Speaker 1: Holy Human with Leanne Rhymes is a production of I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Hello, beautiful people, Welcome, Welcome to today's Holy
Speaker 1: Human Podcast. I am so excited for you to meet
Speaker 1: today's guest. Dr Ethan Cross is an award winning psychologist
Speaker 1: and one of the world's leading experts on controlling the
Speaker 1: conscious mind. He's also the author of a book that
Speaker 1: I have found both fascinating, truly truly fascinating and very useful,
Speaker 1: Chatter The Voice in our Head, Why it Matters, and
Speaker 1: How to harness it. Today. Dr Cross is here to
Speaker 1: explain the incredible hidden power of our inner voice and
Speaker 1: show us how we can harness it to live healthier,
Speaker 1: more satisfying, and more productive lives, all on this episode
Speaker 1: of Holy Human. Yeah yeah, all right, Dr Ethan Cross,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for joining us here on the
Speaker 1: Holy Human Podcast. So it's a delight to be here
Speaker 1: chatting with you about this. So yeah chatting. I love that.
Speaker 1: I'm no fun intended. I have literally recommended your book
Speaker 1: and I'm yet to finish it because it is a
Speaker 1: thick book, but I'm I'm so obsessed. I read like
Speaker 1: a hundred pages this morning because I I find that
Speaker 1: this is a topic that is very close to my heart.
Speaker 1: I feel like it's something that I have. I'm very
Speaker 1: aware of chatter in my mind and how it can
Speaker 1: take on different forms and and control all of our lives.
Speaker 1: And so that's what we're diving into today with you,
Speaker 1: is everything chatter and inner voice. And I would love
Speaker 1: to just start at what when you talk about inner voice,
Speaker 1: what is that? Exactly? What do you mean by that?
Speaker 1: So I think of the inner voice um as this
Speaker 1: amazing tool that we all have. It's our ability to
Speaker 1: silently use language to do lots of different things. So
Speaker 1: it's like a Swiss army knife of the mind. So
Speaker 1: if I asked you to repeat a phone number in
Speaker 1: your head, you use the language to do that, right,
Speaker 1: So it helps us remember things. But we can also
Speaker 1: use our inner voice to to plan and or simulate things.
Speaker 1: So I do it when when I'm when i have
Speaker 1: to give a big presentation, I'll often rehearse what I'm
Speaker 1: going to say in my head, and then I'll hear
Speaker 1: what people in the audience are going to say, and
Speaker 1: I'll often think of what the nasty audience member is
Speaker 1: going to say, and then I'll say something back. And
Speaker 1: usually I'll say something back in my head that I
Speaker 1: wouldn't say in daily life, but right, so, so that's
Speaker 1: like a powerful tool. We also use our inner voice
Speaker 1: to make sense of our experiences. Like things happen all
Speaker 1: the time to us, and we're trying to weave those
Speaker 1: experiences together to give us a sense of who we are,
Speaker 1: and our inner voice helps us do that too. I
Speaker 1: would imagine that in your line of work, you're you're
Speaker 1: also constantly engaging this inner voice when you're hearing sounds
Speaker 1: and a lot of progressions. I mean, maybe I'm wrong,
Speaker 1: but does it does it factor into your everyday experience
Speaker 1: as well? Oh? Yeah, absolutely, Well gosh, I could go
Speaker 1: so many ways with this. I feel like my under
Speaker 1: voice turns on like the moment I get up, and
Speaker 1: it can it can go kind of down one way
Speaker 1: or the other, whether it be a negative path or
Speaker 1: somewhat of a positive path. It just depends on on
Speaker 1: the day. And when I'm performing, I definitely engage it,
Speaker 1: you know. I feel like sometimes that's what the performance
Speaker 1: piece for me is actually the one place where I
Speaker 1: can lose it, where I can go beyond it, which
Speaker 1: is to me what feels so for someone who has
Speaker 1: constant chatter in their mind. It's actually really blissful to perform.
Speaker 1: I mean, obviously I'm still using it because there's I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm engaging when I'm singing words and in that way,
Speaker 1: but when I get lost in my art, there is
Speaker 1: a there's a place beyond the chatter for me. That is,
Speaker 1: like I said, blissful. And at the same time, I
Speaker 1: can actually have full on conversations in my head on
Speaker 1: stage about like what I'm gonna eat for breakfast tomorrow
Speaker 1: and who I'm piste off at. And so it's it's
Speaker 1: interesting how that I can have I can be doing
Speaker 1: something and still have this whole other experience and internal
Speaker 1: dialogue going on. Yeah, I mean that reminds you of
Speaker 1: like when when I'm at the dinner table and like
Speaker 1: my daughters are telling me about their day, and if
Speaker 1: my mind somewhere else, they finished talking and I don't
Speaker 1: necessarily hear what they've said, you know that it has
Speaker 1: happened where they like telling me about a whole experience.
Speaker 1: And then when they're done, I'm like, oh, so what
Speaker 1: happened today? And I just told you that that And
Speaker 1: so that's an example of how you know, really are
Speaker 1: thoughts and which are often verbal in nature. Um, you know,
Speaker 1: they they determine where we are, like what we're feeling,
Speaker 1: what we're attending to even and so they can like
Speaker 1: cloud out our experiences. But but you know, back to
Speaker 1: the inner voice. So so it can do a lot
Speaker 1: of things for us that I think are really really useful,
Speaker 1: but it can also get us into trouble. And and
Speaker 1: chatter is what I the term I used to describe
Speaker 1: what happens when our inner voice gets us into trouble.
Speaker 1: So so we've got this amazing ability, uniquely human our
Speaker 1: ability to use words to silently talk to ourselves, solve problems, create, innovate.
Speaker 1: But then when we experience problems in our life, we
Speaker 1: we we we we go inside, we try to figure
Speaker 1: out why we're feeling this way we are, and then
Speaker 1: we get stuck. We start spinning, we get worried, anxiety, rumination,
Speaker 1: we catastrophize, think of the worst scenarios, and we get
Speaker 1: stuck in those negative thought loops that I think many
Speaker 1: of us have probably experience from time to time that
Speaker 1: may make life not so much fun. You know that
Speaker 1: that make it difficult to be in that blissful state
Speaker 1: you were describing earlier that can interfere with our health
Speaker 1: and our relationships and so so chatter is is what
Speaker 1: captures those the negative side of the inner voice. And
Speaker 1: and you know, my my approach to this is if
Speaker 1: the inner voice is really helpful in some cases, which
Speaker 1: I think it is. I don't think we want to
Speaker 1: stop talking to ourselves. I don't think we want to
Speaker 1: silence our inner voice. We want to figure out how
Speaker 1: to use it more effectively. And so I spent a
Speaker 1: lot of time in my lab trying to figure out
Speaker 1: how to do that, and I talk about that in
Speaker 1: the book. Yeah, so does everyone have an inner voice?
Speaker 1: I've actually read that people some people don't experience an
Speaker 1: inner dialogue? And how does one develop that inner voice?
