The Art of Manliness - #336： Master Your Testosterone

00:00:00.000 brett mckay here and welcome to another edition of the art of manliness podcast

00:00:18.560 testosterone is what puts hair in your chest gives you the big manly muscles

00:00:22.400 you see that deep manly voice and fills you with fiery thumos but testosterone levels in men living

00:00:27.760 in the west have been on the decline in the past 60 years your grandfather and your dad likely had

00:00:32.480 more tea when they were the same age as you to remedy this decline offices and strip malls have

00:00:36.700 been popping up across the country that provide prescription testosterone replacement therapy

00:00:40.660 my guest today argues that while testosterone replacement therapy certainly has a place in

00:00:44.820 treating low tea it's often used too quickly as a first recourse he argues the vast majority of men

00:00:49.600 would be better off increasing their tea levels through simple natural lifestyle changes process

00:00:54.000 he successfully accomplished himself his name is christopher walker he's the author of the book

00:00:57.840 master your tea the definitive guide to raising your testosterone today on the show christopher

00:01:01.860 shares how he raised his own tea levels from almost non-existent to optimal just making simple

00:01:06.360 changes in his lifestyle we then discuss what the symptoms of low testosterone are the main culprits

00:01:11.020 of low t and why this vital hormone has been decreasing in modern men we dig into the benefits

00:01:15.220 of having optimal testosterone and no it's not just about sex and muscles christopher then goes into

00:01:19.960 how testosterone is produced in the body and where things often go wrong in this process and then

00:01:24.360 we get into brass tacks of what you can do to raise your tea levels naturally we also discuss when you

00:01:29.340 should actually go visit a doctor for testosterone replacement therapy great podcast filled with some

00:01:33.840 interesting insights i've enjoyed our series on how to increase your testosterone naturally you'll enjoy

00:01:37.900 this show also a you know medical disclaimer before you make any lifestyle changes go talk to your

00:01:43.040 doctor seek some medical advice also check out our show notes at aom.is slash testosterone where you find

00:01:48.560 links to resources where you delve deeper into this topic

00:01:50.920 all right christopher walker welcome to the show thank you glad to be here so you're an owner of a

00:02:00.700 website called anabolic men you've also published a book called mastering your tea the definitive guide

00:02:06.180 to increasing your testosterone naturally what got you started this is becoming your sort of life work

00:02:11.620 helping men increase their testosterone levels naturally i'm curious what got you started researching

00:02:15.600 and writing about testosterone yeah it's actually a roundabout story it's something i honestly never

00:02:21.140 thought i would ever be doing as a career and then uh i actually fought it in terms of becoming like a

00:02:29.100 business because i was like i just want to do this but i guess starting from square one it was

00:02:34.800 the reason that i never expected to go down this road was because you know i was uh pretty young i was a

00:02:40.480 teenager when i was about 19 years old when when i started to have or i was actually still in high

00:02:46.520 school i think i was 17 when i started to actually have the symptoms of something was going wrong with

00:02:51.400 my health and you know i didn't i was not aware even of nutrition or anything back then so i just kind

00:02:57.860 of went along with things thought it was just you know stress for no reason kind of deal and ended up

00:03:03.600 when i was 19 the doctors found a pituitary tumor after you know a couple years of of like a lot of

00:03:11.860 depression issues a lot of anxiety issues i had to actually take a year off of college because i just

00:03:17.720 couldn't cope with things and there was a lot of stuff going wrong you know a lot of insomnia

00:03:21.040 just all these symptoms of hormonal imbalance eventually it it became you know a thing that i went

00:03:29.280 into my doctor because i had no sex drive as a 19 year old and i said hey i just need a blood test

00:03:34.960 it it was it was crazy and this is what kind of got me onto my current belief of uh helping people do

00:03:40.700 things naturally now because back then you know what it took two years for them to even do a blood

00:03:46.740 test on me a 19 year old with with like you know a lot of issues a lot of health issues and uh i thought

00:03:53.620 that was insane so when they finally did the blood test it became evident that something was wrong like

00:03:58.140 right away my general practitioner sent me to a hematologist oncologist in in northern virginia i

00:04:05.240 went to that guy he did like a full blood and hormone panel instantly said you have a brain tumor

00:04:10.040 and you're pituitary i i would bet money on it so we got an mri found it boom you know at least i knew

00:04:15.900 what was going on and how to how to um go from there at that point but what i thought was so insane was

00:04:22.060 like they were putting me in therapy programs they were putting me on on all sorts of like

00:04:26.440 antidepressants and all these drugs and uh when it comes down to it none of that was issue it wasn't

00:04:32.880 a behavioral problem it wasn't a you know an antidepressant deficiency it was really just i had

00:04:37.060 a tumor and no one ever thought to do a blood test so that's that that kind of uh that experience

00:04:42.500 basically instilled the passion in me i was like i was like oh my gosh this is kind of a messed up

00:04:46.940 system right now and then later when i started to teach and write about stuff that obviously became

00:04:52.380 laced that sentiment or that ethos like became laced into my mentality of you know why i think

00:04:59.580 it's really good for people to explore a natural option because a lot of people's health problems

00:05:04.000 don't have anything to do with the drug deficiency and they i mean drugs have helped a lot of people

00:05:09.680 but they've hurt more more than they've helped and i think there's a current resurgence right now

00:05:14.900 that's really cool of the natural uh you know going back to our roots and figuring things out

00:05:20.320 naturally and have a problem solving mentality there's like an awakening kind of happening

00:05:23.620 generally but um there's still a lot of work to do on that end and so that's what got me into it

00:05:28.540 the the pituitary tumor one of the biggest symptoms the one that i cared the most about was low testosterone

00:05:33.380 my testosterone was 11 nanograms per deciliter which is basically zero the tumor was acting like a

00:05:39.520 blocker so blocking hormone production in my pituitary there's a couple other types of pituitary tumors

00:05:45.600 some of them the other three types actually uh hyper secrete so then you have you have people

00:05:50.480 in that case with like you know extreme growth you know other other sorts of hormonal issues because of

00:05:56.640 that hyper secreting tumor but mine was a blocking tumor so it was blocking all the production of these

00:06:00.960 key hormones that i really needed and uh so it became my personal you know fit and problem to solve

00:06:09.160 and uh all i cared about was testosterone because i was 19 i was like i need to have a sex drive

00:06:13.820 and uh so i but i was tired of the drugs i knew how terrible it made me feel so i uh set off to

00:06:21.300 figure out how to do it naturally and that's kind of how this all ended up my i got my testosterone to

00:06:26.940 almost 1200 nanograms per deciliter completely naturally with you know nutrition like smart

00:06:32.320 nutrition start smart stress management training etc i kind of ran the gamut and tried to figure it out

00:06:38.640 tried all this different stuff and then uh after that a lot of my friends were asking me how to do

00:06:44.640 it i ended up writing a book that book turned into a website eventually turned into uh partnering with

00:06:50.660 ali kuopala on anabolic men.com and now the book is in its fourth edition master your tea like you said

00:06:56.380 and uh here we are here we are well so do you still have the tumor in your pituitary gland

00:07:02.820 uh i don't so i actually haven't uh gotten an mri in a couple years i would imagine it's not there

00:07:07.900 it might sound like a radical thing to say but but you know one of the things i've been doing is

00:07:12.320 fasting for almost eight years now um yeah about eight years and i i did the fasting initially to

00:07:19.940 try and get rid of the tumor i need to go back definitely and get another mri it's been a few years

00:07:24.520 but it hasn't grown at all in terms of uh last time i got checked and i think it's potentially gone

00:07:31.480 because all the symptoms of it have have been gone for many years it's interesting and how do you know

00:07:36.380 why these tumors pop up is it just genetics is it environmental a combination of the two i actually

00:07:43.220 i have absolutely no idea that that's one of the things that i haven't been able to figure out

00:07:47.360 like trying to self-examine and look back like where did this come from because i you know i was

