The 'Friendship Hack' For A Longer Life & How To Biohack Your Partner!

The Biohack Group Chat (: 00:00

We recorded this episode already, but we had to do it again because we were haunted by demons in the studio and squeaky chairs that made us sound like lunatics because we could hear them squeaking, then, so we were talking about it, but then you couldn't actually hear it on the audio, so we just sounded absolutely crazy. So we had to write that off, so we're re -recording again. Gone. Gone forever. We were completely possessed. I have no idea what happened.

We will not be going back there. was a roller coaster. There was like breakdowns, breakouts. I don't even know what happened. At one point I was like, let me just adjust my mic and it just completely came off. god. Yeah, so that failed. Should we get into the podcast? I feel like we could talk, we could do the, yeah. Let's do it. Welcome to the Biohack group chat where we discuss real wellness for real people.

This podcast is all about making small changes that can have a really big impact, helping you to live a happier, healthier and longer life.

I'm Alex. And I'm Anna. So on that subject, we'll be talking about the power of social relationships for helping you live a longer life. And also how to get your partner to biohack with you. So we've got our top tips for how to encourage people you love to get involved. But before we jump into that, we need to report on last week's challenge and last week's promise. Wait, what were they again? I set both of them last week. I think it was getting you back for the meal prep one.

Our challenge last week was to do two hours of grounding. Did you manage to do it? Yes, I did. Well, two hours was really difficult because we don't have a garden, obviously, in London. So it's really hard to sit outside for that length of time because obviously with the amount of water we're drinking, we have to run inside every 40 minutes to use the toilet. No, I'm only joking.

Did like a serious grounding session. I took my hat, my laptop, my gratitude journal, a blanket, water, and I think I managed to stay out there for like an hour, the longest one. I was trying to do it more and more often, but on Monday I was like, right, that's it, I'm gonna smash it out today, two hours. I was like an hour in.

My back was really hurting from like leaning over on the laptop. I was trying to like lie down on the grass and get comfortable, but yeah, I just couldn't. It's so uncomfortable out there. Like you, to do it for that long, you really need like a chair. That would be ideal. And then you can just have your feet in the ground. Nice lounger so you could lay back, have your feet on the ground, have your lap, have like a little desk thing for your laptop. I know what you mean. It is really hard. I didn't manage to do two hours either. I think I probably did an hour and a half, but that was just because I was outside of London.

So I was with my family, I was staying with them for a few days. So I managed to do quite a bit, but I would never have managed to do that if I was in London. Like the park outside mine is like pretty much dominated by the rats. So like they only give you a certain amount of time and then they kick you out, which is fair enough. They've been around longer than I have. So I feel you. It's really challenging, but well done. Thank you. I tried the quality of the grass around me as well.

Like it's really good to find like nice, lush, soft grass around here. It's like everything's like quite either dry or like too long and like reedy and it like you stand up and you have like loads of little stabs in the bottom of your shorts that you need to like pull out. yeah, grass rating around here is low, but I'm still trying to find the perfect place nearby with like a nice, soft, lush grass that I can sit on.

and be comfortable for two hours. We'll find it and we can make it a routine that we go there like every other week just to make sure we get that time in. And what about the promise then? So the promise was to write a gratitude journal for five days. Yes, I really liked this. I didn't do like the structure of three things in the morning.

you're grateful for and three things that went well that day in the evening. Well, I tried it. I did it a few days and I really liked it. The first day I was just like ticking them off like, yep, one, two, three, done. And then I realized the second day like, no, you actually need to like spend 15 minutes, like talk about the things that you're grateful for, make you feel emotionally, like not just describing them, not just writing them in a few words, but like actually diving into it a bit deeper. And then that

that was I think what really connected with me was that part more so than like the structure of doing it every day in the morning and the evening, more so just like using that as a tool for when I'm like struggling with something or moving through something, just going and sitting down spending 15 minutes like talking about all of the things that have come up or things I'm thinking. So what's really amazing about gratitude journaling is when

you're writing and you're just talking about like all of the thoughts that have come up, things that you're struggling with. You will almost answer your own questions, like be your own therapist in your mind. So you'll write like, why am I doing this? Why are these thoughts coming up? What's happening to me? And you'll write about it for a little bit. And then you can literally like write the question of like, how can I stop this? Or like, how can I solve this problem? And then your mind like instantly gives you an answer back.

it like, and it might not be the actual solution and it might not completely solve the issue, but it's just something of like, okay, well, here's the next step. And that's how you can like get progress and move through these problems by writing it all down. It kind of just helps you organize everything in your mind and gives you an answer so that you can move through something, which for me was like really powerful. So that's a tool that I'm going to keep going back to every time I need it.

