a hallmark of aging and dive into the benefits of his product, Qualia Synbiotic, in supporting gut health, brain function, and mood.
First Aired on: Sep 11, 2023
Episode 104
James Schmachtenberger:
Mastering Gut Health for a Vibrant and Youthful Life with James Schmachtenberger
In this episode I am joined once more by James Schmachtenberger, founder of Neurohacker Collective, to discuss the importance of gut health for overall well-being and the gut-brain connection. We explore the concept of dysbiosis as a hallmark of aging and dive into the benefits of his product, Qualia Synbiotic, in supporting gut health, brain function, and mood.
First Aired on: Sep 11, 2023
Table of Contents:
In this episode:
Dysbiosis as a Hallmark of Aging:
- Dysbiosis explained as an imbalance in the microbiome.
- The scientific community recognizes dysbiosis as a hallmark of aging.
- Dysbiosis can negatively impact overall health and well-being.
Gut Health and Overall Well-being:
- Gut health is connected to various aspects of health, including longevity.
- A healthy microbiome positively affects neurotransmitter production, immune function, and brain-gut communication.
- Gut dysbiosis can lead to a cascade of health issues.
Importance of Supporting Gut Health:
- Recent research highlights the significance of the microbiome and its impact on bodily functions.
- Gut health is crucial for overall well-being, not just physical comfort.
- The gut-brain axis allows for communication between the gut and the brain, affecting brain function.
Gut-Brain Connection:
- The gut houses numerous processes related to the nervous system, providing vital information.
- The vagus nerve serves as a major pathway between the gut and the brain.
- Microbiota in the gut can directly communicate with the brain, influencing mood and anxiety.
Developing Comprehensive Solutions for Holistic Health:
- Julie and James discuss their motivation behind creating products for holistic health.
- Frustration with ineffective products and the need for comprehensive solutions based on scientific research.
- Neurohacker Collective's team of researchers and experts synthesizes complex information for the general public.
Impact of Lifestyle Choices on Gut Health:
- The microbiome can be influenced during the first thousand days of life.
- Adults can still positively impact the ratio of bacteria in their gut through lifestyle choices.
- Unhealthy habits like consuming refined sugars and lacking sleep can negatively affect the microbiome.
Importance of Microbial Diversity:
- Exposure to a variety of microbes in the first thousand days provides long-term health benefits.
- Chronic illnesses are attributed to diet, toxins, and a lack of exposure to healthy microbes.
- Neurohacker Collective's supplements address nutrient deficiencies and support gut health.
Keystone Species and Ecosystem Health:
- The reintroduction of wolves into Yellowstone National Park positively impacted the ecosystem.
- Keystone species play a significant role in ecosystem health, similarly to key bacteria in the gut.
- Increasing the presence of keystone species, such as acromantia, positively impacts the gut's overall microbiome.
Prebiotic Fibers and Gut Health:
- Certain prebiotic fibers can have disproportionate effects on the gut microbiome in a short period.
- Feeding keystone species is vital for maintaining a healthy gut microbiome.
- Neurohacker Collective's product contains prebiotics, probiotics, and postbiotics to support gut health.
Digestion, Nutrient Absorption, and Gut-Brain Communication:
- Proper digestion and nutrient absorption are essential for overall gastrointestinal health.
- Enzymes and a healthy microbiome aid in efficient nutrient breakdown and absorption.
- Fermented foods and digestive enzymes can support gut health and improve nutrient absorption.
Importance of Consuming a Variety of Fermented Foods:
- Consuming a few bites of sauerkraut is not sufficient for optimal probiotic intake.
- Limited variety of fermented foods may lack keystone species crucial for gut health.
- Unique ingredients in Neurohacker Collective's products, such as fermented kombucha and berries, provide a broader array of key bacteria.
Study Results and Personal Experiences:
- A recent study conducted by Neurohacker Collective showed improvements in GI health and mood-related conditions.
- Participants reported reductions in GI symptoms, stress levels, anxiety, and improved mood.
- James and Julie share their personal experiences with the product and the improvements they've seen.
How to Consume the Product and Taste:
- James consumes more than the recommended amount and finds it healthy and enjoyable.
- Julie occasionally adds the product to flavor water and finds the taste enjoyable.
- Drinking more than the recommended amount is unlikely to be harmful, but contacting the support team for clarification is encouraged.
Benefits of Trying Symbiotic:
- James and Julie emphasize the positive effects and benefits of trying Qualia Symbiotic.
- They mention the extensive information available on Neurohacker's website about the product and its ingredients.
Other Resources:
Connect with James Schmachtenberger
Episode Transcript
Julie Michelson: [Page//00:00:00] Welcome back to the inspired living with autoimmunity podcast. I'm your host, Julie Michelson. And today James Schmachtenberger returns to the podcast, and we're talking about dysbiosis as a newly acknowledged hallmark of aging and how we can effectively support our gut ecosystem to better our health.
James is the CEO and co founder of Neurohacker Collective, [Page//00:01:00] a company focused on making groundbreaking products for health and well being through complex systems science. In today's conversation, James explains what a symbiotic is and how Qualia Symbiotic can improve our overall health, gut health, brain function, and mood.
James, welcome back to the podcast.
James Schmachtenberger: Thanks, Julie. Yeah. Glad to be back again.
Julie Michelson: It's, it's always so much fun speaking with you and and sometimes I feel like it's just not fair if we don't record it and share it. So you, I am such a fan of neurohacker products and just the. The amount of science and research and brilliance that goes in to your products. And so I'm excited to talk about symbiotic today.
I'm looking to my left because I, I happen to have it right here because I just took mine. So I was [Page//00:02:00] getting ready.
James Schmachtenberger: It's
Julie Michelson: I, I feel like for many of us, and you guys have expanded over the past few years into all kinds of wellness areas because we are whole humans, I definitely think people still tend to often think about, you know, the, the kind of nootropic brain focus kind of.
products with mind and, and and so last time you were here, we were talking about the scintillating and zombie cells, but this time we're going to talk about gut health and this new product. I, I really love, I have the hardest time. Finding products that are powders that I will tolerate because I don't like flavors and sweeteners and things, and it's usually kind of a hard stop for me, and this product is great.
I use it every day, so I'm excited because I finally have one that I can say, even I use it too. Not [Page//00:03:00] only is it good for you, but it tastes good.
James Schmachtenberger: right. No, I'm the same. Like, I love the theory of powder products, but then so many of them have like really, really terrible tasting ingredients, or they're just packed with like tons of artificial flavors and sweeteners. And like, either way, it's just hard to actually stomach them on a consistent basis.
Julie Michelson: Yeah. Yeah. I, I'm like, that's kind of tends to be, I remember when I won't say the brand, it doesn't matter the brand when, when I wanted liposomal glutathione and the, and the only one was the liquid. And I'm like, okay, I'll do pretty much anything that is good for me. And that just sits in my fridge.
It's not going in my body. It's disgusting.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah. Liquid glutathione can be a little rough. It's like, but it's also the smell. It's like, before it even
Julie Michelson: the whole, it's just the whole experience is bad. So, so yay team Neurohacker for, for making this amazing product. And like [Page//00:04:00] your other products, what I, what I'm so excited about, cause I am such a geek is just this full. Spectrum of, of gut support and gut brain and we aren't, we're not discounting the brain because the, because of the whole gut brain connection.
So I know it's supporting the brain health as well.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah, we'll definitely talk a little bit about that because there are some really interesting like, I mean, this was primarily a gut product, but with the gut brain interface, and some of the things we did uniquely with this formulation, there's actually really amazing impacts on mood. And so it's worth kind of understanding that piece a little deeper.
Julie Michelson: I would love it. Let's do it. So, so let's talk about. I'd love to start kind of high up in general, you know, if somebody is not at all familiar with symbiotic, you know, what, what is the main, in your words, the main purpose I read and it's awesome. The on, on the website, like all of the information about [Page//00:05:00] all the different, you know, everything that's included and why and, and the sourcing and it, it's spectacular.
So if somebody has. A half hour they can read. No, I'm kidding.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah, the formulators view. I know, I wish everyone would read those because it's, you know, it's the best way to actually understand in kind of detail what the product does, why each ingredient was chosen, how they interface, like, it's a level of information that most people, you know, wouldn't otherwise get.
But when you get it, it's like, you really understand the benefit in a whole new way.
Julie Michelson: Yeah, and I have clients all the time tell me, you know, I need to know why I'm taking, like, why? Why am I taking this? What's it really doing? And I know with this one, a lot of you, you've got a lot of feedback that, that people feel, feel a difference to, which is always, I think, most important is, you know, I, I, well, most important is understanding what it's doing and then it's a bonus and it'll keep you taking it if you can feel it.
[Page//00:06:00] So I remember probably five years ago thinking like gut health was just, you know, the, the fad, the buzzword, everything is gut health. It's all gut health, which is interesting as an autoimmune specialist, because now I'm like, it's all in the gut. Well, let's, let's talk about this gut, gut health and specifically dysbiosis. What it is and, and why is it important for those of us that are wanting to be healthy and for, and, and have some good longevity to.
James Schmachtenberger: Right. Yeah, I mean, I think, I think gut health is starting to really gain more understanding and, and as a result more popularity, right? Like I think for a long time, everyone knew that gut health was kind of important, but they thought of it as this like isolated thing, right? Like if you have gut symptoms, then you focus on the gut, but otherwise it's just kind of its own thing off in the corner and you focus on other stuff.
And more and more, what research is showing is that that's [Page//00:07:00] completely inaccurate. And that, you know, the gut is tied to almost every aspect of health and, you know, and some of the newer information coming out of showing how key a healthy microbiome is to not just general health, but to actually extending lifespan and health span.
Right? So there's There's what's known as the hallmarks of aging and these are what the scientific community has essentially come to as the most important factors that determine longevity and for, for the last handful of years, it was understood that there were basically nine hallmarks of aging.
Right. And these included things like stem cell production and cellular senescence and epigenetic expression. And, you know, there's a number of different factors. Earlier this year, there was pretty major update to the hallmarks of aging that went from 12 hallmarks or sorry, from nine [Page//00:08:00] hallmarks up to 12 hallmarks.
And one of the new hallmarks of aging that was added as the scientific community's getting a better understanding here is dysbiosis. Dysbiosis, essentially meaning the dysregulated aspects of microbiome. So when the microbiome in your GI tract is healthy, it's gonna have major effects on virtually everything.
When the microbes start to get off and you start to get. You know, too many of some of the ones you don't want too little of some of the more beneficial ones, then that throws off everything right like it throws off neurotransmitter production and throws off immune function. It throws off the ability for the neurons and the brain and the gut to be able to communicate effectively, and there's just this whole cascade of issues right and so gut health, and specifically.
the well being of the microbiome is starting to [Page//00:09:00] become increasingly more and more understood as critical to not just health on a daily basis, but actual longevity. And I think
Julie Michelson: amazing,
James Schmachtenberger: No, I mean, it's, it's so important that this like this information is finally starting to come to light because there have been kind of small subsets of the research community that have understood this for some years now.
But, you know, to a large extent, it was hard to get the rest of the world to pay attention and catch on because it wasn't hitting sort of mainstream science. And now in the last few years with a series of new studies that have come out, it's starting to become more commonly understood, more commonly accepted, and as a result, you know, giving way to the ability to actually do better research and have better impact in this area.
Julie Michelson: which is, is fantastic. Cause as you said, I want to kind of drive home. It's this is not, do you have a comfortable gut or don't you have a comfortable gut? [Page//00:10:00] This is the, the actual, I like how you said the, the wellbeing of the microbiome. So we actually may not have any idea what's going on in there.
