Ep 44. Biohacking for Purpose-Driven Founders: The Intersection of Entrepreneurship and Health with Marie Olivie

[00:00:48] Hey founder. Welcome to today’s show. We are diving into the world of biohacking, but not the version you’ve seen online with red lights and cold plunges, although that’s super interesting as well. We are talking about biohacking specifically for founders today. As a path back to more clarity, more strategy, better decision making, and sustainable energy for founders just like you and me. Today I’m sitting down with Marie Olivie, a biohacking enthusiast, and a global entrepreneur to talk about what it really means to work with your body and not against it, and how strategic that actually is. Marie will share a few of her favorite biohacking tools that you can maybe dabble in if you’d like to, but we also talk about really easy and free things to get started with, like simply connecting with your purpose. This conversation is packed with so much wisdom for any of you who have. Ever been overwhelmed, burned out, disconnected from your body, or just unsure of how to move forward in your business if you’ve ever wondered what it looks like to scale your business in a more modern and effective way that supports your health, this one’s for you. Let’s dive in with Marie.

[00:02:12] It is so nice to have you on the show. And I’m so excited today to talk to you more about the intersection of health and business success, a topic we are both really passionate about. But before we dive in, how about you share just a little bit about who you are, what you do and where you’re from. Okay.

[00:02:52] your biological functions and you’re trying to optimize your health based on the environment, based on the different factors, such as supplements, exercise, et cetera. I really find out that there is a big intersection between the entrepreneurship and also the health. I’m always saying I want you to work hard, but I don’t want you to burn out. also mentorships. And other things. So you can also visit my website, mariolevy. com where you can find more, but also among other things.

[00:04:25] That’s so great. I think it’s so interesting that you blend together things that people normally wouldn’t see in the same sentence. Branding, technology and biohacking. So I’m just so curious to talk about your perspective today. You have a quite international experience. So where have you lived and traveled to in the last decade? How has that changed? Influenced your perspective and your strategies that you use. I know.

[00:05:18] then I discovered that there are seasons and the work is not really as it’s during the season. So I needed to leave sooner or later. And I then continued to London, then to USA, then back to London, then to Cyprus. And at the end, I stayed in Belgium for the past five years. where I also did my second master degree and I also started my own business, which is currently in Belgium. But last year in October, something amazing happened and it’s that I became digital nomad. So as you can see behind me, I actually didn’t know that the background will look this beautiful. It’s just actually a window behind me and it actually like a mirror what is in front of me. So I am now in

[00:06:18] the health because I discovered how sun is really important for the business. Not only from the health perspective, but also for my clients to show them that they can also do business a bit differently than

[00:06:36] Yeah, I love your background. You never can tell these days with the virtual backgrounds, what’s real. So I didn’t want to comment on it, but it is absolutely beautiful. I also have a bit of a digital nomad background. I used to work on a yacht, which is where I met my husband and I’ve been to like 30, 40 countries and what your background just reminds me so much of those days. So I’m super jealous right now. How has your international experience shaped your view of mentorship and pretty much your just philosophy around how to grow a business? Has anything from your travels ended up inside of your, your tools or your strategies that you teach?

[00:07:19] Yes, a lot. Especially I’m coming from a really small city of 20, 000 inhabitants. My family is based in Czechia. They never really lived abroad. They just traveled casually as any other employee just during the summer, and nobody from my family ever lived abroad. So for me, it was quite a struggle at the beginning to get a lots of resilience, especially I was solo traveler. I didn’t have a friend with whom I mean, I had a friends, but my friends actually wanted to stay in Czech Republic, so [00:08:14] morning I woke up and I was like wow. Can somebody tell Marie who is 16 years old that she’s now living the dream with this view and all of these things. It’s just amazing. And I learned a lot during this decade of traveling, especially for my business, because my clientele is global. None of my clients are coming from Belgium or Czech Republic, which are the closest countries to my heart because I spend the most time there. But

[00:09:22] even though from their perspective, but to see how they can do things differently in online business with digital products and with personal brand.

