284. Holistic Wellness & Health Optimisation With Dr Elie Abirached
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Thank you for listening to the Boost Your Biology podcast. My name is Lucas Owen. I uncover the most cutting edge health information on the planet, ranging from hormones, nutrition, supplementation, fat loss, biohacking, longevity, wellness, and a whole lot more. Welcome to the Boost Your Biology podcast.

Hello, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome back to the Boost Your Biology podcast. Today, I'm very excited because we have a very special guest joining me on the podcast. We have Dr. Eli Abirashid. Eli, welcome to the podcast. Thank you for having me, Lukas. Such exciting times.

Awesome. So maybe, I mean, we have briefly sort of seen each other at conferences and now we're finally getting a chance to record this podcast. So maybe, did you want to sort of start out by letting my listeners know a little bit about yourself, your personal journey and how you became so interested in optimizing human health?

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, I'm so glad that we finally were able to do this. We've been back and forth for a few weeks trying to arrange this. So between your time zone and my time zone. So I'm really, really, really excited and thrilled to be here. Thank you again. So, yeah.

I always say to people when they ask me this, because it's a very, very common question that I get everywhere I go, is that how do you get into something like this? And I'm generally introduced as the expert in biohacking. And that always kind of doesn't sit well with me because, you know, that's kind of my ego loves it. But for me, I know, like...

I'm a student. You could never be truly an expert in something like this because it's everything.

like you cannot be an expert in everything. So I'm constantly learning and, and situations such as these, having conversations with amazing individuals like yourself that, you know, teach me, teaches me quite a bit also. So I love these very, very much. So basically my journey started, I think when I was 15 or 16, when I kind of began to be really interested in my physique and my physiology was changing. And obviously I was doing it

for some of the wrong reasons at the time because I wanted to look the best at school, et cetera. Um, but I quickly, quickly got hooked into it. So I was like really laser focused on my pull-ups and, and you know what I do physically and all of that. And then I began to quickly understand what my body was, was reacting to certain things, be it food or be it water or, or, or be it the environment that I am in or the amount of time that I spend in nature, for example, and so on. So, um,

I feel I've been doing it all my life without even knowing that I've been doing this, that I've been kind of following the general guidelines of what biohacking, now a term that seems to be taken off in a crazy way, is.

And the word hacking doesn't necessarily sit well also with me because there are no shortcuts, right? So with hacking, it kind of gives you the impression or delineates a shortcut into something and that's something that I fight against every day.

And so you have to cover the basics. So I was doing the basics all of my life. However, early on when I was at uni, I studied education. I've studied English language and linguistics and things like that. And I got my PhD in that. And then I started teaching. All along, never stopped doing what I'm doing right now. So I was always a wellness freak, you know, did over close to 50 marathons, over 40 marathons.

done all sorts of events that pushed me to my limits and took me out of my comfort zone, which is something that I preach right now. Done a few mountain climbs and summiting and rock climbing and triathlons and things like that. So consistently, I was always trying to get myself out of my comfort zone. But more importantly, is what I did after in order for me to continue to do this and not just being an adrenaline junkie. It wasn't about that.

It was challenging my body to do things that ultimately helped my mind and at the same time kept me healthy, as well as obviously all of the other perks that come with it.

So later on in life, I opened my own business here in Dubai about 20 years ago that was related to business. It was corporate trading. And we did all sorts of things from cultural to physical to all sorts of stuff that within a company culture, be it part of CSR or be it part of a wellness journey for the company. So we did all of that.

And then about 10 years ago, a little bit less, I sold that company and moved to the States. And this is really when I properly instilled and began to properly from a scientific perspective and from a proper educational perspective, go into one rabbit hole after the other. You know what that's like, right? So, and then I think I'm still in several rabbit holes at the same time right now, the multiverse. So, yeah.

And then, you know, I became a yoga instructor. I began PT. I, you know, looked into nutrition, supplementation, looked into basically anything I could put my hands on. Recovery products.

any tools that will help me, non-invasive. I was always very adamant still to this day is I don't use invasive stuff. Maybe throughout my whole career, I've done one or two infusions, for example. I'm not a fan of all of that. Like there's so many other great ways for us to...

stay optimized, in my opinion, at least for me. Again, people generalize all the time and I always keep myself in check that this is super important. We cannot generalize. We're all very unique. So

And after that, I built my own little farm. Like I was kind of doing all sorts of things, learning about every possible aspect of that life. And then three years ago, decided to come back to Dubai and open a recovery space called Restore.