Yeah, definitely. It's like having your own therapist, isn't it? Like in your mind, like you sit down and you ask yourself the things that a therapist would ask you and then you kind of like answer your own questions. Yeah, it's so helpful. I'm really, really glad that you enjoyed it. And are you going to stick with it then? Yes, I've dedicated like this really nice journal that I got from a hotel recently as like my gratitude journal. So I'm going to be going back to that every time. So today's topic

The power of social relationships for longevity and happiness. Yeah, exactly. like how having more friends or more close, good quality relationships can help you live longer. So we've been looking into this a little bit recently, and we want to share kind of our key findings with you and sort of the impact that the people that you surround yourself with can really have on

on your life in terms of how long you live, but also kind of your day to day, like how you live your life and who you become. Yeah, the thing that I found really interesting and why I think we started discussing this topic a while back anyway, is because I was listening to a podcast and they briefly mentioned a study where they found that cancer patients or people who were in cancer treatment had a better treatment outcome.

if they had like strong social relationships. So I remember listening to that podcast and I was like, damn, that's crazy. We should definitely talk about this. So I was researching it and yeah, it looks like your social connections, including family, romantic relationships, friends, there's evidence that your relationships can reduce mortality risk from chronic illness. That's amazing. So essentially like the strength of

those strong social ties can help you like survive, like increase your likelihood of surviving in a situation where you've got like a chronic illness compared to people that don't have those strong social ties and connections. Yeah, so people with strong social ties had 50 % higher survival rate compared to those with weaker social ties. There's also evidence that just having those like really positive relationships around you affects

your mental health and then that translates into better treatment outcomes. So patients with chronic illnesses like arthritis or heart disease who reported high levels of family cohesion experienced fewer symptoms of depression, of anxiety, and then that benefit translated into better physical health outcomes. And they also found a similar thing with cancer patients who had strong family support and a better quality of life.

They therefore had reduced emotional distress, better coping mechanisms, and all of that's crucial for managing chronic illness and improving treatment outcomes. But the important thing to note here is that the quality of the relationship is what matters significantly. So research has shown that negative or toxic relationships can actually have the opposite effect. So potentially exacerbating chronic illness or cancer outcomes because that's increasing your stress or increasing your unhealthy behaviors.

Yeah, of course, like you don't want to be in a stressful situation or going through something serious in your life. And then you've got like really shitty people around you. gonna just gonna make it so much worse. I think that's absolutely incredible. And it just shows like the power like in actual research and data of having good friends like we really need good friends and good family around us. This makes me think of a podcast which I was listening to, I think it was a Stephen Bartlett one. And they were talking about kind of

what are real friends? So kind of like why it's important to have good friends and like what even are good friends? So they kind of described it as having people around you who aren't just sort of acquaintances, like work colleagues or people like that, but people who you know would show up for you, like will consistently show up for you and support you. Not just like call you when they want something from you, but people who you actually have that really close connection with and you would kind of, I know it sounds a little bit.

sent a bit, you know, aww, but people that you would say, love you too. And not just like, might be like your partner, you might say that all the time, but people who really matter to you that you would say, I love you. And, know, hopefully they would say it back. If not, you might want to reconsider that relationship. But the really interesting thing was they were saying how, I think the guy, Simon Sinek, he was saying that strong thigh muscles,

equals more friends, which sounds super random on its own. But essentially what he was saying is, you will get out of bed for the people that you love. The more close connections you have, the more opportunities and reasons you have to physically move your body and show up for people in the literal form, not just the emotional form, but actually be there for them. Get out of bed in the morning and support those people around you, which is just an interesting way to put it, like strong thigh muscles. But essentially, like that's so true.

