Speaker 1: Pushkin, There's no way around it. Sometimes life is tough, awful.
Speaker 1: Even bad things happen all the time, whether it's an
Speaker 1: unanticipated health problem, a new relationship woe, or dire news
Speaker 1: on the job. Sometimes these nasty circumstances result from our
Speaker 1: own behaviors and choices, and sometimes they have nothing to
Speaker 1: do with us whatsoever. Every Day people become the victims
Speaker 1: of random accidents, natural disasters, or even unprovoked attacks. In
Speaker 1: the aftermath of awful events like these, it's easy to
Speaker 1: feel upset and broken, and when things are really bad,
Speaker 1: you can even start wondering whether you'll be able to
Speaker 1: pick up the pieces of your life again. It is
Speaker 1: so fabulous to be back in Miami and this beautiful
Speaker 1: zity and this beautiful weather with you beautiful This spring,
Speaker 1: I was invited to host a discussion at the World
Speaker 1: Happiness Summit in my and that gave me the chance
Speaker 1: to interview someone who's dedicated her career to helping people
Speaker 1: whose lives have been impacted in awful ways. I made
Speaker 1: this amazing audience.
Speaker 2: I was so excited to see. I am so excited
Speaker 2: to be here.
Speaker 1: This is psychiatrist doctor Sue Varma. Sue was the first
Speaker 1: medical director at the World Trade Center Mental Health Program
Speaker 1: at NYU, where she treated people caught up in the
Speaker 1: attacks of nine to eleven. Sue has now gathered her
Speaker 1: insights from decades of this kind of work into a
Speaker 1: new book called Practical Optimism, The Art, Science, and Practice
Speaker 1: of Exceptional well Being. In the book, Sue explores strategies
Speaker 1: we can use to deal with the difficult chapters in life,
Speaker 1: and her biggest recommendation is to adopt a particular form
Speaker 1: of optimism, what she calls practical optimism.
Speaker 2: To me, optimism has head to toe benefits, but at
Speaker 2: the end of the day, what optimism is is a mindset.
Speaker 1: The world happiness of it, or WHASU as we call it,
Speaker 1: is an amazing event. If you like this podcast, you
Speaker 1: would have an Apse sloop Blast at OHASU. But with
Speaker 1: so many speakers scheduled, I only had time to chat
Speaker 1: with Sue about a tiny part of her work, so
Speaker 1: I asked her to record a fuller interview just for you.
Speaker 2: Nice to see you, my pleasure looking forward to it.
Speaker 1: So I got her back to join me on Zoom.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm fine with whatever worked for you. I don't
Speaker 2: mind doing like a full episode yeah.
Speaker 1: And began at the beginning with her story of the
Speaker 1: morning of September eleventh, two thousand and one.
Speaker 2: So, you know, on nine eleven, I was a medical
Speaker 2: student and I was working in a New York City hospital,
Speaker 2: and I remember getting the call to say, you know,
Speaker 2: discharge as many healthy ish people as you can, because
Speaker 2: we need to make beds for people who are going
Speaker 2: to be coming in who are injured. And we did that,
Speaker 2: and we waited and waited and waited, and we just
Speaker 2: simply didn't see the kind of numbers that we were
Speaker 2: thinking because a death toll was so high.
Speaker 1: Do you remember where you were when you first heard
Speaker 1: about the towers, Like, were you already like at work
Speaker 1: and saw it on TV or something?
Speaker 2: Yes, I remember like we would come in at five am,
Speaker 2: so I had already been there for like three plus
Speaker 2: hours when we were hearing the news and seeing it
Speaker 2: live as the towers were coming down as a plane crash,
Speaker 2: So you know, it was freakish. And I remember, like,
Speaker 2: you know, my sister in law was working downtown in
Speaker 2: nine to eleven, so many friends and family members were
Speaker 2: somehow down and around there, and we couldn't get through
Speaker 2: to anybody like nobody was answering the phone, and we
Speaker 2: did lose loved ones, friends. I mean, there were so
Speaker 2: many stories of people getting caught in the dust cloud,
Speaker 2: seeing people jump out of the buildings, getting trampled on,
Speaker 2: and in the days after, myself and my colleagues we
Speaker 2: volunteered in a variety of ways with first responders, with cleanup, rescue,
Speaker 2: recovery at the Morgue, getting trauma training, you know, being
Speaker 2: a New Yorker my whole life, like, this is a
Speaker 2: place I identified with. But I think no matter where
Speaker 2: you were in the country or in the world, I
Speaker 2: think a lot of people felt somehow connected and traumatized rightfully,
Speaker 2: So it was devastating. You know, when I think of trauma,
Speaker 2: like you're never left the same. There's a you before
Speaker 2: it and then there's a U after it. When I
Speaker 2: think of mass disasters and terrorism, it's intended to chip
Speaker 2: away at your morale and your sense of self and
Speaker 2: your source of confidence and trust in the world. And
Speaker 2: so what I saw in you know, this whole concept
Speaker 2: of you know, New York strong, It really to me
Speaker 2: came from this idea that great tragedy, not always, but
Speaker 2: sometimes can bring out a sense of grit and toughness
Speaker 2: and community. And it wouldn't be until years later, after
Speaker 2: I'd finished my residency training at NYU and psychiatry to
Speaker 2: be recruited for this role that I really didn't feel
Speaker 2: prepared for, but felt so honored to be considered and
Speaker 2: thought of for it. And you know, it was a
Speaker 2: massive effort. It was a new program, and so when
Speaker 2: I came on, you know, I remember the early days,
Speaker 2: They're like, there's several hundred patients who are on our list.
Speaker 2: You're going to be treating first responders and civilians. And
Speaker 2: I was like, great, how many psychiatrists do we have?
Speaker 2: Like six seven? They're like, no, it's just you. I joked.
Speaker 2: I'm like, these are big shoes to fill and they're like, no, no, no,
Speaker 2: you're bringing your own shoes because their own a shoes.
Speaker 2: Like this is the first program of its kind, so
Speaker 2: incredibly daunting, challenging, but eventually extremely meaningful and rewarding.
Speaker 1: But you had, if I understand, I kind of someone
Speaker 1: to look up to who kind of dealt with difficult
Speaker 1: situations with optimism. I'm thinking about someone in your family
Speaker 1: that you talked about in your book. Tell me the
Speaker 1: story of the inspiration that your dad was giving you.
Speaker 2: So you know, my dad still is an inspiration. Like
Speaker 2: he's going to be close to ninety soon. And he
Speaker 2: literally looks and acts and thinks twenty years younger, if
Speaker 2: not more, and one of the kindest, sharpest and healthiest
Speaker 2: people that I do. There's such resilience. You know. He
Speaker 2: came from very little in India, and you know he's
Speaker 2: born in late nineteen thirties and has seen so many
Speaker 2: decades of trauma and tragedy and the things that I
Speaker 2: take away from him, you know, he would always say
Speaker 2: simple living and high thinking and this was a big
Speaker 2: saying in my family that I always make fun of him.
Speaker 2: I was like, but Dad, why are you always laughing?
Speaker 2: Why are you always smiling? Like what is there to
Speaker 2: be like, especially now, Like what is there to be
Speaker 2: so grateful for? He's like, I mean you can laugh
Speaker 2: or you can cry. I mean, you make the choice.
