61. JOHN LA PUMA: Why Your Brain Needs the Outdoors

Episode Transcript

Note: Transcript is AI-generated and may contain errors. Please refer to the episode audio or video for exact quotes.

[00:00:00] John: When you are outdoors with this minimum 17-minute effective dose with 10 minutes in the morning, early morning, no sunglasses, light first, coffee second, I would argue, what happens is kind of magic.

[00:00:19] Michael: Hi, I’m Michael Hyatt.

[00:00:19] Megan: And I’m Megan Hyatt Miller.

[00:00:21] Michael: And you’re listening to the Double Win Show.

[00:00:23] Megan: Well, today, we have an amazing show.

[00:00:26] You know, most of us treat time outside as recreation, something to just kinda fit in, you know, when the real work is done. But Dr. John Liepuma says that we have the order backwards. John is a board-certified internist, a professionally trained chef, a regenerative organic farmer, and a two-time New York Times best-selling author.

[00:00:45] I kinda feel like I haven’t done anything with my life when I listen to that.

[00:00:48] Michael: I know, right?

[00:00:48] Megan: Um, he helped create the field of culinary medicine, and he taught the first course on it in an American medical school, and his new book is called The Indoor Epidemic, and it opens with a number that’s hard to shake.

[00:01:01] Apparently, we spend about 93% of our lives inside buildings and vehicles. And his prescription, though, isn’t to quit your job and move to a cabin, although that kinda sounds nice sometimes. It’s to make the small amount of time that you already spend outside of work work harder for you, using morning light, natural movement, open horizons, real conversation, and dark evenings to rebuild your sleep, your focus, and your mood.

[00:01:28] So today, we’re asking whether ambitious people need one more optimization strategy or whether we need to recover a few basic biological signals that modern life has grayed out.

[00:01:39] Michael: He’s a board-certified internist, professionally trained chef, as you mentioned, Megan, a regenerative organic farmer. He graduated from the Cooking and Hospitality Institute of Chicago.

[00:01:51] He cooked under Rick Bayless at Frontera Grill, and I’m gonna butcher this, Topolobampo? That’s pretty good. And he co-created and co-taught the first culinary medicine course in a US medical school with Michael Rosen of the u- uh, Cleveland Clinic. He also led the first skills-based Nature as Medicine continuing education course for physicians, co-sponsored by UCLA.

[00:02:14] He’s a two-time New York Times best-selling author, and he’s author of more than 50 peer-reviewed papers with work published in The New England Journal of Medicine, JAMA, BMJ, and a bunch of others, host of four PBS specials, co-host of Lifetime’s Health Corner for five years, and he lives and farms on the Mesa in Santa Barbara, California, where he grows rare citrus, olives, and herbs, and keeps bees.

[00:02:45] His new book is called Indoor Epidemic. I just ordered another three copies today because I love this book so much, and here’s our interview with John

[00:02:58] Megan: Well, John, welcome to the show. We’re so glad to have you here

[00:03:00] John: Megan, so excited to be here. And you too, Michael. I’m a big fan.

[00:03:04] Michael: Thank you.

[00:03:05] Megan: We’re a big fan of yours, as we were talking about before we started recording, and we’re just chomping at the bit to talk about this because our folks are people who are living at capacity or beyond capacity.

[00:03:19] They feel like they’ve got more to do than they’ve got time to do, and oftentimes taking care of themselves and living in a way that feels sustainable can feel really out of reach. And what I love about your book is that it makes, I think, the ability to live in a way that’s aligned with our humanity and, and our kind of natural design as human beings start to feel like it’s within reach.

[00:03:44] So thank you for that. I think that this is gonna be super encouraging to our folks.

[00:03:49] John: It’s a pleasure. I mean, I think people need help, and this is a new way to provide it, and- Mm-hmm … it’s a low-cost way to provide it. Love that. That’s pretty simple, but quite intentional. I like the idea that people want to produ- increase their per- performance and productivity and presenteeism, and not sacrifice their entire mental health or their entire physical health.

[00:04:14] And so many of us do, but there actually is a way out of spending 93% of our time indoors, 86% in buildings, and 7% in vehicles, which is, are the data now. And most of the time that we spend outdoors now is incidental. You know, walking to the car from one air-conditioned building into another, train to the parking lot.

[00:04:35] You know, it, it’s really not biologically active. We wanna make our time outdoors biologically active so it’s restorative to our brain, and not just add something more to do, but repurpose that, those incidental minutes that we’re spending outdoors into medicine so that they can help our brain and reduce our burnout, feeling more like ourselves again.

[00:04:58] Megan: Well, in fact, you talk about in the book that we’re really living like zoo animals, which is such a- So resonant … so resonant and also just arresting to think about. We’ve all been to a zoo, you know? We understand what that is. And you talk about- Yeah … you know, that we have no horizon, we have stale air, we’re kind of living in a box.

[00:05:16] And you call that captivity biology rather than calling it burnout. So tell us what you mean by that.

[00:05:24] John: As you know, I think there is an indoor epidemic, the title of the book, and your biology reads 24/7 indoors or 93% of our time indoors as captivity Which means that you’re inside of four walls, often sealed four walls, for that time, which takes away the biological inputs that are– we actually require to function optimally.

[00:05:52] And what are those inputs? They’re light, they’re distance, they’re better air, and they’re horizon and movement outdoors. So we need those inputs. Our brain needs those inputs, which are active in our metabolism in a way that we have been missing, which causes not just Being crashing at 3:00 in the afternoon and having been foggy until noon and feeling like you can’t go on at 3:00 and have to hit the vending machine.

[00:06:31] There’s an idea here that performing at work is inevitably difficult because we’re at it all the time, and actually that’s made it more difficult that we are indoors all the time bombarded by pixels, where what we’re supposed to do is being- paying attention to those pixels and we don’t know why we can’t pay attention and our attention drifts off.

[00:06:53] There’s a biological reason for that. It’s several actually. And one is that we’re not getting the biological signals to our brain that allow our brains to reset.

[00:07:05] Michael: Hmm.

[00:07:06] John: We’re simply staying indoors and staring at the screen, whether the screen’s in our hand or it’s on a monitor, and that overwhelms us.

[00:07:15] Even though we’re super capable as people, we need breaks. Our brain needs a break. And the very easiest one to do there is to restore our vision in the morning so that we get the right signal, the right circadian signal, and I know you’ve spent some time on this both personally and with your audience.

[00:07:37] The circadian signal to reset our brain so that our body clock works to our advantage, helps our sleep, help our mood, helps our focus, helps our creativity, and lowers our blood pressure at the same time.

