undeather

It takes years - sometimes even decades for measureable atherosclerotic plaques to form. Most modalities, especially vascular-ultrasound are very crude measurement techniques with very low specificity. MRI-angiography would be a gold standard but is expensive and sometimes difficult to interpret. Calcium-scores are useful, but it comes with a shitload of limitations: Calcification is a late-stage process of atherogenesis, soft plaques are much more common in young people, there are a shitton of heart attacks in young people with CAC=0. Funfact: Statins tend to increase CAC-Scores but decrease the rate of heart attacks. Funnily enough, more calcified plaques tend to rapture less frequently - which makes sense if you think about it. hs-CRP and other acute phase proteins CAN correlate with atherogenesis but it's a terrible proxy because it's regulated by all sorts of processes. If somebody sneezes in front of you, your CRP will go up - good luck decoupling this from tiny changes in plaque formation.

Good advice. Maybe to mention that PCSK9-inhibitors are super expensive (~6-10k $/ year), while statins are cheap as hell. Also, check your Lipoprotein A (Lp(a)) at least once in your lifetime - even if your ApoB is known.

The imperial college London recently published the most elaborate DMT-study ever conducted. They gave 20mg of intravenous N,N-Dimethyltryptamine (DMT) to 20 healthy adults and measured brain activity through multimodal neuroimaging (EEG-fMRI (electroencephalography-functional MRI)). One of the findings was the following: "The results, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, provide the most advanced picture yet of the human brain on psychedelics. The recordings show how the brain’s normal hierarchical organisation breaks down, electrical activity becomes anarchic, and connectivity between regions soars, particularly those handling “higher level” functions such as imagination, which evolved most recently in humans. “The stronger the intensity of the experience, the more hyperconnected were those brain areas,” said Timmermann. This ability to make brain activity more fluid and flexible is thought to underpin not only the profound psychedelic experience but the promising results from early clinical trial patients who were given DMT in combination with psychotherapy to treat depression. “DMT is short-acting, so it’s a very flexible tool compared with psilocybin [the active ingredient in magic mushrooms] and LSD which can last for six to 10 hours,” said Timmermann." I know this following statement might be triggering (esp. for Leo) but is the "I am GOD"-experience nothing more than an illusion caused by overclocked imagination? Let's discuss this. Link to study: https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2218949120 Link to article which is more accessible for most: https://www.theguardian.com/science/2023/mar/20/psychedelic-brew-ayahuasca-profound-impact-brain-scans-dmt?CMP=share_btn_tw

Working in the medical field will do that to you - inevitably so. It takes an unduly heterodox attitude to embrace both worlds in my experience

I like Peter and after having worked with him in the past, I do also respect him as a sincere colleague. Besides that, please take those numbers with a grain of salt. There is a lot of reverse causation and other dynamics at play. Anything that sounds "too good to be true" usually isn't the whole story. Read his book, take his advice - but let's be smart about it!

The most effective way is the one which is in line with your cognitive phenotype. You will find yourself drawn towards certain teachers/teachings and less towards others. Both your nature and your individual conditioning will play part in that process. Any teacher with the necessary amount if integrity and wisdom can lead you towards progress and realization. Some high integrity teachers are imo: - Angelo Di Lullo - A.H Almaas - Adyashanti - Leo Gura - Frank Yang - Peter Ralston It also depends on what you want to achieve. There are multiple realizations to be made and each will come with it's own set of conclusions. Hardcore neo-adveita and no-self teachings will bring their different flavours than god-realization.

This is a thread about the validity of Leo's claims, not my personal insights. If Leo was right, then all wisdom traditions are wrong and you just need to do 5-MeO. If Leo is deluding himself, then the whole game flips. Dont you see how important that is?