Speaker 2: He's always sometimes like laughing at his own jokes in
Speaker 2: his own head, telling himself stories, not in a delusional way,
Speaker 2: just like laughing. And I was like, the Dad, you
Speaker 2: didn't have electricity, didn't have running water. He's like, are
Speaker 2: you talking about we had like dance parties and slumber
Speaker 2: parties on the rooftop and camel rides and you know,
Speaker 2: hurricane lamps. I'm like, that's because you had no electricity.
Speaker 1: Dad.
Speaker 2: He's like, life was great. Life was great. He's like,
Speaker 2: how do you want to look at it? But like,
Speaker 2: how do you want to tell your story? And so
Speaker 2: you know, I just saw him this morning and he's
Speaker 2: like standing there and he's like cutting fruit. That's how
Speaker 2: like immigrant dads show love in the house. He's like,
Speaker 2: what do you want to like, you know, candle up,
Speaker 2: I'm cutting this, I'm cutting that. And I was like, wow,
Speaker 2: you spend three hours cutting fruits for the whole thing.
Speaker 2: Like yeah, he's retired now, he's like, you know, we've
Speaker 2: got to spend our time some way. So I was
Speaker 2: just thinking about him, and I'm like, you know that
Speaker 2: saying like you don't want to just add years to
Speaker 2: your life, you want to add life to your years.
Speaker 2: And he is like the perfect example of that of
Speaker 2: just always enjoying himself no matter where he is. He's
Speaker 2: always reading new books, always coming back and listening to
Speaker 2: podcasts and interviews and sharing things, so keeps himself intellectually stimulated.
Speaker 1: So it seems like part of his story is that
Speaker 1: even though he came from circumstances that might feel kind
Speaker 1: of negative or feel sort of harsh to other folks
Speaker 1: when they're listening to it, he seems like he's really
Speaker 1: happy and optimistic, resilient. And this sort of seems to
Speaker 1: fit with the question that you face when you saw
Speaker 1: your patients. I mean, talk about the puzzle you sort
Speaker 1: of experienced as you saw different patients reactions to the
Speaker 1: trauma of nine to eleven.
Speaker 2: Yes, so you know, first thing I want to say
Speaker 2: is I never want anyone to feel less than if
Speaker 2: they do end up experiencing mental health disorders, whether it's
Speaker 2: related to an event or an incident or not. Most
Speaker 2: people twenty thirty forty percent of folks in their life
Speaker 2: will experience a mental health disorder, and seventy to eighty
Speaker 2: percent of people will experience a life threatening event at
Speaker 2: some point or another. Right, Well, what's interesting that when
Speaker 2: it comes to post traumatic stress disorder that while eighty
Speaker 2: percent of people will experience a life threatening event, only
Speaker 2: about eight to ten percent of people will actually meet
Speaker 2: criteria for post traumatic stress disorders. So what that says
Speaker 2: to me is, Wow, right, like at least ninety percent
Speaker 2: of people will have really bad things happen to them
Speaker 2: in their life, big bad, life changing things, and yet
Speaker 2: they will move on. We had a lot of patients
Speaker 2: who were in the medical monitoring program but never met
Speaker 2: criteria for anxiety depression PTSD. So our brain has a
Speaker 2: great ability to bounce back, right, But to me, bouncing
Speaker 2: back from adversity, that's only part of the equation. It's
Speaker 2: important part, but it's only one part. I wanted to
Speaker 2: help people thrive in the face of adversity, because which
Speaker 2: one of us will escape this world, you know, without
Speaker 2: anything bad ever happened to us, none of us. That
Speaker 2: is where practical optimism came to me, is because I
Speaker 2: would see these folks who a lot of these patients
Speaker 2: who never became anxious or depressed, that they would still
Speaker 2: come to our program and helping other folks. They bring
Speaker 2: them to their appointments. In the aftermath of nine to eleven,
Speaker 2: A lot of patients would have agoraphobia or avoidance of people, places, things,
Speaker 2: reminders is a feature of PTSD, so with hypervigilance, insomnia
Speaker 2: on nightmares, irritability, so they don't want to leave their house,
Speaker 2: and we would have these other patients who are like,
Speaker 2: I'm fine, I'll bring you, I'll take the subway with you,
Speaker 2: because they were so afraid of there being another attack
Speaker 2: in the days after, or just having triggers and reminders.
Speaker 2: So these folks who never made it into my program,
Speaker 2: I would see them in the hallways and I literally
Speaker 2: would be like, what is your secret? And I've started
Speaker 2: to see common threads of specific things that they did.
Speaker 2: But resilience, in my mind, was always something you either
Speaker 2: had or you didn't, and one feature of it was optimism,
Speaker 2: but there were other features like altruism, social support, moral compass,
Speaker 2: cognitive flexibility, but optimism was again one of these things
Speaker 2: that you had or you didn't, and so was resilience.
Speaker 2: But what about the rest of us? And it wouldn't
Speaker 2: be until years later that there was a paper done
Speaker 2: with researchers from UCLA and they said, you know, there
Speaker 2: is a genetic linked toptimism. So that was my first question.
Speaker 2: Is it genetic? Is it something you're born with? And
Speaker 2: I love it when I find science to back up
Speaker 2: things that I'm already thinking. And it said, yes, there is,
Speaker 2: and it's this oxytocin receptor gene and if there's some
Speaker 2: variation in it, you know, you may not be as optimistic.
Speaker 2: And what did that mean? Well, if you're pessimistic or
Speaker 2: have pessimistic tendencies and you're more likely to get depressed.
Speaker 2: And then they looked at this gene and they said, so,
Speaker 2: what is it actually code for? Right, It's a mindset, yes,
Speaker 2: But in addition to being a mindset, it's also the
Speaker 2: ability to regulate your emotions, to be able to ask
Speaker 2: for help. And I was thinking about so many of
Speaker 2: these things that in my therapy with patients. What is
Speaker 2: it that I'm helping them with? And can I teach
Speaker 2: people optimism? Can I teach them the things that optimists do?
Speaker 2: How do we codify this? What does this look like
Speaker 2: behaviorally in the world? And I found data in every
Speaker 2: field of medicine talking about it. People who are optimistic
Speaker 2: and do a brief optimistic intervention recover faster from colds
Speaker 2: or have less colds or infections, or looking at exceptional longevity.
Speaker 2: In this study in drama that I was a meta
Speaker 2: analysis of over two hundred thousand people and said that
Speaker 2: people who are optimistic live ten to fifteen percent longer,
Speaker 2: and not just longer lives, but healthier lives. So the
Speaker 2: concept of health span, because lifespan may be increasing, but
Speaker 2: we're spending the last decade of our lives, especially women
Speaker 2: with dementia, living in a nursing home or dependent on
Speaker 2: other people. So I was like, head to toe optimists
Speaker 2: have less anxiety and depression, thirty percent, less likelihood of
Speaker 2: getting strokes or dying from heart attacks or really all
Speaker 2: cause mortality. They're happier, They're forty percent more likely to
Speaker 2: get a raise in the next year. They have more friendships,
Speaker 2: stronger and longer bonds from childhood. They are happier in
Speaker 2: their romantic relationships. I was like, why is no one
Speaker 2: talking about this? This to me is the jackpot, This
Speaker 2: is the well spring of health.
