Speaker 1: Welcome to the Psychology Podcast, where we give you insights
Speaker 1: into the mind, brain, behavior, and creativity. I'm doctor Scott
Speaker 1: Barry Kaufman, and in each episode I have a conversation
Speaker 1: with a guest who will stimulate your mind and give
Speaker 1: you a greater understanding of yourself, others, and the world
Speaker 1: to live in. Hopefully we'll also provide a glimpse into
Speaker 1: human possibility. Thanks for listening and enjoy the podcast today.
Speaker 1: It's a great honor to have Aj Jacobs on the podcast.
Speaker 1: Jacobs is the author of Thanks a Thousand, It's All Relative,
Speaker 1: Drop Dead Healthy, and the New York Times bestsellers, The
Speaker 1: Note All, The Year of Living Biblically, and My Life
Speaker 1: as an Experiment. He is a contribute MPR and has
Speaker 1: written for The New York Times, the Washington Post, and
Speaker 1: Entertainment Weekly. AJ lives in New York City with his
Speaker 1: wife and kids. And I'm grateful too, kindam as a friend,
Speaker 1: Thanks for being on the show today, A J. Thank you, Scott.
Speaker 1: I hope you considered me a friend as well or else.
Speaker 1: That's awkward. I know I should have said that. Yes, absolutely,
Speaker 1: I consider you a friend and I'm an avid listener
Speaker 1: of your podcast, so thank you for putting that out.
Speaker 1: I listen on Double Speed, so I get twice as
Speaker 1: much Scott Barry Kaufman, So don't be insulted. But I
Speaker 1: do love it. And sometimes I'll even listen twice on
Speaker 1: double Speed, so it's as if I were listening on
Speaker 1: single Speed. I love that. Well, I'm honored to hear that,
Speaker 1: and I'm going to start actually going to start editing
Speaker 1: the podcast and Double Speed. But that's a little background
Speaker 1: information that no one needs to know. Okay, So what
Speaker 1: a really interesting book, What a really neat and clever
Speaker 1: way to talk about the late of science of gratitude
Speaker 1: through your own exploration. And you call it Project Gratitude.
Speaker 1: Is that right? Yes? Exactly? So what is the project exactly? Well,
Speaker 1: the project is. It started a couple of years ago
Speaker 1: when I had read all of this research, including by you,
Speaker 1: about how important gratitude is. You know, it's good for
Speaker 1: every part of your mental health, your happiness level and
Speaker 1: recovering from illness, even and sleep and all sorts of
Speaker 1: so I knew it was important. So I decided to
Speaker 1: start this ritual of saying a prayer of Thanksgiving before
Speaker 1: every meal. But the trick is I'm agnostic, so it
Speaker 1: was kind of weird to thank God, so I didn't
Speaker 1: do that. So instead I would thank the people. So
Speaker 1: I would think, you know, the farmer who grew the tomatoes,
Speaker 1: and then the trucker who drove the tomatoes to the store.
Speaker 1: And one day my ten year old son said, you know, Dad,
Speaker 1: that's kind of lame. Those people can't hear you. You're
Speaker 1: thanking them, but what good is that doing. You should
Speaker 1: go out, if you cared, you would go out and
Speaker 1: thank them in person. And I said, that is a
Speaker 1: very interesting idea a writer. I'm like, that's a book idea.
Speaker 1: I am going to So thank you to my son
Speaker 1: for earning his supper. And I went around the world
Speaker 1: for several months thanking over a thousand people who had
Speaker 1: even the smallest role in making my cup of coffee
Speaker 1: of reality. So not just the baristo and the farmer,
Speaker 1: but those but also anyone you can think of, the
Speaker 1: logo designer, the person who drove the beans in his truck,
Speaker 1: and if he couldn't have done his job without the road.
Speaker 1: So I thank the road pavers and the people who
Speaker 1: painted the yellow lines on the road. So the truck
Speaker 1: didn't veer into traffic, and you realize there are hundreds
Speaker 1: of people we take for granted in every little thing
Speaker 1: we do, and it was it was a life altering experience.
Speaker 1: That's wonderful. Before we go into more detail about those things,
Speaker 1: let me just step back a moment and get a
Speaker 1: very meta look at aj Jacobs. So you I love
Speaker 1: stepping back. Yeah. Cool. So you talk about how dispositionally
Speaker 1: you're moderately grumpy, right, you said to say you're like
Speaker 1: a hybrid between Orry David and who else? Well, I'm
Speaker 1: going with mister Rogers now it's sort of in my mind. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's a fight, and I think this is in everybody.
Speaker 1: There's a fight between the Larry David side and the
Speaker 1: mister Rogers side. And I think, if you believe evolutionary psychology,
Speaker 1: which I think has some merit, we are bred to
Speaker 1: be Larry David's that we have a built in negative
Speaker 1: bias because in Paleolithic times that had sur rival value.
Speaker 1: You know, you wanted to be able to focus on
Speaker 1: the lion, You wanted to remember the one mushroom out
Speaker 1: of ten that was poisonous, So you were drawn to
Speaker 1: the negative. So to me, the idea was to bulk
Speaker 1: up my mister Rogers, just get him ripped and so
Speaker 1: he can take on the Larry David. And it's a
Speaker 1: lot about cognitive behavioral psychology, which I learned about on
Speaker 1: your show. Well, you know, the last two books, like
Speaker 1: this book and your most recent one, I mean, are
Speaker 1: incredibly incredibly compassionate books. One they really point towards a
Speaker 1: unified theme of brotherly love, you know, not in group love,
Speaker 1: but brotherly love and really appreciating as much of the
Speaker 1: world as possible. If one were just to read those
Speaker 1: two books, which I did, I am one who did,
Speaker 1: I didn't at all get a Larry David from them.