I dont know how to respond to this. I am torn. On the one side, your post oozes narcissism and lack of humility. But then it's also true that those qualities have nothing to do with the potential validity of your insights. It could well be that you are one of the few individuals who just "got it". But how do we know? In fact, you are cutting across mytical insights & wisdom traditions which are thousands of years old. Whats the pre-test propability that a bald guy on 5MeO actually got way, way deeper into reality and is not just deluding himself? How do we actually know you are not the one deluding himself? You might say:"If you are open minded and do the work, everything I say here can be verified through direct expereince". Well, yes - but thats the catch phrase of EVERY spiritual teacher nowadays. Frank Yang has that all over his website or in his videos - and for him, you are stuck in an intermediate god-self phase of enlightenment. The thing is that if you just starting scratching the surface of spiritual teachings, you will find absolute truth claims EVERYWHERE. Everyone figured it out - from Buddha, to Ramana Maharshi to Leo Gura. Emptiness is the true nature - no, it's conciousness - no it's pure awareness - there is no self - there is a higher self - you are god - you are nothing.....All those insights are of course contradictory in same way or form. So who is right? Who is deluding himself? The only teacher I know of who has adressed this issue properly is A.H Almaas and his concept of runaway realization. Dont get me wrong, I kind of get where you are comming from. You have experienced things which are beyond anyone's wildest dreams and immaginations - and I can comprehend what those experiences will do to your metaphysical framework. But there are so many spiritual masters who claim similar, undeniable truths. So yeah....

Well, I have been following your content for years and I know how short tempered you can get with that kind of stuff I am also not, in any way or form, god realized - so please consider my perspective. Help me out with this one because I am basically "just" an idealist. Let's assume for one moment that your brain/mind modulates the 5-MeO-experience. It "just" a hyperrealistic imagination. How is there any telling apart from actual metaphysical truths? I mean, there have been dozens of similar truth claims derived from all sorts of modalities (psychodelics, NDE's, meditation, OBE's..)- propagated with a similar, subjectively infallible level of confidence. Now, dont get me wrong - I am NOT a materialist. Consciousness is primary in my understanding - but how would you respond to such criticism?

I grew up and live in the southern part of Austria, which is a country with a huge beer-drinking culture. Almost everyone I know starts drinking at or even before the age of 16 (which is the legal age for beer & wine) and the amount usually increases in your early 20's. When I started university, going out 2-3 times a week partying was just a normal social convention. I played tennis competititvely for years and even there the "after game beer" is the normal thing to do. Funnily enough, most young people are pretty healthy regardless. We generally move a lot and eat decently, which helps. As a gastroenterologist, I can see both sides of the picture pretty clearly. I have propably seen hundreds, if not thousands of lives destroyed because of this substance. The liver is usually an extremely tenacious organ, but if you manage to irreverseibly damage it - then you will suffer through unimaginable hells. I have struggled with this dichotomy but found the middle way to be the best for me personally. Like any other drug - set and setting should be the basis for consumption. Do you drink because you want to suppress your emotions? Deal with fears? Overcome social anxiety? succumb to societal pressure? Or is it because a cold beer is delicious, your life is great and getting wasted with your family/friends on a certain occasion can be an incredibly fun thing to do.