And Restore basically is an e-commerce as well as a recovery space that is set up in few places around Dubai, and it provides recovery services from cold plunges to saunas to hyperbaric chambers to PBMs to compression to VO2 max testing to all sorts of things that will help you have metrics and help you to continue doing what you do well.

and reduce pain, push your limits a little bit more, again, get you out of your comfort zone. And then from that, naturally, in the last maybe 18 months or so, we developed a program called Limitless Human, which is a private biohacking program that helps people to reduce their biological age by up to 10 years.

I chose that only because you cannot work on biological age without working on every other aspect in your environment, internal, external. So it's just a metric, like if there is one target for a program like that, because you get a few programs around the world that talk about longevity. They're not my favorite to put.

to put it mildly. So I just chosen that metric in order for me to truly let people know that this is not a sit on your couch program and then you're going to be younger in six months. So we give ourselves a timeline that is six months and then we optimize every aspect of their journey and their lives.

So, yeah, and this is where we are right now. So you and I met at the biohacking summit, the last one that we were together on, the biohacking summit here in Dubai, and it had so many amazing speakers. And we were just talking before this that, you know, everything was a blur. It's still a blur to me. Like I'm trying to still assimilate all the amazing speakers

knowledge that was shared and the stuff that we're taking, talking about Ben and all of that. So yeah, that's kind of my journey in a nutshell.

Yeah, phenomenal. Phenomenal. There's a few key points I want to sort of go back over. I mean, you mentioned something really interesting around that term, the term biohacking, which, you know, you sort of associate with like shortcuts and that sort of thing. Obviously, if we look at biohacking in a sense, the way I personally perceive it is like,

we're sort of overriding physiological processes in our favor or pushing things in a certain direction, either increasing or decreasing. And I imagine over the years, you've tested out so many different modalities and you've trialed and experimented on yourself and you've researched like crazy. You mentioned going down many different rabbit holes.

What I really want to learn more about Eli is when it comes to nutrition specifically, because this at least can apply to absolutely everyone listening to this podcast. Talk us through how that's evolved. Like how has your perspective on nutrition evolved over the years? So,

I've been extremely fortunate. So I don't know if you know this, but I was born in the Middle East. I was born in Lebanon. And the Middle Eastern diet is extremely well known for it being so incredible. And there are things that I grew up with, you know, like...

when in season pomegranate was always available in our fridge. Like my mom would make sure that that's available, for example. We would have cucumbers when cucumbers were in season. When they are not in season, she would buy or towards the end of the season, she would buy a little more and actually pickle them so we could have them during the winter, for example.

and you all know what the pickled produce does for our microbiome. And that's all many, many years later has been discussed on. So I was extremely fortunate that I had a switched on mom who already understood all of these things. The wisdom of the ages for me is super important.

It is such a powerful sort of source of information for our health at the moment, especially in the region that has passed on from generation to generation. Because my mom was not highly educated. She wasn't doing this with purpose. Her purpose, she knew that these things were healthy. And therefore, I grew up eating seasonal stuff.

I grew up with olive oil being on the table almost on every meal. I grew up that the meal would have some sort of pickled condiment on the table. I grew up that bread was not the staple of food.

you know, of food. No pros, everything was cooked at home. There were no, you know, we didn't, like all of the stuff that we're advocating right now about what whole food does for you and how it does

basically eliminates everything else. So all of the stuff that we're having to do for ourselves, from supplementation, from all of the stuff that we put ourselves through. And the one perhaps thing that...

this whole experience taught me is a true value of the Mediterranean diet. I love how, you know, sumac, like I can list so many things, like sumac, we put it on, on fat tush and we put it on certain food and all of that. And it's literally poison Ivy. Like, you know, I had no idea, you know, right. But it is perhaps the most, the, the, the, the number one antioxidant in the world. Right. So, and it's part of our table. Like we didn't even,

So I was very fortunate. I didn't have to make a huge leap between processed foods, sugary breakfasts, all of that stuff. In the morning, we used to have fresh eggs that were brought from the farm. It was because...

They were available, you know? So, and then when I grew up and went to the West, it was a little bit of a shock because white bread was like with everything, you know, you couldn't get like a, if you were at uni or if you were working or whatever, like the store, you know, whatever it may be, you know, Pret a Manger or whatever it is, you

you know, at the time, everything was done in a certain way that, you know, and for me, it was nice because I've never had it before. But then I quickly, then it made me realize the difference what's happening in my body and, and every aspect of, of, you know, sluggishness, how it impact my sleep, how it impacts my, my physical activities and all of that, the difference between one diet or the other. So, yeah,

Again, you know, incredibly fortunate for me to be able to kind of understand this. And now learning all about the things that people are talking about is literally what I grew up with. And they've been kind of emphasized as truly. So, you know, certain things in life just happen frequently.

