How to instantly achieve top 1% health

It’s never a good thing in Las Vegas when hotel security starts asking you questions.

By way of background, you need to know that Las Vegas is the brightest city on Earth as seen from space at night. Then there’s the reality on the ground after dark. The sensory overload of The Strip cripples your primal biology, including walking under billboards that turn night into high noon. Inside the hotels is even worse. Casinos are purposely designed to overwhelm your internal clock, with no windows and every slot machine blasting you with addictive blue light to hold you in place.      

Blue light at night not only causes psychosis, but also bright outdoor light in particular stimulates aggression and crime. Dr. Jack Kruse noted the strong correlation between FBI crime data and America’s migration from more environmentally friendly streetlights to the strong blue emissions of white LEDs. Furthermore, El Salvador President Nayib Bukele has spoken about the association between bright outdoor lights and gang activity, and he swapped out all the LED lights in the Presidential Palace for healthier incandescent bulbs.  

Studies show that one way to offset the impact of artificial light at night is to get significant daytime light exposure, especially during the morning. Morning exposure to natural bright light resets your circadian clock, reduces the impact of blue light on nighttime melatonin production, and lowers the retina’s sensitivity to evening blue light.

Sunlight between 6 am and 9 am is also special because it has a higher percentage of red and near-infrared light (NIR) compared to later in the day. These wavelengths are known to penetrate tissues and stimulate a key enzyme in the mitochondria that leads to increased production of ATP — the main energy source for cells. Underpowered mitochondria (another way to say “poor metabolic health”) is a key risk factor for everything from cancer to diabetes.

In short, for anyone visiting Vegas, putting morning sun on your eyes is non-negotiable.

However, in spite of my best laid plans, my hotel’s pool opened only at 9 am. My sole chance for morning sun was to sit on the fake grass near the hotel’s main entrance with my shirt off.

It didn’t occur to me that the sight of a person investing in his metabolic health was so suspicious and rare. The hotel sent a security guard to stand over me (blocking my sun) and ask what I was up to. I explained the situation, and the man trudged away.

Given that thousands of hotel guests over several years never thought to go find morning sun, I had a realization about how easy it is to achieve top 1% health. All you have to do is go outside.