Huberman longevity
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Despite his growing popularity, Huberman’s approach is not without controversy. Critics have accused him of straying beyond his areas of expertise and promoting pseudoscientific claims, often tied to his supplement sponsorships. Yet his credentials as a tenured professor at Stanford and his groundbreaking research into neural plasticity and brain function set him apart from the wellness influencers he is often grouped along side.
David Berson, a professor of neuroscience and vice-chair of the neuroscience department at Brown University, explained to Time magazine that he recognizes that Huberman’s decision to popularize and monetize his work has been met with disapproval by many in the scientific community but maintained “he’s kind of a rock star in our field.”
As the Saturday keynote session, Huberman and his friend Lyon, who appeared as his guest on a June 2024 episode of Huberman’s podcast, sat down to discuss the science behind longevity and motivation—and how we can all apply the latest research to improve both.
The building blocks of motivation
Asked by Lyon how we can “build and generate capacity both mentally and physically,” Huberman emphasized the importance of mastering what he calls the “non-negotiable aspects of your biology.”
“The number one thing is… You have to get the rhythms right,” he said, pointing to the foundational role of sleep and circadian biology in regulating both mental and physical states. Without these basics, achieving higher-order mental states like flow and sustained motivation is impossible.
Huberman described motivation as triple layered:
- Biological Foundations: These include sleep, circadian rhythms and autonomic functions like gut-brain communication.
- Dopamine Circuits: Human brains, unlike those of other animals, can decide to be motivated through prefrontal cortex inputs. “You can actually decide to be motivated. Other animals cannot do that,” he explained.
- Higher-Order States: Flow and creativity sit at the top of the hierarchy but rely on the foundational layers beneath. “If you don’t get those basic layers of biology and psychology right, the rest either doesn’t happen or falls apart very quickly,” Huberman said.
His emphasis on dopamine’s role in motivation is well-backed by decades of scientific research. Dopamine circuits drive effort and focus, but sustainable motivation depends on replenishing these reserves through sleep and rest.
“If you’re not getting regular sleep, if you don’t have some level of control over your autonomic activity, if you don’t have some basic understanding of the relationship between work output and dopamine and motivation, then it becomes very hard to be in flow,” Huberman noted, reinforcing the importance of the most basic elements of biology and the brain’s circuits for motivation. “Only then, can you start to fantasize, or even think about in a realistic way implementing tools to get in flow or to access creativity.”
Longevity and the Brain: Lessons from super agers
Huberman and Lyon also explored the neuroscience behind longevity, referencing research on “super agers.” These individuals, whose memory and cognitive abilities rival those of people decades younger, show preserved cortical thickness in brain regions like the anterior mid-cingulate cortex (aMCC) and hippocampus.
According to Huberman, maintaining the size and function of the aMCC—a region critical for tenacity and effort—requires embracing challenges that push us outside our comfort zones.
“If you really enjoy your game of golf, it ain’t gonna increase the size of your anterior mid-cingulate cortex,” he quipped. “If you hate golf, then you should take up golf.”
This aligns with findings from a 2016 study published in The Journal of Neuroscience, which identified thicker cortical regions and preserved hippocampal volume in super agers. These structures are essential for memory, attention and executive function, all of which deteriorate with age in typical adultsSimilarly, a 2021 study in Cortex linked aMCC activity to persistence in the face of difficulty, highlighting its role in cognitive resilience. The takeaway? Consistently engaging in tasks that take you out of your comfort zone or require tenacity helps preserve brain healthand cognitive function .
Cognitive Velocity: Peak mental performance
Huberman’s newest concept, “cognitive velocity,” refers to the brain’s ability to process and retain information efficiently. He described it as the mental equivalent of pushing your pace during a workout: “Think about reading something a little bit faster than is comfortable, with the intention of remembering it as if you were going to be tested on it,” Huberman explained.
