Behind the Scenes Look at the DNA results of Saud Juman

Introduction and Guest Background 0:00

Hello, everyone. Haris Khan here with the DNA company. And today I have a special guest, a very, exciting person that I'm going to be speaking to today. I'm going to introduce you guys to Soji. Man, I've known Soji for many years personally, and he was one of our early adopters. So he's, he's been exposed to the work that we've been doing for for a very long time. So it it's a pleasure to have you here today. Thanks. Are a pleasure to be here. Great sword. So I want to start off by introducing our listeners to, you know, to yourself kind of what you do, your, your background, your lifestyle and why you decided to take the plunge with genetic testing.

Okay. I guess professionally, I'm a tech entrepreneur. Previous to the current company I have right now, which is focused on logistics and supply chain software. Prior to that, about three years ago, I had a health tech company, health care software company that I ran for almost 18 years. Health has always been extremely important to me. It's always been a journey to try to understand my health and decode my health, more and more, and do the things that will uniquely benefit me. It's been a journey, in my early days, it was more focused on athletics and exercise.

You know, then nutrition came into the mix, and then probably from, let's say like 2017 or so onwards, I started to try to tailor my approach to my health, by doing things like genetic testing. Great, great, great. And beyond that, I know you're, you know, you're a big basketball fan, and health and sports has always been kind of your focus. Tell us a little bit more about your, you know, athletics and how you keep yourself fit on a daily basis. Yeah, I mean, basketball was my first love in life, more than anything else.

So, I grew up playing basketball. I played at the high school level. I played at the college level. And then, parallel to that, while I was playing basketball growing up, I started to pursue martial arts. And that's been a constant with me now. So martial arts, I've been actively training in for probably 35 years. And, you know, I'm finding the more that I adopt an approach to holistic health, it is possible to do not just do some of the things that I used to do when I was younger. You know, I'm in my mid 40s now, but to do things that I wasn't able to do even when I was younger as well.

Right. So even though, you know, that whole concept of, you know, I forget who said it, you know, your chronological age and your biological age, really.

Athletics, Martial Arts, and Holistic Health 2:51

You know, it's there's a, you know, you could actually create a pretty significant delta, and not to chase the fountain of youth, but just, for somebody like me to chase, mobility, freedom of movement, the ability to play with my children. And the ability to compete athletically, at, at levels that I didn't think I'd be able to at this age. That's that's wonderful. And, you know, one of the great things, one of the things we learned about when we went through your, your profile was you had a, you had a predisposition towards more androgen dominance, really holding on to the androgen.

So things like testosterone, dihydrotestosterone. And so one of the things that really works in your favor as a male are higher levels of testosterone than the average in the average human in your ability, as you get older, to use more of that testosterone, your body will depend on some of the changes that you're doing in your in your workouts. So adopting a more heavier lifting workout for example. Or even if you're throwing people, you're throwing heavier people, it's actually going to drive some of the, some of the release of testosterone that's normally bound to, you know, things like sex hormone binding globulin and allow your body to use some of that.

Free testosterone is one of the things we did here at the DNA companies, we learned, is that for men, they're most important. Mortality factor as they get older are levels of testosterone. So they did a huge study. Thousands of men were tested. And the common thing they found as these men approached their death was they had low testosterone levels. So, you know, when we when we instruct folks, who are really invested in their health and their athletics, males especially, it's, you know, how do you not rely on having to take external testosterone?

We don't want you to be going out there taking testosterone replacement therapy or stuff, but you can actually access more of your own, internal testosterone. And that contributes, as you said, to your biological versus chronological age. And there's guys out there who are 70, 80 plus and deadlifting 500 pounds because they've been able to understand how that delta works. Wonderful. I want to come back to, you know, we talked about a little bit of physical strength. Another thing I want to talk to you about is mental strength.

Talk to me about, you know, as an entrepreneur, what are the things that make you tick? What are the things that you know really stand out for you when you're dealing with the with the stresses or with the with the with the the weight of managing a company? Yeah. I mean, it's that's been an evolution, right. So I think, you know, my the biggest thing that's helped me is having the, the privilege to be able to learn from my mistakes over, over the years. So in previous chapters of my entrepreneurial career, I would say I really abused myself in terms of the amount of casting, you know, drank, the lack of sleep and I guess connecting my identity, my personal identity to a business, those three things together could be very, very, very toxic.

