How to Hack Your Nervous System to Get Better Sleep, Deeper Meditation, and Less Stress with Dr. David Rabin

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[00:00:42] Dr. David Rabin: This is the fit mess conversations with world-class experts in the fields of mental, physical, and emotional health. And this episode, Paulo actually helps us through the vibration to the skin, helps us to feel better and more able to adapt to stress by calming body and balancing the nervous system, the stress response, and thereby.

[00:01:05] To make change more easily because we're in a state that we're feel stronger and more ourselves, and we're able to make. Now, here are your hosts, Zach and Jeremy. 

[00:01:17] Jeremy: Hi there and welcome to the fitness podcast. So great to have you with us here where this week we're geeking out again. There's just so much technology available these days to help you feel better, live better and be better.

[00:01:28] We talked to just a couple of weeks ago about how much we've loved and learned from our use of the aura. And how it sleep and activity tracking helps us make better choices this week. We want to talk about another tool we've been using for the last few months. The Apollo neuro. It is a scientifically validated wearable technology that uses gentle vibrations to improve your resilience to stress.

[00:01:49] So you can get to sleep, focus, recover, and more in just a few minutes, we'll be joined by the co-founder of Apollo neuro Dr. David, right. We'll talk to him about why he developed this incredible technology and the many ways that can help you live feel and be better. I'm curious how you use it, Zach, what problems do you have that it helps you solve?

[00:02:10] Well, the list 

[00:02:10] Zach: of problems 

[00:02:11] Jeremy: is really big. It doesn't solve them as you have in general. It's pretty long. Yeah, it is. It is 

[00:02:15] Dr. David Rabin: really big. It's 

[00:02:17] Zach: far too big. It's overwhelming. I think we have a show on that. I think so. Anyway. Yeah, no, I use my Apollo band for when I have to have conversations with people. So like I was using it for my, for job interviews.

[00:02:29] Prior to this and even still with it, I would do all these breathing techniques and things like that before an interview, or having a conversation with somebody that I'm nervous about or a presentation that I had to do. Um, but then once I get into the presentation, like I would just forget the breathing and not do the things I need to, but with the band on it actually keeps me stable through the entire conversation.

[00:02:51] So I love that part of it. 

[00:02:52] Jeremy: Yeah. I I'm using it now. And I do. We've had these things for months now, and every time we were. I throw it on. And every time we do an interview, I throw it on. I always have it in the social and open mode because for me being social and open is not, does not come naturally.

[00:03:08] That's not just part of my DNA. So any, any help I can get nudging me in a direction that makes me more social and more open. I can definitely use that help. Um, the other thing I primarily use it for. It's pretty remarkable when I first on, I'm just being honest here. When I first started using it, I was excited about the sleep mode because I thought this is great.

[00:03:29] This will really help me sleep. And it actually made, made my sleep worse for probably the first week that I tried it like noticeably. I was like, wow. My, I just was not sleeping enough. I'd wake up a bunch during the night, felt bad when I woke up, but I was like, I'm not giving up on it. I'm going to keep trying.

[00:03:47] And I stopped. And now, especially since a couple of weeks ago, we were talking about the aura ring and measuring and tracking all of our sleep results. I can see a noticeable difference when I use it to help me sleep at night. So I use the fall two hour mode all night to help me get better sleep. And I can see the numbers improve.

[00:04:04] The heart rate, variability improves the amount of sleep that I get. All of it is better when I'm wearing this thing. So the two pieces of technology that we've talked about in the last two, Really play very well together. And so those are the main two things that I use it for. And again, a huge noticeable difference.

[00:04:21] Yeah. 

[00:04:22] Zach: I, so you use the social and open. I usually use the common focused one, which. It gives me the same feeling as like doing five minutes of box breathing. It's very, very cool. I love that. I, I generally get better sleep when I'm wearing it, but I do have a weird problem in that it, um, it almost gives me insomnia.

[00:04:43] I can't fall asleep very quickly. So, um, so I actually showed my wife how to use it and I would leave it. Yeah. And because she always comes in after I'm asleep. So I showed her what to do with it and I fall asleep with it and she'd come in and fire it up while I'm sleeping, which occasionally woke me up.

[00:05:00] But once I'm asleep, I'm fine. That's funny. Anything that keeps my mind going, keeps me awake. 

[00:05:07] Jeremy: Yeah, he does. Speaking of it, being useful for the social and open stuff, whenever people are coming over or I'm going to any kind of a social function or have a work meeting or something. The work meetings, not the best example, but what it reminds me of is how I used to feel what feels like years ago.

