Speaker 1: Pushkin. Negative emotions feelings like fear, anger, sadness, and overwhelm
Speaker 1: are just part of being human, but that doesn't make
Speaker 1: them any easier to manage. Whether it's the sense of
Speaker 1: dread we get before a challenging task or the frustration
Speaker 1: of dealing with unmet expectations, our big feelings can drain
Speaker 1: our energy, mess up our performance, and make us feel
Speaker 1: like crap. The good news is that we don't have
Speaker 1: to be at the mercy of our big feelings. Research
Speaker 1: shows that with the right strategies, we can not only
Speaker 1: manage tough emotions effectively, but also use them to our
Speaker 1: advantage no matter what life throws our way. So in
Speaker 1: today's episode of the Happiness Labs how To Season, we
Speaker 1: will dive into the science of emotion regulation and to
Speaker 1: help us, we have one of my favorite experts on
Speaker 1: the topic here to teach you how to shift your
Speaker 1: emotions is my friend, psychologist Cross.
Speaker 2: Great to see you guys. Let me put on some
Speaker 2: background here. Yeh again, what do you think I'm just
Speaker 2: going to blur it here? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Blur's finderka Ethan founded the Emotion and Self Control Lab
Speaker 1: at the University of Michigan and his latest book tackles
Speaker 1: the topic of dealing with big feelings head on. It's
Speaker 1: called shift managing your emotions so they don't manage you.
Speaker 1: We'll get to Ethan's specific tips in a moment, but
Speaker 1: I wanted to begin with how Ethan got interested in
Speaker 1: emotion regulation in the first place. Ethan credits a lot
Speaker 1: of his interest in the topic to his grandmother.
Speaker 2: Well, my grandmother had this remarkable story. So she was
Speaker 2: growing up in Poland around the time of World War Two,
Speaker 2: and when it hit, she basically lost everything, so her
Speaker 2: family was for the most pop slaughtered. She ended up
Speaker 2: living in the forest for quite a while, bouncing around
Speaker 2: from one ghetto to the next, and she ultimately survived
Speaker 2: moved over to the States with nothing, this kind of
Speaker 2: classic immigrant story. And I remember as a kid just
Speaker 2: being totally fascinated about her experience, as I think so
Speaker 2: many of us are when we're little. We want to
Speaker 2: just know about where we come from, where the people
Speaker 2: we love come from. And so I would ask her repeatedly,
Speaker 2: like Bubby, what happened back then, Like how did you feel?
Speaker 2: And how did you survive? And she would not engage
Speaker 2: with me on those topics. You know, there's this great
Speaker 2: quote that she once said, which was like, don't ask
Speaker 2: why is a crooked letter, which is actually a really
Speaker 2: interesting phrase that makes you think or it didn't mean,
Speaker 2: but what does that mean? Well, what she meant was,
Speaker 2: you know, asking why is just a source of pain,
Speaker 2: So the just don't go there. And it was interesting
Speaker 2: that she had mastered that command of English language, because
Speaker 2: if you spoke to her, she spoke terrible English. She had, like,
Speaker 2: you know, very accented and never quite really learned how
Speaker 2: to speak fluently, but she had mastered that little bit.
Speaker 2: Of course, I proceeded to not listen to her, and
Speaker 2: I ended up devoting my career to doing a exactly
Speaker 2: what she told me not to do, which is asking
Speaker 2: why about our emotional lives? Why do we have the
Speaker 2: emotions we do? And when we find them getting tweaked
Speaker 2: in ways that we don't want them to be tweaked,
Speaker 2: they get activated too intensely or for too long, what
Speaker 2: can we do to rain them in? And so I
Speaker 2: do attribute a lot of where I am today to
Speaker 2: those early experiences with my grandmother, who, for the record,
Speaker 2: aside from not talking to me about the pain of
Speaker 2: the war, was an incredibly emotive and warm individual. So
Speaker 2: just to put that out there, she was capable of
Speaker 2: experiencing emotion, and she did. She just didn't really like
Speaker 2: to talk about a teach.
Speaker 1: It also seems like she was really not interested in
Speaker 1: talking about the negative emotions. What are some of the
Speaker 1: negative emotions you expected she experienced, but you didn't hear
Speaker 1: it talking.
Speaker 2: About terror, fear, anxiety, you know. I did discover later
Speaker 2: on in her life she did recount her experiences for
Speaker 2: a project at the United States Holocaust Museum, which is
Speaker 2: where I learned a lot lot about her story. And
Speaker 2: I also heard about her stories. Once a year she
Speaker 2: would allow herself to go back to what happened. There's
Speaker 2: like a grassroots organization of survivors from the town and
Speaker 2: the towns nearby where she grew up, and they'd get
Speaker 2: together and they just talk about what happened. And I
Speaker 2: remember learning about an experience where several of her immediate
Speaker 2: family members were killed, but her dad and her had
Speaker 2: made it. And they're in this small ghetto and her
Speaker 2: dad says they're coming to kill us. Hide she hid
Speaker 2: somewhere in the apartment, I can't remember where, And then
Speaker 2: her dad left and then he just never came back.
Speaker 2: So when I think about that, or when I think
Speaker 2: about her experience standing on a line, knowing that she
Speaker 2: would be taken to be killed, and if it wasn't
Speaker 2: for my grandfather essentially convincing the police officer to look
Speaker 2: the other way while she ran away, Like, I think
Speaker 2: to myself, how would I feel in that situation? And
Speaker 2: it's terror, it is anxiety, it is dismayed, this complex
Speaker 2: cocktail of negative emotions, and so, you know, I guess
Speaker 2: in retrospect it made a lot of sense why she
Speaker 2: didn't really want to talk to me about that. So
Speaker 2: these are not pleasant states to be in. But you know, Laurie,
Speaker 2: the thing is, in my mind, my grandmother was superwoman
Speaker 2: for not only being able to survive those experiences, but
Speaker 2: for them arguably by many metrics of success, being able
Speaker 2: to thrive moving over here, living the dream, working super hard,
Speaker 2: eventually buying her own home, restarting her family. And it
Speaker 2: was really that story that captivated me from a young age.
Speaker 1: And in your book you talk about how we've wanted
Speaker 1: to figure out ways to regulate our emotions, especially our
Speaker 1: negative emotions, for a long time. And I didn't know
Speaker 1: the history of some of the kookier ways that people
Speaker 1: went about this. So share some of these kind of
Speaker 1: strange like historic ways that we've tried to regulate our emotions.
Speaker 2: So the best way I can convey my experience reading
Speaker 2: up on the history of emotions and emotion regulations is
Speaker 2: to use the phrase blew my mind. It's just remarkable.
