Speaker 1: I'll get out of you, bloody champs. Welcome to another
Speaker 1: installment the You Project. One of my favorite humans is back.
Speaker 1: The very clever, the very beautifully voiced, the very dulcet
Speaker 1: toned doctor Lillian is back.
Speaker 2: Heank you, Craig.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I do what I can. I do what I can.
Speaker 2: You know, I have to thank your listeners because last
Speaker 2: time I was on the show, which was a few
Speaker 2: months ago, now it feels like forever ago. I asked
Speaker 2: if anyone wanted to volunteer to listen to some of
Speaker 2: my new relaxation mindfulness exercises, and several of your listeners,
Speaker 2: probably maybe six, said that they would love a couple
Speaker 2: and I gave them a couple according to like what
Speaker 2: they were interested in listening to. And yeah, it was
Speaker 2: really good. It was really good to have people listen
Speaker 2: to them for the first time and give me feedback
Speaker 2: and so, you know, and you know, the voice thing,
Speaker 2: it's nice to hear feedback about the fact that your
Speaker 2: voice is relaxing. So that's nice.
Speaker 1: You know, when you do your own you know, like
Speaker 1: whatever you create a program, you write a book, or
Speaker 1: you do a presentation or any of the things that
Speaker 1: you and I do a little bit of it's hard
Speaker 1: to like you have an idea of what it's like
Speaker 1: or what it you know, how the presentation went, or
Speaker 1: you know, you write something and you think, I think
Speaker 1: this is not bad, and then you give it to
Speaker 1: somebody else and they're like, that's that's inspirational or I
Speaker 1: don't get it.
Speaker 3: Or yeah, but that that's that.
Speaker 1: Like I just finished one of my one of my papers,
Speaker 1: and I had to then, well, I finished the first draft.
Speaker 3: But this is an eighteen month paper, right, this is a.
Speaker 1: Mega, mega systematic literature review, which you understand what started
Speaker 1: with eleven hundred and fifty odd papers ended up with
Speaker 1: about one hundred and twenty that I reviewed, one hundred
Speaker 1: and twenty different lots of research to create this table,
Speaker 1: to create this paper out of that, right, Yeah, then
Speaker 1: you just got to go and email to all of
Speaker 1: these people like my team, yea, my supervisor, to go, well,
Speaker 1: here's the final or not, here's the first completed like
Speaker 1: totally completed draft of my paper, and then you press
Speaker 1: you know, refresh on your three months seventy two times
Speaker 1: a day or more. More critically, I sent off you know,
Speaker 1: one of my first papers or my first paper for
Speaker 1: publication and what I guess a lot of people don't
Speaker 1: know this or need to know this. But so when
Speaker 1: you do a you know, like me, a doctorate in
Speaker 1: psychology or neuropsychology, it's all research based. And I'm doing
Speaker 1: mine by publication, which means I have to write papers
Speaker 1: and then send them off to journals, scientific journals and
Speaker 1: they will assess it and I'll go, we might publish it,
Speaker 1: but you need to address these issues or no, we're
Speaker 1: not publishing it, or yeah, we are publishing it. And
Speaker 1: what you don't know when you're me, which is not
Speaker 1: a real academic or definitely wasn't an academic slightly becoming one,
Speaker 1: is so you can send it off and they don't
Speaker 1: even respond for six months before they go no, I know, Well,
Speaker 1: could you've told me that a week in You would
Speaker 1: have saved me six months.
Speaker 2: And yeah, it's so frustrating the whole process really, I mean,
Speaker 2: whether it's by paper, whether it's to do the whole thing.
Speaker 2: And like when I was doing my PhD, you didn't
Speaker 2: have the option of doing it via publication in journals,
Speaker 2: which would have been great actually, but we didn't have that.
Speaker 3: I've still got a hand in a thesis. Don't worry, No, I.
Speaker 2: Know you still have to do that, but like we
Speaker 2: didn't get that opportunity to have people review it in
Speaker 2: that way and even and have the chance to publish
Speaker 2: articles before. What we did is like do the whole
Speaker 2: thing whatever, you three hundred and fifty page you know,
Speaker 2: book basically, and then you're expected afterwards to publish from that,
Speaker 2: and you're like, no, I've just I've just written this
Speaker 2: thing and I'm so over it. Like the last thing
Speaker 2: I want to do is now edit it in five
Speaker 2: different ways to create you know, articles that I can
Speaker 2: actually publish for the rest of everyone else to see.
Speaker 2: But you know, of course you should because you've just
Speaker 2: done all this research and you want people to see
Speaker 2: it and know about it. So yeah, it wasn't the best,
Speaker 2: but yeah, the waiting game. And when whenever you create anything,
Speaker 2: whether it's like an academic report or project, or whether
Speaker 2: it's just you know, a relaxation exercise or a program
Speaker 2: or whatever, it is hard to put it out there,
Speaker 2: you know, like it is your work. You are you
Speaker 2: are actually being judged for it.
Speaker 1: And that's that's part of the vulnerability of even doing
Speaker 1: a podcast, where yeah, I mean, every every single person
Speaker 1: who listens to viewing me today, completely understandably because we're
Speaker 1: all human, has an opinion about you know, is this good?
Speaker 3: Is this crap? Should I listen? Should I lean in?
Speaker 3: Should I turn it off? Should I? Is this valuable?
Speaker 3: Do they know what they're talking about? Does he? Does she?
Speaker 1: You know, it's like we're constantly judging, not necessarily in
Speaker 1: a judgmental way, but just as in we're trying to
Speaker 1: figure out what that is that we're listening to and
Speaker 1: whether or not it's worth investing forty five minutes or
Speaker 1: fifty minutes of.
Speaker 3: My life into this thing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, totally.
Speaker 1: I did a very brave thing with my last book,
Speaker 1: which was called Listen to Me bragging very brave.
Speaker 3: I was so brave.