Although I say all the time, like if you're listening to this, because you have autoimmunity. You need to work on your gut health for sure. So, you know, that's really I love it. The, the, the, the well being aspect because I think it's almost like most things, at least in Western medicine is something has to be really far downstream have gone awry to get any attention. And so I love that you're helping us learn that okay now we know. So, you know, and it is interesting how quickly like to look back and think. The gut is a contained system that just has nothing to do with anything. There's no part of us that has nothing to do [Page//00:11:00] with anything else. Like it
James Schmachtenberger: I mean, fundamentally, we are a deeply interconnected system, right, anything in the body will affect. In essence, everything in the body, right? Maybe not directly, but through a series of different backs. But there are some systems that are, you know, more significant than others, right? And the gut as you know, the research community is kind of catching up is one of those really key systems that has to be in good working order because there's so much about the gut that people just don't ever want to talk about.
Find out or understand, right? Like about 70% of the entire immune system lives in the gut. And if your gut health is off, it essentially directly means that your immune function is just not going to be as strong. So therefore your ability to, you know, fight off pathogens, your ability to bounce back with different illnesses.
And just everything is going to be
Julie Michelson: Or the, the overactive, [Page//00:12:00] right? Or the autoimmune process. It all starts with gut health. It really does. Another. Direct huge impact is, is brain and I want to talk about that because I'm selfish and I'm really interested in it. I love it. So I want to, James's take on, you know, how, how is the brain you, you mentioned a little bit already that neurotransmitters are largely made in the gut.
But, but is, is that the direct connect? I mean, how is taking a product that is. Supporting total gut health, helping us with brain.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah. I mean, so there's a number of connections. So there's, you know, there's what's known as the gut brain access, right? And this term is starting to get more popularity in the last few years, but essentially it's discussing the sort of the interface and the ability for the brain and the gut to communicate.
And so there's a few key [Page//00:13:00] things in this, right? One is that. The gut, it has a tremendous amount of neurons, right? There's more, I don't remember the exact percentage, but there's a massive amount of neurons. And, you know, that's known as the enteric nervous system. But when people say, you know, trust your gut, there's actually something really key to that because.
It's like, there's a whole bunch of processes related to the nervous system that are happening in the gut that are sort of informed in very primal ways and provide tremendous amounts of information. So, you know, there's, there's tons of neurons in the gut and then obviously, you know, even more in the brain.
And then part vagus nerve. Right. So the vagus nerve is one of the largest and in many ways, most important nerves running through the body. It's going to come from the brain through all kinds of stuff, but it has a direct link into the gut. [Page//00:14:00] And that's where information is largely transmitted back and forth.
And depending on what's happening in the gut will then send information and inform the brain, which will then regulate essentially everything in the body. Right. And then similarly, if the brain is off, if you've got excess stress, you know, whatever, then the signaling to the gut becomes ineffective and you start to have breakdowns in gut performance.
So so yeah, the majority of that information is transmitting back and forth through the vagus nerve, but there's also quite a lot of information that's transmitted directly through microbiota. Right. So the actual bacteria also in direct communication capacity. And, you know, though a lot of this is still being researched and isn't fully understood, it is sort of commonly understood at this point that there's actually more information that's being fed from the gut to the brain than the other direction.
Julie Michelson: And this is the part, and I literally, cause I am such a, such a [Page//00:15:00] geek. I just got goosebumps, but this is the part that's so exciting with that. This is now getting to, to be more mainstream knowledge because I think everybody knows, you know, Oh, when you get nervous. You may get butterflies in your stomach or, you know, we, we've for a long time, it's been known that the, that they're connected, but it was kind of thought to be at least much more of a one way unidirectional.
And so it's this back and forth is the really, really amazing part. I see it and, but we're, I'm not, I see it in changes with clients as we work on, on gut health. Where mood, you know, anxiety that was, you know, close to debilitating just goes away or so I see it all the time and, and that's one of the reasons I'm extra excited about having [Page//00:16:00] another tool support.
And also. We're going to get into the product itself. I mean, you guys have consolidated one product. Otherwise we would be taking you know, I was going to say a million things. That's an exaggeration, but, but many more.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah.
Julie Michelson: Yeah,
James Schmachtenberger: Right. Yeah. I mean, that's, you know, I mean, that's, as you know, like, that's sort of our, what we're known for,
Julie Michelson: magic. Yeah.
James Schmachtenberger: upgrades because, you know, there are very few things that can actually be meaningfully positively impacted by a single molecule. There are occasions where that's true, but for the most part, every physiological system is so complex and has so many interconnections that it doesn't need one thing to get better.
There's a whole series of things that have to get supported and supported in kind of relative proportion and priority to each other. And so, you know, [Page//00:17:00] yes, if someone just takes a probiotic, it can have some benefit, or if someone just takes some fermented foods, it can have some benefit. But none of those things on their own are going to have nearly the benefit of when you actually kind of study and look at what does the gut as a whole need?
And, you know, and then how do we deliver on all of that?
Julie Michelson: And that's why I love the neuro hacker products. Cause there's, oh, we they're always synergistic. Like there's, Oh, you're not just throwing like, Oh, all of these things are good for you. So we're going to put them in one formula.
James Schmachtenberger: Right. I
Julie Michelson: the doc I work with a lot always says, you know, the body is like a symphony.
And so, yeah, that's making that one adjustment is not going to, not going to do it for you. So we're talking about,
James Schmachtenberger: the core reasons, I mean, there was a bunch of reasons, but like one of the reasons I started the company was that like for me as an individual, I had various health issues and I was trying to fix them and I wanted the absolute [Page//00:18:00] best of what was possible, but I didn't have an adequate background in chemistry and physiology and all of the things that I would need to be able to figure that out myself and basically everything on the market.
It's. I, well, I tried all of it, I don't even know how obscenely much money on, you know, testing everything and most of it didn't do that much. And the only times where I found that I could actually have really dramatic impacts was when I went to. Like a really cutting edge functional medicine doctor and paid obscene amounts of money and got, you know, these kind of comprehensive programs. And that was awesome. And I was fortunate to be in a position to do that, but not everybody is. And so then the idea was, how can we start to develop products that actually address An entire system and do the absolute best science around that so that the end user doesn't have to, if they want to. Awesome.
Right. [Page//00:19:00] If you're someone who just, you know, studies journals every day and wants to go by, you know, a hundred different powders online and mix them. Awesome. Most people aren't in a position to do that. I mean, I wasn't right. So that was
Julie Michelson: And I'm glad you brought that up. I just literally realized, like, oh my gosh, I, you know, we, I always start with story and I was just so excited to talk to you. You know, the, that for listeners that didn't hear the, the last episode that we recorded there aren't, I actually, I was going to say there aren't many, I don't know that I know any other.
Serial successful six serial entrepreneurs who can sit here and talk about this time. We're talking about microbiome and gut health and brain health. And last time we were talking about senescent cells. And and so it you to have entered this world through your own. Wellness journey,
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah. I mean, when I was [Page//00:20:00] younger, I had a. bunch of different health issues and, you know, they pretty dramatically impacted my life. I was dealing with, you know, adrenal failure and ADHD and, you know, chronic fatigue and it's all kinds of stuff. And so, I mean, yeah, I, I got set on my own health journey.
But I also had years of really intense frustration because even though I, I started this journey with more background in this area than most people. When I really started to try to get into it, I'm like, I don't even begin to understand what I need to understand to be able to help myself. And I started to look at like, what was that going to take?
It's like, well, this is years of
Julie Michelson: of scientists,
James Schmachtenberger: Right. And, you know, so I, you know, like with creating neurohacker, I'm in a ridiculously fortunate position now because we have, you know, six full time researchers, you know, doctors, PhD chemists that are, you know, just all day, every [Page//00:21:00] day studying the stuff and creating these amazing formulas.
And I don't, you know, at this point I'm reasonably well educated, but I don't know anywhere close to what they do, but I end up getting the synthesis of that information.
Julie Michelson: right? Right. But you want, you obviously have a clear, you understand it. You get where you're teachable and then you can, you can share it with us in a language that we can understand. And and so, you
James Schmachtenberger: And that is key, because sometimes when I talk to our researchers, I'm like, can you slow that down a lot?
Julie Michelson: Smaller words.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah.
Julie Michelson: it's, you know, so for everybody listening, we are all getting the benefit of James's process of healing. And, and and I love functional medicine. I, I don't know. But I'm such a fan of whatever tools we can access directly. [Page//00:22:00] You know, that's, that's where medicine needs to go. That's where health and wellness needs to go.
So we're, we're all very grateful that you decided that somebody should be bringing this all together for us. I love it. I love it. So we Can we, you know, I've done all kinds, because again, that's just me, I have also tossed a lot of money and I've done all kinds of different testing and microbiome testing and this and that and can we change our microbiome?
James Schmachtenberger: So the answer there is yes but not as much in the way that people think it happens. So, you know, the, the microbiome is, has got a lot of plasticity when you're first born, right? The first like thousand days or so of someone's life, they are able to affect which bacteria [Page//00:23:00] are in their gut to a pretty significant extent.
After about that first thousand days, then which bacteria take hold in your gut becomes relatively set. And though there is the ability for some impact, you know, when we're in our adult phase, the Different types of bacteria won't actually change all that much. And even if you take entirely new bacteria, maybe a little bit will take hold but not substantial.
So predominantly what's happening when you're affecting your microbiome as an adult is you're changing the ratio of the bacteria that are already present. And that's where most of the benefit or harm comes from depending on, you know, what you're doing.
Julie Michelson: That's true, we're talking, I always think like positive, positive, but it's not always positive, you know,
James Schmachtenberger: Oh, and most of us with our lifestyle are constantly doing things that actually make it worse, right? Like the majority of people in the Western world [Page//00:24:00] are eating way more refined sugars and things then are actually healthy. And those end up being the things that feed a lot of the unhealthy bacteria that you don't want more of.
And then the unhealthy bacteria suppress the growth of the healthy ones. Right. And it's not just sugar. There's a number of things dietarily wise. There's like, lack of sleep is huge, you know, but most of us don't have the healthiest lifestyles. And so we're kind of constantly moving the gut health in the direction that we probably don't want.
And so that then increases the necessity for doing things to move it back in the right direction. And obviously lifestyle should be a key part of that discussion, right?
Julie Michelson: Sure. Oh yeah.
James Schmachtenberger: having, you know, good sleep, consistent timing of sleep, you know, et cetera, should all
Julie Michelson: Stress management.
James Schmachtenberger: But then there's also just the reality that life happens
Julie Michelson: Well, and, and this is why the product is called a [Page//00:25:00] supplement, right? Like, you know, it is supplemental and, and yes, always foundation first. But you gave me one of those. It happens once in a while. Hasn't happened. In, in quite some time that like, ah, I wish I could go back and, and have my kids again.
Cause I totally missed those first thousand days. You know, like just sometimes you get those nuggets it's kind of a big joke around our dinner table when they're, when they're here of, you know and they Definitely inherited a lot of less than ideal genetic tendencies for me to begin with. But like, Oh, well, miss that boat.
But if they have, you know, if and when they decide to have children now, I know
James Schmachtenberger: Right. Yeah. I mean, for, you know, for many people, it's like, okay, we, we've passed that
Julie Michelson: here now. Right.
James Schmachtenberger: but we can do a lot to impact it. And it's good [Page//00:26:00] to know, because, you know, if, you know, listeners are going to be having kids or their kids are going to be having kids or whatever, it's like knowing this information and knowing.