Right? So, you know, you know, there were times in my entrepreneurial life where I was drinking four doppio espressos a day, you know, it's a double espresso from Starbucks, depending on where it happened to be in the United States at that time. Sleeping maybe three and a half, four hours a night. Right. And feeling like the success or failure of the business was an indication of me personally like that. This is this is something that probably a lot of entrepreneurs have done to varying degrees.

And for me, it really deteriorated my health. And even like, like if one were to look at me back then, I would probably look athletically healthy, right? But my mobility, you know, I'd, I'd have weird things happen sometimes, like a weird cough or that I wasn't sick. Yeah. You know, I wouldn't be able to. You know, I'd be very, very anxious. I'd be very, short of patience, like, although those sorts of things. Right. So what kind of help me first was the realization of the identity, seeing me realizing that, hey, it's the business is just the business, right?

It's going to be gone one day. Right. And I'm separate from the business. So that's, you know, that's a little bit of work, you know, that I continue to remind myself, you know, some work that I've continued to do with my psychotherapist and all those types of things. Now, with regards to,

Entrepreneurship, Stress, and Sleep Optimization 7:22

health choices as it relates to my mindset, mentally these days, post exit from my last company, I really realized the importance of sleep. Like, it's huge. I can't believe that I would get on stages and, include in my speeches how little I would sleep at night and still be able to do stuff. So being able to sleep well and figuring out the amount of sleep I need, it's weird. For me. It's like, you know, I've realized that if I sleep eight plus hours, I feel really tired the following day. Like, I feel very groggy. Tired. And.

And this it lasts for the whole day. But if I sleep 6 to 7 hours, I'm in the right way, at the right time. And with a consistent, you know, bedtime and wake time and all of that type of stuff, it's it's great. So like, sleep is big is big for me. Yeah. You know, sleep hygiene leading up to sleep, you know, temperature control. Yeah. I mean, I have this bed that is temperature controlled. I have an app, and it cools the bed, like all the stuff. Right. My entire bedroom has lots of electrical tape and all the little things with little lights.

So the amount of lumens is illuminated, right? So it's complete perfect. So. Yeah. So, so all of those things. But sleep is, is very, very protected. Because I see the benefit in terms of patient's emotional resilience, heart rate variability. Right. It's, you know, for those that are tracking that stuff, like, you know, the right sleep at the right time in the right way, your RV goes, goes all the way up. Right? And also, I mean, there's no there's no magic bullet for everyone. You know, different things that I do help me sleep so much better.

For example, when I remember to stretch before I go to bed, it doesn't have to. I'm a martial artist. It doesn't have to be like a crazy stretch. It can be like a basic stretch for like five minutes. My sleep score the next day. So much better, right? When I take a little, ball. And I do, like, trigger point stuff on me in this in specific areas that are unique for me. Sleep score goes up when I wear my $10 pair of, blue light blocking glasses, you know, from about 6 p.m. or so for me onwards, when I remember to do that big, big impact on my sleep score, right when I forget some of that stuff, it's like, yeah, it's a disaster.

And you know what? And this is this is what we talk about when we're telling people, you know, when we talk about the things that the that that are mind blowing, right. Understanding how exactly everything you describe we can we relate back to the gene. So now there's one gene that we spoke to you about. You may have remembered it was Bdnf. Bdnf was a big gene in your profile because brain derived neurotrophic factor is what influences neuronal looks to your brain. Cells are called neurons and neuronal health, and one of the hallmarks, or many of the hallmarks we see with people with lower levels of nerve, which you are predisposed to were, you know, the, the, the, the relationship you had with sleep and your improvement in falling asleep after doing stretching.

Stretching induces androgen receptors and androgen receptors induce Bdnf production. And so your hack, stretching right before you went to bed actually induced receptors in your body, which allowed circadian rhythms to become regulated in your body. Right now, things you mentioned, like, for example, the sleep hygiene of getting off the phone, not using the phone, keeping the darkness happening, it comes down to are your blue light glasses protect your Bdnf levels from being influence, and people that normally produce lower levels of being are more affected by digital screens.

And so this when we talk, sleep hygiene is always been a huge part of what we instruct. And we always talk about, hey, most of sleep hygiene is free, like turn the thermostat down, you know, get your blocking, curtains, get a night mask, you know, use a noise machine if you need to. Many of these things help regulate circadian rhythms, which are so important for people which are influenced by PDF levels. So it's just it's just amazing to see how the genetics inform the outcome. And then the different decisions we make can actually optimize what our so-called otherwise, you know, suboptimal outcomes in your genes.