Speaker 1: And do people that don't have an inner voice actually
Speaker 1: have a call more world? Wow, they're okay, lot lots
Speaker 1: of good questions here, So let me check how much
Speaker 1: time do you? Yes? I know I can talk to
Speaker 1: you about this all day long. No, I'm game. This
Speaker 1: is this is what I live and breathe, So it's
Speaker 1: all good. So do some people not have an inner voice?
Speaker 1: So I think about the inner voice as like the
Speaker 1: Swiss army knife, of the mind. It does lots of
Speaker 1: different things. And I think if you have the ability
Speaker 1: to speak out loud, then you've got the capacity for
Speaker 1: an inner voice. So most people can use land with
Speaker 1: properly functioning brains can use language to rehearse information. So
Speaker 1: if I give you like like that the challenge I
Speaker 1: gave you before, just here's here are four numbers, repeat
Speaker 1: them in your head. That is a basic feature of
Speaker 1: the human mind that we can use language to do that,
Speaker 1: and I think everyone has that. Now, when you go
Speaker 1: to other other functions that the inner voice provides, like
Speaker 1: having an ongoing conversation with ourselves, there, I think there's
Speaker 1: a lot more variability. Some people report never doing that,
Speaker 1: and you know, there may be a minority of people
Speaker 1: like that who don't have that inner running commentary. Other
Speaker 1: people do it a fair amount, others a lot more.
Speaker 1: In my experiences, the majority of people that I've spoken
Speaker 1: to have certainly had experiences with with chatter, and so
Speaker 1: I think it is a pretty common common experience that
Speaker 1: that people have. Do you find that certain types of
Speaker 1: people are more prone to negative or and or positive
Speaker 1: self talk, Well, so there there are differences. Um, we
Speaker 1: do know that women are more likely to get stuck
Speaker 1: in chatter than men, but the tools that exist for
Speaker 1: managing chatter work equally well for men and women. Now
Speaker 1: this is not to say, by the way, that women
Speaker 1: just have it worse than men. Across the word. Men
Speaker 1: do plenty of things in psychological terms worse than women,
Speaker 1: engage in certain kinds of other harmful behaviors, so so
Speaker 1: it all balances out. But we do know that there
Speaker 1: is that gender difference in terms of the experience of chatter,
Speaker 1: but the tools work equally well, and I think that's
Speaker 1: really good news. Yeah, absolutely this you say that. One
Speaker 1: of my favorite things that you say is the inner
Speaker 1: conversation is is the most important conversation we have all day.
Speaker 1: Can you dive into a little bit of why that is. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we're spending a lot of time I think most of
Speaker 1: us lost in thought. You know. We we often hear
Speaker 1: about the importance of living in the moment and being
Speaker 1: in the moment. And I am all for being in
Speaker 1: the moment at the appropriate time, but our brains evolved
Speaker 1: to not be in the moment. We spend between a
Speaker 1: half and a third of our waking hours flowing into
Speaker 1: the past and transporting ourselves into the future, and we
Speaker 1: spend a lot of that time talking to ourselves about
Speaker 1: past experience. Is trying to figure out, well, why did
Speaker 1: I screw this up? Or or savoring like a past
Speaker 1: event my daughter, my younger starter, had a birthday, you know,
Speaker 1: two weeks ago. I'm thinking about that experience, replaying conversations
Speaker 1: we had, or I'm imagining what I'm going to say,
Speaker 1: you know, during this podcast or something else. So we're
Speaker 1: spending a whole lot of time in our heads and
Speaker 1: a lot of that time talking to ourselves. And so
Speaker 1: I think what we say is really quite important. Um.
Speaker 1: We know those conversations can impact like how we feel,
Speaker 1: our relationships, our ability to focus and perform at work.
Speaker 1: So I think they really are truly important set of
Speaker 1: conversations we have. Yeah, when we get stuck in that
Speaker 1: rumination or that that negative place, what effects does it
Speaker 1: have on our bodies? Like physically do you do? You
Speaker 1: really want to know? Yeah? I would I say this
Speaker 1: because you know, this is disconcerting stuff. And um, and
Speaker 1: so let me preface it by saying, I'll talk a
Speaker 1: little bit about the negatives. But there's a there's a
Speaker 1: light at the end of the tunnel. So you know,
Speaker 1: we often hear that stress kills, stress is bad for you.
Speaker 1: In fact, that's not correct. Stress, like the ability to
Speaker 1: experience stress is really adaptive. When there's something threatening in
Speaker 1: front of us, having this system to react super fast
Speaker 1: is useful when stress gets harmful in a in a
Speaker 1: physical sense, is when we have a stress response, it
Speaker 1: goes up, it's activated, and then it remains chronically elevated
Speaker 1: over time. That's when the stress begins to eat away
Speaker 1: at our body in ways that predict things like cardiovascular disease,
Speaker 1: in certain forms of cancer and information. Now, this inner
Speaker 1: voice that we have is really really good at maintaining
Speaker 1: our stress responses because what happens is something happens in
Speaker 1: the world. Someone tells me I'm a bad professor, or
Speaker 1: they don't like an experiment, whatever, and it happens. But
Speaker 1: then what do we do. We replay it again and
Speaker 1: again and again and again in our heads. And when
Speaker 1: we do, we're essentially conjuring up and reactivating that threat response,
Speaker 1: that that stress response, and we're keeping it active over time.
Speaker 1: So that's one of the ways that stress can get
Speaker 1: under the skin to really impact our health in in
Speaker 1: really powerful ways that, um I think we want to
Speaker 1: try to avoid. Yeah. Absolutely, Um. Well, and you know,
Speaker 1: you talk about something we hear a lot about is
Speaker 1: going inward and turning inward. And I found it so
Speaker 1: interesting how you talk about how introspection can actually backfire
Speaker 1: on some people. Yeah, well, you know, and I found
Speaker 1: this interesting too because it was actually the way I
Speaker 1: got interested in this whole line of work. Wasn't wasn't
Speaker 1: really I think the typical path that most people get
Speaker 1: into psychology and neuroscience. Um so if I inter started
Speaker 1: with my dad when I was a little kid, and
Speaker 1: every time something bad would happen to me, not that
Speaker 1: I got into huge amounts of trouble, but you know
Speaker 1: I didn't get a cookie extra cookie for dessert, or
Speaker 1: I got into find my mom. You know, he'd tell
Speaker 1: me to like go inside, to introspect and try to
Speaker 1: figure out a solution to move on with my life.
Speaker 1: And that advice really served me well throughout my childhood
Speaker 1: an adolescence. And then I got to college and I
Speaker 1: took a psychology class, and I realized that a lot
Speaker 1: of people do exactly what my dad told me to
Speaker 1: do when they get upset, but it doesn't make them
Speaker 1: feel better, they end up feeling worse. Instead, they get
Speaker 1: stuck ruminating over and over and over about things are
Speaker 1: worrying excessively. And so for me, the big question became, Okay, well,
Speaker 1: why does that happen? Why is this really useful ability
Speaker 1: to tap inside ourselves and try to use our mind
Speaker 1: to come up with a solution. Why does it often
Speaker 1: fail us? And we've learned a little bit about about
Speaker 1: the answer to that question over the years. Um. We
Speaker 1: we've learned that when when people are really upset and
Speaker 1: they introspect, they tend to over focus on the problem.
