Breaking the Rumination Loop With Donna Jackson Nakazawa

0:02Thank you for joining me for episode 575 of Live Happy Now. Today we're diving into a topic that affects many of us, the mental loops we get stuck in when life feels overwhelming. I'm your host, Paula Felps, and this week I'm joined by award-winning journalist and author Donna Jackson Nakazawa, whose new book, Mind Drama, unpacks the neuroscience behind rumination. Donna explains that rumination isn't a personal flaw, but rather a survival response gone rogue. And she introduces her powerful MIST framework to help us step out of those old stories and reclaim our sense of belonging, clarity, and calm.

0:41Let's have a listen. Donna, thank you so much for joining me on the show today. Paula, it's such a pleasure to be here. Thank you for having me. I love your book. It really, really hit home for me. And one thing that was so interesting, it was very interesting timing because I was dealing with a situation in my life that I could not get out of my mind, like constantly thinking about like, how am I going to resolve this? What do I do? At the same time, I was reading your book. So it was like, it was crazy because that's usually not my thing. So then it's like I'd pick up your book and kind of get these reminders to put into practice what I was reading about.

1:21So that was absolutely fantastic. So I know the answer this question because I got the head start and already read the book. Tell us what, tell the rest of us, what made you want to look into this topic of rumination? Well, it was very similar to what you said, Paula. My life is a little hectic and I had a situation which happened to be in the work world. And I sort of, when I recently did something for Harvard Business Review and I was It's like all workplace drama is mind drama, right? Yeah. Like it's really simple. Workplace drama is mind drama. We have to get a hold of our mind drama. And this situation, just to give a quick little recap of it, and I start the book with it, as you know, I was coming out with a book, not mind drama.

2:07And I had sent it to a researcher whom he had asked to see it. And I thought, oh, okay, you know, he's super smart. He'll tell me if I went off, you know, like any errors and he was going to read for errors. I was so grateful. Then I was actually at a doctor's appointment. I got a call. I thought, oh, this is really weird. It's from this researcher. And he said, hey, look, you know, this is really important argument. I have a paper that's coming out in a journal and I've just taken these couple of pages and I've inserted them into my work. work and I know you don't mind because your work is about helping people and it's really important to get this out there.

2:47This could really help a significant number of people. And I found myself like, actually, I started to shake. My whole body went into like this gaslight response and I was unable to really speak up for myself. I was able to say, look, you can't do that. Your paper is coming out before my book. Like, it'll look like I'm stealing from you and you're stealing from me. And then the gaslighting, he doubled down on the gaslighting and basically said, but I know you want this and I can help a lot of people and I can't now not know what I know. Oh, my God. Can I tell you, I like, you have to continue this story, but I had an audible response when I read that just because it was so unbelievable to me that somebody would do it.

3:34So continue. you. Yes. And, but we, I think we've all had these situations where something happens. And so here's the thing that started the book is I left the doctors. I could not go through the appointment. I came home by the time I drove home, my whole body was like shaking. And I walked in the door and my husband, who's an attorney, thankfully he was working from home that day. And he was like, what happened? What happened? He thought I'd been in like a major car accident. And I told him, and he's just lovely and practical. And he said, oh, call your editor, call your editor. This is not for you to solve.

4:10And she said, oh, we're going to shut this down. She called the Random House team of attorneys. They had this shut down in less than an hour, less than an hour. Which is beautiful. I think, because we all wish our situations could get resolved that quickly. But here's what I figured out, Paula. It was going on in my head for two weeks. For two weeks, I would wake up in the middle of the night, first thing in the morning, I'd be walking the dog. And so, I mean, I was like, look, I have to be able to get, I have to figure out what's going on here. And so I did some research. I learned a couple things real quickly.

