Speaker 1: Pushkin. Welcome to a special set of episodes of The
Speaker 1: Happiness Lab. The now global spread of coronavirus is affecting
Speaker 1: all of us. This disease has brought a host of medical, economic,
Speaker 1: and political problems, but it's also given us a ton
Speaker 1: of uncertainty and anxiety, which are beginning to have an
Speaker 1: enormous negative impact on our collective while being but whenever
Speaker 1: I'm confused or fearful, I remember that looking for answers
Speaker 1: in evidence based science is always the best way to go,
Speaker 1: and that's where I'm hoping this podcast can help. It's
Speaker 1: really hard to escape bad news right now. As infection
Speaker 1: rates continue to rise and the number of deaths from
Speaker 1: COVID nineteen mount, it's easy to become overwhelmed by doom
Speaker 1: and gloom and also cynicism. We've all heard of our
Speaker 1: fellow citizens selfishly hoarding vital supplies, or stores hiking up
Speaker 1: their prices for profit, or even college spring breakers partying
Speaker 1: rather than staying home. All these stories can make us
Speaker 1: feel even more alone. In our isolation, we just assume
Speaker 1: everyone is out to protect themselves with no thought for
Speaker 1: the well being of others. But when things start to
Speaker 1: feel overwhelming for me. I always think back to one
Speaker 1: of my favorite quotes from mister Rogers. It's one that
Speaker 1: comes up a lot in tragic times like this. You know,
Speaker 1: my mother used to say, always look for the helpers,
Speaker 1: because if you look for the helpers, you'll know that
Speaker 1: there's hope. And so, inspired by mister Rogers, I started
Speaker 1: looking for the helpers. I looked on social media at
Speaker 1: the hashtag COVID kindness, and I started to see some
Speaker 1: amazing stories. I mean, chefs giving away free food, doctor
Speaker 1: is working all hours, and whole countries joining an applause
Speaker 1: to thank their healthcare workers. But one story stuck with
Speaker 1: me in particular. A college student from New York named
Speaker 1: Liam Elkin had to spend his spring break doing something
Speaker 1: amazing for his community. He teamed up with friends to
Speaker 1: set up a website called Invisible Hands, coordinating free grocery
Speaker 1: deliveries for the elderly and vulnerable. Liam's message of hope
Speaker 1: and solidarity went viral. Thousands of volunteers signed up to
Speaker 1: help tons of isolated folks access the vital resources they needed.
Speaker 1: But as I read more of Liam's lovely story, I
Speaker 1: kept thinking I had seen his name somewhere before, and
Speaker 1: that's when it hit me. I'd seen his name before
Speaker 1: because he'd taken my happiness class. He was my student,
Speaker 1: which made me super super proud, but also set me thinking.
Speaker 1: I wanted to talk to Liam and ask for important
Speaker 1: tips for how we can all make a difference to
Speaker 1: and I also wanted to see if the science I
Speaker 1: had taught Liam in class was working out there in
Speaker 1: the real world. I spent the first few days of
Speaker 1: break in Philadelphia doing voter registration, and a lot of
Speaker 1: our hosts were quite elderly. They were providing us with
Speaker 1: our meals or breakfasts every morning. These people were quickly
Speaker 1: becoming my close friend, and so it was scary to
Speaker 1: realize how vulnerable a lot of them might be. And
Speaker 1: you know, then I got home and things were getting worse.
