[00:00:11] Well, well, we are here. Jason, Episode 1, are you excited?

[00:00:17] I am.

[00:00:19] How much on the scale of 10?

[00:00:23] On a scale of 1 to 10? I'm probably above 8, 8 and above. Never done anything like this, so we'll see how it turns out.

[00:00:36] Okay. Just for starters, can you very briefly tell a little bit about yourself?

[00:00:44] A little bit about myself?

[00:00:48] Well, so, do you want me to give you my history?

[00:00:54] Good. What you do and what you currently, all businesses that you manage, just a very brief snapshot.

[00:01:01] So, that's a loaded question. I always struggle with where to start.

[00:01:07] So, I guess to some extent, I am a medical device engineer, and I make little widgets that are used in laser lithotripsy for high-powered laser systems.

[00:01:22] That's the only thing that I do that really makes any money at this point.

[00:01:25] Everything else that I'm doing is mostly from a nonprofit point of view, and I've founded and run two nonprofits.

[00:01:33] Actually, I don't know that I should say that I run them, because my wife runs one of them.

[00:01:40] They focus on Salutogenesis. I assume we'll get into that a little bit more.

[00:01:46] So, I'm a husband and father of three kids, and we stay very active and busy.

[00:01:56] That's a good starting intro.

[00:01:59] Now, before we go into Salutogenesis and understanding more in depth of that, let's go back in time and tell me about your upbringing.

[00:02:11] Where were you born and raised, and did you always want to be an entrepreneur?

[00:02:17] Okay. So, I was born in upstate New York, but spent a lot of my early years overseas until I was around about eight or nine.

[00:02:32] I lived in Belgium, Greece, and Bahrain. Bahrain's a small island nation in the Arabian Gulf.

[00:02:41] And living abroad at a young age really shaped my worldview, and I suppose made me adaptable in a way.

[00:02:50] But it also came with some challenges.

[00:02:54] One particularly intense experience was we had to be evacuated from Bahrain due to political unrest.

[00:03:02] And it was always presented to me, but I was pretty young as being evacuated.

[00:03:08] I think that it wasn't full-on evacuation.

[00:03:11] It was more precautionary because after dropping my sister and I off, my mom stayed with us.

[00:03:19] Actually, I was just talking to my sister today, and I don't remember.

[00:03:23] I thought my mother went back with my father to Bahrain and just left us in the UK for a month or two.

[00:03:31] We stayed with friends that we had met in Greece.

[00:03:38] And eventually, we returned to the U.S.

[00:03:40] And I went to Northern California, where I graduated from high school and attended University of California, Davis.

[00:03:52] Got a dual degree in aeronautical and mechanical engineering.

[00:04:00] But I spent most of my time, most of my free time, that is, playing volleyball.

[00:04:06] And did I always want to be an entrepreneur?

[00:04:09] Yes, absolutely.

[00:04:12] So I grew up watching my dad.

[00:04:14] He could build.

[00:04:16] Actually, he could do just about anything.

[00:04:18] He was really talented.

[00:04:20] And I remember sketching out little inventions that I had.

[00:04:24] And I always wanted my dad to build them for me.

[00:04:28] Of course, he had other things he had to do.

[00:04:32] So the first entrepreneurial experience that I can really remember, we had another family friend who we met in Greece,

[00:04:42] who ended up moving out to the Bay Area with us.

[00:04:47] Or not with us, but also.

[00:04:50] And he ran a or was working for a liquidation company at the time.

[00:04:56] And he was liquidating some company that had a whole bunch of candy.

[00:05:02] And he let my sister and I take a bunch of candy.

[00:05:05] And I talked my sister into giving me her share as well.

[00:05:09] And I set up a little shop right out of my bedroom window.

[00:05:14] And I sold candy to neighborhood kids.

[00:05:18] And I guess that was the beginning of my entrepreneurial mindset.

[00:05:25] That's like the second to the lemonade selling candies to peers.

[00:05:33] Yeah.

[00:05:34] No, I never did a lemonade stand, but I just made it myself.

[00:05:38] Awesome.

[00:05:40] So now let's talk about your journey into the world of health and wellness.

[00:05:45] Was there a specific moment or experience that led to you to go in this field?

[00:05:51] How does that happen?

[00:05:52] Um, so yes, definitely.

[00:05:57] But to be honest, in going through this, it makes me think of,

[00:06:03] I think the first time that I struggled with the idea of health and longevity

[00:06:10] was actually shortly after we got evacuated from Bahrain in the UK.

[00:06:17] I remember I had a nightmare and my sister woke me up and asked me what was wrong.

[00:06:24] And, um, I was only seven at the time.

[00:06:27] So I had a really tough time, uh, trying to verbalize the concept of infinity and, uh,

[00:06:36] never ending time and space.

[00:06:38] And for some reason that really terrified me.

[00:06:40] Um, the best that I could do was say that I was scared to die, had a fear of death.

