Speaker 1: Wind Down with Janet Kramer and I'm Heart Radio Podcast.
Speaker 2: This week's Thursday Therapy, we have doctor Adit, She's a
Speaker 2: Harvard physician nationally recognized stress expert. We also have my
Speaker 2: amazing fiance joining this Thursday Therapy episode. How would you
Speaker 2: say you'd handle stress? You're thrown that question and welcome
Speaker 2: to wind Down Baby.
Speaker 1: How do I handle stress? I handle it deffinitely now
Speaker 1: as I've got older. I think, first of all, you
Speaker 1: can you become better to choose and what you stress
Speaker 1: over and the volume of things that you can stress
Speaker 1: over and what you can control. But I think taking
Speaker 1: time to yourself and even like I know it's cliche
Speaker 1: and it's overused, but meditation and breathing techniques really help
Speaker 1: me in stressful situations. Like even in the moment of stress,
Speaker 1: whether it's a trigger of something, just deep breaths within
Speaker 1: that moment just help to calm me and control my emotions,
Speaker 1: which then helps control the stress.
Speaker 2: It's interesting that you mentioned the age thing, because that
Speaker 2: was going to be one of my questions to her,
Speaker 2: because I feel like a lot of people even they
Speaker 2: say when you're an older parent, they you like, let's
Speaker 2: say a parent has a child at a young age
Speaker 2: and having an older age, Oh well you had a
Speaker 2: like for example, I'll say, like my dad was way
Speaker 2: less chill with my sisters as opposed to me. So
Speaker 2: it's it's interesting when we can handle stress better with age.
Speaker 2: And I'm curious actually why that is, because you would
Speaker 2: think with age comes more stress.
Speaker 1: I think you'll learn to prioritize what affects you, and
Speaker 1: maturity tends to do that, Like there'll be far more
Speaker 1: things will affect you, and now at the age of
Speaker 1: forty excuse yourself. Excuse yourself, at the age of forty,
Speaker 1: and there would have been in your twenties.
Speaker 2: Yes, And there's also things that stress me out more
Speaker 2: now in my forties and in my twenties, like I
Speaker 2: have the weight of the world in forties, just you know,
Speaker 2: support in children, and so that stress is so different
Speaker 2: than when I didn't have that, you know, obviously that responsibility.
Speaker 1: But that you now have the tools to manage it sure,
Speaker 1: Whereas if you had this responsibility, this amount of responsibility
Speaker 1: in your early twenties, you probably wouldn't have had the
Speaker 1: tools to manage it properly.
Speaker 2: How do you think I handle stress?
Speaker 1: I think you manage stress really well because you're I mean,
Speaker 1: there's so many, so many variants of stress, but you're
Speaker 1: so busy all the time, and you're constantly juggling everything podcasting, acting, marketing, stuff,
Speaker 1: influencing and stuff, so your plate's always full. So therefore,
Speaker 1: but I think you're really good on managing Okay, I'll
Speaker 1: allow this to affect me or I won't allow it
Speaker 1: to affect me, And like everyone, you have your moments,
Speaker 1: but I think you handle and whether it's stress. I
Speaker 1: think there's a difference between stress and pressure, A big difference.
Speaker 1: Your pressure to get things done, your pressure to perform,
Speaker 1: your pressure to look after the kids. I think that's
Speaker 1: really different from stress.
Speaker 2: Oh interesting, what do you tell me? What? Why?
Speaker 1: Well, a pressure is mostly something that you put on yourself,
Speaker 1: like your pressures in life will be mostly the ones
Speaker 1: that you put on yourself.
Speaker 2: But isn't that stress?
Speaker 1: No, I mean, just about to speak to an expert
Speaker 1: on it, but I think there's a really big difference
Speaker 1: between pressure and stress. Pressure. You you can a lot
Speaker 1: of people thrive on pressure, but a lot of people
Speaker 1: will deem stresses onhealthy.
Speaker 2: I guess I don't know them. What the difference is
Speaker 2: because it feels like the same to me.
Speaker 1: It's totally different. And the professional world like the difference
Speaker 1: between pressure and stresses, Like I.
Speaker 2: Get the pressure, like, Okay, I have to study all
Speaker 2: these lines. That's pressure. But to me that's also stress,
Speaker 2: Like I'm stressed to have to learn all these lines.
Speaker 2: I'm pressured to learn all these lines. It feels like
Speaker 2: to me, the same effect or the same weight.
Speaker 1: I would say, I think there's a big difference.
Speaker 2: So well, luckily we've got a stress expert that just
Speaker 2: jumped down the zoom. Let's get her on, Doctor Adit.