[00:07:52] Megan: You know, John, um, I have to tell you, about a year and a half ago I started pursuing circadian biology through, uh, my personal trainer kind of shared with me.

[00:08:03] I never really thought about it before other than, you know, I was kind of aware that blue light was disruptive and some of kind of the very basic parts of it. But I, I didn’t really know about the value of getting outside early in the morning. And so I started doing that and in fact about a year and a half ago I put a garden, a raised bed garden on the side of my house, um, thanks to my husband and teenage sons who did most of the hard work with that.

[00:08:26] And now I’m really focused on spending as much time outdoors as possible. Just this year I’ve added beekeeping to the mix and- Oh, good. Every morning though- Wonderful. Great. It’s so wonderful. Yeah. It’s, it’s just joyful. And you know, every morning I’ll take my coffee outside and I’ll… Our, our front yard faces east and I’ll sit in the Adirondack chairs which are in the garden, uh, with my husband and often one of the kids that’s already up and That has probably been the single biggest quality of life change that I have made in the last 10 years, I would say.

[00:08:58] Michael: You’ve been so consistent with it too.

[00:09:00] Megan: Well, partly because you, and I, I think John you would say this, you feel good when you do it. It’s not like you’re… It’s not like a discipline thing. It’s like you actually feel good. It’s enjoyable, right?

[00:09:10] John: It is. And Meg, I can see you’re a convert, and I love this. I too keep bees.

[00:09:15] I have a organic farm in Santa Barbara. I’m outdoors probably four to six hours a day.

[00:09:20] Megan: Mm.

[00:09:20] John: But most people are outdoors only an hour a day, and their minimum effective dose to change their biology, that biology of confinement, where we’re indoors, we’re not getting the signals we need from outside, and we’re subjected to the chemicals that are sealed inside with us, along with rising carbon dioxide levels, which dull thinking.

[00:09:39] And now some forward-thinking companies have CO2 meters in their offices and conference rooms because they know that accumulated CO2 dulls thinking. There’s actually a botch- biologic reason for that brain fog. When you are outdoors with this minimum 17-minute effective dose, with 10 minutes in the morning, early morning, no sunglasses, light first, coffee second, I would argue.

[00:10:04] Megan: Mm-hmm.

[00:10:05] John: What happens is kind of magic, and you’ve experienced it. You reset your body clock. Those photons from the light go to the back of your eye, to your retina, tell your body clock at your suprachiasmatic nucleus, which is the fancy term for the part of the brain that sets the body clock. And it sets the clock in all the organs, so your organs will run on time that day.

[00:10:28] What does that do? It allows you to metabolize properly.

[00:10:32] Michael: Mm.

[00:10:32] John: It allows you to make melatonin 14 hours later, so you get good sleep. It allows you to have deep sleep, the phase of sleep that is restorative, where you rebuild bone if you’re a woman, especially interested in osteoporosis and correction of that.

[00:10:49] You rebuild muscle, if you’re a man or a woman, and you like being strong. And most importantly perhaps, you run the glymphatic system. Had you heard of that before you read about it?

[00:11:01] Michael: No.

[00:11:01] Megan: Mm.

[00:11:02] John: So the glymphatic system, discovered in 2013, I didn’t learn about it in medical school, Nobel Prize given 2017, is in your brain, and it only runs during deep sleep, which by the way, you only get if you set your body clock in the morning optimally It’s kind of a dishwasher for the brain.

[00:11:23] The sulci, the little creases in your brain, open up, and the spinal fluid, which is normally there, wash over it, and they take out beta amyloid and tau, which are the proteins that accumulate during Alzheimer’s disease, and wash it away every night. That’s really cool.

[00:11:42] Michael: Very cool.

[00:11:42] John: You optimize this if you get deep sleep, which you optimally get with your dose in the morning of 10 minutes of bright daylight.

[00:11:52] Why do we want bright daylight? Because it’s 25 to 50 times brighter than indoor light. Why does indoor light seem really bright? It’s only 100 to 500 lux, and outdoors it’s almost always 10,000 or more, but it isn’t. Why is that? Why do you think?

[00:12:10] Megan: I have wondered this, and I don’t know the answer, so I’m so excited you’re gonna tell us.

[00:12:13] Michael: Fuller spectrum light outside for sure.

[00:12:16] John: Yes, you do get the full spectrum of light outdoors for sure. That is absolutely right. And Megan, you said blue light before. That’s also right. Mm-hmm. We need blue light to set our circadian rhythm, but the reason that indoor light, like a grocery store or a TV studio, is not actually bright is because our pupils compensate.

[00:12:33] Megan: Oh.

[00:12:33] Michael: Oh.

[00:12:34] John: Our pupils go, “Yeah,” because they don’t need… When they’re, when you’re outdoors, they constrict, and because you’re now taking in 25, 10, 25, even 50,000 lux on a super bright day. Even outdoors on a foggy day, it’s still 3,000 lux.

[00:12:52] Megan: Hmm.

[00:12:53] John: Way more bright. Five, six, seven more brighter than indoors, even though indoors seems bright.

[00:12:58] So we need bright outdoor daylight to set our body clock to get deep sleep. What I’ve heard most, Megan and Michael, is that people’s sleep improves- Mm-hmm … when they do the things that I suggest at the right time, the right locations for the right period of time.

[00:13:18] Michael: Mm-hmm.

[00:13:18] John: This time is intentional, but it’s also prescribed, dosed, if you will.

[00:13:25] That’s what makes it medicine.

[00:13:27] Michael: I wanna go back to this early morning light. I, I have several questions around this. And first of all, confession, I’m not as consistent as Megan. When I’m at my lake house, I have a view of the horizon, which I don’t have here in the city.

[00:13:40] John: That’s great.

[00:13:41] Michael: And it’s fantastic. Like, I- my, my ideal scenario is to get up at daybreak and then sit there for 30 minutes and wait for the sun to come up, and then sit for another 30 minutes.

[00:13:51] But it’s, you know, it’s an hour, and it’s a lot to ask, you know, on a-

[00:13:53] John: Yeah, no …

[00:13:53] Michael: normal day.

[00:13:54] John: Right.

[00:13:55] Michael: But I wanna talk about- Cortisol. I want you to explain what that is and why that is so important as it relates to early morning sunlight and coffee. Because my trainer is on me all the time about just hold off the coffee.

[00:14:11] Just get the sun and hold off the coffee, and I love coffee, and that’s really hard.

