Kathryn Nicolai: The Neuroscience of Sleep—How to Hack Your Anxious Brain

28:54Darin Olien:so of course they're you're here too yeah so it's almost like the hit i got was like starting with the story and then the kind of the canvas like starting internally feeling safe through the story oh yeah i just got it like wow that's an incredible because as much of course we need to feel safe out here but like gosh if you're cultivating because we all got pain we all got zero to eight trauma yeah we've all got nervous system stuff yeah you know that you can't get out of that there's no perfect parent there's no perfect upbringing it does not exist right so we're all walking around with like all this stuff but like as you said that it really hit me it's Like, wow, cultivating peace, no matter how you do it internally, is definitely going to, you know, maybe from a quantum field perspective, also open up things and create opportunities.

29:56Darin Olien:And then the other thing I was thinking when you were talking was, you know, looking for safety is one thing, but cultivating safety is another. And you're cultivating a level of safety. And I think we can all be an advocate for cultivating our own safety. Like you said, like, okay, I'm in this environment. What can I do? But also like, okay, what actively can I do to build my community, to build those people around me that love me, support me, and in all areas. Whether that's like setting boundaries, deciding, you know, I always think about sort of the be nice versus be kind part of it, you know what is okay and what isn't okay for me um you know and I was going to say part of the element of the storytelling too is it allows you to experience these moments sort of by proxy so you know let's say that wasn't you've never had this experience of this level of safety in in public or kindness from a stranger there's an element of restorative witnessing that even if that wasn't written in your story you're sitting in it now and there's a safe way for you to rewrite that in your brain so a lot of times people will react to that and tell me their story and be like okay well this was not my life at all but just hearing about it reminded me that it could be it's sort of a blueprint and a modeling um and i i think that that's a way to cultivate it as well yeah well if we imagine it you know and you have to see it yeah yeah so like if someone is like which is why it's great when you're telling stories because you're inviting people into an imagination where maybe on their own they weren't yes you know and then it's like if i if i'm listening and i allow myself to go there then there is more hope and possibility than at another point and now if i'm doing that on a consistent basis and then right before sleep yes even better we're planting all these seeds in your subconscious mind and people tell me all the time you know i slept good but them the next day here's the things i noticed you're doing more brilliant work than i even possibly but but but it's it's going off and popcorn in my head i'm so glad it connects i really appreciate you saying that into what you're doing it's like i mean i got butterflies yeah because it's it's really you've connected your niche thing you've connected a lot of very powerful things i like what are some of the i mean you must get some cool feedback i do from people yeah and sometimes it's as simple as you know i haven't slept in a long time and i just slept eight hours five nights in a row and it changed my life that alone is crazy but the moments that i get to step into in people's lives you know definitely people who are trauma survivors who have never looked forward to going to bed because that was not a place where they were safe and they used to have night terrors and anxiety and now they actually look forward to it or people who have lost children and thought I will never sleep again and I'm there for them in the night I've also been and I'm very very honored to be this many times the last voice a person hears in hospice because they knew this is such a safe I'm going to be cradled by this voice in this story so they just let it play all day for the last two or three days of someone's life so I take what I do so and I am so protective because I don't forget any of that stuff as I write even when it comes down to word choice and what is going to be the smoothest and create the less least snags in your brain so that when you hear it it just takes you to the place I'm trying I'm needing you to so you know and sometimes it's like you know I used to call it bedtime stories for grown-ups until I got a lot of emails from kids who were like excuse me I am eight years old and I listen every night and you know I'll hear from people who say you know my son could never fall asleep at night school's making him anxious xyz you know and I remember I sent like one of my books to a kid who was listening and I wrote something in it when he opened it up his mom made a video he said he wrote he said she has anxiety too and it was like this amazing feeling like I could be that for that kid and you know and very empowering for kids to feel like to be able to control things like your sleep that's actually super empowering to be able to control something like rest because that is speaking directly to your nervous system that's not something they have words for but obviously to be able to like oh wait I could decide when I'm gonna react this way or how I'm gonna get out of it when it happens to me there's one story that I'll never forget this was years ago but a woman told me that they were at playground and um they were her daughter was on the pirate ship and she was trying to get her to like tell a story about being on the pirate ship and she said who are you and she went i'm katherine oh my god and i'm driving the pirate ship and i was like shoot me now i don't think it gets better than this but a little girl who hearing my name thought i'm in charge of this pirate ship yeah so instead of saying some other superhero no i know she says i'm a storyteller so to me that is just that's that's i don't think it gets better that's gold yeah well if it does then yeah let's see you know but yeah i'll text you yeah it's it's i love this this is really special and then you know the not only are they sleeping better but that moment of acknowledgement of like i'm not broken because so many not just kids all of us that's not right you're not that you should do this we're trying to put people in boxes every single every single second of every day constantly and there's no box no literally there's no box for anybody yes and we're desperately trying to be whatever normal box there is which is this most insane thing yeah we are inherently completely different yes and yet we have spirit of and love that connects us all and there's a connective tissue of infinity and earth and existence and all of that stuff but we're where there's no leaf that's the same.