Like without friends and family to support and be there for, like what are we doing? We'd just be like getting up, going to work, going home. But yeah, having those people in your life just really can help you actually physically be healthier. Yeah, like it really reinforces that like holistic view of health. Like those two things are linked so closely. Like if you're isolated, depressed, not struggling in your relationships, whatever reason that.

just ties in so well with staying in bed, eating unhealthy, like not moving, therefore maybe putting on weight depending on your body type and if you're a stress eater or all of that sort of stuff, like those things are so closely linked. And if you imagine if you are someone who's spiraling, like with your mental health, like struggling in your job or whatever, but you have like strong family support or friends support around you, they're gonna come in and like pull you out of that, like show up to your house.

knock your door down, like even if you're trying to ignore them, like they're going to pull you out of it, or it's going to be easy, or you're going to have that little bit of motivation to be like, yeah, okay, I am going to get out of bed today because I've got somewhere to go, I've got someone to see, or I've got someone that depends on me, which is another big thing, is like, if they're dependent on you. Definitely, and this ties so nicely into the thing about the Blue Zones, like have you watched any of those documentaries about the Blue Zones?

They're so interesting, aren't they? So basically, if no one's seen them, they're like these regions in the world where there's the highest number of centenarians, so people that live until over 100. And one of the kind of themes in all of these regions across the world, even though they might have kind of different diets and different lifestyles, different, you know, cultural experiences, one of the core themes is that they all have a really strong sense of purpose and people in their life who really need them.

So if you have like more people in your life who depend on you, like you were saying, and you have more responsibility to support other people that you love and do things in service of others, then you do have a greater sense of purpose. And then via having a good sense of purpose and supporting people, that then brings you joy because you have that social connection with those friends and that family and you see those people and it gives you a reason to help them and support them through things and vice versa.

And those two things are so closely associated with those blue zones. you know, that's kind of like the proof is in the pudding really. Yeah, I saw something about that where they were seeing these blue zones in different places, like some in Italy, I think there was one in California, one somewhere else. And they originally thought like it was because of the specific diet they're eating in all these different places. But then they debunked all of that. And they realized that actually, particularly the ones in Italy.

It's just about this sense of purpose and Italian families, they're quite multi -generational in the sense that the grandma and the grandpa are very involved in the daily life. The grandma's making pasta from scratch every morning. The grandpa's out harvesting the fields or fixing shoes or whatever it is, but they have that sense of purpose and that's what keeps them living longer on top of all of the fresh Italian food that they get to eat every day.

my gosh, fresh Italian food. Wish we could have that every day. We should definitely move to the Mediterranean. We should just make that decision now. It's on the cards. It's on the cards. But another thing which I have been reading into is it's related to the social relationships, but not in the sense of kind of longevity, but a bit more about the impact people you spend your life around has on you in terms of how you live your life.

Your friends and your relationships can have like a huge, huge, huge impact on who you are. And there's this expression like you're the result of the five people that you spend the most time with. So like choose who they are wisely and make sure that you know you're surrounding yourself with people that have really like shared values. And this idea kind of suggests that those people that you regularly associate with do have like a really profound impact on your mindset, your behaviors, and then obviously your success as well.

And there's a couple of things that keep coming up when we read into it. So like one of them is around these mirror neurons that you have in your brain. So these neurons, like we've got loads and loads and loads of neurons in our brain and they fire when we like see certain things or do certain things. And these mirror neurons fire when you see something happens, like you see someone do something, but they also fire when you do that same thing. So like if you were to make some pasta, let's say, and then mine would fire.

the same way as if I was doing that same thing. So they like impact our ability to learn new skills, acquire knowledge, and also like form emotional connections. So when you think about that, it's kind of like you see the people that you spend time with doing certain things, you then fire in your mirror neurons and you kind of learn that same behavior. And if they're all doing like really crappy things, then you're gonna learn that same thing.

If they're all excelling at life and being amazing humans, you're going to learn that as well without having to physically do it yourself just by being in the same room as them and associating with them. There's a podcast that Tim Biohacker just released recently and he had a guest on there, Jim Quick, who's a brain and mindset coach, and they were talking about everything that you were just saying. The phrase Tim used was, me your friends and I'll show you your future.

and they were talking about how some people are energy vampires, like they might do it unconsciously, or maybe they just don't want to get your hopes up, like they might be coming from the best kind of place, but they can steal your energy and your vitality and your dreams just because they don't want you to get your hopes up and then get hurt, or they're worried that they're outgrowing you and they're co -dependent on you or whatever it is, but those neurons.

a firing and so we're consciously or unconsciously mirroring the people around you. So if you're trying to achieve something and like working every day towards a goal and then you're around someone who's kind of giving that energy of like, it's going to be difficult for you to achieve this or you can't do it or whatever, then your brain is going to start mirroring those same patterns. And so that even though it might not, like you were saying at the start, it might not affect your longevity.