Speaker 1: So I wanted to talk a little bit about how
Speaker 1: people tend to think about optimism because I think when
Speaker 1: we hear the word optimism, we sometimes get it wrong.
Speaker 1: So what is optimism?
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I think a lot of people I know
Speaker 2: I did think of it as like this woo woo
Speaker 2: thinking and just look on the bright side and everything
Speaker 2: will work out. And that is definitely not optimism. That
Speaker 2: is toxic positivity, asking someone to just get over something,
Speaker 2: or look on the bride side. Optimism simply is the
Speaker 2: tendency to have a positive outlook in an uncertain situation,
Speaker 2: to kind of expect best possible outcome. But to me,
Speaker 2: optimism by itself is only part of the equation because
Speaker 2: it's like, i can have all the positive thinking in
Speaker 2: the world, but if I'm not doing anything actionable and proactive,
Speaker 2: I'm not going to be able to trans those positive
Speaker 2: outlooks into positive outcomes. And so in my mind, I
Speaker 2: needed something more. I needed skill set and a tool set.
Speaker 2: And that is what practical optimism is, and that is
Speaker 2: how practical optimism differs from optimism. So if you're in
Speaker 2: that twenty five percent bucket that is born naturally with
Speaker 2: a positive outlook, excellent, But the reality is that seventy
Speaker 2: five percent of us are not skewed that way. You know,
Speaker 2: we might be sort of somewhere in the middle or
Speaker 2: maybe skeew more pessimistic. So optimism is having a very
Speaker 2: favorable outlook, but by itself it's not sufficient.
Speaker 1: So let's walk through this sort of updated version practical optimism.
Speaker 1: How is that different?
Speaker 2: So practical optimism helps you translate positive outlooks into positive
Speaker 2: outcomes through action and practical optimism is a practice like
Speaker 2: having a yoga practice, learning a new language, learning how
Speaker 2: to ride a bike, learning a sport. Some days it's
Speaker 2: five minutes, some days it's longer, but it does require
Speaker 2: effort and work, and more importantly, it's a skill set.
Speaker 2: And why that was so freeing to me is like,
Speaker 2: we can all learn skills, and we all should learn skills,
Speaker 2: and the practical optimism is a practice that requires you
Speaker 2: to take chances and to put yourself out there in
Speaker 2: the world, and to course correct and to continually learn
Speaker 2: from mistakes.
Speaker 1: It's time for a quick break, but we'll dive deeper
Speaker 1: into Sue's idea of practical optimism when the Happiness Lab
Speaker 1: returns in a moment. In her book Practical Optimism, The Art,
Speaker 1: Science and Practice of Exceptional Wellbeing, psychiatrist doctor Sue Varma
Speaker 1: explains that a major pillar of becoming more optimistic is
Speaker 1: facing up to our emotions and processing them. So why
Speaker 1: is that so important?
Speaker 2: When people look at optimists, they want to dismiss their
Speaker 2: happiness and say, well, they've never had anything bad happen
Speaker 2: to them. Of course they're happy. And what people don't
Speaker 2: realize is that optimists and pessimists both experience the same
Speaker 2: number of life adversities. The difference is that optimists are
Speaker 2: better able to cope with them. And the reason is
Speaker 2: is because they are in real time. Processing their emotions
Speaker 2: requires more effort and more energy to suppress your emotions.
Speaker 2: And when you suppress your emotions, they say that your
Speaker 2: body expresses what your mind cannot. And so a lot
Speaker 2: of my patients will come to me and they'll say,
Speaker 2: I don't know why I'm always sick, or I have
Speaker 2: these headaches, or I have these unexplained aches and pains,
Speaker 2: or ended up in the emergency room from panic attacks.
Speaker 2: So processing your emotions is such a key pillar of
Speaker 2: optimism because it says bad things are going to happen
Speaker 2: to you. People are going to piss you off, and
Speaker 2: what are you going to do about it? And a
Speaker 2: lot of times people end up suppressing negative emotions, like
Speaker 2: when we talk about any kind of addiction or unhealthy
Speaker 2: behavior with substances, with anything, hours of binge watching, doom scrolling,
Speaker 2: if it's meant as an avoidance of a procrastination, you
Speaker 2: cannot escape negative emotions. They will come to haunt you
Speaker 2: and That's why I say manage your emotions before they
Speaker 2: manage you, because in some form or another, I see
Speaker 2: so much suffering. You know, in my practice, a lot
Speaker 2: of these people look to the world as if they
Speaker 2: have it all together. In the realities, I know different
Speaker 2: because I get an interesting inside perspective of what is
Speaker 2: actually going on in their lives, and so in one
Speaker 2: form or another, whether it's their relationship suffering, whether it's
Speaker 2: their work, something is going to suffer. So we know
Speaker 2: that people who deal with their emotions are less likely
Speaker 2: to have all sorts of problems of heart disease. You know,
Speaker 2: there's something called type deep personality. We've heard of type
Speaker 2: A and type B and type DS. Is kind of
Speaker 2: like angry, holding onto emotions, not expressing them. It takes
Speaker 2: less energy to express it. I think so many people
Speaker 2: are afraid of their emotions. They're afraid to be alone,
Speaker 2: They're afraid to be alone with their thoughts. I know
Speaker 2: people who will put the music on always in the
Speaker 2: background because they don't want to be alone with their thoughts.
Speaker 2: And they're like, what would that mean for me if
Speaker 2: I actually had to confront how I feel.
Speaker 1: Which I think is so sad, right, because our emotions
Speaker 1: are this really useful signal about what's going on in
Speaker 1: reality and what we need to do. Differently, I feel
Speaker 1: like ignoring them. We do that really at our parallel
Speaker 1: right totally.
Speaker 2: And you know what it is an interesting Laurie, is
Speaker 2: that I think a lot of times people are afraid
Speaker 2: to confront emotions because it means that they will have
Speaker 2: to make in their mind what they perceive it's massive
Speaker 2: changes in their life and not ready to do that
Speaker 2: because like if somebody confronted the fact, wow, I really
Speaker 2: can't stand my partner and I've been resentful for so
Speaker 2: many years, and if they were to confront it, it
Speaker 2: would require something to change, and maybe they're afraid that
Speaker 2: it would mean that this would be the end of
Speaker 2: this relationship and then who would I be without it?
Speaker 2: So I get it, I understand, But I would also
Speaker 2: say that Rome wasn't built in a day, Like we
Speaker 2: don't have to deconstruct our lives as a result of
Speaker 2: figuring out what it means. Like I had a patient
Speaker 2: the other day who was sharing with me, like a
Speaker 2: lot of things that she was not happy about with
Speaker 2: her partner, and I was like, what do you think
Speaker 2: would be most helpful for me to say right now.