00:07:53.620 always like really active i was in great shape you know through through high school uh an athlete

00:07:58.920 it might have been caused by a nutritional issue that's the only thing i could think of because

00:08:04.160 really all i my diet when i was in high school middle school growing up was consisted of like

00:08:08.860 frozen foods you know pizzas and whatever chips gatorade that was about it so um it could have been

00:08:17.460 a nutritional stressor but other than that i don't really know where these things come from

00:08:22.100 they're surprisingly common though it was one thing i learned was that more people have pituitary tumors

00:08:26.880 than they know um and i've actually talked to people in the since then um you know personal

00:08:31.840 friends who they'll tell me their symptoms will kind of like open up and be vulnerable about what

00:08:37.660 they're going through i'm like i guarantee you you have something going on in there you would

00:08:41.840 definitely want to get an mri and still people when they hear that even though i've had the experience

00:08:45.420 with it they still are reluctant to accept it and which is interesting but yeah they're actually

00:08:51.400 really common right yeah i think there was like recently there was a book that was turned into a

00:08:56.120 movie about a guy who didn't find out he had a pituitary tumor into until his 30s and then he

00:09:02.100 did he got got rid of it somehow what through medication or surgery i don't know what he did

00:09:05.800 but then basically he like went through puberty during his 30s and he just talked about the

00:09:11.400 experience that it was absolutely insane like acne showed up sex drive was just out the roof never

00:09:16.960 experienced that before uh just you know it was just like what you experienced during puberty when

00:09:22.140 you're 13 14 years old do you remember the name of that movie i'd love to i can't remember it i

00:09:26.980 can't remember it i thought we'll put it in the show notes um okay cool whenever i look back at it

00:09:31.940 but uh yeah he didn't know like all through um high school he you know he noted he thought he wasn't

00:09:39.120 developing like the other guys but i didn't think it was anything more was like oh i'm just a late

00:09:41.920 bloomer um and it wasn't until his 30s that he finally found out oh man i haven't gone through

00:09:47.460 puberty yet because i had this pituitary tumor that was preventing testosterone which is like

00:09:52.740 that's what kickstarts puberty right that androgen yeah so yeah um okay well so you had a tumor that

00:10:01.120 um basically stunted testosterone production we'll talk later on about how testosterone how testosterone

00:10:07.400 is produced in the body because i think it's important for guys to understand um so they know how

00:10:11.840 to tackle the problems of low t but besides uh pituitary problems and what other things cause

00:10:19.100 low testosterone because they're like i think i've read research and we've written about on the site

00:10:23.120 that testosterone levels in men in the west have been decreasing for the past century so what does

00:10:30.560 the research say is going on there that you've you've found yep so so over everything that i've read

00:10:36.980 over the years basically i came to the conclusion like people they they tend to chalk it up to aging

00:10:42.560 as like as though that as though time causes uh causes it to lower and that's just what people

00:10:49.800 commonly accept it accept as um but when you use when you look in the context there's a couple things

00:10:55.000 like the context of the last hundred years you got to look at what's changed for for people like

00:11:01.120 you know in in our western world what has changed for us that can leave you know lead you to some

00:11:06.680 clues um but then also the idea that that aging itself you know or time passing forward is in some way

00:11:15.680 uh causing low testosterone i think is it just ends up being uh just kind of like a bit lazy for

00:11:22.140 for when researchers say it kind of frustrates me so because it doesn't tell you the whole picture

00:11:27.820 it's kind of like they just accept it and then stop there the thing is aging is uh there's a lot

00:11:33.440 that goes into you know aging if you take for example if anyone listening to this we just kind

00:11:38.520 of picture uh two people we've all seen it there's like the basically around 50 years old you can

00:11:44.620 typically like i know people that are 50 that look like they're 30 and then i know other people that

00:11:50.640 are 50 that look like they're 70 so what what's the difference between those those uh two two

00:11:57.720 individuals what it really comes down to is uh it's on a cellular level obviously but it kind of

00:12:03.400 goes up to a more macro level uh which is more tangible for people to understand is uh it has a

00:12:09.560 lot to do with micronutrient deficiencies which accumulate over time and a lot of us end up starting

00:12:15.160 on our deficiency train you know when we're kids like think back to what i was just saying my diet was as

00:12:21.660 a kid it was terribly nutrient deficient right um so if you accumulate that and push that over

00:12:28.600 decades and decades to the point where someone gets into their 30s 40s and 50s that's why a lot of

00:12:33.880 people start to experience problems with their hormones and and they they never had those problems

00:12:39.160 before it's basically because it just at that point seems to be where the the kind of the combination

00:12:45.100 of these micronutrient deficiencies these key which are really raw materials so people understand what

00:12:49.920 they are the the vitamins and minerals uh are the raw materials that your body needs to produce

00:12:55.420 hormones and it needs these things to also to regulate your metabolism through your thyroid gland

00:13:01.520 um and so forth so what happens is when it starts to run out of these things if you're not getting it

00:13:07.500 that in your diet and also if you're not assimilating these things in your gut um it's going to start

00:13:13.220 what your body does it will literally pull and create this material from other tissues also

00:13:18.940 so in other places inside the body so just through like processes where maybe it has to take something

00:13:25.040 like two or three steps to get you know some vitamin that it needs to fuel this other thing but eventually

00:13:30.080 you kind of run out and that's when these health problems start to happen um it's also around the time

00:13:35.800 when uh people you know when they're in the 30s 40s 50s they start to have all these health issues

00:13:41.280 because a lot of the stress has uh begun accumulating and starting to manifest in symptoms

00:13:47.840 that are unavoidable or unignorable at that point and you know this this is i guess if there's one

00:13:55.580 thing to point out it's the elevated cortisol levels cortisol is important to um have in a balance

00:14:01.920 and to utilize for for certain uh you know reasons especially uh the topic or the example that i like to use

00:14:09.640 is you know getting them get out of the way of a taxi for example acute acute things right so things

00:14:14.780 that are going to activate your fight or flight response in a survival scenario or in a scenario

00:14:19.680 where it can be constructive for example uh during you know weight training or some kind of physical

00:14:26.780 training that that you can then recover from and become stronger because of it but your body does

00:14:30.940 require an increase in cortisol uh to actually you know lift that whatever it is 250 pound bench 300 pound

00:14:37.980 bench whatever whatever you're doing um but then you need to be able to recover from it where a lot

00:14:43.420 of people running the problem is they have uh chronically elevated and increasingly higher

00:14:49.540 levels of cortisol throughout their life decade after decade especially as you know just logically

00:14:55.240 like you're a kid you don't have to pay bills and you then you start to uh get hit with a lot of

00:15:00.540 realities of the world then you have kids and you you know have jobs and etc you move around

00:15:06.800 like a lot of stress starts to come into people's lives and typically it's around the 30s 40s and

00:15:11.460 50s it starts to really manifest in in potentially health issues and then you add on top of that the

00:15:16.620 micronutrient deficiencies that are basically throwing your hormone production into a state of chaos

00:15:23.800 uh the the combination of those two things i think are the biggest levers that lead to disease and

00:15:31.420 um obviously you know imbalance and health issues in people later and low testosterone is definitely

00:15:37.920 one of those right and i mean besides you know testosterone lowering as you get older because

00:15:43.760 of just stress and just not taking care of yourself like it's actually lowering amongst men who should

00:15:48.980 be at their peak right like like a 20 year old today i think has lower testosterone than say

00:15:54.240 their dad or their grandfather had at the same age yep and and that was another thing also

00:16:00.120 the topic i want to talk about with like what happened in the last hundred years chemicals and

00:16:05.980 the the rise in these chemicals that that act as estrogens in the body or that can act as estrogens and

00:16:13.400 there's there's a lot of them out there there's a surprising amount of things but it also if you

00:16:16.740 think about from just kind of everything that we tend to consume or uh rub on our bodies whether it's

00:16:24.660 soap or lotion or suntan lotion uh that sort of shampoo stuff we're rubbing into our scalp things