Speaker 1: I wasn't sure if I should take the subway when
Speaker 1: I got home. I'm from New York City and my
Speaker 1: grandparents live in New Rochelle, which was had a ton
Speaker 1: of cases and the National Guard came in, and my
Speaker 1: grandparents at first were saying, oh, no, We're going to
Speaker 1: the store every day and stuff like that. You know,
Speaker 1: my grandpa went to the zoo I think, and I said, Grandpa, like,
Speaker 1: you know, and just go home, stay at home. We'll
Speaker 1: FaceTime you. It'll be fine. But rather than just kind
Speaker 1: of throw up your hands, you decided to do something
Speaker 1: about it. A lot of people are seeing this crisis
Speaker 1: unfold and the only thing that they can do to
Speaker 1: help is nothing. Is what they're being told, right, be
Speaker 1: a hero, stay at home. And I'm not saying that
Speaker 1: staying at home isn't important, but it feels like when
Speaker 1: you're dealing with an existential crisis, not just to you personally,
Speaker 1: but to humanity at large, you want to be able
Speaker 1: to do something. And so when you're told that the
Speaker 1: best way to do something is to not do anything,
Speaker 1: you feel very useless. That was kind of what I
Speaker 1: was looking for, is is there a way I can
Speaker 1: actively help people and just and not just passively not
Speaker 1: make it worse? And so I happened to come across
Speaker 1: a Facebook post of a friend of mine and fellow
Speaker 1: Yale alum named Simone Policano, and she was saying, you know,
Speaker 1: is there any kind of program that connects young, healthy
Speaker 1: volunteers with the elderly, the disabled, immuno compromise, the sick,
Speaker 1: just to help deliver them their groceries, necessities, whatever it
Speaker 1: is that they may need. So I thought, wow, that
Speaker 1: sounds amazing. So I reached out to her and I said,
Speaker 1: what if we made program like that. We built a website.
Speaker 1: We were trying to decide if we wanted the sixteen
Speaker 1: dollars a month squares space that would let you not
Speaker 1: take donations or the twenty six dollars a month one
Speaker 1: that would let you take donations, and I said, you
Speaker 1: know what, We'll probably get ten dollars. And almost immediately
Speaker 1: the reaction was insane. I mean, this thing took off
Speaker 1: pretty much immediately. People started sharing it, people started posting
Speaker 1: up our flyers around town. News outlets started picking it up.
Speaker 1: We've been on Morning America, Fox and Friends, CNN, NBC
Speaker 1: with Lester Holt. I mean, people, I think the reason
Speaker 1: that there was such an incredible outpouring of support is
Speaker 1: because people are hungry to help right now, and people
Speaker 1: want to do good in this world that feels so
Speaker 1: bad all the time, and so if there's a way
Speaker 1: to help, people are more than ready to jump at
Speaker 1: that opportunity. But as we grew we quickly realized, you know,
Speaker 1: this is not a thing that we can do alone.
Speaker 1: I was thinking, you know, maybe we would deliver to
Speaker 1: a couple of neighbors, and how lovely would that be.
Speaker 1: But pretty much immediately, I mean, we're now up over
Speaker 1: five thousand volunteers in New York City alone. People are
Speaker 1: reaching out from all over the country saying, hey, how
Speaker 1: can I get this started? In California, in Florida, We've
Speaker 1: had outreached from Malaysia, Kenya, Australia. I mean, people want
Speaker 1: to help their neighbors and to come together in this
Speaker 1: time of crisis. And so it's been really really incredible
Speaker 1: to say, had you ever made a website before, like
Speaker 1: is this new team? Or I'd made one website before
Speaker 1: it is not very good. So it's been crazy, but
Speaker 1: in the best way possible. I mean, I don't know why,
Speaker 1: like our organization in particular was picked up so much,
Speaker 1: because there are a ton of amazing organizers out there
Speaker 1: who are doing very similar work. But the fact that
Speaker 1: we were very much makes me feel the responsibility that
Speaker 1: I need to do this right and do it well
Speaker 1: and do it fast because there's such a critical need
Speaker 1: out there. So yeah, I mean, I built a website
Speaker 1: with mine and Simone's personal phone numbers on it, and
Speaker 1: then the phone started ring pretty much immediately, and we said, okay,
Speaker 1: we should probably take our personal phone numbers off of it,
Speaker 1: but it was too late because Blake Lively had already
Speaker 1: put us on our Instagram story and so then our
Speaker 1: phone numbers were out there, and then it was an
Speaker 1: l dot com with our personal phone numbers, and we said, okay,
Speaker 1: let's make a Google Voice number, find some other way
Speaker 1: that'll redirect to our phone numbers but won't overwhelm us.