[00:09:33] Yeah, I love that. I feel like being international is kind of like a separate country, you know, like all of us with the international experience, we like think a certain way. It’s like we’re one country all together, even though we’re just scattered all around. So I really love that and I know that a lot of our listeners share that same international perspective as well. I want to get into biohacking with you because it’s something that I talk a lot about. I don’t normally use the term biohacking, but essentially, right, we’re always talking about regulating the nervous system and, and accessing the most effective parts of your brain as entrepreneurs here on the business brain rewire podcast. So I love talking to founders who are actually using these tools. I just can’t wait to dive in more with you on what you’re using. So when did you first realize that your mental and physical health was a major driver in your entrepreneurial success. I know you have parents who have been doing this forever, so it’s kind of ingrained in you. But was there a moment when you realized, oh, this is going to make a big difference in my own business?

[00:10:51] So I would start from a bit different angle than maybe you would expect. I was always passionate about IT since I was 15 years old, but I started to pursue the it career to some extent, like when I was like 25 with my second master degree. In engineering, actually in AI, NFTs and all of these cool things that we see around us.

[00:11:22] And this is what I try to show to people. And because of the IT, I actually find out that the optimization of my body, of my physical and mental health, as well as of my brain is super important for the capacity that I deliver in my

[00:12:39] And all of these things are interconnected. It’s really funny that because of the technology, because of the IT, I was like, wow, it’s super interconnected. The health and the entrepreneurship that if I am able to actually rewire my brain and my body in and align it with the for example, that I know my peak hours when I’m most focused, then I am able to also deliver more. I am faster and I can get on the board more clients. I can also be creative at the same time. I don’t need to outsource that much. And I can just absorb more of the knowledges inside me. This is where actually I was like that was that aha moment.

[00:13:29] phone that you need constantly to upgrade, the, you need to update, for example, the applications in your phone, et cetera, it’s the same with the brain. You are always making yourself the higher level, the higher upgrade based on your dreams, based on your plans. What you want to achieve within the next three months, three years, five years, and continue to actually rewire that direction so that it will come or later reality. Sometimes it’s even sooner than you might think, actually. [00:14:00] Yeah, yeah, I love that. I’ve never heard that metaphor before, but it makes so much sense. Why do you think it’s hard for some founders to actually take that seriously? Right, because, I feel like what we’re saying is it’s not new, right? Like everyone is talking about the fact that you shouldn’t burn out your health matters. You should take it seriously. You should take care of yourself. Why do you think it’s hard for some entrepreneurs to take, for example, what we just said that you have a hardware and you have a software, and they’re the most important ones on you need to make sure they’re maintained? Why do you think it’s hard for some entrepreneurs to actually lean into taking care of it?

[00:14:49] I think it’s a part of an evolution that because all of us are usual people. When they are growing up, they are inside the normal system, which means that if you have a problem, you need to go to doctor, the doctors are studying all their lives actually to help you and you are dependent on the system. It means that for the education, you go to the school. For your health, you go to doctor. Then as you get older, you also are more educated about how your body works. So you also have social media probably. So you are getting influenced by different influencers. What is good or bad for your body. Then you realize that not every influencer actually wants good for you and they just

[00:16:01] in the evening. It might also influence your productivity in the morning. It’s a lots of work to actually understand and educate yourself about these things. So why I think that a lots of people are like hesitant about it, or sometimes even bitter, it’s because they are on this curve of evolution of trying to understand. Because for example, like when we were learning how to write, like all of us at some point, we’re crying, screaming that we don’t want to do it, that we

[00:16:40] it is. And then you know that it’s important. You know that you want to drive your body better than you do right now with all of the doctors. But it’s just the unknown. Usually at the beginning, we are super enthusiastic. Like, yeah, wow. From tomorrow, I will be like going to gym. And from tomorrow, I will be like a morning person. And then you are doing it and it’s like super hard and you’re like, no, please stop. I just want to, you know, go out with my friends during the weekends. And, I want to just eat all of the junk food and things like this. It’s so hard. But if you overcome this period of that it’s hard, that other people know more than you and the evolution curve, you eventually will actually end up in the point where you will understand all of the intersection of your body, organs, your hardware, your software, and how is it interconnected. So