that is going to affect your happiness because if you've got goals that you want to achieve and being around people who aren't helping you achieve them, that's not going to make you happy or get out what it is you want from life. you might live a long life, but it might not be a happy one. nobody wants that. Yeah, it's really interesting. like, it's kind of like applied psychology. So there's a couple of theories like social learning theory and observational theory. So social learning theory is

what I was saying before, you can kind of like, can watch someone, let's say like use a hammer and then you learn how to use a hammer based on watching them use a hammer. You don't have to actually do it yourself. And then observational theory is kind of how we learn to imitate or model the people around us. So what you were just saying about how if you've got people saying to you, you can't do this and you you're never gonna succeed, that's obviously gonna impact you because you're gonna start to believe those same thoughts, but.

If you're around people that are literally succeeding, they are doing it and they are also telling you, look, you can do it too. You're gonna observe via these different like social learning theory and observational theory. You're gonna observe and learn how to do those things just by being around them and seeing them do it. And also then having the belief in yourself that you can do it. If you spend time around lazy and unhappy people, you're gonna become lazy and unhappy. So you don't wanna do that.

tying all of this back to what we were just saying about the blue zones and having purpose and how that increases your lifespan and increases your longevity. If you're not achieving your goals because you're hanging around with people who you're mirroring, who aren't helping you get there, then that is going to affect your purpose. So really by that definition or that perspective, it could literally affect the amount of time that you live. Yeah, it could. And also that could be really challenging if you've got

a partner or family members who you love them and you want the best for them and you want to all be living healthy and successful lives together. But it can be challenging if you feel like they might be struggling with some motivation at the moment or whatever it might be. That's really difficult and that can make it more challenging. Yeah, I wonder if that is a good way to lead on to our next topic of how to get your partner to biohack or how

biohacking with others can be a form of connecting because yeah, that is a really difficult situation what you've just presented of like, at the start of the podcast, we're talking about how crucial those relationships of your family members are to you, but now we're talking about that you're gonna mirror them and what if someone's in the position where they can clearly see that the people around them that they need because they need that social connection and that's hugely important for health as we discussed in terms of like chronic illness.

but they can see that they're holding them back almost because they're not living like, you know, a life where they're achieving their goals or feeling like they're good enough to do whatever it is they want to do and get out of life, then that can be really challenging. However, you have to balance those two things because you need those social connections. You can't just like cut out your parents or your siblings or your best friend or your partner like if they're...

If they're good relationships, not like toxic relationships, it's really crucial for you to have those. So I think that's a nice way to lead on to like how to get your partner to biohack, but also whether it's biohacking or whether it's like that holistic view of biohacking that we take where we look at like every single layer of life, like how can you achieve your purpose in life and achieve what you want so you can live longer? whether it's biohacking or whether it's purpose, like that's a good way to

lead on to this topic, because one of the things I wanted to talk about in terms of help getting your partner to biohack or whatever it is, is goal contagion. So that is a psychological phenomenon where individuals adopt or pursue a goal after being exposed to someone else's goal directed behavior. So this suggests that goals can be contagious spreading from one person to another, not necessarily with conscious awareness.

So there's a lot of studies on this and they've provided evidence for this in experiments. So for example, people who were exposed to descriptions of goal -directed behavior, like a story about someone surviving to earn money, were more likely to pursue similar goals themselves. So that's also been proven in terms of like health promoting behaviors, like biohacking. If someone's observing someone else adopt those behaviors, they're more likely to adopt those goals.

So what I would say, going a very long winded way, going back to that challenge that you just spoke about is if you need those relationships, so don't cut them out, nurture them, but carve out time for yourself, do what you need to do, do your biohacking, do your stuff that's gonna get to your goals. And all you can hope is that that commitment and showing up every day for yourself and achieving those things, you'll actually start to see

your family mirroring you rather than the other way around, or your friends mirroring you. Like you, you can't just call like all your family and friends like, you know what, that's it. I've had enough now. All of you go. You're gonna end up with no one and then you definitely won't be living the centenarian life. But yeah, like that's just keep at it, keep at it and they'll eventually get on board. Like it is so contagious. I've definitely experienced that when I've seen people around me

doing like awesome stuff. And it is massively contagious. Like you just get that buzz in you of like, yes, like I feel that I want to do that too. And it has a huge positive impact on you. So keep at it. If anyone's in that situation, just keep going, keep encouraging people around you. Like you don't need to be literally telling them like, get off your ass and go for a run. But even just by you talking about whatever it is you're doing and like healthy habits that you have, that will spread that positivity and that will spread that motivation and eventually.