He stressed that timing matters, urging individuals to identify their peak cognitive windows. For many, this is in the morning, between 6 a.m. and noon, when biological rhythms support focus and learning. “Your biology looks very different between 6 a.m. and noon than it does between noon and 6 p.m.,” he noted.
To enhance cognitive velocity, Huberman recommends high-intensity interval training (HIIT). A 2024 study published in Aging and Diseasesupports this, showing that HIIT not only improves brain function but also sustains these benefits for up to five years in older adults, enhancing hippocampal connectivity and cognitive resilience.
“One of the best ways to enhance brain function—that is, to get better at learning and to increase this thing that we call cognitive velocity, our ability to lean into learning and to really pay attention to something—is through regular cardiovascular exercise. The data is just overwhelming now, but it’s not any cardiovascular exercise. It seems to be the type of cardiovascular exercise in which you go through bursts of higher intensity activity and then more relaxed activity,” Huberman explained. “So, whether or not you’re pushing a sled, or whether or not you’re doing some sprinting for 100 meters on a bike or running, or whatever you can do safely, it does seem like that builds up better mental capacity for learning outside of exercise.”
A 2023 study published in the international peer-reviewed journal GeroScience seems to support Huberman’s assertion. Research backed by the McKnight Brain Research Foundation found that combining cardio with strength training significantly boosts cognitive performance in agingpopulations with participants in the cardio and strength training group scoring significantly better on different congnitive tasks compared to both the cardio and sedentary groups.
Motivation and Longevity: The Shared Secret
Whether aiming for a longer life or greater motivation, Huberman underscored the importance of embracing discomfort. Physical challenges, such as sprinting or weightlifting, and mental tasks that stretch your abilities both contribute to a more resilient brain.
Motivation, as much as it’s linked to dopamine, is really about a readiness to access those dopamine energy circuits, Huberman explained. Engaging in high-effort tasks strengthens the brain’s capacity to maintain focus and persist through challenges.
Lyon agreed, noting that resistance training, which she has long championed, is now recognized as essential for health at any age.
“Ten years ago, I said everybody should resistance train, which, by the way, I can’t take credit for,” Huberman said. “It’s actually Dr. Gabrielle Lyon and others who have really been pioneering this message to men, to women, to people of all ages, to do resistance training. But 10 years ago, that was still thought to be mostly the domain of people in sports… Now we know that everybody should do this.”
As far as where we go from here, if we want to learn the secrets to longevity, Huberman points to the data around super agers and their anterior mid-cingulate cortex (aMMC), noting that super agers don’t just maintain cognitive function, they also live longer.
“A colleague of mine at Stanford was stimulating this brain area [aMMC] in humans, and what he found was stimulating this brain area—and only this brain area—that people would say, ‘Wow. You know, I kind of feel like there’s a storm coming, and I want to lean into the storm, where there’s some impending challenge. But I got this, I can take this.’ It was digging into this feeling, or creating this feeling, of low power and tenacity,” Huberman elaborated. “And then you look at super agers; they maintain the size of the structure. People who are successful in their fitness and dieting attempts increase the volume of the anterior mid-cingulate cortex. People that fail at those attempts? It decreases. It’s correlated with all sorts of things that are good for us, including maintaining cognitive function. The distinguishing feature is those people continually embrace, throughout life, physical and mental challenges—in particular things that, to them, suck.”
Takeaways for your health journey
Huberman and Lyon left the audience with actionable advice:
- Master the Basics: Prioritize sleep, circadian rhythms and nutrition to build a foundation for motivation and longevity.
- Time Your Efforts: Identify when your mental and physical performance peaks during the day and structure key tasks around these windows.
- Embrace the Challenge: Pursue activities that push you outside your comfort zone, whether mentally or physically.
- Incorporate HIIT and Resistance Training: Two or three sessions per week can significantly improve cognitive and physical health, Huberman said.
At its core, Huberman’s message is one of resilience. Whether you’re chasing the motivation to finish a project or striving to age gracefully, the keys lie in pushing boundaries and building capacity. As he put it, “Just being fit is not enough.”
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