Speaker 1: They zoom in so narrowly that the only thing they
Speaker 1: can think about is what happened to them and how
Speaker 1: they felt, and that makes it really challenging for them
Speaker 1: to think about the bigger picture, other ways of maybe
Speaker 1: making sense of the experience that might lead them to
Speaker 1: feel better. And so one of the piece of advice
Speaker 1: we give people is to try to zoom out when
Speaker 1: you're feeling chat when you're experiencing chatter. And there are
Speaker 1: lots of ways you can do that. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: you talk a lot about our environment and how it
Speaker 1: affects this chatter in our mind, and I feel like,
Speaker 1: you know, something I've been experiencing. I think a lot
Speaker 1: of people are experiencing as we sit at home, as
Speaker 1: our lives have changed. You know, I've been I've been
Speaker 1: on the road my whole life, basically since I was thirteen,
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden, now being at home in
Speaker 1: one place, which is something that's never happened to me.
Speaker 1: I've found that, you know this, the chatter can get
Speaker 1: really loud, and I think a lot of people probably
Speaker 1: are experiencing that in this moment. And can you talk
Speaker 1: about how that those shifts in our environment can can
Speaker 1: affect the way that we we talk to ourselves, because
Speaker 1: I know that that shift in my environment has definitely
Speaker 1: been challenging. Yeah, well, you know you're not alone. Um,
Speaker 1: We've seen a threefold increase in clinical levels of anxiety
Speaker 1: and depression in the population over the past year, which
Speaker 1: is quite significant. We have a lot of time that
Speaker 1: we're now spending alone with ourselves and our thoughts, and
Speaker 1: we're living through a really stressful time. Like arguably, I mean,
Speaker 1: I think this is like the chatter event of the
Speaker 1: century if you think about it, Like, but once in
Speaker 1: a century pandemic really scary, economic instability, politics were a
Speaker 1: mess up until recently. People are fighting with each other,
Speaker 1: Like there's a lot of uncertainty in the world and
Speaker 1: a lack of control, and we know that those are
Speaker 1: two ingredients that fuel chatter when we don't have control
Speaker 1: over things. And so the first thing I would say is,
Speaker 1: if you're feeling chatter, you're not alone. I think a
Speaker 1: lot of people are are feeling chatter, and that makes
Speaker 1: total sense. And so then the question as well, well,
Speaker 1: what can you do about it to manage it effect like,
Speaker 1: and you know, there are lots of different kinds of
Speaker 1: tools that people can use. It look like you wanted
Speaker 1: to give an no first. I think it's interesting. I
Speaker 1: feel like I've had to really become aware of the
Speaker 1: fact that it's even happening sometimes, Like I feel like
Speaker 1: we can get so you talk about you know, with
Speaker 1: listening are thinking about something and not hearing your daughters.
Speaker 1: I almost feel like that can happen in my own head,
Speaker 1: Like it just continues to have this conversation. I have
Speaker 1: a friend of mine and I were talking about our
Speaker 1: inner voice, and she's like, if it's not if it's
Speaker 1: not talking, and it finds song lyrics and it just
Speaker 1: keeps going on that and all of this that happens
Speaker 1: to me a lot. All of a sudden, I'm like, wait,
Speaker 1: I've been ruminating on song lyrics now, the same song forever,
Speaker 1: and it's it's almost like the awareness of it has
Speaker 1: to to occur because sometimes we totally just completely unaware
Speaker 1: of that it just continues to talk. Well, I think
Speaker 1: you just described like that's like part one of the
Speaker 1: battle against it is simply like being aware of what
Speaker 1: chatter is and how works. Because I think if you're
Speaker 1: not even aware of it happening, and you're not going
Speaker 1: to do anything to try to fix it. So I
Speaker 1: study self control and I break it down for people's
Speaker 1: self control's got two pieces motivation and ability. So you've
Speaker 1: got to want to do something, and then you've got
Speaker 1: to have the tools to actually do it. So if
Speaker 1: you're if you don't know, if you don't realize your
Speaker 1: experience and chatter, you're not gonna be motivated to reduce it.
Speaker 1: You're just going to get lost in it. Hopefully, listeners
Speaker 1: right now and people who read the book, like step
Speaker 1: one is they just recognize that, Yeah, when I'm getting
Speaker 1: stuck in the thought loop and it's coloring everything I do.
Speaker 1: That's chatter, and that's a cue to maybe try to
Speaker 1: minimize it so I can live a happier and healthier,
Speaker 1: healthier life. And up next we're going to learn exactly
Speaker 1: how to do that. But first we are going to
Speaker 1: take a super quick break. Welcome back everyone. We are
Speaker 1: here with Dr Cross talking about how to minimize negative
Speaker 1: mental chatter. And it's not something we teach, you know.
Speaker 1: This is the amazing thing we're doing research now where
Speaker 1: we've developed curricula on the mind and emotions and have
Speaker 1: a manage it that we're teaching to high school kids.
Speaker 1: It's shocking to me, Like, you know, I spent so
Speaker 1: much time in high school learning about the digestive system. Man,
Speaker 1: I never have the need for knowledge about the digestive
Speaker 1: Like I've used it once in recent history, like to
Speaker 1: explain to my daughters how it's possible to be upside
Speaker 1: down and swallow food, like that is it. But like
Speaker 1: the mind, this thing that that we cared between our ears,
Speaker 1: like we use this all the time. People who understand
Speaker 1: our works are in a good position. Yeah, and it
Speaker 1: can have effect on the digestive system. But it absolutely
Speaker 1: has an effect on the digestives and that's right, so
Speaker 1: very good. Yeah, we really need to start up here
Speaker 1: the to understand anything. And the fact that kids are
Speaker 1: even learning this in high school now, I think it
Speaker 1: is incredible because you know, it really can change the
Speaker 1: course of of their life. Yeah. Well, you know when
Speaker 1: my oldest daughter, when you know, she's eleven, which I'm
Speaker 1: learning is an interesting age. I have an only only child,
Speaker 1: so I didn't know about daughters, and eleven is an interesting,
Speaker 1: interesting time to be one. I'll just say that. And
Speaker 1: when she gets upset about something, like when I tell her, actually,
Speaker 1: you don't have to feel that way. You can you
Speaker 1: can actually choose to feel differently. And and here's here's
Speaker 1: like a way of thinking differently that might make you
Speaker 1: feel better. Like that's eye opening for I think kids, right,
Speaker 1: because if you don't, if no one teaches you that,
Speaker 1: then you don't know any better. And so you're then
Speaker 1: just victim to how you automatically respond. And we know that,
Speaker 1: like our thoughts aren't our destiny, we have the ability
Speaker 1: to control them in ways that can be really useful.