Speaker 2: I'm Janna. This is my fiance Alan.
Speaker 1: Nice to meet you.
Speaker 3: Hi, guys. I know all about you because I've been
Speaker 3: binging it your podcast for the past few weeks, so
Speaker 3: I am like, I'm a true fan.
Speaker 2: It's very sweet, thank you, and I'm I'm excited to
Speaker 2: talk to you because we were just having a little
Speaker 2: bit of a conversation before you came on about stress,
Speaker 2: and you know, he was saying how pressure is different
Speaker 2: than stress, and I you know, I'm very happy to
Speaker 2: have you on because when he was saying that, I'm like, man,
Speaker 2: I get pressure and stress maybe being different, but it's
Speaker 2: the same effect for me. So like if I feel
Speaker 2: like I was an example I was using, was I
Speaker 2: felt pressure to learn all my lines for the last
Speaker 2: movie I was in, but it was also stressful the
Speaker 2: same thing. So I guess what is your take on
Speaker 2: that pressure versus stress? And then yeah, then let's just
Speaker 2: dive into all of it.
Speaker 3: That's a great place to start. So when you say
Speaker 3: pressure versus stress, what you guys are really talking about
Speaker 3: is that there are two kinds of stress and not
Speaker 3: all stress is created equals. So when you say pressure,
Speaker 3: you're talking about healthy, good stress. And then when you
Speaker 3: say stress, like most of us when we throw that
Speaker 3: word around, like I've had a stressful week or I've
Speaker 3: had a stressful day, what we're talking about is unhealthy stress.
Speaker 3: So there's two distinct types of stress, and they both
Speaker 3: impact your brain and body in different ways. You know,
Speaker 3: healthy positive stress. In scientific terms, it's known as adaptive stress.
Speaker 3: We won't use too many scientific words. And then the
Speaker 3: unhealthy stress is known as maladaptive stress. Everything that moves
Speaker 3: your life forward was created because of a little bit
Speaker 3: of healthy stress. So, like you said you were learning
Speaker 3: lines for your movie, or you're rooty for your favorite
Speaker 3: sports team, you make a new friend, get a new job,
Speaker 3: or a promotion, or a new movie role, or I
Speaker 3: don't know, buy a new car or a home, or
Speaker 3: planning for your next vacation. All wonderful positive things in
Speaker 3: your life, but they are stressful. Though they are a
Speaker 3: healthy form of stress. They help move your life forward.
Speaker 3: Unhealthy stress is things that we already know about when
Speaker 3: we say, oh I'm so stressed, or it's a stressful week,
Speaker 3: that's that unproductive, dysfunctional stress that really stops you in
Speaker 3: your tracks. The goal of life is not to live
Speaker 3: a life without stress. That is a myth and it's
Speaker 3: actually biologically impossible to do that. It's to live a
Speaker 3: life with healthy, manageable stress. And what often happens is
Speaker 3: when healthy stress gets out of hand, it can become unproductive.
Speaker 3: So it's about raining it in back to healthy levels
Speaker 3: so that I can serve you rather than harm you.
Speaker 1: Mm hm that makes sense, yeah, absolutely absolutely? And how
Speaker 1: what are the key aspects for someone to know when
Speaker 1: stress becomes unhealthy? If you talk about healthy stress and
Speaker 1: unhealthy stress, what are the key the key points that
Speaker 1: then recognizing that okay, this is now unhealthy and it's
Speaker 1: halting me.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So you know when you think about how stress
Speaker 3: or healthy stress influences your brain. When you're feeling a
Speaker 3: sense of healthy stress, right, it is like a sense
Speaker 3: of excitement or those healthy positive nerves. Excitement and fear
Speaker 3: reside in the same part of our brain, which is
Speaker 3: a good kind of reframe. When you're feeling like, oh,
Speaker 3: there's this new thing coming up and I'm not really
Speaker 3: sure if I can do it, and you want to
Speaker 3: keep it in healthy bounds, you can think to yourself, oh,
Speaker 3: it's excitement rather than a fear. That's one reframe. But stress,
Speaker 3: the unhealthy kind of stress. There's like a million flavors.