Yes

First of all, let me share an important fact: Hashimoto is one of the most common autoimmune diseases and therefore also one of the most well studied. Now lets just assume the worst case scenario for a second: You won't heal and it gets progressively worse. Even in that case, you can substitute thyroid hormones for the rest of your life and just be fine. In fact, funnily enough - Hashimoto has been correlated to increased longevity in some epidemiological research. I have personally treated patients who have been living with their Hashimoto for 30+ years and they are fine as long as they take their medication. So please, do not stress yourself out because of this. Even the worst case scenario isn't really that bad. That said, I am personally convinced that our current medical paradigm is way too reductive when it comes to our approach to autoimmune diseases - and I say this as a MD myself. We are amazing at the treatment of acute causes but almost in the dark ages when it comes to more complex pathologies. What Michael wrote in his response is to the right way to think about it: While there is unlikely to be one driver, with any autoimmunity you basically want to address everything: - your diet - your anthropometrics: mainly your BMI and body fat content - your sleep, relaxation and recovery - physical activity - environmental exposure - toxins, pollution, microplastics, living in are with high usage of pesticides/herbidicesany unresolved traumas or negative beliefs learned in childhood - gut health & microbiome disruption can often be a contributor in autoimmunity - toxic relationships, unfulfilled passions, lack of purpose etc There are countless stories of patients who healed themselves from such conditions, so its definitely possible but also highly individual. Therefore, if you are really serious about it, you should look for a holistically minded medical doctor or experienced health professional to work with you. It takes time and money, but it might be worth it. J Just a word of caution: It's really difficult to find someone decent and the whole scene is littered with snake oil-salesman and major bullshitters. Most stuff you read on the internet is bullshit, be curious but dont take anything face value. I personally can not take new patients at the moment because I am overworked as hell. Actually, what I can recommend to you is the work of my friend Anoop Kumar. He is a MD who runs the youtube channel:"Healing is possible": https://www.youtube.com/@HealingIsPossiblechannel He interviews people who healed from "unhealable" maladies. Here is his website where you can also buy his course where he goes more into the details of it: https://www.healthrevolution.org/ Anoop is a legit dude who knows what he is talking about. Anyway, I hope this helps.

Please dont forget that diet is just ONE part of the antagonistic pleiotropy playbook. Complex systems are in general not bound by zero-sum games - therefore any kind of binary thinking is inappropriate. You can definitely optimize for multiple domains through a variety of influences (supplementation, movement, psychospiritual exercises...) However if you want to talk long term advantage through the domain of nutriton, its actually pretty simple: Keep your ApoB and glucose as low as possible for as long as possible. In general, ApoB is more important for atherogenesis. And yes, its actually pretty easy to genetically influence those genotypes: Just knock out the 2 genes at Y142X and C679X and you basically become immune to heart attacks and strokes. I think it's important to say that when we say "unhealthy" it's usually in relation to another food. A grass fed steak is healthier than a frozen pizza. A quinoa salad with a variety of homegrown vegetables is healthier than a steak. I wont deny though that a lot of guys feel amazing on meat based diets. If it rocks the boat for you, then go for it - it might not be the healthiest for longevity issues, but you will be fine for a very long time.

Leo's health advice is decent in general, but it's not his deepest area of expertise. Let me explain you the thing with coffee: 1) Caffeine affects us in differnt ways and there is a huge interindividual component to it. Meaning if you, I and Leo drink 3 coffees a day - our bodies will each react measureably different to it. The essence of this process is the so called "metabolisation rate" which is mainly predetermined by your genetics but also varies through epigenetic influences and diet or drug/supplement intake (through the so called Cytochrome P450 system). 2) Fast metabolisers can basically drink coffee all day long without facing any negative consequneces from it. My father for example drinks coffee at night and then sleeps like a baby. Others get super shaky when they drink 1 light cup of coffee. Some patients with high blood pressure can almost "heal" themselves through getting off caffinated beverages. Most people are somewhere in the middle of the bell curve and it would not affect them as much. 3) Sleep - there are a ton of case reports of improved sleep quality after caffeine-cessation. Scientifically, there is mixed evidence - it seems like the best thing you can do is to avoid caffeeine roughly 8 hours before sleep. Again, everyones adenosine-pathway will react differently to it and you gotta try it out in the science lab of your own body. Dont't let bad epistemiology like in the case of Matthew Walker tell you otherwise. 4) Health: Coffee drinking is consistently associated with increased longevity. This is a very, very robust correlation. To max out on the health benefits: Drink it black, without sugar and from a high quality, organic roast. 5) Delaying Your Morning Coffee: Delay coffee consumption for a minimum of 1.5 to 2 hours after waking up in order to maximize energy and reset your circadian rhythm. The idea behind is to basically sync your caffeine intake with natural drop of cortisol.