Speaker 2: And she was like, well, I know what I don't
Speaker 2: want you to say. I know I don't want you
Speaker 2: to tell me to break up with it. She knows
Speaker 2: on some level that the way things are not working,
Speaker 2: but isn't ready to end the relationship. So that's just
Speaker 2: one example. There's so many where somebody's like, I know
Speaker 2: what I need to do in terms of changing my
Speaker 2: life or changing a job. Like they know that if
Speaker 2: they were to allow themselves to be enveloped by the
Speaker 2: emotion either that they would be debilitated by it. And
Speaker 2: I always say to patients, think of it is like
Speaker 2: dresser drawers. I'm not saying let's open all of them
Speaker 2: and take everything out and create an entire mass and
Speaker 2: pile in the middle of your room. I'm saying, like,
Speaker 2: let's just look at one drawer at a time and
Speaker 2: I'll help you pack it a little bit neater, right,
Speaker 2: But we're not saying everything, take out everything. And because
Speaker 2: I think there's a fear of being overwhelmed.
Speaker 1: And I think that fear of being overwhelmed can also
Speaker 1: involve not just being overwhelmed by the circumstances. You need
Speaker 1: to change but this worry that you might be literally
Speaker 1: overwhelmed by the emotion itself. Yeah, and that's one of
Speaker 1: the reasons I love your book. You share this sort
Speaker 1: of handy rhyming catchphrase which I love for how we
Speaker 1: can begin processing our emotions. What is this catchphrase?
Speaker 2: So it's name it, flame it, tame it, and reframe it.
Speaker 2: And the naming part is just name the antecedent for
Speaker 2: the trigger, just being aware of it. And there's so
Speaker 2: much evidence that having emotional and granularity, just like understanding,
Speaker 2: putting words to what you're feeling and what caused the trigger.
Speaker 2: You know, when we look at people who have suicidal thinking,
Speaker 2: as weird as this may sound, we feel that patients
Speaker 2: who have understanding of what the trigger was probably have
Speaker 2: a higher chance of recovery and prognosis because they can
Speaker 2: tie it back to a specific event. And if you
Speaker 2: can do that, then you're more likely to be able
Speaker 2: to address the underlying causes and prevent them from happening again.
Speaker 2: So naming your trigger and antecedents and knowing what they
Speaker 2: are is really important.
Speaker 1: And so next up is claim it. What does it
Speaker 1: mean to claim our emotions? So when I say claim
Speaker 1: your emotions where in your body do you feel them.
Speaker 1: A lot of times people will say that I have insomnia,
Speaker 1: or I have frequent urination or frequent bowel movements, or
Speaker 1: I have headaches, or I have a lot of tension
Speaker 1: in my neck and my shoulders. So I say that
Speaker 1: the body expresses what the mind cannot, and a lot
Speaker 1: of times our painful or forbidden emotions shows up physical symptoms.
Speaker 1: Another reason you talk about the importance of claiming emotions
Speaker 1: is it allows us to think about what we might
Speaker 1: call our forbidden emotions. What are forbidden emotions?
Speaker 2: So I think for some people, women, especially anger might
Speaker 2: be really forbidden. I have so many patients that I
Speaker 2: work with that end up crying when they're angry. It's
Speaker 2: scary because either I think that they're afraid of pushing
Speaker 2: the other person way, or that it means confronting or
Speaker 2: challenging the person. And then what, I think we've all
Speaker 2: created stories in our head about if I were to
Speaker 2: say something to someone, They're not going to like it,
Speaker 2: they're going to leave me, they're going to be mad
Speaker 2: at me, and then what And I think it's helpful
Speaker 2: to be like okay, yeah, and then what there's a
Speaker 2: statistic that says that eighty five percent of the time
Speaker 2: the things that we worry about never actually happen, and
Speaker 2: the fifteen percent of time that they do, we're better
Speaker 2: equipped to handle it than we think. So I think
Speaker 2: that's really important to just keep in mind. So that's
Speaker 2: claiming our emotions. But next up is that we have
Speaker 2: to tame our emotions. And one way that you suggest
Speaker 2: doing this is to really try to tame our ruminative loops.
Speaker 2: What do you mean by ruminative loops? I think I
Speaker 2: know what you mean. I think I've experienced this myself. First, yes,
Speaker 2: I definitely have experienced ruminative loops. And it's just like
Speaker 2: you're going in circles with the same thought, and what
Speaker 2: that does is end up creating powerlessness, and it strips
Speaker 2: us away of our agency because you're repeating the same
Speaker 2: emotion what if, or you're catastrophizing assuming the worst case scenario,
Speaker 2: or you're projecting. But taming your emotions is like short
Speaker 2: circuiting and fading a break in that and saying, all right,
Speaker 2: I am feeling angry, anxious, helpless, what am I going
Speaker 2: to do to self soothe? And so taming is really
Speaker 2: about soothing, And what I say is pick an activity
Speaker 2: that's not going to create a negative habit on its own.
Speaker 2: So somebody may say a glass of wine helps me soothe, Right,
Speaker 2: Then what happens when you need two or three or
Speaker 2: four to have the same effect, Right, So we don't
Speaker 2: want the soothing activity to take on a life of
Speaker 2: its own. So I would say, pick something that seems
Speaker 2: relatively healthy ish. Can you make a five minute phone
Speaker 2: call to a friend. Can you text someone that you
Speaker 2: know is going to be supportive and helpful, But you
Speaker 2: do a one minute meditation in place wherever you are,
Speaker 2: just closing your eyes and taking a deep breath. For me,
Speaker 2: walking is one of the most soothing activities. And I
Speaker 2: was fascinated by the science of walking that there's something
Speaker 2: about when you're walking, your eyes have to track what's
Speaker 2: out there in the world, Like so you want to
Speaker 2: get hit by a car, and all of that forces
Speaker 2: you those eye movements to get out of your own head.
Speaker 2: So going for a walk or any kind of exit
Speaker 2: size just gets you out of your own head. It
Speaker 2: gets you out of routine. So whatever you're capable of doing,
Speaker 2: it could be a five minute stretch. So we just
Speaker 2: want to keep it simple and lower the bar. But
Speaker 2: what's soothing for you? That's the big take home point.
Speaker 1: You also mentioned this other strategy that I'm totally going
Speaker 1: to adopt myself, which is this idea of emptying your
Speaker 1: emotional spam folder.
Speaker 2: Yeah, what is this for me? I do that in journaling,
Speaker 2: and I think that there's so much value and there's
Speaker 2: so much science behind two ten minute journaling sessions, and
Speaker 2: there's no one right way to journal what works for you,
Speaker 2: Like sometimes it's literally for me reiterating what happened in
Speaker 2: the day, and it's getting it out of your head
Speaker 2: and putting it on paper, and you're like, all right,
Speaker 2: that's it. I'm done. You know, when I was a
Speaker 2: patient and going for my own therapy, I learned a
Speaker 2: technique called worry journaling. And somebody may say, well, that
Speaker 2: seems counterintuitive. Why would you keep a journal of your worries?
Speaker 2: And what I learned is that when you write the
Speaker 2: same thing over and over again, you start to see
Speaker 2: that there's a trend in your worries. There's a common theme.
Speaker 2: You're worried about the same types of things, and that
Speaker 2: the things that you're worried about are not actually happening.
Speaker 2: And if you're willing to write down how you handled it,
Speaker 2: that creates a sense of mastery as well. So putting
Speaker 2: it on paper is one way to unload your worry
Speaker 2: spam folder.