36:25We're so diminished into feeling like there's a box to fit into. I had this moment the other day where I was scrolling and I saw this headline, nine ways you're cutting fruit wrong. And I said, I can't even cut fruit right. I can't do anything right. But it does feel that way, that there's so many ways to fail. And I think that's part of the culture of measuring things. And we even know this, right? The more that you track stuff, the less happy you are with it. So, you know, being constantly measured, it's exhausting, but it also diminishes the extravagant beauty of your own human existence. So to be able to rebuild that a little bit for people and just be caught in a moment and be, wow, I'm amazed.

37:07Let me tell about it.

37:08Darin Olien:Yeah, there's worlds that exist from the biohacking, I mean, the sleep track. There's no part of me that was ever interested in a frickin' sleep tracker. yeah like maybe if someone's like an extreme situation and they're like okay maybe this will help yeah i'm like god dang like the last thing i want to be doing is like did i sleep right did i fail at this exactly i got 90 like who gives a shit i know it's just a million ways to keep you on the hook to feel like you're not enough and to be a consumer really in that moment right it's manipulative 100 yeah and it's and and and because we're kind of all running around with brokenness because of our imperfections and our perfectness right you know it's so easily to manipulate oh yeah you're lacking this so therefore we have that yes you lack that and then we have this yes and it's like oh okay and now i do this thing and i don't feel any better i know that's the scam i remember years ago a friend of mine was at a yoga conference and um he was listening to this lecture of this guy who was sort of like this you know perfect version of physicality and he was and my friend i don't think was meaning to be an ass but just raised his hand and said so if you are doing it all perfectly why are you not enlightened like why did you not like poof into enlightenment right and he went i could be more perfect and i thought that's that's the trap right there that's the scam of this side this is the dark side of this stuff is that most of us have no upper limit to the amount we will blame ourselves and so we will keep doing stuff that doesn't work and makes us feel bad endlessly because we keep buying

38:55Darin Olien:it never will be it never will be and it will waste your life so I feel like that is like the blooming of my own life coming out of trying to do it all right for a while is really stepping into doing stuff however and then just living and seeing what that's like and not having to measure it it's beautiful imagine going into anything new or anything existing with a the okay of being not okay like not perfect yeah like would people like lean into things a lot more would they try things a lot of course they would yeah beginner's mind because you'd just be like oh i'm just i'm just trying this yeah how could you possibly know yes like if you think about no one knew shit until they just started yep like no one there is no one yeah knew anything until they tried it yeah ask any parent ask any teacher nothing that you're doing was a perfect way of doing it you just have to start yeah and that's the weird like why are we even needing to say that I don't know but it we do we need to give each other permission a lot and ourselves permission a lot to do that but that's one of the things that I think about when I do this stuff is that I am giving people permission around me to just try stuff and sometimes get it wrong and then still have fun with that yeah because you have to see it modeled um otherwise you do sort of live in that shell well because we're seeing so many other things yeah like and it's like is that is that though is that is that that it is that is that is that how i should live life is this picture on instagram actually how anyone lives exactly and is this the model is this make me happy i'm gonna finally be happy yeah yeah it's a it's a weird it's a weird you know we you know and the thing that i am aware of more and more is we have to actually take a very active position in our life for for again passive is buying this next thing buying there's nothing wrong with buying things to optimize your life like that's not what i'm saying but like this whole of trying to do things as opposed to okay where am i feeling shame blame sadness fear anxiety okay where is that like if those are things are good to investigate because oftentimes 95 plus percent of our lives are just automated in our subconscious so so sure and i love the fact of storytelling and and sleeping because we're going into that place imagining yourself and your life into a new reality certainly a doorway absolutely it lets you practice it lets it lets you try what if what would that look like you know and a lot of times that's the first step you know what i find so many people in my studies uh but but you know in life i've asked people like what are your dreams what do you want people have a hard time to even yes that's where without the filter oh yeah of like well i want this because it's more money and like no no no no dreams like like this is it we're on this rock flying around as far as we can tell it's just this one go yeah yeah like that's it we like like how do you want to have fun enjoy your family enjoy your loved ones like yeah you want to do that yeah what's that look like yeah i i have said to people um that my wildest dreams have come true so many times that i have to dream wilder.