Speaker 3: So you can have body manifestations of unhealthy stress like
Speaker 3: I don't know, headaches, neck pain, shoulder pain, back pain,
Speaker 3: abdominal pain, feeling dizzy or nauseous, and then the mental
Speaker 3: health manifestations of too much stress, too much unhealthy stress, anxiety, depressions,
Speaker 3: sleep disturbances, dirtability, a quick sense of anger, emotional reactivity,
Speaker 3: and in some cases feeling a sense of fatigue or
Speaker 3: low energy. So it really depends. Every person is different,
Speaker 3: and what seems like a stress event or a stress
Speaker 3: symptom to me is really different for a stress symptom
Speaker 3: for you for example, or even between you, there's probably
Speaker 3: something that you do is really different than you know,
Speaker 3: than your partner. So it really does depend. The key
Speaker 3: is to know what your baseline. So when you're feeling
Speaker 3: good and you know, if you're not feeling a lot
Speaker 3: of stress, then how do you feel? And then it's
Speaker 3: kind of like your tell. So I talk about this
Speaker 3: idea of the canary in the coal mine, which is
Speaker 3: a historical reference. I am so not into history. I'm
Speaker 3: not a history buff, but I love this metaphor. Back
Speaker 3: when there were coal miners in like World War two,
Speaker 3: they would go into the mines and they would bring
Speaker 3: a canary, a caged bird with them. The air would
Speaker 3: turn bad, but the coal miners were just toiling away
Speaker 3: and working for you know, sixteen twenty hour days. When
Speaker 3: the canary would stop singing, that's when they were like,
Speaker 3: oh wait a second, the air is bad. We need
Speaker 3: to leave the mines. And we as humans were like
Speaker 3: historically really bad at knowing what our canary song is
Speaker 3: like when is it too much? And only when our
Speaker 3: canary we all have one, when it starts belting a tune.
Speaker 3: That's when we pay attention, and that's like, really the
Speaker 3: sign of unhealthy stress that's gotten way out of hand.
Speaker 3: Everyone has its own everyone has their and canary song.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's interesting, that's really cool. I love that. I
Speaker 2: have a friend who she went through years of infidelity.
Speaker 2: She ended up getting cancer. A lot of people said, well,
Speaker 2: it's because the stress. You know, your body keeps a score.
Speaker 2: Is there anything scientifically backing what stress like a stress
Speaker 2: can cause cancer or anything that to that effect.
Speaker 3: So I'm really sorry for your friend for having gone
Speaker 3: through that. And you know, so many times with patients
Speaker 3: that I've seen, they get a chronic illness and then
Speaker 3: they're in my office and they're weeping saying it's because
Speaker 3: of this that happened, or you know, like you blame yourself.
Speaker 3: There's a lot of self blame and you often gaslight yourself,
Speaker 3: right like thinking, oh, it's my fault and it's never
Speaker 3: your fault. And if something happens, I would say, the
Speaker 3: science shows that it's not necessarily a cause. Like she
Speaker 3: had a lot of stress in her life, that is
Speaker 3: not what caused her cancer, but stress contributes to chronic
Speaker 3: medical conditions. So One startling statistic is that sixty to
Speaker 3: eighty percent of all doctor's visits have a stress related component,
Speaker 3: even though only three percent of doctor's visits have stress
Speaker 3: management counseling. That's not to say that like sixty to
Speaker 3: eighty percent of doctor's visits are caused by stress. But
Speaker 3: let's say you have a history of migraines, which is
Speaker 3: really common thing for people to have. Stress will make
Speaker 3: your migraines worse, will make your flares worse, You'll have
Speaker 3: more pain, more frequency of flares, or if you have
Speaker 3: rheumatoid arthritis, that can happen, you know, if it does
Speaker 3: have an impact on your chronic conditions. But it's not
Speaker 3: to say that for your friends, particularly that years of
Speaker 3: stress caused her cancer. I think it's really unfair because
Speaker 3: it makes the person who is going through that difficult experience,
Speaker 3: they're already struggling and they're already suffering. And so you
Speaker 3: know that lens of self compassion is so important when
Speaker 3: you are feeling a sense of stress, right because it's
Speaker 3: like when you're feeling that deep sense of stress and
Speaker 3: you can't get out of that, it's really you against you,
Speaker 3: and you're often in your own way, and so when
Speaker 3: you use that lens of self compassion, it can really help.
Speaker 3: And so I would say, you know, it's so easy
Speaker 3: because of the stress response. Your inner critic is so loud,
Speaker 3: and she was probably thinking, it's probably my fault and
Speaker 3: everything that happened to me, and it's never your fault.
Speaker 3: It is so so not your fault. When something you know,
Speaker 3: when you get a funny condition, it's not because of stress,
Speaker 3: but stress once you have a particular condition, it's a
Speaker 3: good idea to manage your stress and keep it in check,
Speaker 3: even prior to a medical condition. It's a good idea
Speaker 3: only because it can worsen conditions.
