At 49, Israeli entrepreneur Alon Gonen is a serial goal-setter, except his ambitions rarely remain theoretical. He co-founded a startup, became wealthy as it grew into a multibillion-dollar company, moved into investing and other ventures and built a large following on social media. His latest goal sounds simpler, at least on paper: to live better, feel healthier and share what he learns along the way.
That pursuit has led him to give up his office chair, separate carbohydrates from proteins and fats, plant a crop of plantains with his neighbor and invest in a cattle farm so he can know where his meat comes from.
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Alon Gonen: 'Once I started learning what we should eat, it changed my life'
(Photo: Private album)
Just don't call him a biohacker (someone who uses science, technology and personal biological data to try to optimize the way their body works). “It’s not exactly biohacking. It’s more about simply living right. I’m 49, and I want to feel good,” Gonen says.
The shift began around 2018, when he started experiencing abdominal pain. “I went to doctors, had a lot of tests and they told me I was fine, but I’m a perfectionist and I like getting to the root of a problem,” he says. “I realized that maybe I simply wasn’t eating properly, so I started learning what we should eat, how, when and how much. It wasn’t about weight, it was about how I felt, and it really changed my life for the better. Within 24 hours.”
Tell me what you discovered. I want to know too.
“I realized the problem wasn’t genetic. The lifestyle I was living simply didn’t fit human biology. There’s a mismatch between how we’re supposed to live and how we actually live. It didn’t work for me. My body was telling me: You’re sick, you don’t feel good. That was really the discovery. It wasn’t genetics, a disease, a virus or bacteria. It was simply a way of living.”
Explain.
“The central idea is understanding how humans are built and what we were meant to eat: how, when, how much and why. When you look at nutrition, you have to go back to early humans, 10,000 or 5,000 years ago, and understand how they ate compared with how we eat today.
“Today people eat rice with meat, then drink Coke and eat fruit, and in the evening they have yellow cheese with an egg, cottage cheese and a tomato on the side because, of course, you need vegetables too.
“I suddenly realized that the way I had been taught to live and eat was completely different from the way humans ate in nature. In my view, when you change what humans have eaten for hundreds of thousands of years, bad things are going to happen. It’s rare for a change like that to make things better. That makes sense to me.”
Looking to our ancestors
At least when it comes to figuring out complicated systems, Gonen has a record that may persuade even skeptics to keep listening.
In 2008, he co-founded Plus500 with several partners. The Israeli online trading fintech company later listed in London, reached a valuation of billions of dollars and made its founders very wealthy. At some point, Gonen stepped back, moving into investments and new ventures. Over the past year and a half, he has begun turning his ideas into videos for a new audience. Not investors this time, but social media followers.
Today, Gonen lives in northern Israel with his wife and children. His daily routine starts early. “I get up around 5 a.m. Until 6, I mostly read, make some investments and go through emails,” he says. “Between 6 and 8, I go walking, running or swimming in the sea, things outdoors. At 8:30 or 9, I eat breakfast, and then I move on to the rest of the day: meetings, filming, reading, sometimes surfing or playing with the kids.”
He generally eats only twice. “My last meal is around 4 or 5 p.m., and most days I go to sleep between 8 and 9.”
Behind that disciplined routine is a dietary philosophy Gonen has developed for himself over the years. Reduced to its basics, it rests on three rules: eat relatively few meals within a limited window, avoid processed food as much as possible and, most importantly for him, separate carbohydrates from proteins and fats. He is especially strict about that final rule.
“Humans once ate meat, fat and fish almost entirely separately from carbohydrates,” he says. “Imagine a hunter-gatherer running through the forest, catching an alpaca and cooking it. They ate it, and that was the meal. There wasn’t an alpaca inside a pita. If they gathered grains and made bread, they didn’t eat that with the sheep they had caught. They waited a few hours.”
“That was the realization that cracked the whole thing for me. I tried it on myself and my family, and it simply worked.”