[00:05:23] Now I needed a beer to interact with other people. It was just sort of that like helped me let my guard down. And I feel like this has a similar effect where it's not, it's not like it changes my personality. It doesn't totally change who I am. It's just, it's that little nudge and part of it again, maybe it's just the fact that I'm putting on and I'm pushing a button and it's helping me set an intention to be more social and to be more.

[00:05:45] But the science says it's that the vibration that it's giving your body is also contributing to all of the things that you need to actually reach that more relaxed space in that, and that ability to be more social and interact with you. Yeah. And, and 

[00:05:58] Zach: again, I can't, I can't say it enough. I, what it does is does a lot of the same things that breathing techniques and the relaxation pieces that I've learned over the years do, but it allows you to continue interacting, continue being yeah.

[00:06:14] And you have the benefit of all that stuff going on in the background and you don't have to think about it, it's it truly is amazing. It's a, 

[00:06:20] Jeremy: it's that, it's that thing where you don't always have time to listen to a relaxing song. You don't have time to do the breath work. You don't have time to meditate and get into a space where you're ready to go and interact with somebody or focus on whatever task at hand.

[00:06:31] So you throw this thing on and it just sort of helps accelerate your ability to get into that mode. 

[00:06:37] Zach: Yeah. Yeah. And we both know, I just need all the help I can get. So I wear this 

[00:06:41] Jeremy: thing every day. I've got to find ways to clean the band. Cause I wear it so much that it's probably a little gross, to be honest, I got to, I got to clean this thing, but yes, it's incredibly helpful.

[00:06:54] And so I had so many questions about how it does what it does, why it does what it does. And I was very lucky to talk with Apollo neuro co-founder. Dr. David Green. About how it does what it 

[00:07:06] Dr. David Rabin: does.

[00:07:09] Jeremy: Well, let's start really simply. What is the Apollo neuro, what does this thing do? 

[00:07:15] Dr. David Rabin: So Paulo is a wearable technology that is a first of the third and newest, most current generation of wearable technology. Uh, that delivers a therapy through the wearable to the body and that therapy and Apollo is, uh, is a wellness device.

[00:07:33] It is indicated for basically calming the body the same way that somebody holding your hand on a bad day would, or the same as taking a deep breath or getting a hug from a loved one, or hearing your favorite song. Come on. When you walk into a room on a bad day, and it does that with sound waves that are skin risks.

[00:07:52] From the Apollo instead of sound waves that you might hear. So they're very gentle, low intensity sound waves that feel like migrations in skin. And the reason why Apollo is the third generation there's I think it's worth noting is that the first generation of wearables were pedometers set, trackers and basic tracking technology that gave us a bunch of numbers that we then had to interpret and then make a decision to change our behavior about around right in the second generation is a really exciting new stuff is out.

[00:08:21] Or ring and whoop and apple watch and Garmin, and may many others Fitbit, the new Fitbit's, where they actually interpret the data for you to interpret the numbers and then give you something to do, which can be really accurate or not so accurate depending on the person and use. And then, but they don't actually do anything for you.

[00:08:37] They still require us to make the decision to change your behavior. Right. Whereas Apollo actually, yeah. Through the vibration to the skin helps us to feel better and more able to adapt to stress by calming body and balancing the nervous system, the stress response, and thereby helping us to make change more easily because we're in a state that where we feel stronger and more ourselves and we're able to make change.

[00:09:03] Jeremy: That's something I think that has been talked about before. I'm not the first to bring this up. This does not tell you what to do. It's not tracking anything. It doesn't keep track of how far I've walked or anything. This is literally, I guess, manipulating for lack of a better word, my mood and, and helping me to manage my stress.

[00:09:20] Is that, is that a fair? 

[00:09:23] Dr. David Rabin: Yes with the, except for the word manipulating, I was 

[00:09:26] Jeremy: wrestling with that word. Sorry. 

[00:09:28] Dr. David Rabin: No, it's okay. Because, because, and the reason is because, you know, maybe, maybe it's someone that's picky, but, but we deal a lot in words and manipulation implies that we're that, that this is doing something to you that might be against your will or against your best interests or what you want to do.

[00:09:43] And it's really quite, quite the opposite in that Apollo makes it easier to do what you're trying. So by, by, by calming the stress response, these what we call the sympathetic fight or flight response, which is active a lot of the time, it's meant to be active on they're running from a lion or we're running out of air, or we're have lack of food, shelter, et cetera, type of stress.

[00:10:05] Getting too many emails or getting overwhelmed from work or too many responsibilities of the news or whatever, or we're in traffic. That's not what we want that survival sympathetic fight or flight response to kick in. And so Paulo just like soothing touch or deep breath reminds us that we're safe and we're not actually running from a lion because we have time to pay attention to the feeling.