[00:17:40] I think so too. I remember with a couple of different major shifts that I’ve made just with my personal development, there was always a moment where the education, like it just clicked for me. You know, it was just like the information that I had been reading. I was like, Oh, I get it. Oh, I understand it. Oh, okay. That’s important. I was able to make the behavior change. So I agree. I think everyone’s kind of on a trajectory. And then at some point, it’s going to click. And if it hasn’t yet, I think just more education is the way to go about it, rather than like forcing the behavior change. Because eventually your brain will see and our brains really want to help us reach success

[00:18:28] educating yourself giving all of the reasons why your brain should get on board with it , it really really does help with some of the things that I think we’re going to dive into today

[00:18:45] What might help a lot is practice. Not only the theory, because sometimes what we are consuming on social media, also we can read the research papers, which are like super boring. What can help a lot is actually the practice. Like the measurements of, for example, if your heart rate. I, for example, wear our ring and it’s like super cool to study my statistics, like how my sleep influence my heart rate and things like this, the same also with the glucose meter. The CGM, constant glucose meter. This also helped me a lot to understand how my blood sugar works even though I’m not diabetes. And it was because I dated a diabetes type one guy one time. I think, like for two

[00:19:52] trying what I want to see in that? Like CGM when I’m not diabetes. And I was like, yeah, just curiosity. It was really interesting to try it because even though I’m not diabetes, I could actually measure which food, what I’m eating every day, is impacting my blood sugar. So it means like that I’m a bit intolerant towards it because if you have a spike of your blood sugar and you go down, you have a drop,

[00:20:19] nap a lot or go to sleep in the afternoon. So if you are tired a lot, if you wake up without energy, it’s probably because of your blood sugar. I really recommend this CGM to just try it for two weeks and see if you will see some inconsistencies.

[00:20:36] the practice can motivate you a lot to see what is happening

[00:20:40] I think that is so wise, and it’s like applying that education on to yourself. It’s educating yourself about what your body is doing, what your body needs. Once you get that education that applies to you, it can be all you need. As soon as you see the stats from your aura ring or your Apple watch, then it can be enough to really motivate it. I absolutely agree. One of the ones that I recommend a lot to founders to start using, just to kind of dabble in nervous system education, nervous system regulation is neurofit. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of it. You’re probably beyond it because it’s manual HRV readings and a basic tracker of HRV. For everyone listening, HRV just means heart rate variability, but it’s a direct biomarker of your nervous system health, and state. But some of these trackers, and then reading the articles just to understand what some of these numbers mean can be really eye opening. So I love that you mentioned that piece. We’ve already kind of dabbled in some of the things that you use, but what are some of the most helpful tools or strategies that you’ve used? If, let’s say if you had to pick like a list of three to a new founder, like, I’ve never paid attention to my health before. I’ve never even thought about having this as one of my business strategies. Which three should I start with? What would you say?

[00:22:20] Good question. I was just in a biohacking retreat in Mexico, last year, 2024 in October. It was for me really a groundbreaking experience. I feel sometimes a bit off the community here in Europe. That a lots of people they go for profits for entrepreneurship, but they don’t really understand the health. I really craved to connect with the people who are on similar journey of the health and

[00:22:48] also do some entrepreneurship. I went in the middle of the jungle with 25 influencers in health, mainly US influencers. I was the only one European and also, I think that we were there only three women. So it was a really interesting experience that I didn’t expect. I went there alone without knowing anybody from them. And

[00:23:36] also do it without any kind of device by humming. So if you do, for example, for two, five minutes every day, you are actually activating your vagus system and vagus nerve. It helps a lot with the stress of it, how you feel overly, and you will also feel less tired. This I knew before I came to this retreat, but they told us that the nervous system is very much interconnected with muscles. And that if you actually pay attention to your nervous system while you are doing the muscles building, your muscles will build much more than what you are actually used to. I actually didn’t know that there is this interconnection and they told us like, yes, I would actually never have this kind of muscles. I mean, you can just imagine like health influencers, like they