The same evolutionary logic led him to reduce the number of meals he eats each day. “Early humans didn’t eat all day,” he says. “Sometimes they had one meal and sometimes two, but there wasn’t endless eating from morning until night. I don’t fast, and I don’t call it intermittent fasting. I simply try to stick to two meals on most days, and I’m not hungry.”
Processed food is another target. “That’s basic,” he says. “I try to avoid it as much as possible, and that isn’t easy these days.”
For Gonen, those rules ultimately point to a broader principle: the further modern life moves from the conditions in which humans evolved, the greater the potential cost to the body.
“The chance that you’ll change something about the way humans lived and actually improve it is pretty negligible,” he says. “Take cigarettes. Humans invented them and said, smoke these, it’s nice, and obviously they’re harmful. What I’m saying is that when you change the way you were built to live, 99% of the time you’re hurting yourself.”
'The chance that you’ll change the way humans lived and improve it is negligible'
(Photo: Alon Vaknin)
But people used to live only until around 40.
“But they didn’t die because of food. They died from infections, violence, getting hit over the head with a club, falling out of trees. Those weren’t the diseases we know today, clogged arteries in the heart, all the autoimmune diseases. That explains why, if you eat the way people once did while benefiting from all the protections we’ve invented, which are amazing, like hygiene and everything else, you can have an amazing life. “That was the realization. I’m telling you, I tried it on myself, and it improved my life.”
Processed food is not the only thing Gonen has largely removed from his kitchen. He has also given up adding salt to food he prepares himself. “If I’m making food for myself, it’s zero salt,” he says. Again, he links the decision to his interpretation of hunter-gatherer life.
“There’s salt naturally in peas, steak, grapes and mangoes. The salt we add is something humans introduced, and I’m 99% sure it harms health, metabolism and the immune system.”
What does remain on his menu? Plenty of plantains. Gonen speaks about the starchy relative of the banana with the enthusiasm many people reserve for dessert. “I discovered that plantain baked in the oven is just incredible. It’s like eating cake,” he says. “There’s no carbohydrate that compares with oven-roasted plantain.”
Plantains can be difficult to find consistently in Israel, so Gonen decided to solve the supply problem himself. “When I have a mission, I do it,” he says. “I planted a plantain grove with my neighbor and we harvest from it because it’s difficult to find.”
'Money isn’t the issue, money is the excuse'
(Photo: Shai Franco)
He took a similar approach to meat. Gonen wanted to know how the cattle he eats are raised, so he invested in a farm that he says raises cows in conditions as close to natural as possible. “I don’t like cattle being mistreated,” he says. “When they are, the meat doesn’t come out well, and in my opinion it isn’t healthy either because of the hormones and things they inject. I invested in a farm that raises the cows in nature, and I buy the meat from it.”
What about people who cannot afford such a lifestyle?
“I don’t think a breakfast of bananas, plantains, fruit and goat yogurt is expensive,” he says. “I estimate that at 10 to 20 shekels per person for breakfast, with some nuts. And for dinner, buy a piece of steak, chicken, an egg, whatever. I don’t think money is the issue. Money is the excuse. It’s a great excuse, by the way.”
I have a friend who refuses to drink from plastic bottles. He buys only glass bottles. That gets expensive.
“I think drinking from plastic is the smallest problem there is. What I’m saying is that it’s very important to have priorities. If you smoke or don’t get sunlight, or if you eat all kinds of poisons, I think plastic is the last thing you should be afraid of. Everything doesn’t have to be perfect.”
Trading the chair for the floor
Gonen’s attempt to return to what he considers a more natural lifestyle extends well beyond food. At some point, even the office chair became suspect. He now prefers to read, work and study on the floor, on his knees or in a squat.
“I found that sitting like this is the most natural and comfortable thing for me, so my back and knees don’t hurt,” he says. “When I have no choice, I sit in a chair, but it’s very uncomfortable for me.”
Once again, he invokes human evolution. “Look back at humans and you’ll see that squatting is the most natural way to sit without a chair,” he says. “When you sit in a chair, your core muscles aren’t working, and that changes a lot in terms of posture.”