[00:06:46] Um, and, uh, but looking back, um, that, uh, I assume that that kind of makes sense because

[00:06:53] we just been forced to leave our home in Bahrain and that, uh, instilled a sense of, uh, vulnerability,

[00:07:02] I suppose.

[00:07:04] Um, and so looking at it now, that's probably planted the first seeds of interest in health

[00:07:12] and longevity.

[00:07:13] Um, and then I, I kind of put it aside for a long time.

[00:07:18] I developed a love of planes and flight and I pursued a, an engineering degree, um, specifically

[00:07:23] aeronautical and mechanical.

[00:07:25] Um, and, uh, while at Davis, I actually worked for Mueller international making the sky car,

[00:07:32] which was a whole heck of a lot of fun, especially for a college kid.

[00:07:36] Um, and then my first job out of college was working for Lockheed Martin, but, um, working

[00:07:44] on missiles, uh, didn't sit really well.

[00:07:48] And so when a friend invited me to help him, uh, design medical laser systems, I kind of jumped

[00:07:53] at the chance and that allowed me to then shift and start using engineering, uh, to focus

[00:07:58] on health.

[00:07:59] Um, but what really sent me down this path with a sense of purpose was that my entire family

[00:08:08] got cancer.

[00:08:10] Um, and that, that hit pretty hard and I was left kind of questioning everything I knew about

[00:08:18] health and disease and, uh, you know, questioning how could people who were rarely ever sick, always

[00:08:26] active, uh, suddenly diagnosed with stage four cancer.

[00:08:30] It didn't make any sense to me.

[00:08:32] Um, and that's what really started me down this rabbit hole and trying to understand, uh,

[00:08:37] health and disease more profoundly.

[00:08:40] And, um, and, and how, uh, how old were you?

[00:08:45] Like, is it like, uh, after, after you were done with your stint in Lockheed and then moved

[00:08:50] into this world, uh, professionally, uh, how old were you at that time?

[00:08:57] Um, how, how old was I when my parents got cancer or how old was I when I started making

[00:09:03] medical laser systems?

[00:09:05] Both.

[00:09:05] When you lost your parents, how old were you?

[00:09:07] And then, then when you moved into medical devices, when was that?

[00:09:10] Uh, so when I, I moved into medical devices, uh, I only worked for, uh, Lockheed Martin for

[00:09:15] a year, actually a year and a day.

[00:09:17] Um, that way I didn't have to give them back my, my signing bonus, um, after, after college.

[00:09:23] So it was immediately after college.

[00:09:25] Um, and then I, I worked on medical laser systems for the next, I think it was a little over a

[00:09:31] decade, 12 years, I think.

[00:09:34] Um, and then I, oh, actually no more than that, because then I went to work for another

[00:09:40] company and, uh, help them make medical laser systems.

[00:09:44] Um, that you could actually consider that my, my claim to fame.

[00:09:49] Um, I actually changed the, uh, the laser lithotripsy niche and that's, uh, lithotripsy

[00:09:57] is fragmenting kidney stones and bladder stones.

[00:10:00] Um, so my contributions changed an entire industry, but it's small enough that nobody cares, um,

[00:10:08] unless you happen to have a kidney stone, then you might care.

[00:10:12] Um, and then, uh, I actually started a company with my father and then had to, uh, um, that

[00:10:27] we were actually only working together for about a year before he got cancer.

[00:10:31] And then that, uh, kind of threw a monkey wrench in everything.

[00:10:36] Um, and I shifted the focus from, um, taking the little widgets that I had invented and

[00:10:46] instead of designing laser systems around that and continuing to innovate that particular

[00:10:52] niche, um, I, I switched and started looking at, uh, what, what makes people healthy.

[00:11:01] Really?

[00:11:02] I started really researching solute genesis.

[00:11:06] I would imagine like, um, obviously difficult time to just cope with everything, but, uh, giving

[00:11:14] you this drive to go ahead and, you know, basically questioning the world around you and trying to find

[00:11:21] these answers.

[00:11:21] Uh, was that the point when you also moved into where you are in building this nonprofits

[00:11:31] after that, or, uh, or, or, or was there something else that happened first and then that led to

[00:11:37] this?

[00:11:39] Um, so when my, uh, when my entire family got cancer, I started doing a lot of research and,

[00:11:49] um, looked at what health really meant, why, and I didn't care whether it was alternative,

[00:11:58] when it was conventional.

[00:11:59] I wanted to understand why therapies worked and why they didn't work and what the differences

[00:12:04] was when they were working and when they weren't working.

[00:12:07] Um, that, uh, that's kind of where everything started.

[00:12:14] And because of my medical device background making laser systems, I, I absolutely had a

[00:12:21] bias towards looking at, uh, device focused, um, health interventions.

[00:12:27] Um, so I guess that's where I started.

[00:12:30] Did I answer the full question?

[00:12:32] Yeah, you know, you did.

[00:12:33] Yes.

[00:12:34] I did.

[00:12:34] Okay.

[00:12:35] And, uh, so, okay.

[00:12:38] Now, obviously the next step.