You know, how to support people in having exposure to a diverse and healthy set of microbes in that first thousand days, then it's going to set that person up for health in a way that otherwise wouldn't be true. I mean, it doesn't mean they still won't probably need to do supplementation and other things, but, you know, they can start from sort of a healthier baseline,
Julie Michelson: Well, and that's where I think of these, you know, just. Ridiculously increasing trends of chronic illness across the board. And, and so much of it is it's diet, it's toxins, but this is an even, you know, Most of these things were extremely rare if they existed at all back when the only food was real food,
James Schmachtenberger: right? I
Julie Michelson: right?
And, and people got dirty. [Page//00:27:00] They were in dirt. And, and and so I'm like, oh, huh.
James Schmachtenberger: mean, this, what you're touching on there is like one of the key reasons why supplementation in general is really important, right? And is that we don't live in a world that is similar to what our bodies are actually biologically adapted for, right? We get a lot less nutrients from our food, both because it's wildly processed, but even if we're eating, you know, raw organic produce, there's less vitamins and minerals due to topsoil depletion.
We have so much sanitization that you're not getting the dirt that would have given you a variety of healthy microbes, right? And then you're exposed to just all kinds of environmental toxins, stressors, et cetera, that we're not adapted for. So, you know, our bodies and our nervous systems are essentially fighting an uphill battle every day to function within a world that we're not actually well adapted for.
And. That fight becomes easier and you become more [Page//00:28:00] resourced for it when you do the right supplementation and help your body get what it needs, despite the fact that that's hard from just basic diet and lifestyle.
Julie Michelson: Amen. Well, and it, I mean, you know, again, because nothing in isolation, it's like and, and, and what just went through my mind was, it's really almost like if we were just, we're living on a different planet than we were made to live on, like, really, you know, so no small thing, but the good news is we've got, I don't know, companies like Neurohacker out there ready to support us.
Let's talk a little bit, we're talking about ecosystem and the things that we're, we're not exposed to that we should be, and things that we are exposed to that we shouldn't be. Which kind of brings me to keystone species, you know, they're, [Page//00:29:00] why are they so important? How do they work? What are they?
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah, yeah, that's a really good question. So, You know, it, it's useful to think of the gut microbiome like an ecosystem because there's just tremendous correlation between how sort of a natural ecosystem would function to the way that gut functions. And, you know, one of the pieces in that that's becomes really relevant is this idea of keystone species.
So a keystone species is going to be a species that has a disproportionately large effect on the health of the overall ecosystem. I think one of the best examples of this that people, that a lot of people have some awareness around was I don't know, a few years ago, there was a video that went really broadly all over social media that was called How Wolves Affect, or How Wolves Changed Rivers.
I don't know if you ever saw this video, but it was...
Julie Michelson: [Page//00:30:00] not.
James Schmachtenberger: It was amazing, and it's worth going on YouTube and finding it.
Julie Michelson: Okay.
James Schmachtenberger: But basically, what this was, was in Yellowstone, the wolf population had been completely wiped out due to hunting and, you know, just sort of encroachment into their natural
Julie Michelson: Humans. Okay. Humans.
James Schmachtenberger: Yes, we, we wiped out wolves in Yellowstone, right?
And once that happened, there, the ecosystem started to have a number of challenges. And so several years ago, there was a large breeding program that was done to get wolves and be able to reintroduce them into Yellowstone. And what came from that was incredible. And like so much more than anyone would have anticipated because the wolf was a keystone species.
and their presence had a massive impact on sort of everything, right? So when the wolf population got reintroduced, there was a bunch of things that happened, but like one as an example was now the [Page//00:31:00] amount of deers that were present. They started to have a natural predator and as a result it changed their behavior.
And so where they used to spend a substantial portion of their time in sort of open prairie areas and just hanging out along riverbeds, now that made them easy prey for wolves. And they started to spend more of their time in kind of denser forest areas and not in spaces. And as a result of them moving into denser forest areas, that meant that they were eating less of the new flora that was trying to grow and trampling on it less.
And so the areas around the edges of the rivers and the areas in sort of the open prairies all started to grow and proliferate. And then as a result of more of that growth, then you started to get more. You know, different rodents that came in, which then supported, you know, more and more other things and the, and then particularly like the growth along the edge of the rivers, [Page//00:32:00] stabilize the riverbanks in a way that actually physically changed the shape of the rivers.
And where there used to not be a lot of stability, and as a result, there'd be flooding that would then kind of go and wipe out whole areas. Well, the riverbed started to build up more effectively, the flow changed, and over the course of like five or six years, you saw everything just become gorgeous.
Right. It was like so much more plant life, so much more animal life you know, bigger rivers, more water flow. And all of it was the result of just reintroducing the wolves. There was no other changes. And so it's that same concept that applies to the gut microbiome, right? Within the biome, there's tons of different bacteria that are present and they all serve sort of necessary and functional roles, but they don't all Do it with, you know, for lack of a better way of saying it, the same degree of importance.
There's certain [Page//00:33:00] bacteria species in the gut that will have a much more dramatic impact on everything else and actually help to regulate the presence of all of the other ones. So the, there's a few different keystone species, the, probably the main one, or the one that people are starting to have some familiarity with is called acromantia.
Right. And so, you know, in, when you can increase the amount of acromantia in the gut, by doing that, it will, Then cause other good bacteria to start to grow more and cause other ones that you want to have less start to get in check. Whereas like if you were to try to just feed all of the microbes similarly, you wouldn't get nearly as positive an impact as you would when you focus on some of the keystone species.
And so that's kind of one of the core premises of what we looked at when we were doing formulation here [Page//00:34:00] is that. So prebiotics, right, which is kind of a fancy word for fiber but particular kinds of fibers are essentially the food source for probiotics. And so, you know, as a health community, we very heavily focused on probiotics and that's critical, but putting a bunch of probiotics in your system without the food, nothing will really happen.
They'll just die off and go away. Right. Right. So, but then, so what we did was we looked at. What would all the research show around which particular kinds of prebiotics fed which particular kinds of probiotics and we then chose a series of different prebiotic fibers that specifically were the primary food sources for the keystone species.
And so as a result, we end up getting to have this. Disproportionate positive impacts on the overall makeup of the gut microbiome in really pretty [Page//00:35:00] fast periods of time, like A few weeks, as opposed to months or years, which often can take as you know,
Julie Michelson: And it, I always say like the, you know, gut stuff is usually the slowest gut and skin and there's a direct connect there too but the slowest to, to resolve. So that is remarkable and logical, right? Like if these are the important things we want to feed, what are the things that Feed those fast. So
James Schmachtenberger: right.
Julie Michelson: like, I like when science makes sense.
James Schmachtenberger: Well, this is, this is sort of the systems approach that we work with, right, is trying to understand what are all of the interconnected functionalities and then how do we factor for all of that. And knowing that we. Fundamentally can't factor for all of it because there's just so much that science doesn't even know yet.
Then how do we focus on the things that have the largest impact with that, with all information that is
Julie Michelson: what you do [Page//00:36:00] now. Yeah.
James Schmachtenberger: that's where, you know, the sea stone species comes in, but it's also why, like, you know, this is a relatively complicated product, right? Like when people think gut health, usually you think probiotics, you know, it's like a single capsule might have a few different strains of bacteria in it.
You know, here, the reason we call this symbiotic. is it's essentially the synthesis of various kinds of biotics or bacteria, right? So we have the prebiotics, which are going to be the food source for probiotics. We're then introducing large amounts of the right kinds of probiotics. And in our case, we actually also particularly chose strains that are known as psychobiotics.
Meaning probiotics that not only have a gut benefit, but specifically impact brain function.
Julie Michelson: back to that brain health.
James Schmachtenberger: And then we've got a bunch of postbiotics. And a postbiotic is essentially a dead probiotic, right? It's the waste product of [Page//00:37:00] probiotics, but just like in an ecosystem, dead and decaying things become primary fuel sources for every for new life to be able to be created.
And your body will produce a certain amount of postbiotics naturally as probiotics die off, but because most of us don't, right. Well, yeah, I mean, so we do, we eliminate a lot of them, but also because most people don't have the right sort of healthy makeup of
Julie Michelson: to begin with.
James Schmachtenberger: probiotics
to start with, you're Prebiotics, probiotics, postbiotics. And then we took
Julie Michelson: wasn't enough.
James Schmachtenberger: Right. It wasn't. I mean, I mean, that in and of itself would have been
Julie Michelson: That's
James Schmachtenberger: there are companies now that are starting to delve into that space. But then, you know, we also then went ahead and added a series of fermented foods both because they in and of themselves are food sources for the probiotics, but also [Page//00:38:00] the fermented foods then create the A really beautiful variety of different bacteria that your gut wants.
So you're getting a lot more total type of bacteria than the specific ones that we're delivering with the probiotics due to the fermented foods. And then we also have, I believe it's five different types of digestive enzymes that are here. Because though this is primarily a gut formula, meaning the colon, you can't think of the colon independent of the rest of the GI tract. The majority of nutrient absorption happens in the colon, but the majority of digestion happens in the stomach and the small intestine. And most people due to both diet and lifestyle don't have the right makeup of digestive enzymes. So a lot of food doesn't actually get broken down as well as it should as it's going through the stomach and the small intestine, which means that when it gets into the colon, The nutrients can't be well enough absorbed because you have too [Page//00:39:00] large of particles.
So we're essentially supporting the entire GI system, you know, helping to make sure that you've got the necessary enzymes to do all the breakdown and then building a healthy and robust microbiome in the gut so that you have better nutrient absorption and so that you have better signaling between the gut and the brain to be able to.
Basically make everything better.
Julie Michelson: I
James Schmachtenberger: yes.
Julie Michelson: just make everything better. That's what
James Schmachtenberger: I mean, we could explain it, but essentially that's what it comes down to.
Julie Michelson: that's the, and that's what, and there's the, the one hand is understanding what's happening and the other hand is feeling better. Like that's the, that's the, the key. So question about the enzymes.
James Schmachtenberger: yeah,
Julie Michelson: So these, so are, should we be using this with food?
Like I think of digestive enzymes as like, how long are they hanging out in there? Should we be taking, using symbiotic with meals [Page//00:40:00] or, cause I think of digestive enzymes as with my food.
James Schmachtenberger: right. And typically that's true, right? Like a lot of people now have gotten into the habit of taking a digestive enzyme with food to help the breakdown. And, and that's a worthwhile thing to do. And depending on what's happening with someone's GI health, even if they're taking symbiotic, that may still be a good idea to do on top of
Julie Michelson: Yeah, I do
James Schmachtenberger: But
Julie Michelson: but maybe I don't need to be is kind of why I'm asking like, I
James Schmachtenberger: I mean, it definitely becomes less necessary, but you know, if someone's having significant GI issues, that may very well still be beneficial. It just kind of depends on the individual, but
Julie Michelson: value even if you're drinking your symbiotic, not with your meal. There's still value.
James Schmachtenberger: Absolutely. Yeah, I mean, this product is designed to be able to be taken any time of day with or without food. We actually are doing a small study right now looking to see if there's any noticeable difference in effect between empty stomach and food. And there are [Page//00:41:00] indicators so far in our research that it actually gets better effect on an empty stomach.
Julie Michelson: That would make sense.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah, I mean, you, you're going to get better absorption of all the things if it's not competing with all the food that's present, but with the enzymes, you know, it's not like you only have food in your GI tract right when you're eating. Right. It takes quite a while for food to make it through the entire GI tract.