Speaker 1: And we're just starting to get into a place where
Speaker 1: we're starting to build institutions, build alliances. The outpouring of
Speaker 1: support from the community has been amazing and it's crazy
Speaker 1: how many people want to help in this time. This
Speaker 1: is all in a week, like this has happened in
Speaker 1: a week, which is so crazy. Yeah, I have not slept.
Speaker 1: My mom said that my eyes looked like Cookie Monster's eyes.
Speaker 1: Like just I look wired, like I have not slept
Speaker 1: in days. So talk to me about Invisible Hands, Like,
Speaker 1: what was the original idea for the organization? What did
Speaker 1: you expect it to do? So the origin an idea
Speaker 1: for Invisible Hands was that we would just make grocery
Speaker 1: deliveries to people who couldn't for whatever reason, come out
Speaker 1: of their house due to this virus or due to
Speaker 1: physical disability. A lot of people can't get to the
Speaker 1: store anyway, but they may have help that's no longer
Speaker 1: able to come because of this virus. So it's just
Speaker 1: it's compounded a lot of difficulties in a lot of ways.
Speaker 1: And so we figured, you know, we have some time
Speaker 1: on our frequently washed hands, and so may as well
Speaker 1: do something with it. And then what we realized was
Speaker 1: a lot of these people don't just need some fruits
Speaker 1: and vegetables, but they need some company. And in this
Speaker 1: time of social distancing, it's really isolating, and people feel
Speaker 1: really alone, and they feel scared, and they feel like
Speaker 1: they don't have a partner or a friend or an
Speaker 1: ally who can stand with them. And so one thing
Speaker 1: that we make sure to prioritize is that all our
Speaker 1: volunteers call ahead to their recipient and talk to them,
Speaker 1: Engage them in conversation, Hey, missus smith, how's your day going,
Speaker 1: Learn a little bit about them, about their families. I've
Speaker 1: made connections with people who it turns out one woman
Speaker 1: her grand daughter goes to the preschool that I went
Speaker 1: to and is loving it, and we talked about the
Speaker 1: teacher that I had, who she has, and making connections
Speaker 1: like that people in my neighborhood whom I never would
Speaker 1: have met. And so it's a little bit crazy to
Speaker 1: be getting that kind of social connection in this age
Speaker 1: of social distancing, and how people are able to come
Speaker 1: together when it feels like the world is pulling us
Speaker 1: all apart. So those are kind of the main things
Speaker 1: that we started out with was the delivery service and
Speaker 1: the social aspect, but then also thanks to the incredible
Speaker 1: outpouring of financial support, we're also offering financial subsidy to
Speaker 1: the people hit hardest economically by this disease, whether they
Speaker 1: were laid off for if their freelancers and can't get
Speaker 1: any jobs right now, whatever it may be. What were
Speaker 1: your expectations about how this was going to go. I mean,
Speaker 1: if you could head your crystal ball and it went
Speaker 1: as best as it could, what were you expecting a
Speaker 1: week ago? Best option would be I recruit my friends
Speaker 1: and they're super pumped up about it, and I'm able
Speaker 1: to go to the grocery store, make some deliveries and
Speaker 1: make some new friends. Hopefully and that is what has happened,
Speaker 1: and I have made new friends. One person I made
Speaker 1: a delivery too, sent me a picture of her granddaughter
Speaker 1: tried to set me up with her granddaughter. And another
Speaker 1: one I brought her her delivery and she invited me
Speaker 1: in for tea and cookies. And I said, Carol, that
Speaker 1: is the exact opposite of the point you were supposed
Speaker 1: to be physically distancing from one another. And she said, okay, okay, fine,
Speaker 1: but after this thing is over, you're going to come
Speaker 1: over for some cookies and traits. And so we've been
Speaker 1: in communication over email, and so I'm really looking forward
Speaker 1: to that day when this whole thing is over and
Speaker 1: I can come over for some cookies. But you know,
Speaker 1: I was surprised by how many people found us, but
Speaker 1: I wasn't surprised by how much people wanted to help.
