How's it going everybody? Welcome to another episode of the Genius Life. I'm your host Max Lugovir, a filmmaker, health and science journalist in the author of The New York Times Best Selling Book Genius Foods.

In this episode of the show, I'm super excited to introduce you to my friend Gretchen Littaker.

Gretchen is mind-bodies Green's health editor and has worked on the academic and clinical side of integrative medicine for many years.

She did her undergrad in biology and earned her master's in physiology with a concentration in complementary and alternative medicine.

But what this podcast is gonna be about is her new book CBD Oil Everyday Secrets, a lifestyle guide to hemp-derived health and wellness.

CBD is quickly becoming one of the top health trends out there and spending on legal cannabis worldwide is expected to hit $57 billion by 2027.

The business is growing like a weed. See what I did there?

I'm super excited to go on this nerd safari with Gretchen because I don't really know a whole lot about CBD.

It's just not an area of focus for me. Nonetheless, Gretchen's research has convinced me that CBD is definitely a

powerful compound that is worth keeping tabs on and even trying out yourself.

So over the next hour, you're gonna discover the key differences between cannabis, marijuana, hemp, THC, CBD.

There's a lot going on there and even I get confused sometimes, but not anymore.

You're gonna discover the potential benefits of CBD including its implications for autoimmunity,

anxiety, cancer, and pain.

You're gonna start to understand the ubiquitous endocannabinoid system and the role that it plays in your health.

You're gonna find out why you might want to give CBD a try, even if you, like me, have never enjoyed the high for marijuana,

and Gretchen is gonna grace us all with a buyer's guide of sorts so that we can know what to look out for when buying CBD infused products,

including some specific brands to check out, and an unofficial dosing guide.

I'm beyond excited. But before we get to the show, I want to talk to you guys a little bit about the value of medicinal mushrooms.

Another set of compounds that I've really taken the spotlight recently in the health and wellness movement.

Before I recorded this episode, I took a few packets of an extract of lion's mane mushroom that I got from my friends at Forsegmatic.

Forsegmatic is a great company that makes a number of elixirs and organic instant coffees infused with medicinal mushrooms like lion's mane,

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