John Campbell is NOT a medical doctor but a retired nurse educator with a PhD in nursing. Yes, he comes across as someone who seems unbiased and objective, but if you start to dig a bit deeper in the actual evidence, everything falls apart. I dont know what's up with those people - there are a lot of good and legit arguments against the Covid-vaccine - but I guess nuance and reasonableness won't end up with a lot of clicks. Here is a more truthful critique:

Pharmaceuticals are one of the chemically most clean substances commercially available while also heavily regulated & controlled. You know exactly what you get and in general dont need to worry about contaminations or toxins. That said, most drugs contain a complex matrix of excipients, some of them are proven to be biologically active and maybe even harmful in larger quantities. If you look at mouse studies, most of those fillers only start causing trouble at insanely high dosages, so I personally dont really worry about it at all. From an integral/complexity medicine perspective, it's not really an issue either. If you suffer from headache, popping an Ibuprofen is perfectly fine if there are no other contraindications. Even if you need to go on a long-term medication, it's propably not a thing to worry about. People love to give themselves a nocebo-effect with stuff like that. Any chemical can be harmful if overused or not indicated. I have seen other members mentioning herbal remidies/ supplements. Please notice that those are not nearly as regulated as pharmaceuticals. I have done a pretty deep dive into the supplement world and I am kinda shocked how much contamination there is on average. There are many good ones but they they getting dwarfed by the sheer amount of bullshit companies selling cheap, highly concentrated snake oils made from substandard substrate. Even if its labled "organic" - exponentiation of certain agents will always cause a certain accumulation of toxins in the end product. Good companies go out of their way to test their product.

If you are looking for a framework to heal yourself, understand patho-dynamics a bit better or just interested in holistic health in general - Then this is a must watch introduction on how to think about disease and integrative treatment approaches. No bullshit, complex & epistemiologically robust. This is one of the fundamental paradigms my daily routine as a doctor is build upon - a real gamechanger and highly effective. Enjoy.

Can confirm those 2. I cut out the natural gas because there are millions of "natural" gases and all of them act differently when inhaled. Gas stove gas or propane is generally safe when not inhaled directly. The rest sounds like outlandish conspiracy bullshit with zero adequate evidence and a lot of bro-science. I am all for integrative medicine and expanding our current medical paradigm but this is just complete nonsense.

Do you see any red flags with the claims he makes Eugene?

If your symptoms become less frequent during movement, then a heart issue is basically off the table. I have seen many young patients with weird chest-aches in my career and in 99,9% of cases, it's nothing serious at all. Mostly musculoskeletal issues (Ribcage or spine) or gastrointestinal stessors. Blood clots in the lung are for the most part not related to heart issues. Its mosly the result of a venous thrombosis in the lower extremities and the risk factors for that are diverse and super, super rare in males your age. There are some cases where it could origin in the heart, but this would show highly prominent in your EKG , which was fine. Again, dont worry about it. Dont freak yourself out, you are fine! You dont have a heart attack. It just doesnt fit your description at all. Yes, they should have tested your blood, thats true. No, you dont have high blood pressure. 140/90 in the ER is completely fine and that's not high enough to cause symptoms. Everyone has a higher value during stressful situations. A normal 120/80 in the ER is super rare. If you feel uncertain about this, buy yourself a cuff from amazon and measure your blood pressure at home, when at rest. Also, again - it doesnt fit your case since your symptoms tend to get better during movement. Also, you are in your mid 20's and even if you blood pressure was elevated - your arteries and heart would propably deal with it just fine for now. PLEASE, when it comes to acute medical questions like these - dont ask this forum. People dont have experience with medicine and they will freak you out even more. This is an issue that has to be dealt with on the ground with a qualified professional. Visit your general practitioner as soon as possible. You should definitely get a checkup, just to be safe. Most of these cases will just get better on their own - thats why they send you home with pain medication. Dont hesitate to call 9/11 if it gets unbearable. PM me if you have further questions Cheers