[00:24:42] So, men dominated world because there is capitalism, there are a lots of countries are run by men. The whole business, it’s also really masculine energy. This is a bit where we are lacking the nurturing off the nervous system. What I started to practice, is that she because there was one guy who was practicing a lot of the chicken. He has online community with online practices. So I started to do this with him, for example, like three, four times per day. Also, yoga is really good for the nervous system, but I never felt a lots of these the result, as with Qigong, because it’s a lot about the flow, and you get into normal position as you would when you are a child,

[00:25:55] So this is the number one that I would definitely recommend to look into how to nurture your nervous system. Because if you are working on your muscle mass, eating lots of protein, then you really need to also look into nurturing your yin, your feminine self and, how you can also thrive in these senses. Then the second one, I would still rest a bit in the balancing energies. Because as I said, the word is men dominated field. Sometimes you might feel burnout from what you are doing on daily basis because the men energy is really straightforward. It’s a action. It’s let’s do it. Let’s do it right now. If you are like working every day, if you have, for example big days or whatever your schedule is, usually I have a lots of clients, especially women who feel more burnout than men. And it’s because, women are not scheduling their time to actually connect their Yin power to their femininity. Also we might be influenced from the outside world that we have to do things as a man, that we are smaller men, let’s say. But it’s not the case. I was actually living for a really long time in a limiting belief that if I would be a man, I would be able to do more things than when I am a woman. Which caused me a few mini burnouts which also messed up with my mind and things like this. The last year I started to connect to relate to my feminine self and use my feminine self also in a business. So it means, the empathy, also show up as a leader, as a female leader, as a role model that I can do things. In a different way than men. I don’t need to be the boss, the typical man boss of the corporation. I just know that I can do things different and still show up as a leader. And there is nothing wrong about me being a woman. So I would encourage every business woman, especially, to just give up this limiting belief that if you would be a man, you would do much more or data. It’s like a feeling, you are in a men environment doing a lot of the actionable to do list. You don’t have time to rest and you start to feel tension inside you, then it’s the time to do some breath exercise, some meditation to move with a flow, maybe dance, some silly dance around. It will really help a lot. I am not that about like morning routines. So maybe this will be my tip number three. As an entrepreneur, I really tried a lot when it comes to morning routines, like especially on social media, lots of people tell you like, you should

[00:29:10] with all of this morning routine, because at the end, you are entrepreneur. You have a business. You have a vision or you have a purpose, which is actually number one when it comes to biohacking. Because if you have a purpose, you are going to live longer. They find out that people who have a purpose, even when they are retiring, they are actually living longer than those who never found it. So the purpose is your number one. So even if you would for example, take out all of your morning routines of journaling, et cetera. Actual work is the most important for you in the entrepreneurship, of course, your family.

[00:30:04] You want to be the good leader. So just don’t obsess about the morning routines, do what feels good. Just try things don’t commit to them until you say, yes, this is the thing that I love. So for example, like ice baths, I mean,

[00:30:26] So the nervous system balancing feminine, masculine energy, and don’t obsess about the morning routine.

[00:30:33] I want to say a couple of things about what you said because there’s just so much good goodness in what you just pointed out. I think one of the themes that I took away as you were just talking, is that everyone’s nervous system is slightly different. So you were talking about some different movement that worked for you and like saying, Oh, yoga didn’t work for me. Or this morning routine that someone said didn’t work for me. And I think that was a big aha moment for me as well. Is to get the nervous system education and then start experimenting with my own body. With my own mental clarity. With my own focus and find out what works for me because it’s not like someone who has one recipe is going to work for everyone’s nervous system. So I think that’s just so important if you start to get interested and curious in health and you try something, don’t write it off if whatever that first strategy you tried didn’t work. It just means it didn’t attune to your particular nervous system and let’s just keep trying different things. The other thing that I think is really interesting is what you said about being an entrepreneur. First and foremost, I think a lot of people don’t do self care, right? This is typically what I think founders call it before they have nervous system education. They call it self care. They just know they’re burned out and they’re like, I need more self care. But they, they think that it requires a lot of time. It requires, like you said, a morning routine or to get a gym membership or to take a weekend away to refresh. What made a really big difference for me is just understanding that it takes three minutes to reset my nervous system. That I can set a timer on my phone and I can go over to the window and I can feel the sun on my face and I can move my body or I can like, yeah, dance to a three minute song. Feel a shift of my nervous system and then just get right back to it. It doesn’t have to be something that you do like in the morning or in the evening, it can literally be something that you just kind of blend into a workday. So that you can grow your business right during the time that you want to do that. I think that just is so wise. I want to talk to you more about connecting to your purpose because. [00:33:05] articulated it to me that way, and I just think it’s so great that connecting with your purpose is so regulating for your nervous system. So how would you