I think for me, everything in life happens for you, but certain things in life, like particularly kind of give you a leg up. And this is one of the things, but one of the most important thing that I learned is that I learned that, that one of the best ways to hack your diet in general is to plan. It's really simple, you know? So when you, when you think of all of the different tips out there,

that's for me, obviously, again, not generalizing, I'm talking about me, all the different tips out there when it comes to nutrition, about dieting, the amount, calorie count, this, that, whatever. I think one of the main things that people miss is that when we're hungry, we don't make rational decisions, right? And it is a marketer's

You're going to walk into a place and nine out of 10 things that you most likely will pick are not good for you.

So planning is key. And with biohacking, in my opinion, it's all about being disciplined. And if you're disciplined about everything else, if you're disciplined about understanding what your basal metabolic rate is, or if you care about your sleep or you do any of that, then you would take that one step also of planning ahead.

what are you going to eat later? Like you don't take a trip, even the shortest trip, if you're taking a car and driving for six hours without you planning what you're going to do on that trip. Like you're going to be stopping there. I'm going to take a bottle of water with me. I'm going to do this. But when it comes to our diets in general, we leave it to, you know, and human beings were not like that, you know, and when from where we evolved, there was no such thing, obviously, as that, like you had to plan your meals.

So I always, always advocate. And I think the simplicity in that is super, super powerful for me. And that's what I do. Like, I don't leave the house without eating here breakfast that I make. And for lunch, I normally take something with me or I depending on, you know, because I don't kind of stick to one thing and go on forever on it.

Occasionally, I would go on meal plans, for example, where they're readily developed based on what I'm doing. So little changes like that. And we are very, very fortunate here in Dubai to have like a myriads of meal plans, like anything you could think about. And again, because it is Mediterranean foods in general, you get really good food.

Ingredients is a separate thing because obviously we live in a desert. The nutritional value is a separate thing. We live in a desert again. But in general, you're able to eat a whole food that is by far, regardless of where it's coming from here, by far better than any processed food that you can get from a gas station or any of those emotional choices that you make when you're hungry and in the moment, you know?

So, um,

Yeah, I mean, my message is really simple. I think sometimes we overcomplicate it and we want to go down all these different rabbit holes. And again, I speak generally from a point where, and it's complicated, you know, right? Like if there's something, if there's extra stress in your life, your gut is going to tell you about it. If you don't sleep well, your gut is going to tell you about it. You know, so you can't approach one thing. Like you have to look at what's happening in your body, right?

Yeah, exactly. And also, just going back to that, you mentioned earlier on around the biological age reduction as like a key marker, biomarker. Do you want to sort of talk to my audience a little bit about that? I mean, most people probably listening in have heard of that particular terminology that it differs to chronological age, but...

Just talk us through maybe some of the key strategies that you've sort of implemented either for yourself or for clients and seen that really make a dramatic difference in terms of lowering that biological age. 100%. So one term that ticks me off all the time is anti-aging and age reversal and all of that stuff. That by itself creates suffering in my mind.

So it is inevitable. It's part of what we as people of science, people that really care about... Because when you are in biohacking, you cannot not care about your environment. Everything comes together. So that term, as I said, ticks me off. We are designed...

biology is designed to live, now we know, or to exist, I want to say, to about 120 years. So what we do to ourselves by exposing ourselves to toxins, by exposing ourselves to the environment that we live, sometimes without us helping it, without being able to do something about it, with the lifestyle that we have, the amount of stress, the lack of sleep, all of these different things, we leave...

years, chronological years on the table and sometimes biological. So I you cannot turn back time, obviously, but biologically, you can win some of those back. Right. So and it can be drastic.

It can be drastic, like depending on your predisposition, depending on your discipline, your commitment, the environment that you are in if you're supported. And I'll dive into that a little bit more in a second. But I found over the years, over everything, one thing that stands at the top of everything else that you can do as far as reversing your biological age, and that's your mind.

