MEA Foundations
Designing Longevity
Where the Science of Longevity Meets the Art of Living
As seen in:
Your labs can tell you how long you might live. They can't tell you how to flourish.
In five days at MEA Santa Fe, you'll capture a complete biological baseline with physician-led diagnostics, and you'll build the Longevity Lifeplan™ that turns that data into a life rich with energy, purpose, and connection.
Most programs give you one or the other. This is the one built to give you both.
Three Perspectives. One Integrated Approach.
Designing Longevity is a five-day intensive at MEA, co-created by gerontologist and coach Barbara Waxman and MEA CEO Derek Gehl.
Barbara serves as an advisor to Stanford’s Center on Longevity and its program on Lifestyle Medicine. Derek brings more than a decade of experience leading a health-supplements company – and an insider’s perspective on how to separate useful evidence from longevity-industry noise.
To anchor the clinical side, MEA has partnered with Humanaut Health, a physician-led practice specializing in proactive, data-driven care.
From Autopilot to Fully Alive: Zen Tools for Presence and Purpose
What's Missing from the Longevity Conversation
Maybe you've done deep research and experimented with protocols. Maybe you've been meaning to start, but the sheer volume of conflicting advice has kept you on the sidelines.
Either way, you're in the same place: you know longevity matters, but you lack a clear, personalized path forward.
The challenge isn't a lack of information. It's making sense of it. Every expert contradicts the last. Every new study upends what you thought you knew. And whether you're deep in the research or just getting started, the same question remains: what actually applies to me?
Here's what we've learned working with thousands of people at MEA: those asking about longevity aren't uninformed. They're overwhelmed.
And here's what gets lost: the things that matter most for how long and how well you live – how you move, how you sleep, who you spend time with, whether your days feel meaningful – aren't extras. They're the foundation. The supplements and protocols are the finishing touches. (We tend to get that backwards.)
The research is unambiguous on this.
A strong sense of purpose is associated with significantly lower mortality rates. This is an epidemiological finding replicated across multiple large studies. Social isolation increases mortality risk at levels comparable to smoking. Cognitive engagement protects against decline in ways no supplement can replicate.
Meanwhile, your biology sets the terrain. Metabolic health, cardiovascular risk, hormone function, body composition: these shape what's possible.
Focusing only on purpose without understanding your health data is like planning a road trip without checking the car. Focusing only on biomarkers is like tuning the engine without deciding where you want to go.
You need both. Most programs only give you one.
The real question isn't "What's the best longevity protocol?" It's "What's right for me?"
That's a harder question. It requires real data about what's happening inside your body, honest reflection on how you're living, and a framework for turning both into a plan you'll actually use.
That's what this workshop is for.
Who This Is For
Designing Longevity is for people who want to approach the next chapter of life with greater intention, clarity, and agency.
Whether you're 45 or 75, navigating a major transition, or simply sensing it's time to be more intentional about the years ahead, this is your starting point.
Barbara's Study of One© approach starts from a simple truth: no one else shares your exact combination of history, circumstances, values, and goals. Which means no generic advice will ever be the right answer.
Men and women. Longevity looks different in male and female bodies, and both Barbara's Lifeplan framework and the clinical assessments are designed to meet you where you are.
Any age. Whether you're getting ahead of it at 45 or building your next chapter at 75, the Lifeplan adapts to your life stage, not the other way around.
Any starting point. You don't need to arrive with a meditation practice, a fitness routine, or an optimized supplement stack. You just need to be willing to look honestly at where you are and where you want to go.
You're a good fit if:
If that sounds like you, we'd love to have you join us for Designing Longevity.
What Actually Happens Here
Designing Longevity is five days at MEA's Santa Fe campus, and a structured pathway that continues well beyond them.
It's built on a simple premise: you are a study of one. Your biology, your lifestyle, your goals, your definition of a life well-lived. No one else shares your exact combination, which means no generic protocol will ever be the right answer.