Speaker 1: So that's part of the reason why we're trying to
Speaker 1: work with kids and and why I wrote that book. Yeah, absolutely, Well,
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, I've struggled with anxiety and depression,
Speaker 1: and depression for me has has really kind of hit
Speaker 1: hard um the beginning of this year. And you know,
Speaker 1: when you get caught and that you say you can
Speaker 1: choose your thoughts, But when you get caught in that rumination,
Speaker 1: and it can be when I get depressed, it's like
Speaker 1: the lens in which I view the world changes and
Speaker 1: that therefore the thoughts change, and I can literally make
Speaker 1: up a completely different story about the exact same life
Speaker 1: that I that I have, that I love, and all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, like that whole story changes. So when
Speaker 1: you're caught in that rumination, what's the when you, like
Speaker 1: you said, you say you can choose your thoughts. But
Speaker 1: to someone in that rumination space, choosing your thoughts seems
Speaker 1: like the last thing that you're able to do. What
Speaker 1: where's the first place to go when you're in that space?
Speaker 1: So first all I want to point out I love
Speaker 1: the way you just describe that experience because it invoked
Speaker 1: the voice, right you're the stories that you're telling yourself
Speaker 1: when you're when you're depressed or sad, are are shaping
Speaker 1: how you feel right and and so that goes back
Speaker 1: to like these how important these conversations that we have
Speaker 1: with ourselves are because they can really influence how we
Speaker 1: view the world. So what can people do? First of all,
Speaker 1: I break it down into there being like three categories
Speaker 1: of tools that science has revealed that people can use
Speaker 1: for managing their InterVoice. Things that people can do on
Speaker 1: their own to change the way where they're thinking about
Speaker 1: the situation, small ships that can have benefits, ways of
Speaker 1: interacting with other people that can be really useful, and
Speaker 1: then ways of interacting with our environments. And so there
Speaker 1: are like twenty something tools that fit into those different buckets.
Speaker 1: Let me tell you what I do when I find
Speaker 1: myself slipping into chatter, because if I go through all
Speaker 1: twenty tools, probably you might fall asleep and so listeners. Um,
Speaker 1: so take COVID as an example. Not a fun not
Speaker 1: a fun time to be in. So one thing I'll
Speaker 1: do is is we know that when people are experiencing chatter,
Speaker 1: they zoom in really now in the problem, that's all
Speaker 1: there is. And so what we try to do is
Speaker 1: get people to zoom out to broaden their perspective. One
Speaker 1: way you could do it is by doing something called
Speaker 1: temporal distancing or mental time travel. So I'll think about, all, right,
Speaker 1: how am I going to feel nine months from now
Speaker 1: when everyone I know is vaccinated and I'm traveling again
Speaker 1: and going to restaurants That seems pretty awesome? Right, When
Speaker 1: I travel in time in the future like that, what
Speaker 1: that does is it makes it clear that as awful
Speaker 1: as what I'm experiencing is right now, and it really
Speaker 1: is awful, it's temporary. It will eventually fade. And that
Speaker 1: gives me hope. And we know that hope is a
Speaker 1: really powerful antidote to chatter, right, It can really help
Speaker 1: bring people out when you're when you're sad and anxiously
Speaker 1: feel hopeless, So it's giving you the exact opposite. I'll
Speaker 1: also go back in time. I'll think about the pandemic
Speaker 1: from eighteen and how that was even worse than this, Right,
Speaker 1: people didn't have uber eats and zoom and all of
Speaker 1: the things that we can do right now that make this,
Speaker 1: I think much more tolerable. And they got through it
Speaker 1: back then, right, They came and roaring back in the
Speaker 1: nineteen twenties and life was awesome, And so that that
Speaker 1: broadens mic perceptives. That's one thing I'll do. Another thing
Speaker 1: I'll do is I'll try to give myself advice like
Speaker 1: I would give to another person. One of the things
Speaker 1: we've learned is there's a quirk of human nature. We
Speaker 1: are so much better at advising other people on their
Speaker 1: problems than we are taking that advice ourselves. It's bizarre.
Speaker 1: And what we have learned is that it's possible for
Speaker 1: us to coach ourselves through our problems like we're talking
Speaker 1: to someone else. And as wacky as it sounds, one
Speaker 1: way to do it is to use language, to use
Speaker 1: your name to walk yourself people. All right, ethan, how
Speaker 1: are you going to deal with this problem? That sounds
Speaker 1: a little a little strange, But what we know is
Speaker 1: that when people do that silently, what that linguistic shift
Speaker 1: does is it gets you to think about yourself like
Speaker 1: you're another person. Like most of the time we use
Speaker 1: names and when we're talking to other people. So here
Speaker 1: you're giving distance between you and yourself. And that can
Speaker 1: be really helpful too for helping you think objectively and
Speaker 1: not get stuck in a rumination wortex. Have you ever
Speaker 1: have you ever done that? Yeah? Well, so I've been
Speaker 1: been implementing some of these pieces of your book, especially
Speaker 1: during tennis. So I started playing tennis a couple of
Speaker 1: years ago, and I really have been using the self talk,
Speaker 1: the distant self talk piece, you know, like coaching myself,
Speaker 1: you know, Lee, and You've got this like just you know,
Speaker 1: I've been calming myself down, um while playing tennis, because
Speaker 1: I have a tendency to just like at a certain point,
Speaker 1: if I even if I'm winning the match, like all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, I'll start playing harder or trying harder.
Speaker 1: And it's like I've been trying to like kind of
Speaker 1: talk myself back from that. And so today today I
Speaker 1: just played tennis that long ago, and well, there's a
Speaker 1: piece in your book about belief, which is really which
Speaker 1: we can get into in a second. I'll just tell
Speaker 1: my story. But the belief being such a huge component
Speaker 1: in in the way that we can work with our chatter,
Speaker 1: and really a belief being kind of this magical tool,
Speaker 1: is what you call it. And so with belief, I
Speaker 1: had was watching the Australian Open the other day and
Speaker 1: there were these two girls playing and I looked at
Speaker 1: my husband, I'm like, I could play them, and he's like, no,
Speaker 1: you couldn't, and I'm like, yes, I could. I could
Speaker 1: play them. So I went on on the court today
Speaker 1: and I looked at my coach and I told him
Speaker 1: the story. I'm like, I could play them, and he
Speaker 1: very kindly and facetiously was like, oh yeah, sure, you're goold.
Speaker 1: And I literally took that belief and I truly believe
Speaker 1: that if I worked hard enough, I could play them.
Speaker 1: And with that belief and my distance self talk today,
Speaker 1: I have never played better tennis. And he looked at
Speaker 1: me at the end and he went, what the hell
Speaker 1: got into you? Like? I walked away from that realizing,
Speaker 1: like I mean, belief is so powerful. It is incredibly powerful.