[00:14:15] Megan: I have just switched, at his advice, from caffeinated coffee because I was like, “I’m not giving up my coffee in the morning. It’s the ritual I like. I don’t care about the caffeine.” And so I’ve been tapering down, and I’m almost to decaf so that I can have my coffee but still do it in the morning.

[00:14:32] So that’s, that’s my compensation.

[00:14:34] John: So I wanna say several things about this. First, horizon. So many of us don’t have the luxury of being able to see the horizon. We do live in cities. 80% of the country lives in cities. That’s the other huge migration, by the way, into cities away from suburban and rural areas that we’ve experienced.

[00:14:52] And if you can’t see the horizon when you get up, that’s fine. Look at a building as far away as you can, the rooftop- Hmm … of a building as far away as you can. If you can’t get outdoors, go to a threshold or a fire escape or a balcony or, if you need to, a window that’s open but screened. You’ll still get the benefit of the better microbially rich air, which we haven’t talked about yet.

[00:15:17] You’ll still get the benefit of having distance vision. Most people in their houses never look at anything more than 20 feet in front of them, and that makes your world smaller. And you’ll still get the benefit of having that bright daylight and those photons. So for those of us who don’t, can’t get outside physically, we can still do it if we take advantage of the threshold or fire escape or balcony or open window with a screen because this is a dose of light and air and hopefully movement if you are up towards.

[00:15:52] It’s not scenery. It’s a signal, not scenery. Now, cortisol. Cortisol is the major stress hormone in the body. We know it is a stress hormone, and people worry about cortisol being a, too high and elevated all the time, and that is a worry. But the, what happens if you do this properly, if you set your circadian rhythm in the morning, is that you get a cortisol spike from your adrenal glands, which make it, which then comes down so that it’s prepared to spike again when you need to pay full attention.

[00:16:26] Hmm. You get that full spike in the morning for alertness. And the reason your trainer is telling you light first, coffee second, and he’s right, by the way, or she’s right, is that When you get that initial boost of cortisol internally, that’s energy inside that’s telling you, “Hey, I’m awake, I’m alert, I’m gonna do the day.

[00:16:47] Let’s go.” And coffee gives you a different kind of boost. Not quite of… It does boost alertness as well, but for many people it sort of covers exhaustion rather than giving you internal energy. So the cortisol gives you internal energy, stays high, and then drops so that you can continue throughout the day and spike it when you need it.

[00:17:14] The coffee, which I enjoy too, I happen to be drinking much less of it myself, and I– it’s probably because of this, because I practice what I preach, and I kinda don’t need it. But I like having it. It feels kind of revved up. But then I hit the ball too hard in pickleball, and so I back off.

[00:17:37] Michael: If you’re gonna drink caffeinated coffee, is it okay after, like, let’s say you, you get up, you let the cortisol do its thing, and then you drink caffeinated coffee like an hour later or something?

[00:17:47] John: Oh, yeah. Or 20 minutes. Caffeine kicks in about 20 minutes after you drink it. So I like light first, coffee second. I like daytime before screen time.

[00:17:59] Megan: Mm.

[00:17:59] John: So instead of picking up your phone and getting sucked into- Yes … whatever the direct messages and texts are, daytime before screen time. And I like you’re not burned out, you’re indoors.

[00:18:10] Megan: Mm-hmm.

[00:18:11] John: Most people think that they are just on the edge of burnout or they can’t take it anymore. They’re becoming exhausted. And as a culture, we are exhausted. We’re overwhelmed with not just what’s happening in politics, but what’s happening in the environment, what’s happening in our own lives and our own jobs, and the vision for our children and grandchildren.

[00:18:29] But our biology, again, reads our time indoors as confinement, and when we go outdoors, we use a different part of our brains that allow us to pay full attention when we do cognitive work, like you and I and, uh, all of us are doing right now. We’re doing cognitive work. That’s in front of a screen. For us, it’s in front of a camera.

[00:18:52] That’s great. We wanna do cognitive work when it’s time to do cognitive work. But we need a brain reset, and we only get that outdoors. I ask people to go to their window once an hour For a minute. Get up, open the window, look outdoors. If you can’t open the window, fine. Still look outdoors. Look at the shape of a cloud.

[00:19:15] Look at the leaf move. Look at a building across the street. Look at something far away if you can. The reason for this is that there’s so much tension people hold around their temples and in their ciliary muscles in their eyes that scrunch up their eyes.

[00:19:33] Michael: Mm-hmm.

[00:19:33] John: And headache that you get from looking at a monitor or a screen constantly.

[00:19:38] Your brain needs that relaxation. It also lowers your blood pressure, by the way, to do that, and calms your mood, actually lowers cortisol, Michael, as well. All of those things happen when you give your brain a break. If you actually go outside in that minute, or if you’re trying to stall myopia, which we can talk about later, for five minutes, you use what?

[00:20:01] You use your senses. Hmm. When we do cognitive work, we’re not usually using our senses. What are our senses? They’re touch, they’re listen, they’re see, they’re smell, they’re taste. We experience the outdoors with our senses, but we don’t use– do that with cognitive work. We actually need to use our senses to balance the overwhelm that our brain feels.

[00:20:29] There are very simple ways to do this, and it starts with the way that we just described, with morning light.

[00:20:42] Michael: If you were talking to somebody who is a bit of a skeptic, who says, “Look, I, I just… I have to work in front of a screen all the time, and I’m not convinced that it’s doing anything negative for me,” what might be some of the symptoms that they are correlating with something else that are actually coming from the screen and the lack of outdoor light?

[00:21:01] John: Attention fatigue Anxiety, headache, overall fatigue, foggy thinking, the equivalent of road rage when you get an email you don’t like.

[00:21:15] Michael: Mm.

[00:21:17] John: Frustration as a daily mode of transportation. Those are the things that we feel every worker feel. I talked to another man actually on the Oprah podcast recently who had not been outside of his apartment for over 24 hours and thought it was normal.

[00:21:36] Megan: Mm.

[00:21:37] John: He’d just been in front of his screen working remotely. It’s not normal. It’s not only not normal, it’s biologically injurious. It hurts you. It hurts your performance. It hurts your productivity. It hurts your presenteeism. It causes absenteeism. The study we did with, with PathPoint in, uh, Santa Barbara to reverse burnout symptoms showed that you could actually improve back pain and palpitations and other, uh, common related symptoms to absenteeism with simple five-minute intervention of outdoors that the employer paid for, uh, compared with taking care of a office plant or compared with funny texts about nature.

[00:22:19] It’s a remarkably easy fix to many of the symptoms I just described, but it does take being intentional about it.