If you don't start with your mind, you are not able to do that. You're not able to reverse your biological age. You could do everything else right. But if you are harboring trauma, if you are overstressed, if your head is not in the right place, if you're not part of a community, if you do not have purpose,

any of these, not all of them, any of these will drastically influence your biology. And that's something that I'm extremely passionate about because I know for myself, like everything that I do to keep me healthy, I am 52 about to turn 53 next month, by the way, chronologically. Biologically, I am 37 about to turn 36 in a few months, hopefully. So, and I do this

That's how I learned this, is that you can do a lot of changes. I eat whole foods. I exercise religiously seven days a week. I am a part of the 4 a.m. club. I do my run. Even this morning when we were talking, I would not compromise that exercise.

that my ritual in the morning of running, going to the gym, eating healthy, spending some time on my own, doing a breathing technique, maybe getting into an ice bath, you know, that sort of thing for anything, you know? So I never mess my priorities up. So health is one, and then everything else is built on top of that. Whatever you think is a priority right now at that moment, great. But if it is before your health,

You're doing it wrong, you know, so and you will feel it later. That's my opinion. And that's how I live my life with that. So mental health, I think it's a number one thing that you should be focused on. And it's one of those things, again, like when we were talking about the gut, that you cannot focus on it in solitude, right? Because you cannot fix your mental health if you're not sleeping well.

If you don't get into a routine of sleep, right? You know this. If your gut is leaking, if you have parasites, if you have issues with your microbiome, you cannot fix. And they're all interrelated. Unfortunately, sometimes...

our mind is a little bit limited in a sense where it segregates, right? We're really good at that, right? You're Western and I'm Middle Eastern. You're this, I'm that. Like there's always this duality of everything, if not more than duality. So the one thing that I constantly remind myself is that everything is one, like everything.

my whole system works together. It is incredibly efficient at staying healthy. That's its natural state. If it's not...

um something is causing it to be that but no um human being no biological being um natural state is to be ill and sick and and and suffering you know so unfortunately some of it is part of the human condition um but we're delving into something else right now uh but for me for when it comes to biological age as i said is mental health first

And then in order to do that, again, you cannot separate it. You can say I'm focusing only on mental health. So I'm only going to be doing meditation. I'm going to be doing breath work. I'm going to be, you know, doing some maybe I don't know, some hypnosis or or whatever. Right. And that's it. While I sleep two hours a day or I don't hydrate well or I don't eat whole food, it doesn't work.

There's no segregation when it comes to health, like you need to work 360. And that's what my program does. And that's why I decided to choose the metric of biological age, because it's not possible for us to achieve it without addressing all of that, you know, from from foot to head, basically, you know.

So yeah, that's a phenomenal point. It's actually one of the reasons why I mean, my dad's a pharmacist. And whilst he's a pharmacist, I decided to study naturopathy. Because you know, that natural natural medicine, that naturopathy degree was very holistic and incorporated movement, sleep, you know, gut health, all that sort of stuff. So

I definitely agree with you there. There's a huge, like there's a symbiotic relationship between all these variables and the fact that you've chosen biological age reduction. You deep down know that an individual can't possibly lower that biological age unless they're addressing all factors of their lifestyle.

which is just a really great way of framing it. What about in terms of, I mean, you look phenomenal for your age, like I'm sure many, many guys your age would only dream of having a physique like yours. Do you want to sort of discuss a little bit around like muscle growth and fitness and training? Like how has that changed over the years? How have you maintained such a great physique?

So, again, for me, at one point people used to say it is just genes, you know, we know now that that's not the case, like everyone at any age can build muscle, right. But it's again part of an ecosystem, and it's not just one thing that I will change in what I do on a day to day basis and then all of a sudden I'm going to, I'm going to end up with muscles right.

So I do muscles specifically because I want to be able to carry my grandchildren. I want to keep my dignity when I'm 90 years old, you know, or whatever age without someone helping me into the bathroom and out of it. You know, that's what I do that. I don't do it for vanity. Now the rest is great. It's icing on the cake. That's amazing. And I,

when people compliment me generally on my physique, first of all, I'm like a back because I don't see it as that. I don't do it for that. And that's important. And this is what I guide most people around me to do is that if you're going to do it for aesthetic reasons,

it's going to be very frustrating and it's a continuous suffering journey because it's a journey. You're going to have good days. You're going to have bad days. You're going to do this. You're going to do that, you know, whatever. So do it for the right reason and everything else will start falling apart. This is, I think, a rule that applies for business. It applies for your family life. It applies with friends. It applies with your partner. So do it for the right reasons. And my reason is that I want to keep my mental health

um, healthy as long as possible. We know that, you know, muscle contributes to that. Um, and I know that I cannot build muscle, um,

without taking care of every aspect of my body, right? So they all come together. If I don't sleep well, I'm not able to put on muscle. But the myth of, you know, you're over 40, how are you going to put on any muscle? That's, you know, something that we truly, truly need to get over and stop in its track. Like anyone can be muscle at any time. My process is that, as you know, I've been saying, I eat whole foods. I plan my meals.

