The Genius Life: Heal Your Mind, Strengthen Your Body, and Become Extraordinary

Max Lugavere

Mar 2020 · Genius Living Book 2 · Sold by HarperCollins

About this eBook

The author of the New York Times bestselling Genius Foods offers a lifestyle program for resetting your brain and body to their “factory settings”—to help fight fatigue, anxiety, and depression and to optimize cognitive health for a longer and healthier life.

The human body was honed under conditions that no longer exist. The modern world has changed dramatically since our days as hunter gatherers, and it has caused widespread anxiety, stress, and disease, leaving our brains in despair. But science proves that the body and brain can be healed with the intervention of lifestyle protocols that help us to regain our cognitive birthright.

In The Genius Life, Lugavere expands the Genius Foods plan, which focused on nutrition and how it affects brain health, and expands it to encompass a full lifestyle protocol. We know now that the health of our brains—including our cognitive function and emotional wellness—depend on the health of our gut, endocrine, cardiac and nervous systems as there is a constant feedback loop between all systems. Drawing on globe-spanning research into circadian biology, psychology, dementia prevention, cognitive optimization, and exercise physiology, The Genius Life shows how to integrate healthy choices in all aspects of our daily routines: eating, exercising, sleeping, detoxing, and more to create a healthy foundation for optimal cognitive health and performance. Among Max’s groundbreaking findings, you will discover:

·         A trick that gives you the equivalent of a “marathon” workout, in 10 minutes

·         How to get the benefits of an extra 1-2 servings of veggies daily without eating them

·         The hidden chemicals in your home that could be making you fat and sick

·         How to boost melatonin levels by up to 58% for deeper sleep without supplements

The book features an achievable prescriptive 21-day plan for Genius Living that includes daily workouts, meal plans, and meal prep tips, and accompanied with helpful suggestions for healthy swaps and snacks

Ratings and reviews

While I was a big fan of the author's first book this one was hit or miss for me. He seems to be better informed when it comes to areas like food and sleep science but in other areas that get into harder science he seems to make statements that are factoids (an assumption or speculation that is reported and repeated so often that it becomes accepted as fact) rather than scientificly supported facts, especially with many of the wellness topics de jiour. For example he has a section titled "pesticides, herbicides and fungicides" that gives a lot of slanted information such as increased glyphospate usage (if it is replacing something more toxic or concerning that would be a postive overall). Herbicides and fungicides' are also types of pesticides, as are insecticides and rodenticides, so simply saying pesticides is adequate, his title is one used to alarm, not inform. His chapter on being a good person to yourself and others was brilliant and great advice for people of any age.

I love Lugavere's work. I connect at a personal level with his story because my mom's brain is also starting to fail her and she's not even 50! Genius Foods gave us hope and she is doing a lot better now. I just read the sample for this new book and love it so far... looking forward to buying it soon!

Fantastic read. So beautifully and eloquently written. I'm a huge fan of Max. Would definitely recommend this book to anyone!

About the author

Max Lugavere is a filmmaker, TV personality, and health and science journalist. He is the director of the film Bread Head, the first-ever documentary about dementia prevention through diet and lifestyle. Lugavere has contributed to Medscape, Vice, Fast Company, and the Daily Beast, among others, and is a regularly appearing “core expert” on The Dr. Oz Show. He is a sought-after speaker, invited to lecture at esteemed academic institutions such as the New York Academy of Sciences and Weill Cornell Medicine, and has given keynotes at such events as the Biohacker Summit in Stockholm, Sweden. From 2005 to 2011, Lugavere was a journalist for Al Gore’s Current TV. He lives in New York City and Los Angeles.