Speaker 1: I wrote a book called Twenty Questions for Humans, which
Speaker 1: was really just not answering but really exploring twenty really
Speaker 1: common questions that I get asked and a lot of
Speaker 1: people get asked, right just about the human experience where
Speaker 1: we just, you know, we just leaned in everything from
Speaker 1: what's it like being around me? That Craig Harper Chestnut
Speaker 1: through too, you know, what's the meaning of life?
Speaker 3: Right? How do I find my purpose.
Speaker 1: All that just like interesting stuff to have a conversation about.
Speaker 1: And so I finished it and I reached out to
Speaker 1: my I think it was Facebook community, and I said,
Speaker 1: I need twenty five people to come to my Then
Speaker 1: I had a commercial office at this time, so it
Speaker 1: was only a few years ago I got rid of
Speaker 1: the office in COVID, but I had had a forty
Speaker 1: seat lecture theater, so a little lecture theater.
Speaker 3: And some offices and a whole bunch of space.
Speaker 1: And so I said, I want twenty five people to
Speaker 1: come to my office next Saturday to read.
Speaker 3: My book, the book that's not yet published.
Speaker 1: It's I wrote it formulaically, right, and by that I
Speaker 1: mean the average person reads I think it's two hundred
Speaker 1: and fifty words a minute.
Speaker 3: Something like that.
Speaker 1: Anyway, I figured out that i'd written I'd written a
Speaker 1: book that could be read by the average person in
Speaker 1: about sixty to ninety minutes. So really sure, like fifteen
Speaker 1: thousand words. Yeah, And I thought, well, it's easy to read.
Speaker 1: It's not like people have got to spend eight hours,
Speaker 1: Like even if they really amble through it, it's going
Speaker 1: to take them two hours. So everybody came in. I
Speaker 1: got twenty five people in like an hour. They all
Speaker 1: showed up in person, which was very nice of them.
Speaker 1: I gave them all a draft, you know, basically one
Speaker 1: hundred pages or whatever it was, in a big alligator clip,
Speaker 1: just you know, so like literally photo copied book hadn't
Speaker 1: yet been sent for printing.
Speaker 3: And publication, et cetera.
Speaker 1: I gave them all two red pens and said, I
Speaker 1: don't even want to tell you what you're looking for.
Speaker 1: I just want you to read it. If you find
Speaker 1: any mistakes, obviously you know, any grammar or any typos
Speaker 1: or that'd be handy, but I just.
Speaker 3: Want you to read it.
Speaker 1: And you could write a whole lot, not much, nothing,
Speaker 1: you could write on every page, no pages, but knock
Speaker 1: yourself out. And so imagine how long that took me
Speaker 1: to get through twenty five manuscripts. It took me about
Speaker 1: two weeks. But it was really a worthwhile effort because
Speaker 1: you get a real insight into twenty five other human
Speaker 1: beings who are interpreting something that you share with a
Speaker 1: certain intention and a certain kind of story in your
Speaker 1: head about what it is you're giving them, and then
Speaker 1: when you read what it is they're actually getting or reading,
Speaker 1: it's like, oh.
Speaker 2: Oh, now it's so interesting, isn't it. Like you don't
Speaker 2: expect some of the comments that you get. You're like, oh,
Speaker 2: I have this, yeah exactly, like I think it's so
Speaker 2: important what you just said. I love how you did
Speaker 2: it in person, live, and you just gave them like
Speaker 2: two hours to do it. I've never done it that way.
Speaker 2: I've always just emailed it out and then you never
Speaker 2: know when you're getting it back. Your way is so
Speaker 2: much better, you know. So that's a really good idea
Speaker 2: next time. But no, I remember when I cause I
Speaker 2: was I had done my an audio program kind of
Speaker 2: like a podcast, but it was really about coping with
Speaker 2: anxiety and challenging times. And I had written it during
Speaker 2: the COVID period as well, and so I sent that
Speaker 2: out to a bunch of people like is this, you know, helpful?
Speaker 2: And yeah, basically what you just did, like just read it,
Speaker 2: what do you think is this whatever? And I remember
Speaker 2: getting a comment about how because at the beginning I
Speaker 2: talk about you talk about this a lot too, like
Speaker 2: to to manage anxiety or to make any change of
Speaker 2: any kind, there is effort involved. So it's not you know,
Speaker 2: it's not just you're going to read it and everything's
Speaker 2: going to be fine. It's like the do the things
Speaker 2: that are suggested. And one of the comments was you're
Speaker 2: making this sound too hard. It's like, oh jeez, that
Speaker 2: was and I wasn't expecting that comment, and I was like, yeah,
Speaker 2: I can totally understand what she's saying. Yes it, And
Speaker 2: I want to be truthful about the fact that you
Speaker 2: have to put effort in order to get the outcomes
Speaker 2: that you want, but that I also want people to
Speaker 2: do it. So what's the balance between making sure people
Speaker 2: know that they have to do work but also making
Speaker 2: sure they they they actually do it. They're not at
Speaker 2: the very beginning saying no, this is going to be
Speaker 2: too hard, so I'm not even going to try to
Speaker 2: do it.
Speaker 1: So I think one of the challenges for you and
Speaker 1: and May like we we've got different jobs, but we're
Speaker 1: in bulltok.
Speaker 3: You know, will ask like we're trying to help people. Sure, Yeah,
Speaker 3: is that.
Speaker 1: Like what's going to resonate with Sally, won't with Jane?
Speaker 3: What's going to confuse Peter?
Speaker 1: Will be complete like profound wisdom to John And so
Speaker 1: it's like, fuck, I don't even know how to say this,
Speaker 1: because whatever I say, it's going to confuse one person,
Speaker 1: enlighten another person, make one person angry, and another person
Speaker 1: think I'm a genius. Right, So it's like, how do
Speaker 1: I share this thought or this idea or this strategy
Speaker 1: or even this story in a way which will have
Speaker 1: the greatest chance of resonating with the most people, you know?