Speaker 1: And as you may know from Psychology and the Good Life,
Speaker 1: which I was so pleased when I realized that you
Speaker 1: took it in amongst my thousands of students, the act
Speaker 1: of helping people is something that can boost our well
Speaker 1: being in this time of horrible crisis. So I was
Speaker 1: going to ask, do you remember kind of some of
Speaker 1: the stuff from the class. When I had this vision
Speaker 1: that when you were setting up in Visible Hands, you
Speaker 1: thought back to the notes. Of course I had you
Speaker 1: in my mind, but you were the one who gave
Speaker 1: me the idea. I was thinking, how can I be happier?
Speaker 1: And I thought community service? And you remember me from
Speaker 1: your thousands of students, right you saw Liam Elkin. You
Speaker 1: thought that kid. I remember him well, of course I do. Yeah.
Speaker 1: In many ways, I think that the overwhelming response to
Speaker 1: your class reminds me of the interest in Invisible Hands,
Speaker 1: because people want this world to be a better, safer,
Speaker 1: happier place, and they want to know how they can
Speaker 1: get it there. And so I think your class offered
Speaker 1: that strategic way that you know, scientifically proven way of
Speaker 1: making yourself happier and making the world a happier place,
Speaker 1: which is similar to what we're offering, not with psychological tools,
Speaker 1: but with social tools, which are psychologically proven to be
Speaker 1: helpful and scientifically proven to be exactly the thing we
Speaker 1: need right now to increase people's sense of agency, to
Speaker 1: increase people's sense of well being. Again, not just for
Speaker 1: the people you're helping, not for the elderly neighbor that
Speaker 1: gets her prescription, but also for the twenty something who
Speaker 1: feels lost and now has something he can do rather
Speaker 1: than just stay home. Yeah. Well, and I will say,
Speaker 1: you know, I remember you telling us that helping people
Speaker 1: you know, makes us happy. And all the deliveries that
Speaker 1: I've made have brought along new friendships with them, you know.
Speaker 1: As I said, Carol and I communicate a lot all
Speaker 1: and I have been emailing back and forth as well.
Speaker 1: It was one woman's I think it was her seventy
Speaker 1: seventh birthday, and she was really sad that she wasn't
Speaker 1: able to hang out with her friends on that day,
Speaker 1: so we brought along a birthday card with her delivery.
Speaker 1: One person made a collage for her deliverer. I like
Speaker 1: the term mutual aid because I think it gets at
Speaker 1: the fact that it is not just a service on
Speaker 1: our part two other people, but this is a way
Speaker 1: that communities come together and help one another out. And
Speaker 1: I think that a lot of people are really struggling
Speaker 1: with that right now. I've gotten so many calls from
Speaker 1: people who are living with immunosuppression HIV AIDS, or who
Speaker 1: are paralyzed, or even just people who are lonely and
Speaker 1: need a friend. And I think that every time I'm
Speaker 1: able to have a conversation with people like that and
Speaker 1: help them out in some small way by bringing them groceries,
Speaker 1: which is not a huge thing in and of itself,
Speaker 1: but means a lot when you're feeling alone, I think
Speaker 1: that that has untold impacts on people's emotional well being.
Speaker 1: Now that you've heard Liam's inspiring story, I wanted to
Speaker 1: explore why his project has been so powerful. After the break,
Speaker 1: you'll learn how you can get that same benefit Liam
Speaker 1: as from a little COVID kindness. The Happiness Lab will
Speaker 1: be right back. Why is Liam's approach so important in
Speaker 1: these tough times? The answer is twofold the invisible hands.
Speaker 1: Volunteers are bringing support intoeer to their communities, but they're
Speaker 1: also improving their own personal well being. And to help
Speaker 1: me explain the science underpinning this effect, I turned to
Speaker 1: one of my favorite social psychologists and longtime friend of
Speaker 1: The Happiness Lab. Hi. I'm David Desteno, Professor of psychology
Speaker 1: at Northeastern University and author of Emotional Success, The Power
Speaker 1: of Gratitude, Compassion, and Pride. You may remember Dave from
Speaker 1: an episode we did on the Power of feeling gratitude.
