To achieve it, they focused on internal alchemy (visualizations, nutrition, meditation, self-control, and even sexual exercises) and external alchemy (breathing techniques, physical exercises, yoga, medical skills, and producing an “elixir of immortality” using various purified metals and complex compounds). In India, the theme of prolonged life emerged in Ayurvedic texts as rasayana, the science of lengthening life-span.
Not dying is still the number one motivator for all humans, and it isn’t because we choose it. This desire is baked into us at the subcellular level to the point that avoiding death is automatic.
(Ancient alchemy and the modern drive to extend life)
Your mitochondria, the power plants in your cells that evolved from ancient bacteria, have the same basic goal of any successful life-form—to stay alive.
Ironically, we are often distracted from making good long-term decisions for our longevity by the very instincts that are meant to keep us alive. For example, our desire not to die from starvation leads us to consume too much sugar for a quick boost of energy. This keeps us alive in the short term and increases our chance of dying in the long term.
Today it is difficult to calculate exactly what longevity return you might receive on a specific intervention, but we do know the ROI comes in the form of more energy now and years of better health later.
Unlike Thog or the Macrobians, we now have technology that allows us to change every element of your environment—from your hormones to your nutrition, to the light you’re exposed to, to your temperature, to the very vibration of your cells.
Contrary to common fears, our living longer won’t lead to overpopulation and environmental ruin. If we use our advanced wisdom and energy to create a world in which everyone had access to a quality education and reproductive health care, we’d actually start to see negative population growth.
Widen your relationship to time, slow it down. Don’t see time as an enemy but an ally. It provides you with perspective. Aging doesn’t frighten you. Time is your teacher. —Robert Greene, The Laws of Human Nature
That’s because—surprise, surprise—they all have one underlying issue in common: the cumulative damage to your cells, and in particular, to your mitochondria, that takes place over the course of a lifetime. This damage occurs in all of us, though at varying rates. Some damage stems from the bad choices we make, but much of it is simply the price we pay for the basic functions that support life—like metabolizing food and breathing.
(Mitochondria, cell damage, and the root causes of aging)
roughly 115 grams of carbohydrates. If you are always in ketosis, your cells get “lazy” because they never burn glucose, and you actually develop insulin resistance. To get the many benefits of ketosis without developing insulin resistance, sometimes eat a low-carb, ketogenic diet and other times eat a moderate carb diet.
It’s hard to say which nootropics will provide you with the greatest return on investment, in part because everyone’s brain is different and in part because we don’t yet know everything about how they work. The most cautious approach is to simply try them one at a time. The bad news is that if you try each one for only sixty days, you’ll be dead from old age before you try them all. A far more effective strategy is to choose a result you’re looking for and take several supplements at the same time that will likely provide that result. If you get it, you win. Then you can back off from some of the supplements to see if you still experience the same benefits. With pharmaceuticals, including the piracetam family, it’s better to try them one at a time because pharmaceutical interactions are far more likely than with supplements.
There are about a dozen other derivatives of piracetam, and each works differently. Try them individually, not as a “stack,” until you know how your brain responds. One favorite is aniracetam, the only fat-soluble racetam, and the only one to increase memory I/O (in animals),18 which is the ability to get things into and out of your memory. It is also a mild antidepressant. Another favorite is phenylpiracetam, which is banned in professional athletics because it increases physical performance. It is arguably the most stimulating of the racetams, and I wash it down with coffee when I want to really get something done. There isn’t much evidence that phenylpiracetam makes young people smarter, but there is good evidence that it reduces cognitive decline in aging. I have taken aniracetam and phenylpiracetam on a regular basis for almost twenty years and plan to continue for at least the next hundred years. Normal doses are 500 to 750 mg of aniracetam twice per day, and 100 to 200 mg of phenylpiracetam two to three times a day. Ask your doctor about any possible drug interactions. Some people require extra choline, a B vitamin, with these compounds.
The last part makes me sad—I don’t think it’s a good idea for healthy people under twenty-five to use modafinil because the prefrontal cortex isn’t formed fully until that age, and there are no studies showing the effects it might have.
Use oral (spray, gum, or lozenge) products instead. I’m a fan of the start-up Lucy, which makes nicotine products with clean ingredients and no industrial artificial sweeteners.
One of the most powerful anti-aging smart drugs available is selegiline, also known as deprenyl. It is mostly known for stimulating production of dopamine, an important neurotransmitter that is involved in emotions, pleasure sensations, and the brain’s reward and motivation mechanisms. Dopamine also helps control movement, which explains why nerve cell damage leading to a dopamine deficiency causes symptoms of Parkinson’s disease such as tremors and loss of balance.
(Nootropics, smart drugs, and cognitive longevity protocols)
COENZYME Q10/IDEBENONE Your mitochondria use coenzyme Q10 to produce energy. We all naturally have coenzyme Q10 in our bodies, but when you have extra free radicals and oxidative stress (you know, aging!), your mitochondria will use up your coenzyme Q10, leaving you with a deficiency.
If you plan to live longer than you’re supposed to, CoQ10 must be on your short list of supplements at 100 to 200 mg per day. Advanced anti-aging experts often recommend idebenone, a synthetic pharmaceutical that is similar to coenzyme Q10 and is shown to improve skin and help brain cells stay healthy35 and improve learning and memory in mice.
There are two types of PQQ: stabilized disodium salts and active PQQ. Several years ago, I started taking 30 to 40 mg of the salt form of PQQ every day. However, unlike when I took other mitochondrial energizers, I never felt any effect. It’s possible that it was doing something, but I couldn’t detect a difference. PQQ is an expensive supplement, and I’m now convinced I was wasting my money and time on it.
There are different ways of extracting lion’s mane mushrooms, and hot water is not a great one. That’s why I don’t recommend lion’s mane capsules or tea, and it tastes horrible in coffee. The most effective form I’ve ever tried is a double extract that uses both alcohol and heat, made by Life Cykel. Two droppers before bed create noticeable increases in my REM sleep with powerful dreams I can easily remember.
He Shou Wu: Longevity-enhancing antioxidant herb that can also help you regrow and regain color in your hair!
For men, Wiley recommends cycling between testosterone, DHEA, and growth hormone in a natural rhythm to stay young and avoid this fate, and to start as young as twenty-nine, since your levels will drop off about ten years later.