Kayla Barnes wants to live to be 150 years old.
“I do,” says the Los Angeles-based female biohacker, unflinchingly, to The Mindvalley Podcast.
Because she believes it’s possible.
At 34, Kayla is on the quest to show women everywhere how to turn back the biological clock and slow aging so they enjoy life on Earth for longer. Her secret? A foolproof female-first regime that’s more clinical than cosmetic and more surgical strike than self-care Sundays.
“I want to live longer in good health,” she says. “And I want to do that by mastering the basics while we wait for the therapies to catch up [with women].”
Watch the full interview:
Who is Kayla Barnes?
Kayla Barnes—sometimes referred to as Kayla Barnes-Lentz—is a female biohacker, longevity strategist, and co-founder of YV The Wellness Space, an advanced wellness optimization clinic. She also leads the Health Optimization Fund, a venture capital firm specializing in health-conscious tech companies, and grills the minds of biohacking experts on The Longevity Podcast.
Now, while she’s chronologically 34, Kayla’s biological age sits somewhere in her early 20s. Nope, it’s not luck, she says, but the result of endless hours spent on lab work, out-of-the-box health protocols, and self-experimentation dialed down to the cell.
And it all began with her desire to learn how to recover from burnout.
Her origin story
Kayla’s obsession with self-optimization started early. At 17, she launched her first company, a PR and digital marketing agency.
“I didn’t come from a lot,” she says about her entrepreneurial spirit. “But I knew I wanted to create a really incredible life.” To succeed, she says, “I knew I was going to have to have incredible focus, drive, stamina… and I was going to have to work long hours.”
And she did. But the autonomy that comes with—you guessed it—chronic fatigue. The more she hustled, the less freedom she had to enjoy healthier lifestyle choices. It was then that her passion for holistic wellness began. “I knew I had to essentially upgrade my biology,” she adds.
Feeling depleted pushed her to ask herself better questions. She started tracking what she ate, how she slept, and what affected her energy. The data gave her direction, and direction turned into a full-blown pursuit of self-mastery… in the form of biohacking.
And the rest is history. “I feel better now at 34,” Kayla says, “than I did at 18.”
Why biohacking is a gender-specific approach, according to Kayla Barnes
We’ve normalized gender-neutral everything—shampoo, sneakers, even protein powder. But according to Kayla, the same can’t apply to biohacking. You can’t copy-paste male protocols onto the female body, which runs on a completely different hormonal cycle.
“Most protocols are built for men,” Kayla says, on how the nuance often gets lost. Hence, her preference for the term “female biohacking.”
While men operate on a 24-hour circadian rhythm, women experience an additional 28-day infradian rhythm that influences metabolism, energy levels, and cognitive function throughout the month. Ignoring the latter leads to suboptimal health outcomes for the fairer sex.
That this truth is often overlooked is why femtech—technological innovation built specifically for women’s health—is only receiving 2% of venture funding, despite being a multi-billion-dollar industry. (Just ask Marina Gerner, the author of The Vagina Business, looking into this, and she’d tell you.)
But thankfully, Kayla is here to break this spell, paving the way for a more inclusive and effective approach to women’s wellness.
Kayla Barnes’ 5 hacks to keep her body stronger (and how to apply them)
Ask Kayla for go-to advice for women, and she’d tell you. Don’t ignore what feels off, and at the same time, you don’t have to wait for a crisis to start paying attention.
Unlike what the media tells you, female biohacking starts with getting good information about your body. “The best way to do this is with your own data,” she reminds. “You can’t generalize your way into longevity.”
Bloodwork, hormone panels, toxic load, mitochondrial output—your body’s always telling you something. The only way to truly listen is to test, track, and understand what’s happening beneath the surface by tapping into your women’s intuition.
Not sure where to start? Kayla breaks it down into daily habits, simple shifts, and science-backed protocols you can start building into your routine, one layer at a time.
1. Pay attention to your circadian rhythm
Poor sleep affects nearly every system in the body, and nearly 1 in 3 adults don’t get enough of it, according to the CDC. For women, disrupted circadian rhythms can throw off hormone regulation, metabolism, and recovery.
No wonder Kayla doesn’t take sleep lightly.
“Your body knows what time it is,” she explains on the power of your internal sleep clock. “And if you support that rhythm, everything else improves.”
She supports her own rhythm by:
- Getting 20–25 minutes of morning sunlight to set her internal clock,
- Avoiding screens and overhead lights after sunset,
- Sleeping in a blackout room with no blue light or EMF exposure,
- Using a Faraday cage to shield against Wi-Fi and electromagnetic fields, and
- Tracking deep sleep, REM, and heart rate variability through her Oura ring.
“I go to bed at 8:30 p.m. every single night,” she adds.
Her nights are planned with precision, yes, but they’re not complicated. The goal: help her body do what it’s already built to do—repair, recover, and reset.
Need more help snoozing well? Learn how to get more deep sleep today.
2. Eat like your future depends on it
The Kayla Barnes diet is rooted in function, not fads. It’s whole foods-based, anti-inflammatory, and, of course, personalized based on her lab work.
“I think food is one of the most powerful levers we have,” she exclaims. “It’s information, not just fuel.”
She eats to support hormone balance, gut health, and mitochondrial function, not just to check a box. No guesswork, no extremes, just clean inputs that help her stay energized, sharp, and inflammation-free.