Speaker 1: But Dave's also an expert on other social emotions and
Speaker 1: how we can use them in this challenging time to
Speaker 1: feel a little better, and that's why I wanted Dave
Speaker 1: to help me dig into Liam's story a bit. Dave
Speaker 1: argues that Liam was able to reap the benefits he
Speaker 1: did because he tapped into a powerful social emotion, one
Speaker 1: we should all be using more right now, compassion at heart.
Speaker 1: Most of us are compassionate. Most of us really want
Speaker 1: to help other people, but what usually gets in the
Speaker 1: way is not knowing how, not knowing where to start,
Speaker 1: or even feeling like any small act we might do
Speaker 1: might not make a difference. And in COVID nineteen it's
Speaker 1: even harder because the ways that we might normally try
Speaker 1: to reflexively reach out aren't available to us as we're
Speaker 1: socially isolating. And that's why innovators like Liam become really important.
Speaker 1: He's found a way to open a channel for us
Speaker 1: to help other people, to allow us to feel effective
Speaker 1: in what we're doing, and now people are rushing to
Speaker 1: it from all over the country, and that's incredibly inspiring.
Speaker 1: So I want to dig into compassion a little bit
Speaker 1: because when we think about compassion, I know this is
Speaker 1: an emotion that psychologists talk about all the time, but
Speaker 1: it's not an emotion that people tend to think of.
Speaker 1: In the set of emotions like anger for your happiness,
Speaker 1: compassion doesn't come up. So what is compassion? Compassion? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that's true. Most of the emotions we think
Speaker 1: about tend to be kind of the ones that psychologists
Speaker 1: often call more basic states, like anger fear. But for
Speaker 1: humans we have to master not only the physical landscape
Speaker 1: but the social landscape, and so we have this suite
Speaker 1: of emotions that have to do with interpersonal interaction again,
Speaker 1: things like gratitude, things like guilt, things like compassion. What
Speaker 1: compassion is is it's the emotion we feel when we
Speaker 1: want to give care to someone else. It's often mixed
Speaker 1: up with empathy. So empathy these days, at least in
Speaker 1: the neuroscientific sense, means I can feel what you're feeling.
Speaker 1: If you're feeling happy, I feel your happiness. If you're
Speaker 1: feeling sad, I feel your sadness. Compassion actually is the
Speaker 1: emotion that is a caregiving emotion. I understand that you
Speaker 1: are in distress or pain, and I want to do
Speaker 1: something to relieve that, and so it's important to move
Speaker 1: past empathy to compassion. So the Buddhist monks will often
Speaker 1: talk about this. If you're always feeling empathy, you can
Speaker 1: get overwhelmed and feel burned out. If you're trying to
Speaker 1: feel everyone's distress, Well you have to do is say,
Speaker 1: I recognize you're in distress. Let me get into the
Speaker 1: state of compassion where it motivates me to want to
Speaker 1: help you, to sacrifice for you in a way that
Speaker 1: doesn't require me to continually feel your pain and therefore
Speaker 1: get burned out by it. This particular point about the
Speaker 1: power of compassion is really important, particularly right now, and
Speaker 1: so I want to take a second to unpack it
Speaker 1: because many of us are in positions where we have
Speaker 1: to worry about other people during COVID nineteen. Maybe you
Speaker 1: have elderly or immunocompromised relatives, or maybe you work in
Speaker 1: the medical profession and you have to help sick people
Speaker 1: in really risky situations. Or maybe you're just an empathic
Speaker 1: person like Liam who can't help but share the fear
Speaker 1: and worry that everyone's experiencing right now, with so many
Speaker 1: people in need and suffering, it's easy to feel really overwhelmed,
Speaker 1: and that's where the science shows that compassion can really help.
Speaker 1: It protects us from feeling burned out in a time
Speaker 1: of heightened stress. Now, you may, at first glance assume
Speaker 1: that feeling compassion for other people might make you more
Speaker 1: prone to feeling overwhelmed right now, but our most recent
Speaker 1: work shows that it actually allows them to overcome what's
Speaker 1: known as compassion fatigue or compassion burnout, which I think
Speaker 1: a lot of people are feeling right now because they're
Speaker 1: feeling overwhelmed. Take one study by Tanya Singer in her colleagues.