[00:22:27] Megan: So let’s talk about that a little more. You know, with the 7% prescription, um, you talk about morning light and evening darkness as the two anchors of the program. Kind of give us the simplest light rhythm for a normal day in the life of a professional.

[00:22:47] You know, not somebody maybe who, um, lives at the lake or at the beach, but just kind of in a normal suburban or urban context. What, what would their day look like with this prescription in mind?

[00:22:58] John: Well, we, we haven’t actually covered the quality of the air or the kind of movement- Yeah … you need or we, we’ve mentioned distance and, and horizon.

[00:23:08] Megan: Mm-hmm.

[00:23:08] John: But the very simple answer to that is we’ve described morning light in deliberate, intentional ways at the right time, in the right place, wherever you can do it, without sunglasses, I’m gonna say that again.

[00:23:20] Megan: Mm-hmm.

[00:23:21] John: And the next locus would be sometime in midday. What does that look like? Maybe it’s a walking meeting.

[00:23:29] Megan: Mm-hmm.

[00:23:30] John: Maybe it’s lunch outdoors. Maybe it’s a one-on-one with somebody, instead of in the conference room, it’s, uh, in the courtyard. Mm-hmm. It’s somewhere physically out of the environment in which you are normally confined Why is that good? It’s better if you’re walking, by the way, because that’s another zeitgeber.

[00:23:51] A zeitgeber is a German term for a marker that helps to set your circadian rhythm. Mm-hmm. Light is the most powerful, movement is second, and when you eat is third.

[00:24:04] Michael: Huh.

[00:24:05] John: We focus on light because it’s pretty easy to do, but the other things also matter. If you’re actually In light and you’re walking, you’re getting two reinforcements to that.

[00:24:16] You’re getting midday boost in your cortisol level. You’re getting infrared light on your skin, which helps your mitochondria, the power plants in your cell, work so you have more energy, and you’re making vitamin D if you’re outdoors. And then in the evening, if you can, I like people to catch red or amber waves of the sunset anytime, and the reason is that those red and amber waves in the evening are the only natural daylight waves that don’t suppress melatonin release at night.

[00:24:54] And you need melatonin. Remember, you’re going to make it 14 hours later after it’s setting your circadian rhythm in the morning so that you could get good quality sleep that night. Many people make the mistake of taking melatonin in too high doses, three grams, five grams, 10 grams. If there’s nothing that’s gonna make you groggy, it’s 10 milligrams of melatonin the night before.

[00:25:17] Just don’t do that. It’s a hormone. They work in tiny doses. Take no more than half a milligram. More than that, it has negative effects for many people. And there’s another part of this, which is not to look at bright light an hour before bedtime. Why do you think that is? I bet you know, Megan.

[00:25:37] Megan: Yeah. You’re, you’re basically signaling to your, your brain that it’s time to wake up instead of slow down and go to sleep.

[00:25:44] John: Exactly correct. It also suppresses 80% of your melatonin release-

[00:25:49] Megan: Mm.

[00:25:50] Michael: That’s huge …

[00:25:50] John: which you’re g- you actually need to have good quality sleep.

[00:25:54] Megan: Mm-hmm.

[00:25:54] Michael: I recently invested in a, a set of different color lenses throughout the day, a company called Viva Rays. I have no relationship with them other than I’m a customer.

[00:26:05] But, uh, they have a series, like I, I put on yellow ones when I’m working in the day, which helps with blue light, and then toward evening some orange ones, and these are like clip-ons, and then very red at night, almost dark. And we’ve got red lights even through the house where we swapped out, you know, the normal, not incandescent, but the LEDs, I guess.

[00:26:28] Megan: Yeah, that are, that are the circadian bulbs. Yeah.

[00:26:31] John: Yeah. No, that’s great. I like them. You know, yellow lenses filter out harsh blue light and reduce glare, so those are good to have. And s- I like circadian bulbs at night that are red or amber. My night lights at home are red and amber. We just changed the light bulbs in the hallway and in the bathroom so that they are not blue light, but red ’cause you don’t really need…

[00:26:55] You can have other devices on the, like there’s a mirror with a light on it, a blue light, so if, if you need to look at your face brightly. So I like those. I think that they are complementary to getting the right light in the morning. They don’t replace it. I agree. Um, and, and yellow ones particularly block a moderate amount of digital blue light to help ease the eye strain that I talked about during long hours on computers or phones.

[00:27:26] But even more important and probably better than yellow daytime clip-ons are getting up every hour and going to look at the window. Yeah. Because it basically resets your brain so you can use your parasympathetic nervous system Which allows kind of rest and digest instead of fight or flight.

[00:27:46] Michael: Makes sense.

[00:27:47] Megan: Something that you mentioned, John, a few minutes ago was the idea of walking and also getting daylight. Yeah. And one of the things that I’ve done that has been super helpful, I have gotten out of the habit of it this… We’re recording this late in August, and it’s been really hot, so I’ve gotten out of the habit.

[00:28:04] But I, I try to take one meeting a day on the phone or in person if, if somebody happens to be here in person, most of our team’s remote, walking during the day. You know, when it’s not hot outside. It’s been a little hot lately, so I haven’t been doing it- Oh, yeah … as much. And not only does it do the things physiologically that you’re talking about, but I find that those conversations are more enjoyable, more productive, more creative when I’m walking and talking with someone than if I’m just sitting at my desk looking at a Zoom screen or, you know, it would be better if I were in person, which doesn’t always happen.

[00:28:40] But that’s one of those things that is, again, not only good for you, but it’s super enjoyable once you start doing it.

[00:28:46] John: Exactly right. And actually, the data support you completely. There’s a terrific study from Cornell and a complimentary one from Stanford that show that idea generation is better walking together than in a conference room together, and actually makes a financial difference in outcomes.

[00:29:03] I can’t quote the data, but I’m happy to send you the citation.

[00:29:06] Megan: I love that.

[00:29:07] Michael: That is fascinating.

[00:29:08] John: And let’s say about the indoor conference rooms, taking that meeting indoors. You optimize the calendar for people, both of you.

[00:29:16] Megan: Mm-hmm.

[00:29:16] John: But nobody audited the room. Yeah. Yeah. Your system is the best I’ve seen at protecting that block.

[00:29:21] But the planner sits on a desk, and so does the person using it. Yeah. So you, you guys solved when, and it sounds like, Megan, you’re about to solve where as well- … but no one’s done it thus far.

[00:29:33] Megan: Yeah.

[00:29:33] John: And that’s what I’m offering. I want, I want where to be as important as when.

