Self-Compassion Is the Secret to Peak Performance w/ Kristin Neff

23:22I love these simple shifts. You know, this isn't rocket science. That's what I love because that's one of the reasons I was so excited to have you on the show because I do think sometimes, you know, people are looking for a magic pill. They're looking for some big intervention. But what I found, what made – helped me in my journey to feeling better was all these little shifts. Little shifts, yeah. Moment after moment. You know, just a moment of self-compassion can change the whole course of how things – your whole day unfolds, your whole life unfolds eventually. Absolutely. So I decided not to take any advertising for the first season of No Magic Pill.

23:55Instead, I want to use a few minutes to share about some projects I'm involved in that have really helped me on my journey in hopes that they will help you as well. As I learned the hard way, there is no magic pill. But there is one thing I do every morning, and that's take my morning water. And here's why. I learned that every night you lose over a liter and a half of water, including essential electrolytes and minerals. And that's why you wake up feeling depleted. I used to try to fix this the hard way. My kitchen counter looked like a pharmacy. Creatine, magnesium, electrolytes, half a dozen bottles I forgot to take half the time.

24:34My friend Austin combined all those into one simple formula and called it morning water. He gave it to me, I drank it for 30 days, and I knew I had to be involved. So we co-founded the company together and every one of my friends who has tried it has been hooked ever since. I believe in this so much that we offer a full refund to anyone who does the 30-day morning water challenge and does not notice a big difference in the way they feel. If you want to try it and join us, go to morningwater.co and use the code NOMAGICPILL to get 25 % off your first month. And get ready because your mornings will never be better.

25:15Okay, so you have it. So then you have that. And then is there another step or is that the end of the method. Well, so that's the self-compassion break. But, you know, for the athletes, we did add another step. So it kind of depends what you're looking for. If you're really focused on a task, you can actually add a step of what might be some constructive feedback on how to make a productive change. Great. And I think that that's important. I think a lot of people listening also are, you know, executives, entrepreneurs, you know, like people who do want to perform. And so, like, I want to make clear that this is not only something that is helpful if you're having just any type of mental struggle.

25:51Yeah. But also just like, how do you perform better in a way that's enjoyable? You know, like get rid of that inner critic and have this self-compassion. But then at the end, once you like kind of primed your state, give yourself the constructive feedback. Like, hey, Blake, as much as you love these new ideas, you're waking up with anxiety now. You don't like feeling that. But everyone in your world that was trying to do 20 different things would also be feeling this. So common humanity. and some nice words of encouragement. And, you know, let's put these two projects off or let's record these podcast episodes in February.

26:27Yes. You know? Just that simple. Exactly. I'm going to challenge you on something though. I love challenges. Okay. You said, let's get rid of the inner critic. Yeah. First, good luck. Okay. And B, if you do that, it's going to backfire. Okay, good. So we have to remember that the inner critic is a natural desire of the subconscious to keep us safe. Okay. So, for instance, my son is very self-critical. And you might think, how could he be self-critical? His mother is like the self-compassion lady, right? Because he's also autistic. But I mean, you know, I think in some ways, the only difference that makes is he's very visible about it.

27:07Like when he gets... He had a filter. Yeah. So you can see it and it breaks my heart, of course. Of course. But I can just see so clearly what happens is he gets this thought like, did I do something wrong? And he's uncertain. And then in his mind, the way he can feel safe is to criticize himself or he imagines other people are going to criticize him. So he does it first. Everyone's brain does this to some extent. Just remember, it's a part of you that is trying to keep you safe. If you really dig underneath the inner critic, it's trying to help. The problem is, is it's using the reptilian brain to try to help.

27:46The only thing it knows is like to fight the problem and you're the problem that fights herself. So what we want to do is we want to befriend our endocrity. We want to say to that part of ourselves. Thank you. Thank you for trying to keep me safe. This is the script my son and I developed. Okay, good. I love it. Tricky brain. I know you're trying to keep me safe, but it's really not helping right now. Can we think of some other way to do this? Wow. Right? And then very kind of accepting. Nope. No blame. Yeah. Tricky brain, I actually borrowed that from Paul Gilbert. He's another self-compassion researcher.