Speaker 1: And so that's a nice transition to the last of
Speaker 1: our four tips for kind processing our emotions, We need
Speaker 1: to reframe them. What is reframing our emotions? Why can
Speaker 1: it be so important?
Speaker 2: So reframing is one of the best techniques to try
Speaker 2: to put a different spin on a negative situation that happened.
Speaker 2: And I just want to say that there are some
Speaker 2: negative things that happen to you that there will be
Speaker 2: no positive spin. They will be no silver lining, And
Speaker 2: I one hundred percent get that. But other than the
Speaker 2: sort of big tragedies, ask yourself, and sometimes it may
Speaker 2: not be until you've created some distance between you and
Speaker 2: this bad thing that happened. But reframing allows us to
Speaker 2: take back some control and says, you know what, I'm
Speaker 2: not going to allow myself to be debilitated by this.
Speaker 2: And one way might say, is there another way for
Speaker 2: me to look at the situation? Could I look at
Speaker 2: it from another person's point of view? Could I understand
Speaker 2: it in the context of the larger plan for my life.
Speaker 2: So sometimes it might be a rejection, and there's this
Speaker 2: catchy thing rejection is really just redirection. There were so
Speaker 2: many things that I wanted to do at certain times
Speaker 2: in my life, and I am glad in retrospect that
Speaker 2: they didn't happen at that time, because for any number
Speaker 2: of reasons, I might have thought I was ready, or
Speaker 2: maybe I gained more experience later on, or I was
Speaker 2: better equipped to handle the challenge. And you could say, well,
Speaker 2: that's just you trying to be an optimist, and I'd say, sure,
Speaker 2: But the point is I couldn't control it. I couldn't
Speaker 2: change it, so why not reframe it in a way
Speaker 2: that puts me at ease. So reframing and really just
Speaker 2: is taking back control and it's saying I don't have
Speaker 2: to choose to allow myself to be a victim of
Speaker 2: this situation. Reframing is one of the most powerful techniques
Speaker 2: used in trauma processing therapy. But I recognized, you know,
Speaker 2: I had nine to eleven survivor patients and friends and
Speaker 2: they would say, you know, when we would talk about reframing,
Speaker 2: and they're like, you know, I don't see there's no
Speaker 2: silver lining, and I'd say absolutely, And it would be
Speaker 2: later on that I would recognize that there are some
Speaker 2: things that there'll be no positive way to put a
Speaker 2: spin on it. And then I realized from my Eastern upbringing,
Speaker 2: something my parents would say to me is that is
Speaker 2: this a problem to be solved or a truth to
Speaker 2: be accepted? And sometimes you cannot reframe something, and then
Speaker 2: it just becomes about acceptance. And I think, you know,
Speaker 2: my Western upbringing would have me believe that acceptance was resignation, surrender, passive,
Speaker 2: meek and weak. Eastern upbringing says, no, acceptance is a
Speaker 2: very strong place to be when you don't have a choice.
Speaker 1: We need to take another quick break. But when we return,
Speaker 1: Sue will explain how she's been inspired by the Japanese
Speaker 1: art form of kin sugi, taking broken pottery pieces and
Speaker 1: reconstructing them to be even more beautiful than an undamaged face.
Speaker 1: The Happiness Lab will be right back. Treating people caught
Speaker 1: up in the destruction of the World Trade Center had
Speaker 1: a huge impact on doctor Sue Varmer's career. Of course,
Speaker 1: doctor patient confidentiality prevents Sue from talking in detail about
Speaker 1: the specific cases she treated. But she wrote about one
Speaker 1: inspiring person who escaped the collapsing towers, a woman that
Speaker 1: Sue calls Shelley.
Speaker 2: So, you know, one of the first patients I worked with,
Speaker 2: and I had imposter syndrome. I was like, this is
Speaker 2: like a big job, and like, how am I qualified
Speaker 2: to be here? And I was scared, and I was like,
Speaker 2: how am I going to help Shelley? Because Shelley in
Speaker 2: some ways represented a lot of the themes that I
Speaker 2: was seeing, which was these amazing people, many of them
Speaker 2: were high achievers, many of them leaders in their community.
Speaker 2: You know, Shelley's a mom and just like a very honest, hardworking,
Speaker 2: strong human being. And you know, she was someone who
Speaker 2: considered herself an optimist. Go get her. She's like, I'm
Speaker 2: the one always doing the five k races and throwing
Speaker 2: the company get togethers, and so I never saw that
Speaker 2: something could break my spirit. And that was literally what
Speaker 2: she said. She was like, you know, on nine to eleven,
Speaker 2: here I am. I'm getting trampled, I'm getting caught in
Speaker 2: the dust clouds. I'm wearing heels that day. I love
Speaker 2: to look cute when I come to work, and the
Speaker 2: heel broke and then I'm walking barefoot and I'm asking
Speaker 2: for help. The next thing, you know, like the dust cloud,
Speaker 2: like just like there's no ways to even put words
Speaker 2: on what happened that day. You go to work thinking
Speaker 2: this is just a regular day, and then you're seeing
Speaker 2: people die in front of you everywhere. And she was like,
Speaker 2: I couldn't get home that day and my husband couldn't
Speaker 2: reach me. Like she wasn't able to go back to
Speaker 2: work in that office, and eventually when she did, she
Speaker 2: never took a day off and never asked for help.
Speaker 2: And it was really like only through the program that
Speaker 2: a lot of people were told that they're going there
Speaker 2: for physical reasons for checking up like asthma, GI problems,
Speaker 2: and then they got mental health screenings. She wasn't even
Speaker 2: thinking that, like I need to get help. And in
Speaker 2: her story, as she's unfolding it, she's just start crying
Speaker 2: and she like, I don't cry in front of people,
Speaker 2: and I don't think I've ever cried about this in
Speaker 2: front of anyone before. And you know, at the end,
Speaker 2: she said, I feel broken. You know, that was one
Speaker 2: of the hardest things to hear because I was like,
Speaker 2: what role do I possibly even play in helping you
Speaker 2: because everything you're saying to me is one thousand percent legitimate.
Speaker 2: There's no silver lining. How do I get you to reframe?
Speaker 2: There's no positive spin. So the theme was the brokenness
Speaker 2: that Shelley was sharing, and it made me think of
Speaker 2: this art of broken ceramics kinsugi in Japanese culture, which
Speaker 2: is preparing something to beyond its original form. It's restoring it,
Speaker 2: but bringing upon a level of beauty that is like
Speaker 2: the two point zero version in kinsugi, like you're putting
Speaker 2: these broken ceramic pieces together with the golden glue, a
Speaker 2: golden lacquer, and it ends up being even more majestic
Speaker 2: and expensive and valuable. And so when she said that,
Speaker 2: it reminded me because I remember what I was in
Speaker 2: therapy and I saw this art form in my therapist's office.
Speaker 2: It's the thing that my dad had from one of
Speaker 2: his trips many years ago in Japan. I thought to myself,
Speaker 2: is this an opportunity? Could tragedy ever be an opportunity
Speaker 2: for us to come back stronger? And so then became
Speaker 2: the journey. I think it was a parallel journey of
Speaker 2: me becoming a therapist. I think learning so much from
Speaker 2: my patients and just going home and saying, you know what,
Speaker 2: like I'm on this ride with them, for better or
Speaker 2: or worse, and we're going to get through this together.
