The “ANCESTRAL DIET” - A Blue Print For Optimized Health & Healing

Summary

Keeping It Real: Episode Summary - "The Ancestral Diet: A Blueprint for Optimized Health & Healing"

In this compelling episode of Keeping It Real: Conversations with Jillian Michaels, host Jillian Michaels engages in an in-depth discussion with Jason Karp, a visionary entrepreneur and founder of HumanCo. The conversation delves into the transformative power of the ancestral diet, the pitfalls of modern nutritional studies, and the profound impact of psychedelics on health and healing. This summary captures the essence of their dialogue, highlighting key insights, critical discussions, and actionable conclusions.

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1. Introduction to Jason Karp and His Mission

[00:54] Jillian Michaels introduces Jason Karp as a personal friend and the CEO of HumanCo, a mission-driven company aimed at revolutionizing mental and physical health on a global scale. She emphasizes his transition from a successful hedge fund manager to a health advocate following a personal health crisis.

Notable Quote:

"Today we're diving into the bold ideas of a fearless innovator who's redefining health, wellness and accountability." — Jillian Michaels [00:54]

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2. Jason Karp’s Personal Health Journey

Jason Karp shares his profound personal transformation. Once thriving in the high-stakes world of hedge funds, Karp faced a severe health crisis—developing psoriasis, losing his hair, and almost going blind. Diagnosed with a degenerative eye disease with a bleak prognosis, he turned to ancestral methods to reclaim his health.

Key Points:

• Karp's early success and sudden health decline.
• Rejection of pharmaceuticals in favor of natural healing.
• Discovery of ancient indigenous diets as a pathway to health.

Notable Quote:

"I decided to see if I could cure myself with these ancestral methods, which involved much more around removing things than adding things." — Jason Karp [32:31]

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3. Critique of Modern Nutritional Studies and Regulatory Practices

Karp rigorously critiques the reliability of contemporary nutritional studies, highlighting issues such as:

• Manipulation and Bias: Nutritional studies often present conflicting results (e.g., eggs being labeled both good and bad) due to collinear variables and healthy user bias.
• Limitations in Human Studies: Ethical constraints prevent controlled experiments on humans, making it difficult to isolate variables.
• Scientism: An over-reliance on pure science dismisses phenomena that defy easy measurement, like the placebo effect.

Notable Quote:

"With nutritional studies of humans, you can almost show whatever you want... And so all of these studies have all of these other variables that are not necessarily causal, but they're actually correlated." — Jason Karp [06:14]

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4. The Ancestral Diet Philosophy

Karp elucidates the principles of the ancestral diet, drawing from indigenous populations to highlight the common thread of living closely with nature:

• Whole Foods: Consumption of unprocessed, chemical-free foods directly sourced from the environment.
• Physical Activity: Regular movement and community engagement.
• Natural Rhythms: Alignment with natural circadian rhythms and exposure to sunlight.

He argues that modern disconnection from these elements contributes to chronic diseases and mental health issues.

Notable Quote:

"Maybe part of the reason we're so sick is because we've become fully disconnected from how we've evolved." — Jason Karp [37:20]

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5. Holding Corporations Accountable for Processed Foods

Karp and Michaels discuss the ethical and health implications of ultra-processed foods. They spotlight major corporations like Kellogg's and advocate for consumer-driven change through boycotts and demand for transparency.

Key Strategies:

• Boycotting Harmful Products: Encouraging consumers to avoid products with artificial additives and dyes.
• Institutional Pressure: Urging public institutions like schools and hospitals to eliminate processed foods from their offerings.
• Grassroots Movements: Mobilizing communities to influence corporate practices and regulatory policies.

Notable Quote:

"A $3 cheeseburger shouldn't exist." — Jason Karp [02:34]

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6. The Role of Psychedelics in Health and Healing

A significant portion of the conversation explores the therapeutic potential of psychedelics. Karp shares his personal experience overcoming severe depression and PTSD through guided psychedelic therapy.

Key Insights:

• Therapeutic Protocols: Emphasis on "set and setting" to maximize the benefits and minimize risks.
• Scientific Validation: Studies showing psychedelics' efficacy compared to traditional pharmaceuticals like SSRIs.
• Spiritual Awakening: Mystical experiences leading to profound shifts in perception, compassion, and understanding of human interconnectedness.

Notable Quote:

"It is magnitudes more effective [than SSRIs], and it's only one time." — Jason Karp [06:43]

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7. Addressing Materialism and Expanded Consciousness

Karp challenges the materialistic worldview, advocating for recognition of realities beyond the five senses. He discusses how psychedelics can reveal deeper existential truths and foster a greater appreciation for life and the environment.

Notable Quote:

"There are realms that we do not perceive in normal waking consciousness, that under certain altered states, we actually perceive." — Jason Karp [55:16]

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8. Balancing Biohacking with Mental Health

Towards the episode's end, Karp warns against the pitfalls of extreme biohacking—where excessive optimization leads to stress and orthorexia. He advocates for a balanced approach to health, emphasizing flexibility, self-compassion, and sustainable habits over rigid protocols.

Notable Quote:

"Being excessively stressed and neurotic all the time... you have to be willing to have some grace with living a life." — Jason Karp [69:22]

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9. Call to Action and Future Outlook

Karp concludes by encouraging listeners to take actionable steps towards better health:

• Reducing Consumption of Processed Foods: Making conscious choices to avoid harmful additives.
• Supporting Ethical Farming Practices: Choosing organically and humanely raised animal products.
• Engaging in Community and Mindfulness: Building supportive networks and practices that enhance overall well-being.

Notable Quote:

"If you have community and love around you, if you eat a modestly clean diet, it doesn't have to be insane." — Jason Karp [73:05]

He also invites listeners to connect with him through social media and visit his website, HumanCo.com, to stay updated on ongoing health initiatives.

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Conclusion

This episode of Keeping It Real offers a thought-provoking exploration of how returning to ancestral dietary principles, critically evaluating modern nutritional science, and embracing therapeutic psychedelics can collectively foster optimized health and healing. Jason Karp’s journey from Wall Street to health advocacy underscores the transformative potential of aligning modern living with ancient wisdom. Jillian and Jason’s dialogue serves as a clarion call for systemic change, empowering listeners to make informed, health-conscious decisions in an increasingly complex world.

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Stay Connected:

• Jason Karp's Social Media: Follow @HumanKarp on Instagram and X (formerly Twitter).
• Website: HumanCo.com for more information on HumanCo and related health initiatives.

Join the Movement: Embrace the ancestral diet, advocate for transparent food practices, and explore the healing power of psychedelics to unlock your full health potential and contribute to a healthier, more connected world.

Transcript

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[Jason Karp]

What immediately makes Human Company interesting is your background. You're an ex hedge fund manager. You worked for Steve Cohen. You built your own multibillion dollar firm. You quit the industry to make healthy food.

[Jillian Michaels]

Today we're diving into the bold ideas of a fearless innovator who's redefining health, wellness and accountability. My guest today is a personal friend, Jason Karp. He's a visionary entrepreneur and the founder and CEO of HumanCo, which is a mission driven company that's dedicated to transforming mental and physical health on a global scale.

[Jason Karp]

Because of our lax regulations and public company incentives to prioritize profits over safety, millions of Americans are constantly subjected to uncontrolled trials of chemicals that are banned or regulated all over the world. We can reverse this great American poisoning and we already have a playbook on how to do it.

[Jillian Michaels]

Jason's brilliance in data interpretation propelled him to the heights of Wall street, where he managed billions as a hedge fund prodigy. However, after a personal health crisis threatened his vision and he literally almost went blind, it led him to leave that career and channel his analytical expertise.

[Jason Karp]

How can people cure themselves of diseases that are seemingly incurable, like I did with my eye disease into the world.

[Jillian Michaels]

Of health and healing by embracing ancestral nutrition and exploring the transformative potential of psychedelics.

[Jason Karp]

When you compare some of these psychedelics in the clinical research at these universities, when you compare the efficacy of these things to like SSRIs, I mean it's magnitudes more effective.