[00:29:37] Megan: Well, it does really matter.

[00:29:38] Michael: And it’s an important distinction, I think, and I never really thought of it that way.

[00:29:42] But speaking of that, you describe forest bathing as brilliantly anti-achievement. And I’ve got into this some recently, just because I realize that trees give off a lot of infrared light, and I suppose there’s also the oxygen and the carbon dioxide factor. But what happens when we get in a forest?

[00:30:04] John: So when we move outdoors, we are reinforcing our circadian rhythm.

[00:30:09] We are improving our digestion, our metabolism. When we move outdoors in the company of trees or plants, our brain gets other signals, too. One of those signals is the lack of threat. Our threat level internally goes down. We feel a little bit more at peace, not as anxious. And that’s a good thing because those are natural forms and shapes that are actually easier for our brain and eye to digest, if you will, than sharp angles or abstract forms or for that matter, pixels.

[00:30:42] When we’re in the company of trees, and especially when we’re in a forest or a gathering of trees, it doesn’t have to be a dense rainforest or a great forest, it can be simply a collection of trees, we benefit from those trees’ phytoncides. And phytoncides, P-H-Y-T-O-N-cides, are chemicals that trees make that we know from aromatherapy that trees make to communicate with one another.

[00:31:12] We smell them, they smell good, and trees make them as part of their immune system to warn off bugs that would rather eat them and to tell other trees that bugs might be coming Those are immunologically active chemicals made by trees to communicate with one another, and they happen to be really good for us too.

[00:31:34] They cross the blood-brain barrier, which means that they work inside your brain, and they act there as antioxidant and anti-inflammatory chemicals, and they work on your immune system as well. Your immune system, when you get enough of that tree air, makes more natural killer cells, which are white blood cells that your body naturally makes.

[00:32:01] They’re kind of the Navy SEALs of blood cells, white blood cells, which seek out cells that are infected by tumor and infected by virus and kill them, which we want. So adequate exposure to forest air, and especially movement, although it can be very gentle movement, in and around forests helps us not just immunologically by making more natural killer cells, but also cardiometabolically by lowering our blood pressure and mentally by lowering our perception to threat to allow us to, and this is gonna sound a little woo, to let the forest be our therapist, to use our senses outdoors so we can reset our brains and come back to work more productive and more creative and more focused, especially focused.

[00:33:05] Because outdoors, especially among trees, Michael, your attention is drawn. When we’re in front of a computer or we have our device in our hand and we get a notification, what happens? We’re very attentive. We respond right away or think about responding right away if we don’t want to right now. Our d- attention is demanded by that text or direct message or image or video.

[00:33:37] Outdoors, when we see or smell or touch something new, our attention is drawn We’re pulled towards it, but not demanded by it. And our brain interprets that dramatically differently as actually restorative to our constructive cognitive way of thinking. So we need both. It’s a biological input.

[00:34:06] Megan: So cool.

[00:34:07] Michael: One of the things I’m struggling with, and maybe forest bathing, more of that could help me.

[00:34:11] One of the things I struggle with is heart rate variability. It’s too low.

[00:34:16] Megan: Hmm.

[00:34:17] Michael: So what can I do to raise that? Would forest bathing help? Breathing? I know you talk about that.

[00:34:22] John: Yeah, that’s great because I track heart rate variability too, and most people don’t know of it as a metric. You actually want your HRV or heart rate variability to be high.

[00:34:35] We think about pulse being low or blood pressure being lower, but you want your heart rate variability to be high. You want your heart rate to be able to adjust to any certain circumstance. That’s what HRV means. How do you raise your HRV? You get better deep sleep, for one.

[00:34:53] Michael: Hmm.

[00:34:54] John: HRV correlates with deep sleep.

[00:34:56] You get- Enough strain in your activities, you don’t overdo it. Your HRV actually goes down if you work too hard physically. If you run a marathon one day, the next your HRV will likely be very low because that’s a lot of strain. And whether that is a physical marathon or a work marathon or a any other kind of constant strain, that’s another.

[00:35:23] I’d love to talk to the people at Whoop and Fitbit and Apple about this because that’s what people are measuring now, and it’s powerful because we can influence… Those companies actually don’t have enough about circadian biology and chronomedicine in their reminders. I, I have a colleague of mine is doing Noom, and he told me about their circadian biology, which I’m glad they’re asking about, but they need to ask even more specific questions.

[00:35:49] Megan: That is really cool.

[00:35:50] Michael: I wear an Oura Ring and track that, and you’re right. I mean, there’s nothing about that about circadian biology. Yeah. It’s just kind of like a almost a footnote. It’s the last metric on the page.

[00:35:59] John: Yeah. They’re, they’re missing a huge opportunity.

[00:36:01] Michael: Yeah. I agree.

[00:36:02] Megan: Okay, John, one of the things that I was super fascinated to read in your book was about the power of the color blue and how that helps to signal safety to our nervous system, and this is something I kind of intuitively thought of.

[00:36:18] I love design and interior design and, and all of that, but will you explain the science of the color blue? And apparently we need to all paint our houses blue. I don’t know. I don’t know what your prescription is on that.

[00:36:29] Michael: Mine’s blue.

[00:36:30] Megan: That’s right, your house is blue.

[00:36:32] John: Oh, great. So the power of the color blue is, is first of all, it’s the best teaching color.

[00:36:38] Hmm. When I give talks, I try to wear a blue shirt- Huh … because it’s the least kind of threatening color. It’s the most friendly color for education. It has the people who are interested in marketing have understand it as a powerful signal. Think about having bright red calls attention to everything. Not really, I mean, it’s a natural color, but it’s not what you want if what you’re trying to do is be friendly, open and teach.

[00:37:10] Blue is calming, and it has evolutionary roots. You know, it’s the color of a clear sky or a calm sea, a clean river, and all are signs of having a, a rich habitat Everyone who can see can see blue.

[00:37:27] Michael: Hmm.

[00:37:27] John: And that kind of consistency is what we like and trust. There are many theories about why blue is the color of comfort and calm in education.

[00:37:41] It probably is because our ancient biology recalls the fact that natural, um, bodies of water are blue and the sky is blue. But I think being around blue spaces can be as therapeutic as being around green spaces.

[00:37:58] Megan: Hmm.

[00:37:59] John: Blue spaces actually are preferable in some age groups, particularly older age groups.

[00:38:06] Baby boomers, for example, prefer blue water and blue spaces to green spaces overall in the studies that have been done. Huh. And one thought is that when you’re near moving water, which is by the way, the best kind of landscape to have internally if you have a poster- Hmm … for reducing anxiety and improving wellbeing and making people feel calm and relaxed, along with large landscape and deep canopy.