Speaker 1: So have you like radically changed your personality in the
Speaker 1: last fifteen years? Also hanging out with you, like, I
Speaker 1: consider you one of the most compassionate, thoughtful humans that
Speaker 1: I know in this world. So if you're the Larry David,
Speaker 1: then the world's really in trouble. I don't know, I
Speaker 1: don't know. Like, well, that is very nice of you
Speaker 1: to say, and I mean, the Larry David within me
Speaker 1: is strong, but I really addle it, so you don't
Speaker 1: say it out loud. So even in this conversation, right now, Like,
Speaker 1: is the real age age Jacobs having like negative thoughts
Speaker 1: about me? What is that? And you just never well,
Speaker 1: I don't believe in there's a real Aja. I know.
Speaker 1: I think that is there one side of aj who's
Speaker 1: like being hyper critical of everything. But I am pushing
Speaker 1: that side down because I think this is another theme
Speaker 1: in my books is that acting is so powerful. I
Speaker 1: didn't make this quote up, but I love it. It's
Speaker 1: easier to act your way into a new way of
Speaker 1: thinking than to think your way into a new way
Speaker 1: of acting. And this is wisdom that goes back to
Speaker 1: Ecclesiastes in the Bible, and it's also talked about in
Speaker 1: cognitive behavioral psychology that if you act in a certain way,
Speaker 1: your mind eventually catches up. So that's what I've been doing.
Speaker 1: I try to act compassionately even when I don't feel it,
Speaker 1: and eventually my mind will catch up. And that has
Speaker 1: been the way I did this with gratitude. You know,
Speaker 1: I didn't. I woke up grumpy most days, but I
Speaker 1: would force myself to write an hour worth of thank
Speaker 1: you notes and by the end it actually my mind
Speaker 1: had caught up. But do your emotions ever catch up? Like,
Speaker 1: do you feel like you genuinely feel more caring towards people? Oh? Yeah,
Speaker 1: my mind, I meant emotions. Okay, I think your emotions
Speaker 1: do follow your actions. I think it's an incredibly powerful
Speaker 1: We always think of the inside affecting the outside, but
Speaker 1: often you can make it the outside affects the inner.
Speaker 1: Behavior affects your thoughts and feelings. Good. And I like
Speaker 1: this because you're saying, even if someone as grumpy as
Speaker 1: you can become this gratitude like it, there's hope for
Speaker 1: for anyone. Sure. And I am also very lucky because
Speaker 1: in the book I have a gratitude guru, as I
Speaker 1: call them, and that gratitude guru is a highly respected
Speaker 1: author and podcaster, Scott very Caught. I want to thank
Speaker 1: you because, as you know, it's like, who's that, who's this?
Speaker 1: This guy's taking my but I quote you several times
Speaker 1: in the book with your wisdom on how to become
Speaker 1: more grateful and strategies, because that's what I love is
Speaker 1: sort of I don't think it comes naturally to us,
Speaker 1: so coming up with these practices and strategies to make
Speaker 1: us more grateful. Yeah, it was my pleasure to talk
Speaker 1: to you and that really will get you all those strategies.
Speaker 1: That'll be something I know the listeners probably care even
Speaker 1: more about than your own personality. But so insulted. No,
Speaker 1: are you really inserted? Are you really insulted? Absolutely? So
Speaker 1: you wrote nine hundred and sixty four thank you notes?
Speaker 1: That is? Did I say that nine hundred and sixty one?
Speaker 1: I thought I broke a thousand, I think, But yes
Speaker 1: I did that, and I think you know, some of
Speaker 1: them were written, some were emailed somewhere old fashioned, somewhere
Speaker 1: over the phone, and some were in person. And it was,
Speaker 1: as I say, it was a remarkable experience, because on
Speaker 1: the one hand, is a pain in the ass, you know,
Speaker 1: to write that many thank you know ites, thank deam.
Speaker 1: But on the other hand, it feels from a selfish
Speaker 1: point of view, it feels really good after a while,
Speaker 1: because I remember I call the woman who does pest
Speaker 1: control or the warehouse where my coffee beans are kept,
Speaker 1: and I said, you know, I know this sounds strange,
Speaker 1: but I just want to thank you for keeping the
Speaker 1: bugs out of my coffee. And she said, well, that
Speaker 1: is strange. I'll give it to you. But it also
Speaker 1: has it's a highlight of my day because we don't
Speaker 1: get thanked a lot. Who calls the pest control people.
Speaker 1: So feeling appreciated is such an important part of well being.
Speaker 1: And I think that that really hit home, and then
Speaker 1: that would make me feel good. I'd get the dopamine
Speaker 1: or oxytocin or whatever it is. So there's I love it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: It's one of the greatest parts of human and nature
Speaker 1: to me is that being nice can be a selfish act.
Speaker 1: You know, I don't believe that that's why we do it,
Speaker 1: but I believe that the byproduct of being nice will
Speaker 1: make you happier, which is just a wonderful coincidence. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I had a podcast chat recent with Steve Stewart Williams,
Speaker 1: an evolutionary psychologist who argues that altruism is not selfish
Speaker 1: if you get a genuine enjoyment from the giving act.