00:16:31.040 that people don't even think about that they do on a daily basis uh even down to the clothes that we

00:16:35.400 wear have dyes in them that potentially have heavy metals in them there's a lot of stuff getting into

00:16:40.740 our body and our skin is extremely absorbent there's a lot of stuff getting into our bodies

00:16:44.760 these these days that were not even they didn't even exist 100 years ago so it definitely you know

00:16:52.080 on top of all the the micronutrient deficiencies and the stress um we're starting to see these these

00:16:58.680 low testosterone levels in guys in their 20s like you said uh and i think it's from the constant

00:17:04.580 exposure to chemicals that are unnatural for our bodies and easily absorbed because our skin is

00:17:10.880 extremely absorbent right these are called xenestrogens right xeno is that what they're

00:17:16.160 called it's like a special it starts an x xenoestrogen xenoestrogen yeah yeah yeah so yeah

00:17:23.080 it's in chemicals plastics um i've read that even from a pediatrician that um he's been noticing

00:17:30.640 this is sort of anecdotally an increase in hyposidious i think it's what it's called amongst

00:17:36.100 young boys is basically it's when the penis doesn't fully develop and so the urethra instead

00:17:41.900 of the hole instead of being at the tip it's like at the bottom or closer to the scrotum he's

00:17:46.740 sending increase in that and one of the theories or and again this all anecdotal is that mothers

00:17:51.440 being exposed to all these chemicals plastics etc that increases estrogen in their bodies and then

00:17:56.820 that has an effect on the male fetus in terms of development of the genitals yeah that's i mean

00:18:02.440 that's a very plausible theory i would agree with that so um a lot of people think okay well low

00:18:11.060 testosterone it's not that big of a deal i mean you might not have much of a sex drive uh you might

00:18:15.360 not you know be jacked or whatever but i mean besides though are there other downsides or other ill

00:18:21.560 health effects that come with lower testosterone particularly in men oh definitely so the well i think

00:18:28.360 there's there's this thing because having had such low testosterone at some point uh and now having

00:18:34.260 very healthy testosterone levels i can i can think back the biggest thing it was less about like a

00:18:40.600 specific like oh i wasn't jacked or or whatever something like that that people would typically think

00:18:45.380 about first but it was literally i did not feel like a man and i i think that i don't know if there's

00:18:50.840 some like definition of that but the that was the biggest thing and i think that's the biggest asset

00:18:57.640 that a man can actually have is to feel masculine and to be in touch with that and um i felt like an it

00:19:05.120 i remember thinking that back then i was like i just feel like i am asexual and that that went just

00:19:14.040 not not from like a reproductive standpoint only but literally from a a gender standpoint um and

00:19:21.000 having that masculine energy restored uh meant everything to to what happened after that and now

00:19:28.500 you know i'm very ambitious i do whatever i want i completely i seek freedom in my life and i and i

00:19:35.180 build i'm building my life the way that i want it to be and i think on a like not really a physical

00:19:40.040 level but more of a psychological or spiritual level that is the biggest thing for that a man

00:19:47.280 needs to have in balance to really succeed in in their own way like however that guy wants it to be

00:19:53.800 but if that does if if someone has low testosterone and they really are in that situation where

00:19:59.060 they're not they don't have a lot of masculine energy then um restoring that testosterone is gonna

00:20:05.280 really really help right so yeah you uh decrease drive depression is often uh ill effect of lower

00:20:13.960 testosterone and i think that's because testosterone is a precursor to dopamine um so there's lower

00:20:20.160 testosterone there's lower dopamine yeah dopamine helps to increase testosterone it's all in a feedback

00:20:26.500 loop yeah it's all in a feedback loop yeah um so what are the benefits of optimal testosterone i guess

00:20:33.500 you've been kind of mentioning it so it's you just have more energy more vitality anything else beyond

00:20:38.620 that like physiologically that that comes with testosterone that makes it mixes healthy men

00:20:44.000 yeah uh i mean hair hair growth that was a big one i can i can grow a pretty good beard now

00:20:50.540 that was good the the ability to put on muscle and uh really develop the your physique and um just be

00:20:59.640 strong in general i think it's important for men to be strong see a lot of guys that are that are

00:21:04.600 weak and it just you know i think as a man you should be strong you don't need to be like some

00:21:09.720 jacked bodybuilder but you should be pretty strong that's really important as as a protector as a you

00:21:15.560 know provider i mean just the the fact of not having to deal with depression the fact of sleeping

00:21:20.340 really well relaxed uh having your mind like in a really clear place the clarity of mind that i would

00:21:27.200 definitely attribute it to having a balanced you know healthy testosterone level because if anyone

00:21:31.820 who's gone through depression or had anxiety problems if anyone who's gone through that knows

00:21:36.960 you have no clarity at all you're foggy imagine how much more effective you are at anything you do

00:21:43.060 if you have clarity of mind i mean that that's it's again it's like it seems so basic and simple it's

00:21:50.540 not like oh yeah you're going to grow some giant biceps but it's like if you have that if you have that

00:21:54.660 level of execution on a daily basis you're going to get so much more done you're going to feel so

00:21:59.000 much better in general and that that obviously everything i think works in a feedback loop in

00:22:03.560 the body that helps to keep your stress low helps to keep your testosterone high also obviously the

00:22:09.160 benefits of with uh your sex life which is also major i mean people that that if if you're having

00:22:16.620 problems in that department anyone can uh empathize with with how uh i guess decapitating it can be

00:22:23.180 and then also just the fact that there's plenty of research showing that more frequent sex not

00:22:27.640 only increases testosterone but also lowers uh stress levels so and helps helps men relax

00:22:33.080 and women so there's i mean there's a lot of major benefits and and obviously um you know you don't

00:22:38.940 need to have like ridiculously raging high testosterone levels to feel this way to feel good but you need

00:22:45.000 to make sure that they are not low if they're in a nice healthy range which uh typically for guys

00:22:50.640 would be over 600 like between 600 and 1200 i've seen guys get up to as high as 1500 naturally

00:22:57.020 um ali coppola my partner in anabolic men he he's been at 1500 before but beyond a certain point you

00:23:04.540 don't see many like i guess it's it's more like asymptotic in terms of the benefits beyond a certain

00:23:11.140 point there's not like massive returns on it and then you see the guys that go into like super

00:23:16.140 physiological levels by injecting it or using creams or you know some kind of anabolic steroids

00:23:21.760 they start to run into a bunch of other issues at that point so yeah let's talk about that why

00:23:27.620 try to do this naturally why not get testosterone replacement like why didn't you ask the doctor

00:23:33.680 right when you're going through all this stuff just give me some cream or give me an injection

00:23:38.040 yep so at this point i uh when i kind of got to that that point i was i was just tired of

00:23:45.040 pharmaceuticals i i was like i want to figure out a way to see if i can do this naturally

00:23:49.860 it was i was pretty bullheaded like when i get a thought in my mind i just want to do it

00:23:54.880 and i know my parents were kind of freaked out and people like obviously they advised against it but i

00:24:00.540 pretty quickly had figured out because i also went i went to duke university for neuroscience

00:24:06.340 i was learning about the brain and the body the way things work i know there's a feedback loop

00:24:11.560 there are tons of feedback loops in this specific case um you know the testosterone feedback loop is

00:24:18.380 is uh pretty simple and we can get into or it's i mean it's simple to like on an overview level it's

00:24:24.520 actually extremely complicated but if we just want to keep it simple here the there are certain areas

00:24:29.840 to manipulate i knew that if i could at least figure something out in that that uh axis that it feeds

00:24:36.080 back to the brain and will up regulate and increase testosterone production so i was like well i want

00:24:42.180 to do this naturally because also um just on a really on a basic level if i have to be on testosterone

00:24:49.120 replacement therapy uh even as a 19 year old but um you know anybody that's considering it you have to

00:24:55.340 think about this you are going to be you're going to have to be on it for the rest of your life