[00:12:41] So you mentioned this concept of, uh, eudaimonia and this big idea of flourishing.

[00:12:48] That's what it means, right?

[00:12:49] Uh, can you tell us what it means to you and how it aligns with this philosophy behind your

[00:12:56] foundation?

[00:12:56] Also tell us a little bit about, you know, what is Ionic Alliance Foundation and, and, and

[00:13:02] what really, you know, when, what was the first step when you're getting started, started

[00:13:07] with it?

[00:13:09] Uh, sure.

[00:13:10] So, um, there's actually a lot in that question.

[00:13:13] Uh, so I'll, I'll back up a little bit.

[00:13:15] Um, one of the first things that I did after having done all of this research and after my

[00:13:22] parents ended up passing away was I made the emotional vow of, uh, wanting to cure cancer.

[00:13:34] And I understand that that's completely unrealistic.

[00:13:37] Um, but I, but I also think it's, it's a fairly common thing that people say.

[00:13:41] Um, and at the time, the only thing that I thought I could really do was help people live

[00:13:47] more salutogenic lives.

[00:13:49] Um, and so I ended up founding and starting a, uh, the first nonprofit, which is, uh, eudaimonia

[00:13:57] HFC.

[00:13:58] And that's, uh, it's actually a ministry and I'm not super religious.

[00:14:04] So I didn't really feel qualified to run it.

[00:14:09] Um, so I kind of just set it up.

[00:14:12] I actually had a friend, uh, who was a minister.

[00:14:15] He ended up running things, um, he and his wife.

[00:14:19] And then, uh, that kind of freed me up to continue focusing on what health is and really

[00:14:25] looking and, uh, digging into going down that rabbit hole of, uh, different therapies.

[00:14:32] Um, but, uh, so eudaimonia started, um, so we implement or, uh, work with the neurosomatic

[00:14:47] integration.

[00:14:47] And that's really just kind of a fancy way of saying brain-based movement practices.

[00:14:54] Um, and that's, uh, that could be a whole other episode that we could go into all sorts

[00:14:59] of things.

[00:15:00] But, um, basically the brain craves novelty and there are theories that say that we have

[00:15:09] a brain because we move.

[00:15:11] So really novel movement is very healthy for the brain.

[00:15:15] Um, something that could be very novel movement is, uh, ninja warrior and parkour type activities.

[00:15:23] So the, um, the, our facility is, uh, if you come into the, to the main tabernacle, it looks

[00:15:35] like a ninja warrior parkour gym.

[00:15:36] And while the original intent for that was a lot different than just having kids play,

[00:15:43] it's also a lot of fun and it became really popular with kids.

[00:15:47] And then it became a little bit awkward to try and talk to people about chronic disease.

[00:15:52] And, um, and so after a while of trying to do that, we realized that, uh, we needed to,

[00:16:02] uh, or I needed to form another nonprofit, which is the Ionic Alliance Foundation.

[00:16:09] Um, so that's how the Ionic Alliance Foundation came to be, but, uh, you want me to define what

[00:16:17] eudaimonia is?

[00:16:19] Yeah, please.

[00:16:20] Okay.

[00:16:21] So, uh, in ancient Greek mythology, so obviously, uh, since I lived in Greece, some of this, uh,

[00:16:29] strikes a chord with me, but, um, in ancient Greek mythology, uh, we were, uh, we were, uh,

[00:16:32] in ancient Greek mythology, eudaimons were the, uh, the guardian spirits who offered protection

[00:16:38] and guidance to people.

[00:16:41] Um, nowadays, uh, people define eudaimonia simply as human flourishing, but, uh, Aristotle,

[00:16:48] um, he's the Greek philosopher who popularized the term.

[00:16:52] He defined eudaimonia more fully as, um, the innate potential of each individual to live

[00:17:01] a life of enduring happiness and a trading wisdom, optimal wellbeing with authentic love

[00:17:07] and compassion.

[00:17:08] And then he also suggested that, uh, eudaimonia was best cultivated through an active lifestyle

[00:17:14] and continuous growth.

[00:17:15] So it's not about reaching any end goal, um, like nirvana.

[00:17:21] Um, it's more about continuous, uh, growth and constantly moving towards our highest potential.

[00:17:28] And that philosophy is really at the heart of both the, uh, the missions for both eudaimonia

[00:17:33] and my alliance foundation.

[00:17:36] That makes sense.

[00:17:37] Um, and, um, obviously the core focus of this unique approach is salutogenesis.

[00:17:46] And could you explain, like, there is a lot of people who don't just layman terms, what

[00:17:51] it means and why you believe it is essential for lasting wellness?

[00:17:57] Um, sure.

[00:17:59] So, uh, salutogenesis is the concept that health isn't just the absence of disease.

[00:18:04] It's a, it's a positive quality that can be cultivated and optimized.

[00:18:10] Um, and it, uh, it involves not only eliminating disease, but also supporting and promoting health.

[00:18:19] So one way that, uh, might add some clarity is, uh, think of it like this.