You never know, they might turn around one day and suggest going for a nice little run themselves. Yeah. I've literally seen this like with my brother. So he's recently started running and I haven't really been running. I don't particularly like it. And he starts telling me about his running and I'm just thinking like, right, I need to start running again. Like I have to do it now because it is so contagious. And also I think we're maybe a bit competitive as well.

That is actually a good little tip for getting someone like a family friend, whoever partnered to biohack, is finding something that kind of resonates with them. So in my case, I'm quite a competitive person. And like in that example, like my brother saying he's going for a run, that's going to make me want to go for a run. Like we've got that typical sibling rivalry the other day, we got blood tests on the same day, so we can like compare our results.

Just normal family shit. Finding that specific thing which you can do together or that resonates with you both is a great little tip to try and get someone to get into biohacking and take you more accountability for their health. that's a great point. If you're trying to get someone to do something that you love, if the overall goal is for you both to be healthier,

and you love running and you go for like 10k runs every day and your partner or your friend or your family member is just like what the hell that's not something I could ever do or would ever be interested in then finding something that resonates with them like is it tennis is it golf is it swimming what is it that they might have had like a little bit of interest in that you might have just peeked over the years that they like you know one eye was

going to the TV when the divers were on in the Olympic swimming or like whatever it is, like suggest something that's going to resonate with them and click with them so that they can fall in love with it for the fun of it because it's not going to work for everyone just doing it for the motivation of being healthier. Like sometimes you have to fall in love first and then you can do it because it makes you healthier. just something like a nice romantic rooftop sauna with your partner or something like that.

I know a sauna might not be for everyone, if you can find like it might be that someone is interested in that kind of thing, or they love going to a sauna like at the gym or in the spa, but you could find a way to kind of incorporate that into your routine and get like nice moments over it. doesn't have to just be not, I wouldn't want to go for a run, like getting all sweaty with someone except you. That's fine. Don't mind you, but just generally like that can be quite a daunting thing.

putting yourself in a vulnerable position where you might not be feeling your most confident. Someone else that might be the easiest thing in the world, but for me, that would be putting myself in a more vulnerable position. So something like a sauna or a free water swim. You were talking about swimming. What about a nice free water swim? There's loads of ways to get active and ground at the same time. I think the competitive, I don't know if this is competitiveness, goal contagion, or a mix of in between, but

I know that the longest run that I've ever done is when I went with my friend Zoe, it's the only run we've ever been on together, and we ran 7K without stopping. And I've never done anywhere near that in my life before, but because she was in front of me, she was going, I was conscious that I didn't want to like hold her back or I didn't want to look like a wuss or whatever it was, but.

That motivation of having that, whatever you want to call it, accountability buddy or motivator or expander just following her and not stopping made me run further than I ever had. And yes, I couldn't walk for a few days afterwards, but it helped me when I go for runs on my own because now I know that I can push myself so much further.

then I ever would have tried to if I hadn't kind of like broken that mental barrier in the run with her. You've got that motivation and also that is kind of like a pick a mix of all of those things, isn't it? A little bit of like motivation, a little bit of competition, a little bit of kind of showing you that you can do it and like feeling like comfort in the sense that you've got someone there that you know, like believes in you. Or if you want to do something really crazy, like you want to, some people just want to just dive into the deep end.

you could just do something really wacky like do a detox with your partner, like just get the coffee enemas straight out and then stop. That might not be a way to like spice up your love life, but it would definitely be a way to share an intimate moment with someone you love. Is that going to be a future challenge, a coffee enema because I have no idea what to think or to make of that one, but whatever, we'll give it a go.