And the whole time that it's there, it needs the presence of enzymes to be able to break it down as effectively as possible. So yes, traditionally enzymes are great to be taken with a meal, but it's not the only time where they're relevant.
Julie Michelson: Okay. Awesome. Thank you. I, you know, I don't know at all. So I like to ask, I want to circle back to the fermented foods. Because this is another, again, back to the whole idea of supplementing, another area where we know fermented foods are great [Page//00:42:00] for, you know, supporting this whole process. And and I love fermented foods and I tolerate them well.
So that that's something not everybody does. But my two issues with people saying, you know, just add fermented food, you know, I don't take probiotics because I eat fermented foods or you can't eat and not you can't, I can't on a consistent basis, eat enough fermented foods and enough variety of fermented foods.
And then I tend to have a big issue, although I enjoy it with. Kombucha because if you're not paying attention, a lot of 'em have a lot of sugar, even still after fermentation. And so I just wanted to, from the lay person, circle back to that, like that importance of, you know, I don't think anybody is surprised to hear fermented foods are important at this point.
I think that's, It's pretty much general knowledge but I think what people don't realize is, you know, a [Page//00:43:00] couple bites of sauerkraut a day is not, you're not getting anywhere near what you would be getting in, in Symbiotic. So
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah, I mean, so with, so yes, I mean, generally speaking, for most people, eating fermented foods on a regular basis is going to be good, but even if someone does that, like you're saying, it's, it's typically not going to be sufficient, because though you can, though there's a huge variety of potential fermented foods, there's really a pretty small number of ones that most people actually eat, and of those, they are going to be producing bacteria that are relevant, but they're not necessarily going to produce a huge variety of them. And in many cases, they're not going to produce the ones that are sort of keystone in nature, right? So like the most commonplace people think to get probiotics from their food is yogurt, right?
And it does have them, but largely that's going to be lactobacillus. And though lactobacillus is relevant, it [Page//00:44:00] has a perceived relevance that is far
Julie Michelson: just going to say it's, it's overhyped, like it's, yeah,
James Schmachtenberger: there's a key reason for that, which is that lactobacillus is one of the only probiotics that can survive in an oxygen environment. And so years ago, when we started researching and we didn't understand that, it seemed to have far more relevance because it was the only thing that
Julie Michelson: one still alive.
James Schmachtenberger: the lab environment.
Everything else would die off very quickly and it was just sort of determined by researchers that therefore it must be less resilient and less important. Right. And so we got this sort of distorted view of the importance of Lactobacillus because we didn't know how to research it when we first started researching it.
Julie Michelson: makes sense.
James Schmachtenberger: And it's not to say that it's not important, but as far as the gut is concerned, it's for the most part, it's not really a keystone species. So it's helpful, but how helpful? So, yes, I mean, doing fermented [Page//00:45:00] foods is good. I mean, I try to incorporate into my diet on a pretty regular basis, but the particular fermented foods we're working with here are ones that have very high amounts of some of the key bacteria.
They're going to have a broader array of total bacteria because They're specifically cultured for this purpose, right? It's not just the natural fermentation process. It's that sort of on steroids better way
Julie Michelson: and I don't know people that, you know, are fermenting berries at home or, you know what I mean? Like, yeah,
James Schmachtenberger: Right, like we have several different fermented berries, we have fermented tumeric, like most people are not doing that at home.
Julie Michelson: their, in their basement. No. Or fridge.
James Schmachtenberger: And actually two of the things that we have in here, I believe, we're the only company using them. We have one ingredient called Instacombu, which is a fermented kombucha, though without all of
Julie Michelson: right. In the, in the, yeah. The, the part that we [Page//00:46:00] want.
James Schmachtenberger: Right.
Julie Michelson: Yeah.
James Schmachtenberger: then we have one called Berryotics, which is a series of fermented berries. And to the best of my awareness, there aren't any other companies currently using either of those yet. They're, they're very new and very
Julie Michelson: that's not surprising because that's, you guys usually lead the pack. So
James Schmachtenberger: mean, anytime we're formulating, we research so many ingredients. You know, I mean, typically... At bare minimum, we're studying a hundred different ingredients for a given product. And it's not uncommon that that's north of 300. It just sort of depends on the product and what's available. But but we, we do very deep dives to try to make sure that we're getting the best that's possible.
Julie Michelson: Well, and it shows in your products because they're. They're top notch. They're, I'm clearly a fan.
James Schmachtenberger: One of the things you said earlier that I'd love to, you know, just touch on a little bit, you said you know, it's important for people to understand what a product is doing because that will cause them to stick with it. [Page//00:47:00] But also it's important to actually feel it. And so on this topic of feeling it, we we actually just completed our second study on this product.
So we now, one of them is published. The other one should be published within the next few days,
Julie Michelson: Oh, great.
James Schmachtenberger: but we, you know, we had people doing symbiotic every day for three weeks and we did a baseline testing before they started both on various kinds of GI symptoms and as well as mood related.
conditions and then, you know, tracks at, you know, week one, two, three, what the results were. And this one just blew me out of the water. What we saw in terms of GI health was depending on the different symptoms someone was dealing with, we saw an improvement of anywhere between 54%. and 74% in each of the different GI symptoms in three weeks.
Like that's crazy. And obviously, you know, some people will be different than that, but this was 51 [Page//00:48:00] participants, you know, different ages, different genders, different ethnicities. Like it's a pretty Comparable makeup of what average population would look like but yeah, we saw things like, you know, reductions in diarrhea reductions in constipation, reductions in abdominal discomfort just all kinds of stuff.
And I mean, those results were just stunning. And then, to me, one of the things that really stood out because, you know, we formulated this, like I said, primary focus was gut health, secondary was brain health, gut brain connection. We saw a 58% reduction in people's reported stress levels,
Julie Michelson: What?
James Schmachtenberger: a 63% reduction in people's sense of sort of anxiety, and here we're not talking like clinical anxiety, but the types
Julie Michelson: Our experience of anxiety. Yeah.
James Schmachtenberger: 62% lift in mood.
So this would be like. [Page//00:49:00] Again,
Julie Michelson: Right. Right.
James Schmachtenberger: dependencies, right, were alleviated by over half in a very, very short period of time. And I've definitely noticed for myself that those things have all been true. I mean, we just launched this product, so I'm only... A month onto it myself but I've definitely noticed substantially better gut health, less, you know, tendency towards indigestion, bloating, all that.
And, you know, pretty notable improvements in my ability to handle stress, to not be impacted by it, to not feel as anxious. So it's, yeah, the results here are, are pretty awesome.
Julie Michelson: And, and that just led me to another question because what popped into my head was, I know you've, you've been just from when I last saw you, you've been kind of chugging it since started using it. Is there such a thing as using anxiety? too much. Also, I, I was saying how the taste is really good. [Page//00:50:00] I, I had shared this with you.
She'll be thrilled. I'm saying it on air. My daughter doesn't like water. And I work with a lot of people who don't like to drink water. But she also lives very clean and is sensitive to a lot of things. And I'm excited. for her to try this. She's out of the country when she comes back. That's I have a jar waiting for her to bring back with her to the UK.
But can you drink? So my, my thought was for her. And obviously she wouldn't need, you don't need to do a whole scoop every time just to flavor your water. But can you drink too much of it? Like, is there too much of a good thing here?
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah, I've actually been meaning to ask my research team, like, is there an upper bound
Julie Michelson: I know. I hate to throw you, throw you, put you on the spot, but I think, I feel like you're consuming maybe more than a scoop a day.
James Schmachtenberger: I often am. Yeah, I mean, like, [Page//00:51:00] both because it's like, it's really healthy, but also I actually just genuinely
Julie Michelson: tastes good.
James Schmachtenberger: I'm also one of those people that like, I struggle to make myself drink enough water if I don't have something in it, right? So like, I also drink a bunch of chlorophyll water.
I drink a lot of electrolytes. Like, I do, I like to soup up my water and make it
Julie Michelson: a good way to put it. Soup up your water.
James Schmachtenberger: Right. But no, I would say like from everything I know, you know, if someone was to do twice as much as what's recommended on the bottle, I can't imagine any way that that would be harmful. If someone wants to do a lot more than that, email support at neurohacker and we'll find the answer for you.
Julie Michelson: Right. Well, and again,
James Schmachtenberger: I'd like to clarify that with people smarter than me.
Julie Michelson: I kind of answered it myself as well, as far as if you're using it to flavor your water, you're not, cause like all, I'll. Drink my scoop. I love water. So I'm I actually am more prone just to drink plain water unless I'm making an effort. [Page//00:52:00] But what I have noticed and it wasn't even intentional is all drink it and there's that little bit left at the bottom of the glass and I'll just refill it.
And then that's my water. And so I, I can't imagine anybody's going to want to be blowing through a whole container in a week or So I was just
James Schmachtenberger: I mean, I'm similar, right? Because it's like, it's suggested you mix it with 8 to 12 ounces of water, but a lot of times I'll just do it in like a big container and just slowly sip on it for the course of a couple of hours.
Julie Michelson: And you're, you're still getting it. So, so that's a, another good product question. It can stay in the wall. You don't have to chug it.
James Schmachtenberger: No, I mean, you'd want to drink it the same day, but, you know, I just regularly have a big one sitting on my desk that I'm sipping on for the first few hours of my morning.
Julie Michelson: Gotcha.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah.
Julie Michelson: Awesome. Well, I know I've already kept you a long time. I want to make sure before I ask you the final question, I don't know, I just want to make [Page//00:53:00] sure that you have shared enough of your genius with us. Aside from everything you've already said, is there anything you'd like to share about, you know, why this product is so innovative and unique?
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah, I guess the thing that I... I mean, we got to cover a decent amount, but I think the thing I want to share is you know, whether someone fully understands what's happening here or not the, you know, the benefits that we're seeing in our studies so far exceed almost anything that I've ever seen in a natural product.
And It's really just worth trying like with this one, obviously, you know, as a company, I'm excited by the fact that we created a great product, but, you know, more than that, like, I'm actually really excited for what this has the potential to do for people broadly. Gut health is just so fundamental.
Obviously, someone's mood impacts the entire quality of their experience of life. And we're [Page//00:54:00] seeing with such consistency right now, these things improving at really, really rapid rates. So I would just, I would encourage everyone to try it. You know, we, we have a hundred day money back guarantee. We try to make it super easy if a product doesn't work for someone to.
be able to get the money back. So there's really not a risk in trying it. But this one, I actually haven't seen a single person so far that has tried it and not felt better. So I'm, I'm just encouraging people to actually give it a try and see what happens.
Julie Michelson: which is, is remarkable when you consider how biodiverse we are, right? So that's, I was, when you were sharing the stats from this last study, I was thinking like, I can't wait until there's more long term, like, I just, Just that information alone makes me think, Okay, when we can get more and more people using this product, the world will be a happier place, right?
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah.
Julie Michelson: You know, [Page//00:55:00] because when we feel better, we're better humans, like we just are. And so I think you already answered, you just answered my last question, which is, what is one step listeners can take today to start to improve their health? I'm going to say what order a container of symbiotic. Yeah.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah. It, I think it's worth trying. Like it's, Everyone who's tried it has loved the flavor. Everyone who's tried it has, you know, I mean, usually within a few days started to notice improvements, but it's around like the three, four week mark that you really start to, to see it. So yeah, I think everyone should try it.
And if, if you want to understand it better first, that's awesome. We have. Tons of information on the site. You can see the published studies. We have the article we talked about a little bit earlier, which is called the formulators view on symbiotic. And that is a pretty solid deep dive explaining the whole sort of domain of science.