Here's how it works:
1
You build your Longevity Lifeplan.
This is the heart of the experience. Barbara guides you through a wayfinding sequence (Get Your Bearings, Map Your Wellbeing, Chart Your Course) grounded in decades of gerontological research and her Study of One© methodology. The full sequence is below.
2
You capture your biological baseline.
Alongside the Lifeplan work, you'll complete a comprehensive set of clinical diagnostics through our partnership with Humanaut Health: body composition, cardiovascular risk assessment, VO2 max estimation, strength and movement analysis, and a full blood panel.
Some results you'll have during the retreat. Others require lab analysis and arrive in the weeks that follow.
3
You learn to navigate your own health data.
Derek will teach you how to use the latest tools, including AI, to take control of your health data once you have it. How to ask the right questions, how to identify what matters, and how to walk into any doctor's office and have a productive, informed conversation instead of a passive one.
This isn't about becoming a medical expert. It's about never being in the dark about your own body again.
4
After the retreat, your data meets your plan.
Your complete results are sent to Humanaut Health. Within weeks, you'll have a dedicated one-on-one virtual consultation with their longevity physicians to review every result, assess where you stand, and identify your top clinical priorities.
This is where your biological data gets woven into the Longevity Lifeplan you built with Barbara, giving you a complete picture and even more precision as you put your plan into action.
The Longevity Lifeplan™: How You'll Build It
The diagnostics tell you what's happening in your body. The Longevity Lifeplan™ is where you design for a life that is long and flourishing. Guided by Barbara through a wayfinding sequence refined across two decades of coaching and gerontological research, the work unfolds in three movements:
Your Trophy Years© Vision. A specific, written picture of your later years: who you want to be, how you want to feel, what you want to contribute. Research on age beliefs shows that how you envision your future self measurably shapes your health outcomes. This is where your plan gets its destination.
Your Study of One© Profile. A structured self-portrait of your habits, circumstances, and preferences. Most health plans fail because they're built for someone else's life; yours will be built around how you actually live, which is what makes it the plan you'll still be using next year.
The Seven Lifestyle Levers Assessment™. A quantitative self-assessment of how you're doing across the most impactful areas of lifestyle medicine: Movement, Nourishment, Renewal, Relationships, Cognition, Purpose, and Stress Management. You'll leave with a score, a category, and a clear picture of where focus yields the greatest return.
Your Fulfillment Wheel. The qualitative view: a visual snapshot of how fulfilled you feel across the domains that give your life meaning. This is Thirdspan™ work; beyond lifespan (how long you live) and healthspan (how well you function), the Thirdspan asks how deeply you're flourishing. The wheel shows you where your life as you're living it falls short of the life you want, and you'll define two Flourishing Shifts to close the gaps that matter most.
Your biological baseline, captured through the Humanaut diagnostics, completes the map: quantitative, qualitative, and physiological. Three lenses, one complete picture; no other longevity program gives you all three.
Your Wellbeing Team Map. The people, professionals, and resources that sustain your vitality, mapped as a constellation with you at the center. You'll see who's already there, who's missing, and who to bring closer. Longevity is not a solo project; this is where you design your support system on purpose.
Your Quick Win and High-Impact Shift. Two committed goals, each with actions, a timeframe, and a definition of success. One builds momentum immediately; one changes your trajectory over time. Not forty-seven action items; two that matter.
Your North Star Statement. The synthesizing statement of who you're designing yourself to be and why. When the research shifts, when life interrupts, when the next protocol trends, this is what keeps your plan yours.
What You Leave With
You'll step away from the noise and leave with two things most people never have at the same time: a complete picture of your wellbeing, and a design for your life that's built to evolve.
"I went in with a fairly strong background in longevity. I'd studied the subject, worked on my own health, and hired two longevity coaches. I wasn't expecting an entirely new world of ideas. What impressed me most was how effectively the program brought the many different dimensions of longevity into one coherent experience. This was not simply a workshop about living longer. It was about how to live better for as long as possible.