Speaker 1: And that's an ever present challenge on this show, Like
Speaker 1: how we talk about human behavior and psychology and the
Speaker 1: brain and neuropsychology.
Speaker 3: And you know whatever, without sounding.
Speaker 1: Like aliens and without disenfranchising people or confusing people and
Speaker 1: still being relevant, but also giving people actual things that
Speaker 1: they can you know, I was going to say operationalized,
Speaker 1: like even that way, don't say that, craz don't say operationalized,
Speaker 1: right exactly giving people ideas or strategies or tools that
Speaker 1: they can go Oh Like, I'm like, look, this might
Speaker 1: not be for you, but a thing that I do
Speaker 1: when that happens is I do this. So you know,
Speaker 1: maybe this is not a prescription, but you might want
Speaker 1: to try it. You might want to see what happens
Speaker 1: when you try it, and then maybe if you think
Speaker 1: that's not a bad idea for you, then you kind
Speaker 1: of weave that into your protocol or not see what happens.
Speaker 3: Right, But that's the thing is trying to share.
Speaker 1: You know, insight and psychology and wisdom and science with
Speaker 1: people in a way that's not about me or you
Speaker 1: stroking our ego going look at how clever we are.
Speaker 3: Actually actually you know where people go.
Speaker 1: I get that, I'm going to do that boom, Like
Speaker 1: Lilian said something, I try to something do something worked,
Speaker 1: Thanks Lilian the end.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Yeah, you want to make it as accessible as possible.
Speaker 2: But also like I think sometimes for me, I'll I
Speaker 2: don't have I usually can explain what, but I forget
Speaker 2: sometimes to explain how Yes, And I think that that's
Speaker 2: the part that people really want and need, is like
Speaker 2: you know, I can, we can talk about skills, but
Speaker 2: like break it down, how do I actually do this? Yeah?
Speaker 2: And I think, you know, like that's what I would
Speaker 2: get frustrated with if I was trying to learn something
Speaker 2: like I'm trying to learn the whole range of things
Speaker 2: to do with running a business and like sales and
Speaker 2: marketing and all this crap. But I did I was
Speaker 2: never educated on so and so if people are like, yeah,
Speaker 2: this is what you do, and it's like, yeah, I
Speaker 2: know what to do, but like tell me, like what's
Speaker 2: step one, step two, step three? And then within that,
Speaker 2: within step one, how in detail do you do step one?
Speaker 2: You know, like there's all this assumed knowledge I think,
Speaker 2: and I definitely have, like I know, like from being
Speaker 2: in psychology for so long, like for twenty five years,
Speaker 2: you start to think that what you know is common sense,
Speaker 2: and so you don't have to explain, and you don't
Speaker 2: want to be an over explainer and you know, patronize people.
Speaker 2: That's obviously not what we want to do. But at
Speaker 2: the same time, we we have to understand that, you know,
Speaker 2: like explaining it in a way so that people can
Speaker 2: actually action it so that it's helpful for them is
Speaker 2: what's the important thing. And not to assume that everyone
Speaker 2: knows what you think seems like common sense. It's only
Speaker 2: common sense because you've been doing it for twenty five years,
Speaker 2: not because it's common sense. So yeah, so that's been
Speaker 2: tricky for me too.
Speaker 3: It's I think it's ironic how many people who are in.
Speaker 1: The human behavior space don't understand how other humans think.
Speaker 1: It's like they, you know, the false consensus affect people
Speaker 1: think that other people think like them.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so they erroneously listen to me, fuck.
Speaker 2: Wrongly, wrongly, Greig.
Speaker 1: Sorry, So they wrongly assume that their intention, their intended meaning,
Speaker 1: will be the other person's experience.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: It's like, yeah, you know when someone goes, oh, you
Speaker 1: did this and that new I felt this and that,
Speaker 1: and the person goes, oh, well, that definitely was my
Speaker 1: wasn't my intention, and you go, it doesn't matter what
Speaker 1: your intention was. It's nice, but your intention isn't necessarily
Speaker 1: my experience. So trying to even I mean, this is
Speaker 1: it my will has very much theory of mine and
Speaker 1: met a perception and all that stuff, right, But to
Speaker 1: try to actually understand how another person thinks, because how
Speaker 1: I think may or may not have anything in common
Speaker 1: with how they think. So and I think one of
Speaker 1: the mistakes that people make is that they think that,
Speaker 1: you know, understanding how someone else thinks is analogous to
Speaker 1: listen to me is the same as agreeing with what
Speaker 1: they think. It's like right, right, Like, I've worked with
Speaker 1: our colleagues and addicts for a long time, but I've
Speaker 1: never been drunk or high, and I don't you know,
Speaker 1: I while I love addicts. I don't like addiction. But
Speaker 1: the reason that I know now, after doing a bad
Speaker 1: job for a while, I now know how to have
Speaker 1: really good, meaningful, healthy, helpful conversations with people battling with
Speaker 1: addiction is because I've done it a lot, and I
Speaker 1: have some in site into their version of right now
Speaker 1: because I've been in a lot of conversations with alcoholics
Speaker 1: and people struggling with different kinds of addiction. Definitely not
Speaker 1: an expert, but for someone who's never had booze and
Speaker 1: never had a drug, I have some pretty good insight.
