Why You Can’t Stop Scrolling & The Simple Fix That Actually Works | Anders Hansen

0:00Anders Hansen:Welcome to Live Well Be Well, a show to help high performers improve their health and well-being.

0:10Anders Hansen:I think two things came up to my brain that when you spoke about habits. One was brushing your teeth. It's not an exercise I think any of us learn to love, but we do it automatically on autopilot because we know if we don't, our teeth are going to fall out. And probably one of the big things is aesthetic is probably very important to a lot of us. So we do it so we can look better. But actually, it also has so many other health things connected to it. Health benefits like cardiovascular disease, even dementia. All of these things are connected to our mouth. But we do it because we've taught it from such a young age.

0:44Anders Hansen:And it makes me think about our brain. We don't get taught any of this when we're young at all. We don't get taught kind of how we look after our brain and how we can grow up making these habits. I think about from a nutrition perspective not having junk food in my house because I know that when it's there like Christmas I will just keep eating it because it's there and my brain can see it as a signal whereas when it's not in the house it's why everyone I think struggles at Christmas not because a Christmas dinner isn't healthy because it's not it's just because there's just this constant flow of Moorish food everywhere and our brain is like well it's right there I can eat it whereas if you have to walk to the shops or get in the car and drive to the shops you do stop and that's that's kind of a habit that we create these loops in so how can we create healthy loops for our brain to support us emotionally like what are the few things that you would advise

1:43Sarah Ann Macklin:well the example of candy is is the most obvious one we the brain evolved for for for survival and And obesity was not a problem for survival. It was a non-existent problem. But starvation was a huge problem. And that means that the brain evolved to eat all the things that it could find, especially calorie-rich food. And that means that it's very hard for the brain not to eat calorie-rich food when that is around. And we all see that during Christmas. We eat because it's around. And from that we learn, okay, we can't have food around all the time. I can't have candy in my pockets because I will eat that.

2:23Sarah Ann Macklin:It's just not possible. And I think we have been incredibly naive when it comes to the digital revolution. We have smartphones in our pockets. And the most valuable things in today's society is not dollar or pounds or Swedish krona or bitcoins. It's human attention. And there are companies who are getting better and better and better and grabbing that attention by creating more and more addictive products. And when we have those products, and by that I mean Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and so on, when we have them available at all times, it's like having candy all the time. We can't, you know, we will pick it up.

3:04Sarah Ann Macklin:Not because we like it, because it's an instinct in us that is being exploited by these companies. And from that, we learn that we can't have the phone around. so we have to have our smartphone in another room if we have a meeting or if we have a class in school or if we want to be interested in what's being said etc yeah the information diet yeah it's a whole thing and it's a whole thing and and and again we are not we don't pick up the phone because we think it's a great thing to do and because it's good for happiness we pick up the phone because humans, Achilles heels, human instincts have been hacked by these companies who are getting better and better and better at it.

3:49Sarah Ann Macklin:And when you, in the same way that, that producers of candy hijacks our instincts, our drive for fast calories, these companies hijack our needs for social information and how we want to learn about dangers and stuff like that. And And that's, you know, by the algorithm present these things that we have, it's hard for us to look away from. And from that, we understand, OK, we can't have candy around all the time. We can't have the phone around all the time. Good. That's a start. For instance, I exercise every day, but I hate it. I never like to run, but I do it anyway. And I have realized that my brain is incredibly good at making excuses.

4:30Sarah Ann Macklin:You know, it's too cold outside. Sweden is very cold or in the summer it's too warm outside. or maybe there's something problem with my knee or maybe it's my tendon or whatever. There's always something. And from that, I've just said, I'm just going to do it. No matter what, I'll do it. If I'm not sick, I do it. And by sick, I mean I should have a temperature. So I think, again, learning about these things, you could build your way around them. You can understand why some things will work and why some things will probably not work.

5:02Anders Hansen:Thanks so much for listening. to hear the full episode. There's a link in the description.