[Jillian Michaels]

Jason not only cured his condition, but also discovered his life's true purpose. And today he talks with us about his journey and his work exposing the harmful practices of the food industry.

[Jason Karp]

A $3 cheeseburger shouldn't exist and his.

[Jillian Michaels]

Dedication to holding corporations accountable for selling processed, poisonous, unhealthy Products.

[Jason Karp]

High time for American consumers to punish companies that do not respect their own customers.

[Jillian Michaels]

This isn't just a conversation about food. It's a call to action for systemic change and how we approach health and wellness. Here we go.

[Unknown]

Keeping It Real with Jillian Michaels. Jillian Michaels.

[Jillian Michaels]

Keeping it real, real, real. Jason Karp, you are the most interesting man in the world. Welcome to the show. How are you?

[Jason Karp]

I'm good. L. A is. The traffic is unbearable and I' I don't live here.

[Jillian Michaels]

It sucks here, huh?

[Jason Karp]

Yeah. It took me an hour and 20 minutes to go 18 miles.

[Jillian Michaels]

Oh yeah. I mean, there's a million reasons to leave and you know, we've both found them. But then of course, my generous benefactor Bill Maher's studio is here. So welcome. Oh, thank you. Yes. So these are my notes. I'm not quite sure where to begin. Let's see. You've made nine figures in two unrelated fields. You've cured yourself of blindness. You started humancoming, which is, you know, everybody eat the fantastic chocolate. Which.

[Jason Karp]

Well, Hue is actually separate from Human Company. But both of my businesses have the word human in them. But that's okay, Hugh. We sold Human Company is a separate. Was the second chapter. But we can come back to that.

[Jillian Michaels]

So always something else to learn.

[Unknown]

Okay.

[Jillian Michaels]

All right. And you are currently the face of the Froot Loops movement.

[Jason Karp]

Yes.

[Jillian Michaels]

That has dominated the media. So I don't know when I'm going to be able to get this up, but nobody will have missed this by now about the frickin carrot coloring versus yellow number five and so on. That's you. We met at the Senate hearings, sat next to each other in our impassioned soliloquies and have subsequently right next to each other. All right. Which was faded. And then I was able to pick your brain about psychedelics, which I did not happen to mention my other talking point, my major quote, dark night of the soul episode that led me to psychedelic therapy and philanthropy. About that. You are also a self proclaimed expert in UAPs. If you hadn't accomplished everything. Oh, and you've been testifying to different Texas.

[Jason Karp]

Texas Senate last week. Yeah, yeah. That was about Kellogg's and about the difference in the regulatory policy of ingredients in the US versus ingredients in every other country.

[Jillian Michaels]

Oh, I forgot. And you've gotten me hooked on nicotine with nicotine gum.

[Jason Karp]

Okay.

[Jillian Michaels]

Which I think is okay so far.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah. Nicotine has a couple drawbacks, but it's actually a lot safer. It's the.

[Jillian Michaels]

You're telling me that part now?

[Jason Karp]

The delivery of nicotine is. The cigarettes are terrible. Okay. But yeah, nicotine itself, as its own compound is. It's addictive, but it's generally nontoxic and it's quite an effective nootropic.

[Jillian Michaels]

Let's hope so. I'm hoping it enhances this interview so you'll be far more impressed with my interviewing skills since it's not my first trade, if you will. Okay, hold on. This actually was the thing that I initially instigated this interview regarding studies. We were in a room with a host of other health experts talking about different studies you went on to kind of not allude to, you told me, but in a very limited capacity, how the research is completely manipulated. I didn't get a chance to talk to you about that.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah, yeah, okay. It's not that it's manipulated. It's that with nutritional studies of humans, you can almost show whatever you want. And this is why for our whole lifetime we've heard eggs are bad. Eggs are good. Fat is bad. Fat is good. Yes. And red wine is bad. Red wine is good. Resveratrol is neutral. Resveratrol is great.

[Jillian Michaels]

Collagen's bad. Collagen's good.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah, it's not bad, but.

[Jillian Michaels]

Oh, it doesn't work the way you say it does.

[Jason Karp]

My original background when I first started working was as a empirical trained data scientist. They used to call it. I was originally used to call it a quantitative research analyst, but now they call them data scientists, where everything was based on data. And in certain areas like physics and chemistry and what they call hard sciences, traditional scientific method works very well. But when you start dealing with softer sciences, things like economics, things like psychology, things like nutrition, it's much harder to prove without a shadow of a doubt that something is real or not, or something is damaging or something is good for you or not. And the reason with frustrating. And I've been looking at nutritional studies for 20 years. And the reason why it's so hard, A few things. First off, with humans, you're not allowed to do a traditional controlled scientific experiment where you subject one group to a known problem and then you subject the other group to a not known problem.

[Jillian Michaels]

You give the rat a disease or.

[Jason Karp]

Something you can do with animals, but you can't do it with humans. Ethically, you're not allowed to do that.

[Jillian Michaels]

Understood.

[Jason Karp]

So it doesn't exist. The bigger problem with nutritional studies and like there was a very, very famous study that came out over 20 years ago that was called the sort of infamous China Study, which basically posited that when the standard of living started to improve in China, they started consuming meat. And when they started consuming meat, they posited or they showed that things like modern Western diseases and cancer started to go up. And so there was this whole movement of veganism because of the China Study.

[Jillian Michaels]

Oh my gosh, of course I remember this. This is years old.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah, this is over 20 years ago. Yes. The problem when you do those kind of studies is what they do is these are generally epidemiological studies where they look at groups of people and they try to kind of draw patterns. And the problem is it's very hard with humans to isolate the variables because a lot of variables are what are called collinear, where they're, you know, when you start eating more meat, you also start eating more fries.

[Jillian Michaels]

I understand.

[Jason Karp]

You also start eating more processed food. You also start doing things that are probably not as healthy, related to the behavior.

[Jillian Michaels]

So it's like you start working out, but then maybe you also stopped smoking at the same time and you started self kick, you gave up soda.

[Jason Karp]

That's called the healthy user bias. So that's actually the opposite of it, which is when they take someone and say, hey, we're gonna take you off of the standard American diet and we're gonna put you on a vegan diet. And what happens is when people start doing that, they start adopting other healthier habits. And it's very hard to extract the different variables. And they try to extract known variables like are they smoking, are they not smoking, are they exercising, are they not exercising? But they can't quantify the amounts of these things. And they certainly can't quantify things like how much are you sleeping, are you stressed, are you not stressed? And there are a lot of variables that are impossible to measure. And so all of these studies have all of these other variables that are not necessarily causal, but they're actually correlated. Right, I get it. And so it's very hard to extract what is true and what isn't true. And so what's happened in the last 20, 30 years, there is a sort of a negative philosophy that's called scientism. And what scientism is is basically an excessive over reliance on pure science and using the aspects of pure science to try to make your point and to try to sort of demonstrate to the other person that if it can't be proven with pure science, it must not be real. And that's just not, that's just not like true in life. There's a ton of things in life that we can't Measure, but it doesn't mean it's not real. We can't measure love, for example, doesn't mean it's not real. Right.

[Jillian Michaels]

And can I give two examples that I think would be relatable? And you tell me if I'm getting this wrong to just try to show exactly what you're talking about. So if I looked at things like seed oils.

[Jason Karp]

Yes.

[Jillian Michaels]

I sat next to a doctor recently at some conference. He's like, well, you know, the data, it still hasn't bore out with regard to these things being bad for you. And when my wife was like, I don't get it, it's a seed like sunflower oil, I was like, it's not that, honey, it's the processing.

[Jason Karp]

It's how they're made.

[Jillian Michaels]

Right. It's how they watch a video and it's like bleached and burnt and boiled in chemicals.

[Jason Karp]

Deodorized and. Yeah, deodorized. And they extract it with hexane or butane, which is a petroleum derivative.

