by Sean Croxton

Oh no, not another one!

That’s exactly what went through my head when I heard that Mark Sisson had a new book on the way.

In my opinion, the last thing the world needs right now is yet another Paleo book recommending that we eat real food and remove grains and dairy from our diets.

I think I’ve read that book about 15 times — with 15 different authors and titles — in the past year or so.

Besides, Mark did an outstanding job teaching us what to eat in The Primal Blueprint. What more could he have to offer in his latest opus The Primal Connection?

The answer is quite a bit. In fact, The Primal Connection has little, if anything, to do with diet. It’s about all of that other stuff.

That other stuff has become one of my favorite topics these days. Yes, we know that our dietary choices can have a dramatic impact on gene expression, switching the good (or bad) genes on or off. But it doesn’t end there.

Environmental factors — social interactions, sunlight exposure, our inner dialogue, and even laughter — can have just as profound an effect on our genes as what we stuff into our mouths. I’ll give you a few examples:

Did you know that laughter turns on the genes that fire up your immune system by increasing production of NK (natural killer) cells responsible for defending against cancers, infections, and other bugs?

I remember learning in my CHEK Holistic Lifestyle Coaching course that the average person chuckles just once a day. A chuckle. That’s not even a full-blown laugh!

Did you know that simply being touched can turn on the gene that controls the receptor for the stress hormone cortisol, thus reducing its effects?

These days, being touched brings to mind allegations of sexual harassment more than its potential to mitigate the effects of stress.

Or, did you know that your genes expect you to spend time in nature? The sights, sounds, and smells are all hardwired into your DNA. In fact, the Japanese are finding tremendous hormonal and cellular benefits as a result of what they call “forest therapy”.

When was the last time you got “nature-fied” — a hike, a climb, a dip in the ocean?

These are but a few examples of how your overall health is determined in large part by what you do in between meals and workouts. We are meant to laugh, play, touch, love, socialize, sleep, get dirty, relax, and even get an adrenaline rush here and there.

Your diet may be amazing, but are you feeding your genes everything else they expect?

Are your truly living?

Last night, Mark and I spent an hour chatting about everything non-food related on UW Radio. My favorite part was our discussion of his Ten Habits of Highly Effective Hunter-Gatherers…

#1. Take responsibility
#2. Be selfish
#3. Build a tribe
#4. Be present
#5. Be curious
#6. Trust your gut
#7. Pick your battles
#8. Get over it
#9. Sharpen your spear
#10 Be affluent

Click the video below to listen to a short clip on Taking Responsibility and Being Selfish. Or click the mini-player to listen to the entire episode.

Be sure to pick up your copy of The Primal Connection.

I know it’s really early, but so far it’s my 2013 Book of the Year.

Great job, Mark.

Sean
Author, The Dark Side of Fat Loss

by Sean Croxton

On this day thirty-five years ago my Mom gave birth to a little nerdy kid who rarely spoke and liked to read a lot.

I still like to read, but these days I can’t seem to stop running my big mouth!

So today we celebrate my 35th birthday with a super awesome (and healthy) chocolate coconut cookie recipe, courtesy of Diane Sanfilippo’s bestselling book Practical Paleo.

Here’s what you need…

* Organic cocoa
* Maple syrup (grade B)
* Coconut flakes
* Vanilla extract
* Butter
* 2 Eggs
* Baking soda
* Baking sheet
* Parchment paper

I’ll be honest, I ate 8 of them yesterday. Whoops! My bad.

Check out the video below and follow along as Allyson the Assistant whips up a batch. Enjoy!!

Out.

Sean
Author, The Dark Side of Fat Loss

by Sean Croxton

I know! I know!

I’m about a week late with this post.

My team and I have been busy, busy, busy piecing together the upcoming Real Food Summit set to launch on Sunday, July 8. It’s gonna be MAJOR! Stay tuned.

A little over a week ago, my main man Dean Dwyer — author of Make Shift Happen — CRUSHED his appearance on UW Radio.

I can talk about mindset, success strategies, and personal development books all day long.

If you don’t know Dean’s story already, he spent 19 years of his life as a vegan/vegetarian but with little success in terms of his health and fat loss. Eventually, he realized that fat loss went far beyond diet and exercise. And he began to incorporate personal development and success strategies to not only his fat loss goals but to his life in general.

In this episode, Dean reveals a handful of the 20 shifts and strategies he outlines in his outstanding book, including:

* How to step away from the fat loss gurus and instead become an expert on YOU!

* Why you should Log Like Captain Kirk in order to collect the necessary data to uncover what works for you.

* The importance of Getting Your Beta On, or why thinking like a software developer can help you upgrade your health and fat loss program.

* How to eliminate on-the-spot decisions by Deciding in Advance.

* Why a Purpose Driven Workout — having reasons beyond weight loss to work out — may be the missing link to staying consistent with your exercise regimen.

* How a book about writer’s block can help quiet the heckler in your head.

* The Power of Less. How small changes have a HUGE impact on BIG change.