Speaker 1: Right, Okay, I have a question which links to which
Speaker 1: links to athletes and field and the link between so,
Speaker 1: as an athlete, every day, particularly on match days of
Speaker 1: the high performance days, on match days, you're constantly dealing
Speaker 1: with stress of hormones. Court is all adrenaline every single
Speaker 1: day because of the pressors and stress of being an athlete,
Speaker 1: both emotionally and physically. Do you think there's a huge
Speaker 1: link between professional athletes. They learn how to try and
Speaker 1: manage the stress of hormones every single day of the life.
Speaker 1: So every day they're dealing with it, and there's a
Speaker 1: link between that becoming a habit of dealing with it.
Speaker 1: But then when they retire, they no longer have that
Speaker 1: adrenaline and court is all kicking in every day that
Speaker 1: there no longer having to manage it and there's a
Speaker 1: big void in a life now. So do you think
Speaker 1: there's a link between the mental health of athletes upon
Speaker 1: retirement to stress during their careers.
Speaker 3: I love that question because I think a lot about
Speaker 3: athletes because I practiced in Boston and it's a real
Speaker 3: sports town with lots of athletes that I've taken care
Speaker 3: of over the years. You know, what is fascinating about
Speaker 3: top tier athletes is that they live and breathe the
Speaker 3: mind body connection and mere mortals like we're living in
Speaker 3: our heads or neck up people and athletes really have
Speaker 3: tuned into their mind body connection and what the mind
Speaker 3: body connection is. It's really important for stress management. It's
Speaker 3: that your brain and your body aren't constant communication and
Speaker 3: inextricably linked. What's good for your body is good for
Speaker 3: your brain, and vice versa. When it comes to athletes
Speaker 3: and the stress response, there is an habituation process and
Speaker 3: what that means is when these athletes are put into
Speaker 3: situations that are high stress, because they are so tuned
Speaker 3: in and in sync with their brain and their body
Speaker 3: and that mind body connection, they are able their brain
Speaker 3: it responds accordingly. They are used to that high level.
Speaker 3: Of course is all an adrenaline and they're moving their
Speaker 3: body and they're connecting their mind and their body. You know,
Speaker 3: our brain is a muscle. So your brain is just
Speaker 3: like a bicep that when you train it in certain ways,
Speaker 3: it responds. It's not like the brain you had at
Speaker 3: birth is the brain you're going to have for life.
Speaker 3: And so your brain can learn new things and can
Speaker 3: grow and adapt in the face of life's challenges. Being
Speaker 3: an athlete, you have a physical challenge and a mental
Speaker 3: challenge on the field, and so your brain adapts to that.
Speaker 3: And so then when you retire as an athlete and
Speaker 3: you get off of the field, there is a habituation,
Speaker 3: like your brain is used to a certain level of stress,
Speaker 3: and it depends on the athlete. So I have known
Speaker 3: athletes who have retired and then they have something called
Speaker 3: the delayed stress reaction, which is what a lot of
Speaker 3: us have gone through over the past several years. We're
Speaker 3: not athletes. I mean I exercise, but I'm not an athlete.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: It's basically that like you keep it together at all costs,
Speaker 3: and then the minute that acute stress is gone or
Speaker 3: that like stressful time is gone, you just fall apart.
Speaker 3: It's the dam breaks because your brain is built like
Speaker 3: a dam. You keep it together, and then immediately afterwards
Speaker 3: you feel psychologically safe and then you release, right, and
Speaker 3: it's like all of those pent up emotions come out.
Speaker 3: So that's one avenue, that's one path that could happen.
Speaker 3: Or you know, often what happens with elite athletes is
Speaker 3: that they channel that energy because it's very positive energy.
Speaker 3: It's healthy stress, right, that's gotten them to that level
Speaker 3: the mind body connection. They channel that energy to another area.
Speaker 3: So then they become entrepreneurs or they do all of
Speaker 3: these wonderful things and you see them really thrive in
Speaker 3: another area because it's skill building. They've built a whole
Speaker 3: sense of skills on the field, and then they can
Speaker 3: use them and transfer them off the field. But it
Speaker 3: takes time and practice. And you know, for those of
Speaker 3: us who are not elite athletes, we can do that too.
Speaker 3: You can tap into your mind body connection. You can
Speaker 3: learn to harness all the power of neuroplasticity to help
Speaker 3: decrease your stress. Because the mind body connection, you can
Speaker 3: pay attention to it and tap into it off the
Speaker 3: field as a regular person me or mortal. And the
Speaker 3: other thing about the mind body connection is that you
Speaker 3: can influence it to serve you, which is what athletes
Speaker 3: do all day every day, rather than harm you.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 2: So you have your new book, The Five Resets rewire
Speaker 2: your brain and body for less stress and more resilience.