Speaker 1: But it took a long time, and it took me
Speaker 1: realizing Craig, they do not think anything like you, So
Speaker 1: don't assume anything. Just shut the fuck up and be
Speaker 1: present and listen and try to get away from your
Speaker 1: reality and have a look through their window. And then
Speaker 1: if you can see through their window a bit, which
Speaker 1: is understanding, not agreeing, not aligning, just understanding, then you
Speaker 1: can build a level of connection and rapport where now
Speaker 1: you can help them. But if I'm standing on my
Speaker 1: judgmental I don't smoke, I don't drink, I train every day,
Speaker 1: be more like me, Well, you're going to create more
Speaker 1: problems and solutions.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Actually, that was one of the things that I
Speaker 2: was always interested in. I didn't know I was going
Speaker 2: to go into psychology WHI I was like nineteen or
Speaker 2: twenty probably, but from very young I was. I became
Speaker 2: interested in why I've noticed that people made choices like,
Speaker 2: for instance, using drugs or alcohol, you know, at thirteen, fourteen,
Speaker 2: fifteen sixteen, Yeah, And I noticed that their willingness to
Speaker 2: do that was different to my willingness, right, And so
Speaker 2: I was really interested in why is it that I
Speaker 2: think differently about this, Like why is it that they
Speaker 2: make choices that I wouldn't make and vice versa? And
Speaker 2: I did. That ended up being what I wanted to
Speaker 2: do as my PhD, right, because I my first job
Speaker 2: out of out of UNI was working with young people
Speaker 2: who had alcohol and drug problems, so age twelve to
Speaker 2: seventeen wow, who yeah? Who were Yeah? And they were
Speaker 2: remanded by the courts, usually to a residential substance rehabilitation
Speaker 2: program and a lot of the people who worked there
Speaker 2: were in AA or NA, and then they had some
Speaker 2: counselors like you know, junior MBI. I was just out
Speaker 2: of school to do work with this group. Of children basically,
Speaker 2: and like you said, it's well, I mean it was
Speaker 2: a it was a really good introduction to trauma, yeah,
Speaker 2: and the impact of that on children, and and like
Speaker 2: what you said, like what's the important thing is to
Speaker 2: connect to understand We had children who would come men
Speaker 2: who were very racist, for instance, and had to be
Speaker 2: with other kids from other races and nationalities, and it
Speaker 2: was and it was the process of being able to
Speaker 2: connect with someone like that and love them and care
Speaker 2: about them and see them change their mindset over time
Speaker 2: was like really powerful. So when I went to do
Speaker 2: my PhD, I really was interested in again like why
Speaker 2: what are the what are the things that influence decisions
Speaker 2: to use drugs and alcohol and make these kind of
Speaker 2: risky choices in life. But what happened was the person
Speaker 2: who could have been my supervisor for that was not available,
Speaker 2: and the person who was in the eating disorder space
Speaker 2: was available. So I had to change my So I
Speaker 2: wanted to study the same thing, but I changed my
Speaker 2: question away from substance abuse and towards unhealthy and risky
Speaker 2: eating and weight loss behavior choices basically, So it was
Speaker 2: kind of like, yeah, it was still about decision making
Speaker 2: and risk taking, but with the different behavior or different behaviors.
Speaker 3: I didn't know that that was.
Speaker 1: So I started my PhD started, or where I started,
Speaker 1: was looking at the role of motivation, so nothing about
Speaker 1: metaproceptional metaaccuracy. Looking at the role of motivation what we call,
Speaker 1: you know, colloquially motivation as in that emotional state, that
Speaker 1: level of arousal excitement.
Speaker 3: So not motivation as in the.
Speaker 1: Reason for doing something, but more about the psychological and
Speaker 1: emotional state that people get in.
Speaker 3: And so I was looking at that.
Speaker 1: Kind of emotion, that kind of motivation, and how that
Speaker 1: correlated with success and what role motivation played in helping
Speaker 1: people change. And it was just super messy. It was
Speaker 1: just like, oh, there was no like even even there's
Speaker 1: no unified definition of motivation. Really there are a lot
Speaker 1: of kind of different thoughts around it, and it was
Speaker 1: just and I just it was just it was going
Speaker 1: to be a bit of a.
Speaker 3: Research minefield, and not in a good way, in a
Speaker 3: good way.
Speaker 1: So I had another idea, obviously, and I just leaned
Speaker 1: into that. But I think back to your thing about
Speaker 1: the kids, you know, and what predisposes somebody to be
Speaker 1: more or less inclined to choose to pick up booze
Speaker 1: or pick up a drug or you know, and there's
Speaker 1: a viron mental factors and you know, cultural sociological variables, factors,
Speaker 1: blah blah blah. Then there's like, yeah, you know, biochemical
Speaker 1: and genetic where some people seem to be more genetically
Speaker 1: predisposed to addiction. I mean David Gillespie who is on
Speaker 1: a lot with us, he talks a lot about how
Speaker 1: some brains just don't produce as much dopamine and naturally,
Speaker 1: so the only time that people actually feel normal and
Speaker 1: inverted commas is when they pick up booze and then
Speaker 1: so they're at a genetic disadvantage before they start. And yeah,
Speaker 1: I just think it's people, don't Some people do, I'm sure,
Speaker 1: but I think a lot of people see being an
Speaker 1: addict or being an alcoholic is almost a sign of
Speaker 1: weakness or like, oh wow, that's so not so not
Speaker 1: the case.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I mean any like mental health issues can
Speaker 2: be seen as a sign of weakness.
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, yeah, And I.
Speaker 2: Truly like, I think the stigma has lessened over the years,
Speaker 2: for sure, but it has not gotten to a level
Speaker 2: that's where it needs to be, because those are still
Speaker 2: words that people would use to describe people with mental
Speaker 2: health issues.
Speaker 3: Well, see it's the line, doc where.
Speaker 1: Like, we want to help people, and of course, you know,
Speaker 1: we want to be compassionate and empathetic and kind and
Speaker 1: aware and all of those things. But like, I wouldn't
Speaker 1: treat virtually anybody the way that I treat myself, Like
Speaker 1: I'm I'm brutal with me, like I'm hard on me.