I could interview this guy every week!! Like I told him during the show, he’s like my brother from another mother!

Click the PLAY button below to listen to the entire show. You’ll dig it.

Books Mentioned in this Epidose

Sean
Master of Making Shi(f)t Happen

by Sean Croxton

I used to love Richard Pryor.

Still do, in fact.

I imagine it was my father who turned me on to him. At the time, I didn’t really understand his stand-up comedy routine — jokes about sex, women, and cocaine kinda go over a 6-year-old’s head, ya know.

I just remember my Mom covering my miniature-sized ears while he cursed up a storm on stage.

But that just made him cooler, Mom.

Off-stage and on the silver screen there was a lighter side to the potty-mouthed comic. The Toy — co-starring the great Jackie Gleason — is still one of my favorite movies. And who can forget his roles in Brewster’s Millions with John Candy, Superman III with Christopher Reeve, and the hilarious Hear No Evil, See No Evil with sidekick Gene Wilder.

I may have been 9-years-old when I first heard the bad news of Pryor’s diagnosis with multiple sclerosis (MS), a condition he battled for 17 years.

Like his comedy act, I was then too young to fully understand the outlook and implications of an MS diagnosis. It was not until I watched the movie Harlem Nights that it finally clicked.

Right away I knew that something wasn’t right with Richard. His speech was slightly slurred. His coordination seemed a bit off. His facial expressions weren’t the same ones I was used to.

He was deteriorating.

Over the next decade I would watch his condition progress further as he struggled through television interviews. Eventually, his wife did most of the talking for him.

The man who once strutted back and forth on stage had been confined to a wheelchair.

The man who made a living with his BIG mouth was rendered nearly speechless.

In 2005, he was gone.

The laughter had ended. MS is no joke.

The despair of the Richard Pryor story serves to magnify the incredibility of another.

Late last year, I learned of Dr. Terry Wahls and her miraculous recovery from MS. During her now-gone-viral TEDx talk, I was very happy to find out that the doctor’s recovery was not attributable to the latest technology or pharmacological research, but to Real Food.

Unwilling to live out the rest of her years from the confines of a tilt-reclined wheelchair, Dr. Wahls took it upon herself to scour the research on neurodegenerative diseases. What she found were 45 critical brain-building nutrients, most of which are deficient in the Standard American Diet.

As Dr. Wahls explained during our broadcast, the human body is a chemistry set requiring specific nutrients in order for reactions to occur and for structures to be built. Without these critical nutrients, the structures of the brain (as well as the many other systems of the body) are either made incorrectly or not made at all. Like I say, you can’t build a brick house without the bricks.

When at least two out of three people reading this blog are deficient in minerals, and one in two are deficient in the B vitamins as well as vitamins A and C, I think it’s fair to say that we are nation short on bricks, and knee-deep in chronic degenerative diseases as a result.

When the chemistry stops, we die. In the meantime, we deteriorate. That is, unless we add the right bricks back to our diets.

What’s exciting about Dr. Wahls’ story is the fact that the bricks she used to reverse her MS came by way of the Paleo Diet, as she removed grains, legumes, and dairy while maximizing the consumption of the 45 brain-building nutrients.

Never underestimate the power of Real Food.

In OUR PODCAST, Dr. Wahls covers a range of topics including…

* The different stages of MS

* Why greens, sulfur-containing foods, and colored veggies are critical for building a healthy brain and body

* The connection between starches, gut health, and autoimmune diseases like MS

* The importance of removing toxins from the body

* Why a supplement program is important but not a replacement for Real Food

* The doctor’s take on grains, gluten-free flours, and eggs

* Why the standard medical approach to MS will not change without published clinical trials

* What you can DO to support nutrition-oriented MS research by visiting The Wahls Foundation website

And best of all, you’ll learn why we should all take Benjamin Franklin’s advice and “Fart Proudly”.

MS never got the chance to take away Dr. Wahls’ ability to make us all laugh.

Somewhere, Richard Pryor is cheering for her.

Sean
Totally Watching The Toy on iTunes Tonight

by Sean Croxton

You thought it was over, huh?

No. No. No.

Every great show deserves an encore!

By popular demand, our 3 most popular presenters are coming back to the stage one last time.

In Room 1, Dr. Tom O’Bryan eloquently demonstrates the link between gluten, muscle pain, bone loss, autoimmunity, and more.

If you thought gluten was all about the gut, you MUST watch this presentation.

Attend Dr. O’Bryan’s presentation HERE.

In Room 2, Chris Kresser updates us on the latest in cholesterol research. Your cholesterol scores may not be what you think they are!

Attend Chris’s presentation HERE.

In Room 3, our favorite neurosurgeon, Dr.Jack Kruse, uncovers how leptin resistance lies at the root of inflammation, obesity, and chronic disease.

Attend Dr. Kruse’s presentation HERE.

Today is your LAST CHANCE EVER to order your Summit Upgrade Package for the special price of ONLY $67!

Click HERE to learn how you can take the summit home, along with some bonus Paleo goodies.