Speaker 2: What is one of the biggest things that you want
Speaker 2: people to take away from your book? Like? What is
Speaker 2: and what's the biggest Like if you could tell someone
Speaker 2: just one big takeaway, like hey, I this is going
Speaker 2: to help you with your daily stress, you know, to
Speaker 2: feel better, what would that be?
Speaker 3: I think the biggest takeaway is to use a lens
Speaker 3: of self compassion when you are thinking about your own
Speaker 3: stress and burnout, understanding that if you are feeling a
Speaker 3: sense of stress or burnout, you are not the exception,
Speaker 3: You're the rule. Data shows that seventy percent of people
Speaker 3: have at least one feature of stress and burnout. That's
Speaker 3: like in a room of thirty people. Twenty one people
Speaker 3: are struggling right now. So if you're struggling with your
Speaker 3: mental health right now, you are not alone, and it
Speaker 3: is not your fault. There are so many things. We've
Speaker 3: had an onslaught of things, one after the other over
Speaker 3: the past several years, and your brain and your body
Speaker 3: you're expertly designed to handle short bursts of stress. But
Speaker 3: what we've experienced has been chronic and ongoing. So your
Speaker 3: brain isn't broken. There's nothing wrong with you. All of
Speaker 3: these messages that you may have been told through you know, society,
Speaker 3: or yourself or your friends, if you are struggling with
Speaker 3: stress and burnout, you are having a normal, healthy reaction,
Speaker 3: in fact, to an abnormal situation that we are living in.
Speaker 3: So that's kind of the first thing to normalize and
Speaker 3: validate the difficult experience you're going through. And then the
Speaker 3: other big myth I want to debunk is this idea
Speaker 3: of resilience. Right like you hear that word resilience, and
Speaker 3: I don't know about you guys, but I bristle, like
Speaker 3: I cringe. It's such a cringe you word to me,
Speaker 3: because resilience back in twenty eighteen was a positive thing.
Speaker 3: It's like your innate biological ability to adapt, recover, and
Speaker 3: grow in the face of life's challenges, but now it's
Speaker 3: morphed into toxic resilience, which is why we hear that
Speaker 3: word and we're like, oh, don't tell me to be resilient.
Speaker 3: It's the last thing I want to do, because true
Speaker 3: resilience honors your boundaries, honors your human limitations, and really
Speaker 3: respects your need for rest and recovery, your brain and
Speaker 3: bodies need for rest and recovery. Toxic resilience, which is
Speaker 3: a manifestation of hustle culture, is productivity at all costs,
Speaker 3: a mind over matter mindset, and it's like the energizer
Speaker 3: bunny in the US, like just keep going, or in
Speaker 3: the UK, keep calm and carry on. It's this idea
Speaker 3: of a toxic, sinister version of resilience. And I think
Speaker 3: the biggest takeaway is that if you are feeling burned
Speaker 3: out or stressed, it is a myth to say that, oh,
Speaker 3: resilient people don't feel burnout and stress. That has been
Speaker 3: scientifically debunked. In fact, you can still be resilient and
Speaker 3: still experience stress and burnout. They are not mutually exclusive.
Speaker 2: When it comes to. So I'm always like, oh, I'm
Speaker 2: such a great multitasker and I thrive in, you know,
Speaker 2: having a million things at one time. But I'm reading
Speaker 2: how You're like, that's actually not a good thing to
Speaker 2: be like bragging about. So what do I do?
Speaker 3: So multitasking is a myth. I hate to break into you.
Speaker 3: I am a recovered multitasker, and there's no such thing. Scientifically,
Speaker 3: multitasking doesn't exist. When you are multitasking, what you are
Speaker 3: doing is task switching, meaning you are doing two separate
Speaker 3: tasks in rapid secession, and your brain is wired to
Speaker 3: do one thing at a time. Multitasking what it does
Speaker 3: is it weakens a certain part of your brain right
Speaker 3: here behind your forehead called the prefrontal cortex, and that
Speaker 3: area is really important for solving complex problems, memory, cognition, attention,
Speaker 3: and ironically, productivity. Multitasking or task switching, weakens all of
Speaker 3: these elements, particularly your productivity, and so instead of multitasking,
Speaker 3: it is important the antidote to multitasking is monotasking, that
Speaker 3: means doing one thing at a time. So when I
Speaker 3: suggest that, people laugh, like, come on, it's modern. You know,
Speaker 3: we got the slack channel and the emails and a
Speaker 3: million things competing for our attention. How can you monotask?
