Intentions and Motivation Behind Longevity Protocols

In the previous lesson, I mentioned that this portal does not sell any supplements, therapies, or other products that are the subject of objective evaluation regarding the effectiveness of any health-related activity.

So what is the motivation behind its creation?

This is a valid question, and to answer it I need to write a few words about the creator of Longevity Protocols.

Building a company is an exciting experience, but you pay a high price for it. Years of fighting in business come with dangerously high levels of stress, sleep problems, anxiety, a constant sense of threat and instability, and disrupted life priorities.

I was proud of my professional achievements, but I couldn't hide from myself that year after year I felt worse and worse, and I wasn't sure why.

I had financial stability, fantastic people around me, a happy family, lots of travel, and a job I loved—so why did I feel bad?

I'm a rational person, and looking at my life situation, I simply had no right to be in such poor mental condition.

And yet, that's how it was. An increasing sense of constant fatigue, growing anxiety, a persistent feeling of running out of time and transience, and increasing irritability. The slightest thing could ruin my mood for the entire day.

Like an executioner's axe, the thought was hanging over me—what was the point of all those years of struggle, all that effort, all that striving, if I simply couldn't feel good about myself?

I felt an increasing meaninglessness in all my actions and had a sense that the axe was gradually getting closer to my neck.

While searching for an explanation for my condition, I came across Bryan Johnson—an American entrepreneur who, despite enormous success, struggled with depression and eventually managed to overcome it.

My state certainly couldn't be called depression, but the similarities between his story and mine were significant enough that I couldn't ignore it.

Bryan's diagnosis was simple—it was simply the gradual degradation of health that was leading the body and mind to a worsening condition, and they were signaling this by begging for action.

It comes down to a simple truth that humans have known for centuries—when health is lacking, it's hard to enjoy anything else in life.

This thought hit the heart of my situation, because it gave me the answer to the riddle—how can you have everything needed for happiness, and still not feel happy?

The answer was a blunt slap in the face: If you haven't taken care of your health, your body, and your mind, no money, no professional success, no travels, achievements, or even a happy family will let you enjoy yourself.

Bryan Johnson's approach inspired me to change, but a few things about his methods raised my doubts.

Bryan consumes over 100 supplements every day and conducts a huge number of various interventions and therapies on himself. There are significant problems with this:

• Conflict of interest: His company sells supplements and longevity-related products. There is a very clear conflict of interest, as it is in his best interest to promote the highest possible consumption of these supplements.
• Lack of scientific method: Bryan emphasizes that the scientific method is crucial for longevity, but he doesn't always apply it to himself. By applying so many variables to one person, we cannot isolate their effects. Therefore, we cannot determine from what Bryan does what really works and what effect it has.
• No published methodology: Bryan writes that at the beginning of his journey, he and his team chose from among numerous interventions those that had the best-proven evidence and the lowest risk of side effects. However, he never published this methodology, so we don't know exactly what he based his longevity protocol on.
• No gradual implementation: Bryan published his protocol, but the number of actions he takes goes far beyond what an average person can do—either due to required time or cost. For people who want to take their first steps on this path, it's hard to follow in his footsteps, as the entry threshold seems impossibly high.

Bearing in mind the above shortcomings, I decided to do two things:

• Conduct my own year-long experiment: Like Bryan, I decided to choose only those actions with the strongest evidence for their effectiveness and those within my reach. I committed to rigorously applying them for a year.
• Publish the results of my experiment: And do it in a form that addresses the flaws of Bryan's approach and lets others benefit as much as possible.

A year has passed, and the Longevity Protocols project is the result of my year-long experiment, along with the knowledge base and tools that can help you achieve similar—or even better—results.

Let me stress up front that throughout this year I only undertook actions that are clearly beneficial to health and do not carry a high risk of side effects (so there was no talk of steroids or invasive therapies.)

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The first takeaway is that I’m shocked at how powerfully our bodies can regenerate and how surprising the results can be in just one year when you leverage the latest advances in science and technology.

I’m deliberately sharing unretouched photos from everyday life rather than a dedicated photoshoot—I want everything to look natural, just as it is in reality.

Rate of aging and biological age

My rate of aging is 0.6 (meaning each year of life equated to just 0.6 years of aging), and my biological age is estimated to be about 10 years below my chronological age.

Physical condition

Just two years ago, I could barely climb the stairs to my apartment without getting winded. Today, according to multiple tests (including VO₂max), my fitness is at the level of professional athletes—well above the norm even compared with people in their 20s.

Secondly, besides the results I expected most—like body recomposition and better mood—I noticed a number of other, unexpected changes.

Hair repigmentation

I started going gray before thirty, so I had long accepted this as one of the most characteristic signs of passing time.

Honestly, as a big Witcher fan, I even had a soft spot for white hair ;)

Now I’m surprised to see my hair gradually regaining its natural color.

Reversing hair loss

Twenty years of doing headspins significantly thinned my hair at the crown. Professionally this is called mechanical alopecia, and I earned it before age 20, so I’d stopped paying attention to it long ago.

(Me and my signature headspin, which cost me the hair on the top of my head)

I didn’t expect any change here, yet my bald spot has clearly shrunk.

Dental health

I was never able to boast about my teeth being in the condition I wanted. My mom used to say that in our family everyone unfortunately has weak teeth and it’s genetically determined.