[00:10:24] And then that brings us back into the present centers, the mind back in the back. And that helps us transition from any one IX, one state to another, from wake to sleep. It's like to focus board to board, to part intensely focusing or meditating and just kind of helps smooth out the transitions. Sure. 

[00:10:41] Jeremy: So I'm wearing mine right now and I've got it on the social and open mode.

[00:10:45] So what is it doing for me to help with this scenario or, and how would this help someone who is otherwise kind of anxious in social situations or whatever, what is it actually doing to you? 

[00:10:55] Dr. David Rabin: So I can I, and I'm using the same mode by the way. For most, most times that I have to socialize or interact with someone else on an interview because the social open mode is like a clear, sort of a clear and clear and focused, but also.

[00:11:12] My attention is on you. And what you're saying in the conversation, it's on a minute, more, slightly more present, more empathic listening state. And the best way that I can describe this to you is what I was like when I had a slight fear of public speaking before Apollo, which was that I would get on stage or I would get into a discussion like this, where I knew lots of people were listening.

[00:11:36] Spending my time thinking about what the person I was talking to, or the people I was presenting to were thinking about what I was saying when I'm saying it. Right. Which is the biggest mistake. And first mistake to make that most of us make when we're doing any kind of public presentation, it's the same in social situations where we're trying to make friends and we spend most of the time instead of being ourselves, we're thinking about.

[00:11:56] What if somebody else is thinking about how we're acting or speaking, or what have you. And that of course makes us seem nervous or for standoffish or, and it takes attention away from what we actually want to be doing, which is focusing on having an empathic conversation with someone or giving a talk or presentation, or what have you.

[00:12:15] So. So the Apollo facilitates Jew, as if taking a deep breath would do in the same moment, it helps remind us that I'm just having a conversation. I have been doing this for years. I know how to do it. My body knows how to do it. I know what to say. I know how to talk. Right. And, and that, I don't need to worry about what other people are thinking about me right now.

[00:12:38] And so our attention becomes more focused on what it is we're actually doing. Right. Right 

[00:12:45] Jeremy: now. I love mine. I've been wearing it for several months and, uh, I've, I've felt the differences, but it's interesting. I've heard you say on just now in other interviews that it's similar to taking a breath. So why is it beneficial for me to wear this device rather than to train myself?

[00:12:59] Hey, just take a breath. When, when things get. 

[00:13:02] Dr. David Rabin: So, so it's absolutely better. And I would never say otherwise to train yourself, to do breath work, right? Breath work is the best thing that any of us could do for ourselves at any time to learn how to control our breath in the moment of stress. But the fact of the matter is that.

[00:13:18] Then studies have been done on this, that it is extremely difficult to learn a new skill and particularly to learn how to breathe and control our breath and getting to their breath. And we're already stressed out. Right? And most people, even people who are excellent breath workers and practice all the time.

[00:13:36] And by all the time, I mean, for like hundreds of thousands of cumulative hours of breathwork time, still have trouble sometimes remembering to take a breath in that moment of stress when they're doing XYZ. And so breathing is absolutely one of the most important skillsets that we have to work on for our own health.

[00:13:56] However, it is incredible, incredibly difficult to learn. It can be when we're alone. In the stress out states. So again, having a nervous system lubricant, right? If you think about it or, or a little nudge. That helps our bodies getting to a state that reminds us that we're calm enough to take a breath.

[00:14:13] Right. And so it's, it's almost like for those of us like myself and maybe you who never had the benefit of learning breath work when we were young, when that would have really been the time to teach it as a coping strategy, it's harder for me to learn now. And so Apollo helped me. Learn how to get the benefits of breathwork in my day to day.

[00:14:31] And then that makes it easier for me to teach myself how to breathe in those moments of stress. So right now I've been using it for years, right. And it's actually trained me to be able to access some states of calm or flow, whatever you want to call it, clear and focused. What have you, in the moment without requiring as often, it's almost been, it's been very much like a training tool, which is really great.

[00:14:53] Jeremy: So it didn't exist until you made it. Uh, and I understand you and your wife developed it together. Is that, does that correct? So this didn't exist and you have used it as a, as a tool to help yourself. How did this come to be? What made you decide? This is something I need to put into. 

[00:15:07] Dr. David Rabin: So I think the, it started and you're right, Catherine, my wife is the CEO and the co-founder of Paula with me and she, without her, this really wouldn't exist because as much of, as much as I might be talented in the sciences and the medicine world, I knew very little about business before we started this work and her, her brilliant breath business brain, and tenacity really helped move.