Speaker 3: You can practice something called time blocking. So let's say
Speaker 3: you guys have an hour to finish four tasks. Instead
Speaker 3: of doing all four tasks at the same time, do
Speaker 3: one task for ten or fifteen minutes and take a
Speaker 3: five ten minute break. Then start tests two and take
Speaker 3: a five or ten minute break, and by the end
Speaker 3: of that hour, you will have completed all four tasks.
Speaker 3: You have made headway on them, maybe not completed, but
Speaker 3: you will have made progress on all four tasks, and
Speaker 3: you have taken a break. And the reason those breaks
Speaker 3: are important for your brain is because the sigence shows
Speaker 3: that when we learn new information, and we're always learning right,
Speaker 3: when we learn new things, it's not actually the activity
Speaker 3: that is when the learning happens, it's during rest, and
Speaker 3: that period of rest is really important for another big
Speaker 3: concept called neural consolidation, another fancy word. It simply means that,
Speaker 3: like new information floating in your head, becomes cemented deep
Speaker 3: into knowledge. So it's the move is the movement from
Speaker 3: information to knowledge. So multitasking is in fact bad for
Speaker 3: the brain. And even though one hundred percent of us
Speaker 3: think we are excellent musciligh taskers. The truth is only
Speaker 3: two percent of human brains can effectively multitask. So instead
Speaker 3: of multitasking, I love it, I love it, try to monotask.
Speaker 3: That's the antidote.
Speaker 1: Okay, I've got one question, one last question. So for
Speaker 1: someone like yourself who's taken a deep dive into your
Speaker 1: field and are incredibly knowledgeable, I think it's a real
Speaker 1: art for someone like I specialize in a certain field,
Speaker 1: I think it's a real art for someone to simplify
Speaker 1: the knowledge. So what you've done is you've taken all
Speaker 1: these thousands and thousands of hours of speaking to people
Speaker 1: and tracing people, and you've put it into five steps.
Speaker 1: Did you find that difficult to take all best knowledge
Speaker 1: and compact it into just five simple steps? Was that
Speaker 1: difficult for you or was it an easy process?
Speaker 3: That is a beautiful question and probably the highest compliment
Speaker 3: I can receive. So thank you for saying that. That
Speaker 3: is always what I strive for. In fact, when I
Speaker 3: give my talks or even in this book, when people
Speaker 3: say like you've just made it so simple for me.
Speaker 3: You know, we all have lots of gifts, and we
Speaker 3: all have many flaws, right, Like we're human beings. We're flawed,
Speaker 3: imperfectly perfect. But one of the things that I have
Speaker 3: always enjoyed doing because I like communication, is taking complex
Speaker 3: information and making it simple. We're easy to digest understand.
Speaker 3: It took me twenty five years to write this book,
Speaker 3: so of course it wasn't overnight. But I think when
Speaker 3: you talk to people when you're a doctor, and I
Speaker 3: always prided myself on not using doctor language as a doctor,
Speaker 3: because I used to hate that. It's called affected speech.
Speaker 3: You know, when people who are doctors speak and they
Speaker 3: like sound like aliens because they're not talking like regular
Speaker 3: everyday people. I loved my doctors or my teachers when
Speaker 3: I was in medical school who just talked to me
Speaker 3: like a regular person, and they spoke like regular people.
Speaker 3: I think it's so much more effective in terms of
Speaker 3: communication when you lead with authenticity and vulnerability. And so
Speaker 3: it took me twenty five years to get to this
Speaker 3: place of wanting to write the book. For ten years
Speaker 3: people have been asking me to write like patients and
Speaker 3: other people and media people, and I was like, no,
Speaker 3: it's not the right time. It was a process, so
Speaker 3: now it's a skill like anything else. I think simplifying
Speaker 3: complex information seems really hard in the beginning, but like
Speaker 3: if you just keep doing it over and over and
Speaker 3: over anything, right, like sports, there's things that you do
Speaker 3: that I could never do in sports, but it just
Speaker 3: is a skill and I just continued to build it.
Speaker 3: But it is truly something I love doing. Like the
Speaker 3: more complicated the better because then I can distill it
Speaker 3: down into manageable, bite sized chunks for all of us
Speaker 3: to digest. Because ultimately, it's like if something feels really
Speaker 3: far away or aspirational, that's the thing with stress. It's
Speaker 3: like often you get these messages about stress and burnout
Speaker 3: and they're so like out there, like go to Bali
Speaker 3: for six months and learn how to surf. Yes, I
Speaker 3: would love it, sign me up for that life plan,
Speaker 3: But that's not real life.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 3: We have financial obligations and parenting obligations and responsibilities and
Speaker 3: all these roles that we fulfill. And so it's about
Speaker 3: finding ways to build in stress relief and burn out
Speaker 3: recovery and reset some of these things in our brains
Speaker 3: and our bodies in the here and now, in the
Speaker 3: messy middle. And so that is what I've aspired to
Speaker 3: do making it as simple as possible and of course
Speaker 3: science based.