He describes sedentary living as particularly harmful and says he keeps a mat next to the wall so he can lean against it while squatting. “If we grew up squatting, it would be easier for us,” he says. “You can see 90-year-old people online who squat and sit that way. Our bodies are built for it.” He even uses the same position in the bathroom, claiming that squatting solves “99%” of bowel-related problems.
'Being sedentary is very harmful'
(Photo: Private album)
Then there are supplements. Gonen believes many people today are deficient in iodine, coenzyme Q10, zinc, omega-3 fatty acids, vitamin D and several B vitamins. “These things have a crazy effect,” he says. “People don’t eat organ meats anymore, and that’s where a lot of these B vitamins are. People today eat only the muscle, but people in the past ate the whole animal, nose to tail.”
Iodine occupies a special place in his routine. “I take three drops of iodine, and so do my wife and children,” he says. “I was tested and found to be deficient, and then I tested again after taking the drops.”
He argues that modern diets contain too little seafood and cites Japan as an example of a society with high iodine consumption. He also believes folate deficiency is widespread, not only a concern for women during pregnancy.
A one-man laboratory
Gonen does not rely only on whether he feels better. A man who made his fortune in a numbers-driven business eventually wants data from breakfast too. His tools include blood tests, scientific studies and continuous glucose monitors, effectively turning his body into a one-person experiment.
Rather than constantly tracking his body, Gonen says he uses measurements only long enough to test a specific idea. He forms a hypothesis, tests it and, once satisfied, moves on. “In general, I don’t measure all the time,” he says. “I measure to confirm something. Once I see that it’s good, I leave it alone. I don’t believe in measuring constantly.”
One of his most closely tracked experiments involved wearing a continuous glucose monitor for about a week to 10 days. He wanted to see how his body reacted to different eating patterns: two meals a day versus eating throughout the day, natural food versus processed food and separating macronutrients versus mixing them. Later, he also put monitors on his parents.
“I wanted to understand what happens to my blood sugar when I eat a lot, when I eat throughout the day or when I eat two meals, and to see that I’m on the right track because I live differently from most people,” he says.
“I saw that when I snack between meals, eat processed things or mix foods, my sugar goes wild. By contrast, when I eat two meals a day, 95% of the time my blood sugar is around 95 to 100.”
Gonen extrapolates from those personal results to argue that a single morning fasting glucose test provides too narrow a picture. “You need to see what it does throughout the day,” he says. “If blood sugar stays above 120 or 130 for a long time, it damages the body’s systems. Our systems aren’t supposed to function with high blood sugar.”
The monitor was only one side of Gonen’s experiment. Because his diet can contain large quantities of meat and fat, he also began checking his cholesterol and other blood markers. “There are days when I eat a kilogram of meat, and there are days when I eat a lot of fat, meat and fish. I actually like fat even more than meat,” he says.
“I realized I needed to check my cholesterol and blood tests and make sure everything was fine. My results came back perfect. Once I saw that it was good, I stopped monitoring all the time.”
For him, blood glucose and blood lipids are the two most important markers. “What has the biggest effect on them is what you eat,” he says.
What began as a private experiment eventually became public content. Over the past year and a half, Gonen has increasingly posted videos about nutrition, blood tests, supplements and glucose-monitor experiments alongside the subjects that originally built his online audience: money, careers, entrepreneurship and investing.
Hundreds of thousands of followers now watch the man who helped build a major fintech company try to decipher another complicated system: his own body. “Nutrition is less of the main focus, but I think it’s even more important and interesting,” he says. “The videos with the glucose monitor were amazing, and I also showed people the supplements I think are worth taking.”
‘I’m the anti-Bryan Johnson’
The combination of a wealthy technology entrepreneur, a body treated like a project and a stream of data shared online invites an obvious comparison: Bryan Johnson, perhaps the world’s best-known longevity enthusiast.
Johnson, an American tech entrepreneur who made hundreds of millions of dollars from the sale of his payment company, has turned fighting aging into an intensive personal project involving a tightly controlled diet, exercise, supplements, testing and experimental treatments.