Speaker 1: And for me, I have been you know, like I said,
Speaker 1: I've been sitting at home. Another way that they have
Speaker 1: kind of flipped this on myself is also sitting at home,
Speaker 1: not being on the road. And the first place that
Speaker 1: my mind goes, and this is another story telling your
Speaker 1: book about the picture that forgot how to pitch. The
Speaker 1: first place my mind has gone, not being in practice
Speaker 1: of singing every other weekend or whatever it may be,
Speaker 1: is oh ship, well, I forget how to sing. That
Speaker 1: path can take me down to a really dark place
Speaker 1: where I'll go to sing and all of a sudden
Speaker 1: have all this apprehension around something that I've never thought about,
Speaker 1: like I don't think about singing just comes out. And
Speaker 1: so that's been so interesting to have the time to
Speaker 1: sit and be like, wait, when do I know what
Speaker 1: I'm doing? Still? And when I read that part in
Speaker 1: your book about the picture forgetting to pitch, it actually
Speaker 1: gave me some context of what was going on in
Speaker 1: my own mind, and it allowed me to go, oh,
Speaker 1: I can shift that, I can change the way that
Speaker 1: I'm thinking about this. And to be able to see
Speaker 1: the way that my belief changed my tennis. It was
Speaker 1: like having the yin and the yang of experiences of
Speaker 1: belief shaping the way that I talked to myself and
Speaker 1: the outcome of things. Yeah, well that's that's that's a
Speaker 1: great example. Too bad I'm not still writing the book.
Speaker 1: I would have used that one of the anecdotes. And
Speaker 1: the belief is, you know, just remarkably powerful. And I think,
Speaker 1: you know, there's so much science behind showing like when
Speaker 1: the placebo work. So if you give people a sugar
Speaker 1: pill and you say take this pill, it's gonna make
Speaker 1: you feel better. It's going to help relieve your anxiety
Speaker 1: and depression. And sure enough, if you actually believe the
Speaker 1: physician who gives you that medication, research shows that for
Speaker 1: mild and moderate forms of depression and anxiety, it actually
Speaker 1: has that effect, which to me speaks to the power
Speaker 1: of belief to impact how we feel. Right, And so,
Speaker 1: you know, how does that work? Why can't we just
Speaker 1: often believe ourselves into something? Right? Well, there's always like
Speaker 1: some nagging self doubt, right, and in our critical nous
Speaker 1: that I think gets in the way. But when you've
Speaker 1: got a trusted physician or coach who says, Leanne, this
Speaker 1: is going to make you feel better, I am certain
Speaker 1: of it, right, they're basically taking away those downs and
Speaker 1: just letting your belief carry the day. And so I
Speaker 1: think a lot of really great coaches do this for
Speaker 1: their players, right, their masters at channeling this belief. But
Speaker 1: what we've learned is that there are ways we can
Speaker 1: we can do that for ourselves, and I think that
Speaker 1: provides us with a useful tool. Yeah, So, do you
Speaker 1: have to be a hundred percent and on a belief
Speaker 1: for it to work? Because I find there is the
Speaker 1: inner believer. And there's also like the one that doesn't
Speaker 1: like there is the one who is a skeptic in
Speaker 1: me too. And so for the magic to work, do
Speaker 1: you have to be all in? You have to be
Speaker 1: all in for the belief one to to usually work.
Speaker 1: That's that's typically how that one goes. So you may
Speaker 1: have some trouble with that. But but here's the good news.
Speaker 1: The good news is that the belief that's like one
Speaker 1: of twenty different tools that exist. So here's another tool
Speaker 1: tennis related that you don't have to believe in it
Speaker 1: for its work and as rituals, so so like athletes
Speaker 1: um and performing artists as well. Actually you do you
Speaker 1: have any rituals before you perform that you engage them,
Speaker 1: you know what I Actually I probably do, but they're
Speaker 1: not like elaborate or concrete in any way. But I'm
Speaker 1: sure there's some kind of well, I would have to
Speaker 1: say probably one of the things that I've when I'm
Speaker 1: on the road that I do before my guitar player
Speaker 1: will come in and we'll just kind of like play
Speaker 1: over music just it doesn't have to be songs we're
Speaker 1: going to perform, but just to like get us in
Speaker 1: that headspace. I think that's probably the one. You just
Speaker 1: did it. You said we didn't, we didn't rehearse that.
Speaker 1: That was just organic. Yeah, got you in the headspace, right.
Speaker 1: So here's what's super fascinating about rituals. Rituals by the way,
Speaker 1: you know, I think we often think of rituals as
Speaker 1: synonymous with like obsessive compulsive disorder in certain worms of anxiety.
Speaker 1: That is an extreme usage of rituals. But we have
Speaker 1: been using rituals to help with our chatter for a
Speaker 1: really long time. Like cultures around the world give us
Speaker 1: rituals for handling the ultimate chatter provoking events like death. Right,
Speaker 1: no matter what your religion is, you probably have a
Speaker 1: grieving ritual that you engage in. When babies are born,
Speaker 1: there are birthing, this is a tumultuous time. Our cultures
Speaker 1: give us rituals to engage in. And what we see
Speaker 1: is that, like a lot of athletes and people who
Speaker 1: perform under stress, they organically create their own rituals. So
Speaker 1: Raphael Adualts bring it back to the tennis. He's got
Speaker 1: a great story that I just I just love. Um.
Speaker 1: He is interviewed and someone asked him like what's the
Speaker 1: hardest thing you do on the tennis court? And and
Speaker 1: you know, this guy is playing against the best athletes
Speaker 1: in the world, like athletes who are trained from the
Speaker 1: moment they're born to beat him, basically, and competing against
Speaker 1: his athletes, that's not the hardest thing he does, he says.
Speaker 1: The hardest thing he does is battle of voices inside
Speaker 1: his head, the nagging inner voice, the chatter that can
Speaker 1: get in the way of him and performing well. And
Speaker 1: how does he do it. He engages in a ritual,
Speaker 1: a very rigid, structured sequence of behavior. So he always
Speaker 1: walks onto the court the same way, and then he
Speaker 1: you know, takes his jacket off in a very particular way,
Speaker 1: and he lines his water bottles up diagonally against the cord.
Speaker 1: And before ever we serve, he runs his fingers through
Speaker 1: his hair and he picks his shorts out of his butt.
Speaker 1: I mean, weird, wacky stuff, right, but he does it
Speaker 1: every time. And what it does for him is it
Speaker 1: provides him with a sense of order and control and
Speaker 1: one word, experienced and chatter. We often feel like we
Speaker 1: don't have control of what's happening, right, like our mind
Speaker 1: is taking over, like ah, like I can't control what
Speaker 1: I'm what I'm thinking and feeling. And what we've learned
Speaker 1: is you can compensate for that feeling of a lack
Speaker 1: of control by creating order around you, and rituals are
Speaker 1: one way that people do that. And the science shows
Speaker 1: that you don't actually have to even believe that they're
Speaker 1: going to help you. If you engage in the rigid
Speaker 1: sequence of behaviors, they still have benefit. And so the
Speaker 1: beliefs aren't working for you. You know, you can do
Speaker 1: a ritual interesting, so you don't actually have to believe
Speaker 1: that they're working. Oh that's fascinating. Yeah, Now if you
Speaker 1: do believe, right, it's only benefit. But there's research which
Speaker 1: shows you don't have to believe and you still bet
Speaker 1: you can still benefit from them. That's interesting. Um. The
Speaker 1: environment pieces is always is fascinating, and it's for me.