I am religious when it comes to my sleep. I get seven to eight hours relentlessly every day. Occasionally, I miss that for other social reasons, I want to say, or even career reasons. But that would be one night. I would never allow it to go two nights, you know. So...

There's never anything that urgent that will keep me away from sleep. So if you get these right, if you eat enough clean protein, if you reduce sugars in your diet, if you keep your mental health in check,

if you move regularly and in an amazing variety. That means I see men younger than an age, in their 20s, getting on a treadmill every day, same thing, exactly the same thing, day in, day out. Getting on elliptical, doing the exact same, or every Monday is bench press Monday. It blows me away that people are still not...

onto the fact that your body is extremely complex. Let's talk quickly about the gait cycle, like every step you take, the one step that you take. There are 60 muscles involved in that, right? So when you think to yourself, I'm exercising something, I'm doing whatever it is. If I do it enough, the body is so incredible that it's no longer bothered by it. You do something for a few weeks,

And you're not challenging it. You're not making changes. You're not pushing your heart rate. You're not doing HIIT exercises. You're not shifting weights around. You're not doing cardio, functional, mixing it all up. Because the body is so intricate and it's capable of these amazing things, we then limit it into one particular thing. And we think, okay, I'm doing my bit.

Well, you're not. You're just starting and your body gets used to it. You have to switch it up and you have to do different things. So that's what I do. I eat well. I sleep well. I keep my mental health in check. And during my exercise, I exercise seven days a week. Even my recovery day is an exercise day because I do active recovery. And sometimes I do it more than once. So

In the morning and evening, like yesterday, I had two workouts, for example, in the morning and in the evening. So it doesn't happen often, but sometimes I do. So you need to commit to it. It's discipline, it's commitment, and looking at your priorities. In terms of analyzing biomarkers and blood testing, what's your...

What's your stance there? Are you very much like adamant on getting blood tests done like once or twice a year? You sort of taken that very like objective approach. What does that typically look like? So every three months for me personally, and generally everyone that I'm working with, we do a comprehensive blood test.

To look for inflammation markers, look at the usual stuff, you know, because your body is constantly speaking to you. And like, we ignore it constantly. You know, you wake up with a light headache in the morning, you think, well, you know, but it happens for a week continuously. You think, well, you know, whatever. I don't like that. Like your body is constantly saying something to you. And you need to have that mind-body connection and do something about it.

So we do, me personally, let me put it that way. I do every three months, I do a blood test. I've done my true age test, the DNA test.

which gives you, I love this test because it gives you, there are some really cool ones now coming out of Japan and there are so many beautiful DNA tests that are around the world that are doing great, great things. But this one in particular that I use at the moment, it also gives you the age of each of your organs. So you can tell the age of your liver, your lungs, your heart, et cetera. I had one of my clients the other day who is 30 years old, but his biological age was 39.

So he's actually, you know, he had a history of trauma, of being overweight and all of that. And his organs have not recovered, even though he feels great at the moment. But his organs are not there yet. So it gives you these insights that are incredible. What's the name of that test from Japan? TrueAge.

But the true age, so it sort of breaks it up into different organs and gives you data. So you can pretty much track that, see what changes. Let's say you go on like a liver detox protocol, you can actually see changes in liver. That's awesome. Exactly, exactly, exactly. Visceral fat, you know, other things that kind of, you know, hinder a particular organ from doing what it does best. You know, everything in your body is, is, um,

incredible at what it does, you know, so it blows my mind, the possibility. I keep saying this in like almost in every talk that I do is that when we cut ourselves, it actually heals and closes like, you know, like it's just, the body is capable of stuff that are sometimes we take for granted, you know, um, the recovery process of the body. And that's why when it comes to recovery myself, I try to do, I try to just promote what the body naturally does and,

um in order for it to recover properly and the main thing of that as as you and i know is sleep right um that's the one thing that you you you know cannot um truly live without so um

Yeah, so that's kind of what we do when it comes to that. And generally, we do it again at the end of the six months. Some people want to do it in the middle. It's kind of open to do follow-up tests from a DNA perspective. But you can immediately tell that there is obviously massive movement in the right direction from the blood work that we do. But we also do things such as VO2 max because we help to boost that too. It's super important.