[00:18:24] Many people, especially when they're young, um, have naturally robust immune system.

[00:18:29] They don't really need to do much to avoid disease.

[00:18:32] Uh, and that leads to them feeling if, if they're not sick, well, then they're healthy,

[00:18:39] but health and disease really exist on a spectrum.

[00:18:43] And the absence of disease is really just the starting point of health and real health

[00:18:50] requires nurturing.

[00:18:51] And our, our, our lifestyle choices can either move us toward health or toward disease.

[00:18:58] And almost every decision that we make from the food that we eat, the activities that we

[00:19:03] engage in, or the thoughts that we think impact our place on that spectrum.

[00:19:08] And salutogenesis really just emphasizes those choices that actively promote wellness and longevity.

[00:19:16] And, uh, looking from the, you know, the lens of the foundation, especially the

[00:19:24] Ionic Alliance Foundation, what is specifically happening there to support using this as a foundation

[00:19:33] to build solutions to help, you know, in general in this wellness journey for the people,

[00:19:40] what exactly you are building there?

[00:19:43] So the Ionic Alliance Foundation is, uh, studying and attempting to increase awareness of what

[00:19:51] we're calling ion biotechnology.

[00:19:53] And that's really just the, uh, the study of how, um, essential ions are used at the cellular level

[00:20:05] and what can happen at the cellular level with sufficient supply of different essential ions.

[00:20:15] So basically it's, uh, it's a fairly focused look at nutrition, um, but not, not, uh, not a real broad,

[00:20:24] uh, um, scope, but very focused to these essential ions or these particular types of essential ions.

[00:20:33] And most of those that we're looking at are, uh, metal ions.

[00:20:38] And, and, uh, is this, uh, uh, on the tech side of it, this turns into some kind of, uh, uh, some device,

[00:20:47] tech solution or a treatment?

[00:20:49] What, what exactly the, how it works for the end users?

[00:20:54] Um, yeah, so, uh, I, I guess it's, it's a, it is a technology that we're, uh, trying to put together

[00:21:02] and help, uh, develop really, it has been, it's derived from an ancestral medicine.

[00:21:10] Um, so this has been around for a long time.

[00:21:15] And what we're looking at is different ways of making these essential ions significantly more bioavailable

[00:21:23] so that you can get more to cells as those cells are under stress and need, uh, need, uh, greater access to, to the supply.

[00:21:36] Um, and the output of this hopefully is going to be a whole range of the ludogenic products.

[00:21:46] Uh, hopefully that will be not only nutritional classification products, but then also branching over into medical devices and or drugs.

[00:21:57] But instead of being, uh, uh, cratogenic being salutogenic.

[00:22:05] So truly supporting health as opposed to forcing some particular cellular action.

[00:22:16] That may or may not be required.

[00:22:18] So we're trying to let the body decide, let the cells decide and use their internal wisdom, if you will, as to what really needs to happen.

[00:22:30] Just make sure that they've got all of the nutrients that are needed to do whatever it is they need to do.

[00:22:39] Interesting.

[00:22:39] And, um, uh, and of course we'll have different episode to talk more on that tech separately, but, uh, uh, is there a certain age group when it becomes the most,

[00:22:55] like, uh, you know, I, I guess, uh, most applicable to apply these things that you're building?

[00:23:03] Or is it like, just like, uh, it's more diagnostic.

[00:23:06] It starts with the wrigling.

[00:23:08] You do the diagnostic along with, uh, keep doing the diagnostic as you would do it, your animals and keep going ahead.

[00:23:14] How, how does it work in that way?

[00:23:17] Um, you're, you're asking about the age at which, uh, uh, people will hopefully be able to use this or need it.

[00:23:25] Or are you, are you asking about the age, how long this will take to develop?

[00:23:29] Yeah, I guess two questions, uh, two questions to clarify here, because, um, it's probably a thing which you're doing proactively.

[00:23:38] So there's a preventative part to it, right?

[00:23:40] So, uh, and so it's not like the sick care system, which is our traditional system where you are sick and then you get the treatment.

[00:23:49] So, uh, and then it's too late already in many cases.

[00:23:53] And, uh, so the question is in your, how you're doing it in this specifically in the world of salutogenesis, are there also checkpoints that's been kind of like built part of the diagnostics that we might not do it in traditional medicine, but we are doing it now, right now.

[00:24:14] Are there any, those, uh, things done proactively or what are those things?

[00:24:18] Those are done proactively.

[00:24:20] Um, sure.

[00:24:21] So the, this path has been very counter to the traditional, uh, pharmaceutical drug development process.

[00:24:31] If that's the way that you want to look at that.

[00:24:33] Um, we're actually coming from this from a point of view of, Hey, this ancestral medicine is actually having very significant effects on pretty,

[00:24:44] severe diseases.

[00:24:45] And so we started studying why and how that could occur and looked at how to improve the, uh, the, the ancestral medicine.

[00:24:58] Um, and then still focused mostly on, uh, treating is the wrong word, but looking at how it could be used to treat, uh, different severe conditions.