What, you know, pre, post, probiotics, all these things are, and [Page//00:56:00] then actually going through in detail and explaining each individual ingredient and what they do, what the research on them shows. So if you want to go deep and really understand it, then the information is readily available. If you just want to feel better, then just give it a try.
Julie Michelson: I, I agree. I'm not somebody who I never recommend anything. I don't person. Well, that's I tend to not recommend something. I don't have personal experience with. I mean, I'm sure there's a lot of good science and stuff that I haven't used myself, but it is, is remarkable. So I, I second the just go try it if somebody and all the links are going to be in the notes, but if somebody's like, you know, what is this neuro hacker collective?
How do I learn more? Where's the best place for them to find information?
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah, I mean, so, I mean, best place would be to go to our website, neurohacker. com. You can find info in a bunch of other sources all over the internet, but neurohacker. com, [Page//00:57:00] you're going to be able to find all of our products. We have... Those, those really extensive explanations are in existence for every single product.
And then just huge amounts of additional information. You know, we, we try to not only make really great product, but also provide as much education as we can.
Julie Michelson: Well, and you do a great job. You really, I literally, I could spend hours just which is rare. I can't tell you how many times I've gone to a website either to see what's in a supplement or, and you're digging and digging and digging. And if that's the case, I, I'm, I'm out. But you guys have. I can't imagine there's any information somebody wants that they can't find on the website.
Like, it's, it's spectacular. It's
James Schmachtenberger: There's a lot there. And if there's information we don't have, send us an email and we'll probably write an article on it.
Julie Michelson: Right. Well, I, I so appreciate you giving us your time again and appreciate [Page//00:58:00] NeuroHacker Collective in general for, and it's, it's also a group of amazing humans. I mean, everybody. That I know, not that I've come into contact with everybody involved in the company, but you guys are just all really incredible humans.
So I, I appreciate you and what you're doing to allow all of us to support our health long term. So thank you.
James Schmachtenberger: . Really appreciate it and appreciate you having me on. This was fun.
Julie Michelson: Of course. And for everybody listening, remember you can get the transcripts and show notes by visiting inspiredliving.show. I hope you had a great time and enjoyed this episode as much as I did. I'll see you next week. [Page//00:59:00]
James is the CEO and co founder of Neurohacker Collective, [Page//00:01:00] a company focused on making groundbreaking products for health and well being through complex systems science. In today's conversation, James explains what a symbiotic is and how Qualia Symbiotic can improve our overall health, gut health, brain function, and mood.
James, welcome back to the podcast.
James Schmachtenberger: Thanks, Julie. Yeah. Glad to be back again.
Julie Michelson: It's, it's always so much fun speaking with you and and sometimes I feel like it's just not fair if we don't record it and share it. So you, I am such a fan of neurohacker products and just the. The amount of science and research and brilliance that goes in to your products. And so I'm excited to talk about symbiotic today.
I'm looking to my left because I, I happen to have it right here because I just took mine. So I was [Page//00:02:00] getting ready.
James Schmachtenberger: It's
Julie Michelson: I, I feel like for many of us, and you guys have expanded over the past few years into all kinds of wellness areas because we are whole humans, I definitely think people still tend to often think about, you know, the, the kind of nootropic brain focus kind of.
products with mind and, and and so last time you were here, we were talking about the scintillating and zombie cells, but this time we're going to talk about gut health and this new product. I, I really love, I have the hardest time. Finding products that are powders that I will tolerate because I don't like flavors and sweeteners and things, and it's usually kind of a hard stop for me, and this product is great.
I use it every day, so I'm excited because I finally have one that I can say, even I use it too. Not [Page//00:03:00] only is it good for you, but it tastes good.
James Schmachtenberger: right. No, I'm the same. Like, I love the theory of powder products, but then so many of them have like really, really terrible tasting ingredients, or they're just packed with like tons of artificial flavors and sweeteners. And like, either way, it's just hard to actually stomach them on a consistent basis.
Julie Michelson: Yeah. Yeah. I, I'm like, that's kind of tends to be, I remember when I won't say the brand, it doesn't matter the brand when, when I wanted liposomal glutathione and the, and the only one was the liquid. And I'm like, okay, I'll do pretty much anything that is good for me. And that just sits in my fridge.
It's not going in my body. It's disgusting.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah. Liquid glutathione can be a little rough. It's like, but it's also the smell. It's like, before it even
Julie Michelson: the whole, it's just the whole experience is bad. So, so yay team Neurohacker for, for making this amazing product. And like [Page//00:04:00] your other products, what I, what I'm so excited about, cause I am such a geek is just this full. Spectrum of, of gut support and gut brain and we aren't, we're not discounting the brain because the, because of the whole gut brain connection.
So I know it's supporting the brain health as well.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah, we'll definitely talk a little bit about that because there are some really interesting like, I mean, this was primarily a gut product, but with the gut brain interface, and some of the things we did uniquely with this formulation, there's actually really amazing impacts on mood. And so it's worth kind of understanding that piece a little deeper.
Julie Michelson: I would love it. Let's do it. So, so let's talk about. I'd love to start kind of high up in general, you know, if somebody is not at all familiar with symbiotic, you know, what, what is the main, in your words, the main purpose I read and it's awesome. The on, on the website, like all of the information about [Page//00:05:00] all the different, you know, everything that's included and why and, and the sourcing and it, it's spectacular.
So if somebody has. A half hour they can read. No, I'm kidding.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah, the formulators view. I know, I wish everyone would read those because it's, you know, it's the best way to actually understand in kind of detail what the product does, why each ingredient was chosen, how they interface, like, it's a level of information that most people, you know, wouldn't otherwise get.
But when you get it, it's like, you really understand the benefit in a whole new way.
Julie Michelson: Yeah, and I have clients all the time tell me, you know, I need to know why I'm taking, like, why? Why am I taking this? What's it really doing? And I know with this one, a lot of you, you've got a lot of feedback that, that people feel, feel a difference to, which is always, I think, most important is, you know, I, I, well, most important is understanding what it's doing and then it's a bonus and it'll keep you taking it if you can feel it.
[Page//00:06:00] So I remember probably five years ago thinking like gut health was just, you know, the, the fad, the buzzword, everything is gut health. It's all gut health, which is interesting as an autoimmune specialist, because now I'm like, it's all in the gut. Well, let's, let's talk about this gut, gut health and specifically dysbiosis. What it is and, and why is it important for those of us that are wanting to be healthy and for, and, and have some good longevity to.
James Schmachtenberger: Right. Yeah, I mean, I think, I think gut health is starting to really gain more understanding and, and as a result more popularity, right? Like I think for a long time, everyone knew that gut health was kind of important, but they thought of it as this like isolated thing, right? Like if you have gut symptoms, then you focus on the gut, but otherwise it's just kind of its own thing off in the corner and you focus on other stuff.
And more and more, what research is showing is that that's [Page//00:07:00] completely inaccurate. And that, you know, the gut is tied to almost every aspect of health and, you know, and some of the newer information coming out of showing how key a healthy microbiome is to not just general health, but to actually extending lifespan and health span.
Right? So there's There's what's known as the hallmarks of aging and these are what the scientific community has essentially come to as the most important factors that determine longevity and for, for the last handful of years, it was understood that there were basically nine hallmarks of aging.
Right. And these included things like stem cell production and cellular senescence and epigenetic expression. And, you know, there's a number of different factors. Earlier this year, there was pretty major update to the hallmarks of aging that went from 12 hallmarks or sorry, from nine [Page//00:08:00] hallmarks up to 12 hallmarks.
And one of the new hallmarks of aging that was added as the scientific community's getting a better understanding here is dysbiosis. Dysbiosis, essentially meaning the dysregulated aspects of microbiome. So when the microbiome in your GI tract is healthy, it's gonna have major effects on virtually everything.
When the microbes start to get off and you start to get. You know, too many of some of the ones you don't want too little of some of the more beneficial ones, then that throws off everything right like it throws off neurotransmitter production and throws off immune function. It throws off the ability for the neurons and the brain and the gut to be able to communicate effectively, and there's just this whole cascade of issues right and so gut health, and specifically.
the well being of the microbiome is starting to [Page//00:09:00] become increasingly more and more understood as critical to not just health on a daily basis, but actual longevity. And I think
Julie Michelson: amazing,
James Schmachtenberger: No, I mean, it's, it's so important that this like this information is finally starting to come to light because there have been kind of small subsets of the research community that have understood this for some years now.
But, you know, to a large extent, it was hard to get the rest of the world to pay attention and catch on because it wasn't hitting sort of mainstream science. And now in the last few years with a series of new studies that have come out, it's starting to become more commonly understood, more commonly accepted, and as a result, you know, giving way to the ability to actually do better research and have better impact in this area.
Julie Michelson: which is, is fantastic. Cause as you said, I want to kind of drive home. It's this is not, do you have a comfortable gut or don't you have a comfortable gut? [Page//00:10:00] This is the, the actual, I like how you said the, the wellbeing of the microbiome. So we actually may not have any idea what's going on in there.
Although I say all the time, like if you're listening to this, because you have autoimmunity. You need to work on your gut health for sure. So, you know, that's really I love it. The, the, the, the well being aspect because I think it's almost like most things, at least in Western medicine is something has to be really far downstream have gone awry to get any attention. And so I love that you're helping us learn that okay now we know. So, you know, and it is interesting how quickly like to look back and think. The gut is a contained system that just has nothing to do with anything. There's no part of us that has nothing to do [Page//00:11:00] with anything else. Like it
James Schmachtenberger: I mean, fundamentally, we are a deeply interconnected system, right, anything in the body will affect. In essence, everything in the body, right? Maybe not directly, but through a series of different backs. But there are some systems that are, you know, more significant than others, right? And the gut as you know, the research community is kind of catching up is one of those really key systems that has to be in good working order because there's so much about the gut that people just don't ever want to talk about.
Find out or understand, right? Like about 70% of the entire immune system lives in the gut. And if your gut health is off, it essentially directly means that your immune function is just not going to be as strong. So therefore your ability to, you know, fight off pathogens, your ability to bounce back with different illnesses.
And just everything is going to be
Julie Michelson: Or the, the overactive, [Page//00:12:00] right? Or the autoimmune process. It all starts with gut health. It really does. Another. Direct huge impact is, is brain and I want to talk about that because I'm selfish and I'm really interested in it. I love it. So I want to, James's take on, you know, how, how is the brain you, you mentioned a little bit already that neurotransmitters are largely made in the gut.
But, but is, is that the direct connect? I mean, how is taking a product that is. Supporting total gut health, helping us with brain.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah. I mean, so there's a number of connections. So there's, you know, there's what's known as the gut brain access, right? And this term is starting to get more popularity in the last few years, but essentially it's discussing the sort of the interface and the ability for the brain and the gut to communicate.
And so there's a few key [Page//00:13:00] things in this, right? One is that. The gut, it has a tremendous amount of neurons, right? There's more, I don't remember the exact percentage, but there's a massive amount of neurons. And, you know, that's known as the enteric nervous system. But when people say, you know, trust your gut, there's actually something really key to that because.
It's like, there's a whole bunch of processes related to the nervous system that are happening in the gut that are sort of informed in very primal ways and provide tremendous amounts of information. So, you know, there's, there's tons of neurons in the gut and then obviously, you know, even more in the brain.
And then part vagus nerve. Right. So the vagus nerve is one of the largest and in many ways, most important nerves running through the body. It's going to come from the brain through all kinds of stuff, but it has a direct link into the gut. [Page//00:14:00] And that's where information is largely transmitted back and forth.