Speaker 1: I don't give myself much credit for many things, you know,
Speaker 1: And I'm not saying this is a good idea everyone,
Speaker 1: but like I'm quite like I have a pretty strict
Speaker 1: operating system that works for me. And in the middle
Speaker 1: of that, like I'm pretty like far from perfect, but
Speaker 1: pretty functional, pretty okay, right, yeah, but the stuff that
Speaker 1: I make me do and the I wouldn't make most
Speaker 1: people do. But at the same time, I think, how
Speaker 1: do we how do we be both empathetic and kind
Speaker 1: but also realistic and practical, because I mean, if you're
Speaker 1: holding someone's hand for fifteen years and going there, there,
Speaker 1: it'll be okay. And of course I'm being a little
Speaker 1: bit tongue in cheek. At some stage, people have also
Speaker 1: got to help themselves, like yes, support, yes, perhaps medication. Yes,
Speaker 1: you know, kindest love, compassion.
Speaker 3: All of it. I'm all for it.
Speaker 1: But also I don't want my thirty five year old
Speaker 1: friend who's struggling to wake up and be a fifty
Speaker 1: year old friend who's made no progress. Yeah, because everybody's
Speaker 1: trying to nerf the world.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well that I mean that is the the main
Speaker 2: I guess I'm trying to think of the right word.
Speaker 2: The main role of a like a therapist or like
Speaker 2: what I try to do with my in my client work,
Speaker 2: whether it's individual or in groups, is what's the balance.
Speaker 2: What's the balance between yah supporting someone and challenging them?
Speaker 2: And Uh, there's a there's some research that's been done
Speaker 2: that I always think about when I think about that,
Speaker 2: and I can't I don't know who wrote it and
Speaker 2: where it's from. I just remember what it is. But
Speaker 2: there was some research done on group therapy and what
Speaker 2: they found was, so they had three different groups. One
Speaker 2: was like just supportive, yes, one was just very change focused,
Speaker 2: and one was a combination of both. Right, And so
Speaker 2: what they found was with the supportive group, huh, they
Speaker 2: had great reliable attendance, Like people came to that group, right,
Speaker 2: it felt good. People felt supported and so they came
Speaker 2: every week. But there was little change with the change group.
Speaker 2: There was a lot of dropouts, yes, because there was
Speaker 2: they didn't have that other side, right, but with but
Speaker 2: with the group that where they were they focused on
Speaker 2: both of those things obviously, you mean, you know the
Speaker 2: results are going to be you know, they they they
Speaker 2: stayed and they changed. So I think when you come
Speaker 2: to when you're in therapy, it really is about supporting them,
Speaker 2: like supporting them and pushing them forward at the same time,
Speaker 2: but not always at the same level, Like you're constantly
Speaker 2: tie trading that depending on what's going on for the
Speaker 2: person in the moment.
Speaker 3: You look at you Todd Triting, you did it? You did?
Speaker 2: Did I did? Sorry? Yeah?
Speaker 1: So yeah, but how do you know, like how do
Speaker 1: you know and I mean I know there's no three
Speaker 1: step plan, right, but how do you doctor Lilly? And
Speaker 1: how do you know when to push someone a little?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Well, I think I think this is an interesting thing.
Speaker 2: I think over time, what I've learned is trust your
Speaker 2: client to tell you as well. Sometimes well what I
Speaker 2: often tell my clients is, you know exactly what I
Speaker 2: just said, Like, like, therapy is about you know, getting
Speaker 2: support and also making changes, and that sometimes I might
Speaker 2: I tell them that I might do one or the
Speaker 2: other more than what you think is helpful. Yeah, And
Speaker 2: so I want you to tell me if I'm off
Speaker 2: in one direction when you need more of the other,
Speaker 2: or vice versa. So part of it is being really
Speaker 2: clear that I'm not always going to know exactly what
Speaker 2: you need and want, and I'm going to need you
Speaker 2: to tell me what you need and want as well.
Speaker 2: But then there are times where you know, like based
Speaker 2: on what's going on for the person. So if someone
Speaker 2: is presenting overwhelmed and really burnt out and they've got
Speaker 2: a lot of external stressors and there's so much distress,
Speaker 2: you know, like then what they need is support. Right,
Speaker 2: You're not like, you know, going to put more on
Speaker 2: their plate yes to do like whereas others who might
Speaker 2: just be if you're like not seeing any change and
Speaker 2: you just hear like a lot of stuckness, then you're
Speaker 2: you know, you're going to be pushing them forward and
Speaker 2: getting them to start to do things, even if it's
Speaker 2: in a slow, graded way. That's often how the best
Speaker 2: way of going little behavioral we call them behavioral experiments,
Speaker 2: which is essentially just like doing things as an experiment.
Speaker 2: So you're not like saying you have to change this
Speaker 2: behavior and do this behavior forever. You're saying, well, you
Speaker 2: have these kind of ideas about what this behavior may
Speaker 2: or may not do. Let's see and let's set up
Speaker 2: an experiment, and like, you tell me what you think
Speaker 2: is going to happen, and then we're going to set
Speaker 2: it up so that you do it, and then you're
Speaker 2: going to come back and you're gonna tell me what happened.
Speaker 1: Okay, what about Yeah? What about somebody who I think
Speaker 1: quite often what people want is not what they need. Right,
Speaker 1: So what people want is the couch and Cheetos and
Speaker 1: a cornetto and Netflix.
Speaker 3: What they need is to get the fuck up and
Speaker 3: go for a walk.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's like I'm going to tell you, oh, you
Speaker 1: know what I need, But I'm not really telling you
Speaker 1: what I need. I'm telling you what I want because
Speaker 1: what I actually need from you is to go No,
Speaker 1: that's not real, Craig. That's an excuse. That's not a reason,
Speaker 1: that's a that's an excuse wearing a pretty dress. Right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: so but what I you know, I'll go, oh, look,
Speaker 1: I can't. I can't work out because I've got a
Speaker 1: sore ankle, and you go, well, Craig, I'm pretty sure
Speaker 1: there's nine hundred things you can do that won't involve
Speaker 1: your ankle, right, So, I mean, I'm not trying to
Speaker 1: be a hard ass, but I just think, you know,
Speaker 1: I had so many conversations with people who I look
Speaker 1: at them and I'm like, you could do so much.