So sad to see this summit end. You guys have been a great group.

The Underground Wellness train keeps chugging along this week with the following events…

Tuesday — UW Radio LIVE with Brian Johnson, author of A Philosopher’s Notes. All about mindset and living a life you love. Click HERE for details.

Wednesday — How to Become a Health Detective webinar hosted by Reed Davis and yours truly. Learn how you can get certified as a Functional Diagnostic Nutritionist (FDN). This course changed my life! Without FDN, there would be no Paleo Summit! Click HERE for details.

Thursday — UW Radio LIVE with Dr. Jack Kruse. Can’t get enough of the doc! Click HERE for details.

Keep up with me on Facebook and Twitter. I’m a social media addict!

That’s all, folks!

Thanks for attending the UW Paleo Summit.

Sean
Host, The UW Paleo Summit
Author, The Dark Side of Fat Loss

by Sean Croxton

All good things must come to end.

And this Paleo Summit is going out with a blast!

If you’ve read my ebook The Dark Side of Fat Loss, you know that the first nine chapters are all about the
nuts and bolts of diet and lifestyle, while the final chapter is all about DOing it.

Yep, the big D word — DOing!

So, of course, today’s summit presentations are all about getting your mind right, so you can actually DO some of the things you’ve learned about over the past week.

First up, I always tell people that if they want to DO something, they might want to learn from someone who has already DONE it. In Room 1 fellow podcaster Jimmy Moore — who used to weight over 400 pounds — shows us how to break free from the grips of morbid obesity and embrace healthy living for life.

Jimmy shares the struggles of keeping his weight down, the obstacles he has had to overcome, as well as whether or not he’s still a low-carber.

Attend Jimmy’s presentation HERE.

Rooms 2 and 3 feature a couple of rising stars in the Paleosphere.

Stephanie Greunke — a rare breed as a Paleo-centered registered dietitian — talks about that other D word, DIET!

Stephanie covers how Paleo is different from run-of-the-mill fad diets, how a “diet” mentality is sure to fail when following the Paleo approach, as well as which aspects of “dieting” we can use to our advantage.

Attend Stephanie’s presentation HERE.

A lot of attendees have asked if I would be posting a presentation of my own. Well, not this time. But if there is one presenter whose approach is most similar to mine, it is our Room 3 presenter Dean Dwyer.

Dean goes beyond diet and exercise, and shares his 6 “inner game” components that helped him go from fat to fit. This is great stuff!

Don’t miss the book recommendations toward the end. They’re golden!

Attend Dean’s presentation HERE.

Don’t forget! Today is the last day to order the Summit Upgrade Package for the special event-week-only price of ONLY $67!

Click HERE to learn all about this LOADED package of presentations and bonus Paleo goodies.

I’m kinda bummed that this summit is coming to an end. This has been incredibly fun. I have thoroughly enjoyed reading and responding to your emails. You guys have been awesome!

At the same time, I’m looking forward to getting a full night’s sleep for the first time in over a week. I’m exhausted!

Stay tuned for the next UW Summit. I still have not decided what the focus will be. If you have any ideas, shoot an email my way.

Thank you for attending the UW Paleo Summit!

Sean Croxton
Host, The UW Paleo Summit
Author, The Dark Side of Fat Loss

by Sean Croxton

Yo! What’s Up, Y’all!

Got a bad case of Paleo Summit fatigue?

Oh well! Get over it!!!

Because we’ve got some BIG TIME truth bombs dropping in today’s presentation rooms!

First up, my favorite medical doctor Cate Shanahan puts the effectiveness of top-selling prescriptions drugs up against a real food based Paleo diet. Guess which one wins!

Dr. Cate’s talk covers the REAL cause of atherosclerosis, how bone drugs cause jaw bones to disintegrate, and the connection between LDL cholesterol and weight gain. Fascinating stuff, indeed!

Attend Dr. Cate’s presentation HERE.

Then head over to Room 2, where fitness trainer Keith Norris speaks about something I am very familiar with — the FACT that high performance is not always an indicator of health. In other words, you can look great and be a beast in the gym, but you can be also be very unhealthy at the same time.

Attend Keith’s presentation HERE.

And lastly, we’ve talked a lot in this summit about what Paleolithic man and woman ate as well as how he and she exercised. But if there is one thing we often overlook it is the fact that Paleo peeps spent plenty of time outdoors connected to the Earth with bare feet.

In Room 3, Dr. Daniel Chong presents on the science of grounding and the benefits of connecting to the Earth’s surface — including reduced inflammation, increased free radical neutralization, and better sleep!

Personally, I think this presentation is destined to be the sleeper hit of the summit.

Attend Dr. Chong’s presentation HERE.

There’s only one more day left!

Time is running out for you to upgrade your summit experience. Order all 23 presentations — videos, audio files, and transcripts — for only $67!

See you tomorrow.

Happy Saturday, my friends.

Sean
Host, The UW Paleo Summit
Author, The Dark Side of Fat Loss