Speaker 1: I know that while I've been sitting at home, a
Speaker 1: lot of lists have been happening. I know you talk
Speaker 1: about a lot of that lot about the like people
Speaker 1: can tidy up their environment, which helps a lot, especially
Speaker 1: as we're all sitting at home, like you know. Um,
Speaker 1: for me, it's been about lists and and being able
Speaker 1: to execute the things on my list. Like, that's a
Speaker 1: way I know that from my own mind that I
Speaker 1: feel like I have a bit of control over a
Speaker 1: time when I have I feel like I also I
Speaker 1: feel like I have zero control. You're you're you're creating order,
Speaker 1: and we know that when when anxiety is heightened, people
Speaker 1: naturally try to re establish order in ways like that
Speaker 1: by by creating lists in order. I tell a story
Speaker 1: in the book about how when when I was a
Speaker 1: little chatter prone one writing the book, like when a
Speaker 1: paragraph wouldn't come out right, or I had a deadline approaching,
Speaker 1: I would do something really strange for me, strange because
Speaker 1: I'm not a particularly like orderly. I'm pretty free, you know,
Speaker 1: like books are all over the place, and to my
Speaker 1: wife's dismay, like a shirt might be in one corner another.
Speaker 1: But when I was struggling, like my office never looked
Speaker 1: so good, and I go to the kitchen and like
Speaker 1: carefully clean all the pots and put them away really nicely.
Speaker 1: And that was my way. And I think doing what
Speaker 1: you're doing with lists, right, I'm trying to compensate for
Speaker 1: this feeling of despair that I'm experiencing by leaning on
Speaker 1: my environment and I think that's fascinating that they were
Speaker 1: like tools that exist in the world around us for
Speaker 1: managing the chatter inside our head. Like, again, we don't
Speaker 1: learn that growing up, you know, we kind of just
Speaker 1: stumble on these things through the course of living. But
Speaker 1: I think science can help guide us now and say, Okay,
Speaker 1: here's what we've learned about how to harness your environment
Speaker 1: to your betterment. Well, that's what I love about your
Speaker 1: book is that there's scientific proof. I mean some of
Speaker 1: these ticks and things that we're not aware that we're
Speaker 1: actually sometimes already doing these things. And you know, that's
Speaker 1: where the science is so fascinating to me because for
Speaker 1: me reading it, it's made me aware of the things
Speaker 1: already do and given me context around why why it works.
Speaker 1: And I think like you were saying that in the placebo,
Speaker 1: it's like here, take this placebo. It will help you
Speaker 1: feel better. It's and knowing how the placebo works and
Speaker 1: why it's gonna help you feel better, It's like knowing
Speaker 1: the why has really been beneficial for me at least
Speaker 1: on you know, continuing to to do these things that
Speaker 1: I kind of naturally already do and doing them even
Speaker 1: with more purpose. Yeah, and I think I think that's
Speaker 1: exactly it. It's knowing what the tools are and how
Speaker 1: they work allows us to be a lot more deliberate
Speaker 1: about how we use them in our lives. So so
Speaker 1: if I experience a moment of chatter, I have a
Speaker 1: go to like chatter cocktail that I take as not
Speaker 1: alcohol based right to deal with it. Definitely don't do
Speaker 1: chat alcohol not conferred competition, that's not in your book.
Speaker 1: It's not in the book. Not a good thing. But
Speaker 1: you know, I'll do the mental time travel, I'll do
Speaker 1: the distance self talk. I'll do something we haven't actually
Speaker 1: talk about yet. I'll talk to people about my chatter.
Speaker 1: But like, I'll be really careful about who I choose
Speaker 1: to talk to because other people can be incredibly helpful
Speaker 1: when it comes to our chatter, but they can also
Speaker 1: get us into a lot of trouble. And that's not
Speaker 1: a message you hear often conveyed. You know, we often hear, oh,
Speaker 1: if you're feeling bad, just get it out, vent your emotions,
Speaker 1: find someone to unload. And we know that that that's
Speaker 1: not actually helpful for helping people deal with chatter. So
Speaker 1: what is beneficial then for for each other? Find someone
Speaker 1: who's there to like really listen to you and show empathy,
Speaker 1: someone who you can have a conversation with, but at
Speaker 1: a certain point they hear you, but they don't just
Speaker 1: keep asking you to rehash what you felt. Oh my god,
Speaker 1: he said that, and how did you feel? What are
Speaker 1: you going to do? Like not just getting you to
Speaker 1: keep venting, because what if you're just venting? That makes
Speaker 1: you and I feel really close and connect did like
Speaker 1: our friendship grows, but it doesn't do anything to help
Speaker 1: you solve the problem. So what you really want to
Speaker 1: find as a person who can let you bend a
Speaker 1: little but then nudge you to think about the bigger picture,
Speaker 1: trying to help you reframe the experience. So so you know,
Speaker 1: if you're really down about let's say your your last
Speaker 1: performance didn't go so well, you know maybe I'm like, well,
Speaker 1: but yeah, you've done hundreds of thousands of these performances before, right,
Speaker 1: Like you've had bad ones before, you've gotten over it
Speaker 1: and you've gone onto great things. So think about that,
Speaker 1: or or let me tell you about the last time
Speaker 1: I floved a presentation, and you know, like here's what
Speaker 1: I did. And so these are ways of just trying
Speaker 1: to break you out of that doom and despair that
Speaker 1: characterizes chatter. And other people can be helpful. But um,
Speaker 1: but if they don't do that, they can make the
Speaker 1: chatter worse. So I'm super super careful about who I
Speaker 1: go lose throughout. And sometimes it's not the people who
Speaker 1: are the closest with it's other people. M hm, Well
Speaker 1: it's my husband so great at that of giving that
Speaker 1: type of advice, And sometimes I just want to slap
Speaker 1: him because I'm like, that's not what I wanted to
Speaker 1: hear at this moment in time. All right, at this
Speaker 1: moment in time, we are going to pause for a
Speaker 1: quick break. But don't worry, we'll be right back. Welcome back, loves.
Speaker 1: We were talking about the best people to bounce your
Speaker 1: inner chatter off of. But that's a very important um caveat.