Speaker 1: It's only selfish when you are giving to someone, so
Speaker 1: that it's a means to an end for something else.
Speaker 1: So I wouldn't actually say that selfish. If you feel
Speaker 1: it's not selfish. If you feel good helping people, that's
Speaker 1: not selfish. That's altruistic. Great. Yeah, I mean I would
Speaker 1: say it's sort of a semantic thing. But I think
Speaker 1: as a way to market being nice, it's good to
Speaker 1: remind people that it's like, you know, a little hit
Speaker 1: of yeah prozac. By being nice, it can actually make
Speaker 1: you happier. Yeah, I think that's right. And you picked coffee.
Speaker 1: Is this you're drinking coffee right now? In fact, well
Speaker 1: you do that again. I'm going to screen capture that. Okay,
Speaker 1: So I mean I can even tell as you're drinking
Speaker 1: it right now, you're doing it very mindfully and appreciative,
Speaker 1: like it didn't go away, right, true? Yeah, well I try.
Speaker 1: I mean, I chose coffee because it's such a big
Speaker 1: you know, it's I can't function without it, and it's
Speaker 1: they're two billion cups of coffee drunk every day, and
Speaker 1: it has an effect on every part of our lives.
Speaker 1: And I also thought that it would show just how
Speaker 1: many hundreds of people are involved in every little part
Speaker 1: of our lives. So you know, this coffee was made
Speaker 1: with the help of biologists and miners and goat herters
Speaker 1: and shippers, and it just goes on and on. And
Speaker 1: the part that you brought up about being mindful while
Speaker 1: drinking coffee, this is one of my favorite lessons that
Speaker 1: I learned from you was the idea of savoring, which
Speaker 1: is really integral to gratitude, and it will make your
Speaker 1: life much better because, as you put it, the key
Speaker 1: is to take a moment and really just latch on,
Speaker 1: slow down time, stretch it out, because otherwise life goes
Speaker 1: by in a flash and it all blurs together. And
Speaker 1: that's what I tried to do with coffee in a
Speaker 1: literal sense. Try to save for it. You know, we're
Speaker 1: all busy, but if you leave on your tongue for
Speaker 1: just two extra seconds and think about it, it will
Speaker 1: make your life better. And one of the people I
Speaker 1: thinked on my journey was the guy who buys the
Speaker 1: coffee beans. He goes around to South America Africa to
Speaker 1: buy coffee beans, and he's hilarious because he will take
Speaker 1: a sip of coffee and you know, his face will
Speaker 1: light up and he'll say, oh, I'm getting hints of
Speaker 1: maple syrup and apricot, you know, like overripe apricot. And
Speaker 1: I'll take a sip and I'll be like, I'm picking
Speaker 1: up coffee. Is to me, there's some coffee taste. But uh,
Speaker 1: if you do focus just for two seconds on the
Speaker 1: texture and the acidity and the sweetness. It will make
Speaker 1: your life better. So that's what I try to do.
Speaker 1: But you know, of course there's we're all busy, so
Speaker 1: there's the temptation to guzzle. So you've got to really
Speaker 1: work at it. Make it a practice, absolutely with almost
Speaker 1: anything in your daily life. I was a really good
Speaker 1: example how you dug into that. So you started this
Speaker 1: project in reverse, starting with your local cafe and then
Speaker 1: working solely backward to the birth of the coffee. Let's
Speaker 1: start with the barista. It's barista, right, yeah, I think so?
Speaker 1: And is that gender neutral? Am I? Is that political correct? Barista? Yes? Right?
Speaker 1: I think Okay, So I think it's gender fluid to
Speaker 1: use a yeah, is it a fluid term since coffee
Speaker 1: is a fluid get it? I do get it. That
Speaker 1: was That was good, So let's start with this. Cut
Speaker 1: that out. So what do we not really appreciate about
Speaker 1: the life of a barista? Well, a barista's life is
Speaker 1: not easy, you know. I spend a lot of time
Speaker 1: talking to my local barista, Chung Lee is her name,
Speaker 1: at Joe Coffee in New York. And you're encountering people
Speaker 1: in a very dangerous state, which is pre caffeination, so
Speaker 1: people are not at their best, and she's had people
Speaker 1: make her cry just by being rude, and to her,
Speaker 1: one of the worst parts is people treat her like
Speaker 1: a venting machine. But yeah, they just hand her their
Speaker 1: credit card without even looking up from their phones. They're
Speaker 1: just you know, focused and don't acknowledge her humanity, and
Speaker 1: she says, you know, it just makes her feel terrible,
Speaker 1: and so, you know, talking to her, I made the
Speaker 1: vow to actually make two seconds of eye contact when
Speaker 1: I have interactions with people. And I know that you're
Speaker 1: calling the Nobel Prize committ in Oslo right now, but
Speaker 1: it's actually it's such a small expenditure and it has
Speaker 1: such a big impact, you know, low cost, high benefit
Speaker 1: for everyone and not just her. You know, it makes
Speaker 1: me feel better because I do think we're programmed to
Speaker 1: be social and look people in the face. So yeah,
Speaker 1: that was the big lesson from Chung the barista. And
Speaker 1: I will say this, she never said this, but I've
Speaker 1: read I read about Barisa's and some of them, probably
Speaker 1: not the majority, Like if you're a jerk to them,
Speaker 1: they will give you decaf to even so or extra caffeine.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, maybe the other way exactly. Okay, Look, so
Speaker 1: you know you bring in very cleverly, you we even
Speaker 1: seamlessly the science. So Bob Emmons has done a lot
Speaker 1: of great work on this. And what does he argue
Speaker 1: to the enemy of gratitude? Well, first of all, I
Speaker 1: loved when I interviewed you, you were very clear to
Speaker 1: thank Bob Emmons. Well, he's alleged in this field the legend,
Speaker 1: and he does well I think, and you know you
Speaker 1: know better than me. But he talks about taking things
Speaker 1: for granted as being an enemy of gratitude because it's
Speaker 1: so easy to forget just how much goes into every
Speaker 1: little thing we do. I could have literally written about
Speaker 1: one hundred different books depending on which corridors I went down.