Derek and Barbara made a very strong team. Barbara has an ability to take a very broad and sometimes complicated subject and make it understandable, relevant, and personal. Derek, who was a CEO in the health supplement industry before MEA, was willing to challenge and debunk a number of the claims that have become common in the longevity industry. Rather than promoting a complicated collection of supplements and protocols, he encouraged us to be skeptical, ask better questions, and focus on the things that actually have evidence behind them.
I left Santa Fe thinking less about how long I might live and more about how I want to live. That is a much more useful question."
– Ed Robinson
Before the workshop, I was in the middle of a real transition, one of those moments where you know something needs to shift but you're not quite sure where to start. Barbara and Derek brought a rare combination of rigor and humanity, and the clinical work with Humanaut gave the whole experience a grounding I didn't expect. Real data, about my real body, informing a real plan. That's not something most programs even attempt.– Meryl U
Before the workshop, I knew I needed a change, but I didn't have the motivation to go to the next level. The workshop flipped a switch for me. My cohort and the workshop content gave me the push I needed. I have learned SO MUCH about my personal health and the changes I need to make in order to flourish moving forward. I have met people who help me stay on track for my goals. I have gotten new insight into how I can change my habits sustainably moving forward to increase longevity. If you are considering whether or not the workshop is for you, stop thinking about it, and enroll. You will not regret the decision. I am so glad I had this opportunity.– Lana Merewether
I walked in thinking I was pretty healthy and walked out knowing I had work to do, and that knowledge may have saved my life. The workshop raised my awareness of biomarkers I'd never known about. Three months out, I'm down 8 pounds, have an active fitness program, and am working with my doctors to resolve health issues identified by the medical tests during the workshop.– Bob Cavnar
Watch A Study of One: Cutting Through the Longevity Hype
Who Leads This
Barbara Waxman, MS/MPA/PCC
Longevity and Leadership Advocate, Coach, Gerontologist
Barbara has spent twenty years proving something the longevity mainstream is only beginning to accept: how you think about aging changes your biology. She works with adults midlife and better, not to fight time but to design toward it, with intention, vitality, and the full expectation of getting better.
She’s a gerontologist by training, a credentialed coach by practice, and a counter-cultural voice by conviction. That combination is what makes her work different: the science is real, the coaching goes deep, and the perspective is unapologetically pro-aging.
Barbara serves on the Advisory Council for the Stanford Center on Longevity, co-leads Stanford's Lifestyle Medicine Gratitude and Purpose pillar, and is a resident faculty member and advisor at the Modern Elder Academy. Her insights have appeared on CBS This Morning and Thrive Global. Her books, including The Middlescence Manifesto, have shaped how a generation thinks about midlife.
Barbara's Website, LinkedIn and TEDxBoston talk
Derek Gehl
CEO, Modern Elder Academy
Derek spent over a decade as CEO of a health supplements company, deep inside the longevity industry: testing protocols, tracking biomarkers, and working with leading researchers and physicians on the cutting edge of human performance. Then he walked away, having learned the industry's most valuable lesson from the inside: most of what's sold as optimization is noise, and knowing the difference is worth more than any protocol.
That's what he teaches here. At this workshop, Derek brings the biological lens: how to use the latest tools, including AI, to take control of your own health data, identify what actually matters in your results, and have informed conversations with any healthcare provider, so you're never passive about your own health again.
He's candid about what doesn't work, including his own past mistakes. That willingness to say what most people in the industry won't is part of what makes his guidance so practical.
Humanaut Health is a physician-led longevity medicine practice designed to bridge the gap between traditional reactive healthcare and proactive health optimization.
Founded in 2023 by a team that includes the co-founder of Restore Hyper Wellness and physicians who have collectively performed over 7,000 regenerative medicine procedures, Humanaut was built to make advanced longevity medicine accessible to people who are serious about their healthspan.
