How to Improve Your Metabolic Flexibility With Lumen

hey there dr morgan nolte here today’s

episode is all about how to improve your

metabolic flexibility with lumen

lumen is a small convenient breath

device that helps your body develop

metabolic flexibility

that means you can efficiently switch

between using carbs and fat for fuel

lumen identifies if you’re using carbs

or fat for fuel by measuring the level

of carbon dioxide in your breath when

your body’s cells produce energy from

either carbs or fats they release carbon

dioxide in your bloodstream

when you’re using carbs for fuel more

carbon dioxide is released than when

you’re using fat this translates into

carbon dioxide levels in your breath

which lumen measures pretty cool

a higher level of carbon dioxide means

your body is using carbs a lower level

of carbon dioxide means your body is

using more fats

i’m going to show you how to use the

device

so all you need is your phone so you’ll

download the lumen app

and then here’s the lumen device and it

comes with this magnetic cap that you

can just pop off like that

and when you’re ready to test your

breath you’re going to open up the phone

app

so i’ll turn it towards you

and then you press this little button

right here

a little purple breath

and so this is my morning breath

now technically it’s best if you’re

sitting down and you’re relaxing for a

few minutes before you’re you to your

breath not necessarily recording

um like i am right now that’s how you’re

going to get the best results

so it says to turn on your lumen and so

i just press that little white button

there on the front

and it’s connected to my phone

and you’ll press the little let’s go

button

okay

so it’s warming up

she told me to inhale deeply through my

lumen and you’re gonna see this little

ring grow in size so

hold your breath

exhale in three two

one

and then it likes to usually take

another breath

so it has you hold your breath for

several seconds

um and then you exhale so i don’t know

if you heard her say that um but you’re

supposed to inhale till the circle turns

green and then hold your breath for

about 10 seconds and then exhale

and it kind of gives you a nice little

indicator on how fast to exhale so you

don’t go too slow or too fast

inhale deeply

here’s the second breath

hold your breath

exhale in three

two

one

all right so let’s see i have not eaten

anything yet today

so we’ll see what i’m burning

so it says i’m burning mostly carbs so i

got a level four

which isn’t totally surprising so let me

explain why that is a little bit more

one day a week i allow myself an

exception and so like last night i had a

dessert i had some healthier monster

cookies like three little ones

but that was probably enough

carbohydrates to

give me enough to continue to burn carbs

this morning for fuel and the other

thing that really affects that again is

any stress

if i’m sleep deprived which we kind of

are

in this phase of life because we have

two young kids and that will kind of

push you to burning more carbohydrates

too because it’s a chronic stress on

your body

so

the other thing that can push me into

burning mostly carbs would be

in eating too much protein the day

before so excess protein can be turned

into glucose i still follow a pretty

high protein diet

but it will affect my ketosis if i’m

eating um too much protein so kind of

interesting pretty easy hopefully you

found that tutorial helpful

to get the most out of lumen you’re

going to want to use it each morning at

the very least and follow its

personalized macronutrient plan each day

what your body uses for fuel in the

morning is a main indicator of your

metabolic health

lumen has five levels level one means

you’re burning mostly fat for energy

while level five means you’re using

carbs for energy and ideally a good goal

is to have a level one or two when you

wake up in the morning

that means you’re burning fat overnight

and using a lower carb approach and

intermittent fasting are two excellent

tools to help you get into a fat burning

mode faster if your body is using carbs

for fuel right when you wake up several

things could be going on you may have

eaten later at night eaten too many

carbs the day before been stressed out

or maybe you had a bad night of sleep in

my case sometimes i actually overdo it

on the protein which can be turned into

glucose and hamper my fat burning

ability so seeing that higher lumen

level in the morning is a good reminder

to check in with yourself and see what

you can optimize for fat burning

if you are consistently eating carbs

throughout the day your body won’t have

a chance to really utilize the glucose

in your blood and glycogen in your liver

and muscles to truly tap into excess fat

storage for energy because it doesn’t

need to

and as a friendly reminder you can

become metabolically inflexible the

other way too

if you’re eating very low carbohydrate

for a sustained amount of time your body

reduces its ability to efficiently

process those carbohydrates and this is

when i get reports of people who have