Speaker 1: You know, I could have gone down the cup corridor
Speaker 1: and just talked about the lumberjacks and the people who
Speaker 1: make the helmets for the lumberjacks and who they are.
Speaker 1: And so did I get the answer right? Is that
Speaker 1: what the enemy of gratitude is? So what did you
Speaker 1: actually say, was the enemy of gratitude there take things
Speaker 1: for granted? Oh, taking things for granted? Well, I don't know.
Speaker 1: He said grateful living as possible only when we realize
Speaker 1: that other people and agents do things for us that
Speaker 1: we cannot do for ourselves. Is that right, that's pretty
Speaker 1: much the same thing, right, same area? Yea, I mean that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the quote I put in the book, and I
Speaker 1: loved it because it is realizing are humans involved and
Speaker 1: a lot of thought. And that's one of my favorite
Speaker 1: parts of the project, was just realizing how much thought
Speaker 1: goes into every little part of life. Like even this,
Speaker 1: I know it's a podcast, but this, I'll I'll take
Speaker 1: another picture. It's cardboard sleeve around the cup. At first
Speaker 1: of all, that has a name, which I love. It's
Speaker 1: Zarf Zarf. And there were zarfs even in ancient China too,
Speaker 1: made of gold and silver, and now they're made of cardboard.
Speaker 1: But just the fact that someone came up with it,
Speaker 1: and I interviewed the guy who came up with it,
Speaker 1: like thirty years ago, who was in a car picking
Speaker 1: his daughter up and he got a cup of coffee
Speaker 1: to go and it's spilt on his lap because it
Speaker 1: was too hot, and he's like, I'm going to solve
Speaker 1: this problem. So just realizing that there was someone behind
Speaker 1: that who came up with him and there are hundreds
Speaker 1: of people who manufacture it. How do you spell that?
Speaker 1: Z A R F ZARF. Okay, I'm going to tweet
Speaker 1: out picture of the screen capture I just took, and
Speaker 1: my look on my face is one of wonder and
Speaker 1: awe and uh that's what I want. Yeah, important emotion.
Speaker 1: I gotta say, that is what I was trying to
Speaker 1: tap into a lot of the time. Yeah, I'm correlated
Speaker 1: with gratitude. Yeah, so Bob. Back to Bob, you know,
Speaker 1: he argues that the gratitude emergers from two different information
Speaker 1: processing forms of information processing are stages. What are they
Speaker 1: exam in my book? I know it's in my book.
Speaker 1: I'll tell you. I'll say, sorry, Affirmation and recognition. It's
Speaker 1: a good book. I do that too. I do that too.
Speaker 1: So he argues that we affirm the good and credit
Speaker 1: others with bringing it about. So affirmation and recognition. I
Speaker 1: just wondering if you could talk about and maybe give
Speaker 1: it a couple of examples of, like throughout the course
Speaker 1: of this journey where you utilized both. Yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: I think affirmation is so crucial. And there was just
Speaker 1: a study like a month ago that you might have
Speaker 1: sent me. But it was about how we overestimate how
Speaker 1: awkward it's going to be to thank people and underestimate
Speaker 1: how it is to them. And I love that study
Speaker 1: because it is a little awkward, you know, calling people
Speaker 1: out of the blue. And even in my own life,
Speaker 1: I would during you know, I became enamored of gratitude,
Speaker 1: so I would. I called my old boss, who was like,
Speaker 1: you know, I hadn't spoken to him fifteen years, but
Speaker 1: just called to thank him for that all he taught me.
Speaker 1: And it's awkward, you know, because I hadn't talked to him,
Speaker 1: but it was also very meaningful to I, at least
Speaker 1: me and I think him. So affirmation is crucial, and
Speaker 1: recognition is one of my crusades is to show that.
Speaker 1: There's a whole section in the book about one of
Speaker 1: the guy who does the tasting for coffee. He's also
Speaker 1: in a band, like an alternative rock band, and he's
Speaker 1: a bassist, and he talks about how important bassists are.
Speaker 1: They don't get the limelight like the lead singer or
Speaker 1: the lead guitar, but they are so crucial. And I
Speaker 1: found that such a great metaphor for so much of life,
Speaker 1: and that basis, you know, psychologist, like you call it
Speaker 1: the responsibility bias, that we tend to focus on one
Speaker 1: person that we think is responsible for so much, when
Speaker 1: in fact it's almost always a team effort. And there's
Speaker 1: a part in my book that actually I got from
Speaker 1: Adam Grant's book on Give and Take, where we talk
Speaker 1: about Jonas Salk. And you know, I don't want to
Speaker 1: attack Jonahs Salt, but I'm going to because Adam did.