So that's it's incredible to hear that you're, you're hacking your genes in that manner. I remember once, you know, we've had a few conversations about this personally as an entrepreneur, you realized fairly quickly that you know where your strengths are, your business development guy, and you know you're out there, you're doing things and one of the things that you felt were done better by others was people management. Talk to us about that. Talk to us about why that was important for you to identify that and quickly address that as you grow your business.

Yeah, maybe it's just getting older and realizing what your strengths are and what your weaknesses are. But there are certain parts. When I reflected back on my last journey, which again, you know, lasted for almost two decades, I, I took stock of asked myself, do I want to do this again? And when I realized, yes, I want to try to do this again, then I had to be honest with myself and say, well, you know, and again, you know, it should be noted like I have. I do have the privilege and luxury of of thinking in this way at this point to ask myself things such as, what do I find fun in entrepreneurship?

Whereas before I'd probably didn't have that where I felt like, I've got to master everything I've got to be good at everything. This is part of entrepreneurship. Let me just bite the bullet and do it. But this time around, I, you know, I kind of took stock and said, well, what am I what am I good at? What are the few things that I'm good at? What do I find fun? And it was, you know, client success, sales, marketing, revenue generation that, that, that, that type of stuff. But on the flip side, operations, people management doesn't, doesn't like me up.

Right? I'm probably not good at it. And, you know, I, I did a podcast last week with a friend. He's writing another book on, employee retention. Right. And he was he was saying with something that I'm doing different now that I didn't do it at my last company. And I think for this company, for the employees that we're hiring, I let them know once they're, you know, even before they're hired. I said, look, one day you're going to have a manager, right? And she or he is going to be a great manager.

But until then, because we're in startup mode, you're stuck with me and I don't enjoy managing people. I'm not particularly good at it. But you know, you're going to have to deal with me, right? Yeah. And, you know, I'm, I'm a very, like, driven person or whatever else, but also I, you know, maybe I lack, you know, all of the empathetic skills that a manager might, might need to have, right? Yeah. So I find that that works right now because, you know, they get a laugh out of it. And that kind of sets the expectations and soften things a little bit for them to know that, hey, I'm trying my best, but that's not my forte.

Yeah. Yeah, it's it, it's it's hilarious that you say that because, like you, it's your gene. Your your genetic makeup literally speaks to you as a person. So you mentioned a keyword there. Maybe I don't display empathy as people come to expect it. And literally, you know, you and I, we carry the same DNA profile here. We are folks who are logically and ethnically driven. So we evaluate things that happen, whether they're stress or negative or problems like it's happened. I'm not going to sit here crying about the spilled milk.

I got to figure out the fastest way to solve it. So, you know, sometimes we joke about this. You know, an employee comes in and says, oh, you know, my dog died today, and you're like, oh, I'm so sorry for your loss, but can we talk about tomorrow's media quickly? Because you know what I mean?

Genetics, Recovery, and Personalized Health 15:31

Like, we we're able to quickly logically move forward. And people may say, well, so and so like it's not that they we lack empathy. It's how we process things as process events differently to the average person and differently to what people may expect one should show empathy about. And so the superpower is we're very logical about how we need to get things done. And the challenge then, as you realize very quickly, is that, hey, this is how I work. And so people, you've set an expectation that you're going to work this way.

So it's not that, you know, don't expect empathy from me. Just don't expect the empathy that perhaps you've seen it because I work in this way. I love you and I care for you, but maybe not in the way people come to expect. And it speaks to your genetic profile. And I think the other thing you found was you're probably very regimented person like, you like your days to be mapped out, like you need to know what you're doing at nine, 1011 12 p.m. because as an entrepreneur, as a CEO, one thing that gets this is decision fatigue.

Like, we don't want to make a decision about every single thing. And because of our genetic profile, you and I again share the same thing here. We're more prone to decision fatigue than the average person. So we need to make as less decisions as possible. So our brain is available for the big decisions. Like, you know, you probably hate having to decide what to eat for dinner and what to eat for lunch, and what to wear today and what like you don't care. Like just have it laid out for me. Tell and I'll do it.

It's one less thing I have to worry about. I don't need to micromanage these decisions because it's eating up my brain space. So how do I do that? I do have everything mapped out, actually. Yeah. And, you know, there's a good saying that I read a long time ago. Like, discipline leads to freedom, right? So not just in work, but, you know, nutrition, you know, at this point, you know, we have, every meal mapped out, right down to the macros, to everything else. So I just know that that I don't have to decide on.