gone keto and have such a strong rebound

of weight gain when they don’t sustain

that diet and start eating carbohydrates

again

lumen also likes to keep track of things

like your daily exercise sleep and

carbohydrates

now based on this information it gives

you a customized macronutrient goal for

the day to improve your metabolic

flexibility

what’s interesting about lumen is that

it provides a metabolic flexibility

score

which is measured on a scale of 0 to 21

a great metabolism is flexible it’s good

at shifting quickly between fuel sources

based on its needs and to estimate how

healthy and flexible your metabolism is

lumen relies on three factors your

body’s ability to burn fat to burn carbs

and how closely your morning flex score

is in sync with your daily lifestyle

data that you’re entering

so levels 0 to 6 means your metabolism

is not as flexible as it could be

7 to 14 means you have a healthy

metabolism

and 15 to 21 is a very flexible

metabolism to teach your body to use

both sources of fuel lumen recommends a

customized nutrition plan each day

what this means is that it gives you

slightly different macronutrient goals

for the day

it also gives you high carb days which

they call boost days to help your body

shift to burning carbohydrates

the ratio between the low carb and the

high carb days will depend on your

personal metabolism and goals

there are a lot of benefits to having a

flexible metabolism

your blood glucose levels will be more

consistent so you’ll have more energy

throughout the day with less energy

crashes

you’re going to perform better during

workouts and have fewer carb and sugar

cravings

and my favorite part is that your

insulin sensitivity will improve which

will help your body burn fat more

effectively

build more lean muscle mass and help you

improve your body composition more

easily

as your insulin sensitivity improves

your insulin resistance goes down which

is what i’m all about for sustainable

weight loss and disease prevention

a strong level of metabolic flexibility

has also been linked with a stronger

immune system and better sleep quality

one of our new zibli members spoke truth

into this as just a month into her lower

carb intermittent fasting lifestyle and

mind you she wasn’t doing anything more

than about 13 hours of fasting each day

she reported better sleep quality better

fitting genes a thinner face and less

pms symptoms all in just one month

research has shown that people who are

more metabolically flexible are less

likely to develop chronic health issues

like obesity type 2 diabetes heart

disease and even dementia

again this goes back to reducing insulin

resistance

based on my own research lumen’s

nutrition plan or daily macronutrient

ratios lined up with what i typically

recommend to my members so i was happy

to see that

the amount of protein remained pretty

steady each day while the amount of

carbohydrates and fats is what

fluctuated

to make it easier to follow their

nutritional recommendations they’ve

included some tools inside their app and

highly encourage you to focus first on

carbohydrates i liked this because when

you’re just starting out it may be

overwhelming to try and focus on

optimizing all your macros

prioritizing on reducing carbs was a

good call there are a few basic

trainings in the form of click-through

images and short videos sort of like

instagram content explaining how to use

lumen and get the most out of it they

also provide some resources to track

your carbohydrate servings in a day

they have a food database which will

give you the food and how many carb

points it is for the day

and it also has some nice recipes and

meal inspiration

they are planning on rolling out an

in-app food tracking system so that you

don’t have to use a separate app like

the carb manager app i like using

personally i think it’s a lot simpler

just to track net carbohydrates instead

of trying to learn their rules for how

many carb carbohydrate points

certain carbs have but you can

absolutely do that too you can track

macros or you can do carb servings they

just use the points system to try to

make it simple for people who don’t want

to track their macronutrients

however from my experience i know that

carbohydrates specifically added sugar

are hiding in a lot of healthy foods so

to get the most out of lumen i do

recommend that you also track your

macronutrients

it will be highly beneficial when they

have their own macronutrient tracking

system inside of the app which is a

feature that should be rolling out

shortly i hear i’m interested to see if

the daily macronutrient goals

change according to their

recommendations based on your breaths

the carb manager macronutrient goals and

most every other app that i know of are

the same every single day which makes

getting the most from lumen a little

difficult and why i think they emphasize

focusing on tracking carbohydrates first

to make it simpler my guess is that in

the lumen tracking app your

macronutrient goals will automatically

be updated each day to help you reach