[00:33:20] connect back to it? Because sometimes we can be working in our purpose driven business and be totally stressed out and not connected to the purpose. So do you find that there’s any particular practices or any particular things that you have found helpful to just get back connected to the why of what you’re doing so you can get that energy and that motivation back online?

[00:34:09] the regularity that it’s actually happening. It usually means that something is off with your body. So , it’s not that like you are sick or something, but it’s a small tweak that you usually need. It can be, for example, detoxification, dehydration. Usually what works for me very well is actually running and to put into my headphones beast mode. Which is a playlist on Spotify and it’s like really about you know why you are doing this? Just go, just, you will do it. It’s a lot about motivation. Especially for me, the running, is that I switch off the thinking and I just listen to this music and run. Then when I come back, running is really good for detoxification for lymphatic system ,again to move, so this is why for me works the best running. For some other person can be for example other activity.

[00:35:05] That you are off that day, find the activity that actually helps you. For some people might be yoga, for some people running, for some people martial arts. It’s really up to you. For me, I really liked running because it’s free. I can do it while I am traveling and it’s the time when I really can switch on. [00:35:43] early age. A lots of kids were actually smiling and not bullying me, but they were making fun of me that I’m sick and things like this. But now I can really see the difference what the supplements did over the years that I was taking them. So it can be just that you have deficit of vitamin D. For example, and vitamin D is something really important and not a lots of people know how much vitamin D they are needing. I just heard in the one podcast recently that if there is one thing that you should do today is to test your vitamin D levels and how much vitamin D you need to supplement, especially if you don’t live in warm country, like I am for example, right now. If I am in Brussels, where I was living for five years last year, I had really big deficit of vitamin D and I really felt bad. So I really recommend to also try to go for the blood test to your doctor and to really see what are the deficits that you have of the vitamins or the minerals so that you can supplement it much better than you maybe do right now.

[00:36:54] I love that because what you’re saying is, when you’re feeling a little down, a little frustrated, a little hopeless, right, you’re just having that, what you think is like a circumstantial challenge in the business or something mentally going on, it’s physical. So many founders, you know, show up in coaching sessions. A lot of founders will show up in these coaching sessions thinking I need to solve this problem circumstantially. I need to talk through this problem and to feel better about it. Often, there is a physical component that is very easy to solve. It gets rid of a lot of that brain drama, a lot of that negative spiral thinking that it’s happening. As well as it gets rid of a lot of complexity and rumination about stuff in the business that actually doesn’t matter. A lot of founders are thinking about stuff that’s unnecessary contemplating questions that don’t need to be answered and worrying about things that don’t matter. And when their nervous system is cared for when their body’s cared for, this stuff goes away So I love that you you mentioned how easy this can actually be and how physical it can be. I love that. One of the things that I like to do to connect to my purpose is I go on walks and I just make it a practice to think about. This is not like some long, drawn out, thing that I do, but I just think about the impact that my company has had recently. I try to just connect to maybe one conversation I had or one person I helped or to just connect to the future vision of the impact. I try to generate the feeling of gratitude. Once you understand what gratitude feels like you can just get yourself there, right? Just shifting yourself and kind of orienting your focus there. Kind of like we were talking about at the beginning, rewiring your software can be really energizing and motivating and can lead to the most creative ideas in your business. So that’s an easy one that I love to do.

