If You Want TO Live As LONG As Humanly Possible, Don't Forget To Focus on This!

Here are the top 10 key takeaways from Ed Mylett's podcast with Dave Asprey on living longer while maintaining consciousness, inner peace, and peak performance.

1. Intuition is a trainable human ability everyone possesses

Intuition isn't mystical thinking but rather a fundamental human capacity that can be developed through practice. Everyone has the biological wiring for intuitive responses because we are alive and functioning beings. Some people may have stronger natural abilities, but the core skill exists in all humans and can be strengthened over time.

The key to accessing intuition lies in recognizing the very first, small response your body gives to any situation before emotions and logic take over. This initial reaction happens instantly when someone walks into a room or when you encounter a new opportunity. Most people miss this signal because it gets immediately overwhelmed by emotional responses and logical analysis that follow.

Successful investors demonstrate this principle in action. When both their spreadsheet analysis and gut feeling align positively, they typically make profitable investments. However, when the numbers look good but their intuition says no, they often lose money. The most successful outcomes sometimes occur when logic says no but intuition says yes, because following trained intuition can lead to counter-intuitive but correct decisions.

2. The nervous system processes reality through five fundamental drives

The human nervous system operates through five core drives that process every experience in a specific order. These drives happen automatically at the cellular level, involving trillions of mitochondria that make decisions before conscious thought occurs. Understanding this sequence helps explain why humans react predictably to different situations and why certain marketing or communication approaches prove more effective.

Fear comes first, triggering immediate responses to potential threats like pulling your hand away from heat or jumping away from danger. Food follows as the second drive, compelling organisms to seek nourishment in case of future scarcity. The third drive involves fertility and reproduction, ensuring species continuation through sexual impulses and mating behaviors.

The fourth drive focuses on supporting friends and community, creating cooperation within species for mutual survival. The final drive, forgiveness, represents the highest evolutionary capacity that allows humans to stop wasting energy on past threats and redirect it toward growth and service. This progression from survival to transcendence forms the foundation for understanding human behavior and developing consciousness.

3. Forgiveness functions as a performance-enhancing drug for the nervous system

Forgiveness operates as a measurable neurological process rather than just an emotional decision or social gesture. When you harbor grudges or resentments, your nervous system continuously allocates energy to process those unresolved emotional states. This creates a constant drain on your mental and physical resources, similar to having multiple phone notifications constantly demanding attention.

The forgiveness process described involves eight specific steps that create measurable changes in brain wave patterns. During proper forgiveness work, brain activity shifts to resemble that of advanced meditation practitioners. This isn't about telling someone you forgive them or deciding intellectually to let something go. Instead, it requires entering an altered state that fundamentally changes your nervous system's response to triggers.

True forgiveness means becoming non-reactive to situations that previously caused pain or anger. You can achieve this state without ever speaking to the person who hurt you or declaring the harmful action acceptable. The goal is internal freedom from being controlled by past experiences, allowing you to respond to current situations based on present circumstances rather than old wounds.

4. Brief intentional conscious exposure to pain regulates the nervous system

Deliberately exposing yourself to manageable discomfort helps regulate your nervous system and increases motivation for other activities. This principle explains why various traditions throughout history have incorporated controlled pain experiences, from monks using self-flagellation to yogis sleeping on nail beds. The practice isn't about self-harm or punishment but about training your nervous system to function more efficiently.

Modern biohacking applications include cold plunges, standing on spiky yoga mats, eating extremely spicy foods, or taking cold showers. The key is that the discomfort must be brief, intentional, and conscious rather than accidental or prolonged suffering. When your nervous system learns it can handle controlled discomfort while remaining safe, it requires less dopamine to motivate you for other tasks.

This technique proves particularly valuable before activities requiring focus or discipline like meditation, work, or exercise. By demonstrating to your body that you can tolerate discomfort, you essentially reset your motivation threshold. People often naturally seek these experiences without understanding the mechanism, which explains why many former addicts have tattoos or why humans are drawn to challenging physical activities.

5. Heart rate variability provides crucial insights into nervous system health

Heart rate variability measures the spacing between individual heartbeats rather than just counting beats per minute. This metric reveals far more about your nervous system state than simple heart rate monitoring. When your heart beats with very even spacing, it indicates a stressed nervous system, while healthy variability shows adaptive resilience.

Low heart rate variability often stems from controllable lifestyle factors. Eating dinner too late forces your digestive system to work during recovery hours, disrupting natural rhythms. Exposure to artificial light in the evening, particularly blue light, interferes with your body's preparation for rest. Room temperature also plays a significant role, with cooler sleeping environments supporting better nervous system recovery.

Chronic infections, dental issues, or other hidden health problems can prevent heart rate variability improvement despite lifestyle changes. When basic interventions like earlier dinners, darkness protocols, and cooler temperatures don't help, deeper investigation into underlying health issues becomes necessary. True Dark glasses that filter specific light wavelengths can provide measurable improvements in heart rate variability when worn for an hour before bed.