His published protocol still includes extensive tracking, supplements and a detailed daily routine. Despite all this, he recently revealed that he had been diagnosed with a chronic autoimmune disease affecting the stomach
Gonen wants no part of the comparison. “You could see me as the anti-Bryan Johnson,” he says. “I’m horrified by what he does. He does all these unnatural things. He takes a huge number of pills, did plasma exchanges, works out in an indoor gym and doesn’t eat meat. I believe exactly the opposite. I believe in nature.”
Gonen says he tries to spend 30 minutes to an hour in the sun and eats meat regularly. “When I saw what he was doing, I learned nothing from him,” he says. “I just said: That’s how you shouldn’t be.”
'What happens 20 years from now isn’t relevant'
(Photo: Private album)
Their goals differ too. While Johnson has built his public image around aggressively slowing aging and extending life, Gonen says longevity itself is not what drives him. “My goal is to feel good here and now,” he says. “It isn’t that critical to me how old I’ll be when I die. I don’t think about what age I’ll reach.”
“As long as I’m here walking among you, I want to feel good. If I look good too, even better. But the goal is to feel good today, now and tomorrow. What happens 20 years from now isn’t relevant.”
That may be the simplest way to understand Gonen’s approach. Despite the strict rules he has adopted for himself, he does not tell followers to plant orchards or throw their chairs out the window. “The main thing is to think about what people used to do,” he says. “For me, that’s the big rule for everything.
“It’s important not to do anything extreme. Take everything calmly and see how you feel. You can try separating foods and learn to understand yourself. In the end, all anyone wants is to feel good and live well, and nutrition and physical activity are among the best things in the world.”
Should you try it at home?
Gonen’s story comes with personal results and considerable conviction. But there is an important distinction between what works for him and what scientific evidence supports.
“There is no scientific basis for the claim that separating carbohydrates from proteins and fats provides a unique health benefit,” says Limor Tal Pony, chief dietitian at Maccabi Healthcare Services. “The digestive system simultaneously releases enzymes that efficiently break down different macronutrients together, and many foods themselves consist of combinations of them,” she says.
What matters, she explains, is the overall balance of macronutrients in the diet, not whether they are kept apart during an individual meal. In fact, she says, combining protein, fat and dietary fiber with carbohydrates can slow glucose absorption into the bloodstream. Eating carbohydrates in isolation can instead produce a faster and sharper rise in blood sugar.
The picture is more complicated when it comes to Gonen’s limited eating window. “Intermittent fasting is a studied eating pattern that may help improve insulin sensitivity, reduce fat mass and balance blood glucose,” Tal Pony says. “However, it isn’t suitable for everyone and isn’t always easy to maintain, so it should be adapted to each person’s metabolic condition, routine and preferences.”
Dietitian Limor Tal Pony; professional guidance remains important
(Photo: Maccabi Healthcare Services)
She also urges caution around supplements. “There is no blanket recommendation to take iodine or folic acid for longevity,” she says. “The recommendations are based on preventing deficiencies, not extending life in people who are not deficient.”
Iodine deficiency does occur in Israel, she notes, partly because the country relies heavily on desalinated water. But that does not justify taking a fixed dose without medical guidance. “Particularly in children or people dealing with thyroid problems, supplementation without testing and professional guidance should be approached cautiously,” she says. Excess folic acid can also mask a vitamin B12 deficiency.
And what about continuous glucose monitors? “There is currently no evidence-based recommendation for routine use of continuous glucose monitors in healthy people without diabetes,” Tal Pony says. The devices can offer personal insights, she says, but they can also lead people to misinterpret perfectly normal fluctuations.
“In a healthy person, a rise after a meal to 130 or 140 milligrams per deciliter can be an entirely normal response that quickly returns to baseline and does not indicate systemic damage,” she says.
Still, some of Gonen’s principles fit comfortably within mainstream nutritional guidance. “Reducing processed food and cutting back on snacking contribute to metabolic health,” Tal Pony says.