Speaker 1: But he you know, of course he did a great
Speaker 1: thing by inventing the polio vaccine, but he was also
Speaker 1: kind of a jerk because he gave very little credit
Speaker 1: to his collaborators and there were lots of them, including
Speaker 1: six crucial people in his lab, so that made them
Speaker 1: very upset. And I think it's just bad for society
Speaker 1: as a whole that like everyone feels they have to
Speaker 1: be a rock star and if you aren't a rock star,
Speaker 1: then you're dissatisfied, when in fact you can lead a
Speaker 1: wonderful life as part of a team. And then there's
Speaker 1: this I don't have this in the book, but there's
Speaker 1: a story that really sticks with me, and it is
Speaker 1: it's not apocryphal. I actually looked it up. It is
Speaker 1: when John F. Kennedy was president and was touring NASA headquarters.
Speaker 1: They came upon a janitor and just like sweeping up
Speaker 1: the hallway and JFK said, what's your job here? And
Speaker 1: he said, my job is to help put people on
Speaker 1: the moon. And I just love that because framing your
Speaker 1: life like that gives it so much purpose. And it's true,
Speaker 1: he's not the you know, the astronauts could not do
Speaker 1: their job if they slip on the hallway and you know,
Speaker 1: break their skull. And so it sounded like someone just
Speaker 1: fell and broke their skull. What does that sound serious? No?
Speaker 1: Do you that I have my headphones on. Okay, I
Speaker 1: heard something like drop in the background. Okay, did I
Speaker 1: go check them in? Sure, there's no one. I think
Speaker 1: we're good. Okay, good, okay, good. But anyway, that I
Speaker 1: thought was a lovely story and a lovely way to, yeah,
Speaker 1: to reframe your life, you know, and I love it.
Speaker 1: I really love it. I mean the reframing your life
Speaker 1: no matter what job you're in. I mean that's kind
Speaker 1: of like an easter egg or of your book. Like
Speaker 1: your book has lots of threads, right, and you have
Speaker 1: your main thread, but I feel like there's all these
Speaker 1: other really kind of profound points that were not kind
Speaker 1: of you're either profound points. Yeah, and you know, you
Speaker 1: said a couple of things I wanted to talk about.
Speaker 1: So one thing you said saying thank you, but you
Speaker 1: you're right about how people consider it more sincere if
Speaker 1: you use the phrase I'm very grateful or yeah, I couldn't.
Speaker 1: I couldn't be more grateful? Is that right? That's a
Speaker 1: better way of saying it than thank you. That was
Speaker 1: a study of Wharton study that I think Robert Evans
Speaker 1: talked about in one of his books. Yeah, that actually
Speaker 1: saying I think that it's the problem is thank you
Speaker 1: might seem robotic it, you know, it sort of falls
Speaker 1: ontoa fears So anything to shake it up and to
Speaker 1: remind people, you know, I'm not just saying these words,
Speaker 1: I'm feeling this emotion. And so I would say that
Speaker 1: to my wife and I'd be like, I am deeply
Speaker 1: grateful that you took our son to the orthodontist, and
Speaker 1: she'd be like, are you in some sort of cult?
Speaker 1: Like what the hell is this deeply grateful? But well
Speaker 1: that's just her personality. Yeah, exactly, So I wouldn't use
Speaker 1: the word deeply that seems to be going too far,
Speaker 1: but anyway to shake it up and be creative. And
Speaker 1: I found that in terms of of thanking in general,
Speaker 1: it's so much more powerful to be specific. And I
Speaker 1: am now in the midst of writing one to promote
Speaker 1: the book. I agreed. I have the idea to write
Speaker 1: one thousand thank you notes to readers, and I've actually
Speaker 1: reached a thousand, but I'm extending it because I'm it's
Speaker 1: such a delight. It's a pain in the ass, but
Speaker 1: it's also delightful. So can I just if people want it?
Speaker 1: Ajjacobs dot com slash thanks and there's a form and
Speaker 1: you go, I'll put on the show NOTESJ Yeah, please.
Speaker 1: I would love to write more. And what I love
Speaker 1: about it though, is you know it's got your You
Speaker 1: put in your name and your address, but then you
Speaker 1: put in a note of you know what you're interested in.
Speaker 1: It could be you know, you love the Seattle Seahawks
Speaker 1: or whatever, or you know you're graduating dentistry school. And
Speaker 1: I am able to write these very specific notes to
Speaker 1: these people and then they say some lovely things and
Speaker 1: I'm able respond to those. And sometimes things get weird. Well,
Speaker 1: you know, I've gotten a lot of people who want
Speaker 1: me to thank their dog, which is fine. I understand
Speaker 1: I'm a dog person. One guy wanted me to thank
Speaker 1: his ex wife for divorcing him, so, which I suppose,
Speaker 1: you know, if it's probably better that she divorced him.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I am loving that. But the more specific
Speaker 1: a thank you note or face to face thank you
Speaker 1: is the more powerful for both parties. That's great. Let's
Speaker 1: keep up the list of some strategies people can do
Speaker 1: to increase their sense of gratitude in their early life.