Speaker 1: They showed people scary news reports. As you might expect,
Speaker 1: people naturally felt pretty bad after seeing this footage. But
Speaker 1: Singer and colleagues gave one group of subjects a compassion
Speaker 1: booster shot, one that we've talked about in previous episodes.
Speaker 1: She had our subjects attend a one day mindfulness course
Speaker 1: on loving kindness meditation, a form of meditation that's known
Speaker 1: to bump up people's compassion over time. If you want,
Speaker 1: you can try one of these practices out at the
Speaker 1: end of the episode. So what happened after people watched
Speaker 1: these distressing videos After boosting their compassion a bit, the
Speaker 1: subject's negative emotions dropped. In fact, the people who meditated
Speaker 1: showed positive affiliative emotions when watching the screenings. The act
Speaker 1: of experiencing compassion allowed them to see people in pain
Speaker 1: and want to help them without feeling overwhelmed, which is
Speaker 1: kind of what all of us need right now. So
Speaker 1: compassion can give us the power to get through hard
Speaker 1: times without feeling burned out. But Dave has also shown
Speaker 1: that compassion makes it easier to do a lot of
Speaker 1: the hard things we need to do right now, like
Speaker 1: self sacrificing and staying home, in order to flatten the curve.
Speaker 1: To the extent that you can cultivate compassion even among
Speaker 1: your family, it will color your views. It will change
Speaker 1: your mind's response to any instance that comes up, making
Speaker 1: you more willing to sacrifice. By social isolating and not
Speaker 1: going out to dinner or shopping, by maybe trying to
Speaker 1: take time to call your elderly neighbor who does not
Speaker 1: know how to order food online, or taking her order
Speaker 1: and doing it for her right, it will make you
Speaker 1: more willing to do those sacrifices. I love this tip
Speaker 1: because I think anything we can do to reduce the
Speaker 1: challenge associated with what we need to do to not
Speaker 1: be just frustrated the whole time we're sitting in our
Speaker 1: houses can make us feel better. And it seems counterintuitive,
Speaker 1: but the simple act of experiencing more compassion can just
Speaker 1: make it easier to hang out and just accept that
Speaker 1: we're sticking around in a house and it's okay, that's right.
Speaker 1: And you know, when you think of it that way,
Speaker 1: that compassion, you understand the sacrifice and you know that
Speaker 1: the compassion that you're doing, which should normally make you
Speaker 1: want to reach out and go help someone, if you
Speaker 1: reframe it this way, no, staying home is actually helping.
Speaker 1: Then compassion can be channeled in that way, and trust me,
Speaker 1: it will make it easier for you. It focuses your
Speaker 1: value on long term outcome as opposed to what would
Speaker 1: make you feel good right now. And the reason we
Speaker 1: do hard things. What makes us do hard things. Sometimes
Speaker 1: it's because what we think we should do, but more
Speaker 1: often it's because what we feel we should do it.
Speaker 1: If you feel you should do it, then you're not
Speaker 1: using your reason to combat your impulse inside, which is yeah,
Speaker 1: but I really want to go out or I really
Speaker 1: want to do this if you cultivate an emotion of compassion,
Speaker 1: then you're not fighting your impulse to want something else.
Speaker 1: It's actually making you want to sacrifice for others. Compassion
Speaker 1: can give us the strength we need to focus on
Speaker 1: others in a really tough time, and that can pay
Speaker 1: huge dividends, and not just for the people who are
Speaker 1: helping through our actions. As Liam remembered from my class
Speaker 1: and saw firsthand, doing nice things for others can make
Speaker 1: us feel really good. Liam describes this as win win.