[00:15:28] To another level where it's not an actual product purchase, which is pretty incredible. But this started originally at the lab and the university of Pittsburgh between 20 14, 20 18. I was researching chronic illnesses and CRA and with a focus on chronic illnesses that typically didn't get better over time with the standard treatments.

[00:15:47] And the folks that I was working with were a lot of folks with PTSD post-traumatic stress disorder, which was above and beyond the most common. Uh, common population that I saw and also, and many of these people were veterans. And I also worked a lot of people and many of them also had substance use disorders and depression.

[00:16:05] And then there were folks that had depression who also had these trauma histories and, and, and ultimately none of these people were getting better with the treatments that were being offered them. And when you went, I went back and looked at the literature. I was not the only person who was seeing this.

[00:16:16] It was very clear that in the literature, in psychiatry, Antidepressants. And most of the treatments that we have available that are the recommended gold standard treatments, even psychotherapy because of how much work it is only are successful, 50% of the time or so. And that's not a very good number, you know, for long-term success, uh, where people don't have to take medicine for an ideally.

[00:16:40] They don't have take medicine every day, right. There's years where they're symptom free or mostly symptom free. Right. Medicine. And that just doesn't happen in these books and that's unfortunate. And so it forced us to ask the hard questions right of me. Are we thinking about this the right way? Are we thinking about stress and trauma?

[00:16:57] The way, the way that makes sense if these medicines aren't working and perhaps there's a more fundamental way to look at this, where we look at the stress response system and because stress always makes all of these people's symptoms worse, right. And stress always makes it harder for them to recover.

[00:17:14] And so we started to look at what made them feel, not stressed. What made them feel safe? The breathing, the soothing touch, the empathic, listening with another human being, where they really know that they're being heard in a nonjudgmental way. Right. And that kind of those kinds of experiences, soothing music was a huge one for these people that really made them feel good.

[00:17:35] And many, many of my patients would just listen to music all the time, because it really helped them feel calm and lots of different situations. And so we started to basically just dive into all the literature about this. And start to understand how does the nervous system respond to these things? How does it respond when we debrief?

[00:17:52] How does it respond when we are experiencing soothing music? So I think touch and what happens in the stress response system. And it turns out there was quite a bit known about that. And then thanks to Catherine's help. We started. Other ways to tap into that system without the ears and without the eyes and without having somebody else there that was required to be part of the, of the experience to make you feel better.

[00:18:15] And would it be possible to give somebody something like a wearable? You know, this is, again, back before there was a company before we had really done any real big studies. And we were just asking a question about, do you have a hard questions? Is it, is it possible to make something that you could wear?

[00:18:29] That could give you the same benefits as soothing music and soothing touch. And then over time, years of research and experimentation later, we figured out that absolutely there are certain rhythms that the skin feels as soothing, that induce a very similar response in the body to deep breathing or somebody holding your hand on a bad day or a great song.

[00:18:49] And that was really, really cool. So then as we started to look into that more and more, we did the placebo controlled double blind randomized trial. And that showed us. We were really on something in terms of the pattern of how these patterns, how these vibrations were affecting the body. And then that spun off into more real-world testing, thousands of subjects, and then the current device, which is now, I guess, phase three, count the original prototypes we built.

[00:19:14] Wow. 

[00:19:14] Jeremy: I'm very curious about the placebo studies. And I want to ask you about that, but, but the whole concept of. And the physical vibrations, having an effect on our body, I would have always just assumed. It's just, I like the sound of that music. The words mean something. It's the attachment that I have to it because of the story or the time that it appeared in my life or whatever.

[00:19:34] It's fascinating to me that the physical vibration from music. Can alter my mood, I guess, or, or my emotions. That's, that's fascinating. 

[00:19:43] Dr. David Rabin: And it's not just your mood, right? It's your heart rate. It's your heart rate, variability. You are how much we sweat, how fast we breathe, how deeply breathe. It alters. Lot.

[00:19:53] Our metabolism can alter lots of different things. In addition to mood, the mood is perhaps the most obvious way that we notice the experience, but it's actually changing lots of things in our body at the same time. And it's booth. And if you listen to music that you find, even if you consider it subjectively smooth, it soothing, right?

[00:20:12] Like you feel nice and calm when you're listening to it. That music is having the result of feeling and you're feeling calm because your recovery rest and digest nervous system is proceeding us safe. And when you send safety signals to your body, That nervous system can turn on and divert resources away from the fight or flight stress response away from the skeletal muscles and the heart and the lungs and the motor cortex to the parts of our body that are really important for feeling good, right.