[00:38:37] When you’re near moving water physically, the burble of the stream, the lapping of ocean waves, the lapping at a lake, that movement of water that’s steady, particularly a stream, actually takes your agitated beta waves in your brain and transforms them into more relaxed waves, theta waves. Oh. And so external blue spaces that are moving have a neurophysiologic and neurooptimization effect on your brain to reduce anxiety, to improve attention, but not cognitive attention, sensory attention.

[00:39:24] Megan: Hmm.

[00:39:24] John: And we need that, again, to be restorative. Unlike outdoor movement in green spaces, you don’t have to move to experience the benefit of blue spaces. And even a fountain, an outdoor fountain, even the shower carries those kinds of benefits. But obviously, the more that you’re outdoors and experiencing those benefits in microbially rich air, those phytoncides we talked about.

[00:39:55] And by the way, outdoor air, with the exception of terrible forest fires and the like, is almost always five times cleaner than indoor air, even with good filters. The best way to clean indoor air, by the way, is cross ventilation Having an open window on both sides of your house or both sides of the room.

[00:40:19] Because you want that outdoor air to flow through, take out the buildup of carbon dioxide inside that’s suppressing cognition by 15% when it gets to 1,000 parts per million. Take out some of those off-gassing VOCs and phthalates and chemicals and sprays and fresheners and foam retardants that are so prevalent in our houses, and microplastics as well.

[00:40:43] Cross ventilation is kind of an unsung secret of improving indoor air. But when you’re in your outdoor air, near moving water, you have the benefit of the stabilization of your own brainwaves with that of the moving water and the relaxation that comes with it.

[00:41:05] Michael: Wow.

[00:41:06] Megan: How cool is that?

[00:41:08] John: I’m glad you think so.

[00:41:09] Megan: Uh, yeah.

[00:41:10] Michael: You know, it’s funny ’cause I, I can see a lot of things that we’ve done right at our home. We have an out- outdoor fountain with running water all the time, and boy, just when I walk outside and hear that, instantly calming.

[00:41:22] John: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Well, obviously there’s a physiologic reason for that. Measurably slowing heart rates, measurably lowering high blood pressure, promoting relaxation, easing anxiety, reducing mental fatigue.

[00:41:33] You know, it, it’s, it’s such a powerful, simple tool. And, and even a fountain, as I said, can help, and you’ve just demonstrated that. You don’t have to go to the ocean. You don’t have to go to a river. It’s nice if you can. Because one of the reasons it’s nice if you can is because… And I whole, devote a whole chapter to this in the book, is that nature is social.

[00:41:56] Mm-hmm. You talk, Megan, about having more productive meetings when you’re outdoors with someone. Part of that is bonding. Part of that is you’re- Mm … increasing oxytocin. Part of that is you’re decreasing loneliness, which has a mortality risk of 15 cigarettes a day. And you only meet people when you’re outdoors, and that’s a good thing.

[00:42:17] Even in our polarized society, most people are good. Yeah. And when you meet somebody, particularly when you’re outdoors, particularly when you’re doing something, you have a reason to talk to them. Everyone knows if you’re walking a dog, and a dog is terrific. I devote a whole chapter in the book to the importance of companion animals.

[00:42:36] When you’re walking a dog, you know, somebody might say hello to your dog before they say hello to you. That’s okay. You still get to meet them if you want, and all of a sudden you have your dogs in common, or a dog in common.

[00:42:49] Michael: I’ve

[00:42:49] John: noticed that. That makes us feel like we’re part of something bigger than our own problems.

[00:43:01] Michael: We could talk all day. I know your time is limited. And if you were gonna write a prescription For one of our, like, just a, a typical person that might be a patient of yours who wants to sort of use the minimum effective dose. I mean, it’s like they’re already feeling overwhelmed, and this could become a full-time job, or they think it might as they’re listening to this.

[00:43:22] But what’s sort of the minimum effective dose?

[00:43:24] John: Yeah, yeah. God forbid they bring another full-time job. 17 minutes a day is a minimum effective dose. It’s not a full-time job. It’s a tiny sliver of your day that’s already you’re using incidentally. So I’m just wanting you to turn that incidental time into intentional time, and here’s how you do it.

[00:43:43] There are four dials. One, intentional time. Use ten minutes in the morning to get your morning light, right place, right location, right duration of time, daytime before screen time, preferably within an hour of waking. If you wake up before the sun rises, use a 10,000 lux therapy lamp. Sets your circadian rhythm.

[00:44:03] You get a double anchor later on in the morning if you get outside for just a few minutes. So if you get up before the sunrise, you can still do it. 10,000 lux lamp doesn’t have all the wavelengths, but it’s enough to get you started. You can pick it up later. So that’s just ten minutes in the morning. At noon, have a walking meeting.

[00:44:21] Go outside for lunch. Have a one-on-one with someone in a courtyard. Just experience sitting and looking at a fountain. Try to find a place that’s greener. Greener is always better. A tree-lined street beats a treadmill by a window, you know. And then in the evening, just a few minutes. Remember, we’re going for 17 minimum.

[00:44:40] You’re already outdoors because you’re coming home from work. Try to catch the last rays of the sunset. Look in the distance. Use your distance vision. Know that the world is not small but large, and that you’re capable of everything, and that you can focus and do what you need to do because you’re restoring your brain, which is now powering down so you can get good sleep that night.

[00:45:05] You know, this is not that easy to commercialize, Michael. You know, nat- nature can’t be patented. Uh, the trials come out of Japan and Finland and South Korea, but it’s not fringe. It’s just unfunded.

[00:45:18] Megan: Such an important point.

[00:45:19] Michael: I really do believe this is the kind of thing that can dramatically improve the quality of our life.

[00:45:25] And like I’m all about longevity at my age . Me too. But I’m, I’m all about increasing my, not just my lifespan, but my health span. And I think this, this is just such a marvelous way to increase quality of life as well as the length of our lives. So thank you.

[00:45:43] John: My pleasure. You know, this is the only invention I know that plays into four of your nine domains at once.

[00:45:50] Body, mind, family, community, and it’s all the 17-minute minimum effective dose. So this isn’t a hobby, and it’s certainly not a new job. It’s just leverage. Yeah. And I would say body isn’t just one of the domains. It’s the substrate for the other eight.

[00:46:04] Megan: Mm-hmm.

[00:46:04] John: Um, you can’t spend attention you don’t have on family or community or work.