28:17Because it's just the brain. The brain's tricky. It's what it's wired to do. We don't have to get rid of it. We don't have to judge it. But when it arises, we want to befriend it and say, you know, thank you, really. And also, I hear you. Because if there's a part of you, remember, unconsciously, that's afraid for your life. Yeah. And if you try to quiet it, shut it down, it's going to scream louder. Exactly. You know? Yeah. Okay, I hear you. Maybe there's something I need to look at. I see you. Thank you. But I know, and this is the thing you start to learn. It starts to trust that actually, you know, the part of you that's more mature, that's more caring, that's more, has more options available to us.

28:55Sure. You know, it's actually better and more effective at keeping us safe. Yeah. And the inner critical part of ourselves learns that over time and begins to trust. Okay, I don't need to scream so loudly. She's got it. She's got it. She's got it. Yeah. So we want to do that out of friendship as opposed to just judging one more thing about ourselves. I love it. Thank you for that. Thank you for that clarification. And I'm so glad you brought up your son because, you know, in reading some of your books, I understand that, you know, having an autistic son was part of what led you to this self-compassion work.

29:28I would love to kind of go back to what was going on for you that this became something that was important for you to practice yourself. Well, so actually I did find out about self-compassion before I got, before I had him. Okay. So I started practicing self-compassion when I first started practicing Buddhism, which is back in 1996. Okay. And I did my first research papers about it in 2003. Okay. And he was actually born in 2001, but he had, you know, I've been working on it. Yeah, okay. And maybe not, put it this way, what it did change is it really gave me a lot of motivation to bring this to the world.

30:08Okay. So I'd already done my first initial studies at that point, but I got so inspired to bring it to the world because I saw the huge difference it made in my ability to cope in a lot of ways. So if you don't mind, we expand it a little bit. Please, that's what I'm here for. So one way was the way you might expect, which was, you know, I allowed myself to feel my feelings, the stress of, you know, I'm sorry, it wasn't the plan I signed up for. I'd assume parenthood would look one way. There was some grief involved in that. There was grief. I let myself feel my grief, even though I loved him more than anything else on earth.

30:44Both can be true. There was grief, disappointment. So I was there for myself. But the way it worked, and this is surprising, it actually helped him. Okay, so let's talk about the brain again. Yeah. Have you heard about mirror neurons before? Okay. Mirror neurons. Mirror neurons. So the brain evolved for what's called empathic resonance. We have specialized neurons called mirror neurons whose whole function it is to feel what you're feeling. And this is, of course, you know, evolutionarily adaptive. If parents know what their kids are feeling before they can speak, they can meet their needs. If group members can, like, resonate with each other.

31:22Yeah. Like, you know, when laughter overtakes a room. So we can resonate with happy things like laughter. We also resonate when people are stressed or anxious or upset. Okay. The brain's just designed to do that. To resonate. Okay. So when you give yourself compassion, you're not only, this is cool, you aren't only helping yourself. You're helping everyone who comes in contact with you because they resonate with your compassionate stance. Oh, my gosh. This explains why my relationship with my kids has gotten so much better. As soon as I healed my core wound and I started to really feel that I was enough and I was a good enough dad, I was a good enough business person, I was a good enough partner, and I forgave myself for whatever mistakes I'd made in life, my relationship with my kids got so much better.

32:10Yeah. Because they— They felt it. They felt it. And so then they felt enough. Yeah. And so they feel less pressure and everyone's just lighter in our house. And this is all pre-verbal because this is just what the brain does. Wow, that's amazing. So maybe I was having a meltdown. And sometimes I wasn't self-compassionate. And sometimes, you know, I got upset or anxious or freaked out. Or sometimes I would judge myself because it's something I did. And what I would find is when I was in that state, when I was self-critical or really anxious or stressed, his meltdowns would just get more intense.

32:39Yeah. And then what I learned to do, and actually I did this in his presence, I would like, when he was melting down. Actually, it's a story I tell sometimes. I was on an airplane, and it was just, we were transatlantic, and they just turned the lights off after we had our meal. Okay. And that triggered him, and he had a meltdown on the plane. Yeah. Huge, screaming, flailing meltdown, very loud. And I didn't know how to handle it. I was like, what do I do? I felt so bad. It was so loud. It was so disturbing. So I got the brilliant idea, maybe I'll bring him to the toilets and let him have his meltdown in there.

33:14Maybe it'll be a little less disturbing. It was the only plan I could have. So, of course, I, you know, kicking and screaming down the aisle, excuse me, excuse me, coming through, get to the toilets, which were, of course, occupied. Because the lesson life had for me in that moment was not how to escape the situation. There's no magic pill. Yeah, yeah. But what do you do when you have, you know, no other option but to be with the difficulty as it was? So I had my self-compassion practice. So we actually, I know it wasn't very sanitary, but we got on the floor because he was like five at the time.