What that looks like in practice:
- Prioritizing protein with every meal to support muscle and hormone health,
- Including fermented foods for gut resilience and microbiome balance,
- Cooking with healthy fats like olive oil and ghee to stabilize energy and reduce inflammation,
- Eating more red meat during menstruation to replenish iron levels naturally,
- Avoiding processed foods and seed oils at all costs to avoid disrupting hormone regulation and mitochondrial function, and
- Using data to guide nutritional tweaks based on her unique nutrient panels and inflammatory markers.
3. Practice cycle syncing to honor your unique blueprint
Female hormones shift week to week, yet most health advice assumes we’re the same every day. That mismatch can lead to overtraining, fatigue, and hormonal dysregulation, especially when following protocols designed for men.
Kayla doesn’t leave that up to chance.
“I lift heavy and do VO₂ max training only in my follicular phase,” she says. “That’s when recovery is fastest.”
She uses her cycle as a map, not a hurdle. Her approach? Push when the body’s primed. Then, recover when it asks for it.
Here’s her master plan for cycle syncing:
- Strength training and VO₂ max workouts in the follicular phase (days 1–14) ,
- Easing up during the luteal phase with more mobility, lighter recovery work,
- Adjusting cold therapy intensity based on where she is in her cycle, and
- Tracking hormonal patterns to optimize sleep, stress, and nutrition.
“Once I started syncing my lifestyle to my cycle,” Kayla points out, “everything got easier.”
Curious to move with your cycle? Here’s a guide on working out on your period.
4. Know your biological markers to a tee
If you don’t test anything, you’re playing the guessing game. And guesswork, Kayla emphasizes, is no way to build longevity. That’s why she doesn’t leave room for assumptions. “I test,” she says. “I’ve run over 100 markers on myself.”
And your biological age, nutrient status, and inflammation levels are measurable indicators of where you are, health-wise. Once you know which ones need more attention, you can fix them more easily, sometimes with the help of professionals.
Kayla, in particular, keeps things on track by:
- Testing her biological age using DNA methylation: This helps her understand how fast her body is aging on a cellular level, not just by the calendar.
- Monitoring her hormones, inflammation, and VO₂ max levels: These metrics impact energy, recovery, immunity, and how well the body handles stress.
- Measuring nutrient gaps and adjusting supplementation: To make sure she’s not low on key essentials like B vitamins, magnesium, iron, or omega-3s.
- Running panels on toxin exposure, gut health, and mitochondrial function: Gives insight into how well her body is detoxing, absorbing nutrients, and producing energy.
- Using generative artificial intelligence (AI) to interpret lab results better. By asking ChatGPT to elaborate on additional aspects like grip strength and body composition, she gets a more holistic view of her health. (P.S., you can do this with other AI tools, too.)
5. Reboot your endocrine system
Stress and age can affect hormones, but they’re not always the cause of their imbalance. What you eat, what you wear, and what you slather on your skin, says Kayla, can also contribute to it.
Microplastics, for one, are a rising concern. They’re everywhere, even through the human body, from your brain to your blood and circulation system to even your lower limb joints. “We absorb them more than we think,” she reveals.
For women who want to be mothers, the consequences are grave. Turns out, a high level of microplastics is found in the placentas of premature births compared to those that went to full term. At large, this suggests that plastic accumulation can affect the population.
No wonder Kayla makes it her mission to reduce her exposure to these particulates while detoxing what’s already built up inside through:
- Swapping plastic for glass or stainless steel containers,
- Using only non-toxic, fragrance-free skincare and beauty products,
- Wearing natural fibers and avoiding synthetic, tight-fitting clothes,
- Running toxin burden tests to measure her baseline, and
- Supporting detox with infrared saunas, binders, and hydration.
Simple choices, real impact.
Where to find Kayla Barnes
You’ve seen how she lives it. Here’s where you can learn from her directly and plug into the tools and insights she shares every day:
- Her website is the place to find her updates, full female biohacking protocol, supplement stack, and longevity resources. Oh, and her online courses are tailored for women who want clinical-level health without the overwhelm.
- LYV The Wellness Space, the clinic she co-founded with her husband and fellow biohacker, Warren Lentz, is where you visit if you’re ready to run the labs and access advanced therapies. You’ll work with a team that knows how to personalize wellness at the cellular level. If you’re ever in Cleveland, give this clinic a go.
- The Longevity Podcast is where Kayla sits down with the world’s leading minds in health and wellness, from Dave Asprey (the father of biohacking and fellow Mindvalley trainer) to Dr. Mark Hyman (a leader in functional medicine). The goal? To explore longevity in depth and what it means for the future of human health. Also available on Spotify.
No matter which point you’re starting from, one thing’s clear: Kayla’s work is a reminder that data is power. And your health can be built, rebuilt, and upgraded right now, no matter where you are in life.
Future-proof your wellbeing
If you, too, have been feeling the nudge to learn how to age better, explore a glimpse of Smarter Not Harder, a Mindvalley program led by the father of biohacking himself, Dave Asprey.
This free 14-minute session is a preview of the program’s key takeaways:
- Why laziness is the fuel for self-optimization (forget willpower),
- The six areas of self-upgrade that define everything in life,
- How to design your life to require less effort and free up more time, and
- So much more.
The results of Dave’s teaching speak for themselves.
Dijana Llugolli, a Stockholm-based coach, was juggling the demands of work, wellness, and focus without a system that truly worked for her body. After taking Dave’s course, everything started falling into place. She shares:
I changed my sleeping habits, my exercise habits, and some of my spiritual practices—all in just 12 days. My brain power, energy, and recovery went up. I didn’t just learn about biohacking—I lived it.
And like Dijana, you can, too. The shift you need to unlock your best self, living life on your terms, on your timing, is all within reach. Mindvalley is here to remind you of that.
Welcome in.