Speaker 1: There's so many things that you could do. You're so talented,
Speaker 1: you've got such good genetics, you're so smart, but you're
Speaker 1: so fucking soft, Like any reason to give up, you
Speaker 1: find it, any reason to stop, you stop.
Speaker 3: And this has been decades.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and no, we're not all We're not all going
Speaker 1: to be you know, fucking worry and I get all
Speaker 1: of that, but at some stage it's like, my mum
Speaker 1: is the toughest person I know her and John, my
Speaker 1: friend that got blown up, but Mum, Mum's been at
Speaker 1: death's door three times, just the most resilient, most tough,
Speaker 1: best attitude, and she's an eighty five year old, forty
Speaker 1: two kilo woman who's fucking terrifying. That's all I mean
Speaker 1: is like, we don't have to be big and physically strong.
Speaker 1: But you know, if we really want to be capable
Speaker 1: and resilient and be able to be the calm and
Speaker 1: the chaos and create good results and change and learn
Speaker 1: and grow and evolve, which everyone kind of says they
Speaker 1: want to, Well, you need to go and do hard things.
Speaker 3: Sometimes not all the time, not all day every day.
Speaker 1: And by the way, you can't always be right, you know,
Speaker 1: when do we open that door where we go no,
Speaker 1: I call bullshit or we don't because you you know,
Speaker 1: and I know, but you're nicer than me that some
Speaker 1: people are full of shit.
Speaker 2: I feel like that's I mean, of course that's true.
Speaker 2: Like I think we're all full of shit sometimes. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I think for the most part, by time people get
Speaker 2: to me, Yeah, they know what they need and they
Speaker 2: know what they want, and they know when those things
Speaker 2: are clashing against each other, right, and they can say
Speaker 2: it openly and if I and if they can't say it,
Speaker 2: and I say it for them, it is it is
Speaker 2: more often than not acknowledged.
Speaker 3: Is yeah true?
Speaker 2: Okay, But I do think you're right. There is a
Speaker 2: place for challenging people in that way like that, the
Speaker 2: way that you're saying, I think that you know, there
Speaker 2: are real obstacles two people changing, and some of them
Speaker 2: are not obvious. Yes, And so the way that I
Speaker 2: look at it with my clients is, let's look at
Speaker 2: what could be getting in the way. And I think
Speaker 2: I might have mentioned this before on the previous show,
Speaker 2: but I just divide it up into like thoughts, feelings, relationships, behaviors,
Speaker 2: and circumstances and just get them to I have like
Speaker 2: a worksheet that you know, I give to them to
Speaker 2: like work through all of that so that we know
Speaker 2: from the beginning what's going to get in the way
Speaker 2: of change, and so that we can start dealing with
Speaker 2: that first. There's and you know, I think that maybe
Speaker 2: part of the reason I thought to do that was
Speaker 2: because of my training in dialectical behavior therapy, because that's
Speaker 2: a therapy that has a pre commitment part of it
Speaker 2: built in, so before you are accepted into the treatment,
Speaker 2: you do this thing called a pre commitment face, which
Speaker 2: is really two well, one orient them to the treatment,
Speaker 2: orient people to the treatment, but also to say like whoa,
Speaker 2: what you know what's going to get in the way?
Speaker 2: Like are you are you actually sure you want to
Speaker 2: do this? Because this is actually really hard it's very
Speaker 2: time consuming. It's going to be super uncomfortable. You're going
Speaker 2: to have to come for three hours a week, You're
Speaker 2: going to have to talk in front of people you
Speaker 2: don't know, like this might not be the right thing
Speaker 2: for you, Like what's going to get and if you
Speaker 2: do want to be part of it, what's going to
Speaker 2: get in the way and how are you going to
Speaker 2: deal with that? Yeah, and so when you do all
Speaker 2: of that upfront, then when things start getting hard and
Speaker 2: motivation lags and discipline lags, and you know, people stop,
Speaker 2: you know they're not attending or they're not doing the
Speaker 2: home work, or they're not you know, doing what they
Speaker 2: said they were going to do. You're like, well, we've
Speaker 2: we've already we already knew that this might happen, and
Speaker 2: we've already problem solved it. Here's what you said you
Speaker 2: know would work or that you would commit to should
Speaker 2: this occur. So I think even just having that being
Speaker 2: very clear from the beginning, like what the what the
Speaker 2: purpose of you know, if it's therapy or if it's
Speaker 2: you know, coaching or whatever, it is a group program,
Speaker 2: this is what it is. Be very clear about what
Speaker 2: it is and what what part you play in this process.
Speaker 2: And if you're not ready for it, that's okay, Just
Speaker 2: there's other things you can do. You don't have to
Speaker 2: do this, But if you are ready for it, this
Speaker 2: is what it involves, and this is what the expectations are.
Speaker 3: Yeah, how flexible or adaptable or varied?
Speaker 1: I guess is the programming or the prescription with what
Speaker 1: you do? Like when I just compare to say, you know,
Speaker 1: being a trainer or an exercise physiologist or whatever, and
Speaker 1: people come in and you know, some people have got
Speaker 1: them training like a powerlift. To some people they're doing
Speaker 1: a whole lot of flexibility and balance. Some people are
Speaker 1: really just trying to get better posture. Yeah, some people
Speaker 1: are doing heaps of pinloaded shits. Some people don't touch pinloaded.
Speaker 1: Some people are doing really functional kettlebell training. Some people
Speaker 1: are doing deadlifts and squads. Some people are running, some
Speaker 1: people are working on like it's some people like it's
Speaker 1: really varied. It's it's not on any level, cookie cutter.
Speaker 2: Yeah, what about?