42:34And that has sort of become like a watchword for me is wilder because you have to be

42:39Darin Olien:a little bit willing to put yourself out there and go, you know what? I think I'm the person to do this crazy thing. I got an idea and it's big. It's a little wild, but I have to say putting it into practice, it made my life so much bigger, so much more fun. It made me such a more open person. And that is investigating some of those vulnerabilities. You know, I feel like a lot of the stuff we're looking for is through that door marked that makes me uncomfortable you have to go through that to find the stuff well our human condition is we do seek comfort oh for sure like all the time you're just like oh yeah and then it's like okay but what is the result yeah you know what it what it can become very small it can become very gray exactly yeah and i think through that practice of going through the door there is some sort of powerful stimulation in that absolutely some breakthrough some expansion some creation begets creation right so i think you take that step and it begets the next step sure so and with a whole lot more information that you couldn't know unless you took the step yes right yeah and that's the exciting thing yeah But like we want to, as humans, we want to know all of those things before we take that step.

43:58Darin Olien:But you can't. You can't. It's just a fantasy. Yes. Some fantasies aren't so great. Yes. In that way. Yeah. There's that line, your urge to control life controls you. And I find that that's a lot of it is that urge. I want to control this experience. I want to know before I go. Yeah. But you can't know. Instead of just stepping in and saying, let's freaking let it rip. Yeah, what's here? Yeah. how did you get into how did you get into the sleep thing how did that happen you know I just saw that need and I thought um but you weren't even sleeping back like how did you know how did you see that need I think it just from hearing so many people especially as you get older I feel like sleep changes for a lot of people and you know I worked in a small town I had like a small town yoga studio which was kind of great because there was no other yoga studios so I could raise them up from children and be like, this is how we act at yoga.

44:50Everybody's really nice and nobody talks in the yoga room. Yeah. They're like, and there's no clicks and everybody's really sweet and you don't bring your phone in here. And they were like, Oh, okay. Nobody knew any different. So I did. So, um, you know, it was an aging population. So I loved being with people through 20 years and being like, okay, what's it like now? What's it like now? What are you going through? What are your needs? And sleep was something I came back to over and over again, as well as anxiety.

45:16Darin Olien:Okay, everybody, are you ready to upgrade your operating system? I know I am. I'm always game to do that. Not just physically, but mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. That's what we're doing over at Super Life Patreon. This isn't just behind-the-scenes membership. It's a global experiment in conscious living that I am connected to, committed with, in every cell of my body. Each week, you'll get exclusive access to deeper podcast conversations, extended interviews, voice notes from the road of me personally, personal reflections, behind-the-scenes footage, community wellness challenges, and even surprise drop-ins that I no longer do on social media because I don't really dig it anymore.

46:08Darin Olien:We're talking decentralized healing, reclaiming sovereignty, ancient wisdom meets future tech, any tribe of people with you walking the path. If you love this podcast, the Patreon is where we go deeper, get more real, and reclaim our power together. Join us at patreon.com forward slash Darren Olean. That's patreon, P-A-T-R-E-O-N dot com forward slash Darren Olean, D-A-R-I-N-O-L-I-E-N. Join the movement, support the mission. Let's rise together. Because a lot of times we're not sleeping because of anxiety. So it was just on my mind a lot. And I kept thinking, you know, I also was somebody who I'm the kind of reader and I'm a voracious reader who gets very involved in the emotions of the characters that I'm reading about.

