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Jay Shetty Podcast

Dr. Zach Bush ON: The Importance of Gut Health & Why Dehydration Is Worse Than You Think

In this episode, I welcome Dr. Zach Bush, a medical doctor and holistic health practitioner known for his work in the fields of medicine, nutrition, and regenerative agriculture.

Dr. Zach BushguestJay Shettyhost

Jul 3, 20231h 17mWatch on YouTube

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CHAPTERS

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Chapter summaries

From Engineering to Internal Medicine and the Chronic Disease Explosion
Jay Shetty asks about Dr. Zach Bush's move from conventional medicine. Bush describes starting in the Philippines delivering babies, then training in internal medicine, and witnessing the surge of chronic disease from the 1990s onward.
- •Bush turned from engineering to health after birthing babies in the Philippines
- •He entered medicine just as chronic conditions like attention deficit disorder, gluten sensitivity and chronic fatigue emerged
- •He describes a sixth extinction event and the breakdown of cell-cell communication
- •He frames human health as a description of an ecosystem rather than a single species
Chasing Root Causes: Chemotherapy, Nutrition and Distance from Nature
Jay asks what started the global decline in health. Bush explains how endocrinology, metabolism and chemotherapy research led him to question nutrition, ancient medicine, and the chemical dependence of farming and pharmacy.
- •Bush trained in endocrinology and metabolism and found mitochondria vulnerable to toxins
- •He realized chemotherapy was not addressing the root cause of cancer
- •He left university in 2010 to start a nutrition-based clinic
- •He points to Chinese medicine and Ayurveda and to a 100-year march away from nature
- •Chemical dependence in farming and the hospital undermined nutritional health
Compassion vs. Empathy and the Fear-Based Medical Paradigm
Jay asks how hard it is to help people reconnect with what they've forgotten. Bush distinguishes compassion from empathy and describes how fear in both doctor and patient traps people in a death spiral.
- •Bush says reconnecting is nearly impossible when trying to prove someone wrong but easy when starting from compassion
- •Empathy matches another's fear vibration, while compassion holds a different possible reality
- •Fight-or-flight shuts down creativity, and Bush criticizes stimulant drugs for children
- •Doctors and patients are both caught in fear of an endpoint
Extinction, Rebirth and the Virome
Bush argues nature never sees endpoints, citing past extinctions and the deep topsoil of the dinosaur era. He describes the virome as a library of genetic potential and calls for abundance rather than scarcity.
- •Past extinctions were followed by richer and more intelligent life
- •Sixty million years ago topsoil was 30 feet deep, versus about three inches now
- •The virome is a database of potential genes, with billions of viruses in his bloodstream
- •Medicine, he says, has been built on scarcity and fear of death
Where to Begin: Eight Steps, Intuition and the Anatomy of the Soul
Jay asks where an overwhelmed person should start. Bush outlines eight foundational lifestyle steps beginning with coming out of fear, turning the arrow inward, and he discusses near-death experiences, identity and the electromagnetic field as the soul.
- •Bush's team distilled eight basic steps, the first being to come out of fear
- •He urges turning the arrow inward toward intuition rather than seeking external causes
- •He describes patients retaining identity during near-death experiences
- •He suggests the electromagnetic field that organizes the body may be the soul
- •The Journey of Intrinsic Health is an eight-week program, and he moved from a clinic to a coaching model
Why Dehydration Is Worse Than You Think: Crystalline Water
Jay asks about water, and Bush explains that most body water is in a crystalline gel form holding captured sunlight. Plain water passes through quickly, and he describes phase angle testing as a measure of cellular water and vitality.
- •About 70% of the body is water, mostly in crystalline structure around proteins
- •Plants capture sunlight and mitochondria release it into crystal water
- •Plain water has no reservoir in the body and is excreted within about 45 minutes
- •Phase angle measured by impedance: ideal 10 to 12, cancer around 4, death at 3.5
Glyphosate, Cell Communication and the Microbiome Supplement