Speaker 1: Can you talk about some others? Yeah, Well, one that
Speaker 1: I use every single day is that when I'm trying
Speaker 1: to go to sleep, instead of counting sheep, I count
Speaker 1: things I'm grateful for. And I do it alphabetically, so
Speaker 1: I might start at A and you know, I'm thankful
Speaker 1: for the honey Chris Bappel. I just had honey Chris
Speaker 1: Bapple yesterday, and I just I always forget how good
Speaker 1: honey Crisp is, and then be could be you know.
Speaker 1: I talked to Scott Barry Kaufman today and ye Erry,
Speaker 1: it's a stretch, but I wantn't get you in there. Uh,
Speaker 1: it's a stretch that you would be grateful for talking
Speaker 1: to me today. No, the b for gotcha. I thought
Speaker 1: it would be more natural to k or yes, but
Speaker 1: that would take too long to get there. Well, the
Speaker 1: honeycomb thing starts with an h anyway than apple, so
Speaker 1: it's all good. Yeah, there you go. Okay, So yeah,
Speaker 1: I find that very helpful for falling asleep, because I
Speaker 1: rarely I don't think I've ever gotten to z. I
Speaker 1: usually am out by like amazing. So you just fall
Speaker 1: asleep because otherwise my mind I don't trust my mind.
Speaker 1: I think that if you leave it alone, it can
Speaker 1: go into some you know, rumination. It's really attracted to
Speaker 1: rumination and worries, and so I have to fight that.
Speaker 1: And this is a discipline I use to fight it. Good. No,
Speaker 1: that's great. One. Okay, should we do another strategy? Sure? Sure,
Speaker 1: hold on, let me think of it. One you've already
Speaker 1: talked about is just writing thank you notes to people.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, and there's tons of research on that, as
Speaker 1: you know. I mean, there was I think a famous
Speaker 1: experiment where the idea is and you did this with
Speaker 1: your students, I believe, is that right? It is one
Speaker 1: of the exercises that's right. Yeah, yeah, so you can
Speaker 1: talk about it better than I can't tell the ideas
Speaker 1: that you have to write and not a long thank
Speaker 1: you note. So what did you ask? Maybe just tell
Speaker 1: me what you asked your students to do, because I
Speaker 1: think it is similar to what I did. Oh, I'd
Speaker 1: be happy to tell you. Well, I I feel like
Speaker 1: you're an expert on this, so why not get your
Speaker 1: point of view? Let me just google my course syllabis. Ah, okay,
Speaker 1: if you're googling yourself, that's okay. Yeah. And by the way,
Speaker 1: niece went to the University of Pennsylvania and took your
Speaker 1: course and found it incredibly meaningful. So oh, thank you
Speaker 1: on behalf of her. You're being like really nice to
Speaker 1: me today. I mean you're you always, I mean you
Speaker 1: always are nice to me, but I feel particularly glowing. Well,
Speaker 1: you know, it's the mist around your sign. Listen, he's
Speaker 1: really in full force today. I might get tired. When
Speaker 1: you get tired, then that's when the Larry David side
Speaker 1: comes out. So you might want to Yeah, you don't
Speaker 1: want to go too long or else that will come
Speaker 1: Larry David. But honestly, you know you can be with me.
Speaker 1: No matter how you feel, you know that I'm not.
Speaker 1: I'm very non judgmental, So I'll read the activity that
Speaker 1: I had the students do. So the exercise is choose
Speaker 1: a person in your life who has been especially kind
Speaker 1: to you but me not have ever heard you express
Speaker 1: your deep gratitude to them. Rate him or her a
Speaker 1: letter with the intention of reading it out loud to
Speaker 1: this person. If at all possible, Describe in detail what
Speaker 1: the person has done for you and exactly how it
Speaker 1: has affected your life. Mention how often you remember his
Speaker 1: or her efforts, and how you may plan to pay
Speaker 1: this kindness forward somehow, if possible, read the letter out
Speaker 1: loud to the recipient. If this is not possible, you
Speaker 1: can read the letter over the phone or mail the
Speaker 1: letter and follow up with a phone call complete a
Speaker 1: rin reflection to detailing what it felt like to engage
Speaker 1: in this gratitude intervention. You may feel free to share
Speaker 1: the letter itself and your reflection, but you do not
Speaker 1: have to. So that's the lovely And do you have
Speaker 1: any Do you remember any particular instances where it was
Speaker 1: particularly powerful for a student? You know, I do, I
Speaker 1: vaguely do now I remember receiving a long email from
Speaker 1: a student three four years ago saying like, while I
Speaker 1: totally rekindled with like my dad, who haven't talked to
Speaker 1: in many years, or something like yeah, this person like
Speaker 1: really felt like they reformed a connection that was meaningful
Speaker 1: to them. Yeah. Yeah, and I think that the research,
Speaker 1: if I remember correctly, says that it has a lasting effect.
Speaker 1: It's not just you know, a week, It like lasts months,
Speaker 1: if not years. The sort of the boost you get
Speaker 1: from doing exercise like this. Yeah, we don't know exactly
Speaker 1: how long, but certainly at least two weeks. I would say, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's nothing. If you write one of those notes every
Speaker 1: two weeks, then you know, oh yeah, booster shots. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's what you gotta do for sure. So did you
Speaker 1: want to talk about any other strategies you did? Like
Speaker 1: maybe one more? Sure? Let me think of that. Where
Speaker 1: the other strategies, Well, all right. One strategy I had
Speaker 1: is just making sure I notice the hundreds of things
Speaker 1: that go right every day, because that, as you know,
Speaker 1: my default mode is to notice the three or four
Speaker 1: that go wrong. So you can do this a number
Speaker 1: of ways. One is just like spend five minutes, you know,
Speaker 1: I would press the elevator button. I'd be thankful the
Speaker 1: elevator came, I'd get in the elevator. I'd be thankful
Speaker 1: it didn't plummet to the basement and break my classical.