Speaker 2: Sure, yeah, I love that you with all of your
Speaker 2: studies and interviewing people. What does the biggest mistake people
Speaker 2: make when it comes to stress? Like, what is the
Speaker 2: one thing that's like, oh, that is that's the constant
Speaker 2: thing that you see with people doing you know, wrong with.
Speaker 3: Doing too many things all at once. So everything but
Speaker 3: the kitchen sink, right, So, like it takes a while
Speaker 3: to get that awareness of wait a second, I think
Speaker 3: get stressed or do I have burnout? And then you
Speaker 3: have that like light bulb moment of yes I have
Speaker 3: burnout or yes I have stress, and then you do
Speaker 3: everything with the kitchen sake. And I've had so many
Speaker 3: patients come in with binders like okay, doc, here's what
Speaker 3: I did, and like, you know, and same thing with
Speaker 3: NER's resolutions. People take on twenty things and then by
Speaker 3: like week two or three, you're down to one, probably zero,
Speaker 3: because the human brain cannot sustain huge lifestyle overhauls during
Speaker 3: periods of stress, and even positive change, like making a
Speaker 3: positive change in your life is a stress on your brain,
Speaker 3: so even positive things, So instead aim for two small
Speaker 3: changes at a time. If you want those changes to stick,
Speaker 3: work with your biology rather than against it. It takes
Speaker 3: eight weeks to create a habit, and part of habit
Speaker 3: formation is actually falling off the wagon and getting back up.
Speaker 3: So like in week two and three, if you're like, oh,
Speaker 3: I'm not going to do that, like there's no way
Speaker 3: you follow that. You know, for three days, you don't
Speaker 3: do it. Four days and you're like, you know what,
Speaker 3: maybe I'll start again. You're not a failure. It's just
Speaker 3: part of the learning process and part of your brain
Speaker 3: circuitry actually wiring in a new and different way. That's
Speaker 3: called neuroplasticity, right, And so that is probably the biggest
Speaker 3: mistake doing too much all at once. Nothing sticks. So
Speaker 3: follow the rule of two. It's called the resilience rule
Speaker 3: of two. It's how your brain responds to change. It's
Speaker 3: why during the pandemic, like you may have had huge,
Speaker 3: lofty goals to do all of these things, and now
Speaker 3: it's a wonder if you shower once a day. It
Speaker 3: needs some vegetables because you can't sustain huge lifestyle aperhols
Speaker 3: during periods of stress. Two small changes at a time
Speaker 3: eight weeks let them fold into your life, and then
Speaker 3: you can add two more and so by the end
Speaker 3: of the year you will have perfected. You know, there's
Speaker 3: fifteen strategies in the five resets, five main principles and
Speaker 3: fifteen strategies, and by the end of the year you
Speaker 3: will have brought in all of those strategies, but not
Speaker 3: all at once because your brain and body can't handle it.
Speaker 2: In one of the resets, a second reset, it's find
Speaker 2: Quiet in a Noisy World? Are then, are you a
Speaker 2: fan of Does that mean meditation or what is your
Speaker 2: best tool for that?
Speaker 3: I personally have meditated for a long, long time, several decades.
Speaker 3: It's not for everyone, and it's certainly not something I
Speaker 3: recommend in that particular reset Find your Quiet in a
Speaker 3: Noisy World. It is all about digital boundaries and sleep.
Speaker 3: Those are the two biggest buckets of finding your quiet.
Speaker 3: And what are digital boundaries? We have boundaries in every
Speaker 3: other relationship in our life, right like our partners, colleagues, friends, children,
Speaker 3: and yet we have no boundaries or as boundaries when
Speaker 3: it comes to our relationships with our digital devices, and
Speaker 3: the science shows that creating a sense of a boundary.
Speaker 3: This is not about becoming a digital monk because the
Speaker 3: science also shows that our health and well being is
Speaker 3: actually improved by decreasing our reliance on devices rather than
Speaker 3: giving them up entirely. That doesn't seem to have as
Speaker 3: much benefit. But it's about creating some boundaries. And why
Speaker 3: do you want to create boundaries? So there's some geographical
Speaker 3: boundaries you could create, and some logistical boundaries you could create.
Speaker 3: Think about what you do first thing in the morning,
Speaker 3: before your second eye is even open. Most of us,
Speaker 3: like me and all of us, over fifty percent of
Speaker 3: people scroll subtle device. Right, you're checking your phone first
Speaker 3: thing in the morning and before your second eye is
Speaker 3: even open. Think about what that's doing to your brain.
