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Bryan Johnson’s Best Health Hack: Lower Your RHR Before Sleep = Sleep Better and Live Longer

October 14, 2025 / 10:39

This episode features Brian Johnson discussing his quest for longevity, biological age testing, and health optimization strategies.

Brian Johnson, who sold Venmo for $800 million, shares his mission to defy aging and improve health. He emphasizes the importance of understanding biological age and how different organs can age at varying rates.

During the episode, Johnson conducts a biological age test with the audience, explaining how balance can indicate aging. He also highlights the significance of resting heart rate and sleep quality for overall health.

Johnson provides practical tips for improving sleep, such as avoiding food and screens before bed, and suggests that prioritizing sleep can enhance mental health and performance.

He concludes by presenting his ideology of "Don't die" as a new guiding principle for humanity, encouraging listeners to embrace health and well-being.

TL;DR

Brian Johnson discusses longevity, biological age, and health tips for better living.

Episode

10:39
00:00:01
True or false? You, Brian Johnson, the
00:00:04
man sitting across from me, one day, at
00:00:08
some point, as of yet undefined in the
00:00:10
future, you will die.
00:00:14
False.
00:00:16
Sold Venmo for $800 million. Has spent a
00:00:19
fortune on a quest to stay young
00:00:21
forever.
00:00:22
Don't die is the general theme of what
00:00:24
we're trying to do. It's humanity's only
00:00:28
objective. None of us live forever
00:00:30
except Brian Johnson.
00:00:32
Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome
00:00:35
Brian Johnson.
00:00:40
[Music]
00:00:47
Hi guys. Okay, everybody stand up. Okay,
00:00:50
what you're going to do is you're going
00:00:51
to choose your left or your right foot.
00:00:54
I'm going to count down from three and
00:00:57
you're going to stay standing on your
00:00:58
selected foot as long as you can with
00:01:01
your eyes closed. Okay? Hands by your
00:01:04
side. You can't be out. It's got to be
00:01:05
close by. Your foot's got to be
00:01:07
somewhere close by. You can't be clear
00:01:09
out. Okay? So, just choose right or left
00:01:11
foot.
00:01:13
And those of you on the balcony, be
00:01:14
careful.
00:01:16
If somebody fell off, that'd be a bad
00:01:17
situation. Okay. Foot selected. Let me
00:01:21
pull out my timer. And I'm going to
00:01:22
count the number of seconds that pass.
00:01:24
Okay.
00:01:26
Ready? 3 2 one. Close your eyes.
00:01:36
5 seconds.
00:01:41
10 seconds.
00:01:42
And your foot can't move. Stationary.
00:01:46
15.
00:01:51
20. Okay, we'll stop there. Who's Who's
00:01:53
still up?
00:01:54
Okay, good. Okay, good. We'll do it one
00:01:55
more time. All right, you got No, no,
00:01:58
stay up. This is a biological age test.
00:02:04
As you age, part of your brain that
00:02:06
keeps you well balanced atrophies and
00:02:09
you can't maintain a balance very well.
00:02:11
So, kids are very good at this. As you
00:02:13
age, you get worse. Okay. So if you are
00:02:16
uh between 15 and 30 seconds, that's
00:02:19
roughly age 20 to 40. 7 to 15 seconds,
00:02:23
you're between 40 and 60. And 0 to 7,
00:02:26
you're 60 plus
00:02:28
as an age category. Okay.
00:02:31
Yep. All right. Ready? Okay. You can
00:02:33
choose again. Right or left foot? Your
00:02:35
foot's got to be stationary. You can't
00:02:36
move it around. Arms close by. Okay.
00:02:40
Three,
00:02:41
two, one, go.
00:02:48
Five.
00:02:53
10.
00:02:58
15.
00:03:03
20. Make it to 30, you guys. 10 more
00:03:06
seconds.
00:03:13
30. Okay, cool. Good job, you guys. All
00:03:17
right, you can take a seat. This is the
00:03:20
neat thing about biological age testing
00:03:22
is you of course know when you were born
00:03:24
and therefore you know how many years
00:03:26
you've lived. You can look at yourself
00:03:27
in the mirror and say, you know, I have
00:03:29
a few wrinkles or a few spots. But
00:03:31
actually in your body, your organs have
00:03:33
different ages. So, your lungs are a
00:03:35
certain age, your brain, your eyes, your
00:03:38
ears, your gums, your pancreas, your
00:03:40
liver, they're all different biological
00:03:42
ages. And it's really important to know,
00:03:45
for example, my left, so I'm 47. My left
00:03:48
ear is 64 years old.
00:03:51
It's because I shot a lot of guns as a
00:03:54
kid. I was right-handed like this with a
00:03:56
lot of exposure in my ear. And I also
00:03:57
listen to a lot of loud music. And so
00:04:00
that's really important for me to know
00:04:01
because when you have hearing loss and
00:04:02
you don't correct for it with a hearing
00:04:04
aid, it can affect it can result in
00:04:06
cognitive decline. So this applies to
00:04:09
all things about the heart. And so a
00:04:11
couple years ago, I posed this question.
00:04:14
Are we really the first generation who
00:04:17
won't die?
00:04:19
It's kind of the coolest question in
00:04:21
existence. What matters more than our
00:04:23
experience, our ability to live? And so
00:04:25
to do this, I wanted to do an
00:04:27
experiment. So, I measured the
00:04:29
biological age of every organ in my body
00:04:31
as much as we could. We then went
00:04:33
through the scientific evidence and we
00:04:34
tried to reverse and or slow down my
00:04:36
speed of aging. And what I've been
00:04:38
trying to do is create a sport or a new
00:04:41
genre of what it means to be healthy.
00:04:42
And so, I put my biomarkers out and
00:04:45
said, basically, I have the best
00:04:46
biomarkers of anybody in the world.
00:04:48
Anyone's willing, anyone's, you know,
00:04:50
capable of competing with me. But try to
00:04:52
make it like a quantified thing where
00:04:54
it's just like I'm healthy or not. And
00:04:56
so it's been a really fun journey. And
00:04:58
so today I'm going to tell you guys in
00:04:59
just a few minutes time everything I've
00:05:01
learned about health. I'm going to
00:05:03
compress it into some very simple