[Jillian Michaels]

Jay, how does that go into an organic product? Is question number one. But then my point I guess would be so the data says it's fine. In fact, I've heard Numerous scientists and MDs, PhDs and MDs are like, well, the data says it's okay. Same with artificial sweeteners. And Casey, you know, I had Casey means on back. Dr. Casey means bit ago. And she's like, well, I don't know Jill. I mean for me, I don't want a man made chemical in my body like aspartame. But the data doesn't show necessarily that it's bad for you, but common sense would dictate it's horrendous.

[Jason Karp]

Well, there's a few things that these studies generally don't take into account. So the first thing they don't take into account cumulative compounding effects. So they don't take into account if you eat these every single day for five, 10 years because we don't have a way to track that. And a lot of these studies, and then the other thing that people push back on and why the cumulative aspect is relevant is a lot of scientists will push back on the quantities in animal studies. So they'll say like, oh, you're feeding animals 100 times what you would feed a human. And, and there are plenty of studies, by the way, that show seed oils are bad. There's also plenty of studies that show that they're fine. And so what a lot of the hardcore scientism people will rely on is that it's not conclusive. They're not denying that. They're like in the case of food dyes, which is obviously one of the things that I've picked on, it's not overwhelmingly conclusive. And what they cite is that they'll use cigarettes as like the gold standard of conclusiveness. And in food there's literally nothing that has that level of conclusiveness as like what cigarettes have done over 20, 30 years.

[Jillian Michaels]

Even if we got into things like glyphosate or.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah, no, I mean, cause like again, there's plenty of people that are paid forever chemicals. The glyphosate example, there's plenty of people that are paid for by Monsanto that will say that glyphosate in very small doses doesn't affect humans.

[Jillian Michaels]

Oh, very small doses. So the dose dependent conversation.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah, but then it doesn't take into account in 1970, cumulative effects and it doesn't take into account how those cumulative effects begin to affect the body over time. And things like cancer do not come out of nowhere. It's not like you have a little bit of glyphosate and you have cancer the next day. These are all cumulative biological processes that take a lot of time to show up in terms of cellular damage, DNA damage, inflammation. And then the other thing that's really, really hard to do with human studies is there's so many variables that interact with each other, right. So you've probably heard of people like George Burns who lives to 100, and they smoked every single day before they died. And then people are like, oh, that guy lived to 100. Warren Buffett drinks a can of Coca Cola every single day. And you know, Donald Trump beats McDonald, he's 95, right. So there's obviously a genetic component which is well understood, but stress is a massive component to how these things actually manifest and present in the body. You could take two identical twins and you could subject one to massive chronic stress and you could take another and have them have a beautiful, happy, easy going life and you give them the same diet and they will have dramatically different health outcomes. And so. Or you just subject one person to sleeping four hours a night and the other person to sleeping eight hours a night. They will have dramatically different health outcomes with the exact same diets. So that's why this stuff is such a, I think like a false rabbit hole to get caught in. And this is why when we were on the panel together, I mentioned the whole aspect of we've allowed scientific studies to get in the way of common sense. When there's other countries that haven't. Right. There's other countries like France and Italy who take tremendous pride in their farming. They take tremendous pride in foods that have been around for hundreds of years. And they're just like, I mean like, they immediately banned cellular based meats. You know, meat that you grow in a petri dish in a bioreactor. And they're just like, hold on, sorry.

[Jillian Michaels]

What actually is a bioreactor?

[Jason Karp]

So cellular based meats, which was this concept.

[Jillian Michaels]

This is a Bill Gates thing.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah, yeah. And I don't. This is a very long rabbit hole that we don't have.

[Jillian Michaels]

Give me, give me, give me, give, give me a little bit of.

[Jason Karp]

We don't have time to get into it. But basically the concept of where it came out of was a noble concept, right? Which was we don't have enough land for the amount of US meat consumption. We don't have enough land to devote to all of the meat consumption. And that it shows that when you feed all these cows, all of this deforesting the Amazon, but it really came from kind of a global warming carbon issue where cows that are fed non natural diets, particularly of corn and grain, they fart a lot more than cows that are fed grass. And that creates a lot of CO2 and that contributes to global warming. And so a lot of this kind of came from. Cows are a very inefficient calorie source and we're devoting a lot of resources to that and it's contributing to global warming and yada, yada, yada. So if we could basically clone the genetics of the cow and basically use the technology. And this technology was developed originally for replicating muscle cells for human use. If you need like to graft on flesh inside for like organs. Like you can actually grow organs in a petri dish. And this was like a really cool innovation.

[Jillian Michaels]

I mean, I've actually told my kids when they eat garbage, I'm like, I hate that you're doing this. I'm gonna be so mad if you get. This was a cool innovation, a new liver or something. Cause you don't deserve it. Yes. Cereal, for example. It's like, I've known this was coming down the road. You're telling me I can use it, right?

[Jason Karp]

So this. But this has been around for a while. And then a few of the scientists who had used this for that were like, hey, we can use the same technology to clone flesh of a cow and, or of a chicken. And we can basically grow it in a. Originally it was Grown in like a petri dish to prove that you could.

[Jillian Michaels]

It's actually meat. I thought this stuff was like, it's not meat. Or impossible. Whatever the hell.

[Jason Karp]

No, that's not so beyond meat. Beyond meat and Impossible Burger are not meat.

[Jillian Michaels]

Check. And that's crap. Well, separate show. They're all doing it for quite some time.

[Jason Karp]

This is actual meat from grown flesh in a petri dish without a physical body, without a heart, without an animal.

[Jillian Michaels]

Jason here, I'd be like, well, that's kind of cool. We're not killing anything.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah, right. It sounds pretty cool.

[Jillian Michaels]

Sounds cool.

[Jason Karp]

It sounds pretty cool. But then you get into some spiritual questions, right?

[Jillian Michaels]

I could rather do that than kill the cow.

[Jason Karp]

So let me just, Let me pose it to you this way.

[Jillian Michaels]

All right?

[Jason Karp]

Okay. So if I took Jillian Michaels and I cloned you, that'd be unfortunate for the world, okay? And I cloned you and then I grew a Jillian Michaels in a matrix, like pod that had no air, no gravity, no food, right? But it was an exact clone of you, right? Literally your full DNA clone.

[Jillian Michaels]

So you're not just making like the muscle, you're making the whole freaking cow.

[Jason Karp]

No, this is just a thought experiment.

[Jillian Michaels]

Okay, okay.

[Jason Karp]

This is just a thought experiment.

[Jillian Michaels]

I'm with you.

[Jason Karp]

And I cloned you, okay? And you never had any of your experiences, you never had any of your workouts, you never had any of your, you know, food and growing up and all that stuff. And I cloned you in a matrix like pot, Right. Would that be the same Jillian as this Jillian?

[Jillian Michaels]

No.

[Jason Karp]

Right. And would you want to, if you were a cannibal, would you want to eat that Jillian versus this Jillian? Right.

[Jillian Michaels]

That definitely depends. Sorry. Okay, Come on. I'm going to be serious.

[Jason Karp]

I'm sorry, I'm following you, but I think there's a lot of questions and what I take issue with. And actually, Dr. Mark Hyman took issue when they were coming out with the lab grown meat, what Dr. Mark Hyman came posited. I was in a closed door conference about this where Mark Hyman and I were like the two people raising our hands saying, like, we have a problem with this. Which is these scientists would take the flesh that was grown in the petri dish and they would do these various tests on the amino acids, on the molecular breakdown of the meat. And they'd say, this is identical to this meat. Right? But Mark raised his hand and said, there's a lot of things when an animal grows that you can't measure or that we don't measure. Yet we don't know what goes into when an animal turns into an animal. There are other aspects of what goes into the making of that animal that we may not be able to measure. That's as simple as saying, like, they have the same DNA, they have the same, you know, mass spectrometry or whatever tests we have. And so there's a lot of things that go into the making of an animal, presumably that comes from God, that we can't measure. And you start playing around with things that, because we think we're our own gods now, we start playing around with things where we just presume that if we can measure must be the same. And there's plenty of evidence that there's a lot of things we still can't measure. And just because we can't measure it doesn't mean it's not real. I got it right. So, for example, in health, the most common thing we have no idea how it works is the placebo effect. We have no idea today, with today's everything, today's science, today's technology, we have no idea how the placebo effect works. But we know it works. And it's in every single scientific controlled drug trial. And that is a very mysterious thing. Where does it come from? How can the mind influence how the body behaves? How can people cure themselves of diseases that are seemingly incurable, like I did with my eye disease? How can we cure ourselves of diseases because of what's in our mind? And there are tons of those things that are out there that science still cannot explain. Science can't explain the origins of life. Science can't explain the origins of Earth. Science can't explain the Big Bang theory. When I was growing up, the Big Bang theory posited that the entire universe was created 5 billion years ago. Today that number is 14 billion. I thought it got bigger, and it used to be 4. It used to be 5 billion.