[00:25:09] And most of these were chronic disease, uh, such as cancer.

[00:25:14] And, uh, but also in going through all this, uh, or this entire process, realizing that this truly is a salutogenic substance, uh, and process that we're putting together.

[00:25:27] And so at the same time, you don't, you don't have to wait until you get cancer to start using it.

[00:25:35] Um, it was originally put into cosmetics and people were using it on a daily basis.

[00:25:42] Um, and you know, if it, if it can make cancer go away, it can absolutely keep cancer from occurring in the first place.

[00:25:53] And in truth, that's by far the best way to, to treat things, right.

[00:25:57] Is to make sure that you never have the problem in the first place.

[00:25:59] Um, now that's not what most people end up doing.

[00:26:04] Um, but, uh, that's some of what Eudaimonia and Ionic Alliance Foundation are trying to change so that we can live more salutogenic lives and not have the same types of, uh, or, or not get the same types of diseases that we get.

[00:26:25] Now, in truth, that might be, well, I don't want to say that's a fool's errand.

[00:26:34] Um, but there are so many more stressors and toxins nowadays that you can try and live a really healthy lifestyle as my parents did, as my family did, and still come down with these diseases.

[00:26:53] And that, uh, there's, so if I look back, what could my parents have done to live healthier lifestyles?

[00:27:05] I almost can't come up with something.

[00:27:08] My father probably could have been in better shape, but in truth, we were really active.

[00:27:12] Um, the first time that he, uh, that we knew anything was wrong, we were actually up on a skiing trip and, uh, it was over Christmas.

[00:27:23] And, uh, that particular day we were up at, uh, Breckenridge and that particular day, instead of skiing, we went sledding and we were running up this big hill and then, you know, uh, diving onto sleds.

[00:27:36] And my dad, um, so he had colon cancer and he, uh, how we knew about it was he actually had a secondary tumor on his clavicle.

[00:27:48] And the first that we knew about it was it had damaged his clavicle to the point where it wasn't very strong.

[00:27:57] He was, he got up the top of the hill and then he took a few steps and dove onto, uh, the sled.

[00:28:06] And that force was not forced to actually break his clavicle.

[00:28:11] Um, and that was the first we knew that he had colon cancer, which seems crazy.

[00:28:17] Um, but so it's, it's not like he wasn't in very good shape.

[00:28:22] You know, he was, we were running up hills and he, he actually was diving down them.

[00:28:28] Um, so I, you know, and, and we always ate excessively healthy.

[00:28:34] Um, my mother was actually a, uh, practitioner of a, an energy medicine.

[00:28:42] Um, and, uh, you know, we ate organic food, um, so on and so forth.

[00:28:51] And yet, oh, lived up on the mountains.

[00:28:54] Um, didn't live in a city.

[00:28:57] And yet with all of that, they still both got cancer within just a couple of years of each other.

[00:29:04] And so would you think, uh, obviously one of the missions you mentioned is to drive awareness towards this.

[00:29:10] Uh, would you think that is the difference between right now?

[00:29:16] People just don't know about anything in this.

[00:29:20] They just know traditional medicine and that's where it all goes.

[00:29:24] So there is no actions taken because there is no awareness.

[00:29:28] Uh, is awareness is the number one thing you would pinpoint to that is like, uh, you know, we are still like everybody's just, you know, it's just traditional medicine.

[00:29:37] And that is, you know, kind of like you only know it when you get sick.

[00:29:41] There's nothing done, no lifestyle changes.

[00:29:44] So would you say that?

[00:29:45] Yes.

[00:29:46] And now I, the collective consciousness is changing on this issue for sure.

[00:29:52] One of the things that I want to change in what you said, um, what Western medicine is, that's not traditional medicine.

[00:29:58] That's conventional medicine.

[00:30:00] Um, uh, we start saying traditional, um, but, uh, I think that's a misnomer.

[00:30:08] It's, it's, it's conventional medicine and it's not to say that conventional medicine is bad.

[00:30:13] Um, what I think that is bad about conventional medicine is how, uh, profit focused it is and how narrow in scope it is.

[00:30:23] Again, it focuses very much on, well, if you don't have a disease, then you're healthy.

[00:30:28] And it goes so far as to be, if I can't diagnose your disease, you're healthy.

[00:30:35] And lots of people get really frustrated with that because they know that something's wrong.

[00:30:39] They just can't tell me what it is, in which case they're saying there's nothing wrong.

[00:30:44] And that's, that's where, um, that's where we need to start changing.

[00:30:50] There are plenty of things that we can be doing to increase our health, regardless of whether or not somebody says we've got a disease or not.

[00:30:59] Um, um, and then on top of that, and hopefully we can get into, uh, dig into lots of these things, um, more in, in later episodes.

[00:31:08] But the conventional medicine is so profit driven that, um, it's very difficult to develop, uh, treatments for things.

[00:31:21] If there's not going to be a significant profit there.

[00:31:24] And then to make matters worse, the way that the FDA is run and our regulations are set up, it is so ridiculously expensive to develop treatments.