Speaker 2: I don't have all the answers, and I don't have
Speaker 2: them right now. We're going to co create and co
Speaker 2: construct a new reality that hopefully will be just as good.
Speaker 2: It's never going to be the same. I get it
Speaker 2: that Shelley who wore the heels is the Shelley that
Speaker 2: now wear sneakers or if she wears kitten heels, and
Speaker 2: she brings like a book bag duffel bag and had
Speaker 2: a change of clothes, always anticipating in a way, like
Speaker 2: what if this were to ever happen again. So in
Speaker 2: some ways she was right, she was never going to
Speaker 2: be that person. But after the treatment ended, you know,
Speaker 2: I sat with her and her husband and he's like,
Speaker 2: I used to be the warrior in the relationship, and
Speaker 2: like I finally have my wife back, and she's able
Speaker 2: to function and she was able to ask for help.
Speaker 2: But it's returning back to a person that sense of
Speaker 2: self that they lost, of like that ability of I
Speaker 2: can do this.
Speaker 1: It seems like going through trauma, so many people that
Speaker 1: you've worked with went through this idea of the sense
Speaker 1: of inner brokenness, and you talked about this as the
Speaker 1: effect that trauma has had on people's self efficacy. What
Speaker 1: is self efficacy and why is it so important for
Speaker 1: mental health?
Speaker 2: Self efficacy is your confidence in your own abilities. And
Speaker 2: I think it's so interesting because it's not really saying
Speaker 2: anything about your actual abilities. And you know that saying
Speaker 2: like faked till you make it. I think there is
Speaker 2: some truth to it, but not the realities. Nobody is
Speaker 2: saying completely faked. Like you need to do the work,
Speaker 2: whatever that work is, if it's training to become a musician,
Speaker 2: like you need to train, but you also have to
Speaker 2: have faith and confidence in your ability to achieve the
Speaker 2: thing that you're working towards. So there's two aspects of it.
Speaker 2: One is continuing to push yourself to develop that ability,
Speaker 2: but then eventually believing that it is going to come
Speaker 2: to fruition. And we see there's so much work. Like
Speaker 2: Albert Bandura had done a lot of study on self efficacy,
Speaker 2: and he says that this sense of confidence comes from
Speaker 2: your own personal experience, from vicarious learning, looking at role models,
Speaker 2: getting feedback from trusted people, and then also just a
Speaker 2: sense of how does it make you feel your own
Speaker 2: physiological feedback.
Speaker 1: It also seems like self efficacy involves some specific expectations,
Speaker 1: both expectations about ourselves and outside ourselves. Explain what the
Speaker 1: research shows about that. Yes, there's two features to it.
Speaker 2: One is just the belief that you yourself have the
Speaker 2: capacity to achieve this and then the fact that this
Speaker 2: outcome is achievable. Period. So I'm just going to use
Speaker 2: weight loss as an example. Somebody may say I'm doing
Speaker 2: all the things I know, like I know what I
Speaker 2: need to do, and that could be anything like if
Speaker 2: somebody said I'm trying to put on more muscle, I
Speaker 2: need to eat more protein. I know what I need
Speaker 2: to do if I need to wake up like better
Speaker 2: sleep hygiene. So intellectually knowing what the steps are, that's
Speaker 2: a part of it. Number two, you carrying it out.
Speaker 2: But number three, will my work in the end be impactful?
Speaker 2: Will I see results? Because there'll be people who say
Speaker 2: I'm still not seeing the result. Sometimes the results are
Speaker 2: not in your hand. You may say I'm working really
Speaker 2: hard at work for promotion. I know what I need
Speaker 2: to do, but I'm dealing in a very stressful work
Speaker 2: environment that feels unfair, that feels biased, that feels like
Speaker 2: I'm walking an uphill battle. So I think that there
Speaker 2: are two parts that you need to feel efficacious, because
Speaker 2: your environment lends itself to making you feel that way.
Speaker 2: And the environment needs to be supportive because you can
Speaker 2: do all you want. But if the system feels rigged
Speaker 2: against you, and again, it could be a matter of
Speaker 2: perception or it could be reality. So we have to
Speaker 2: entertain both. Always try to ask my patients. I said, listen,
Speaker 2: I just want to get a better sense of your work.
Speaker 2: Tell me a little bit about your boss's personality, give
Speaker 2: me a sense of the interactions. How do you feel?
Speaker 2: How do your colleagues feel about this? So I never
Speaker 2: want to deny that reality if somebody says I'm trying,
Speaker 2: I am doing my best and things are still not
Speaker 2: working for me.
Speaker 1: But both of those expectations seem to contribute to the
Speaker 1: benefits of experiencing self efficacy. What happens when it feels
Speaker 1: like we're not able to do what we really want
Speaker 1: to do. What happens when we're not feeling so effective?
Speaker 2: So I think we end up feeling demoralized disenchanted, disenfranchised,
Speaker 2: and we give up. And it's natural to think that
Speaker 2: you're going to fail, but what you really need to
Speaker 2: be reminded of is that you can rise up again.
Speaker 2: And so to me, proficiency is about reminding people at
Speaker 2: their very core of their capability. And like they did
Speaker 2: experiments with athletes and they're told, you're not going to
Speaker 2: win against this person. There's so much better than you.
Speaker 2: What they didn't know was they were actually matched with
Speaker 2: an athlete who was at the same level as them.
Speaker 2: But when you're told in advance you're not going to
Speaker 2: be able to do this, it can't. And when they
Speaker 2: were told the opposite, all this person sucks compared to you,
Speaker 2: You're so much better, you're going to win. So a
Speaker 2: lot of times our expectation really predicts outcomes. And like
Speaker 2: there's an experiment where they tell students going into a
Speaker 2: classroom the people that are very friendly or they're not,
Speaker 2: and the success of this student going into the classroom
Speaker 2: being able to make friends really had to do with
Speaker 2: what their expectations of what was to come. So I
Speaker 2: do believe in this concept of self fulfilling prophecy, and
Speaker 2: I don't think that optimism is at all magical thinking.
Speaker 1: So, how can we fight some of these barriers that
Speaker 1: lead to a lack of self efficacy? What can do
Speaker 1: we do to become more proficient? One of the barriers
Speaker 1: you talked about a lot sort of fighting helplessness. How
Speaker 1: can we fight our inner sense of helplessness?
Speaker 2: So I think the first thing is just understanding and
Speaker 2: recognizing it as that, and allowing yourself time to rest
Speaker 2: and to sometimes hit pause, maybe not stop. Validation is
Speaker 2: a key part of that is just to say I
Speaker 2: had a really hard time, Like if you're lucky enough
Speaker 2: to have someone really like loving and caring and has
Speaker 2: your best interests at heart, to say I get it,
Speaker 2: I see you, I see how hard you're working, and
Speaker 2: this was not your fault or could you learn something
Speaker 2: from this if you did have a role in it,
Speaker 2: and what can you do differently? So I think pausing, resting, recovering,
Speaker 2: because I think so many of us just go from
Speaker 2: one project to another to another, and it's this like
Speaker 2: sort of destination addiction where you're like, I need to
Speaker 2: get to the next place without really thinking through why
Speaker 2: do I continue to strive? You know, and sometimes to
Speaker 2: look at the helplessness and say, is this an opportunity
Speaker 2: for me to change course? You know, am I meant
Speaker 2: really for this? Do I really want this? Or is
Speaker 2: there another way for me to achieve this?