your metabolic flexibility goals but i

don’t know about that yet because they

haven’t released it

personally i think that the lumen device

would be most beneficial for athletes

who want greater insight into how to

optimize their performance during

workouts while optimizing fat burning

when they’re not doing those high

intensity trainings

you can take a breath before your

workout to understand if you’re using

carbohydrates or fat for fuel before

your workout

carbohydrates are the preferred fuel

source for high intensity workouts

because they’re very efficient for your

body to use when it needs that quick

energy

if you don’t have enough available

energy or carbs before a high intensity

workout you might feel sluggish maybe

get a light a little light headed so the

lumen goal before a high intensity

workout would be to achieve a three four

or five indicating that you’re using

some or mostly carbs if you’re at a

level of one or two

meaning you’re using mostly fat a small

dose of carbs before your high intensity

workout may improve your performance

for a low intensity workout like walking

or yoga you’ll be just fine using fat

for fuel

the last thing i wanted to talk about

was what lumen calls a boost day

when you’re practicing a low carb diet

for a long time you’re risking your

body’s ability to use carbs as fuel

efficiently this means when you do eat

carbs you’re going to feel bloated and

gain weight quickly

on your boost day you’ll be eating

significantly more carbohydrates and

less fat than your baseline

but they do recommend getting those

carbohydrates from whole food sources

such as fruits veggies or grains

it’s important on your boost day to take

a breath measurement

30 minutes after eating your high

carbohydrate meal

getting a 3 4 or 5 will show that your

body has shifted to use carbs for energy

and that your boost stay worked this

information is worked into your overall

metabolic flexibility score which you

can have after using the device for a

couple of weeks consistently

that’s why regular breath measuring and

following their nutrition plan is

important for accurate results about

your metabolic flexibility in ziv lee we

teach something similar but we call it

an exception day we recommend following

your baseline plan about 90 of the time

when you’re losing weight and 10 percent

of the time having an exception day or

meal or food

everyone’s exceptions will look

different based on their personal goals

nutritional preferences and mindset

around how loose they want to get with

their nutrition

my overall assessment of lumen is that

it’s a lot like anything else in life

you’re going to get out of it what you

put into it i found it interesting that

lumen measured fat burning via carbon

dioxide levels whereas i was used to

measuring my ketones to assess the level

of fat burning

and that requires a finger prick so

ketones are a byproduct of fat

metabolism and they’re a really accurate

way to assess if your body is burning

fat for fuel

i did notice the lumen tended to be

easier to manipulate

if you take a test breath too close

together

you’re going to get false data that

you’re leaning more into fat for fuel

than you probably actually are

so definitely take several relaxing

minutes between breaths if you’re going

to be doing repeat testing to get more

accurate information i did appreciate

that the lumen was easy convenient and

simple to use and that i didn’t have to

prick my finger or get a ketone test

strip out to check and see if i was in a

fat burning mode or not

i believe that this would be best

utilized by someone who is already

comfortable tracking their

macronutrients and is ready to optimize

their metabolic flexibility if you want

to start tracking your macros we have

free trainings for you at

www.zivuli.com forward slash macros i

would also love to use this device

during a longer fast

to see what fuel sources i’m using as

the fast goes on

because i’m so evidence-based i did

appreciate that they tried to make the

evidence behind how to achieve metabolic

flexibility

as simple as possible

lumen tells you what to do however

if i was a newbie i would probably need

a little bit more information for how

and why to do things they do have a

facebook group that likely offers some

level of support and then aside from

that facebook group they also have

nutritionists on staff and really

helpful customer support if you need any

help or have any questions along the way

knowing what to do works well for some

people for other people they need a

little bit more support and

accountability to learn how to do it

consistently

our goal with zivali is to give you what

to do

how to do it why to do it and the

ongoing coaching and behavioral support

so that you can do it consistently

if you’re highly motivated detail

oriented

love learning and you want to take your

results to the next level give lumen a

try i’ll put a link in the description

below this episode for how you can try

lumen yourself you can also learn more

on their website at www.lumen.me