[00:20:41] The reproductive system. And then I just assist and the metabolic system that we store energy with our immune system that keeps us healthy and from getting sick all the time, which happens when we get too stressed out, right. We've all been there and our sleep. Right. So all of these parts are connected, which is often.

[00:20:57] Todd not to be the case, but they're absolutely all connected. So can 

[00:21:01] Jeremy: I totally confuse my system by like putting it on the relaxed mode and then like cranking up the foo fighters is my body just going to explode and confuse. 

[00:21:10] Dr. David Rabin: That's a really interesting question. You asked that nobody has ever asked that question before.

[00:21:15] That's a really important, there's a really important point there because ultimately yes, you can confuse your body and the goal that, so, and what you're describing actually is what most people experience on a regular basis is that type of confusion, because there's so much incoming stuff from all different kinds of inputs.

[00:21:37] Whether again, Our family, our responsibilities, the news, our work responsibilities and the traffic and all the things. And the sounds around us, the construction, right? All of that stuff is feeding us sensation and it affects the way that our body is functioning. It affects the way we feel and ultimately.

[00:21:59] If we, the goal is that we want, uh, sensations that we surround ourselves by to be things that facilitate access to the goals that we actually want in our lives, right. Are our actions. And by which our actions, I mean, the things we do and the things we choose to put ourselves around, right. The sensations and the environment that we choose to put ourselves in, which sometimes is a lot of our choice.

[00:22:23] And sometimes it's not much of our choice at all. That all comes together and should align with our intentions to achieve a certain goal. If they're not, we will be confused. Our bodies will feel confused and that confusion is restlessness. Right? That's that's what turns into anxiety. 

[00:22:40] Jeremy: That's fascinating.

[00:22:41] You mentioned the placebo. I'm so curious how you test the, the placebo effect of something. I physically feel. How, how are you able to tell if somebody is just imagining, oh, I put this thing on and I push play. So now I feel bad. Or versus the, the actual physical response that happens. How do you even, how do you even do that?

[00:23:00] Dr. David Rabin: So it, it involves a lot of work. It's not easy to do, but when we started working on Apollo, we had the benefit of one of the best cognitive neuroscience laboratories in the country. That had an electromagnetically shielded room with EEG, brainwave, measurement tools and heart rate and EKG measurement tools and respiratories bands.

[00:23:21] And pupillometry we measured pupil responses and physical movement and lots of, and sweat from the body. And we could do all of this in tandem in time. Right? So as the body changes, you can collect a signature for each of these different metrics in an image. Time with how people are saying they feel, and then you deliver to the body different vibration patterns.

[00:23:43] Some of which are the vibration patterns that made it into the current Apollo and other ones were vibration patterns that didn't, which were not layered in the same specific way that we found. Maybe Apollo vibrations. And so the pattern was very different and the plus the placebo or what we call active controls.

[00:24:01] Cause they're not just placebo. Right. All vibrations, as we're just talking about, do something to the body. So they are changing the body. And one was a pattern that had been studied in the literature. That are known to help people feel more calm, subjectively speaking, which was a very slow tapping vibration.

[00:24:18] And the other one was a cell phone buzz, basically vibration, which is known to notify, notify people and make them more alert. And nobody knew what patterns they were getting. And then there also no vibration divisions, nobody knew what patterns they were getting and nobody, and even the researchers didn't know.

[00:24:33] What patterns were being sent to the subjects at any given time during a task was they're all randomized and blinded. And so each user would then go through the same, same cognitive tasks over and over and over again. And do each condition multiple times with all of these different patterns of vibration or no vibration.

[00:24:52] Jeremy: Yeah. Interesting. You mentioned tapping and that is something that I I've, I haven't gone to someone who facilitates the tapping therapy, but I've read a little bit and done just very one-on-one stuff on myself. Is there room for that in what you're developing? Do you see a way to, to blend sort of that tapping therapy with what you're doing?

[00:25:13] Is there another device that could be developed that does what tapping does. 

[00:25:18] Dr. David Rabin: It's a good question. We have. I mean, so, so one of the other ways that I think tapping is referred to as EFT, emotional, emotional freedom technique, and it works in a similar way to the way that Apollo works in terms of calming and, and moving things around in the book.

[00:25:37] In the nervous system, however, tapping is often very local to the VOC, certain locations of the body. And there's certainly, and it's, I think it's a lot of it from my so-so knowledge on the topic, admittedly, is that it's based on some of the Chinese medicine, Meridian systems and where they believe energy flows through the body.