We do grip tests also. These are really important. We do inflammation, excuse me, inflammation tests through something called thermography.

where we use thermal imaging of the body to understand, to identify asymmetry in symmetry. So we would take an image of a body and then the software analyzes the difference between my one side versus the other side in temperature and slight variation in temperature between this side and this side can tell me if I have something in my joint, in my muscle, in my nerve, in my cartilage and so on.

So that helps because if you're pushing yourself in a certain, you know, way or you change your exercise or, um, you know, all of that is different, by the way, I want to just touch on that, that, that guy, the 30 year old guy is actually doing a triathlon this weekend. So, uh, like, you know, so it just people, um, you know, when, when, when they're given the opportunity, when they realize the importance of their health, um, they make massive changes. Um, and, uh,

Yeah, so I hope people listening to this are, you know, hopefully... Oh, highly, highly, highly valuable, highly useful information. I think a lot of people are going to be excited to learn more from you. And I'll make sure to leave your, you know, Instagram URL linked in the podcast show notes. But I have a question for you around going into learning mode. Like when you go into that mode of like, let's learn and let's just research, right?

Like, where do you personally go to research? Like, are you the guy that's going on PubMed? Do you have certain people that you sort of look out for? You consume their content? What does that look like? So my approach is like everything else in life. I never focus on one source.

It's a lot to do with my community and people like yourself that I trust and respect that have done incredible work themselves that helped me achieve certain things in that sense, where we exchange information in order for us to reach a common goal. That's super important for me. And then obviously, you know, one of my major tools that I use right now and I think is a game changer for health is AI.

So AI is democratizing health for everyone. It's taking health from

you know, the few and making it available or information about health at least to everyone. So you have your genes. That means you know all your predispositions and you know how your body is working. Then you could test everything. You have these incredible tests, like people are coming up with these amazing tests for almost everything in your physiology. And then you have AI. Oh my God, what else do you need? Like in order for you to do the number thing, the number one most important thing in your life.

So, yeah, it's a combination of these few things. And it's all about keeping an open mind, taking everything with a grain of salt.

that people are constantly learning. There is no definitive point and that's it. As you've seen yourself, I'm very sure that one thing turns out to be one thing and then later on it changes into something else and it interacts with this and that. It's a constant learning. So there are no absolutes, right? So that's why one of the things that I love about what you do is that you don't speak of supplements as just, let's take this, let's do that. No, no, no, no, no.

understand your deficiencies, then supplement what you need. So that's the approach. That's the approach is that when I see something on TikTok or Instagram about someone talking about, I think you've mentioned ashwagandha in one of your talks or something. I don't know. I don't remember now. Someone's talking about ashwagandha as like the end all of this. You're going to make you sleep. You're going to reduce your stress. You're going to do this. You're going to do that.

well, hold on. Like, you know, I, then I buy the first one off Amazon or I buy this, whatever. And then I start gobbling in and, you know, I'm maybe on 10 other medications. I maybe have, you know, trauma that is, I maybe my, you know, the temperature in my room is terrible, like all sorts of other things that I could be making changes to. Um, only if I put my mind to it, um,

That could make a massive event. So it's taking everything with a grain of salt and stop picking information just as it is. If I say it, it doesn't mean it's 100% true. And that's the only thing that could work for you and all of that. Just pick up as much as possible. Look inside, see what is happening with you. And then implement with

moderation, understand. Same thing is happening with peptides and bioregulators and all of that. I don't know, I think you've done some recent content on peptides and bioregulators too. Amazing, by the way. So with that also, content

constant, like there isn't a day now that I don't have someone who's asking me about peptides. And I look at them and they clearly don't work out as much as they should be. They clearly have stress. They clearly, their physiology, you know, and then the first thing I tell them, well,

Get into homeostasis first, get yourself sorted out first, and then we could talk about that. You know, there are, you know, this is what they're made for. It's not a magic pill. Like it doesn't work that way. So it's all again about education. So, yeah. Definitely. And I think also as part of that is when we go into that phase of learning, it's like we put on the critical thinking hat and it's like, how do we dissect and disseminate different things?