4:49One, we're all ruminating more than we used to. And that is a problem because Because the degree to which we ruminate more than any other mental act is linked to our future mental and physical health, more than any other mental act. Number two, only about a third of us really understand what the word rumination means for most of us. It's like this concept that we can't wrap our heads around. And yet, we're doing it more than we ever have. It determines our mental and physical health. But you cannot solve a problem that you have never named. I love that. So just so we're on the same page. What do you mean when you talk about ruminating?

5:29Yeah. So rumination is clinically defined as re-spinning these negative recursive stories about the past that replay, we call it in the vernacular, thought spiraling, right? Like, or thought loops that we can't get out of. Generally, they tell us a story about ourselves that is pretty negative. and we tend to get revved up with a lot of self-derogatory talk, self-referential talk, as in, what did they think of me? Or why did I do that? Or what did I do wrong? And a lot of criticism towards others, like, he's such an asshole. He's such a jerk. Why did they do that? They should have done this. And it's a particular area of our brain, the default mode network that gets us spun up and in this repetitive thinking that we can't turn off.

6:18But here's the thing, rumination, that replaying, it also leads to future casting, what's going to happen next, and worry about the future and anxiety about the future. And yet, we know, because in the last couple of years, we've done an awful lot of research on this area of the brain that gives rise to our ruminative thoughts, those negative recursive thoughts virals we so badly want to get out of, but we can't. They suck us in seductively over and over again. We keep loading the same reels. But when we can get in and intervene, something kind of amazing happens. The word rumination also has a positive meaning.

7:01In the dictionary, it's these recursive spirals we can't get out of, but it also means to muse, to ideate, to be creative, to problem solve. The same area the brain that is kind of, if you want to think of it, the villain of these recursive thought loops that drag us down. It is also the seat of not only our negative ruminating thoughts, it is the seat of our highest creativity. So my question when I set out to write the book and research this is how do we flip that switch? Flip it from this self-derogatory negative yuck that we get lost in for hours of our day and years of our lives into that state of illumination.

7:44Yeah, because I think if you wanted to do some more research on this, I think every lifetime movie probably starts with rumination. That would just be my personal thinking. So I don't know, maybe that's your next project. But you know, one thing I loved in your book, how you said it's one part research and one part me-search. And it truly is written just the way you promise in your introduction. You take us on a journey as you learn how to address your own ruminating, and then we learn along the way. So thank you for doing the heavy lifting for us. What surprised you most when you were researching and writing this?

8:22What did not surprise me is that we're ruminating more than we used to. I mean, given our digital world, the lack of face-to-face, we're faced with this unending fire hose of negative outrage and negative news. But a couple of things really did surprise me, and I'll kind of run through them. First of all, we're all doing it. It's not a character flaw. It's a survival response gone rogue. This is wired into our evolutionary biology. And really, you're here on this planet because your ancestors were good ruminators. Oh, interesting. It was a threat detection system so that when we were all sitting around the communal fire, if people were laughing at you or poking fun at you or dissing or dismissing you, it was your brain survival response so that you would pay attention.

9:12because back then, any kind of social dismissal was physically dangerous. You could be set at the edge of the tribe where you might be picked off by marauding tribes or predators. Your gene pool wasn't going to get the good meat or the good tubers. And so our immune systems evolved over evolutionary time along with our social threat detection system so that at the very first sign of that social distress or that emotional distress, our bodies create this giant physical response to prepare for physical danger. So that kind of surprised me because we all know when we've been ruminating, you feel it in your body.

9:55Right. It's happening right then. Yes. And also surprised me that when we're ruminating right now, it might be about something that happened 20 years ago, two minutes ago, doesn't matter. Your brain does not have the sophistication to discern whether that thing happened in the past or is happening again now. You will have the same negative biophysical response that is harmful to you over time. So that really surprised me, but I think there's some tender things that really sat with me and are at the heart of this book. And those are that we all ruminate about the same things. We all ruminate about whether we feel we matter and belong to the people and places that matter most to us.