[00:46:09] That’s why morning light comes first, because it’s upstream of everything else.

[00:46:12] Megan: Hmm.

[00:46:13] John: Your team- Such a great- … your kids, they’ll just copy what you do. So this is also about leadership.

[00:46:19] Megan: Hmm.

[00:46:20] Michael: It is.

[00:46:21] Megan: Fantastic.

[00:46:21] Michael: Indeed.

[00:46:22] Megan: Well, John, thank you for being with us. This has been a pleasure. Yes, thank you. And I just can’t recommend enough, as someone who’s mid-read of The Indoor Epidemic right now, get this book.

[00:46:32] As I said to you before we started, John, you make this doable and understandable for normal people with imperfect lives that are full and, uh, lots of competing priorities. This is something that we can all do, and I’m so grateful that you’ve helped to, to make that possible for us.

[00:46:48] John: Megan, it’s been a pleasure.

[00:46:49] Michael, so thank you so much.

[00:46:51] Michael: Thank you, John.

[00:46:52] John: Take care of yourselves.

[00:47:02] Michael: Okay, Meg, what did you think of that interview?

[00:47:04] Megan: Well, I would’ve only been happier if we had had another hour to continue, because my gosh, we had a whole conversation after we quit recording about beekeeping, and little did I know, I mean, John is a passionate beekeeper. I kne- I knew that, I guess, from his bio, but he’s just so passionate about all these things that he’s doing, and I, I sort of s- feel like I wanna be John when I grow up.

[00:47:27] Michael: Well, and I have to say, and I do notice this, for a man as accomplished as he is, with such a long, impressive resume of doing so many amazing things, he’s very humble.

[00:47:37] Megan: Yeah.

[00:47:38] Michael: And very accessible.

[00:47:39] Megan: Yes.

[00:47:39] Michael: And very curious. I mean-

[00:47:41] Megan: Mm-hmm …

[00:47:41] Michael: before we got on, he a- asked us a bunch of questions and- Yeah … mentioned that he followed our stuff and-

[00:47:46] Megan: Yeah

[00:47:47] Michael: read our books and so forth, and I was just, I don’t know, just really honored by that, and he was a joy to talk to.

[00:47:53] Megan: He was, and you know, the, as, as I’ve kinda been on my own journey with this over the last year and a half or two, that really began a couple years ago in December when we, uh, heard our friend Ryan Levesque speak about his Return to Real message.

[00:48:10] Um, and you know, we have recently had him on the podcast. My life is measurably better. I’m happier, less anxious, more fulfilled, I think probably more enjoyable to be around, because of the time that I spend outside intentionally, and I didn’t really think about it a whole lot before. Um, it was kind of like a non-category in my mind, and I just keep trying to find more things that I enjoy doing outside.

[00:48:36] I don’t think about it like it’s something I have to do. I think about it like something that gives me joy and, and makes me happier and, um, you know, more relaxed and all that kind of stuff. So I’m, as… When I decided to keep bees, it was like, okay, I need, I need something else to do outside. I need one more reason to be outside more and be off of my screens.

[00:48:54] I think that’s really the secret to spending less time- Mm-hmm … on the screens is like you gotta have something you wanna do more than that, you know? More than just check out. And it has been life-changing for me, so it’s cool to see it affirmed in the science in the way that he, he does so accessibly.

[00:49:07] Michael: I’ve really noticed a change in you too, and I mean, you’re amazing in every way, even before you started doing all these things.

[00:49:13] But I will, I will say, I feel like- You’re less irritable.

[00:49:19] Megan: Yeah.

[00:49:20] Michael: Less easily triggered.

[00:49:22] Megan: Mm-hmm.

[00:49:22] Michael: Uh, to quote Elizabeth Stanley’s book title, You’ve Widened the Window-

[00:49:27] Megan: Yes …

[00:49:27] Michael: and kind of your emotional and nervous system capacity- Mm-hmm … to just kind of absorb the give and take of life.

[00:49:34] Megan: Yep.

[00:49:35] Michael: And that kind of resilience is critical for surviving, you know, the stuff that we’re going through in, in the world today.

[00:49:43] And I, I like the fact that he said toward the end of the interview that, you know, this really isn’t something you can commercialize very well because it’s all- Yeah … available to us for free.

[00:49:53] Megan: Thank

[00:49:54] Michael: goodness. You know?

[00:49:54] Megan: I’m

[00:49:55] Michael: so grateful for that. So

[00:49:56] Megan: I love

[00:49:56] Michael: all that. And you and I have both been a proponent of supplements and peptides and all these things, but those can get expensive quick.

[00:50:03] Megan: Right.

[00:50:03] Michael: And sometimes I think that if we just did these natural things, so many of those other things would become less necessary.

[00:50:11] Megan: Absolutely. Well, one of the things that Ryan Levesque said in the interview, and that he says in his book, he tells a story of he got way down the rabbit hole on, like, grounding mats.

[00:50:20] Like, you know- Yeah … you’ve heard that it’s good to be, like, barefoot outside and all that, but you can kinda simulate it with this electrical mat that you can put your feet on, like, under your desk. And he went to, like, go order one, and then he was like, “Wait a second.” I just need to go outside. Like, it’s literally free.

[00:50:33] I don’t need to order this thing off of Amazon. I just need to go outside. And it’s like how much of the things we spend money on and time on for our, quote unquote, “health” are really just expensive, complicated substitutes for what nature gives, and, and inferior substitutes for what nature gives us absolutely free right outside our door.

[00:50:52] And, and y- you… it won’t feel like one more thing you have to do. It’ll be something that is l- literally life-giving to you, absolutely free.

[00:51:00] Michael: I, I wanna ask you what you do during inclement weather. Kind of rain’s one thing, and then the really cold weather’s another thing, but what is, what is your practice like for morning light and all of that during that time?

[00:51:12] Megan: Well, last year, I… Rain, I don’t really do anything. I just sort of, like, give up on those days. But it’s- Hmm … honestly, it’s not that many days. Now, maybe if you lived in Seattle this would be trickier, but it doesn’t really rain that many days that happen to be that, you know, 10 to 20 or 30 minutes you’re gonna be outside, so I don’t find that that takes me out very much.

[00:51:31] The cold is a factor, and last year I bought the most ridiculous down bathrobe. I, I look like a human marshmallow when I put this thing on, okay? Like, it, it only comes in white. I, I feel like it could fit somebody three times as big as I am. Um, it, like, only comes in one size. And it’s heavy. I mean, it’s like wearing a down comforter.