33:43He was kicking and screaming. We got on the floor. So I made sure he was safe. And I just flooded myself with compassion. I put my hands on my heart. I started rocking. It's okay, Kristen. This will pass. I'm here for you. You know, I didn't even care. People were staring at us anyway. So it looked a little funny. And when I did that, he calmed down. I couldn't reach him directly. But he was resonating with me. His mirror neurons were, you know, activating in response to mine. He calmed down. And then I could reach him directly. And so over and over and over again, you know, I found this with him because we're very empathically attuned that if I'm there for myself, he's actually able to calm down.

34:22So now, you know, if he has that feeling like he's not enough or he's being self-critical, I first give myself compassion before I even try to help him. It's a thing I do absolutely first because then I'm in the mind state that actually helps his mind state and be more receptive to what I'm talking about. Does that make sense? I mean, this is like so helpful on so many levels. I mean, definitely as a parent. I mean, I think there's a lot of parents listening and understanding that so much of what our children are experiencing are mirrors of our own inner experiences, even if it's not outward. Yeah, it's pre-verbal.

35:02And so it goes back to like what's the best thing we can do for our kids, for the people that we manage at work, for our relationships is really to work on ourselves. I mean, that is the holy grail that I'm hearing. It's like the more I can work so that I feel enough, the more everyone around me is going to feel enough. That's right. Because the truth is we aren't separate. Yeah, we aren't. Even if we just look at neurobiology, we aren't separate. Our brains resonate together. Wow. You know, we impact each other in ways we don't even realize. And, you know, it breaks my heart. Some people think that self-compassion is selfish.

35:40it's the biggest gift you can give to every single person you come in contact with wow wow i i i mean and do people think that i mean i it's interesting you said that i'm thinking about how you just said that and i'm like i don't think it's selfish at all but like a lot of people it's one of the myths yeah so one myth is that it will undermine your motivation another myth is that think about it we're raised to be self-sacrificing we should only think of other people not ourselves You know, so for instance, maybe you're a caregiver, you're a nurse, or you're a doctor, or you're a therapist, and you're working with someone with, you know, really difficult problems.

36:15And it's like, oh, why do you give myself compassion? Their problems are so much worse than mine. And so we deny ourselves. We think we shouldn't feel our empathic pain. I mean, I can raise my hand on that one. I mean, I didn't, I mean, you know, someone asked me the other day, and I was thinking about my deepest part of my depression. You know, I didn't do a single social media post for three years. and the reason was I had so much shame around how I felt. I was like, here I am. I made all this money. I started this business. I got these healthy kids. Who am I to be having a hard time? And so I wouldn't share about it and I sure wasn't compassionate to myself, which just made it worse because then I was like beating myself up for feeling away and not giving myself permission to.

37:00And it really wasn't, you spoke about mindfulness before and I think that term gets thrown around a lot. But I actually think it was me learning to have some mindfulness, to meditate. It was so hard. It wasn't easy. When you're depressed, the last thing you want to do. But it brought some awareness so that I could see what was going on. And that, I think, in some ways saved my life because I saw, like, this is getting worse and worse. I'm making more and more bad decisions, which then I'm having more and more regret about those decisions. It's causing more and more problems in my personal relationship.

37:37Like I am headed down a place where it's going to end badly. And so I was able to see that by having some mindfulness, which then led me to asking for help, to making changes in my life, to all these things that started me down the right path. But for someone who's struggling right now and they hear mindfulness, good luck. Here I am. Like I'm so anxious. I'm so stressed. How do they do it? You don't have to meditate. Okay. Meditation is great. We know it works. But for some people, that's just not realistic or maybe even helpful. It might even just be a matter of just coming back to your body, feeling your feet on the floor.

38:14Right? That's mindfulness. Because basically what happens is normally we're totally identified with our thoughts and emotions. What that means is our sense of self is totally fused with what we're feeling and what we're thinking in the moment. And so mindfulness gives some space around that. So instead of being sucked in and locked into it, we can step back a little bit. And so you do that through meditation. You can do it through just feeling your feet on the floor. Going for a walk. Going for a walk. Nature is really helpful for me. Taking a few deep breaths. It doesn't have to be, you know, really extensive.