[00:39:16] In the morning, I usually say to myself how beautiful day is today. Like really to have the positive mindset around. If I catch myself during the day around negativeness, I try to understand why I feel negative about it and try to. Like more turn it as opportunity.

[00:39:36] with my father is that if something negative happens to us, then we find out why it actually happened to us because there was the opportunity behind it, because for example,

[00:39:45] I love that.

[00:40:07] this actually happened to you. So just rewire it towards the positiveness and also be humble. Every evening I thank 10 times to something. Thank you for bringing me this opportunity. Thank you for always challenging me. Thank you for my family. Thank you for my friends. Really thank 10 things during the day which makes you humble and again, connected to that day that you left. So just a few tips. [00:40:34] I love that. Yeah, I have never heard someone say humble, and I think that’s really an interesting one. So I’m gonna to experiment with that one on my walks. I like to use gratitude, but I think that and I probably already kind of tap into that homeless because when you’re really grateful, you are humble. You have this sense of like, wow, I didn’t quite deserve that or, or that happened to me. Right. I just am filled with all this gratitude. So I love the angle of. Doing it from this place of being humble and that just feels so much better than being in control, being in charge, forcing things, trying to be accomplishment driven and like, just being thankful for the wins that day. Right? Like those are two very different places to be. Being thankful that you accomplished something and that you get the gold star versus being grateful out of humility for like, wow, I’m just being cared for and taken care of. So I definitely think the one that you’re talking about is way more regulating and it does way more or has way more benefits for the brain. Oh, when you do that second one.

[00:41:52] of mindset. Actually like the lowest mindset is the negativeness. So that you are like upset that the work is like horrible. Then the second one is that you rewire your brain towards the positiveness. So you just switch, you anymore, you don’t really see things negative anymore, you just think positive. How everything is beautiful. Usually the rainbow people and then like positive people are like this.

[00:42:23] Actually, I know my purpose, I know what I’m doing. I can change the word. So you already have that positive mindset, but you just add that purpose and you know that there is something bigger for you. You want to make impact on other people. Then there is the last stage in the mindset. You can imagine it as somebody like meditating. Just sitting and just enjoying what is happening around you. This is the being the humble, that you are no longer like the active, yes, I can change the word, but you are just there in the situation in the present moment. Don’t really need to force the positive thinking. You don’t need to like really dictate your purpose because you know that it’s just around you. So this is the last stage of let’s say the

[00:43:17] which level you’re on. Yeah, that’s so fun. I’m going to as a fun exercise to think back to when I was on those stages. Because as you’re talking, I’m like, Oh, actually, I remember going on that progression. I remember when I thought it was about. Oh, I remember when I got super passionate about impact. Then I got really accomplishment driven, and then I was forcing it. Then I kinda dropped into just, the flow of like, I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be. So, I love that. This has been such a fun conversation. I feel like I could just like, nerd out all day with you and we could just bounce ideas back and forth and hopefully everyone listening is just having fun listening to us just banter back and forth. But we’re out of time today, so I’m going to have to have you back on the show to continue talking more about this. But is there any last words of wisdom that you want to share before we wrap up?

[00:44:11] I would like to share that definitely what I said at the beginning, work hard, but don’t burn out because I know that you are an entrepreneur, you work hard. You know your purpose, you know your why. You want to help the people around you, but don’t forget about yourself, . In the sense of the self care, you don’t necessarily need that sauna. You don’t necessarily need that morning routine. What you need is really try different tactics from the biohacking from the health. Also explore. Go into different retreats where you can meet other like minded people who also know more about the health. I will be talking next week about how to get a client while not burning out. So if you want, you can find at mariolevy. com and you can also follow me on LinkedIn, which I really like, as well as, Instagram. Yeah, we can connect and dive deeper into these topics.

[00:45:11] Yeah, that’s perfect. Thank you so much, Marie. We’ll talk to you soon.

[00:45:16] Thank you so much, Kari.

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