Their approach goes far beyond a standard annual physical. Humanaut's clinical team builds a complete picture of your health risks, metabolic function, and longevity potential using advanced diagnostics that most primary care physicians don't offer.
Their results speak for themselves: 83% of members with diabetic-range HbA1c lowered their levels. 87% of high-risk members reduced ApoB, a critical cardiovascular risk marker. And 68% achieved meaningful LDL reductions. Their work is featured in Forbes, Wired, Inc., and on Apple TV.
Humanaut partners with MEA to provide the clinical diagnostic assessments and post-workshop consultation that anchor this experience. Their role is specific: review all of your biological data, then sit with you one-on-one after the workshop to provide clear, practical direction.
This is not a quick screen. It's a thorough clinical assessment from a team that does this every day.
The Diagnostic Pathway: Your Longevity Bio-Profile
In partnership with Humanaut Health, every participant receives a comprehensive set of clinical assessments: your biological baseline and the physiological lens of your Longevity Lifeplan™.
During the Workshop
DEXA Scan — Full body composition analysis including bone density, lean muscle mass, and visceral fat levels.
CIMT Scan — Carotid intima-media thickness, a non-invasive assessment of cardiovascular risk that can detect issues years before symptoms appear.
Strength, Power & Movement Assessment — A clinical-grade dynamometer measures how much force your hands and forearms can produce. It sounds simple, but grip strength is one of the most well-researched predictors of longevity, and it tracks closely with your overall strength.
VO2 Max Estimation — VO2 max is widely considered the single most powerful predictor of cardiovascular health and all-cause mortality. We use a validated, sub-maximal protocol specifically selected for safety and accuracy at Santa Fe's 7,000-foot elevation.
Blood Panel and Biomarker Analysis — A comprehensive blood draw completed on-site, then sent to the lab for full analysis.
After the Workshop
Your complete results — every scan, every marker — are sent to Humanaut Health. You'll then schedule a dedicated virtual consultation with their longevity physicians. This isn't a surface-level review. They'll walk you through your full picture, provide a clear clinical assessment of where you stand, and identify your top priorities for action.
It's a pathway: collect the data, learn to navigate it, then receive expert clinical interpretation from physicians who specialize in exactly this.
The MEA Santa Fe Experience
MEA's Santa Fe campus sits on 2,600 acres of high-desert landscape in northern New Mexico.
Wide skies. Open land. A quiet that most people haven't experienced in years.
There's something about being in a place this expansive that changes how you think. The questions get bigger. The noise gets quieter.
Your days will be full — classroom sessions with Barbara and Derek, hands-on diagnostics, and the kind of conversations that only happen when you put the right people in the same room. Evenings are for meals together and rest.
The food deserves mentioning. Our chef sources locally, and the meals are designed to demonstrate that eating well doesn't require deprivation. It's one of those details that matters more than you'd expect.
You'll also have access to the ranch's trails, outdoor spaces, and wellness amenities. Horseback riding is available as an add-on.
Investment
This includes:
Common Questions
Medical Disclaimer
This workshop provides education, assessment, and planning support for your longevity journey. It does not diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. The diagnostic assessments and Humanaut consultation provide information about your health markers, not medical advice. If you have health concerns, please consult your physician.
Results vary based on individual factors including genetics, lifestyle, and follow-through.
Your Next Chapter Starts Here
In five days, you'll step back from the noise and come away with something rare: a Longevity Lifeplan built around your actual life and what matters most to you. Real data about your body. The tools and knowledge to advocate for your own health. And a community of people asking the same questions.
This isn't about optimizing yourself into someone you're not. It's about designing a life rich with energy, meaning, and connection, and having the health to sustain it.
Your peak decades aren't behind you. They're waiting ahead, energized, purposeful, and uniquely yours.
Designing Longevity May 10-15, 2027 | Santa Fe, NM
Includes lodging, meals, all diagnostics, workshop curriculum, and a post-workshop Humanaut Health physician consultation.
Space is limited to ensure personalized attention.