I’d accepted that too, and I didn’t tear my hair out when at every six-month checkup, despite my best efforts (I really put a lot of work into oral hygiene), I always had at least three cavities to fix (seven was my record).

So this year, when I went for a checkup after 12 months (I skipped the half-year one), I expected a record number of teeth to be treated (I guessed eight).

I thought I’d misheard when, after carefully examining my teeth, the dentist looked at me in surprise and said: “Mr. Michał, there’s nothing to treat—your teeth are all healthy. Congratulations.”

Sleep

Unfortunately, I’m someone with very restless, delicate sleep. The slightest noise wakes me, I toss and turn, I get up multiple times at night to use the bathroom, and falling asleep could take me over an hour. I often woke up in the middle of the night and couldn’t fall back asleep because of intrusive thoughts and anxiety.

Because of poor sleep, it was inevitable that every day around noon I’d crash completely and have to take a nap. It was incredibly frustrating—I felt I was losing precious time during the day.

In short—I didn’t like sleeping. Nights were mostly a torment, and I always longed for morning.

That’s now history. The chart below of my sleep quality from the first six months of my experiment (data from the Whoop band) illustrates it best.

What does it look like now?

• I fall asleep within a few minutes of my head hitting the pillow
• I sleep like a log—no waking at night, no bathroom trips
• I wake up so full of energy and excitement that I spring out of bed like a slingshot
• The afternoon energy dips are gone, and naps are a thing of the past
• I’ve come to love sleep—I can’t believe how pleasant and relaxing it can be. It may sound odd, but for me it’s a completely new experience

Acne

I could never understand it—how can a guy in his thirties have acne? As a teenager I accepted it, but worrying about pimples at 35? Unbelievable.

It seems that’s also in the past—the breakouts I’d lived with my whole life have finally retired and stopped bothering me.

Lower stress levels

Objectively, the amount of stress in my life hasn’t decreased, but subjectively I feel it much less. My anxiety has diminished, far fewer things can throw me off balance, and work problems feel less overwhelming.

Mental performance

I’ve always enjoyed mental clarity and quick thinking, but in recent years I inevitably noticed my mind slowing down and more frequent “blackouts”—that brain-fog feeling.

Nothing has pleased me more than feeling back to the best cognitive shape I can remember—I now feel my mind running at full throttle, and at the same time with a great sense of joy and excitement.

Summary

I noticed many other changes I won’t dwell on here. To sum up briefly—while many of my peers sing a mournful song about lost youth and the relentless signs of aging, I feel I’ve never been in better shape, nor felt better or younger.

At the same time, I feel I’m only at the beginning of my longevity journey. There’s still a lot I can do, and each month brings another medical breakthrough. It’s an exciting time to live—and to take care of yourself and your loved ones.

The Longevity Protocols project is now part of my path, and I’d like to invite you to join me. I hope it brings you great benefit.

Creating and maintaining the Longevity Protocols project takes a lot of my time, effort, and money. At this moment, I do not get any financial benefit from it, but my motivation to develop it is still immense. Why?

Having a life purpose is important for longevity

The topic of longevity is fascinating to me, and by helping others take care of their health, I feel that I am doing something right and meaningful.

To put it bluntly – it simply makes me feel better, and I’m adding another brick to my own well-being by doing it.

Minimizing egocentrism

I am fulfilled professionally and family-wise. However, when you take care of your business or your loved ones, in reality, you are always taking care of yourself, reinforcing your sense of egocentrism.

Functioning with too strong a sense of egocentrism (that is, with the feeling that everything you do is for yourself/your closest ones) is ultimately harmful in the long run. A stable sense of well-being and happiness requires doing things for others from which you derive no tangible benefit.

I want to have activities in my life that pull me out of my egocentrism, and Longevity Protocols is one of them.

I want to be surrounded by people with a similar mindset and values

I hope that the Longevity Protocols project will attract many people who share a similar mindset and values to mine, creating a mutually motivating community.

Like anyone else, I also need motivation, and nothing is more motivating than a group of people who support and uplift each other.

My own development

Here’s an example from my industry – in learning programming, one of the most important rules is to start working on a real project as soon as possible, because that's when you develop fastest.

By working on Longevity Protocols, a real project aimed at bringing real benefits to real people, I’m also developing my own knowledge in health and longevity. This is exciting work for me, and I’m happy to do it for free.

Caring for my loved ones

I believe that the most valuable thing loved ones can give each other is health.

I think that anyone who has had a seriously ill person in the family will agree with me that the amount of suffering that illness brings not only to the patient but also to their loved ones is overwhelming.

That’s why whenever someone close to me asks what gift I’d like for my birthday, for example, I answer – take care of yourself, give me your health so I can enjoy your presence for as long as possible.

Over the past year, I managed to get a group of my closest people into a healthy lifestyle – including my 60-year-old mother and 72-year-old mother-in-law, who both visited the gym for the first time in their lives and since then have been working out like true fitness enthusiasts ;)

My mom, age 60

My mother-in-law, age 72

Even my wife, at 8 months pregnant, doesn’t skip the gym, which makes me very happy.

So I’m also creating this project for them, wanting to take care of the health of those I care about most.

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I hope that now my motivation is clear and convincing for you, and that this somewhat long story gives you confidence that the Longevity Protocols project is founded on noble goals.

If you want to contact me, use the communication channels below:

• E-mail: m.szymanski@mdbootstrap.com
• WhatsApp: Join our WA community
• LinkedIn: My LinkedIn profile
• Social media: