Health Theory is one of the best shows online.

There is SO MUCH gold in Tom Bilyeu’s work.

It’s ridiculous.

Health Theory is like the health class we should have had in high school.  He brings on some of the biggest names in the health industry—medical professionals, entrepreneurs, and “citizen scientists.”  Health Theory is easily the best content online for anyone looking to learn about (and improve) their health.

By breaking them down:

I lock in my learnings and create a catalog of information to use later.  They already provide a running outline along the bottom of the screen and great show notes on each video’s YouTube page.  I simply take things a step further.

Welcome to Zach’s digital notes on Health Theory.

See the full playlist here.

Or, feel free to use my annotations.

Health Theory – The Best Health Content Online

This list goes in order of release date.

If you’re looking for my thoughts on a specific topic like Sleep or Nutrition, check out my Health Favorites.

Otherwise, I hope you enjoy the data dump.

📚🤓📺

Why The Keto Diet Will Change Your Life | Mark Sisson on Health Theory

This, the first episode of Health Theory aired March 1, 2018.

In this episode Tom interviews Mark Sisson.

From the episode description:

Mark Sisson is a former endurance athlete turned nutrition author and entrepreneur. In 2006, he began his popular health blog, Mark’s Daily Apple, where he’s blogged every day for 12+ years. Mark is the founder of Primal Kitchen Foods and best-selling author of several books including The Primal Blueprint and his most recent hit, The Keto Reset Diet.