[00:25:56] It can get trapped from whatever different kinds of things, stress, inflammation, et cetera. And, and so. The, the thing that we really tried to do with Apollo is make it non-local right. We want it to induce a full body effect that you would perhaps even notice in your, in your mood or in your attention or your ability to focus or feel clear without it having to be on any specific part of your.

[00:26:21] Right. And tapping is very local to a specific part of the body. So Apollo can be worn on the wrist and we were on the ankle. You can put it on your chest, you can put it on your neck, your back, your head. People use it in lots of different locations and get benefit from it. It's non-local right. That, that actually.

[00:26:38] Was something that we had to choose in terms of the effect, that things, all of that being said, what's interesting is we have some EFT practitioners using Apollo with our clients and it, they do combine well. So, so that is interesting. 

[00:26:54] Jeremy: You have done tons of work, researching stress this last 18 months, 27 years, whatever, whatever it feels like it's been, I have to have just been doing extraordinary damage to, to all of us on a level we'll never understand.

[00:27:09] Can you try and put into perspective what the pandemic, multiple lockdowns, political strife, racial reckoning, like everything that we have gone through in the last year. I don't, I don't understand it. I don't understand how we've gotten through it and the damage that it's done. Can you kind of paint a picture of what kind of, where we are now versus where we were then?

[00:27:30] Because of the stress we've all been under. I can do my best. It's a 

[00:27:34] Dr. David Rabin: simple, you know, 30 seconds please. I think so. So it's, there's absolutely no doubt that this has been an incredibly difficult year for almost all of us and that are a year plus. Right. And that there is probably more difficulty, more challenge to come.

[00:27:54] That being said, the humans. Yeah. As we are homeless homo-sapiens are the most adaptive creatures on the face of the earth. We are the most resilient, the most able to bounce back and overcome challenge and to, and in large, Do so by working together by, through our collaborative nature is actually why we've been able to overcome so much more challenge than any other species, which is pretty incredible.

[00:28:24] That is something that we can't forget in terms when all of the stuff is going on, right? There's all of this craziness in the world it's going to happen and it's happened. And that's currently happening. That is going to continue to take our attention away from the fact that we are. Super adaptive, adaptable creatures.

[00:28:44] Right? And this is if you're going to, if you're going to narrow down humanity to one thing to really like one core strength, it is that it is adaptability adaptation. So ultimately we, these, these stressors, these challenges that we face, many of us have challenges and commons. There are also many times where those challenges feel incredibly unique to them.

[00:29:08] And I think the, the solace that I can, that I can offer is that everyone is challenged in their own way. And those challenges are opera know, can be also seen as opportunities to, to grow for sure, without challenge. It's really, really hard for us to grow and to become stronger. And there's all, no matter how,

[00:29:32] no matter how shitty, uh, our experience might, might seem in the moment. There are always things that we can take away from it that we sometimes don't realize for a long time that are incredible learning opportunities to become stronger, better versions of ourselves. And again, these are things that we may not be able to see in the moment and oftentimes we can't, but they're always.

[00:29:57] And it's really our goal. You know, I think the goal is to do everything we can to support each other and to get through these challenging times, right. Humans are incredible adapters on our own, but the reason why we are the governing species of this planet is because we work together and. And that's our arc.

[00:30:18] That is the thing that we do better than anyone else. And that's what we can't forget. So it's the biggest damage that's being done right now that I think is I'd be remiss if I didn't mention is division in and of itself, the polarizing division that is going on to separate us. Us feel like some of us are better than others, or some of us are writing.

[00:30:40] Some of us are wrong or whatever is, is really the most damaging thing, because that is what stops us from accessing our true strength, which is collaboration. And we have an entire part of our brain and entire strip of our brain that most other animals don't have that is entirely dedicated to empathy and collaborative connected work.

[00:30:59] And that's called be insulin. Particularly the anterior insula cortex, which is one of my favorite parts of the brain. Um, but as you might be able to tell, but this is, you know, it's a hard question, but I think thinking about it from the standpoint of evolutionary biology and why we are the way we are and how we got here is really important because that's how we remember who we are.

[00:31:20] And, and what our roots are and our, what our real ability is to overcome these incredibly difficult times that we're in right now. 

[00:31:27] Jeremy: That's a great answer. And I'd like to end there, but I did want to ask you one more thing if I can. And it's just, you you've mentioned breath work as a, as a vital tool to, to manage wellness.

[00:31:35] Obviously the Apollo band is another tool. W what are like two or three from, from the really basic to kind of extreme, you'd have to go somewhere special things that you would suggest people try to sort of manage their, their stress. 