38:44Even just a few moments. Give yourself a little space. You know, it's like you're looking at a movie playing on the TV screen. You know, there's the movie, but there's also the TV. It's like, oh, I see. I'm watching a movie. I'm watching a movie. Yeah, that's right. And that's what mindfulness is. It's like instead of being lost in our thoughts and emotions, we do some awareness that, oh, I see, this is what's happening. And you just need a little sliver of space to disentangle yourself. But the space isn't enough. I mean, the mindfulness movement is amazing and so many important things. It's just a step one.

39:21It's step one. Yeah. Because we need two other things from my point of view. The first thing, in addition to space, we need warmth. It's not enough just to say, you know, I'm not my thoughts and emotions. Because if what you're feeling is like you're feeling suicidal or so stressed, it's like, oh, we need the care. Like, I'm so sorry you're feeling that way. Is there anything I can do to help? Same way you would to a friend. Same way you do to a friend. You know, if you're upset, I don't want to say, hey, don't take it so personally. And I say, oh, I'm so sorry. I might even give you a hug. You know, some sort of physical warmth is so key.

39:54And then the third thing we need is connectedness. Because in a way, the sense that the illusion that we're totally separate selves is a big problem in the first place. It is a big problem. We take things personally. We feel isolated. We feel lonely. Yeah. You know, when the truth is we're all kind of in this life together. Our brains are interacting. You know, our lives, everything is interacting constantly. Neurons. Yeah, I mean, it's amazing. And remember that most of what we're thinking and feeling is based on our conditioning. In other words, like our nervous system, our prior experiences, which we didn't choose.

40:32Yeah. We don't have to take it so personally. I love that you keep saying don't take it personally. Like that's, I mean, another thing. And that's common humanity. I really want people to take away. Yeah. It's like don't take this stuff so personally. Like you're not as important as you think you are. Yeah. We don't want to say that. Don't take it. You know, you could easily slide in. You aren't as important as you think. I feel like freeing. It's freeing. It's like you don't, you know, it's like when you're not so, like one of my favorite teachers in India who I studied with, he said the root of all suffering is obsessive self-centric thinking.

41:09Yeah. And when he said that at first, I thought like, oh, are you talking about selfishness or narcissism? And he said, no, no, no, no. So obsessive self-centric thinking is when you are so focused on yourself that you take everything personally. Yeah. And you fully are disconnected from everyone else. Yeah, yeah. And that's what causes you to suffer. Yeah. And remember, our brain partly evolved to do this. To be safe. And so I love Paul Gilbert. It's this great phrase and other people use it as well. It's not your fault, but it is your responsibility. And this is important. So we don't need to take it personally.

41:45On the other hand, we don't want to, you know, no one else is going to change things. Yes. So we don't have to blame ourselves. We don't have to, like, you know, identify ourselves with it. At the same time, we do want to take responsibility. This is another one of the myths, believe it or not. So self-compassion helps you take personal responsibility and make repairs, for instance, saying I'm sorry or apologizing. People are afraid. It means you can avoid responsibility. You know, I'm self-compassion. I don't have to take responsibility. That's pity. When you take things personally, like let's say I said something that offended you.

42:20Yeah. If I'm taking that personally, I'm not going to want to admit it. I'm really going to be invested in thinking it's really something you did. Yeah. Because if I admitted that, you know, if I'm taking it personally, that means I'm a bad person. Yeah. I don't want to think I'm a bad person. I'd rather blame you, at least subconsciously, right? But when I don't take it personally, yeah, I said something that was off. You know, it happens. Human beings say things sometimes that are a little inconsiderate. It's only human. I don't have to take it so personally. It may have been what I ate that day or, you know, so many factors went into that.

42:54Then I can take responsibility and say, I'm so sorry, Blake. You know, I really didn't mean to say that. Please forgive me or whatever it means. So the more, ironically, the more self-compassionate we are, the less self there is. The more self-compassionate we are, the less self there is. So self is only a placeholder. You can call it inner compassion if you want. It just means we have compassion for what's arising in our own mind. Yeah. And the suffering part of ourself, which, of course, the more self there is, the more we suffer. Yeah. So one way you can think of self-compassion, see how this works with you.