Speaker 1: And I talk a little bit about this. There's an
Speaker 1: art to being a good chatter advisor and so um
Speaker 1: And you know, as a scientist, I'm not used to
Speaker 1: talk to me about art in what I view, right,
Speaker 1: but but there's an art here in this in the
Speaker 1: following sense, Different people need different amounts of time to
Speaker 1: just unload their emotions. Like, so maybe I take two
Speaker 1: minutes of subscribing it to my wife before I'm ready
Speaker 1: for her to help me, but maybe for someone else
Speaker 1: it's twenty minutes, right, or fifteen minutes. I think the
Speaker 1: art of being good chatter advisors being able to read
Speaker 1: the person you're interacting with so that you can know
Speaker 1: when they've really felt heard like and are ready to
Speaker 1: go broader. And and it's going to be different for
Speaker 1: every every individual. That's interesting. Yeah, that is very important.
Speaker 1: Did these voices change, I mean throughout our lives and
Speaker 1: like what influences that you know, like where, when, at
Speaker 1: what times can they can they change and shift? Yeah?
Speaker 1: So they can shift? And um, I like to think
Speaker 1: about it as the voices in our head are are
Speaker 1: tuned by our surroundings, and so early on in life,
Speaker 1: our parents and caretakers are playing you know, they're in
Speaker 1: our heads quite a bit. As we grow older, the
Speaker 1: other other people in our lives and our relationships, like
Speaker 1: our colleagues are, our partners, are loved ones like their
Speaker 1: voices are shaping our own voices. So we are very
Speaker 1: sensitive to our surroundings. And that makes sense, right, because
Speaker 1: we want to be tuned to the world around us
Speaker 1: so that we can navigate it optimally. So the kinds
Speaker 1: of things that are causing you concern or giving you
Speaker 1: joy at different moments in time are likely going to
Speaker 1: be shifting depending on where you are in your life,
Speaker 1: right and so you know the things that give me
Speaker 1: joy right now professionally, like I don't know, twenty five
Speaker 1: years ago I would have made fun of Like in fact,
Speaker 1: I remember, like in college, saying to myself, if I
Speaker 1: ever end up doing them for a living, like you know,
Speaker 1: someone shake me, and here I am doing it. So
Speaker 1: so how we think about our lives and use language
Speaker 1: and do so is very sensitive to who we surround
Speaker 1: ourselves with. Yeah, I mean, what are some of the
Speaker 1: unconscious ways that our environment is shaping the way that
Speaker 1: we think? Well, So, so this goes to a tool
Speaker 1: that I think could be really useful, which is which
Speaker 1: is nature? So nature, there's actually just an article yesterday
Speaker 1: in the Wall Street Journal, I think it was that
Speaker 1: basically said is two hours of time in nature the
Speaker 1: New ten Thousand Steps, and and I talked a lot
Speaker 1: about nature in the book. What we've learned is like nature,
Speaker 1: our physical surroundings provide us with the tool for rejuvenating
Speaker 1: ourselves after we're depleted from chatter. So when we're experiencing
Speaker 1: chatter like that's taking up all of our attention. And
Speaker 1: that's in part why it impairs us when it comes
Speaker 1: to work, because we can't think about anything else. It's
Speaker 1: what we've learned is that exposure to green spaces. So
Speaker 1: if you go for a walk, I can see your
Speaker 1: window right now looks much nicer than mine because I'm
Speaker 1: facing like a foot of snow, but yours looks a
Speaker 1: lot more pleasant outside. Yes, not here. More, what nature
Speaker 1: does for us is it captures our attention in a
Speaker 1: very soft way. So it's like our our attention just
Speaker 1: drifts to the leaves and the trees and and the
Speaker 1: bushes and the squirrels, and and that it occupies our attention,
Speaker 1: but we're not working really hard to make sense of
Speaker 1: our surroundings. And that allows our attention, our ability focus
Speaker 1: to restore, and that can be really, really helpful. So
Speaker 1: that's one way that our environment can, outside of our awareness,
Speaker 1: really help us well. And I found it, sorry not
Speaker 1: to interrupt you, I found it interesting that you said
Speaker 1: not only being in nature, but actually photos and sounds
Speaker 1: and so a lot of people, you know, have been
Speaker 1: stuck at home and they don't have access to nature.
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm fortunate have a backyard, you know, I
Speaker 1: can go out in it, like so many people can
Speaker 1: be stuck in small places. And that's what I've found
Speaker 1: so fascinating about the research of nature. It's just even
Speaker 1: looking at photos or hearing sounds of nature can be
Speaker 1: just as impactful. Yeah, absolutely right. You know, I will
Speaker 1: say that I think the more immersive it is, the better.
Speaker 1: So the more time you spent and the more all
Speaker 1: consuming it is, the more likely it is to have
Speaker 1: the biggest effect. But you can absolutely benefit from it
Speaker 1: by looking at pictures or videos. In fact, when I
Speaker 1: became involved in some of this research, the first thing
Speaker 1: I did is in my office at work, I took
Speaker 1: down like the picture of whatever that was there, and
Speaker 1: I put like a photo of a tree that my
Speaker 1: sister I had taken for me because like, you know,
Speaker 1: practice what I preach it. I got like an orchid
Speaker 1: in the corner now because I know I know what
Speaker 1: the science says. So that's one way the environment up.
Speaker 1: But the other really cool thing, and I mean I
Speaker 1: suspect people actually get this from like going to your concerts,
Speaker 1: and I'd be curious about whether you experienced this too.
Speaker 1: On the other side, we've learned that experiencing awe, the
Speaker 1: emotion of awe, can also help us manage chatter and
Speaker 1: so really quick. The way that works is as an
Speaker 1: emotional we experience when we're in the presence of something
Speaker 1: vast that we have trouble explained. And so a lot
Speaker 1: of people get it from nature. So when I think
Speaker 1: about like the number of planets in the universe, I
Speaker 1: can't it's hard for me to contemplate that it's awe inspiring.
Speaker 1: But other people get it from attending an amazing concert
Speaker 1: where everyone's singing together and there's a sense of transcendence,
Speaker 1: like you're all in it and the sounds are amazing.
Speaker 1: And this is hard to understand how that actually works.
Speaker 1: And what we know is that when people experience that emotion,
Speaker 1: it makes us as individuals and our concerns feel a
Speaker 1: whole lot smaller. Our self shrinks, And when it comes
Speaker 1: to chatter, like shrinking your chatter is that's not a
Speaker 1: bad thing, right, Like our concerns feel a lot smaller
Speaker 1: in their presence of something bad. So to me, that's
Speaker 1: a really just neat beautiful finding and so do you
Speaker 1: ever experience that when you're I think that's what I
Speaker 1: was saying earlier about getting past the chatter, is that
Speaker 1: the the awe of knowing. I always say that I'm
Speaker 1: being sung instead of being the one singing. And when
Speaker 1: I experienced that kind of effortless, free flowing energy and
Speaker 1: knowing I'm connected to something else, Um, that is inspiring
Speaker 1: on stage and you know you're saying, so many people
Speaker 1: singing you know the same song. Like to watch the
Speaker 1: energy of a massive crowd like coming right back at you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's absolutely inspiring. I think about it. You know, I
Speaker 1: live for those moments. I think when we experience then,
Speaker 1: we all really do like it takes you out of
Speaker 1: your own inner chaos for a moment and and places
Speaker 1: you somewhere that's um for what I feel is kind
Speaker 1: of probably our truest The truest place for us is
Speaker 1: out beyond us. Well, here's what's really cool about the
Speaker 1: awe research, I think, which is not everyone gets to
Speaker 1: sing in front of how many tens of thousands of
Speaker 1: people to experience that, and a lot of us don't
Speaker 1: get to go to that many concerts right, like you know,
Speaker 1: once every couple of years maybe, um. But what we've
Speaker 1: learned is like you can find I think your own
Speaker 1: awe triggers, Like you don't have to wait for those experiences,
Speaker 1: so you can like seek out like, okay, are there
Speaker 1: are there things in the park that give you a
Speaker 1: sense of also and I go, like to the arboretum
Speaker 1: by my house and like think about the fact that
Speaker 1: a tree has been here for three years, like that's
Speaker 1: all inspiring. Or if I look at an amazing piece
Speaker 1: of art, like that fills me with awe. So there
Speaker 1: are ways of Again, now that we know how these
Speaker 1: things work, you can try to be really deliberate to
Speaker 1: build these chatter fighting tools and experiences into your life.