Speaker 2: So we have likely been struggling with our ability to
Speaker 2: manage our emotions for as long as we have been
Speaker 2: roaming the planet. Why do I say that, Well, if
Speaker 2: you look at some of the earliest writings ever discovered,
Speaker 2: writing on clay tablets, these were writings that talked about
Speaker 2: the pain of emotion, of being rejected, the pain of
Speaker 2: a broken heart, and how that was managed. The first
Speaker 2: surgical technique, the first technique that we believed was developed
Speaker 2: for surgical technique was drilling holes in people's heads. And
Speaker 2: there are likely many reasons that it was believed to
Speaker 2: be used, but one of them, according to medical historians,
Speaker 2: is to help people manage extreme emotions dysregulated states. And
Speaker 2: like you know, if you think back eight to ten
Speaker 2: thousand years ago when that first came on the scene,
Speaker 2: you have this instance of people being consumed, assumed with emotion,
Speaker 2: and what do we gotta do well, our theory about
Speaker 2: what may have been driving that was there some evil
Speaker 2: spirits in there, so you gotta purge yourself of those.
Speaker 2: And that kind of purging mentality existed for quite some
Speaker 2: time exorcisms, leeches, blood letting. But then if we fast
Speaker 2: forward to the nineteen forties, there's another giant spike on
Speaker 2: the emotion regulation timeline. A Portuguese physician wins the Nobel
Speaker 2: Prize for what I would describe as an emotion regulation intervention.
Speaker 2: That is right, someone has won the Nobel Prize for
Speaker 2: emotion regulation intervention. What was it called the leucotomy or
Speaker 2: in modern terms, the frontal lobotomy. So foot back the eyelid,
Speaker 2: poke a few holes in your frontal cortex and turn
Speaker 2: the volume down on how we are feeling. Nobel Prize.
Speaker 2: But you know, one other really fun kind of historical
Speaker 2: fact that I forgot to put in there is if
Speaker 2: you go to the best selling book of all time
Speaker 2: by a wide margin, let's tell everyone what was what
Speaker 2: is the best selling book of all time? The Bible? No,
Speaker 2: you got it, Bible.
Speaker 1: I feel like I'm on Jeopardy.
Speaker 2: I was like, I drink it's the Bible. But yeah,
Speaker 2: Bible has sold many, many copies. What is one of
Speaker 2: the most famous stories from the Bible. It is the
Speaker 2: story of Adam and Eve. This is a story about
Speaker 2: emotion regulation, or the failure to regulate emotions. So we've
Speaker 2: been struggling with this stuff for a really long time.
Speaker 2: And I get it.
Speaker 1: I mean, there have been times when if I knew
Speaker 1: it was medically reasonable to drill a hole in my
Speaker 1: head and I would stop ruminating or being sad or
Speaker 1: kind of especially after like breakups and things like that,
Speaker 1: Like I would have gone for it.
Speaker 2: You know, either the pain is real and if you
Speaker 2: look at the statistics, they're shocking. You know, this laur
Speaker 2: better than better than most and and folks who are
Speaker 2: listening to the podcast are no doubt familiar with these
Speaker 2: statistics too. But the wellness industry, by some estimates, is
Speaker 2: a trillion dollar industry. You see increasing amounts of resources
Speaker 2: being devoted to helping people with mental health, with well
Speaker 2: being written large culturally, I think we are now at
Speaker 2: an inflection point where we really recognize the role that
Speaker 2: our emotions are playing in our lives and understand the
Speaker 2: need to manage them. So here's the really good news.
Speaker 2: What fills me with hope is that we have learned
Speaker 2: a lot about how we can manage our emotions without
Speaker 2: having to take these extreme steps of damaging our brains. Which,
Speaker 2: to be clear, I think I could speak for you,
Speaker 2: Laurie of saying we do not endorse that on this podcast.
Speaker 1: We're not endorsing brain holes.
Speaker 2: No, yes, no brain holes. No no holes, Like, let's
Speaker 2: just leave the holes out of the equation. Like, we've
Speaker 2: got a fantastic array of non invasive tools that we
Speaker 2: can use if we know what those tools are and
Speaker 2: how they work. This is not to say we know
Speaker 2: everything about emotion regulation. We have a lot to learn.
Speaker 2: That's exciting, but we have learned quite a bit. And
Speaker 2: what also to use my favorite phrase blows my mind
Speaker 2: is if you ask most people, hey, where you ever
Speaker 2: taught these tools growing up? By far and away, the
Speaker 2: majority will say no. If I ask an audience, hey,
Speaker 2: when is the first time you learned, like how to
Speaker 2: exercise physically, most people will say, you know, probably like
Speaker 2: first or second grade. We have gym class. Yeah, jumping jacks,
Speaker 2: push ups, you know how to do those? I may
Speaker 2: not like to do it, but we know what to do. Okay.
Speaker 2: When is the first time you learned how to formally
Speaker 2: learned how to manage your emotions? Most people will say never,
Speaker 2: and that to me is a travesty, and I think
Speaker 2: it's something that we have the opportunity to address by
Speaker 2: you know, quite frankly, what you're doing on this podcast,
Speaker 2: which is to take science and to share it with
Speaker 2: folks in ways that can benefit them.
Speaker 1: I still find it amazing that we teach physical education
Speaker 1: and even drivers to our young people, but we don't
Speaker 1: always give them the tools they need to cope with
Speaker 1: their big feelings. It's time for a short break, but
Speaker 1: even soon be back to share the first of his
Speaker 1: evidence based how to tips for regulating big feelings, the
Speaker 1: Happiness Lab. Will be back in a moment. Big emotions
Speaker 1: often feel pretty out of control when feelings like fear, overwhelm,
Speaker 1: and anger kick in, they often feel like they're here
Speaker 1: to stay. But psychologist Ethan Cross, author of Shift Managing
Speaker 1: Your Emotions so They Don't manage You, argues that there
Speaker 1: are lots of ways to get big feelings under control,
Speaker 1: and his first tip for doing so is to find
Speaker 1: the right outside sensory stimulus, a hook from a friend,
Speaker 1: hearing a kind word, or maybe even sipping a warm drink.
Speaker 1: Research shows that using our senses can be a great
Speaker 1: way to break out of big feelings. In fact, Ethan
Speaker 1: has a particularly good example of his own emotions being
Speaker 1: altered by a cheesy song or let me rephrase by
Speaker 1: a stone cold rock classic.
Speaker 2: So Journey, Don't Stop Believing. I will admit, huge fan,
Speaker 2: what's one of my go to feel good pump up songs?
