The SuperHuman Academy Podcast

Today we are joined by Dr. Barbara Oakley. If that name sounds familiar, it should, because not only is she a professor of engineering at Oakland University, but she also teaches the world's largest and most popular online course, literally. It is called Learning How To Learn and has over 2 million students. You have probably also seen Barb's, as she told me to call her, Ted talk, which is a viral hit and definitely worth checking out. So, it is pretty obvious why I wanted to have Professor Oakley or Barb on the show. There is so much overlap between the things that we do, and we completely hit it off. We agreed on so many different things in this talk, but we also learned from one another. At a certain point she shares with me some ways in which the techniques that I've been teaching for years can be used, that I didn't know of and at another point I shared with her some of the visual mnemonics and gave her some advice as to how she can overcome a memory and learning challenge that she's been going through. We had an incredible groove recording this episode. We're definitely going to have Barb back on the show and I know you guys are just gonna love this episode and learn so much.

Today we are joined by Steven Kotler. Steven is the co-founder of the Flow Genome Project, and he is also a New York Times' best selling author. He has written quite a number of books, many of which you have already heard of, like "The Rise of Superhuman", his book on flow, "Abundance", his book on the future, "Tomorrowland: our journey from science fiction to science fact" and "Bold", which he wrote with Peter Diamandis, the book about how to go big, create wealth and impact the world. He has also written a bunch of other books like "Stealing Fire", his most recent one. Steven is an absolute authority, not just on writing, but also on flow. The Flow Genome Project has been doing research for decades, developing and understanding ways that we can get into flow and understanding what flow is and why it matters, why it exists and what we can use it for. I think that this is one of the most important topics in the whole realm of becoming SuperHuman and it is something that we haven't really covered in any of the stuff we've put out, from the podcast to the online courses. It has been my goal to fix that, to understand flow, to understand why it is crucial and most importantly to give you the skills and strategies to get into flow, so you can go out there and be SuperHuman. Steven did NOT disappoint on any of these, as he was extremely generous with his time, enthusiasm, energy and wisdom. Personally, I think you guys are gonna be blown away by this episode!  

Greetings, SuperFriends! Today we are honored to have with us Dean Karnazes. He's a speaker, a bestselling author, an athlete, and an entrepreneur. TIME Magazine named him one of the top 100 most influential people in the world. Why, you ask? Because he is an ultra marathoner... not just any ultra marathon, by the way: he has run three hundred and fifty CONTINUOUS miles... not going sleep for three nights. He's run the Sahara Desert at 120 degrees. He has run 50 marathons in 50 days. He's biked for 24 hours straight. He swam San Francisco Bay... I could just go on basically and spend the entire episode talking about all the insane feats of endurance and athleticism that Dean has done. But I won't because I want you guys to hear from him. In any case he's been on The Today Show, 60 Minutes, Late Night Show, CBS, ESPN, CNN... basically all the networks! Again, I could spend the entire episode. I wanted to get Dean on the show for very obvious reasons. He is literally a superhuman. He has a lot of very interesting things to say about tenacity and about fitness. About training... well, he has some things to say that will surprise you. Some things to say that definitely will NOT surprise you. And in general we just hit it off and had a really great conversation. I hope you guys enjoy it as much as I enjoyed creating it!

Greetings, SuperFriends! Today we are joined by Ira Pastor. He is the CEO of BioQuark, and he has over 30 years of experience across multiple sectors in the pharmaceutical industry, working on biological solutions, managed care, OTC's, and more. He's served as the V.P. of business development for a drug development company. He's raised tons of money for different companies, and today he's working, as I said, at BioQuark, which is a company doing really really interesting things with biologic solutions to many of our health problems. I wanted to talk to Ira to understand what research is being done today to make us literally superhuman: to help us live forever, get rid of diseases, and so on. I learned a lot about just the types of research that are being done, and ultimately, I found it super interesting just the reverence and respect that Ira has for Mother Nature as an innovator and as a way for developing solutions to problems. It's a great episode. I'm sure you guys are going to enjoy it very very much!  

Today we are joined - and I want you guys keep an open mind here - by Jeff Berwick of the Dollar Vigilante. He is the author of one of the largest anarchocapitalist and libertarian blogs on the Web. And he's the organizer of the world's largest a anarchocapitalist conference. Now like me, you may feel the hairs on the back of your neck stand up when I say the terms anarchocapitalist or libertarian. And I certainly did. And I was really really uncomfortable when my partner at Bitcoin Academy suggested that I interview Jeff. But, you know what? I was completely surprised. Because what I learned in this interview was not only just how close the financial system is to major issues (and going through the numbers, I realized that we are all in big financial risk potentially), but also I realized that an ideology that I had always been told was evil and selfish was not nearly as evil or as selfish as it's portrayed to be. I had the opportunity to open my mind and gain some insights into something that I always had such a negative view on. But beyond that, Jeff and I talked about some really interesting things that I think relate to Becoming Superhuman: protecting yourself against... well... when things go bad. There's no nice way to say that. Protecting yourself against the idea that, "hey, there's a 20 trillion dollar debt. What's going to happen with that?" and "hey, you know, governments are starting to act a certain way," and you know, if you were in Spain last month, you're starting to feel that things are getting a little tense. I wanted to bring this episode to you guys really to bring to you this idea that hey, you should probably be prepared. You should probably keep your eyes open, and you may want to take some measures just to ensure that if things go south, you are prepared. And I have to say, I got a lot more than that. So I think you guys are really going to enjoy the interview if you do. I want to let you know that there's actually a longer an uncut version of this interview in my new online course Bitcoin Academy - my new project - which is this week's sponsor. Let me know what you guys think, and thanks, as always, for keeping an open mind!