And that's you all in there? Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. And it's like, one less thing that you have to worry about. So now you're putting your brain to growing that business, which is really important for you. So that's fantastic. Now, how did you sort of adjust your diet? You know, you come from like, like many of us, we don't have the traditional we didn't grow up in the traditional Caucasian Western diet. We grew up with our own diets from our cultures. How did you sort of come to adjust that, to work in your favor rather than work against you?

Yeah, that's you know, that's how we started in my late 20s. One thing that I've, that I realized about myself that I don't think is the norm for most people, is when I realize that something is going to benefit me. It's such as, you know, improve my health. I'm just going to do it. Yeah. And I do it like I do it for good, like I don't it doesn't go back or forth right. So, you know, in terms of diet, I would say I've always wanted to I had the desire to eat healthier and healthier and more nutritious.

The concept of food being an experience or fuel is something that I read, many years ago through some literature by a guy called Mark Verstappen, a very well-known trainer in the pros. And, and when I read, you know, fuel, I thought, yeah, that is kind of how I view food like, you know, I, you know, I don't really find food as a big experience. I know some people, you know, it's it's a big experience the way it looks and in a certain setting and all this other stuff. And and you mean it's got to be truly exceptional setting and everything.

For me to be. Of course, this is an experience, you know, an example of the eating pizza in Naples, Italy, right? You know, I did that with my wife. That was an experience, right? Yeah. But ordinarily, like 99.9% of the time, it's fuel, right? It's like, you know, I look at a whole chicken, I'm like, now I need the breast because I know that six ounces of that is going to get me 52.3g of protein. And that's that's what I'm looking at. I'm looking at where am I going to get the 52g of protein. Right.

So, but I think the biggest thing that I've learned from is over the past year, I have taken some of what I learned from you guys. And as part of my annual physical where I go, I have a nutritionist. Right. And the pastor, I've worked with her, and that's the first time in my life I've worked at this activity with the nutritionist. And she's a nutritionist that primarily works with athletes. And I've learned the goal wasn't really to lose weight, right? Yeah, but I've lost probably in the last year by 25 pounds.

Right. The last 25 pounds. But my strength has stayed the same. Right. And, you know, I learn different things about it's not about the weight reduction. It's about body recomposition. Right. So, I actually don't care about so much about the 25 pounds that I've lost. I care about the musculature of whatever I have. Right, right. And how do I how do I fuel in the right way to get the performance goals that I want and the sleep goals that I want as well? Right. So those are those are kind of the two, the two factors when it comes down to nutrition and naturally, you know, I'm eating healthier, right?

I think my diet for the most part is really healthy. Now. It's just a matter of like, is that is that thing of the right timing or not right? Or is that, you know, I mean, yeah, it's a lot of it is like the, the timing of, of of what to eat. Like for example, if I, if I consume collagen. Right. I know that for me I'm like consuming collagen for like the beauty of my skin, I'm consuming collagen maybe 45 minutes before I train. Right, right. And I got to make sure I have some vitamin C with it so it absorbs into me a little better, so then I could perform even better.

Yeah. That's it's fascinating stuff. Once you start getting really personalized and that's what we always tell people is like you know don't follow what Joe Schmo on Instagram is telling you in terms of what your workout is. You need to go out there and tinker with your body and figure out what works for you, because personalization is the key. If you don't know how your body functions, how are you going to achieve what you want with your body without knowing exactly what steps you need to 200% like there's a big trend with fasting, right?

Intermittent fasting. Yeah, that's stuff, you know, outside of one month a year where I'm obligated to fast. Yeah. I mean, intermittent fasting does not work with me, right? Because I work out in the morning. Yeah. So it would like I would be just wasting my workouts if I an intermittent fasting while I'm lifting weights or sprinting at the local track or something like that, and then I'm done and then I'm like, well, you know, it's three more hours until I eat, so I'm not going to consume any protein.

Yeah. Anything else? Or replenish myself with some carbs or whatever it is. Right. Yeah. It wouldn't, it wouldn't work. I tried it and I just felt sick and depleted. Yeah.