Yeah, we might have to do that in a couple of weeks, but we've already got a challenge for this week, which I'm excited to present you with soon. Okay. Let's talk about the promise first, shall we? Yeah, let's do it. To remind everyone, each episode we're going to make a little promise to ourselves. And the idea is that it's something small that can have a big impact. And usually they're related to the themes of the episode. So our promise for this week is... So this week,

Each day we want you to tell someone that you wouldn't usually say it to, that you love them. So we usually do the little promise for five days because we think it's a good amount of time just to try it out and then see if it's something you want to stick with. So if you've got a partner and you do it like every day, 10 times a day anyway, maybe try and say it to a family member or a friend, just like show them how much they mean to you. And this is really relevant and important for the reasons we discussed earlier. kind of like acknowledging who those

really close relationships are that you have and taking a moment to kind of, you know, like self -evaluate, like who are those people for me? Who do I love? And you feel that strong connection with. So it's gonna be like a really nice process to kind of just go through yourself. I did it recently and I also messaged a friend who started it as well. And going through that process, she kept saying to me like how amazing it is to firstly, like have a think about who those people actually are. But secondly,

To see the reaction of people that you don't usually say it to when you're on the phone and end the conversation, you're like, I love you, or you meet up for a coffee and you're like, I love you, bye, and they're like, what? It's just so confused. But it's strange, isn't it? Even though we love these people, we don't necessarily always say it. Culturally, it's not as common, I think, in the UK as other places. I was just about to say, in the UK, think, we're pretty bad for that.

And I saw a reel like a couple of days ago of it was basically saying like POV, you were raised in like a family who's not affectionate at all. And then you marry into one that is really affectionate. And there was just like all these different scenes of like people like leaning on her and sharing her blanket. And she was just sat there like, what the hell is going on? Or like saying, love you when they were leaving and she'd be like hiding behind the kitchen counter and they'd be like, hey, say it back. So yeah.

I actually love this promise because of I think it is something a lot of people don't do in this, in the UK specifically. And like you were saying, it can really help with a lot of our relationships, especially relationships that we've had for many, years, or like the family that we grew up around with and we've known these people for our whole lives. We can have like these really weird...

communication barriers and there's just like certain things you don't say and you've never said them for 20 years. So now the thought of saying them is like so incredibly daunting and scary. But I love that because I'm just like a huge believer in we should do anything that scares us because it's how we're gonna grow. Like every time you're out of your comfort zone, you're gonna grow. And the I love you one specifically reminds me of when I was in Columbia and I met this woman through volunteering.

and she was hosting this Heal Your Life retreat. And I had no idea what it was, I've never heard anything about it, but it's basically a retreat that had like curriculum or whatever the word is that was taken from Louise Hayes' How to Heal Your Life book. And if you don't know who Louise Hayes is, she was like the original manifesto in like the 80s. Like she invented it basically.

And she apparently like healed herself from cancer and all these incredible things just through like the old school manifestation rhetoric of like reprogramming your thoughts. But we did like all this crazy stuff. Like I tried meditation for the first time. I did like a crystal healing session, like all this sort of stuff that I'd never ever done before. Like that was my first introduction to this whole like self -healing world, which I now.

love and like I've taken the best bits of that retreat and left the bad bits and took everything with a pinch of salt basically and now here I am like almost 10 years later still doing some of those things and still loving some of those things and still really helpful. But it makes me think of that because there was one activity that we had to do where we were outside in the garden which was like this really beautiful like farmhouse and there was like avocado trees, wild chickens, like a stream.

running down all this amazing plants and trees and there was just this really weird song playing and we had to go walk around and look into different people's eyes from the group and sing the words of the song which were like, love you. And it was the most cringe thing you've ever done in your whole life because you have to walk around a group.

pick a different stranger, go up to them, look them into the eyes and then sing, love you, like directly into their That is wild. my word. Absolutely wild. It was so like overpowering and overwhelming the whole experience that everyone was just like crying. Like, I don't know, it was just so weird, but it was like so uncomfortable. But when you do something that's like so against every single social norm,

one do it. Honestly, Columbia: 2025

But it is strange, isn't it? It's like you can sing like, I love you to strangers, right? And you're in like a retreat in Colombia and then you come home and then you like find it really hard to say it to people that you actually know and love and have that strong relationship with. It's such an interesting thing, isn't it? We're so bad for it in the UK. So if you are struggling with that or if that's something that you want to give a go, you don't have to sing it like Alex just did. But if you want to, you can.

Yeah, try it out for five days. Say, love you to five different people that you love and see how it goes. We would love for you to try it with us and share your experience back. But it is also totally optional. Don't forget, we know everyone has super busy lives, so there's no pressure. But here's just a little bit of inspo or motivation to try a new habit. So if you're up for it, join us. And definitely, definitely let us know. Ping us on IG or TikTok and let us know how you find it.