Speaker 3: These are not benign entities. You are scrolling the headlines,
Speaker 3: social media, your work email, all of these things. You've
Speaker 3: just had a good night's sleep, or if you have
Speaker 3: a lot of stress, you've had a fragmented or disruptive
Speaker 3: sense of sleep. Your brain and your body are fresh,
Speaker 3: you're awake, and you're scrolling, and that is activating the
Speaker 3: stress response in your brain. And instead, create a digital boundary.
Speaker 3: Keep your phone off your nightstand, invest in a low
Speaker 3: cost alarm clock instead. This is not about being a
Speaker 3: digital monkt abstinence. You can check your phone, but you know,
Speaker 3: wake up. Take in the light of day, look at
Speaker 3: your bed partner, if you have one, brush your teeth,
Speaker 3: and then check your phone, so creating a little buffer.
Speaker 3: And then at night, same thing. When it's off your nightstand.
Speaker 3: You're not scrolling in the middle of the night. During
Speaker 3: the day, keep it off, out of arms reach and
Speaker 3: out of sight. And the reason you want to do
Speaker 3: that is because when you are feeling a sense of
Speaker 3: stress or burnout, you have a primal urge to scroll.
Speaker 3: We've all been there when you're feeling a sense of stress,
Speaker 3: like you're like this, you're scrolling and scrolling. You don't
Speaker 3: know why. It doesn't feel good, but you can't stop.
Speaker 3: The reason you can't stop is because it's a biological
Speaker 3: wiring of our brain. You know. Evolutionarily, when we all
Speaker 3: lived as strive as people, when we were all cave people,
Speaker 3: there was a night watchman who kept watch on the
Speaker 3: tribe while everyone slept right and now we have all
Speaker 3: become our own night watchmen. And when you are feeling
Speaker 3: a sense of stress, you're a migdala, which is a
Speaker 3: small almond shape structure deep in the brain is what's
Speaker 3: creating that fight or flight response and the stress response,
Speaker 3: that sense of hypervigilance. Your middala is focused on survival
Speaker 3: and self preservation, immediate needs, immediate sense of safety, and
Speaker 3: a sense of danger. And so you scroll because it's
Speaker 3: a way to keep yourself safe. You're scanning for danger.
Speaker 3: You're scrolling, You're seeing what's in the news, what's in
Speaker 3: the headlines, what's on social media. And so how can
Speaker 3: when you're amygdalas on and you're feeling a sense of stress,
Speaker 3: how can you shut that off by creating digital boundaries,
Speaker 3: by letting the other part of your brain what we
Speaker 3: talked about earlier, that prefrontal cortex take over again. And
Speaker 3: so it's a scientific principle, but it doesn't have to
Speaker 3: feel scientific. You just take your phone and keep it
Speaker 3: out of arms reach, keep it off your nightstand. So
Speaker 3: creating those boundaries can really do wonders for your sleep,
Speaker 3: your energy, your mental bandwidth. It also decreases something called
Speaker 3: popcorn brain, which is a phenomenon that many of us have.
Speaker 3: Most of us have. It's not internet addiction. Internet addiction
Speaker 3: is when you are consuming and you're online, and it's
Speaker 3: affecting your relationships, for your work and other things. That's
Speaker 3: not most of us. Most of us have popcorn brain,
Speaker 3: which is a real biological phenomenon where you are spending
Speaker 3: so much time online that your brain circuitry starts. You
Speaker 3: have that sensation of popping. It's not truly popping, but
Speaker 3: it's that sensation. It's hard to live offline because you
Speaker 3: are just like always, you know, hyper stimulated, over stimulated.
Speaker 3: So it decreases that sense of popcorn brain, which in
Speaker 3: turn decreases your stress. So it's like this loop and
Speaker 3: you have to break that cycle. And the circuit breaker
Speaker 3: is a digital boundary.
Speaker 2: I love that boundary. Up. We have boundaries like no, no,
Speaker 2: the phone's the dinner table, the bits, right, that's a
Speaker 2: big one, the big boundary. And the kids. I love
Speaker 2: that because for some reason, no, you remember, they like
Speaker 2: hid your phone the other day.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they love it.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, that's like they get to like have that,
Speaker 2: which is which is cute. But thank you so much
Speaker 2: for coming on. Everyone, go get the five resets, rewire
Speaker 2: your brain and body for less stress and more resilience.
Speaker 2: We appreciate you, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 3: It was such a fuss, so sweet guys. Thank you
Speaker 3: so much. Guys.
Speaker 1: Bye,