[Jillian Michaels]

I thought it got longer, too, after that James Webb telescope.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah. By the way, 9 billion year difference is a huge difference. We have no idea what we're talking about with a lot of stuff. Okay. So that's like the basis. And so I think the way Europe approaches it, which is what we talked about on our panel, is they say if this isn't something that's food and this isn't something that humans have been eating for hundreds of years or thousands of years, and it's something that we have to synthetically make in a laboratory that has no connection with nature, none. Maybe we shouldn't eat it and I think that is actually a very healthy attitude. Instead of just presuming, which is what America does, that with all of our marvelous technology that we can create stuff in a laboratory, put it inside of our bodies and just presume that it's gonna be fine.

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[Jillian Michaels]

Okay? So let me push back on you, Jason. And this is a legitimate pushback here. I'm not just playing devil's advocate.

[Jason Karp]

I've had many, many debates.

[Jillian Michaels]

I'm sure people far more adept at, at this type of psychological yes, go warfare than me, go shoot it. Okay. If it's harmful to the environment and we want to grow the species and we're deforesting the Amazon for cows and we want to. We're saying that meat is healthy and it's better than cereal, which we'll get to in a moment. It's not sustainable. Why would you stop scientific progress? You're positing it's unhealthy. You don't even have proof it's unhealthy.

[Jason Karp]

Yep.

[Jillian Michaels]

Is there any scenario where we could get to a place where you might be on board with that? Would it be like we gotta feed that to frigging mice for 30 years, but even still, it's not a human.

[Jason Karp]

I am all for technological progress as it relates to helping us work with nature for us to eat. So for example.

[Jillian Michaels]

I see.

[Jason Karp]

I'll give you an example.

[Jillian Michaels]

That's the gold standard for you is.

[Jason Karp]

Like within like regenerative farming. I think we should be spending far, far, far more time on improving natural farming methods. And I can give you all the pushbacks on that one too. I understand. But I think like for example, there's some great AI that's come out in the last five years that historically when farmers want to use pesticides on crops. Right? And if you use pesticides on crops, you dramatically improve crop yields. You dramatically improve. You know, the economics of a farm like this is why this stuff happened. But in the old days they literally used to the term was crop dust. Where a plane would just go and just spray it on everything. Right? And it would poison everything, including the soil. They now have some technology where they have these machines that are on like the farm equipment where it uses AI to spot, using like pattern recognition, what a weed looks like versus what like the corn looks like. And it will single handedly, in a surgical way, spray a little bit of pesticide just on the weed and not on the corn. And it'll do it in a rapid fashion. And so you're able to actually dramatically improve the yields without destroying the soil. That's an innovation. That's awesome. And it's still consistent with the way in which we can live off of the Land.

[Jillian Michaels]

Okay.

[Jason Karp]

Right. Yeah. I think the issue with meat, which is a very unpopular opinion that I have, I don't think every single person should eat meat.

[Jillian Michaels]

Really?

[Jason Karp]

Yeah, I don't think, I mean, I don't think every in terms of affordability. I think to be able to grow an animal in a way that is evolutionary consistent where you are treating the animal in a humane way before you kill it for food. Right. And compare like a grass fed pastured cow versus a cow that you put into a confined pen and you turn it into like a widget. You're turn me into a vegan again and you literally.

[Jillian Michaels]

I'm going to get anemia again.

[Jason Karp]

You literally torture the animal for its entire life. Which is the way most mass industrial animal agriculture works. If you were able to do it properly, where you're humanely treating the animals before you eat them, that costs more money. Right. Which means that you should never have a $3 cheeseburger. A $3 cheeseburger shouldn't exist. And there's plenty of things that we acknowledge are more expensive and that's okay. And I think if we devoted a significant amount of the money we spent on stupid things, right? The amount of money we spent on just keeping chronic disease from. Or just the amount of money we spend on chronic disease which is clearly continuing to make ourselves worse. Right. If we were able to tackle chronic disease and reduce that spend burden and we're able to take some of the subsidies that we put towards corn, wheat and soy which go into hyper ultra processed foods, and we take those subsidies and we start putting them into regenerative farming and we start putting them into foods that we know are nourishing for humans instead of poisoning humans. We can make those things more affordable. But I think at the end of the day, like we got into this and this is not the case in Europe, we got to this place where Americans became obsessed with the cheapest possible food. And what people don't realize is that you get what you pay for. And we should never have had a $3 cheeseburger. There was a time, I remember.

[Jillian Michaels]

Hold on, I want to clarify your position real quick because you're not actually waging a war on meat at all. You're saying that this cheap meat is totally unethical and completely unhealthy. You're suggesting not to eat that over.

[Jason Karp]

Correct. I'm not anti eating it.

[Jillian Michaels]

How do I not eat it? Well, not eating it is better than eating it. But if I said if I gave you three scenarios, do I eat it? Do I not eat it. Do I have a grass fed, pasture raised grass, finished cow. Of my three scenarios in moderation, I personally don't think people need as much meat as they're eating. Which would you choose? I'm curious.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah, three.

[Jillian Michaels]

Yeah, that's a disagreeable day.

[Jason Karp]

I'm very pro meat. I'm very pro meat. I'm heavily animal based in my diet. A lot of how I kind of cured my eye disease and a lot of how I got healthy again was embracing a more what they call an ancestral diet, which is you want to eat things as close to nature as possible. So if it's plants, it's the least processed and the least filled with chemicals and pesticides. And if it's animals, and this is another thing that is important, it's also hard to measure. And it comes back to the example I gave of the Jillian cloning. We can't easily measure, although there have been some studies on this, but I don't think they're conclusive. But we can't easily measure the difference in the quality of the meat of an animal that was tortured and abused and filled with growth hormones, antibiotics and all sorts of pesticide ridden feed versus a fully healthy, vibrant animal. Like we can't easily measure that. But again, come back to common sense.

[Jillian Michaels]

You can see it though in a photo.

[Jason Karp]

Which do you think? Yeah. If you eat a diseased, sickened animal, like what do you think is going into you?

[Jillian Michaels]

I want to go to the eye disease. Because you've alluded to it a few times and you know, you and I never finished this conversation.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah.

[Jillian Michaels]

So. Because we ended up going down 10 different rabbit holes. Right. Okay. You were explaining to me you're running this massive hedge fund. Correct me if I'm getting my timeline wrong, but you're quite young, you're running a massive hedge fund. You're like a gazillionaire at this point and you begin to go blind.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah.

[Jillian Michaels]

Well, pick me up from there.

[Jason Karp]

I wasn't running a massive hedge fund and I definitely wasn't a gazillionaire. But it was. I was 23.

[Jillian Michaels]

But you eventually were.

[Jason Karp]

I was two years. I was two years into working.

[Jillian Michaels]

Okay. So.