47:05And I remember there was a period where I could not seem to find a book that wasn't absolutely gut wrenching and devastating. And I was just like, what is this? Is this despair porn? What is this? Why can there not be a soft space to put my brain? And I thought if I'm looking for this, other people must be looking for this. And then I was like, kind of like I said, when we sat down, nobody's coming. It's going to have to be you. So I was like, I can't find it. So I must have to create it. So that's really where I was like, OK, bedtime stories. And because I'd been a yoga teacher, I knew how to use my voice.

47:43I don't think I'm going to surprise anybody when I'm going to say I was a theater kid. so i felt like i was all ready to step into that role and then i i thought it was just going to be sleep and it actually turns out to touch pretty much every element of people's mental health

47:59Darin Olien:yeah and i just want to illuminate this gap that you fill the the and what i'm talking about is you having the awareness of like it didn't exist so therefore I can fill it. That is a gap that people often don't let themselves own. I saw it a few times in my life for sure and it created a wild ass career in a lot of ways. And that's an important thing I think to illuminate because it's kind of in the zeitgeist of really what we've been talking about in that oftentimes people don't allow themselves like it doesn't exist I can easily now complain yep and I can stay in that why is this like this I can't find any good book and you stay in that kind of cycle which is not great yeah for you over time purposeless yeah and you said I must need to where do you think that came from where do you think that permission you gave yourself was that a muscle that you learned was it uh I think there's a scrappiness that honestly does come from growing up in Flint um there we go we're back to Flint I'm always gonna be I'm always gonna be hometown proud what's Flint doing now yeah but honestly like growing up there you know we did stuff like we didn't me and my friends created flint city players which was a theater that we put into the ante room of a coffee house because that's where we could fit i just want to show up and see what the hell flint it's amazing you should go flint city players we did shakespeare um we were like 19 years old and we were just like putting stuff together because it didn't exist in our city in a lot of ways so that was i practiced finding the niche and filling it finding the need and filling it over and over when I was a kid.

49:59And even stuff like I foreign exchanged when I was 16. I moved to Italy. I didn't speak Italian, but I was like, I can't possibly later in my life look back and think I could have gone to Italy and didn't. So I've, I don't know where that courage comes from to, cause I feel like also seeing a gap and filling it, you have to have some confidence to go. There's a, I'm not like, I'm seeing this. Right. and also I could do that you have to have some confidence yeah um I don't know where that comes from in me but it's never been short I have that was it was it I mean we don't need to psychoanalyze it but was that your upbringing was it your parents did they kind of cultivate that my parents are super supportive and just always kind of made me think I could do anything and if I came up with an idea like me selling them on going to Italy we didn't even have cell phones there you know then you know and they didn't know what was you know but they were like if you can reason a good reason why like tell us the argument for this and that's a big job and

51:01Darin Olien:they let me do it from from from Michigan to Italy yeah that's that's not common you know So my parents have always been, you know, like just fortifying me in that way of you can do anything. When I said maybe I want to open a yoga studio and I was 22, 23, they were like, yeah, that's a great idea. Even though I just got a degree in Spanish and had plenty of student loans and they were like, yeah, I guess yoga now, you know. So they've just always seen the vision that I have. And that makes a big difference to have that support system. And then you're walking through it and building this muscle.

51:39Darin Olien:And that's, I think, if there's a takeaway for people, it's not magic. It's not just left for you to do. It's a muscle of stretching and leaning in. And if it fails, okay. Maybe you can gain some wisdom. It's not even maybe. You can. You can. Right? Every failure is sitting there as a piece of gold that is there to learn from. And then it's like, okay, let's go forward. Where from now? And like you said before, also, that's what safety does. I felt safe. My parents were loving and accepting and supportive. I had friends and family and people around me who believed in me. So if I messed this up, I could go on to do something else.

52:30Darin Olien:You're like, yeah, it's okay. Brothers and sisters? I have a brother who I'm really super close with. Nice. Yeah. Also an artist, also creative. So. Amazing. Yeah. So you really had a great. I did. Yeah. That's lovely. Yeah. So on the sleep side, you saw that this was a thing. You stepped into it. What was some of the first steps that you had to figuring out what people needed when it wasn't yours to yeah I don't need it but you know that's a yeah that's an interesting motivation yeah I didn't have the personal experience there right and it really didn't exist so there wasn't a format right um I've always been somebody who's very tied into my intuition and instincts I have very strong gut instincts and so I knew some things about it intuitively I knew things like I wanted to tell the story twice because repetition in itself allows you to let go.

