I Tried At-Home Ultrasound for My Brain : 1377
The Human Upgrade: Biohacking for Longevity & Performance
Dave Asprey
4.6 • 7.3K Ratings
🗓️ 9 December 2025
⏱️ 58 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Most people stay locked in a constant sympathetic state without realizing it, which drains focus, sleep quality, emotional balance, and long-term resilience. This episode gives you a science backed path to retrain your nervous system, improve heart rate variability, and shift out of stress on command using focused ultrasound technology that targets the vagus nerve.
Watch this episode on YouTube for the full video experience:
https://www.youtube.com/@DaveAspreyBPR
Host Dave Asprey talks with Jon Hacker, CEO of NeurGear and creator of ZenBud. Jon is a biomedical engineer who has dedicated his career to bridging neuroscience and daily wellness. His work includes peer reviewed clinical research on anxiety, PTSD, autonomic regulation, and non invasive vagus nerve stimulation. He is one of the first innovators to bring focused ultrasound out of the lab and into a practical wearable designed to help people regulate state, build resilience, and create more conscious control over their biology.
In this conversation, Dave and Jon break down how ultrasound activates the auricular branch of the vagus nerve, why most electrical vagus nerve devices fail, and what actually happens in the first three to five minutes when the system begins shifting out of sympathetic activation. Jon explains how early trauma wires the autonomic system, why chronic stress is often physiological rather than psychological, and how daily stimulation strengthens vagal tone through Hebbian learning. They also explore how HRV reflects hidden state changes, how nervous system training supports clearer thinking and better emotional regulation, and why this type of tech matters as AI, algorithms, and modern stressors continue to push people into dysregulated states.
You’ll Learn:
• Why sympathetic dominance is so widespread in the modern environment
• How the vagus nerve influences stress, recovery, inflammation, and emotional balance
• What makes focused ultrasound more precise than electrical vagus nerve stimulation
• How ZenBud produced a 78 percent remission rate in clinical anxiety research
• How early trauma alters autonomic patterns and keeps people in hidden fight or flight
• How three to five minutes of stimulation can reset state during panic or overwhelm
• Why daily use strengthens vagal tone and builds long term resilience
• How HRV training, consciousness practices, and nervous system workouts fit together
• Why noninvasive brain interfaces may become the safer future path as AI advances
This episode is essential for anyone interested in biohacking, stress physiology, nervous system training, emotional regulation, HRV, meditation, trauma recovery, longevity, and building a more adaptable brain and body. It gives you a practical look at how the autonomic system really works and how focused ultrasound may change the future of human performance.
Dave Asprey is a four-time New York Times bestselling author, founder of Bulletproof Coffee, and the father of biohacking. With over 1,000 interviews and 1 million monthly listeners, The Human Upgrade brings you the knowledge to take control of your biology, extend your longevity, and optimize every system in your body and mind. Each episode delivers cutting-edge insights in health, performance, neuroscience, supplements, nutrition, biohacking, emotional intelligence, and conscious living.
New episodes are released every Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, and Sunday (BONUS). Dave asks the questions no one else will and gives you real tools to become stronger, smarter, and more resilient.
Keywords: focused ultrasound vagus nerve stimulation, autonomic nervous system regulation, sympathetic dominance recovery, auricular vagus nerve activation, heart rate variability training, anxiety remission ultrasound, PTSD autonomic modulation, Hebbian learning vagal tone, parasympathetic state shift, ultrasound neuromodulation research, trauma induced nervous system wiring, panic attack recovery tools, non invasive brain interface, emotional regulation biohacking, stress physiology retraining, early adverse events autonomic impact, vagus nerve inflammation pathway, TBI secondary injury prevention, ultrasound neural action potentials, HRV resilience protocols
Resources:
• Go to http://www.zenbud.health/dave and use code ‘Dave15’ for a discount! You’ll also receive:
- 3 months of ear buds
- 3 months of silicone gel
- 1 copy of Heavily Meditated
- 1 bottle of Daily Zen supplement by Vatellia Life (60 day supply)
• Dave Asprey's Latest News | Go to https://daveasprey.com/ to join Inside Track today.
• Danger Coffee: https://dangercoffee.com/discount/dave15
• My Daily Supplements: SuppGrade Labs (15% Off)
• Favorite Blue Light Blocking Glasses: TrueDark (15% Off)
• Dave Asprey’s BEYOND Conference: https://beyondconference.com
• Dave Asprey’s New Book – Heavily Meditated: https://daveasprey.com/heavily-meditated
• Upgrade Collective: https://www.ourupgradecollective.com
• Upgrade Labs: https://upgradelabs.com
• 40 Years of Zen: https://40yearsofzen.com
Timestamps:
0:00 – Trailer
2:00 – Intro
8:04 – Understanding Stress and the Vagus Nerve
14:14 – Jon’s Story and Why He Built ZenBud
16:17 – How Vagus Nerve Stimulation Works
21:07 – Using ZenBud and Clinical Results
24:23 – Why We’re All So Anxious
30:54 – Longevity, TBI and Recovery
44:01 – The Future of Brain Computer Interfaces
50:54 – Closing
Thank you to our sponsors!
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Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Most people are in the sympathetic or fight or flight state because it's profitable to put people there. |
| 0:04.4 | If you're in fire flight state, you're not thinking. You're more likely to buy or likely to just be a nice little consumer. |
| 0:09.5 | And especially not social media and short form algorithm, algorithmic content, which is literally used as a gateway key to activate dopamine centers in your mind and directly activate your sympathetic system to get you to keep watching. |
| 0:24.1 | But it's not okay to control someone else's without their consent. |
| 0:27.0 | And I don't want Sam Aldman, I don't want Mark Zuckerberg, I don't want Bill Gates, |
| 0:30.0 | I don't want any government person anywhere to say anything about what I do with my consciousness. |
| 0:34.7 | And anyone who tries to do that sounds like they're an enemy of |
| 0:38.1 | humanity. You have the guards up. You've built up the firewall, so to speak. The thing is, |
| 0:42.3 | children do not have the firewall. And especially if you're in an environment where you've never |
| 0:46.6 | not been introduced to these things, you've never had a chance to build up the firewall. |
| 0:50.9 | How could you say you grow up with a completely as your brain is forming its concept of |
| 0:57.0 | reality? I discovered when I started doing heart rate variability training many years ago, |
| 1:01.4 | that hundreds of times per day, without any conscious knowledge, my system was flipping into |
| 1:07.2 | sympathetic mode. It was PTSD. So a lot of times if you're in a high sympathetic state |
| 1:12.0 | before you use it, it'll bring you to a parisemopathic state. We do have peer reviewed and |
| 1:16.5 | published clinical work, taking a look at things like anxiety and PTSD. And we see really, |
| 1:21.1 | really strong results in both. We have, like, 78% remission rate when it comes to anxiety. |
| 1:26.5 | Wow. Yeah, very high. You're listening to the |
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... |
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