6. Meditation requires matching the practice to your personality type

Different meditation styles work better for different personality types, particularly when distinguishing between "farmer" and "warrior" mentalities. Most traditional meditation practices were designed for agricultural populations who spent their lives in steady, repetitive work. However, people with warrior mentalities who naturally run toward danger rather than away from it need different approaches to achieve beneficial states.

Warrior-type personalities often struggle with farmer-style meditation that emphasizes relaxation and emptying the mind. These practices can feel like taking valium rather than creating empowering states. Instead, warrior personalities benefit from practices like Zazen, a Japanese samurai meditation that involves sitting in a specific posture with eyes open, focusing intensely on a single point for just two to five minutes.

The key is finding practices that create positive altered states rather than forcing yourself through uncomfortable experiences that don't suit your natural wiring. If a meditation consistently feels wrong after you've learned it properly, the issue might be style mismatch rather than poor technique. Successful meditation should leave you feeling more capable and present, not drained or agitated.

7. Longevity without consciousness work creates a form of hell

Extending lifespan through biohacking and medical interventions becomes meaningless or even torturous without parallel development of consciousness and emotional freedom. Living for centuries while carrying anger, resentment, and unresolved trauma would create an extended form of psychological suffering. The goal isn't just to live longer but to live with joy, purpose, and inner peace.

Biohacking ultimately serves three core purposes: increasing energy, extending longevity, and gaining control over your conscious state. All the physical interventions like peptides, supplements, and medical treatments support these goals, but consciousness work becomes essential as lifespan increases. Without forgiveness and trigger clearing, extended life becomes a burden rather than a gift.

This perspective reframes consciousness work as practical rather than spiritual luxury. If you plan to live to 180 years old, spending decades angry about something that happened when you were 25 represents massive wasted potential. The combination of physical optimization with emotional and spiritual development creates the foundation for a life worth extending.

8. Cellular memory may carry information across generations

Evidence suggests that memories and trauma can be transmitted through cellular mechanisms across generations, potentially explaining intuitive knowledge that seems to come from nowhere. This concept bridges the gap between different spiritual and scientific perspectives on consciousness and memory. DNA-based memory and generational trauma transmission have scientific support, though the exact mechanisms remain unclear.

During deep consciousness work, people often access three types of non-personal memories after clearing their individual triggers. Some recall prenatal experiences or birth trauma that creates healing when processed. Others connect with generational patterns, finding relief by addressing inherited family trauma even from deceased relatives. A third group reports accessing what feels like past-life memories, regardless of their beliefs about reincarnation.

The practical value lies not in proving these experiences but in their healing effects. Whether these memories represent actual past lives, genetic inheritance, or information fields doesn't matter if processing them creates lasting peace and freedom from triggers. This approach allows people from different belief systems to benefit from the work without requiring specific spiritual commitments.

9. Altered states facilitate high performance and healing

All peak performance states, healing experiences, and flow states involve altered consciousness rather than normal waking awareness. This includes everything from athletic performance to business breakthroughs to intimate experiences. Recognizing this pattern helps explain why various traditions developed specific practices for entering these states intentionally.

Multiple pathways can access these beneficial altered states. Breath work, meditation, movement, sound, fasting, and even properly conducted intimate experiences can create transformative consciousness shifts. Some people explore psychedelic substances, though these require careful consideration of safety and proper guidance. The goal is finding safe, repeatable methods that work for your specific constitution and circumstances.

Twenty percent of people report profound spiritual experiences during intimate moments, demonstrating that transcendent states don't require exotic practices or substances. Tantric and conscious intimacy practices represent valid paths to consciousness expansion that mainstream culture rarely discusses. The key is approaching any method with intention and awareness rather than seeking escape or entertainment.

10. The body's delay mechanism creates opportunities for conscious choice

Your nervous system holds all sensory input for one-third of a second before presenting it to your conscious mind, creating a natural "censorship window" similar to live television delays. During this brief period, your mitochondria and survival systems decide how you'll feel about the incoming information. Understanding this delay reveals opportunities for conscious intervention in automatic responses.

This mechanism explains why cats appear supernaturally fast, with only a 30-millisecond delay compared to humans' 300-millisecond delay. Younger people also process reality faster, with 19-year-olds having quarter-second delays that contribute to superior athletic performance. Elite performers like Bruce Lee had unusually fast response times that gave them apparent superhuman abilities.

Recognizing this delay allows you to work with your nervous system more skillfully. Instead of fighting automatic reactions, you can train the system that operates during this window through practices like forgiveness work, meditation, and trigger clearing. This creates lasting changes in how you automatically process reality rather than requiring constant conscious effort to manage responses.