Speaker 2: If we go back in time, about five or so years,
Speaker 2: I was coaching my daughter's soccer team on the weekends.
Speaker 2: She was around five or six. And I love, love,
Speaker 2: love coaching kid soccer, not because I'm particularly good at it.
Speaker 2: It's also I'm not getting super immersed it. It's just
Speaker 2: a fun contrast to everything else I do. And so
Speaker 2: I would look forward to these games with her on
Speaker 2: the weekend throughout the week and normally she was just
Speaker 2: a ball of excitement and ready to go. But there
Speaker 2: was this one day that really sticks out in my
Speaker 2: memory where she was just really bumming me out. She
Speaker 2: was super glum, like it was like I was pulling
Speaker 2: her to get into the car to go. She did
Speaker 2: not want to be there, and you know, I start driving,
Speaker 2: look in the rear view mirror. Her head's kind of
Speaker 2: like draped over her shoulder, no smile. And then all
Speaker 2: of a sudden, Don't Stop Believing comes on the radio,
Speaker 2: and I'm instantly kind of getting a little bit more excited.
Speaker 2: And then I start audibly, you know, kind of humming
Speaker 2: and singing along and turn the volume up a little bit.
Speaker 2: And then I look in the back seat and I
Speaker 2: noticed that she's beginning to jam out also, and she's
Speaker 2: bopping her head and she's kind of humming along, you know.
Speaker 2: Fast forward about seven minutes. We get to the park,
Speaker 2: and before I can even park the car, she just
Speaker 2: opens the door, bolts out of the car, and scores
Speaker 2: what I remember to be seven thousand goals that game
Speaker 2: not true, but it was really in many ways that
Speaker 2: experience with my daughter and Jerney. A light bulb went off.
Speaker 2: From that point on, when I would look at my
Speaker 2: dashboard and see the music console, I no longer just
Speaker 2: saw an LED dashboard. I now saw an emotion regulation device.
Speaker 1: This is such an important idea because I also use
Speaker 1: music without realizing it to regulate my emotions all the time.
Speaker 1: But I think this is a spot where I kind
Speaker 1: of mess up, right, because unlike you who had this
Speaker 1: moment where your daughter is feeling glove and you put
Speaker 1: on Don't Stop Believing, which is like the most happy
Speaker 1: pump up get out dancing on your soccer match related song. Ever,
Speaker 1: when I'm feeling kind of glove, I don't gravitate towards
Speaker 1: the journey, or I gravitate towards journey, but different journey
Speaker 1: songs that come is.
Speaker 2: Sad you know Chicago.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, Like it's like the whiny you know, love
Speaker 1: bites kinds of songs, right, And so what am I
Speaker 1: doing wrong there? Because I'm using music to kind of
Speaker 1: move my erooss around, but it seems like it's not shifting.
Speaker 2: Well, I wouldn't say you're doing something wrong unless it's
Speaker 2: counter to your goals. And let me unpack that for
Speaker 2: a second. So, one really important message I hope to
Speaker 2: convey in this book is that all of our emotions
Speaker 2: are functional when they're experiencing the right proportions, not too
Speaker 2: intense or not too long. What do I mean by that?
Speaker 2: How could anger or sadness or envy ever be useful? Well,
Speaker 2: if you look at what those emotions are doing. They're
Speaker 2: often being triggered in particular situations where the way they
Speaker 2: are motivating you to think, feel, and behave can actually
Speaker 2: be adaptive. So let's take sadness as an example. Because
Speaker 2: you brought up the kind of sh hago, a deell
Speaker 2: genre of songs. We typically experience sadness when we experience
Speaker 2: some loss that we cannot regain, so the loss of
Speaker 2: a loved one, we don't get a job, we can't
Speaker 2: ever get it. And in that circumstance, when we feel
Speaker 2: this emotion, what research shows it motivates us to do it.
Speaker 2: It slows us down physiologically, it leads us to turn
Speaker 2: our attention inward, to inter respect, to try to make
Speaker 2: sense of the situation. There is a need for menimaking.
Speaker 2: Often when you experience sadness, well, the world is no
Speaker 2: longer the way I expected it to be or have
Speaker 2: experienced it. I got to like reconfigure how I make
Speaker 2: sense of this world now. So let me take some
Speaker 2: time by myself to engage in that reflective process. But
Speaker 2: because going off in the corner by myself maybe a
Speaker 2: little dangerous, right, we don't want to leave people totally alone.
Speaker 2: We have evolved to send warning signs to other folks
Speaker 2: to let them know that we're experiencing sadness and might
Speaker 2: need a little help, which is often a sad expression.
Speaker 2: When you see a sad expression on someone else's face,
Speaker 2: you mimic that. My kids, by the way, have mastered this.
Speaker 2: I can be like really appropriately upset for some negative
Speaker 2: behavior and they do this exaggerated stick out the lower
Speaker 2: leb and it is so powerful it gets me every
Speaker 2: time in any case I digress. So sadness can be functional.
Speaker 2: It could help us think through some problems. So your
Speaker 2: intuition to like listen to journey that is a way
Speaker 2: of you going deeper into that potentially sad state to
Speaker 2: facilitate that introspective meaning making process. Here's the big butt
Speaker 2: that I want to convey though, and I think it's
Speaker 2: where you originally were going. If you are feeling sad
Speaker 2: and you don't want to feel sad, don't listen to
Speaker 2: sad music. Then what you want to do is you
Speaker 2: want to resist that urge to listen to the music
Speaker 2: that is congruous. So we're talking about this emotional congruency effect,
Speaker 2: and you want to go in the other direction. So
Speaker 2: this is what I do strategically if I've got like
Speaker 2: a high stakes presentation coming up and I have some jitters, right,
Speaker 2: I'm not going to listen to music that just amplifies
Speaker 2: that and say I'm going the journey route, right, I'm
Speaker 2: going to other terribly terribly cheesy pump up music. Living
Speaker 2: on a Prayer being another great example, with a little
Speaker 2: bit of Metallica enter the Sandman mixed in right, Like,
Speaker 2: this is a way in which I am strategically harnessing
Speaker 2: my senses to push my emotions on a different trajectory.
Speaker 2: And the senses should not be underestimated as a tool
Speaker 2: that could be strategically used to do that, because we
Speaker 2: know that the links between sensation and emotional experience, these
Speaker 2: are very strong links that exist in our brains. And
Speaker 2: so if you are aware of how your senses could
Speaker 2: affect you, this opens up the door to all manner
Speaker 2: of tools that you can recruit to help you out.