10:45That is where rumination, that is the seat of rumination is the longing to belong. And when we get those signals that in some way we don't, maybe it's at work on our slack, Maybe it's in the kitchen. Our spouse says something snarky to us. Maybe we're on the phone with our teenager trying to sort something out and they're being a teenager. Which isn't good for anybody. And making us feel however it is we feel, but certainly not the normal close relationship we have with our child. It could be you come out of a work meeting and your boss said that kind of weird thing that you replay because you're not quite sure if that was like indicating a future demotion or that your ideas don't matter.

11:32Or maybe you leave lunch with friends or dinner party and you're like, I don't know, something just didn't feel right. Like I just didn't, something didn't feel right. And you know that something has changed. So all those, our brain is dancing with thousands of messages in every millisecond with one question, like, do I belong or not belong? Am I safe here or am I not safe here? That's how we're wired across evolution. The problem is that our brain is super great at getting us into that state of assuming that there is a reason to worry that we're under social threat because that's highly protective, but it is a survival response gone wrong.

12:16And so we actually have to intervene in that storytelling, those stories we spin for ourselves to get out of them because the brain evolved to be great at getting us in, but gave us no skills for getting out. We have to add those in. Very often our primitive thought spirals are these signal fires that are trying to get us to pay attention to something very deep. And that's important for us, but it's also important for us to be able to, as you said, get out of that. And I wanted to go over a part that I really liked, which was your different techniques to end rumination. I think that's so helpful.

12:52That's something every listener can take away today. So can we go over those and explain what each one entails? We'll be right back with more of Live Happy Now.

13:06If you've ever wished your brain had a switch you could flip to be more positive, we've got good news for you. It kind of does. Neuroscience tells us that you can actually train your brain to look for the good. And once you start practicing, it gets easier, faster, and a whole lot more fun. That's exactly why every Tuesday in our Live Happy weekly newsletter, we give you a quick little workout for your optimism muscles. The look for the good word search. It's a tiny puzzle with a big purpose. Every week you hunt for words that spark gratitude, joy, resilience, all the good stuff your brain loves to build on.

13:42It takes just a couple of minutes, feels like a win, and gives your brain a gentle nudge toward noticing what's going right. Think of it as a microdose of positivity disguised as a game. So if you want to get better at seeing the bright spots, even on messy days, subscribe to our Live Happy weekly newsletter by visiting us at livehappy.com and play along with our Look for the Good Word search. Your brain will thank you. And now let's hear more from Donna Jackson Nakazawa. So Paula, the number one framework that I know of for getting out of rumination is the MIST framework. And this is a tool that I developed based on the latest neuroscience for quickly exiting our thought spiraling by naming the experiences that our brain generates when we're ruminating with real granular specificity.

14:36And MIST is an acronym. I chose MIST because when we're ruminating, our brain is not interfacing with all the areas of the brain that will allow us to problem solve and have ingenuity and creativity. We're actually in a fog. We are in a fog. Our default mode network has locked us into a fog. So the MIST framework is drawn from the three different distinct experiences that the brain gives rise to when we're ruminating. And M is for mental imagery. So when we're ruminating, we're playing a lot of mental images. You've ever wondered why your brain loads the same reels over and over? That is thanks to your default mode network.

15:20And this one area of the brain serves up the same mental movies, which we've seen a thousand times and which together tell us a story about ourselves, a self-referential story, which is usually quite negative. And that is how the default mode works. Over a lifetime, we begin to tell ourselves a story about who we are in the world, and this wires up in this area of the brain. So we begin the MIST framework with M for mental movies, mental imagery, and we name with real specificity all the reels that we're re-serving. And we start it with this sentence, here is my old story of how. And for somebody, it might be, here is my old story of how people always dismiss me.

16:07Or here is my old story of how people always put me down. Because when we're ruminating, we are serving up movie reels, which retell a negative story about ourselves. Here is my old story of how no one wants to hear what I have to say. Here is my old story. I've heard everything. Here is my old story about how I'm a terrible decision maker. Here is my old story of how I can't speak up for myself. So let's say that this area of your default mode network, which is triggering your rumination in response to something happening, is here is my old story of how no one wants to hear what I have to say.