00:25:00.040 to feel good to feel the way you want to feel because what happens is you you use that testosterone

00:25:06.400 that exogenous testosterone the the body because of the feedback loop it sends signals to your brain

00:25:12.500 that says uh we have plenty thank you and what happens is your brain stops producing or signaling

00:25:18.820 to produce more testosterone so you're actually just reliant on this this uh you know whether it's

00:25:25.160 synthetic or bioidentical this exogenous testosterone for the rest of your life in order to feel the way

00:25:30.560 you want to feel and that did not seem like a good idea to me so um i thought i'd try my hand at

00:25:36.300 figuring it out naturally because i know also with the feedback loops and this is something that a lot

00:25:40.660 of people get worried about they're like oh what if i get it too high you know isn't that going to

00:25:44.860 run into problems thing is if you do it all naturally you're not it's not possible to get it too high

00:25:50.380 because that feedback loop doesn't just increase production but it will decrease production

00:25:54.860 so when you get to that that high level which i think is about probably 1500 nanograms per deciliter

00:26:00.900 the highest i've ever seen someone do it um with you know completely natural methods but when you're

00:26:06.700 around that level it's going to start to just slow down it's not going to cut it off but it's going

00:26:11.580 to say okay we're good like we don't really need any more now we can just hang around here

00:26:15.800 so um yeah did that answer your question or did that help yeah no that was perfect i mean but is

00:26:22.920 there a point where you think um like say a guy just i'm gonna try to do it naturally but he's not

00:26:26.920 seeing any progress is there a point where he should like go talk to a doctor about trt um so what i would

00:26:32.740 say for guys to that the people i would recommend guys that use trt i there's a couple different

00:26:38.480 things so uh first off if if someone has an issue with a gland or some aspect like a real medical

00:26:46.320 issue uh where something is not there like for for some reason i've gotten emails from guys that have

00:26:52.880 no pituitary gland for example i'm like well sorry you honestly can't and they want to do it naturally

00:26:58.800 but i was like i don't know really if there is any way you can um i think trt is probably a good option

00:27:05.760 so and also guys that have to get their testes removed for example for uh cancer testicular

00:27:12.960 cancer that again throws kind of a fork in the spokes of uh the whole system um anyone with

00:27:20.640 certain brain damage or or um organ damage or something that really like for example uh say

00:27:27.080 say someone has like really terrible liver problems or maybe they're an alcoholic for many many years and

00:27:32.560 the because when when your liver is out of balance uh what's going to happen is there's going to be a

00:27:36.460 lot of production of uh shbg and uh aromatase so there's gonna be really high estrogen and really

00:27:43.260 high or low free testosterone but high shbg which is going to bound that that um serum testosterone

00:27:49.020 so it's going to bind the serum testosterone so there's certain issues like that where these are

00:27:54.720 like real you know kind of nuanced medical issues that i would i would say you know you might want to

00:28:01.140 consider it if you want to feel better more immediately but or and in guys like some some

00:28:07.600 guys i actually have people that that that read our stuff or read our books and whatever and i've

00:28:12.800 emailed in that are in their 60s guys that are in their 60s they say i do this all naturally or i'm

00:28:16.700 i'm using like something supplement advice that sort of thing and they increase their testosterone levels

00:28:22.360 i had the guy who was he was 62 and he had over 700 testosterone and he was just he was loving it but

00:28:28.980 he did it all naturally um but there's another group where there's guys that you know they're

00:28:34.320 they're over 75 80 years old maybe they feel like they're on their last leg of life and they really

00:28:39.160 want to feel better for a period of time that might be a good option at that point but for the most part

00:28:44.840 i think people are way too quick to get in there and try and get it because they think it's a quick

00:28:49.420 fix but really what's going to happen is you're going to be relying on it for the rest of your life

00:28:53.000 i think there's plenty of people are perfectly capable of increasing their testosterone naturally

00:28:59.240 and then getting it to a point and developing the habits that are necessary to get it to that point

00:29:03.040 just developing those habits is going to change your life because most people don't want to look

00:29:08.240 at like what caused it in the first place if if you look at all the bad habits that that you've been

00:29:12.740 doing that caused a low testosterone in the first place and then you start to adjust those

00:29:16.180 and adjust them towards something that's that's healthier you're not only going to feel better

00:29:20.940 but you also now have these much better habits in general that are going to carry you forward

00:29:24.840 gotcha so um you mentioned earlier that you want to shoot for like optimal testosterone

00:29:30.440 around 600 what's it mega i don't know what's the measurement we're using here i'm just

00:29:36.220 nanograms per decimeter that's total yeah i wouldn't say that was opt i'd say like somewhere in

00:29:41.700 the 800 and 900 range but i'd say 600 ish is like where it's you'll start if you'll feel

00:29:46.060 you start feeling like is it like below 600 you might start feeling like uh i'm not this is i'm not

00:29:50.920 doing well right now yeah well i mean so how do you how do how do you recommend guys go

00:29:56.080 getting tested because i've when i wrote our series about testosterone a couple years back

00:30:01.100 i remember we got a lot of comments saying that they're you know when these guys are going to the

00:30:06.100 doctor and say i want a testosterone test but like their doctors were really reluctant to give

00:30:09.680 them a blood test for testosterone which is really simple how do you go i mean what's the best

00:30:15.400 way to go get tested for your testosterone levels yeah i mean luckily now the there are a lot of

00:30:21.180 services out there that make this easy because i think personalized medicine is really becoming a

00:30:25.880 thing it's going to be a big movement here in the next 50 years but uh something like wellness effects

00:30:31.560 offers testosterone tech tests uh life extension offers a ton of tests and uh so if people

00:30:38.660 haven't checked out life extension is pretty good there's you know they do mail order tests i just saw

00:30:42.860 another one called i think it's called well path yeah let's see customize oh this might not be the

00:30:54.620 one but there are some other ones i saw another one uh that did they're advertising a lot on instagram

00:31:00.080 right now oh yeah well it's not this one it's like this is like a shake but there's one that's

00:31:05.020 advertising on instagram a lot right now that that they do uh saliva testing obviously blood testing i think

00:31:10.560 is more accurate uh if you're trying to measure how much testosterone is in your blood but um saliva

00:31:15.700 testing is still a measurement point you know it's like a scale that's how i view it it's like if you

00:31:21.520 if you're going to test saliva then just keep testing saliva uh if that's what you want to base your

00:31:26.140 point of reference on uh but now yeah there's there's a lot of options out there and um uh what's

00:31:32.820 that other do you know are you familiar with wellness effects oh it's talking yeah i'm familiar yeah

00:31:38.100 talking 20 is the other one not familiar with them yeah they're like the alternative to uh

00:31:43.240 wellness effects and um do you recommend like how do you go about getting tested because from what i

00:31:48.980 understand about testosterone because when we haven't gotten to it yet but how testosterone is

00:31:52.280 produced there's so many moving parts and there's this feedback loop and it's highly sensitive

00:31:56.620 that you can go in and measure your testosterone on one day and it's out the roof and then the next day

00:32:02.400 measure at the same time and it's like way down so how do you go about measuring your testosterone so

00:32:09.280 you get a good outlook of what your testosterone like your base testosterone levels at i would take

00:32:16.080 multiple data points for someone if someone's concerned with that or i would always measure under

00:32:21.000 the same conditions so uh for example you know if obviously if you're going to measure under the same

00:32:26.780 conditions say if someone was going to get if you're going to test it in in at 10 a.m.