Speaker 1: And I guess psychologically, mentally, emotionally, cognitively, people are just
Speaker 1: as diverse as they are biologically and physical as in
Speaker 1: you know, body, sure mine brain like how do you
Speaker 1: figure out other than in a assessment.
Speaker 3: I guess that's a big part of it.
Speaker 1: Figure out how do you figure out where you're going
Speaker 1: to go because what you'll do with Craig would be optimal,
Speaker 1: but it won't be with Dive.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean what you said is you do start
Speaker 2: with an assessment. So you start with getting to know
Speaker 2: the person. Yeah, and you start with well what are
Speaker 2: they here for? And well, when you're a clinical psychologist,
Speaker 2: it's often a mental health issue or disorder that they're
Speaker 2: coming in for. And then you start then you start thinking, Okay,
Speaker 2: what are the most effective evidence based treatments for that? Yeah?
Speaker 2: And so what we would normally do with a client,
Speaker 2: or I should speak for a mist what I would
Speaker 2: normally do with a client is I usually present them
Speaker 2: with like a brief on like my formulation of the
Speaker 2: problem based on what they have told me. Yeah, this
Speaker 2: is all by the way, I always say in draft form,
Speaker 2: like because because it's collaborative. So I'm like, you've said
Speaker 2: this stuff and I've formulated it, and now I want
Speaker 2: your feedback on is this correct or is it what's missing?
Speaker 2: Like you know, all of that sort of stuff. So
Speaker 2: I give them like a little brief and then I
Speaker 2: and that includes the what they've come in for, but
Speaker 2: also what their strengths are and what's making what's kind
Speaker 2: of perpetuating or making the issue worse. And then I
Speaker 2: have like a chart with three columns and one is
Speaker 2: like what they said their goals were in the left column,
Speaker 2: and then in the middle like the strategies that I
Speaker 2: think would assist them with these issues. And then the
Speaker 2: last column the expected outcomes. So if we implemented these
Speaker 2: treatments or strategies, what we would expect the outcomes to
Speaker 2: be at the end, so they have like a very
Speaker 2: clear and then also I often will give them a
Speaker 2: couple of questionnaires to see where they are objectively kind
Speaker 2: of at a baseline, so that we can measure change
Speaker 2: over time, so that it's not just based on my
Speaker 2: subjective view that they're better or worse, that we actually
Speaker 2: have some data that supports it as well. And then yeah,
Speaker 2: then I give it to them to have a look
Speaker 2: at and make changes and decide what their priorities are.
Speaker 2: And then we go So I mean we usually start
Speaker 2: with an evidence based treatment, for instance, with anxiety problems
Speaker 2: and disorders cognitive behavioral therapy is generally the go to
Speaker 2: for that. Does that suit everybody? No, it suits seventy percent.
Speaker 2: So I work eclectically in the sense that I'm not
Speaker 2: married to CBT. I know that one formula doesn't work
Speaker 2: for everybody, but we'll start with the one that usually
Speaker 2: works yes, and if it doesn't, then we can move
Speaker 2: to another evidence based treatment that does it slightly differently.
Speaker 2: Sometimes I'll do it like that. Sometimes I'll present them
Speaker 2: like the different options up front and say what do
Speaker 2: you think it would work best for you? And we
Speaker 2: can start with that option. Yeah. So I definitely have
Speaker 2: like there's a structure and models there, but it's not rigid.
Speaker 2: It's definitely flexible and adaptable to the person.
Speaker 1: I was going to ask you a question that's quite philosophical.
Speaker 1: It's down the old conversational rabbit hole, but I'm gonna
Speaker 1: I'm going to tell you the question I was going
Speaker 1: to ask, but then I'm going to change it. So
Speaker 1: the question I was going to ask you is how
Speaker 1: well do you.
Speaker 3: Think people understand themselves?
Speaker 1: But my actual question, my modified question is I don't
Speaker 1: know the answer to this, So it's not like I
Speaker 1: know the answer. I'm waiting to hear if you agree
Speaker 1: with me, Yeah, my question is how can we understand
Speaker 1: ourselves better? I'm not even sure what that question means totally,
Speaker 1: but what comes to mind for you? Like to me,
Speaker 1: it's in the space of you know, self awareness, and
Speaker 1: I think soccer he said to know thyself is the
Speaker 1: beginning of wisdom, right, So I feel like knowing yourself
Speaker 1: and understanding yourself kind of same.
Speaker 3: Same.
Speaker 1: What comes to mind for you when I say like
Speaker 1: getting to understand ourselves or know ourselves?
Speaker 2: Well, the first thing that pops into my mind is
Speaker 2: such a CBT thing to say. It's very It's called
Speaker 2: self monitoring. So what all that means is like, if
Speaker 2: you're like, pick, what are you actually trying to work
Speaker 2: out about yourself and then create some awareness about that
Speaker 2: in your life? And often that involves writing writing stuff down.
Speaker 2: So if we and this is like a very common
Speaker 2: what we would say homework, Yeah, that we would give
Speaker 2: our clients. So that might be, for instance, if people
Speaker 2: are having trouble with a particular emotion like anxiety, depression, anger, even,
Speaker 2: then we would give them a worksheet where they would
Speaker 2: note down whenever they felt that feeling at it at
Speaker 2: a level that was dysfunctional. They'd write the feeling down,
Speaker 2: and then they'd write down what thoughts are going through
Speaker 2: their head at that moment, right, And then then they
Speaker 2: would write down the situation that it occurred within, right,
Speaker 2: and then they would write down what they did. Yeah, right,
Speaker 2: And that's like the very beginning. And then you, if
Speaker 2: you have what I would say, you know, give them
Speaker 2: the worksheet, explain why the rationale were doing it, Send
Speaker 2: them away for a week or two, say, write as
Speaker 2: many of these instances as you can, and then when
Speaker 2: you bring it back in, we'll look at all of
Speaker 2: this data basically about your life and how anger shows
Speaker 2: up for you, for instance, and find the patterns. And
Speaker 2: you might find patterns in the situations. You might find
Speaker 2: patterns in the thoughts, you might find patterns in the behaviors.