I recently discovered this amusing fact about the origin of materialism - so keep it in mind for the next you have a discussion about it. In August of 1619, a retreating Habsburg army camped in Ulm, which is a small city in the south of germany. They were retreating from a campaign against Prague, where they had successfully deposed the wintered king and queen - and among this group of several thousand troops was a young french adventurer, a soldier of fortune. There was nothing special about him up to this point, but in the night of august the 12th, a mild and cozy summer night, this young individual went to sleep and had 3 subsequent dreams where an angel appeared to him and said:"Conquest of nature is to be achieved through number and measure". This young man's name was René Descartes, the originator of the cartesian heuristic — one of mechanics, formulae and material. Now, Descartes himself was a substance dualist - but his thought is the foundation of what we call "cartesian materialism" in modern philosophy. It's the idea that at some place (or places) in the brain, there is some set of information that directly corresponds to our conscious experience. It's the idea that is held by most of the mainstream scientists and philosophers in todays world. It's what Daniel Denett or Anil Seith believe in. It's ubiquitous. Now, take all this into account and think about the punchline: Modern science and the materialistic worldview were created at the behest of an engelic entity I guess they wont teach this at our universities....

I am very sorry to hear that, Jake. As a practicing doctor, accompanying patients on their "last" journey is part of my daily business. The dying process itself is not scary, so don't worry. In fact, more often than not, there is a certain peacefullnes about it. Don't hesitate to alleviate certain discomforts or pains through adequate pharmaceuticals. Take care of unfinished business - personal and worldly. Have deep & meaningful conversations with your loved ones before you go. Maybe even take psychodelics if this is what you want. The psychological aspect is the most challenging part by far - but what I can surmise from your post is that you seem like a very centered young guy who made peace with his destiny. Well done, brother! Now, what will happen to "you" afterwards? You will hear a lot of noise and opinions from everyone and their mom, especially here on this forum. I would advice you to ignore them all, including my take. Even if someone would draw up the exact, accurate truth about dying & becoming - how would you know? See the issue? Embrace the mystery to it's fullest and go into it with as much conciousness & courage as possible. It's going to happen in it's own way anyway, no matter what "we" think. That said: You can find solace in the fact that conciousness or "experience" won't end. I think that's clear. It's also factual that God=Love - so it doesn't really matter what the process involves, you will be fine. This is very important - YOU will be fine. Reincarnation seems to be part of this game. So is a sort of between-life experience. If you collect as much data as possible, so everything from reincarnation-studies, near-death experiences, OBEs, psychodelic insights and what have you.. then a picture of some sort of cosmic game with a certain telos emerges from it. It's remarkebly consistent throughout history and between reports. I think this is the closest we can get if we dont want to overly rely on "our own experiences", which is limited. But please, as I mentioned, take this with a grain of salt.

I know myself pretty well. In fact, my nature is one of being extremely introspective, almost painfully so. You have no idea how much experiences I have gathered in my life, you dont know me at all. I just disagree with your whole premise and I layed out the argument in my previous post. By saying that "I just need more experience" you are begging the question, which is when you use the point you're trying to prove as an argument to prove that very same point. Rather than proving the conclusion is true, it assumes it. That's a bias. Again, there is a core of truth in what you say - but you seem to be quiet an absolutist:"If you understand yourself, you can understand other peopel". I would meet you when you would change it to "It's easier to understand other people if you understand yourself". The rape victim analogy is also very partial. There is well known phenomenon in psychologoy that some rape victims actually enjoyed it, which can make the healing process even more difficult. Do you see the issues of absolute relateability and emotional grief in that example? Yes, Socrates did say it and I never said otherwise. Many greek philosophers used this phrase. I said it ORIGINATED from the Oracle of Delphi and the context you used it for was not Socratian in nature.