00:32:30.620 and you know you weren't drinking a lot the night before or you you had like the same kind of level

00:32:37.480 of sleep as the previous test that'd be a pretty accurate uh reference point in terms of like looking

00:32:43.760 at different areas as long as you know know what variables you need to control for and then uh the

00:32:49.300 other option is to if you if you can afford it to take multiple tests at different times of the day

00:32:56.220 and then also to control for similar variables every time you do it because uh you know you could

00:33:02.060 have a different level potentially in the morning that you do in the evening and you likely will

00:33:05.460 but what you'll find is you'll there'll be like a standard deviation basically and uh as long as you

00:33:11.800 know what to expect there also as long as people don't you know really emotionally tie themselves to

00:33:15.380 like always having the perfect level uh but really staying within a good range that i think that would be

00:33:21.300 helpful yeah that is helpful because yeah that you're right your testosterone levels do peak in

00:33:25.820 most men in the morning which is why it's hard to go to the bathroom when you first wake up in the

00:33:30.880 morning um you always know what i'm talking about here yeah um so yeah and other kind of weird things

00:33:37.420 too is like i i uh you're i've read that research has shown that uh your t levels actually increase

00:33:42.880 generally in the fall for some reason and like thursdays are a day that i don't know that might be

00:33:49.420 just sort of like some kind of men's health stupid study but that wasn't something else i i've read

00:33:53.560 oh that's yeah i've never seen those but yeah um i mean it kind of makes sense like you could

00:33:58.740 correlate that thursday like the week starts getting really really long people are getting tired

00:34:03.880 thursday's like at that point maybe the stress is built right right um all right so a blood test is

00:34:09.940 ideal um because you can actually see what's in your blood saliva test is just another data point

00:34:14.640 and yeah you can get this online you don't necessarily have to go to your doctor of course if you go to

00:34:18.560 these other services insurance doesn't cover it but i think the price you're going to pay i've seen

00:34:23.720 like 70 to 100 for a serum blood test and it'll tell you your total and free testosterone levels

00:34:31.460 yeah exactly and i think i mean if someone wants to get a bit more extensive on what they're looking at

00:34:37.060 it does help to it does it helps to know because like for example if somebody measured uh free serum

00:34:43.660 um dht cortisol and e2 then they so they have like a gauge on the estrogen levels

00:34:51.940 then that would be a really good test to to take regularly because if a lot of people they'll get

00:34:58.860 they'll get a test and they'll send me a test that they have and say hey what do you think about this

00:35:04.080 but it's like just serum testosterone or something and it's low so i have no idea what they should do with

00:35:11.360 that right because if they had these other markers it would help to know oh you're even shbg is a

00:35:19.260 really really good one to test if your shbg is really really high it's pretty damn obvious why

00:35:24.000 your free testosterone is low that it you know it's because of your your shbg so um that and then that's

00:35:31.320 not that difficult to to regulate and then it's like you're you're saying it's like when you understand

00:35:35.720 the system then you can know where to to go in so if you have more data points it's really helpful

00:35:41.240 okay so we've been thrown around terms like total free testosterone shbg so a lot of people there's

00:35:48.760 misconceptions like oh my i look at my total testosterone number that's going to tell me

00:35:52.380 everything i need to know about my testosterone like i've got a really high test total testosterone

00:35:57.500 but like i'm still not seeing the effects so what are what's the difference between total

00:36:02.420 testosterone and free testosterone and then what role does shbg play in that yep so basically uh you

00:36:10.380 know the common two measurements are the are the total and free there's also the albumin bound but

00:36:15.000 typically they lump that in um with the uh where they lump it i think they lump it with free or with total

00:36:21.820 because it can easily be turned into free like you can easily break the albumin binding um the the

00:36:28.380 the shbg is is basically a hormone called is produced by the liver or it's a protein called a sex

00:36:36.200 hormone binding globulin and what it does is in the bloodstream it binds to the testosterone molecule

00:36:42.460 so when it's bound that testosterone molecule now cannot bind to an androgen receptor so you want a

00:36:50.740 and shbg is necessary in the scheme of things it's necessary as part of the whole feedback loop

00:36:55.860 but what happens is you know the bad thing is when people have too high of shbg um and they need to

00:37:03.060 lower it you know there's ways to lower it there's also ways to lower estrogen naturally there's ways

00:37:09.180 to manipulate all these things but understanding that when it's too high and it's binding too much

00:37:13.780 testosterone that your your free testosterone the active testosterone that's going to be able to bind to

00:37:19.160 the androgen receptor uh is now going to be much lower than it needs to be and then you're going to

00:37:25.200 have the downstream issues the fact you know any of the symptoms associated with low testosterone so

00:37:30.340 for example the example you used with a guy that has really high total you know but still has symptoms

00:37:36.100 of low testosterone that that would be a good guess of he probably you know and he definitely should

00:37:41.680 measure his shbg and is free so um you can kind of get a get a hold on stuff and and for example shbg

00:37:49.920 uh it's interesting because it is uh produced by the liver you see people that take on this might

00:37:56.620 be a helpful tip for some people is people that take regularly uh acetaminophen you know like over

00:38:02.180 the counter pain medicines they typically it's very taxing on the liver especially if it's taken

00:38:07.500 frequently there's been linked a link between acetaminophen consumption and higher shbg levels

00:38:13.440 and obviously if people that are that are uh you know excessively drinking like alcoholic is going

00:38:19.820 to have higher shbg as well also higher estrogen so um yeah hopefully that's helpful like kind of

00:38:26.340 clearing there um some of the the basic hormones and proteins involved here right so we got total

00:38:32.020 testosterone which is all your testosterone combined free testosterone is the stuff that can actually work

00:38:36.440 on your body and have that androgen effect on you and then this shbg is like what binds to your

00:38:44.400 testosterone that makes testosterone not free testosterone okay um let's talk about how testosterone

00:38:50.540 is produced you kind of mentioned it before there is sort of this feedback loop and let's just start

00:38:55.700 like where does it start like how does our body decide okay it's time to make more testosterone okay so

00:39:01.860 so so really what people should focus on is what's called the hpg axis and the hpa axis also plays a

00:39:09.140 role in this because that's tied to your adrenal so hp those those stand for hypothalamic pituitary

00:39:16.500 and then the g is gonadal like your testes basically and then the a is adrenals and so um this is where we

00:39:25.880 can kind of talk about the interplay of the cortisol too because that's produced in the adrenal glands but

00:39:31.640 really what happens is it starts it's a cascade of signaling it's not like it starts i guess it's a

00:39:36.020 it's a loop but you're you get information from your gut initially if you really want to go back to

00:39:41.840 the root the gut has a ton of neurons that are signaling constantly to your brain telling it oh

00:39:49.460 we've got these resources we're good here we're good you know good there or we don't have these

00:39:53.320 resources etc so there's a lot of signaling that goes on from your gut to your brain what happens in this

00:39:58.740 case the hypothalamus signals gonadotropin releasing hormone to the pituitary which then

00:40:06.800 basically based on what it said with the gonadotropin releasing hormone signals with

00:40:11.100 lh and fsh which is luteinizing hormone and follicle stimulating hormone

00:40:16.220 to the testes that's that's the signal to the testes about like oh you know here's what we're looking

00:40:23.340 at um in the body the the blood serum testosterone free testosterone etc uh so you should produce this

00:40:31.040 much right now and so boom it produces it it's the info is fed back based on the current state because

00:40:37.680 obviously we're also always providing new stressors into the body new situations um so that feedback

00:40:44.640 goes back to the hypothalamus through the spinal cord and uh you you know you're back to starting again

00:40:51.940 and this is just constantly always going on right and so um yeah once your body produces enough

00:40:57.080 testosterone it's going to tell your pituitary gland all right we don't need any more shut things off

00:41:02.380 well yeah like kind of yeah regulate things regulate things handle it and but but what happens when

00:41:08.120 people take the testosterone replacement therapy is that that's what it says it says shut it off

00:41:13.780 right no we're good because it all you're it's always in your blood there's always you know a ton of it

00:41:19.680 okay so let's talk about where things can get messed up and like where and it causes the testes to

00:41:25.860 produce less testosterone so yeah what are what are some things that can disrupt that that access

00:41:32.880 yep so um on a basic level like the things that i that i mentioned with the signaling hormones um the

00:41:41.360 signaling hormones are are interesting and those are always a good clue for people that want to do a blood

00:41:46.100 test if you look at your levels of lh and fsh uh that'll tell you a lot of information the the lh is