Speaker 1: And one of the reasons I loved reading your book
Speaker 1: is that, of course I've known about the music example,
Speaker 1: maybe not for shifting in the right direction, but I
Speaker 1: knew that that was a powerful sensory tool. I could
Speaker 1: use your book really reminded me. There are lots of
Speaker 1: sensory tools you can use. Right. I can use touch
Speaker 1: of like a comfy blanket. Right, I could use just
Speaker 1: the visuals, like turning the light on more to kind
Speaker 1: of wake myself up more. There's just so many different
Speaker 1: kinds of sensory experiences you can use to shift your
Speaker 1: emotions around. I kind of remembered audition, but I've kind
Speaker 1: of forgotten about some of the other ones.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean this was my experience too. In fact,
Speaker 2: one of my regis sudents, sim Mi Kayla Rodriguez. We
Speaker 2: actually wrote a paper after I dug into this literature.
Speaker 2: I like, why aren't we talking about our senses more
Speaker 2: so that we wrote this paper called Sensory Emotion Regulation,
Speaker 2: which we looked at each of the major senses and
Speaker 2: all of them have this capacity to relatively effortlessly shift
Speaker 2: our emotions. And I think the effort piece is an
Speaker 2: important one to put on people's radar. I talk about
Speaker 2: a ton of different tools in shift from pushing our
Speaker 2: emotions around. Some of them aren't quite effort full. They
Speaker 2: take resources for us to implement these tools, and there's
Speaker 2: nothing wrong with that. There's a time and place for that.
Speaker 2: But what we know about all of us human beings
Speaker 2: is that in general, if we don't have to exert effort,
Speaker 2: we're not going to do it. We tend to be
Speaker 2: a lazy species in that regard because we're trying to
Speaker 2: conserve our resources. Our senses push our emotions around really
Speaker 2: really fast. And so touch is another great example that
Speaker 2: I like to remind folks about. I call this tool
Speaker 2: affectionate but not creepy touch because you have to be
Speaker 2: careful about how you wield that tool. But you know,
Speaker 2: like a fist bump at work, that's a tactile exchange
Speaker 2: that activates an emotional response, right, Like, what is the
Speaker 2: first tool we use with kids when they're born into
Speaker 2: this world to soothe them, to regulate them. It is
Speaker 2: skin to skin contact. Those kinds of tactile experiences they
Speaker 2: stay with us throughout our lives. The caveat, of course,
Speaker 2: is research does show that if a tactile experience is
Speaker 2: not wanted, which would be the creepy form of touch,
Speaker 2: it not only mitigates positive effects, that actually can elicit
Speaker 2: a negative reaction. So to be clear to everyone who's listening,
Speaker 2: Laurie and Ethan and I think I can say this
Speaker 2: for you, Laurie. We are not advocating haphazardly touching people
Speaker 2: at work and in your lives. In the appropriate context, though,
Speaker 2: this cannot be.
Speaker 1: Powerful, and I think we can just use forms of
Speaker 1: self touch that feel really good. Right reading your book,
Speaker 1: I was reminded, there's this blanket that just feels really cozy,
Speaker 1: and when I'm having a bad day, like I can
Speaker 1: just kind of go to it.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: I have like slippers that are just really comfortable.
Speaker 2: Right. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I'm also a huge fan of some of Kristin Neff's
Speaker 1: suggestions that, you know, if you need that kind of
Speaker 1: self touch but you're not around somebody for whom it
Speaker 1: would be effectively appropriate to ask them, you can give
Speaker 1: yourself some self touch, a little self hug or a
Speaker 1: little self soothing. Because brains are stupid, they don't know
Speaker 1: who's giving you that self touch.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, I I'll share with you, And I
Speaker 2: guess everyone who's listening a somewhat embarrassing implementation of this tool.
Speaker 2: And I did it unknowingly. I was giving a presentation
Speaker 2: the other the other day, and it was after lunch,
Speaker 2: so I had an upset stomach and I found myself
Speaker 2: like pacing the room and just rubbing my stomach a
Speaker 2: little bit, rubbing your tummy, yeah, rubbing my tummy. And
Speaker 2: then I had the metama, what are you doing? Stop
Speaker 2: doing this? So I stopped doing immediately. So here's other
Speaker 2: one fun fun finding in this space. Organizations are leveraging
Speaker 2: this tool of sensation as a regulator all the time,
Speaker 2: and often completely out of our awareness. So many organizations,
Speaker 2: for example, have beautiful artwork on the walls and visual
Speaker 2: stimuli designed to push us into a different emotional space
Speaker 2: that may not be so surprising, But what was surprising
Speaker 2: to me were the ways in which organizations often pump
Speaker 2: certain kinds of odors through their ventilation systems to arouse
Speaker 2: a certain kind of positive response. And there are companies
Speaker 2: that really specialize in constructing the right ode to match
Speaker 2: the organization's goals. And so this came full circle to
Speaker 2: me because earlier on in life, I remember my children
Speaker 2: whenever we go on vacation, we go to a hotel,
Speaker 2: and I remember they were going, ah, daddy itself so
Speaker 2: nice in here. This is such a nice place. And
Speaker 2: that is exactly the goal, and it is a way
Speaker 2: that we are being regulated by another organization through this path.
Speaker 1: But the idea is that we can do exactly the
Speaker 1: same thing ourselves totally. We'd scented candles or just all
Speaker 1: the kinds of ways that we can manipulate our sensory
Speaker 1: environment to feel better.
Speaker 2: That's right. And you know, the real hope that I
Speaker 2: have for this book is it lays out all of
Speaker 2: the tools that exist. Some of these tools may be film.
Speaker 2: You may have like encountered some of these tools but
Speaker 2: not realized it. You may not know about some of
Speaker 2: these tools. But the idea is that when we lay
Speaker 2: all of this out and explain how this works, now,
Speaker 2: we give you the opportunity to start wheeling these tools
Speaker 2: strategically to help you match your emotion regulatory goals. My
Speaker 2: hope is that that is a boon to people in
Speaker 2: terms of improving their lives.
Speaker 1: So let's jump to tool number two, which is how
Speaker 1: we can shift our emotion using our attention. A big
Speaker 1: one that I know I tend to use a lot
Speaker 1: when it comes to shifting my emotions with attention is
Speaker 1: through distraction. Am I alone is distraction to kind of
Speaker 1: go to strategy for lots of folks.
Speaker 2: Distraction is is that's a big eat, and it is
Speaker 2: a go to for lots of folks. And what's interesting
Speaker 2: is it doesn't always get the props that it deserves.