[00:31:36] That they have to be outrageous to ever get a return on investment.

[00:31:42] Um, and I think there are all sorts of things that we can do to make lots of this better, um, both on the conventional medicine side and on the not needing the conventional medicine interventions in the first place.

[00:31:55] Um, but then even if you do the best that you can throughout your life, which I think my parents were pretty close, you can still get cancer.

[00:32:07] And it's, it's not, I don't want to say it's a crapshoot, um, because the, the, the toxic load is just so much higher now.

[00:32:23] And, and when I say toxic load, I'm talking about, uh, stress.

[00:32:27] I'm talking about, um, you know, the chemicals in our environment, the chemicals in our food, uh, in our, uh, you know, clothing, everything.

[00:32:37] And it's expounding and expanding every day at a pretty rapid pace.

[00:32:42] Um, this explains why cancer is increasing at a younger age.

[00:32:52] Even at the same time, if it is getting better or treatments are getting better at an older age, how is that possible?

[00:32:59] How can we both be getting better and worse at the same time?

[00:33:01] Well, it's because kids never used to get cancer because there really wasn't enough time for them to build up this toxic load to, uh, cause the problems that initiate it.

[00:33:17] It took quite a bit of your life to be able to get there normally.

[00:33:22] And, you know, you hear all sorts of people.

[00:33:25] Well, actually you don't really hear this much anymore, but when I was younger, you'd hear about, you know, oh, my grandfather smoked and drank every day of his life and he never got cancer.

[00:33:34] Yeah.

[00:33:35] If you actually look at that person, they also ate organic food every day of their life.

[00:33:40] Cause that's all that existed back then.

[00:33:43] And the, the toxic load that existed back then, somebody who drank too much and smoked probably was on the order of what average people are today in terms of toxic load.

[00:33:55] Maybe even better.

[00:33:59] Sorry.

[00:34:00] I feel like I, I went off rambling there a little bit.

[00:34:03] No, no.

[00:34:04] I mean, uh, uh, it is the reality.

[00:34:07] I was speaking with another physician and who is, uh, made this move towards functional medicine.

[00:34:13] And, uh, you know, he's basically ditched the insurance system.

[00:34:17] And for just to this specific point that he actually uses quoted the same way how you are quoted that, you know, there's so much, uh, plastic in the environment.

[00:34:27] The air is bad.

[00:34:28] The food is, you know, not organic enough.

[00:34:32] And we are consuming all these things.

[00:34:34] Uh, it all turns down is like, uh, the, and his words were like, if I practice the medicine in the box of insurance, I just feel like I just don't have enough time to make the right assessment for his patients.

[00:34:47] And which kind of, which, which, which, which, uh, which obviously, um, from his perspective as a professional in this field was, uh, kind of going to this thing, how you were connecting to like, you know, how it leads towards themselves.

[00:35:02] Like now that this is two things, again, both the money thing that you were mentioning, how it's done.

[00:35:08] And the second thing was just because our, you know, it's, it's, we are just too much toxin all around us, like from food to environment to everything else.

[00:35:17] And this, uh, and he kind of like explained in his job, like it stops from doing his job as well.

[00:35:23] So, uh, it's, uh, reminded me of that when you were speaking.

[00:35:27] Um, but, uh, let's, let's talk about like, while you are on, or while you have been on this journey for a little bit now, uh, what's been like one surprising thing that you learned about people's approach to health and healing specifically?

[00:35:44] Any example?

[00:35:48] Um, yeah.

[00:35:51] And, and, uh, so actually.

[00:35:55] Actually, let me pick two, uh, one good and one bad.

[00:35:59] Um, there've been lots of surprising things, but, uh, probably too much to talk about.

[00:36:07] So focus just on to the good.

[00:36:11] Um, I've actually seen how, uh, when it comes to healing, uh, people seem to expect a radical change or extreme treatments to make real significant progress towards healing.

[00:36:23] Um, but surprisingly, it's, it's the small, consistent lifestyle and mindset shifts that yield the most sustainable health benefits.

[00:36:32] Um, daily habits like, uh, optimal nutrition, exercise, uh, simple stress management practices when done consistently, um, create truly transformative results.

[00:36:47] And, uh, uh, I guess the surprising part to me is that true healing doesn't always require these drastic measures.

[00:36:57] And it's the steady intentional changes that make the biggest long-term impact.

[00:37:01] And that's, uh, that, that might sound obvious to lots of people.

[00:37:06] That, that was really hard for me because I, I want to make big changes and to some extent, uh, big changes can have a dramatic impact as well.

[00:37:15] They can shift your life and then your habits from that point on have now shifted.

[00:37:22] Um, so I'm not discounting that, but I'm more talking about, um, you know, oh, I was diagnosed with cancer.

[00:37:35] Give me chemotherapy and then I should just be better.

[00:37:38] Right?

[00:37:38] Well, okay.

[00:37:40] It took you a really long time to develop cancer in the first place.