00:41:54.380 is typically what's sending you know the luteinizing hormones was sending the signal for the testosterone

00:41:58.460 uh the fsh is for more like sperm biomarkers like second reproductive stuff um so if those if those are low

00:42:10.020 then you know it's a good a good sign that something's off um then i guess uh think of

00:42:16.580 other hormone well the cortisol in the adrenal gland cortisol basically is antithetical to

00:42:21.580 the testosterone also but it's regulated through the same the the top of the axis is the same

00:42:27.800 so um if something goes wrong in that signaling obviously if you're producing you know you have like

00:42:33.800 excess cortisol production um it's it's initially interestingly coming from the same place

00:42:38.620 as the uh testosterone production however they act opposite of one another i guess what else

00:42:44.300 maybe that maybe did that answer the question or yeah like i mean what role so you mentioned

00:42:49.420 estrogen levels like men have estrogen levels right yeah like that's it's it's healthy to have

00:42:55.120 estrogen but too much can be a detriment so how come too much estrogen in the body disrupts

00:43:00.900 testosterone production uh so yeah estrogen is interesting because uh also right now if we want to

00:43:06.480 talk about like what the last 100 years men also have much higher estrogen levels than they used to

00:43:10.720 because of chemicals and stuff but but so basically estrogen you need to have a good balance and it's

00:43:16.900 really like people when you if you want to get granular more granular but more accurate with things in

00:43:22.820 terms of what to look for is is the testosterone to estrogen ratio and uh you know people basically when

00:43:30.480 you're when that ratio is off like when the estrogen is too high compared to the the testosterone level

00:43:36.900 that's when they start to have the issues with the estrogen not necessarily and i know i remember so

00:43:43.760 you'd mentioned uh the increase in in estrogen your body's naturally going to try and maintain a ratio

00:43:49.420 there you know a healthy ratio so that's really why you see guys start producing more testosterone they

00:43:55.560 also will see an uptick in their estrogen levels however if that ratio is is good and healthy

00:44:01.860 the way where it should be you're not going to have any symptoms of higher estrogen because of the

00:44:06.980 the ratio is really what controls it so wait was that helpful was that what you were asking yeah

00:44:12.440 no yeah yeah that makes sense okay um so we've got this system in place that there's a feedback cycle

00:44:19.840 that determines how much testosterone we have in our body let's talk about what we can do

00:44:25.000 to manipulate this or optimize this feedback system so like i think a lot of guys when they

00:44:31.360 they're i want to increase my testosterone the first thing they do is like go right to searching for

00:44:35.560 a supplement that will fix the problem um but in the book you don't advocate for that

00:44:41.360 what should men do first when they're wanting to increase their testosterone levels yep so we actually

00:44:48.840 um this is honestly the most common question uh in terms of like what supplement should i take so

00:44:55.640 everyone going toward the supplement right away and you know i even i own a supplement company called

00:45:00.440 truth nutra but i in in the in the essence of like what to actually is going to solve the problem i was

00:45:07.020 trying to figure out a way to illustrate this visually and in the book in the in the beginning

00:45:12.300 chapters there's a a pyramid it's what we came up with we were like okay how do we visually illustrate

00:45:17.720 this so that anyone can think about it and then i could you know obviously speak it over a podcast

00:45:22.260 or a video or kind of have it so it's easy to understand the base of the pyramid is what's the

00:45:27.880 most important thing to do to optimize your testosterone and on the top of the pyramid is the

00:45:32.740 least important but it's still part of the pyramid and still helpful right so the base of the pyramid

00:45:37.500 is micronutrients and this is what it all comes back down to you need the raw materials available

00:45:44.580 to be able to produce the right amount of you know each hormone and keep that in a balance

00:45:50.140 so the micronutrients also it's like insanely simple but most people it's almost too simple

00:45:56.500 where people want to just ignore it but it's so simple and and there i mean it's it's radically

00:46:02.080 simple because there's actually been there was a field of research back in i think it was in the

00:46:07.020 80s called nutrient therapy that got totally just hammered by the pharmaceutical market

00:46:12.160 pharmaceutical companies but it was doing some revolutionary things where they were using

00:46:17.460 these nutrients to cure major disease like quote diseases in people and there's still a guy out

00:46:24.780 there that does it named william walsh he's a he's a phd in biochemistry and he cures people of

00:46:32.020 schizophrenia and other psychological disorders using nutrient therapy which highlights really

00:46:36.880 how powerful it is when you bring the nutrient balance back to where it should be um so the

00:46:42.960 micronutrients are really really important and one of the easiest ways obviously if you can get the data

00:46:47.920 it really is very helpful there are micronutrient testing companies you can also order blood tests

00:46:54.080 that will give you you know your micronutrient levels but what the one that i recommend i met these

00:47:00.460 people in in la a few years ago it's called reset yourself they do it's a analysis hair analysis

00:47:07.400 of uh like baseline micronutrient levels and they give you all the like all the helpful ones basically

00:47:12.640 that are required the essential ones so if you get the data and you can see oh i'm deficient in this

00:47:18.540 this or that or whatever and and for example it's like you're it's never going to be perfect so it's

00:47:24.320 something that's always always uh helpful to have some data on because uh for example i had i went

00:47:30.040 through a period last year where i was just feeling like out of nowhere just very anxious kind of

00:47:36.220 depressed i wasn't sleeping well and i was like oh shoot what's going on something's wrong i went and

00:47:42.560 got a micronutrient test i was deficient in four things and they were key things like magnesium sodium

00:47:49.040 uh potassium and uh selenium so i was like oh boom i got some data i went i started to consume a lot of

00:47:57.720 uh um like high mineral content water started supplementing with those specific things within

00:48:03.060 two weeks i was feeling amazing so it was just this very simple so basically what is called nutrient

00:48:08.020 therapy um and that will help to solve also this issue the testosterone issue because if your body

00:48:15.100 doesn't have the raw materials it needs it can't actually produce enough testosterone

00:48:18.660 the next thing on the list up on the uh pyramid the next level up is the nutrition and we're

00:48:25.200 talking in terms of leverage here right so you're going to get the highest leverage from getting rid

00:48:29.200 of your deficiencies next level up the nutrition aspect and uh another radically simple idea is that

00:48:36.560 balance matters in terms of the nutrition there's if you look at the landscape especially nowadays like

00:48:41.760 the keto diet is very popular uh when in the past just a few decades ago the low-fat diet was very

00:48:47.260 popular so there's a fair amount of research um on both ends of the spectrum out there but you have

00:48:53.960 to if you're going to look at it with intellectual honesty you have to look at it with look at the

00:48:58.940 full gamut of the research the actual context which a lot of people don't they they just try and confirm

00:49:04.200 what they want to hear but if you actually look at the full gamut there are people that um there's

00:49:09.880 research showing that people are in terms of macronutrients are increasing they have higher

00:49:15.020 levels when they do a low-fat diet and then there's also the opposite the high-fat diet so

00:49:19.400 people are cherry-picking that stuff to fit their agenda at this point but if you look at the full

00:49:25.700 gamut it's like what does that mean and then you add the protein into the mix people that are on high

00:49:29.880 protein diets typically have lower testosterone levels guys so um understanding the the uh and that's

00:49:37.980 that's because they aren't consuming enough of their calories from the carbs and the fats so if

00:49:43.160 you look at that all together what it means is there's really this uh winning ratio or which is

00:49:48.840 going to be a little bit different for every individual based on obviously even like insulin

00:49:53.560 regulation but the the ratio ends up being somewhere around where the protein levels are pretty moderate

00:49:59.980 like pretty almost low what a lot of bodybuilders would consider lower somewhere around a 20 of your intake

00:50:05.940 from protein and uh and then you know the starting point that i tell people is 40 40 on carbon fats

00:50:12.600 and not just any fats though monounsaturated fats and saturated fats typically good the polyunsaturated

00:50:20.080 fats which always they come from vegetable oils are pretty toxic to the body and very bad for your