Bush explains how glyphosate dissolves communication between cells and leaks light and water, linking it to the disease explosion between 1992 and 2002. He describes the supplement as a redox signaling system extracted from fossil soils that restores cellular communication via the microbiome.
- •Glyphosate is in 90-plus percent of weed killers, with about 4 billion pounds sprayed worldwide
- •His lab found it dissolves communication between human cells
- •Disease is described as a failure of a wireless cell-communication network
- •The supplement is not a nutrient but carbon molecules from fossil soils
- •The microbiome is a diverse ecosystem making signaling molecules
We Know Everything If We Listen Inside
Jay asks about soil regeneration, but Bush first responds to the idea that we don't know enough. He says deep knowing comes from inner connection, silence and remembering rather than intellect.
- •Bush says that after 17 years of education he now feels he knows everything, not in his head
- •Spending time in silence reveals knowledge, as Jay did as a monk
- •He says truth is remembered rather than discovered
- •He connects this to the genome and to a connection with the future
Soil as a Living System and Regenerative Agriculture
Bush describes soil as the most complex life form, explains monoculture versus biodiversity, and links gut health to soil health. He explains chemical farming as ICU-style care and introduces regenerative agriculture and Farmer's Footprint.
- •A teaspoon of soil holds more organisms than there are people on Earth
- •There is no good or bad bacteria, only healthy ecosystems or monocultures
- •Glyphosate is patented as an antibiotic and Roundup-ready crops tolerate it
- •Regenerative agriculture aims to grow life in the soil rather than kill pests
Food Security, Lawns and Vulnerable Supply Chains
Bush warns about 3,000-mile supply chains and cities with days of food supply, citing the Dust Bowl, victory gardens and Russian farming resilience. He suggests converting lawns to food forests and eating dandelion greens.
- •40 million acres of American lawn could become food forests
- •Victory gardens supplied 45% of food in World War II
- •Los Angeles has about a three-day food supply, he says
- •Soil health is framed as national security
Eating in a Supermarket World: Reconnecting Through Nature and Fire
Jay asks how to protect oneself eating from supermarkets. Bush describes the youth-led regenerative movement, biodiversity of inputs including media, and the practice of looking at trees and fire, with stories of death-bed clarity.
- •Women and youth lead the regenerative agriculture movement
- •A diet of single-source news creates a monocrop of belief
- •Lying under a tree or watching a fire can rewire the brain
- •A study showed stem cells activating when looking down at a fire
- •Purpose is described as being you
Breath, CO2 and the Planet's Lungs
Jay shares reflections on Hawaii and asks about breath. Bush explains exhalation, CO2 and shallow breathing, then extends it to the planet's depleted soil lungs, a view of warming as lack of breath, and the pandemic and police killing as fractal suffocation.
- •Exhalation releases microRNA and CO2, which is needed to use oxygen
- •Shallow fight-or-flight breathing mirrors addiction to water that never becomes crystal
- •97% of arable soils are depleted, which Bush calls the planet's lost lungs
- •He argues the planet has a fever from lack of breath rather than CO2 alone
- •He calls for letting the planet breathe and moving from fear to abundance
Where to Find Zach's Work and Quorum Sensing
Jay asks where listeners can learn more. Bush shares his websites and program links, and talks about community and quorum sensing as a way biodiversity yields collective intelligence.
- •Websites cover his work, the eight-week program and soil science and supplements
- •He stresses connected community beyond products and classes
- •Quorum sensing is when enough biodiversity produces more intelligence than any part
- •He hopes for a planetary quorum-sensing moment
Final Five: Advice, Marriage, Beauty and Biodiversity
Jay asks Bush the closing fast five questions. Bush gives short answers, then opens up about unconditional love after his divorce and shares the Icaria story that biodiversity of people, not diet alone, explains longevity.
- •Best advice is to slow down and worst is to stop moving
- •He no longer values marriage as an ownership box after learning unconditional love in his divorce
- •He is trying to learn the witness of beauty
- •His one law would be biodiversity
- •An Icarian man told him they live long because a chair is set for a stranger and they ask who they ate with

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