[Jason Karp]

But I was. But, but for, for what I had always hoped and for a 23 year old, I was very successful and they made me the youngest partner at my hedge fund when I was 23 and I was working for somebody else. And on the surface it looked like I was winning at life, but I was falling apart. And so the financial part was great. But my physical health started to crumble. I developed psoriasis all over my body. My hair was falling out in clumps, and I started going blind. And the various eye doctors that I saw, the ophthalmologists, I was diagnosed with a degenerative, incurable eye disease. It was very, very progressed where I was already seeing double. And they said I had between six and seven years before I was fully blind. And so I was looking at a future where I would be fully blind by the age of 30. And I was a Division 1 academic, all American athlete in college. And I always thought I was, like, healthy. And that was when I was 21. And two years later, I'm literally dying and going blind, and nobody can figure out what's wrong with me. And the doctors told me the only thing I could do was put my name on a corneal transplant list and hope that that would work. And at the time, the odds of that working were pretty poor. This was 22 years ago and 23 years ago now. And I had, like, a voice in my head that basically said, there's another way. And you didn't just, like, go from healthy to dying in two years. And no doctor could figure out what was wrong with me. And I decided to see if I could cure myself with these ancestral methods, which involved much more around removing things than adding things. And I refused to take pharmaceuticals because I didn't think that was going to work. And I also thought that was just a band aid. And because my background at the time was in data and research, I started studying ancestral indigenous peoples. And it turns out there's lots of indigenous peoples all over the world. And these are what you would call hunter gatherer types. So in many cases, they don't have running water. You know, these are how we probably live 10,000 years ago. And what I found, which was interesting, was these indigenous peoples all over the world have totally different climates. So if you go into the Arctic, they're living off of, like, whale and seal blubber and meat. There's no fruits and vegetables. And then if you go to, like, the Maasai tribe in Africa, it's cow blood, milk, raw milk, by the way, lots of meat, very little fruits and vegetables. And then there were tribes that are living off of nuts, seeds, and fruit. And they all, every single one. Assuming there wasn't any outside influence from Western culture. There was no chronic disease. There's no obesity, there's no diabetes, there's no heart disease. They also had no adhd, and they had no allergies. And there was like no incidence of autism. And you're looking at all these different cohorts and you're wondering, what is the common thread? Because their diets aren't the same. And the common thread is they live as close to nature as possible. And when they kill animals, they're wild animals that are right there. And when they're eating fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds, it's directly from the earth, and there's no chemicals, pesticides, or adulterants. And in addition, they're walking all the time. They're community based, so they spend a ton of time with each other. They spend a ton of time relaxing. There's not hustle culture, and they're out in the sun all the time. And they're on a natural circadian rhythm with nature, but they basically live with nature in a very holistic way. And so that got me thinking. Maybe part of the reason we're so sick is because we've become fully disconnected from how we've evolved. And that was why I named my first company Hu. Cause Hue stands for human. And our slogan is get back to human. Because I believe that we are so sick because we live at odds with how we evolved as people. And that our collective health problem, which includes mental health, is a function of disconnection. It is a grand disconnection problem. And it's not just disconnection from the food. It's disconnection from Mother Earth, it's disconnection from each other, it's disconnection from the sun, and it's disconnection from what makes us like living organisms on this planet.

[Unknown]

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[Jillian Michaels]

This actually is going to take me to one of our other conversations, and I have yet to do any sort of significant dose of psychedelics. And you and I touched on this before for people listening, you know, like 17 years old, you did recreational psychedelics. God knows what you did.

[Jason Karp]

Recreational psychedelics.

[Jillian Michaels]

I saw patterns in the cottage cheese ceiling of my studio apartment at 18 after taking, I think, you know, two hits of ecstasy. And for the most part, I like to be in control. Like, I never really, you know, a few things when I was young. And I have danced around this conversation because of everybody I work with in health and wellness and PhDs and health advocates and activists are all very knowledgeable about the subject matter. And, you know, I told you, listen, I'm thinking of doing ayahuasca for the first time. And you and I, you engaged in this conversation. And our mutual friend Brigham Bueller, I've had on the show was like, you need to talk to Jason about this. I was like, wait, hold on. Wait a sec. Wait. Jason, the hedge fund guy who also is the statistician who went blind but cured it. Now I need to talk to Jason about psychedelics. So I didn't see that one coming at. Yeah. So first, can you tell people how.

[Jason Karp]

I got into it?

[Jillian Michaels]

Bingo. And then let's talk about it, because it's definitely connected to your message, without question.

[Jason Karp]

It is, it is. And it saved my Life. So in 2016, at the height of my financial career, which is when I was running my own fund, we had just won New Hedge Fund of the Year. And I won all these awards.

[Jillian Michaels]

Jason.

[Jason Karp]

My. I had this. It was actually, it started when we went to this, like, award ceremony where it was like, it was like the hedge fund Oscars equivalent. And I won a bunch of awards at that thing. And I had been working like, my whole adult life for this day.

[Jillian Michaels]

I knew it was a hedge fund Oscar.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah. Believe me, it's not. It's not that interesting. It's not interesting. It's not interesting. It's just a way of, you know.

[Jillian Michaels]

Thank you, Warren Buffett.

[Jason Karp]

And I walked off the stage and my wife was there, and I'm holding, like, two of these trophies. And I said to my Wife, I felt this, like, hole in my stomach. And I said to my wife, I said, I don't think I can do better than this. And she said, what do you mean? And I said, well, like, this is like, the pinnacle of what you can do in this field. And I just had, like, the best year of my life, you know, made a crazy amount of money that year. And. And I said, I feel awful. I said, I feel like I got to the top of my mountain and there's nothing to see up here. Wow. And I felt this, like, despair. And then a few weeks later, my best friend and business partner of 16 years killed himself.

[Jillian Michaels]

Yes.

[Jason Karp]

And it was extremely traumatic for me. And I was in a world of extreme machoism where men didn't generally share their feelings. We were never vulnerable. And I was, like, deeply depressed. And it got so bad that I actually got suicidal. And I didn't talk about it. I tried to raise the issue with a few people who I thought might be receptive to helping me, and they kind of gave me the how dare you be depressed? Right? Like, you have all this. You have a family, you're pretty healthy, you have all this money. Like, how dare you be depressed? And that made me even more depressed, and that made me even more ashamed, because then I felt like, why am I like this? I can't control it, you know? And I was having night terrors because of my best friend's suicide, where I couldn't sleep for months. And every night I'd wake up with these horrific night terrors. And a close friend of mine who I went to college with was a Survivor in the 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks and experienced extreme post traumatic stress disorder. And he had found psychedelics again, not in a recreational way, but in a fully therapeutic, night and day, therapeutic medical way as a way to deal with his ptsd. And I was like a boy Scout in college, I think I smoked pot a couple times, and I ate like a bag of mushrooms once when I was a freshman in college. But, like, I stayed away from drugs. I thought these were drugs. And I was, like, very scared about it. And he said, I think it'll really help you. And I was so broken. And I was curious because this was someone I deeply respected. It was a very intellectual guy. And I said, okay, I'll listen to you. I'll try it. And he connected me to this amazing therapist in New York when it was super underground and it was very hard to find and to figure out and to get there. And, like, I felt like I Was like committing a crime just by trying to deal with my suicidal depression. And my wife wasn't that supportive because of the drug part. She wanted, obviously, me to heal, but she was very scared about, like, what is he doing? And he's gonna take, like, mushrooms, and, like, that's gonna help him. And so I went in, and the therapist was a brilliant guy who gave me a lot of background. He gave me some science behind it and why it works. And he's treated thousands of people over 25, 30 years. And I went in, and again, it's a very proper setting where it's defined dosage, and you put on blindfolds and they play music and you go inward. And in that session, I was able to make peace with my best friend and his suicide. And when I came out of it, my night terrors were gone forever. Forever. And I, like, slept for the first time in nine months. And it continued. And I thought, like, a week or two later after that, I said, wow, like, this is the craziest thing I could ever imagine. It was one time. It was four hours of experience, and I was, like, cured of that problem. And so I decided. And this is 2017 now, I decided to dive really deep into whatever was out there on psychedelics.

[Jillian Michaels]

You're exceedingly early to this. And I just, you know, now it's like, it's on Huberman, and it's on. But to be clear, in each of the steps that you've mentioned of, like, the blindfold, the music, the going inward, this is all part of the therapy, the protocol. Yes, yes, right.

[Jason Karp]

It's very defined now. And they actually have this studied at many universities where they have. They call it the set and settings. And the set is your mindset when you go into it, and that's very important. And the setting is literally the setting where you don't want distractions. You don't want, like, a party, you know, this is a very, very specific protocol that has been established now across a variety of different universities. So now it's accepted as a modality, and it's really, really effective for veterans. And how this became, I'd say, accepted in the mainstream was because of how helpful it is for war veterans, for people who have had limbs blown off or have seen assassinations or murders where you can't live a normal life when you've been in that kind of war. And they have done a lot of science and research, and this is all very scientific about how it alters the neural pathways in your brain so that you don't have these painful memories, but it doesn't wipe out your memories. It just. What it does is it alters the way in which those memories affect you. And it's this like incredible thing that still, I mean, when you compare some of these psychedelics in the clinical research at these universities, when you compare the efficacy of these things to like SSRIs. Right. I mean, it's magnitudes more effective and it's only one time. And obviously the pharmaceutical industry doesn't like this because they want you on SSRIs for life.

[Jillian Michaels]

This is a whole thing going on.

[Jason Karp]

This is a one shot, the war.

[Jillian Michaels]

Against these in medicine.

[Jason Karp]

Oh, this is a terrible development for Big Pharma because in many of these instances, it's one time or two times and you're cured even.

[Jillian Michaels]

I've spoke to Matt Johnson a few years ago who was working at Johns Hopkins then, is at Shepherd Pratt now. And we were talking about smoking secession.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah.

[Jillian Michaels]

And he was getting like 80 plus percent smoking secession. Chantix is 35 with a host of terrible side effects. And I was curious because having worked with people who are morbidly obese for so many years, it's so much. It's so much deeper, you know, than some of the stuff that is affecting the average guy with dad bod. And I began to understand a little bit of it. And then I kind of moved away from it and I was like, no, no, no, I don't need to do this. And then I became more curious and I started to feel called to it. And Callie talked to me about it and Brigham was talking to me about it, and then you and I were talking about it. And I can see very clearly that it has permeated every aspect of your philosophy.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah, well, because what happens is. And again, this is also documented. And this happened to me and this happens to many people.

[Jillian Michaels]

Deep breath.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah, deep breath, deep breath, because we're gonna get a little woo here.

[Jillian Michaels]

I'm ready. Let's go. Woo. I mean, but you're living proof that. Let me. Hold on, let me table this real quick. When I look at all my friends who have done it, let me throw this out there. And Callie has told this story publicly, so I feel okay telling it. So Jason and I are both friends with Kali Means, a big activist in the health and wellness space. Callie and Dr. Casey means, who's out there very prominently now. Their mother dies of pancreatic cancer. He's a lobbyist, she's a head and neck surgeon. Both, they would argue part of the problem at the time with healthcare, they walk away from it all, take a massive dose of mushrooms, have a vision that they're gonna change healthcare in America.

[Jason Karp]

And then they do.

[Jillian Michaels]

And here we are.

[Jason Karp]

And then they do, and then they do.

[Jillian Michaels]

So I was like, okay, hold on. Is that what I was missing to be super effective was this massive dose of mushrooms. And I've heard the same stories from people like Brigham and people like yourself. So my point is that it might sound a little woo, but with every single person that I know in the space, I'm like 10 steps behind you guys, I can drink 10 cups of ayahuasca if I need to. Because you guys are living proof that you've tapped into something I've certainly missed.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah, I mean, look, there's a very academic science based book called the Immortality Key that I would encourage all of your listeners to at least read the summary of. It's written by a dear friend of mine named Brian Marascu. He's been on Joe Rogan like five times. Very academic. He's actually never done psychedelics. And part of the reason he's never done psychedelics is because he wants to be taken seriously on this topic. The Immortality Key, basically. And again, it's a very dense book, so maybe just read the summary. But it basically shows with the most archaeological proof that the ancient Greeks all used psychedelics as a way of rite of passage before leaders became leaders like Socrates and Aristotle and Plato, and a lot of our modern foundations of society, like democracy, came out of ancient Greece. And this whole book talks about how psychedelics was a critical part of how they were able to tap into something that was inaccessible in regular life. And it's a very academic book, but it's a brilliant, brilliant book. And what happens to a lot of people? And depending on how woo you want to go, what happens to a lot of people? What happens to a lot of people is that when you are in that state, and this has been documented in all the university researches as well, a few things happen. So they typically talk about the hallucinations, but what also happens is you see aspects of, let's call them reality, that feel a lot more real than hallucinations. And you realize in many cases that we are much smaller and more insignificant than we pretend to be. And we realize that there's something much bigger than us and that we are part of something much bigger. And many people see what they call God. Many people see aspects of the universe that they can't explain. But what universally happens when people have this mystical experience is when they come out of it, their appreciation for life, their appreciation for Earth, their appreciation for what part we play on Earth, dramatically changes. And it makes people far more conscientious about each other. It creates a lot more respect for each other. It creates a lot more respect for our place. And it shows you in some instances that we are children of Mother Earth and that we are children of something bigger. And that we are here actually to serve and to help each other. And we're not here to just make money and to just die. And this happens with incredibly high frequency if you do it in the right set and setting. And the way that the ancient Greeks set it up was that it happened basically every time. And it was a precondition for leaders to do this because it made them far more compassionate and understanding leaders when they understand the human condition in this profound way. The Wu interpretation, which I actually believe, having spent a ton of time on this, which most people will not believe unless you've experienced this. So this is one of those things that you cannot believe it unless you experience it.

[Jillian Michaels]

I understand.

[Jason Karp]

Is that what we believe? So there's this notion called materialism, and it's not like that you like to buy stuff. Materialism is basically that we believe that the only things that are real are things that fit into our five senses. So if we can't smell it, taste it, touch it, see it, or experience it, it's not real.

[Jillian Michaels]

Right.

[Jason Karp]

And the way we know that materialism is false is because other animals have different senses than we do. Bats have sonar. They see the world very differently than we see it. Their dogs can hear sounds that we can't hear. There's a lot of things that we think this is our full reality. That is not our full reality. It's only our reality in these five senses. Okay. And they know this because they can sort of generally see the way that other animals. We can't obviously, get into the brains of the other animals, but animals consistently surprise us in a lot of ways.

[Jillian Michaels]

I mean, dogs can smell like a gram of some drug, car paint or something.

[Jason Karp]

But, like, dolphins can tell if you're pregnant, for example. Right. And they know this. And so, like, there's all sorts of things that we can't explain.

[Jillian Michaels]

Yep, I got it.

[Jason Karp]

But, like, it's a different reality.

[Jillian Michaels]

Yeah.

[Jason Karp]

And so what? And I can refer you in your show notes to some podcasts with scientists, okay. This is all science based, who have posited that our brains are not actually blobs of flesh that do computation, that our brains are Actually more like transceivers, where we receive information from something else. And that when you do psychedelics, it basically reduces the filters that we normally have on and it allows us to perceive aspects of what is that we normally cannot perceive when we are in our regular waking state. And that is why. And they've done studies with this, with one psychedelic compound called dmt. And that's the one you talk about with the machine elves. Oh, God. Yeah. But they've done clinical studies with dmt.

[Jillian Michaels]

Okay.

[Jason Karp]

And DMT is naturally secreted by the plant.

[Jillian Michaels]

Hold on, I have to preface the machine elves thing. I feel like we need to. So there's different plant medicines, so there's this one type that people are doing dmt and there's this common theme that people are seeing machine elves and going to a parallel universe. And the weird part is that so many people are seeing the same thing and the same location and it feels like they've been there a million times before.

[Jason Karp]

Correct.

[Jillian Michaels]

Yeah, it's frickin bizarre. Okay, sorry, go ahead.

[Jason Karp]

So they have studies on this now where they're giving people who are not near each other and they're not talking to each other the same medicine. And these people see the same things.

[Jillian Michaels]

Yep.

[Jason Karp]

This also happens with ayahuasca. People always report seeing Mother. Ayah.

[Jillian Michaels]

I'm good with that. The machine else thing, I'm not there.

[Jason Karp]

The point is.

[Jillian Michaels]

The point is I'm here with it.

[Jason Karp]

There's enough evidence that there are realms that we do not perceive in normal waking consciousness, that under certain altered states, we actually perceive. And there's enough evidence over thousands of years. And every culture going back thousands of years used some form of plant medicine to achieve and activate these higher realms. And so in these other realms, this is where people confront the fact that there is something bigger than us, like God. And people have different terms for what this God is. Some people call it source, some people call it God, depending on your religious backgrounds. But it is undeniable to people who have experienced this that there is something greater than us. And there is something that is a creator and there is something that is behind us and why we are so magnificent and complicated. And even Huberman talks about this. And all of the greatest scientists who've ever lived, Nikola Tesla, Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison, they've all acknowledged that their science only got them so far. And then they reached a point where they can't explain a lot of things. And so they naturally then believe in God. And so does Huberman. Because what Huberman cited on one of his podcasts is that when you go super deep into the complexity of the human body and you go super deep into how DNA works, and you have two choices, which is to say this came out of randomness, this came out of nothing, and just random evolution produced this, or there is something bigger than us that had a divine element in terms of how we became, how we became. It's actually more plausible, the latter explanation than all of this came out of complete random nothing.

[Jillian Michaels]

Right.

[Jason Karp]

And the psychedelic renaissance that has been happening has also been deeply connected to the awakening that we're having with big Food, that we're having with society, that we have been suppressed and that we have been. We have been. The information has been hidden from us. It's why the UAP stuff is now.

[Jillian Michaels]

Coming out, which is that Unidentified aerial phenomenon.

[Jason Karp]

Yep. And it's why there is such an interest in all of this stuff that we kind of suspect is real, but we've always been told it's not real. And now we're actually. People are finally waking up and they're like, wait a minute, like there's actually. This actually gives me more comfort that there's something bigger than us.

[Jillian Michaels]

Well, the fricking Pentagon is like, yeah, okay, there are these things. We don't know what they are. They're not ours. Yeah, it's been a while. Sorry for misleading you.

[Jason Karp]

And there's plenty of conspiracy theories that are conspiracy theories.

[Jillian Michaels]

Right.

[Jason Karp]

But this is not one of them.

[Jillian Michaels]

Yeah, but you've got the. This is not one of them at this point. Now you've got multiple congressional hearings, numerous eyewitnesses. You've got, you know, nevertheless, that's a whole separate beast.

[Jason Karp]

But so the psychedelic renaissance, I think, has been happening for a reason, which is that we acknowledge as a species that we have been getting paid to poison and harm each other for 50, 60, 70 years now.

[Jillian Michaels]

Has it been all of human existence, though, Jay?

[Jason Karp]

No.

[Jillian Michaels]

Like raping, pillaging, marauding.

[Jason Karp]

That's different.

[Jillian Michaels]

Land borders, landowners.

[Jason Karp]

That's different. No, we've been brutal forever. But where we are now, where we're like. And maybe this is just like a more civil way to do it, but.

[Jillian Michaels]

It'S modern day warfare.

[Jason Karp]

But what bothers me so much is that capitalism, which again started with. And I was a capitalist capitalism, which started with great intentions, has created a society where people have become literally enslaved. People are the sickest, the most depressed, the most infertile we've ever been in human history. And people are deeply, deeply depressed. I mean, we're having a True mental health epidemic loneliness is the best predictor of early death. And loneliness is a better predictor of early death than cigarettes. There was a Yale study that showed that being chronically lonely is equivalent to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. And so what's happening is that people are now desperate to say there's something else that we're missing. And I believe that this psychedelic renaissance that is happening is a reflection of people's desire to be more of a truth seeker, to learn what's really reality and how to kind of get out of it. And people talk about like breaking out of the matrix.

[Jillian Michaels]

Yes.

[Jason Karp]

We're kind of in a matrix.

[Jillian Michaels]

Oh, completely.

[Jason Karp]

And we have to break out of.

[Jillian Michaels]

It in so many different capacities.

[Jason Karp]

And we just assume because we live in this modern, large, functioning in quotes functioning society that everything works. But when you actually look at the condition of people, it's not working. And so people are desperate for change. And I think that's why the election was a landslide. I think that's why the Make America Healthy movement had such massive momentum, because these people are outraged. I mean, you said it. You said we're outraged. And now the people are learning, like, wait a minute, they're actually knowingly putting this shit in our food when they're not doing it in Europe. Like, people didn't know that. People didn't know that.

[Jillian Michaels]

Why did you grab onto that, by the way? Like, you're the. Again, I go back to each one of these subject matters and I have you for a finite period of time and I have to pick my kids up from sports or we would have like a Rogan esque five hour episode. And there will have to be a sequel here because each one of these topics is a two hour show unto itself. But the funny thing is, you've got to me is you get this guy, he's like, you could be done. You could go retire on a beach. Started numerous companies, you know, and you how you're like, you know what? Yeah. The Fruit Loop thing. And that's. And Jason, I have to give it to you. It's the easiest tool.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah.

[Jillian Michaels]

To explain very quickly.

[Jason Karp]

Yeah. The problem.

[Jillian Michaels]

What the F is going on.

[Jason Karp]

Yep.

[Jillian Michaels]

And the fact that there is already a solution.

[Jason Karp]

Yep.

[Jillian Michaels]

It's like. But they're doing it over there.

[Jason Karp]

Yep. That's why I picked it. I didn't pick it because I think that if we get rid of food dyes, we're all gonna get healthy all of a sudden.

[Jillian Michaels]

Right.

[Jason Karp]

Which is one of the like straw man arguments that the opponents have Used against.

[Jillian Michaels]

Yes, of course. The New York Times fact check was fantastic.

[Jason Karp]

That was amazing. But they're just like. They're like, getting rid of food dyes is not gonna make everyone healthy.

[Jillian Michaels]

This is crude oil and this is carrots. But it's the same number of ingredients. My God, how. The New York Times. Anyway, go on.

[Jason Karp]

I wanted to start with the most flagrant example of the symptom of the problem of our ultra processed food epidemic in this country. And I felt like a lot of the other issues that I've explored for 15 years, like how much sugar should be in things and how processed should things be, and how refined should grains be? Like, these are nuanced topics. Artificial food diets is not a nuanced topic because there is no purpose for it other than it makes it really bright. That's it. And it cheapens the cost for the manufacturer.

[Jillian Michaels]

And kids like it better, and kids.

[Jason Karp]

Like the brighter colors better. And they already have a fruit juice colorant that works in other countries. And it's just so ridiculous that I knew in a congressional setting that if I picked something that was so ridiculous, where there's no counter argument, it would begin the conversation. And you have to start somewhere because it feels like you have to. It feels like it's too big of a problem. And so if you start with one thing and you get Americans to realize like, this is insane, then you can go to the next thing, and then you can go to the next thing and you start with Kellogg's. And I don't want to just stay on Kellogg's, but we had to pick the most flagrant, most anti American company that I knew of that has complete disregard for all the American citizens. They literally give, you know, an F. U to the 450,000 people that said, we don't want this. They refused to meet with us. They refused to address it publicly. They just reported their quarterly numbers. They didn't even bring it up. They're just acting like it's going to go away. And I think it is high time for American consumers to punish companies that do not respect their own customers.

[Jillian Michaels]

And how do we do that?

[Jason Karp]

By boycotting their products and not buying it. Because if their sales start to drop precipitously, they will either go bankrupt or they're going to have to change.

[Jillian Michaels]

I feel. Oh, man, they must ruin the day. They got your attention. It's like, woo. They pissed off.

[Jason Karp]

And we wanted to work with them. It was a constructive initial discussion.

[Jillian Michaels]

It was.

[Jason Karp]

But they basically said to us, like, no, we're not gonna deal with you. Like, what we're doing is legal, and we're gonna keep doing it as long as it's legal. And they were just hoping that it would go away. And I think Americans are now showing them it's not going away.

[Jillian Michaels]

You said something so great because a lot of people reached out to me after those Senate hearings, and they're like, what do I do? What can I do? And I said, well, you know, this guy that I met, because we just met, said that if we can impact the bottom line of a company just a few percentage points, we don't even have to wait for the legislators.