00:05:04
lessons for you because health is really
00:05:07
complicated. It's very confusing. It's
00:05:08
all consuming. It's overwhelming. Cool.
00:05:12
Okay.
00:05:14
So first uh who got eight hours of sleep
00:05:16
last night?
00:05:19
Uh, 7
00:05:22
6 5 4 3
00:05:28
Thank you for your honesty. Two. There.
00:05:30
Thank you, sir. One. Yeah, I appreciate
00:05:34
that. Okay. Who has a confession to
00:05:36
make? Who recently polished off a bag of
00:05:38
chips, ate some ice cream, and then
00:05:39
jammed some Twizzlers? What did you do,
00:05:42
sir?
00:05:44
Chips. A whole bag. One sitting. All
00:05:46
right. Great. Who else? Yeah. What did
00:05:48
you do? Gelato.
00:05:50
Gelato. Yeah, I get it. Okay, cool.
00:05:54
Okay, so you guys, the single best thing
00:05:56
I've learned out of everything I've ever
00:05:58
done is your resting heart rate before
00:06:01
sleep is the best thing you can do for
00:06:04
your health. Hands down. Okay, so here's
00:06:07
what you're going to do tonight. Before
00:06:08
you go to bed, you're going to get a
00:06:09
baseline read. You're either with a
00:06:11
wearable or just on your fingers on the
00:06:13
neck. You're going to lay down on your
00:06:14
bed, take a few deep breaths. You're
00:06:16
going to find your resting heart rate.
00:06:17
Let's say it's 60 beats per minute.
00:06:19
Okay, your goal over the next month is
00:06:21
to lower your heart rate by 10% or so.
00:06:25
So, if you're 60, be down to 54. And
00:06:27
here's how you're going to do it. If
00:06:29
your bedtime's at 10 p.m., eat your
00:06:31
final meal of the day at 6 p.m. After 6,
00:06:34
no more food, no more snacks. Okay? By
00:06:38
doing that, you have you allow your body
00:06:39
to digest your food. And you're going to
00:06:41
see that as you do that, your heart rate
00:06:43
is going to go down. And the reason why
00:06:44
heart rate is so important is the lower
00:06:46
your heart rate is, the better your
00:06:48
sleep. The better your sleep, the better
00:06:50
your willpower. Did you know if you
00:06:53
don't sleep, your prefrontal cortex goes
00:06:55
offline and you lose your willpower. So
00:06:57
when you're trying to not eat the
00:06:59
cookie, you're powerless. You can't do
00:07:00
it. It's gone. So sleep is the best
00:07:03
performance-enhancing drug in the whole
00:07:04
world. It's the thing you want to do
00:07:05
every night. So first thing is eat your
00:07:07
final meal 4 hours before bed. Number
00:07:09
two is you need to turn your screens off
00:07:12
an hour before bed. Okay? Okay, now I
00:07:14
realize that's hard. We are all addicted
00:07:16
to our phones, but that 1 hour is so
00:07:19
important because you have to give your
00:07:21
body ability to wind down. And if you're
00:07:23
scrolling or working, you're going to be
00:07:24
in a roused state, which boost your
00:07:26
heart rate. Anything that boosts your
00:07:29
heart rate before bed is going to be bad
00:07:30
for you. Okay. Three is you want to have
00:07:32
uh amber and red lights in your house.
00:07:34
No blues like these are very blue. Uh
00:07:37
you want to have u be mindful of your
00:07:39
stimulants. So noon thereabouts is when
00:07:42
you want to stop your caffeine intake
00:07:44
because caffeine has roughly a 6-hour
00:07:45
halflife. So if you have a cup of coffee
00:07:47
at 4 p.m. at bedtime a half a cup of
00:07:50
coffee is in your system. And then
00:07:52
finally you want to have some kind of
00:07:54
windown routine where you read a book,
00:07:56
go for a walk, do breath work, meditate,
00:07:58
but something to calm yourself down.
00:08:00
Okay, now just be sober with me for a
00:08:04
minute.
00:08:05
I promise you
00:08:08
this is the single best thing you can do
00:08:12
for your health. And if we're honest,
00:08:15
the majority of you in this room have
00:08:18
some moderate to serious mental health
00:08:20
problem.
00:08:23
Tell me I'm wrong.
00:08:27
Waiting. It's true. Like you sample your
00:08:31
friends. Like it is a pretty tough
00:08:33
environment right now. We are on our
00:08:34
phones all the time. We don't sleep
00:08:36
well. We eat junk food. It's very hard
00:08:38
to take a moment to ourel to be healthy.
00:08:40
I promise you, optimize your resting
00:08:43
heart rate and it's going to be the very
00:08:45
best thing you do for your mood. If
00:08:47
you're experiencing anxiety or
00:08:48
depression or you're having some other
00:08:50
kind of difficulty, I'm telling you,
00:08:51
high quality sleep is the thing. And
00:08:54
culture that tells us right now that you
00:08:56
have to grind and not sleep is a lie.
00:09:00
It's a bad deal for you. You can be
00:09:03
ambitious. You can have unhinged
00:09:07
ideas about the world and still sleep.
00:09:12
Okay. So, I've got 20 seconds left.
00:09:15
Who's going to commit to this?
00:09:18
Yep.
00:09:20
Who's not?
00:09:22
So, I can shame you. Okay. Why? Why are
00:09:23
you not going to commit?
00:09:24
I'm a startup founder.
00:09:26
Okay. There we go. This is Okay. This is
00:09:27
it, you guys. Here's it. Yes, you're a
00:09:29
startup founder. Okay. The narrative is
00:09:32
you have to martyr yourself, literally
00:09:34
martyr yourself to achieve success.
00:09:38
That is not true. You will be a better
00:09:42
founder slashparent/partner
00:09:44
slash whatever if you prioritize your
00:09:47
sleep. I'm telling you, it is a false
00:09:49
idea. Don't fall for it.
00:09:54
Don't die. Yes, it's about health. It's
00:09:57
also the next major ideology for the
00:10:01
human race. We are giving birth to super
00:10:03
intelligence.
00:10:05
Our ideas about reality are going to
00:10:06
shift. Existence itself will be the
00:10:09
highest virtue.
00:10:11
Don't die is the next major ideology on
00:10:14
par with democracy, capitalism,
00:10:16
Christianity, Islam. It is the next
00:10:18
thing we do as a species. So friends,
00:10:21
be well. Go to bed on time. Am I seeing
00:10:24
this? You committed? All right, guys. Be
00:10:27
well.
00:10:30
[Music]
00:10:30
[Applause]