53:29In the same. And I even say, I'm going to tell this story twice, and I'm going to go a little slower the second time. I've already given you permission to let go because you don't have anything to keep track of. It's going to come back around.

53:41Darin Olien:I forgot what she said. You don't have to. Even the title, nothing's going to happen. It's called Nothing Much Happens. There's nothing to stay on top of. Nothing Much Happens podcast. Great. Amazing. So I knew that stuff intuitively. I knew how to use my voice after 20 years in the yoga room. and then because I had been building these stories in my brain for years I knew what felt soft to me what were the landing places where you know I used to have one that was I would go to very commonly where I would get home from work and turn the locks on my door and feel like the world was outside and I was inside and then I would walk through the rooms of my house and pull the curtains and I'd get further and further into the inner rooms of my house and feel guarded you know and that was really the first story I ever wrote was was about that experience and so many people relate to it in fact I have a friend who's a newscaster and she told me I've only ever heard that that's my only story I listened to episode one every single night for years no I said you know there's 399 other episodes we just hit 400 so but you know if it works it works that's all I care about so and then I had other ones like there's one called closing up shop that was in season one And because I owned a studio and I often was there to close it up, there was a feeling of putting the place to bed that I cared about and setting things up for the next day.

55:00So I had already these moments that my brain recognized as this is a place where the loops feel closed, where there's nothing snagging me, and it feels really soft and safe. So I always would build my stories around those kind of moments. And then I also knew intuitively they have to be sensory rich. Because when we're in our senses, we're present. Being present makes us naturally calm. So I'm always going to tell you about the texture of the table, about the flavor of the tea, about the way that the wine smells. Because it's going to drop you right into those experiences. And then I'm going to bring in stuff with just really soft nostalgia.

55:34Even if it's not your lived experience, it's something you can recognize as good. You're always going to have this feeling of, that's nice, that's good. which is kind of a mantra in my own brain that when I step into something and something is good, I say it, I name it because I want to point at it. So all of that came together. And from the beginning, that was what the podcast looked like. I didn't have much trial and error. My instincts were there.

56:02Darin Olien:And again, it's just the, the alarming obviousness is the safety, you know, and just creating that safety and like even how you say i'm buttoning up this i'm going here i'm walking click click click like that it just feels like an antidote it does so much going on yeah and people often tell me that they cry when they hear my voice because and they said it's because i i hadn't known i didn't feel something and that was an immediate release of that emotion my brother said that to me within like the first couple of months he said why do i cry every time i hear this and i thought it was just because he was my brother and i said because i have this power over you um but you know then people would write to me about that and tell me that and that used to happen in yoga a lot that people would cry and i'm sure for their own reasons but i just made it feel open enough they had their finger in the dam and finally yeah that that that over excited nervous system overstimulated too many tabs open you know in every direction absolutely giving yourself a chance to feel to exhale and we always take two deep breaths at the beginning um to just physiologically signal we always have to you know just speak the language of the body there's you can't reason with anxiety i always say like it's like when someone yells at you to calm down yeah we can't do that we have to demonstrate it calm down huh yep it's got to be stop the war all right okay well don't attack me yeah yeah so you just have to build in all the environment and then they'll do the rest themselves wow i'm so excited to listen i purposely didn't want to turn it on before i sat down with you because i wanted to i want i didn't want to come in with other things.

58:00Darin Olien:I wanted to hear the source of it. And now that hearing that, probably a lot more, it like naturally leans me in. Let me know what you think. You know, it's developed over the years. Like now there's reoccurring characters, there's storylines and locations that people want to go back to. But it's fun for me as a writer. You know, people often say like, when are you going to run out of stuff to talk about? You're writing about nothing and I'm like I still have so much to tell you so um I feel like there's a lot of there's a word at axography and it means pretty writing about small things and I feel like that's that's my language it's cool it's kind of like the calm version of Seinfeld right somebody said that to me last week oh really I was in New York last week actually talking with an author and she was like this is like the sleepy version of Seinfeld and I was like yep that's so funny i i'm curious um if you've been out in the world does someone like in the world hear your voice and then catch you it's happened a couple times yeah and it is sort of surprising because i do so much of what i do alone i write alone i record alone um but sometimes people will either hear my name yeah or or they follow me on social media now they know what i look like we just had a meetup last week in new york and um on the steps of the new york public library which was just really sweet people came out and when i stepped out of the car to have like these people turn and look at me that was a strange moment you know um because it's also a very intimate moment when you fall asleep you're quite vulnerable and so um you know people feel like they know me quite well um and i'm glad they feel that way because i'm honestly trying to be there in that way for right oh clearly it's very genuine i hope it comes across that way i'm earnest in this absolutely and it's like if you were looking for anything else this is a really bad direction this is like if you scripted you want to be famous well we're going to talk about this very niche you're going to be asleep you're not even going to hear my work exactly exactly yeah it's It's really interesting and also just that obvious shift from sympathetic, parasympathetic.