Speaker 2: There's a common belief that when you experience big, significant
Speaker 2: emotional events in your life, you should not avoid them,
Speaker 2: you should not distract, You should approach them work through them.
Speaker 2: This message is often reinforced in popular culture, and it
Speaker 2: turns out if you look at the science, it is
Speaker 2: not entirely true. So what we have seen is that
Speaker 2: really the key to wielding your attention effectively is being
Speaker 2: strategic in how you do so, approaching certain kinds of
Speaker 2: experiences to work through them when the conditions are right.
Speaker 2: But also if you can distract in a healthy way.
Speaker 2: What I mean by that is not by substance abuses
Speaker 2: or risky behaviors, which some people. Some people do, but
Speaker 2: a positive form of distraction can often be really useful
Speaker 2: for giving you some space from the experience to then
Speaker 2: let you reapproach it with a healthier perspective. My grandmother
Speaker 2: is actually really effective at using attention strategically. She would
Speaker 2: not dwell on the experience over and over. She didn't
Speaker 2: get lost in rumination and chatter about this event. She
Speaker 2: would focus on things that were under her control, her kids,
Speaker 2: her job. But when the conversation with other people one
Speaker 2: time a year, or even if she ran into fellow
Speaker 2: survivors lend itself to thinking about this experience, she would
Speaker 2: with it so she wouldn't avoid it to the point
Speaker 2: where it was a chronic form of avoidance that we
Speaker 2: know is really harmful. You know, there are various I
Speaker 2: think steps that people can follow to figure out when
Speaker 2: they should approach and when they should avoid or go
Speaker 2: back and forth between their experiences. Step one is just
Speaker 2: I like recognizing there's no one size fits all solution here,
Speaker 2: not for wielding your attention, or for that matter, for
Speaker 2: using any of the different shifters and emotion regulation tools
Speaker 2: I talk about in the book. What we know is
Speaker 2: that variability is the rule, not the exception. Different tools
Speaker 2: work for different people in different situations. I liken it
Speaker 2: to physical exercise. If I take ten people in my
Speaker 2: social network and I ask them what they do to
Speaker 2: keep physically fit, I'm likely going to get ten different
Speaker 2: physical health routines. The data that we and others have
Speaker 2: collected suggest that emotion regulation is very, very similar. We
Speaker 2: rely on different tools in different situations. Let's say you
Speaker 2: encounter an experience that provokes you in some way and
Speaker 2: you decide to distract, and so what's your favorite distraction?
Speaker 1: Laurier the wordal archive, where I kind of go back
Speaker 1: and do old wordal puzzles that I haven't done before.
Speaker 2: That is a really really good distractor because it is pleasant,
Speaker 2: but also it is cognitively demanding, so it captures your attention,
Speaker 2: which is useful for a distraction. You want a distraction
Speaker 2: to capture your attention to prevent it from going back
Speaker 2: right away to the situation that's just provoked you. So okay,
Speaker 2: So let's say you know you have let's say a
Speaker 2: podcast interview doesn't go the way you want.
Speaker 1: That would never happen, ethan, come on, now, it.
Speaker 2: Would never happen, So you know, so that happens and
Speaker 2: you distract, and then when you're done distracting, turns out
Speaker 2: you're done. You're not thinking about that problem that that
Speaker 2: interview again. Well, if that's the case and it doesn't
Speaker 2: resurface into aware, like fantastic, keep doing what you do,
Speaker 2: move on with your life. Your psychological immune system has
Speaker 2: done its job behind the scenes. Time has passed, the
Speaker 2: intensity of the emotions has decided, and you're off to
Speaker 2: the next challenge, the next interview. If, on the other hand,
Speaker 2: you take a break, you distract, and then you find
Speaker 2: yourself thinking about the experience again when you're done, well,
Speaker 2: then that could be a signal to then, okay, let
Speaker 2: me re engage with it. And now with the gift
Speaker 2: of time, which often moderates the intensity of our emotions. Now,
Speaker 2: let me try to work through this experience a little
Speaker 2: bit more productively. And maybe I'll even layer another shifter,
Speaker 2: another tool on to help me do that. So maybe
Speaker 2: I'll try to figure out, well, why did this happen?
Speaker 2: Why didn't this interview go very well? I'll think about
Speaker 2: it from a distance perspective. All right, Laurie, why do
Speaker 2: you think this didn't go so well? So you'll try
Speaker 2: to process it from a more objective standpoint, So you're
Speaker 2: layering in other tools there.
Speaker 1: And this is a really nice transition to the third
Speaker 1: shifter that you mentioned in your book, the fact that
Speaker 1: we can get a little bit of perspective when we
Speaker 1: need to regulate our emotions. Now, this is something we've
Speaker 1: talked about on this show before, but explain again why
Speaker 1: perspective can be so important to shifting our emotions.
Speaker 2: Well, the reason perspective is so useful is we all
Speaker 2: have the capacity to reframe how we think about our circumstances,
Speaker 2: but it can often feel really hard to do that
Speaker 2: when we are totally immersed in the situation and the
Speaker 2: emotions are flooding us. Actually the name of this chapter,
Speaker 2: it's named after an anecdote with one of my close friends.
Speaker 2: I don't know how I can actually say this, you know.
Speaker 2: I was driving back from dinner one day with another
Speaker 2: couple and the other couple is talking about a difficult
Speaker 2: experience that my friend was having at work, and his
Speaker 2: wife said to him, well, why don't you just think
Speaker 2: differently about it? And his response was easier bleeping said
Speaker 2: than done to convey. I think this very common experience
Speaker 2: we have, which we know that we can think differently,
Speaker 2: and we should think differently. We should reframe how we're
Speaker 2: thinking about this, be more optimistic, but we just have
Speaker 2: hard time doing that in the moment. And so what
Speaker 2: we've learned is that in those situations, taking a step back,
Speaker 2: thinking about our circumstances from a more distanced perspective, almost
Speaker 2: like we're giving advice to someone else can be really
Speaker 2: helpful for allowing us to do that.
Speaker 1: And you've come up with a super easy way we
Speaker 1: can do that linguistically, just how we use different pronouns, right.
Speaker 2: That's right, So using your own name and you can
Speaker 2: be a useful tool for allowing us to do this.
Speaker 2: So we usually use the word you and we give
Speaker 2: advice to other people. So when you use the word
Speaker 2: you to refer to your own problem, so ethan, why
Speaker 2: are you doing this? And what do you think you
Speaker 2: should do? What that does is it automatically switches your perspective.