Speaker 1: It's a win for the person who's receiving help that
Speaker 1: they need right now, and it's a win for the
Speaker 1: person who's giving that help. Giving to other people is
Speaker 1: incredibly rewarding. It makes us happy at heart. But really,
Speaker 1: I'd say this is a win win win situation, and
Speaker 1: that third win stands for the upward spiral of gratitude
Speaker 1: and compassion that's going to come from this. Right people
Speaker 1: who are helped feel grateful for that help, and we
Speaker 1: know that sense of gratitude makes them then want to
Speaker 1: pay it forward to someone else, spreading that network. And
Speaker 1: also the people who are giving and they're experiencing compassion
Speaker 1: that makes them want to join Liam's organization. And give
Speaker 1: that compassion will continue to be of evoked in them
Speaker 1: and make them want to help even wider circles of people,
Speaker 1: strangers that they might not even know now. And so
Speaker 1: I think that third wind is in some ways the
Speaker 1: most inspiring because what it suggests is that this network
Speaker 1: is going to continue to grow, and allowing a trusted
Speaker 1: network to grow during scary times like this can mean
Speaker 1: the difference between surviving this crisis and not. One of
Speaker 1: my favorite examples is when Superstorm Sandy hit New York
Speaker 1: City in twenty twelve. It decimated a lot of neighborhoods.
Speaker 1: What the AP did and the North Research Institute was
Speaker 1: they came in two years later and they did a study,
Speaker 1: and what they found is that once you controlled for
Speaker 1: a lot of the degrees of physical damage that occurred,
Speaker 1: the best predictor for which neighbors whether most resilient, meaning
Speaker 1: the ability to bounce back, were those that where people
Speaker 1: felt that they could trust and count on their neighbors,
Speaker 1: which is why programs like LIAMS are so important. They
Speaker 1: allow neighborhoods to build up trust and connection with one another.
Speaker 1: It's also important that LIAMS noticed the importance of connection
Speaker 1: right he's having his volunteers make calls to people and
Speaker 1: they're talking to each other, making that social connection. As
Speaker 1: he said, one woman was trying to set him up
Speaker 1: on a date. And what you're seeing there is the
Speaker 1: growing of trust within a community, the growing of connection,
Speaker 1: and that's going to pay dividends moving forward, because, as
Speaker 1: I said earlier, what underlies the community's resilience is the
Speaker 1: extent to which people trust each other. And that's the
Speaker 1: same whether it's virtual communities where we can help across
Speaker 1: wide networks without being physically near each other or within
Speaker 1: the same town. And hopefully that sense of connection won't
Speaker 1: only help people's anxiety and well being now, but will
Speaker 1: continue to foster connection and giving as we move forward
Speaker 1: and even beyond the COVID nineteen crisis. So does your
Speaker 1: research make us hopeful that if we can harness our
Speaker 1: emotions in the right way, we really can get through
Speaker 1: this crisis in a deeply cooperative way. It makes me
Speaker 1: very hopeful for that. And I don't say that in
Speaker 1: a Pollyanna sense. I say because I think that is
Speaker 1: what's worked many times in the past. One of my
Speaker 1: favorite sayings right now that I see and I know
Speaker 1: all religions say this, but I think the Dalai Lama
Speaker 1: says it most eloquently, which is, compassion is not a luxury.
Speaker 1: It's a necessity for human survival. Right now, we need
Speaker 1: more compassion, and not in the fancy you kum bay
Speaker 1: Us sends let's just all sit down in a hippie
Speaker 1: dippy way. I mean it in a truly deep, scientific,
Speaker 1: evolutionary way. These emotions will push us towards the cooperative
Speaker 1: behaviors that we need right now to come through this together.
Speaker 1: Compassion is what we need now more than ever. It
Speaker 1: can give us strength to sacrifice for others and can
Speaker 1: help us do so in a way that doesn't exhaust
Speaker 1: our own well of goodwill. And as Liam's story so
Speaker 1: nicely shows, having a bit more emotional bandwidth to help
Speaker 1: others can lead to some creative new win win wins,
Speaker 1: ones where we can help the people who need it
Speaker 1: most while improving our own mental health and building communities
Speaker 1: of trust around us. Mister Rogers was right it does
Speaker 1: pay to look for the heroes, But what he didn't
Speaker 1: say is that it pays even more to become a
Speaker 1: hero yourself, and so to help you supercharge your own compassion.
Speaker 1: I thought it'd be fun to share another quick meditation.