[00:37:43] So imagining that we could do something drastically to the body to immediately change things and suddenly you get better.

[00:37:52] Oh, that's kind of unrealistic.

[00:37:53] It's going to take some time.

[00:37:56] Now there are all sorts of things that we can do to accelerate that timeline.

[00:38:01] Um, because hopefully we weren't trying to get bad over time.

[00:38:07] If you tried to get bad over time, you could probably get bad really fast.

[00:38:11] Uh, likewise.

[00:38:13] If we try to get better and heal, we can do that fairly quickly.

[00:38:17] But those larger drastic changes are difficult to incorporate as an ongoing habit in your life.

[00:38:28] I guess that's my point.

[00:38:31] Um, so that's the good thing.

[00:38:34] Small changes can actually have a really big impact over time.

[00:38:38] Now, uh, the bad is, I guess I would sum it up this way.

[00:38:44] Uh, fear clouds rational decision making and there's no end to the people who will exploit that.

[00:38:52] Um, a life threatening illness, uh, like cancer makes it incredibly difficult to think clearly.

[00:38:59] And in that situation, we, uh, our natural reaction is really to defer to an authority or to defer to somebody else who has more information than us.

[00:39:09] And then just say to them, okay, well, you know, more, you take care of this.

[00:39:14] Because it's, as I said, it's, it's hard to really think rationally in the presence of significant fear.

[00:39:21] Um, and this leads people to, you know, following advice to put highly toxic substances in their body and pay large sums of money to do it.

[00:39:34] And those toxic substances can either be conventional or alternative.

[00:39:40] Um, and this kind of strikes a nerve with me because when my parents were battling cancer, um, we spent well over six figures on all sorts of junk, conventional and alternative.

[00:39:54] Um, and in many cases, somewhere in their mind, people can consciously even make that choice.

[00:40:04] When it comes to like alternative therapies, there are someone's going to charge me a few thousand dollars to do some various thing.

[00:40:11] It's probably a scam, but I'll go ahead and pay the money anyways.

[00:40:15] Cause you know, otherwise I'm going to die.

[00:40:17] I might as well try it.

[00:40:19] You know, there's a small chance that maybe this guy's not trying to scam me.

[00:40:22] Um, and, and I suppose that that also, uh, played a big part as to why I started both Ionic Alliance Foundation and, and Eudemonium.

[00:40:34] Um, yes, I wanted to do what I could to help others avoid the pain of losing loved ones too soon.

[00:40:42] Um, but I also wanted to reduce the, uh, that exploitation that I saw that was all too common.

[00:40:54] And, um, speaking of, um, you know, misconceptions and myths, uh, if you had probably, I guess, uh,

[00:41:06] is there one specific thing that you would like to debunk, especially for salutogenesis or alternative therapies, anything that you could pick?

[00:41:16] What would that be?

[00:41:18] Um, so, uh, hopefully I can back up and be really general here.

[00:41:25] Um, lots of people think that alternative therapies are just placebo, the placebo effect.

[00:41:31] Now, I disagree in many cases, but, but let's pretend for a moment that they are placebo.

[00:41:37] So in conventional medicine, if something performs only as well as a placebo, it's, it's considered worthless.

[00:41:44] Now, most of that's probably because it also comes along with all sorts of, uh, adverse effects.

[00:41:49] And, and, uh, if you could get the same effect with a placebo, well then obviously getting negative effects.

[00:41:56] I mean, you wouldn't want that approved as a drug.

[00:41:59] But the, the, the, the placebo effect itself, um, shows us how body or how powerful the body's, uh, ability to heal really is.

[00:42:10] So placebo isn't nothing.

[00:42:12] It's a trigger that engages the brain's ability to start the healing process.

[00:42:18] Um, so let me contrast to things that are clearly not placebo.

[00:42:23] Like, so take stitches, for example, stitches don't heal your skin.

[00:42:29] They simply pull to, uh, or the torn edges of skin back together again and hold them together long enough for the body to heal.

[00:42:40] But it's the body that heals itself.

[00:42:42] The stitches don't do anything except change the environment there so that it's easier for the body to heal.

[00:42:49] Um, likewise, most drugs work in a similar fashion.

[00:42:52] They force a certain cellular action to occur.

[00:42:56] And that causes a shift in the environment that allows healing to occur.

[00:43:01] But it's the body that's actually doing the healing, not the conventional intervention.

[00:43:11] And so, uh, the placebo effect, uh, really suggests that we can, we can trigger this healing directly.

[00:43:19] Um, there's even a, uh, I think it's called the purple pill.

[00:43:24] There was a company making, uh, a little pill.

[00:43:27] I think it just had, uh, yeast in it or something.

[00:43:30] Um, and the whole idea was that you took this purple looking pill, you set a healing intention, and then you take the pill.

[00:43:40] And you let that, uh, that action initiate the healing response from the brain.

[00:43:46] Um, and so, uh, the brain's link to a novel physical action, um, could also explain why, uh, so many therapies work, uh, fairly well initially and then peter off.

