Related Episodes for Anxiety, cortisol and meditation and their effects on insomnia | Matthew Walker

“Researchers treated patients with major depressive disorder with heat so that their core body temperature reached temperatures equivalent to those experienced with sauna use. Following just one treatment session, subjects experienced elevations in mood that lasted for several weeks.”

“Time-restricted eating, which involves taking in food within a specific period of the day and fasting for the remainder, can improve certain biomarkers of health - even without weight loss. One theory is that this eating pattern coordinates food intake with the body's peak metabolism period.”

“In a short controlled protocol in healthy young men, five nights of restricted sleep impaired glucose tolerance and muscle mitochondrial function, while participants who added high-intensity interval exercise did not show the same changes.”

“A 2025 meta-analysis found improved quality of life, no clear overall change in ejection fraction, and a borderline improvement in New York Heart Association functional class across a small set of trials.”

“In this Institute for Functional Medicine excerpt, Dr. Rhonda Patrick describes her personal 10–15-minute routine, usually five days per week: Tabata-style all-out efforts alternating with Zone 3 and sometimes Zone 2 recovery, plus resistance training.”

“In Aliquot #131, The Muscle and Bone Benefits of Creatine, creatine expert Dr. Darren Candow and I discussed how creatine supplementation affects muscle quality, physical function, and even skeletal health, particularly in older adults.”

“In this Aliquot, I explain why visceral fat behaves so differently from other fat, how it drives insulin resistance and chronic disease, and what research shows about the most effective ways to reduce it.”

“The arrival of a new year is a great opportunity to make health-focused resolutions – promises to ourselves that we're going to live better, healthier, and (hopefully) longer. We all age at different rates, however, so our chronological age – the number of years we've lived – often differs from our biological age.”

“Meditation is a form of mental training geared toward improving aspects of a person's core neurocognitive function, such as the regulation of attention and emotion. Research suggests that meditation may protect the brain from the negative effects of stress and promote mental health.”

“Whether the medical community will embrace these lifestyle interventions remains to be seen. Available pharmaceutical treatments have their advantages and disadvantages, and while they are helpful for a subset of depressed people, a quarter of patients taking antidepressants may get worse.”