00:50:26.700 thyroid and thyroid imbalance also causes low testosterone so i always say like get saturated fats and

00:50:32.660 monounsaturated fats from good sources it's interesting because monounsaturated fats come

00:50:36.480 from fruits they don't come from vegetables the vegetable oils it's fruit oil like avocado olive

00:50:42.580 oil that sort of thing and uh and then the saturated fats which people can get from animal meat and

00:50:48.100 obviously the quality of the meat does matter also because a lot of shitty quality meats injected with

00:50:53.520 all these hormones too it's like this constant minefield to be aware of you know but yeah the the on the

00:50:59.100 nutrition side of really having a balance not eating like a ton of protein all the time which

00:51:03.600 is something that a lot of bodybuilders think they call you know because i'm a bodybuilder i'm manly but

00:51:08.000 there's tons of research showing that competition level bodybuilders have extremely low testosterone

00:51:13.960 especially when they're dieting so yeah i hope that's helpful on the nutrition side and i obviously go

00:51:19.040 in i go in a lot more detail on the book in the book but also on on anabolic men.com if any of you guys

00:51:24.140 want to google that we have like specific articles related to carbohydrates to fats to protein it's

00:51:30.760 all up there for free then on the training side the oh the lifestyle is actually next up on the on the

00:51:37.300 thing on the pyramid and the lifestyle elements that includes stuff like sleep sleep is extremely

00:51:42.660 important anyone who's dealing with low testosterone i just tell them across the board to sleep eight to

00:51:47.840 ten hours a night until you're feeling better a lot of people sleep way too little they see it as a

00:51:51.640 like a sign of strength to sleep less uh when in in reality it's it's leading to a hormonal imbalance

00:51:58.300 over time and there's probably ways to to sleep less in a healthy way but it probably takes a long

00:52:03.620 time things like meditation there's research showing that when people are meditating deeply that they don't

00:52:08.960 need as much sleep but very few people meditate on that level you know and also this includes things

00:52:15.220 like sex uh in that in that element of the pyramid uh if you're having more actual contact you know

00:52:21.880 sex uh there's there's obviously the difference between autoerotic touch like basically masturbation

00:52:28.560 and then actual sexual intercourse the sexual intercourse has been shown to increase testosterone

00:52:34.780 levels consistently like reliably when in men but then the uh the masturbation it's interesting

00:52:41.380 because it only depends on on basically the amount of guilt that the person has that's what it seems

00:52:45.500 uh over over the process the ejaculation itself is i mean the body can tell like when it's not

00:52:52.580 authentic but the it seems like there's a cortisol rise in studies where people are they somewhat feel

00:52:59.440 guilty for having done it which is also kind of strange because it's a study of like people

00:53:04.280 masturbating so it would probably be a bit skewed because it's an odd you know who would feel comfortable

00:53:10.300 in that scenario right sign me up and so also just relaxing making time for play is also because that

00:53:17.320 just reduces stress levels and things like that yeah oh definitely yeah anything that's gonna help

00:53:22.100 people regulate stress just probably the biggest huge lifestyle lever that someone could pull you know

00:53:27.100 if you can lower your stress you're gonna just be feeling much better because that cortisol does

00:53:31.280 lower your testosterone all right so beyond lifestyle it's training any particular type of training

00:53:36.400 yep so um in looking at all the all the research out there i tried to put i basically put together a

00:53:42.700 formula i call the testosterone work principle and it it essentially comes down to um activating as

00:53:51.160 much muscle volume as possible and as little period of time as possible under a stress threshold

00:53:56.480 so each of those elements matters quite a bit but what that and that's based on there's you know

00:54:02.740 it's looking at actual research of researchers that were trying to elicit as much testosterone and as

00:54:07.760 much growth hormone as possible from training and uh they were obviously they were looking in elite

00:54:13.060 athletes and a lot of this research is done uh in elite athletes and then comparing elite athletes to

00:54:19.020 regular people to try and figure out how they can get an edge you know for for these olympians or whatever

00:54:25.000 but it's pretty cool because what you see is by activating a lot of muscle volume so for example

00:54:32.240 uh sprinters are a common subject in these studies so but if you look at a sprinter's body it's like

00:54:38.980 the classic thing of it's like holy shit all these sprinters in the olympics they look amazing

00:54:43.220 right their physiques look great um a lot of them are also juicing so i'm not going to be naive about

00:54:48.940 that but you know in general even even people like high school sprinters they tend to have better

00:54:55.500 physiques than a high school uh distance runner before the juicing is introduced so the the muscle

00:55:03.160 volume activation really does matter and the explosion really does matter uh and that's where

00:55:08.540 if especially if you're lift in lifting weights making sure that you're not like lifting with terrible

00:55:13.240 form at too heavy of a weight that'll injure people and then it's no good to anybody but if you're

00:55:18.800 lifting heavy to really use an explosive movement i see a lot of people lifting extremely slowly and

00:55:24.240 there's probably some research showing that i know everyone's got research on everything but

00:55:27.760 specifically for testosterone production the explosion over a large amount of muscle volume really

00:55:33.080 does help elicit a bigger anabolic hormone response and then the other element to the equation was the stress

00:55:39.920 and you know it's it's good to have like i mentioned earlier in the in the podcast it's good to have the

00:55:45.040 the cortisol spike to really like help you lift heavy however what happens is it's there seems to be a

00:55:52.360 threshold over which the body becomes just too stressed out from the experience and typically it

00:55:58.720 in a in a you can display this graphically over time uh like time elapsed in the training session

00:56:04.480 a lot of the the research that i saw was it was right around like a 45 to 60 minutes is where this

00:56:11.740 starts to happen for people that are training in a really you know intense type environment but

00:56:16.420 also what happens is you have to look at on a macro level like over time because you need to recover

00:56:21.700 from your training belt in order for your your muscles to actually recover it and have a good

00:56:26.120 chance at at you know doing repeating this process basically so but what a lot of people even

00:56:31.300 something like crossfit they do a lot of good movements for this for the first parts of this

00:56:36.300 this equation uh for example like active you know doing like power cleans for example right you're

00:56:41.220 activating a lot of muscle volume doing a lot of work on the on the muscles by displacing that

00:56:46.940 weight over a distance right so but the problem is a lot of people in crossfit end up they're like

00:56:53.060 puking their guts out afterward right and then they're but some people that are more intense about

00:56:56.820 it they go they're doing it every single day of the week uh what happens over time they're getting

00:57:01.160 into a really stressed state in their body uh they're not really recovering from it so you have

00:57:06.140 to kind of look on a micro and a macro level the micro being the training session itself in terms of

00:57:10.760 what the sweet spot is for time for you as an individual where you start to feel the the stress

00:57:16.100 really from this session is becoming unproductive and then also on a on a macro like a week level where

00:57:22.980 you have enough recovery and inside that week to actually have good good training sessions where

00:57:27.040 you're lifting more and you have a progressive overload because the way the body works is it's

00:57:32.380 going to especially with muscle gain it's gonna you gain muscle with the help of these anabolic

00:57:38.200 hormones that are released right so you need to constantly put your body into an increasingly

00:57:44.600 elevated you know homeostasis because it's always going to want to have that homeostasis that level

00:57:49.220 of balance and in that zone you're not actually going to be you know producing any more of these

00:57:54.400 hormones because your body has no reason to there's no stimulus for it to adapt to at that point so

00:58:00.060 you need to have a progressive overload constantly going for more weight you know for example it could

00:58:06.140 even be just one pound on on the lift or two pounds but always increasing the weight and try and do that

00:58:11.580 at an interval that's that's uh you know considerable like for every week or every two weeks um up

00:58:17.620 increasing the weight in your lifts uh that's going to help with this because your body what your body's

00:58:22.340 going to do to respond to that increasingly high stimulus is it's going to release more of these

00:58:26.840 anabolic hormones and in turn you're going to build more muscle so um yeah that's kind of like in a

