AMA #12: Strategies for longevity (which don't require a doctor)

**Peter Attia** (0:11)
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So without further delay, here's today's sneak peek of the Ask Me Anything episode.
Welcome to AMA episode number 12 In this episode, we discuss all things related to longevity that you don't need a doctor for. This actually came out of a discussion I was having with Bob and Nick about how much of the stuff that I do with patients I think people could do on their own if they had sort of the right guidance. So we focus by looking at nutrition, exercise physiology, and sleep physiology for the most part. If you enjoyed this conversation, we're happy to have a follow-up AMA based on any more questions that come out of it. And of course, if the reception to this is positive, we can certainly go into other things that we didn't have time for in this episode, which would include, for example, things around supplements, techniques around distress tolerance, things like that. I'm once again joined and hosted by my head of research, Bob Kaplan. So without further delay, here is today's AMA episode.

**Bob Kaplan** (1:40)
So welcome to another AMA episode. I'm Bob Kaplan and with me is full-time shepherd and part-time race car driver, Peter Attia. Peter, how are you doing?

**Peter Attia** (1:51)
I'm good. I was thinking today, I've never done anything as bad as I do driving.
It is actually the worst thing I do. I'm a much better everything than I am driver.

**Bob Kaplan** (2:03)
That's why you're a full-time shepherd and a part-time race car driver. We wouldn't want to switch those.

**Peter Attia** (2:07)
Yeah, and today I just was really frustrated in the simulator at how bad I was.
It is definitely the hardest activity I've ever tried. It's infuriating.

**Bob Kaplan** (2:17)
In another life, you know, a thing or two about longevity and lifespan and health span. So we might get to a few questions on those and not just shepherd related topics today. So despite all the questions, we do get around shepherds and race car driving, which we actually do have the latter.
We thought a great theme for today's AMA is all things related to longevity that you don't need a doctor for, with a focus on the five tactics of longevity, which this covers a huge range of questions that come from the listeners. And to remind the listeners what those five levers are, or five tactics are nutritional biochemistry, exercise physiology, sleep physiology, distress tolerance and telomeres, wait, sorry, exogenous molecules, which includes drugs, hormones and supplements, and maybe telomeres. So I thought we would just go down the list and start with nutritional biochemistry. We get a lot of questions around these.
And if we just start with nutrition, I would say that people are asking a lot of different questions. Should I eat this? Should I not eat that? But I think in some ways, they're asking the same thing, which is what or how should I be eating or not eating in order to live better now and or in the long run. So Peter, how do you approach this question, maybe about personally, and what do you think is the answer to that question, or how do you even approach that question?

**Peter Attia** (3:46)
Well, before even getting into that, I would say that this is a great place to start for the theme as you've laid it out, which is we're really gonna focus today on things that one can do that specifically does not require the help of a physician. Because I know that it's just difficult for people, depending on where they are, geographically or otherwise, to find physicians who are thinking about the problem this way. So I think there are lots of physicians who do think about the problems this way, meaning they think long and hard about the long tail of longevity and what the long arc of prevention needs to look like. But I also realize that a lot of people don't happen to be in an area where they're going to be able to find a doctor that can help them with that. And so what I've been thinking about, and what I think we'll talk about today is, okay, imagine for a moment, you absolutely have no access to medical care. You have no access to a physician who can help navigate you through this. What could you do on your own?