[Jason Karp]

That's right.

[Jillian Michaels]

You'll see change.

[Jason Karp]

That's right.

[Jillian Michaels]

So it's a vote with your dollars kind of game, then.

[Jason Karp]

It is. It is. And I'll say with Kellogg's, one of the challenges, which is why it hasn't shown up as drastically as I would like it to be. Kellogg's derives a lot of their business from schools, hospitals, military, and, like, hotels. Right. Like, if you go into, like, a hotel, like, buffet, you'll see tons of Kellogg's products. Right, right.

[Jillian Michaels]

Of course.

[Jason Karp]

So it's not just the grocery store. So if your listeners care about this, you have to tell your public schools, you have to tell your hospitals, you have to tell your hotels. Get this shit out. Because if the government, and I'm hoping that Bobby is going to do this, if he comes out and says our taxpayer dollars are not going to support this garbage that you're feeding to our children, I mean, it'll be a catastrophe for them because so much of their business comes from these, like, automatically renewing contracts. And so I think it's a combination of boycotting at the store, telling all your store managers, like, you shouldn't carry this. This is poison. And then telling, you know, all the institutions that carry this stuff, like, don't use this stuff. Right. But it's gonna take a village. And they're not wavering.

[Unknown]

Wild.

[Jason Karp]

They're not wavering. It's crazy.

[Jillian Michaels]

Absolutely wild.

[Jason Karp]

It's crazy.

[Jillian Michaels]

Wow. Okay, so let's not buy Kellogg's until they waver. How hard can it be? There's a host of other food options.

[Jason Karp]

Tons of other options. There's tons of other options. But the point is, if you make an example out of them for treating Americans with a recklessly profiteering way, then other companies will start to have respect for these kinds of things. And I'll tell you some good news. Vonnie sent a letter with me.

[Jillian Michaels]

Vonnie is working with Jason, Bonnie Hari.

[Jason Karp]

The food babe, sent a letter to General Mills on Friday. Okay. And cc'd me and Callie on the letter. General Mills replied on Tuesday. They're willing to meet. And they came out with a public statement yesterday.

[Jillian Michaels]

Oh, dear.

[Jason Karp]

That they are willing to work with regulators in the new administration to comply with whatever they want.

[Jillian Michaels]

I sort of believe it. Jay. I've been a little. Cause I played this game on Biggest Loser and I went down there and they're like, I'm working on this is our natural color blue. And nothing came out.

[Jason Karp]

I'm not saying it's gonna change, but at least they're responding.

[Jillian Michaels]

I agree immediately. You are right.

[Jason Karp]

And that is good news.

[Jillian Michaels]

I couldn't agree more.

[Jason Karp]

That is good news.

[Jillian Michaels]

Is there anything I didn't ask you that I should have for our first installment?

[Jason Karp]

Yeah. Yeah. I think I had one topic that I think is really relevant to sort of. End, please. So I have taken issue. So in my earlier life when I was like insanely neurotic overachiever.

[Jillian Michaels]

Because you're not an overachiever now.

[Jason Karp]

Well, I'm much more balanced today.

[Jillian Michaels]

I moved insanely neurotic.

[Jason Karp]

Yes. But there has been this movement in the last five years, ten years of biohacking.

[Unknown]

Yes.

[Jason Karp]

And it has created a new form of neurosis. And this is being personified by Brian Johnson.

[Jillian Michaels]

I like Brian.

[Jason Karp]

And I haven't met Brian. And some of the.

[Jillian Michaels]

I hear you. I hear you.

[Jason Karp]

Some of the things he's doing I think are amazing.

[Jillian Michaels]

I understand he's lab testing foods.

[Jason Karp]

I think it's amazing.

[Jillian Michaels]

I want to give you the floor here.

[Jason Karp]

Go ahead. But there's a bunch of other people that are like that.

[Jillian Michaels]

I understand.

[Jason Karp]

I understand where I wake up at 6 and it's 6:15 I cold plunge. And at 6:30 I do my sauna. And at 6:45 I eat my whey protein. And at 7:15 I do my fake meditation. And then at 7:30 I go through email and then it. And their entire day is mapped. And it sounds awesome because I used to do this, by the way. It takes one to know one.

[Unknown]

I see what you're saying.

[Jillian Michaels]

Yeah.

[Jason Karp]

And what happens is you give yourself no flexibility and you give yourself no grace. And it is a form of orthorexia where you become so hyper neurotic about doing everything perfectly and like, oh my God, I didn't get to bed at 8:30 and I'm gonna ruin my day tomorrow.

[Jillian Michaels]

I see.

[Jason Karp]

And what people don't realize, which I learned the hard way, is being Excessively neurotic and stressed will overpower everything else that you're doing. And that there needs to be flexibility in your life. And it's okay to have flexibility. It's okay if one night you stay out till 11 on a weeknight by accident because you're with a friend.

[Jillian Michaels]

Yeah.

[Jason Karp]

It's okay if you accidentally eat some seed oils. It's okay. And you have to be able to give yourself some grace because this incredibly neurotic form of living is actually self destructive. And I'm sure you've seen it with those super crazy people. You know, I've seen it with some, like, with some like really intense vegans where they look really unhealthy and they're like gaunt.

[Jillian Michaels]

I have seen it. I know, exactly.

[Jason Karp]

And they bring their own food everywhere. And so I think I used to be that way.

[Jillian Michaels]

I get it.

[Jason Karp]

And what I realized is if you are excessively stressed and neurotic all the time, none of that other stuff matters. And that you have to be willing to have some grace with living a life, especially if you have a family, especially if you have children, because you're not gonna be able to control everything perfectly. And so my, my feedback would be have a little bit more flexibility and fun in life, because if you're so obsessed with living longer, you're actually not gonna live longer.

[Jillian Michaels]

You know what? You're totally right about all of that. If I could play devil's advocate for Brian for just a moment, because I had an opportunity to pick his brain for several hours. And what's interesting is he doesn't. For him, it's not stressful. And he's not advocating that protocol. He's trying to extrapolate the key parts that are tangible for people so he can say, listen, I've gone to Mecca and back, and of the thousand things, here's three now. You are totally right and nobody should live like that. And it's the worst thing ever. And it is absolutely a part of orthorexia. But to Brian's credit, I don't think he's trying to advocate for that. I think he's trying to get answers because he personally thinks it's fun and fascinating. But I.

[Jason Karp]

But my. I guess my takeaway, which is very encouraging for all your listeners, is that there's only a few things you need to do and you can get 90% of the way there. You know, if you sleep seven to eight hours a night, if you have community and love around you, if you eat a modestly clean diet, it doesn't have to be insane. If you have a mindfulness practice like meditation and you exercise four to six days a week and you just get rid of the ultra processed chemicals, you'll get 90, 95% of the way there without any of the weird things like the blood plasma transfusions, you know, and all, you know, and all the weird things that are coming out now. Like, sure, those are helpful, but you can get all the way there with just the simple things that the indigenous peoples do every day.

[Jillian Michaels]

You couldn't be more right. Jason. Where do we find you? Where do we go to get more.

[Jason Karp]

My social handles are HumanKarp K A R P I'm on Instagram and I'm starting to get more active on X now. Humanco.com is my business's website where you can learn about our various businesses, including True Food Kitchen and some of the other businesses we're involved in. And yeah, now with the movement that you and I had on the Senate panel, it appears that a lot of our stuff is being published on many channels now.

[Jillian Michaels]

So I think it's just beginning. But I'm here for it. I know who you are and it's just beginning.

[Jason Karp]

The grand awakening is just beginning and I'm very excited about it.

[Jillian Michaels]

Thank you for everything. You're wonderful. I look forward to our next installment.

[Jason Karp]

Thanks for having me.

[Jillian Michaels]

Longer Deeper dives yeah, thanks for having me. Thank you so much for watching.

[Unknown]

If you enjoyed the podcast, please like.

[Jillian Michaels]

Comment, subscribe and share.

[Unknown]

And make sure to let me know.

[Jillian Michaels]

What guests you want to see on in the future.