[00:31:48] Dr. David Rabin: So I think so, so easy. To do, I would say Apollo and soothing and soothing touch is the, are the two best things.

[00:31:59] Hands down of the easy stuff to do. Soothing touch is easy because it doesn't all, it also doesn't require another human being. You can't. Having another human being to help you. And that's better, but if you don't, there are certain parts of your body that you can press on the center of your chest. It can put pressure on to calm, to calm the body.

[00:32:18] The inside of the outside of our ear, that's like the closest of the outside ear to the canal. You can rub that and gently, and that will also, and do sense of calm in the body, rubbing the inside of the hand, where the thumb connects to the Palm can do a similar thing. And there's lots of other parts of the body that can do this and there's tapping, right?

[00:32:38] So tapping something you can absolutely do yourself without having someone around to release pressure, stretching. Is immensely helpful and it doesn't even have to be full on. Yoga can just be like gentle, relaxed, stretching in your house and just doing whatever feels, you know, moving whatever it feels tight.

[00:32:54] Right? So those are the things that I would recommend everybody start with because they're the above and beyond the easiest I would actually put breathwork next up, up there on a scale of easy to hard, because breathwork does require a lot of discipline and time and attention, but you can start doing it any time and actually.

[00:33:12] Going back to the easy stuff. There is this, these great practices that come better than that. I'm I think is a really wonderful metaphor for strengthening our emotional brain, which is called it's referred to something as something similar, but different in many different ancient cultures. But my favorite take on it is the Peruvian Shipibo culture, where they talk about the four pillars of the foundation of trust in ourselves, which are self gratitude, practicing self granted.

[00:33:40] Self forgiveness, self compassion, self love as skills that we can practice in any moment at any time of day. And it can start just by writing down those words every morning, every night, but really the goal is just to keep them in our minds as often as possible every day. And that really sets the frame that helps us to literally strengthen the view from which we're looking at the world, right.

[00:34:04] From a standpoint of gratitude, the world looks a lot brighter. And a lot more manageable than it does when we're looking at it from a standpoint of feeling completely overwhelmed out of control. And one of the other ones that's really great is soothing music, right. And just having music on more of the time, rather than TV and the news or things that kind of like zone sunk you out or, and distract you, or that might set you off because they're really.

[00:34:30] Terrible. Maybe difficult. Yeah. And so there's a lot that we can do with music. Just having it on in the background, it can change how much energy we have and how relaxed we feel and how easy it is to wind down before bed. And all, a lot of it helps solve a lot of problems that we all have that are pretty common.

[00:34:51] And when you combine all of those, which is the best thing was really combining the music and the title. And, and things tech and things like Apollo and other tools and the breath work and stretching and those kinds of things, they amplify each other and it helps to retrain our nervous system to be in a state.

[00:35:08] That's more balanced more of the time, not just when we're doing those activities, but more of the time throughout our day-to-day. That's awesome. 

[00:35:15] Jeremy: Just, just really quickly. What's next for Apollo? Are there going to be new, new modes coming? Is there a new version that you're working on? What's the future look like?

[00:35:25] Dr. David Rabin: So the future is bright. We have lots of stuff coming. We just released a new product actually, which is the Twilight Apollo, which is my favorite. And there'll be new, of course, software updates coming out regularly for the devices that are currently out, which is exciting. And, and I think I can't go into too much detail, but what I can say is that the software that is coming is going to be increasingly focused on personalizing the experience to the individual in several different ways.

[00:35:53] That is all based on the great feedback that we've gotten from our users. And so we have lots of, and we have tens of thousands of users out there contributing information to us about their experience and help us make a better product. And we really appreciate that 

[00:36:07] Jeremy: awesome stuff.

[00:36:07] I'm going to leave it there. Thank you so much for your time and for the work you guys are doing, it's really important. And I'm glad we got this opportunity. 

[00:36:14] Dr. David Rabin: Thanks for having me. It was a pleasure. 

[00:36:16] Zach: Our thanks to Dr. David. If you want to pick up your own Apollo band, you can head over to the fitness.com and go to our affiliates page.

[00:36:23] And there's a link right there and you can save 10% off. So Jeremy, funny story though, I wear my Apollo band on my ankle per the instructions. I actually like it there because it's out of sight out of mind. So when I am in a situation where I need it to call me. It's I completely forget about it. It does its job.

[00:36:41] I do my job. We all win. Right. But I've worn it out. I wear shorts year round. You know that? Yeah, me too. But I'm, I've worn it out in public a couple of times. And the number of times I've been asked if I am leaving my house. When I shouldn't be leaving my house, it's quite often, but it has always led to like all of these awesome conversations.