And depending on what's happening in the gut will then send information and inform the brain, which will then regulate essentially everything in the body. Right. And then similarly, if the brain is off, if you've got excess stress, you know, whatever, then the signaling to the gut becomes ineffective and you start to have breakdowns in gut performance.
So so yeah, the majority of that information is transmitting back and forth through the vagus nerve, but there's also quite a lot of information that's transmitted directly through microbiota. Right. So the actual bacteria also in direct communication capacity. And, you know, though a lot of this is still being researched and isn't fully understood, it is sort of commonly understood at this point that there's actually more information that's being fed from the gut to the brain than the other direction.
Julie Michelson: And this is the part, and I literally, cause I am such a, such a [Page//00:15:00] geek. I just got goosebumps, but this is the part that's so exciting with that. This is now getting to, to be more mainstream knowledge because I think everybody knows, you know, Oh, when you get nervous. You may get butterflies in your stomach or, you know, we, we've for a long time, it's been known that the, that they're connected, but it was kind of thought to be at least much more of a one way unidirectional.
And so it's this back and forth is the really, really amazing part. I see it and, but we're, I'm not, I see it in changes with clients as we work on, on gut health. Where mood, you know, anxiety that was, you know, close to debilitating just goes away or so I see it all the time and, and that's one of the reasons I'm extra excited about having [Page//00:16:00] another tool support.
And also. We're going to get into the product itself. I mean, you guys have consolidated one product. Otherwise we would be taking you know, I was going to say a million things. That's an exaggeration, but, but many more.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah.
Julie Michelson: Yeah,
James Schmachtenberger: Right. Yeah. I mean, that's, you know, I mean, that's, as you know, like, that's sort of our, what we're known for,
Julie Michelson: magic. Yeah.
James Schmachtenberger: upgrades because, you know, there are very few things that can actually be meaningfully positively impacted by a single molecule. There are occasions where that's true, but for the most part, every physiological system is so complex and has so many interconnections that it doesn't need one thing to get better.
There's a whole series of things that have to get supported and supported in kind of relative proportion and priority to each other. And so, you know, [Page//00:17:00] yes, if someone just takes a probiotic, it can have some benefit, or if someone just takes some fermented foods, it can have some benefit. But none of those things on their own are going to have nearly the benefit of when you actually kind of study and look at what does the gut as a whole need?
And, you know, and then how do we deliver on all of that?
Julie Michelson: And that's why I love the neuro hacker products. Cause there's, oh, we they're always synergistic. Like there's, Oh, you're not just throwing like, Oh, all of these things are good for you. So we're going to put them in one formula.
James Schmachtenberger: Right. I
Julie Michelson: the doc I work with a lot always says, you know, the body is like a symphony.
And so, yeah, that's making that one adjustment is not going to, not going to do it for you. So we're talking about,
James Schmachtenberger: the core reasons, I mean, there was a bunch of reasons, but like one of the reasons I started the company was that like for me as an individual, I had various health issues and I was trying to fix them and I wanted the absolute [Page//00:18:00] best of what was possible, but I didn't have an adequate background in chemistry and physiology and all of the things that I would need to be able to figure that out myself and basically everything on the market.
It's. I, well, I tried all of it, I don't even know how obscenely much money on, you know, testing everything and most of it didn't do that much. And the only times where I found that I could actually have really dramatic impacts was when I went to. Like a really cutting edge functional medicine doctor and paid obscene amounts of money and got, you know, these kind of comprehensive programs. And that was awesome. And I was fortunate to be in a position to do that, but not everybody is. And so then the idea was, how can we start to develop products that actually address An entire system and do the absolute best science around that so that the end user doesn't have to, if they want to. Awesome.
Right. [Page//00:19:00] If you're someone who just, you know, studies journals every day and wants to go by, you know, a hundred different powders online and mix them. Awesome. Most people aren't in a position to do that. I mean, I wasn't right. So that was
Julie Michelson: And I'm glad you brought that up. I just literally realized, like, oh my gosh, I, you know, we, I always start with story and I was just so excited to talk to you. You know, the, that for listeners that didn't hear the, the last episode that we recorded there aren't, I actually, I was going to say there aren't many, I don't know that I know any other.
Serial successful six serial entrepreneurs who can sit here and talk about this time. We're talking about microbiome and gut health and brain health. And last time we were talking about senescent cells. And and so it you to have entered this world through your own. Wellness journey,
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah. I mean, when I was [Page//00:20:00] younger, I had a. bunch of different health issues and, you know, they pretty dramatically impacted my life. I was dealing with, you know, adrenal failure and ADHD and, you know, chronic fatigue and it's all kinds of stuff. And so, I mean, yeah, I, I got set on my own health journey.
But I also had years of really intense frustration because even though I, I started this journey with more background in this area than most people. When I really started to try to get into it, I'm like, I don't even begin to understand what I need to understand to be able to help myself. And I started to look at like, what was that going to take?
It's like, well, this is years of
Julie Michelson: of scientists,
James Schmachtenberger: Right. And, you know, so I, you know, like with creating neurohacker, I'm in a ridiculously fortunate position now because we have, you know, six full time researchers, you know, doctors, PhD chemists that are, you know, just all day, every [Page//00:21:00] day studying the stuff and creating these amazing formulas.
And I don't, you know, at this point I'm reasonably well educated, but I don't know anywhere close to what they do, but I end up getting the synthesis of that information.
Julie Michelson: right? Right. But you want, you obviously have a clear, you understand it. You get where you're teachable and then you can, you can share it with us in a language that we can understand. And and so, you
James Schmachtenberger: And that is key, because sometimes when I talk to our researchers, I'm like, can you slow that down a lot?
Julie Michelson: Smaller words.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah.
Julie Michelson: it's, you know, so for everybody listening, we are all getting the benefit of James's process of healing. And, and and I love functional medicine. I, I don't know. But I'm such a fan of whatever tools we can access directly. [Page//00:22:00] You know, that's, that's where medicine needs to go. That's where health and wellness needs to go.
So we're, we're all very grateful that you decided that somebody should be bringing this all together for us. I love it. I love it. So we Can we, you know, I've done all kinds, because again, that's just me, I have also tossed a lot of money and I've done all kinds of different testing and microbiome testing and this and that and can we change our microbiome?
James Schmachtenberger: So the answer there is yes but not as much in the way that people think it happens. So, you know, the, the microbiome is, has got a lot of plasticity when you're first born, right? The first like thousand days or so of someone's life, they are able to affect which bacteria [Page//00:23:00] are in their gut to a pretty significant extent.
After about that first thousand days, then which bacteria take hold in your gut becomes relatively set. And though there is the ability for some impact, you know, when we're in our adult phase, the Different types of bacteria won't actually change all that much. And even if you take entirely new bacteria, maybe a little bit will take hold but not substantial.
So predominantly what's happening when you're affecting your microbiome as an adult is you're changing the ratio of the bacteria that are already present. And that's where most of the benefit or harm comes from depending on, you know, what you're doing.
Julie Michelson: That's true, we're talking, I always think like positive, positive, but it's not always positive, you know,
James Schmachtenberger: Oh, and most of us with our lifestyle are constantly doing things that actually make it worse, right? Like the majority of people in the Western world [Page//00:24:00] are eating way more refined sugars and things then are actually healthy. And those end up being the things that feed a lot of the unhealthy bacteria that you don't want more of.
And then the unhealthy bacteria suppress the growth of the healthy ones. Right. And it's not just sugar. There's a number of things dietarily wise. There's like, lack of sleep is huge, you know, but most of us don't have the healthiest lifestyles. And so we're kind of constantly moving the gut health in the direction that we probably don't want.
And so that then increases the necessity for doing things to move it back in the right direction. And obviously lifestyle should be a key part of that discussion, right?
Julie Michelson: Sure. Oh yeah.
James Schmachtenberger: having, you know, good sleep, consistent timing of sleep, you know, et cetera, should all
Julie Michelson: Stress management.
James Schmachtenberger: But then there's also just the reality that life happens
Julie Michelson: Well, and, and this is why the product is called a [Page//00:25:00] supplement, right? Like, you know, it is supplemental and, and yes, always foundation first. But you gave me one of those. It happens once in a while. Hasn't happened. In, in quite some time that like, ah, I wish I could go back and, and have my kids again.
Cause I totally missed those first thousand days. You know, like just sometimes you get those nuggets it's kind of a big joke around our dinner table when they're, when they're here of, you know and they Definitely inherited a lot of less than ideal genetic tendencies for me to begin with. But like, Oh, well, miss that boat.
But if they have, you know, if and when they decide to have children now, I know
James Schmachtenberger: Right. Yeah. I mean, for, you know, for many people, it's like, okay, we, we've passed that
Julie Michelson: here now. Right.
James Schmachtenberger: but we can do a lot to impact it. And it's good [Page//00:26:00] to know, because, you know, if, you know, listeners are going to be having kids or their kids are going to be having kids or whatever, it's like knowing this information and knowing.
You know, how to support people in having exposure to a diverse and healthy set of microbes in that first thousand days, then it's going to set that person up for health in a way that otherwise wouldn't be true. I mean, it doesn't mean they still won't probably need to do supplementation and other things, but, you know, they can start from sort of a healthier baseline,
Julie Michelson: Well, and that's where I think of these, you know, just. Ridiculously increasing trends of chronic illness across the board. And, and so much of it is it's diet, it's toxins, but this is an even, you know, Most of these things were extremely rare if they existed at all back when the only food was real food,
James Schmachtenberger: right? I
Julie Michelson: right?
And, and people got dirty. [Page//00:27:00] They were in dirt. And, and and so I'm like, oh, huh.
James Schmachtenberger: mean, this, what you're touching on there is like one of the key reasons why supplementation in general is really important, right? And is that we don't live in a world that is similar to what our bodies are actually biologically adapted for, right? We get a lot less nutrients from our food, both because it's wildly processed, but even if we're eating, you know, raw organic produce, there's less vitamins and minerals due to topsoil depletion.
We have so much sanitization that you're not getting the dirt that would have given you a variety of healthy microbes, right? And then you're exposed to just all kinds of environmental toxins, stressors, et cetera, that we're not adapted for. So, you know, our bodies and our nervous systems are essentially fighting an uphill battle every day to function within a world that we're not actually well adapted for.
And. That fight becomes easier and you become more [Page//00:28:00] resourced for it when you do the right supplementation and help your body get what it needs, despite the fact that that's hard from just basic diet and lifestyle.
Julie Michelson: Amen. Well, and it, I mean, you know, again, because nothing in isolation, it's like and, and, and what just went through my mind was, it's really almost like if we were just, we're living on a different planet than we were made to live on, like, really, you know, so no small thing, but the good news is we've got, I don't know, companies like Neurohacker out there ready to support us.
Let's talk a little bit, we're talking about ecosystem and the things that we're, we're not exposed to that we should be, and things that we are exposed to that we shouldn't be. Which kind of brings me to keystone species, you know, they're, [Page//00:29:00] why are they so important? How do they work? What are they?
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah, yeah, that's a really good question. So, You know, it, it's useful to think of the gut microbiome like an ecosystem because there's just tremendous correlation between how sort of a natural ecosystem would function to the way that gut functions. And, you know, one of the pieces in that that's becomes really relevant is this idea of keystone species.
So a keystone species is going to be a species that has a disproportionately large effect on the health of the overall ecosystem. I think one of the best examples of this that people, that a lot of people have some awareness around was I don't know, a few years ago, there was a video that went really broadly all over social media that was called How Wolves Affect, or How Wolves Changed Rivers.