1:00:25I love to push that button. And I love knowing the science behind it. As a yoga teacher, that always was the part that thrilled me. I wanted to be able to explain it to people because I think if you understand the how, you're going to put it into play more. It's going to become a habit for you. so I feel really lucky to have all that behind me and then slip it in in a way that you know I always like I'm gonna put the vegetables in your tomato sauce and not even getting them you know

1:00:47Darin Olien:so I love that stuff well what's running so rampantly in this world is our default mode network our egos it just gets so yeah it just gets so heavy and so to be able to surrender and allow your right brain to come on and receive and and which is you know we're in a do-do world as opposed to like receiving and feeling you know that's that's the thing let's feel let's that's what's in our bodies be connected to that yeah and default mode is what you're experiencing when you wake up at three o 'clock in the morning and your brain spins that you're in the default And really that's why storytelling moves you out of it because we put you in task positive mode.

1:01:34We give your brain a job to do. And the job is very soft and pleasant just to listen. But that's why we would tell people to count sheep or do XYZ. We're trying to give your brain a job to do.

1:01:42Darin Olien:That's why you can read and fall asleep with your book hitting your face and then get really comfortable and you can't sleep. Because the job went away. And the fault came back. Because that is true. I mean the brain is going to do what the brain does. It's just an organ. It's doing what it evolved to do. but sometimes what it does sucks yeah like you can feed it more or you can i talked to a i talked to a remote viewer a couple days ago and uh and one of them said uh he goes when i remote view i have to get very calm and i actually give one of the guys said i give my ego something to do so on the side he gives it a task and then over here he's doing remote.

1:02:32Darin Olien:It was interesting I was like whoa that's such a he's going to come and we're going to do it he can teach people how to do it and so I'm like I've always been fascinated 25 years ago I met the guy who developed it for the military like Coke bottle glasses I forget his name

1:02:55Darin Olien:but it's It's again, you understand the mechanism of a system and the brain is doing that. The brain is never meant to not be the brain or the ego will never go away. It's like, but what are you feeding all the time? Yeah. And that's why I think a lot of times people feel like they can't meditate because it's so poorly explained. They expect their mind to go quiet, but that is like expecting your heart to stop beating. It's doing what it was designed to do. but even when you notice your brain being loud well you are meditating you're observing the nature of your own mind well done you know but let's you know there's a million ways to get there it could be walking it could be listening to a story it could be writing or creating you know so i'm gonna listen to that episode because that sounds interesting yeah yeah it's really yeah i haven't had them on the podcast yet but it's just wild and fascinating what's capable so the book is the same title my first book is called nothing much happens okay published in 35 countries you can get it everywhere it's it's great too if you are somebody who is able to put your phone in another room awesome read the book it's also really nice reading a lot of people tell me i bring it to my memory care facility because my mom doesn't remember who i am but we can both read the book we can listen to the story and connect to that it's a really lovely beautiful book beautifully illustrated there's recipes meditations in it too and the new book on the street where you live comes out this july it's an audio book it's an only audio book only um but um that's one of the that's my favorite way to receive the world is through audio um and then the app is coming out probably within another month or two and yeah that'll be all under nothing which happens to you you're coming in hot it's only the beginning yeah i want to hear the secret you later okay awesome so yeah wonderful to connect with you too you're doing some incredible things and i love that your niche is expanding to as many people as possible thank you so much and thank you for so many wonderful thoughtful questions i really appreciate it of course thank you yeah all right cheers yeah cheers amazing