Man Spending $2m A Year To Reverse His Biological Age Reveals Why He Takes Over 100 Pills Every Day

Bryan Johnson, aged 45, a technology entrepreneur based in California, who almost a decade ago sold his company Braintree Venmo to PayPal for a substantial $800 million, engaged in a conversation with Steven Bartlett on the Diary of a CEO Podcast during this week.

Bryan Johnson/Instagram

Bryan Johnson thinks that if you always sleep at the same time, stop eating after 11 am, and take 100 pills, you can stay young forever. He really believes these things are the important secrets to never getting old.

His big goal for the 21st century is to not die. He tries everything he can to make life longer. He even did a strange thing: he put some of his 17-year-old son's blood into his own body.

Bryan Johnson/Blueprint

"I'm revolting against the culture of death," he said on the podcast.

"I was born to introduce this new idea to humanity," he told Dragon's Den star Steven.

"In the 21st Century, the only goal is not to die. It's the rallying cry for the 21st Century, those two word: "don't die", he added.

During the current week, he shared how his upbringing as a Mormon and his battle with depression and thoughts of ending his own life played a role in his present success. However, he expressed concern that not taking good care of himself in his earlier years might have caused harm.

Bryan Johnson/Blueprint

Bryan also mentioned that he firmly believes it's entirely achievable to "live forever." He relies on algorithms to make all his decisions, avoiding giving his mind the power to make choices.

He also talked about how sleep is really important for him. He checks how good his sleep is, and he's had really good sleep quality, 100 percent, for six months in a row.

He shared that he goes to sleep at 8:30 pm every day, even though this might not be great for his social life. However, he believes the benefits outweigh the drawbacks.

After he wakes up, he frequently avoids talking to anyone for around four to five hours. This gives him the time to have uninterrupted thinking.

Bryan Johnson/Blueprint

"I probe myself to deep levels, but you can get knocked off so fast."

"Someone saying "how are you, how was your sleep" can knock me off."

"I've built my life around sleep," he explained.

"That's the opposite of cultural norms, most people will blow their bed time if they want to go out with friends."

"I've made the hard decisions. There's a bunch of small things."

"My last meal of the day is at 11am, by the time I go to bed I have more than eight hours of digestion."

The tycoon in 2019 with his ex girlfriend, the director Taryn Southern Getty Images for Tribeca Film Fe

"I ran a few hundred experiments on this. I sleep best with an empty stomach."

He added that he 'never shares a bed' with anyone and won't have sex after 8.30pm either.

"I'm single, I've tried to date before, I've given them a list of 10 things that will make them impossible to like me."

Bryan also mentioned that his upbringing followed a "typically American" and not very healthy pattern. During that time, he used to consume a lot of sugary cereals. However, he has completely eliminated cane sugar from his diet now, as he believes it doesn't provide any benefits.

Talking about his eating habits, Bryan mentioned that he consumes a daily intake of 2250 calories and believes that every calorie should have a strong reason to be included in his diet.

Bryan Johnson/Instagram

To kick-start his day, he opts for a bowl of what he calls 'super veggies.' This mix includes broccoli, cauliflower, garlic, ginger, and hemp seeds, all drizzled with extra virgin olive oil and cacao. He refrains from adding salt or other seasonings, except for potassium chloride.

Bryan's daily vegetable consumption is around a kilogram. He includes dark chocolate in his diet to help curb any cravings for sweetness.

Following this, he treats himself to what he terms a 'dessert' – a blend of macadamia nuts combined with berries and proteins.

Including in the diet are three tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil, along with a beverage referred to as the 'green giant.' This regimen also encompasses the ingestion of 111 pills.

Bryan Johnson/Blueprint

Bryan allocates a yearly budget of $2 million (£1.6 million) to sustain a team of over 30 medical professionals and doctors. Their primary responsibility is to oversee and evaluate nearly every aspect of his bodily functions. The objective is to transform his body into one resembling that of an 18-year-old.

He has amassed a collection of 33,537 images of his intestines and keeps track of various metrics, from his bone weight to the frequency of his nighttime erections.

Bryan Johnson/Blueprint

Both Bryan and his medical experts assert that within a span of two years, he has managed to decrease his biological age by more than five years. Consequently, his heart is purportedly comparable to that of a 37-year-old, his skin resembles that of a 28-year-old, and his lung capacity and physical fitness align with an 18-year-old. The leader of his medical team is Oliver Zolman, a 29-year-old doctor focused on researching aging therapies at Cambridge.

In his most recent pursuits, Bryan Johnson has been engaging in a practice called plasma swapping. Prior to performing this with both his father and son, Johnson had been involved in plasma transfusions. He obtained plasma from a young and healthy donor, whose identity he kept anonymous. Johnson was meticulous in his screening process, ensuring that the donor had an optimal body mass index, followed a healthy lifestyle, and was free from diseases.

Starting with Talmage, plasma was taken from him, and the procedure was then replicated with Richard. In this case, some of Richard's blood was removed and mixed with some of Bryan's blood.

The concept of using plasma transfusion as a method to combat aging is far from being conclusively established and has its origins in experiments conducted on mice.

In 2005, a team of researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, made a surprising discovery. They found that when they connected old mice and young mice so that they shared blood and organs, the cellular ages of these mice changed.

During a five-week experiment, they paired an old mouse with a young one to share their blood and organs. The results were intriguing. The muscles of the old mice healed at a similar speed to those of the young mice. Additionally, the old mice developed new liver cells at a rate similar to that of youthful mice.

In a subsequent study, it was revealed that transferring blood from an older mouse into a younger mouse could actually accelerate the aging process.

In this context, Talmage, Bryan, and Richard each experience different outcomes. Bryan stands to benefit the most from the blood transfusion, as limited yet somewhat conclusive research suggests that it might rejuvenate him internally. 

Richard, on the other hand, likely gains the most from the procedure. He receives a blood transfusion from one of the healthiest individuals on the planet. Their relationship has been complicated, and Richard views this transfusion as a way to renew their familial connection and strengthen his bond with his father.

Richard told Bloomberg: "Yeah, I won the lottery. There has to be a benefit in getting this much volume of him."

Upon extracting Bryan's plasma from his veins, he observed the yellow-gold color that signifies the presence of healthy blood.

He said: "Hey, look at that. This is how you can tell if I’m a fraud or not. The color is nice. It’s pristine."