I don't know if you ever saw this video, but it was...
Julie Michelson: [Page//00:30:00] not.
James Schmachtenberger: It was amazing, and it's worth going on YouTube and finding it.
Julie Michelson: Okay.
James Schmachtenberger: But basically, what this was, was in Yellowstone, the wolf population had been completely wiped out due to hunting and, you know, just sort of encroachment into their natural
Julie Michelson: Humans. Okay. Humans.
James Schmachtenberger: Yes, we, we wiped out wolves in Yellowstone, right?
And once that happened, there, the ecosystem started to have a number of challenges. And so several years ago, there was a large breeding program that was done to get wolves and be able to reintroduce them into Yellowstone. And what came from that was incredible. And like so much more than anyone would have anticipated because the wolf was a keystone species.
and their presence had a massive impact on sort of everything, right? So when the wolf population got reintroduced, there was a bunch of things that happened, but like one as an example was now the [Page//00:31:00] amount of deers that were present. They started to have a natural predator and as a result it changed their behavior.
And so where they used to spend a substantial portion of their time in sort of open prairie areas and just hanging out along riverbeds, now that made them easy prey for wolves. And they started to spend more of their time in kind of denser forest areas and not in spaces. And as a result of them moving into denser forest areas, that meant that they were eating less of the new flora that was trying to grow and trampling on it less.
And so the areas around the edges of the rivers and the areas in sort of the open prairies all started to grow and proliferate. And then as a result of more of that growth, then you started to get more. You know, different rodents that came in, which then supported, you know, more and more other things and the, and then particularly like the growth along the edge of the rivers, [Page//00:32:00] stabilize the riverbanks in a way that actually physically changed the shape of the rivers.
And where there used to not be a lot of stability, and as a result, there'd be flooding that would then kind of go and wipe out whole areas. Well, the riverbed started to build up more effectively, the flow changed, and over the course of like five or six years, you saw everything just become gorgeous.
Right. It was like so much more plant life, so much more animal life you know, bigger rivers, more water flow. And all of it was the result of just reintroducing the wolves. There was no other changes. And so it's that same concept that applies to the gut microbiome, right? Within the biome, there's tons of different bacteria that are present and they all serve sort of necessary and functional roles, but they don't all Do it with, you know, for lack of a better way of saying it, the same degree of importance.
There's certain [Page//00:33:00] bacteria species in the gut that will have a much more dramatic impact on everything else and actually help to regulate the presence of all of the other ones. So the, there's a few different keystone species, the, probably the main one, or the one that people are starting to have some familiarity with is called acromantia.
Right. And so, you know, in, when you can increase the amount of acromantia in the gut, by doing that, it will, Then cause other good bacteria to start to grow more and cause other ones that you want to have less start to get in check. Whereas like if you were to try to just feed all of the microbes similarly, you wouldn't get nearly as positive an impact as you would when you focus on some of the keystone species.
And so that's kind of one of the core premises of what we looked at when we were doing formulation here [Page//00:34:00] is that. So prebiotics, right, which is kind of a fancy word for fiber but particular kinds of fibers are essentially the food source for probiotics. And so, you know, as a health community, we very heavily focused on probiotics and that's critical, but putting a bunch of probiotics in your system without the food, nothing will really happen.
They'll just die off and go away. Right. Right. So, but then, so what we did was we looked at. What would all the research show around which particular kinds of prebiotics fed which particular kinds of probiotics and we then chose a series of different prebiotic fibers that specifically were the primary food sources for the keystone species.
And so as a result, we end up getting to have this. Disproportionate positive impacts on the overall makeup of the gut microbiome in really pretty [Page//00:35:00] fast periods of time, like A few weeks, as opposed to months or years, which often can take as you know,
Julie Michelson: And it, I always say like the, you know, gut stuff is usually the slowest gut and skin and there's a direct connect there too but the slowest to, to resolve. So that is remarkable and logical, right? Like if these are the important things we want to feed, what are the things that Feed those fast. So
James Schmachtenberger: right.
Julie Michelson: like, I like when science makes sense.
James Schmachtenberger: Well, this is, this is sort of the systems approach that we work with, right, is trying to understand what are all of the interconnected functionalities and then how do we factor for all of that. And knowing that we. Fundamentally can't factor for all of it because there's just so much that science doesn't even know yet.
Then how do we focus on the things that have the largest impact with that, with all information that is
Julie Michelson: what you do [Page//00:36:00] now. Yeah.
James Schmachtenberger: that's where, you know, the sea stone species comes in, but it's also why, like, you know, this is a relatively complicated product, right? Like when people think gut health, usually you think probiotics, you know, it's like a single capsule might have a few different strains of bacteria in it.
You know, here, the reason we call this symbiotic. is it's essentially the synthesis of various kinds of biotics or bacteria, right? So we have the prebiotics, which are going to be the food source for probiotics. We're then introducing large amounts of the right kinds of probiotics. And in our case, we actually also particularly chose strains that are known as psychobiotics.
Meaning probiotics that not only have a gut benefit, but specifically impact brain function.
Julie Michelson: back to that brain health.
James Schmachtenberger: And then we've got a bunch of postbiotics. And a postbiotic is essentially a dead probiotic, right? It's the waste product of [Page//00:37:00] probiotics, but just like in an ecosystem, dead and decaying things become primary fuel sources for every for new life to be able to be created.
And your body will produce a certain amount of postbiotics naturally as probiotics die off, but because most of us don't, right. Well, yeah, I mean, so we do, we eliminate a lot of them, but also because most people don't have the right sort of healthy makeup of
Julie Michelson: to begin with.
James Schmachtenberger: probiotics
to start with, you're Prebiotics, probiotics, postbiotics. And then we took
Julie Michelson: wasn't enough.
James Schmachtenberger: Right. It wasn't. I mean, I mean, that in and of itself would have been
Julie Michelson: That's
James Schmachtenberger: there are companies now that are starting to delve into that space. But then, you know, we also then went ahead and added a series of fermented foods both because they in and of themselves are food sources for the probiotics, but also [Page//00:38:00] the fermented foods then create the A really beautiful variety of different bacteria that your gut wants.
So you're getting a lot more total type of bacteria than the specific ones that we're delivering with the probiotics due to the fermented foods. And then we also have, I believe it's five different types of digestive enzymes that are here. Because though this is primarily a gut formula, meaning the colon, you can't think of the colon independent of the rest of the GI tract. The majority of nutrient absorption happens in the colon, but the majority of digestion happens in the stomach and the small intestine. And most people due to both diet and lifestyle don't have the right makeup of digestive enzymes. So a lot of food doesn't actually get broken down as well as it should as it's going through the stomach and the small intestine, which means that when it gets into the colon, The nutrients can't be well enough absorbed because you have too [Page//00:39:00] large of particles.
So we're essentially supporting the entire GI system, you know, helping to make sure that you've got the necessary enzymes to do all the breakdown and then building a healthy and robust microbiome in the gut so that you have better nutrient absorption and so that you have better signaling between the gut and the brain to be able to.
Basically make everything better.
Julie Michelson: I
James Schmachtenberger: yes.
Julie Michelson: just make everything better. That's what
James Schmachtenberger: I mean, we could explain it, but essentially that's what it comes down to.
Julie Michelson: that's the, and that's what, and there's the, the one hand is understanding what's happening and the other hand is feeling better. Like that's the, that's the, the key. So question about the enzymes.
James Schmachtenberger: yeah,
Julie Michelson: So these, so are, should we be using this with food?
Like I think of digestive enzymes as like, how long are they hanging out in there? Should we be taking, using symbiotic with meals [Page//00:40:00] or, cause I think of digestive enzymes as with my food.
James Schmachtenberger: right. And typically that's true, right? Like a lot of people now have gotten into the habit of taking a digestive enzyme with food to help the breakdown. And, and that's a worthwhile thing to do. And depending on what's happening with someone's GI health, even if they're taking symbiotic, that may still be a good idea to do on top of
Julie Michelson: Yeah, I do
James Schmachtenberger: But
Julie Michelson: but maybe I don't need to be is kind of why I'm asking like, I
James Schmachtenberger: I mean, it definitely becomes less necessary, but you know, if someone's having significant GI issues, that may very well still be beneficial. It just kind of depends on the individual, but
Julie Michelson: value even if you're drinking your symbiotic, not with your meal. There's still value.
James Schmachtenberger: Absolutely. Yeah, I mean, this product is designed to be able to be taken any time of day with or without food. We actually are doing a small study right now looking to see if there's any noticeable difference in effect between empty stomach and food. And there are [Page//00:41:00] indicators so far in our research that it actually gets better effect on an empty stomach.
Julie Michelson: That would make sense.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah, I mean, you, you're going to get better absorption of all the things if it's not competing with all the food that's present, but with the enzymes, you know, it's not like you only have food in your GI tract right when you're eating. Right. It takes quite a while for food to make it through the entire GI tract.
And the whole time that it's there, it needs the presence of enzymes to be able to break it down as effectively as possible. So yes, traditionally enzymes are great to be taken with a meal, but it's not the only time where they're relevant.
Julie Michelson: Okay. Awesome. Thank you. I, you know, I don't know at all. So I like to ask, I want to circle back to the fermented foods. Because this is another, again, back to the whole idea of supplementing, another area where we know fermented foods are great [Page//00:42:00] for, you know, supporting this whole process. And and I love fermented foods and I tolerate them well.
So that that's something not everybody does. But my two issues with people saying, you know, just add fermented food, you know, I don't take probiotics because I eat fermented foods or you can't eat and not you can't, I can't on a consistent basis, eat enough fermented foods and enough variety of fermented foods.
And then I tend to have a big issue, although I enjoy it with. Kombucha because if you're not paying attention, a lot of 'em have a lot of sugar, even still after fermentation. And so I just wanted to, from the lay person, circle back to that, like that importance of, you know, I don't think anybody is surprised to hear fermented foods are important at this point.
I think that's, It's pretty much general knowledge but I think what people don't realize is, you know, a [Page//00:43:00] couple bites of sauerkraut a day is not, you're not getting anywhere near what you would be getting in, in Symbiotic. So
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah, I mean, so with, so yes, I mean, generally speaking, for most people, eating fermented foods on a regular basis is going to be good, but even if someone does that, like you're saying, it's, it's typically not going to be sufficient, because though you can, though there's a huge variety of potential fermented foods, there's really a pretty small number of ones that most people actually eat, and of those, they are going to be producing bacteria that are relevant, but they're not necessarily going to produce a huge variety of them. And in many cases, they're not going to produce the ones that are sort of keystone in nature, right? So like the most commonplace people think to get probiotics from their food is yogurt, right?
And it does have them, but largely that's going to be lactobacillus. And though lactobacillus is relevant, it [Page//00:44:00] has a perceived relevance that is far
Julie Michelson: just going to say it's, it's overhyped, like it's, yeah,
James Schmachtenberger: there's a key reason for that, which is that lactobacillus is one of the only probiotics that can survive in an oxygen environment. And so years ago, when we started researching and we didn't understand that, it seemed to have far more relevance because it was the only thing that
Julie Michelson: one still alive.
James Schmachtenberger: the lab environment.
Everything else would die off very quickly and it was just sort of determined by researchers that therefore it must be less resilient and less important. Right. And so we got this sort of distorted view of the importance of Lactobacillus because we didn't know how to research it when we first started researching it.
Julie Michelson: makes sense.
