Virtual Biohacking Conference 2020 Recap: Resilience, Bulletproof Coffee, and Building Inner Strength
On October 10, 2020, Dave Asprey hosted the first-ever Virtual Biohacking Conference — a response to the pandemic that canceled the planned in-person gathering. The theme was perfectly chosen for the moment: Resilience: What to do when the fit hits the shan.
From a biohacking perspective, resilience isn't an attitude — it's a physiological state. It means having enough energy, cognitive clarity, and nervous system stability to handle whatever comes at you without being derailed. And in 2020, there was plenty to handle.
Jay Shetty: Monks Are the Original Biohackers
Jay Shetty — former monk, author, and one of the most-followed wellness voices in the world — opened with a reframe that immediately resonated: monks are the original biohackers. Through years of deliberate practice, they develop fine-grained control over their attention, emotional state, and cognitive function. What modern biohacking does is accelerate access to those states through technology, nutrition, and environment design.
His message: to change your external circumstances, you have to change your inner workings first. Resilience starts inside, not in the environment.
Four primary motivations govern human behavior, he explained: fear, desire, duty, and love. Fear and desire are powerful short-term drivers, but they're not sustainable — they run out of fuel or stop working when the threat or goal disappears. Duty and love, by contrast, create meaning. When you connect what you do to service and to what you genuinely care about, motivation becomes self-replenishing.
His practical framework for building internal resilience: when you feel stress, agitation, or the urge to avoid, say to yourself: "I'm about to learn. I'm about to grow." That single reframe shifts the nervous system's interpretation of the signal — from threat to opportunity.
"Help one more person, don't sell one more person." — Lisa Nichols
Mitochondria and Resilience
The connection between mitochondrial health and resilience was a recurring thread throughout the conference. Chronic stress has a direct negative effect on mitochondrial function — and since mitochondria are responsible for producing the cellular energy that powers every thought, movement, and immune response, this connection matters enormously.
The conference reinforced that human beings evolved to handle periods of intense stress followed by genuine recovery. Modern life provides chronic, low-grade stress without the recovery cycles — keeping the nervous system in a state of sustained hyper-arousal. The antidote is intentional recovery: sleep, stillness, breath, and permission to rest.
It's okay to rest. It's okay to take a break from the news. It's okay to step away from social media. These aren't weaknesses — they're physiological necessities.
Resilience as a Choice
Resilience is not a fixed trait — it's a practice. You can't necessarily control your environment or the thoughts and emotions that arise. You can control your response once you notice them. The awareness that precedes response is the space where choice lives.
In the age of distraction, intentional attention is increasingly rare — and increasingly valuable. Mindfulness isn't about emptying the mind; it's about noticing what's there without being pulled around by it. When the mind wanders (and it will), the practice is noticing that it wandered. That noticing is the practice.
Bulletproof Coffee: The First Biohack
The second major section of this newsletter became a deep-dive into Bulletproof coffee — the biohack that started everything for many people in the community, including me. I started drinking it on April 26, 2017, without making any other changes, and immediately began losing weight and feeling sharper.
The formula: quality coffee + grass-fed butter or ghee + MCT oil (or Brain Octane C8), blended — not stirred.
Why each component matters:
Coffee — Rich in polyphenols and over a thousand bioactive compounds that reduce inflammation, support cellular function, and modulate gene expression. The mold and toxin risk in conventionally produced coffee is real; sourcing tested, high-quality beans matters. Brewing with a metal filter (French press, gold filter, espresso) preserves the anti-inflammatory oils that paper filters remove.
Grass-fed butter or ghee — High in fat-soluble vitamins (A, D, E, K), antioxidants, and conjugated linoleic acid. Grass-fed is essential — grain-fed butter loses nearly all these benefits. Ghee has the additional advantage of removing casein and lactose, making it more tolerable for people with dairy sensitivity.
MCT oil / Brain Octane C8 — Medium-chain triglycerides that convert to ketones within minutes, bypassing normal fat digestion. C8 (caprylic acid) is the most ketogenic fraction — four times more effective than coconut oil at raising ketone levels. It provides fast, clean fuel for the brain without an insulin spike, and suppresses hunger for hours.
Blending, not stirring — This is what creates EZ (exclusion zone) water — the structured fourth phase of water that forms more readily in the presence of fat and agitation. Blended Bulletproof coffee isn't just coffee with fat in it; it's a fundamentally different product at the molecular level.
The result of drinking this for breakfast: no hunger until lunch, steady cognitive energy without a crash, and (for many people) gradual weight loss without caloric counting — because the quality and composition of what's consumed changes what your body does with it.
Gratitude as a Biohack
The conference closed with a reminder that emotion can follow action — you don't have to wait to feel motivated or grateful before acting. Take the action, and the feeling follows.
One of the most powerful ways to build resilience: recognize envy and redirect it. When you see something good happen to someone else, instead of the automatic contraction, try to genuinely imagine their joy. That single shift changes the internal chemistry of the moment.
"Be grateful for all the things you don't want that you don't have." — Agapi Stassinopoulos
Staying resilient is core to being wellthy. In 2020, it was especially tested. The biohacking community's response — gathering virtually, sharing tools, building each other up — was itself a demonstration of what resilience looks like in practice.
For upcoming health optimization and biohacking conferences, explore the Health Conference Directory.