[00:51:51] And so I bought, last year, flannel pajamas, this ridiculous robe, and these, um, kinda like moccasin leather boots with shearling inside from, I think they’re from L.L.Bean, and I have, like, wool socks. And so, like, I’ll just put my, like, warm pajamas and slippers, the, you know, the moccasin things on, and then I’ll put that on, and I’ll usually…

[00:52:11] I won’t go into my garden if it’s really cold, but I’ll, I’ll try to sit and look at the sun for 10 to 15 minutes with my coffee right when I get up. And it’s actually not bad, you know? It’s surprising. And sometimes I’ll take a blanket out there, but I mean, there’s not that many days that it’s miserably cold and I- Yeah

[00:52:30] won’t do it, you know? There are some days, and I think that’s okay. I also have a red light panel that I’ll use as kind of a backup for that. I’ll lay under the red light for 15 or 20 minutes. Um- That’s what I’ve been doing, too. But I think that is still an indoor supplement for something that’s best done outdoors, so I try to think of it like that.

[00:52:46] Drive by my house, you’ll see me in the marshmallow outfit.

[00:52:48] Michael: In a perfect world, I’d love to get rid of daylight savings-

[00:52:52] Megan: Yeah …

[00:52:52] Michael: and just have one time. And I’d like to live my life based on the natural circadian rhythms- Right … so that my days were, my work days were shorter in the winter- Right … than in the summer.

[00:53:04] Megan: Right. And

[00:53:05] Michael: then I just, you know, I, I slept in later in the winter- Yeah … and went to bed earlier. Yeah. And I think that’s- That’s very natural, but that’s, that’s hard to do-

[00:53:14] Megan: It’s, it’s hard to

[00:53:14] Michael: do … when you’re trying to function in society.

[00:53:15] Megan: The good news is, is I don’t think you have to do that to get the benefits.

[00:53:19] And I think- No, I don’t either … one of the things that I, I wanna always say to people when I talk about this is I think if you’re overwhelmed and you’re kind of like on the edge of burnout, it can feel like, “Well, I gotta get my life together and get some margin before I can do this.” And that, you know, there’s a certain sense in which maybe that’s true.

[00:53:35] On the other hand, this is the thing that you can just fit in the cracks of your life. Like his 17-minute prescription, everybody can do that. I mean, it’s not- Right … even like take a 30-minute walk a day. Like, it’s, it’s even smaller than that, and I think it’s actually what gives your… gives you the neurological, psychological capacity to do things better in terms of prioritizing and thinking about making better decisions with your time that ultimately create the margin.

[00:54:01] So I’m not sure that it’s not the thing that’s upstream of everything. You know, I mean, I started to do this when I had a lot of complicated medical stuff going on in our family with our kids, and it was a whole thing, and my life was not perfect, and it was not, on the personal side, full of margin. And I made, I made it work, and it, it actually was expansive in that way.

[00:54:22] So I think don’t let that discourage you if you’re like, “Well, you know, my life isn’t perfect.” It’s okay. It doesn’t have to be.

[00:54:27] Michael: So one of the things that Alex and I have been talking about, our mutual trainer, is safety signals.

[00:54:34] Megan: Yes.

[00:54:35] Michael: And you know, when your body receives safety signals, then it’s able to function- Yeah

[00:54:41] at its best.

[00:54:41] Megan: Right.

[00:54:42] Michael: And one of the things he said to me, very similar to what he’s probably said to you, and you’re probably channeling what he said to you. But he said, you know, like, “If you can’t get outside for 30 minutes first thing in the morning,” ’cause I like to get from daybreak to the, the sunrise and a little bit after that.

[00:54:56] He says, “What’s the minimum effective dose?” And he said, “If you could just go out for two minutes, it still signals to your body the right things.” And I think the temptation for, I don’t know, somebody that’s kind of a maximalist like I tend to be, it’s all or nothing.

[00:55:12] Megan: Yeah.

[00:55:12] Michael: And I, I think the thing that I’m realizing is whether it’s, it’s prayer or it’s getting sunlight or it’s working out, something is better than nothing.

[00:55:22] And, and the measure or the, the basic, the measure month that we should hold ourselves to is what can I do in a day where I’m really busy-

[00:55:32] Megan: Yeah …

[00:55:32] Michael: and might be tempted to blow it off? But what’s sort of the minimum thing? Not, not when the day’s clear and- Right … I can do whatever I want, and I can take a, a, you know, a really long slow morning.

[00:55:42] No.

[00:55:42] Megan: Right. ‘

[00:55:43] Michael: Cause that’s, that’s rare.

[00:55:45] Megan: Right.

[00:55:45] Michael: And basically you’re building in failure to your system if you try to be a maximalist.

[00:55:50] Megan: Yeah. I think that’s so true. I’ll often say to myself, you know, my ideal scenario is I go sit in my chairs in the garden, all that. That’s, that’s… You know, I do that, you know, probably three or four days a week.

[00:56:00] But the other days, you know, when I have something early, um, whatever it is, I’ll say, “Just go sit on the porch with your coffee.” And again, I’m, I’ve, like, worked this down to where I have basically a decaf coffee now, but it’s really just ’cause it’s warm and it tastes good that I wanna drink it. But I’ll just say, “Just go sit on the porch,” like literally- Mm-hmm

[00:56:14] three steps out of the front door for, like, five minutes. You know, just that. And I’ll usually stay longer than that once I’m out there, but I’m just like, “Just, just, like, five minutes.” It’s nothing. Like, no one’s gonna make… day is made or, or broken by five minutes. And that really helps me. Like, I just find, man, if you’re struggling to be consistent, just, like, lower the bar.

[00:56:31] You know, make it easy.

[00:56:33] Michael: Lower the bar. That could be a whole book. Yeah. Maybe it should be your next book. Okay. Well, guys, you’ve absolutely got to get the book. It’s called Indoor Epidemic: 93% Inside Steals Sleep, Focus, and Years. The 7% Outdoor Rx, or Prescription, Restores Them. So the book’s out. It’s brand new.

[00:56:56] It’s a must read, so I hope you’ll pick it up.

[00:56:58] Megan: And guys, if this has been helpful for you, if you’ve had some light bulbs go off during our conversation, I wanna ask you to share this with a friend. I love it when people share podcasts with me. That’s how I find most of the podcasts that I listen to and that are ultimately transformational for me, and that’s what we’re about here.

[00:57:15] We’re about helping people win at work and flourish in life, and we’d love the opportunity to do that with more people. So help us get the word out. Share this episode with someone that you know and love that could benefit from this message about the indoor epidemic. All right. We’ll see you next week.