James Schmachtenberger: And it's not to say that it's not important, but as far as the gut is concerned, it's for the most part, it's not really a keystone species. So it's helpful, but how helpful? So, yes, I mean, doing fermented [Page//00:45:00] foods is good. I mean, I try to incorporate into my diet on a pretty regular basis, but the particular fermented foods we're working with here are ones that have very high amounts of some of the key bacteria.
They're going to have a broader array of total bacteria because They're specifically cultured for this purpose, right? It's not just the natural fermentation process. It's that sort of on steroids better way
Julie Michelson: and I don't know people that, you know, are fermenting berries at home or, you know what I mean? Like, yeah,
James Schmachtenberger: Right, like we have several different fermented berries, we have fermented tumeric, like most people are not doing that at home.
Julie Michelson: their, in their basement. No. Or fridge.
James Schmachtenberger: And actually two of the things that we have in here, I believe, we're the only company using them. We have one ingredient called Instacombu, which is a fermented kombucha, though without all of
Julie Michelson: right. In the, in the, yeah. The, the part that we [Page//00:46:00] want.
James Schmachtenberger: Right.
Julie Michelson: Yeah.
James Schmachtenberger: then we have one called Berryotics, which is a series of fermented berries. And to the best of my awareness, there aren't any other companies currently using either of those yet. They're, they're very new and very
Julie Michelson: that's not surprising because that's, you guys usually lead the pack. So
James Schmachtenberger: mean, anytime we're formulating, we research so many ingredients. You know, I mean, typically... At bare minimum, we're studying a hundred different ingredients for a given product. And it's not uncommon that that's north of 300. It just sort of depends on the product and what's available. But but we, we do very deep dives to try to make sure that we're getting the best that's possible.
Julie Michelson: Well, and it shows in your products because they're. They're top notch. They're, I'm clearly a fan.
James Schmachtenberger: One of the things you said earlier that I'd love to, you know, just touch on a little bit, you said you know, it's important for people to understand what a product is doing because that will cause them to stick with it. [Page//00:47:00] But also it's important to actually feel it. And so on this topic of feeling it, we we actually just completed our second study on this product.
So we now, one of them is published. The other one should be published within the next few days,
Julie Michelson: Oh, great.
James Schmachtenberger: but we, you know, we had people doing symbiotic every day for three weeks and we did a baseline testing before they started both on various kinds of GI symptoms and as well as mood related.
conditions and then, you know, tracks at, you know, week one, two, three, what the results were. And this one just blew me out of the water. What we saw in terms of GI health was depending on the different symptoms someone was dealing with, we saw an improvement of anywhere between 54%. and 74% in each of the different GI symptoms in three weeks.
Like that's crazy. And obviously, you know, some people will be different than that, but this was 51 [Page//00:48:00] participants, you know, different ages, different genders, different ethnicities. Like it's a pretty Comparable makeup of what average population would look like but yeah, we saw things like, you know, reductions in diarrhea reductions in constipation, reductions in abdominal discomfort just all kinds of stuff.
And I mean, those results were just stunning. And then, to me, one of the things that really stood out because, you know, we formulated this, like I said, primary focus was gut health, secondary was brain health, gut brain connection. We saw a 58% reduction in people's reported stress levels,
Julie Michelson: What?
James Schmachtenberger: a 63% reduction in people's sense of sort of anxiety, and here we're not talking like clinical anxiety, but the types
Julie Michelson: Our experience of anxiety. Yeah.
James Schmachtenberger: 62% lift in mood.
So this would be like. [Page//00:49:00] Again,
Julie Michelson: Right. Right.
James Schmachtenberger: dependencies, right, were alleviated by over half in a very, very short period of time. And I've definitely noticed for myself that those things have all been true. I mean, we just launched this product, so I'm only... A month onto it myself but I've definitely noticed substantially better gut health, less, you know, tendency towards indigestion, bloating, all that.
And, you know, pretty notable improvements in my ability to handle stress, to not be impacted by it, to not feel as anxious. So it's, yeah, the results here are, are pretty awesome.
Julie Michelson: And, and that just led me to another question because what popped into my head was, I know you've, you've been just from when I last saw you, you've been kind of chugging it since started using it. Is there such a thing as using anxiety? too much. Also, I, I was saying how the taste is really good. [Page//00:50:00] I, I had shared this with you.
She'll be thrilled. I'm saying it on air. My daughter doesn't like water. And I work with a lot of people who don't like to drink water. But she also lives very clean and is sensitive to a lot of things. And I'm excited. for her to try this. She's out of the country when she comes back. That's I have a jar waiting for her to bring back with her to the UK.
But can you drink? So my, my thought was for her. And obviously she wouldn't need, you don't need to do a whole scoop every time just to flavor your water. But can you drink too much of it? Like, is there too much of a good thing here?
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah, I've actually been meaning to ask my research team, like, is there an upper bound
Julie Michelson: I know. I hate to throw you, throw you, put you on the spot, but I think, I feel like you're consuming maybe more than a scoop a day.
James Schmachtenberger: I often am. Yeah, I mean, like, [Page//00:51:00] both because it's like, it's really healthy, but also I actually just genuinely
Julie Michelson: tastes good.
James Schmachtenberger: I'm also one of those people that like, I struggle to make myself drink enough water if I don't have something in it, right? So like, I also drink a bunch of chlorophyll water.
I drink a lot of electrolytes. Like, I do, I like to soup up my water and make it
Julie Michelson: a good way to put it. Soup up your water.
James Schmachtenberger: Right. But no, I would say like from everything I know, you know, if someone was to do twice as much as what's recommended on the bottle, I can't imagine any way that that would be harmful. If someone wants to do a lot more than that, email support at neurohacker and we'll find the answer for you.
Julie Michelson: Right. Well, and again,
James Schmachtenberger: I'd like to clarify that with people smarter than me.
Julie Michelson: I kind of answered it myself as well, as far as if you're using it to flavor your water, you're not, cause like all, I'll. Drink my scoop. I love water. So I'm I actually am more prone just to drink plain water unless I'm making an effort. [Page//00:52:00] But what I have noticed and it wasn't even intentional is all drink it and there's that little bit left at the bottom of the glass and I'll just refill it.
And then that's my water. And so I, I can't imagine anybody's going to want to be blowing through a whole container in a week or So I was just
James Schmachtenberger: I mean, I'm similar, right? Because it's like, it's suggested you mix it with 8 to 12 ounces of water, but a lot of times I'll just do it in like a big container and just slowly sip on it for the course of a couple of hours.
Julie Michelson: And you're, you're still getting it. So, so that's a, another good product question. It can stay in the wall. You don't have to chug it.
James Schmachtenberger: No, I mean, you'd want to drink it the same day, but, you know, I just regularly have a big one sitting on my desk that I'm sipping on for the first few hours of my morning.
Julie Michelson: Gotcha.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah.
Julie Michelson: Awesome. Well, I know I've already kept you a long time. I want to make sure before I ask you the final question, I don't know, I just want to make [Page//00:53:00] sure that you have shared enough of your genius with us. Aside from everything you've already said, is there anything you'd like to share about, you know, why this product is so innovative and unique?
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah, I guess the thing that I... I mean, we got to cover a decent amount, but I think the thing I want to share is you know, whether someone fully understands what's happening here or not the, you know, the benefits that we're seeing in our studies so far exceed almost anything that I've ever seen in a natural product.
And It's really just worth trying like with this one, obviously, you know, as a company, I'm excited by the fact that we created a great product, but, you know, more than that, like, I'm actually really excited for what this has the potential to do for people broadly. Gut health is just so fundamental.
Obviously, someone's mood impacts the entire quality of their experience of life. And we're [Page//00:54:00] seeing with such consistency right now, these things improving at really, really rapid rates. So I would just, I would encourage everyone to try it. You know, we, we have a hundred day money back guarantee. We try to make it super easy if a product doesn't work for someone to.
be able to get the money back. So there's really not a risk in trying it. But this one, I actually haven't seen a single person so far that has tried it and not felt better. So I'm, I'm just encouraging people to actually give it a try and see what happens.
Julie Michelson: which is, is remarkable when you consider how biodiverse we are, right? So that's, I was, when you were sharing the stats from this last study, I was thinking like, I can't wait until there's more long term, like, I just, Just that information alone makes me think, Okay, when we can get more and more people using this product, the world will be a happier place, right?
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah.
Julie Michelson: You know, [Page//00:55:00] because when we feel better, we're better humans, like we just are. And so I think you already answered, you just answered my last question, which is, what is one step listeners can take today to start to improve their health? I'm going to say what order a container of symbiotic. Yeah.
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah. It, I think it's worth trying. Like it's, Everyone who's tried it has loved the flavor. Everyone who's tried it has, you know, I mean, usually within a few days started to notice improvements, but it's around like the three, four week mark that you really start to, to see it. So yeah, I think everyone should try it.
And if, if you want to understand it better first, that's awesome. We have. Tons of information on the site. You can see the published studies. We have the article we talked about a little bit earlier, which is called the formulators view on symbiotic. And that is a pretty solid deep dive explaining the whole sort of domain of science.
What, you know, pre, post, probiotics, all these things are, and [Page//00:56:00] then actually going through in detail and explaining each individual ingredient and what they do, what the research on them shows. So if you want to go deep and really understand it, then the information is readily available. If you just want to feel better, then just give it a try.
Julie Michelson: I, I agree. I'm not somebody who I never recommend anything. I don't person. Well, that's I tend to not recommend something. I don't have personal experience with. I mean, I'm sure there's a lot of good science and stuff that I haven't used myself, but it is, is remarkable. So I, I second the just go try it if somebody and all the links are going to be in the notes, but if somebody's like, you know, what is this neuro hacker collective?
How do I learn more? Where's the best place for them to find information?
James Schmachtenberger: Yeah, I mean, so, I mean, best place would be to go to our website, neurohacker. com. You can find info in a bunch of other sources all over the internet, but neurohacker. com, [Page//00:57:00] you're going to be able to find all of our products. We have... Those, those really extensive explanations are in existence for every single product.
And then just huge amounts of additional information. You know, we, we try to not only make really great product, but also provide as much education as we can.
Julie Michelson: Well, and you do a great job. You really, I literally, I could spend hours just which is rare. I can't tell you how many times I've gone to a website either to see what's in a supplement or, and you're digging and digging and digging. And if that's the case, I, I'm, I'm out. But you guys have. I can't imagine there's any information somebody wants that they can't find on the website.
Like, it's, it's spectacular. It's
James Schmachtenberger: There's a lot there. And if there's information we don't have, send us an email and we'll probably write an article on it.
Julie Michelson: Right. Well, I, I so appreciate you giving us your time again and appreciate [Page//00:58:00] NeuroHacker Collective in general for, and it's, it's also a group of amazing humans. I mean, everybody. That I know, not that I've come into contact with everybody involved in the company, but you guys are just all really incredible humans.
So I, I appreciate you and what you're doing to allow all of us to support our health long term. So thank you.
James Schmachtenberger: . Really appreciate it and appreciate you having me on. This was fun.
Julie Michelson: Of course. And for everybody listening, remember you can get the transcripts and show notes by visiting inspiredliving.show. I hope you had a great time and enjoyed this episode as much as I did. I'll see you next week. [Page//00:59:00]
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James Schmachtenberger
James Schmachtenberger is a successful serial entrepreneur, with a lifelong focus on using business and innovation to effect large-scale change for the benefit of humanity. James is the co-founder and the CEO of Neurohacker Collective, a company focused on making groundbreaking products for health and well-being through complex systems science. His areas of expertise include nootropics, anti-aging and regenerative medicine, sleep and fast-paced entrepreneurialism.
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