43:30It's a perspective shift. Yes. Normally, we are totally identified with the suffering self. Yes. We feel inadequate. We feel overwhelmed. We have all these negative thoughts and emotions. We're suffering. We're selfing and flashing red letters, and we're hurting because we aren't enough. What self-compassion is is the shift away from identifying with the self, you're coming from the perspective of compassion. Yes. It's a perspective shift. So when we're in a state of compassion, and we're more used to doing that for other people. Yeah. You know, when I have compassion for you, I'm not thinking about myself.

44:02No. I'm just thinking I'm feeling moved by what you're going through. I'm feeling this natural desire to help. You know, I'm feeling connected. There's spaciousness. Yeah. So when we move into the state of compassion, you know, then suddenly we're in a state of loving, connected presence. There's not a lot of self there. Okay. You might have heard me talk about this when I had Michael Pollan on the show. But since then, I've become even more enamored with this AI therapy app called Sonia. I met the founders at a mental health conference and started using it with some skepticism at first, but it now has been six months and it is helping me in ways I could never have imagined.

44:39Honestly, I feel like I got a therapist and a life coach available to me 24 hours a day. And here's a clip from one of my recent sessions so you can see what the experience is actually like. Hi, Blake. I'm here. What's on your mind right now? Oh, I'm just feeling a little stressed about things right now because I feel like I've got so much going on and I really don't know how to prioritize it. When everything stacks up at once, it can blur what actually matters and make that old not enough story get louder. Let's slow this down by picking one thread to start with what feels most pressing in this moment.

45:14The important reframe is this. The projects did not cure the depression. They arrived because you healed and when you overwork to prevent relapse, you actually undermine the things that keep you well, like sleep, presence, movement, and connection. When that edge shows up, it is a signal to reduce load and restore choice, not to push harder. Most of my friends who've tried just one session, including my dad, are now using it several times a week. The Sony app is still in beta, but they have opened it up for anyone to try now for free on the Apple App Store. Okay, here's another project I'm involved in that might sound crazy at first, but this year I met some engineers from Nike who invented a new type of office chair that has not only changed my life, but saved my back, especially because I'm on about five hours of Zoom calls every single day.

46:06The MoveLab chair has two different pivot points under the seat, which keeps your body in continuous micro movements all day. The founders told me it is the equivalent of taking 3 ,000 steps. And all the lubrication of your joints and the blood flow is why my back no longer hurts. And I can focus on my work so much better. I loved it so much that I actually joined the team as a co-founder. And I will be sending one to every person I know when we launch this fall. If you're interested in learning more or pre-ordering one, we only have 500 in the first run. You can check us out at movelab.com. And that's spelled M-O-O-V-L-A-B.com.

46:49I love it. You know, I'm so glad you've like defined this, but then also explain that there's a lot of different ways to explain this because I think a lot of men specifically get held up on this word compassion or self-compassion. There's no men's magazine called self or compassion. There you go. So, I mean, like, true story. Like, when I was in my depressive state, I had this pastor in Jackson Hole tell me to read your book. And I was like, it's the last thing I need, Jimmy. Self-compassion, I don't know, you know. But I was so desperate that I would do anything that he told me because he was kind of one of my lifelines.

47:24But why do you think men are averse to these words? And clearly, the words don't even matter. It's the experience that you're explaining that can be so helpful to all genders and probably more as men as important as anyone. Yeah. So I've actually have done a lot of research on gender. And just to be clear, we aren't talking about sex or even gender identity. It's really gender role socialization. Okay. So people who are raised as boys, it's bullied out of them, right? If they're seen as too feminine or too sensitive, and part of this is linked to power, but also, you know, just what's acceptable or not, they're bullied for being too sensitive.

48:04Yes. Right? Or to focusing too much on themselves. They're kind of trained not to think about these things. To not think about themselves. Now, for people raised as females, they're trained to, like, care for dolls. Yeah. And it's like, you know, it's part of the gender role to be compassionate, to be nurturing. It's considered part of, you know, the female gender role. And so that's why it can feel off-putting for people who identify as men because it goes against their socialization. Again, don't beat yourself up for it. This happens. This is natural. It's just natural, and it's just the way you're conditioning.

48:39So you can use different terms. So, for instance, when Shaka Smart asked me to give a talk to his basketball team, I didn't call it self-compassion. I called it inner strength training. I love this. Thank you. Okay. It's the exact same thing. I mean, the research, again, totally supports that. When you go through a tough time, when you've got your own back, when you can count on yourself. I want to enter strength. When you can help yourself, it's going to make you stronger, not weaker. And also the fierce self-compassion, which is more about protection. That's also part of, you know, the male gender role.