00:58:33.320 nutshell how the how the training principles work uh involved with this and it is relatively simple i mean

00:58:39.180 and almost logical um so hopefully that's helpful right so basically lift heavy explosion uh if you're

00:58:47.760 going to do cardio do the high intensity training yep yeah and yeah like sprinting that kind of

00:58:54.040 sprinting and things like that all right so that so basically what you're saying like you know i think

00:58:58.460 in my own life when i did my own experiment with increasing my testosterone levels naturally a couple

00:59:02.520 years ago basically just making simple lifestyle changes did it all right it was just like eating right

00:59:10.760 getting like exercising and like just managing stress was the big one for me so people can do that

00:59:17.440 they're gonna see a lot of bang for your buck and then the the capstone of the pyramid is is

00:59:20.980 supplements so i mean there's a lot of stuff you go to like whole foods right and you go to the like

00:59:24.960 there's like the men's section and there's like like viper cobra supplement or whatever like

00:59:30.900 yeah are there supplements that actually increase testosterone or um i mean what does the research say

00:59:37.680 on that yep so um people so basically what i would advise is looking on an ingredient level people are

00:59:44.960 going to go look at the viper cobra whatever you know like testo max 10 000 or whatever you're going

00:59:53.240 to see as a formula sitting there but the if you have a basic understanding of the ingredients that do

01:00:00.260 increase testosterone the specific minerals uh the herbs that have good research behind them in terms

01:00:05.700 of increasing testosterone it can be more helpful in selecting what supplements someone wants to take

01:00:09.660 right so in terms of the minerals uh magnesium and zinc and boron across the board increase

01:00:16.260 testosterone in the research uh especially in people that are deficient in those minerals those are

01:00:23.140 what i would consider the big levers to pull with with minerals so magnesium also i mean it's really

01:00:30.000 good for for free testosterone specifically because it helps to control that and reduce the levels of

01:00:35.800 the shbg so if that was something that from earlier in the episode if people have higher shbg levels and

01:00:41.920 they want something specific to help regulate that magnesium definitely helps and then zinc is just in

01:00:48.100 in general like really really important for your body it is it helps to regulate over 100 different

01:00:53.820 enzymatic reactions in the body and so if you're deficient obviously it's going to be affecting

01:00:59.440 all of those things but especially in testosterone in androgen receptor availability dht production so um

01:01:08.040 you know we've we accumulated quite a few of studies and also over on anabolic men we've got a lot of

01:01:13.420 free content for anyone wants to read more about magnesium or zinc but there's there's just across the

01:01:19.580 board these things really do work and they help and they help also with thyroid function um they help in

01:01:25.240 the entire system which one of the pitfalls that people it helps to understand what what works and

01:01:30.520 then what really doesn't work because there there are things um like like the common things like

01:01:36.620 fenugreek and uh saw palmetto that are really commonly marketed out there as as uh t boosters but they

01:01:45.140 they only increase testosterone levels in by basically blocking dht conversion so it's it's basically by by uh

01:01:53.240 almost like a negative manipulation in this system so what people end up experiencing especially with

01:01:58.980 saw palmetto uh is really common people have like really really adverse reactions to it in the same way

01:02:04.220 that people have adverse reactions to a drug like um finasteride so uh because of that dht blocking

01:02:11.600 capacity so it's important to stay away also like be educated enough on on the subject when if someone's picking

01:02:19.160 a t booster in the store to make sure that it doesn't have certain ingredients in it that could be potentially

01:02:24.760 damaging um in terms of herbs ashwagandha is awesome ashwagandha is so good for regulating it's got a ton of

01:02:33.280 studies behind it these are like it's like legit research specifically with regulating stress and then there's also

01:02:39.340 studies showing uh really big increases in fertility biomarkers you know sperm quality that sort of thing also

01:02:45.860 testosterone levels and and just like direct testosterone type research around ashwagandha

01:02:51.080 ashwagandha is awesome and the the best form of it that i know of is ksm 66 which is an organic it's like a

01:02:57.360 trademarked version of it it's it has a double the with analyte content in it which is the active

01:03:03.280 ingredient and then forscolin which increases uh cyclic amp production which downstream increases uh

01:03:11.120 testosterone production and helps with androgen receptor activation so those are really really

01:03:17.580 good ingredients in terms of like high leverage ingredients there's a couple others i mean creatine

01:03:22.620 is very very well studied creatine monohydrate has been shown to increase testosterone levels

01:03:28.360 naturally i think creatine is is probably the most if not the most studied natural compound uh with

01:03:36.320 relation to this stuff it might be it's among it's among the top three probably it has like 88 human

01:03:41.600 studies on it specifically which is rare for a supplement to get that kind of attention

01:03:46.280 and um also mucuna prarions because mucuna prarions helps to increase the dopamine levels

01:03:53.720 and so what people are going to see is you know not only an increase in testosterone levels but they're

01:03:58.620 also going to see a heightened uh like good feeling basically in in a way it's not not like a euphoria

01:04:06.240 where someone was taking more of an illicit drug that was working on them in uh the dopamine levels

01:04:10.780 but more of like a nice calm focus type thing when you take the mucuna so yeah those are those are

01:04:16.820 probably the the high leverage things that work so if you understand it on an ingredient level

01:04:20.840 and the the research around the ingredients then that's when someone can make an accurate

01:04:27.100 i guess um assessment of whether a supplement that they're looking at is good or not gotcha but again

01:04:33.940 this is the capstone thing like you wouldn't go to this first um yeah i would say that this is this

01:04:39.780 is if you are doing everything else and you're making progress on all the other things and you want

01:04:45.020 to really you know enhance things that yeah then then start looking at this stuff because it's also

01:04:50.520 fun i mean it's fun to like mess around in my opinion i i enjoy messing around with different

01:04:55.420 supplements and seeing how things feel as long as i do my homework on them right but yeah some people

01:05:01.040 just love supplements right but so yeah start off the base thing eat a balanced diet exercise

01:05:06.360 manage stress and that's gonna that's gonna take you a long way and then you know the cap it off you

01:05:11.740 know maybe take some supplements if you're still having some deficiencies even after you do all those

01:05:15.320 those base things yep yeah and then something like a really like a good probiotic can really help

01:05:19.840 someone because really the the first step in the uh in the sequences really involves the food that's

01:05:26.660 going into your gut and uh the ability to assimilate the nutrients from that food so you know this is

01:05:33.960 another really common thing nowadays people have just really terrible gut health so uh if someone

01:05:40.580 thinks that they do you know symptoms would be obviously stuff like diarrhea brain fog um just poor

01:05:46.460 digestion in general uh like consistently probably have have issues with that so that's where a probiotic

01:05:51.940 would be helpful awesome well christopher this has been a great conversation um where can people go

01:05:56.880 to learn more about your work uh so in terms of the content anabolicmen.com in terms of uh my my

01:06:04.220 company is truthnutra.com and uh yeah we've got plenty of free information across the two of those and

01:06:11.360 then uh our book is master your tea for anyone who likes to you know physically read a book awesome well

01:06:17.920 christopher walker thank you so much for your time it's been a pleasure thanks a lot brett my guest

01:06:22.080 today was christopher walker he's the author of the book master your tea the definitive guide to

01:06:25.780 raising your testosterone it's available on amazon.com you can also find more information about his work

01:06:30.320 at anabolicmen.com and also check out our show notes at aom.is slash testosterone where you can

01:06:35.700 find links to resources where you can delve deeper into this topic

01:06:38.020 well that wraps up another edition of the art of manliness podcast for more manly tips and advice

01:06:53.860 make sure to check out the art of manliness website at artofmanliness.com if you enjoy the

01:06:57.700 show i've gotten something out of it i appreciate you take one minute to give us a review on itunes

01:07:00.960 or stitcher helps that a lot as always thank you for your support until next time this is brett mckay

01:07:05.300 telling you to stay manly

The Art of Manliness - September 06, 2017

#336： Master Your Testosterone

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