Badges

This episode stands out for the following:

  • 70
    Most inspiring
  • 70
    Best concept / idea
  • 60
    Most quotable
  • 60
    Most creative

Episode Highlights

  • The Quest for Longevity
    Brian Johnson discusses humanity's goal of not dying and his personal journey to achieve it.
    “Don't die is the general theme of what we're trying to do.”
    @ 00m 22s
    October 14, 2025
  • The Importance of Sleep
    Johnson emphasizes that optimizing your resting heart rate and sleep is crucial for health and mood.
    “Sleep is the best performance-enhancing drug in the whole world.”
    @ 07m 04s
    October 14, 2025
  • Redefining Success
    Challenging the idea that success requires sacrificing sleep, Johnson advocates for prioritizing health.
    “You will be a better founder if you prioritize your sleep.”
    @ 09m 42s
    October 14, 2025
  • A New Ideology for Humanity
    Johnson proposes that 'Don't die' could be the next major ideology for our species.
    “Don't die is the next major ideology on par with democracy.”
    @ 10m 14s
    October 14, 2025

Episode Quotes

  • Don't die is the general theme of what we're trying to do.
    Bryan Johnson’s Best Health Hack: Lower Your RHR Before Sleep = Sleep Better and Live Longer
  • Sleep is the best performance-enhancing drug in the whole world.
    Bryan Johnson’s Best Health Hack: Lower Your RHR Before Sleep = Sleep Better and Live Longer
  • You will be a better founder if you prioritize your sleep.
    Bryan Johnson’s Best Health Hack: Lower Your RHR Before Sleep = Sleep Better and Live Longer
  • Don't die is the next major ideology on par with democracy.
    Bryan Johnson’s Best Health Hack: Lower Your RHR Before Sleep = Sleep Better and Live Longer

Key Moments

  • Quest for Immortality00:22
  • Biological Age Test02:04
  • Sleep Optimization07:04
  • Challenging Success Myths09:42
  • New Ideology10:14

Words per Minute Over Time

Vibes Breakdown

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