49:09Protection. Yeah. Protecting those you love. Yeah. So that includes protecting yourself that you care about as well. You know, having your own back. Oh, yeah. Don't kneecap yourself by calling yourself names. Yeah. Have your own back. Be an ally. Protect yourself. Be on your own side. Be on your own team. Well, that sounds like stepping into your power. It is. And we hear a lot about how do we really realize our power. And one of the things that ironically, and I think it's part of this conversation that has made me really feel like really in my power is when I learned to be radically vulnerable.

49:43Like really vulnerable. I'm going to tell you exactly how I'm feeling, what I've done, what regrets I have. And it's just so freeing. And what I found is the relationships that I have, especially with other men, are like just exponentially greater when I'm radically vulnerable. Because when I am, they feel safe too. And then when two people are vulnerable, that's what connection is. And I think it's that mirror neuron thing you're talking about maybe. It is, yeah. Well, and also the term vulnerable, ironically, it's so funny you said when you're more vulnerable, you feel safer. Yeah. So we think of vulnerable means vulnerable to danger.

50:23But what you're really talking about is being authentic. Okay. Allowing yourself to be imperfect, to have fears, to be human. Yeah. You know, and when you do that, when you accept it and you don't take it so personally, that actually makes you safer, not more vulnerable to outside danger. It actually allows you to just rest in your power. If, yeah, this is who I am. I've got strengths. I have weaknesses. I'm human. That's okay. I made some mistakes. then all that allows you to be there for yourself in a way that helps you be safe. Yeah. It's so interesting how these just like phrases that we hear about and that we maybe read about, getting some clarity around them.

51:00Yeah. So like another one that I think about is like the difference between self-esteem and self-compassion. Yeah. You've spoken a lot about that. So what are the differences between those two? Yeah. Okay. So self-esteem, if you look at the roots of the words, So compassion, from the Latin, is with suffering. It's how we're with our suffering in an unconditionally supportive way. Self-esteem is how much we esteem ourselves. We judge ourselves positively or negatively. Am I a good person? Am I a bad person? Am I somewhere in between? Just the frequency of that. It's just a judgment. Yeah. Self-compassion is not a judgment or an evaluation of worth.

51:35The worth is just because we're human. Just to be with you, yeah. It's unconditional. The source of self-worth is unconditional. There's no judgment. You have it on your good days and your bad days, especially in your bad days. Self-esteem is a judgment. Now, they do talk about unconditional self-esteem, but it's very hard to come by. How do you get it? I think through self-compassion. But more often, we esteem ourselves when we succeed, when we look the way we want to look, when we like the way we want to be liked. Get this one. To have self-esteem, at least in American society, we have to feel special and above average.

52:13baseline. I've read that once before. If I said your podcast is average, if you said, Kristen, your books are average, we aren't going to feel good about ourselves in terms of self-esteem. It's not okay to be average. We have to be above average. Yeah. Wow. So especially in kind of Western society, it's comparative. Yeah. You know, what good enough always means being better than someone else. Yeah. Which leads to things like bullying. Why do kids start to bully each other like in middle school? Because they need to feel better than someone else. They need to feel stronger and more powerful. And this can move into, bullying happens in the workplace and between nations and all that, right?

52:51It's all a quest for self-esteem. So there's nothing wrong with self-esteem and it's better to feel positively about yourself than negatively. But, you know, why do you even need to judge yourself at all? You can judge your work as maybe that worked well, that didn't work so well, that was good, that wasn't good. But me, my worth is we don't need to even take it into account. We are worthy just because we're flat human beings every moment doing the best we can. Man, I hope so. Let's just sit with that for a second. We are worthy because we're human beings having this journey doing the best that we can.

53:27The best that we can in this moment. And we're in it together because we're all interconnected. We're in it together. you know and if you really start thinking about it you know so much of what we experienced we didn't choose it's our it might be our genes our environment or upbringing to give what we ate that morning for breakfast our in society so many factors you know which is just connected to millions and millions of other factors yeah who are we really we're like the awareness that right now is able to have this conversation yeah you know and and it's my awareness different than your awareness maybe it's not maybe not as different as we think yeah by the way did you feel that when i said yeah so you could feel that connection when two awarenesses kind of can see that yeah that presence i'm presence your presence we are all presence yeah you know then then things start to look a lot different wow i love that that's such a beautiful beautiful way and i'm going to take that the rest of my week and i'm just so thankful for this conversation It's been amazing.