Speaker 1: And that really nicely gets to a second barrier. You've
Speaker 1: talked about this idea of stuckness, where it's like I
Speaker 1: just I'm never going to find a path forward. I'm
Speaker 1: just always going to be stuck. How do we fight
Speaker 1: this barrier to proficiency? Fighting stuckness is about finding flexibility.
Speaker 1: And I talk about in the book about patients who
Speaker 1: are like, oh, I must go to I don't know,
Speaker 1: fill in the blank, like business school or medical school
Speaker 1: or whatever it is. And he was actually a patient
Speaker 1: who you know, she was like I have to be
Speaker 1: a PhD In psychology, Like this is the only thing
Speaker 1: she wanted since she was a kid. And her parents
Speaker 1: were like, no, you're not really meant for that very
Speaker 1: long course, and we don't have the money for like
Speaker 1: and I remember talking to this patient saying, is there
Speaker 1: anything else that you can think of? And one thing
Speaker 1: led to another, and next thing, you know, she's the
Speaker 1: head of a wellness company and years later, you know,
Speaker 1: she sent me a clipping of some award that she
Speaker 1: got and it said she had written thank you and
Speaker 1: this was something you should with me in therapy, write
Speaker 1: your purpose and pen but your path in pencil. And
Speaker 1: that was so poignant to me because I was like,
Speaker 1: number one, don't remember saying that, but thank you.
Speaker 2: I'll take it. And then number two, Wow, you know
Speaker 2: it was something that probably I needed to hear at
Speaker 2: that time. And you know, just this idea that we
Speaker 2: don't have to be fixated on one specific path because
Speaker 2: there's so many roads to feeling satisfied, to feeling needed,
Speaker 2: to feeling impactful, and often it's not the road that
Speaker 2: we thought that we would be and that's totally fine.
Speaker 2: So flexibility is a big part of proficiency. Like you
Speaker 2: have to be nimble, you have to be quick, you
Speaker 2: have to say I have tried and it is okay.
Speaker 2: Giving up isn't always a sense of failure. I think
Speaker 2: a lot of times in this culture of go go
Speaker 2: go and work warrior make it happen, too much emphasis
Speaker 2: on the final product, on the success rather than the process,
Speaker 2: which is about making this and learning and fun and
Speaker 2: creativity and getting lost. When my husband and I travel
Speaker 2: and sometimes we make plans and sometimes we don't, you know,
Speaker 2: we don't like to have fixed, structured itineraries. We like
Speaker 2: to drive and go to small villages and meet people
Speaker 2: and see where things take us, you know. And I
Speaker 2: get that that's not always reality, and it's not always
Speaker 2: productive or efficient, especially if you're traveling with young kids.
Speaker 2: But I think as much as possible, I love the
Speaker 2: idea of getting lost and just think about what feels
Speaker 2: safe and what parameters and guardrails. How do you want
Speaker 2: to intentionally and safely allow yourself to get lost.
Speaker 1: It's such a nice way to sort of reframe your perceptions,
Speaker 1: which I think is like such an important part of flexibility.
Speaker 1: And so so those are ways we can sort of
Speaker 1: fixed stuckness. But the third barrier is also one that
Speaker 1: I relate to a lot. It's this kind of just fatigue,
Speaker 1: this idea that like I'm too tired to be proficient,
Speaker 1: Like I just can't do this. What are some ways
Speaker 1: we can break through that barrier to proficiency?
Speaker 2: Laurie, I love that you share that, because when I
Speaker 2: think of so many like really successful and high achieving people,
Speaker 2: I feel like we are at risk of burnout because
Speaker 2: we hold ourselves to really high standards and I feel
Speaker 2: like in this culture, we're often taught that rest has
Speaker 2: to be earned, or that rest is wasteful, unproductive, and
Speaker 2: it's like frowned upon. And I just think that rest
Speaker 2: and leisure need to be incorporated as part of the
Speaker 2: work plan and schedule with the same type of intention
Speaker 2: and urgency in a way. So when fatigue sets in,
Speaker 2: I think that whatever fills your cop play, I think
Speaker 2: for me is always a way to do that. So
Speaker 2: give yourself grace and be gentle and recognize that do
Speaker 2: you want to get to the peak or the summit
Speaker 2: of this mountain completely out of breath, weathered and worn down, demoralized?
Speaker 2: You got to the peak? But at what costs?
Speaker 1: It also sounds like it's just really recognizing our natural limitations,
Speaker 1: whether those are just kind of mental natural limitations, like
Speaker 1: we just need some rest, we need to take a break,
Speaker 1: but also physical natural limitations. I think this is sometimes
Speaker 1: why we feel so fatigued, is that we're not taking
Speaker 1: care of our physical bodies too.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, And I say, like, for me, like something
Speaker 2: I'm really working on right now, and it's something I've
Speaker 2: been thinking about for a long time is like sleep hygiene,
Speaker 2: you know, I think that I've always just taken my
Speaker 2: physical health for granted, and sometimes there's consequences to that,
Speaker 2: and I've just assumed, oh, I'm a machine, it'll work
Speaker 2: itself out. And I remember a friend several years ahead
Speaker 2: of me telling me that, so there's going to come
Speaker 2: a point in your life when you're going to make
Speaker 2: your schedule around sleep. And I was like, I don't
Speaker 2: believe you, Like I make my schedule around everything else,
Speaker 2: but that that just fits itself in. She's like, no,
Speaker 2: I'm very careful about it. And now I'm thinking backwards
Speaker 2: where I'm like, if I want to protect this time,
Speaker 2: whatever it is, seven eight, nine hours, then I'm going
Speaker 2: to work backwards, and the things that I'm saying yes
Speaker 2: to and no too are going to be centered around
Speaker 2: the sleep schedule. You know, it's about making deposits into
Speaker 2: this rest account. And so sleep is one way, fifteen
Speaker 2: minute naps is another way, one minute meditations is another way,
Speaker 2: exercise is another way. Anything that's going to refill your
Speaker 2: cup and replenish your energy.
Speaker 1: And so all these strategies that you're talking about for
Speaker 1: replenishing your energy, fighting helplessness, feeling less stuck, these were
Speaker 1: exactly the kind of things you talk about with Shelley.
Speaker 1: What was the outcome there? Was she able to use
Speaker 1: these strategies to kind of heal that inner sense of brokenness.
Speaker 2: Yes, And it's funny because she would joke. She's like,
Speaker 2: I didn't often know where you were going with certain things,
Speaker 2: like when I'm telling you how I'm scared about another
Speaker 2: terrorist attack happening, or I feel like my sense of
Speaker 2: safety or calmness or hope has been changed or demoralized.