Speaker 1: So you can make a list in five minutes of
Speaker 1: one hundred things that go right that we take for granted.
Speaker 1: Another way to do this was to really make a
Speaker 1: note when something goes right. Because, for instance, if you
Speaker 1: asked me five years ago, what's your luck? Do you
Speaker 1: have good luck or bad luck? I'd be like, oh,
Speaker 1: I always I'm on the you know, always on the
Speaker 1: slowest line when I go to the drug store. What's
Speaker 1: up with that? But that's not true, that's just my bias.
Speaker 1: That's just because when I am on the slowest line,
Speaker 1: I get so annoyed that it sticks in my memory.
Speaker 1: So making a conscious effort to when you're on a
Speaker 1: line that zips right through, I like to try to
Speaker 1: say aloud to myself, like, remember this, don't be an idiot.
Speaker 1: This is an example of things going right. And next
Speaker 1: time you're on a slow line, remember that. I do
Speaker 1: like that. There's a form of gratitude that I'm trying
Speaker 1: to coin, and wanted to run it by you. It
Speaker 1: actually emerged from a conversation I had with the physicist
Speaker 1: Sean Carroll. Oh, I love his book. Yeah, you recommended
Speaker 1: his book to me. I'm in the middle of it. Oh,
Speaker 1: that's right, Yes, you're right. It's really good. And by
Speaker 1: the time this our episode comes out the Sean Carroll one, well,
Speaker 1: I've already been out. And this idea of existential gratitude
Speaker 1: is not discussed, hasn't been measured, but I'd like to
Speaker 1: start maybe doing some research on it. And I would
Speaker 1: just think of it as just like, at the very least,
Speaker 1: why not just have be happy that you're alive? And
Speaker 1: how improbable that is considering how many things could have
Speaker 1: gone wrong in the creation of you. Oh yeah, that
Speaker 1: is interesting. I remember Bill Bryson has a passage about
Speaker 1: how unlikely it is that you exist at all. Yeah, like,
Speaker 1: out of the millions of sperm, you know, the one
Speaker 1: with you was the one that connected. It's crazy. And
Speaker 1: I also I loved when I interviewed another one of
Speaker 1: my advisors in this project, Will mcgaskell, who is a
Speaker 1: philosophy professor at Oxford and I love him. He's one
Speaker 1: of the founders of a movement called effective altruism, and
Speaker 1: I asked him, what are you grateful for? And he said, well,
Speaker 1: sometimes I'm just grateful that I have arms. And he said,
Speaker 1: you know, it's easy to be grateful for a raise
Speaker 1: at work, but being grateful for those things that we
Speaker 1: truly don't even think about, like having arms. And I
Speaker 1: thought that was that was a wonderful way to put it,
Speaker 1: Absolutely wonderful. Yeah, I know, it's very true. I I
Speaker 1: don't know if that's the same thing as existential gratitude.
Speaker 1: But what did you think of the idea of existential gratitude?
Speaker 1: Did you think it was promising? And you can be
Speaker 1: honest with me if you no. I love it. I
Speaker 1: think it's very important. I mean the question as long
Speaker 1: as your life is a net positive, which I do
Speaker 1: think most I don't know. I can't say that, but
Speaker 1: I knew, I knew, I knew where you were going
Speaker 1: with that, and then I knew I knew the thought
Speaker 1: process that put the brakes on it. I can't say that.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think my life, luckily, I'm so lucky
Speaker 1: that you know, it is a net positive despite all
Speaker 1: the horrible things that happen in everyone traditional life. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I had this debate with Will mcgaskell. Actually, like you know,
Speaker 1: is the average human life a net positive? And he
Speaker 1: says he thinks so, otherwise there would be mass suicides.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure that tracks to me, because your survival
Speaker 1: instinct could out weigh your decision to commit suicide even
Speaker 1: if your life is a net negative. But anyway, for me,
Speaker 1: I consider myself extremely lucky and my life is so
Speaker 1: far I think a net positive, and so yeah, I
Speaker 1: should be unbelievably grateful that I exist. And you know,
Speaker 1: I forget where I read it, but just this idea
Speaker 1: that we are, you know, just this little sliver of
Speaker 1: light between two black doo eternal blacknesses. And I actually
Speaker 1: I am very into Memento Maury, the Reminders of Death,
Speaker 1: because I think it's a wonderful tool to remind ourselves
Speaker 1: that how short our lives are. And you know, I
Speaker 1: studied the history of them and they had a lot
Speaker 1: of in paintings in the Renaissance, they would have skulls
Speaker 1: all over just to remind people your mortal So, you know,
Speaker 1: try to live life while you can. And I have
Speaker 1: a Meno Maury on my computer, Like on my computer,
Speaker 1: I have a little it's not a scary skull because
Speaker 1: I didn't want to be depressed. It's like sort of
Speaker 1: a happy, fun, psychedelic, colorful skull. But I do like
Speaker 1: to remember, you know that life is fleeting and have
Speaker 1: existential gratitude, as you would say, wonderful. This conversation really
Speaker 1: did get existential and dark, but I started it. So
Speaker 1: let's talk a little about something a little more hopeful,
Speaker 1: and that's appreciating mom. So you talk about the house.