Speaker 2: Like you probably find patterns in all of these things,
Speaker 2: and that whole process then helps you understand why you
Speaker 2: might flare up, for instance. So that's like one aspect
Speaker 2: that's like a very present tense way of doing it, right,
Speaker 2: there's also like past tense, like what's gone on in
Speaker 2: your life before that may be leading to these kinds
Speaker 2: of responses. Now, so that might be you know, that
Speaker 2: would be involved taking a history connecting the dots for people.
Speaker 2: There are some really good questionnaires that can help people
Speaker 2: understand where their core beliefs and schemas have come from
Speaker 2: and why they might have developed that way because of
Speaker 2: their early attachments or their early you know, experiences with
Speaker 2: their caregivers and things like that. So there's a whole
Speaker 2: range of ways that people can get to know themselves better.
Speaker 2: But I think sometimes it's just like put pen to
Speaker 2: paper and write about what's going on. And then that
Speaker 2: actually is in and of itself therapeutic, Like when people
Speaker 2: come in with panic disorder, for instance, and they're like,
Speaker 2: I don't know, they're just coming out of the blue
Speaker 2: and I don't know what's happening and what's going on,
Speaker 2: and then you send them home to write about what happens, Yeah,
Speaker 2: you know, when it happened, for how long, what were
Speaker 2: the symptoms, what was a situation, what was happened before,
Speaker 2: what happened after. Hannah can reduce just through the act
Speaker 2: of monitoring panic. Yeah, yeah, So it's therapeutic just as
Speaker 2: a tool in and of itself.
Speaker 3: And I think.
Speaker 1: Like realizing that I've had this happened before and I
Speaker 1: didn't die.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: One of my friends used to have panic attacks.
Speaker 1: And mostly not around me, but then one day he
Speaker 1: had one around me.
Speaker 3: And I said this recently on the podcast, so apologies everyone, but.
Speaker 1: You know, I just I was with him, and you know,
Speaker 1: I said, what's going on? And he told me what's
Speaker 1: going on? And I said, how many times do you?
Speaker 2: So?
Speaker 3: I didn't go, oh God, are you all right? What
Speaker 3: can I do? I went, oh, wow, I go, how
Speaker 3: many times do you reckon? This has happened to you?
Speaker 1: And he goes hundreds and hundreds hundreds, I go, and
Speaker 1: I go, and you didn't die any of those times, right,
Speaker 1: And it's like, well, obviously not. You're probably not going
Speaker 1: to die this time, right. He's like, well no, I go. So,
Speaker 1: you know, and I think almost getting comfortable in the discomfort.
Speaker 1: You know, oh, I recognize this, and just like there's
Speaker 1: of course, there's the feeling, there's the anxiety, there's everything
Speaker 1: that's going on in the body, but also there's this
Speaker 1: awareness and knowing that oh, this this is not terminal.
Speaker 1: It's horrible, but it's not going to but it's not
Speaker 1: going to kill me. And then all of a sudden
Speaker 1: recognition kind of brings things down a tiny bit.
Speaker 2: Oh well, I mean that's the treatment. That's literally basically
Speaker 2: what it is. I mean, for panic attacks to become
Speaker 2: a panic disorder, it really is, because it's like the
Speaker 2: criteria for that is worry about having another panic attack. Yeah, yes,
Speaker 2: so you're the treatment is to help people not worry
Speaker 2: about it because and not catastrophize the experience, and when
Speaker 2: they're in the experience, to be able to say to themselves,
Speaker 2: this will be over in ten minutes. You know, it's
Speaker 2: really uncomfortable, but I cope with it before, you know,
Speaker 2: like just changing the way that they talk to themselves
Speaker 2: through it, because normally what people will be thinking is
Speaker 2: I'm having a hard attack, I'm going crazy, I'm out
Speaker 2: of control this, you know, because this is horrible. I'm
Speaker 2: going to like all those all those kind of catastrophizing thoughts,
Speaker 2: which of course make it worse, lasts longer, and make
Speaker 2: it very anxiety provoking for you know, anticipating the next one.
Speaker 2: So and you know, I think part of the thing
Speaker 2: with self monitoring, going back to that is one of
Speaker 2: the reasons why it's so powerful is because it's essentially mindfulness.
Speaker 2: It's essentially like stopping and being more aware of what
Speaker 2: you're experiencing in an objective, non judgmental way. You know,
Speaker 2: it's like doing a science, scientific study on yourself. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I think that that's why it actually helps so much.
Speaker 1: Well, I had to do this, but it's six minutes
Speaker 1: to three and I'm meant to meet my training partner
Speaker 1: at three, so he's going to be very sad when
Speaker 1: I'm not there.
Speaker 2: But I can't believe it's gone by so quickly.
Speaker 1: I know it went quick, didn't it. Hey tell people
Speaker 1: how to connect with you, please.
Speaker 2: Doc Doctorliliannija dot com is my website and also contain
Speaker 2: your Brain dot com if you want to have a
Speaker 2: look into managing your worry. Got an app for that
Speaker 2: that's free. So if you want more information about that,
Speaker 2: you can go there.
Speaker 1: You need to learn how to promote yourself a little
Speaker 1: bit more enthusiastically. Please, do you sound like you're apologizing.
Speaker 3: I'm sorry. I have a website. I'm sorry, I'm here.
Speaker 3: Go and check it out. She's amazing. Go and check
Speaker 3: it out. She's bloody life changing. There you go, I'll
Speaker 3: say it's Craig. We'll say goodbye. I fair doc, but
Speaker 3: tom as always thank you, appreciate.
Speaker 2: You great being here. Thanks Craig,