  • Tom Talk Briefly About His Health Journey ~ 4:14
  • The Value of Fat In Our Diet ~ 5:48
    • “burnable calories… creation of cell membranes… hormone precursors”
    • “Fat makes you fat has [long been] dispelled”
  • The Context of Calories ~ 6:57
    • “Body can’t burn that much sugar”
    • “First 30-40 grams of protein… intended to be used to rebuild”
    • Mentions Mark’s Context of Calories Post (Recently Updated)
    • “it’s about the individual nutrients and how you partition them”
  • Metabolic Flexibility ~ 9:43
    • “extract energy from the fat on your plate, fat on your body, glycogen in your muscles… ketones your liver makes”
    • “historically, humans didn’t have access to… food everyday”
    • “wired to eat, over eat, store those calories as fat”
    • “It’s such an elegant system”  (Powerful Illustration) ~ 10:32
    • “all of it comes down to the choices we make in our food”
    • Tom tosses in a few insights (lost personality on low-fat diet; fat storage in the body) ~ 11:13
  • Mark’s Athletic Career ~ 12:19
    • explains old understanding and “carbo loading”
    • “we thought the furnace would burn anything”
    • “became really fast… but started to fall apart at a very early age”
      • “osteoarthritis in my feet”
      • “tendinitis in my hips”
      • “IBS that ran my life… from 14 to 47”
      • “[sick] 6-8 times per year”
  • Paradigm Change in Endurance Athletics ~ 15:10
    • “On the inside I was dying, falling apart.”
    • “The running was an effort to do something that science showed would improve my longevity”
    • “There’s gotta be a way to do this doesn’t come with so much pain, suffering, and sacrifice”
    • “One of the key elements that was overlooked… was you have to recover.”
    • “He’d be doing 200 mile rides with avocado oil as his primary source of energy” ~ 16:47
    • “we can [extract] 95-97% of our energy from fat when we are performing at a very high level”
  •  Teaching Your Body to Burn Body Fat ~ 18:38
    • Benefits of Developing Metabolic Flexibility
      • “more energy all the time”
      • “hunger being suppressed or mitigated”
      • “metabolic efficiency…get by on 30% fewer calories”
      • “reduction of inflammation”
      • “house cleaning” for cells in the body
    • Keto Catchphrase: “No Requirement in Human Nutrition for Carbohydrate”
    • “Anti-Aging Aspect of Keto, Intermittent Fasting, and Long-Term Fasting”
    • “New Era of Science…”
  • Eating Food That Tastes Great ~ 23:35
    • “If It Doesn’t Taste Great, I’m Not Eating It.”
    • “There Is a Point At Which It Does Not Serve Me To Eat Anymore.”
    • “I Adjust My Intake on a Daily Basis [Based on] How I Feel… I’m Not One of Those Quantified Self Guys”
    • “Nice Tradeoff… To Give Up Candy or Soft Drinks” If:
      • “Get Rid of Hunger, Cravings, and Appetite”
      • “Trend Toward Ideal Body Composition”
      • “All the Energy [You Need], All the Time”
      • “Sleep Well”
      • “Enjoy Every Bite of Food You Eat”
  • Keto Changing Relationship with Food ~ 27:33
    • Tom Talks About His Journey to Ketogenics
    • Discuss Mark’s Keto Reset Diet Book
    • “We Have a 21-Day Stair Step Program… To Earn the Right to Go Keto”
    • “Every Bite of Food Has a Hormonal Effect on the Body”
    • “There Are All of These Different Processes That Happen As a Result of Your Choices in Food”
    • “Reprogram Your Genes to Burn Fat”
      • “Deny Glucose… [the Body] Takes Fat Out of Storage and Burn It In the Mitochondria”
      • Deny Glucose Long Enough and Body Will “Make More Mitochondria, Which Is Where the Fat Burns”
      • “Over Time, You Reduce Glucose.  The Brain Says… Better Go to Plan B.”
      • “Your Body Builds the Metabolic Machinery to Burn Ketones.”
      • “As Long As You Don’t Go Back to 2, 3, 500 Grams of Carbs Per Day… You Still Have That Metabolic Flexibility”
    • “Most People… Live Right on the Edge of What Can I Get Away With”
      • Marvelling at People Developing a Gym Habit to Eat Crap
      • “What’s the Least Amount of Food I Can Get… and Not Be Hungry”
      • “Tim Ferris Would Say The Least Effective Dose of Food”
  • Feel Good Naked ~ 37:21
    • From #LookGoodNaked to Feel Good Naked
    • Mark’s Daily Apple Community About Feeling Good
    • “That’s Why We’re Here, to Get the Greatest Amount of Real-Time Pleasure in the Moment As Possible.”
  • Battling Irritable Bowel Syndrome ~ 38:47
    • Tom Talks About His Wife’s Battle with IBS-like Symptoms Being the Inspiration for Health Theory
    • “It Was… My Emphasis on Complex Carbohydrates… Healthy Whole Grains… Consuming 700, 800 Grams of Carbs Per Day, Sometimes 1000 Carbs Per Day”
    • “I Didn’t Recognize… the Damage Some of the Anti-Nutrients in Certain Grains Would Do”
    • “The Gluten in Wheat [and Corn]… Were So Tightly Wound That Humans Hadn’t Developed an Efficient Way of Digesting Them”
    • “I had to drive an hour and fifteen minutes to get here this morning… I would have had to think about what gas stations were open along the way with a bathroom.”
    • “I woke up with severe cramps everyday of my life from 14 to 47 pretty much.”
    • “So I gave Up Grains for 30 Days”
      • “The Arthritis in my fingers went away.”
      • “Some of the tendinituses I had subsided.”
      • “The Upper Respiratory Infections Went Away”
      • “Most importantly, the IBS Went Away.  It just literally went away.  It almost brings me to tears today to think how much I suffered…”\
    • “That Was What Drove Me… To Take a Position On How Important Nutrition Is For Everybody.”
    • Tom Pitches In a Bit About Cognitive Benefits of a High Fat Diet Before Transitioning to Next Question
  • The Microbiome ~ 44:26
    • “Trying to Discern 3000-5000 Different Strains of Bacteria and Figure Out Which Combination is Good for You… That’s a Truly Complex Equation.”
    • “How More Old Tech Could You Get Than Consuming a Sh!t Milkshake.”
    • “The Gut Biome Is Huge.”
    • “If You Have a Healthy Gut Biome All You Really Need to Provide It Are the FODMAPs.”
  • Living Awesome ~ 47:27
    • Tom Sets Him Up with Story of Woman Who Had Struggled to Lose Weight Throughout Her Life But Got Results Once She Starting Going to a Therapist
    • “I Think Play Is An Important Thing.”
    • “Sleep Cannot Be Overemphasized or Overlooked.:
    • “Sun Exposure.”
    • “I want to Change the Way the World Eats.”

This was a decent episode.  Mark comes from an athlete’s perspective.  The scope of his work isn’t on the level of some of the characters on Healthy Theory, but he is a veteran of the keto space.  He knows this stuff like the back of his hand.  And of course, Tom is great at pulling out those magical nuggets from his guests.

Why Sleep is More Important Than Diet | Shawn Stevenson on Health Theory

This, the second episode of Health Theory aired March 15, 2018.

In this episode Tom interviews Mark Sisson.

From the episode description:

Shawn Stevenson, host of The Model Health Show and author of Sleep Smarter, joins Tom to discuss why sleep is necessary, how a lack of sleep impacts your every day, and what you can do to optimize your sleep.

Coming Soon Eventually

😁🙏😅


As you can see, I still have quite a ways to go to catch up to the show.

I’ll be doing them piecemeal for a while.  Eventually, I’m sure to knock out 10-20 of them back to back.  This will really be a useful data dump then.

Still, one episode or many, there is plenty here for anyone to learn from.  There’s no point holding content back that is already fit to go.

While the formatting and plenty else has room for improvement, I have bigger fish to fry.

So perhaps a bit premature, but this one goes live.

My Daily Content Challenge marches on.