Speaker 1: This one is called loving Kindness or Meta. It'll take
Speaker 1: a couple of minutes, but the science shows that performing
Speaker 1: just this kind of practice over time can bump up
Speaker 1: your levels of compassion. So why don't you pause this
Speaker 1: episode right now, grab a seat, and let's get started.
Speaker 1: Now that you're sitting somewhere comfortably, it's time to close
Speaker 1: your eyes and begin to pay attent into your breath.
Speaker 1: Just try to get a sense of how you're feeling
Speaker 1: right now, and then follow your breath as it comes
Speaker 1: in through your nose and then out through your mouth.
Speaker 1: One more time, following your breath as it comes in
Speaker 1: through your nose, a deep breath in and then out.
Speaker 1: And now I want you to bring to mind someone
Speaker 1: who's really easy to care about. This could be a
Speaker 1: partner or a child, someone you really love. People even
Speaker 1: can pick a favorite pet. And so I want you
Speaker 1: to bring to mind this person or this critter. And
Speaker 1: I want you to feel in your heart what it
Speaker 1: feels like when you think about them. And I want
Speaker 1: you to send this individual some good wishes. I want
Speaker 1: you to think about this person and think, may you
Speaker 1: be happy, May you be healthy, may you care for
Speaker 1: yourself joyfully, and may you be safe. And just think
Speaker 1: about that individual and repeat those phrases again, and just
Speaker 1: watch what's happening in what's called your heart space, the
Speaker 1: area just around your chest. Some people describe thinking of
Speaker 1: these things and watching that area kind of fill up
Speaker 1: a little bit. And if you don't notice anything, that's
Speaker 1: okay too. Sometimes this practice takes a while. Now I
Speaker 1: want you to bring to mind another person, someone else
Speaker 1: you're close with, and we'll walk through those same statements. Remember,
Speaker 1: see what this feels like in your heart space. May
Speaker 1: you be happy, may you be healthy, May you care
Speaker 1: for yourself joyfully, and may you be safe. Now we'll
Speaker 1: take a second to apply compassion to someone. That's often
Speaker 1: hard to feel compassionate towards ourselves. So now take a
Speaker 1: second to think about yourself, and let's apply those same statements.
Speaker 1: May I be happy, may I be healthy, May I
Speaker 1: care for myself joyfully, and may I be safe. For
Speaker 1: some folks, it's easier to apply compassion to themselves, but
Speaker 1: some folks find it hard. So just notice what it
Speaker 1: feels like for you, and then we'll try to broaden
Speaker 1: our compassion to an even bigger group. I want you
Speaker 1: to think of your entire community, especially all the folks
Speaker 1: that might be affected by this crisis, and I want
Speaker 1: you to send your compassion to all of them, thinking
Speaker 1: about all the folks together. May you be happy, May
Speaker 1: you be healthy, May you care for yourselves joyfully, and
Speaker 1: may you be safe. Then just repeat those statements over
Speaker 1: and over again in your head and again sort of
Speaker 1: monitor what's happening in your heart's face. See if you
Speaker 1: can feel what it feels like to feel compassion for
Speaker 1: the people around you. And then just to close, let's
Speaker 1: take one more really deep breath in through the nose
Speaker 1: and then let's side it out through the mouth and
Speaker 1: you can open your eyes. And that was your quick
Speaker 1: introduction to loving kindness meditation. The research suggests that the
Speaker 1: act of doing a practice like that regularly can bump
Speaker 1: up your compassion and can help you with burnout. I
Speaker 1: hope it's been useful to you during this tough time,
Speaker 1: and I hope you'll join me again for the next
Speaker 1: episode of The Happiness Lab with doctor Laurie Santos. The
Speaker 1: Happiness Lab is a Pushkin podcast. It's co written and
Speaker 1: produced by Ryan Dilley and mastered by Evan Viola. Our
Speaker 1: original music is written by Zachary Silver. Special thanks to
Speaker 1: Ben Davis, Heather Fame, Carly Mgliori, Julia Barton, Neil La Belle,
Speaker 1: Jacob Weisberg, and the rest of the Pushkin Crew