So let's talk about the challenge. You're going to love this. This is going to be so fun for you. So this challenge, so each week we take different challenges. So we want to try out all these complicated things in the world of biohacking and sort of learn from our journeys. So we can suggest products or services that we think are potentially valuable to try, make sure that, you know, we give it a go first before you decide whether or not to invest in it.

and then we'll share with you all of the benefits, drawbacks, cost, everything, see if it's something you wanna do or not. Our challenge for this week is, I'm so nervous to say this to you because you're gonna absolutely hate me. So this week, we're gonna do hyperbaric oxygen chambers. Okay. Your worst nightmare. So these are chambers which are sealed environments where you go inside

I think of it like a tiny little submarine and you go into this pressurized environment where you breathe pure oxygen. So kind of the benefits of this include things like enhanced wound healing, reduce inflammation. It basically helps increase the amount of oxygen that gets delivered to all of your tissues. So this can improve recovery, all sorts of conditions. And it's also just really, really excellent to help heal your body and also block.

harmful bacteria, so like it's strengthening your immune system. I love them, but Alex, I don't know if you want to share your thoughts on this. You don't love the idea as much as me. I mean, all those benefits sound great, but as a claustrophobic, I'm not getting in a submarine tube. So what are we going to do? So I've done a little bit of research and I have found what I hope is a compromise.

So I'm going to show you this now. I have managed to find one which is a two person mini submarine. Mini submarine. Can we just not say it? Just put submarines out of this, okay? Don't use that word because we're not going underwater. I was going to say we're not going underwater so it's not sub. So technically it's just marine, I guess.

But there's no C either. Okay, so I've managed to find a two person hyperbaric chamber. So take a look and let me know what you think. And I really hope that you're okay with it. Okay, it's loading, but it does look like a submarine. It does. So I What? You told me it, I thought it was like going to be a proper room with a desk. It's just like these two chairs.

in like a submarine -esque type. It's literally like a submarine, but just a Yeah. God. I know. It's fine. You'll be in there with me. So I think I'll be fine. in there together. But yeah, let's just stop using the word submarine because I'm going to think that we're going to implode while we're in there. So don't do that. yeah. Submarine's not got the best rep at the moment. okay. No, it's honestly like I've... So I did one of these before and it was just...

The best thing ever. says 60 to 90 minutes on the link you've just sent me. That's a long time. to 90 minutes. Well, we can take our laptops in. And I was thinking, so I was going to save this until we got there, but I'll tell you now. I was thinking we take our laptops in, we put on a movie, we just have a real nice chill. Like we just relax, have a little catch up, breathe some pure oxygen, watch a movie and have a great time. Next thing you know, it's done.

and you're wishing you were back in there. Okay. And is there like a window? Cause I can only see the inside. There's a huge window. I said to them, look, we're not coming unless you've got a big ass window. And they were like, we've got a big ass window, babe. So really you're all good. Yeah. But look, honestly, if we get there and you don't want to do it, we'll, go. Well, we'll wait, we'll wait 60 to 90 minutes.

I'll watch the movie outside, you watch the movie inside, we'll just press play at the same time and then look at each other through the window. We can see each other's reaction whilst I'm in the submarine. No, I think you're going to really enjoy it, but you can get out whenever you want. No, but you can't because it has to depressurise. I read somewhere that it takes 10 minutes to depressurise and if you're in a bigger one, it might take double the time.

Okay, if we get there and you don't want to do it, we'll leave. But look, I think the benefits are just incredible. we breathe 20 % oxygen in the natural air in the environment. I think it's like 21. And this is 100%. So like, not only do we only breathe 21 % when we're out and about in the world, but we live in London. like what we're breathing is just it might be 21 % oxygen, but there's a hell of a load of crap in there as well.

So just to put ourselves in that situation where we can breathe in that pure oxygen, what we're destined to breathe. All right, I'll give it a go. Thank you. I appreciate you and I hope you love it and I really think you will. Well, is that it for today's episode? That's it for today. We'll be back next week with our report on the hyperbaric oxygen chamber and how we found it, hopefully how Alex found it. If we go in. Can't wait.

Well, thank you so much for listening. We hope you enjoyed this as much as we did. We would really appreciate if you could support our podcast by subscribing to help us keep bringing you quality and fact -checked biohacking content. And if you want to see more of us, you can join the community on Instagram and TikTok at biohackgcpodcast. Lots of love. Thank you for joining the group chat. We'll see you next week. Bye.