Speaker 1: Zeene was was a son of someone you interviewed. Is
Speaker 1: that ny who suggested the son of mine? He's your son? Yeah?
Speaker 1: There you go. Okay, so your son Zane suggested to you.
Speaker 1: You know, really, birthday celebrations should be about honoring the mom.
Speaker 1: Why is it always about the kid? Oh? Yeah, I
Speaker 1: love that idea. It's so crazy that we on our
Speaker 1: birthday it's all about the person who was born, But
Speaker 1: the person who did all the work that day, who
Speaker 1: you know, went through incredible pain. Is the birth the mom?
Speaker 1: And so why we only celebrate the birth ee and
Speaker 1: not the birth is insane once you think about it.
Speaker 1: And you know, I think the the phrase labor day
Speaker 1: has already been taken. But uh so we've got to
Speaker 1: find another name. But I do love the idea of
Speaker 1: thank every birthday. Now I write a thank you note
Speaker 1: to mom for birthing me. And by the way, speaking
Speaker 1: of moms, I don't know if you know the economist
Speaker 1: Russ Roberts, but he I was speaking to him, and
Speaker 1: he turned me on to a poem called the Lanyard
Speaker 1: that is so lovely about appreciating moms and how much
Speaker 1: they do for us. And we think, like when we
Speaker 1: made a lanyard at the camp and gave it to them,
Speaker 1: like now we're even, Like here, I gave you this
Speaker 1: lanyard for all that you've done for me, So we're
Speaker 1: pretty even. It's by Billy Collins, the poem so I
Speaker 1: would google that. It's a wonderful little poem, thank you.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people will be googling that.
Speaker 1: So you also talk about the importance of interconnection. You
Speaker 1: say the gratitude trails intersect and overlap everywhere. In fact,
Speaker 1: if you mapped it out, you could probably connect almost
Speaker 1: anyone in the book to almost anyone else. I mean,
Speaker 1: isn't there an obvious thread there between that and your
Speaker 1: prior book? You know how everyone? Oh yeah, it's all relative,
Speaker 1: How everyone's right? Right? My previous book was called It's
Speaker 1: All Relative, And for that one, I joined this group
Speaker 1: of researchers and scientists who are trying to build a
Speaker 1: family tree of the entire human race through DNA and
Speaker 1: through sort of internet wiki technology. And again, yeah, exactly,
Speaker 1: it's the six degrees of Kevin Bacon and everyone's Kevin Bacon.
Speaker 1: So that and you can figure out how you're related
Speaker 1: to almost any We figured out how we were related, right,
Speaker 1: didn't we? No? I don't think we ever did that.
Speaker 1: All right, I'm going to have to do that. I
Speaker 1: would like to do that. Actually, yeah, all right, it's easy.
Speaker 1: I mean I find it fascinating because there's an experiment
Speaker 1: two years ago by Harvard where they took Israelis and
Speaker 1: Palestinians and one group they showed concretely how they were
Speaker 1: genetically related, how closely they were, and the other group
Speaker 1: they didn't. And the group that was told how they
Speaker 1: were related treated each other with more kindness in these
Speaker 1: various memory tasks, and they were more open to negotiation.
Speaker 1: So I actually think that it's not going to solve
Speaker 1: all our problems, but this seeing concretely how we're related
Speaker 1: and linked can be a nudge in the right direction. Yeah,
Speaker 1: how is Trump and Obama related? I did find that
Speaker 1: out that I don't think has worked out in terms
Speaker 1: of their cooperation yet. But yeah, I actually think in
Speaker 1: all seriousness, this whole in group outgroup way of viewing
Speaker 1: the world as a zero sum game is what the
Speaker 1: way Trump views the world, And any way we can
Speaker 1: get to a road that way of thinking is going
Speaker 1: to make the world a better place. Yeah, very well said.
Speaker 1: So you say if we connected the world with threads
Speaker 1: signifying gratitude, the result would be thick as a blanket. Well,
Speaker 1: I am really quite grateful not deeply grateful, but quite
Speaker 1: grateful for the book you wrote and for putting these
Speaker 1: ideas out into the world, not just in this book.
Speaker 1: But there's this theme that does emerging through your entire existence,
Speaker 1: I would say, a deeper existence that is quite hopeful
Speaker 1: and loving at its core. Well, thank you. I know
Speaker 1: I have to say it because it's my job, but
Speaker 1: I do mean it. Thank you, Scott, and thank you
Speaker 1: again for all your wisdom. It made the book so
Speaker 1: much better and gate So I didn't pay you. I
Speaker 1: didn't pay you to say any of that, and I
Speaker 1: didn't pay you to be the record that's true. Thank you,
Speaker 1: aj I really do appreciate that. Thanks for listening to
Speaker 1: the Psychology Podcast. I hope you enjoyed this episode. If
Speaker 1: you'd like to react in some way to something you heard,
Speaker 1: I encourage you to join in the discussion at the
Speaker 1: Psychology podcast dot com. That's the Psychology podcast dot com. Also,
Speaker 1: please add a rating and review of the Psychology Podcast
Speaker 1: on iTunes. Thanks for being such a great supporter of
Speaker 1: the podcast, and tune in next time for more on
Speaker 1: the mind, brain, behavior, and creativity.