16:45Then we would name that with real specificity. And we could say it out loud. We can write it down. We can think it in our minds. It's very, very powerful to speak it aloud. It's very, very powerful to write it down. But it also works just to say it in your mind. Then we move on to I for intense emotions. And now we're going into a different area of experience that's generated by this area of the brain. And it's these intense interior emotions that accompany our mental movies. You can think of it this way. It's like the movie score on a film. If you were just watching the film without the music to drive the emotion, it would be more like a series of pictures, but it's accompanied by this intense interior emotionality.

17:30And so now we're going to start with M. We always start with, here's my old story of how, in the MIST framework, here's my old story of how no one cares what I have to say. My voice doesn't matter, which makes me feel, and we're going to name our intense emotions, small and unseen and afraid. And now we're really getting somewhere. Now we're really getting to a sense of a pattern versus being locked in a singular experience of our tiny mad ideas. And then we're going to add an S in the MIST framework, and we're going to move from mental movies and intense emotions into the somatic sensations that these movies and emotions generate in our body.

18:20Bodily sensations arise very quickly alongside our mental imagery and our intense interior emotions. So we're going to start again, always with the MIST framework, with here's my old story of how no one wants to hear what I have to say. My voice doesn't matter, which makes me feel small and unseen and afraid and angry. And my heart pounds and my gut churns. And what we've done right there is we've tied it all together. And that is what T is for. We have to tie all three parts of the default mode network together to see the story. And once we do that, we can see on fMRI scans that the story dissipates.

19:05I can see when I'm working with audiences and in workshops that people tell me all of a sudden the story is a little bit over here. It's not inside their head anymore. It's actually a little bit outside of them. This is just that millisecond. That's amazing that you can take something and change it that quickly. A millisecond of freedom to go, okay. And here I begin to see people ask themselves questions like, wait a minute, when did I sign up for this story? Like, wait a minute. And I write about this in my drama. Usually we sign up for these early beliefs very early in life in response to our environments and caregivers.

19:48We can see that taking place in the brain. We have very, very robust neuroscience on that. But we're calling the story out. And it's almost like I call our rumination codes, our rumination patterns, these signal fires from the past, because they are begging you to pay attention to the story and to inquire with a tender heart. Hey, why am I back here again? What is it that I have not yet, beneath all this mental noise, tenderly held beneath all of this hurt and anger and exile? Like what tender part of myself have I not paid attention to? And usually it is a hurt place of feeling a lack of being seen or belonging.

20:36Rumination is always about not belonging, as I said. And once we do that, our brain literally thanks us. Rumination is the brain survival response gone rogue, which keeps us seductively in a story that doesn't serve us while also not facing the story. It is actually a way of avoidance. So what we're doing with the MIST framework is we're saying, I see you. I can hold this. When did I sign on for this? And what I see is that people begin to change. change all of a sudden you develop voice because when you are lost in the fog of rumination you have no voice just like this the story that I gave you at the start and I see people develop their interior sense of knowing what they need to do in situations where they previously did not know how to respond and how does it help not just our mental health but our physical well-being because the brain doesn't know the difference between something that happened 20 years ago and you replaying it today.

21:45We know that neurobiologically, when these stories get generated by our default mode network, we are sending a cascade of hormones and chemicals through our body that are associated over time with higher rates of anxiety, depression, substance use disorders, eating disorders, and every kind of outcome you can think of. Like literally rumination, the degree to which you ruminate after a medical procedure is linked to your length of recovery. That's amazing. That's absolutely incredible. It's incredible. But here it is. So we know it's this mental act that has so much weight in our well-being. And yet none of us have been taught a way to deal with it.