Speaker 2: It puts you in this frame of mind where now
Speaker 2: you're giving advice to essentially another person. It's another person
Speaker 2: who happens to be you, So you have full access
Speaker 2: to everything that's happening inside that person's mind. But it's
Speaker 2: just easier to do so because you're doing it from
Speaker 2: that more objective standpoint. So that's one really simple distancing
Speaker 2: tool that you can use. Another powerful way of broadening
Speaker 2: our perspect active is to do what I call mental
Speaker 2: time travel. So you jump into this mental time travel
Speaker 2: machine we all possess. You could go into the future
Speaker 2: and think, so, how are you going to feel about
Speaker 2: this next week, next month, next year. When you ask
Speaker 2: yourself that question, and notice I'm doing that, still maintaining
Speaker 2: the linguistic distance, right, how are you going to feel
Speaker 2: about this down the road? What that does is it
Speaker 2: makes clear to you something you've experienced your entire life,
Speaker 2: but we often lose sight of it in the moment,
Speaker 2: which is as awful as our emotions are. As time
Speaker 2: stretches on, they typically fade. It's a very common trajectory
Speaker 2: that characterizes emotional responses. As time goes on, they kind
Speaker 2: of peter out. And so how am I going to
Speaker 2: feel about this next year? I'm going to feel better
Speaker 2: about it. I've lived through that countless times in my life.
Speaker 2: So mental time travel machine into the future helps you
Speaker 2: with that. You could also go back in time. It's
Speaker 2: another way of broadening our perspective. It works a little differently.
Speaker 2: And if I'm struggling with a really difficult situation at
Speaker 2: work or in my personal life, I could jump into
Speaker 2: the mental time travel machine and go to the Polish
Speaker 2: Woods in the nineteen forties with my grandmother. Right now,
Speaker 2: I'm thinking about the adversity that she experienced back then,
Speaker 2: and I'm thinking to myself, Wow, if she was able
Speaker 2: to get through this, I can handle what I'm dealing
Speaker 2: with now, So that's time to travel to the past.
Speaker 2: Those are some other distancing tools.
Speaker 1: Self talk and mental time travel are great ways to
Speaker 1: put your emotions in perspective. But if big feelings are
Speaker 1: still dragging you down, Ethan has a more radical suggestion
Speaker 1: forgetting some distance between you and whatever's bothering you. That
Speaker 1: radical suggestion is coming up right after the break of
Speaker 1: all the tips Ethan cross outlines and his new book Shift,
Speaker 1: Managing your Emotions so they don't manage you. The one
Speaker 1: that resonates with me most is the strategy of putting
Speaker 1: some physical space between you and your problems. What I
Speaker 1: didn't realize was that his insights about the power of
Speaker 1: physical distance were partly inspired by me.
Speaker 2: It's funny you bring that up, Lori, because it was you, Laurie,
Speaker 2: who I talked to about this, and so maybe I
Speaker 2: could turn the tides here and ask you about this.
Speaker 2: So you know, as I was researching the book, I
Speaker 2: was struck by the power of spaces to push our
Speaker 2: emotions around. I think spaces, like our senses, are often
Speaker 2: a tool for manager emotions that we see literally every
Speaker 2: day as long as our eyes are open, but we
Speaker 2: totally take for granted. And you have a really powerful
Speaker 2: story about how changing your spaces powerfully modulated your own
Speaker 2: emotional response. So would you mind telling telling folks what
Speaker 2: you told me?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah, Well it's in the book now, so I
Speaker 1: guess everybody's going to read it anyway.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I know.
Speaker 1: This was around the time that I was experiencing a
Speaker 1: lot of burnout in my role as a head of
Speaker 1: college working on y'elle's campus where it was just after
Speaker 1: the pandemic. I was feeling incredibly burned out, and I
Speaker 1: made the tough decision to leave that role. But when
Speaker 1: I left that role and had some time off, I
Speaker 1: had to face the question of like, Okay, well where
Speaker 1: do I want to be Right, I have a house
Speaker 1: in my hometown in Connecticut. I could have moved there,
Speaker 1: but my husband and I weren't tied to anything, and
Speaker 1: so I said, well, why don't I go to a
Speaker 1: different place, a place that's really far away from the
Speaker 1: physical place where I was experiencing burnout, but also a
Speaker 1: place that had certain memories for me or certain associations,
Speaker 1: And so I decided to move back to where I
Speaker 1: went to grad school in Massachusetts and Cambridge, Massachusetts, and
Speaker 1: I moved from my huge head of college house into
Speaker 1: this smaller apartment, and honestly, I think it was the
Speaker 1: thing that wound up making me feel much less burned out. Right,
Speaker 1: I was just in a completely different place with totally
Speaker 1: different sensory experiences than I was in before. It was
Speaker 1: a nice way to distract myself from some of the
Speaker 1: things that were tricky during my life at Yale and
Speaker 1: some of the stresses I was facing. It allowed me
Speaker 1: to focus my attention more on running this podcast rather
Speaker 1: than worrying about my lab and some of these other things.
Speaker 1: And within like weeks, I was feeling completely better. And
Speaker 1: I thought that this was just kind of an accident
Speaker 1: of my little burnout story. But you wanted to use
Speaker 1: the story to explain to deep principles about the importance
Speaker 1: of place for shifting your emotions.
Speaker 2: Well, I think it's such a powerful story. And you know,
Speaker 2: our spaces, the spaces around us often impact multiple shifters
Speaker 2: that exist inside us, So, like you were talking about,
Speaker 2: they certainly impact our attention, like what we're exposed to,
Speaker 2: and by impacting what we're exposed to. They have implications
Speaker 2: for our senses. We also form connections to places, and
Speaker 2: what really stood out to me about your story when
Speaker 2: I think about it, is when you moved back to Cambridge.
Speaker 2: Cambridge had these warm associations attached to it. This is
Speaker 2: where you were a student and you had these formative experiences.