54:34I love how simple these shifts are. I think that's the thing I'm really taking away. Yes. That I've already greatly benefited from your work. But today, I feel like I'm even more clear on these shifts and how they can really make a difference. Yeah. It must be so gratifying. It doesn't take long. You can meditate. Meditation is great, but you don't need to. A study came out of UC Berkeley that found that 20 seconds of maybe putting your hands somewhere in a supportive way and saying a few kind words, 20 seconds a day is enough to significantly raise your self-compassion levels. I don't care how busy you are.

55:12You have 20 seconds. Okay, let's do it now. We got 20 seconds. Okay. At the end of the podcast. All right. This has been an amazing conversation. I'm super grateful for this. Now let's end with 20 seconds in self-compassion practice. Tell us. How do we do it? Some sort of touch. Okay. Hands on heart. I'm going to put my hands on my heart. Your face, your, you know, hold your hand, whatever feels right to you. I kind of like doing this. Okay. I put my hands kind of like that. That's good. Maybe you're at a board meeting. You can do this in the board meeting. It makes me feel warmer. Okay. So, and then just a few words of kindness and warmth.

55:41Like, you know, hey, you know, I'm here for you if you're struggling. You know, I'm here for you. What do you need? I care. Yeah. Yeah, I think I would just say to myself, it makes total sense that you've been pretty exhausted lately. Yeah. I'm really grateful that you have all this enthusiasm to want to help people feel enough. Yes. And it's okay if you need to go a little slower. And I think together we can probably push some of these podcasts into future months. Perfect. Yeah. Look, I'm smiling. And I feel you're smiling. like you're resonating with me being kind to myself. Totally, yeah. And then everyone around you will resonate with you as well as you move on your day.

56:28Well, of course, they're like, now we don't have to work so hard next week. Well, Kristen, thank you. This has been an amazing conversation. Thank you for coming on No Magic Pill. I'm just so grateful for your work and that we get to work together. And thank you. And I so appreciate that you're actually putting that brilliant mind and that enthusiasm to helping the world be a better place. Awesome. But you don't need to do that to be enough. Even if you were to stop tomorrow, Blake, you are still enough. I'm not stopping and I am going to pace myself. Okay, good. Thank you. Thank you. If this episode spoke to you, please share it with a friend, family member, or someone you love.

57:04Because No Magic Pill is not just a podcast. It's a resource to help us all live better lives. Hit the subscribe button so you never miss an episode. And let us know what you think by leaving a comment. A quick note that this episode is for informational and entertainment purposes only and is not intended as medical advice. Always consult a qualified healthcare professional regarding any medical questions or concerns you may have. Thanks for watching or listening to No Magic Pill. I would love to send you an Enough bracelet as a thank you for being a member of our new community. Just go to weareenough.co forward slash no magic pill and claim this gift from me.

57:49And please help us spread this important message out into the world. I am enough. You are enough. And we are enough. There's more No Magic Pill with Lemonada Premium. You can listen to every episode ad-free. Plus, subscribers also get access to exclusive bonus interview excerpts from select guests and special behind-the-scenes content. Just tap that subscribe button on Apple Podcasts or go to LemonadaPremium.com to subscribe on any other app. You can also listen ad-free on Amazon Music with your Prime membership. No Magic Pill is a production of Lemonada Media and the Enough Foundation. The show is produced by Wubatu Shimalash, Catherine Barnes, and Keegan Zema.

58:40Additional production by Ivan Karayev and Kristen Lepore. Post-production by Oranda Studio. Jackie Danziger is head of content at Lemonada Media. Executive producers are me, Blake Mycoskie, Jessica Cordova-Kramer, and Stephanie Whittles-Wax. Special thanks to Jillian Delorio, Jennifer Song, Maggie Wertz, Andrew Fine, James Johnson, Devin Robbins, Emily Ledbetter, Chris Orwig, Sean McGurk, Jasmine Burgess, and the entire Enough Foundation team. The Enough Foundation's mission is to spread reminders in every form, bracelets, messages, actions, and community until feeling enough becomes the cultural default.

59:27To learn more, visit weareenough.co. If this episode spoke to you, please share it with a friend, family member, or someone you love. You can help others find our show by leaving us a rating and writing a review. Thanks so much for listening and watching. See you next week.