22:31We don't talk about it because we're so ashamed of it. So you cannot solve something you're too ashamed to admit you're doing. When we get a hold on it, we begin to see that those inflammatory stress chemicals and hormones that drive mental and physical health concerns, they go away. We stop being our own worst enemy. I love that. And one thing that you bring up, and this is a really important way to end this, is that rumination is not all bad. because near the end of the book, you tell us that rumination can potentially be useful for things like creativity, insight, self-understanding. So tell us how we learn to harness it for good, not evil.

23:15So it's so important to know that once we understand these stories and we hold them very tenderly and we understand these signal fires from the past, the brain will thank us by all the areas of the brain that are really important for creativity and compassion for yourself and for others, and for solving that problem that you've been sitting on the sofa rehashing for four hours, those areas of the brain come online. And so does the capacity for creativity and ingenuity. And of course, in the book, I have over 150 strategies for doing that. But it's very important to remember that this is work that we choose to do.

23:59And we are going to find things. So if you're reading the book and you look at these hundred things, you're going to find things that immediately land for you with real sticking power. And they're going to be different than what lands for your partner or your kid. And all of these different things, pick three or four, put them together. I have the things I love and use the most that I use every day. And I guess I will say that at the beginning of the book, I had my brain scanned to see if I went on this year long journey with the things I'm doing really work. And at the end, and they do work. They do work.

24:35Yeah. So that's what I love is it's like method writing, right? It's like you didn't just research it, you did it and you show us and you, as you said, you did the me search and you shared that with us and took us on that journey. So what is it that you really hope that your readers take away from this book? That this is a tender story, that your ruminations, the things you get caught in, are things you signed on for before you really had an option to decide if this is the way you wanted to think about yourself and your place in the world. And that all of this is very much affected by how and what actions you take on your own behalf.

25:26And that your brain is forever plastic. We used to think it was the first five years, then 18, then 25, then 28. We now see growth in the hippocampus across the lifespan, which is related to that area of the posterior cingulate cortex, which is giving rise to these movie reels. We see new neurons being born there all the time now in response to how we tenderly care for our own experience. And I really want you to know that this is fun. It is fun. I see a lot of stuff out there, as you said, actionable neurohacks or what have you. This stuff is fun. I find it joyful to be able to be in maybe an extended family setting and go, oh, here's my old story of X, which and then lose the story and just be able to say, no, that's not acceptable and walk out.

26:24And here's what happens when you make friends with your rumination codes and you do this little bit of very fun work, you stop ruminating and you stop being stuck in the story and you stop pulling up the old stories because your brain knows that you have dealt with and emotionally processed them. And you will find your voice. You will find that you can say what needs to be said in the most difficult situations, in the most difficult relationships and walk away and not be spinning it again. And what an incredible gift to be able to do that. What a gift to give yourself to change that, all of that, change that story, change that movie.

27:13It's absolutely incredible. And your book really lets us believe, makes us know that it's possible. Enjoy. It was great talking to you. Well, Donna, we are going to tell our listeners how they can find you. were offering a download of your appendix, which is letting you know if you're ruminating too much. Nice little quiz people can take. And then we're going to tell them how they can find your other books. There's a lot more that they have to explore and where they can follow you. So I appreciate you taking the time to sit down with me today and talk about all of this. Pleasure to be with you.

27:51That was Donna Jackson Nakazawa talking about her book, Mind Drama, the science of rumination and how to outwit your inner defeatist. Donna is part of our all new Live Happy Summer Reading Program, and if you'd like to read along with us, make sure you download the Summer Reading Tracker. It's an easy way to read along with us each week and jot down your insights as you go. You can also find out how to order Donna's book, follow her on social media, or get a free download to find out if you're ruminating too much. All of those links are waiting for you when you visit livehappy.com and click on this episode.

28:26That's all we have for today. We'll meet you back here again next week for an all-new episode featuring Deborah Santana talking about her new book, Loving the Fire, Choosing Me, Finding Freedom, which tells her story of leaving a high-profile marriage and rediscovering who she was born to be. Until then, this is Paula Phelps reminding you to make every day a happy one.