[00:37:03] People think I'm under house arrest and breaking along, leaving the house and then they want to go on themselves. 

[00:37:09] Jeremy: Well, let me share a little story with you. If I might, when I first came to Canada earlier this year showed up late at night, walked in. Cause they pulled us in and had to ask us a bunch of questions.

[00:37:20] Cause we're trying to cross the border when the border was. And we walk in, they ask us all these questions. What are you doing here? What makes you think you can cross the border? Blah, blah. The whole time I'm wearing this thing on my ankle wearing shorts. And I, and I totally was just like, I want to be focused on the drive.

[00:37:37] It's going to be late. It's going to be dark. And the kids and dogs and all the things just want to be as focused as I can, didn't even think about it. And so the guy's asking me, he's like, well, you know, I got to ask you about that thing on your own. And I was like, oh shit, how do I explain this? So then I'm trying to explain to them like, yeah, it's this 

[00:37:56] Dr. David Rabin: like, uh, vibration 

[00:37:58] Jeremy: Sonic thing that helps me stay focused and he's like, relax, relax.

[00:38:02] It's fine. I know it's not a house house arrest bracelet. Those things are a lot bigger. But I had to ask because you show up wearing a thing on your ankle, trying to cross the border, just raises some questions, 

[00:38:14] Dr. David Rabin: dumb ass. So 

[00:38:17] Jeremy: be smarter than me. Don't try and cross a closed border, wearing an Apollo neuro on your ankle, nothing wrong with it.

[00:38:24] It's just going to raise some questions. Just, 

[00:38:26] Zach: just move it to your wrist. It works just fine on your wrist as well. 

[00:38:30] Jeremy: I get a lot fewer questions wearing it on my wrist. 

[00:38:33] Zach: So one other thing I really like my band four is it has a rebuild and recover setting too, that I like to put it on right after like a good workout.

[00:38:41] And it just, I think it helps kick my body into gear to start rebuilding all the, the tissues that I need from, from the workout that I potentially destroyed. I love that setting 

[00:38:53] Jeremy: that one's awesome. Yeah. I've used that one, a bunch of myself and one important thing I want to point out here and he acknowledged it in the interview.

[00:39:00] A lot of the things that this amazing device does you can do on your own. You don't have to spend the money to buy this device to do the things that it does. A little breath, work, a little meditation, a hug, or just some affection from a loved one. All of these things are equivalent to these things that you can do naturally.

[00:39:22] However, those things are not always available. You can't always turn on the music you want to listen to. You can't always get the hug that you want to. You can get in big trouble. Yeah. Especially with HR don't even get me started, but I just think it's amazing that, that they have created this thing that can make it a little bit easier to tap into those things that you need to be a little more relaxed, be a little more social sleep, a little better.

[00:39:47] And so I just, I just can't recommend it enough. I love it. So if you want to grab yours, like Zach said, 10% off on our website, the fitness.com click the affiliates link and it'll take you right to the appropriate. All right. Well, 

[00:39:58] Zach: Jeremy, I'm going to say, we call it quits for the day because I need to go turn on a different mode for my Apollo band called relaxed and unwind, which is to me anyway, it's almost like drinking glass class wine before bed.

[00:40:09] Right? I love it. It's 60 minute. Totally brings me down and I'm ready for bed so that my wife can surprise me later by turning my 

[00:40:17] head. 

[00:40:18] Jeremy: Oh, by turning the Apollo band on. Okay. I was curious where we were going with that one. I see Apollo band for me. I'm going to throw it on rebuild and recover. Cause after working with you on this.

[00:40:28] I need all the recovery I can get. That's like the third 

[00:40:31] Zach: time I've heard 

[00:40:31] Dr. David Rabin: that too. There

[00:40:36] Zach: must be 

[00:40:36] Jeremy: something wrong with other people. It must be everyone else. All right, everyone else go to our website, the fitness.com. Subscribe on whatever podcast player you're using. Follow us on social media, whichever channel you like the most and subscribe to the newsletter. So you never miss an update about it.

[00:40:52] Thank you so much for listening, we will be back next Wednesday with a brand new episode@thepitmaster.com. We 

[00:40:58] Dr. David Rabin: know this podcast is amazing. It doesn't seem to lack anything, but we need a legal disclaimer. Prior to implementing anything discussed in this podcast is your responsibility to conduct your own research and consult your physician.

[00:41:10] You should assume that Jeremy and Zach don't know what they're talking about, and they're not liable for any physical or emotional issues that occur directly or indirectly from listening to this podcast.