Speaker 2: And what we've learned in the science that I think
Speaker 2: doesn't get as much attention as it deserves, is we
Speaker 2: routinely form attachments to places in a way that is
Speaker 2: similar to the way we form attachment to people to
Speaker 2: other people. So we talk a lot about attachment to
Speaker 2: other individuals in our lives, attachment figures who when were
Speaker 2: in the presence of those figures. This provides us with
Speaker 2: a sense of safety and support, parents, caretakers, partners, friends. Well,
Speaker 2: we also form attachments to places, and when you're enough
Speaker 2: in the presence of a place that you are positively
Speaker 2: attached to, that likewise gives you this sense of safety
Speaker 2: and security. I'll bring this back to my kids when
Speaker 2: it's funny when you learn new material and you filter
Speaker 2: it through the lens of your own experiences. I remember
Speaker 2: when my kids were upset, they always used to do
Speaker 2: this curious thing when they were little and just they
Speaker 2: just wanted to go home, and when we got home,
Speaker 2: they'd want to go in their room, and that just
Speaker 2: provided them with a sense of security. And so it
Speaker 2: turns out that's not just true of little kids, it's
Speaker 2: true of all of us. And I think the invitation
Speaker 2: that extends to us is to do some thinking ahead
Speaker 2: of time before the triggers ignite, Like what are the
Speaker 2: spaces in our lives that have those restorative properties that
Speaker 2: make us feel safe? In supert I have several of
Speaker 2: these positive spaces located around ann Arbor that I've like
Speaker 2: marked on a map figuratively, and I know where to go.
Speaker 2: It's like in the movies, you know where there's a
Speaker 2: safe house for the ci agent when they need to
Speaker 2: escape people who are getting going after them. Like, I've
Speaker 2: got my safe spots. There's the law school quadrangle here,
Speaker 2: which is just this magnificently beautiful space. There's the arboretum,
Speaker 2: there's my home. Those are places I can go to
Speaker 2: and they are managing my emotions without me having to
Speaker 2: do anything by just being in that place.
Speaker 1: But you've also talked about ways that we can manage
Speaker 1: our spaces in more local ways, right, Like my situation
Speaker 1: is a case where I literally move cities. Not everybody
Speaker 1: can do that. You're talking about kind of within your town,
Speaker 1: specific spaces you can go to. You've talked about how
Speaker 1: we can take our local spaces and make them more
Speaker 1: emotionally regulatory.
Speaker 2: How do we do that? Yeah, this is I think
Speaker 2: a really important point because changing your space is a
Speaker 2: luxury we don't always have the ability to engage in.
Speaker 2: You can think of that as like a macro way
Speaker 2: of moving our emotions around via spaces. But then there's
Speaker 2: a more microway you could do this. There's a way
Speaker 2: of harnessing your immediate spaces, and there are lots of
Speaker 2: things you could do here. There's research that we and
Speaker 2: others have done where you put pictures of attachment figures
Speaker 2: in your surroundings, so pictures of love ones. Research shows
Speaker 2: that when you glance at a picture of a loved
Speaker 2: one after thinking about something negative, it speeds the pace
Speaker 2: at which you recover from emotional turbulence. Right. So you know,
Speaker 2: after I did that research, I went on a picture
Speaker 2: frame shopping spree and I put pictures of loved ones
Speaker 2: all around my offices, So that's putting something new in
Speaker 2: your environment to push you in a direction where you
Speaker 2: want to go. Another example of that would be plants.
Speaker 2: We know that looking at images of green things, so
Speaker 2: plants and trees, flowers. This also has restorative calming effects,
Speaker 2: so you can imagine decorating your space in that way.
Speaker 2: You can also modify your space so by removing things
Speaker 2: that are pushing your emotions in the wrong direction. Lots
Speaker 2: of ways you could do this. We're talking right now
Speaker 2: and I have my cell phone turned over, so I've
Speaker 2: now modified my space to reduce a distractor which would
Speaker 2: get in the way of our conversation. I tell a
Speaker 2: story in the book True Story. This is true. I've
Speaker 2: done this many times. I tend to overorder pizza whenever
Speaker 2: we have people over to watch football, and I know
Speaker 2: that if I don't give every single size of pizza
Speaker 2: away before our friends leave the house, I will come
Speaker 2: down to the kitchen at between ten and twelve at
Speaker 2: night and I will eat the cold pizza and I
Speaker 2: will have such a positive emotional experience while doing so
Speaker 2: that will then end the second I finished consuming it,
Speaker 2: and then I won't be able to sleep at night.
Speaker 2: So the solution, I'm modifying my space to remove that
Speaker 2: as a distractor, as a temptation. So you can modify
Speaker 2: your spaces and really architect your surroundings to help you
Speaker 2: achieve the emotions that you want to achieve.
Speaker 1: And that gets us to the final shifter that we'll
Speaker 1: talk about in this episode, which is something that exists
Speaker 1: in our space and definitely something that I tried to
Speaker 1: do when I physically move spaces, which is I wanted
Speaker 1: to surround myself with different people. Our relationships can also
Speaker 1: be big shifters. Explain this idea of emotional contagion and
Speaker 1: why it could be a powerful tool for changing our
Speaker 1: emotions around.
Speaker 2: So other people. We are a social species, and our
Speaker 2: emotions are powerfully calibrated against other people and how we
Speaker 2: think about them and interact with them, and emotional contagion
Speaker 2: is a great example of this. There's lots of research
Speaker 2: that shows that when we are not sure of how
Speaker 2: to respond in a given situation, we reference other people
Speaker 2: because other people are a rich source of information. Now
Speaker 2: that can push us in good or bad directions, right, So,
Speaker 2: you know, one frowning face in a room can quickly
Speaker 2: lead to any other frowning faces, smile and joy can
Speaker 2: spread as well. I do this exercise often with groups
Speaker 2: when I lead workshops to demonstrate the power of emotional contagion,
Speaker 2: where I break people up into groups. Then I ask
Speaker 2: each member of the group to volunteer a leader, and
Speaker 2: so I take the leaders out and then I count
Speaker 2: off one two one two one two and as eara Ones,
Speaker 2: I'm going to go back into the room with you
Speaker 2: in a few minutes. I'm gonna give you a really
Speaker 2: hard problem to solve. I want the ones to be
Speaker 2: an ultra supportive cheerleading leader. And then I turn to
Speaker 2: the twos. They kind of know what's coming. They're kind
Speaker 2: of nervously laughing, and as Arai two's you know who
Speaker 2: I want you to be. I want you to be
Speaker 2: the A holes. I want you to be, stoic, disapproving,
Speaker 2: don't give much positive reinforcement. I assure them that I
Speaker 2: will debrief everyone the moment the exercise is over, and
Speaker 2: then they go back into the rooms. They work on
Speaker 2: this problem, and the leaders follow the orders I've given them.
Speaker 2: It is remarkable, Lourie, to see how these different groups
Speaker 2: respond with than seconds, the groups of the positive leaders
Speaker 2: they're brainstorming out loud, they're giggling, they're laughing, they're having fun.
Speaker 2: In the other groups like no one is talking, they're
Speaker 2: just looking at the piece of paper, right because the
Speaker 2: emotion of the leader that has then spread throughout the
Speaker 2: rest of the group. We see this, of course playing
Speaker 2: out not just in person to person context. It happens
Speaker 2: on social media a lot in ways that can have
Speaker 2: really consequential effects. So this is often how moral outrage spreads.