Greetings, SuperFriends! This week, we have a very special episode. Why is it special? Well, because as I write and record this, I am in hour 60 of a 72 hour fast. You may remember that in the past, we've spoken with a number of experts who advocate various types of fasting. We've spoken with Brad Pilon, an advocate of intermittent fasting. We've spoken with Jimmy Moore, a proponent of ketogenetic diets and longer-term fasting. And, more recently, we've spoken with Elaina Love, who teaches people how to complete 3-7 day "cleanses" that are very closely aligned with fasting principles. For years, I've wanted to try out a 3 to 7 day fast, but my schedule - and a good bit of fear - haven't permitted it. Recently, however, I was able to set aside the time (and have the proper supervision in the form of a live-in partner) to really try this out... and the results have been surprising, to say the least. In this episode, I want to talk through some of the things I've been experiencing and thinking about, explain the reasoning behind this fast, and share with you what has been one of the more interesting and reaffirming biohacking experiences I've ever had. Rather than script this entire episode out, I've outlined some bullet points, and want to speak directly and improvise. This is partly to save time, but also to demonstrate the kind of mental clarity that I've been able to maintain during this fast.

Today we are joined by Tony Gaskins Jr. a celebrity life coach, a bestselling author an international speaker and a serial entrepreneur. But life wasn't always so amazing for Tony. He struggled very much with a lot of different things throughout his youth: he got kicked off the football team, lost his football scholarship, and found himself, like quite a few of the guests we've had on the show dealing drugs at the age of 18. But somehow Tony managed to turn his entire life around. At 22 years old he started publishing books. He started speaking and fast forward not that far ahead, Tony was invited to speak on Oprah, Tyra Banks, and many other media outlets, where he started sharing his wisdom and life experience... an absolutely incredible turnaround. As you'll see in the episode, Tony has so much to share about everything: about coaching and finding the right coach, about how Tony learns, about how to prioritize certain things in your life and set standards for yourself, and everything in between.  I'm sure you guys are going to love this episode!

Today we are joined by Zach Evans and Zach actually came to us through a recommendation of someone in the SuperLearners Facebook group. Zach is a professional pianist who has also started very successful online music and piano training business, and he specializes in accelerated learning techniques for piano. Now I know some of you in the audience are saying right now "well I'm not interested in playing the piano, why does this relate to me?" I would encourage you to put that thought aside, because actually, Zach and I got into some pretty in-depth accelerated learning techniques... and I have to say I actually learned quite a bit from him in terms of things that I'm not doing that I could be doing better. Including some things that could improve the way that I learn, and ways that I've maybe been neglecting to structure out my own learning process. Zach really shares some very interesting stuff just about how learning a musical instrument, like learning a language, can be an incredible way to improve, refine, and test your learning methodology. And I think you guys are going to learn quite a bit from this episode. If you enjoy it, please note that there are many like it in the SuperLearner MasterClass - including an uncut video version of this one.

Today we are joined by Elaina Love. She's a repeat guest who is known as an authority in the organic and raw food spaces, but more than that, she's known for cleanses. It's something that we didn't cover at all in our previous episode together, so I wanted to have Elaina back on the show. Not just because she's amazing and I really enjoy talking to her, but also because she knows so much about cleanses. Now if you're skeptical about cleanses I was too. And you know, what I came to realize that all the research about fasting is so positive, and cleanses are just a way  to fast, but to give your body some additional ingredients as you're fasting, to help it clean out and get all the benefits of fasting... and then some. I have to say - I'm a convert. I've committed, on the air as you will see, to doing my first cleanse fast fast cleanse and I hope you guys will give it some consideration as well. What I love about talking to Elaina is she dabbles in both this soft world of holistic, raw food, and vegan, but she also dabbles in the hardcore science, and she knows to tell you what your biomarkers will do, she knows to talk to you about gut permeability and insulin like growth factor in so many other things that I think a lot of people in the space just cannot hold a candle to her.

Greetings, SuperFriends! Today we are actually joined by economist and author Jeffrey Tucker. Now, you might have heard of Jeffrey Tucker. He's very popular in the Bitcoin scene. He's an Austrian School economist...and you might be thinking, "what does this have to do with becoming superhuman?" Well, Jeffrey was here in the studio with me and we were talking about Bitcoin for a new project that I've been working on. Like myself, Jeffrey believes that Bitcoin is going to be one of the key technologies, if not the technology, that liberates humanity, creates unseen prosperity, unseen freedom, and much more. And as I was talking to him, about Bitcoin, I came to realize that a lot of the stuff that he was talking about is about financial freedom, having responsibility for your future, and a lot of different things that we've covered on the show only tangentially, but which really relate to becoming super human. And so I decided to share this interview with you guys here today. I know Bitcoin is not a topic that you would typically think would be superhuman, but it's something that I am extremely passionate about, and something that I want to start talking more and more and more about. Put simply, I think it has the potential to really help a lot of people. So throughout the interview, we talk about what it is, why Bitcoin is such a powerful thing, and why Jeffrey is the first economist who came out and said "hey, this this technology has potential to change the world." We talk about how it's going to change people's lives. We talk about how you can get involved and get started (here's a link to get $10 in Bitcoin free), and much, much more. I hope you enjoy.