you know levels of information credibility of information and and then we come to what we what we perceive as like our version of the truth right like it's like we're looking at information where we're putting two two and two together we're thinking outside the box we're thinking oh if this does this then this might lead to this like it's just being really critical and i i really want to encourage my audience those that are listening in to when you're looking up research papers or um

you're looking at maybe videos on youtube or instagram posts just think really critically like what is this person trying to like convey is there a hidden agenda are they trying to sell something

um it's a really important point like just to be like hypercritical but then also to like learn how to switch out of that mode as well and sort of float into that intuitive like it's a nice balance between critical thinker and then going back into intuitively i feel like

eating, I don't know, six eggs a day may not be great for me. I don't feel intuitively it may not be right for me, you know, that sort of thing. Right, right, right. And in general, it is likely that if you're suffering from something, there's more than one cause. So if you say to yourself, oh, I'm not sleeping well, and then you hear someone say,

talking about this magic thing that you could do and you think, oh, but that's it. Well, there's usually more than one cause, right? So just be patient, digest, sleep on it, so to speak, and explore what is happening. Test and assess, test and assess. And I think that's the essence of what biohacking is rather than the latest gadget. But it's that essence of, all right, something is off.

What could the cause be? And this is from naturopathy perspective, from functional medicine perspective, all of that. That's what it goes to. And that's why people are shifting towards that. Not to move away from medicine because they do a great marriage. It's just to shift into something where...

If I have a symptom, and it's generally a symptom, you don't feel the cause, you feel the symptom, right? If you have a symptom, find out what the cause or causes are. And in most cases, there's more than one cause. So do it, as you said, critically. Take your time with it, sleep on it, so to speak, as I said.

And it's really important that people kind of hold back a little bit and not jump on directly on Amazon right after they see a reel to order the next miracle, whatever powder root from, you know, Himalayans or whatever it is, you know? So, and the other thing is that gets a little bit under my skin is, yeah,

These like really cool, highly educated individuals that have lots of great information to share, but are not always relevant to certain parts of the world. Like, you know, I, I try to focus everything that I learn and everything that I share for the Middle East.

because of our pool, Jean, because, Jean pool, I mean, because of our diet, the stuff that we eat, because of our cultural influences, because of the family dynamics, because of all of these different things, you know, when you hear someone that you truly, truly respect and they have lots to share with you, right? They have great information, but they start with 80% of Americans suffer from this or, you know, like, you know, stuff like that.

And they're focusing on processed food as a thing where we know on our tables here, this is not the case. The majority of people do not eat processed foods and so on. So that's another thing too. When you're sourcing information, source information that is relevant to you.

source information that you feel has the 360 approach to it. Is it relevant to your culture? Is it relevant to what happens? How supported are you? What is legal and not legal? That's another one, right? And all of that other stuff when it comes in certain parts of the world. So...

Yeah, that's, that's basically it. But it's the moment that you I think you think that you have nothing to learn is, is when you completely, you know, have fallen off the deep end, like it's, you shouldn't be in this, like, it's, you're constantly learning, there isn't a day, there isn't an hour, that there is something that I get kind of corrected on or learn. And I take it always, you know, my ego doesn't love it. But

That's how learning happens, right? So it's all good. Yes, because let me give you a quick example. So when I started the proof of concept for my Limitless program, I took on six people, six athletes that are really high achieving, they're doing great, et cetera. But I promised them that I'll be able to take them to the next level.

Be it in their personal bests, be it in the way they feel, be it in their gut, be it their performance, be it all of these different things, recovery and all of that. And I said, in three months, we're going to be working together and I'm going to be trying to optimize all these different things from all different perspectives. And we did the usual, the testing and all of this. So in the first two weeks, I began seeing people breaking their personal best.

feeling stronger, sleeping better, all of that. Then I looked at what I was doing and I thought, we just did the tests. I don't even have all the results. I really didn't do anything for these guys to be feeling this way. And there was no other explanation that I could find at the time, except that

When these individuals were shown interest, when someone was looking after them, when they felt that there's someone looking over them and taking care of certain aspects of their lives, they felt they could let go and all of a sudden felt empowered. That's the power of the mind. And this is...

continuously being proven to me over and over again. So now my passion, the area that I truly focus on is, or now that my latest passion, I should want to say, is trauma and mental health. So that's the area that I'm focused on right now. For me, for my family, because you cannot do any of this

and expect it to only influence you, right? Nothing. Like if you're sleeping better, it doesn't only influence you. You just become more empathetic. Your relationships improve. Like everything that you do to improve yourself improves everything around you. And it doesn't end in the moment. Also, it actually goes on to the future. That's one of the many other reasons that I love about what I do is that...

you know, you take from the past, you're optimizing the present, but you're also influencing the future with what we do. Like, it's incredible. Like how many, how many things that you do in your life, you can say that, that, that do that, you know, anyway. So trauma is, is one of my latest, latest passions at the moment. And I'm doing quite a bit of work with that, trying to

learn from as many people as possible, from do as much reading as possible when I can, and discussing it. Because I haven't had a discussion yet on trauma or mental health that I haven't learned something from people, even people that are not in the mental health space. Because just sharing your story says a lot about what your mental health is like, and it gives insight into so many things. So yeah, so that's my latest.

