Episode Details

For this last week of 2020, each day we will re-release one of the most popular episodes of the past year. We will resume our regular schedule with a new episode on 1/4/2021. Have a Happy Holiday and Happy New Year!

Best of 2020 #3: Dr. Andrew Huberman - The Surprising Truth About Stress (And How it Can Actually Be Healthy) (Originally released 8/18/20)

Dr. Andrew Huberman: The Surprising Truth About Stress (And How it Can Actually Be Healthy) 

THIS EPISODE WILL BLOW YOUR MIND!

Do you want to know the surprising truth about stress and how it actually can benefit your health?

Then, you will not want to miss today's episode with neuroscientist, Dr. Andrew Huberman where we cover addiction, stress, cell phones (as he calls it digital concussion) and his incredible story. 

Andrew Huberman, Ph.D., is a neuroscientist and tenured Professor in the Department of Neurobiology at the Stanford University School of Medicine. He has made numerous important contributions to the fields of brain development, brain function and neural plasticity, which is the ability of our nervous system to rewire and learn new behaviors, skills and cognitive functioning. 

Huberman is a McKnight Foundation and Pew Foundation Fellow and was awarded the Cogan Award in 2017, which is given to the scientist making the largest discoveries in the study of vision. His lab’s most recent work focuses on the influence of vision and respiration on human performance and brain states such as fear and courage. He also works on neural regeneration and directs a clinical trial to promote visual restoration in diseases that cause blindness. Huberman is also actively involved in developing tools now in use by elite military in the US and Canada, athletes, and technology industries for optimizing performance in high stress environments, enhancing neural plasticity, mitigating stress, and optimizing sleep. 

Work from the Huberman Laboratory at Stanford Medical School has been published in top journals including Nature, Science, and Cell and has been featured in TIME, BBC, Scientific American, Discover, and other top media outlets.

Andrew’s Journey

Andrew had a great start to his life. 

His mother wrote children’s books and his father was a theoretical physicist. Everything in Andrew’s life was going very well, until he turned 13 and his parents separated. When his dad left, Andrew’s mother began to experience stress. 

At about the same time that Andrew’s parents separated, his older sister had just left for college. This left him to face life’s obstacles all alone, and reality took a sudden turn for Andrew.

With everything changing so fast in Andrew’s life, he turned to skateboarding as a way to handle and relieve the stress. 

It was while skateboarding in Embarcadero, San Francisco that Andrew started to meet new friends, most of whom were growing up without much parental control or influence.  This is when Andrew began to recognize that kids growing up without two parent families, lived lives that were more chaotic than other kids with more normal home lives. As Andrew entered puberty, he started skipping school, and from the ages of 14-17, most of his time was spent either skateboarding or with his girlfriend. 

As time went by, Andrew also turned to boxing as another tool to handle his stress.

Andrew was ultimately kicked out of school because of the constant troubles that accompanied his presence. He was offered a chance to resume his studies under the condition of going to therapy. 

The therapist was of great help, demonstrating to Andrew that there was a better way for him to structure his life. By adding certain types of life tools and structure to his life, Andrew learned that he could achieve the life he was