[00:43:59] As the brain becomes more accustomed to this new stimulus, it has less of an effect.

[00:44:05] Um, but something that if you start studying applied, uh, applied neuroscience or applied neurology, you'll find that, uh, the answer to almost every question is almost always, it depends.

[00:44:20] Um, you can, uh, it's, it's also possible that the brain, as it becomes familiar with a specific stimulus being associated with healing, that, that healing process gets stronger.

[00:44:34] So, so you could actually go either way.

[00:44:36] Um, regardless, uh, what I find interesting here is that if somebody in authority discredits the placebo effect for any treatment, pick, pick whatever treatment you want.

[00:44:52] If you believe that, then for you, those placebo effects disappear.

[00:44:57] And assuming no one was being taken advantage of, um, I question whether the authority that performed, uh, this, uh, or, or convinced you, um, or discredited this placebo.

[00:45:15] Did they do you a service or not?

[00:45:18] Right.

[00:45:19] Whatever it was, it worked before and almost by definition had no adverse effects.

[00:45:24] And now it won't work.

[00:45:28] So while I don't think that most alternative therapies are placebo, even if they are, I don't want to discredit them.

[00:45:40] Because you can think of prayer as a placebo effect, meaning the act of praying and asking your body to get better or asking God to get better.

[00:45:54] God or spirit or whatever to help you get better can be in some instances enough of a trigger to your brain to turn on the healing process.

[00:46:05] Are you going to ever tell somebody not to do that?

[00:46:09] Um, I don't know.

[00:46:12] I guess, I guess, I guess that's what I would say in terms of, uh, if I can debunk anything, it's that the placebo effect can be the most amazing healing, uh, possible.

[00:46:24] Yeah.

[00:46:24] You're kind of, uh, you're kind of, uh, making a point that, uh, why, why stop doing it if it's, it is going to be net negative for you.

[00:46:36] So, uh, it's at least having it is going to probably lead to, even if it's placebo is can lead to positive, uh, results, outcomes, whatever that is.

[00:46:48] So, uh, by not doing it, you basically are closing that door to healing or whatever that you want to say it.

[00:46:56] So, and that's, and that kind of like putting yourself out of that option of what it is.

[00:47:03] Right.

[00:47:03] So, uh, interesting.

[00:47:05] Yeah.

[00:47:05] That's very interesting the way you put it up and explained it, but makes sense.

[00:47:10] Um, okay.

[00:47:11] Well, this has been great, but before we conclude today's, uh, conversation or episode,

[00:47:19] what would you like listeners to walk away with after, you know, uh, hearing your story and the mission behind, uh, Ionic foundation?

[00:47:31] What, what, what's like one thing, uh, would you like all the listeners to walk away with?

[00:47:38] Um, I guess I would say three things.

[00:47:40] Uh, first is that, um, conventional medicine doesn't have all the answers and money plays a huge role.

[00:47:50] In what treatments are offered and why in conventional medicine.

[00:47:54] Um, I'd actually, in an ideal world, there wouldn't be convention, conventional versus alternative medicine.

[00:48:03] There would just be medicine and there would just be healthcare.

[00:48:06] And it doesn't matter whether something took a billion dollars to develop or has been being practiced for a thousand years.

[00:48:14] If they produce benefit, um, we could use both of them and we could look at both.

[00:48:21] And if somebody wanted to do research, you could actually do the research on the, the traditional practice and look at why it is beneficial.

[00:48:31] Um, but at the same time, if people have been doing that for a thousand years, um, you could argue that that might be a waste of money because we already know it's working.

[00:48:41] But from a conventional viewpoint, you're not allowed to say that because no one's proven it.

[00:48:47] Um, so that's my first thing.

[00:48:49] Convention in Madison doesn't know everything.

[00:48:51] Uh, the second thing I know I pointed out how there's no end of the people who will exploit the fear associated with a significant disease.

[00:49:04] But I'd like to also point out that there are also people who generally want to help and are trying to make a difference.

[00:49:14] Um, and finally, I guess we should remember that the choices we make every day, what we eat, how we move, what we think moves us along the wellness spectrum, either toward health or toward disease.

[00:49:33] And finding a balance there is key.

[00:49:36] Uh, and, and I, I guess I would suggest striving to make healthy choices roughly 80% of the time is probably a good, good rule.

[00:49:45] The 80-20 rule, uh, shows up everywhere and health and wellness is no exception.

[00:49:54] So those would be the three things that, uh, that I'd like you to take away.

[00:49:58] All right.

[00:49:59] Um, you heard it and Jason, this has been great conversation and, uh, we will put all the,

[00:50:08] links to the show notes, including website and Apple, Spotify, wherever you get your, uh, podcast.

[00:50:15] And if you want to watch the video, it will be on YouTube and also on the show website.

[00:50:19] And, uh, we will come back next time with more detailed discussions on the next topic.

[00:50:25] Thank you for your time, Jason.

[00:50:26] Much appreciated.

[00:50:27] Well, thank you very much.