And I guess like the final sort of concept I'd like to sort of pick your brain on is in regards to like the mindset and mental health you sort of mentioned, that's a key area you're passionate about as well. In terms of like speaking to someone who feels like they're lost and that they're struggling mentally,

with like motivation or they're struggling being productive. I'm sure you've had a number of clients probably very successful in their career, but they're just not deeply fulfilled. So did you want to sort of speak upon that? Yeah. So the same approach again, we need to think a little bit scientifically. The same approach applies if let's say you're lacking energy or let's say you're not able to put on muscle. The same approach applies.

It's science, one. Two, there's usually more than one cause. So you need to break down those barriers. You need to have conversations. You need to understand how long has this been happening? Is there a moment in time where he can or she can contribute to where these things started happening? Was there an accident? Did you lose a loved one? Was there a relationship hiccup? Was there, you know, whatever, something that has happened? What is your...

self-image how what do you think of yourself you know you cannot truly love anyone else unless you love yourself right um so if you feel like a fraud if you feel like an imposter if you feel like someone who is uh unfulfilled if you feel like uh your boss is being unfair to you all of these other things um you know you you you drill down to that a little bit more and kind of say

I mean, why would I feel that way? Like if the boss is being unfair, that's on the boss, not me. There isn't anything in life

um, that happens to you, right? I mean, this is something that I constantly remind myself with, right? So nothing happens to you. It happens for you. So if you are in a toxic relationship, you need to understand why you are in that relationship and make the changes and things like that. So generally more than one cause,

And almost in every one of those cases, there's been at least two or three causes that led this person to where they are right now. Lack of self-esteem, lack of energy, lack of motivation, no purpose, no sense of purpose, no direction. You ask someone where they would like to be in 10 years time, they have no answer. All of these different things, right? And all of a sudden, once you start kind of discussing these and putting certain weight on them,

And naturally, they bounce back into a natural state of being productive, useful, caring about your fellow man, caring about your own health because it impacts everyone around you and all of these other things that are absolutely essential, I think, for our society.

community, society and the world in general, you know, so these are tough times. And I mean, I think they've always been tough times one way or another. People say these are tough times. I feel like, oh, it was perfect before. And now it's it's we always have tough times. Right. And we need each other. We need to be kind to each other. We need to be able to. And it starts with us. Right.

Absolutely. I was just about to say, if it weren't for people like yourself who are sharing the message and promoting positivity and actually educating people on how they can actually boost their quality of life through science, through some of these health optimization techniques and using objective tools like you've mentioned, TrueAge, you've mentioned blood testing, so you're merging those.

not only your historical upbringing, learning about nutrition at the dinner table, but you're also merging in modern science and you're actually open-minded to utilizing these to actually better the overall health of the population. So I just want to say that I really respect what you're doing and I really do love the mission and the vision that you have.

And, you know, I'm hoping to follow a very similar path. You know, I think we're both operating on the same sort of. We are. We are. You're amazing, Lucas. Yeah, I agree. I agree. Well, thank you so much. I really, really appreciate you. Yeah, awesome. Well, thank you for coming on the podcast, Eli. If you want to just share with my listeners how they can either connect with you, if they would like to work with you, where can they find you?

Yeah, no, absolutely. I mean, I'm on the usual suspects when it comes to social media, but LinkedIn and Instagram are perhaps the most that I personally kind of involve in. So for Instagram, it's Ellie.truth, E-L-I-E.truth. And for LinkedIn is Dr. Ellie Abirashid on Instagram.

And, you know, hope to see you there. And if there's anything I could do, I'll be happy to. Awesome. Thank you for your wisdom. And yeah, we'll definitely be in touch. Let's talk about something that's not always top of mind, but still really important. Life insurance. Why? Because it offers financial protection for your loved ones and can help them pay for things like a mortgage, credit card debt. It can even help fund an education.

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