Speaker 2: You would say to me, talk to your boss about
Speaker 2: trying to get time off or sleep. She's like, I
Speaker 2: didn't understand where we were going necessarily, but you know,
Speaker 2: I figured I'm here, so I might as well show
Speaker 2: up and go with you. And so I think a
Speaker 2: lot of times when people come in to work with me,
Speaker 2: they'll come in with one specific problem in mind, and
Speaker 2: they're hoping to get an answer for that problem. And
Speaker 2: then I often say, let's back up and sort of
Speaker 2: take a three sixty to approach your wellness even though
Speaker 2: you're talking to me about, let's say, problems at work.
Speaker 2: You know, she wanted to get a raise, she wanted
Speaker 2: to get a promotion, but she was just so afraid.
Speaker 2: She thought if I asked for days off, if I
Speaker 2: ask for rest, even if it was like blocking off
Speaker 2: an hour for therapy, that all of these things would
Speaker 2: get in the way of promotion because she would be
Speaker 2: seen as, you're not really serious about this job. And
Speaker 2: what was interesting was by taking care of her mental
Speaker 2: health by resting more. Her boss was like, I had
Speaker 2: no idea that you were going through all of this.
Speaker 2: I am more than happy to give you PTO. No,
Speaker 2: I'm not going to doctor pay like a lease. Consider
Speaker 2: it as part of the sickly that you have, which
Speaker 2: you have tons of. You have never taken a sick
Speaker 2: day in your life. And she finally felt her mission
Speaker 2: to rest, permission to take care of her mental health,
Speaker 2: and she ended up getting the promotion. I mean, her
Speaker 2: life changed, like a lot of it is because embracing
Speaker 2: the fact that your life is not the same, you know.
Speaker 2: And I think that's the hardest part because so many people,
Speaker 2: very quickly after trauma or any any kind of setback,
Speaker 2: want to get back to who they were. I mean,
Speaker 2: it's not possible because this event has transformed you and
Speaker 2: your understanding and framework of the world. But also for
Speaker 2: a lot of people going back to baseline also doesn't
Speaker 2: make sense because your baseline might have gotten you to
Speaker 2: where you are right now and why you're in my
Speaker 2: office to begin with. So really think about when someone
Speaker 2: said I just want to be who I was? Is
Speaker 2: it realistic? Is it possible? And is it healthy?
Speaker 1: Because sometimes optimism really seems like it's about kind of
Speaker 1: accepting where we are and giving ourselves the grace to
Speaker 1: be in that spot.
Speaker 2: Yes, exactly. So it's interesting because when you think about optimism,
Speaker 2: it's just you think it only means one thing, which
Speaker 2: is to look on the bright side, not recognizing that
Speaker 2: it includes a practice of gratitude, of leisure, of rest
Speaker 2: of self, compassion, of proactivity, of challenging the way that
Speaker 2: you're thinking. So there's so much more to it, and
Speaker 2: optimists do it naturally not to mention having healthier habits
Speaker 2: and what's involved with that.
Speaker 1: Thanks to doctor Sue Varmah and the folks at the
Speaker 1: World Happiness Summit who introduced me to Sue's work. If
Speaker 1: you want to learn more about the summit or sign
Speaker 1: up for their twenty twenty six event, you can visit
Speaker 1: World Happiness Summit dot com. That's World Happiness summit dot com.
Speaker 1: But my discussion with Suet Wahasu was so insightful and
Speaker 1: I can't help but leave you with one more of
Speaker 1: the highlights. This was when Sue agreed to lead me
Speaker 1: in the audience in a name It, Claim It, Team it,
Speaker 1: and reframem it exercise.
Speaker 2: Okay, so first of all, just if you want to
Speaker 2: close your eyes, feel free. If you want to keep
Speaker 2: them open, you know, whatever worked best for you, name
Speaker 2: the antecedent. Think of a problem, right, Think of anything
Speaker 2: that might have happened today or in the last week
Speaker 2: that could have triggered you to feeling upset, right, And
Speaker 2: the more granular you get, the more likely you are
Speaker 2: to be able to put your finger on it and
Speaker 2: change the problem. And we see this even as far
Speaker 2: an extreme as suicide, where somebody can put their finger
Speaker 2: on These were the events that led to me feeling
Speaker 2: like my life didn't have value anymore. I didn't want
Speaker 2: to live anymore. Right, So that is a dark scenario.
Speaker 2: But just in think of an everyday problem, name the antecedent. Right.
Speaker 2: Then I want you to feel in your body, right,
Speaker 2: so maybe you want to close your eyes for this,
Speaker 2: Where in your body are you feeling the tension, right?
Speaker 2: Are you feeling it in your jaw? Are you feeling
Speaker 2: it in your shoulders? Are you feeling it in your legs?
Speaker 2: Where do you tend to hold the problem and the
Speaker 2: stress in your body? Right? So, now you've named the antecedent,
Speaker 2: You've claimed where it is in your body. Because often
Speaker 2: the body will express what the mind can be right
Speaker 2: and it will take place in the form of medical problems, headaches,
Speaker 2: things like that. And then I want you this is
Speaker 2: the taming part, and everybody has a different form of
Speaker 2: self soothing. Some people may say that I want to
Speaker 2: take one minute meditation. I call these oasis moments where
Speaker 2: you are shutting the world out and finding your grounded
Speaker 2: sense of peace internally. Right, it could be one minute
Speaker 2: meditation or something that I've worked on that is based
Speaker 2: off of a best possible scenario. It's an optimism intervention.
Speaker 2: It's ten minutes, but this is a one minute version
Speaker 2: of it. So if you want to do this with me,
Speaker 2: let's go. I'd like to just close your eyes, settle in,
Speaker 2: let your shoulders drop, and I want to take you
Speaker 2: on a little journey with me. So now that I've
Speaker 2: asked you to envision a problem. Right so you've clearly
Speaker 2: defined the problem in your mind. I want you to
Speaker 2: imagine a road, a path leading to the solution to
Speaker 2: that problem. I want you to get very specific. What
Speaker 2: does that solution look like? And what does the road
Speaker 2: to the solution look like? Is that road straight? Does
Speaker 2: it wind? Does it twister? Turn? And now I want
Speaker 2: to imagine that we are walking together towards that solution.
Speaker 2: We're getting closer. You're getting closer, and this solution is
Speaker 2: the best possible outcome that you could have envisioned. And
Speaker 2: you're starting to feel the anticipation of excitement, of delight,
Speaker 2: of success, of satisfaction, of personal gratification. You're getting closer,
Speaker 2: and now you have arrived at the best possible outcome
Speaker 2: of your solution. And I want you to feel all
Speaker 2: the feelings that come with success, with mastery, with resolution, peace, happiness,
Speaker 2: and success are enveloping you. Right now. I want you
Speaker 2: to take a deep breath to the count of five,
Speaker 2: inhaling gently through your nose and exhaling slowly through your mouth.
Speaker 2: Your feeling relaxed, hopeful, successful, and just know that this
Speaker 2: feeling is always at your fingertips. Success is accessible within
Speaker 2: you through a positive mindset that you have chosen, and
Speaker 2: take a deep breath and open your eyes.
Speaker 1: Pretty good, right, that's pretty good. Thank you,