Diet, Training, and Why Genomic Testing Matters 22:48

And it's and it speaks exactly to your genomic profile. This is what we tell people like it mean fasting is great. Maybe not so great for you. Ketogenic might be great. It's not great for you or, you know, paleo might be great. And people have this thing, you know, where they get confused, like, oh, I have to stick within the the boundaries and rules of the intermittent fasting. Well, if you're working out, you're burning through calories, you're burning through energy. You need to replace that to get muscles and muscles don't just you don't just workout and not eat and expect to have things.

It's not going to work that way. It's just common physical science. And I think people get really lost in sort of following the fads, and they lose sight of what the big picture is. So that's, that's that's a really great point. So, so I know for others who are listening, there's gonna be a ton of people listening here. Obviously. Why would you recommend someone go and do a genomic test, both from sort of you as an, as the entrepreneur and you as the individual caring about your health. Why do you think it would be important for someone to do a genomic test?

I think it's it's data. Right. The problem these days is there's a lot of noise out there when it comes to like, invasive health, invasive meaning like, you know, getting data about yourself in a unique way. Right. And, so, so this is not one of them. Right? This is not noise. This is like legitimate data that all of us, you know, assuming if you had the time and the means and everything else, you, you you should get by. And, and I will say that no data point is the be all and end all. I think it's it's, the way I kind of view things.

It's kind of assembling, you know, your dream team of people, your dream team of data points. You bring it all together and then, you know, trusting that you're intelligent enough to kind of put the plan together in place. Right? So, so for me, it was genetic testing from your company that was a big block of data was like, oh, wow. Like, you know, the things I learned that, you know, I forget what the what the genome is called, but, the one for concussions, right? Yeah. Yeah, it's the Bdnf one, Bdnf. Right?

I never knew that, you know, I was so predisposed to that. And I never knew that there were different types of concussions. Right? You know, I'm a martial artist, right? I, I have rarely ever gotten in 35 years, ever gotten punched or kick or struck in the head or the face because I'm just, I don't know, maybe something inside of me where it's like, it's not happening, right? Yeah. So there's a concussion that can come that way. I've never knock on wood. I've never suffered from a physical concussion. Yeah, right.

I also learn there are emotional concussions. Yes. Right. That's a huge one. And going back to entrepreneurship that answered a lot of questions like, wow, when I was super stressed, right? Yeah. When you have a long entrepreneurial career, people are going to say bad things about you. You'll receive the odd like legal letter from somebody threatening this that the other thing I remember the first time that something like that happened, I literally felt like I got kicked in the head. I just shut down shellshocked.

I had all the psychosomatic symptoms that would come up. I felt sick, I felt nauseous, I felt everything right. And then I learned from you guys. There's, there were chemical concussions. You know, if I walk through, you know, the the perfume section at the bay, a department store or something like that. I would leave feeling in a daze. I'm like, oh, my God. Right. Like, I would just, you know, like, just the sense, would, would kind of set me up. So when I learned that, I was like, oh, okay, that makes sense.

So then I would regulate my stress differently. You know, the heat therapy thing that I learned from you guys, which is, you know, sauna usage, sauna usage over steam room and whatever else, like getting hot enough a few times a week where even after you towel off and you are you, you take a shower, everything else, you're still sweating a little bit. That makes me feel great, right? Yes. And the crazy, the crazy thing was, elevating your Bdnf levels increases your elevation, mood. Like you feel great after a workout or after the sauna usage.

Literally because your body and even the type of workout though, like getting your heart rate at a certain, you know, BPM for a certain amount of time. Yeah, based on the sports I've chosen to do, I can't always do that type of longer training. But when I happen to do that, I'm like, oh, that actually was great. So but but now I know because I don't do that type of training. Endurance type of training. Yeah, I'll do the heat stuff a little bit more. You feel great right. So yeah. So again you know the answer your question again it's data.

You you get the right data from you know about your genomes, about your nutrition, about you know you take all the injuries you've had in the past into consideration and you start assembling what the best plan and blueprint is for you. Okay. That's awesome. And look, I appreciate your time. And I know you're busy, guy. And, thank you for taking the time out here and sharing your experience with us. And everyone is going to be listening. I'm sure there's entrepreneurs out there who are like, yeah, I'm just like, son.

So now I know what I need to do. I need to hire the guy to manage the operations for my employees, and I need to work out a certain way. I need to get a sauna room. And, and so I hope people will benefit from the knowledge and experience you've shared with us here today. So that people start optimizing the health. So thanks again. So I really appreciate it. Yeah. Thank you. And thank you guys for, you know, having this genome test. Yeah, absolutely. Thanks again everyone. Have a great day.