Speaker 1: And that's the challenge I think that we all face,
Speaker 1: which is, once we are aware of the different tools
Speaker 1: that exist, how do we bring them in and fold
Speaker 1: them in profitably to help us live better lives. I
Speaker 1: want to ask a bit of a selfish question right now,
Speaker 1: because I mean, I don't think it's probably selfish. I
Speaker 1: think a lot of people are experiencing this in the
Speaker 1: morning when I like when I wake up, like I said,
Speaker 1: that's my first thing that I'm aware of the chatter
Speaker 1: that instantly starts. Is there anything to set us on
Speaker 1: the right path in the morning when it comes to
Speaker 1: our own chatter? Well, I think I think what you
Speaker 1: could try to do is like try to create like
Speaker 1: a chatter habit. You know, so if you know that
Speaker 1: as soon as you wake up, boom, like there's that
Speaker 1: voice and I don't want to hear it. Um, you know,
Speaker 1: think about, like what are the tools that really work
Speaker 1: for you. So maybe it's a ritual that you engage
Speaker 1: in right away that like that morning to start your
Speaker 1: day and you know, followed by a walk and wherever
Speaker 1: to you know, try to give you a double hit, Like, so,
Speaker 1: find the tools at work and then make habits, make
Speaker 1: specific plans to activate those tools right away before you
Speaker 1: let the chatter to take hold. A lot most of
Speaker 1: the tools I talked about in the book are are
Speaker 1: pretty simple to implement, Like these aren't tall orders. Um,
Speaker 1: they're not meant to replace, like clinical interventions if the
Speaker 1: chatter gets too extreme, Like I'm a huge proponent of
Speaker 1: science based interventions and therapy and things like that. For
Speaker 1: most of us, we experienced like chatter is a part
Speaker 1: of life and so just trying to think about how
Speaker 1: you can bring those tools in and and make those
Speaker 1: plans can hopefully help prevent it from getting more intense,
Speaker 1: might require you to get more more intensive intervention. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, we're living in a really interesting, chatter provoking time,
Speaker 1: and I think that your book is is really fascinating
Speaker 1: and and so helpful. Like I said, I've I've been
Speaker 1: implementing the things that that you write about, and I
Speaker 1: am living proof that it actually does work, and which
Speaker 1: makes me excited because there's a lot of you know,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of books and a lot of information
Speaker 1: out there, and you know, like so much that people
Speaker 1: can that people claim to be helpful. And I just
Speaker 1: found that the tools that, like you said that you
Speaker 1: that are fairly simple and easy to implement, and the
Speaker 1: tools that you have provided have definitely already been impactful
Speaker 1: in my life with just the first like a few
Speaker 1: days of really implementing them. And that makes the four
Speaker 1: years of drudgery that went into that all worth it.
Speaker 1: I mean really, um, I mean, you know, the reason
Speaker 1: I wrote that book was to take what we know
Speaker 1: and translated for others, like you know, not so just
Speaker 1: signed just talking about the stuff so that people can
Speaker 1: benefit from it. So the fact that it's having that
Speaker 1: effect really warms my heart and is the best news
Speaker 1: I've gotten. While so very good, Thank you well. I
Speaker 1: always like to end my episodes with music because obviously
Speaker 1: music is such a big part of my life, and
Speaker 1: I find it fascinating to hear what music people love
Speaker 1: and what's on their playlist and what's inspiring them. So
Speaker 1: I call this the Holy Five. I've so do you
Speaker 1: are you? Are you a music fan? And do you
Speaker 1: do you have five songs that are that moview that
Speaker 1: you'd like to share? I do, but I think you
Speaker 1: might have to change it from calling the Holy five.
Speaker 1: I don't know that you'll these will be holyse blongs.
Speaker 1: No no, no, no, like whole holy as in like
Speaker 1: you know your whole five? I see, okay, good not
Speaker 1: with an age, not with the age the w okay.
Speaker 1: So no judgment. I love music, but I've been made
Speaker 1: fun of throughout my life for my case, so here goes.
Speaker 1: Don't stop leaving journey. Oh that's that's a solid one. Um,
Speaker 1: it's gonna get worse. Just prepare with or without you
Speaker 1: YouTube that's still solid. Uh. Jesse's Girl, Rick Springfield, Jessee's good. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a good one. Um, blinding Lights the weekend and
Speaker 1: more contemporary one. Oh yeah, very cool. I'm maybe and
Speaker 1: bon Jovie living on a prayer Steve you that's those
Speaker 1: are all great. I got made made fun of big
Speaker 1: time in college for those choices, so oh well, now
Speaker 1: you're cool. Thank you to stand for approval. Yes, absolutely,
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for joining us today. Um. I
Speaker 1: really think people will benefit from from everything we discussed
Speaker 1: and especially your book, So thank you so much. Thanks
Speaker 1: for having me. It's ten of fun alright everyone. That
Speaker 1: wraps up this episode and kicks off our second season
Speaker 1: of Holy Human. I am so thrilled that we are
Speaker 1: on our second season. Thank you so much for all
Speaker 1: of you for coming along on this journey with me.
Speaker 1: I truly truly appreciate you joining me on this ride,
Speaker 1: and I also love hearing from you. So please leave
Speaker 1: me your feedback wherever you're listening, and don't hesitate to
Speaker 1: share this podcast with anyone in your life that you
Speaker 1: feel could benefit from hearing it. I send you my
Speaker 1: love until next time. On the next episode of Holy Human,
Speaker 1: We're going to tackle something that is truly transformative, heart
Speaker 1: centered guidance with the beautiful Daniel apport. Until then, loves,
Speaker 1: have a beautiful day, a beautiful week, and I love you.
Speaker 1: Holy Human with Me Leanne Rhymes is a production of
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio. You'll find Holy Human with Leanne Rhymes
Speaker 1: on the I Heart app, Apple podcast, or wherever you
Speaker 1: get the podcast that matter most to you.