Speaker 2: There are also instances and once you see positivity spreading
Speaker 2: within networks too, So simply being aware of this, I
Speaker 2: think can be very important for all of us. Number One,
Speaker 2: if you are in a leadership point of view, whether
Speaker 2: it be in an organization, in a friend group, and
Speaker 2: a family, recognize that the emotional tone that you bring
Speaker 2: to a situation directly impacts other people, often without any
Speaker 2: explicit direction. If you're a leader, you might also want
Speaker 2: to be away of the fact that if you want
Speaker 2: this group to be pushing in a particular direction, and
Speaker 2: there's one voice or one person there that maybe isn't
Speaker 2: abiding by that, you want to be sensitive to that
Speaker 2: too and nip that reaction in the blood right away.
Speaker 2: But emotional contagion is a really powerful lustration of how
Speaker 2: other people can affect us.
Speaker 1: It also really gives us an opportunity. You know, sometimes
Speaker 1: we can think about emotional contagion as this terrible thing, like, oh,
Speaker 1: I'm just at the mercy of everybody's emotions on my
Speaker 1: team or whatever. But I think you also can recognize
Speaker 1: that that's an opportunity. You can see the emotions that
Speaker 1: you really want to see in the group, like through
Speaker 1: your own actions. And in some ways, this is what
Speaker 1: you were doing as the leader of your family with
Speaker 1: your daughter in the car with Don't Stop Believing, right,
Speaker 1: You could have kind of caught her a glom emotion
Speaker 1: and felt bad, But you're like, non, if I shift myself,
Speaker 1: it's going to shift her too. And I think this
Speaker 1: is the real opportunities that we can use ourselves as
Speaker 1: these pivot points to not to shift our own emotions,
Speaker 1: but emotionally regulate for the people we care about too.
Speaker 2: Couldn't agree more. And you know that a really profound
Speaker 2: and eloquent way of summarizing saying how a lot of
Speaker 2: these shifters come together, because they have implications for not
Speaker 2: only the way you manage your own life, but how
Speaker 2: you affect those around you, and ideally you're motivated to
Speaker 2: affect those around you in a positive direction, but you
Speaker 2: can also muster or out even further. Because our understanding
Speaker 2: of how these principles of emotion regulation work, they also
Speaker 2: have the opportunity to shape the cultures of the groups
Speaker 2: that we belong to. So, you know, I've belonged to
Speaker 2: a bunch of different groups characterized by different cultures, and
Speaker 2: I'm constantly trying to be explicit about the values and
Speaker 2: beliefs I have about emotion and emotion regulation. These are
Speaker 2: states of being that I think are really important, and
Speaker 2: I think we need to spend more time investing in
Speaker 2: because doing so is going to help people think and
Speaker 2: perform more effectively at work. It's going to improve the
Speaker 2: quality of relationships and their health. So I'm being really
Speaker 2: clear about what my beliefs are for this culture, and
Speaker 2: I'm backing that up. I'm not just saying that, I'm
Speaker 2: interacting with folks in ways that establish norms that reinforce
Speaker 2: my values and beliefs, and I'm even giving people some
Speaker 2: tools to try to hone these these abilities to shift.
Speaker 2: And so that's the way you go from knowing about something,
Speaker 2: to try it and to actually shift a culture around
Speaker 2: a topic, which I think is a really important challenge
Speaker 2: we all we all have in front of us.
Speaker 1: It's great, we've come a long way from holes in
Speaker 1: the head, I think, which is good.
Speaker 2: We thankfully have come a very long way from putting
Speaker 2: holes in our head. And I think, you know, look,
Speaker 2: there's there's a lot more we have to learn, but
Speaker 2: we have a mass, a pretty compelling set of insights
Speaker 2: regarding how we manage this wacky, you know thing called
Speaker 2: emotions and our emotional life. And I think we'd all
Speaker 2: be a whole lot better off informing ourselves of what
Speaker 2: we've learned and using it to help us live the
Speaker 2: emotional lives we want to live.
Speaker 1: I'm so grateful that Ethan and so many other scientists
Speaker 1: have given us practical tools for regulating our big field
Speaker 1: between work stress and life stress, not to mention politics.
Speaker 1: In the state of the planet, I experienced big feelings
Speaker 1: like fear, anxiety, and overwhelm a lot.
Speaker 2: These days.
Speaker 1: I'm so happy I've gotten Ethan's tips for helping me
Speaker 1: find peace. They're much better than having someone drill a
Speaker 1: hole in my head. Let's quickly recap first up, prepare
Speaker 1: a big emotions playlist. If you're scared or sad, dispel
Speaker 1: that mood by hitting play on some feel good music. Personally,
Speaker 1: I think some dad rock like Journey is definitely the
Speaker 1: way to go. Ethan's second tip divert your attention. There
Speaker 1: are plenty of quick ways to distract yourself away from
Speaker 1: big emotions. Try going for a run or my favorite
Speaker 1: solving the word. Tip three is to take a step
Speaker 1: back and view your problems as a stranger might see them.
Speaker 1: Are things actually so bleak? What would a coach or
Speaker 1: mentor say about what you should do? The fourth way
Speaker 1: to regulate your emotions is to get some physical distance
Speaker 1: from what's upsetting you. Get out of your home or workplace.
Speaker 1: Remember that escaping the environment that's stressing you out can work.
Speaker 1: Wonders and Ethan's final strategy to tame big feelings is
Speaker 1: to surround yourself with positive people. Just like getting away
Speaker 1: from a location that's upsetting you, we can benefit by
Speaker 1: taking a break from the friends. Co workers are loved
Speaker 1: ones who are spiking our negative emotions. But above all,
Speaker 1: a metatip, if you will, is to remember that your
Speaker 1: emotions are functional. If you're feeling lonely, or if your
Speaker 1: boss is something that upsets you, or if a politician
Speaker 1: enacts some policy that gets you read with anger, that's
Speaker 1: a signal for you to take action. But once you've
Speaker 1: figured out what your big feeling is there to teach you,
Speaker 1: that big feeling has done its job, and it's time
Speaker 1: for that big feeling to move on. It's also time
Speaker 1: for our how to season to move on. Next up,
Speaker 1: we'll be looking at something that's super useful in small doses,
Speaker 1: but can prove very harmful when it's allowed to rule
Speaker 1: our lives. We'll be exploring how to fight stress. That's
Speaker 1: next time on the Happiness Lab with me Doctor Laurie
Speaker 1: Santos